← The Bulwark
The Bulwark
From Bunker Hill to Normandy, JD Vance Is Wrong About America (w/ Rep. Auchincloss)
00:12:50
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- [00:00]
A
Instagram quantifies the lifetime value of a teenager on their platform at $280. And my response to Instagram is, I think my kids are worth more than $280.
- [00:13]
B
That's about to say they're selling us out cheap.
- [00:15]
A
Yeah, go fuck yourself. And we're going to tax you and we're going to spend that money on educating our kids. That's my response to Instagram on that.
- [00:26]
B
Welcome to how to Fix It. I'm John Avlon, and you know it. The purpose of this podcast is to focus on finding solutions to the problems we face, not just endlessly fixating on the problems themselves. And joining us today is Congressman Jake Auchincloss from Massachusetts. He is a problem solver who's building a new patriotic center, something that really resonates with the work I've been doing, and it's a pleasure to have him on the show. Jake, thanks for joining us.
- [00:53]
A
John, it's good to be with you.
- [00:55]
B
All right, Patriotic Center. There are a lot of modifiers. You had Arthur Schlesinger Jr. The vital center. Lately, a lot of us have been talking about a radical center. You've been talking about the patriotic center with majority Democrats. Explain to folks how you see that and where it fits in the ideological spectrum of the Democratic Party today.
- [01:13]
A
It injects into the political debate faith, family, and the flag. And it insists that Democrats can lay claim to what have traditionally been conservatively coded values. And I just reject that. I grew up, John, not with musicians and athletes and celebrities on my bedroom wall, but with the portraits of the Founding Fathers. I served in the United States Marine Corps. I've sworn an oath to the Constitution eight times now in my life. I would die for that document. And the idea that Republicans claim that they are the party of patriotism, I find repellent. That is not true. And J.D. vance, in his 2024 speech to the Republican Convention, laid forth a particular vision of patriotism, where he described his family cemetery plot in eastern Kentucky, his blood in the soil, quite literally, and described that type of blood and soil populism as what it means to be a real American. He said, Americans won't fight for ideas, but they will fight for their homeland. And my counselor to the vice president is, you're wrong, actually. From Bunker Hill to Shiloh to Selma to Normandy, Americans do fight for ideas. And we're going to fight for freedom and equality and opportunity again in 26 and 28.
- [02:39]
B
Amen, brother. I mean, we are singing from the same hymnal. I deeply believe we need to reclaim the flag. That there's a fundamental difference between patriotism and nationalism. And it is stunning to see the blood and soil nationalism, which is a Confederate identity, it is also a German identity at different parts in the century, get openly embraced. But Democrats do need to step up and reclaim these virtues and values. And yet, I want to press you on one thing, which is that if you look at polling, there is a patriotism gap among young Democrats, liberals in particular. It is deeply troubling to me. Why do you think that is? And is this the way we fix it, or do we need to do more?
- [03:17]
A
You're right. And I worry that on the progressive left, and indeed within the Democratic Party, it is seen as a mark of sophistication to be cynical about the future and to be cynical about your country. Now you can be critical of your country and oftentimes need to be. I spend a lot of time criticizing the policies that come out of Washington D.C. but I am not cynical about my country. This is the greatest nation in the history of the world, founded upon the most beautiful ideas in the history of the world that the circumstances of your birth should not determine the condition of your life. And while we imperfectly meet that moral mandate, we are always trying to extend the envelope of freedom to yet more people. And that is something to be proud of. And I am proud of it. And we are going to continue to fight for it.
- [04:04]
B
Elevating the idea. This is what Obama did at Selma in his Selma speech, right? Elevating the idea of patriotism to make it relevant and inclusive and break us out of these false divisions. That leads me to my second question. And this is one of these, these tricky, these tricky things. And I'm not trying to place, you know, I, I'm. I think centrism is a powerful, misunderstood force for good in our politics, particularly on the center left. But there needs to be an insurgent energy. And when the center left is seen as being a defender of the status quo, we lose, understandably. What's your prescription for how we can make a. Give populist energy to the radical patriotic center, to take advantage of the polarization, to make folks realize that this is a faith of change and modernization.
- [04:52]
A
Love that point, John. Fully agree with it. There is two different conceptions of what it means to be in the center of American political life. And I love that phrase radical center, because I agree with that. Radical. The etymology of that is root level reform. Right? To be radical is to reform from the root. And I think that is necessary because Americans reject a return to the status quo. One conception of centrism is a tug of war between left and right where you pull and you pull and you pull and you get exhausted and you end up in the mushy middle. I reject that conception as well. The part that I embrace is to canvas the various factions of American ideological life and take the most compelling ideas from all of them and reformulate a center by dragging and dropping those best ideas. Because no one ideological faction has a monopoly on good ideas in America. And indeed no one faction has even a majority of Americans that subscribe to it, whether populism or libertarianism or conservatism or liberalism. And all of these factions have good ideas. I think, for example, that progressives insistence on investing in young people and investing in a more fair tax code to give every American a fair shot if they work hard and play by the rules. I agree with that. And we can, you know, we can talk about taxation and how to make that real through policy. I think traditional liberals defense of civil rights and defense of the rule of law is deeply important, especially now. I think traditional conservatives who talk about the family as the core social unit, not the government. I agree with that. The best social program is a job and the best social program is two parents having dinner with their kids. I agree with that. And that shouldn't be coded as a conservative issue. That should be coded as just something that Americans subscribe to.
