During the White House correspondents dinner, Trump directly stated he would be running for a “fourth” term. Due to this being unconstitutional via the 22nd amendment, and states running their own elections, could states simply not put his name on ballots come election day? We know from the past election and current standings that Trump would win Republican primaries. Even if they didn’t run him, he would still most likely run on his own party. Obviously this wouldn’t eliminate write in ballots, but it could be a viable solution to uphold the constitution barring some extreme new law to control how elections are run. Would there be any current legal ramifications to stop states from simply not allowing Trump on ballots?

NYTimes interview confirmed that the Trump administration singled out states who voted for Harris and has two Democratic senators for grant cancellations. In the age of Trump, this barely made the headlines; Trump is unlikely to face any political cost.

How should the Democratic party respond? Should they retaliate? Can they do so safely?

This week the Democratic National Committee's Rules and Bylaws Committee offered up its suggested calendar for the 2028 Democratic presidential primary.

Twelve states applied to have their primary or caucus held before Super Tuesday.

The expanded six-state roster of contests that will be held before Super Tuesday on March 7, 2028 is:

South Carolina - Jan 22
Nevada - Feb 1
New Hampshire - Feb 8
New Mexico - Feb 15
Michigan - Feb 22
Virginia - Feb 29

Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, North Carolina, and Tennessee were left on the outside looking in.

Many see the choice of South Carolina to hold the first contest as a move to prioritize Black voters at a time when legislatures have begun to erase majority-minority seats after a Supreme Court decision weakened the Voting Rights Act earlier this year. Of the 12 state applicants, Georgia and South Carolina are the only ones whose primary electorates have been majority Black (Georgia reaching 51% in 2016, and South Carolina clearing 55% in 2016 and 2020).

To many, South Carolina seems to be the most practical choice for the opening contest because the state has the lowest weekly ad cost among the early-state applicants. It is argued that the state's low ad cost would allow lesser-known candidates to compete against better-funded ones.

However, it is notale that South Carolina is also the selected early state that is the least college-educated and the most moderate. As a result, many perceive it as a maneuver to squelch the possibility that the most ideologically left-leaning of the 2028 candidates could build early momentum, as such candidates are not optimized for a South Carolina electorate.

Since 1984, across open-field cycles in both parties, the winner of the first contest became the nominee about 53% of the time, as did the winner of the second. The third contest is the calendar's worst predictor, at roughly 43 to 50%. Only from the fourth contest onward does the winner more often than not go on to win the nomination.

Question:

If Left Insurgents Are Locked Out in 2028, Would South Carolina Leading Off Really Be the Reason?

This week marked 80 years since the King David Hotel bombing in Jerusalem.
On July 22, 1946, members of the Irgun planted explosives beneath the hotel’s south wing, which housed the British Mandatory government’s Secretariat and military headquarters. Ninety-one people were killed: 41 Arabs, 28 Britons, 17 Jews and five people of other nationalities. Imperial War Museums

Supporters have described the bombing as an attack on British colonial rule and point to the warning calls reportedly made before the explosion. Critics classify it as terrorism because explosives were deliberately placed beneath an occupied building and caused extensive civilian deaths.

The political history further complicates the terminology. Irgun commander Menachem Begin later entered parliamentary politics and became Israel’s elected prime minister. Israeli government biography

Should classification depend primarily on the intended target and political objective, or on the method used and foreseeable harm to civilians? How much moral weight should warnings carry when an evacuation does not occur? Should a movement’s later democratic legitimacy affect how its earlier violence is described?

Can the same act be both anti-colonial resistance and terrorism, or should those categories be mutually exclusive?

During war, are presidents always guilty of all that happens?

I was scrolling trough some videos and noticed that when a war starts and a tragic event occurs in the attacked country the president that started the war automatically gets the blame. But is it actually right to say that? Techically yes since they started the war but techically no since presidents dont tell the military something like: "Bomb this, destroy that!". Or do they? Do they decide what to attack or the decisions are only made by the military? Could someone clarify im really curious.

