Thought for the Day: The Party Switch

From Gerard Baker’s Wall Street Journal column today:

In not much more than a generation, virtually all the protagonists, values and identities of ideological competition have swapped places.

Not very long ago, college-educated professionals voted for Republicans in vast numbers, while blue-collar workers picked Democrats. Now a college degree is the most reliable indicator of Democratic preference; the proletariat is dependably Republican. Liberals used to be passionate defenders of free speech; now progressives seek to shut down dissent wherever they find it. The left once regarded domestic intelligence agencies as a threat to democracy and individual freedom; now they embrace them as essential weapons against their domestic adversaries, whom they accuse of “misinformation” and “sedition.” Democrats were traditionally suspicious of and hostile to big business. Now, on issue after issue—climate alarmism, “diversity,” the virtues of a borderless world—they are tightly aligned.

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