Reasons for optimism but more caution; cautious optimism?

 

Analysis of the 2026 election results will continue to dribble out for at least the next couple of months. But data from national exit polling arguably is maybe cause for cautious optimism tinged with caution about defense of democracy and the rule of law against radical right American authoritarianism and kleptocracy.

National exit polling reported by NBC News indicates there is a deep split in voter sentiment. On the pro-democracy side, (1) 71% of voters said Congress was not doing enough to provide checks and balances on the presidency, (2) 63% disapproved of Trump’s performance, including 54% who strongly disapproved, (3) 62% said he prioritized his personal interests over the country’s interests, and (4) independents voted Dem by 58% to 38%, and moderates by 66% to 32%.

But on the pro-authoritarianism side, for voters identifying as Repub, 93% voted MAGA, with 97% of conservatives voting for MAGA. Of people who voted for Trump in 2024, 91% voted MAGA in 2026. For those people, they apparently don’t see vote-changing levels of failure, corruption, cruelty or lawlessness. To them MAGA elites are still better and still worth voting for than the Dems.

The 90% figure on concerns about corruption does not show a shared understanding of who is corrupt or what accountability requires. On which party could better handle government corruption, 37% chose Dems, 30% Repubs, and 32% neither. Among voters who called corruption crucial or a major factor, 41% nevertheless voted Republican. That means a hopeful reading, e.g., “Americans overwhelmingly reject Trump’s corruption”, cannot be extracted from the corruption question alone. Some respondents probably were (1) thinking about Dem corruption, (2) distrusting both parties, or (3) accepting corruption while prioritizing something else. The poll does not indicate which explanation applies to each person.

Arguably, the most hopeful pro-democracy finding is voter’s desire for stronger congressional checks. That connects public dissatisfaction to a specific mechanism for limiting presidential power.

A reasonable synthesis of all this date might be that MAGA has not secured the public’s acquiescence, and pro-democratic resistance has a substantial constituency. However, MAGA retains a cohesive base that will sustain the authoritarian and kleptocratic danger for the foreseeable future.

In other words, the exit polling gives reason to reject despair, but no reason to relax and go into business as usual mode. This data indicates that American politics still isn’t a matter of business as usual. MAGA demagoguery will at least continue as it has, or maybe more likely, expert demagogues will seek to up their aggression by improving the intensity and sophistication of their attacks on democracy, the rule of law, civil liberties and honest, competent democratic governance.

Q1: Assuming this exit poll data as described in this OP reasonably reflects reality, does the data personally feel more hopeful than threatening?

Q2: From this data can one reasonably believe that, at present, (1) most rank and file Dems and moderates see corruption and threats from the MAGA elites and MAGA politics and policy, while (2) most rank and file Repubs see corruption and threats from the Dems and Dem politics and policy?

Q3: In the long run, does radical right American authoritarianism and kleptocracy have a major advantage because those forces can block or limit opposition efforts to improve economic conditions for average people, allowing the radicals to claim that the opposition failed to deliver, and therefore people need to vote for the radical right again?

Impeaching Hegseth

 

For better or worse, it looks like the House at least vote on starting impeachment proceedings against Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) filed multiple articles of impeachment and is trying to force a vote on the measure as soon as it can be done. If that goes ahead, the House will very likely convict him, but the Senate will very likely acquit him. Conviction in the Senate require 67 votes and the Dems will have 56 at most after Alaska and Mississippi elections are decided. Right now, the Dems have 54.

Massie says there are eight separate impeachment offenses. They accuse Hegseth of engaging in unlawful war or military actions in Iran, Yemen, and Venezuela, “ignoring laws that minimize civilian casualties”, engaging in extrajudicial killings; and suppressing free speech rights.

There is more than plenty of evidence to impeach Hegseth. A lot of the evidence is clearly laid out in this 35 minute video by comedian John Oliver. Sure, Oliver is a comedian, not a professional investigator. But that fact doesn’t negate the video clips conveying plenty of damning evidence against Hegseth. We can see and hear it on our own. Committing murder and/or war crimes are among various bits of vicious naughtiness the evidence shows that Hegseth is responsible for.

Hegseth really did commit murder, commit war crime or both

Why bother and waste time?

Would there be any point to impeachment and then a trial and acquittal in the Senate? Would that necessarily be futile and a waste of the extremely precious, maybe very short time that the Dems have in power? Yes, two years is very short time in this context. Some say it’s a waste of dem time in power because the Senate won’t convict. It is probably true that MAGA Senators would vote to acquit. But that ignores the detailed, evidence-based public record that a House impeachment would leave, even if the Senate acquits. Some of the video evidence that Oliver shows really does deserve to be memorialized in a detailed, professional public document.

If the dems don’t spend much House time with this, letting staff and investigators collect the evidence, organize it and write the report, a House impeachment ought to take a limited amount of time the House is in session and debating this. The impeachment document will be of value.

Q1: Assuming the Senate acquits him, is the public record it would create worth impeaching Hegseth?

