This time, we’re not going to hold back Destroying from the ladies tees I love with Doug More media implosions ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Democracy is over when my irrelevant newspaper folds Passover is too Jewish The uniqueness of the Holocaust Opinion mongers making calls about newsworthiness
Re: the staying power of podcasts about "wokeness" and the "limit to the amount that people want to hear about crazy people saying absolutely crazy stuff."
I have unsubscribed from several podcasts in the new year. We reached peak heterodox in 2023 and we're going to see it decline in 2024. Initially, it was exciting to hear people saying things about race, gender, crime, DEI, etc., that had become forbidden in the mainstream media and halls of academia, and each podcast seemed to have its own unique perspective and focus. Eventually, the content started to coalesce around the same weekly news stories and the hosts all sung in chorus. It ain't heterodox when everyone agrees and it's not heretical when you're shouting it at tens of thousands of weekly listeners.
Worse than that, most of the hosts offering their hot takes on things like Claudine Gay's plagiarism, George Floyd's death, and Oct. 7 aren't experts on higher ed, racial politics, or the Middle East. If you're going to last as a pundit, even a heterodox one, you need originality and expertise, like Glenn and John when it comes to DEI & academia, Kmele on race and free speech, Matt on the media and libertarian stuff, Moynihan on Israel (and apparently, everything), and the Smoke 'Em gals on journalism, urban decay, and #metoo.
I'm down to three podcasts subscriptions that don't re-hash the same things constantly. There are only so many ways to say, "I think gender ideology/DEI/postcolonialism/anti-racism" has gone too far.
As my entry in the obscure Austrian economist joke of the day:
And if they really wanted to lean into libertarianism they could have Hans-Hermann Hoppe on to explain why the newspapers failing, and the death of democracy that represents, was a good thing. Also bonus commentary on why we'd all be better off living under a still going Hapsburg Dynasty.
In reference to the genocide comparisons and the nature of the Holocaust, I do find it interesting that many of the same people who will tell us that over 150 years after slavery, America is an irredeemably racist country and that racism permeates are very nature to the point where it is impossible to weed out; but less than 80 years after the Holocaust the idea that anti-Semitism plays any part in European countries' political and cultural policies is utterly ridiculous.
For some reason, I received a promo price for all access that was cheaper than games only. Once that runs out, I’ll be downgrading. If there were another app that provided similarly challenging word games, I wouldn’t mind switching.
I let my subscription lapse because I have too many undone crossword puzzle books lying around to justify paying for more, but I do miss the non-crossword puzzle games. Rows Garden, Marching Bands, and Spirals were my favorites.
I’m not familiar with those. Maybe they were discontinued? My home page lets me play Spelling Bee, Wordle, Connections and Letter Box plus the crossword. You can play a few of them for free without paying but not the crossword and only a limited number of words for spelling bee.
Michael insisting that Matt had interviewed Bill James on a previous episode was funny. Accusing Matt of dementia on a baseball thing when Michael just had the wrong name. Hell, I would remember if that'd happened and I don't care much about baseball!
They’re still great cars (if you want an electric) despite Musks super-online antics. I wonder how Henry Ford would be remembered if he had a Twitter account. Actually, scratch that...
Did you know that Henry Ford pioneered the 40 hour work week? He’d get soooo much shit for that now; he didn’t even allow remote work!
Edit: my assistant has just handed me a slip of paper noting that Henry Ford was also a prominent anti-Semite, so I guess it would all even out in Twitter World?
I am not bothered at all by Elon's antics (mostly because I don't follow or care). It has no relevance to my opinions on the Teslas. And yet, when I bought and EV last year, I did not consider a Tesla for a moment for a few reasons.
The biggest of those reasons is that I *loathe* the trend of getting rid of all physical buttons and moving controls to a touch screen. Tesla apparently does a better job of this than everyone else who is trying it but that's just having the tastiest shit sandwhich. I think I'd rather just pass on the sandwich entirely. Luckily, this trend appears to be dying among other manufacturers. If Tesla ever catches on, I might consider them in the future.
If you are playing the 5th Column drinking game this podcast gets you hammered. Matt waxing reminiscent on the la times and Moynahan making a Baeder-Meinhoff reference.
