I'd also be interested to know the source of the statistic Brooks quoted which Capehart is objecting to:
"If you look at who thinks violence is justified, it tends to be young people by a lot. Most progressives and most conservatives oppose violence, but you get two and a half times as many progressives say it's justified as not."
I wonder where he gets that from? And I wonder what the hell it actually means - It seems to completely avoid mentioning the percentage split within conservatives, but the grammatical meaning makes nonsense of "most progressives and most conservatives oppose violence".
Could he possibly be trying to say that two and a half times as many progressives as conservatives justify violence (even though this is not what he actually said)? And if so, I wonder what the actual percentages are, not to mention when these statistics were derived. If, for example, during the ICE adventures in Minneapolis, it would be interesting cherry-picking indeed....
Talking of clusterfucks, I've just seen that James Comey has been indicted again, on two counts involving threats to kill Trump, as far as I can understand (hard though it is to believe) to do with the seashells signing "86 47". I wonder if his yes-men have tried to convince the POTUS that it might not get thrown out this time? And if so, presumably he's just happy to continue to subject his enemies to vexatious, time-wasting (and expensive?) charges...
Although it felt very weird (Vance being hustled off the stage before Trump, Trump's apparent lack of concern), I reluctantly have to agree with cleek, russell and wonkie. The fact that it might improve Trump's poll numbers before the midterms is just a piece of luck for them - and although it sounds like it, I am not speaking with forked tongue. Let's face it, almost everything about the current administration feels surreal, weird and unbelievable, why should this be any different?
I've just been watching the footage from the White House Correspondents' Dinner. I find it fascinating that the Secret Service hustle Vance out first, then come back for Trump. Has there been much speculation or commentary about that?
This is the latest from Comment is Freed, for anyone who is interested:
The US no longer leads The changing context for UK defence policy Lawrence Freedman Apr 25
One of the most important tasks of political leaders at times of crisis is to explain to the public the seriousness of the situation and possible courses of action. Perhaps the government assumes that the nature of the current crisis is self-evident, that it is understood that so long as the Strait of Hormuz remains closed the conditions of life not only in the UK but around the world will worsen. The future of US-Iranian negotiations remains clouded in uncertainty but even if an agreement on the Strait is reached soon, it will take months before the backlogs are cleared and supply lines get back to normal.
The crisis however goes much deeper, because the current situation is the result of a catastrophic set of errors by the Trump administration. We have been witnessing the astonishing picture of one of the greatest powers the world has ever known wilfully weaken and undermine itself so that it no longer is either willing or able to play its accustomed role in the international system.
This is not an easy aspect of the current crisis to address for governments closely allied with the United States. They do not want to give up on the multitude of defence and security arrangements, including NATO, that have bound them together and have led them to look to Washington for leadership. It is even more awkward to acknowledge that one reason for this is that the President is unhinged, uninhibited in launching insults at foreign leaders, including the Pope, and with no coherent agenda other than servicing his own ego. His ‘MAGA’ coalition is already fracturing, as its hero has blundered into exactly the sort of Middle Eastern war he was pledged to avoid. Perhaps the current dramas will become too much even for his own party and cabinet to bear, although there are no signs of that happening yet. Eventually he will leave office but by the time he does so the world will be a different place.
However difficult it might be to talk about this aspect of the current crisis candidly it is essential that ways are found to do so, because only then can the full implications for the UK and its European partners be appreciated.
In particular this is why it is essential to end the Treasury block on the Defence Investment Plan, which was supposed to have been announced at the end of last year. There is a commitment to get core defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP in 2027 and then 3 per cent in the next parliament and to 3.5 per cent by 2035. This is required to begin to compensate for decades of under investment, leading to the serious deficiencies set out so clearly in last year’s strategic defence review, whether in logistics, recruitment, cybersecurity, ammunition stocks or heavy equipment.
The weakness of our armed forces, especially the Royal Navy, has become even more painfully apparent in recent weeks, as it struggled to get a single destroyer to the region. The delays caused by the Treasury/MoD standoff has meant that instead of a start being made on improvements there has been further deterioration, even as the international situation has become more urgent. When the announcement eventually comes questions will be asked about what this means for other areas of public expenditure or how can the Treasury be sure that money will be spent more wisely than in the past. But that will be the wrong framing. The issue is the dramatic shift in the international system. The government seeks to play a leading role in addressing the various resulting crises from Ukraine to the Strait of Hormuz, yet its credibility in these efforts is undermined by its reluctance to commit the necessary resources.
It has become something of a cliché for some years, at least since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, that the current security environment is the most challenging since at least the end of the Cold War. But it has now acquired extra layers of challenge that requires a reappraisal of all aspects of foreign policy, and indeed in some instances of domestic policy as well. After describing how this has come about, I will then turn to the current crisis over the Strait of Hormuz, before concluding with some suggestions about possible ways forward.
Layers of Challenge
The Russian annexation of Crimea in March 2014 provided the first warning that the comfortable assumptions about the stability of the European political order could no longer be taken for granted. At NATO’s September 2014 Cardiff summit the allies agreed ‘to reverse the trend of declining defence budgets, to make the most effective use of our funds and to further a more balanced sharing of costs and responsibilities.’ They agreed to take more seriously than before a target of 2 percent of GDP, which by and large they did.
The 2022 invasion of Ukraine, as a crude act of aggression, combined with an energy crisis, reinforced the sense of gathering danger. As Ukraine resisted, and NATO countries helped it do so, Moscow’s rhetoric became ever more shrill and threatening. There were questions as to whether the conflict could be contained or would spill out, with some in the Biden administration fretting about the possibility of nuclear escalation.
This provided yet another prompt to look again at defence capabilities with added urgency. And then with Trump’s return to the White House the issue required an extra dimension as he sought more than just ‘a more balanced sharing of costs and responsibilities’ but a completely new relationship. He wanted the Europeans to accept responsibility for their own security.
It was a challenge that Europeans largely accepted, as there was no reason in principle why this collection of rich nations could not cope with whatever threat Russia might pose in the future, at least in the conventional sphere. Their readiness to spend more on defence – up to 5 percent of GDP - could be offered to Trump as a major political gain, with the expectation that in return the US would retain its commitment to NATO along with the nuclear guarantee. Part of the calculation was that by going along with Trump’s core demands, alliance relations could be kept relatively harmonious.
One key concern shaping this approach was that if alliance relations got out of kilter, Trump might sell out Ukraine completely. When he came to power it was evident that he felt that the US should no longer donate to Ukraine’s war effort. If the Europeans wanted to support Ukraine then that was up to them. The concern in those early weeks was that Trump was so eager to do a deal with Putin to end the war that he would put unreasonable pressure on Kyiv to make unwarranted concessions. It was only with some effort from European leaders that Trump was persuaded to work with Zelenskyy and accept that Putin was not offering any serious concessions.
Later in the year he once again became more sympathetic to Russia’s demands that Ukraine hand over territory to Russia that it had failed to conquer. By this time, with the end of US donations and the growth of European support, as well as Ukraine’s own efforts, Trump had lost leverage over Kyiv. Now Zelenskyy openly resists the pressure to cede territory. Here there is an important lesson. When the Europeans put in the effort, in this case supporting Ukraine both financially and militarily, they can act effectively independently of the US.
To complicate matters further, during the course of the year it became clear that the issue was not just fundamental policy disagreements with Trump, but also the developing sense of chaos surrounding the administration. This was manifest with Trump’s tariffs, which he presented as the answer to all of America’s economic woes, and which he was prepared to impose on all trading partners, including allies, The actual impact of the policy was limited by its haphazard implementation - in the process creating an impression of an administration which didn’t really know what it was doing and why. This confirmed a pattern evident in other policy areas. The administration was thinly staffed, often with barely qualified people, with whole functions axed because they carried the whiff of woke.
This year Trump’s public appearances and demands have become increasingly unhinged. Perhaps some ideas were no more than teases in bad taste, such as urging Canada to become the 51st state, although these were backed by punitive sanctions. The push to acquire Greenland for the United States could not be dismissed. The hint that this could involve military means and the explicit threat of economic pressure demanded an unequivocal response. Those states that had worked hard to keep Trump on side – UK, France, Germany – could not fudge the issue. They made their disapproval clear. Trump soon backed off, largely because of unfavourable market reactions, but the damage had been done. The forms of dialogue over 2025 that had continued during 2025 became harder to sustain. Trump’s commentaries on his allies became more insulting and delusional. Rather than argue back the simplest approach was just to ignore him.
Iran
Then came the Iran War. Because we are still in the middle of this crisis and we do not know how it will end there is still a tendency to wait and see, as if once the Strait is open things will soon return to normal. I fear that this is complacent. Whatever happens now the knock-on effects are going to be substantial and calamitous for many countries and industries. As is always the case, it is the poorest that will suffer most. The immediate consequences are going to stress all governments. Inflation, shortages, flight cancellations will soon be dominating all public discourse.
This conflict has been mismanaged on a spectacular scale and has exposed the dysfunctions of the Trump administration. In itself this is a transformational moment in the international system.
A recent article in the New York Times by David Sanger, presenting the problem as one of contrasting negotiating styles, barely does justice to the scale of the problem. It is easy enough to capture the Iranian style. They are aware that Trump is trying to bully them so they have to demonstrate resilience, endurance and patience.
But how to characterise Trump’s style? We know how he sees himself – Sanger puts it as ‘the master of coercive diplomacy, forcing his opponents to capitulate quickly to American demands or face the threat of attack.’ He quotes veteran diplomat Robert Malley who worked the Iran file for both Obama and Biden:
‘Trump is impulsive and temperamental; Iran’s leadership is stubborn and tenacious.’ …. ‘Trump demands immediate results; Iran’s leadership plays the long game.’ …. ‘Trump insists on a flashy, headline-grabbing outcome; Iran’s leadership sweats every detail. Trump believes brute force can compel obedience; Iran’s leadership is prepared to endure enormous pain rather than concede on core interests.’
