The gang’s all here! I hope your Christmases were merry, lads (and Fifdom). These dispatches are keeping me afloat during a lonely holiday season, and I thank you.
Dec 30, 2022·edited Dec 30, 2022Liked by Matt Welch
Fif'-dom, what are some things that made you happy this year, and what are you looking forward to in 2023?
I moved to a quieter part of town and have a house full of plants, which makes me very happy. I've grown to appreciate the routines of this new place, like morning walks and watering the plants.
Curating my news feed has been enormously helpful. I left my last social-media platform at the end of last year and cancelled a few subscriptions. In 2023, I'll further limit my news consumption.
Reading books that have nothing to do with current events. I've been focussing on philosophy and histories of and from the Roman Empire. In 2023, I'll continue that a bit more intentionally. Hopefully, I'll brush off my old Latin textbooks and struggle through Virgil.
Meeting my neighbors has made me happy.
Listening to this podcast has made me happy. It's pretty much the only podcast that I can listen to without getting terribly upset. Thanks, lads, for keeping it lighthearted, providing good context, treating the absurd as the absurd, and for talking about cool books and such!
In 2023, I'm looking forward to further cultivating my non-political interests and hopefully, meeting more people. I'm also looking forward to attending the next TFC live show.
In 2023, I intend to make the most of the last year before 2024 primary elections actually begin. If anyone knows of a Chrome extension that will let me block all news containing the terms "poll", "2024", "primary", and "election", let me know!
Dec 30, 2022·edited Dec 30, 2022Liked by Matt Welch
I bought a Fender Stratocaster (HSS Player series, polar-white with a maple neck.) My goal (perhaps my resolution) is to be able to drop some face-melters by 2024. It's a reasonable, measurable, lovely rock and roll goal. Also, I resolve to read, do math (relearn algebra and hopefully take precal--just for the exercise), play chess, and exercise daily--and move back to California's Central Coast in Monterey, I'm in fucking Ohio and I have finished this state (I love Columbus, but come on.)
Now that I've read your plans, I might steal a bit of those ideas.
I’ve never played one of those HSS Strats, but they sound lovely from what I’ve heard. White with maple neck is always THE iconic choice for that guitar too, IMO, even though I tend to gravitate toward sunbursts.
My holy grail solid-body electric guitar remains an American Strat—preferably an older one, though I suppose I could be persuaded—set up exactly the way my old dear friend and roommate got his: HSH (like a Player Strat but done custom, with better pickups than they use for the Player—no offense to you of course, as these custom pickups also cost 2-3x as much), with the five-way switch customized to allow particular configurations (including the ability, done with a separate switch, to drop a coil from one or both of the humbuckers) so you can have the thickest, most honey-like sound that good humbuckers can offer, right through to the glassy, gorgeous tone that good singles will give you. That guitar is a treasure—and the product of some inspired work by the owner himself, both in planning and building it—and I’d love to have one for myself someday.
Enjoy that thing though man; they’re still the standard against which all other solid-body electrics are measured, and it’ll be with you for decades to come.
I know this is an old thread at this point, but I forgot to ask this as I was writing a billion words about guitars: what is it that’s got you down about Ohio? Or is it just that, having lived on the central coast—which, I can attest, is a majestically beautiful place—no other place measures up? I could never live in Ohio, and I’ve got my reasons for that (largely aesthetic, as is my wont, but not entirely), but I wanna hear yours.
My aunt and uncle live in Cincinnati, and given how gorgeous that area is, it’s kind of a shame how run-down the downtown area is at the moment. But that’s a whole other world compared to Columbus.
I like Ohio, but I only came here to get my RN. I was an LVN out in California. It’s cheap here and it’s easy to get into the nursing programs outside of California—it seems like everyone wants to be a nurse out there.
My family and friends are in California so I’m headed back there by summer.
Taking the plunge into hot yoga (groan, yes, but also it's awesome during MN winters), moving my reading list off Goodreads and on to a personal substack (https://jessemyneiger.substack.com/p/books-i-read-or-started-in-2022), dyeing my hair blonde, reading The Satanic Verses. Reading less fiction and more nonfiction. Writing my novel. Getting two cats!