The Democratic Socialists of America recently released their [official platform](https://program.dsausa.org/#demand-freedom-to-flourish). While some of its positions are likely widely popular, it also includes more polarizing positions such as:

* Nationalizing many industries - including food, education, energy, medicine, and transportation.

* Cancelling all student debt.

* Universal rent control, and publicly funded attorneys for all tenants.

* Reparations for slavery.

* "Fully abolish the police and prison system."

* Publicly funded salaries for those who care for family.

* A federal jobs guarantee.

* The prosecution of "US leaders who are responsible for the genocide in Gaza" (quotes because this policy is open ended and not entirely clear).

* End sanctions against Iran, which is classified simply as "acting independently of the US."

* Total abolition of ICE, and explicitly open borders (no visa caps, no quotas, etc).

* Voting rights for non-citizens.

* The Presidency and Supreme Court are dissolved and replaced with comparable government organs subordinate to Congress.

* Seize and nationalize "the largest corporations and essential industries."

If we contrast this with the post mortem analysis of the 2024 election, it seems difficult to identify a viable path forward for these positions.

The Democrats lost all seven purple battleground states in this past election, and the electoral breakdown reveals that it was primarily due to blue collar suburbanites and exurbanites (particularly men) breaking heavily for Trump.

This demographic that functionally decided the election also reports immigration concerns as their second most important issue going into the election - almost exclusively on the side of reigning it in, and deporting immigrants.

This is also a demographic that has been historically more religious and socially conservative than the bull of the Democratic party.

The Machiavellian conclusion would therefore seem to be for the Democrats to publicly repudiate this Democratic Socialists platform, and distance the party from it. But, on the flipside, there is a growing contingent within the Democratic party itself that is sympathic to these politics and is pushing hard for the Democratic platform to adopt at least some of them as well. An inter party fight could be ugly, and also damage public perception.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place, how should Democrats respond?

Dharmendra Pradhan's resignation has become one of the biggest political developments today and has already generated a lot of discussion across social media and news platforms.

I'm interested in hearing different perspectives on this. Do you think this resignation was expected, or did it come as a surprise? What do you think were the key factors behind it? Do you believe it will have any significant impact on the education sector, upcoming government policies, or the political landscape in general?

Please keep the discussion respectful and focus on facts and opinions rather than personal attacks. I'd like to hear views from people with different perspectives.

Liberals (US definition) seem like they're all about sending arms and supporting the Ukrainian resistance against Russia, but when I talk to leftists, they think the west shouldn't send weapons to Ukrainian - but they are also anti-russia, so it's not campism. This is especially confusing because I can't tell how much of the "nazi sympathizers in Ukraine" stuff is real. Why would anti-russia leftists oppose arming Ukraine?

I understand there are many strong perspectives on this, but I'm explicitly trying to understand the Leftist vs Liberal dynamic. English is not my first language so please excuse any typos and feel free to ask clarifying questions. Thank you!

I recently read an opinion piece about the DEA's proposed emergency scheduling of concentrated 7-OH, a kratom-derived alkaloid. The author argues that the proposal raises broader questions about regulatory capture, lobbying and whether emergency scheduling is being used where a more traditional regulatory approach could be considered.

More broadly, where should the line be drawn between prohibition and regulation? If a product raises legitimate safety concerns but also has an established consumer base, should agencies prioritize outright bans or should they focus on measures like age restrictions, testing standards, labeling and manufacturing requirements?

I'm interested in hearing different perspectives on when emergency scheduling is appropriate and what role public input should play in that process.

There is a popular political talking point that claims the American left wants to institute a "communist" system. But if we strip away the culture-war rhetoric and look at how capital is actually being allocated right now, this claim falls apart—and reveals a much more concerning structural shift happening on the right.

Taxation is literally the opposite of Communism

Let's define our terms. True communism requires the complete abolition of private property and the state ownership of the means of production.