But this still makes Trump’s approach appear as a deliberate choice, rational in its own way even if counter-productive. This characterisation does not capture its full craziness, with its bluster, absurd rhetoric, delusion, incoherence and constant contradiction. Trump makes threats as if scripted for a bad B-Movie. (When telling the Iranians to accept a deal he said if they did not ‘the United States is going to knock out every single Power Plant, and every single Bridge, in Iran. NO MORE MR. NICE GUY.’)
Another story, this time in the Wall Street Journal, records his temper tantrums, ignorance of key features of the situation, limited attention span and loss of focus, preferring to talk about happier topics such as his White House ballroom. When the rescue of a US aviator was underway the journal reports that aides ‘kept the president out of the room as they got minute-by-minute updates because they believed his impatience wouldn’t be helpful, instead updating him at meaningful moments.’ He rationalises his own behaviour as an example of the long-discredited madman theory, as if performing as a crazy person might scare an opponent into more concessions. But this does not work when the working assumption is that he really is crazy. The conclusion is not that he can be calmed with more concessions but instead that he is an impossible person to deal with.
Because he has consistently declared victory in both the war and in the negotiations, even though the Iranians have been far from surrendering and have agreed to very little, he cannot be honest with himself or with the American people about the true situation. In line with this determination to prove that the US ‘has the cards,’ Trump is unwilling to acknowledge that Iran enjoys any leverage, even though it clearly does. On 17 April he boasted that the Iranians had ‘agreed to everything’, including turning over their ‘nuclear dust.’ The Iranians denied this, and it is reasonable to suppose that Trump made this made this all up, because that is what he does. We have reached the stage that any statements from Trump about the negotiations must be disregarded until they are confirmed by a more authoritative source.
Most seriously on 17 April an apparent opportunity to get the Strait of Hormuz opened was lost. After apparently being persuaded by Pakistan that if they ended their blockade the US would end its blockade of Iranian ports, they announced that they would do so. This was welcomed by Trump, but he then decided not to reciprocate by ending the US blockade, for this meant that the US was left with an advantage. Unsurprisingly the Iranians closed the Strait again. Since then the Iranians have fired on freighters while the US has boarded Iranian tankers.
The experience with calling off the blockades reinforces Iran’s view that the US does not negotiate in good faith. In 2018 he abandoned a serviceable agreement, negotiated under Obama, in the belief that he could get a better one. Twice in his second term negotiations appeared to be progressing, only for the Israelis to persuade the US that they would get a better result by bombing Iran. His all-purpose negotiating team of Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner have now got an impressive record of under achievement.
The Iranians have decided to harden their stance if only to underline the point that they cannot be cowed. It has moved aggressively in the other direction, demanding tolls, saying it will charge unfriendly countries more, and blocking any ships owned by countries sanctioning it.
It is quite an accomplishment to allow the Iranian regime to appear as the more effective strategic player. This is still the same regime that not that long ago was slaughtering its own people to suppress any insurrectionary tendencies. It would be surprising if there were not tensions between the IRGC hardliners who are seeking to impose their will on the world and more moderate types who are worried about how to govern a country with wrecked infrastructure and a collapsed economy, which has dared not turn on the internet for six weeks. But for now the regime is going to great pains to demonstrate unity, especially in the light of Trump’s claims about chronic infighting and splits. At least for now they have an agreed strategy. They are determined not to appear needy. They know Trump also wants to extricate himself from an unpopular war. But the tensions are there (see this from Ali Ansari) and likely to become important if there is actual progress in negotiations and hard choices have to be made about potential concessions.
The allies have every reason to be furious with Trump for starting a war without a plan for ending it. Yet it is Trump, in one of his vindictive moods, who is said to be plotting ways of demonstrating his displeasure at these European countries who have given insufficient support to the US. This apparently includes reappraising the US position on the UK’s claim to the Falklands. (I don’t think the US has ever backed the UK claim: the position was that the dispute should not be solved by force). At the same time he has been rewarding Russia, which has actually supported Iran, with eased oil sanctions and an invitation to the G20 summit in Miami.
After charting how unpopular Trump has become in Europe and elsewhere, even amongst those on the right who once supported him, Fareed Zakaria observes that:
‘countries have started making long-term policy shifts, and these will soon take on a life of their own. They realized that they had entrusted their security and well-being to Washington, and it has used this dependence to squeeze them hard. So, they have decided to buy insurance, to protect themselves from an unreliable America. And who can blame them?’
What is to be done?
It is possible that negotiations will resume in Islamabad. On past performance we cannot presume success but let’s hope that they do. The urgent priority is to get the Strait open. After that there is the nuclear issue, easing of sanctions, promises of no further aggression, and so on, which may be as intractable as before.
But whatever happens now, in its origins and its conduct this war is a symptom of something bigger and deeper. So long as Trump is in power it is hard to see how there can be normal relations with the United States. Even if a moderate Democrat becomes president in 2029 there will be no return to the position of 2024. Core capabilities will have been lost and key relationships attenuated. The US national security apparatus has been gutted and will need to be rebuilt. A return to civility and proper consultation will be a good start, but progress will take time. As always much will be determined by the first big crisis the new administration faces. There have always been major policy disagreements. That is not new. What matters is how they are handled.
For the next 30 months issues will keep arising in which it will be impossible to align our position with that of the Trump administration. Most importantly it will become necessary to find ways of dealing with problems without the US, often with countries which are not traditional allies. This has already happened with Ukraine and could happen should an agreement be reached in principle on the Strait which then requires practical action to demonstrate its safety to commercial shipping. If the Islamabad talks fail then it might be necessary to pick up the pieces to see if a broad based international coalition can do a deal with Iran. A year ago talk of Europeans taking more responsibility for their defence led to considerations of speculative scenarios involving a Russian push against a Baltic state. Now it involves coping with a series of ongoing challenges.
The obvious conclusion for the UK is that we need to strengthen our ties with the EU and this process has begun. It has also become routine to coordinate responses to new developments with the major European capitals. There is an argument for shifting defence procurement away from the US to European partners, especially as the US has begun to withhold deliveries to allies (the latest is Estonia) because the war has left it short in its inventories of vital systems. In practice this is going to be of marginal impact and there is going to be a degree of dependence on the US defence industry for years to come. At any rate the point is not to break completely with the US but to accept that our interests are no longer as close as they once were, and that in current circumstances it cannot be a high priority to accommodate American wishes.
If this is the case, and we must be able to act more independently of the US, then we must start to reorganise our armed forces to cope with the challenges they face, which means having deployable capabilities, properly kitted out. As things stand we are setting ourselves up for more embarrassments as we seek to contribute but then find that we have little to offer. This is not a difficult argument to understand but it needs to be made by the government with clarity and urgency.
It's funny: we always thought it couldn't get much worse than Nixon when he was POTUS. Then we thought it couldn't possibly get worse than Reagan, and even more so Dubya. We have learnt that it can always get worse.
Maybe you had to be in an American college. Liberals (and hippies) despised Reagan anyway, but especially after Kent State. And in those intensely homophobic times, and given that he was an actor, I wouldn't be at all surprised if that and other such casual slurs were directed at him by people who detested his politics.
Yes, I think "anti-war" is a ridiculous slogan and an own goal in much the same way as "defund the police" - it lays the road open for your opponents to walk through. As for anti-militaristic, I'm all for it, as well as anti-jingoistic, but I don't think they do as rallying cries. I've said before (probably at boring length) how the ridiculous cosplay posturing of Hegseth and Trump ("warfighters", "Secretary of War", "lethality") is nothing but an open demonstration of their pathetic, macho attempt to ape "real men", a clear development of "fuck your feelings", and an obvious demonstration of their inadequacy. But alas, not obvious enough to almost half the US population. Although that may be changing - apparently 1 in 5 Trump voters is now in favour of impeaching him....
I too like Buttigieg, but I'm scared. It's so obvious to me (and probably to most of us) that he has the right stuff, but one has to think about the prejudices of the electorate. Which, I know, may not always have been the best way to think about it. It's a hard one.
wj, I see your point; to me it's crazy to talk about "anti-war" as a policy, everything depends on the context and the rationale for war. But as an electoral strategy, always including those caveats, that's different.
But while I'm at it (using my remaining gift articles), here is Jamelle Bouie on Trump's corruption, in comparison (which I found valuable) to all previous American presidents:
Talking of elections, and since this is the most recent Open Thread, this is a gift opinion piece from the NYT by Ben Rhodes about the Graham Platner campaign. I've been ill for a couple of days, so I'm just skimming instead of reading seriously (and you can listen instead), but I wonder what the ObWi commentariat make of him, especially given this:
“If the Democratic Party is to flourish in the future,” Mr. Platner told me, “it needs to be an antiwar party.” As talks to end the latest disastrous war focus on reopening a narrow strait of water that was open before the war began, this seems like an obvious conclusion. And yet many Democratic politicians would most likely be wary of embracing it.
Mad Kings, and mad (or worse) judges. This is Judge J Michael Luttig, that hugely eminent and respected conservative judge (notwithstanding his unfortunate delivery - although impeccable in content - in front of the January 6th hearings), on a recent speech by Clarence Thomas. Honestly, the degradation of the SCOTUS has to be seen to be believed.
