Jonah Goldberg (2:34)

Like is Jonah one of the topics?

Michael Warren (2:38)

Because I was my favorite Jonah of 2025. You'll be surprised.

Megan McArdle (2:43)

We're staging an intervention. Jonah.

Steve Hayes (2:46)

I sent it just to the other panelists and not you. Most annoying Jonah moment of the year. Maybe that's a good place to start. No, no, no, it's not. We won't. We won't do that. We won't subject. Subject you to that.

Megan McArdle (2:56)

Well, not. Not live.

Steve Hayes (2:58)

Not. Not live. And not in front of you.

Jonah Goldberg (3:00)

Not on the air. Plus, you guys trying to sort of replicate my relationship with my wife is weird.

Steve Hayes (3:07)

Actually, had I thought about it, I could have gone to her for some prompting questions.

Jonah Goldberg (3:11)

Yeah.

Steve Hayes (3:11)

Let's start with the best book you read in 2025. And we should be clear with people that we said these could be books. Books published long before 2025, but book that you read in 2025. And, Megan, I'll start with you.

Megan McArdle (3:30)

Well, there is a backstory to this. As some listeners know. I have another podcast at the Washington Post. This is an interview show. I am not trying to steal the thunder.

Steve Hayes (3:42)

We love your other podcast. We will gladly put a link in the show notes. And you're welcome to mention it by name and promote it.

Jonah Goldberg (3:48)

We'll beep that out.

Megan McArdle (3:53)

It's called reasonably optimistic. And the idea is that I think people are getting tired of endlessly being told why everything in the world is terrible. But. So the first interview I did, as we were sitting around thinking about guests, I said to my producers, well, what about Neal Stephenson, who is a science fiction writer? And they said, oh, that's interesting. Yeah. And I said, okay, well, I'm going to need a lot of lead time because I haven't read his books in many years, and he writes very long novels. And they said, okay. And they said, okay. We booked him in two weeks.

Steve Hayes (4:26)

That was not the lead time you were looking for?

Megan McArdle (4:29)

That was not the lead time I was looking for. So for two weeks, I did nothing except work and read Neil Stevenson novels. My husband, like, took over everything in our house. I read, I don't know, 7,8000 pages of Neal Stephenson novels. And one of them was the first Neal Stephenson novel I ever read, which is a book called the Diamond. Now, I read this in galleys. My first job out of college was as an editorial assistant at Bantam Doubleday, Dell's science fiction division. I lasted three months before being fired by an editor who said, I think you're going to be a very good editor someday, but you're a terrible assistant. Totally, totally true. Absolutely justified. And so I then picked this up for the first time since 1994, and it was as amazing as I remembered it. And I think also speaks to the current era in a way, because it's about the question of, first of all, the educational divide between wealthy and Poor, but also something that I think parents are really struggling with as we see all sorts of problems in the education system, which is how do you give your kids the challenges that allowed you to screw up but that also made them strong and resilient and able to tackle failure and overcome it? You know, the system now is designed to minimize failure. It selects on people who never fail. Right. That's the college admissions system is basically like for those of a certain age will remember Nadia comanich the perfect 10. Right. That's what you have to do. You have to make no mistakes in order to get into college. You know, Jonah, I think had a somewhat similarly checkered high school career.

Jonah Goldberg (6:21)

In fact, if I can interject for one second as a Gen Xer here with a checkered adolescent career, when you say the perfect 10 and Nadia Comanici.

Megan McArdle (6:32)

No.

Steve Hayes (6:32)

Where Jonah's.

Jonah Goldberg (6:33)

Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense. But I'm thinking Boderic.

Megan McArdle (6:39)

Fine. Okay. Well, ladies and men are different. So like I think the plot of the story is about basically a high up lord in a future where like society is fractured a bit, but there's this Neo Victorian society that is weird and wonderful. And he. But he looks at his grandkids, he looks at his kids who have become incredibly conventional and he wants to make them more interesting, to make them capable of having interesting lives. And so he has an AI or what, what Ste. Stevenson then calls pseudo intelligence. Make an. An interactive book that will adapt and grow with the child and provide her with the kind of. The danger and the unconventional thinking that he worries that his children are missing. And it gets weirder and more wonderful from there. It is. Anyway, so this book falls into the hands. One copy, there are three copies made and one of them falls in the hands of a girl living in the slums of as. And it is just a deeply fascinating story about what happens to that little girl who has a terribly underprivileged life.

