I think that Vance is preferable because he is a little pig man, to quite Jamelle Bouie. He is a deeply online freak who is capable of cosplaying reasonable to the kind of coastal elites who created him but incapable of appealing to the low info reprobates Trump depends on.

I mean I completely agree that Vance is the aspiring tyrant who's easier to beat (touch wood) but the last sentence from Jain here is pretty clearly "no YALE man would be a TYRANT"

Oh totally. Thing is Trump has already given the Nazis power. I don’t see much policy difference between Trump 2.0 and Vance.

oh yeah not one inch

A few inches, but none closer to the light. I don't think he's at all invested in the tariff otaku shenanigans but I also think he'd be a lot more hands on with the immigration stuff where Trump agrees in principle but doesn't really care about the details.

and like I don't know how you can be reading beyond the headlines today without noticing that something like 90% of the ideological anti-democracy anti-republicanism cabal are Ivy League fucks

At some point, you have to assume that they're on board with his Nazism

“Unwilling”

Vance solidifies the rule of the Technocrats

I think Vance is probably less willing to do the insane announce a new tariff every day, but will probably also try banning birth control and talk about a need to return to the realization that women are the country's breeding stock

OMG

It's funny that Vance's own law school roommate has publicly called him "dangerous" and his classmates launched a special fundraiser to defeat him, but the American elites who *don't* personally know him are still like "hm, Yale Law, how bad could he be?"

We can just call him three Ted Cruzes in a trenchcoat and they'll get it

imagine thinking "is smarter" is a good thing!

Every crank that tries to Moneyball politics eventually thinks they’re a pundit.

Jain really should spend more time with right post-liberal converts.

IDK. The question is not is Vance bad or worse, the question is will he get the same support ? Will he be able to *do* worse things. Will SCOTUS carve out special rules for him? Will Congress (and the Dems) cower in fear of a nickname from Vance? Will the media sane wash his ideas? I think no.

It's correct that Vance is less scary than Trump, but basically not for lack of trying

JD Vance's RNC speech was quite literally just the 14 words

This Feb. JD said the European Unions censorship of the far right and electoral firewalls keeping the far-right out of power was a greater threat to the continent than Russia.

Tbf this is the same blind memory-hole-ing they did with trump, and it will predictably have the same results

CS may not be preparation for political wisdom.

I actually think Vance is much more committed to his illiberalism than Trump. He’s repeatedly discussed how they need to ignore the Judicial branch.

He knows he is hated and will push things through forcefully without support. I bet there's a higher likelihood the right wing rises up to fight for Constitutional protections for rights against him when he does so, than under Trump. I think Vance is incredibly dangerous and destabilizing.

his positions are just as bad as trump, if not worse, but he would still be better for america because he has the charisma of the falling waffle and therefore could not even begin to hold together trump's coalition.

it sadly loses something in gif form, being deprived of the pitiful plop sound.

What would you recommend as a general reading on Vance?

Vallier’s book too

I really like Vallier's other work - should check this out.

www.cnn.com/2025/02/14/e... I think this CNN report on JD's speech to the EU is pretty revealing. Calls European censorship of the far right a greater threat to the continent than Russia and compared it to Soviet restrictions on speech during the Cold War

defends a mans right to burn Korans in public, takes a hard line agaisnt the political firewalls keeping the far-right of government in many European capitals and also liberal immigrarion policy in Europe, follows it up with a meeting with the head of Germany's AfD.

I think it's a bit hard to navigate because there is a lot of stuff that basically reads as fan fiction to me. (For example, I sort of doubt that Curtis Yarvin is particularly important to JD Vance? I think Yarvin sort of tries to sell himself as being influential and that people shouldn't buy it).

Yarvin has been cited by the VP and is a close friend of the VPs greatest benefactor.

I'd generally agree on the Yarvin point, but Vance is an odd character because he seems to actually do the reading and unlike the more Trumpian fascists may buy into a lot more of the obscure output of the Claremonters and others.

Vance seems like such a flim flam man, I can believe that Vance gives a lot of people an impression that they are highly influential to him.