Haha, one of the biggest happy-making things for me was moving (back) to a noisier place, though a quieter part of it than the one I left: my ladyfriend and I left Manhattan for St. Louis in June of 2020 because of a family emergency in her family (she’s from STL), and we moved back to New York—but to Astoria, Queens instead of Manhattan—in May of 2022.
The great thing about the new spot is it’s still very much NYC—very walkable, public transit, incredible food and shops all over the place—but it’s way more chill: You can have a car with minimal hassle (by NYC standards, anyway), and you don’t have the literal millions of randos who don’t live here walking around the way you do (by design and necessity) in Manhattan. So it’s the best of both worlds: relaxed place that feels like a real community where I already know a bunch of people, but from my doorstep I can be in Central Park in Manhattan in a little under 20 minutes by subway—and the rent is honestly not that bad (again by NYC standards), especially considering what we’re getting for it.
Turns out I’m one of those odd ducks who really do love this chaotic and insane city more than just about anywhere else, and it’s nice to be able to live here without it feeling like a giant sacrifice so much of the time. It’s just a bit more civilized out here in Queens, it turns out, or at least it is in Astoria. I can imagine myself (maybe) wanting to move to some lovely village in New England one day 15-20 years from now; I think a quaint little town like, say, Boston would probably do the trick as a quiet, laid-back place for an aged version of myself, lol.
I’m hoping to really make myself a genuine member of this community somehow, whether by volunteering at stuff or whatever else I can think of, and my real goal/resolution is to get a genuinely solid job that pays well and that I can enjoy and learn from—preferably one where the work actually occurs in a physical location! I know this makes me a weirdo to a lot of people, but I’m not a huge fan of the WFH, scattered-to-the-four-winds setup, where all of one’s colleagues (and oneself) are brains in jars conducting “meetings” on zoom. I miss actual people—though I see/am around more of them now than was the case a year ago for sure—interacting like humans; I gotta get more of that in my life.
Oh, and live music! Seeing a big huge show at MSG for New Years tomorrow night, but I wanna get back to seeing lots and lots of shows the way I used to. That always used to keep me happy even when everything was going to shit, and I don’t know why I drifted away from it.
Happy new year everyone! Hope you all have good shit happening in your lives either now or in the very near future.
That place is incredible and takes less than 10 minutes to walk to from my house, so I’ve been there, y’know, quite a lot (they’re really cool folks who really appreciate their repeat customers)—the only problem when I walk out my front door is deciding between it and the 600 other incredibly appealing things that are also within that radius. We expected to like it here a lot, but even we have been taken aback with how great this neighborhood is. Only thing Brooklyn has on us—other than better public transit, for which I think I’d trade our much better roads/parkways—is architecture, IMO.
Another Latin nerd! Are you familiar with Catullus 16, the first and last line of which is “pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo,” something I’m sure Moynihan would like to say to Bob Woodward and/or non-melanated HVAC people?
Lol, good lord. If I ever get old and eccentric, I might consider getting "pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo," printed in a homey "Live laugh love" style wall decoration.
I haven't read much Catullus, though I recently put him on my "buy" list after being reminded of him in Suetonius' "Caesars". I'll pick up some Catullus tonight. Thanks for the recommendation. :-)
Where’s that “Subscriber” who is always complaining about the lack of merch? I would pay exorbitant money to watch an episode of “Fixer Upper” to see Joanna Gaines hanging one of those signs up on a newly renovated mud room.
For all but the last 50-odd years of the existence of the English language (and probably a bunch of other languages), translators either deliberately mistranslated that poem or pretended it didn’t exist. The line I quoted means “I will fuck you [plural] in the ass and fuck your faces.”
Lol, I tried Google translate and it rendered it as “I will bite you and break in”. I suppose Latin isn’t a language they’ve gotten very good at translating over there at Google. (Also, I get non-melanated, but what on earth are HVAC people? I must’ve missed that memo.)
Hahaha, HVAC stands for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, but it probably says something about Fifth Column listeners that we’ll immediately guess it’s some new marginalized identity category.
Another favorite of mine (Matt may resonate with this if he sees it): the immortal Rusty Kuntz, MLB player from 1979-85.
Didn’t have much of a career, but he did hit what became the decisive RBI in the ‘84 World Series (in the form of a sac fly to 2B, lol), in the last-ever World Series game at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.