Steve Hayes (7:58)

So I'm. I am decidedly not a science fiction guy. I've never got it and haven't done very little reading. I know this comes as a shock, but that sounds absolutely fascinating to me.

Megan McArdle (8:11)

I. I think you. I. Give it a try. Give. Even if you're not a science fiction person, give it a try.

Steve Hayes (8:16)

I will, I will. Jump in. Jonah. Have you read Stevenson?

Jonah Goldberg (8:20)

I did and I agree. It's a great book. Right at the beginning the conversations about AI taken on in earnest and it does. I don't know, it has a. You know, there's the old phrase, you can't ever read the same book twice the same way, you know, because it's just a different experience. And I found it hard. I still think it's a fantastic book. I found it hard for me not to read it as if I was going to write about it rather than just fall into it. In part because I knew what was going to happen and in part because I don't read for pleasure as much as I would like these days. And so it's hard to get out of writer mode when reading. And a point I'll be returning to when it's my turn.

Steve Hayes (9:08)

It's your turn.

Jonah Goldberg (9:09)

All right. So as I said, I don't do much to my wife's chagrin because she has been on a reading tear the last couple years. Like it seems like three, four books a month of just all sorts of different kinds, if not more. And as some listeners know, I am. I haven't signed the papers yet, so I can still back out, but I am planning on writing a book about conservatism. We can discuss that book another day, but it's requiring me to go and explunking in various aspects of sort of intellectual history and whatnot. And I read this book, the Lost History of. What's the exact title? Yeah, the Lost History of Liberalism by Helena Rosenblatt. And I don't agree with everything in it, but it's a really rich book that it's an interesting way of doing it. Instead of doing a history of the idea, she does the history of the word, like literally the word and how its meaning changes over time. We don't have to get too deep in the egg heady weeds about it. But liberalism being liberal, I can't remember the Latin, you know that where we started from, but.

Michael Warren (10:27)

Liber. Right?

Jonah Goldberg (10:28)

Yeah, Libert. Libertas. You know, they're the different versions. But the point is it originally had to do with character of being a generous person, of sort of being the patriarch of a clan or a family in ancient Rome or ancient Greece, and that you were a generous person. So like when I say give me a liberal pour of Scotch, in many ways that is hearkening back to the original understanding because it's a generous poor, right? Like you do well by your staff, even your or your slaves, you do well by your clients, you know, in the sort of old, you know, because people forget that the original form of political organization was sort of clientelism, where you were the local, you know, aristocrat, and yet you had this sort of reciprocal relationship with people and it grows over time, having different theological things. We don't need to do the whole history. But one of the things I. I've taken away from it, which is a helpful realization for me, is that when people like Megan and I often will refer to ourselves as classical liberals, the implication is that there was a classic age of liberalism and there kind of really wasn't. The idea that liberalism and democracy go hand in hand is just not true. One of the things I resent a lot about the book is that a lot of the developments of the idea of liberalism happens in France and Germany rather than in where it belongs in England and Scotland. But it's sort of a helpful perspective on it. And the idea that liberalism always meant laissez affairs just really kind of not true. It did not mean it either. It just depended on the context and the place and the time and all of that. And so one of the reasons why I find it useful and interesting to think about, is that conservatism and liberalism, which we think are these antipodal terms, that's largely because of Franklin Roosevelt, by the way. Boo his. The idea that, you know, in the 18 revolutions of 1848, the. The liberals wanted, or you can call them the Republicans because those terms that for periods of time were kind of interchangeable too. They wanted constitutions or they wanted a broader franchise, or they wanted property rights for the middle class. And with the emergence of what we come to know as the left, the liberals are cast as conservatives. Right? The people who want kings, divine right of kings are reactionaries and the liberals are kind of the conservatives. And Dan Klein did a great paper which I wish he addressed doing, because now you can do these massive database searches of all printed materials. And he found that we really owe the term liberal as libertarians and class and sort of classical liberals, as we use the phrase today, we really owe it not to the. The Spaniards and the liberals of Cadiz, but to Adam Smith, because it was Adam Smith's liberal system of economics that gets to be called liberal liberal economics. But again, this golden age where there was like all these classical liberals around, they all agreed on what it was never existed. And it's always been a contested term for someone who needs to figure out how to define all of my terms. It was a very useful starting point for more reading and reading and reading.

Steve Hayes (14:12)

So we will look forward to it being reflected in the pages of your new book. Mike, Best book you read in 2025.

