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- [00:00]
A
Hey, it's John. I want to talk to you about Shopify. A lot of people talk to me about starting podcasts. This podcast is 10 years old. It's in a different place from a lot of podcasts because we're obviously part of a nonprofit institution and it's not a way that we are seeking to earn our livelihoods. But a lot of people look at this and say, this is something I can really do to create a business and run the business and do it in a really comfortable, practical and serious way.
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B
Gotta wear a lot of different hats when you start your own business.
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A
Can be very intimidating. But one of the things that I know from a lot of people is that if your to do list is growing and growing and growing and that list starts to overrun your life, you need a tool that not only helps you out, but simplifies everything that can be a game changer for millions of businesses. That tool is Shopify, the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world and 10% of all e commerce in the US from household names to brands. Just getting started. You get started with your own design studio. With hundreds of ready to use templates, Shopify helps you build a beautiful online store to match your brand style. You can accelerate your content creation because it's packed with helpful AI tools that write product descriptions, page headlines, and even enhance your product photography. You get the word out like you have a marketing team behind you. Easily create email and social media campaigns wherever your customers are scrolling or strolling. And best yet, Shopify is your commerce expert with world class expertise in everything from managing inventory to international shipping to processing returns and beyond. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Turn your big business idea into Kaching. With Shopify on your side, sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com commentary. Go to shopify.com commentary that's shopify.com commentary Hope for the.
- [02:23]
C
Expect the worst Some.
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A
Pre champagne some die of thirst no way of knowing this way it's going Hope for the best Expect the worst Hope for the best welcome to the Commentary Magazine daily podcast. Today is Halloween, Friday, October 31, 2025. I'm John Pod Hortz, the editor of Commentary magazine. With me, as always, Executive editor Abe Greenwald High. Abe.
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D
Hi, John.
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A
Senior editor Seth Mandel. Hi, Seth.
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C
Hi John.
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A
Social commentary columnist Christine Rosen. Hi, Christine.
- [03:02]
E
Hi John.
- [03:03]
A
And Washington Commentary columnist Matthew Continetti.
- [03:06]
F
Hi Matt.
- [03:07]
G
Hi John.
- [03:08]
A
Matt, we must make a sad announcement today, which is that this is Matt's final. Maybe not final, but as a regular. This is Matt's.
- [03:23]
E
The regular conclusion of Matt's moving into special guest star.
- [03:26]
A
Yeah. As a Commentary magazine daily podcast cast member, panelist, co host. Matt, why don't you tell the people what's happened with you that has led you to have to say goodbye to this audience that loves you so much? Sure.
- [03:49]
G
Well, it's with a heavy heart that I am saying goodbye to my regular spot here because tomorrow, November 1st, I become a contributor to the Wall Street Journal. That might not be my official title for people who are, you know, pedantic about it, but I'll be writing for the Wall Street Journal beginning in November, their editorial pages and the Opinion Journal website, the online version of the editorial pages. And so that means that I'm leaving my other writing and speaking spots with Commentary, where I've been writing a column for 11 years now in each issue and then appearing on the podcast regularly since I think the spring of 2023 is when I started coming on Daily. And then also I'll be leaving the Free Press, where I've been writing a weekly column since, since this past February or so, and all my writing and podcasting or, you know, Journal editorial report on Fox, that will all be through my new employer, the Wall Street Journal.
- [05:16]
A
So when you, you were, I would say our permanent was like, you were like the permanent guest star before you joined Chevy Chase.
- [05:28]
G
Chevy Chase to Noah Rothman.
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A
Yeah.
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G
Arson.
- [05:32]
A
Yeah. Or. Yeah, you remind me of then Chevy Chase Rivers or.
- [05:41]
G
That's a high compliment.
- [05:42]
A
Yes. Anyway, so. So the, the podcast audience has known you for a decade, and the readers of Commentary, who did not know you previously have known you for more than a decade with your media column and then your Washington commentary column and all of that. It strikes me as, I think about it really has been in your career as a Commentary regular, a kind of chronicle of the Trump era to some.
- [06:23]
G
I like to joke, you know, I've been doing this for 22 years since graduating from Columbia in oh, three. And I like to joke the first half of my career was spent arguing over the Iraq War, and the second half has been spent arguing over Donald Trump. Right. And so that second half is really when I started appearing each month in Commentary. And then, of course, the podcast. I gotta say, it was not easy to say goodbye to the podcast. I love the podcast. I especially love our audience. I think it's just been a fantastic experience to, to hear from our audience and to meet them at the roasts or, you know, sometimes in Washington on the street. And I, I just hope that people will tune into Potomac Watch, which is the Journal's Editorial Report podcast, and then, like I say, I should be on the Journal Editorial Report on Fox every now and then.
- [07:27]
A
And.
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G
My other gigs on Special Report and Hugh Hewitt, those will also remain.
