No doubt the 2026 midterms will be profoundly consequential. It’s the first scheduled national-level test of whether the Trump revolution is a reversible aberration or a real threat to the neoliberal status quo. However, even if the current crew of revolutionaries prevails in 2026, that doesn’t mean their particular vision will become a new, post-neoliberal status quo — far from it. A pro-revolutionary result will only mean that fundamental change has wide support. Beyond that, things are unpredictable, e.g., neither Napoleon nor Lenin were predictable in 1789 and early 1917, respectively.
Note also that a pro-revolutionary result doesn’t necessarily mean that the Republican party will retain or increase its Congressional majorities. It probably does, but it is possible that over the next eighteen months or so the Trump revolution loses energy and devolves into some form of neo-narrative neoliberalism. It is also possible, though unlikely, that the Democratic party undergoes a radical transformation and rejects neo-narrative neoliberalism. In that case, a Democrat electoral victory would be flying the revolutionary banner. The essential point is that developments leading up to and including 2026 midterms can be characterized as a focused battle between neo-narrative and ideological power, with red/blue institutional power being a very important, but fundamentally secondary, factor.
Eighteen months is an eternity of time in politics, but maybe not much at all to create and inculcate a neo-narrative that will effectively camouflage the ongoing social and economic depredations of neoliberalism. I think we’re seeing the beginning of serious work on the project, or the surfacing of work that’s already been done. There’s a lot at stake — the failure of the last neoliberal narrative in 2024 resulted in the election of Trump, this time they better get it right before the revolution solidifies.
Like the varying colors and shapes of camouflage for different environments (e.g., jungle, desert, urban, etc.), the neo-narrative will have to be somewhat customized for different political audiences. But since it has to be effective across a landscape large enough for electoral power, a degree of uniformity is required, or at least not jarring and obviously opposed discontinuities. And the Narrativators will have to make the neo-narrative workable at the interstices of the power quadrant I sketched out in a previous post, From an Unstable Mix of Forces, a Possible Path. These interstices are where interesting stuff will happen for the next eighteen months, I think.
Interstice 1 — New Left and Establishment Democrats
As you’d expect for a party that recently lost elections, institutional power is weakened, and the factions are actively fighting. Some of the action bubbles to the surface, which is useful to get hints as to what the Narrativators are doing. It looks like, as expected, the ‘Abundance’ neo-narrative is the main approach, perhaps in testing mode. But it’s encountering ideological resistance, as described in The Coming Democratic Civil War.
A civil war has broken out among the Democratic wonks. The casus belli is a new set of ideas known as the abundance agenda. Its supporters herald it as the key to prosperity for the American people and to enduring power for the liberal coalition. Its critics decry it as a scheme to infiltrate the Democratic Party by “corporate-aligned [i.e., neoliberal] interests”; “a gambit by center-right think tank & its libertarian donors”; “an anti-government manifesto for the MAGA Right”; and the historical and moral equivalent of the “Rockefellers and Carnegies grinding workers into dust.”
Interstice 2 — Establishment Democrats and Traditional Republicans
Since both sides of this interstice are on board with the underlying neoliberal agenda and understand the need for effective camouflage, things are easier for the Narrativators here. Their neo-narrative can be customized with a few unessential issues and differential emphasis to create the illusion of a red/blue divide, but the same primary themes should work for both. The ‘Abundance’ narrative would seem to be ideally suited for this purpose — maybe this interstice is where it came from originally?
Interstice 3 — Traditional and MAGA Republicans
Although the Republican party has the most institutional power that it’s had in a while, the ideological gap between the Traditional and MAGA wings is profound, because it’s essentially the difference between nearly pure neoliberalism and actual post-liberalism. There’s a civil war there, I think, waiting to happen. An ‘Abundance’ neo-narrative doesn’t need to make the MAGA folks particularly happy, but it can’t be too blatant or enthusiastic about some things that the neo-narrative needs for Democrat unity. For example, re renewable energy and other green economic matters — Texas becomes front line of GOP civil war over energy — could force a showdown that the neoliberals of both parties want to avoid.
Interstice 4 — MAGA Republicans and New Left Democrats
This interstice is the most interesting. The two sides would appear to be utterly opposed except for one thing — neither buys the neoliberal story, regardless of narrative, neo or not. This doesn’t pose much threat to the Narrativators as things stand because the sides’ ideological power is mostly directed against each other. But should that change, and some consensus about some things arise, the overall landscape could become uncamouflaged — that is, ideological — quickly and the neo-narrative (whatever it happens to be) will fail. At that point, the real reaction against neoliberalism decisively begins — and the Narrativators are likely left to consider career alternatives.