The Roaring 2020s returns
How the fall of Kabul affects Biden, Canada's early elections, and season three of Titans
Welcome to the revamped Roaring 2020s newsletter! Apologies for the summer hiatus, but we’re back and moving forward with a slightly different setup. Each week the newsletter will cover a domestic political topic, an international election, and something in entertainment that I’ve recently enjoyed. Longer-form posts will still come out as I have time.
Politics at home: Afghanistan’s electoral effect
Far and away the biggest news story of the week has been the collapse of the government in Afghanistan in the wake of the final withdrawal of U.S. troops from the country. These events obviously have serious implications both for the people of Afghanistan and the rest of the world. But I’m not going to pretend to be a foreign policy or humanitarian aid expert and I don’t expect any Taliban-run elections anytime soon. So instead I’m going to focus on how these events might effect upcoming U.S. elections in 2022 or 2024.
The answer is almost certainly not at all. The Afghanistan withdrawal is a major story now, but there’s a good chance that it will be totally gone from the news in two months. And without Americans in the country in significant numbers, there’s no reason to expect the country to receive major American news coverage moving forward. Absent some kind of Afghanistan-based, Taliban-involved terrorist attack next year, this is basically an electoral non-story.
Looking back at a similar situation 40 years ago, President Ford didn’t suffer at all for the fall of Saigon in 1975. Gallup had his approval moving up a point in May and up another 10 points in June, though that was likely due to other events.
Similarly, President Reagan’s approval improved in the wake of the withdrawal of troops from Lebanon in 1984. Neither the 1976 election nor the 1984 election were affected by these moves one way or another.
And despite the extremely negative coverage of the withdrawal and evacuation this week, the withdrawal itself remains popular with the American public. From NBC News:
A Yahoo News poll found that 40 percent support the pullout, while 28 percent oppose it. (In July, 50 percent favored the pullout.)
A Morning Consult/Politico poll found that 49 percent support the withdrawal, while 37 percent oppose it. (In April, 69 percent backed withdrawal.)
Likely voters support the withdrawal by 51 percent to 37 percent, according to a new poll by Data for Progress, a progressive firm that has been cited by the White House.
None of this is to downplay what a tragedy these events are for the people of Afghanistan or the real implications it has for American foreign policy. But it’s just not an issue that any elections are going to be fought over.
Politics abroad: Canada’s early federal election
Liberal Party Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called an early election on Sunday, sending Canadians back to the polls in just over a month on Sept. 20. Trudeau announced that his government needed a mandate to deal with the pandemic and the economic recovery, but is widely seen as looking for a legislative majority after having led a minority government for the past two years.
In recent polling, the Liberals have had a lead on the Conservatives of anywhere from 3 to 15 points, which would likely lead to a Liberal majority government. The state of play is illuminated by the Conservative Party's opposition to calling an early election, despite it nominally giving them an opportunity to take power two years early; they even released a very strange Willy Wonka themed video criticizing Trudeau for calling an early vote. (Update: the video was taken down by Twitter after a copyright claim, but you can see a screenshot and description here.)
However, the Nova Scotia election that took place this week provided a warning for Trudeau and the Liberals. The Nova Scotia Liberals, who led every poll taken in the past two years, lost in a major upset to the Nova Scotia Progressive Conservatives (PCs). The PCs made major gains in the rural parts of the province despite relatively minor changes in voting (PCs up 2.7%, Liberals down 2.8%).
On the one hand, there are a lot of differences between the upcoming national election and the Nova Scotia one. Provincial parties in Canada are less connected to federal parties than in the U.S. and the Conservatives in Atlantic Canada have always been far more moderate than their federal brethren. Premier-elect PC leader Tim Houston even publicly said he wasn’t a member of the federal Conservative Party. The PCs in Nova Scotia arguably ran a more progressive campaign than the Liberals did, pushing an improved health-care system (which is run at the provincial level in Canada) while the Liberals preached fiscal responsibility.
On the other hand, this proves that counting on a moderate polling lead to sustain itself throughout a campaign and then be accurate on Election Day could be a recipe for disaster. Trudeau will hope that the Nova Scotia experience won’t be replicated nationwide.
Meanwhile, the progressive New Democratic Party (NDP) won 22% of the vote and 11% of the seats, which is actually not bad for the third most popular party in a first-past-the-post system. They’ll be facing the same problems in the federal election next month.
The other major upcoming international election is Germany, six days after Canada’s. We’ll check in on the race to replace Angela Merkel next week.
What I’m Watching: Titans (HBO Max)
For fans of: Classic MCU movies
Titans just started its third season last week, but has never really broken through the way you’d expect a big name superhero show would, in part because the first two seasons aired on DC Comic’s now defunct streaming site. The show follows Dick Grayson (Brenton Thwaites), a retired Robin, as he picks up the superhero mantle again and eventually forms a new team of younger superheroes called the Titans.
The first two seasons were inconsistent but entertaining enough if you like superhero shows. Season three, perhaps due to coming under the HBO umbrella, has been a noticeable step up in quality. The first episode is a bit clunky in maneuvering the characters to where they need to be for the season’s overarching storyline, but after that, the show has churned out some of its best episodes to date. Episode three ends on a genuinely shocking scene that makes you wonder how some characters will move forward from it.
The first four episodes of a 13 episode season are out now and the rest are releasing weekly on Thursdays.