- [07:39]
A
So you mentioned our audience and I've been thinking about our, the, the durability of, of this experiment in communications more than 10 years, but five, five, almost six years or coming upon or five and a half years, let's say, since you went daily with the coming of the pandemic in March of 2020, certainly not thinking that that was going to be a permanent state. That was just sort of like a Hail Mary play as I've described it before. I thought maybe we could do something akin to Nightline. When Nightline first started in 1979 as a 15 minute report on ABC at 11:30pm called America Held Hostage, which then morphed into the Ted Koppel Nightline show that then ran for, I don't know, 25 years or something like that after that and was certainly in its heyday, the single best news program that America has ever been on an American network. And that one of the things that made Nightline Nightline was the consistency with which new was there every night. It wasn't the news, it wasn't the nightly news, it wasn't Carson, it wasn't the local news. It was a news analysis program, newsmaker interviews, panel discussions, things like that. That was at an extraordinarily high level. I mean, a level so high by comparison to what you get today that it's almost impossible to believe that it actually took place on a major broadcast network and got 10 or 15 million people to watch it every night. So serious was Kabul. So, so serious were the topics that he covered. So little fluff was there. And that wasn't really my intention.
- [09:47]
G
You know, what's interesting is a Special Report started similarly Special Report on Fox started as a daily update to another national crisis, the Monica Lewinsky scandal, and then morphed into a, you know, really the best news program on television.
- [10:08]
E
Okay. But I have to say, and this is what everybody says when, when someone you care about abandons you being sarcastic. One thing that we do really well, that and I love all the journals, products, I contribute to its pages, it's a wonderful institution, is that we have a little more fun here on the podcast. And I do remember the first time Matt experienced the glory that is Commentary After Dark. You're like, what, what is this Exactly. When we let our hair down. So I will say, I think our listeners will certainly demand some return appearances where Matt Continent, he gets to let his hair down a little more than he might get to on Potomac Watch. So I'm holding that out as a permanent, you know, expectation.
- [10:48]
G
Yeah, I mean, I was. I guess it'd be. I will be present while you all let your hair down. I don't think I ever.
- [10:56]
E
I think we got you a few times.
- [10:58]
A
So what's interesting is how you. You took on the role. Nothing that ever happens here happens as a result of a plan at all. Ever, ever, ever, ever. Whole podcast was a mistake. It wasn't a mistake, but it was sort of like Noah Rothman bugging me that we should do a podcast. And then finally I said, you know what? If you can figure out a way that we can do a podcast where it doesn't cost any money, I'll. We'll give it a shot. Why not? But, like, I don't want it to cost any money, and I don't want to have to do any preparation because I'm too busy. So we figured out. We bought a soundboard and four mics, and we had an extra room in our office, and we all did it together in this one room. We bought some sound baffles from. From Amazon again for a couple hundred dollars, and there it was. And that's what we did. And for a time, we were doing it in a conference room. Here's a funny story for you. We're doing a conference room. Our conference room. Of course it was. There was no video, and we needed to have the mics up high enough to catch our voices because we didn't have the right mics or good mics. And Jake Sherman now put huge poobah in the Washington media business as the owner, manager, or the director or whatever, a punchbowl. But then at Politico noticed that we were using to pile up our. As the books that we're using to pile up our microphone. Because at the time, Seth's wife, Bethany, I believe, took a photograph of us podcasting in the office. Either it was Bethany or it was Daniella Greenbaum Davis, I don't remember who. And then put it on Twitter, and he said, are you using a SHAS as your microphone stand.
- [13:10]
E
Now?
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A
And so immediately, I realized that we were doing something horribly sacrilegious, and we switched the books around. Seth, would you mind. So, yes, we're using a. Would you mind telling the people what a SHAS is?
- [13:24]
C
It's the Talmud.
- [13:25]
A
It's the Talmud.
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F
It is.
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A
Shas is the full volumes of the Talmud. Yeah. So we took various bound volumes of the Talmud and we're using them because.
- [13:39]
C
There is something appropriate in, there's something inappropriate in, you know, an argumentative Jewish podcast. Standing on the shoulders of the original argumentative Jewish podcast.
- [13:52]
A
That is a, that is a thank you. That is a beautiful image that you've just come up with. We were standing on the shoulders of the, the greatest rabbis, rabbinical scholars, Torah scholars the world has ever known. But yes, so that, that is how hazard and happenstance the commentary podcast was. And then of course, Zoom was both our, you know, was both our jail because like everybody, we had to stay home for months and was our liberation because we were able to have people do this every day from home in different cities and, and, and go about what we were doing and then bring other people in one of the other things. And I say this now as a directive to any PR person who is listening to me, who says to me in letters, I really love the POD listen to your podcast. I'm really excited. I, I have here a book by Dr. You know, Rachel Wein grad about a really good low calorie diet. Would you like to interview her for your excellent podcast? Of course. When I hear that, I know the person has never actually listened to the podcast, but it is the case that we are very loath. I'm very loath and have not. I could, we could immediately turn this into a half of it could be an interview with a somebody with a book or something like that. And I've never wanted to do that. I don't want to do it now and I won't do it because I think we've established that one of the things that makes this project meaningful to people is listening to pretty much the same voices over a long period of time. And, and we evolve. If you had thought that I was going to basically give Donald Trump credit for helping to save the Jewish people from Iran back when we first started talking about him as a potential presidential candidate in 2015, there are many things I would have said. You know, you would have, you know, you should have been institutionalized. That that would have been, would have been very high on the list of things that I would have said. If you had said, you know, I went into the, I went on time machine, I went into the future. And then I heard you in September of 2025 praising Donald Trump and thanking God that he was president at this moment or whenever that was June, July, The Iranian nuclear program strike. So there is a lot of variation and learning over time and positions changing as facts change that you can only really experience if you listen to something for a long, long time, I think. Yeah.
- [17:02]
G
And different people have come in and out. Right. Because when you started, you had the core, you and Abe and then Noah. And was Sourav there at the beginning?
