Dingus of the week: Matt Yglesias

Well, the good news is no one is going to storm the Capitol.

The bad news is that’s because Donald Trump won the election. I suppose in the end, the only thing that could put to rest the big lie about the election being stolen was millions of Americans showing up to willingly vote for a convicted felon, billionaire wannabe, misogynist and all-around derp. A real testament to the American dream that if you barely work, you are very unattractive and you’re also racist, you too can be president. I’d say he’s really broken the glass ceiling for male blowhards, but let’s be real about who our founding fathers were. Also Andrew Jackson.

Imagine the Democrats doing all that work to steal an election just to get Joe Biden as president, then deciding not to do it again.

This is what the majority of Americans want. And I am not full of despair. I have clarity. This is the America we have.

But I do find it funny that millions of men voted for Trump because they are lonely and sad and feel entitled to the love of a woman. It’s not like JD Vance is now going to personally assign you a match on Hinge now that Trump has won. Ending no-fault divorce and the right to an abortion isn’t going to make someone suddenly happy to be dating or married to you. Seven Brides for Seven Brothers was a silly musical, not the basis of a policy proposal. “Your body, my choice?” Sir, women in the middle ages threw themselves on fires to get away from bs like that. We call them saints today.

And I know it’s been a minute since you went on a date, but, “Man, I sure do love ending the Department of Education” isn’t a line that gets women all hot and bothered.

Also, rolling back women’s advancement in public life was what started the second wave of feminism. You are about to be more divorced than ever before.

This isn’t our first time with a Trump presidency. I sure hope it’s the last. And it sucks. Plain and simple. Also, you know a political event really sucks when people who never post poetry on their social media are suddenly posting Mary Oliver. Like Mary Oliver cannot singlehandedly uphold the mental health and well-being of every liberal in America with her spare lines. She’s just one woman!

But as devastating as these next four years will be, the reality is that I live and work in a red state, and the work is not much different despite the results of the election.

Even under a Democratic president, Iowa saw a loss of reproductive rights, an erosion of the social safety net, book bans, loss of rights for LGBTQ people, and the loss of funding for public schools. I still saw the childcare tax credit discontinued and wages stagnate while the cost of living rose.

Someone recently asked me if I think about moving. And I do think about moving. Sometimes. But there isn’t less racism and misogyny in other places just because Tim Walz is the governor there. It’s easy to hide and say, “Well, my state is blue,”  but this election shows that no amount of “In this house we believe…” signs in the front yard can change that a majority of Americans voted for the guy who thinks Hitler had some good ideas and great generals. And yes, that includes your neighbors. 

Nor does living in a blue area free us from complicity in the slaughter in Gaza and Lebanon.

Last week, I wrote about the myth of blue and red states and concluded, “We’d all love to tune out. To unsubscribe. To resign and retreat. But there’s no impenetrable blue bubble, no safe haven available to any but the wealthiest. There is only one America, and we’re all still living in it.”

There is a lot of blame-gaming going on right now. Everyone wants to blame everyone for this loss. I have my own gripes, some valid, some not. I don’t think Democrats lost just because Harris is a woman, although gendered grievance was always the story of this election. I don’t think it’s just because Democrats are bad on class and economic issues, although I do wish you’d all stop thinking every Republican is just some stupid moron who drowns puppies for sport. I don’t think it’s just because Democrats keep running candidates who can best be described as Republican lite. 

And I am still furious about the news cycle that infantilized white women voting for Trump as victims of their husbands’ authority, when the reality is and always was that the majority of white women are all too willing to make others the victims of their politics and privilege. How can a campaign reach people when it doesn’t see them, and I mean really see them? How can we change America when we are in denial about the ugly realities of our country?

But also, maybe we were always going to lose in a time when our systems are failing us and one party told us the status quo was fine and the other told us they’d blow it all up.

Maybe all of these things contributed, maybe none of them did. I know that the feverish rush for finger-pointing and lectures and righteousness is exhausting. The posting, the postulating, the prognosticating. Maybe Elon Musk didn’t make social media unusable — maybe we did with our breathless desire for relevancy and graphomania. But this is all speculation on a Friday after a historic election. Despite the insatiable internet need for hot takes that validate our own biases and fears, real insightful analysis takes thought and time. And will continue to take time. 

