Matthew Yglesias: “One of the dualities of Donald Trump is that while his opponents think he’s an authoritarian goon who doesn’t respect the rules, many of his fans also think that he’s an authoritarian goon who doesn’t respect the rules — but in a good way.”
“On the right, there is a widely held and poorly evidenced belief that Mitt Romney lost because he was too much of a nice guy and that part of what’s good about Trump is that he’s willing to fight dirty. You might not think it’s a good idea to cheat on your pregnant wife with a porn star. But conditional on having done so, playing fast an loose with campaign finance law in order to keep it covered up and win the election is better than behaving ethically and losing — because winning elections is really important. I think all partisans can sympathize, to an extent, with this logic…”
“But Trump takes this further than a standard politician, because a huge factor in Trump-era politics is a sense among those on the right that they are besieged, socially and culturally.”