- [17:15]
A
Yes. Sourab Amari was the four of us. And then Christine.
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G
Well, not join.
- [17:20]
D
The very beginning was just John and Noah.
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G
Just John and Noah.
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D
Then it was me.
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A
And then.
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G
And then Christine replaced Sohrab and then I replaced.
- [17:34]
A
Did you replace. Did you replace she over level. Weren't you on at the same time at some point? And then. And then he left. Right, I think.
- [17:46]
E
And then that's when we were twice. Twice a week.
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G
So.
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A
Yes. And you came on when. When Noah left.
- [17:52]
G
Noah left. No, left, Right.
- [17:56]
A
Right. And then Seth came on after October 7th.
- [17:59]
G
October 7th.
- [18:00]
A
Seth, who had worked at Commentary in the. In the 2010s before leaving to go work the New York Post, then at the Washington examiner, but had been an editor and a writer on the website. You know, when. 2011, like 2011 to 2014, something like that.
- [18:23]
C
Yeah, yeah, right around there.
- [18:25]
A
Because I called him and I said, I need you. We need to cover. We need to have. We need to be writing about the threat to the Jews posed by September, by October 7th. Little did I know how global. How far from Seth being able to just, you know, sort of toss off a piece or so a day, how, you know, there would be 10 possible topics at any given day about some horror monstrosity being done to Jews or ideological assault on Jews or whatever that, that, that needed to be. That needed to be covered. But you talk about the audience.
- [19:11]
C
And that was the subject of one of my posts one day. I. I was just gonna say, I. That was. That was a subject of one of my posts because I remember waking up and. And looking at all the news and thinking, well, which one of the. You know, I am gonna. I could write. You know, how do I just write two posts out of these 12 stories or whatever? And then I actually literally just wrote a post about how there was so much to write. And that resonated with a lot of people because it was like, you know, that's kind of what it was during that period of time, which is like, what do you focus on?
- [19:51]
A
Hey, everybody.
- [19:52]
B
John here. I'm here to talk to you about Brooklyn Betting. And look, the best thing I can tell you about Brooklyn bedding is that they decided they wanted to try advertising with us. They offered us a mattress. We took it, my wife and I for one of our kids and so impressed were we by the mattress. By the way, one of my three kids slept on the mattress and found the mattress so comfortable that we went out and got two more for our other two kids. I don't know what better endorsement I can give you about the high end mattress experience you get from Brooklyn Bedding without the sky high price tag. Super comfortable, looks great, doesn't cost a fortune and high quality materials to last a lifetime. It's like my kids got a first class upgrade without a first class price. They handcraft every mattress in an Arizona factory. No middleman, no gimmicks, just top tier quality, honest pricing and real American craftsmanship for a better night's sleep. So go to BrooklynBedding.com and use my promo code commentary at checkout to get 30% off sitewide. This offer is not available anywhere else. That's BrooklynBedding.com and promo code COMMENTARY for 30% off sitewide. Support our show and let them know we sent you after checkout. That's Brooklyn Betting promo code commentary. Okay guys, I'm excited because it is.
- [21:22]
A
Fall and it is time for me.
- [21:24]
B
To talk again about my favorite clothing, Quince sweaters. Quince has the kind of false staples you'll actually want to wear on repeat. Like 100 Mongolian cashmere from just 60 bucks. Classic fit denim and real leather and wool outerwear that looks looks sharp and holds up. You know I wear a lot of Quint sweaters. If you watch us on YouTube, you're.
- [21:47]
A
Going to see Quince sweaters all winter.
- [21:49]
B
But I got my eye on their suede trucker jacket. It's perfect for layering and just looks really casual.
- [21:55]
A
But put together by partnering directly with.
- [21:58]
B
Ethical factories and top artisans, Quince cuts.
- [22:01]
A
Out the middlemen to deliver premium quality.
- [22:04]
B
At half the cost of similar brands.
- [22:07]
A
So layer up this fall with pieces that feel as good as they look. Go to quints.com commentary for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns.
- [22:18]
B
Now available in Canada too.
- [22:20]
A
That's Q U I n c e.com.
- [22:23]
B
Commentary Free shipping and 365 day returns. Quints.com Commentary.
- [22:34]
E
Well there can I also add to the earlier question John sort of posed as a joke, but that could potentially become a good bit of merch. The Commentary Podcast Was this all a mistake? Question mark One of the things that I think we all take for granted because in our working lives we do this a lot. But that I think our listeners, they've told me they really appreciate is that we are kind of like a really good editorial meeting. When a really good team that works on ideas gets together on a regular basis and hashes out the those ideas, disagrees, pushes back, learns from each other, that's a great editorial meeting. And the best publications have those daily. And in a way, since we've gone daily, they're also uneven, though, so sometimes we'll all sit down and go, what are we talking about? But that's how you put together like an editorial page or a good magazine. And, and in that sense, I think giving people a window into how ideas are, are a constant give and take and push and pull and how you try to learn from your colleagues, even if you don't agree with them, you have to listen to their point. All with the sensibility of, of open mindedness and a willingness, as you said, John, to change our minds over time. It frustrates partisans and it frustrates tribal folks who just want to have their priors confirmed, as Noah loved to say. But I think it's what makes it, it's why I look forward to talking to you all every day. And it's certainly. And Matt came into a team that had been doing that for a while and then Seth did as well, and, and you guys fit right in. And I think it's because you have that same sensibility, you know, that's an important point.
