Do Not Despair

The importance of being hopeful.

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After a long and draining week of speeches, fancy dinners, and finally acknowledging the existence of his intern, Jonah phones in the beginning of today’s Ruminant by simply reading through the stories in Friday’s Morning Dispatch. Luckily, things quickly pick up speed when Jonah turns to a wacky article by the mother of the recently disgraced CEO of FTX on why we should abandon the concept of personal responsibility. A lengthy philosophical discussion follows on the problems inherent in critical analysis, the necessity of pricing signals, and why bad ideas must be taken seriously. Following some thoughts on judicial activism and the future of the Federalist Society, Jonah wraps things up by discussing hope, optimism, and the nature of despair.

Show Notes:

– Barbara H. Fried: “Beyond Blame”
– “A Moment of Truth for the Federalist Society”

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Comments (23)
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  1. Francislyo

    I appreciate much of what you say, Jonah. However, your approval of the plan by Congressional Republicans to investigate Hunter Biden’s finances goes so far as to imagine out loud that Democratic leaders likewise go after family members: "what if Biden had an R after his name?". This is baffling: in reality, the Democratic Congress didn’t investigate financial dealings of Trump family members, even though there’s been plenty of impropriety there. (The Dispatch podcast “Here Come the GOP Investigations”).

    Republican leaders going after family members of Democratic leaders has gone even to the point of the disgusting tweets about Mr Pelosi, an elderly man whose head was smashed with a hammer by a man half his age (who planned to use that hammer on the Democratic Speaker of the House). Oh, yes – and Trump’s son led the way with the most disgusting tweet of all. He doesn’t just profit from politics - he is a leader. Yet no investigations.

    The Democratic Congress *did* investigate the Jan 6th indefensible attack on our democracy, launched by a sitting president. In contrast, Republican leaders led election denialism while throwing every obstacle at investigation. Many of us now find their plans to investigate Hunter Biden, Merrick Garland, Anthony Fauci, and the "mistreatment" of Jan 6th rioters as the height of hypocrisy. We’re cringing in expectation of the wild conspiracy theories likely to be promoted as "evidence" by MTG and other crazies who've been promised power to direct these investigations.

    Republican leaders have been promoting outrageous lies that Democrats are engaging in great evil from stealing elections to setting wild fires with space lasers. They’ve also pandered to the worst elements of their party who engage in vicious personal attacks on fellow Republicans, including those who averted a constitutional crisis (ex: Rusty Bowers, Liz Cheney) at great personal cost.

    Yes, Democracy was on the ballot. The failure of many Republicans to understand this is what led to midterm results that shocked them.

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    1. Francislyo

      Months later, the Republican investigations begin:
      Hearing Breaks Down After Marjorie Taylor Greene Interrupts Democrat To Confront Ex-Twitter Exec:
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtM6C4JUjO8

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    Hatfieldam

    Thank you for this. I listened to the majority of the podcast yesterday while driving with my youngest son cross country to see my daughter. This morning I got in the car to run an errand and picked up where I left off last night. It happened to be at the point where you begin talking about despair and hope. On this Thanksgiving morning it was a godsend. My oldest son committed suicide in August. He was 20 years old. We buried him on what should have been the first day of my youngest son's senior year in high school. Today we celebrate not only Thanksgiving, but my daughter's first birthday without her brother, her first friend. I fight despair constantly, my need for hope is very real, especially when I look at my surviving children. Your word reminded me of the importance of putting one foot in front of another, take one moment at a time. Thank you.

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    1. Francislyo

      I’m sorry you lost your son - so loved, and now so missed by you and your family. You convey a lot of love with a few words.

      I do have strong hope that you will see your son again.

      (Even as I realize that we all have different ideas about what comes later, this is my hope and my prayer).

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    Bill Dyer (aka Beldar)

    My preferred insult involving footwear is: "MGT is too stupid to pour p!ss out of a boot that has instructions printed on the heel."

    The American Bar Association is a bad joke and has nothing whatsoever that resembles "power" in any meaningful sense. Nor is it worthy of respect, by anyone. The last hurrah of the ABA was when its former president, Lewis F. Powell, Jr. was nominated to the SCOTUS by Nixon, and he retired in 1987. It's the Columbia Record Club of the legal profession; its leadership and involved members generally embody the worst qualities of Tracy Flick; and for every other lawyer, you're only a member if you've somehow escaped having to pay the dues from your own pocket. The ABA should simply be ignored — say I, a lawyer of four-plus decades who has consistently followed that strategy without any consequence whatsoever.

