[[{“value”:”In July of 2024, Tyler Cowen, the economist and cultural commentator, wrote a blog post that proved to be among the election’s most prescient. It was titled “The change in vibes — why did they happen?” Cowen’s argument was that mass culture was moving in a Trumpian direction. Among the tributaries flowing into the general shift: the
The post Ezra Klein on the vibe shift appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.”}]]
In July of 2024, Tyler Cowen, the economist and cultural commentator, wrote a blog post that proved to be among the election’s most prescient. It was titled “The change in vibes — why did they happen?” Cowen’s argument was that mass culture was moving in a Trumpian direction. Among the tributaries flowing into the general shift: the Trumpist right’s deeper embrace of social media, the backlash to the “feminization” of society, exhaustion with the politics of wokeness, an era of negativity that Trump captured but Democrats resisted, a pervasive sense of disorder at the border and abroad and the breakup between Democrats and “Big Tech.”
I was skeptical of Cowen’s post when I first read it, as it described a shift much larger than anything I saw reflected in the polls. I may have been right about the polls. But Cowen was right about the culture.
And the end bit:
Cowen may have correctly called the shift in vibes, but he isn’t particularly comfortable with it. If 2024 was partly a backlash to the Democratic Party and culture of the last four years, what might a backlash to this more culturally confident and overwhelming form of Trumpism look like?
“I’ve taken to insisting to my friends on the right: ‘Be careful what you wish for,’ ” Cowen told me. “You might get it.”
Here is the full NYT column.
The post Ezra Klein on the vibe shift appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.
Current Affairs, Political Science, Uncategorized
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