- [24:03]
G
One of my favorite podcasts these days is our occasional guest Mark Halperin's podcast, the Morning Meeting that he does with Sean Spicer and Dan Tarantin. And it has the same atmosphere, it's three people, very well sourced, intelligent, just kind of saying, hey, here's what, what, here's what's going on in the day. It's modeled on the morning calls that the news divisions used to have and that Halperin used to, you know, be a part of when he was working for abc. And yeah, so the editorial meeting template for podcasts, I think is underutilized, I guess. You know, another good podcast, National Reviews, the editors is the same. Right, right. And so, yeah, so that's a, that's a good format for a multi person podcast.
- [24:55]
A
Right?
- [24:57]
G
Yeah.
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D
I mean, you know what else? I mean, just since we're just talking.
- [25:01]
A
About the podcast and literally it has served as this. Abe.
- [25:05]
D
Sorry, Yeah, I was gonna say what else is interesting? I think, I think unique about our podcast is, and this has happened with, in every iteration, with every change, with every new person Everyone involved were really all quite different.
- [25:25]
G
Different.
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D
I mean. I mean, we're all on the same page in a broad ideological sense, but different in how we think about things, in who we are, where we are, both geographically and in life and temperamentally. And that's always been fun. I think that's part of the shaping that's part of the. That that's how you. That's part of the changing over time is because we keep rubbing up against one another and, and, and new people in the mix.
- [26:03]
A
I mean, it also has functioned as an, almost literally as an editorial morning meeting. Now, first, Seth has taken advantage of the conversations that we've had in the morning to adapt some of the things that we talk about into a blog post that he will write later in the day. And Abe, having taken up, I guess, nine months ago, having, or 10 months ago, having taken up the daily newsletter which he produces and comes out mid to late afternoon, Monday through Friday, very much influenced by the conversations we've had that morning. And Abe and I often then have conversations after the podcast about whether or not topics that we've surfaced merit a longer and more considered evaluation or explanation in the pages of the monthly magazine where we can get an authoritative.
- [27:04]
B
Take.
- [27:05]
A
On them that, you know, involves scholarship and narrative storytelling and an effort to make a definitive statement about something that we just were able to kind of bat around a little bit. And so in that sense, it's been immensely helpful as a germinator of ideas and a progenitor of, of the kinds of things that we want the world to know about that you might only know about if you happen to listen that day. And obviously, you know, we have several hundred thousand people listen every month. You know, about 40 to 50,000 listen every day. So they're different people. And, you know, we know in terms of unique listeners, we have several hundred thousand a month and we have these, you know, basically incredibly solid, like 40, 40,000 a day.
- [28:03]
G
And so let's not forget our YouTube audience.
- [28:07]
A
Since this is my last regular appearance.
- [28:13]
G
I'm the ally of the several thousand people who watch our podcast on YouTube each day. I hope subscribe, like and subscribe, like and subscribe, because that helps commentary and helps spread the message of pro America and pro Israel.
- [28:35]
A
Now, I think the. The interesting thing about the YouTube visual component brought in by YouTube is how most of the time I am sitting in front of the book case in my office most of the time or not half of the time, Matt, I would say you are sitting maybe less than half the time with Your. The bookcases of your home office in the background. Seth almost always has this bookcase. You can see right now in his background. Christine has the.
- [29:12]
E
I will soon have a bookcase. No, but. But I will. No, I will soon have a bookcase because I'm about to have to have windows installed in this room. So I will be in front of my bookcase in about a month. You'll see my books.
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A
Wow. Okay.
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G
Because.
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A
Because what we get, it is as though she is waking up on, you know, in, like, on Martha's Vineyard with the sun streaming.
- [29:39]
E
So it looks like I. I wrote a meditation app or something.
- [29:44]
A
Yeah, yeah. And then Abe has the craziest painting behind. Craziest painting on a little couch behind his head. And that's the visual flavor that you get is books. Or then the thing is that when Matt has been at his office, very monochromatic. A, you dress monochromatically. B, you have a wall that's half gray and half white. There's a white board. You do it.
- [30:16]
G
Hugh Hewitt likes to call my office here when I record from my office the Stasi bunker. So I've always a likable guy, but he. He has demanded that I record my appearances on his show in a different location because he can't stand the Mark Rothko, like, background.
- [30:37]
A
Yeah, it is very frank, I would say. It's flat. It's. It's. It's the. It's. If. If in the. In the world of action painting or abstract, you have. What you have is a version of the flat Frank Stella painting that is also white and gray. So it's white and gray and flat.
- [30:56]
C
Whereas Christine have a bookshelf next to you. And so it's like, kind of a tease because people watching at home are like, I wonder what's on the bookshelf. I'm seeing a gray wall, but I wonder what's right next.
- [31:07]
E
But the best. The best description we got from one of our earliest YouTube recordings was someone asking why we had put Abe in a Nordstrom's dressing room, which I still think was just, like, hilarious.
- [31:23]
A
So I am not there today, but if I were at my office today, and you would see in the background another hilarious comment that was made in all in earnest. So I have a taste for American kitsch, and it is good that my wife does not share my taste for American kitsch, or our home could conceivably have turned into a kind of American kitsch museum in which weird items of pop culture obscurantism would be dominating our lives. One of my proudest finds, which you don't see in the pop, but sitting in my office is a Bionic woman lunchbox I found in Eagle River, Wisconsin at an ebay store.