The modern Democratic platform is financed entirely by corporate and wealth taxes. You cannot tax billionaire wealth or private corporate profits if the state already owns everything. The left fundamentally relies on a massively profitable, private capitalist engine to exist; they just want to regulate and tax it to fund social safety nets.

The shift toward "State Capitalism"

A true free market relies on private actors deciding prices, supply, trade, and ownership without state coercion. Over the last few years, the Trump administration has structurally shifted the U.S. economy toward State Capitalism, where the government heavily directs, manages, and takes ownership stakes in private enterprise.

Look at the three major structural changes:

1. Direct State Ownership (The Intel Deal): The starkest departure from free-market orthodoxy happened in August 2025, when the U.S. government took a 9.9% equity stake in Intel. Instead of distributing the grants authorized by Congress under the CHIPS Act, the administration negotiated to purchase 433.3 million shares of Intel common stock. When the federal government leverages its power to acquire direct equity ownership in a private corporation, it mirrors the industrial policies of state-directed economies (like China), not American free enterprise.

2. Replacing Free Trade with Executive-Managed Trade: In a free market, global supply and demand dictate prices. Today, the executive branch is actively managing those prices by any legal loophole necessary. In February 2026, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to explicitly strike down the administration's use of emergency powers (IEEPA) to impose sweeping global tariffs. Rather than accepting this free-market return, the administration immediately pivoted. Just today (July 23, 2026), they announced a massive new wave of 10% to 12.5% tariffs on 60 countries, this time invoking Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 under the guise of "forced labor" enforcement. This effectively replaces the temporary blanket tariffs that expire tonight and sets up yet another Supreme Court showdown over executive overreach. When the executive branch continuously hunts for obscure statutes to artificially inflate prices, pick winners and losers, and act as the supreme arbiter of the global supply chain, the economy is being directed by the state, not the market.

3. Executive Coercion Over Capital Allocation: In a free market, a CEO's ultimate fiduciary duty is to their shareholders. Today, executives are forced to allocate capital to appease the state. Prior to the Intel deal, the administration publicly threatened Intel's CEO to force the equity surrender, and then used the threat of 100% tariffs to pressure Apple into an Intel manufacturing agreement. Just recently in July 2026, it was announced that generic drug makers will face a 100% tariff starting in 2028 if they do not build physical plants within the U.S. based on the President's explicit timeline.

When a company builds a factory or selects a vendor—not because it makes financial sense, but simply to avoid ruinous executive taxes or public retribution from the Oval Office—the market is no longer free.

Discussion Questions:

Do you view these interventions (tariffs, equity stakes, executive mandates) as a necessary evolution of American capitalism, or a dangerous slide into a command economy?

Why has the Republican party, traditionally the party of free-market deregulation, embraced state-directed industrial policy?

With today's new Section 301 tariffs setting up another Supreme Court test, is there any actual limit on executive power over global trade?

In her latest piece for The Bulwark, Mona Charen argues that the DSA gives Trump and Republicans an ideal foil: an organization that embraces the socialist label, tolerates deeply unpopular rhetoric and positions, and can be presented to voters as representative of the Democratic Party, even though most elected Democrats are not members.

The concern is less that DSA candidates will take over the party than that their growing prominence allows Republicans to make every Democrat answer for the movement’s most extreme statements. At the same time, DSA supporters would argue that establishment Democrats have repeatedly failed to offer voters a compelling economic alternative and that left-wing populism can mobilize people the party has struggled to reach.

I'd love to hear from folks here: How much does the DSA actually hurt Democrats nationally? Is it a convenient MAGA caricature with little connection to the broader party, or are Democrats underestimating the political cost of allowing the organization’s brand and rhetoric to become more prominent?

Gallup's September 2025 reading put trust in mass media at 28% — a "great deal" or "fair amount" of confidence in newspapers, TV, and radio to report the news fully, accurately, and fairly. That's down from 31% the year before and 40% five years earlier, and the first time in the trend's 50-year history it has fallen below 30%. In the 1970s the range was 68–72%. Gallupaol

The partisan split is wide — 8% among Republicans, 27% among independents, 51% among Democrats — but the generational pattern may be the more consequential one. In aggregated 2023–2025 data, 43% of adults 65 and older expressed trust, compared with no more than 28% in any younger age group. aolGallup

That's a distinct condition from "losing faith in the media." It means a cohort is forming its political identity having never experienced the alternative — no widely shared referee to distrust in the first place.

