A healthier politics is possible

Must politics be a fight to the death? This week just showed us a better way.

President Biden and Andrew Cuomo.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock, Library of Congress)

The strange thing about political extremism is that at a certain point it unfolds according to its own logic.

Ask the most radical ideologues and analysts on the right why they have taken to entertaining or concocting arguments justifying an American Caesar or Salazar, and they will tell you it's because the other side is already practicing authoritarianism and actively seeking to impose soft totalitarianism on the country. We're just trying to defend ourselves, they'll say. In such a circumstance, failure to use any and all tactics available would be foolish, like tying your own hands in the midst of a battle to the death with a mortal enemy.

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Damon Linker

Damon Linker is a senior correspondent at TheWeek.com. He is also a former contributing editor at The New Republic and the author of The Theocons and The Religious Test.