On this episode of The Federalist Radio Hour, Washington Examiner Commentary Editor Conn Caroll joins Culture Editor Emily Jashinsky to discuss his recent article, “J.D. Vance and the national populists” and how the GOP is reorienting its approach to balance GDP and social capital.
“The populist right and the populist left can agree on things like child tax credits and they can agree on things down the line … but I don’t think the populist left agrees with what you just said. I don’t think the populist left really truly sees itself as American. It doesn’t have the same reverence for the country and for the system,” Jashinsky noted.
“The left never has,” Carroll agreed. “There was a reason Bernie Sanders went to Russia for his honeymoon. There’s a reason you go onto college campuses and you see, T-shirts, with Che Guevara on them. The left has never thought of themselves as American. They’ve always cringed at nationalism and patriotism.”
Marriage, Carroll noted, should also be at the forefront of this conversation.
“The left is just ambivalent about the family at best. They’re ambivalent about marriage at best,” Carroll said. “They truly see it just as an option on the menu that people all have and not as something that we should be trying to protect and preserve.”
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