Author and historian Rick Perlstein is a seismologist of the chaotic American political landscape. His four volumes on the rise of modern conservatism have traced our cultural fault lines from the failed Republican presidential bid of Barry Goldwater in the 1960s to the success of Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. Over the past two decades the fifty-two-year-old has become a prominent chronicler of America’s rightward shift, charting the tectonic movements beneath the surface to show how today’s political divisions are the unmistakable aftershocks of earthquakes long ago.
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The Sun Interview
The Elephant In The Room
Rick Perlstein On The Evolution Of The American Conservative Movement
Correspondence
Rick Perlstein conflates conservatives with white identity politics and the KKK; describes them as paranoid, reactionary, and racist; and defines conservatism as a “political movement designed to uphold hierarchies and authority.” I wonder if he’s ever talked with any genuine conservatives.
The ones I know advocate for free speech and academic freedom, operate small businesses that are the backbone of the American economy, and judge people by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. I was raised by liberal Kennedy Democrats but walked away from the party because many Democrats indulge in the kind of unfair discourse exemplified by Perlstein.
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