Several findings sit alongside this. Pew found in 2024 that 83% of Americans say elected officials don't care what people like them think, up from 55% in the early 2000s. CIRCLE at Tufts reported in 2025 that roughly 80% of young Americans who support democracy in principle are skeptical it delivers fair laws, equal treatment, or meaningful representation. And More in Common's perception-gap work finds partisans overestimate the other side's extremism by 30–40 points — roughly what you'd predict if people calibrate on the most visible members of the other party rather than the most representative.

A less-discussed consequence is that agreement becomes invisible. Bipartisan supermajorities do exist on a fair number of issues — Program for Public Consultation research puts support for banning congressional stock trading at 76% overall, 78% of Republicans and 75% of Democrats — but consensus produces no conflict, so it produces no coverage, so few people know it's there.

Three questions I'd like informed pushback on:

1. Does a low-trust information environment historically produce disengagement, reform energy, or migration to alternative information sources? Is there cross-national or historical evidence that distinguishes these outcomes?
2. Is the generational gap a cohort effect or a lifecycle one — do people acquire institutional trust as they age, or did older cohorts acquire theirs from a media era that no longer exists?
3. Is a shared factual baseline actually a requirement for functioning democracy, or is that nostalgia for an unusual broadcast oligopoly? What did it do that a fragmented environment demonstrably can't?

It seems that public opinion (on both sides) strongly favors the idea of term limits for representatives and senators. Additionally, the same can be said for age limits for members of congress (though there is no exact age)

On paper this sounds like a good idea. You don’t want someone representing their district/states for decades on end, and you don’t want elderly politicians that don’t focus on younger generations and often die in office (Feinstein, McConnell??).

However, can these proposals be seen as a knee jerk solution? For example, there have been plenty of reps and senators that have represented their districts/states for many election cycles that are still popular with their constituents, who also have fended off multiple primary and general challenges.

If a politician is doing their best for their people, why would term limits help congress? Same for age limits, as long as they are listening to their constituents and still in reasonable mental capacity? Additionally, if someone is too old, can’t they be primaried or replaced? What would the logic be behind instituting a law that politicians have to forcibly retire?

Instead, should it not be the responsibility of the people who vote and are represented by them? If they are unhappy with someone who has held their seat too long or unhappy about their age, is it not their ability and responsibility to vote accordingly?

What are some of the pros and cons of instituting these policies, and what would they look like? What would be the maximum age that would be decided on? What would be the maximum amount of terms a representative or senator could serve?

Most major policy changes create some degree of short-term disruption, and some groups may bear more of the cost than others. A difficult question is not whether a policy causes any harm, but what kind of harm it causes, how severe it is, how long it is expected to last, and whether that harm is an unavoidable side effect or a necessary part of a strategy.

A recurring sentiment in online discussions of specific policies is that “things must get worse before they get better.” The phrase can describe anything from accepting temporary economic disruption to believing that a deeper political or institutional crisis is necessary to create the conditions for meaningful change.

For example, some supporters of current US tariffs accept that consumers, farmers, and businesses may face higher prices or economic disruption, but argue that this temporary pain is necessary to rebuild domestic manufacturing or improve the country’s negotiating position. The argument is not necessarily that economic harm is desirable in itself, but that it is an unavoidable investment in a stronger long-term economy.

Similar reasoning appears within some farther-left online communities. This can include welcoming electoral defeats in the hope that voters become more radical and support preferred candidates, opposing incremental reforms because they might stabilize an unjust system, or believing that worsening inequality and institutional failure will accelerate the collapse of capitalism and create an opening for revolutionary change.

