Matthew Yglesias
Writes Slow Boring, a near-daily newsletter on American politics and public policy; co-founded Vox in 2014 and left it in 2020.
Matthew Yglesias did not write this page.
We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.
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Their wordsDonald Trump is such an incredibly overexposed figure that it’s easy to overlook how mysterious he is.
- 1 day earlier
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Our reading
Pushing for unreasonable levels of American support for Israel could lead to bad failure modes.
Their wordsBut pushing so long and so hard for unreasonable levels of American support could lead to some really bad failure modes unless the leaders of and donors to these organizations are prepared to admit — fast — that they need to dramatically change course.
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Their wordsThese dynamics were most present on the Democratic Party side this year and are driving the formerly bipartisan pro-Israel consensus to become sharply polarized.
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Their wordsAnd while Vance is wrong to solely attribute the Trump administration’s political problems to Iran, it is unquestionably true that the war supercharged anti-Israel sentiment in the United States by imposing massive costs not just on Palestinians but on everyday Americans — and for that matter, on literally billions of people around the world.
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Our reading
Democrats need to stick with their new, better messages if they want to win in the future
Their wordsIt’s important to keep these changes in mind, because Democrats are going to need to stick with their new, better messages if they want to win in the future.
↗Seventeen thoughts on an epic repudiation of Donald Trumpslowboring.com
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Their wordsNobody particularly cares about Stevens, and there are very few single-issue pro-Israel voters in America — especially at a time when Israel played a key role in getting America embroiled in a toxically unpopular war.
↗Seventeen thoughts on an epic repudiation of Donald Trumpslowboring.com
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Their wordsIf they get sloppy, lazy, or undisciplined, we’ve seen over and over again that large electoral swings are very real and they happen in both directions.
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Their wordsstate elections are a constant reminder that public appetite for sweeping change is actually quite limited.
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Our reading
Politics is about more than vibes, vertical video skills, or superficial rhetorical choices.
Their wordsThat politics isn’t just about “vibes” or vertical video skills or superficial rhetorical choices.
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Their wordsBut something like 12 percent of Americans — and a much larger share of Democrats — live in California, so the slow counting of California votes meaningfully distorts our understanding of the national political climate.
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Their wordsBut the 2026 map is also bad and the 2028 map will also be bad. Basically all the Senate maps are bad, so you can’t grade Democratic electoral performance in any given cycle on a curve.
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Their wordsThe phenomenon of “midterm backlash” is something we’re accustomed to, but while it now operates more or less as a law of the political system, it’s not an actual law of physics — whether any given backlash emerges is somewhat contingent and actually drives much of the drama of American politics.
↗The seven most important midterms of all timeslowboring.com
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Our reading
Congress is the main driving force of the American constitutional system outside of foreign policy
Their wordsMidterms lack the personalistic drama of American presidential elections, but outside of foreign policy, Congress really is the main driving force of the American constitutional system, and midterm votes often bring big changes.
↗The seven most important midterms of all timeslowboring.com
- 3 days earlier
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Their wordsThis means that while you can boost the fortunes of any given occupation by creating barriers to entry, doing so across a large fraction of occupations will end up making everyone worse off than if you hadn’t done it.
↗The underrated — but hated — insights of Econ 101slowboring.com
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Their wordsMedicare for All has become this endless factional discourse object that only serves to make people angry at each other, but there ought to be a system whereby everyone can get free or nearly free health care at government expense.
↗How I would fix all of America’s major problemsslowboring.com
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Their wordsThe material living standards of the poorest Americans are shockingly bad given the overall high living standards.
↗How I would fix all of America’s major problemsslowboring.com
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Their wordsAs A.I. companies race to rid the world of gainful employment, we now face the question of what it would even mean to be human if labor itself becomes obsolete.
↗“The Argument” podcast, ad free: The human condition in the age of A.I.slowboring.com
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Our reading
The U.S. is a rich country with relatively poor public-health outcomes given its prosperity.
Their wordsThe U.S. is a rich country with relatively poor public-health outcomes given our prosperity.
↗How I would fix all of America’s major problemsslowboring.com
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Their wordsThe difference is that the natural state of the safe-seat Democratic Party legislator is to say “yes” to a lot of different interest-group asks without thinking too hard about them or whether they’re contradictory.
- 2 days earlier
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Their wordsThere is no way to rescue the country without Democrats becoming meaningfully competitive in multiple states that Trump won three times in a row.
- 3 days earlier
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Their wordsThis serves to rationalize all kinds of scumbag behavior when the simple truth is that Romney — or some other honorable and decent person — could easily have won if he had Trump’s views on Social Security and Medicare.
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Their wordsBut under conditions of contemporary partisanship, a risk you take to expand access to health care is a drag on efforts to secure abortion rights or address climate change or help the poor.
↗Your favorite cause is not the civil rights movement and neither is mineslowboring.com
- 3 days earlier
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Their wordsThe truth is that Democrats have made meaningful gestures, and those gestures have had a real impact on voters.
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Their wordsIn inflation-adjusted terms, hardcover books are much cheaper than they used to be.
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Their wordsI agree with Hasan that this approach of targeting Mamdani is not a good way to do politics.
↗Why anti-Israel protestors are targeting New York’s anti-Zionist mayorslowboring.com
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Their wordsSo it should be easy for a country like the United States to substantially increase the number of permanent residency slots we hand out while making all of the increase selective in the sense of bringing over people with above-average earnings.
↗The right-wing obsession with “The Indian Question”slowboring.com
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Their wordsAnd I think it’s more toxic than generally realized to make symbolic concessions that undermine the legitimacy of the national community.
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Their wordsPublic schools only work if people with financial and social capital participate.
↗Live your values, and adopt values to live byslowboring.com
- 3 days earlier
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Their wordsIt’s just hard to make the case for it in a world of financial scarcity where Democrats are at a financial disadvantage all across the board.
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Our reading
Their wordsThe betting odds heavily favor Greg Abbott, and I don’t see any reason to doubt that.