Transcript
Sleep Number Representative (0:00)
Why choose a sleep number Smart bed?
Audrey Moorhead (0:01)
Can I make my site softer?
Tangle Contributor (0:03)
Can I make my site firmer? Can we sleep cooler?
Sleep Number Representative (0:06)
Sleep number does that cools up to eight times faster and lets you choose your ideal comfort on either side your sleep number setting. Enjoy personalized comfort for better sleep night after night. And now max out your savings. The more you buy, the more you save on beds, bases and more. Plus get free home delivery on any smart bed with base limited time. Check it out at a sleep number store near you or@sleepnumber.com today.
Mayra Ameth (0:31)
A Mochi moment from Sadie who writes I'm not crying, you're crying. This is what I said during my first appointment with my physician at Mochi because I didn't have to convince him I needed a GLP one. He understood and I felt supported, not judged. I came for the weight loss and stayed for the empathy. Thanks Sadie. I'm Mayra Ameth, founder of Mochi Health. To find your mochi moment, visit joinmochi.com.
Bombas Representative (0:57)
Sadie is a Mochi member, compensated for.
Tangle Contributor (0:59)
Her story Blood Donation is Now More Inclusive More people are able to donate blood with the American Red Cross through FDA guidelines that eliminate eligibility questions based on sexual orientation. The Red Cross celebrates this historic change and welcomes those who may be newly eligible to donate blood. There's a place for everyone in the mission of the Red Cross. The Red Cross is committed to achieving an inclusive blood donation process that treats all potential donors with equality and respect while maintaining the safety of the blood supply. Join us. Help save lives. To learn more and make your appointment to donate blood, visit redcrossblood.org LGBTQ that's redcrossblood.org LGBTQ.
Audrey Moorhead (1:55)
Hi everyone, this is Tangle Associate Editor Audrey Moorhead. Today's podcast is a piece that I authored responding to Isaac's piece from last week. I hope you enjoy. I found Tangle in the aftermath of the 2020 election. At the time, I lived in deep red Lynchburg, Tennessee and my community was awash in anger and speculation about a stolen election. I was alarmed by the various theories in my conservative media bubble, but the concept of a massive conspiracy to obstruct democracy was too much to at face value. A stolen election would completely alter the way I saw the country I love. I knew these were serious accusations and I didn't want to trust them blindly. But to my chagrin, when I tried to seek out different sources, most of the mainstream media seemed far too dismissive of fraud claims, treating them as self evidently ridiculous and anyone who believed them, like my family and friends, as ignorant or stupid. I was predisposed to distrust these outlets and they weren't doing themselves any favors. Luckily, I came across Isaac's excellent work chronicling most, if not all of the major election fraud claims. Instead of starting from a place of complete skepticism and dismissal, Isaac presented the strongest arguments in favor of fraud and then used evidence to prove them wrong. He had won my trust and piqued my interest in his product. Could I really see both sides of the conversation in one place alongside fact based reporting and Isaac's take, which promised to be nuanced? But honestly, fast forward to now and I'm pleased to report that reading and working for Tangle has challenged and invigorated me. I'm grateful to be exposed to alternate viewpoints. Sometimes I've changed my mind, while other times I've learned how to better articulate my beliefs in the face of opposition. I truly think Tangle's culture and approach are a model for bridging the partisan divide, and I feel honored to spend every day doing such important work. When we were preparing last week's Friday edition, the team, as usual, engaged in lots of debate. And while I absolutely believe Isaac was right to voice his concerns about the direction he thinks we're headed, I also thought his piece wasn't properly attuned to the conservative perspective on modern politics. I wanted to offer a counterpoint to his perspective, to explain how Trump isn't the only one to blame for the erosion of our political institutions and why so many in the conservative movement are willing to stomach Trump or even fully embrace him. To be quite clear at the top, I'm not speaking for all or even most conservatives. For one thing, I have never been a fan of President Trump, and my trepidation has only grown over the course of his second term in office. In fact, I commend many of the principles Isaac was vouching for, and some developments in the modern conservative or maga, movement alarm me as a young conservative even more than they do him. For example, the recent texting scandals and the subsequent intra movement discourse worried me far more than they worried Isaac when he wrote about them. White supremacist extremists have been part of the right throughout my lifetime, just as communist anti American revolutionaries have been a fixture of the left. But those extreme views are clearly growing more influential in the gop, and I felt like Isaac's take on the leaked texts underrated those dangers. Furthermore, I'm much more in line with old school American conservatism, uplifting the benefits of traditional social structures like the family and religious communities, while also emphasizing a limited federal government and personal freedoms. I think sincere religious faith and family formation are the keys to living a good life. But I also think the law should allow you to disagree with me and live the life you want to live, so long as you're not overtly harming yourself or others. Yet rising stars of the GOP seem to reject this religiously informed tolerance in favor of coarser barstool conservatism, which abandons traditional social values in favor of uninhibited personal freedom and forgets about the social harms that can follow or more overtly religious post liberalism, enforcing narrow, often specifically Catholic values by outlawing other lifestyles. As such, while I've never felt wholly at home in the Republican Party, I've begun to feel that it has completely cast me out. And yet, despite being disturbed by what I see as a shift in the party's ideology, I can still understand my friends and family who find the Trump administration the lesser of two evils. I myself even felt that way during the election. While I think major players in the Trump administration are acting in openly authoritarian ways, I don't think all or even most of the GOP base supports this approach to government. In fact, I think their support of Trump and the GOP is driven by conservatives sense that the left has been trending toward authoritarianism. Understanding this feeling, even if you think conservatives are wrong to feel that way, is essential to moving forward from the moment we're in and reuniting our increasingly divided nation around the same common ideals. I contend that the left has similarly eroded political norms and overstretched its power, if less extensively than Trump. Still more than is acknowledged in mainstream media and even by many TANGLE readers who wholly endorsed last week's piece of Furthermore, the left has been uniquely capable and effective at using its dominance in our cultural institutions to attempt to enforce ideological uniformity socially. And the backlash against this hegemony has led so many to Trumpism.