Anchor Theory: Why Democrats Sprint Left

I think I know why. Talk me out of it.

Democrats are racing left, sprinting faster and faster toward abject authoritarian idiocy. Democratic socialists are defeating old Democrats in Congress and governing our big cities to death, and the DSA now offers an explicitly post-capitalist future in which everything is “free,” the one thing that resources can’t actually ever be:

You have no debt. You don’t need health insurance. You don’t pay a mortgage or have a landlord, because comfortable housing is a human right. Your retirement is publicly funded. Food, education, energy, medicine, and transportation aren’t for-profit businesses; they are common goods and utilities.

You get as much food, energy, and everything else as you feel that you need, and labor is no longer imposed on anyone. Should work well.

Meanwhile, after years of dire warnings that Evil Trump doesn’t respect our Constitution, here’s an actual headline today from one of the mindless institutions of the Democratic Party’s narrative-making apparatus:

They also propose the replacement of the Supreme Court, the restructuring of the presidency, and the elimination of the Electoral College, but other than that they’re really mad that Trump doesn’t respect our political norms. Trump is very bad, because he’s tearing down our political system, and also we demand the destruction of our political system.

Why are they moving left, moving left, and then moving left some more? Why doesn’t anything ever hold them in check?

Because there’s no anchor on the right to hold the left anywhere near the center. There’s no force in American politics pulling consistently and effectively in the other direction. They’re unopposed and unanchored, so nothing holds them. Mixing metaphors, it’s like gravity ceased to exist, so the moon is floating away. Political centering is the product of a contest. Bad ideas are punished and rejected through debate. And we increasingly don’t have that. Here’s a Republican congressman bragging about getting his measure passed to make home repairs a federally funded giveaway:

Congressman Troy Downing@RepTroyDowning

Flew back to Washington for a busy week, and the House just passed the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act. ✅ This bill includes my Whole-Home Repairs Act and takes important steps to expand housing opportunities for Montana families. Now, let’s get it to the President’s desk.

11:30 PM · Jun 23, 2026 · 889 Views

7 Replies · 4 Reposts · 15 Likes

Democrats think the federal government should just give you whatever you need as a government handout, while Republicans think the federal government should, how can I put this, just give you whatever you need as a government handout. Your bathroom faucet broke? Don’t worry, that’s a federal program.

Meanwhile, while Democrats demand the abolition of the Senate, the Supreme Court, the Electoral College, and private property, prominent Republicans are theatrically angry at…Donald Trump.

It’s all they know how to do. Trump Trump Trump Trump Trump, they explained.

yOU hAvE tO gIvE aWAy mOrE frEE moNeY, Republicans explain, offering the conservative counterbalance to leftist ideology.

The derangement of American political discourse by personality obsession, by the Trump Trump Trump Trump Trumping of the “news,” is eliminating the checks and balances implied by the presence of normal debate. No matter how far Democrats swing to the left, Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski and John Cornyn and a bunch of other elected idiots, not to mention the Never-Trump precincts in media like The Bulwark and the repulsive human tapeworm that calls itself David French, will wake up in the morning and rail against the Republican president. They’ve abandoned their role in a balancing discourse. They’ve siphoned off the contest.

• Democrats: We need single-payer healthcare and a government housing guarantee for all Americans without regard to what they earn by working!

• Republican Response: How dare Trump take away endless free money for Africa, and we need a federal program to pay for your routine home repairs.

No one is on the other side.

You’ve seen this image a thousand times:

If it was accurate, the figure on the right would drift steadily to the left as the figure on the left races leftward. The whole image would shift. “Conservative Republicans” are basically Harry Truman, now, and Democrats are boarding the train for Finland Station. The left is racing farther left because it isn’t checked by an opposing force.

“Tell me how this ends.”