Buzzed on Coffee and Double Standards

On the inverted pyramid of concern.

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(Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)

Dear Reader (except those of you who got sick of leftover spaghetti),

Get ready for a stemwinder—I’m pretty jacked-up on caffeine, nicotine, and relief. 

I’ve had a bunch of things on my plate lately—both figuratively and literally. The figurative plate-crowders have led to a lot of literal plate crowding. You see, to paraphrase Dewey Oxburger, I swallow a lot of stress—and a lot of pizza. But now that a good number of the stress-inducers are behind me, I think I gotta start taking better care of myself. 

I watched a few clips of our excellent special episode of The Remnant and I was reminded of that scene from Friends where they’re watching some old home movies of Monica when she was morbidly obese. She explains that the “camera adds 10 pounds” and Chandler asks, “How many cameras were on you?” 

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  1. BPhillips

    The concern about caffeine deaths made me think of the political pearl clutching concerning trans athletes. Missouri's Governor Mike Parson told the legislature that if they didn't pass legislation banning trans athletes from competing at all levels he would call them back for a special session to address the issue. That makes it a very, very important issue that must be addressed as quickly as possible before there are dire outcomes right?

    In Missouri, since 2016, there have been 13 transgender athletes who have asked to compete on a team that matches the gender with which they identify. Of those, 8 were 6th thru 12th grade. As far as I could tell, 0 of those kids were what you would call "elite athletes" - they were just kids who wanted to play sports with their friends.

    Missouri passed the law this week as Parson requested.

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    Michael Harris

    "I’m a simple-rules-for-a-complex-society kind of guy"
    Your discussion with Sarah about allowing local communities to selectively ban speech (i.e. banning Nazi's matching in Skokie) doesn't seem like it would lead to simple rules!

    Sorry for the late response. I kept having to stop to think about various things you said in the column.

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    Rlritt

    Graphic novel!?

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    Kommisar89

    Jeez, I should be dead then. When I was at Defense Language Institute studying Russian back in the day there was a little snack bar down by the old classrooms. They served coffee and refills were free so I'd get there before class and order a 20-oz coffee, drink it in the shop, and then get a refill to go. Then on my break a couple of hours later I'd do the same thing again. Four twenty once cups in about 3 hours give or take. If cups of coffee are 8-onces then that's ten cups. Phew! But I needed that to counteract the 15-pack of Stroh's I'd had the night before. Those were the days.

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      Citizen60

      Were you at the DLI in Monterey studying Russian in the early 70's? So was my AF husband

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        Kommisar89

        No, mid-80s for me.

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    Ben Connelly

    “ Get ready for a stemwinder—I’m pretty jacked-up on caffeine, nicotine, and relief. ”

    This is how you know it’s going to be a good G-File!

    “ You can probably see the problem. Abortion rights activists have long insisted that human fetal pain is either a “myth” or that, even if it’s real, it doesn’t really matter (including at Vox). I’m hard pressed to understand why fetal pain for Gallus gallus domesticus should be a major cause for concern, but fetal pain for Homo sapiens shouldn’t be.”

    Oh man! This was a point I made in college which I thought was funny and the pro-choice vegetarian I made it to didn’t (I asked why a pro-choice vegetarian would have any problem eating eggs).

    “ Smoking is so terrible that even vaping must be banned because it reminds people of smoking, but isn’t it great that everyone is free to smoke as much weed as they want? ”

    Man this is so true too. I’d rather cut a toe off than smoke weed or vape, but all the stuff about how weed (and now psychedelics) are supposedly “good” for you but we should make tobacco illegal is so silly.

    “ But the policy of “Let your freak flag fly” has done nothing to protect core political speech. Many people who blithely shrug at fringy expression are constantly talking about the need to censor, restrict, or regulate political speech.”

    This is a very good point. People want to protect the speech that doesn’t matter, but as soon as it comes to politics they start moaning about conspiracies related to dark money and corporations and megadonors, which is somehow justification to restrict speech in the one area we should most care about free speech.

