Back when I was in college (‘85-’89), it seemed to me that both the ideological campus right and the ideological campus left were far more interested in asserting and indulging their own identities than in actually changing minds. One of their favorite things to do was bash the college paper for bias. When I ran the editorial pages there, I’d ask these guys to submit op-eds. More often than not, they never got around to it. Changing minds requires hard labor, patience and — how to put this? — social skills. Self-righteousness and tribalism will always be easier than the humble work of persuasion, and thinking creatively about democratic politics. But it ends in futility and frustration. I wouldn’t have understood that when I was 18 either.