Since Kmele said this might be the final dispatch of the year, you all have put out 9 more episodes. "Final dispatch of the year" is as accurate as "we should wrap this up" followed by 48 more minutes of show. And I'm thankful for all of it.
If Moynihan wants to move to St. Louis and sell people HVAC equipment, I'll hire him, but he has to stay out of my booze. Ok fine he can have Sazerac 6-year and lower.
Really enjoyed Matt's mid-pod soliloquy on stepping back and moving on. If I've learned anything from the past three(?) years of this long international nightmare, it's that there's value in removing yourself from conversations and environments that don't give anything back. Discovering that I didn't need to share every half-formed philosophical grunt or knee-jerk reaction to Twitter's Main Character of the Day has improved my mental, physical and maybe even metaphysical health tenfold. World's dumb and full of stupid shit. Why fill your day up with more than you need?
To the Fifthties: Have yourselves the happiest of New Year's. Thank you for the mirth and madness. Y'all have done *so much* in keeping me sane throughout all of [gesticulates wildly in an everywhere direction]... this.
To the rest of you filthy animals: Take care out there. Get some fresh air, pet some dogs, drink some water and remember that you can conscientiously object out of the Culture Wars if you want. (And to those of you who can't, keep it mean but, please, keep it clean.)
Dec 30, 2022·edited Jan 1, 2023Liked by Matt Welch
Also, workshopping this but feel free to steal if it's worthwhile... I think the best way to describe the edgelord libertarian faction is "devotees of Critical Liberty Theory". CLT is a dangerous, mind-warping series of single factor analysis tools, sort of a dark mirror version of the identity obsessed critical theory worldviews that proliferate on the left. It even has its own version of intersectionality, where you can tease out the government abuse that's hidden to the eyes of mere mortals - which is how you end up with harebrained takes like "straight white men are the most oppressed category in society" (iirc the LPNH chair tweeted something to that effect).
Like CRT, CLT can yield some interesting analytical insights, but becoming a full blown acolyte leads to madness and myopia that makes you irritating at best and unbearable at worst.
I enjoyed the discussion of the current (and past) state of the LP. I live in PA and in the last election I had the choice of an insane man vs Frankenstein. I looked into the LP candidate but as far as I could tell he was deep into the Mises caucus so I wrote in "None of the above". That is funnily enough a suggestion by Justin Amash that we have that on every ballot choice. I told a friend of mine about Amash's suggestion and he (a former conservative who is now a progressive) got very upset with me. I sent him a gift sub the TFC,
There is a bill in the PA legislature to allow those registered as independents to vote in party primaries (they currently cannot) but I'm not sure those party hacks will pass it because I think that there will be more registered independents than those registered to either party.
I share Moynihan's views of the current state of the LP. I only wish that there were more people like Amash in charge.
And Matt is absolutely right. The results in 2016 were a product of Clinton vs Trump and in 2020 that so many did not want a second Trump term. There was hope (myself included) that Biden would trend to the center. But sadly from day 1 that was not the case.
Is a Hall of Famer obscure? I guess it depends on one's frame of reference. (I happen to be a native MNan, so it almost goes without saying that I know who Paul Molitor is.)
I’m half way through book about the Abraham Accords (“Trump’s Peace” by Barak Ravid) and it’s pretty incredible. That Kushner boy don’t fuck around.
Also Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone, this podcast has brought so many wonderful people and experiences into my life, and we’re just getting started ❤️
I made a beautiful brisket last night & desperately wanted to note that I was “embracing my Jew-ish side”.... but I do not think Instagram is ready for that joke.
This is egregious cultural appropriation that does real, measurable, and definitely not made up harm to American Jewry. My culture is not your dinner! Judging by your name, I’d say you should be confining your diet to potatoes and boiled cabbage.
My Aunt (RIP) was all Ashkenazi and made the worst brisket in the whole world.
I think she started cooking the beef a week before Passover, to ensure it was Beef Jerky adjacent Brisket.
In fact, the 2nd worst cuisine after the Brits, is Ashkenazi Yids.
Have you ever seen Gefilte fish? It tastes worse than it looks.
Gehakte liver? I have never been able to taste it because the smell is rancid.
We all have gut disease to avoid eating this food.
Even though some Ashkenazi look down on the "animal" Sephardic Jews (inter- ethnicity/race/religion discrimination is always hilarious), they are definitely responsible for the amazing Israeli cuisine (also as MM noticed, Sephardic are hotter and tougher than Ashkenazi).
