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Kim Messick

Kim Messick lives in North Carolina. His blog, Primarily Politics, is at kimmessick.wordpress.com.

A supporter of U.S President-elect Donald Trump sits with an American flag outside of Manhattan Criminal Court on January 10, 2025 in New York City. (Adam Gray/Getty Images)

It’s MAGA’s problem now

Kim Messick
US President Joe Biden delivers the State of the Union address as U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris (L) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) look on during a joint session of Congress in the U.S. Capitol House Chamber on March 1, 2022 in Washington, DC. (Saul Loeb - Pool/Getty Images)

The American crack-up: Why liberalism drives some people crazy

Kim Messick
Virginia Thomas, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito (Photo illustration by Salon/Getty Images)

The Supreme Court’s term of clear corruption and the innocence of influence

Kim Messick
Donald Trump (Jeff Malet, maletphoto.com)

The GOP’s big lie: They want us to believe Trump’s hateful rhetoric isn’t part of the conservative tradition. Don’t buy it

Kim Messick
(Reuters/Rick Wilking)

The GOP’s anti-modern rage: What Republican anger at the CNBC moderators tells us about the party

Kim Messick
(AP/Stephen B. Morton)

Donald Trump is the last whimper of the angry white man: What’s really behind his stubborn lead

Kim Messick
(AP/Danny Johnston/Chris Carlson/Photo montage by Salon)

Republicans’ private terror: Why they despise the modern American state — and embrace fanaticism

Kim Messick
(AP/Ed Reinke/Reuters/Jonathan Ernst/Photo montage by Salon)

R.I.P., American conservatism: What’s really behind the Tea Party’s barren individualism

Kim Messick
Ted Cruz, Mitch McConnell, Rand Paul (Reuters/Lucas Jackson/AP/Manuel Balce Ceneta/photo montage by Salon)

The right’s big morality puzzle: Why giving in won’t save liberals from the politics of cynicism

Kim Messick
Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, Grover Norquist (AP/Reuters/Doug Mills/Mike Theiler/Yuri Gripas/photo montage by Salon)

GOP’s paranoia and cruelty: The real lessons of the Obama presidency

Kim Messick
(AP/Chris O'meara/Cliff Owen/Reuters/Jonathan Ernst/AP/Rick Bowmer)

GOP’s moronic inferno: The real reason cranks and shills rule the party

Kim Messick
Rand and Ron Paul (Reuters/Jim Young)

Libertarians’ reality problem: How an estrangement from history yields abject failure

Kim Messick
Bobby Jindal, Rand Paul (AP/Michael Conroy/Timothy D. Easley)

GOP’s epic internal struggle: The modernists vs. libertarian fabulists

Kim Messick
George Wallace, Rand Paul (AP/Erik Schelzig)

Modern GOP is still the party of Dixie

Kim Messick
(AP/Isaac Brekken)

The conservative crackup: How the Republican Party lost its mind

Kim Messick
(AP/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

The Tea Party’s paranoid aesthetic

Kim Messick
John Boehner, Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh (AP/Susan Walsh/Stacy Bengs/Reuters/Micah Walter)

No, there isn’t a GOP civil war

Kim Messick