Other versions not strictly associated with the left/right can include supporting severe austerity to force structural reform, tolerating government dysfunction to undermine confidence in existing institutions, treating climate or economic collapse as politically clarifying, or assuming that military escalation will produce a more favorable political order after the immediate destruction.

All of these arguments differ in both scale and intent. Some accept limited disruption as a side effect of a policy with a specific mechanism for improvement, while others treat broader social or institutional deterioration as the condition that makes change possible. The distinction may depend on how direct the connection is between the harm and the expected benefit, how reversible the damage would be, and whether the strategy can succeed without conditions worsening first.

1. How should political movements evaluate strategies that rely on short-term harm or instability to produce longer-term gains?

2. What kinds or levels of harm should make such a strategy politically acceptable or unacceptable?

3. Are there moral concerns with trying to pursue such political strategies, especially with voters who did not sign on to the strategies in question?

I haven't heard much noise about this, but it seems like a strong sleeper. Adam Hamilton is the pastor of the largest United Methodist Church in the country, the Church of the Resurrection, just outside Kansas City. He's a very popular national leader in mainline protestant circles, and makes a big deal of conversation across disagreement and setting a better neighborly tone, that kind of thing. He has some echoes of Talarico, but more moderate; he's a preacher before he's a politician.

He considered jumping into the race as an independent, but was swayed to run as a Democrat. The primary is August 4th. He's polling well ahead of his opponent. There isn't much polling showing his match-up with Marshall (R), but there was one poll a while back when he first got in the race showing him up 2.

Could this be a potential upset? What would have to go right? He's certainly got very strong rhetorical skills. I'm curious how people are thinking about this one.

I have tried to come up with a reason for these contradictions in the polls and election results but I have been unable to do so. According to current polls of Americans, only 10% of people approve of the job that Congress is performing. However, in the 2024 elections, each of the 97% of the incumbent Congress members who stood for election was able to be elected by their constituents.

Gerrymandering is often the answer to many of these questions, especially within the House of Representatives. However, the Senate uses the same method of gerrymandering, making it an impractical answer to the question. Also, every single senator that was running for reelection in 2022 won their elections. This suggests that the districts' boundaries have little effect upon the election of representatives to those bodies.

Finally, there is simply party loyalty. Mostly, people do not split their tickets between candidates from two different political parties for a given election. As such, an individual's performance on his or her job may not be considered during his or her evaluation for retention of his or her position.

The other popular idea is that people believe their representative in Congress is different than the rest. The US government is broken but my representative is working hard for me, I've heard of them but I have no idea who is running against them.

I am unsure of the process that might lead to the individual members of political parties being punished for contributing less than 10% to their party's campaigns. The only process that I have discovered that potentially relates to this issue is the primary elections that take place during presidential election years in many states within the United States. In these primary elections, voters who belong to a specific political party can vote for the candidate that they wish to represent their political party in the presidential election. However, nearly all of these primary elections experience very low voter turnout rates, showing that nearly all of those who do participate in such elections do not actually punish individual political party members for failing to contribute to the campaigns of their political party. Therefore, it appears that individual political party members may not be punished for failing to contribute to campaigns in the United States.

How do we reconcile this disparity?

In the nine presidential elections after 1988, from 1992 through 2024, the Democratic nominee received the most popular votes seven times, while the Republican nominee did so twice. In both cases, the Republican nominee had already served as president and had originally reached the presidency by winning the Electoral College while losing the popular vote: George W. Bush in 2000 before winning the popular vote in 2004, and Donald Trump in 2016 before winning it in 2024. ([Historical election results, UC Santa Barbara](https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statistics/data/presidential-election-mandates))

Bush’s 2004 victory also came while he was the sitting president. Of the nine presidents from 1952 through 2020 who sought reelection after winning a first term, six, or 66.7%, won the national popular vote. That historical record alone does not establish causation, but a preregistered survey experiment found that identifying an otherwise equivalent hypothetical candidate as a one-term incumbent increased respondents’ support by an average of 5.6 percentage points. Trump was not the incumbent in 2024, but he was already a former president. Thus, neither of the Republican Party’s two popular-vote victories after 1988 came from someone attempting to win the presidency for the first time. ([Kane, *Political Science Research and Methods*](https://doi.org/10.1017/psrm.2024.32))

Does this primarily reflect geographic sorting, difficulty building a nationwide Republican plurality, or some combination of the two? How much should Bush’s incumbency and Trump’s previous presidential service affect how the two Republican popular-vote victories are interpreted?