The Most Important Speech of Political and Constitutional Philosophy That Never Should Have Been Given Judge J. Michael Luttig Apr 20, 2026
The speech that Justice Clarence Thomas gave last week at the University of Texas could prove to be the single most important speech of political and constitutional philosophy that never should have been given. As a conservative my entire life, I certainly wish Justice Thomas had not written and given the insidious speech. Though his unmistakable targets were Progressives and progressivism, his speech is far more injurious to Republicans, conservatives, and conservatism than it is for progressivism because it is demonstrably and inarguably wrong as to Progressives, but it is a siren song to today’s Republicans and conservatives. Webster’s Dictionary defines “siren song” as “: an alluring utterance or appeal, especially one that is seductive or deceptive.” Justice Thomas intended his speech as a Republican and conservative manifesto for our times — and for all times. But the political and constitutional philosophies he described and embraced are neither doctrinal conservatism nor Republican nor political conservatism, and they are manifestly not constitutional conservatism. No one should mistake for true conservatism, or even Republicanism, much less constitutional conservatism, the political and constitutional philosophies that Justice Thomas has embraced his entire life and spoke about last week. His philosophies represent anything but true conservatism. Rather, together, they constitute a bastard strand of conservatism that lingered and languished in the faculty lounges of the conservative academy from around the mid-1960s until it was summoned forth from the academy by acolytes of Clairmont McKenna College’s natural law philosopher Harry V. Jaffa to fuel Donald Trump’s rise to power in 2016. Those acolytes included Justice Thomas and his, and my, former law clerk John Eastman. Thus, the overarching significance of Justice Thomas’ speech last week is that it represents the intellectual political and constitutional philosophies for Donald Trump’s two presidencies and his entire MAGA movement. It was these political and constitutional philosophies that underlaid and justified Donald Trump’s failed plan to cling to power on January 6, 2021, the architect of which was John Eastman. The political and constitutional philosophies that Justice Thomas embraces are as certainly wrong for America, whose preeminent law is the Constitution of the United States, not the Declaration of Independence’s admittedly majestic and inspirational Preamble,” as Justice Thomas believes they are certainly right for America under that Constitution. His twin philosophies are, simply and demonstrably, wrong as a matter of historical fact, political fact, and both constitutional fact and law. Together, they are a shockingly and reprehensibly ahistorical characterization of liberals and progressives and progressivism, as well as an ahistorical characterization of Republicans, Republicanism, and conservativism. These philosophies are a radical understanding of American and world history over the past century and a quarter, a radical way of thinking about American political history, and a decidedly radical way of thinking about the relationship between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. This is emphatically not what the Founders of this nation and the Framers of the Constitution of the United States contemplated, envisioned, or ever intended. The historical flaws in Justice Thomas’ speech are many and every one of them has already been identified and authoritatively denounced by experts and scholars across the political, philosophical, and ideological spectrum. Justice Thomas purports to trace progressivism in America back to Democrat President Woodrow Wilson, when in fact progressivism for the past century and a half is actually traceable directly back to Republican President Theodore Roosevelt. Astonishingly, Thomas then blames all progressives of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries – including progressives in the United States over this period – and charges them with responsibility for the profound failures of societies worldwide during those one hundred and twenty-five years, including Stalinism, Maoism, Mussolini’s fascism, Naziism, and worse. Oblivious to the actual history, but supremely confident in his ahistorical understanding of that history, Justice Thomas intoned as if reading from the Gospel that “Progressivism has made many inroads in our system of government and our way of life. It has coexisted uneasily with the principles of the Declaration. Because it is opposed to those principles, it is not possible for the two to coexist forever…. Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, and Mao all were intertwined with the rise of progressivism, and all were opposed to the natural rights on which our Declaration was based. Many progressives expressed admiration for each of them shortly before their governments killed tens of millions of people.” Justice Thomas’ invidious accusation that progressives in America for the past century and a half up to this very day have been pursuing the same anti-democratic and anti-constitutional regimes as Stalinism, Maoism, Mussolini’s fascism, Naziism, and the like, is frightening, risible, and reprehensible. While it can fairly be said that Woodrow Wilson was critical of the Declaration’s Preamble, virtually no other Progressive or Democrat since Woodrow Wilson has so much as criticized the Preamble, much less rejected it. The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., famously regarded the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as the “promissory notes” to which all Americans were heir and he called upon the nation to fulfill the pledges of these two Founding documents. Jeffrey Rosen, one of the greatest constitutional scholars and historians of our times and indisputably the foremost constitutional scholar of America’s Founding, writes in his recent book The Pursuit of Liberty: How Hamilton vs. Jefferson Ignited the Lasting Battle Over Power in America that Thomas Jefferson was, after all, the founder of the progressive Democratic Party and most Democrats in 19th and 20th centuries revered Jefferson. Mr. Rosen goes on to explain that when he was President Wilson’s closest advisor, progressive Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis handed out biographies of Thomas Jefferson to Kentucky schoolchildren, quoted Jefferson in the greatest free speech opinion Brandeis ever wrote on the Supreme Court, and took his famous criticism of the “curse of bigness” from Thomas Jefferson. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, a liberal originalist, worshiped and frequently quoted Thomas Jefferson. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt built the Jefferson Memorial on the Mall in Washington D.C. and had Jefferson’s portrait permanently engraved on the obverse of the nickel and his Virginia home, Monticello, engraved on the reverse. Mr. Rosen writes that President Roosevelt died the day before Thomas Jefferson’s birthday with an undelivered speech in hand, in which he called Thomas Jefferson the prophet of the post-war order. And of course, President William Jefferson Clinton began his inauguration with a pilgrimage to his namesake’s Monticello home in Charlottesville, Virginia, symbolically traveling from Thomas Jefferson’s mountaintop home to the Nation’s Capital, to be sworn in as the 42nd President of the United States. As a matter of historical fact, every single progressive president since Theodore Roosevelt, with the arguable exception of Woodrow Wilson has unhesitatingly embraced the Declaration’s Preamble, the Declaration itself, and indeed, Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence. For 250 years, it has never been the case that either of America’s two political parties has been anti-Preamble, anti-Declaration of Independence, or anti-Constitution . . . until, that is, the past 10 years, when the Republican Party led by Donald Trump has acted as if it were all three. As a matter of historical, political, and constitutional fact, it is the 47th President and today’s Republicans and conservatives who, every day of the week, act in denial of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States, all the while professing to revere these two Founding and foundational documents of the United States of America.
Well, this is very interesting. A NYT report of a trial in France, headlined A Stunning New Verdict Rewrites the Rules of Corporate Morality, signals quite a change in the way these things have always gone in the past:
have him lecturing the Pope on the fine points of [Catholic] doctrine
And not just any old Catholic doctrine: on Saint Augustine's theory of a Just War. The Pope is a) the first Pope from The Order of Augustine, and b) wrote his PhD thesis on Augustinian thought. A quotation from the thesis:
“There is no room in Augustine’s concept of authority for one who is self-seeking and in search of power over others,”
OK - from Comment is Freed on the Hungary election:
The fall of Orbán What it means for the global battle against the radical right Sam Freedman Apr 14, 2026
There’s hasn’t been much for liberals to cheer recently, but Péter Magyar’s victory in Sunday’s Hungarian election has unleashed a wave of exuberance far beyond the streets of Budapest.
Magyar is not an obvious liberal saviour. He’s a social conservative and was a member of Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party until 2024. By campaigning on corruption and the cost of living, while maintaining iron discipline over his newly formed Tisza party, he’s been able to hold together a broad enough coalition to win. Whether he can keep it together in power is yet to be seen. Some of his supporters are inevitably going to be disappointed. He will also face a demanding task dismantling Orbán’s network of cronies, though having a two thirds supermajority in parliament at least makes it plausible.
But while there may be trouble ahead, liberal excitement is justified. Orbán was a figurehead for the international radical right, creating a playbook for cementing executive power. He changed the constitution and electoral system; stacked the courts; took over much of the country’s media; filled the civil service with political appointees; and enriched his business associates. His willingness to fund populist parties and personalities in the US and Europe, and ally with Putin, made him a critical node in the global nationalist network.
If he can beaten, then so can the other parties in that network. But that doesn’t mean they will be. Because every election these days feels so existential there’s a danger in overreading results as signifying a broader trend. Every time a Georgia Meloni or Geert Wilders wins there are articles despairing at the inevitable victory of nationalism everywhere. When there’s a big loss, like Trump in 2020 or Orbán this week, it’s proof that populism has peaked.
Of course the reality is messier. In most democracies a radical right party is now firmly established as a major player. As voters will always eventually tire of incumbents, especially when the economic picture is so turbulent, they will continue to win elections some of the time. In the past year we’ve seen Wilders’s party in the Netherlands lose its way, Putin-backed candidates defeated in Moldova and Romania, and Orbán finally turfed out in Hungary.
But we’ve also seen Karol Nawrocki, the Law and Justice Party candidate, win the presidential election in Poland and the right-wing populist Andrej Babiš become Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. Looking ahead the AfD look set to win their first German state in Saxony-Anholt in September, and Reform will win another dozen or so councils in the UK next month. Radical right parties lead the polls in Britain, France, Germany and Italy.
The lack of a straightforward pattern doesn’t mean that Orbán’s defeat is just a one-off with no broader significance. His loss shows the limits of the radical right: that while the new wave of nationalists are not about to disappear, there are serious flaws in their approach to politics that can be used to halt their progress. In the rest of the post I’ll look at the three big lessons we can learn from Magyar’s victory.
International nationalism
One oddity of the modern radical right is that it’s simultaneously extremely nationalist and yet also operates as a global movement. There’s an obvious contradiction in claiming to represent national interests better than everyone else, while also being financed and supported by other countries.
Orbán benefited enormously from these relationships. He decided to tie himself to Putin in 2014 when the Kremlin agreed a €10 billion loan allowing Hungary to build two new reactors at its only nuclear plant. Since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Orbán has increased imports of Russian oil from 61% to 92% of the country’s total, getting a substantial discount which enabled him to finance his political network. In return he has blocked critical aid to Ukraine and created no end of headaches for the EU leadership.
His links to Trump were less about money and more about international status. In recent years he funded a succession of MAGA intellectuals like Rod Dreher, a leading postliberal, to live and work in Budapest. In 2023 he hired another big name in MAGA circles, Gladden Pappin, to run the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs. One of Pappin’s jobs has been to build relationships with organisations in the US, and with other radical right parties around the world.
Developing these networks meant that Orbán was able to call on the Trump administration for favours, including participating in his battles with the EU, and limiting support for Ukraine. Pappin is an associate of Michael Anton, who wrote Trump’s national security strategy that, when it comes to Europe, essentially sets out Orbán’s talking points. It also allowed the Hungarian Prime Minister to position himself as a global figure, agreeing to host a summit last year with Trump and Putin.