What we know is that this election was not going to fix everything. Writing in Slate, Scaachi Koul noted, “This election was never going to save us, and so I have to believe it was never going to doom us either… Harris was not a savior; she was only ever a placeholder for something — someone — better.” This election wasn’t going to ever suddenly eradicate racism or reverse book bans. This election wasn’t going to suddenly make everyone be less transphobic or decide to care for the unhoused. The work remains the same no matter who is in office.  

There are no quick fixes to building a better life. Even if Harris won, Trump voters would still be around, still running our school boards and state legislatures. 

This is the work.

Which brings me to the dingus…

Matt Yglesias

Matt Yglesias is nominally a journalist who writes about economic issues. But mostly he’s a professional haver of very hot takes. This week, Yglesias was among a handful of Democrats who suggested that in order to win next time around, liberals adopt policies that exclude trans people.

First of all, there is no evidence that backing trans rights actually cost Harris the election, because she didn’t really offer full-throated advocacy for trans rights and gender-affirming care. 

And even if her relatively mealy-mouthed support for LGBTQ+ people cost Harris the election: If winning an election means selling out the very people you seek to represent, maybe you shouldn’t win.

Let me say that again. If winning the presidency or any other public office means you must sell out trans people, you should not do it. You should pack it up, change your name; do a face-off with your enemy; adopt a new life somewhere far, far away. 

Scapegoating a vulnerable minority in order to beat the people who scapegoat vulnerable minorities isn’t the move. The solution to having more Nazi-types in power isn’t to go more Nazi.

If your response to a loss is to become more inhumane, what were you really in this for? 

Do not compound your loss with cowardice. We didn’t lose because we were wrong. We lost because Americans, this time, just loved money more than their fellow humans. (Or at least the promise of money. The second Trump presidency is going to be terrible for a lot of Americans’ finances. But that is another newsletter.)

I’m not devastated. I’m just furious. And the answer isn’t to be quieter, pull up the rug, make the tent smaller, make our hearts smaller, and retreat. Fuck no. The lesson is to be meaner, be louder, be more ruthless and aggressive in your kindness and love for your communities. Get feral with rage and hope and kindness. And remember the enemy isn’t your neighbors (well, unless your neighbor is Matt Yglesias); the enemy is the systems and institutions that profit from our labor and leave us nothing but strip-mined humanity in return. 

Also Elon Musk. 

And now for something good, because, yes, some good things have happened

Abortion rights measures win in 7 out of 10 states.

Alexandra Petri.

People seem to be reading books again, that’s nice.

Mysterious 400-year-old “vampire” woman comes back to life. (Not like that.)

Monkeys escape from a research facility in North Carolina. It’s a Monkey’s Pawshank Redemption!

Iowa made history by electing Aime Wichtendahl as our first trans state representative. And also, while I don’t give Republicans in the state any credit, they did do one thing Democrats failed to do: They seem to have defeated a Democratic senator who was credibly accused of sexual assault. The race is still too close to call.

What I am enjoying

The night of the election, I went to a bar with some friends. As the results came in, I started to realize what was going to happen and I told everyone I was leaving. Once again, like in 2016, I didn’t want to emote in public. A few people went back to my house and got very very high and dissociated in front of the television for hours. And at some point we decided that Fox News was less annoying than MSNBC or CNN. Fox actually had a more racially diverse panel and more women on their network. 

And at some point, we are going to need to unpack that. But not now.

But what I want to say is I’ve been here before. I remember coming home from the 2016 election, back to my house, where my Republican husband sat on the couch watching the returns and told me to “get over it.” I remember waking up hung over after sleeping in the guest room and then getting the kids off to school. Then, coming home, eating sour cream straight from the fridge and wondering what I was complicit in. Eight months later my marriage was over and I moved out.

America may be ready to take back its shitty ex, circling that drain once again, hoping this time it doesn’t end in some felonies and the mass deaths of people during a worldwide pandemic. Girl, he didn’t change. He got worse. 

But this time, when Trump was elected, I was in my home, surrounded by my dear friends, serving them endless Halloween candy, tea, and chips. I stayed up until 2am having wonderful (if stoned) conversations. And on Sunday, I am packing my house with people. I am feeding them baked potatoes and chili. We are going to play games and I’ll ply them with beverages.

This too is politics. This is political. And this is progress.