Today we are at the odd and fleeting vantage point between the two conventions.
Conventions are how a party tells the country what it is all about. We’ve just seen what the Democrats are about, and we’re about to see the Republicans. (If you don’t have time to watch: The GOP is about Trump. They didn’t even write a platform this year, they just said they support Trump.)
To me, this is a good moment to contemplate the more vague attitudes and identities that form the cultural difference between the parties. It’s easy to list issues where they have different positions — immigration, guns, abortion, racism, healthcare, climate change, and so on. But if we’ve learned anything from the Trump era, it’s that positions on issues can be ephemeral. The Republican Party has changed its mind about free trade and deficits and NATO and the importance of character and a long list of other things. And yet, the party’s base consists of the same people who were there a decade ago.
So what defines the real boundary line between a liberal and a conservative? I’ll look at that in the featured post, which should be out between 10 and 11 EDT.
The weekly summary also has a lot to cover: A Senate report verifies that the Trump campaign really did collude with Russia. Steve Bannon got arrested for fraud. The Manhattan District Attorney is one step closer to seeing Trump’s tax returns. And the all-virtual Democratic Convention seems to have worked pretty well. That post should appear between noon and one.
The Weekly Sift 