Post-ideological era, part 2

A few weeks ago I wrote that we are in what can be described as a post-ideological era, as evidenced by the rise of the likes of Jordan Peterson, Dave Rubin, Sam Harris, and Ben Shapiro (whom I have dubbed ‘the four horsemen of centrism’). Yet ideological division is manifestly obvious on social media. Donald Trump’s official Twitter account has as many Trump haters as fans, and they are constantly slugging it out in the comments. On Facebook a similar pattern is observed.

But by post-ideological era, what I also mean is that ideology is having an increasingly small effect on policy and the overall direction of the nation, whereas in earlier decades, such has the 50’s-70’s, ideology and politics played a much bigger role in steering the direction of the country on major social and economic issues. Trump’s inability to carry out legislation, save for tax-cuts, which were an easy win and inevitable, is evidence of this, but also the growing influence of Silicon Valley and Wall St. on policy, but also on society in general. We’re living in Elon Musk’s, Jeff Bezos’, and Mark Zuckerberg’s country, three individuals who are not only immensely wealthy and powerful , but eschew ideological politics. They are so powerful that, unlike politicians, they don’t have to play politics to get what they want, and even Trump is more than willing to accede to their wants. Trump’s thinking, “yeah..that Zuckerberg is rich like me..and he’s smart and a successful capitalist…so if he wants more immigration, maybe he is right…let’s work out a deal for those dreamers…the dems have been terrible for dreamers.” On June 1st, 2017, after Trump pulled out of the Paris agreement, Elon Musk resigned from Trump’s advisory board. But recently Trump congratulated Musk on his rocket launch, showing that the acrimony was only in passing, if there ever was any to begin with. The point is, billionaires and businessmen tend to not hold long-standing bitter feuds, unlike normal people, and don’t subscribe to ideological divisiveness. They are always willing to work out deals and compromise, which may be good for business, but it means that if billionaires, especially really smart ones, are running the country, we will get what billionaires want, which are based on business interests more so than ideological ones.