Which is why it is important to realize that Vance is part of a circle where it’s valuable to appear to be influenced by moldbug

A circle where collegial disagreement looks like “I’ve read and value moldbug, but disagree on points…”

bc yes, a lot of these people seem to disdain each other, but this doesn’t mean they don’t form an intellectual trend that Vance has tried to make himself part of. Maybe the incentives would be different if he were president, but the recent evidence is he sees these ppl as his path to influence

Vance has openly sited Yarvin (well, "moldbug") before. See www.vox.com/policy-and-p... among others

Doesn't this seem like a fairly weak connection? (And note that the context of this is an interview with Yarvin about How Important Yarvin Is)

Heck, looking at the transcript of that interview, he's saying he disagrees with Yarvin.

What Vance is suggesting is also insane.

I am not suggesting it isn't.

I understand, and you are probably correct that Yarvin’s influence is overstated, especially now. He seems like something of a joke at this point.

He disagrees about the solution, not the diagnosis.

"It is hard to implement conservative policy given that the bureaucracy is temperamentally, if not necessarily instrumentally, libs." is not a particularly unique insight.

What kind of conservative policy is it hard to implement, exactly? Tax cuts?

Oh, you know the ones

Yes, exactly!

Anything that goes through the administrative state.

This is very explicitly a "you know the ones" situation.

If it’s not a unique insight then why would he cite an obscure blogger? (Except that he hangs out with him and is funded by the same person)

Because he is specifically saying "Here is one person's suggestion. I disagree."

Jain's main point (that Vance is not willing to take dictator actions) is very stupid as Vance was picked for VP because he was willing to say he would have ended US democracy in 2020. www.politico.com/news/2024/09...

Um we read that very differently. He is saying he agrees with him that collapse of the US is imminent and uses it as justification for the president defying the Supreme Court. He’s saying he mildly disagrees there has to be a complete collapse if you basically install a dictator.

He’s promoting Yarvin’s ideas and letting people know to read Yarvin’s “interesting perspectives” while offering a disagreement that allows him to maintain safe enough distance. Given his connections to Thiel, Thiel’s closer connections to Yarvin, it seems a ploy to get Yarvin “in the discussion”

Do you think that this is a reasonable theory? That he would name drop him once in a 90 minute podcast, and not mention him again (or at least, not more than once/year), as part of an insidious plot?

I will also concede that on its face, it’s not a reasonable theory, but the involvement of Peter Thiel can make the unreasonable sound reasonable, because he does seem to like plotting and elaboration, partly for the sake of it. Your theory makes more sense, but I can’t rule out weird plotting

Well, I see that was 2022, when there was a lot more interest in downplaying Vance’s connections to these types. This Politico article is I think fair in highlighting Vance’s loose connections, but also that Yarvin’s ideas are part of the environment Vance hangs in: www.politico.com/news/magazin...

But also, Thiel and his acolytes do love the “Straussian communication” bullshit about leaving breadcrumbs for initiates to direct them to “forbidden” ideas that the writer/speaker does not want to publicly endorse, so if anyone would actually try corny word game stuff..

Although I also concede that JD Vance is an empty suckup and might have been name-dropping for cred with the Silicon Valley types

I'm trying to find further evidence of the Vance-Yarvin connection, but alas I'm limited to google and the relevant results are all paywalled

Would you mind explaining why you think this is a weak connection? If someone said "there's this guy, Hitler, who has written about some of these things..." in support of their political vision, it would be reasonable to conclude that Hitler has noticeable influence on their political views

> in support of their political vision See my next tweet - he's specifically saying he disagrees with Yarvin.

(totally reasonable to think "The VP should not know who Yarvin is", but we also all know who Yarvin is...)

I suppose you could argue that this isn't conclusive evidence that Hitler in this analogy is *central* to that person's views, but has OP asserted Yarvin was likewise *central* to Vance's views?

Further, even if Yarvin is not *central* to Vance's views, the fact that Vance has both horrifying political beliefs and also cited Yarvin as an inspiration for those views is strong evidence of how terrible Vance is

Vance said he considers Yarvin a friend, that seems kind of important? Deneen is important to Vance as well.