But tying himself so strongly to the interests of other countries opened him up to accusations of selling out the national interest. When it emerged last month that Hungary’s foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, had been passing on details of European meetings to the Russians, Magyar accused him of betraying Hungary. In the days before the election, the opposition leader was given another easy hit when transcripts of calls with Putin were leaked in which Orbán obsequiously compared himself to a mouse helping the Russian lion and offered to help “in any matter where I can be of assistance.”
Watching young Hungarians celebrating Tisza’s victory by shouting “Russians, go home” indicated the value of this approach. In Magyar’s victory speech he said: “Hungarians said yesterday they will write their history, not in Moscow, not in Beijing, not in Washington.”
As for the relationship with the US, all that positive coverage in right-wing papers and newsletters may have boosted Hungary’s reputation in certain circles, but it turned out to be useless in a domestic political battle. The election was lost before J. D. Vance turned up to speak at campaign rallies. But it may have helped get Tisza a supermajority, given Trump’s rising global unpopularity. At very least it distracted Orbán from talking about issues people cared about. Tisza’s campaign was focused on economic hardship and corruption. Vance’s thoughts on the fight for western civilisation were irrelevant.
Radical right leaders in western Europe have had to distance themselves from Putin since the invasion of Ukraine, despite getting financial support from him in the past. Many are now trying to do the same with Trump, as he goes increasingly off the rails. Meloni gave a speech last week listing all the ways she’d disagreed with the American President. Here, Nigel Farage has been desperately briefing newspapers with a list of the times he’s pushed back against Trump. The AfD is having a public row about their association with him.
It won’t be so easy to pivot away though. There’s plentiful evidence of prior support for Trump that opposition parties can exploit. And the wider ecosystem around European nationalist parties is still financially dependent on the US, especially in Britain where right-wing papers and newsletters rely on MAGA subscriptions. So speaking out against Trump also carries risks. The dissonance is becoming a major problem for them.
Democratic resilience
Every election against radical right parties seem existential because a loss feels like it might never be recoverable. They all seek to undermine institutions and centralise power. Usually this is done legally, or at least with the pretence of legality. Orbán didn’t violate the Hungarian constitution, he rewrote it. Reform’s proposals to replace senior civil servants and judges with political appointees, while packing the Lords with cronies, could all be done without breaking any laws.
This democratic backsliding can feel irreversible, creating a kind of self-defeating nihilism amongst liberals. But, as Hungary shows, as long as the core right to vote is protected it’s always possible to defeat a government, however much they’ve gerrymandered the system. Attempts to rig things can even backfire. The “winner-takes-all” electoral model that Orbán designed allowed him to maximise gains against a divided opposition. But once the opposition unified it allowed Tisza to take enough seats for their own supermajority that will enable Magyar to rewrite the constitution and remove his predecessors’ cronies. The downside of centralising power is that if your opponents get their hands on it they can quickly reverse your decisions and take advantage of it to strengthen their own long-term position.
A key lesson for those pushing back against backsliding is to be creative in maximising whatever institutional levers are available, even as others are being eroded. Orbán’s opponents were able to make use of Hungary’s EU membership to gain some protection. He was never in a strong enough position to consider leaving the Union given the economic value of cohesion funds (Hungary has received around €50 billion over the past two decades – some has been frozen in recent years due to corruption, but €10bn was released in 2023 as part of a deal to secure aid for Ukraine).
Magyar used his position as an MEP to gain immunity from malicious prosecution, of the type common in Russia or Turkey. Orbán tried to do everything possible to skew the electoral system to his advantage but he was constrained in ways true totalitarian governments are not.
These institutional levers will look different in different countries. There’s no equivalent of the EU to act as a barrier to Trump, but it is much harder to change the US constitution than the Hungarian one. While the conservative Supreme Court has given the President plenty of leeway they have provided just enough of a block to prevent many of his madder plans. As I set out a few weeks ago, despite Trump’s obvious desire to rig the midterms, it’s practically impossible for him to do so without breaking the law or launching a full-blown coup.
Making the best use of whatever constitutional protections are available requires constant vigilance and determination. Fatalism – the belief the battle is already lost – is the enemy of successful opposition. For sixteen years the Hungarian opposition kept fighting, and kept winning small victories, even as Orbán seemed invincible. They also kept finding ways to disseminate evidence about his corruption, despite his control of newspapers and TV.
Social media is often seen as helping the radical right due to its value in disseminating disinformation, but it also prevents authoritarian governments from gatekeeping effectively. Magyar supplemented his effectiveness with modern media tools with old-fashioned campaigning, tirelessly travelling the country for two years giving endless speeches and setting up grassroots networks he called “Tisza islands”.
Democratic backsliding is a real phenomenon and an ongoing threat. The UK is particularly vulnerable due to our lack of codified constitution. But democracies also have a lot of inbuilt resilience, as long as people fight for them. Various indexes of democracy have seen global scores decline over the past two decades but, as yet, no country that was a strong democracy has ceased to be one, even if some (like the US) have seen their overall score decline.
The corruption factor
Magyar’s campaign was built around Orbán’s corruption. His rise to prominence began in February 2024, after it emerged that President Katalin Novák, an Orbán ally, had pardoned the deputy director of a children’s home who’d covered up multiple cases of sexual abuse. Novák was forced to resign alongside justice minister Judit Varga.
When this scandal broke Magyar quit Fidesz and launched an anti-corruption campaign that went viral, as it was so unusual to have someone from within the regime talk about its behaviour. His biggest bombshell was a secret audio recording he’d made of Varga, who happened to be his ex-wife, admitting to corruption in another case.
There was plenty of material for him to work with, Orbán is by far the most corrupt politician within the EU, siphoning funds to his business cronies and enriching friends and family members. His personal estate is far more lavish than anything than could be afforded on his salary. Hungary is at the bottom of Transparency International’s EU corruption league table and 76th globally. This is what allowed Magyar to build such a broad coalition.
It’s also a fundamental weakness for the radical right more broadly. Even in opposition, corruption scandals have dogged nationalist parties in Western Europe. Marine Le Pen has been barred from running in next year’s presidential election due to misuse of EU funds. AfD parliamentarians have been caught taking bribes from Russia, as was Reform’s leader in Wales.
In power the opportunities for graft are vastly greater. Trump is an extreme example, being utterly shameless in his determination to use his office for personal enrichment. But it’s a consistent pattern, Poland’s Law and Justice party lost the 2023 parliamentary elections in part because a corruption scandal related to selling visas for bribes, and further allegations around other schemes have emerged since they left office.
Of course, politicians from parties across the spectrum get caught up in scandals, especially in countries with more fragile democracies. But it’s endemic to radical right parties because of their ideological construction. They are typically opposed to institutions designed to protect the rule of law, as they are seen as controlled by the liberal establishment. They always seek to centralise power, which creates more opportunities to misuse that power. As insurgent parties they are typically run by strongmen (or women) whose prefer loyalty over competence and tend to reward that loyalty by granting favours.
If properly exposed corruption is electoral kryptonite. Even in genuinely totalitarian states it can be the trigger for revolution. There’s a reason why Xi Jinping keeps purging senior members of his regime for corruption. It’s a useful way to dispatch rivals but it also manages public anger about the grift that’s pervasive in Chinese society.
It sometimes takes time to happen. Orbán kept going a long time before someone was willing to blow the whistle loud enough to cut through. The Democrats still haven’t managed to fully capitalise on Trump’s venality, though his sheer brazenness about it is one reason his approval ratings are now falling, along with inflation and Iran. But openness to corruption is another limitation on the radical right’s ability to hold power.
Qualified hope
Perhaps in a decade’s time we’ll look back to 2026 as the turning point for liberal democracy, especially if Trump loses the midterms in November. But there’s no guarantee. It could just be a brief respite before the next wave of nationalist victories in the wake of yet more economic turmoil and another refugee crisis.
What should give us hope, though, is that, just as Orbán created a playbook for the global radical right, Magyar has given us one for those trying to defeat it. While local context matters there are generalisable lessons. The radical right’s relationships with Putin and Trump can be exploited against them and can form the basis for the kind of appeal to patriotism with which liberal parties typically struggle. New media, used alongside relentless grassroots campaigning, offers a way to circumvent authoritarianism. The populist’s tendency to corruption is a profound weakness when it can be properly exposed.
Most of all we should take hope from the resilience of democracy. Protecting it requires constant vigilance but it’s hard to kill. They’ll be more depressing days in the future, but if Orbán can be beaten then anyone can.
Michael, I think that's right. BUT: he has said a) he'll stop blocking the EU from sending that $90billion to Ukraine, and b) he'll pivot Hungary more towards the EU and away from Russia. And the huge crowds at his victory speech were shouting "Russians out! So that is a huge source of relief.
Oh my God, as a friend of mine just texted me "just when we thought the forces of evil had all the bases covered"...
nous, those two very questions were uppermost in my mind - the resolute rejection of the Trump/Vance attempt to influence the vote is a smaller but still noticeable pleasure!
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “It’s funny what gets left out”
I'd also be interested to know the source of the statistic Brooks quoted which Capehart is objecting to:
"If you look at who thinks violence is justified, it tends to be young people by a lot. Most progressives and most conservatives oppose violence, but you get two and a half times as many progressives say it's justified as not."
I wonder where he gets that from? And I wonder what the hell it actually means - It seems to completely avoid mentioning the percentage split within conservatives, but the grammatical meaning makes nonsense of "most progressives and most conservatives oppose violence".
Could he possibly be trying to say that two and a half times as many progressives as conservatives justify violence (even though this is not what he actually said)? And if so, I wonder what the actual percentages are, not to mention when these statistics were derived. If, for example, during the ICE adventures in Minneapolis, it would be interesting cherry-picking indeed....