Appropriate away. We need all the outside help we can get. I only wish you could share pics of your cuisine appropriation. TFC is definitely ready for that joke.
Happy 2023!!
May you and your family continue to enjoy ALL the cuisine appropriation
My ex was (as he put it) “Oshkosh”, so I am aware of the food crimes and have made my share of Kosher for Passover desserts. Fortunately, they were not a gefilte family; unfortunately, when I was a teenaged cashier, someone dropped a very large jar of Manischewitz brand on the floor in my line. A very bad time was had by all.
Brisket was braised with pomegranate and cumin. My imaginary inner Jew is a Mizrahi.
Cleaning up a broken jar of Manischewitz gefilte fish, in your formative years, didn't turn you off Jews? Your ex was a lucky man, who clearly didn't properly appreciate you and your culinary talents.
Substack really has to up their game in 2023. We need pictures.
More seriously, though, I had disproportionate exposure to the two great American religious outgroups - Jews & Mormons - from a young age (geography, mostly?) and my takeaway is that they are both A+++++
Brisket done well is excellent, as is gefilte fish. I hope you’re not judging the latter by the crap in a jar they have at the supermarket. But yeah, liver’s pretty gross, and the one time I tasted kishke I was desperately, but fruitlessly, searching for a place to spit it out. As for Israeli cuisine, there’s some Ashkenazi influence there too (schnitzel, for example, is pretty ubiquitous).
You are not the first to point out quality gefilte fish exists & doesn't have any resemblance to the embalmed version at the supermarket. I just can't.
My bubbe was a terrible cook (polish, immigrated pre-1935)- her signature dish was poison soup. My prejudice against Ashkenazi food may be particular to her food or because I was diagnosed with gut disease when i was 10, so all food made me sick.
Respect for being in the same room as kishke, let alone tasting it. One of the many problems with being an adult is the inability to just spit food out. Kids get in trouble for doing it, but that doesn't stop them.
Can we claim schnitzel or is that native to Austria or Germany? Not sure?
Happy 2023. May we both enjoy many evenings of laughter & high quality brisket, with the people we love.
I think schnitzel qualifies as Ashkenazi, regardless of who originally invented it. Almost all culture was appropriated from somewhere, as I believe one or more of our dear Fifth hosts has mentioned in the past. Besides, Austria gave us Hitler, so think of schnitzel as reparations.
Happy 2023 to you as well, and to anyone else who happens to be reading this!
Also! Re: rule of thumb from the last episode, I remember hearing that in the intro sequence from Boondock Saints, and immediately thinking "yep, that's the kind of shit they make up in Boston"
I’ve been listening to TFC since episode one, after discovering the lads on RedEye. Y’all have been a raft of sanity in a sea of insanity for me since 2016. I’m closing out 2022 listening to Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds because of some aside MM had in an episode last month. And it’s glorious.
All my love and thanks to Michael, and the gentlemen.
I’d like to see to an analysis of Trump’s manner of speaking. I’ve never heard anyone construct thoughts like that. A made up example: “I ordered the pancakes. People said I shouldn’t have ordered the pancakes. I ordered the pancakes. Best breakfast ever!” Who speaks like that? Seriously, it’s strange regardless of what he says. Anyway, hope everyone has a good New Year ’s Eve.
The gang’s all here! I hope your Christmases were merry, lads (and Fifdom). These dispatches are keeping me afloat during a lonely holiday season, and I thank you.
Fif'-dom, what are some things that made you happy this year, and what are you looking forward to in 2023?
I moved to a quieter part of town and have a house full of plants, which makes me very happy. I've grown to appreciate the routines of this new place, like morning walks and watering the plants.
Curating my news feed has been enormously helpful. I left my last social-media platform at the end of last year and cancelled a few subscriptions. In 2023, I'll further limit my news consumption.
Reading books that have nothing to do with current events. I've been focussing on philosophy and histories of and from the Roman Empire. In 2023, I'll continue that a bit more intentionally. Hopefully, I'll brush off my old Latin textbooks and struggle through Virgil.
Meeting my neighbors has made me happy.
Listening to this podcast has made me happy. It's pretty much the only podcast that I can listen to without getting terribly upset. Thanks, lads, for keeping it lighthearted, providing good context, treating the absurd as the absurd, and for talking about cool books and such!
