The right's intellectual destitution

Conservatives are out of ideas, so they're compensating with catchphrases and vitriol

Conservative intellectuals used to quote Richard Weaver's maxim that ideas have consequences. But as the modern GOP is demonstrating, the absence of ideas has consequences, too.

President Trump's rhetorical assault on Baltimore — and the GOP pile-on that followed — is the most recent example of the right's intellectual destitution. Conservatives are out of real ideas — and, in some cases, disdainful of them — and are compensating with catchphrases and vitriol.

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Windsor Mann

Windsor Mann is the editor of The Quotable Hitchens: From Alcohol to Zionism.