- [32:17]
E
How did I not know about this?
- [32:18]
A
I don't know, but it's there. It's a bionic childhood heroic woman lunchbox. And in Burlington, Vermont, I found this amazing kind of like inside flea market with lots of stalls. And it had two things that were particularly note to me, one of which were incredibly cheap old political buttons. Stevenson for president, Wallace for president, Nixon Lodge, 1960, stuff like that. If you look very closely the next time in my office, which will be in a couple of weeks, you can make these out dimly in the background. But mostly what I got were these incredibly kitschy LPs, old album covers, and one from Engelbert Humperdinck. I have a comedy album from the comedian Pat Cooper. And then one of my proudest, which is a collection of the songs of Al Jolson. And I get an email one day from a listener saying I don't know who your dog whistling with that Al Jolson, that album dedicated to Al Jolson. Are you saying that you support blackface? Are you trying to reintroduce the idea that minstrelsy is acceptable? How dare you. What kind of message are you trying to impart? Thus allowing me to use my ludicrous knowledge of ancient American showbiz history to explain. Your ignorance is showing because Al Jolson was in fact the Michael Jackson of the 1920s. Al Jolson was without question the single biggest star in all of show business for about eight years and was one of the original's best selling recording artists. Of course the star of the first talking picture. Huge, huge star, like one of the first superstars. And of course the son of a cantor. And therefore the first worldwide Jewish show business celebrity was Al Jolson, unless you want to count the actress Sarah Bernhardt. And so that's why I have the Jolson album. But I do think, I don't even know why I've gone this way. But I just want to say that the YouTube people would not know, wouldn't have been able to scold me for my possession of an Al Jolson album were it not for Matt's devoted efforts to grow our audience on YouTube.
- [35:15]
G
Pivot to video.
- [35:17]
A
The Pivot to Video. It destroyed people once. It seems not to be destroying them again. But it is, it is indeed.
- [35:26]
E
I could do without the wardrobe advice I receive unsolicited. Just, I'm just gonna say thank You. But no, thanks.
- [35:35]
C
Yeah, Christine, you just need to smile.
- [35:37]
E
I need to smile.
- [35:38]
A
That's the other thing.
- [35:39]
E
I should smile more.
- [35:40]
A
You smile a lot. I don't know if anybody said that.
- [35:43]
E
I do. I'm a very happy person.
- [35:45]
A
Yeah, you do smile. But. But it is. It is an interesting thing. Christine is the Rorschach test of the show in some ways, I would say to our audience, based on the emails we get, because either people love her or they complain on her behalf. They're like, that Christine, she's so wonderful. I mean, I just. I thrilled her every insight. And it's like, you guys won't let her talk. It's just a classic situation of men talking over women and mansplaining and why don't you let Christine talk? And, you know, shame on you. So you do represent a kind of object of fascination for our. For.
- [36:34]
E
I'm the token. I'm the token.
- [36:39]
A
Okay.
- [36:41]
C
Anything you need to get off, you.
- [36:44]
A
Are no longer going to be a token. Because the other announcement to make today is that we will be joined in Matt's stead on a permanent basis beginning next week by Eliana Johnson, who is. Has been a. Again, was in over the last year. Really. Just as Matt was the Joan Rivers of a previous era before he became a permanent fixture on the podcast. Eliana has been that for us over the past year, not coincidentally in these terms. Also Matt's successor as editor of the Washington Free Beacon, and she will be joining us on. On a daily basis. So we are. Oh, the great.
- [37:30]
E
That's right. We're taking over. Guys, look out. We're gonna make y'.
- [37:34]
A
All. And if the two of you start, you know, complaining all.
- [37:38]
E
Karen scolding all the time.
- [37:41]
A
Yeah.
- [37:41]
G
And complaining about cooperation and creativity. And before you know it, our audience will be trans.
- [37:49]
C
By the way, this and this and this podcast.
- [37:51]
A
Won't anybody with other. Does anybody have anything to say about this? We're talking about this essay that made a huge splash last week. Helen Andrews herself, formerly, I believe not now, but formerly the editor of the American Conservative. Very odd intellectual character around New York. And then she moved to Australia and various other things. Had a. Had a blog called Cigarette Smoking Girl during the heyday of the blogs. And she wrote this piece saying, woke is not leftism. Woke is feminization. And cancel culture is the feminization of culture. Because this is what women do to each other. And now they've been given. They are. They are. They have become dominating figures in society, and they're now doing it to every. Everybody.
- [38:46]
E
Well, but we need to look. And she stipulates this herself in the essay, the printed version of it. This is not her argument. This was a self published book that came out a few years ago and it's been kind of in the right wing manosphere. An argument that's been made by various others. So it's not an original statement. And I think one of the challenges that this, this argument poses is this idea that some. Is the chronology of it. Because if the argument is that when an industry becomes largely female, these things begin to happen, it would have happened much sooner than it. I think some of her critique of. I think it's a broader and effective critique of the kind of HR Ification of lots of fields. And I think in that regard it's a really interesting argument she's making. There have been Layla Briscoe, Sargent and a few others have written some really interesting responses from her side of the story, like agreeing with her on some of the points, but, but sort of making a more detailed and sustained argument for what it is that she's really getting at. I mean it's a broad sweeping thing. It started interesting conversation, but I think it's got some serious intellectual flaws in terms of the cause and effect that she's arguing about here. I just think there's another lady attacking another lady. Look at the cat fight.