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  4. Clint

    Thank you for calling us "subscribers" instead of "members." "Members" just reeks of corporate double-speak pretending that we're part of some exclusive club. I won't deny that being a Dispatch subscriber has a few tenuous club-like aspects, but the primary relationship is journalistic enterprise and subscriber - so please call it what it is!

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    Ben Connelly

    This was exactly what I needed to pick me up on a stressful afternoon.

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  6. GregS

    I like how you mentioned the guy convicted of illegally funnelling Rusian money into the Trump campaign only in the context of how you always thought he was a schmuck.
    And also mentioned on the same episode how the Russia investigation was bogus.

    Do the whole "what if Biden had an R after his name" shtick with Jesse Benton. Or Paul Manafort. Or Jared and his billions fron Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
    And then tell us again about media bias and how investigations of Hunter Biden are very important.

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  7. Bobby D

    Thanks for bringing up the Ahmari-Hazony stuff again.

    I recently listened to Andrew Sullivan’s interviews with both of them. As a conservative, I expected that they’d make some good points with which I’d have to wrestle for a few days. But that wasn’t the case at all. In fact, I didn’t even sense that these guys had any interest in persuading skeptics. In fact, it wasn’t even clear how they’d arrived at their conclusions. They seemed to start with their conclusions, as though the conclusions had been revealed to them in some mystical vision. And if you couldn’t intuit the supposed truth of what they had to say, that was simply evidence that you don’t belong among them. It reminded me of Rod Dreher’s proclamation in the 2014 timeframe that he didn’t need to cite any reasons why civil same-sex marriage was evil because its evil was clear and apparent to anyone whose moral vision hadn’t been corrupted.

    This leads me to wonder whether the whole NatCon movement isn’t just a right-wing version of therapeutic snowflakery. Unless you share the insecurity and anxiety felt by the Very Online young men who dominate this movement, you’re not going to understand it. I had trouble seeing any meaningful difference between this movement a band of SJWs crowing about “their truth.”

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    1. Aaronhfrank

      I miss Sorab Ahmari from his Commentary days. If you listen to him and read him the life he espouses is one of family, faith, and service. At the same time Mr. Ahmari hammers David French. If there is anyone who is a living, breathing example of family, faith, and service, it is Mr. French. Whether you agree with all his opinions and stances, David French comes off as honorable, decent, and authentic. That Mr. Ahmari goes after Mr. French so much say more about Mr. Ahmari.

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      Ben Connelly

      I think you hit on two separate but interrelated phenomena: the average age of people in the online New Right, and the victimhood mentality borrowed from the left.

      As a young man (26) myself, I wonder whether in different circumstances I might have gone in the direction some of my peers did. I was in first year of college when Trump first came on the scene. To be honest, I think a lack of self- and historical- and philosophical-awareness on the part of many young people leads them to be more susceptible to movements like this. They believe the myths their new leaders tell them about what say, Reagan and Buckley were all about. Or even what the Founders were all about.

      My generation (Millennial) and the one behind (Z) were definitely raised in a victimhood culture (although the oldest Millennials not so much). If you’ve read Coddling of the American Mind or The Vanishing American Adult, I think both apply well. I don’t mean that everyone my age acts like a victim, but that it’s seen often as a badge of honor or a way to gain popularity, whereas perhaps 50 years ago being a victim wasn’t something that made someone especially popular.

      I’ve long held that victimhood culture came out of the identity politics left but that Donald Trump perfected it and was the quintessential victimhood president (unlike his predecessors or even Biden). Elements of the populist right saw that as a feature, not a bug, and I suspect younger ones were more susceptible to it.

      There’s so much more I could say. I just listened to Hazony’s interview with Sullivan and you hit the nail on the head. He’s given over to misdirection about history and philosophy among other things. The NatCons all love to falsely claim the moral high ground and pretend their chosen opponents (ie remnant conservatives) are making arguments we didn’t know we were making.

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      1. Bobby D

        Thanks for the thoughtful response. I didn’t want to get into the errors in Hazony’s argument because his reasoning is just back fill. He’s already determined that he’s right based on some apparent revelation he’s received.

