Your boss is the American People, NOT Donald Trump.

Rogue government employee Donald Trump got almost as bad a performance review from his boss as he deserved yesterday, in the form of firings of some of his fellow delinquents in both houses of Congress and seeing four red-state governorships (including Texas!) flip to the Democrats.

As I said in part this morning, "I greeted this morning's news with the same kind of relief I used to feel when the Republican won the Presidency."

The primary mission was accomplished yesterday: get some control over Trump and repudiate his cult-like, anti-American "MAGA" movement.

According to electoral-vote.com and RealClear Politics, the Democrats lead the Senate 54-44 (with Alaska and Mississippi too close to call), the House 236-148 (with 51 uncalled), and the majority of state governorships at 27-20 so far. The political significance of this spanking was not lost on the folks at the former site:

This election made the 2028 Republican presidential primaries a lot more messy. There will be a MAGA lane, there will be a non-MAGA lane, and each will attract a bunch of candidates. It is no longer plausible that Donald Trump could bestow his blessing on, say, J.D. Vance, and that's the end of it.

If this just keeps Vance out of the White House, it would be great news by itself, but it probably does open the door for a better Republican candidacy in 2028, which we will want, because the Democrats are (also) not exactly who we need running everything.

There is much to digest, so I'll leave with a smattering of notable news:

• Most of us saw Talarico beating Paxton, but justice was truly served by Trump's policy of placing loyalty above even sentience failing in South Carolina, where Darline Graham lost her Senate seat. (This was an early indicator, being on the East Coast as it was, that a rout was coming.)
• It was not all good news. In one race where it would have been better for a Republican to win, Michigan elected anti-Semitic "progressive" Abdul El-Sayed.
• Among other upsets, Kansas elected a Democrat to the Senate for the first time in almost a century, shadowing Texas and South Carolina's mere decades of Republican control.
• Mississippi may yet elect its first black Senator since Reconstruction:

  Even observers who predicted a "blue wave" was coming express surprise at the magnitude of the Democrats' showing, producing historic victories in Senate races in Kansas and running in a statistical tie in Mississippi, of all places. There, under-funded African American lawyer Scott Colom ran a spirited, humorous, and aspirational campaign against Sen. Hyde-Smith in a race that was too close to call going into the morning hours.

  I heard that Colom leads by 28 votes. I hope he ends up winning by 47.
• Proposition 40, California's billionaire tax, hasn't been called yet, but is trailing. A loss for that would be good news.
• In probably the worst news of the night, data centers felt the misdirected ire of voters in various races.

That's it for now. The results are incomplete and there will be much more to digest, both in terms of what this means for the rest of the Trump term and for the remaining lame duck congressional session.

-- CAV

The whole structure of Republican cope shattered today, and Republicans still don’t know what to do with it.

Republicans can win easily. They can win the next election easily. They could have won this election easily, if they were living in reality. Instead, from top to bottom, from voters to pundits to politicians to donors, they decided to live in la-la land. With what results, we see.

The whole theory of the postwar Republican Party is that Republicans take governance seriously, whereas Democrats only care about power. True enough. But not true enough to win. Just true enough to lose.

Republicans win a little bit of power and do some small things. The second Trump administration is real. It has done real things. Some have been screwups. Most have been good things. Yes, the White House actually needs a ballroom. Obviously our informed, concerned citizens can see that, and vote for the President who finally gave America the ballroom it deserves.

But all the pundits who blame this on “the divisive MAGA agenda,” and all the other pundits who blame it on “not executing the MAGA agenda,” are profoundly out to lunch. There is no “agenda” that will fix this. There are no “issues,” like “affordability.”

Republicans lost this election because they believe that elections are won by motivation, and motivation is about “issues” and “agendas.” This is indeed how a republic works.

The reality is that the United States is not a republic—a “res publica.” It is not a government of informed, concerned citizens coming together to govern themselves better. It is a Third World democracy in which parties are armies. It is the late Roman Republic.

In a Third World democracy, an election is a war: a contest for power. Ballots are bullets. Yes, wars need motivation. If history has any examples of war—foreign or civil, hot or cold—motivated by civic responsibility, I don’t know them. No one ever fought a war for an “agenda.” Wars are motivated by (a) loathing and (b) fear.

