Murdoch, Rupert
National Review
on Buchanan
Buckley and
on Civil Rights Bill
goals of
nationalism
authoritarian
white
nativism
Nehlen, Paul
neo-Nazism
Neuhaus, Richard John
Neumann, Mark
New Deal
New Right
The New World Order (Robertson)
New York Times
news media
Alt Reality
Alt Right
echo chamber
fact checking
Obama and
social media and
Trump and
Nixon, Richard
Nixon conservative
No Child Left Behind
Nugent, Ted
nullification
Oakeshott, Michael
Obama, Barack
birtherism
conservative rhetoric about
conspiracy theories about
executive orders
Heritage Action opposition to
Limbaugh on
media coverage of
Republican resistance to
Tea Party and
Obamacare
“death panels”
opposition to
O’Donnell, Christine
online trolls
ordered liberty
O’Reilly, Bill
outrage, conservative
Palin, Sarah
Fox New and
paranoia
“The Paranoid Style in American Politics” (Hofstadter)
partisanship
in Congress
evangelical Christians and
truth and
Paul, Rand
Pelosi, Nancy
Perry, Rick
Peters, Jeremy
Petraeus, David
Phillips, Kevin
Pipes, Daniel
“pizzagate” story
policy think tanks
political divisions
Politico
PolitiFact
Pomerantsev, Peter
populism
anti-
conservatism and
rejection of
“postliterate politics”
Power Shift (Sale)
Prager, Dennis
president, as role model
presidential elections. See also 2016 presidential election
political divisions in
2012
Priebus, Reince
progressivism
propaganda
Pulse nightclub shooting
Putin, Vladimir
racism
Alt Right and
birtherism and
conservative tolerance of
conservativism and
“cuckservative” and
rhetoric
“radical conservatives”
Rand, Ayn
Rather, Dan
Reagan, Ronald
conservative media and
conservative values and
The Heritage Foundation and
immigration policy
nostalgia for
rise of
Simpson-Mazzoli Act, 1986
tax cuts
Trump and
Reaganism
“recovering liberal”
Reformicons
Reich, Robert
Reid, Harry
relativism
cultural
moral
religion. See also Christian Right
anti-Muslim sentiment
anti-Semitism
Christianity
the Right and
A Republican Looks at His Party (Larson)
Republican party
on birtherism
civil rights and
Congress and
conservatism and
government shutdown controversy
“modern Republicanism”
Obama and
the Right and
science and
spending cuts
Tea Party and
voting base
“war on women”
Rice, Susan
the Right
Alt Right and
on Clinton, H.
conservative values and
culture of intimidation
extremism of
GOP and
New Right
paranoid worldview and
reactionary
religion and
stupidity of
tensions in
The Road to Serfdom (Hayek)
Robertson, Pat
The New World Order
Rockefeller, Nelson
Romney, Mitt
Roosevelt, Franklin
Rosenberg, Yair
Rossiter, Clinton
Rothman, Noah
Roy, Avik
Rubio, Marco
Rusher, William
Ryan, Paul
Breitbart News on
conservatism
rise and fall of
Salam, Reihan
Sale, Kirkpatrick
San Bernadino shooting
Sanders, Sarah Huckabee
Sandy Hook shooting
Savage, Michael
Scam PACs, Tea Party
scorched-earth tactics
secession
September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks
conspiracy theories
sexist language
sexual harassment
Shapiro, Ben
Shapiro, Matt
Shaw, Jazz
Sherman, Gabriel
shootings
Aurora movie theater
Pulse nightclub
San Bernadino
Sandy Hook
Simpson-Mazzoli Act, 1986
Sobran, Joseph
social media. See also Facebook; Twitter
“chatbots” and
echo chamber
fake news and
Social Security
spending cuts
Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr
Somin, Ilya
Spencer, Richard
spending cuts
scorched-earth tactics
Spicer, Sean
Starbird, Kate
Stenner, Karen
The Authoritarian Dynamic
Stephens, Bret
stereotypes, of conservatives
Stone, Roger
Strassel, Kimberley
Strategic Defense Initiative
strongman
student protests
Supreme Court
Citizens United
conservative justices
Sykes, Charlie
Taft, Robert
talk radio
influence of
Trump and
Tapper, Jake
TARP. See Troubled Asset Relief Program
Tate, Mike
tax policy
Tea Party
candidates
conservative rhetoric and
demise of
Fox News and
fund-raising by
influence of
IRS targeting of
Obama and
Republican party and
rise of
Scam PACs
voting base of
de Tocqueville, Alexis
Too Dumb to Fail (Lewis)
Tracinski, Robert
traditionalism
libertarianism and
tribalism
new
power of
Trilling, Lionel
Troll Army
Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP)
