Article snippet: Mark Lilla, the author of the new book The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics, appeared on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS on Sunday and said Bannon is someone who understands everyday Americans of all backgrounds. “If Steve Bannon says it works for him, I’m inclined to agree with him. He is someone who knows his business,” Lilla said. Last week, Bannon told the American Prospect‘s Robert Kuttner that economic nationalism would trump identity politics every day of the week. His message to salad-bowl Democrats: Bring. It. On. “The Democrats,” Bannon said, “the longer they talk about identity politics, I got ’em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats.” Zakaria said that Bannon’s “intellectual influence seems to still dominate” and told Lilla that Zakaria agreed with the thesis of his book, “which is that as long as the left plays identity politics, it’s great for the right.” Lilla, The Once and Future Liberal author, said that “identity politics in this country really means two things. On the one hand, it means a focus on understanding our social problems. And to understand any problem in America, you need to understand identity.” “But when it comes to addressing those problems, identity politics as a strategy has been disastrous because rather than establishing a connection between those who are affected by these problems and those who may be u... Link to the full article to read more