Q2: Would it be worth impeachment if the Senate votes to convict him?

The ancient war isn’t over, probably never will be

 

The ancient war can be described different ways. One way to understand it as a tension between two conflicting human tendencies, one is toward concentrating wealth and power in the hands of one ruler or a small elite, roughly, authoritarianism, vs. the other which is toward distributing both more broadly, roughly, democracy. Of course, a democratic system doesn’t necessarily always mean that wealth and power will be reasonably distributed. One can argue that modern America under MAGA control is an example of such a “bad” democracy.

Through history, some people have understood and commented on the nature of the endless war.

Notice that Jefferson packaged corruption with tyranny — sound familiar?

The unitary executive structure that MAGA authoritarianism is building is Adams’ “One Assembly”

Evidence the 2026 election did not change MAGA’s war mindset

Maybe recovering from shock at the outcome, and despite Trump saying he will accept the election results, now he’s starting to recover to his old vicious, vengeful self. Trump is calling for criminal inquiry over allegations of extortion by Dems who had threatened Attorney General Todd Blanche and other administration officials with impeachment. Trump says those officials had committed no impeachable offences, so the Dems belong in jail. That’s full-blown tyranny in action.

Also, Trump promoted the well-known racist Steven Miller to be his chief of staff. Miller’s racism is cruel, aggressive and out in the open. Besides Miller’s blatant lie that the GOP is more popular than ever, he made crystal clear his intent to support Trump as dictator at all costs. Trump clearly signals his unwillingness to fight and oppose Dems in congress.

After regaining composure, Trump is even starting to question the outcome of the 2026 elections. Earlier, he said he would accept the outcome. Now maybe he doesn’t, regardless of what he says.

Q1: Have the 2026 election results mostly quelled the ancient war, at least for a while?

Q2: Can the Dems meaningfully overcome the power of MAGA Senators’ filibuster, Trump’s promised vetoes, an authoritarian, completely corrupted USSC and MAGA political party who usually defend Trump, and an authoritarian, completely corrupted DOJ and FBI who serve as his personal law harassers and enemy persecutors?

Some info sources:

Economic Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy

The Economic Origins of Democracy Reconsidered

Donald Trump Reportedly Wants To Imprison Democrats for Doing Their Jobs as Experts Say This ‘Will End Poorly’

Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies (Feb. 2025 Executive Order) — It shall be the policy of the executive branch to ensure Presidential supervision and control of the entire executive branch. ….. However, previous administrations have allowed so-called “independent regulatory agencies” to operate with minimal Presidential supervision. These regulatory agencies currently exercise substantial executive authority without sufficient accountability to the President, and through him, to the American people. Moreover, these regulatory agencies have been permitted to promulgate significant regulations without review by the President.  (comment: this is Trump’s clearest expression of authoritarian unitary executive intent; here he calls independent federal agencies “so-called ‘independent regulatory agencies’”, clearly rejecting congressional oversight functions and claiming dictator-level power)

Stephen Miller Calls Trump GOP More Popular ‘Than Ever’ in First CoS Speech

Twisting Stephen Miller’s Words (FactCheck, 2017) — Well, I think that it’s been an important reminder to all Americans that we have a judiciary that has taken far too much power and become in many cases a supreme branch of government. ….. The end result of this, though, is that our opponents, the media and the whole world will soon see as we begin to take further actions, that the powers of the president to protect our country are very substantial and will not be questioned. (comment: this probably is Miller’s clearest expression of support for dictator-level unitary executive power)

Trump sends ‘clear message’ to Democrats with Miller promotion — President Trump sent a blunt message to the incoming Democratic majority on Capitol Hill by tapping Stephen Miller to be his new chief of staff, setting up what is likely to be a contentious two years between both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. ….. “They are not going to slow down on executive power, executive orders, and regulations. Stephen is going to move aggressively on all of that.”

Trump shares posts questioning midterm election results

I have met Stephen Miller – they call him Voldemort for good reason — He is, they say, Donald Trump without the sense of humour. ….. At school, Miller was known for baiting liberal-minded peers and teachers, reportedly throwing rubbish on the floor and demanding the cleaning staff pick it up. “Am I the only one here who is sick and tired of being told to pick up my trash when we have plenty of janitors who are paid to do it for us?” he once said. ….. Miller cast himself as a free-speech champion. An aversion to immigration drove his trajectory from California schooldays to Duke University, where he read politics, and later to Breitbart, the right-wing news website. When Trump declared, “Our whole country is rotting, like a third-world country,” Miller emailed friends: “Trump gets it… I wish he’d run for president.” A year later, Trump launched his campaign, and Miller, barely 30, joined it.

Stephen Miller’s Racist Emails Are an Outrage Even by 2019 Standards

Stephen Miller Goes Full Sycophant in Bonkers Trump Tribute — “Let me tell you, if it wasn’t for President Trump, the United States of America would not exist right now. This man saved America,” Miller declared. “He saved our military from collapse. He saved our economy from destruction. He saved our border from annihilation. And he saved our country from threats at home and abroad, which would have been the end of the American dream forever,” he continued, without offering any evidence to support his assertions.

