Matt Walsh Ate Our Lunch

Greg Abbott signed an executive order calling for “punishment” for “antisemitic rhetoric.” Here’s why that is absurd, wrong, and un-American. pic.twitter.com/ErgAE2Fynb

— The Honorable Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) March 29, 2024

The Most Anti-Christian President In History Declares Easter ‘Transgender Day of Visibility’

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 – 00:23 Opening
1:44 – 16:20 The Most Anti-Christian President In History Declares Easter ‘Transgender Day of Visibility’
17:35 – 27:17 David Jolly Calls Out… pic.twitter.com/kmZJ4Ov3Xs

— The Matt Walsh Show (@MattWalshShow) April 1, 2024

The Mayor Of Baltimore Attacks White People As The City Deals With Bridge Collapse

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 – 00:21 Opening
1:47 – 13:35 The Mayor Of Baltimore Attacks White People As The City Deals With Bridge Collapse
14:43 – 27:31 Illinois School District Approves $6.8 Million Bill… pic.twitter.com/0EhWShVsA1

— The Matt Walsh Show (@MattWalshShow) March 28, 2024

In the previous two articles, I argued that an Alt-Right 2.0 is a terrible idea.

The term Alt-Right originally referred to the space beyond the pre-Trump “True Conservatism” consensus of Conservatism, Inc. It was coined in a time when the Center Right was still dominant. National Review and The Weekly Standard still set the tone for the conservative movement.

In those days, there were powerful gatekeepers who kept all sorts of important topics out of the mainstream, which is what created the Alt-Right space. There was a time not too long ago when VDARE was considered an extremist website. White identity politics was deeply stigmatized. Even when Donald Trump was president, it was still extremely rare to hear mainstream conservatives even acknowledge the existence of White people or that animus toward White people was a major problem.

In retrospect, the Alt-Right depended on a strong Center Right to remain coherent and stable. We dreamed of overthrowing cuckservatism and “moving the Overton Window.” In the long run, we got exactly what we wanted. The Center Right had dwindled down to about 15% of the Republican coalition. The Weekly Standard has gone out of business. Never Trumpers have become Democrats. There is less and less pressure on the Right to cater to the priorities and preferences of that faction.

After Charlottesville, the angry manlets revolted and toppled Richard Spencer. The Alt-Right disintegrated into cliques and cults of personality. It rebranded as the “Dissident Right” with each little faction having its own vision. In this void of leadership, people like Tucker Carlson and Matt Walsh have seized on the substance of the movement and cleaned it up and made it palatable.

The clips of Matt Walsh above illustrate how the online Right has changed since 2019. Walsh has a huge platform at The Daily Wire and a direct pipeline to the conservative base. He will take a topic which a few years ago might have still been taboo enough that only Alt-Right commentators or Dissident Right accounts would touched. He will sit in front of a camera and will look normal and presentable and talk about this topic on his show. Tucker Carlson did the same thing for years on FOX News.

Ask yourself how many of the leaders of the Alt-Right / Dissident Right are capable of doing this without coming across as weird or unlikable. James Edwards is normal enough to pull this off, but he has never had access to a huge platform on FOX News or The Daily Wire. Jared Taylor can talk about race in a genteel, presentable, non-threatening way, but he has never been given a platform.

Kanye West denying the holocaust in a gimp mask on the Alex Jones show pic.twitter.com/6OvNdmkNCZ

— Trev Ken ( ?° ?? ?°) ? (@trev_ken) December 1, 2022

Greg Conte = Comedy gold! pic.twitter.com/10SyDDFcLU

— Colin Liddell (@cbliddell) February 17, 2023

Try to imagine almost any other WN 1.0, Alt-Right / Dissident Right figure being casted in the same role: Alex Linder, Harold Covington, Richard Spencer, Matt Heimbach, Mike Enoch, Sven, Eric Striker, Andrew Anglin, Nick Fuentes. Could any of these figures sit in front a camera and do what Tucker and Matt Walsh have done with a mass audience without coming across as eccentric?