- [39:59]
G
We're just, we're letting you speak. You speak, Christine.
- [40:03]
E
I mean, let me. I'm speaking, I'm speaking. Something I have to say, I nevertheless made sure I never.
- [40:12]
A
Nevertheless, you persisted.
- [40:14]
E
There we go.
- [40:15]
A
I was thinking about this because Jonah Goldberg wrote a really, really good column about this G file about this yesterday and that the thing about cancellation is that it is a deep human impulse and it goes as far as, you know, religious societies from juice to everybody having the tradition of literal ostracism, the act of, the act of excommunication or ostracism, where a person is cast out of a community which, you know, in the, in the, in the ancient days of ostracism on, you know, in nomadic tent life, you were basically being put to death. Like if you could not live around the people live, you know, in a sort of mutual defense packed society that was someone. People were always on watch to make sure that, you know, a lion didn't come in and kill everybody, you were, you were, you weren't going to survive. And so the fear of ostracism was a fear of death. It wasn't just a fear of virtual death or emotional death. Or something. It was an actual fear of death. And. And it was an important disciplinary measure that societies had to keep people in line with in terms of their behavior. And I think we're all very much. When we read something that makes us enraged or furious or something like that, one of the first things we think.
- [41:47]
B
Is.
- [41:49]
A
That person shouldn't have been allowed to publish that. No, somebody shouldn't have published that. Or she should get fired, or he should get fired, or the editor should get fired. Like, because you get unreasoningly, you feel like you've been assaulted. Something's been done to you, and somebody needs to be punished. And that is an impulse. And then you have to kind of civilization requires you to get over it and say, well, better be okay for them to say it. So I can say things and I won't get fired for making other people angry. But there are these points when things reach a critical mass and everybody starts reading singing from the same hymnal, and there's a kind of awakening, and then the cleansing begins. So me too. The cleansing of me too, or the cleansing after George Floyd or whatever. Those things are terrible in my view, but partially because what they reveal is that we haven't progressed at all as people. We haven't. We haven't learned anything. We're not better than the old tribal people were. We're exactly the same. We're driven by exactly the same impulses. And at least in America, people can come back from cancellation. Look at. Look at the people who've come back from cancellation. Louis CK Is performing again. J. Bhattacharya is the head of the. Is it the National Institutes of Health, having been basically also that.
- [43:31]
C
I mean, we should also note that, you know, Helen has a particular connection to this discussion because she was a. She went through a different kind of cancer sort of cancellation. But the, you know, that part of the culture.
- [43:46]
E
She was unfairly, publicly shamed is what happened to her. Yeah.
- [43:49]
A
And she.
- [43:50]
F
She.
- [43:50]
C
She was. And she sort of found it difficult, through no fault of her own, to navigate the, you know, the. The career that she had been navigating up until then. And she's. She's written about it, and she. She. She lived in Australia for a bit, and when she came back, I hired her at the examiner because she was ready to get, you know, sort of back into the swing of things. And one of the things that I encountered was that, you know, I called her old, you know, editors, people she had written for, you know, at National Review and elsewhere, and, you know, and said, you Know, what did you think? You know, it's been a while since Helen has been in this space because of what happened to her. But, you know, what do you think? And literally every person I asked said, oh, she's brilliant. She's, you know, wonderful. She's easy to work with and all that other stuff. And so you really. That. That was when I really got a sense of just how unfair it was, what she had gone through, because, you know, in private, nobody she had worked for had a complaint or there was nothing like lurking. You know, it's like, maybe we're not getting the full story. Everybody's like, oh, I love Helen. Helen's great, and. And just, you know, brilliant, and, you know, this and that. And so she. She had to sort of navigate her way back through this world. And when she came back, she wrote a very interesting essay about it and about. Also, that included, you know, for a while, there was the, you know, this. I forget what it was called. The Terrible Media Men List. What. Whatever it was.
- [45:31]
A
Yeah, there was, you know, dash t y list.
- [45:37]
H
Right.
- [45:38]
C
And so that, you know, for a while was like. And she wrote about that. And that, I think, was from, you know, you can see how she gets to where she is in the point about feminization, because she had been talking about, you know, women's role in that from a woman's perspective and why that culture, you know, which was the Terrible Media Men's List was, you know, this. This writer had. Had come up with a list that was, you know, a. A Google document you could add to saying, oh, this guy's a jerk. This guy's a jerk. And here's what he did. And of course, it went. It got leaked. And, you know, Helen wrote this piece saying, you know, this author says that she didn't intend for it to ever be public or whatever. But I don't believe her, you know, that she had, you know, And. And she had said, you know, Helen's perspective was this stuff is aimed at bad men. Right? But it's not good for women.
- [46:36]
I
I'm Oliver Darcy.
- [46:37]
H
And I'm John Passantino.
- [46:39]
I
We have spent years covering the inner workings of the news media, tech, politics, Hollywood, and power. Now through our nightly newsletter, status.
- [46:47]
H
And we're bringing that same reporting and sharp analysis to a new podcast, Power Lines.
- [46:53]
I
Every Friday, we're breaking down the biggest stories shaping the industry, explaining why they matter, and saying the things most people are thinking but too timid to say out loud.
- [47:01]
H
No spin, no fluff, just sharp analysis that isn't Afraid to call it like it is. We also pull back the curtain via our exclusive reporting to take you behind the scenes.
