Read on Twitter
1. A very nice salute from @TheEconomist's Lexington columnist to the Never Trumpers, the "most remarkable of all" the forces in the broad Biden coalition. https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/10/29/battle-hymn-of-the-never-trumpers
2. Lexington notes that "Not since Lyndon Johnson crushed Barry Goldwater in 1964 have so many leading lights in one party backed the nominee of the other" -- for reasons that, btw, I explain in my latest @madebyhistory column in the @washingtonpost! https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/10/30/whats-driving-so-many-republicans-support-joe-biden/
3. Lexington notes that by setting themselves against the sitting president of their own party, the NTs "have made themselves heretics on the right while taking on the mantle of truth-tellers, authenticated by a willingness to commit career suicide, to almost everyone else."
4. The column also correctly observes that the NT'ers' conversion "has transformed their reputations," but not primarily I think by making them popular on the L. Yes, criticism of the R from former insiders plays well on the L for obvious reasons... https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/8/24/21348295/trump-stuart-stevens-it-was-all-a-lie
5. But, rather, by liberating themselves from partisan & ideological blinders, the NT'ers have become the present-day counterparts to the ex-Trotskyist intellectuals of the '60s/'70s -- the sharpest political thinkers of the era because the least deceived
https://www.pbs.org/arguing/nyintellectuals.html
https://www.pbs.org/arguing/nyintellectuals.html
6. Not gonna lie -- I have benefitted mightily and at no personal cost from absorbing the hard-earned wisdom of those like @BillKristol who have lost so much from criticizing the movement and party that gave them their ideological home and raison d'être
7. I'm glad that @SykesCharlie has found a perch at @BulwarkOnline -- but he could have made real $ by taking the ticket and going on Fox et al. to say that while he once had opposed Trump, now at last he has seen the results of his great leadership etc.
https://podcast.thebulwark.com/hosts/charlie-sykes
https://podcast.thebulwark.com/hosts/charlie-sykes
8. I agree with Lexington that @murphymike and @Timodc "have shown themselves to be two of the wittiest people in politics" who have done the country a great cultural service by challenging the left's dominance of satire
9. I'd add that @RadioFreeTom has emerged as one of the clearest and most courageous exponents of principles and convictions that many of us on the center-right had oft thought but ne'er so well expressed https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/my-never-trump-elegy/616917/
10. And Lexington justly praises @SarahLongwell25 as "perhaps the Never Trumper-in-chief," the genius behind @RVAT2020 who has taught us all so much by talking to and learning from the voters on the ground who are likely to decide this election https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/why-people-who-hate-trump-stick-him/616758/
11. Notwithstanding the success of @ProjectLincoln, the political wilderness beckons for most Never Trumpers: "They are not trusted by Democratic decision-makers. And there is no way back to the Republican Party, where they are hated" https://lincolnproject.us/video/mourning-in-america/
12. But Lex is right that no matter the outcome, NT'ers "have played an admirable part. ... If they are now enjoying success, it is because their consciences turned out to be a better predictor of America’s response to Mr Trump than their cynical former colleagues anticipated."
