For a book that’s ostensibly about the oppressively liberal American political system, a surprising number of pages are devoted to the ins and outs of what happens on elite college campuses.

Despite his weakness for abstraction and overstatement, [Deneen] is a serious historian of ideas.

Deneen’s disregard for details, among them the awkward fact that no one actually defends the position he attributes to practically everyone, is unfortunately characteristic. The post-liberals are dramatic, even hysterical, stylists, prone to sweeping pronouncements about the entirety of culture since the dawn of time.

The newer book contains all the faults of Why Liberalism Failed but adds one: dishonesty.

Apparently considers himself a victim of liberal persecution compelled to practice the art of circumlocution in the name of his 'truth.' And while the book has received a great deal of attention for its appeal to a new brand of right-wing politicians like Josh Hawley and J. D. Vance, it is particularly dangerous in the way that some of the most reactionary aspects of Deneen’s argument might appeal to people who don’t think of themselves as conservative.

The theme throughout the book is that things were simply better before liberalism reared its ugly head.

It’s unfortunate that one of the examples of family-friendly, birth-rate–promoting government that Deneen holds up is the far-right Orban regime of Hungary. It’s even more unfortunate that the conservatism it upholds is a counter to the "ethos of cosmopolitanism," that last term being a historic antisemitic dog whistle, whether Deneen intends it that way or not.