    I’m with you on the caffeine point too. There’s a bogus category of journalism that involves hyping some incredibly insignificant thing to get people frightened out of their minds about something mundane because 1 in every 100000 people does something idiotic with it and has a bad side effect.

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    Beverly

    Incredible column - I wish we could amplify your message, or at least make it required reading in DC.

    (BTW, I think it was Syndrome and not Dash that uttered that line in The Incredibles.)

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      CarsonJ

      Syndrome says it to much effect in the middle of the film, but I'm pretty sure that Dash says it toward the beginning of the movie when they're all in the restaurant. It's been a while since I last saw it so I could be misremembering though.

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        Beverly

        I'm relying on memory too - as good a reason as any to rewatch. Though it's probably on the internet somewhere if only I'd look... ;-)

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      Ben Connelly

      It was Syndrome!

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    KAM

    Several months ago, a fellow Christian asked me, after patiently listening to my lamentations about Christian pundits, “OK, then who DO you like?”

    Very annoying.

    “Great question. Who do I like. Hmmmm…. Jonah Goldberg.”

    (You know, my God is a Jew. So ….)

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    Citizen60

    Clear, bright guidelines require a society that can achieve a high degree of consensus.

    The immigrants who came to these shores—which is everyone but the Native Americans—came or stayed to get away from “the old ways.” Roles/economic caste, conformity, being ruled by a monarch. Between that “rugged individualism” and settlement patterns, the chances of consensus are slim. US history is one of force—through majorities in all 3 branches of government big enough to override Presidential vetos, through slavery, warring over land with slaughter and starvation (hello Native Americans), or The Mexican-American and Civil War. Talk about warring: Women—1/2 the population—fought for 70 years to get the vote, and it barely passed then.

    This is not a nation able to hold a “national conversation” or reach consensus. Will it evolve into one? Hasn’t come close yet.

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      Cogitatio

      "which is everyone but the Native Americans"

      Actually, they immigrated here as well, they just did it much earlier.

      "US history is one of force"

      By this definition, all of history is "of force," so why focus on the United States? The reality is that the United States has a history of evolving and changing through other means, and that it has changed quite rapidly when compared to nearly every other nation.

      Can we ever hold a "national conversation?" Probably not, at least not in the near future. I would rather that we stopped trying to, and that people stopped trying to change everyone else. Accept that people are different, stop being crazy, and just follow some version of the golden rule. Above all, stop trying to rule the actions -- and thoughts --of others.
      And yes, I recognize that asking people to change is somewhat hypocritical. But there is a world of difference in asking that people cease to run around trying to change everyone else, and asking them to believe something different about religion, race, gender, US history, etc.

      Just a thought.

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        Citizen60

        Yes, I guess you're right about all of history being one of force, although The Black Plague allowed for dislocation without armed actions. But the topic of my answer was/is the US.

        How did the US evolve and change through other means except force? And the reason the US has changed quite rapidly that nearly every other (developed?) nation is we are a very young country.

        Can we ever hold a "national conversation?" When did the US ever hold a national conversation? Polarized or not as we are now--and not to this degree for the first time--it has never happened. And the "rugged individual" character of those who came and stayed is such they really don't want one. My favorite example is: Canada's and the UK's national health systems cover birth control and abortions--can you imagine the US ever common to consensus on those issues?

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  9. Bskrantz

    Face it, what most people think, and think they know, is not based on application of fundamental principles to objective information using logical reasoning. People are emotional animals driven by core urges that predate the species, especially tribalism, status-seeking, and nepotism. These are manifest in doctrine, which provides the basis for more "advanced" societies than bands of chimps and hyenas. And once positions are enshrined in tribal doctrine, thought, i.e. questioning, is not only no longer required, it is no longer allowed.

    I often wonder about how accidental some entrenched positions among our political tribes might be. Could opinions on abortion fallen the other way, with those on the left championing the rights of the fetus as another weak oppressed class? Or those on the right promoting the interests of black and brown people who might be more Christian than urban-suburban whites?

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  10. Sarah Matthews

    Good Job Jonah! Hope the fair Jessica brings you a treat from her travels!

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