An explicitly illiberal project built on the delusion of achieving permanent political and ideological dominance. Politicize everything. Deploy lawfare against your political rivals (and anyone standing too close to them). Purge dissent. Expand executive power, even at the expense of constitutional fidelity. And most importantly, assume (against all reason) that once seized, power will remain safely in your hands — and that if it somehow slips away, your enemies will suddenly rediscover restraint. It’s an astoundingly shortsighted and tragically common form of self-deception: the belief that you can normalize abuses without eventually being consumed by them. *** The rhetoric is almost comically bellicose (the ⚔️ emoji radiates *scrawny theater kid who always dreamed of making the varsity football squad* energy), but bravado isn’t strength. And delusions of grandeur are not a strategy. The Trump administration isn’t just embracing this approach — it’s already demonstrating how incoherent and self-defeating it is in practice. These aren’t “new tactics.” It’s a clumsy retread of old, doomed ideas — the kind that leave you weaker than when you started. “Get ready.” Diabolically cringe. Classical liberalism isn’t magic. It doesn’t defend or renew itself. Every generation must relearn why it matters — and fight to safeguard it against threats foreign and domestic, and perhaps especially domestic. Whatever its defects, I prefer classical liberalism to Rufo’s prescription. He is part of the problem. Been true for some time.