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How the Political Spectrum Turned Inside Out
The political landscape of two decades ago seems almost unrecognizable now. Back then, opposing wars and the surveillance state was so completely coded as left-wing that Republicans regularly denounced Ron Paul as a liberal squish. Some of the same cable news pundits who cheer for Democrats today were almost universally viewed as paladins of the right. Vaccines weren't really seen as a left/right issue at all—and if you pushed people to tell you which tribe was more open to anti-vaxxism, they'd likely as not point to the crunchy left.
Some of the changes since then simply reflect shifts in particular individuals' images or opinions. (If you think too hard about what the politics of the Taylor Swift/Kanye West beef used to be, you'll get a headache.) But there's been a deeper transformation too. Ponder that phrase I just used: "the crunchy left." In an era when the conservative press is increasingly prone to publishing paeans to alternative diets and cottagecore lifestyles, how many people still think crunchy implies left in the first place?
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How the political spectrum turned inside out
From 9/11 to the COVID-19 pandemic, crisis moments keep reshaping the political landscape.
reason.com