Re: the discussion about the Holocaust. This argument about whether the Holocaust has vern wrongly exceptionalized isn’t that new. I went to the Holocaust Museum in DC pre-2010 with an ex and his family, and I was aghast when my ex’s dad complained that there was too much focus on the Holocaust and not on other genocides--particularly the “Native American genocide.” I told him, well, this isn’t the genocide museum, it’s the Holocaust Museum. 🤷🏻♀️
That whole class of comment would seem to tie very closely to Moynihan's frequent complaint that lots of modern media review boils down to complaining that they didn't make the book/movie/whatever that the reviewer thinks they should have made, rather than just reviewing the thing as itself.
The Holocaust Museum has a hall for other genocides. I went to their auditorium once to listen to some Uyghur refugees talk about their situation under the Chinese Communist Party. They’re doing way more than they need to do to cover other things.
And it’s a particularly dumb argument given that we have an enormous tax-funded Museum of the American Indian and the African American museum both within walking distance, which are presumably filling precisely the niche this person wants filled.
One of the earliest Gustavo Arellano podcast projects at the LA Times was also one of of the best: a 3-part series on California's infamous Prop 187, from 1994, which targeted illegal immigration but wound up kneecapping the state's GOP instead. Kudos to former Governor Pete Wilson, too, who appeared with Gustavo for an extended conversation in a follow-up bonus interview.
Shame the LA Times has shut down such work because, five years later, it may be a topic worth revisiting. Californians are showing signs of souring on public largesse directed to illegal immigrants.
Look for ex-Dodger Steve Garvey to pick up the issue this year in his Senate run. And if he can get an endorsement from Fernando Valenzuela, then California politics just might get fun again.
Matt, Doug was a Coolies album. Dumb as hell, but kinda fun. Per Google generative AI:
"Doug is the story of a skinhead, named Doug, who kills a drag queen short-order cook, steals his recipe book and becomes a "culinary giant" when the cookbook becomes a nationwide bestseller."
When I was a poor college student, I went to my local indie record store once a week and bought one album my guy there recommended, no questions asked. I should have asked some questions about Doug.
Now that I've picked up on that from you, and Kino from Moynihan (I reviewed Gruppa Krovi for my college paper), it's time for Kmele to surface some late-eighties white boy dumbassery that I can imaginarily bond with him over.
I’ve been to Yad Vashem and it’s a moving experience and a must visit if you’re lucky enough to go to Israel, it clarified for me the horror and number sacrificed in a way that just saying a big number doesn’t. But the thing that really brought home to me just how planned and regimented the Holocaust was, was visiting Dachau and seeing the map of camps. We all know the big names of course, but the network of camps was basically every town, an incredible web where there was literally no place to go to avoid it. There was just no happenstance about any of it and that’s important to recognize in today’s attempts to fool people over what happened and why, and why Israel as a place is a necessary safe haven. Imho of course, but for this topic, I’m choosing a side and believe I’m doing so rightly.
Visiting Dachau had a huge impact on me as well - the bureaucratic efficiency of the Nazi murder machine was really terrifying.
Side note, when I was there (25 years ago), this guy Martin Zaidenstadt was there, and hearing his story was overwhelming and sad - but then years later I found out that he may have been making up a bunch of stuff. And as you can see in the article, there's a weird premonition of the whole "poetic truth" idea - even though other groups of Dachau survivors say his stories aren't true, "...most people who know him seem to acknowledge, Mr. Zaidenstadt, born of a Jewish family in Poland, fits a particular category of pain, made up of those who cannot shake their memories and must return to the scene of atrocity to pick over the wounds of the Holocaust."
Visiting Auschwitz was a harrowing experience for me. The level of evil cruelty the Nazis perpetrated on the Jews is astounding and I feel sick to my stomach when I consider it.
Re: the staying power of podcasts about "wokeness" and the "limit to the amount that people want to hear about crazy people saying absolutely crazy stuff."
I have unsubscribed from several podcasts in the new year. We reached peak heterodox in 2023 and we're going to see it decline in 2024. Initially, it was exciting to hear people saying things about race, gender, crime, DEI, etc., that had become forbidden in the mainstream media and halls of academia, and each podcast seemed to have its own unique perspective and focus. Eventually, the content started to coalesce around the same weekly news stories and the hosts all sung in chorus. It ain't heterodox when everyone agrees and it's not heretical when you're shouting it at tens of thousands of weekly listeners.