On “Clusterfucks r us”
Talking of clusterfucks, I've just seen that James Comey has been indicted again, on two counts involving threats to kill Trump, as far as I can understand (hard though it is to believe) to do with the seashells signing "86 47". I wonder if his yes-men have tried to convince the POTUS that it might not get thrown out this time? And if so, presumably he's just happy to continue to subject his enemies to vexatious, time-wasting (and expensive?) charges...
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Although it felt very weird (Vance being hustled off the stage before Trump, Trump's apparent lack of concern), I reluctantly have to agree with cleek, russell and wonkie. The fact that it might improve Trump's poll numbers before the midterms is just a piece of luck for them - and although it sounds like it, I am not speaking with forked tongue. Let's face it, almost everything about the current administration feels surreal, weird and unbelievable, why should this be any different?
On “What a wonderful world?”
I've just been watching the footage from the White House Correspondents' Dinner. I find it fascinating that the Secret Service hustle Vance out first, then come back for Trump. Has there been much speculation or commentary about that?
On “Your choice: an open thread”
This is the latest from Comment is Freed, for anyone who is interested:
The US no longer leads
The changing context for UK defence policy
Lawrence Freedman
Apr 25
One of the most important tasks of political leaders at times of crisis is to explain to the public the seriousness of the situation and possible courses of action. Perhaps the government assumes that the nature of the current crisis is self-evident, that it is understood that so long as the Strait of Hormuz remains closed the conditions of life not only in the UK but around the world will worsen. The future of US-Iranian negotiations remains clouded in uncertainty but even if an agreement on the Strait is reached soon, it will take months before the backlogs are cleared and supply lines get back to normal.
The crisis however goes much deeper, because the current situation is the result of a catastrophic set of errors by the Trump administration. We have been witnessing the astonishing picture of one of the greatest powers the world has ever known wilfully weaken and undermine itself so that it no longer is either willing or able to play its accustomed role in the international system.
This is not an easy aspect of the current crisis to address for governments closely allied with the United States. They do not want to give up on the multitude of defence and security arrangements, including NATO, that have bound them together and have led them to look to Washington for leadership. It is even more awkward to acknowledge that one reason for this is that the President is unhinged, uninhibited in launching insults at foreign leaders, including the Pope, and with no coherent agenda other than servicing his own ego. His ‘MAGA’ coalition is already fracturing, as its hero has blundered into exactly the sort of Middle Eastern war he was pledged to avoid. Perhaps the current dramas will become too much even for his own party and cabinet to bear, although there are no signs of that happening yet. Eventually he will leave office but by the time he does so the world will be a different place.
However difficult it might be to talk about this aspect of the current crisis candidly it is essential that ways are found to do so, because only then can the full implications for the UK and its European partners be appreciated.
In particular this is why it is essential to end the Treasury block on the Defence Investment Plan, which was supposed to have been announced at the end of last year. There is a commitment to get core defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP in 2027 and then 3 per cent in the next parliament and to 3.5 per cent by 2035. This is required to begin to compensate for decades of under investment, leading to the serious deficiencies set out so clearly in last year’s strategic defence review, whether in logistics, recruitment, cybersecurity, ammunition stocks or heavy equipment.
The weakness of our armed forces, especially the Royal Navy, has become even more painfully apparent in recent weeks, as it struggled to get a single destroyer to the region. The delays caused by the Treasury/MoD standoff has meant that instead of a start being made on improvements there has been further deterioration, even as the international situation has become more urgent. When the announcement eventually comes questions will be asked about what this means for other areas of public expenditure or how can the Treasury be sure that money will be spent more wisely than in the past. But that will be the wrong framing. The issue is the dramatic shift in the international system. The government seeks to play a leading role in addressing the various resulting crises from Ukraine to the Strait of Hormuz, yet its credibility in these efforts is undermined by its reluctance to commit the necessary resources.
It has become something of a cliché for some years, at least since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, that the current security environment is the most challenging since at least the end of the Cold War. But it has now acquired extra layers of challenge that requires a reappraisal of all aspects of foreign policy, and indeed in some instances of domestic policy as well. After describing how this has come about, I will then turn to the current crisis over the Strait of Hormuz, before concluding with some suggestions about possible ways forward.
Layers of Challenge
The Russian annexation of Crimea in March 2014 provided the first warning that the comfortable assumptions about the stability of the European political order could no longer be taken for granted. At NATO’s September 2014 Cardiff summit the allies agreed ‘to reverse the trend of declining defence budgets, to make the most effective use of our funds and to further a more balanced sharing of costs and responsibilities.’ They agreed to take more seriously than before a target of 2 percent of GDP, which by and large they did.
The 2022 invasion of Ukraine, as a crude act of aggression, combined with an energy crisis, reinforced the sense of gathering danger. As Ukraine resisted, and NATO countries helped it do so, Moscow’s rhetoric became ever more shrill and threatening. There were questions as to whether the conflict could be contained or would spill out, with some in the Biden administration fretting about the possibility of nuclear escalation.
This provided yet another prompt to look again at defence capabilities with added urgency. And then with Trump’s return to the White House the issue required an extra dimension as he sought more than just ‘a more balanced sharing of costs and responsibilities’ but a completely new relationship. He wanted the Europeans to accept responsibility for their own security.
It was a challenge that Europeans largely accepted, as there was no reason in principle why this collection of rich nations could not cope with whatever threat Russia might pose in the future, at least in the conventional sphere. Their readiness to spend more on defence – up to 5 percent of GDP - could be offered to Trump as a major political gain, with the expectation that in return the US would retain its commitment to NATO along with the nuclear guarantee. Part of the calculation was that by going along with Trump’s core demands, alliance relations could be kept relatively harmonious.
One key concern shaping this approach was that if alliance relations got out of kilter, Trump might sell out Ukraine completely. When he came to power it was evident that he felt that the US should no longer donate to Ukraine’s war effort. If the Europeans wanted to support Ukraine then that was up to them. The concern in those early weeks was that Trump was so eager to do a deal with Putin to end the war that he would put unreasonable pressure on Kyiv to make unwarranted concessions. It was only with some effort from European leaders that Trump was persuaded to work with Zelenskyy and accept that Putin was not offering any serious concessions.
Later in the year he once again became more sympathetic to Russia’s demands that Ukraine hand over territory to Russia that it had failed to conquer. By this time, with the end of US donations and the growth of European support, as well as Ukraine’s own efforts, Trump had lost leverage over Kyiv. Now Zelenskyy openly resists the pressure to cede territory. Here there is an important lesson. When the Europeans put in the effort, in this case supporting Ukraine both financially and militarily, they can act effectively independently of the US.
To complicate matters further, during the course of the year it became clear that the issue was not just fundamental policy disagreements with Trump, but also the developing sense of chaos surrounding the administration. This was manifest with Trump’s tariffs, which he presented as the answer to all of America’s economic woes, and which he was prepared to impose on all trading partners, including allies, The actual impact of the policy was limited by its haphazard implementation - in the process creating an impression of an administration which didn’t really know what it was doing and why. This confirmed a pattern evident in other policy areas. The administration was thinly staffed, often with barely qualified people, with whole functions axed because they carried the whiff of woke.
This year Trump’s public appearances and demands have become increasingly unhinged. Perhaps some ideas were no more than teases in bad taste, such as urging Canada to become the 51st state, although these were backed by punitive sanctions. The push to acquire Greenland for the United States could not be dismissed. The hint that this could involve military means and the explicit threat of economic pressure demanded an unequivocal response. Those states that had worked hard to keep Trump on side – UK, France, Germany – could not fudge the issue. They made their disapproval clear. Trump soon backed off, largely because of unfavourable market reactions, but the damage had been done. The forms of dialogue over 2025 that had continued during 2025 became harder to sustain. Trump’s commentaries on his allies became more insulting and delusional. Rather than argue back the simplest approach was just to ignore him.
Iran
Then came the Iran War. Because we are still in the middle of this crisis and we do not know how it will end there is still a tendency to wait and see, as if once the Strait is open things will soon return to normal. I fear that this is complacent. Whatever happens now the knock-on effects are going to be substantial and calamitous for many countries and industries. As is always the case, it is the poorest that will suffer most. The immediate consequences are going to stress all governments. Inflation, shortages, flight cancellations will soon be dominating all public discourse.
This conflict has been mismanaged on a spectacular scale and has exposed the dysfunctions of the Trump administration. In itself this is a transformational moment in the international system.
A recent article in the New York Times by David Sanger, presenting the problem as one of contrasting negotiating styles, barely does justice to the scale of the problem. It is easy enough to capture the Iranian style. They are aware that Trump is trying to bully them so they have to demonstrate resilience, endurance and patience.
But how to characterise Trump’s style? We know how he sees himself – Sanger puts it as ‘the master of coercive diplomacy, forcing his opponents to capitulate quickly to American demands or face the threat of attack.’ He quotes veteran diplomat Robert Malley who worked the Iran file for both Obama and Biden:
‘Trump is impulsive and temperamental; Iran’s leadership is stubborn and tenacious.’ …. ‘Trump demands immediate results; Iran’s leadership plays the long game.’ …. ‘Trump insists on a flashy, headline-grabbing outcome; Iran’s leadership sweats every detail. Trump believes brute force can compel obedience; Iran’s leadership is prepared to endure enormous pain rather than concede on core interests.’
But this still makes Trump’s approach appear as a deliberate choice, rational in its own way even if counter-productive. This characterisation does not capture its full craziness, with its bluster, absurd rhetoric, delusion, incoherence and constant contradiction. Trump makes threats as if scripted for a bad B-Movie. (When telling the Iranians to accept a deal he said if they did not ‘the United States is going to knock out every single Power Plant, and every single Bridge, in Iran. NO MORE MR. NICE GUY.’)
Another story, this time in the Wall Street Journal, records his temper tantrums, ignorance of key features of the situation, limited attention span and loss of focus, preferring to talk about happier topics such as his White House ballroom. When the rescue of a US aviator was underway the journal reports that aides ‘kept the president out of the room as they got minute-by-minute updates because they believed his impatience wouldn’t be helpful, instead updating him at meaningful moments.’ He rationalises his own behaviour as an example of the long-discredited madman theory, as if performing as a crazy person might scare an opponent into more concessions. But this does not work when the working assumption is that he really is crazy. The conclusion is not that he can be calmed with more concessions but instead that he is an impossible person to deal with.
