In July 2024, The New York Times sent David Brooks to interview Steve Bannon, Donald Trump’s strategist and regular right-hand man, who was about to go to jail for contempt of Congress. Brooks kept suggesting that a guy like Bannon might benefit from chatting to his political enemies, as previous eras of Republicans, like Bill Buckley, seemed willing to do. Wouldn’t that be a better strategy, Brooks asked?

Brooks: I’ve found that most people are pretty reasonable. You can have a conversation, and you’ll at least see where they’re coming from.

Bannon: I think you’re dead [expletive] wrong.

Brooks: That’s where we disagree.

Bannon: No, it’s 100 per cent disagree. What are you talking about?… We’re not looking to compromise. We’re looking to win. Now, the biggest element that Buckley had that the book Bowling Alone had, and you talk about, is the atomization of our society. There’s no civic bonding. There’s no national cohesion. There’s not even the Lions Club things that you used to have before. People tell me all the time: ‘You changed my life. I ran for the board of supervisors, and now I’m on the board of supervisors.’ They have friends that they never had met before, and they’re in a common cause, and it’s changed their life. They’re on social media. Every day, they have action they have to do.

Brooks: This was Hannah Arendt’s point that loneliness is a seedbed for authoritarianism. But you’re not about conversing with the other side, you’re just fighting with the other side.

Bannon: What do you mean, not conversing with? There’s nothing to talk about.1

I am, of course, not arguing that we should think like Steve Bannon. Indeed, on basically every issue of substance I am radically opposed to what he stands for. Nor do I agree with him on points of strategy in the narrow sense. (I am, for example, opposed to racist, conspiracy-driven attempted overthrows of the government). I am, however, struck by how precisely Bannon has identified what makes people commit to political ideas and take action, how well his movement has weaponized this insight. They have friends that they never had met before, and they’re in a common cause, and it’s changed their life… Every day, they have action they have to do.