Let me go next to our caller from the five
one zero area code, who's calling today from
five one zero.
I mean, yeah, it is.
OK, great.
My question is about.
I've heard a lot of not and not experts, but
sort of political hobbyists like Domar.
They say they're on the left talking about
how identity politics and political correctness
has kind of been the key feature of turning
off moderate voters.
That would have otherwise voted for Clinton,
but instead voted for Trump.
It seems like this is just kind of a distraction
and getting away from the core issues of sort
of centrist, lukewarm policies.
But I'd be curious to know if there's any
truth to it.
You know, anytime there's a question about
what is the thing that has led to something.
Nothing is ever that simple, so to say, like,
there is no doubt that there are people that
have been turned off by the perception that
the Democratic Party is too focused on identity
politics.
There is also a lot of people who have exaggerated
the degree to which that's the case in order
to turn people off, like we have to understand
when we're being propagandized to.
There is a movement that insists on saying
the left is only about identity politics at
this point.
And that makes people get turned off even
if it's not actually true.
So you understand how sometimes that can also
be propaganda.
Right.
Yeah, absolutely.
I'm wondering if this if there's any actual
evidence or not even any conclusive, but it's
just there's just some sort of evidence or
any kind of study taken that would suggest
that because it seems like just solely based
on the fact that I haven't been able to find
anything like that, that it's kind of a distraction
from what I've not seen any evidence that
what what lost it for Hillary, what the difference
maker was, was the perception of the Democratic
Party is too focused on identity politics.
Now, you mentioned what I call Republican
lite.
A lot of Democrats being just slightly less
centrist versions of status quo, neo liberal
politics.
I think that's a much more serious critique.
And you've seen a lot of Senate candidates,
even presidential candidates, who I mean,
listen, you know, Republican lite is sort
of a pejorative.
But it's it's true that most Republicans now,
many Republicans and most Democrats exist
within a pretty narrow range of the political
spectrum.
You've got a bunch of extreme right wingers
now that are outside of that, and you've got
some more left wing folks like Bernie Sanders
who are maybe outside of that.
But it is a fair criticism that a lot of mainstream
politics is mainstream because it's all sort
of the same.
Its center, left and center.
Right.
That's a good critique.
All right.
Well, thanks very much.
I was sorry to see that the chess competition
was just trophy of the tournament was not
in your hands.
But our next time.
Next time.
Yes, there is.
There will be another one.
I'm actually I'll be announcing when the third
tournament is going to be very, very soon.
Oh, great, great.
I'll try to run into that.
All right.
Thank you for the call.
I appreciate it.
Hope to hear from you again.
