The Realignment: Is the U.S. on the Path to Civil Conflict, Reformation, or Dissolution?
Starting of 2022 with a bang: new episode, episode summary, and more...
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Welcome Back to The Realignment
Happy New Year everyone. With today’s episode on Stephen Marche’s prediction that the U.S. is on the path to a new civil war, we clearly decided to launch with a bang.
Saagar and I are nearing our third year of The Realignment. The show’s consistently gotten better since we launched in summer 2019. I’m 100% certain that we’ll be able to look back at this time next year and say the exact same thing.
With that said, this show only gets better if the audience sends their thoughts and about what is (and isn’t) working. Reply to this email, comment below, or send thoughts to realignmentpod@gmail.com.
We’re also adding a new feature to the newsletter. A few months ago, Aaron Visser wrote in with thoughts on the show. If you haven’t read his critique/suggestions yet, read them here. We’re excited to announce he’s joined the team. One of his main duties is helping us with questions and prep. From now, we’ll attach what he’s produced underneath that week’s episodes. See below for his thoughts/review/summary of Stephen Marche’s book.
Expanded Thoughts on Talk of Civil War + Audience Reaction Request
A commenter on YouTube today said they appreciated me and Saagar discussing our reaction to the episode. As per another audience member’s suggestion, we’re working on tightening up our intros, so aside from maybe attaching commentary to the end of each episode, we’ll add additional thoughts here.
I (Marshall), really enjoyed this episode. Initially, I was reluctant because like Saagar, I’m usually put off by loose talk of civil war, national divorce, and general secessionist talk on Twitter. With that in mind, the second half of the episode’s much stronger than the first, as we moved beyond a pretty obvious and frankly unproductive literal debate about whether the U.S. could ever truly have a civil war.
The second half of the conversation focused on several ideas though that are worth expanding on:
To Stephen’s point, there has literally never been a state/country that’s lasted forever. So it’s worth considering how the U.S. as we conceive it could come to an end.
Another useful point from Stephen is that the story of nations and empires since 1945 has been one of decentralization/dissolution. Countries have consistently split along ethnic/religious/political divides, so rather than dismissing the prospect, we should ask ourselves what prevents the U.S. from being subject to the same forces.
I particularly enjoyed our conversation about the importance of national myths/stories, and how it’s pretty clear that the U.S. is increasingly losing that feature. I’m curious whether audience members agree with that point or not? If you agree, what could a 21st-century story look like?
Despite the disagreement at the start of the episode, we all agree that this “version” of the U.S. is coming to an end. The question we’re interested in is what exactly takes its place. As Stephen pointed out, there’s a weakness to the metaphor, but I still think the French example of a 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th Republic as a useful example.
Lastly, it’s worth pulling out the point that there are modern nations such as the United Kingdom that’ve resisted dissolution. It is worth diving further into that topic.
Overall, I realize Stephen needs to sell books, but the civil war frame distracts from an actually interesting and useful conversation around the forces pulling apart nations since the end of World War Two. Leave your thoughts below.
This Week’s Episode
Episode 189: Stephen Marche: Is the U.S. on the Path to Dissolution?
Stephen’s Writing/Interviews
How Ivy League Elites Turned Against Democracy The Atlantic 1/5/2022
Secession Might Seem Like the Lesser of Two Evils. It’s Also the Less Likely The Washington Post 12/31/2021
Q&A: Does Stephen Marche Know How America Will End? Washingtonian 12/30/2021
Aaron’s Review/Summary
Unfortunately, the qualities that make good speculative nonfiction also make good fiction. This is because they have the same goal: bringing the reader into a world and holding them there. They both strive for realism. I don’t know whether I found The Next Civil War convincing as a work of dire prediction or fiction. Its author, Stephen Marche, is also an acclaimed novelist and he views the fine line between fiction and nonfiction as a dare. In five separate sections Marche envisions different scenarios designed to test the cohesion of the country: a militia standoff, a presidential assassination, climate diaster, domestic insurrection, and finally full succession. He blends them with quotations from experts, headlines, and average Americans. The events described are crazy and provocative: perhaps intentionally so. Marche works best when he’s raising questions, causing you to do the thinking.
Often its speculative nature confirms its own thesis. Most of Marche’s evidence for the future civil war is the fact that everyone feels like there’s going to be a civil war: citing conservatives advocating for violence and violent action. Yet none of the evidence is as compelling as the existence of the book itself, one that serves as a worst case scenario, but also a liberal fantasy. Marche uses his Canadian nationality to recuse himself from bias, but I can’t help but feel that he too or at least his audience enjoys concocting a scenario where the guns finally can come out for the conservatives. Whether it was his intention or not, I feel Marche has forged something powerful, less in the text itself than what the response to it reveals. It’s like a New York Times comment section in an article about a Conservative advocating for succession: “Isn’t that guy (Ted Cruz, it’s usually Ted Cruz) crazy to advocate for succession, but I sure would love to live in an America without those red states.” Look in any online comment section in a review for this book and you’ll find that same sentiment of succession for me and not for ye.