- [47:11]
I
My understanding having reported this is that the Pentagon protested to CNN and tried to effectively exile the CNN producer. And when the moment calls for it, we've got some hot takes. I just think Brad Pitt, honestly, he kind of seems a little washed up.
- [47:27]
B
Stop.
- [47:27]
H
Oh my God. That's Power Lines presented by Status. Follow Power Lines and listen on Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, or your favorite podcast app.
- [47:41]
F
I'm Mark Alper and I want to let you know that two Way Tonight, the destination for the best political news and analysis anywhere, is now available as an audio podcast. Each weekday I'll be joined by special guests from the worlds of news, politics and the media, along with members of the two Way community for conversations like no other. It's the best way to stay informed at the end of your day or first thing in the morning every weekday. It's a show like no other because we involve the community. We hear from people from around the country, around the world. They're part of a conversation. There is no other platform like this and I hope you will find it to be not only different than everything else, but more meaningful as you become part of a special community around the program. So listen and follow two Way tonight with Mark Alperin on Apple, Podcasts, Spotify or any other major streaming platform.
- [48:29]
E
She was absolutely right about the Media Men list in part because one of the, one of her and many of our people's objections to it is that there was no verification. It was just you could make any accusation against anyone and everyone believed it and it was the believe all women moment. And that's. That feeds into a kind of vigilante justice sort of approach to very complicated questions that should be taken on a case by case basis. She's a really interesting thinker and I mean I'm glad this conversation sparked this conversation.
- [49:00]
A
Yeah. Speaking of that, though, it's worth noting because as I'm saying, I think the thing, the lesson of the last seven years or eight years is that cancellations need not be permanent. It's actually, it requires the canceled person to have a degree of inner fortitude and ability to wait out a storm or just keep, put your head down and keep going. In that case in the shty Media Men list, the person who was really whose career was destroyed by it most sued Moira Donegan, its progenitor, and won a settlement of financial settlement. His name was Stephen Elliott. Her name is Maura Donegan. He said she had defamed him and she had. And her argument was, well, it can't be defamation because, you know, people talk about these sorts of things anyway. And, you know, basically he was like, no. And I, you know, maybe a moment of confession on my part. I mentioned J. Bhattacharya and one of the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration that said that the government was going about the COVID protocols all wrong and that these were not conforming to science and the public health community was doing things that were not grounded in science. And dear friend of mine kept saying, you should have Jay on the podcast. You should have him on the podcast. He's got this really interesting perspective. You should have him on the podcast. And I didn't want to because I didn't want to wade into those waters. I was a sort of middle of the roader when it came to Covid, and I didn't want to align myself with the activist class on Covid on the right, which had many, you know, which had lots of different valences, like from the, you know, there's chips in the, there's chips in the vaccine to what I believed, which was that you should not. You don't need to vaccinate small children because all the data show that small children don't get Covid, and therefore there's no reason to create a universal standard in which kids can only go back to school if they're vaccinated. But Jay and some other people, I don't know him, but I know some other people who were in. In that world whom I had. Had. Didn't really like personally. And so I was like, I don't want to defend, like, I don't want to be leaders of their defense. And I'm ashamed of that now because I took the road of least resistance there. I wasn't. Didn't want to become a major fighter, a combatant in the COVID wars because I was trying to analyze them, among other things, and, you know, they were right and everybody else was wrong and they were mistreated. And I thought they, I mean, I certainly didn't defend their mistreatment at the time, but I did not, you know, it was one of the failings of this podcast that we, maybe we weren't as forthright or we didn't provide as much support to people like that. Matt wasn't on the podcast really in the height of that moment, no.
- [52:31]
G
But I went through the same thing. And, you know, I made the call at the time. In fact, I believe I guessed it on the podcast pretty early on in the pandemic, and at that point point, I think we were all kind of so shocked by what was happening in the rapidity at which events were unfolding that I deferred to the experts and, you know, maybe I defer to the experts, but then the real, which is that kind of, you know, people herd together at times of crisis. But then it was only as the pandemic unfolded that you began to realize and once the data came in, certainly on the schools, that the experts were wrong and, and truly, truly wrong in ways we're only beginning to understand. Since it's my last appearance as a regular, may I make a double recommendation?
- [53:30]
A
Well, I just do want to say. I just want to thank you also, because when we start at another point. Okay, no, about you before you do the recommendations. Because the recommendations was something we did, we talked about doing to have something light to end the show with. So we didn't just sort of end on another morose note. Another morose note. Another morose note. So we decided we were going to try this recommendations thing, which we do haven't. Haven't been as rigorous with over time because someone doesn't really have anything to mention or to talk about. But you have always been a consistent driver of the recommendation regime and we are going to miss you because the rest of us aren't as dutiful in the recommending business and we're going to have to step it up without you, without you there. And I think people have taken a lot of profit and have read a lot of good books and seen a lot of movies they might not otherwise have seen and learned about things they might not otherwise have learned from Commentary recommend. So that is one of your. That will be one of your. Well, you know, when you're, when you're inducted into the Commentary Podcast hall of Fame, your role as a recommender will be one of.
- [54:52]
G
Well, your words, your words are so touching that I'm going to expand my double recommendation to a triple recommendation because. Do it. Let's do it. That means only that you can only recommend one thing in response, though.
- [55:06]
A
I'm not going to recommend anything.
- [55:08]
G
You can only make one additional recommendation.