The Overview Effect compared to the 2026 election outcome

 The Overview Effect (OE) as an experience in which, for some people (not all), viewing Earth from space produces overwhelming emotion and identification with humanity and the planet as a whole. Its central features include awe, connectedness, and self-transcendence. People’s ordinary concerns seem to become smaller within a newly felt experience of a greater whole or reality. In space, people are at a distance and they’re seeing the Earth in the context of the universe. That is not the same context as what they can see while on Earth.

This is how one can catch a case of overview effect

Is there an Overview Effect analogy with the 2026 election outcome?

Can one make an analogy between the OE and the election by comparing that to political perception? Maybe. A person’s frame might change from “Is my side winning? Are our enemies being defeated?”, to “What happened to the society we all have to inhabit? What are we doing to other people, to our institutions, and to our capacity to live together?”

Arguably the analogy is a meaningful because it describes a change in the unit of concern from the political faction to the shared world. That doesn’t require equating political disillusionment with astronauts’ experiences, or claiming that research has established such an effect among former MAGA supporters.

The emotional center of the analogy is grief, not just “I was wrong”, but “Something valuable has been damaged or lost, and I can no longer avoid seeing it.”

That is somewhat different from the central emphasis of the OE phenomenon, which concerns awe and expanded identification rather than primarily feelings of loss. For the painful part of the analogy, research on “shattered assumptions” offers a closer conceptual connection. Disturbing experiences can challenge foundational beliefs about the world’s benevolence, meaningfulness, or reliability. A three-year study of 2,138 US adults found that worldview changes were generally modest. Profound transformation probably isn’t the usual response to adversity, e.g., the damage and loss that MAGA has caused.

If that is applied cautiously to the 2026 election outcome, several different losses could plausibly be involved: (1) Loss of faith in leaders or a movement someone trusted. (2) Loss of confidence in institutions they believed would prevent serious abuses. (3) Loss of an innocent national self-image. (4) Regret about bad MAGA conduct that many MAGA supporters supported, excused, or failed to oppose.

Those are possible interpretations of the experience of feelings about the 2026 election outcome. They are not findings about the 2026 electorate. And they need not all involve something that genuinely existed and is now gone. Sometimes the perception of loss is of an illusion. For example, the belief that institutions were automatically secure, that cruelty was incidental rather than intentional, or that one’s own political community could reliably distinguish loyalty from wrongdoing.

Meta-politics — beyond partisanship?

Could some voters are experiencing a political analog of the OE, not the wonder of seeing Earth from space, but the shock of seeing their country beyond the frame of partisan loyalty? What once appeared to be a struggle for their side to win may begin to look like the basis for serious damage and loss to society and what was good in it. Institutions that protect rights and deliver essential services have been weakened or dismantled, commitments to due process and humane treatment have been violated, and people who depend on those protections and services have suffered documented harm. Recognition of that could bring grief, shame, and a renewed sense of responsibility to at least some newly awakened people.

The election outcome arguably is be consistent with such an awakening. Of course, that alone cannot tell us how many people, if any, have felt the loss or undergone any awakening at all. As far as I know, there is no research on this point, so the sense-of-loss hypothesis here is speculation.

Q: Can partisans on both sides of the MAGA divide experience feelings of grief or regret over what we have lost regardless of how the election turned out because humans are human, regardless of their politics, or is there no plausible analogy between the OE and what some people might feel after the 2026 elections?

Some info sources:

The overview effect: Awe and self-transcendent experience in space flight

William Shatner experienced profound grief in space. It was the ‘overview effect’ — “I was crying. I didn’t know what I was crying about. I had to go off some place and sit down and think, what’s the matter with me? And I realized I was in grief. I wept for the Earth because I realized it’s dying. I saw more clearly than I have, with all the studying and reading I’ve done, the writhing, slow death of Earth and we on it. It’s a little tiny rock with an onion skin air around it. That’s how fragile it all is. It’s so fragile. We hang by a thread … we’re just dangling.”

When are assumptions shaken? A prospective, longitudinal investigation of negative life events and worldviews in a national sample — Older age buffered the association between negative events and worldview change. Individuals who experienced more negative events had less stable worldviews over time. In general, worldview change was small, highlighting the apparent stability of these beliefs.

Trump Administration’s Pervasive Attacks on Rights — Democratic Norms and Anti-Discrimination Remedies Rejected; Rights Undermined Globally (pro-democracy norms are gone and probably not coming back — maybe they should not come back, but replaced by laws imposing mandatory jail time)

Trump’s aid freeze sparks mayhem around the world (decades of steady, American compassion and humanitarian presence is lost, maybe forever because we’re in horrific debt — as long as MAGA is in power the US will remain a far more callous humanitarian presence)