144 Comments
Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

This one was a banger!

Freddie de Boer would be my "I disagree with 90% of everything you say but I love your prose" selection.

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Good choice.

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Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

Lads, I’ve said it before, and it’s more true every time I do: There needs to be a Fifth Column YouTube channel. It’s time to increase your reach, and your revenue.

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I too would like to see more of a live thing. I like looking at what's on the table in front of them. Bongs? House plants? Children's art? A bowl full of multi-colored pills? A variety of vape pens in front of Mike? A stack of books somewhere to back up the best quote ever from John Waters: “If you go home with somebody, and they don't have books, don't fuck 'em!”?

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It’s crazy that they have such a tiny footprint there. Before the Megyn Kelly clips there was practically nothing

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True. Other than MK, most of what you’ll find online, video-wise, of the Fifth is not the Fifth. Kmele and Matt on The Independents, Moynihan’s Vice shows, individual appearances on other podcasts and Real Time with Bill Maher. Some Reason stuff, too. All great, but they deserve more exposure.

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I suspect that the boys already say enough stuff that they'd get demonetized. From what I can tell, that Algo is a very cruel and capricious master. My general preference would be against a Pivot to Video.

Although live shows would be pretty cool at select locations would be pretty cool; We're Not Wrong has been excellent for having shows on the road as they cover the primaries.

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I hadn’t thought of that. Still, they’ve all worked in television, I think they could adjust without sacrificing their integrity. But also, they have other careers, so monetization wouldn’t necessarily be a dealbreaker.

To be clear, I mean audio and video. See for example: Conversations with Coleman, Getting Hammered, The Glenn Show, Megyn Kelly...many others. The Free Press has been adding more video content, too.

Beyond that, I suppose there’s always Rumble, which is where Glenn Greenwald hosts his show. Who watches that channel, though?

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Ironically it might be Kmele and his melanin force field that would get them demonetized. Does YT allow "the word" on channels?

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I meant to say, congratulations, Aaron.

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My issue is that I only ever listen to podcasts when I can listen, but not watch and will hate it that I don't watch them

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Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

cowwoborate UwU :)

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Didn’t expect to see an uWu reference on the Fifth Substack

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Kmele talked more in the first 2 minutes than in the last 2 episodes (he showed up for). Is he on that special white powdered Adderall you ingest via nasal cavity?

Don’t mind me…I’m just jealous Adderall has never had the same kind of effect on me. Glad to have you back Kmele!

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The Waking Up app is working wonders.

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*wink* waking up *wink*

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Winking Up?

Faking Up?

Taking Up?

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Kmele needs to do more drugs

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Feb 1Liked by Matt Welch

Completely random but just saw they’re making a TV series based on Say Nothing, Patrick Radden Keefe’s 2019 book about the murder of a mother of 10 during the troubles. Moynihan did an interview with Keefe on Episode #146 which was very enjoyable.

https://variety.com/2024/tv/news/fx-limited-series-say-nothing-the-troubles-northern-ireland-1235894557/

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It was a great interview. The book is also amazing and everyone should read it.

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The book is great.

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What I love about the Cori Bush thing is that it’s such a brilliant distillation of the way that gun grabbers will do literally anything to keep the plebs from arming themselves while stealing hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars for armed security.

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(I know that this is the lowest hanging libertarian fruit in the world, but it’s not wrong.)

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Reminds me of the infamous Carl Rowan incident from back in the 80's.

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Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

I learn so much from this podcast. After each installment you gentlemen, and Moynihan, expand my horizons in ways I never see coming. I'm happy to be a paying subscriber, and excited for the gift you've given me.

Snowbilly. Thank you.

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The Messenger layoffs also prompted this extraordinary admission -

https://x.com/walsh_eli/status/1752803915203305705?s=46&t=DG0ToeimhGTKT79Th4M8uw

(Kicking off a job search with the confession that you took a paycheck for months to copy-paste other journalists’ work is really quite something.)

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Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

And Iiiiiiiiiiii-yi-ayyyyyyyyyyy will always love Youuuuuuuuuuuuu

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Dolly Parton version or the Whitney Houston version?

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Whitney 100%. Sometimes the cover is better than the original. Another one is Jimi's All Along the Watchtower, which I think even Dylon has said was better than his original.

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Johnny Cash's "Hurt".

Reznor said "that song isn't mine anymore".

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Tough call. It’s like they’re too different songs.

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Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

Outstanding update from Aaron. Hell yeah!

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I can’t believe the Gents didn’t discuss Ben Shapiro’s rap collab. Consider me disappointed

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I caught a bit of that video and assumed it must be a deep fake.

Is he going by Ben Rap-hero now?

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We need a fifth rap collab!

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Imagine the accents Moynihan could bring into it.

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I remember that Fox attempt at comedy. Cringe.

Jon Stewart was magic in his heyday. A moment in time, I guess. It is sad to see what he has turned into. Earlier today I hate watched his Apple TV episode on trans children. Cringe.

Personally, I want to put politics-as-entertainment behind me and I do not think that I am alone. My guess is that his show will be a dud.

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You are not alone. At this point, I’m as much for a separation of politics and entertainment (and entertainers) as I am a separation of church and state.

