David Brooks wrote an astounding column last Friday, The American Idea and Today’s GOP. He’s either incredibly ignorant or deeply deceptive. His argument is that Donald Trump and others are destroying the conservative tradition in America because it has always been forward looking. He noted that in this way it is different from conservatism in other places where it is all about holding on to the history of the place. But if that’s what American conservatives are, then what have the American liberals been doing? Have the last 250 years been a battle about how we are going to rush to the future?

There’s no way of saying, because Brooks never mentioned Democrats in that context — or liberals at all. Apparently, America is the conservative movement. That’s how he can write something like this, “From Lincoln to Reagan to Bush, the market has been embraced for being dynamic and progressive.” Yes, there’s a real continuum there from the man who headed an abolitionist party to the man who gave his first speech as the Republican nominee for president about “states’ rights” at the site of where three civil rights workers were lynched. And really, is that what the Republican Party is? Lincoln — a 120 years — Reagan — 20 yeas — Bush?!

But the big question is who exactly were the people who thought they could just take the land of native peoples because they had the power too? The ones who later committed genocide against them? And who were the ones who practiced and defended slavery? I’m not talking parties here, because obviously, over time, things get mixed up. But what movement was John Calhoun part of? Was he a liberal? A conservative? Or just someone we have to throw aside as an outlier? That last option seems to be Brooks’ choice, because he certainly doesn’t engage with it.

If we assume that modern conservatives are not the descendants of Calhoun, who are? Who are the people who fight against every change? Who are the people who think that things are just fine the way they are? Who are the people who think that it is God’s will that the poor are poor and the weak are weak? Because these are the things that Calhoun stood for — the things that he believed. Today, it would be hard to find someone who would make the same arguments for slavery. But the same arguments are being made to preserve less outrageous injustices. And unless I’m just really dense, the answer is very obviously found in the majority of the Republican Party.

I get so tired of hearing people like Brooks complaining that the conservative movement has gone off track. There are two strains of American thought that currently find themselves wedded in the Republican Party. One is the Alexander Hamilton strain of business and profits before people. Brooks mentioned him, because that’s the part that isn’t embarrassing — the part that history hasn’t completely repudiated. But the other strain is very much John Calhoun. And Brooks knows that. What’s more, he knows that without the fearful bigots, there’s no way the Republican Party would ever win an election anywhere. And if he doesn’t know that, he has no right to be printed in WorldNetDaily, much less The New York Times.

Many years ago, I was talking to a liberal friend of mine. I noted that the last two years of Bush’s presidency weren’t that bad. He seemed to have taken control from Cheney. He didn’t have control of Congress. He wasn’t good, but he was about as good as you could expect from a Republican president. And most of all: he was far better than he was the first six years. My friend did not like this at all. She started ranting about how evil Bush was and how he would run for a third term if he thought he could get away with it. And on and on.

This is a problem with all of us. I certainly fall into it myself. I assume the worst possible motives to conservatives. But I try not to. I try to remember that they really do think if we just cut taxes and regulations, then there will be jobs aplenty and it will be 1963 with June there to welcome the Beaver home from school and have dinner on the table when Hugh got home from work. Although I have to admit, the evidence against the kind of economic policy that Republicans favor is hard to justify. But I figure it is mostly tribal, not not that they just want to screw everyone but the rich.

But this attitude — that a politician you don’t like has evil intent — is nowhere as big as it is for the Clintons — Hillary especially at the moment. And this isn’t just on the right. There are lots of liberals who have a hatred that can only be described as pathological. And it’s strange. I understand that Rush Limbaugh thinks that the Clintons dress up in black robs and ritually torture infants to death in their secret underground lair; and then Hillary bathes in the blood to stay young. But he’s a demagogue.

