Since his election, Missouri’s Senator Josh Hawley has done several stunts for the purpose, apparently, of drawing to himself the attention of the far right. Now we read that he’s given a bravura dog-whistle oration to the chauvinist National Conservatism Conference. Urging the “Blut und Boden” values of the 1930s, he denounced “citizens of the world” as “rootless cosmopolitans.” He is quoted as saying of “a powerful upper class” with “cosmopolitan priorities” that they “run businesses or oversee universities here, but their primary loyalty is to the global community.” What a skillful blend of class warfare and anti-intellectualism and old-time anti-semitism. Of course, with a little adjustment he could say the same of American Catholics who work and teach here, but whose primary loyalty is to the City of God.

All this leads me to the question: Is Josh Hawley a genuine neo-nazi, or is he just talking like one to ingratiate himself with those who are?