But wars are fought by organization. The Democratic Party is an organization. Yes, it is ramshackle and polycentric. It’s still an army. The fundamental principle of an army is absolute loyalty. In the Democratic Congress, voting discipline is absolute. Democratic voters do not need to be “motivated” by an “agenda.” There are two segments of Democratic vote: elites and clients. Elites are motivated by fear and loathing. Clients are not motivated at all. They are not political “citizens.” They are harvested by the head.

The Republican Party is a label. As I said when I talked to former Democratic organizer Evan Barker: there is no “Republican Party.” Yes, there is a headquarters which distributes various funds. Yes, there is a gerontocratic corruption machine on the Hill. But every Republican politician is a party of one. He raises his own money. He makes his own lobbyist deals. He has his own “agenda.” The Republican Senate machine could not even pass a bill to make their own elections easier. Why? They would rather lose, and hope it rids them of these MAGA clowns. The gerontocrats’ seats are safe.

This is an abysmal form of government. We are in the abyss. The first stage of getting out of any abyss is realizing that you’re in it. American politics has always had a strong flavor of “manifesting:” living in the reality you want to see. If we all believe at once! To escape from the abyss, if it is even possible, first discard all myths, all lies, all illusion, all baits. Execute only in reality.

How do we get back to our constitutional republic? What kind of republic do we want to live in? That’s like asking ourselves how we want our steak dinners cooked once we’re rescued (as we deserve to be, so God of course will provide) from a desert island. It’s a mouse asking himself how he can escape from the trap, but also keep the cheese.

Historically, Third World democracy is also a temporary form of government. It is “late-stage democracy.” It ends in the victory of one army. It seems very likely that a Democratic victory in 2028 will result in a permanent one-party state: the US as California. There are infinitely many ways to run a one-party state with pretend elections. Heck, for all the tangible impact that any election since has produced, we’ve been there since 1933.

The Democratic Party has also entered a new phase. Except between 1941 and 1945, its bread and butter has been a “Mutt-and-Jeff” game of “moderates” and “radicals.” There was never any moral conflict between these groups. Along with mere personal jockeying, the “moderate” position has always been: “idiots, don’t frighten the sheep,” to which the reply is: “idiots, why are you afraid of sheep?” The radicals have been winning this argument, slowly but surely. Now they’ve pretty much won.

There is only one Democratic Party. This is a land of wolves now. Are you a wolf? No, but learn to fight like one. The healthy core of the Republican Party is the sheepdog party. As a Republican leader, you have exactly two jobs: fighting wolves, and herding sheep. Not “governing.” Not building ballrooms, bombing Iran, etc.

This final appearance of historical reality in politics, naked and unashamed, means we have only one remaining election. Losing this election will result in the destruction of the Republican Party as an effective historical force. Winning it, therefore, needs to result in the destruction of the Democratic Party as an effective historical force.

This is our only hope for escaping from a Third World future which will inevitably be dominated by China. The US will be Argentina, with nukes and the global reserve currency: two artifacts of the 20th century. The nukes will never be used, and the delicious transoceanic river of Amazon Prime gewgaws traded for crisp new green bills is a national drug addiction. Unfortunately, China has no reason to turn this river off—I wish they would.

First: Trump should resign now and let Vance go into the election as the incumbent. “Governing” is dead in this lame-duck admin. The most sickening element of Republican governance is the constant mendacious pretense that the President is in control of the executive branch. Stop lying at once! The President, in our regime as presently constituted, is not the CEO of the executive branch. The Congress is the CEO of the executive branch.

A Republican President is not the God-Emperor. He is a tribune of the people—a rebel in office. And in office, as the system works now, he is quite firmly chained. He has no power to do anything significant. Every statement and action of the new President must reflect and reinforce this reality, because we cannot escape from our trap until it is conveyed accurately to 100 million people.

When Americans rebel against the permanent New Deal regime and elect a dissident President, his goal must be to destroy the regime and the whole system of narrative fictions around it. The “Project 2025” strategy of tinkering with executive orders is counterproductive. Either it doesn’t work, or it does. When it does, it strengthens the enemy, by giving substance to the enemy’s lies. Oh good, you saved some money! You did a heckin governance! More green paper to send to China. If tinkering can significantly attrit enemy forces—as with USAID—it’s great. Likewise if it builds forces on our side. Otherwise, it’s pure vanity.

