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Back this week with the full cast and another full show. We start with a deep dive on the Bari Weiss resignation and free speech in general. Then our favorite Denmark dude, Bjørn Lomborg joins to discuss his new book, How Climate Change Panic Costs Us Trillions, Hurts the Poor, and Fails to Fix the Planet. and we give him a chance to rebut a very snarky New York Times review of said book. Happy to help, Bjorn. Then, our favorite health care wonk, Avik Roy (listen to his 2x a week Covid in 19 podcast — co-hosted by some guy we’ve ever heard of– for all the latest COVID news and analysis) drops by to school us why schools should stay open. Finally, yep it’s another Lileks Post of The Week, this time by Ricochet member Tocqueville, who has compiled a very good list of Bullsh*t words/expressions that have got to go! 2020 Edition. The guys add a few of their own, so please feel free to give us yours in the comments below. In the meantime, stay safe and mask it.
Music from this week’s show: Times Like These by Glen Campbell
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I think he calmed down about Trump.
What’s Thiel done that’s kooky?
Isn’t one of the Koch Brothers still alive. I mean, I’m all for investing in economics programs, but they should diversify.
I thought there was an implied “so-called” when the word “kook” was used.
Well, I figure Scott just believes all Trump supporters are kooky.
Let’s see …
Kraft is a Democrat (according to Wikipedia).
Murdoch is a kind of wishy-washy conservative, who supported Tony Blair and admired Barack Obama.
Thiel and Singer are a little atypical, as conservatives go, being big gay marriage supporters.
Maybe we need to throw the net wider.
I’m all for that. But my opinion is that billionaires are all about the Benjamins, it’s our fault if we can’t show them that investing in us is better than investing in professional smashers. Let’s not go the route of the failed 2016 candidates. (Remember when they didn’t actually have any plan to repeal the unconstitutional health care bill that they ran against?)
Not all of them. Not even most of them. In fact, I really only think @max is kooky.
Rob’s monologue about the need for alternative conservative institutions was embarrassing and Peter was too kind in reminding him that many already exist and have been around for a long, long time. The problem is Rob finds these current places unpalatable for any number of reasons, but for the most part because they are critical in one way or another of the rarefied air he breathes constantly in his elitist bubble of negronis and juvenile GLOP podcasts, not to mention Venice Beach and Manhattan. And the fact that so many of the people who scream for alternative conservative institutions will at the drop of a hat still send their own children to the Ivy League colleges they themselves attended should make people take their protestations with a very large grain of salt. After all, setting your child up for a life of privilege and connections is a hard temptation to resist.
The Long Game
I was interested in the somewhat passing comment about the Democrats playing the “Long Game”. This actually is something that Republicans have missed almost entirely. I am not sure why exactly, but I attribute it to the underlying philosophical foundation of Republicanism, centered more on individual liberty and individual responsibility than the central state and dependence on the State.
The problem is that the Progressive movement, beginning over 100 years ago, with President Wilson being the first to note that the Constitution as written is no longer relevant, has moved along an inexorable path to embedding the latest in progressive thought into all our institutions. Since “Rules for Radicals” they understood that you could have an organized (albeit in some respects informally organized) movement to achieve their objectives.
The Bill Ayers left prison, got an advanced degree in education, and proceeded to initiate a fundamental reform of school curricula – leaving us with the uneducated masses we have observed on the Streets of Minneapolis, Seattle and other places recently.
The younger generations have learnt narratives, but are unable to manage critical thinking. Thus the herd-like acceptance of media-driven narratives on the Covid crisis.
What is necessary is for the Right to begin to employ similar tactics. Trump is a populist reaction to Obama’s administration overplaying their hand. But Trump seems to be a “tactic” and not the foundation for a strategy for long term restoration.
Much of what the conservative right wanted to “conserve” in our culture is lost – possibly permanently. Thus Thomas Sowell noted that his most recent book on “Charter Schools and their Enemies” he considers to be the most important book he has written. He understands that education is the foundation for our culture (the same understanding as Bill Ayers) and thus we must focus on changing education if we have any hope of restoration. What is needed is not a “Conservative” party but a “Restoration” party – up front, in your face and taking no prisoners. The same tactics as the left.
What’s also needed is a “movement” – one or more foundations – that are focused on developing long term strategic plans for the restoration of various aspects of culture.
Thus far we have been focused on tactics, on reaction. What we need is to develop a movement mentality and create our own strategy-driven “Long Game.”
I don’t know. Rob comes from a unique background but it’s not like he’s dishonest about it. This is somebody who makes his way in Hollywood and New York and refuses to hide. I’m with you on what I’ve inferred as your annoyance that Rob manages to come to wrong conclusion on a lot of important issues, but I’d say he’s a guy of solid character – regardless of whether his judgement can be questionable at times. He’s a good dude.
But doesn’t that also mean “with friends like these…” ?
How can you argue with this?
I’d pay good money to see the LA cancel crowd approach Rob. I’d bet he could be pretty funny about not apologizing.
You think he wouldn’t apologize? I wouldn’t be so sure.
I don’t know the man, so I can’t say for certain, but it’s how I’d bet.
Has he apologized for going to Yale yet?
What? Changing the name won’t change how it was built, etc! They need to close, and tear it all down.
But I don’t think Rob has anything to fall back on if he loses TV producing etc. So he literally can’t afford to be “cancelled.”
I don’t personally know either Rob Long or J.K. Rowling, but I still know that Rob Long is no J.K. Rowling.
He’s a talented writer, and I’d think he could transition into political commentary with ease – if it were necessary. I suppose he’d prefer to keep the gig he has, though. If nothing else, I’ll credit him with probably being smart enough to know that confessing to the mob is participating in your own cancellation. I don’t really suspect that fear has influenced his opinions that much over the last few years, probably just residual progressive goo from his younger, liberal years.
It’s funny you say that about Rowling and Rob, I get the two mixed up all the time. 😜
Yeah, I think one of Jesse’s other tweets said that all Yale graduates must renounce their degrees or be considered slavery apologists.
Not if the name is woke enough. How about The New Haven Institute for the Perpetually Aggrieved?
Seize its endowment. It might just pay off the debt.
I don’t know about name changes. But shouldn’t all Yale degrees be “cancelled,” retroactively?
Will that mean they have to say they didn’t go to college? Or that they went to slave college?
I enjoyed God and Man At The New Haven Institute for the Perpetually Aggrieved.
Actually, any time someone says they went to Yale, just respond “Oh, Slave College!” and see what they say.
But that would only be fun when used on “progressives.”
Is “call out” another trendy expression used mostly or even entirely by the left to mean “denounce (and immediately find guilty)”?
In German, one hears “entlarven,” a high-frequency verb used to describe the exposure of all sorts of evil-doers. You know, the usual: racists, fascists, homophobes, all trying to hide in their (privileged) cocoons.