Video summary
Ezra Klein reacts to a recent exchange between the official Democratic National Committee account and Republican strategist Stephen Miller, highlighting what he views as an absurd degradation of political norms. The incident began with Steven Miller celebrating James Tallarico's primary victory in Texas by noting that Democrats made history there first by nominating their transgender Senate candidate. In response, @TheDemocrats replied with a profanity-laden insult telling Miller to "shut up." Klein finds this interaction deranged and points out the irony of an institutional account behaving like a typical internet troll rather than maintaining decorum. He argues that while such extreme behavior garners massive attention—reaching 50 million people—it represents a tragedy of the commons where only the most outrageous voices succeed in a cacophony, forcing institutions to either ignore norms or risk being drowned out by louder extremes. Klein connects this specific incident to broader shifts in political communication driven by figures like Donald Trump and algorithmic media platforms that reward sensationalism over substance. He notes how politicians have moved away from the disciplined, sober style of past leaders toward a more aggressive, unfiltered approach that mimics online culture. This shift is evident not just on the right with Miller's gleeful rejection of traditional behavior but also as Democrats attempt to "ape" this style by engaging in similar vitriol. Klein suggests that while some may find these interactions exciting or entertaining at first, they ultimately feel like consuming fast food—enticing initially but leaving one feeling worse afterwards if overconsumed. He emphasizes that the current political landscape is an evolutionary arms race of "bullshittery" where attention spans are short-lived and novelty wears off quickly unless something genuinely new appears. The conversation pivots to a deeper analysis of masculinity, virtue, and self-mastery within modern politics, particularly contrasting contemporary right-wing influencers with figures like Brian Stelter or progressive candidates such as O'Rourke. Klein observes that many masculinist philosophies on the right reject self-discipline as evidence of being warped by modernity, favoring instead a primitive dominance orientation. However, he argues that this rejection is actually a symptom of losing control rather than gaining strength, and it signals a desire for political virtue to return in response to such excesses. He highlights how candidates like O'Rourke successfully connect with voters through language rooted in morality and progressive Christianity, raising more money based on an aura of decency that the current chaotic discourse lacks. Klein believes people are beginning to reject the system because they dislike feeling at its mercy, similar to addiction cycles where getting angry is a necessary first step toward recovery. Looking forward, Klein predicts that the political pendulum will swing back toward leaders who demonstrate social virtue and statecraft-like decorum, though this new version must still possess charisma and appeal in today's media environment. He contrasts the grim scowl of Donald Trump with the genuine smile of Zohran Mamdani, suggesting that a "sunny" aesthetic is emerging as a viable alternative to performative anger or bullying tactics. Klein warns against viewing these interactions merely as two bullies fighting for satisfaction; instead, he advocates for moving away from performing sunniness toward actual authenticity and warmth in political discourse. He concludes that the winning strategy for politicians over the next few years will be finding "the way out" of this toxic arms race rather than doubling down on the destructive dynamics that currently dominate online platforms and traditional media alike.
Read the full video transcript
Did you see that tweet earlier on today?
Very, very bottom, it's hiding down
there.
>> I did, yes. I saw both of us.
>> Yeah. So, I had to double-check that at
the Democrats is the Democrats official
proper So,
>> Democratic National Committee, yeah.
>> Correct. Yeah. And I'm like, is is this
a parody account? It's got to be. So,
the Democrats tweet, "Fired up, ready to
go. It's time to take back Texas."
Steven Miller replies and says, "The
Democrats made history in Texas by
nominating their first transgender
Senate candidate."
And @TheDemocrats replied, "Shut up, you
ugly fuck."
And that reached at least 50 million
people. It's like 300,000 likes. Right?
I I get it. The he did it first thing of
pointing from one side to the other, but
is
Maybe this is just my sort of British
properness coming through.
The
the thought that a
the online
representative account for one of the
parties saying, "Shut up, you ugly
Is is that not absurd? Like, that feels
kind of deranged to me.
>> It is deranged. But But this is a little
bit what I mean about the whole medium,
right? Because one thing that does one
thing that every movement like this
does, and I take Donald Trump, honestly,
as a bit of a first mover here,
is it is shifting people's sense of what
political communication should sound
like.
>> Agreed.
>> So, I mean, that is the outcome, I would
say, of a long process of learning that
if you tweet like a
normal, sober
stalwart
>> Boring. Or institution. Boring.
>> Boring.