Because he has consistently declared victory in both the war and in the negotiations, even though the Iranians have been far from surrendering and have agreed to very little, he cannot be honest with himself or with the American people about the true situation. In line with this determination to prove that the US ‘has the cards,’ Trump is unwilling to acknowledge that Iran enjoys any leverage, even though it clearly does. On 17 April he boasted that the Iranians had ‘agreed to everything’, including turning over their ‘nuclear dust.’ The Iranians denied this, and it is reasonable to suppose that Trump made this made this all up, because that is what he does. We have reached the stage that any statements from Trump about the negotiations must be disregarded until they are confirmed by a more authoritative source.
Most seriously on 17 April an apparent opportunity to get the Strait of Hormuz opened was lost. After apparently being persuaded by Pakistan that if they ended their blockade the US would end its blockade of Iranian ports, they announced that they would do so. This was welcomed by Trump, but he then decided not to reciprocate by ending the US blockade, for this meant that the US was left with an advantage. Unsurprisingly the Iranians closed the Strait again. Since then the Iranians have fired on freighters while the US has boarded Iranian tankers.
The experience with calling off the blockades reinforces Iran’s view that the US does not negotiate in good faith. In 2018 he abandoned a serviceable agreement, negotiated under Obama, in the belief that he could get a better one. Twice in his second term negotiations appeared to be progressing, only for the Israelis to persuade the US that they would get a better result by bombing Iran. His all-purpose negotiating team of Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner have now got an impressive record of under achievement.
The Iranians have decided to harden their stance if only to underline the point that they cannot be cowed. It has moved aggressively in the other direction, demanding tolls, saying it will charge unfriendly countries more, and blocking any ships owned by countries sanctioning it.
It is quite an accomplishment to allow the Iranian regime to appear as the more effective strategic player. This is still the same regime that not that long ago was slaughtering its own people to suppress any insurrectionary tendencies. It would be surprising if there were not tensions between the IRGC hardliners who are seeking to impose their will on the world and more moderate types who are worried about how to govern a country with wrecked infrastructure and a collapsed economy, which has dared not turn on the internet for six weeks. But for now the regime is going to great pains to demonstrate unity, especially in the light of Trump’s claims about chronic infighting and splits. At least for now they have an agreed strategy. They are determined not to appear needy. They know Trump also wants to extricate himself from an unpopular war. But the tensions are there (see this from Ali Ansari) and likely to become important if there is actual progress in negotiations and hard choices have to be made about potential concessions.
The allies have every reason to be furious with Trump for starting a war without a plan for ending it. Yet it is Trump, in one of his vindictive moods, who is said to be plotting ways of demonstrating his displeasure at these European countries who have given insufficient support to the US. This apparently includes reappraising the US position on the UK’s claim to the Falklands. (I don’t think the US has ever backed the UK claim: the position was that the dispute should not be solved by force). At the same time he has been rewarding Russia, which has actually supported Iran, with eased oil sanctions and an invitation to the G20 summit in Miami.
After charting how unpopular Trump has become in Europe and elsewhere, even amongst those on the right who once supported him, Fareed Zakaria observes that:
‘countries have started making long-term policy shifts, and these will soon take on a life of their own. They realized that they had entrusted their security and well-being to Washington, and it has used this dependence to squeeze them hard. So, they have decided to buy insurance, to protect themselves from an unreliable America. And who can blame them?’
What is to be done?
It is possible that negotiations will resume in Islamabad. On past performance we cannot presume success but let’s hope that they do. The urgent priority is to get the Strait open. After that there is the nuclear issue, easing of sanctions, promises of no further aggression, and so on, which may be as intractable as before.
But whatever happens now, in its origins and its conduct this war is a symptom of something bigger and deeper. So long as Trump is in power it is hard to see how there can be normal relations with the United States. Even if a moderate Democrat becomes president in 2029 there will be no return to the position of 2024. Core capabilities will have been lost and key relationships attenuated. The US national security apparatus has been gutted and will need to be rebuilt. A return to civility and proper consultation will be a good start, but progress will take time. As always much will be determined by the first big crisis the new administration faces. There have always been major policy disagreements. That is not new. What matters is how they are handled.
For the next 30 months issues will keep arising in which it will be impossible to align our position with that of the Trump administration. Most importantly it will become necessary to find ways of dealing with problems without the US, often with countries which are not traditional allies. This has already happened with Ukraine and could happen should an agreement be reached in principle on the Strait which then requires practical action to demonstrate its safety to commercial shipping. If the Islamabad talks fail then it might be necessary to pick up the pieces to see if a broad based international coalition can do a deal with Iran. A year ago talk of Europeans taking more responsibility for their defence led to considerations of speculative scenarios involving a Russian push against a Baltic state. Now it involves coping with a series of ongoing challenges.
The obvious conclusion for the UK is that we need to strengthen our ties with the EU and this process has begun. It has also become routine to coordinate responses to new developments with the major European capitals. There is an argument for shifting defence procurement away from the US to European partners, especially as the US has begun to withhold deliveries to allies (the latest is Estonia) because the war has left it short in its inventories of vital systems. In practice this is going to be of marginal impact and there is going to be a degree of dependence on the US defence industry for years to come. At any rate the point is not to break completely with the US but to accept that our interests are no longer as close as they once were, and that in current circumstances it cannot be a high priority to accommodate American wishes.
If this is the case, and we must be able to act more independently of the US, then we must start to reorganise our armed forces to cope with the challenges they face, which means having deployable capabilities, properly kitted out. As things stand we are setting ourselves up for more embarrassments as we seek to contribute but then find that we have little to offer. This is not a difficult argument to understand but it needs to be made by the government with clarity and urgency.
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It's funny: we always thought it couldn't get much worse than Nixon when he was POTUS. Then we thought it couldn't possibly get worse than Reagan, and even more so Dubya. We have learnt that it can always get worse.
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Maybe you had to be in an American college. Liberals (and hippies) despised Reagan anyway, but especially after Kent State. And in those intensely homophobic times, and given that he was an actor, I wouldn't be at all surprised if that and other such casual slurs were directed at him by people who detested his politics.
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Meanwhile, a court has apparently stopped the Virginia anti-gerrymandering action (ironic name) in its tracks, at least temporarily...
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Yes, I think "anti-war" is a ridiculous slogan and an own goal in much the same way as "defund the police" - it lays the road open for your opponents to walk through. As for anti-militaristic, I'm all for it, as well as anti-jingoistic, but I don't think they do as rallying cries. I've said before (probably at boring length) how the ridiculous cosplay posturing of Hegseth and Trump ("warfighters", "Secretary of War", "lethality") is nothing but an open demonstration of their pathetic, macho attempt to ape "real men", a clear development of "fuck your feelings", and an obvious demonstration of their inadequacy. But alas, not obvious enough to almost half the US population. Although that may be changing - apparently 1 in 5 Trump voters is now in favour of impeaching him....
I too like Buttigieg, but I'm scared. It's so obvious to me (and probably to most of us) that he has the right stuff, but one has to think about the prejudices of the electorate. Which, I know, may not always have been the best way to think about it. It's a hard one.
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wj, I see your point; to me it's crazy to talk about "anti-war" as a policy, everything depends on the context and the rationale for war. But as an electoral strategy, always including those caveats, that's different.
But while I'm at it (using my remaining gift articles), here is Jamelle Bouie on Trump's corruption, in comparison (which I found valuable) to all previous American presidents:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/opinion/trump-crypto-pardons-corruption.html?unlocked_article_code=1.c1A.jBgv.Yg8rd6qmlCeP&smid=url-share
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Talking of elections, and since this is the most recent Open Thread, this is a gift opinion piece from the NYT by Ben Rhodes about the Graham Platner campaign. I've been ill for a couple of days, so I'm just skimming instead of reading seriously (and you can listen instead), but I wonder what the ObWi commentariat make of him, especially given this:
“If the Democratic Party is to flourish in the future,” Mr. Platner told me, “it needs to be an antiwar party.” As talks to end the latest disastrous war focus on reopening a narrow strait of water that was open before the war began, this seems like an obvious conclusion. And yet many Democratic politicians would most likely be wary of embracing it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/opinion/graham-platner-forever-war-trump.html?unlocked_article_code=1.c1A.y7Zw.Ph6i6M6cDZFd&smid=url-share
On “Imagining a mad king”
Aaaargh! Possibly premature on the Onion/Infowars situation, just like last time:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/20/business/infowars-alex-jones-the-onion.html?unlocked_article_code=1.clA.Us8Z.EKEy8QCvAkAg&smid=url-share
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And finally, the Onion succeeds in taking over Infowars! Hip hip hooray!
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Mad Kings, and mad (or worse) judges. This is Judge J Michael Luttig, that hugely eminent and respected conservative judge (notwithstanding his unfortunate delivery - although impeccable in content - in front of the January 6th hearings), on a recent speech by Clarence Thomas. Honestly, the degradation of the SCOTUS has to be seen to be believed.
The Most Important Speech of Political and Constitutional Philosophy That Never Should Have Been Given
Judge J. Michael Luttig
Apr 20, 2026
The speech that Justice Clarence Thomas gave last week at the University of Texas could prove to be the single most important speech of political and constitutional philosophy that never should have been given.
As a conservative my entire life, I certainly wish Justice Thomas had not written and given the insidious speech.
Though his unmistakable targets were Progressives and progressivism, his speech is far more injurious to Republicans, conservatives, and conservatism than it is for progressivism because it is demonstrably and inarguably wrong as to Progressives, but it is a siren song to today’s Republicans and conservatives. Webster’s Dictionary defines “siren song” as “: an alluring utterance or appeal, especially one that is seductive or deceptive.”
Justice Thomas intended his speech as a Republican and conservative manifesto for our times — and for all times. But the political and constitutional philosophies he described and embraced are neither doctrinal conservatism nor Republican nor political conservatism, and they are manifestly not constitutional conservatism.