The President is the CEO of foreign policy—of the world, really. But not of America. This power is only useful inasmuch as it is used to help America. America needs a lot of help. Right now, it needs help with only one thing: winning the next election. Are there foreign-policy moves that will help win the next election? If so, make them.

But most of all, Republicans need to take the next two years to organize an actual political party. Winning the Presidency is not enough. Even winning Congress is not enough, as we saw in 2025 and 2026.

The White House is a political liability—a weak, demoralizing target—unless it can act with real power. There are only two ways to get this. One is a completely tame Congress, like FDR’s Congress, that will rubber-stamp bills written in the White House. The other is a constitutional reinterpretation that restores the executive branch’s status as a coequal branch, not subject to the legislature or courts. In this constitutional model, the accountability checks on the executive are reduced to election and impeachment.

The tame Congress is the easiest way. The best way to build a tame Congress is to do elections the AOC way: cast candidates like actors. Centralize all the funding and all the staff. Since fundraising is the main job of a Congressman, they now have no real job at all, which is appropriate for actors. They can record soundbites on TikTok if they want. As usual, the Democrats are running this program already.

To make any of this work, Republicans have to relate to their voters in a completely different way: not like a crowd of self-motivated citizens concerned about “issues” and agendas,” but like an army of disciplined soldiers amped up on loathing and fear.

The motivating question of the election is: are we going to make it to the future? Some future? Any future? Or are we going back to eternal 2021? Does the government actually care about the people it rules over, or is it an insane power cult obsessed with bizarre causes and crusades? Will the US continue on its path of becoming a Third World country? Will it open the borders to the entire Third World?

Compare this as a source of martial energy to “affordability.” Yes, I’m going to fight in this election that’s a war for… money. Well, not money for me. Money for people like me. “Gibs,” as we say on the Internet. We are not expecting our soldiers to fight with bullets, not because that would be bad or wrong, but because they are not actual soldiers and have never shot anyone in their lives. Fortunately, ballots will be enough. (“Ballot” and “bullet” have the same etymology—votes used to be cast with little balls.)

Then, organize our soldiers. Where we find the missing power is simple: turnout. Or as we say in Silicon Valley, engagement. If your product is not getting enough engagement, it is probably not very engaging. You know what’s engaging? War. Also, games.

We need to gamify voting. Voting, in fact, is an augmented-reality game (ARG). Here’s how a 21st-century political party works: it’s an app. On your phone. Every time you have a chance to fire a ballot in the war, your phone pops up and helps you pull the trigger. You are not interested in “issues” or “agendas” or even “candidates.” Voting is just data entry. If you have the party’s app installed, it will show you what data to enter and how to enter it. Ideally, this nuisance would be eliminated, and the party would just vote automatically on your behalf.

This party is a real party, not a label like the “Republicans.” It has real structures. It has a party line, which is always true. It has an intelligence organ, which makes sure the party line is always true. This party line is spun by hundreds of media professionals, as talented as anyone at NPR or the NYT, into a rich and compelling narrative, which is also true (if often shocking), and which everyone can live inside. Since local news in America is also dead, constructing local narratives is also a rich opportunity.

These systems do not exist today for a reason: everyone expects them to magically exist on their own. Actually, a real political party is not and cannot be a profit center. It’s a cost center. What does it cost? A lot! What does it cost to spend $500 million in the midterms on boomer consultants who place boomerslop TV ads? Also a lot.

A real political party is, of course, a shadow government. It is not just a shadow government in the British sense of “ministers in waiting.” It is a shadow single-party state. It contains all the organs of the new state which can operate before its founding in a private capacity—including state media, and eventually even state education.

At the core of the shadow government is an intelligence agency, whose only goal is to find out and distribute the truth. A completely harmless private organization—but neither profitable (since its product is power, not money), nor a nonprofit (since this makes it vulnerable to law fare).

