All Blood, No Progress

In a blistering episode of The Commentary Magazine Podcast, Noah Rothman, author of the newly released *Blood and Progress*, argues that left-wing political violence in America has evolved from rare spectacle to a normalized, culturally celebrated phenomenon—particularly since October 7th, 2023. Drawing on the recent assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and the ecstatic public reaction to it, Rothman exposes a deep-seated cultural shift where violent acts are not just excused but glorified as revolutionary justice. He traces this trend through three historical waves of left-wing militancy—from early 20th-century anarchists to 1960s radicals—and reveals how elite institutions, from academia to media, have systematically downplayed or erased these violent episodes from public memory. The episode confronts the hypocrisy of mainstream left-wing discourse, which condemns right-wing violence while celebrating left-wing assassins like Assata Shakur and Leonard Peltier, and criticizes the Democratic Party for co-opting radical energy without accountability. Rothman warns that the normalization of violence as a political tool—fueled by anti-Western, anti-systemic ideology—threatens to unravel American democracy unless leaders confront the ideological roots of this culture of celebration. The book, he insists, is not about counting bodies but about diagnosing a moral and cultural collapse that has gone unacknowledged for decades.