Do you have a link to the friend claim? I haven't seen that (but I haven't seen lots of stuff!).

www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/04...

The last few paragraphs the author shows how Vance quotes Yarvin on podcasts and hangs out with him in public. The rest has bits and pieces of Yarvins influence on Vance.

> Vance quotes Yarvin on podcasts This is the same single incident of him being quoted that is in every other article! > hangs out with him in public This is the bit about them both waiting for cars in the lobby?

And in the beginning of the article call him a friend. I mean if you call someone a friend, you hang out with him in hotels and cite him on podcasts. While being connected to the same guy who bankrolls you, there just might be a connection

> And in the beginning of the article call him a friend. Does he? I think the author of the article says that, not Vance.

Perhaps the author is lying or slightly overstating. But Vance is familiar with his ideas enough to cite him, is funded by Thiel who is influenced by Yarvin and they hang out in the same groups.

Andreessen and Masters are also written elsewhere as saying Yarvin is a friend, my operating assumption is this was probably in group chats or messages of which a transcript hasn’t been published.

It’s written in the Politico piece attached but I haven’t been able to track down a source for it. www.politico.com/news/magazin...

It's funny that the only explicit connection that this mentions is the same podcast reference.

fwiw Yarvin has been showing up a lot more in postliberal spaces and has written for Claremont (a lot of Vance's staff - chief of staff + press sec) - originate there)

Sure! To be clear I'm not denying that there's a general milieu that they are both connected to, but that this gets oversold in a way that I think is fairly misleading.

fwiw i think Yarvin has sold himself as such too, the festival of ideas basically names him "JD Vance's Court philosopher"

Right, but to what extent is that Yarvin self promoting?

Chattering class dipshits could fill a fucking ocean with their unknown unknowns.

Unfortunately most of the pundit class will react like this because they like Republicans and Vance talks like he’s on a debate team

Or his Rockhurst Institute or his bestie Oren Cass

I just assume Jain is in the group chats

Trump never thinks about the Constitution unless its an obstacle for him. Vance actively wants to unravel what's left of it.

Vance is unwilling to do undemocratic actions??

He isn't capable of it, he doesn't have the personalist system built up around himself.

I agree that he'd be less dangerous because other politicians do not fear him, but that's not what Jain is saying.

Jain has a lot of bad takes and I'm not sure if he's entirely correct here either, but he does say basically exactly this downthread, that he's less of a threat regardless of his personal views because he does not command a cult of personality like his boss.

Fair enough, his argument may be better in full context.

"Banal point that's poorly argued" a common internet tragedy

folks say this, but i’m less convinced by the day. the GOP is a Nazi project at this point; i don’t think they’d *like* switching figureheads but i see no indication they’d actually rebel

Nazis also had a personalist system...

I do think Vance would be an improvement because no one is loyal to him, or even likes him. He would be a less effective autocrat than Trump and thus a lesser threat (though still a threat) to democracy for that reason, and that reason alone. In all other respects he’s just as bad.

Wait, what the.....? JD Vance is smarter but he will LARP sh*t. And still keep Stephen Miller running state police. Also, he floats the idea 'de-baathification' to purge government employees. There's no such thing better when someone becomes a playbook fascist instead of yelling grandpa fascist.

Idk how anybody can call Vance a “mentally stable individual” after the “have you said thank you” incident

postliberal like postfuckhead, he’s bringing it back

As abjectly vile as Vance is, he clearly has none of the unholy devil-rizz that makes half the US electorate flood their panties for Trump. And I feel like the current fascist project is basically dead in the water without that.

JD Vance has expressly said if he had been in Mike Pence's shoes he would've thrown out the 2020 election!

I mean, you gotta hand it to him. Vance would be very, very dangerous and hurt the country in many ways, but Trump is a maniac - and now completely checked out and at the mercy of Miller & co. The bar is *that* low.

