Katie Miller Attacks the "Deeply Left"
close enough
I know that, on this blog, I say a lot of wild stuff. Sometimes, I even put out drivel.
HOWEVER! Despite the fact that I am (according to my paid subscribers) consistently wrong on religion, and geopolitics, and all sorts of other mildly important things, thatâs never been the core of Deep Leftism.
The core of Deep Leftism is very simple:
In the age of MAGA, the Overton Window is shifting such that classical liberals are being forced into the left.
It wasnât always this way, of course. The Republican Party was, for most of the last 166 years, a fair enough camp for classical liberals to find themselves in. Republicans opposed slavery. They supporting gun rights (shout out to John Brown). Since 1896, Republicans represented the side of lower taxes, lower spending, and conservative fiscal policy.
But MAGA is so egregious, so populist, and so toxic, that this narrative no longer holds for the future.
We can litigate some of the finer points of classical liberalism. Of course leftism has supported higher taxes for a while now, and an expansion of the welfare state. Thatâs not very classically liberal. There is always a chance that the left could turn out worse than the right. But as things stand today, classical liberals are being squeezed out of both parties, and they need to choose wisely if they want to salvage a bad situation.
The left, at this point, is consumed by considerations of race and gender. The right is following closely behind. For the left, that means you can be a libertarian and still considered a leftist. That wasnât the case in 1932, perhaps, but it is certainly the case in 2026.
The heart of classical liberalism, ultimately, is not just economics. It is the question of whether we live in a society ruled by populism or a society that protects the rights of minorities. That was the entire purpose of the First Amendment â to create a space for dissidents to exist outside of the tyranny of populism. It was to protect the minority from the mob.
Classical liberalism means you have the right to exist as a minority, and to express opinions which the majority finds strange, foreign, or blasphemous. That means you cannot be persecuted for your appearance or your ideas. Katie Miller, in attacking classical liberalism as âdeeply leftist,â is correct. Classical liberalism is indeed the wellspring of American leftism. Katie wants to kill it because her future is wedded to the victory of petty oligarchs and mafiosos like her husband.
ICE wins if, in 2028, Trump declares the election invalid, and sends in goons to arrest Democrats. I donât believe that will happen, but thatâs the endgame. Classical liberalism stands against that. Katie is correct in her diagnosis: classical liberalism is the foundation of the left. The further we get from it, the more we enable the populist right. The right-wing depends on and needs wokism â just like Jews need antisemitism. Itâs a vicious cycle that only classical liberalism can halt.
In order for classical liberals to advance, they need a vehicle. The Democratic Party is not a perfect vehicle, but itâs the best we have.