"The Golden Age of America begins right now"

Another face of National Greatness Conservatism

Donald Trump is sworn into office by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts as Melania Trump holds the Bible in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda on January 20, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Julia Demaree Nikhinson - Pool/Getty Images)

“A real nation in democratic decline situation.”
—John Ganz on Twitter/X, January 20, 2025, 8:23am

In the tweet quoted above, my fellow Substacker John Ganz was talking about the first big story to break this morning—President Joe Biden’s decision to use his final hours in the White House to issue preemptive pardons of a series of figures the incoming President Donald Trump (and/or nominees to serve in his administration) has threatened with prosecution.

But he could have been talking about so many other things.

Ganz could have been talking about Biden’s thoroughly bizarre declaration last Friday that he believes the Equal Rights Amendment has been ratified and is now the 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (even though the ERA has not been ratified, the president has no role in ratifying constitutional amendments, and so the ERA is not, in fact, the 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution). (For more on just how bizarre and indefensible Biden’s statement about the ERA really is, I recommend Noah Millman’s agonized post on the subject.)

Ganz also could have been talking about the last-minute announcement from the Biden White House that the 46th president has issued to his entire family the same kind of sweeping, blanket pardons he offered to his son Hunter Biden in December.

Or Ganz could have been talking about Donald J. Trump’s Inaugural Address, delivered inside the Capitol Rotunda just after he took the oath of office for the second time early this afternoon.

Conservatism as American Dynamism