“All politics to existential conflict.” The term: “The Left” is an existential crutch. ” Who are these people. The Left. It’s an illusion. There is no such thing as the left, and any war against people who do not exist is a little silly. The left, the left, the left, right left. The divide starts with a crucial asymmetry.” As does surgery. I see it as the human behavior of charisma trolling. JFK could read a room. But we could not read him. Washington worried about power and charisma. I find nothing about humanizing political deviance as anything other than spinning plates of distracted cohorts. It uses diversion as a dimension. String Theory is quite consequential here. Which brings us to ideas of identity and perception. Douthat is right to pick at existential scabs. It’s what physicists do when they wander around explaining stuff like the Big Bang. Let us review: Conflict. Conflict does not happen in a vacuum. Goodall studied conflict and organization. It is a competition of what is there (turns into bloodsport), versus what is not there (turns into bloodsport). I know this (thank you, Jane), chimps practice politics and factions. Why. Because all the tribes hating on all the other tribes because perception shared is pouring reality through a silk screen of ideas. We have never turned swords into ploughshares. But it looks good as an idea, not as something any of us want to do. Chimps need lots of room to play. It’s called spinning. The podcasters are the gossips. The crucial asymmetry Douthat dangles is really all about faith and evolution. All of it, existential. We all cling to stereotypes to inform our second selves as to who the enemy really is.