“You don’t need to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing.”
—Bob Dylan
As children growing up, most of us enjoyed pretending to be someone else. I even remember in my childhood there was a rock song “The Great Pretender.” With maturity, those dreams disappeared. In recent years, however, pretense has become a frequently used tactic in politics. One of the most obvious techniques is the political version of “bait and switch,” in which a politician pretends to have one identity or ideology to get elected, whereupon (s)he reverts to their true views.
A recent example is Abigail Spanberger, who ran for Governor of Virginia in 2025 posing as a moderate and citing her employment with the CIA before being elected to Congress, but, after being elected, has governed as a radical, restoring the green energy program that serves mainly to increase fuel and energy prices; pushing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies; and seeking to tax practically everything except (possibly) the air we breathe. Her example has been widely copied, especially since her party is having increasing difficulty attracting one of its traditional bases: white working-class voters, especially men.
It is understandable that people are reluctant to support politicians who characterize them as “bitter” people who “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them” (by Barack Obama), “deplorables” (by Hillary Clinton) or “garbage” (by President Biden), not to mention the snide observation by FBI agent Peter Strzok that he could smell them at Walmart. After seeing white non-college graduates, a demographic that still represents 40% of the electorate, increasingly supporting Republicans, with a peak of 66% voting for Donald Trump in 2024, the left realized that a majority of Americans didn’t share their views. Modifying their platform wasn’t an option, so they opted for searching their ranks for candidates who could appeal to working-class white voters while downplaying their true views.
One of the first products of the search for “Mr. White” was Tim Walz, who didn’t exactly set the world on fire as governor of Minnesota and vice presidential nominee, though some of his supporters did. Walz’s recent pardon of a child molester who was, thankfully, promptly deported was just the latest in a long series of acts defending illegal immigrants culminating when a personal scandal compelled him to abandon his re-election campaign. At this point, the left and their media acolytes transferred their affection to Graham Platner, winner of the Democratic U.S. Senate primary in Maine. Platner tried to appear to be a working man, like good old “Lunch Bucket” Joe Biden from Scranton, although it turned out that his cover as an oysterman was a business financed by his affluent family whose only customer was his mother’s restaurant. Nothing could derail his campaign: not having a Nazi SS tattoo; not a history of anti-Semitism; not distorting his military history; not his description of his fellow soldiers as fools for their service—not even allegations of sexual abuse from his Republican former girlfriend, whose complaint was disregarded. It was only after a similar accusation from a Democratic ex-girlfriend surfaced that his party’s leaders reluctantly forced him off the ballot. Apparently, the catchphrase “#BelieveAllWomen”—created to advance the absurd sexual allegations against Justice Brett Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearing in 2018—applies only to Democrat women.
With Platner’s political demise, all attention now turned to another “Great White Hope,” Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico, whose primary claim to fame was being an evangelical Christian. Talarico’s candidacy, too, has drawbacks. He claims Jesus was multiply gendered, and, at a more mundane level, is a militant vegetarian in a state with a sizable cattle industry. We’ll have to see how that turns out.
One of the most obvious techniques is the political version of “bait and switch,” in which a politician pretends to have one identity or ideology to get elected, whereupon (s)he reverts to their true views.
While all these Democrats are trying to conceal their positions, others now seem confident enough to reveal theirs. The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), who are increasingly becoming the dominant force in the Democratic Party, have just released their platform, “Workers Deserve More!” to which every candidate seeking their endorsement must subscribe. Among its provisions, as reported by Stu Smith in City Journal (and published by the DSA and numerous other sources):
- “…the replacement of ‘the President and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress.’”
- “…full public financing for campaigns and the abolition of the Electoral College.”
- “…the establishment of public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries to ensure democratic control and accountability, and strict regulations on investment properties.”
- “…defund the Department of War, close overseas bases, and end all economic sanctions—which would include those in states like Iran, Cuba, and Russia.”
- “…universal amnesty for illegal immigrants, and ending ‘restrictions on … marriage,’ which would presumably entail the legalization of polygamy.”
- “…the abolition of the carceral elements of the capitalist state,” i.e. prisons and police.
- “…a provision explicitly naming Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state.”
- “…ranked-choice voting.”
As radical as this program may sound, it represents no more than the traditional realization of communism. As Stu Smith explains, “‘Workers Deserve More!’ has revolutionary aspirations. It aims to ’win the battle for democracy, draft a new constitution, and create a democratic socialist republic.’ The document makes clear that achieving this vision would require ‘building a new society from the ground up,’ accompanied by sweeping structural changes.”
What is truly alarming about this platform is that it is coming ever closer to being adopted as the DSA consolidates its control of the Democratic Party, as evidenced by the fear of establishment progressive Democrats of speaking out against it: Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) claimed not to have read it; Ilhan Omar (D-MN) refused to answer any questions about it; Pete Aguilar (D-CA) asserted that, since he wasn’t a DSA member, he couldn’t comment.
In sum, the U.S.A. has lasted for 250 years, which is widely held to be the average lifetime of a human society. Can we beat the odds by going further? When asked as he left the Constitutional Convention what kind of government the assembly had given us, Benjamin Franklin famously replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.” Can we? Time will tell.