In 2023, I'm looking forward to further cultivating my non-political interests and hopefully, meeting more people. I'm also looking forward to attending the next TFC live show.
In 2023, I intend to make the most of the last year before 2024 primary elections actually begin. If anyone knows of a Chrome extension that will let me block all news containing the terms "poll", "2024", "primary", and "election", let me know!
A happy New Year to all!
I bought a Fender Stratocaster (HSS Player series, polar-white with a maple neck.) My goal (perhaps my resolution) is to be able to drop some face-melters by 2024. It's a reasonable, measurable, lovely rock and roll goal. Also, I resolve to read, do math (relearn algebra and hopefully take precal--just for the exercise), play chess, and exercise daily--and move back to California's Central Coast in Monterey, I'm in fucking Ohio and I have finished this state (I love Columbus, but come on.)
Now that I've read your plans, I might steal a bit of those ideas.
Happy New Year.
I’ve never played one of those HSS Strats, but they sound lovely from what I’ve heard. White with maple neck is always THE iconic choice for that guitar too, IMO, even though I tend to gravitate toward sunbursts.
My holy grail solid-body electric guitar remains an American Strat—preferably an older one, though I suppose I could be persuaded—set up exactly the way my old dear friend and roommate got his: HSH (like a Player Strat but done custom, with better pickups than they use for the Player—no offense to you of course, as these custom pickups also cost 2-3x as much), with the five-way switch customized to allow particular configurations (including the ability, done with a separate switch, to drop a coil from one or both of the humbuckers) so you can have the thickest, most honey-like sound that good humbuckers can offer, right through to the glassy, gorgeous tone that good singles will give you. That guitar is a treasure—and the product of some inspired work by the owner himself, both in planning and building it—and I’d love to have one for myself someday.
Enjoy that thing though man; they’re still the standard against which all other solid-body electrics are measured, and it’ll be with you for decades to come.
Sick, dude! Sounds like a gorgeous instrument. Hope your move and learning goes well.
I know this is an old thread at this point, but I forgot to ask this as I was writing a billion words about guitars: what is it that’s got you down about Ohio? Or is it just that, having lived on the central coast—which, I can attest, is a majestically beautiful place—no other place measures up? I could never live in Ohio, and I’ve got my reasons for that (largely aesthetic, as is my wont, but not entirely), but I wanna hear yours.
My aunt and uncle live in Cincinnati, and given how gorgeous that area is, it’s kind of a shame how run-down the downtown area is at the moment. But that’s a whole other world compared to Columbus.
I like Ohio, but I only came here to get my RN. I was an LVN out in California. It’s cheap here and it’s easy to get into the nursing programs outside of California—it seems like everyone wants to be a nurse out there.
My family and friends are in California so I’m headed back there by summer.
Taking the plunge into hot yoga (groan, yes, but also it's awesome during MN winters), moving my reading list off Goodreads and on to a personal substack (https://jessemyneiger.substack.com/p/books-i-read-or-started-in-2022), dyeing my hair blonde, reading The Satanic Verses. Reading less fiction and more nonfiction. Writing my novel. Getting two cats!
Haha, one of the biggest happy-making things for me was moving (back) to a noisier place, though a quieter part of it than the one I left: my ladyfriend and I left Manhattan for St. Louis in June of 2020 because of a family emergency in her family (she’s from STL), and we moved back to New York—but to Astoria, Queens instead of Manhattan—in May of 2022.
The great thing about the new spot is it’s still very much NYC—very walkable, public transit, incredible food and shops all over the place—but it’s way more chill: You can have a car with minimal hassle (by NYC standards, anyway), and you don’t have the literal millions of randos who don’t live here walking around the way you do (by design and necessity) in Manhattan. So it’s the best of both worlds: relaxed place that feels like a real community where I already know a bunch of people, but from my doorstep I can be in Central Park in Manhattan in a little under 20 minutes by subway—and the rent is honestly not that bad (again by NYC standards), especially considering what we’re getting for it.
Turns out I’m one of those odd ducks who really do love this chaotic and insane city more than just about anywhere else, and it’s nice to be able to live here without it feeling like a giant sacrifice so much of the time. It’s just a bit more civilized out here in Queens, it turns out, or at least it is in Astoria. I can imagine myself (maybe) wanting to move to some lovely village in New England one day 15-20 years from now; I think a quaint little town like, say, Boston would probably do the trick as a quiet, laid-back place for an aged version of myself, lol.