Worse than that, most of the hosts offering their hot takes on things like Claudine Gay's plagiarism, George Floyd's death, and Oct. 7 aren't experts on higher ed, racial politics, or the Middle East. If you're going to last as a pundit, even a heterodox one, you need originality and expertise, like Glenn and John when it comes to DEI & academia, Kmele on race and free speech, Matt on the media and libertarian stuff, Moynihan on Israel (and apparently, everything), and the Smoke 'Em gals on journalism, urban decay, and #metoo.
I'm down to three podcasts subscriptions that don't re-hash the same things constantly. There are only so many ways to say, "I think gender ideology/DEI/postcolonialism/anti-racism" has gone too far.
I subscribed for dirty jokes and racist accents.
I stayed for in-depth socio-political analyses of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Comparing a failing newspaper to imperial Hungary is something that can only happen on this podcast
https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304447804576414832869865182
As my entry in the obscure Austrian economist joke of the day:
And if they really wanted to lean into libertarianism they could have Hans-Hermann Hoppe on to explain why the newspapers failing, and the death of democracy that represents, was a good thing. Also bonus commentary on why we'd all be better off living under a still going Hapsburg Dynasty.
Hoppe: But wait, hear me out, what if it was a GOOD dictatorship?
Charles Haywood would be a great Hungarian guest to have on. I've had him on my show twice. Head of the Worthy House. https://theworthyhouse.com/
In reference to the genocide comparisons and the nature of the Holocaust, I do find it interesting that many of the same people who will tell us that over 150 years after slavery, America is an irredeemably racist country and that racism permeates are very nature to the point where it is impossible to weed out; but less than 80 years after the Holocaust the idea that anti-Semitism plays any part in European countries' political and cultural policies is utterly ridiculous.
Whaaa?! This is like a second Second Sunday!
I, too, only subscribe to the NYT for the word puzzles/games.
You can subscribe to the games without getting the paper, I believe. But at some point I couldn’t even bear giving them money for that.
For some reason, I received a promo price for all access that was cheaper than games only. Once that runs out, I’ll be downgrading. If there were another app that provided similarly challenging word games, I wouldn’t mind switching.
I let my subscription lapse because I have too many undone crossword puzzle books lying around to justify paying for more, but I do miss the non-crossword puzzle games. Rows Garden, Marching Bands, and Spirals were my favorites.
I’m not familiar with those. Maybe they were discontinued? My home page lets me play Spelling Bee, Wordle, Connections and Letter Box plus the crossword. You can play a few of them for free without paying but not the crossword and only a limited number of words for spelling bee.
Michael insisting that Matt had interviewed Bill James on a previous episode was funny. Accusing Matt of dementia on a baseball thing when Michael just had the wrong name. Hell, I would remember if that'd happened and I don't care much about baseball!
Moynihan really keeping up his righteous gentile status. Nice.
I did not take Moynihan for a Tesla man.
They’re still great cars (if you want an electric) despite Musks super-online antics. I wonder how Henry Ford would be remembered if he had a Twitter account. Actually, scratch that...
Did you know that Henry Ford pioneered the 40 hour work week? He’d get soooo much shit for that now; he didn’t even allow remote work!
Edit: my assistant has just handed me a slip of paper noting that Henry Ford was also a prominent anti-Semite, so I guess it would all even out in Twitter World?
I am not bothered at all by Elon's antics (mostly because I don't follow or care). It has no relevance to my opinions on the Teslas. And yet, when I bought and EV last year, I did not consider a Tesla for a moment for a few reasons.
The biggest of those reasons is that I *loathe* the trend of getting rid of all physical buttons and moving controls to a touch screen. Tesla apparently does a better job of this than everyone else who is trying it but that's just having the tastiest shit sandwhich. I think I'd rather just pass on the sandwich entirely. Luckily, this trend appears to be dying among other manufacturers. If Tesla ever catches on, I might consider them in the future.
I can’t believe he supports Fascist cars!
If you are playing the 5th Column drinking game this podcast gets you hammered. Matt waxing reminiscent on the la times and Moynahan making a Baeder-Meinhoff reference.
This was such a good podcast. I’m so grateful I found y’all during lockdown! Sanity savers!