- [55:10]
A
Recommend. Show. This is it.
- [55:12]
G
Okay, well, I'm just saying. I'm just saying I'll be brief. I'll be brief here because we all have things to do. But, you know, as some people noticed, I was away for two weeks earlier in October, and that's because I went on a trip hosted by the Hudson Institute to India and Sri Lanka, Very educational trip. It also, you know, inspired me to do a lot of reading about India, where I've never traveled before. And so my first recommendation, Very Brief is an excellent book if you are interested in modern India or if you're planning a trip to India. It's a history of India since independence called India After Gandhi by the Indian writer Ramachanda Ramachandra Guha. Guha is Gandhi's biographer. He's written a monumental two volume biography of Gandhi which I have not read. But this book made me want to at least dip into that biography. It's long, it's about 800 pages. I had a lot of time on my hands during trips, you know, to, in and within India. But it's very informative and it takes you from independence and the partition between India and Pakistan and the horrors of that, through India's wars with Pakistan, India's war with China, the Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister and his anti Americanism, his daughter Indira Gandhi, who of course imposed the emergency in 1975 when basically she suspended democracy in India. That's an actual authoritarian challenge, by the way. That has happened in history, unlike the ones we sometimes worry or panic about here at home. Really up to the rise of Narendra Modi in his first election in 2014. Now, Guha is definitely a Gandhian and someone who's very sympathetic not only to the Gandhi philosophy, but also to the Congress Party, which was Gandhi's party. And so as you get closer to the modern moment, his kind of critiques of the bjp, which is the Hindu party that Modi leads, become more apparent. But I learned a lot from it. So that's my first recommendation. My second is another book that I have not finished yet. But since I won't be on the show when I do finish it, I want to recommend it. Now I'm about 100 or so pages in. It's a book called American Kings, a biography of the quarterback by Seth Wickersham, who's associated with espn. He's written a lot of sports books. You know, it's NFL season. I love, I love professional football. And if you're interested in quarterbacking, this is a great book. It's an interesting narrative. He bounces around a lot. So you'll go from Warren Moon to John Elway and then you'll go back to Terry Bradshaw and then forward to Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. But through that kind of kaleidoscopic intro, you do get a sense of what quarterbacks do. What makes one special kind of the myth, the mythos of quarterbacking. And the reason I'm definitely recommending it is it introduced me to a character I never heard about, a guy named Bob Waterfield, who was one of the first celebrity quarterbacks. He was for the LA Rams when they were there the first go round. And he was also noted for his marriage to the actress Jane Russell, who was one of the first big pinup actresses. And so that's a fascinating story all on its own, and it's just one little piece of this great book, American Kings. And then finally, I'm rushing through. But my final recommendation. I was traveling while Diane Keaton died, and I didn't get to talk about Diane Keaton with you all. I was surprised, and I was very sad to hear that she died. She was one of my favorite actresses. And I just want to recommend one of her movies that's not. Not as famous as, of course, as the Godfather or Annie Hall. But it's a. One of my favorite, if not my favorite, Woody Allen movie. It's called Manhattan Murder Mystery. It came out in 1993. It's a small Woody Allen movie. Diane Keaton actually was not slated to star in the film with Woody Allen, but the film. You know, Woody Allen makes a movie every year, or at least did up until about last year. This film was scheduled to go into production right when the scandal between Woody Allen and his wife, Mia Farrow, and. Or if they were even married, I'm not even sure, partner, Mia Farrow. They weren't married. But then involving the woman Woody Allen would marry soon, Yee Previn, Mia Farrow's adopted daughter. Anyway, when that broke out, everything. Mia Farrow canceled her participation in this film. And so Alan's good friend Diane Keating stepped in. And I actually think it was just kind of one of those, you know, serendipitous moments, because basically, they play a couple that you can kind of imagine what would have happened had Annie hall gotten together with Woody Allen's character in Annie Hall. Except now they're in the 90s, early 90s, and Diane Keaton's character becomes convinced that their neighbor down the hall in their Upper east side apartment has killed his wife. And it just kind of goes on from there. And it's just a lovely movie, 90 minutes long. If you love New York like I love New York, it's a great Woody Allen New York movie because you see a lot of the city. And it's also very funny, and it features the great Don Keaton. So there you go. I think I did it under three minutes, three recommendations.
- [61:27]
A
Amazing.
- [61:27]
B
Amazing.
- [61:28]
A
And you did, you did history, you did sports and you did movies. A true final trifecta for the ages.
- [61:38]
G
Renaissance man.
- [61:40]
A
You're the Renaissance man. We're going to miss you. Obviously we will all be friends and colleagues and texters and all of that, but I'm just glad that our audience got two and a half years to spend well.
- [61:58]
G
And like MacArthur, I shall return.
- [62:03]
A
He didn't.
- [62:04]
C
I was going to say like Tom.
- [62:05]
A
Hanks, but yeah, he didn't really return.
- [62:07]
C
Come back to the show.
- [62:10]
G
Yeah, he did.
- [62:10]
A
Oh, he did return. Well, of course he returned then.
- [62:12]
F
Then of course.
- [62:15]
G
Japanese. He returned.
- [62:16]
F
Yeah.
- [62:16]
A
No, he returned and then of course, in 1951 he didn't return anyway, so. But you will return. We will also return on Monday with Eliana Johnson. So until then, for Abe, Seth, Christine and Matt, keep the camel.