However, it takes two to tango and Marche is correct to focus on the Right as the future culprit for any political violence. Belief in institutions is still high on the Left and violent tendencies are lower. Marche details the high levels of extreme right violence over the last few years and the multitude of anti government paramilitary groups. The events on January 6th speak for themselves. More disturbing is the depth of support for the insurrectionists and the cause they acted for. By any poll, Republican belief in illegitimacy of Biden’s election is overwhelming and this naturally finds its expression in politicians. January 6th was chosen for the insurrection because it was the day that congressmen and Senators were voting to overturn valid election results. Even those who do not partake in Stop the Steal ignore or downplay the events of that day. Tucker Carlson’s television event Patriot Purge is the most prominent example, where the narrative of rioters trying to overturn the election is replaced is one where the Deep State cracks down on American patriots. Republicans aren’t a monolith who take marching orders from Tucker Carlson (many aren’t even registered Republicans), but all this together faith shows our crumbling faith in our institutions, the largest of which is the country itself.
This book does not contain the obligatory chapter on solutions, choosing to only raise bleak questions with bleaker answers. The Next Civil War is a welcome addition to the growing End of America? cannon, which in our hyper partisan world has been relegated only for the The-Daily-Listening-New-Yorker-Totebag-Carrying-Double-Masking. However, besides the obvious comparisons, The Next Civil War reminded me of Stephen King’s The Stand, which depicted a cataclysmic pandemic.The wasteland of The Stand never came to pass of course, but as we’ve learned during Covid, better than the apocalypse is still bad. The ship of our political system is being ripped apart by partisan winds and even if we avoid Civil War, we should all wish to sail to calmer waters.
The Realignment Bookshop
The Realignment’s Books of the Year 2021
Here’s a brief selection of some of our favorite books.
The Age of Acrimony: How Americans Fought to Fix Their Democracy, 1865-1915
Alpha: Eddie Gallagher and the War for the Soul of the Navy Seals
Rock Me on the Water: 1974 - The Year Los Angeles Transformed Movies, Music, Television and Politics
The War That Ended Peace: The Road to 1914
Mercury Rising: John Glenn, John Kennedy, and the New Battleground of the Cold War
As a reminder, we’ve created a Realignment Bookshop affiliate store showcasing books by guests, what we’re actively reading this year, and deeper dives into the featured topic of an episode.
If you purchase a book using our link, the show gets a 10% commission, a local, independent bookseller gets support, and you get an awesome book!
We’re reorganizing our book lists over the next few weeks, so for now, check out our primary one:
Books by Realignment Guests
Let us know what you think about this or any other week’s episodes. Please share The Realignment with anyone who’d enjoy the podcast.
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The whole long intros thing has come up multiple times over the last month and I have to say that I don't mind the intros at all. It's one of the few opportunities we have to hear your thoughts about the issue at hand without the restrictions of the interview format or the time limit.
Maybe you can put your longer or less organized thoughts at the end so they're still available but not bothering the people who like short intros.
While the critiques of many here about the guest are legitimate, I was (maybe for the first time ever) disappointed by Saagar's approach during the interview. He seemed not just skeptical and provocatively argumentative about the Civil War idea, but borderline rude, and lacking in the curiosity that he usually brings to all his guests regardless of the topic (I wish he had more skepticism about that China hawk and the anti-marijuna guy they had on) btw. In any case its unfortunate because I think if Saagar could have held his skepticism a bit and asked probing questions we would have all heard a much more interesting conversation. Marshall approached him much more effectively and respectfully.
I don't care in particular about the prediction of civil war even if that's the main thesis of the book, but about the underlying factors that he says are tearing the country apart in many ways. That's what struck me as so odd about Saagar during the interview; on Breaking Points and Realignment he is constantly hammering home the point/sounding the alarm bells that our institutions are crumbling like never before, that citizen faith in those institutions is at record lows, and polarization is at record highs. Unless I have seriously missed the major messages by them, our government is inept, corruption by corporate and media elites is profound, and there is no clear way out...so why does Saagar in this interview seem entirely unable to imagine any scenario where this leads to some awful consequences? Has the Realginment and BP not done various episodes about how the financial and mortgage crisis, bail outs, corporate greed, nepotism, corruption, wokeness-ID politics, Iraq/Afghanistan, political ineffectiveness, unfair trade deals, etc. contributed to the erosion of the Middle class, decimated working class communities, and fractured belief in American exceptionalism?
I don't see how things just sort themselves out without any major changes, and I haven't heard them argue how it just gets any better from here naturally. Again, please critique the prediction about civil war, but many of his points about where America finds itself (not a good place) are the same points frequently raised by Saagar himself. Going out on a limb here I think Saagar let his emotions get the best of him and was seriously distracted by the idea that his beloved America could ever be destroyed so entirely, he felt he had to be particularly combative about the civil war piece and missed a lot that they actually agree on about what isn't working in the country right now. Which is a lot.