The fact that this organ does not exist is a measure of our weakness, and our failure to understand the basics of historical statesmanship. Our knowledge of those basics is what has to get us out of the abyss. Lies, illusions, myths, will no longer suffice. We have no choice but to live and act in the full historical truth. We can still soften and spin it for the boomers, but not by hiding it or denying it. That’s all over.

(50 invites to my Urbit lodge, %moldbug-club, behind the paywall. Discuss there.)

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It's not hard to minimize today's national coming-out party for the Democratic Socialists of America. Yes, the DSA caucus in the House of Representatives is poised to quadruple in size. But growing from just two members (New York's Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Michigan's Rashida Tlaib) to around eight will only achieve the socialists' numerical parity with the Congressional Ski and Snowboard Caucus.

But that's an overly DSA-centric view of the socialistic left. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I—Vt.), the universally acknowledged godfather of the movement, is not technically a member of the DSA. Neither is the candidate who today is setting the most red hearts aflutter, Michigan's Abdul El-Sayed, a "socialist in all but name," as Reason's Robby Soave has pointed out. You will never run out of hairs to split when assessing who is or is not a member, or national endorsee, or local-only endorsee, or a former member who nonetheless got endorsed by New York Mayor and DSA kingmaker Zohran Mamdani, or a former endorsee who got excommunicated because he didn't sign onto the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.

The forest surrounding these trees is a rapidly growing bloc of elected officials who oppose American wars, softball the human rights crimes of American adversaries, and seek Medicare for All. They want to tax the rich, blunt the growth of data centers, abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), drive corporate money out of politics, and sever U.S. bonds with Israel.

"The DSA, the energy and the desire for bold change, not incremental change, is very much going to be…dominant," Gavin Newsom, the California governor and potential 2028 presidential candidate,  predicted last month. "I mean, that is going to be the mainstream Democratic movement. Absolutely. No question in my mind."

With new Democratic majorities predicted for the House and increasingly the U.S. Senate, all eyes will be on the size of the socialistic rump and whether it exceeds the margins of partisan control.

"I would rather the Republicans keep the House by five [seats] than the Democrats win by five, because if that happens, they're hostage to the DSA," longtime Democratic strategist James Carville groused last month. "Like, [incoming House Speaker] Hakeem [Jefferies] cannot move. There's no place for him to go."

Such a scenario will be familiar to those who followed the rise and fall of the Tea Party movement within the GOP. After sweeping into office via a series of insurgent primary challenges against establishment opponents, the Tea Party bloc, which graduated into the House Freedom Caucus, leveraged its numbers to torture and eventually oust a series of speakers, from John Boehner to Paul Ryan to Kevin McCarthy. In the 2011–12 and 2013–14 sessions especially, the cantankerous caucus harassed the opposing-party president and shaped national politics in a material way, culminating in the sequestration budget cuts of 2013.

Being the loudest minority within a majority that stands in legislative opposition to an unpopular president means that DSA and DSA-adjacent members of Congress are going to be getting a lot of screen time over the next two-plus years, abetted by their comparative youth and good looks. Here are a few of the new specifically DSA faces to follow.

Darializa Avila Chevalier

New York's 13th Congressional District (Harlem/Bronx)

An anti-Israel activist at Columbia University who Mamdani boosted to a shock primary victory over a five-term incumbent who was chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, the 32-year-old DAC is a prison abolitionist who last month was pushed to the ground by cops at an anti-ICE protest and then called on Mamdani's police commissioner, Jessica Tisch, to resign. She marched in solidarity with Palestinians on October 8, 2023, named Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump as the most detestable humans alive, and has a social media past that includes opposing interracial relationships, calling Joe Biden a "rapist," and supporting the nationalization of industry. The Washington Monthly, a decidedly left-of-center publication, named her as one of the "10 worst midterm candidates running for Congress" in 2026. Prediction markets put her odds of winning at north of 97 percent.

Claire Valdez

New York's 7th Congressional District (North Brooklyn/Queens)

Another establishment-smiting Mamdani pick, the 37-year-old Valdez is an artist-turned-union-activist-turned-state-lawmaker who last year was arrested outside the offices of Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand during a protest against their opposition to halting arms sales to Israel. She believes in single-payer healthcare, universal rent control, nationalizing airlines, and a federal jobs guarantee. One of her campaign ads features her smacking a Starbucks coffee out of some stranger's hand, in protest of the company's policies toward unions. Prediction markets have Valdez at around 97 percent.