The complaint from the liberal and “moderate” side seems to be that the Clintons are fake. But I actually think this is totally wrong. When Bill Clinton was first elected president, I was a libertarian. But I was amazed that people had such a problem with him. It seemed to me that the complaints about him being “slick” were just the complaints of losers that the winner was really good at what he does. If sprinters were as petty as these people, they would complain that Usain Bolt was “slick.”

Let’s face it: all politicians are fake to one degree or another. That’s what you get when you make politics into a “beauty” pageant. But in the case of the Clintons, there seems to be some very twisted logic. Bill Clinton was attacked explicitly because he seemed authentic, “I feel your pain.” But to the professional pundit, the more authentic someone seems, the less authentic they must be. That’s certainly what seems to be going on with Ron Fournier — the man who always finds the truth exactly halfway between the two parties and almost always finds them equally to blame for everything. Except when it comes to anyone named Clinton. He claims that, “The email scandal is a distraction from the important work of the Democratic Party.” As though it isn’t exactly him and like minded individuals who continue to push this fake scandal.

Kevin Drum wrote an excellent retort, If You Accuse Hillary Clinton of Lying, You Should Be Careful With the Truth Yourself. It turns out that everything that Fournier is complaining about is either wrong or misleading. The details don’t actually matter (but click over if you are interested). As Drum said, “It’s been months now, and there’s simply no evidence of anything other than unwise email practices and an unfortunate but instinctive defensiveness from Clinton over trivial matters.”

But Fournier and others know there must be something there. There must be, because it is Hillary Clinton. My take away from the Starr Report in 1998 was that the Clintons had to be the most honest politicians in the history of the world. And here’s the thing: that’s what a reasonably rational and objective person concludes. But people like Ron Fournier are basically conspiracy theorists: they’ve decided that there is “something” there and they will never believe anything else because there is no way to prove a negative. Fournier could be obsessed with finding that teapot that might be orbiting the Sun somewhere in space between the Earth and Mars. But instead, he’s obsessed with the malfeasance that he “knows” Hillary Clinton must be involved in.

See also: Centrist Solutions Lead to Right Wing Extremism.

Well, Donald Trump has a new tax plan out that he claims “is going to cost me a fortune.” And apparently, a lot of news outlets are buying that, because hey, it’s easier to just listen to him than it is look at the tax plan. But even looking at the bullet points shows what a sham it is. He’s lowering everyone’s tax rate. Well, that won’t work. And then he says individuals making less than $25,000 per year will pay no taxes — but most of them already don’t. But the crowning achievement in the plan is that it eliminates the estate tax.

Think about that for a moment. No one even argues that the estate estate tax limits investment. So why is it even part of this plan? And under current law, there is no estate tax when money is transferred between spouses. And there is no estate tax on amounts given to individuals up to $5 million. So this change is not meant to help the rich; it is meant to help the super rich; it is meant to help people like him. His line that it “is going to cost me a fortune” is so much nonsense, and it is outrageous that we have such an incompetent press that it reports this stuff seriously.

Luckily, there are people who actually look at the policy. CNN did a pretty good job of summing up what some of those people had to say, Donald Trump Unveils Plan to Slash Taxes for the Poor — and the Wealthy. For example, according to the Tax Policy Center, this year, 45% of Americans will own no Federal income taxes. All Trump’s plan does is push that number up to about 50%. Alan Cole of the Tax Foundation said, “Some of what Mr Trump has done in his press conference is just sell us on one of the better features of what our income tax already does.”

But the biggest news is that the top tax rate would go down from just shy of 40% to 25%. As Donald Trump might say: that’s huge. What’s more, he wants to get rid of the alternative minimum tax. And he wants to cut the capital gains tax rate. That’s always presented as a way to spur investment, but it’s done to decrease the taxes on the very richest people. There are better ways to encourage actual investment, but people like Trump aren’t interested in that.

