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The single, all-consuming story of our time continues to dominate the press, but there appears to be an increasing hunger among news consumers for distractions from it. And, so, we discuss them. Trump’s aggressive behavior on Twitter. Viral videos. Joe Rogan and the backlash to his success. We discuss it all.
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We’re all just a figment of John’s daughter’s concussion? Thanks, now I have that to worry about.
Another excellent podcast! The discussion on the President’s JS tweets got me thinking: I did not vote for Trump, for the obvious principled reasons. As these Trump years pass, I’m getting a rising feeling that I will likely vote for him in November. Why? As I sort out this feeling, I’ve identified a few reasons:
Mark Alexander
I don’t know if he still feels the same way as he did on the Ricochet podcast of May 30, 2019, but Norman Podhoretz, the inimitable twentieth-century intellectual with a great appreciation of and affection for blue collar folks, said Bill Kristol had lost his mind in wanting to primary Trump. Could not agree more. Politics is filthy business. I wish there were more statesmen, but I see none and most definitely none in the Democratic Party, which has totally left working people behind (but not Norman). I would understand not voting. But to my mind, voting for the Democratic candidate for president would be comparable to putting Covid-19 patients in nursing care facilities.
There is not a binary choice between lockdown and doing little as your conversation implies. There is little need for healthy people below 50 to be in lockdown, if they get the virus they will not overwhelm the hospitals. Instead we need to look for effective and sustainable ways to isolate vulnerable populations until there is a vaccine, if there is one. This approach would have the advantage of being less of a drag on the economy.
The Left wants to see the pandemic as the worst until there is a vaccine?
No, the Left wants to see it as the worst until there is an election and Trump is defeated.
The idea that this is all playing out in Miss Podhoretz’s head essentially was the premise of the last episode of the old hospital drama, in which they suggested that everything shown in the entire run of the series took place in the imagination of the autistic son of the guy running the hospital.
Also, Joe Rogan is a current stand-up comedian and not a former stand-up comedian, although all comedians are taking a break due to the pandemic.
It might be noted that one of perhaps many things that elevated Rogan’s fame were his very long interviews with clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson. That relationship appears to be somewhat similar to the relationship between fellow comedian and podcaster Adam Carolla and Dennis Prager.
Another thing that makes Joe Rogan different is that he is willing to interview conservative-leaning people that the mainstream media either hates or fears or people like Jonathan Haidt, Sam Harris, Elon Musk, Tim Pool, Bill Maher, Edward Snowden, and Bill Burr who have proven to be more than two-dimensional Leftists. He also has on a lot of former military veterans who served in the recent Wars on Terror and who are often active in outdoor survival activities.
Some of the conservative-leaning interview names have included Ben Shapiro, Dan Crenshaw, Candace Owens, Steven Crowder, Ted Nugent, Gad Saad, Dave Rubin, Gavin Mcinnes, Peter Schiff, Mel Gibson, Carl Benjamin, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Adam Curry, the Podfather and former MTV VJ who sort of started it all and who I think sometimes supports libertarians and conservatives. Probably only about 1% to perhaps 5% or so of his guests have really leaned conservative, but that is typically too much for the Left.
I think guests like Jim Norton, Roseanne Barr, and Adam Curry even endorsed Trump.
Apparently one of his biggest disagreements that Joe Rogan has with people like Ben Shapiro, Dan Crenshaw, Steven Crowder, and Ted Nugent is that they do not support the use or legalization of recreational marijuana.
Rogan also asks questions neither the Left or the mainstream Right would ask like, “Why is Antifa allowed on Twitter when the Proud Boys aren’t?”
Rogan’s interview with Ted Nugent was surprising. Nugent’s stance on hunting is a true environmentalist stance, one that he articulates with fascinating details.