No one should mistake for true conservatism, or even Republicanism, much less constitutional conservatism, the political and constitutional philosophies that Justice Thomas has embraced his entire life and spoke about last week. His philosophies represent anything but true conservatism.
Rather, together, they constitute a bastard strand of conservatism that lingered and languished in the faculty lounges of the conservative academy from around the mid-1960s until it was summoned forth from the academy by acolytes of Clairmont McKenna College’s natural law philosopher Harry V. Jaffa to fuel Donald Trump’s rise to power in 2016. Those acolytes included Justice Thomas and his, and my, former law clerk John Eastman.
Thus, the overarching significance of Justice Thomas’ speech last week is that it represents the intellectual political and constitutional philosophies for Donald Trump’s two presidencies and his entire MAGA movement.
It was these political and constitutional philosophies that underlaid and justified Donald Trump’s failed plan to cling to power on January 6, 2021, the architect of which was John Eastman.
The political and constitutional philosophies that Justice Thomas embraces are as certainly wrong for America, whose preeminent law is the Constitution of the United States, not the Declaration of Independence’s admittedly majestic and inspirational Preamble,” as Justice Thomas believes they are certainly right for America under that Constitution. His twin philosophies are, simply and demonstrably, wrong as a matter of historical fact, political fact, and both constitutional fact and law. Together, they are a shockingly and reprehensibly ahistorical characterization of liberals and progressives and progressivism, as well as an ahistorical characterization of Republicans, Republicanism, and conservativism.
These philosophies are a radical understanding of American and world history over the past century and a quarter, a radical way of thinking about American political history, and a decidedly radical way of thinking about the relationship between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
This is emphatically not what the Founders of this nation and the Framers of the Constitution of the United States contemplated, envisioned, or ever intended.
The historical flaws in Justice Thomas’ speech are many and every one of them has already been identified and authoritatively denounced by experts and scholars across the political, philosophical, and ideological spectrum.
Justice Thomas purports to trace progressivism in America back to Democrat President Woodrow Wilson, when in fact progressivism for the past century and a half is actually traceable directly back to Republican President Theodore Roosevelt. Astonishingly, Thomas then blames all progressives of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries – including progressives in the United States over this period – and charges them with responsibility for the profound failures of societies worldwide during those one hundred and twenty-five years, including Stalinism, Maoism, Mussolini’s fascism, Naziism, and worse.
Oblivious to the actual history, but supremely confident in his ahistorical understanding of that history, Justice Thomas intoned as if reading from the Gospel that “Progressivism has made many inroads in our system of government and our way of life. It has coexisted uneasily with the principles of the Declaration. Because it is opposed to those principles, it is not possible for the two to coexist forever…. Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, and Mao all were intertwined with the rise of progressivism, and all were opposed to the natural rights on which our Declaration was based. Many progressives expressed admiration for each of them shortly before their governments killed tens of millions of people.”
Justice Thomas’ invidious accusation that progressives in America for the past century and a half up to this very day have been pursuing the same anti-democratic and anti-constitutional regimes as Stalinism, Maoism, Mussolini’s fascism, Naziism, and the like, is frightening, risible, and reprehensible.
While it can fairly be said that Woodrow Wilson was critical of the Declaration’s Preamble, virtually no other Progressive or Democrat since Woodrow Wilson has so much as criticized the Preamble, much less rejected it. The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., famously regarded the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as the “promissory notes” to which all Americans were heir and he called upon the nation to fulfill the pledges of these two Founding documents.
Jeffrey Rosen, one of the greatest constitutional scholars and historians of our times and indisputably the foremost constitutional scholar of America’s Founding, writes in his recent book The Pursuit of Liberty: How Hamilton vs. Jefferson Ignited the Lasting Battle Over Power in America that Thomas Jefferson was, after all, the founder of the progressive Democratic Party and most Democrats in 19th and 20th centuries revered Jefferson.
Mr. Rosen goes on to explain that when he was President Wilson’s closest advisor, progressive Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis handed out biographies of Thomas Jefferson to Kentucky schoolchildren, quoted Jefferson in the greatest free speech opinion Brandeis ever wrote on the Supreme Court, and took his famous criticism of the “curse of bigness” from Thomas Jefferson.
Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, a liberal originalist, worshiped and frequently quoted Thomas Jefferson. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt built the Jefferson Memorial on the Mall in Washington D.C. and had Jefferson’s portrait permanently engraved on the obverse of the nickel and his Virginia home, Monticello, engraved on the reverse. Mr. Rosen writes that President Roosevelt died the day before Thomas Jefferson’s birthday with an undelivered speech in hand, in which he called Thomas Jefferson the prophet of the post-war order.
And of course, President William Jefferson Clinton began his inauguration with a pilgrimage to his namesake’s Monticello home in Charlottesville, Virginia, symbolically traveling from Thomas Jefferson’s mountaintop home to the Nation’s Capital, to be sworn in as the 42nd President of the United States.
As a matter of historical fact, every single progressive president since Theodore Roosevelt, with the arguable exception of Woodrow Wilson has unhesitatingly embraced the Declaration’s Preamble, the Declaration itself, and indeed, Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence.
For 250 years, it has never been the case that either of America’s two political parties has been anti-Preamble, anti-Declaration of Independence, or anti-Constitution . . . until, that is, the past 10 years, when the Republican Party led by Donald Trump has acted as if it were all three.
As a matter of historical, political, and constitutional fact, it is the 47th President and today’s Republicans and conservatives who, every day of the week, act in denial of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States, all the while professing to revere these two Founding and foundational documents of the United States of America.
On “Your choice: an open thread”
Well, this is very interesting. A NYT report of a trial in France, headlined A Stunning New Verdict Rewrites the Rules of Corporate Morality, signals quite a change in the way these things have always gone in the past:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/17/opinion/lafarge-corporate-terrorism-syria-france.html?unlocked_article_code=1.blA.FvGi.Zv079P7l-Uca&smid=url-share
On “Imagining a mad king”
I was particularly taken with the Stephen Miller backroom (even harder and weirder) porn reference: it couldn't be more perfect
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hsh: you did beat me to it - I've only just got to the papers!
When she's on top form (which she is here), she's unbeatable....
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have him lecturing the Pope on the fine points of [Catholic] doctrine
And not just any old Catholic doctrine: on Saint Augustine's theory of a Just War. The Pope is a) the first Pope from The Order of Augustine, and b) wrote his PhD thesis on Augustinian thought. A quotation from the thesis:
“There is no room in Augustine’s concept of authority for one who is self-seeking and in search of power over others,”
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novakant: that Hegseth thing is good, but it's not as good as J D Vance saying the Pope should be very careful when discussing theology!
On “Maybe time for an Open Thread”
Thanks Charles - have used with great success and no need for importing text editor!
On “Your choice: an open thread”
OK - from Comment is Freed on the Hungary election:
The fall of Orbán
What it means for the global battle against the radical right
Sam Freedman
Apr 14, 2026
There’s hasn’t been much for liberals to cheer recently, but Péter Magyar’s victory in Sunday’s Hungarian election has unleashed a wave of exuberance far beyond the streets of Budapest.
Magyar is not an obvious liberal saviour. He’s a social conservative and was a member of Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party until 2024. By campaigning on corruption and the cost of living, while maintaining iron discipline over his newly formed Tisza party, he’s been able to hold together a broad enough coalition to win. Whether he can keep it together in power is yet to be seen. Some of his supporters are inevitably going to be disappointed. He will also face a demanding task dismantling Orbán’s network of cronies, though having a two thirds supermajority in parliament at least makes it plausible.
But while there may be trouble ahead, liberal excitement is justified. Orbán was a figurehead for the international radical right, creating a playbook for cementing executive power. He changed the constitution and electoral system; stacked the courts; took over much of the country’s media; filled the civil service with political appointees; and enriched his business associates. His willingness to fund populist parties and personalities in the US and Europe, and ally with Putin, made him a critical node in the global nationalist network.
If he can beaten, then so can the other parties in that network. But that doesn’t mean they will be. Because every election these days feels so existential there’s a danger in overreading results as signifying a broader trend. Every time a Georgia Meloni or Geert Wilders wins there are articles despairing at the inevitable victory of nationalism everywhere. When there’s a big loss, like Trump in 2020 or Orbán this week, it’s proof that populism has peaked.
Of course the reality is messier. In most democracies a radical right party is now firmly established as a major player. As voters will always eventually tire of incumbents, especially when the economic picture is so turbulent, they will continue to win elections some of the time. In the past year we’ve seen Wilders’s party in the Netherlands lose its way, Putin-backed candidates defeated in Moldova and Romania, and Orbán finally turfed out in Hungary.
But we’ve also seen Karol Nawrocki, the Law and Justice Party candidate, win the presidential election in Poland and the right-wing populist Andrej Babiš become Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. Looking ahead the AfD look set to win their first German state in Saxony-Anholt in September, and Reform will win another dozen or so councils in the UK next month. Radical right parties lead the polls in Britain, France, Germany and Italy.
The lack of a straightforward pattern doesn’t mean that Orbán’s defeat is just a one-off with no broader significance. His loss shows the limits of the radical right: that while the new wave of nationalists are not about to disappear, there are serious flaws in their approach to politics that can be used to halt their progress. In the rest of the post I’ll look at the three big lessons we can learn from Magyar’s victory.
International nationalism
One oddity of the modern radical right is that it’s simultaneously extremely nationalist and yet also operates as a global movement. There’s an obvious contradiction in claiming to represent national interests better than everyone else, while also being financed and supported by other countries.
Orbán benefited enormously from these relationships. He decided to tie himself to Putin in 2014 when the Kremlin agreed a €10 billion loan allowing Hungary to build two new reactors at its only nuclear plant. Since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Orbán has increased imports of Russian oil from 61% to 92% of the country’s total, getting a substantial discount which enabled him to finance his political network. In return he has blocked critical aid to Ukraine and created no end of headaches for the EU leadership.
