NY Times should look across the Hudson, not across the Atlantic

Responding the gloominess of recent posts, I thought I’d try a piece that’s more optimistic about Europe, if not about the US. It’s a mashup of a couple of recent Substack newsletters. The New York Times has a thumb-sucker about the rise of the European far right, which would greatly mislead anyone not up with the facts. The picture is one of inexorable advance, citing parties such as “the Party for Freedom of Geert Wilders in the Netherlands, the Sweden Democrats and the Reform U.K. party of Nigel Farage.” The New York Times doesn’t mention that: The right-wing coalition of which Wilders was part collapsed when he withdrew support and lost the subsequent election. Wilders’ party split and is competing with two other far-right parties, also in opposition. The right-wing Swedish coalition, which had promised the Sweden Democrats a role, was defeated at the recent election, with the SD vote declining. Farage’s Reform party has also split, and Farage himself is now massively unpopular.…