He’s paid for by the same autocracy inc (& more theocracy inc!) sources that put Trump in power. The only plus is he’s got negative charisma & outrageous policies Trump’s cult is letting pass may not be as passive if he’s perceived in charged. Make no mistake, people perceive his arrogance.

BUT HE'S SMART!

Jain knows one thing, and that is that Vance never said he would defund the police

Jain he’s going to deport you/strip you have citizenship

when your only quality metric is the value of your 401K

he praises German nazis! bsky.app/profile/shar...

bsky.app/profile/shar...

In one sense Jain is correct, which is that Vance would be a better president because his only base of support would be people like Lakshya Jain

Does he not know about Pakistan? Does he think the UK is more "Islamist" than Pakistan?

"UK will be the first Islamist..." Pakistan : Am I a joke to you?

bsky.app/profile/atru...

Wrong Cheney. Her father, of course, shoulda been tried at the Hague.

bsky.app/profile/shar...

bsky.app/profile/shar...

does this sound like a guy unwilling to break democracy?

There's a lot of category confusion w people not thinking critically here. "Wouldn't publicly shitpost memes all day, skitter around like broken-wheeled bike" or "be better at Formally President-ing" can get wrongly conflated with "would be better all-around" or "less bad for liberal democracy."

"Doesn't have the juice" is the reason he'd be less bad all around.

I think that’s true! But I worry that the mysterious charisma juice is what lets Trump get elected, and Vance won’t need that part for the next three years.

Republicans won't be intimidated by Vance. The whole thing is held together by the charisma juice.

Shein Homelander

Vance is more dedicated to a specific evil agenda, but I think he's a lot less effective at pretty much everything and will end up cowed by a bunch of dork-ass senators.

Trump is part mob boss, part carney. Both excellent traits if you want to develop a cult of personality so you can get people to buy into your evil shit, even when it’s too their detriment. Vance has none of those traits so he’ll be less effective. But he’ll still be a fascist that does real damage

Yeah I think the key differentiator for Trump is that he has the power to get a member of Congress primaried and so they are scared of him — nobody is gonna be intimidated by Vance

Right, in the short term a Vance presidency is probably worse but longer term nobody actually likes him, so it’s hard to see him having the juice to keep it going Like, there’s a reason cults of personality don’t tend to have succession planning

Yeah. And like, Vance seems to back down from conflict most of the time.

I agree. Nobody will go, "Jawohl, mein Führer!" for JD the way they do for Trump.

@lakshya.splitticket.org you sure about that?

The past 11 years has shown me there's an absurd number of liberal pundits who are credulous to the point of gullibility when it comes to meeting a fascist & believing the lies they spout. Fash worked for YEARS trying to mainstream their views when all they had to do was say they'd be nice, honest!

He cannot be anything other than the exact kind of guy he rails against. It’s impressive.

insane things to say about a certified Bronze Age Mindset enjoyer

Certified BAP enjoyer? Certified ephebophiles Wop wop wop wop wop

"the hillbilly elegy guy?"

Literally the only thing that could be better about Vance is that he is so thoroughly uncharismatic and unctuous that nobody could possibly be persuaded by him to do anything

Which is huge.

Agree. That is literally the only good thing that could be said about JD Vance. That most people do not like him.

But no one should doubt that he is an 11 on the 1-10 fash scale

Lakshya is probably the poster child for how a lot of blue state libs don't have the same kind of threat assessment for the right as red/purple state ones because his frame of reference for republican governance is Arnold Schwarzenegger

It’s not that he’s from a blue state, it’s that he’s better on hard data. Politics isn’t just data, it’s about strategy, comms and individual interactions and personalities. And he clearly doesn’t understand Vance as a person.

Who, incidentally, is now in the "Trump needs to burn in the fires of hell" camp...

Its just the nature of the beast. I trust his number work near entirely though his root causing of those numbers can sometimes be a point of contention. Really, the traits that make his numbers and quant analysis are the ones that give him some blindspots to the historical nature of events were in.

In a lot of ways, Rick Santorum is as much responsible for my politics as, say, Tocqueville.

This is the actual problem with polarization.

People that think it begins & ends with Donald seem to be desperately self-soothing themselves that we can get back to "normal".

