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This week on the Big Show, one guest: John O’Sullivan. We booked him to fact check this season of Netflix’s The Crown as he was a speechwriter for Margaret Thatcher and was a witness to much of what occurred in the show (and what didn’t). But that wasn’t the only topic we covered with John. We also had a long and shall we say lively conversation about the Trump legal team’s efforts to overturn the results of the election. We think Mr. O’Sullivan represented the views of many of our members and listeners, much to the consternation of one of the hosts of this podcast (guess who?). Also, Peter Robinson discovers The Beatles forty years after the fact and then immediately proceeds to blame them for a lame Christmas song written decades after the band broke up. Also, a new Lileks Post of The Week courtesy of @majestyk and a short but thorough primer on why streaming killed the movie theater star.
Music from this week’s show: Her Majesty by The Beatles
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If a remember correctly, he came fairly close to losing his seat in the election preceding his latest one (either the general, the primary, or both). Suffice to say he was not a friend of the Tea Parties, and still isn’t a friend to the base. Calculations now are different than they were back then.
Regardless, maybe we shouldn’t attack each other and be mildly supportive of imperfect Republican candidates?
I’m about done listening to this podcast as I find Rob Long a Never Trumper bore! He is rude, self-righteous, pugnacious and belligerent. He grandstands as if his opinion is the only one allowed. You know,, like a Never Trumper, or Leftist elitist.(no difference) You are rude and obnoxious Rob. I am not impressed by a NYC, Hollywood writer insider for the “golden people”. I’m OK with being a deplorable. It makes it so easy to spot a narcissistic obnoxious fool.
Being nice is immensely useful in convincing people. I am surprised at how rarely that is employed.
Forcing myself to vote on account of how existentially despicable the modern Democrats are is the best I can do.
Another good band name. :-)
Maybe Rob is actually intending to drum up support for Trump, with his bone-ignorant filibusters! The first half-hour of this week’s episode made me sympathize with the people who say they will walk away from Ricochet altogether.
Liberals and progressives know that they can win their arguments with conservatives only by silencing them; thus, Twitter and Facebook and Google and Youtube. This seemed to be Rob Long’s approach as well: to simply not let John O’Sullivan get in a word edgewise. One of the other hosts eventually had to tell Rob to shut up (or words to that effect) and let O’Sullivan speak.
But then, in the last analysis, Rob Long needs the support of Hollywood progressives a lot more than he needs our support. So I don’t expect him to change.
I also think this likely explains a lot. But it seems we aren’t allowed to speculate or have these opinions since we don’t personally know Rob well enough. If anything, it would arguably be worse if Rob is acting these ways but DOESN’T care how it affects his status with Hollyweird.
Given the bellwether counties and Trump’s extraordinary coattails (see #111), the burden of proof is now on anyone who wishes to claim that the election was not stolen.
Like a wife who refuses to believe that her husband is molesting her child, people who claim that the election was A-OK are operating from a place of faith, not reason —
“It can’t happen here!”
“And even if it does, I refuse to see it!”
And yet it has happened here, and with rather important elections–a Lyndon Johnson Senate election, was it? And Al Franken–which is how we got Obamacare.
Plenty of blame to go around. Don’t forget the DOJs persecution of Ted Stevens
For the last many years, I have enjoyed listening to this podcast on Saturday mornings. I have never had any issue with Rob or his views, but I must admit, I couldn’t even get half way through this weeks podcast. I felt that Rob’s behavior, especially with the guest was completely unprofessional. I went to the comment section. There was a full page of comments with nothing about Rob’s behavior. I thought it was just me. Then Sunday night, I came back to the comments. Wow! Thank Goodness. I am not the only one who thinks Rob was not at his best this week.
Maybe Rob just needs a timeout until after the inauguration.
