9 Comments

Thank you for introducing Sam Quinones to those of us who haven’t read his books. You and Quinones shed so much light on the relationship between the large and ever expanding encampments and meth and fentanyl use. Quinones was able to explain the rapid expansion which had been the most mysterious aspect of the issue for me. We have always had homelessness, but not like what we see today. It’s a different thing altogether. I wish it were a call-in podcast because I think there is so much more to explore. I would like to hear his opinion about the drug and violence problem in the cities like Chicago, Baltimore, and Detroit. Is that a different problem requiring different solutions? I used to think taking the profit motive out of drugs and decriminalizing them would reduce the problem, but I think I heard the opposite from Quinones. I also was unaware of the meth issue among gay men. The gay men I socialize with don’t talk about it, but maybe they are not having the problem (we are boomers). So much to learn and I do think it is among the top three social issues we must solve. It crosses all races, genders, and sexual orientations so maybe a good problem to work on together outside of the political tribalism we are so easily swept up I.

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The left is pursuing their signature tactic of what I call ‘rhetorical douchebaggery’ to the bitter end. The strategy is simple: say something insulting and untrue, and when someone takes the bait and objects, insult them a second time by condescendingly explaining that they’re too stupid to understand what you really meant. All men are rapists. Intent doesn’t matter. All cops are bastards. America is only about white supremacy. Silence is violence. Homosexuality is transphobic. Objectivity is racist. Biology is a Western construct. Just kidding! We’re trying to shock people out of their complacency through provocative thought experiments! (Repeat).

This immoral motte-and-bailey game is a cover for the true prize: an opportunity to berate and punish with a clear conscience. To paraphrase Alan Turing, people like cruelty because it feels good. That simple spiteful pleasure of getting the best of someone, of insulting them and getting away with it, is profoundly addictive, and as with all addictions we find rationalizations to get the rush without admitting what we’re doing. The left relies on the dual meaning of ‘racism’ (deliberate antipathy versus simple unawareness) to play this game, but they run the risk of getting their wish: the second meaning may be embraced as acceptable, robbing the first of its sting.

Your comparison of the new left with the old religious right is very apt. So much of human history has involved this ethical hypocrisy, the old “love the sinner, hate the sin” way of splitting our soul, with one half a brittle parody of righteousness and the other a smoldering, smug sadist. I fear we’ll never be free of it.

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The last listener commentator who say he/she lived in W Europe in the 2010s and that not much has changes has for sure missed my country of Sweden - it has been trandormed by mass immigration from the Middle East. We now have a greater share of foreign born residents (20% and rising) than the United States has ever had in its entire history as an independent nation. I can tell you that that has a lot of impacts on a country and a great deal of them are negative (increased welfare dependence, dilution of welfare services) to very negative (rising violent crime, religious extremism resulting in violence and even terrorism).

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Crt can can be turned around with the institutions we have. It slipped in and it will be kicked out. It's fixable as we now are. Success for the forces behind 1/6 , the consequences of unaddressed climate change; these things are not fixable and are far clearer dangers

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Mindblowing it was...

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Would it be worthwhile to have someone on that could speak to Portugal’s methods of addressing drug use?

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