- [06:38]
B
Daniel Patrick Boynton had some scars around that debate, but there is, there, but there is a really. I mean, you know, the far left is angrier at the center left sometimes than I think folks appreciate. But it takes a certain confidence. You are the leader of Majority Democrats, an organization want to give you a quick chance to describe what that is, that effort. And then I want to talk about policies you're putting forward. Build America, education and social media reform and a taxation system that could be fairer as a fresh start.
- [07:09]
A
Majority of Democrats is a new organization that consists of about 40 elected officials, senators, governors, members of Congress and importantly state house leaders and mayors. And we are a faction within the Democratic Party that are seeking to reinvent the Democratic Party by 2028 in order to win durable majorities and to govern better. Our aim is to earn back the trust of an American electorate and that has been demoralized and disempowered by a status quo politics that they see as corrupt and out of touch. And we are doing that one by recruiting dynamic young leaders. And I again emphasize in particular the mayors, Mayor of Cleveland, Mayor of Boise, mayor of Miami, mayor of Kansas City, mayor of Cincinnati. These are some of the leaders who are getting stuff done in ways that are pragmatic and impactful. And we are trying to deploy money, mobilization, traditional and new media and moral energy through policy and surrogacy to the creation of this radical center that you are describing, such that a compelling candidate in 2028 can build off of it and have the infrastructure that they need to run a dynamic campaign.
- [08:24]
B
The infrastructure is the key point and that's where I think we need to build an infrastructure, coordinate efforts, because the algorithms are against us right now in the vital center. The algorithms reward extremes and we need to counteract that force.
- [08:43]
A
I think it's a really profound issue that we have, which is for voters under 40 in particular, they're just getting their news off socials. That is just the state of play. TV still matters for voters over 40, but increasingly for voters under 40, you got to reach them through socials. Now the challenge with that, as you said, is it's an enraged to engage business model where whether it's TikTok or Insta or Snap or Twitter or whatever, centrifugal forces have the advantage. Those that are pushing to the extremes get amplified. Now, I think there's two approaches that we have to take to that. One is to recognize, as we just discussed, that the radical center, by the nature of its radicalism, can also be galvanizing to people and can also put out memetic ideas that can surf that algorithm effectively. So we should be doing that. You can't give up on what is the new printing press of the era. But two, and this is still more nascent to me, and I'm interested for your thoughts on this. I think with the rise of AI and the slop being thrown across the Internet because of AI, I think you're going to see people increasingly get their news, opinion, news and opinion from high trust micro communities. The new high signal environments are going to be like WhatsApp chats and text message threads and signal chats of between two to 20 people. And these high trust micro communities built out across an entire country, I think become the new organizing infrastructure.
- [10:23]
B
So that's, that's certainly a vision of the tiny platoons in the most atomized sense. And I think you're right. I mean, the macro change beyond simple fragmentation in media is from trusted institutions to trusted individuals, because trusted institutions we've allowed to atrophy, aided in part by, I mean, what TikTok we can discuss whether it's a foreign disinformation effort designed to SAP our civic strength. I would say signs point to yes, yes, yes. I think the challenge is, is, is, is in an environment where loudest voices get biggest with the least cost basis, that the original fact based reporting is in danger of further atrophying.
- [11:10]
A
Right.
- [11:11]
B
We're seeing the death of newspapers every day. And so in those chat groups you need something solid that has been fact checked, edited, reported, scooped to push off of. And, and that, that's where, that's where I'm a little concerned. But I do think that we need to consciously invest in that architecture. We need to consciously invest in short form digital video.
- [11:34]
A
And that's why, you know, organizations like Rebuild Local News are so important and Report America because they are doing some of the work state by state on how do you create the right business model, the right philanthropy to support local and national journalism. I totally agree with you. I think that's, I think that's you're right. It does not replace that. It just, it requires that to get traction.
- [11:57]
B
It does. And so I just think, yeah, we've got to keep our eye on that ball too. And there's some, you know, I think, you know, federal proposals about, you know, it's, it's tricky how to define hiring reporters as tax deductible, but we do need to always stay focused on. You mentioned the Constitution. The Constitution doesn't mention political parties, but it does mention journalism in terms of a free press. And so the founders understood that democracy depends on a free press and we are in danger of it atrophying. And the only, the only positive thing I saw it was an FT article that showed there, there may be a unexpected counterweight with AI because it's based on credible sources and established facts. It may have more of a centering impact on our discourse than social media has. That's hopeful. It's a toehold.
- [12:46]
A
I've read that analysis too, actually. I think a lot of it comes down to how.