I’ve only seen one segment from The Problem with Jon Stewart, from the episode “The Problem with White People” (groan), during which an obese white woman representing the preposterous Race 2 Dinner called fellow guest Andrew Sullivan a racist — and Stewart, dismissing Sully’s protests, went right along with it. Disgraceful.

Stewart’s best work has been his crusade to help 9/11 first responders get the benefits they deserve. I’d say this was his finest moment:

https://youtu.be/iQkMJgaHAkY?feature=shared

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I cannot think of Stewart the same after his Andrew Sullivan segment. It was similar to when Malcolm Gladwell disgraced himself during the Munk debate against Matt Taibbi. I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

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That’s a good comparison.

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I mistakenly took my kid to a talk at UCSB that turned out to be a white gal on stage (also obese, no relation) tell us all about how shameful we are. I love that my kid was with me on "well that was some bullshit" afterward.

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Didn't Stewart utter the always insightful line

"We're not having a real conversation about race in this country!"

Yes Jon, 250 years and nobody got it right until you. Of course this was 5 minutes before the obese women said she doesn't talk to white men anymore. Always productive to start a real conversation by excluding a large segment of the population.

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Wasn't his 9/11 crusade (the recent one) overblown because what he was championing going to happen anyway?

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Really? I hadn’t heard. I’ll look into it, and I might as well start being disappointed now.

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I looked a little bit but didn't find anything to support my memory.

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I’ll stay disappointed, just in case.

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Also his efforts for veterans:

https://youtu.be/iUW3-dzmRZc?feature=shared

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He reminds me a lot of George Carlin. Carlin was MAGIC in his hey-day. He was hilarious, fearless, smart. Then he got old and famous, and decided he needed to be taken seriously, and he turned into a disconnected, utterly unlikable wind-bag who said all kinds of nonsensical horseshit.

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That's a really common pattern for comedians. Early on, they channel their anger into humor. Then they get tired of how much work that is, and switch to just ranting angrily.

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To the clapter of their devoted audiences.

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Carlin's later comedy committed the cardinal sin of storytelling. He was telling and not showing.

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He also got sober; good for his health, maybe bad for his comedy.

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I really thought he was still old Jon when he single handedly blew the lid off the lab leak theory on Colbert’s show. Then he came out with his new show with the trans activism and white guilt that we all collectively roll our eyes at. Super disappointing

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I was listening to that episode of the Glenn Show earlier today. What he said gave me goosebumps.

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Yes, I'm a subscriber, and listened to that yesterday. Glenn Loury can do some awesome rants, and rarely without justification, but that one was the Gold Medal of his to date. I remember somebody writing, years ago, that he loved seeing somebody get angry in print. He was reviewing Wendell Berry, another one of my heroes. Berry and Loury are national treasures.

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Glenn's such an incredible thinker and on his show, does such a good job of demonstrating how to give proper consideration to an issue. He's fantastic.

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Which episode???

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January 2024 Q&A (subscriber only) around 18 minutes in

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I was on my way home from work yesterday listening in a half slumber on the train and when Kmele played the clip it shook me awake. I love Glenn, and how passionate he gets about things - gotta listen to the full episode now.

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Feb 2Liked by Matt Welch

Look at Matt always liking everybody's posts. He's like this boards grandmother, and I love it.

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More like the cold and withholding step-father who pits his step-children against each other in cruel contests as they desperately strive to win his approval.

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Look at that man's profile picture and tell me that he's capable of cruelty. I won't hear it!

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Well sure when you look at the three of them together Kmele is the obvious one who screams "vicious sociopath"(after all it's the quiet ones you have to watch out for).

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Speaking of OJ Simpson, yesterday I found a used copy of Jeffrey Toobin’s book about the OJ trial on a shelf of free stuff. A lot of the pages are stuck together for some reason, but it’s in decent condition otherwise.

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Wear gloves when you read it.

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Wearing gloves is taking a page out of O.J.’s book.

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Feb 2·edited Feb 2

People including you yucksters forget that Craig Kilborn was the O.G. Daily Show guy and, dare I say, was on par if not better than Stewart. And now your moment of Zen....

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Do dare say it. I’ve always thought The Daily Show was funnier with Kilborn, before it became political and started living up to its initials: TDS. It was a light, silly half hour at the end of the day. Remember 5 Questions?

The correspondents were good, too. Liz Winstead (co-creator, I believe), Brian Unger, A. Whitney Brown. “When news breaks, we fix it!”

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Did A. Whitney Brown ever become The Whitney Brown?

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Ha!

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Feb 2·edited Feb 2

Hear! Hear! Much wittier, always enjoyed watching. Never took itself so seriously, hit the target consistently; though Stewart always denied it, they took themselves very seriously, especially in the latter years, and managed to come off as insincere.

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100 percent. The more attention Stewart and the show got, the more he fancied himself a political pundit.

That reminds me, TDS begot The Colbert Report, which led to Colbert hosting, and ruining, The Late Show.

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Complete with Riki-Oh head smash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF87aeZvnJQ

I think I own that ridiculous movie because of the O.G. Daily Show

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Yup, that's what got me into it as well. I remember the segment. It was some book about the best movies to watch while high. Not sure Doug Benson wrote it but what do I know.

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