Jeffery Tyler Syck

Why does the political center feel hollow today? Centrism promises compromise, balance, and reason—but modern politics rewards passion, grievance, and identity.

This is why the center struggles and what they could do to fix it. A thread 🧵

A Soulless Center – Tyler Syck Yair Zivan’s volume attempts to revive centrism, but fails to offer any workable guide for how it can find a soul.

f you want to see more, see an old book review I wrote in Law and Liberty.
lawliberty.org/book-review/...

To survive in modern politics, the center must rediscover its soul: moral, emotional, and philosophical grounding that resonates with voters and inspires loyalty, not just rational agreement. That soul can be found in harmony.

Renewal requires more than compromise. The center must ask: who are we for? What moral purpose guides our choices? Without answering this, it remains empty and inert.

Harmony might sound soft, but it resonates. After chaos or division, people long for stability and normalcy. A center grounded in these ideals can move hearts more than policy expertise ever will.

History shows the center can have a soul. Cicero preached civic harmony, Eisenhower promoted stability and balance. Both offered moral grounding and emotional connection, not just technocratic solutions.

That’s the central problem: centrism is soulless. Competence and compromise can’t compete with movements offering narratives of justice, restoration, or grievance. People follow stories, not spreadsheets.

Defenders of centrism have spent hours and hundreds of pages trying to show its strengths. They show centrism as a procedural stance: balance, negotiation, managing tension. But voters don’t respond to process alone; they crave meaning, identity, and moral vision.

This story is not unique to France, it happens all over the world. Populists thrive by rejecting compromise outright. They tap anger, nostalgia, and identity, making rational, technocratic centrism look tepid and detached, no matter its expertise or intent.

French President Emmanuel Macron once declared the “end of French politics as we know it,” hoping centrism could replace entrenched left vs. right conflict. Years later, his vision is battered, showing that moderation alone rarely excites voters.

Why does the political center feel hollow today? Centrism promises compromise, balance, and reason—but modern politics rewards passion, grievance, and identity.

This is why the center struggles and what they could do to fix it. A thread 🧵

A Call for Realism, Love, Localism, and Democracy: Review of Rory Stewart’s “Politics on the Edge” - Providence Rory Stewart's "Politics on the Edge" describes at length the failures of both David Cameron's center-right neoliberalism and Boris Johnson's populism, yet leaves the reader with hope for a renewed po...

Rory Stewart’s “Politics on the Edge” describes at length the failures of both David Cameron’s center-right neoliberalism and Boris Johnson’s populism, yet leaves the reader with hope for a renewed political future. @jtylersyck.bsky.social
providencemag.com/2025/07/a-ca...

The problem of mass produced education • Kentucky Lantern Biggest issues beleaguering higher education are systemic rather than ephemeral demographic disruptions or ideological capture.

Commentary by @jtylersyck.bsky.social

Universities are ground zero in the culture wars, but we must not let that obscure deeper issues

kentuckylantern.com/2025/08/19/t...

🦌The extraordinary white deer in Sweden 🇸🇪

Can this two-party system be saved?  • Kentucky Lantern If Democrats have a path back to relevance in Eastern Kentucky, it's the economy. They should offer solutions to the region's housing and jobs crises.

Commentary by @jtylersyck.bsky.social

If Democrats have a path back to relevance in Eastern Kentucky, they might find it by focusing on the economy.

kentuckylantern.com/2025/06/04/c...

I have unintentionally become a character on Frasier. This morning I ordered a nonfat latte with a "spritz of sugar free vanilla and a dusting of cinnamon" while showing off a custom made dress shirt to a friend.

Shore up social studies education to shore up American democracy • Kentucky Lantern Better social studies education requires good teachers, more resources and a thoughtful curriculum. Nothing less than U.S. democracy is at stake.

Commentary by @jtylersyck.bsky.social
For many principals and superintendents, social studies classes are simply the dumping ground for patronage appointments and athletic coaches, especially in rural KY where school districts are often the largest employer.
kentuckylantern.com/2025/01/02/s...

Shore up social studies education to shore up American democracy • Kentucky Lantern Better social studies education requires good teachers, more resources and a thoughtful curriculum. Nothing less than U.S. democracy is at stake.

From @jtylersyck.bsky.social:

No place in Kentucky for the abomination that is conversion therapy • Kentucky Lantern In the modern political climate, culture war battles are a dime a dozen. Whether it’s immigration or school choice or transgender bathrooms, the average voter can easily get lost in the sea of discont...

Commentary by @jtylersyck.bsky.social
Religious freedom has never protected moral barbarism.
kentuckylantern.com/2025/01/10/n...

The key players in New Zealand's new government New Zealand's National Party, ACT New Zealand and New Zealand First Friday signed a coalition agreement and will be sworn in as the 54th government on Monday.

America’s fracturing conservative fusionism, the alliance between free marketers, social conservatives, and foreign policy hawks, has me thinking about New Zealand’s own fusionist experiment. In 2023, the country saw its first three-party coalition. Let’s take a look. www.reuters.com/world/asia-p...

John Quincy Adams is America’s Edmund Burke. By this, I do not mean that he is the founder of American conservativism but something far deeper. Adams understood and articulated the cultural tradition that is America – our ideas, hopes, and history – better than any other thinker.

This is quite possibly the most professor outfit I have ever worn.

My latest piece:

"The time has come for the right to discover the greatness of the New Deal and to improve it. Rather than ceaselessly caterwauling about Roosevelt’s imagined despotism."

Check it out below!

www.theamericanconservative.com/conserving-t...

Twitter I did not see much, but it seems like my Twitter has been entirely consumed by politics lately.

See I had the opposite experience. Was almost the only thing on my Facebook all Thursday long.

My latest article in Law and Liberty:

"The religious wars of the early modern period or the cruel despotism of modern Iran should give us some idea of what life becomes when the state adopts an official answer to all important questions."

lawliberty.org/old-mistakes...

I am especially fond of that picture of him.