        I’m a Gen Xer who grew up on a farm in rural Indiana. Victimhood won’t harvest the crop or get the hogs to market. So, I have no patience for it. It’s a luxury for elites and the bane of the lazy.

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          Ben Connelly

          “his reasoning is just back fill. He’s already determined that he’s right based on some apparent revelation he’s received.”

          That’s exactly it. That’s what’s so annoying about him. Some of what he says is accurate but other parts seem to be spin and conjecture and he weaves it together into a narrative that leads him to wild conclusions while essentially saying that anyone who doesn’t arrive at those conclusions is either an idiot, historically and philosophically illiterate (not as smart as him), or lacks the moral high ground that he claims for himself.

          Then when Sullivan asks him about policies he’s vague and defensive and refuses to give many straight answers.

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          1. Bobby D

            A prime example of this is his retelling of the American founding with a near-exclusive emphasis on intellectual contributors who were Christian sectarians (Richard Hooker) and a marginalization of those contributors who were secular (Locke and Reid). Or his assertion that the word “Union” in the Preamble evinces an intent to subject the Constitutional order to Christian sectarian interests. But, as you note, when anyone pushes back on this, Hazony just dodges the question and plays the victim card.

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    Michael Garrett

    When you discussed the call to move past blame and social responsibility, in my mind's ear I kept hearing that often misidentified political philosopher George Carlin: "In football you pay a penalty. In baseball you make an error. Whoops!"

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    Mleach

    This episode was the perfect start to my Saturday morning. While making my coffee and toast for my daughter, I laughed out loud about MTG needing to write TGIF. After dropping my daughter off at work, the thoughts about despair and hope were a perfect bookend to beginning the week listening to a sermon on why we should not be anxious. Well done, Jonah.

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    Rjosephpaquette

    To pick nits, The Supreme Court is still subject to democratic process after they are confirmed—they can be impeached. And as Jonah mentioned, we can also over rule their errors through the amendment process.

    I’ve read Barbara Fried piece and the logical conclusion is the “evil” members of a society must be killed (I guess humanely). Just as we don’t try to punish and reform cancer cells—their nature is determined by biology after all. It’s a moral philosophy which leads us to a bleak place. I prefer believing each person has free will and the power to change. It’s also a more just way to run a society.

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    1. GregS

      I don't think that "kill all evil criminals" is the necessary implication of Fried's essay. As Jonah says, you'll have to show your work that no other conclusion is possible.

      For example, one conclusion could be - put violent criminals in prison and focus on changing their mental health, influences, and circumstances, such that they are far less likely to reoffend.
      It might mean, don't put people in a violent prison system which exposes people to greater violence and crime and makes it make likely that they will reoffend.

      Fried doesnt explicitly say this (I read the essay too) but blame tends to go with retribution. And a retribution-focused system doesn't necessarily care that prisons are violent - such a system *jokes* about prisoners being raped by other inmates.
      A non-blame focused system could, perhaps, try to use incarceration to change the likelihood of future crime rather than just casting blame and seeking retribution.

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        Rjosephpaquette

        Fair point, it’s not the only option. But “rehabilitation” of cancer cells doesn’t work. The treatment is death of those cells for the good of the entire body.

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        1. GregS

          Rehabilitation of cancer cells doesn't work?
          Says who?
          Famously, Gastric MALTomas can be treated without killing all the involved cells, just by treating the infection.

          But more importantly, I don't think there's any reason we must conclude that criminals are exactly like cancer cells.

          No, the bigger issue to me is that a "rehabilitation" focused justice system could end up being even more arbitrary than one focused on retribution.
          Say you stole a TV - in a retribution system perhaps you get a year in prison. What if in a rehabilitation system it takes 3 years tk be sure youre truly rehabilitated? What if it tskes some people longer than others because they've got more issues to rehabilitate? How do we make sure such a system is equitable and not prone to even worse unfairness and bias than our system today?
          These problems might be entirely insurmountable - or the solutions so seemingly unfair that they can never be accepted.

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            Rjosephpaquette

            Again. My point. Is WHEN rehabilitation of cancer cells doesn’t work the logical last resort is extermination or removal. I’ve already conceded there are other options.

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