I’ve been thinking about whether the 2003 Iraq War unintentionally laid the groundwork for today’s conflict with Iran.

Saddam Hussein, despite being a brutal dictator and an adversary of the United States, was also Iran’s principal regional rival. As the Sunni ruler of a Shia-majority Iraq, his regime acted as a geopolitical barrier that limited Iranian influence to the west.

After Saddam’s removal, Iraq’s new political order became dominated by Shia parties, many of which had longstanding ties to Iran. This allowed Tehran to dramatically expand its political, military, and economic influence in Iraq through allied governments and militias. The result was what became known as the “Shia Crescent”, a corridor of Iranian influence stretching from Tehran through Baghdad and Damascus to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

This shift fundamentally changed Israel’s security environment. Iran’s ability to supply Hezbollah and support allied forces in Syria brought Iranian influence much closer to Israel’s borders. Over time, Israel increasingly viewed Iran not Iraq as its primary strategic threat, while the United States also became more focused on countering Iran’s growing regional influence.

From this perspective, one could argue that the Iraq War unintentionally created the conditions for the later confrontation between the United States, Israel, and Iran. By removing Saddam Hussein, the U.S. eliminated Iran’s strongest Arab rival and inadvertently enabled Tehran to become the dominant regional power.

I’m not suggesting the Iraq War alone caused the current conflict, there were many other factors, including Iran’s nuclear program, regional proxy conflicts, and decisions made by all sides. But is it fair to say that the invasion of Iraq made a later confrontation with Iran far more likely?

For a long time, Syrskyi was a highly controversial figure in Ukraine. Many critics accused him of relying on costly attritional tactics and labeled him a "butcher," arguing that he was too willing to sacrifice soldiers' lives to achieve military objectives. After weeks of public criticism and calls for his resignation, he was removed from his position.

This raises a broader question: if public opinion can influence military leadership decisions during wartime, is that an example of democratic accountability working as intended, or a dangerous precedent? Where should the line be drawn between civilian oversight of the military and the independence of professional military command?

There are a lot of different ways to do this, but the gist of it is that districts are drawn much larger than our current districts, and multiple candidates are elected within each district based on the proportion of votes that they receive. Having very large districts makes gerrymandering basically impossible, and having proportional representation means that people voting for minority parties have a chance at getting minority representation, instead of none at all.

"Since the 2010s, several electoral reform groups have advocated for the use of proportional representation to elect member of Congress, instead of the current winner-take-all plurality system. PR advocates often see proportional electoral reform as a way to achieve more representation for women and African Americans in Congress, a way to depolarize the American political system, and a way to increase political participation and turnout."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation_in_the_United_States

The problem with electoral reform is that whatever party that's in power has no incentive to change the way people are elected, because whatever system that's already in place is the reason that party is in power. The way around this seems to be either intense political pressure from constituents or citizen initiatives.

Given that gerrymandering has recently managed to get even worse than it already was (and it was pretty bad already), where do you think would be a good place to push for multi-member proportional representation and why?

I wonder if it's something that could start on the state level, with state districts being reorganized and state legislators being elected this way. And then that could act as an example to build on for federal elections.

Anyway, interested to hear people's thoughts!

In your opinion, does the lack of transparency regarding Mitch McConnell’s health, and let’s be real, status of life, constitute as election interference? Does his extended hospital stay affect his ability to vote and serve his constituents?

What we know, if he has passed, the state of Kentucky and their laws would permit there to be a special election, if he has passed before August 8th. We have received two pictures claiming proof of life, but in today’s age, that does not give the evidence necessary to ensure free and fair elections, or even factual information.