The podcast wasn’t even available until rather late on Friday, so a lot of people probably didn’t even see it until maybe fairly late already on Saturday. (Depending on if they slept in, had other things to do…)
At least what he managed to get past Rob’s interruptions…
That is true, and it certainly appeared that the R’s much preferred to use Obamacare as an issue with which to fire up the base rather than something to be gotten ride of. But, President Trump helped kill any hope of getting rid of it by characterizing at least one of the Republican alternatives as “mean.” And then went on record saying that pre-existing conditions should be covered. It’s hard to “remove and replace” Obamacare under those conditions. The biggest share of the blame, though, was good ol’ Mister Maverick himself voting against repeal.
They needed to have something decent to replace it with. Undoing employer-based insurance is going to be pure hell, especially now.
Yes, Rob was a bit badger-y early on, but relented and O’Sullivan got to make all of his points. Also, he didn’t seem fazed at all by Rob.
What this gets at is the idea that it’s hard for some people not to take Rob’s disagreement as an implicit value judgment by him of you for your support for Trump. It is hard to get around, and it works both ways, but it is ultimately a “if the shoe fits” kind of thing–you can choose whether or not to take it personally. I don’t.
And now you explicitly insult him, after complaining about incivility. Do you not see that you’re doing the very thing you decry? This is exactly what I’m talking about: expecting civility and manners from the same people routinely characterized in the comments here as one or more of the following: deranged (see above,) deluded, traitorous, GOPe sellouts, actually on the take to oppose Trump, led by the nose by the “Washington establishment,” stupid, uncaring if not actually hostile to the working class, or neocon bitter-enders who lament an interruption of their warmongering, etc.
I’m not saying here that the anti-Trump folks are models of restraint, good-faith argumentation, or kind words. What I’m saying is that “both sides” (which is a problem in and of itself, as we’re devolving into tribal partisanship, just like the culture at large) traffic in this stuff. Beams and motes, folks, beams and motes.
There are other reasons, which some of Trump’s critics have made very plain. This is part of the problem in the discussion: both sides omitting arguments that are harder to argue with.
Yes, Rob was somewhat excitable with John initially, but did calm down and let Mr. O’Sullivan make his points. John himself seemed unfazed by it.
Except that even when they are fair but pointed, people still complain. So yes, I’m with you on niceties, but it has to work both ways.
But it’s going to have to be done, though now it might be after the system collapses. The Dems bet correctly: Obamacare was unpopular, but once they forced it through and people started using it, it became all but impossible to get rid of. The Rs are going to have to make a sustained case over a long time that a) there are alternatives to Obamacare that would be cheaper, less injurious to liberty, etc., and b) here’s what they are. They’ve done neither a nor b, and are perpetually surprised that their replacement efforts are unpopular.
Frankly, I think it is only a matter of time before we get single payer government health care. It will mean crappy health care for everyone except the elite and rich, but it is what people want. I just hope it is not the end of innovation in health care.
Isn’t it maybe a little different when Rob has been hurling his insults “publicly” for at least 4 years, vs he gets pushback for his bad behavior on a podcast?
Okay, so, Rob can start behaving better first. After all, he started it. How’s that?
I don’t think unilateral disarmament ever works.
All I want from the Aliens is how to do warp drive so that we can reopen the frontier. Having a frontier will allow more entrepreneurship, wealth creation, and a place to go that would be away from government. This would solve a lot of our current political problems.
LBJ’s Outer Space Treaty of 1967 states that
outer space, including the Moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means.
The Soviets could hardly believe their luck, that the only power on Earth capable of landing men on celestial bodies had voluntarily given up the right to even modest territorial claims, in return for — nothing. (Yet another fiasco in the long record of Democratic foreign policy bungling.)
Not surprisingly, manned space exploration ground to a halt a few years later: imagine what the colonization of the Americas would have looked like if nobody was permitted to claim anything.
That’s fine, I never wanted to found the United States Planet Of Mars anyway. I wanted to found MY Planet Of Mars!
Not useful or accurate, but also not surprising.
The problem is that you look at it as a “disarmament” issue.
What would be your counter? That “we” started it by electing Trump, and Rob was just being “rude” in response?
If we stop being rude BACK to Rob, but he continues being rude to us, how does that help?
That will change once it’s not as hard to get to other worlds.
I think living on Planet Elon Musk might be pretty nice!