Burning Down the House

Or just letting it burn?

By

Finally on the verge of overcoming his lingering COVID symptoms, Jonah approaches today’s rambly Ruminant with renewed verve. After tackling the strangeness of Elon Musk’s Twitter reign and the freakishness of Kanye West, he explores how Trumpification has changed the right and what sane Republicans can do to move forward. From there, things get philosophical, as Jonah examines the nature of ethical universals and what specifically is immoral about authoritarian regimes. Finally, things conclude with some sweet, nourishing dog content.

Show Notes:

– The Wednesday G-File

– Election denial in Cochise County

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Comments (24)
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  1. Avatar photo
    Rob W

    A great listen as always Jonah. Thank you for your description of 2022 which I will share with my extended family. We've had a similar year and the proctological exam with high school class ring is the perfect analogy. Enjoy your well deserved vacation and belated congratulations on your anniversary.

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    The Bell Tower

    Did you just finish with Vox Readers, Vox Dei? You’re killin me.

    As for this Chinese stuff, I’m unreasonably angry about it. I harp on my family in the comments quite a bit but my wife and mother in law have sacrificed a great deal to be here in America and build a family with me. They didn’t swim the Danube or anything but there are a lot of sacrifices that go into leaving your home country and family halfway across the world.

    Are they not Chinese? Or is this fluffy turd over at the Economist going to pat my kids on the head and say “Your American values are cute but that’s not real Chinese.”

    Sounds a lot like corroborating the abhorrent trash that spews from the communist windbags in China and is enabled by the neo-Marxist ignoramuses in the West who re-appear like cockroaches every so often using different language to describe the same tired baloney. If we can’t expect the Chinese people to know how to be free because of their heritage, we’re just signing off on the Han Supremacist junk that their idiotic government is pushing in the first place.

    Maybe I misunderstood what was actually said over on that podcast and maybe I’ll take a listen. I’ve been an Economist subscriber for years but if they’re really taking this crap seriously, they’re asking a lot of me to keep paying money to them.

    Anyway, it’s good to have Jonah back.

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    Seth B

    I would not be displeased to read a G-file detailing the similarities of news anchors' faces to those of babies. :)

    An excellent Ruminant, Jonah, characteristically thoughtful and funny - even if the promised ruminations on "the freakishness of Kanye West" in the description never materialized in the podcast itself.

    I'm a little saddened that I never hear the complete Remnant intro anymore, since I immediately press the "skip ahead 15 seconds" button until I find that the initial commercial has ended, and I've landed somewhere in the middle of the drumming. 'Tis a small complaint to be sure, but one I'm not above making. I do hope that someday the Dispatch will find a way to eliminate the commercials for subscribers.

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    Ben Connelly

    Jonah, you probably know this by now if you read the comments but you absolutely made the right call the double down on integrity these last several years and you shouldn’t feel bad about the likes of Lindsay Graham and Dinesh. You’ve colored yourself in glory and then haven’t.

    I’m so glad you used Ibsen as the example of a bad agitprop playwright. I hated reading the Dolls’ House in high school.

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    EmmyCab

    "Cochise County is not... being denied a warm water port on the Aegean or whatever..." This made me rewind and giggle. Thank you, Jonah!

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    Katenesvick

    On the point about dogs are not babies, I just rewatched Game of Thrones and I kept getting hung up on Dany saying the dragons were her children. Like of all the things - blood magic and zombies and leaf people - the hardest thing for me to accept was that no one called her on that bovine excrement. Ma'am, that is a lizard. Just because you raised it from a hatchling doesn't make it your child. They should have known she was crazy all along!

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      CynthiaW

      My Daughter D watches veterinarian (and zoo) shows, and you see the kookiest people on the vet shows. One that sticks in my mind was a woman with an obese pot-bellied pig who said to the vet, "She's literally my daughter," and I said, "Honey, I almost believe that."

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        Francesca

        There was a woman who bought a puppy from us and she kept referring to him as her son. She would bring it into conversation and say my son this and my son that I could never get my head round the idea that she was referring to this eight week old puppy

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          George.Skinner

          It bugs the heck out of me too. My younger daughter kept wanting to talk about my wife and I as our dog’s “mommy and daddy”, which is just kind of creepy. She finally settled for referring to us as “Alpha and Female Alpha.”

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            Francesca

            I've given up on the dog mom thing. Everyone says it, and its useless to object. But turning it around and calling a dog your son freaks me out, especially when done consistently.

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          CynthiaW

          People are crazy.

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      Ben Connelly

      It really annoys me when people suggest I (or anyone else my age) should get a dog instead of having kids. Those are two totally different decisions! They aren’t the same!

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  7. Bruce Metzger

    Jonah, if I may make a small suggestion fir next Fridays G-file while you are on vacation. It’s dog related. Can you republish the essay that appeared in “The Dadly Virtues”. Pretty please from an old guy.

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  8. Henry

    All in all a good episode, but you failed to address the most critical question: why DO you refer to yourself as "thumb guy" in the Pippa tweets?

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    1. Aahutchins

      Yes! Came here to see if anyone had noticed the same. He came tantalizingly close...and then zagged. Someone, please: Where did the Thumb come from?

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    David Hendrickson

    Hey Jonah, I just wanted to correct you on something small but worthwhile. At the 34 minute mark, you say that the Arizona Secretary of State is a Republican, but it's actually Democrat Katie Hobbs, who is now the governor-elect of the state. She pulled a Brian Kemp!

    Loved this episode, keep up the great work!

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    Alexanderspalding

    On a solo road trip, really wishing I could get a new episode of Drive Time. (Drive Tribe, whatever it was called, I miss it.)

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