>> Barack Obama is I I'm a big Barack Obama
fan.
That guy's Twitter account, not great.
>> Not sexy enough.
>> No.
>> And And so, this is where everything
changes. Like, it actually it it changes
the expectations. It changes the people,
and it changes what can succeed. And so,
you know, sometimes maybe they I mean, I
guess you can ask the Democrat
@TheDemocrats if they went too far or
not. Maybe they Maybe to them it's a
huge success. But the This is what I
mean when you have to think about these
mediums, you have to think about the
attention, you have to think about the
norms, you have to think about the
discourse as a kind of public good. What
that is doing
like that right there is a tragedy of
the commons problem. It's very hard for
at the Democrats to be noticed. There's
a huge cacophony of voices. The voices
that get noticed are extreme. So, here's
the thing.
You notice them. We are here talking
about at the Democrats rejoinder to
Stephen Miller.
>> I can't remember the last time that I
talked about at the Democrats.
>> So, they probably just succeeded. But
>> Yeah.
>> it's a
tragedy of the commons. Like Stephen
Miller, by the way, a deputy um chief of
staff to the president is tweeting about
James Tallarico, who whatever else you
want to say about Tallarico, an
incredibly decent person, an incredibly
decent man in politics, who tries very
hard to treat people on both sides with
respect. Stephen Miller, deputy chief of
staff, his reaction to Ken Paxton, by
the way. It wasn't even like Tallarico
won the primary last night. It was or a
couple nights ago. It was Paxton
was first transgender candidate. So,
again, the
you know, I don't want to sit here and
just like tut-tut and and chin stroke,
but it is a degradation
of the entire system.
>> so uncool. I can even feel my own sort
of cringometer of being out of touch
occurring as we're talking about it.
Like, what do you mean you
both within the a couple of years of
each other. Are you really going to be
the fuddy-duddies finger-wagging at
people these kids on the internet having
fun or whatever? I'm like,
I don't know, man. It feels like
extracting from a system that it
shouldn't be. It feels like there's
something that's going wrong with
regards to that. I guess one of the
other one of the biggest talking points
that we've had over the last couple of
years was around what happened in the
2024 election, especially independent
media sort of being involved in that.
Do you think if the left had had its own
version of Joe Rogan
that the last election would have really
changed?
>> The election was close enough in the
battleground states
that
I think you end up in a situation where
you can change any variable and imagine
moving I don't remember the exact number
but something like you would have needed
I think 150,000 votes to switch. I mean
those votes would have had to have been
correctly uh like apportioned. But it
was in you know just a handful of
states.
So maybe not just Joe Rogan like I would
say that the way to think about this is
not a liberal or illiberal Joe Rogan.
It's candidates who are comfortable in
the kinds of spaces that we mean when we
talk about Rogan. Like the point is not
getting like one guy who is more on your
side. The point is you know Harris and
Walls having been everywhere and having
been capable of talking more effectively
with different kinds of of person.
But but but let me
pull back on something you said a second
ago. Uh
I've been thinking a lot about virtue
and politics.
And virtue
I was going to say it's not a word we
use that much but I actually think
particularly in your corners of the blog
of the blogosphere.
We were talking about blogs before we
started.
Of the podcastosphere.
>> It is something we talk about.
And I was just doing a show that'll come
out shortly about a bunch of the kind of
more masculinist philosophies on the
right people like Bronze Age Pervert and
Raw Egg Nationalist and
and one of the things I was thinking
about is how much those visions of
masculinity
have a primitivism to them. Right? It's
this desire to rediscover
a stereotypically testosterone soaked
much more competitive dominance oriented
aggressive. Right? There's a view that
modern man has been
warped into and constrained into this
soft cooperative like against their own
instincts. Okay.
The thing that I was noticing how when I
actually read what these guys were
writing
the thing that I was noticing was so
absent was
the idea of self-mastery and
self-discipline
as a fundamental dimension not just of
like manhood or masculinity but just of
humanity. In fact, a lot of these places
seem to take self-discipline and
self-mastery with the exception maybe of
like a homosocial weightlifting
component as a negative, right? It was
evidence of
the way modernity had warped us into
this
attenuated shape
that works for, you know, modern
feminism and liberal democracy, right?
That's the argument.
And so you see, I think this is partly
true on Trump and you see with Stephen
Miller
this gleeful rejection
of norms of behavior that once sort of
reflected, I think, a kind of
self-disciplined, right? Politicians
don't talk the way Donald Trump talks,
right? They are disciplined. They know
not to just unleash on the people they
don't like in a way that is destructive,
most of them.
