50 Comments

Shout out to whoever included the intro ident at 47:17 into Kmele's conversation with Coleman, for no reason.

Expand full comment

When I heard this I thought, “am I baked? Or was Miguel baked when he was editing.”

Expand full comment
founding

Uncomfortable, like the back of a Volkswagen?

Expand full comment
founding

No, like someplace girls dread.

And thank you for this quote, made my day

Expand full comment
founding

I once fit 9 people in my 1970 Bug, my first car, which I paid $350 for in 1993 when I was 17, to go to a party out by Emigrant Lake. It was badass, as Ashland Oregon was when I grew up there. Safety third!

**I was driving, no idea how uncomfortable it was besides the 1" "heater" on the front floor that sucked regardless of passengers.**

Expand full comment
author

I almost drowned in that lake.

Expand full comment
founding

Really, no story there? How dare you.

The mind reels - did you pick up acid from one of my shady friends and it took a turn? Did a shitkicker pull you out of the water while they were out 4Xing after a half-rack of Zima? Had you jumped off the cliff at "the cove" area? Whatever happened, I sure hope the rest of your Ashland experience was amazing (which means it would have happened more than 15 years ago when it was cool).

Expand full comment
author

Summer of 1989, probably August. Chuck Berry or B.B. King or some legend was playing by the lake. Me & my then-best pal went down, brought a case of Meister Brau or whatever, played a lot of nerf football, then he (a bull of an athlete) says "OK! Let's swim across the lake." I made it about 3/5ths of the way; he dragged me to the other side. Then promptly got up and swam back. I ... walked. Surely, the water body would end just around the bend there, right? Twelve hours later, feet covered in blood, parched, having just crossed what the search & rescue team had assured everyone was an impassable rock dam, I stumbled into the search party. I will never forgive them for only having warm Diet Coke (and I will never willingly drink any such beverage again). The incident had some symbolic meaning as well, but that's for another decade.

Expand full comment
founding

I was at that show. BB King I think it was. I feel like I remember a lost person…huh. One degree of separation. Not bad.

Expand full comment
author

Funny!

Expand full comment

Or maybe uncomfortable like the history of Volkswagen as a company?

But hey, we can just treat 1949 as year zero, right?

Expand full comment

That made me laugh! And brought back memories (fond with the passage of time) of when I was one of FIVE intrepid souls who traveled from Southeastern Ohio to the 1968 Newport Folk Festival in a VW Beetle. We had sleeping bags and, obviously, not much else.

Expand full comment

Smart commentary on the Tucker interview, I actually sat through the whole thing... He asked Putin to release the WSJ reporter to his production team, and tried more than once.

I also liked when he asked Putin how he can call himself a Christian when he is a murderer (in more polite terms) which produced an interesting conversation.

Not the most hard hitting journalism, but not fawning propaganda either.

Expand full comment

Man, Jeffrey Goldberg really pooped on his own shoes, huh? (Am I using that right, Matt?)

Expand full comment
author

Yes.

Expand full comment

This was taped prior to the disasterous Biden special counsel report and press conference. Can't wait to hear them talk about it!

Expand full comment

I also really need Moynihan's impression of Biden talking about shrinkflation (of Doritos and/or his own cognitive capacities).

Expand full comment
founding
Feb 12Liked by Matt Welch

In the Kmele-Coleman interview, Coleman mentions his podcast with David Bernstein detailing the evolution of the "racial" classifications in American law and demography, and how they are political artifacts and logically incoherent. Would recommend, youtube video below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oXTBXDt_ng

Expand full comment

I don't get it. How are you boys (looking at you too Coleman) so freaking calm about the Mounk rape allegations?? I don't know the woman's name, and don't tell me bcs I'll only be more pissed, but how is the response to her anything but Mounk is innocent!? I know zero about that man or what he did, but he is innocent until *proven* otherwise. And that woman is vile and monstrous for making accusations on Twitter/media. If he raped you, lady, tell the cops. Call the DA. Running around crying Rape! Rape! and calling his employers while not working through the justice system is juvenile and low-character. It's bad citizenship. It pisses me off. How are you not furious?? This stuff has to stop. We should all be telling her to shut up and call the cops. Thankfully I give up Twitter for Lent so I won't watch this playout, or I might have a stroke..

Ok, rant over. Now I can finish listening to the episode.

Expand full comment

Great to have Coleman on early in his doing the rounds. Loved his (audio)book. As this dispatch was recorded before the DoJ report dropped I'm looking forward to hearing the guys digging into what the feasible steps are to the palace coup.

Expand full comment

Hah! I just finished watching Hughes' appearance on Real Time a few minutes ago. So this very convenient, thanks!

Expand full comment
founding

Kmele, Michael and Matt, how much do I have to pay to get added to your group chat??? Could be a great new revenue stream for you guys.

Expand full comment
founding

Just to watch, not to reply. Highly informed political links/texting mixed with a few parenting comments, some late-night drunk shit-talking, business $talk, and baseball references from Matt. Plus music links.

Expand full comment

Yeah, I would pay real money to be a wordless cuck in that groupchat.

Expand full comment

The expression for Joe Scarboro, that's the next level up from living in an echo chamber is to have"disappeared up your own arse"

Expand full comment

Seriously though, what is going on with the intro/outro song? You have completely stripped the base out of the theme song. Wtf

Expand full comment

Was wondering if it was on my end. Used to thunder across my speakers when I started the podcast... now, more like a whimper. Fortunately, the spoken words still hit.

Expand full comment

I bet I'm the only TFC subscriber who has both been a paying member since the Patreon era AND had a batting lesson from American hero, world series champion (and star of Rookie of the Year) Carney Lansford. Prove me wrong.

Expand full comment
author

whoa

Expand full comment

I was a competitive baseballer in the sf bay area around the same time as his kids so he was around at the talent showcases.

Expand full comment
author

Carney had one of the weirdest batting stances; that thing he did with his hands tucked in and low and throttling the handle. They'd teach it out of kids nowadays.

Expand full comment

Yeah he gripped it HARD.

Expand full comment

I appreciate that Coleman talked a little bit about population genetics. It doesn't come up much on TFC, and when it does I don't think that Kmele treats it with the same level of nuance with which he tries to treat other issues.

I'm far from an expert on this subject but I enjoyed reading "Who We Are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past" by David Reich. It's not really about modern concepts of race and genetics -- it focuses almost entirely on some of the science and techniques behind population-level genome studies and uses this to at least try to paint a history of human populations, migrations, and ancestry. As someone who is scientifically literate I'm not sure that I trust all of its conclusions to hold up 20 or even 10 years down the road, but it was still interesting and helped give me a fuller picture of just how much people have moved around over the millennia.

Having said all that, the book does spend a chapter towards the end discussing the implications of the field within the framework of modern racial categories. The conclusions are mostly in line with what Coleman himself said in this episode.

Expand full comment

Rape requires two people to be in the same room. How did/does Celeste Marcus know Yasha Mounk? I watched one of her interviews and she didn’t talk about the alleged incident (or her relationship with Yasha), just her processing of it. That seems strange to me.

Expand full comment

I've only done cursory reading about the story, but she seemed to indicate they were friends and were sleeping together in the same bed.

Expand full comment

Does anyone have the Kornacki and Scarborough clip referenced around 2:01:00?

Expand full comment