Re: the discussion about the Holocaust. This argument about whether the Holocaust has vern wrongly exceptionalized isn’t that new. I went to the Holocaust Museum in DC pre-2010 with an ex and his family, and I was aghast when my ex’s dad complained that there was too much focus on the Holocaust and not on other genocides--particularly the “Native American genocide.” I told him, well, this isn’t the genocide museum, it’s the Holocaust Museum. 🤷🏻♀️
That whole class of comment would seem to tie very closely to Moynihan's frequent complaint that lots of modern media review boils down to complaining that they didn't make the book/movie/whatever that the reviewer thinks they should have made, rather than just reviewing the thing as itself.
The Holocaust Museum has a hall for other genocides. I went to their auditorium once to listen to some Uyghur refugees talk about their situation under the Chinese Communist Party. They’re doing way more than they need to do to cover other things.
And it’s a particularly dumb argument given that we have an enormous tax-funded Museum of the American Indian and the African American museum both within walking distance, which are presumably filling precisely the niche this person wants filled.
As always, it's worth remembering that in the 2012 campaign, Biden said Romney was going to reinstitute slavery.
https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/08/vp-biden-says-republicans-are-going-to-put-yall-back-in-chains
One of the earliest Gustavo Arellano podcast projects at the LA Times was also one of of the best: a 3-part series on California's infamous Prop 187, from 1994, which targeted illegal immigration but wound up kneecapping the state's GOP instead. Kudos to former Governor Pete Wilson, too, who appeared with Gustavo for an extended conversation in a follow-up bonus interview.
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-10-15/prop-187-this-is-california-battle-podcast
Shame the LA Times has shut down such work because, five years later, it may be a topic worth revisiting. Californians are showing signs of souring on public largesse directed to illegal immigrants.
https://unherd.com/thepost/california-voters-turning-against-immigration/
Look for ex-Dodger Steve Garvey to pick up the issue this year in his Senate run. And if he can get an endorsement from Fernando Valenzuela, then California politics just might get fun again.
Matt, Doug was a Coolies album. Dumb as hell, but kinda fun. Per Google generative AI:
"Doug is the story of a skinhead, named Doug, who kills a drag queen short-order cook, steals his recipe book and becomes a "culinary giant" when the cookbook becomes a nationwide bestseller."
When I was a poor college student, I went to my local indie record store once a week and bought one album my guy there recommended, no questions asked. I should have asked some questions about Doug.
Now that I've picked up on that from you, and Kino from Moynihan (I reviewed Gruppa Krovi for my college paper), it's time for Kmele to surface some late-eighties white boy dumbassery that I can imaginarily bond with him over.
I owned Doug, and the verse I remember from the record is:
It's a hot night
and the crack pipe
is buuuurning my hand
I’ve been to Yad Vashem and it’s a moving experience and a must visit if you’re lucky enough to go to Israel, it clarified for me the horror and number sacrificed in a way that just saying a big number doesn’t. But the thing that really brought home to me just how planned and regimented the Holocaust was, was visiting Dachau and seeing the map of camps. We all know the big names of course, but the network of camps was basically every town, an incredible web where there was literally no place to go to avoid it. There was just no happenstance about any of it and that’s important to recognize in today’s attempts to fool people over what happened and why, and why Israel as a place is a necessary safe haven. Imho of course, but for this topic, I’m choosing a side and believe I’m doing so rightly.
Visiting Dachau had a huge impact on me as well - the bureaucratic efficiency of the Nazi murder machine was really terrifying.
Side note, when I was there (25 years ago), this guy Martin Zaidenstadt was there, and hearing his story was overwhelming and sad - but then years later I found out that he may have been making up a bunch of stuff. And as you can see in the article, there's a weird premonition of the whole "poetic truth" idea - even though other groups of Dachau survivors say his stories aren't true, "...most people who know him seem to acknowledge, Mr. Zaidenstadt, born of a Jewish family in Poland, fits a particular category of pain, made up of those who cannot shake their memories and must return to the scene of atrocity to pick over the wounds of the Holocaust."
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/26/world/memories-of-dachau-still-hold-a-survivor.html
Visiting Auschwitz was a harrowing experience for me. The level of evil cruelty the Nazis perpetrated on the Jews is astounding and I feel sick to my stomach when I consider it.
I think the Replacements would have been the band to name an album “Doug.”