TALKING POINTS MEMO: The ideas this group is pushing basically go back to what is often called “Catholic integralism”. (Most of the players are Catholic, though Hawley comes from the Protestant side of this traditionalist grouping.) This is a form of anti-pluralist Catholic political ideology most associated with quasi-fascist governments in Spain and Portugal and political movements in France (Vichy being the example in power) and other European countries. The basic thrust is a political vision that prioritizes hierarchical social cohesion and has the government takes a leading role enforcing traditionalist cultural and social values and keeping conservative Christianity as the taproot of the state. Church and state are both on the same team and working, collaboratively, toward the same end. The pluralist vision of the state most of us are familiar with, in which it is a semi-neutral arbiter between lots of different visions of how people should live their lives, is anathema.
How this would all play out in an American context which is based on significantly different ideas about government is anyone’s guess. But the more immediate impetus and focus of these writers is a bit different. As others have noted, the idea is that the culture war and the related battle for an ethno-nationalist identity are simply too important, immediate and dire to have any time to worry about things like the rule of law or even democracy. Read through these different pieces and you’ll also get a strong feel for the priority of fighting, that these folks are driven by a desire to fight their liberal enemies on all fronts at all times and that this is the core of political action. This is heady and scary stuff. But reading through it you can see how Trump fits into the contemporary right. MORE
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