The Collapse of Build Back Better

In the final episode of “The Dispatch Podcast” in 2021, our hosts talk about Joe ...

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In the final episode of “The Dispatch Podcast” in 2021, our hosts talk about Joe Manchin’s non-reliability for the Democrats, the increasing tensions between Russia and Ukraine, and the growing spread of the more-infectious Omicron variant. They close by asking a question: How will historians in 100 years view the past two decades?

Show Notes:

–Give someone a Dispatch subscription this Christmas

–TMD: “Manchin Says No to Build Back Better”

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  1. Avatar photo
    WKDawson

    I didn't listen to this until today, so two things ...

    First, I note that it was still worth listening to this after one month. Although especially a problem with the Trump years, one month has become like something three years ago, so even more than a one month half-life is sign of good journalism.

    Second, part of the reason I was reluctant to listen to this was because I expected to hear gloating. I appreciate that the attitude was a little more gentle.

    It's not that I'm a big fan of B**3, but I do think we need to rethink some priorities in our system and we should be coming up with ways to mitigate a multitude of problems that have evolved in our system.

    For example, I think even Jefferson considered education to be fundamental to a democracy. This should mean that it is just absurd to allow the costs to fly so far out of reach for many people that they must end up paying off a house to get the education they need. Education is fundamental to our infrastructure. How could we allow this? Long ago, in the paleolithic era, I was able to put my own self through school on regular wages and no student loans. That seems utterly impossible now unless I stumbled on a small fortune early on. Everything now is lean with absolutely no room for error. This, to me, is just wrong.

    [Footnote: Yes B**3 ended up dropping any subsidy at all for college education, and many people have even more immediate issues I guess, but education seems like something that is fundamental to advanced technology, business, management and even our diplomacy. How do we make good diplomats when we care absolutely nothing about foreign language studies, except one year to pretend that we did something for our college entrance?]

    B**3 should have been something thought out seriously across the isles for many years, but because of the rotten situation carnival barkers, we have to rush this stuff and cannot do it in smaller, intelligently-crafted bills that properly restructure the system to meet our current needs.

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    Peter A

    When are you all expecting to have another Members Only Dispatch Live in 2022? I'm sure I'm not the only one who enjoys them!

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    Denise Cote

    Sarah, Sarah, Sarah. ;)
    And yes Steve, that musak was awful. I always listen to the very end for the possibility of getting a little gift. Thanks guys.

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  4. Randolph Mitchell

    As I was walking and listening to this podcast today, the label "The Hijackulators" for the participants came to mind. You're welcome!

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    Ben Connelly

    Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to the four of you!

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      Sarah Isgur vertical-nib Author

      And to you too!! Merry Christmas to the entire comments section!

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        Judy Karonika

        Don't know if you read these posts and replies, this much later. But, you and I have an uncle and several cousins in common. I spoke to one (Isgur) cousin, last night. Since I live in Houston, I actually knew your grandparents (and uncle Mayer, aunt Reva and cousin Jake), better than that cousin (who I spoke to last night), who grew up in MO. Would like to get in touch with you or your Dad and talk about Uncle Looie and Aunt Ethel. Wish I knew a better, more private way to get in touch. But, I hope you will respond and, as a site facilitator, hopefully you have access to my email.

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        Ben Connelly

        Thanks!

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    James Spiller

    Sarah is wrong to believe that there are lots of wars like this. In Sarah’s lifetime, there have been two sorts of wars like this: wars of conquest that were reversed (Falklands, Kuwait) and wars of conquest started by Putin.

    The Kaiser’s warmongering was unacceptable, so we fought the war to end wars to end it and anything like it. We outlawed it at Kellogg Briand. It was why anyone thought that Neville Chamberlain’s choice to start WWII over Poland, the biggest conscious sacrifice of a leader’s people for principle in history, was not crazy. We conducted the Nuremberg trials over it. It underlay the structure of NATO.

    The norm against wars of conquest is the chief argument in optimistic narratives of our age like the Better Angels of Our Nature. It is perhaps the single greatest achievement of the 20th century in terms of lives saved and lives improved, although there are other strong contenders (the defeat of communism has some overlap, advances in farming and medicine less so).

    The reason that David went to the close parallel of the Czechs is that we don’t have a non-Hitler example of this sort of serial conquest since then. Last time we voluntarily suffered over 50 million allied deaths to put an end to it, and that was lucky; had American politics been slightly different and Hitler less keen to abandon his alliance with Stalin, Chamberlain might have sacrificed enormous numbers only to see Hitler radically empowered by the war.

    This time, we could respond with relatively trivial danger and cost by supporting our allies in, among others, Syria, Ukraine, Georgia, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, and Mali. But we don’t because there are massive electoral rewards for people who take the “the 1980s called” line, and too many of our politicians are too unprincipled to take that loss. Biden, of course, is in a league of his own among major politicians on these matters; even Trump, who should have been impeached for undermining our support for Ukraine, was night and day better, increasing sanctions, creating a little ambiguity about Syria, arming Ukraine, and obstructing Nord Stream 2.

    But, no, unless Sarah can come up with an example of a war of conquest, she should not claim them to be common.

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    The Bell Tower

    As Tip O’ Neil might say, all COVID is local. I kept trying to convince my Dad to get the booster (he’s late 70’s) and he refused because he didn’t want to have a reaction and ruin the holidays.

    So, he got COVID and ruined the holidays anyway (good job, Dad). Omicron has been like a Seinfeld episode around here for us. Worse than last year for sure.

    Sarah, you deserve an award for podcasting all this time in the midst of these old white guys. I think South Park answered your question in Go God Go and Go God Go XII.

    In short, the collective will always be idiots fighting over idiot things and religion will just be replaced with something else for them to misinterpret and then kill each other over various versions of misinterpretation.

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  8. david rae

    I think the better way to phrase the Russia/Ukraine question is to ask what US national interest is at stake? Some may want Biden to commit troops to send the US military to defend a non-NATO country (and some may want him to fail as a result), and others will claim he's appeasing Putin by not committing our military or other assets to dissuade a Russian invasion. It's similar to the media's treatment of Trump - always trying to frame the issue as a no-win situation for the President. If Biden doesn't want to commit the military, he's weak. If he does and service members die, their blood is on his hands, and he should have pursued "peace" by other means. He does have economic sanctions (and NordStream) available - maybe he lays out to Putin up front what will happen should he attack, and ensure the consequences are severe enough to prevent the aggression in the first place. But waiting to see what happens next is not a plan.

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      Reading451

      I think you’re correct. I was waiting to hear what Steve envisions a muscular US response to Russia might look like. We have to do something but I’m not clear what that is short of committing troops. Booting Russia from
      sWIFT?

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    Marian Cates

    Great episode.

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    Dave

    I had no idea who this Jesse Watters was other than that he’s a host on Fox. So Jonah’s analogy went mostly over my head when I listened to the podcast yesterday. I happen to be staying at my parents’ house for Christmas, so coincidentally this happened yesterday: thanks (no thanks) to my Dad, I saw my first episode of The Five yesterday.

    Holy cow.

    I literally wanted to shoot the TV. What a disgusting, annoying, infuriating, dishonest, steaming pile that show is. I now understand the reference, and I’m now wishing I could have that memory expertly and precisely extricated from my hippocampus.

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