His links to Trump were less about money and more about international status. In recent years he funded a succession of MAGA intellectuals like Rod Dreher, a leading postliberal, to live and work in Budapest. In 2023 he hired another big name in MAGA circles, Gladden Pappin, to run the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs. One of Pappin’s jobs has been to build relationships with organisations in the US, and with other radical right parties around the world.
Developing these networks meant that Orbán was able to call on the Trump administration for favours, including participating in his battles with the EU, and limiting support for Ukraine. Pappin is an associate of Michael Anton, who wrote Trump’s national security strategy that, when it comes to Europe, essentially sets out Orbán’s talking points. It also allowed the Hungarian Prime Minister to position himself as a global figure, agreeing to host a summit last year with Trump and Putin.
But tying himself so strongly to the interests of other countries opened him up to accusations of selling out the national interest. When it emerged last month that Hungary’s foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, had been passing on details of European meetings to the Russians, Magyar accused him of betraying Hungary. In the days before the election, the opposition leader was given another easy hit when transcripts of calls with Putin were leaked in which Orbán obsequiously compared himself to a mouse helping the Russian lion and offered to help “in any matter where I can be of assistance.”
Watching young Hungarians celebrating Tisza’s victory by shouting “Russians, go home” indicated the value of this approach. In Magyar’s victory speech he said: “Hungarians said yesterday they will write their history, not in Moscow, not in Beijing, not in Washington.”
As for the relationship with the US, all that positive coverage in right-wing papers and newsletters may have boosted Hungary’s reputation in certain circles, but it turned out to be useless in a domestic political battle. The election was lost before J. D. Vance turned up to speak at campaign rallies. But it may have helped get Tisza a supermajority, given Trump’s rising global unpopularity. At very least it distracted Orbán from talking about issues people cared about. Tisza’s campaign was focused on economic hardship and corruption. Vance’s thoughts on the fight for western civilisation were irrelevant.
Radical right leaders in western Europe have had to distance themselves from Putin since the invasion of Ukraine, despite getting financial support from him in the past. Many are now trying to do the same with Trump, as he goes increasingly off the rails. Meloni gave a speech last week listing all the ways she’d disagreed with the American President. Here, Nigel Farage has been desperately briefing newspapers with a list of the times he’s pushed back against Trump. The AfD is having a public row about their association with him.
It won’t be so easy to pivot away though. There’s plentiful evidence of prior support for Trump that opposition parties can exploit. And the wider ecosystem around European nationalist parties is still financially dependent on the US, especially in Britain where right-wing papers and newsletters rely on MAGA subscriptions. So speaking out against Trump also carries risks. The dissonance is becoming a major problem for them.
Democratic resilience
Every election against radical right parties seem existential because a loss feels like it might never be recoverable. They all seek to undermine institutions and centralise power. Usually this is done legally, or at least with the pretence of legality. Orbán didn’t violate the Hungarian constitution, he rewrote it. Reform’s proposals to replace senior civil servants and judges with political appointees, while packing the Lords with cronies, could all be done without breaking any laws.
This democratic backsliding can feel irreversible, creating a kind of self-defeating nihilism amongst liberals. But, as Hungary shows, as long as the core right to vote is protected it’s always possible to defeat a government, however much they’ve gerrymandered the system. Attempts to rig things can even backfire. The “winner-takes-all” electoral model that Orbán designed allowed him to maximise gains against a divided opposition. But once the opposition unified it allowed Tisza to take enough seats for their own supermajority that will enable Magyar to rewrite the constitution and remove his predecessors’ cronies. The downside of centralising power is that if your opponents get their hands on it they can quickly reverse your decisions and take advantage of it to strengthen their own long-term position.
A key lesson for those pushing back against backsliding is to be creative in maximising whatever institutional levers are available, even as others are being eroded. Orbán’s opponents were able to make use of Hungary’s EU membership to gain some protection. He was never in a strong enough position to consider leaving the Union given the economic value of cohesion funds (Hungary has received around €50 billion over the past two decades – some has been frozen in recent years due to corruption, but €10bn was released in 2023 as part of a deal to secure aid for Ukraine).
Magyar used his position as an MEP to gain immunity from malicious prosecution, of the type common in Russia or Turkey. Orbán tried to do everything possible to skew the electoral system to his advantage but he was constrained in ways true totalitarian governments are not.
These institutional levers will look different in different countries. There’s no equivalent of the EU to act as a barrier to Trump, but it is much harder to change the US constitution than the Hungarian one. While the conservative Supreme Court has given the President plenty of leeway they have provided just enough of a block to prevent many of his madder plans. As I set out a few weeks ago, despite Trump’s obvious desire to rig the midterms, it’s practically impossible for him to do so without breaking the law or launching a full-blown coup.
Making the best use of whatever constitutional protections are available requires constant vigilance and determination. Fatalism – the belief the battle is already lost – is the enemy of successful opposition. For sixteen years the Hungarian opposition kept fighting, and kept winning small victories, even as Orbán seemed invincible. They also kept finding ways to disseminate evidence about his corruption, despite his control of newspapers and TV.
Social media is often seen as helping the radical right due to its value in disseminating disinformation, but it also prevents authoritarian governments from gatekeeping effectively. Magyar supplemented his effectiveness with modern media tools with old-fashioned campaigning, tirelessly travelling the country for two years giving endless speeches and setting up grassroots networks he called “Tisza islands”.
Democratic backsliding is a real phenomenon and an ongoing threat. The UK is particularly vulnerable due to our lack of codified constitution. But democracies also have a lot of inbuilt resilience, as long as people fight for them. Various indexes of democracy have seen global scores decline over the past two decades but, as yet, no country that was a strong democracy has ceased to be one, even if some (like the US) have seen their overall score decline.
The corruption factor
Magyar’s campaign was built around Orbán’s corruption. His rise to prominence began in February 2024, after it emerged that President Katalin Novák, an Orbán ally, had pardoned the deputy director of a children’s home who’d covered up multiple cases of sexual abuse. Novák was forced to resign alongside justice minister Judit Varga.
When this scandal broke Magyar quit Fidesz and launched an anti-corruption campaign that went viral, as it was so unusual to have someone from within the regime talk about its behaviour. His biggest bombshell was a secret audio recording he’d made of Varga, who happened to be his ex-wife, admitting to corruption in another case.
There was plenty of material for him to work with, Orbán is by far the most corrupt politician within the EU, siphoning funds to his business cronies and enriching friends and family members. His personal estate is far more lavish than anything than could be afforded on his salary. Hungary is at the bottom of Transparency International’s EU corruption league table and 76th globally. This is what allowed Magyar to build such a broad coalition.
It’s also a fundamental weakness for the radical right more broadly. Even in opposition, corruption scandals have dogged nationalist parties in Western Europe. Marine Le Pen has been barred from running in next year’s presidential election due to misuse of EU funds. AfD parliamentarians have been caught taking bribes from Russia, as was Reform’s leader in Wales.
In power the opportunities for graft are vastly greater. Trump is an extreme example, being utterly shameless in his determination to use his office for personal enrichment. But it’s a consistent pattern, Poland’s Law and Justice party lost the 2023 parliamentary elections in part because a corruption scandal related to selling visas for bribes, and further allegations around other schemes have emerged since they left office.
Of course, politicians from parties across the spectrum get caught up in scandals, especially in countries with more fragile democracies. But it’s endemic to radical right parties because of their ideological construction. They are typically opposed to institutions designed to protect the rule of law, as they are seen as controlled by the liberal establishment. They always seek to centralise power, which creates more opportunities to misuse that power. As insurgent parties they are typically run by strongmen (or women) whose prefer loyalty over competence and tend to reward that loyalty by granting favours.
If properly exposed corruption is electoral kryptonite. Even in genuinely totalitarian states it can be the trigger for revolution. There’s a reason why Xi Jinping keeps purging senior members of his regime for corruption. It’s a useful way to dispatch rivals but it also manages public anger about the grift that’s pervasive in Chinese society.
It sometimes takes time to happen. Orbán kept going a long time before someone was willing to blow the whistle loud enough to cut through. The Democrats still haven’t managed to fully capitalise on Trump’s venality, though his sheer brazenness about it is one reason his approval ratings are now falling, along with inflation and Iran. But openness to corruption is another limitation on the radical right’s ability to hold power.
Qualified hope
Perhaps in a decade’s time we’ll look back to 2026 as the turning point for liberal democracy, especially if Trump loses the midterms in November. But there’s no guarantee. It could just be a brief respite before the next wave of nationalist victories in the wake of yet more economic turmoil and another refugee crisis.
What should give us hope, though, is that, just as Orbán created a playbook for the global radical right, Magyar has given us one for those trying to defeat it. While local context matters there are generalisable lessons. The radical right’s relationships with Putin and Trump can be exploited against them and can form the basis for the kind of appeal to patriotism with which liberal parties typically struggle. New media, used alongside relentless grassroots campaigning, offers a way to circumvent authoritarianism. The populist’s tendency to corruption is a profound weakness when it can be properly exposed.
Most of all we should take hope from the resilience of democracy. Protecting it requires constant vigilance but it’s hard to kill. They’ll be more depressing days in the future, but if Orbán can be beaten then anyone can.
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PS and that "large emergency loan" to Ukraine is from frozen Russian funds in Europe
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Michael, I think that's right. BUT: he has said a) he'll stop blocking the EU from sending that $90billion to Ukraine, and b) he'll pivot Hungary more towards the EU and away from Russia. And the huge crowds at his victory speech were shouting "Russians out! So that is a huge source of relief.
On “Maybe time for an Open Thread”
Thanks lj - have now downloaded Sublime Text and will try to get it together next time!
On “What exactly did William Wallace say?”
Oh my God, as a friend of mine just texted me "just when we thought the forces of evil had all the bases covered"...
nous, those two very questions were uppermost in my mind - the resolute rejection of the Trump/Vance attempt to influence the vote is a smaller but still noticeable pleasure!
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