Truman, Harry
Trump, Donald
Ailes and
Alt Right and
anti-intellectualism and
anti-Semit
ism and
Bannon and
birtherism
Christian Right and
conservatism and
conservative critics of
conservative media and
conservatives and
conspiracy theories and
Coulter and
critics of
culture of intimidation and
dissenting conservatives
evangelical Christians and
fake news and
Fox News and
Hannity and
immigration bans
Jones, A., and
Kelly and
the Left on
Limbaugh and
news media and
nomination of
political critics of
racism and
rationalizing
Reagan and
as role model
sexual assault controversy
talk radio and
truth and
tweets
voter ignorance and
in Wisconsin
Trumpism
anti-anti-
effects of
elitism and
threat of
TrumpXplainers
truth
partisanship and
post-truthism
subjectivity of
Trump and
what is
Twitter
anti-Semitism on
trolls
Trump on
2012 presidential election
2016 presidential election
Alt Right and
binary choice in
Christian Right and
conservatives and
fake news and
“The Flight 93 Election”
Fox News and
Limbaugh on
Wisconsin primary
Tyndall Report
United States (U.S.)
Congress
Constitution
The Unmaking of a Mayor (Buckley)
values. See also conservative values
character as
of Christian Right
Van Maren, Jonathan
veteran’s benefits
Vietnam War
voter ignorance
mainstream media and
Trump and
voting base
Democratic
Republican
Tea Party
white working-class
Walker, Scott
critics of
Wall Street Journal
Wallace, George
War on Terror
“war on women”
Washington Post
Weber, Vin
Weekly Standard
Wehner, Peter
Weigel, Dave
Weiner, Greg
Weisman, Jonathan
Welch, Robert
Wessel, Steve
West, Allen
White, Paula
“white genocide”
white nationalism
white working-class voters
Why the Right Went Wrong (Dionne)
Will, George
on Bush, G. W.
Williamson, Kevin
Wilson, Rick
Wisconsin
Trump in
2016 presidential election primary
Walker and
WND. See World Net Daily
Wolfson, Howard
Woodruff, Betsy
World Net Daily (WND)
xenophobia
Yiannopoulos, Milo
Ziegler, John
ALSO BY CHARLES J. SYKES
Fail U: The False Promise of Higher Education
A Nation of Moochers: America’s Addiction to Getting Something for Nothing
50 Rules Kids Won’t Learn in School
The End of Privacy: Personal Rights in the Surveillance Society
Dumbing Down Our Kids: Why America’s Children Feel Good About Themselves but Can’t Read, Write, or Add
A Nation of Victims: The Decline of the American Character
The Hollow Men: Politics and Corruption in Higher Education
ProfScam: Professors and the Demise of Higher Education
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Charles J. Sykes is the author of eight books on current affairs and education, including Fail U., A Nation of Victims, and ProfScam. He has written pieces for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Time.com, among others. A longtime host of the #1 conservative talk-radio show in Wisconsin, he resigned from that position and is now a regular contributor to MSNBC, NPR, and other media. He lives in Wisconsin. You can sign up for email updates here.
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Epigraphs
Introduction
I. HOW THE RIGHT LOST ITS MIND
1. Did We Create This Monster?
2. Confessions of a Recovering Liberal
3. The Attack on the Conservative Mind
4. The Conservative Idea
5. Storm Warnings
6. The Perpetual Outrage Machine
II. THE POST-TRUTH POLITICS OF THE RIGHT
7. The Alt Reality Media
8. The Post-Truth Politics of the Right
9. Drudge and the Politics of Paranoia
III. THE TRUMPIAN TAKEOVER
10. The Fox News Primary
11. Limbaugh’s Flop
12. The Bigots Among Us
13. The Rise of the Alt Right
14. The Binary Choice
15. What Happened to the Christians?
IV. RESTORING THE CONSERVATIVE MIND
16. Trolls and Flying Monkeys: The Right’s New Culture of Intimidation
17. The Contrarian Conservative
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
Also by Charles J. Sykes
About the Author
Copyright
HOW THE RIGHT LOST ITS MIND. Copyright © 2017 by Charles J. Sykes. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Rob Grom
Cover photograph © Alan Robles Photography/Shutterstock.com
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Names: Sykes, Charles J., 1954– author.