I’m hoping to really make myself a genuine member of this community somehow, whether by volunteering at stuff or whatever else I can think of, and my real goal/resolution is to get a genuinely solid job that pays well and that I can enjoy and learn from—preferably one where the work actually occurs in a physical location! I know this makes me a weirdo to a lot of people, but I’m not a huge fan of the WFH, scattered-to-the-four-winds setup, where all of one’s colleagues (and oneself) are brains in jars conducting “meetings” on zoom. I miss actual people—though I see/am around more of them now than was the case a year ago for sure—interacting like humans; I gotta get more of that in my life.
Oh, and live music! Seeing a big huge show at MSG for New Years tomorrow night, but I wanna get back to seeing lots and lots of shows the way I used to. That always used to keep me happy even when everything was going to shit, and I don’t know why I drifted away from it.
Happy new year everyone! Hope you all have good shit happening in your lives either now or in the very near future.
Love me some Astoria. Obviously the Czech beer garden is tops....
That place is incredible and takes less than 10 minutes to walk to from my house, so I’ve been there, y’know, quite a lot (they’re really cool folks who really appreciate their repeat customers)—the only problem when I walk out my front door is deciding between it and the 600 other incredibly appealing things that are also within that radius. We expected to like it here a lot, but even we have been taken aback with how great this neighborhood is. Only thing Brooklyn has on us—other than better public transit, for which I think I’d trade our much better roads/parkways—is architecture, IMO.
Thanks for sharing this.
Thing I most enjoyed in ‘22: TFC’s NYC live show and after-party.
Thing to which I’m most looking forward in ‘23 or beyond: TFC’s next live show.
Happy New Year.
Another Latin nerd! Are you familiar with Catullus 16, the first and last line of which is “pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo,” something I’m sure Moynihan would like to say to Bob Woodward and/or non-melanated HVAC people?
Lol, good lord. If I ever get old and eccentric, I might consider getting "pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo," printed in a homey "Live laugh love" style wall decoration.
I haven't read much Catullus, though I recently put him on my "buy" list after being reminded of him in Suetonius' "Caesars". I'll pick up some Catullus tonight. Thanks for the recommendation. :-)
Where’s that “Subscriber” who is always complaining about the lack of merch? I would pay exorbitant money to watch an episode of “Fixer Upper” to see Joanna Gaines hanging one of those signs up on a newly renovated mud room.
Cat was such a dirtbag.
Tell us more.
For all but the last 50-odd years of the existence of the English language (and probably a bunch of other languages), translators either deliberately mistranslated that poem or pretended it didn’t exist. The line I quoted means “I will fuck you [plural] in the ass and fuck your faces.”
Lol, I tried Google translate and it rendered it as “I will bite you and break in”. I suppose Latin isn’t a language they’ve gotten very good at translating over there at Google. (Also, I get non-melanated, but what on earth are HVAC people? I must’ve missed that memo.)
Hahaha, HVAC stands for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, but it probably says something about Fifth Column listeners that we’ll immediately guess it’s some new marginalized identity category.
If you like Bill Boner, you might also like:
Butch Otter, former Governor of Idaho
Dick Swett, former Rep from New Hampshire
Mike Hunt, former Sheriff of Aiken County, South Carolina
And of course, Harry Baals, former Mayor of Fort Wayne, Indiana.
I think I've just gotten myself in trouble with the former staff of BaseCamp.
The fish and game warden of my small town in upstate New York growing up: Dick Head
And yet he kept the nickname.
Another favorite of mine (Matt may resonate with this if he sees it): the immortal Rusty Kuntz, MLB player from 1979-85.
Didn’t have much of a career, but he did hit what became the decisive RBI in the ‘84 World Series (in the form of a sac fly to 2B, lol), in the last-ever World Series game at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.
The Dannemora prison break is so ingrained in my mind as “Dick Sweat” that I misremembered that as the actual name of one of the runaways.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Clinton_Correctional_Facility_escape
Since Kmele said this might be the final dispatch of the year, you all have put out 9 more episodes. "Final dispatch of the year" is as accurate as "we should wrap this up" followed by 48 more minutes of show. And I'm thankful for all of it.
