I have been hesitant to engage in the discussion about what will happen if Donald Trump loses the 2020 election and refuses to concede. That is because merely talking about the possibility gives it some credibility that is explosively dangerous. In my mind, I’ve weighed that against the problem of ignoring the mounting evidence that it is actually a possibility. So I’ve never been completely comfortable with either option.
Writing at the Federalist, Mollie Hemingway has finally convinced me that it is time to break the silence. We’ve now gone beyond Trump joking (?) about serving more than two terms, while some of his more rabid supporters talk about a new civil war. But before getting to what Hemingway wrote, it is helpful to note that in 2013, Ben Domenech announced the launch of the Federalist by comparing it to the original Time magazine.
Henry Luce’s magazine aimed to cover and distill the news of politics, economics, world affairs and culture for the nation’s rising middle class. It leaned to the political right, with a small-c conservatism equipped with a populist respect for the middle class reader outside of New York and Washington, and an abiding love for America at a time when snark and cynicism were not considered substitutes for smart analysis.