This is a big reason why having so much of party leadership being from New York for so long is a huge problem.

Vance is going to try to speed run a Catholic theocracy faster than you can say “couch fucker”

I do think Vance would try to do jan 6th if he lost but I dont think he would ever have fans that would do whatever he said or would be willing to die for him like Trump. He does not have any of the charisma or reality deflection charm that Trump has. But hes also significantly more evil than Trump.

Right I just hope he's right about the not commanding fealty part

I love what it says about Trump when Vance is "stupid" and has dumb ideas, but is smarter than Trump.

I do generally believe that JD Vance does not have the instinct to go through with putting a dog on the basketball court like Trump does. I can also believe he's juiceless enough that people won't go to bat for him like they do for Trump. But yeah not convinced he wouldn't try the conventional evils

I saw somebody the other day with a shirt that said something like "It takes a felon and a hillbilly to save America" and when that type of person finds out that Vance hates hillbillies and wants to be recognized as a Very Special Ivy League Boy, I don't think they'll like it very much.

I agree that Vance would be a better President for liberals than Trump, but it because of the chaos Trumps death will cause in the party. Essentially they are in an equilibrium state around the personal dictates of Trump the man and the minute that is gone the whole system destabilizes.

I wouldn't say Vance wouldn't be anti-democratic, he is a deeply anti-democratic ideological extremist. But I think there's truth in the point he'd be preferable to Trump in part because he's not batshit crazy and an erratic idiot, and that's where the most extreme Trump actions come from.

Vance could have done all the same fake electors and ridiculous lawsuits stuff and spreading conspiracy theories about 2020. I don't think he could have, or would have attempted to, incite a riot to attack the Capitol. That was a Trump-level deranged thing as much as it was evil ideological beliefs.

True he wouldn't have the cult of personality or the party in such lockstep. But between what Vance believes and what all Trump's current goons (including Vance!) believe, that's basically a wash on ideology. The all-around chaos from Trump being Trump is its own additional high cost on top of that.

Yes this strikes me as correct. ATM there is a ton of possible variance in outcomes that is befitting the right because of Trump's general chaos mode, if you switch suddenly to Vance the variance starts to benefit Dems more IMO. This of course may be different if Vance takes power after 2028

I do think Vance would be less effective with the anti-democratic stuff, but that’s because he has zero charisma and is incredibly unpopular. It’s not that he thinks it’s wrong.

Jain and Vance travel in the same group chats lol

Willfully ignorant. Why do folks think if someone can create an election forecast that they know shit about American politics?

What a terrible take. A Vance Presidency would involve a short period of him doing all the grifty and weird things Peter Thiel wants, until the infighting among Trump cronies and sycophants rises to some level where instead of one bad set of policies…

we’re dealing with a variety of incoherent and possibly contradictory policies. The resulting chaos would still be terrible, in potential ways we can’t even imagine yet. Plus no one knows who emerges from that vicious morass of racists and thieves.

"Dear Leader dies" is a pretty common way to kick off a democratic transition.

Lakshya is a fucking imbecile This is just ignorance on top of massive Twitter brain rot from consuming far too much right wing propaganda on the Nazi app

The fact that almost no Americans know anything about Vance or the positions he very publicly holds is yet another indictment of their utterly useless political news media

If his positions are very publicly held then isn’t the indictment of the virtueless electorate? It is a personal choice not to know anything about the vice president. More than enough info is freely available to know all we need about Vance. The electorate is the problem.

💯. The electorate here voted for legislative and financial misery for everyone else but themselves. They voted for concentration camps and ethnic cleansing. Well, a little over 1/3 did. MORE than 1/3 went 🤷 IDGAF.

I agree that he can’t command the cult.

JD Vance is a servant of Peter Thiel, which means that he is all in on the idea of turning Trump America into a loose confederacy of corporate run fiefdoms where CEOs pick the King. The one thing that makes him better is that he doesn't have Trump's ability to con the masses

He is more willing to pull off anti-democratic actions because he wants to do them for more than selfish reasons. He believes in it ideologically.