I'm an institutionalist

The rule of law, like money, rests on the ephemeral sands of belief. When people stop believing in them, though, they have to be replaced, or else we're reduced to anarchy and barter, not a good look for a nation in the third decade of the 21st century. So what to do with the failed institutions of the US senate, the electoral college and the Supreme Court? I don't know.

What I do know is history. When the existing institutions failed, we got Bollshevik Russia, Franco's Spain, Hitler's Germany and Mao's China, just to cite a few egregious and long-lived examples. As a confirmed institutionalist, I don't have a good answer for someone who asks why America should have any confidence in today's Senate and SCOTUS. Hope is not a plan.

"One of the more consequential contradictions of the Democratic Party is that the vast majority of its staffers, consultants, electeds, and media avatars, along with a substantial portion of its electoral base, are institutionalists. They believe, broadly, in The System. The System worked for them, and if The System’s outputs are bad, it is because we need more of the right sort of people to join or be elected to enter The System. But when the party does manage to win majorities, it depends on support from a substantial number of anti-system people. Barack Obama defeated the Clintons with this sacred knowledge, before he started reading David Brooks.

"Institutionalists, in my experience, have trouble reaching an anti-system person, because they think being against The System is an inherently adolescent and silly mindset. But believing in things like “the integrity of the Supreme Court” has proven to be, I think, much sillier, and much more childish." https://theap.substack.com/p/the-institutionalists-dilemma?s=w&fbclid=IwAR0_gNolaPtgQxFtLkOPoyXkmudbEEB_Oj1tnB68Bdsz3NUJqmwFZALQetI