Melat Kiros

Colorado's 1st Congressional District (Denver)

The 29-year-old Ethiopian immigrant and budding lawyer defeated a 30-year incumbent in the shock primary, on a platform of Medicare for All, abolishing ICE, federalizing rent control, opposing data centers, and an arms embargo on Israel, which she accuses of being an ethnostate engaged in genocide. Kiros has "made Zionism a defining issue in Denver's congressional election," reports Denverite, by doing things like going on Hasan Piker's podcast in May to call the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks "an inevitable consequence of apartheid, of occupation, decades of occupation," and refusing to characterize a deadly Boulder bombing attack on release-the-Israeli-hostages demonstrators as antisemitic. She is prediction-marketing at around 99 percent.

Donavan McKinney

Michigan's 13th Congressional District (Detroit)

A political organizer and state representative, the 34-year-old McKinney narrowly toppled in the Democratic primary a one-term, pro-Israel incumbent backed by House Leader Jeffries. McKinney has focused on affordability issues, such as insurance premiums and childcare, in addition to Medicare for All and abolishing ICE. His odds are at around 98 percent.

Angela Gonzalez-Torres

California's 34th Congressional District (Los Angeles)

California's top-two primary/runoff system means that the battles that otherwise get decided at the initial primary level can carry on into November. Such is the case with this 31-year-old DSA activist seeking to unseat a 51-year-old Democratic incumbent, on a platform of the usual DSA-pol positions, with an extra dab of affordability and anti-AIPAC. Gonzales-Torres cares so much about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that she introduced a resolution supporting Gaza while serving as president of the Historic Highland Park Neighborhood Council, then derided her successor in that post as a "very Zionist gentrifier man, a white man" and a "threat to my community." AGT's prediction markets are closer to 80 percent.

Chris Rabb

Pennsylvania's 3rd Congressional District (Philadelphia)

The graybeard of the DSA group at age 56, Rabb is a politico, an academic, and an amateur comedian who focused on criminal justice reform, climate activism, and conscious capitalism before competing for this open congressional seat against some establishment-favored opponents. In addition to the usual Medicare for All/abolish ICE/data center moratorium/staunch criticism of Israel, Rabb has plumped for Mamdani-style government-run grocery stores. He's a 99 percenter.

There are plenty of more DSA-adjacent pols, such as my (odious) next representative, Brad Lander, who are poised to join the out-and-out DSAers in the 120th Congress. Whether their ranks will cohere enough without infighting, let alone outnumber the margin of Democrats over Republicans, is anyone's guess. The much tighter projected margin in the Senate means that even a DSA-friendly caucus of two (Sanders and El-Sayed), or even three (in case the much-less-ballyhooed Angie Nixon squeaks one out in Florida), could impose Carville's math over the neck of potential Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

And even if the numbers don't add up yet to Tea Party–style influence, the DSA pulse-quickening among younger Democrats everywhere will exert at least some pull over the most centrist and establishmentarian of Dems. Almost 12 years since Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders upended American politics, the populist moment is far from over.

The post The DSA's Coming-Out Party appeared first on Reason Magazine.