And it was this wiping away of that as a
kind of show
of
that you would not be held back by the
system as it existed. And and so there's
a message in what Miller is saying and
then if Now you see like the Democrats
trying to to ape it, but what I do think
is going to it's going to create I think
what it's already creating
is going to be a swing back
to a desire to see political virtue
to see social virtue demonstrated in in
leaders. Everything creates its opposite
in politics always.
And so this
>> of statesman-like, a bit more decorum.
>> Yeah, it'll have to be a version that
works for today.
>> It'll still need to be sexy. You got to
have an aura. You need to have charisma.
You need to have an aura.
>> Correct. But the real O'Rourke, I mean,
the reason O'Rourke is dangerous to
them, and I'm not saying he's going to
win, Texas is a hard state for a
Democrat to win in,
but the reason O'Rourke popped in the
first place, the reason he ended up on
Joe Rogan in the first place, is he is
able to talk through a kind of
progressive Christianity in a language
of morality and virtue that people found
exciting.
>> And that you didn't really hear from
Democrats anymore. And I think he was
one of the first moments and he's raised
more I think of than any Senate
candidate in the country based on this.
And I think he's one of the first
moments where you really see where the
pendulum is going to swing back to.
Because I think people are looking
around and they're seeing what it looks
like when we unleash ourselves
in a way that conforms to algorithmic
media.
And I'm not saying everybody dislikes
it. Some people feel real excited by it.
But I think most people dislike it. Even
people I know who are Trump supporters,
they don't like the way this all feels.
>> You like it in the way that you like
having a McDonald's. That at the time
it's kind of enticing, but afterwards
you feel a bit shitty. And if you have
too many of them in a row, you actually
start to reject the system a little bit.
It's interesting I was having this
conversation with Arthur Brooks
yesterday and he was saying, "The moment
that you break any kind of addictive
cycle, the first thing that you have to
do, at least following evidence for a
broad range of aggregated addictions, is
you have to get mad."
You have to be angry at the thing. Like,
"I'm sick of being at the mercy of this
thing. I'm sick of being at the mercy of
porn. I'm sick of being at the mercy of
drugs. I'm sick of being at the mercy of
alcohol. Sick of being at the mercy of
scrolling on my phone." Getting mad is a
really effective first step. And I
wonder at what point that people just
get bored. Like cuz this is
evolutionary arms race of like
bullshittery that keeps on happening
online. Like now, if the Democrats tweet
shut up you ugly [ __ ] again, it gets a
tenth as much attention that we've
already seen it.
>> Yeah.
>> So unless you're going to continue to
play that game, okay, well what's new?
Well, what's new is the equivalent of a
a sundress and a cake. Right? You know
what I mean? Like it's something that
feels a little bit more kind of
vestigial.
>> I I feel like there's been a move and
again, you don't see any of that tweet
set where we're we're using as our text
here.
A rich text if spare.
I already think there's a to towards
something sunnier.
I mean, if you had to use one word to
describe the aesthetic of Mamdani, it's
sunny.
You can say a lot of other things about
him, right? And people disagree with
him, and you know, you everybody can
have their arguments about what he
believes.
You never saw that guy without a smile.
>> Mhm.
>> He didn't I mean, if you ever just
looked at the Mamdani smile, it's like
Trump had this scowl. Even in his second
presidential portrait, this is not me
ragging on him. He has a portrait in
which he's scowling. It's a very unusual
portrait. It's this kind of like looking
down.
>> And Mamdani the smile and I Guardar had
this great piece in his sub stack the
ink about like the red Mamdani smile as
rhetoric.
And Telerico
Mamdani you start to see something new
working.
And of course, it will only work for so
long, and we'll see where it goes. It's
not the only thing working. But that
Steven Miller, the Democrats exchange
it sucks, right? Like who who wants to
feel that way?
>> No one.
>> And so, that's a it's a way in, not a
way out.
And I do think the winning move in
politics in the next couple years is
going to be
the way out, not the way in.
>> At best, it's a sort of gleeful dancing
over somebody else. Like done
in the same way as
two bullies fighting against each other
kind of take a degree of satisfaction
from having a pop. It's not
Yeah, it it it's not sunny. It's it's
performing sunniness, right? I care less
about what you think of me. Oh, no,
actually we care even less about what
you think of us than you think that we
do.
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