Dylan Matthews put together, Donald Trump’s Massive Tax Cut for the Top 1 Percent, in One Chart. You may remember recently I wrote, The Narrative of Jeb Bush’s Tax Cut Plan. It was one of a couple of articles I wrote about how Bush’s tax plan is a huge tax cut for the rich. Well, as you will see, Trump’s “populist” tax cut, is far worse:

Yes, Trump’s tax cut does provide more to benefit to those at the lowest levels of the economy — but not much more. And it totally explodes at the top — exactly where tax cuts are unnecessary. The people are the top have been doing great since 2008. It’s not the upper class — much the less the top 1% — that needs help. Here’s how the numbers break down. Those in the lower class (lowest quintile), would get less than 2% of their yearly income in tax breaks. The middle class would get 5%. And the top 1% would get a bit more than 10%. Progressive tax cuts!

One of the better moments at the last debate was when Trump told Carson that we have always had progressive income taxes and that it isn’t socialism. But when it comes down to it, Trump’s tax plan is regressive — making the tax system less progressive. Almost 70% of the tax cuts go to the upper class (top quintile). Republicans just can’t help it. They can’t seem to think any other way about these kinds of things. But that doesn’t mean we have to believe their rhetoric.

Over at Vox last week, Dylan Matthews wrote a great article, The Case Against Equality of Opportunity. It’s somewhat long, but I recommend reading it. He showed that “equality of opportunity” is just not possible. This should be understood by everyone at this point. We simply don’t have the kind of society that would say to rich people, “You can’t spend your money on your kids!” And that is what it would take. In fact, we don’t even have the kind of society that provides equal funding for all children in public school. Even that kind of “equality of opportunity” is a bridge too far.

But the meat of Matthews’ article is that we shouldn’t want equality of opportunity. His quote of Thomas Nagel sums up the point, “When racial and sexual injustice have been reduced, we shall still be left with the great injustice of the smart and the dumb, who are so differently rewarded for comparable effort.” Take it to extremes: do we provide the same “opportunity” to get ahead to a child born without arms and legs as we do to other children? It’s a ridiculous notion when put in such stark terms, but that’s what we are saying. It just isn’t as obvious because someone who is intellectually slow would probably struggle through life. But that’s hardly fair.

The problem is both genetic and environmental. People who have a natural gift for trading stocks are more likely to have children with a similar gift. And, as Matthews pointed out, “We know, for example, that lead paint is more prevalent in poor neighborhoods. We also know that lead poisoning hurts children’s IQs, their ability to pay attention, and their school achievement, and that its effects on cognition last through adulthood.” Offering such children “equality of opportunity” is obviously just a sick joke.

But a sick joke is exactly what many conservatives would like to offer. A couple of years ago, reformish Republican Avik Roy wrote an article where he laid out what Republicans mean by “equality of opportunity.” And it was truly vile. According to him, equality of opportunity means only the lack of explicit laws. So as long as there were no laws stopping African Americans from having certain jobs, there was equality of opportunity. Note what’s happened here. First, Republicans said they believed in equality. Then it was equality of opportunity. Then even that “reformer” Avik Roy defines out of existence.

When we liberals talk about equality, we aren’t requesting that everyone have the same thing — all that Harrison Bergeron nonsense. The funny thing is that not even the communist countries pretended to have that. All we are really talking about is the safety net. The truth is that we are far too wealthy a country not to provide a basic level of care to our citizens. I would go far beyond that. Since I’m no fan of the idea of “free will,” I believe in great limits to how far one can rise economically. But we are at a point where we still have to argue about whether poor children should be given school lunches.

Matthews’ main point is directed at liberals. He pointed out that we want people’s lives to be better, “The desire isn’t egalitarian, but humanitarian.” And that means we care about outcomes. To me, the politics of this are pretty simple. And it goes back to what I’ve long been saying about how the New Democrats destroyed America. The Republicans and the Democrats talk about “equality of opportunity.” But it is meaningless. It is just a way of avoiding doing those things that would improve the lives of the ever increasing share of Americans who are struggling. The fact that the numbers are increasing should be all that we care about.