On Election Day, the X account AGHamilton29 drew attention to a New York Times report headlined "Jewish Leaders in Michigan Urge Support for El-Sayed’s Senate Bid." There was something funny -- literally funny -- about the signatories to the letter from Michigan Jews for Democracy. Bayliss Wagner began their report on September 17: A group of Jewish voters in Michigan is urging support for Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, the state’s Democratic nominee for Senate, in an open letter that acknowledges concerns among some Jewish voters about his candidacy and his criticism of Israel.The letter, signed by more than 500 people who identify as Jewish leaders or voters in the state, says that the election of Dr. El-Sayed, a staunch critic of Israel, is “clearly the better choice for Jews” compared with his Republican opponent, former Representative Mike Rogers.AG noted a quick skim of this list of signatories not only has a pile of people who don't use their last name -- instead you just get "Jaime B." and "Janie P." -- but it includes the name "Jack Mehoff" of East Lansing, home to Michigan State University.AG pointed out: "I happen to know that one of the names is someone deceased. A majority of the signatories don’t even use their full names, just a last initial, so it’s impossible to confirm these are even real people or Jewish. Why would they publish a story about a completely unreliable list with random names on a google sheet? Because the point was the narrative."Yesterday the NYT published a list of what was alleged to be over 500 Michigan “Jewish leaders” supporting El-Sayed. The point of doing so was to paint a narrative that he has strong Jewish support in MI. But did the NYT do any vetting to the list? A quick skim and you notice it includes names like “Jack Mehoff”. I happen to know that one of the names is someone deceased. A majority of the signatories don’t even use their full names, just a last initial, so it’s impossible to confirm these are even real people or Jewish. Why would they publish a story about a completely unreliable list with random names on a google sheet? Because the point was the narrative.— AG (@AGHamilton29) November 3, 2026“The New York Times will openly and without shame publish a list of ‘Jews for Abdul,’ which includes the name ‘Jack Mehoff’ and then completely ignore that this fatally compromises the whole story and just power through it,” Jon Levine of the Washington Free Beacon wrote on X.Many people enjoyed the controversy, with bartender Moe from The Simpsons asking for a "Jack Mehoff," just like Bart Simpson crank-called and caused Moe to say "I need Amanda Huggenkiss!" Twitchy found this one: "Was Haywood Jablowmy on there too?"There was also the inevitable Jeffrey Toobin masturbation gag:  Image Screenshot from X Thomas English at the New York Post put some meat on the funny bones: A university spokesman told The Post he could “confirm that MSU does not have a record (past or present) of that particular individual attending the university.”...The clergy who signed the letter have also had their credentials called into question.One, Rabbi Chava Bahle, made history in 2014 as the first rabbi to lead a Unitarian Universalist church.Another, Rabbi Alana Alpert, leads a Reconstructionist congregation whose adherents insist Judaism is defined by culture and social values rather than traditions or rituals such as keeping kosher.The Post couldn't get a response form the El-Sayed campaign, but the Times did issue a reply: …. “This story from September is one of several looking at Dr. El-Sayed’s relationship with Jewish and Democratic voters,” Times spokesman Charlie Stadtlander said. “We found this letter newsworthy because of a number of the notable individuals who signed on and we confirmed that the people specifically mentioned in the story did in fact add their name. The story also highlights a letter from Jewish Democrats and Independents who came out in support of Mike Rogers.”

This is today’s cartoon by Ben Jennings in the Guardian:

If you can’t see the cartoon, it shows a man and a woman in what looks like a TV studio set up for a Sunday morning political interview. The man, a toffee-nosed member of the upper classes, is saying, “Britain has already paid reparations for slavery to all those poor slave-owning families who lost out when it was abolished…”. The woman – presumably the interviewer – looks nonplussed.

The cartoon is clearly meant to suggest that the British government of the 1830s paying the slaveowners the then vast sum of twenty million pounds to free their slaves after the passage of the Slavery Abolition Act was a bad thing.

It was indeed regrettable that those who had done evil were rewarded rather than punished. But paying off the masters worked. After half a century of effort, and with a thousand caveats and complications, it freed the slaves.

I ask Mr Jennings, as I ask everyone who sneers at the fact that the British government paid off the slaveowners, what strategy they think the government should have followed to free the slaves instead?

Just telling the owners to get on and do it because Parliament said so ran the risk that, without any incentive to obey a law that would impoverish them, they would simply refuse. Then what – war? The slaves were held in the colonies, not in Britain itself. Sending multiple fleets across thousands of miles to subdue each rebellious island and territory would have been beyond the capacities of any government in the world at that time. Civil wars, as this would have been, are particularly terrible. The war the United States fought to end slavery in that country killed a higher proportion of the people involved than almost any other war in history.

Another thing: the outcome of war can never be certain. The slaveowners might very well have fought off the overstretched government forces, establishing independent slaveowning states in which slavery might have lasted for generations more than it did in real life.

All in all, if you were a slave circa 1833 and you somehow heard about this proposal to bring freedom to you and your family at the cost of unjustly rewarding your oppressor, would you want it to go ahead?