All Rants Lead to Rome

Everyone in the past did terrible, evil things.

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Frank Sinatra once observed that “you’ve either got or you haven’t got style,” but when you’re living out of an RV in the wilds of Iowa—or, for that matter, representing your state in the halls of the US Senate—that doesn’t really matter. Jonah’s still on the road today, but he can’t outrun his existential dread. To drown it out for a while instead, he delivers yet another unfocused, inordinately long Ruminant to end the week. This time, much of his irritation is directed toward the renewed jackassery of Matt Gaetz and the politics of a potential Biden impeachment, but plenty of righteous indignation is also reserved for the Senate’s new dress code and the increasingly shaky prospect of a second Biden term. Plus, tune in to hear Jonah elaborate on why men spend so much time thinking about Rome (almost as much, in fact, as they spend thinking about Nixon).

Show Notes:

– Jonah: “Why Rome?”

– Mike Duncan’s Revolutions podcast

– Jerry Muller’s The Mind and the Market

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Comments (38)
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  1. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    Glory to the Republic!

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    The Bell Tower

    One of your best. I just came here to say that inequality is an excuse to wrap the hatred of success and hard work in the cloak of caring. We should always care about our fellow brothers and sisters who fall behind but that has zero bearing on the success experienced by others. But that rage and anger is what they want to feel. They don’t care about the suffering of others.

    That’s all radical progressivism and communism are. Envy. I’ll never forget the letter to the St Pete Times years ago where some woman noted that she was so happy to wait for heath care shortages in some other country because at least rich and “important” people had to wait in the same line.

    And I definitely cite the Lenin NEP all the time. Lenin basically said “Bro, we need some markets around here or all these starving people are gonna string us up.” That is all you ever need to know about communism.

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  3. VV

    I recently finished Mike Duncan’s History of Rome podcast and started working on Revolutions. I might need to listen to the History of Rome again at some point. I wish I remembered more of it so I could think about the Roman Empire more often.

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      The Bell Tower

      Read Storm Before The Storm. Excellent summation of what I would argue is the most consequential era of Roman history for our times.

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  4. Laura Zaner

    https://babylonbee.com/news/man-who-doesnt-ever-think-about-the-roman-empire-worried-he-might-be-trans

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    George.Skinner

    I'm going to preface this by saying that dressing up in a suit has never been a big deal for me. I spent my teenage years wearing and caring for a uniform every day as an Air Cadet, including the 6-8 weeks every summer spent living on a military base for training. However, does it ever occur to you what a silly, impractical garment a business suit is? They're typically made of fabrics that are easy to damage, require special cleaning care, and are sensitive to weather (at least the nicer ones made with wool or flannel.) The jacket is something that made more sense when buildings had poor heating. The necktie is goofy - you don't need it to tie your shirt shut anymore, and it's basically a long strip of fabric flapping around your neck and posing a hazard. Realistically, the business suit is an anachronistic descendant of day to day men's wear of 50-80 years ago. The case for considering a business suit as the standard for being well-dressed is rooted in a cultural habit. Eventually, something's going to give, and the business suit is going to go the way of breeches & silk stockings or togas.

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      Kevin M. James

      Some well-taken points for sure. The thing that fills me with dread about following your argument to its logical conclusion is that there may have never been a worse moment to entrust Western culture with the task of coming up with an alternative.

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  6. Hartzlk

    So I decided to look into this podcast Jonah mentioned - Revolutions, by Mike Duncan.
    It was a chore to just scroll long enough to get to the 10th season on the Russian revolutions.
    And there are over 100 episodes in just that 10th season.
    If you don't hear from me for a bit, this is why. I just finished the second episode, and still looking forward to continue filling in those missing gaps in my knowledge of history.

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    1. RaoD

      I actually learned a lot from that series. Most importantly nothing really seemed to have changed much.

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    Charley Warns

    As Jonah brought up the point that it takes courage to take on an unpopular position (from the perspective of kindred spirits), does anybody want to touch my point about Tou Thao a couple down? I'm arguing that he was assassinated by our "justice" system by being sentenced to the same amount of time in prison –for just doing crowd control!– that George Floyd served for aiming a pistol at a pregnant woman's stomach (like how ruthless was that?!) during a home invasion.

    "Tou Thao, the last former Minneapolis police officer convicted in state court for his role in the killing of George Floyd, was sentenced Monday to 4 years and 9 months."

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  8. Mccabe66

    Romans didn’t sacrifice humans? The Christians thrown to the lions in the Coliseum might beg to differ!

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      Charley Warns

      If they were doing it for sport rather than to appease their gods, it wouldn't be a sacrificial offering.

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      1. Avatar photo
        CynthiaW

        All the Roman sports were religious events.

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        1. Avatar photo
          Mike B

          As are American sports.

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            CynthiaW

            There's a strong case for that, philosophically, but Roman (and Greek) sports were openly practices of religion.

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  9. ConProf

    People who judge the past make the same sort of error as the reincarnated: they assume that had they lived then, they’d have the morals and ethics they do today. They also, wrongly, believe that the people of the future won’t look back on their mores as barbaric.

    What happened to Guy? Did he get shitcanned?

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  10. Avatar photo
    Charley Warns

    A system for avoiding a system is a system. Where the dress code is cargo shorts, sandals, and a Hawaiian shirt ... the guy wearing a suit, tie, and penny loafers is the anarchist.

    In "The Convenient State," Gary Wills writes : "At another extreme of our experience is anarchism, which (read the paradox how you will) is a system for avoiding system. It, too, has a principle of order—the removal and continued negation of political coercion—corresponding to its untrammeled freedom. These systems are both unworkable, since virtue that is enforced is not virtue, and anarchy that is guaranteed against control is to that extent controlled."

    You explained why Charlie Cooke considers football to be a drug.

    Regarding having the courage to take on an unpopular cause ... I've noted how nobody wants to defend Tou Thao – for fear of being called a racist I figure being the obvious explanation. All he was doing was crowd control! Consider how many cops got taken out of the picture in order to avenge someone who inarguably should be described as a landmine waiting for a cop to step on in (noting that Floyd had previously pointed a gun at the stomach of a pregnant woman during a home invasion yet sadly got less than 5 years for it). The judge that put Floyd back on the street should be in prison, not Thao. Think about that ... if Floyd had simply served a reasonable sentence for his crime, he'd be alive and those cops would be working. Instead, what we have is the justice system assassinating a police officer:

    "Tou Thao, the last former Minneapolis police officer convicted in state court for his role in the killing of George Floyd, was sentenced Monday to 4 years and 9 months."

    Each Republican nominee should be asked if they'd consider pardoning Thao. I highly doubt any will volunteer an answer.

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