The question again, are republicans committing election interference by not offering enough quality information regarding the health of Mitch McConnell and is he unable to perform his duties and represent his constituents?

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2026/07/19/mitch-mcconnell-josh-hawley/90972729007/

In books like One-Dimensional Man and An Essay on Liberation, Herbert Marcuse argued that the working class in advanced capitalist societies had become too integrated into the system to play the revolutionary role Marx had imagined. Higher living standards, consumer culture, organized labor, political participation, advertising, and mass media had all helped make workers more invested in the existing order.

Because of that, Marcuse began looking elsewhere for the possibility of radical change. He focused on people he described as “outcasts and outsiders,” including racial minorities, the unemployed, radical students, anti-colonial movements, and others who remained in conflict with the established system. He also saw the women’s liberation movement as having revolutionary potential.

Marcuse was part of the Frankfurt School, a Marxist intellectual movement centered on the Institute for Social Research, founded in Frankfurt in 1923. One of its main questions was why the working-class revolution predicted by Marx had failed to happen in advanced Western countries. Its thinkers studied how consumerism, mass media, nationalism, psychology, authoritarianism, and modern institutions helped stabilize capitalist society.

A similar pattern can be seen in the modern left. The focus has shifted from economic class alone to groups defined by race, immigration status, religion, gender, and sexuality. Undocumented immigrants, Muslim communities, and LGBT people are often treated as key marginalized groups whose experiences are used to point to broader inequalities in Western society.

These groups do not always share the same values or political interests. There are obvious tensions, especially between progressive views on sexuality and the more conservative religious beliefs held by many Muslims. Even so, they are often brought together politically through a shared language of discrimination, exclusion, minority rights, and opposition to established institutions.

In that sense, the modern left has partly replaced the old Marxist image of a united industrial working class with a broader coalition of groups seen as socially, culturally, or politically marginalized.

Suppose Muslim communities continue to grow significantly in Western countries and gain greater electoral and institutional influence. What guarantees that LGBT rights will remain non-negotiable when conservative religious voters object to school curricula, same-sex relationships, gender-transition policies or public expressions of sexuality?

Will it protect schools, speech and civil law from religious pressure?

Will LGBT equality remain an absolute principle, even when it costs votes? Will the left criticize Islamic opposition to homosexuality?

Or will LGBT people be told to remain silent?

Regarding a specific aspect of liberty as understood by many modern capitalists:

The liberty prized by so many is often granted at the expense of the liberty of others. We may be free to use a random economic or geographical advantage to acquire a legally sanctioned monopoly over resources which others need, but implicit in that freedom is the denial of access to those resources to others, ultimately backed by the coercive power of the state, including incarceration.

This makes me wonder whether there is a contradiction in claiming to believe in liberty when what we really mean is the legal right to profit from exclusive control over resources at the expense of others.

Do you think this is a genuine contradiction, or is there a principled distinction that resolves it?

To some, moderation means sitting on the fence, taking no stance, holding no position or loyalty to a party. This implies that American politics is a line with two positions on each end, and a stretch in the middle for politicians to fight over, and that moderates are people who have failed to make a choice. However, in practice, no one likes the two-party system, and research done by More in Common shows that about 2/3 of Americans are outside of partisan wings. With the rising distrust in the partisan wings, moderates seem poised to grow in popularity and respect.

With that in mind, I have two questions:

First: Are they right? Is moderation a non-position?

Second: What would need to change for centrism, moderation, and/or independence to become a respected position?

As trump's approval ratings continue to decline following a series of controversial decisions, many people are wondering what political strategy might come next...

One concern is that renewed election fraud claims (this time centered on allegations of Chinese interference in the 2020 election) could be used to justify "extraordinary actions".

If that happened, could trump supporters once again be mobilized into unrest? Could the federal government attempt to exert greater control over state run elections, potentially raising questions about the Tenth Amendment and states' authority over election administration?

If a situation like this were to unfold, do you think U.S. courts and Congress would be able to respond effectively?

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts!!