If Moynihan wants to move to St. Louis and sell people HVAC equipment, I'll hire him, but he has to stay out of my booze. Ok fine he can have Sazerac 6-year and lower.
If he wants to move to MN and sell hvac equipment, I can get him hired AND he can have whatever booze he can find.
That is a pretty sweet deal
Really enjoyed Matt's mid-pod soliloquy on stepping back and moving on. If I've learned anything from the past three(?) years of this long international nightmare, it's that there's value in removing yourself from conversations and environments that don't give anything back. Discovering that I didn't need to share every half-formed philosophical grunt or knee-jerk reaction to Twitter's Main Character of the Day has improved my mental, physical and maybe even metaphysical health tenfold. World's dumb and full of stupid shit. Why fill your day up with more than you need?
To the Fifthties: Have yourselves the happiest of New Year's. Thank you for the mirth and madness. Y'all have done *so much* in keeping me sane throughout all of [gesticulates wildly in an everywhere direction]... this.
To the rest of you filthy animals: Take care out there. Get some fresh air, pet some dogs, drink some water and remember that you can conscientiously object out of the Culture Wars if you want. (And to those of you who can't, keep it mean but, please, keep it clean.)
100% you should get Bob Woodward on, with a guest appearance by Ben Dreyfuss.
I feel like if All The President's Men was released now, Moynihan would tear it to shreds.
Also, workshopping this but feel free to steal if it's worthwhile... I think the best way to describe the edgelord libertarian faction is "devotees of Critical Liberty Theory". CLT is a dangerous, mind-warping series of single factor analysis tools, sort of a dark mirror version of the identity obsessed critical theory worldviews that proliferate on the left. It even has its own version of intersectionality, where you can tease out the government abuse that's hidden to the eyes of mere mortals - which is how you end up with harebrained takes like "straight white men are the most oppressed category in society" (iirc the LPNH chair tweeted something to that effect).
Like CRT, CLT can yield some interesting analytical insights, but becoming a full blown acolyte leads to madness and myopia that makes you irritating at best and unbearable at worst.
All in on Touch Grass 2023
I enjoyed the discussion of the current (and past) state of the LP. I live in PA and in the last election I had the choice of an insane man vs Frankenstein. I looked into the LP candidate but as far as I could tell he was deep into the Mises caucus so I wrote in "None of the above". That is funnily enough a suggestion by Justin Amash that we have that on every ballot choice. I told a friend of mine about Amash's suggestion and he (a former conservative who is now a progressive) got very upset with me. I sent him a gift sub the TFC,
There is a bill in the PA legislature to allow those registered as independents to vote in party primaries (they currently cannot) but I'm not sure those party hacks will pass it because I think that there will be more registered independents than those registered to either party.
I share Moynihan's views of the current state of the LP. I only wish that there were more people like Amash in charge.
And Matt is absolutely right. The results in 2016 were a product of Clinton vs Trump and in 2020 that so many did not want a second Trump term. There was hope (myself included) that Biden would trend to the center. But sadly from day 1 that was not the case.
I can't believe you perpetuated the dangerous conspiracy theory that Paul Molitor is a real person.
I’m mostly subscribed for the obscure baseball references
Is a Hall of Famer obscure? I guess it depends on one's frame of reference. (I happen to be a native MNan, so it almost goes without saying that I know who Paul Molitor is.)
I’m half way through book about the Abraham Accords (“Trump’s Peace” by Barak Ravid) and it’s pretty incredible. That Kushner boy don’t fuck around.
Also Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone, this podcast has brought so many wonderful people and experiences into my life, and we’re just getting started ❤️
I like Barak! I’m surprised he can’t find a US publisher. Between the right-wing Jews and the evangelicals, that’ll sell some copies.
I'd buy it ;)
I made a beautiful brisket last night & desperately wanted to note that I was “embracing my Jew-ish side”.... but I do not think Instagram is ready for that joke.
This is egregious cultural appropriation that does real, measurable, and definitely not made up harm to American Jewry. My culture is not your dinner! Judging by your name, I’d say you should be confining your diet to potatoes and boiled cabbage.
You’re not wrong, which is why I’m so keen to appropriate my dinner.
My Aunt (RIP) was all Ashkenazi and made the worst brisket in the whole world.
