The Week

• There’s nothing less candid than Strait talk.

• “We are capitalists,” read the open letter signed by a small group of moderate House Democrats in June, “not socialists.” It was a necessary rejoinder to both the Democratic Party’s radical fringes and its primary voters, who have spent the summer catapulting socialists closer to positions of power. Those candidates are hostile not just to capitalism but, it increasingly seems, to America itself. Darializa Avila Chevalier, who knocked off the chairman of the House Hispanic Caucus in her New York primary, once boasted about wiping her hands with the American flag and founded a college group that sought to “undermine and eradicate America.” Melat Kiros struggled to call the firebombing of Jews in Boulder, Colo., antisemitic and said America’s actions made the 9/11 attacks “inevitable.” She defeated a 15-term Democrat in Colorado. New York’s Claire Valdez devoted herself to fighting the “lie” that “the U.S. empire defends freedom, advances democracy, and protects human rights.” Pennsylvania’s Chris Rabb blamed “Zionists” for the slaughter of Jews on Australia’s Bondi Beach. New Jersey’s Adam Hamawy is likely headed to Congress despite his longtime association with the architect of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. What links these candidates is not their shared contempt for the Jews, or the banks, or even President Donald Trump. The root of all evil in their worldview is the West, particularly the United States.