Title: How the right lost its mind / Charles J. Sykes.
Description: New York: St. Martin’s Press, [2017] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017018870 | ISBN 9781250147172 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781250147219 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Conservatism—United States. | Right and left (Political science)—United States. | Political culture—United States. | United States—Politics and government.
Classification: LCC JC573.2.U6 S95 2017 | DDC 320.520973—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017018870
e-ISBN 9781250147219
Our ebooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by email at [email protected].
First Edition: October 2017
* Headlines captured the shift: Washington Post: “As Trumpism Coopts CPAC, the Reagan Era Ends”; Los Angeles Times: “Trump’s Popularity at CPAC Gathering, Which He Shunned a Year Ago, Shows How He’s Conquered Conservatives”; Yahoo News: “Trumpism Versus Conservatism at CPAC�
��; New York Times: “Big Tent or Circus Tent? A Conservative Identity Crisis in the Trump Era.”
* In the wake of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, Kimberley Strassel describes how the Left targeted conservative activists, moving “to harass and scare and shame opponents out of speaking.… They called out conservative donors by name, making them targets of a vast and threatening federal bureaucracy.… Liberal activists took to the streets—to urinate on houses, and block the entrances to stores. They left threatening telephone messages, and delivered ugly e-mails, and got people fired from their jobs for holding unpopular political views.” (Kimberley Strassel, The Intimidation Game: How the Left Is Silencing Free Speech (New York: Hachette Book Group, 2016), x–xi.)
* “He said in a series of interviews that he does not need to read extensively because he reaches the right decisions ‘with very little knowledge other than the knowledge I [already] had, plus the words ‘common sense,’ because I have a lot of common sense and I have a lot of business ability.” —Marc Fisher, “Donald Trump Doesn’t Read Much. Being President Probably Wouldn’t Change That” Washington Post, July 17, 2016.
* “Not every conservative media outlet was shuttering operation at the end of the 1970s. But as the New Right, the religious right, and Reaganites were gathering steam, conservative media were losing it—crippled by shrinking budgets, tragic losses, and a sense of aimlessness. A conservative resurgence was coming, but they would not be at its helm. For the generation of conservative media activists who had built the movement, it seemed the time for media leadership was over.” —Nicole Hemmer, Messengers of the Right, 251.
* One activist wrote an email to the grandmotherly cochairman of the legislature’s Joint Finance Committee that read:
To Soon to be ex-Senator Darling:
Instead of cajoling you to change your mind, I’m just going to tell you what you are: you’re a useless f**king c*nt that has no redeeming value. There are not enough words to describe how much I hate you and the rest of the f**king scum in the Wisconsin GOP.
You’re parasites and you contribute nothing. Enjoy getting recalled you useless f**king dried up c*nt. (www.maciverinstitute.com/2011/06/notoriously-profane-emailer-had-struck-earlier/.)
* This was, unfortunately, illustrated in several pre-Trump senate races. In Missouri, senate candidate Todd Akin’s bizarre notions about “legitimate rape” provided unnecessary fuel to the Left’s claim that the GOP was waging a “war on women.” Indiana senate candidate Richard Mourdock’s comment that pregnancy from rape was “something that God intended” simply made things worse. Both Akin and Mourdock were widely criticized by other Republicans, but both had enough support to remain in the race and go down to defeat. In 2012, the GOP ended up losing Senate seats in an election in which it was expected to gain several seats and perhaps even take control of the upper chamber.
Two years earlier, Delaware’s Christine O’Donnell became a punch line, and Nevada’s Sharron Angle squandered a chance to unseat the eminently beatable Harry Reid. As unfair as much of the criticism was—and much of it was quite unfair—Angle made it easy to characterize her as ridiculous with her position on the fluoridation of water and support for Church of Scientology–run Criminon drug-treatment programs. Then there was Michele Bachmann, who briefly led the pack of GOP presidential contenders until she shared her internet-gleaned wisdom about the dangers of a vaccine for human papillomavirus (HPV). Her unsubstantiated claim that the vaccine was linked to mental retardation reinforced the narrative that Republicans were hostile to science.
How the Right Lost Its Mind Page 27