I think she started cooking the beef a week before Passover, to ensure it was Beef Jerky adjacent Brisket.
In fact, the 2nd worst cuisine after the Brits, is Ashkenazi Yids.
Have you ever seen Gefilte fish? It tastes worse than it looks.
Gehakte liver? I have never been able to taste it because the smell is rancid.
We all have gut disease to avoid eating this food.
Even though some Ashkenazi look down on the "animal" Sephardic Jews (inter- ethnicity/race/religion discrimination is always hilarious), they are definitely responsible for the amazing Israeli cuisine (also as MM noticed, Sephardic are hotter and tougher than Ashkenazi).
Appropriate away. We need all the outside help we can get. I only wish you could share pics of your cuisine appropriation. TFC is definitely ready for that joke.
Happy 2023!!
May you and your family continue to enjoy ALL the cuisine appropriation
My ex was (as he put it) “Oshkosh”, so I am aware of the food crimes and have made my share of Kosher for Passover desserts. Fortunately, they were not a gefilte family; unfortunately, when I was a teenaged cashier, someone dropped a very large jar of Manischewitz brand on the floor in my line. A very bad time was had by all.
Brisket was braised with pomegranate and cumin. My imaginary inner Jew is a Mizrahi.
Cleaning up a broken jar of Manischewitz gefilte fish, in your formative years, didn't turn you off Jews? Your ex was a lucky man, who clearly didn't properly appreciate you and your culinary talents.
Substack really has to up their game in 2023. We need pictures.
I mean, I didn’t have to clean it up.
More seriously, though, I had disproportionate exposure to the two great American religious outgroups - Jews & Mormons - from a young age (geography, mostly?) and my takeaway is that they are both A+++++
Brisket done well is excellent, as is gefilte fish. I hope you’re not judging the latter by the crap in a jar they have at the supermarket. But yeah, liver’s pretty gross, and the one time I tasted kishke I was desperately, but fruitlessly, searching for a place to spit it out. As for Israeli cuisine, there’s some Ashkenazi influence there too (schnitzel, for example, is pretty ubiquitous).
Brisket, cooked properly, is sublime.
You are not the first to point out quality gefilte fish exists & doesn't have any resemblance to the embalmed version at the supermarket. I just can't.
My bubbe was a terrible cook (polish, immigrated pre-1935)- her signature dish was poison soup. My prejudice against Ashkenazi food may be particular to her food or because I was diagnosed with gut disease when i was 10, so all food made me sick.
Respect for being in the same room as kishke, let alone tasting it. One of the many problems with being an adult is the inability to just spit food out. Kids get in trouble for doing it, but that doesn't stop them.
Can we claim schnitzel or is that native to Austria or Germany? Not sure?
Happy 2023. May we both enjoy many evenings of laughter & high quality brisket, with the people we love.
I think schnitzel qualifies as Ashkenazi, regardless of who originally invented it. Almost all culture was appropriated from somewhere, as I believe one or more of our dear Fifth hosts has mentioned in the past. Besides, Austria gave us Hitler, so think of schnitzel as reparations.
Happy 2023 to you as well, and to anyone else who happens to be reading this!
“Small district in queens that nobody cares about” 😭
Thank you for this end of year episode 😘 Happy New Year to you all & your loved ones. Should we be sending parkas to Michael?
Also! Re: rule of thumb from the last episode, I remember hearing that in the intro sequence from Boondock Saints, and immediately thinking "yep, that's the kind of shit they make up in Boston"
I had a psych prof in undergrad (in 2001) who told that lie about rule of thumb, and he said that instead we should use "mental heuristic".
I’ve been listening to TFC since episode one, after discovering the lads on RedEye. Y’all have been a raft of sanity in a sea of insanity for me since 2016. I’m closing out 2022 listening to Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds because of some aside MM had in an episode last month. And it’s glorious.
All my love and thanks to Michael, and the gentlemen.
I’d like to see to an analysis of Trump’s manner of speaking. I’ve never heard anyone construct thoughts like that. A made up example: “I ordered the pancakes. People said I shouldn’t have ordered the pancakes. I ordered the pancakes. Best breakfast ever!” Who speaks like that? Seriously, it’s strange regardless of what he says. Anyway, hope everyone has a good New Year ’s Eve.