Source: Paul Krugman
by Paul Krugman

“[W]hile Orbán didn’t manage to end elections in Hungary — probably because Hungary remains highly dependent on aid from the European Union — he tried hard to lock in one-party rule. His party largely killed the free press, making sure that its allies controlled the media. It rigged the electoral system in ways that would allow it to stay in power unless there was a landslide vote for opposition parties. Again, it did what MAGA is trying to do in America. But despite (or perhaps partly because of) JD Vance’s unprecedented campaigning for Orbán, he was, in fact, handed a landslide defeat by the Hungarian people. And to his credit, Orbán did what Trump never has: he conceded defeat.” (04/13/26)

https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/the-axis-of-autocracy-loses-a-wheel

Source: Liberal Currents
by Matthew McManus

“Conservatism, and even more radical forms of right-wing thought, has often been defended with insight and even profundity. Liberals and leftists would benefit from spending more time internalizing the wisdom of the right. Nevertheless Mill, who was very familiar with intelligent right-wing contemporaries like Carlyle and Coleridge, grasped an important point that Kirk rarely acknowledged: the undeniable anti-intellectual streak that has pervaded the right down to Donald Trump declaring his love for the uneducated and JD Vance proclaiming professors are the enemy. This is a feature, not a bug, of many (though obviously not all) on the right’s worldview.” (04/13/26)

https://www.liberalcurrents.com/the-right-wants-you-stupid/

Source: The UnPopulust
by Laszlo Gendler

“Magyar’s victory was not supposed to be possible. Orbán was not supposed to lose his grip on power. How, exactly, did Orbán fail to steal the election? The structural advantages were real and formidable. The gerrymandered electoral map had delivered Fidesz 135 seats on 54% of the vote in 2022. Campaign spending limits had been abolished. Fidesz and its proxies outspent Tisza 11 to 1 on advertising. … Part of the answer is that the EU held its ground. The €19 billion in frozen funds — suspended over rule-of-law violations — became a material argument that Orbán’s system carried a direct cost for ordinary Hungarians. … But the larger answer, put simply, is bravery. Autocracy runs on fear—on the assumption that enough people, confronted with sufficient consequences, will decide that compliance is safer than truth. What dismantled Orbán’s operation was the accumulation of individual decisions to the contrary.” (04/13/26)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/orban-lost-spectacularly-because

Source: Wall Street Journal
by Matthew Hennessey

“You know what a blanket party is. Popular at sleepover parties, military barracks and prisons, it’s when you throw a blanket over someone’s head so that everyone can take free shots to the guest of honor’s head and ribs. California Democrats, and some in Washington as well, threw a surprise blanket party for Rep. Eric Swalwell Friday night. I don’t mean to traffic in redundancy. A party like this is by definition a surprise for the guy under the blanket. The real surprise is that it was organized at all. Mr. Swalwell, 45, is a seven-term congressman from the Bay Area. He ran for president in 2020, staying in the race just long enough to participate in one debate. … you have to imagine someone backstage on the Biden team, aka the Democratic Party Machine, writing Mr. Swalwell’s name in a little book under the heading ‘Dead Men.'” (04/13/26)

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/free-expression/a-blanket-party-for-eric-swalwell-871bbd09

Source: Brownstone Institute
by Ann Bauer

“You have no idea what’s happening inside someone’s marriage or home or family life. And the hardships people mask are myriad. This is the most sinister I can name, in part because cowardly people lay blame on parents who are just holding on.” (04/13/26)

https://brownstone.org/articles/the-hardships-that-people-mask/

Source: Law & Liberty
by Thomas Savidge

“Adam Smith warned against the temptation of debt monetization. We still won’t listen.” (04/13/26)

https://lawliberty.org/the-juggling-act/