Michael Warren (14:19)

I have it right here, actually. It is the revised and updated edition of and a bottle of Rum by Wayne Curtis, who was the longtime may still be the current Drinks cocktails columnist at the Wall Street Journal. This book is nearly, gosh, it's probably more than two decades old at this point. This is a revised version. The subject matter alone is worth the read. It is the story of the new world through 10 cocktails. In fact, that's the subtitle of the book, A History of the new world in 10 cocktails focused on the spirit of rum. It is sort of the ideal for telling a story about a subject over the course of history because it's not only a story about this particular spirit. It feels if you're not a drinker or if you really don't know nothing about rum, which I really didn't know much about rum before I read this book. But you appreciate history. This is a book that sort of walks you through these moments. It's not comprehensive in terms of North American and ultimately American history. But you sort of take these little pit stops across moments from the original colonization of the New World by the Europeans, through the sort of later colonial period, through the early days of the United States, and all the way through basically to modern times. And each chapter has a different cocktail that that is associated with that time period. One of my favorite chapters was about the period where rum as a drink, which rum, again, for anybody who doesn't know, it's a spirit that's created from a sugar byproduct. Most of the time that's molasses, sometimes that's sugar cane juice. But other than that, rum is kind of whatever you want to make of it. And rum really fell out of fashion after being sort of the. One of the most popular spirits in the early part of the United States. History really fell out of fashion starting sort of the mid 19th century. But it was during that time that, you know, moments, rum still had this hold on the culture. We remember, you know, the phra used by Republicans in the post Civil War era to kind of criticize the Democratic Party, which was getting a lot of, you know, getting a lot of the immigrant vote from Ireland and other of these sort of second class countries in Europe that were coming in. The phrase was, are you going to vote for Republicans or are you going to vote for the Democrats? Which would bring, you know, rum, Romanism and rebellion even though nobody was drinking rum. You know, this idea that rum was this representative, this just disgusting, low status kind of person. There's a story to be told even when people aren't drinking rum. Jonah, you talked about how you can't read a book without thinking about writing about it. I often find myself, particularly with these kind of popular histories, thinking about how the author put this together and how that could reflect my own writing and how to put put things together as well. So I also read this book thinking about that I was reading this in the run up to writing something, a piece for the, for the Dispatch about, about tiki cocktails and tiki culture. And so I got a lot of just the stylistic inspiration for that piece by reading this book.

Steve Hayes (17:52)

Did you try any of the rum recipes in the book?

Michael Warren (17:56)

Yes, absolutely.

Jonah Goldberg (17:58)

But you spit it out, right, Like a good sommelier. You just wanted to.

Michael Warren (18:01)

Totally, absolutely. It's. It's funny because some of them are truly. I'll just read you one of the ones that I can't believe anybody actually drink this? This is called a flip. Mix 1 cup of beer, 2 tablespoons of molasses, and 1 ounce of Jamaican style rum into a mug or tankard. Heat loggerhead to red hot in an open fire. That's a fireplace poker, basically. Then thrust it into the drink and stir. Keep loggerhead immersed until foaming and sputtering ceases. Drink hot. I did not try that one.

Megan McArdle (18:36)

Yeah, we, we've made flips. They're delicious. Beer flips are wonderful. We don't have a fireplace, so we do not use a hot poker. But you can just also heat it on the stove. Same effect.

Michael Warren (18:46)

True.

Steve Hayes (18:47)

That's crazy. That does not sound absolutely delicious to me.

Megan McArdle (18:50)

No, I know, it's funny. It doesn't. But it's like, it's like kind of a dessert beverage almost like it's. And they're really tasty. I don't like beer. So the fact that I am willing to drink this tells you something.

Jonah Goldberg (19:04)

Well, not the traffic. And I'm sorry, not the traffic in gross ethnic stereotypes, but how many McCardell's don't like beer? I mean, is it one? Does it get out of single digits?

Megan McArdle (19:15)

My sister also doesn't like it, so that would be two.

Jonah Goldberg (19:17)

Okay.

Megan McArdle (19:19)

I'm not familiar with any others, but if there are any McArdles out there, listen, if you're hearing this and you don't like beer, reach out.

Steve Hayes (19:28)

That's roundtable@the dispatch.com. joni, you mentioned that you don't do as much pleasure reading as you used to. And one reason I'll keep mine short is because I'm in the same boat. And it's really actually sort of pathetic how little pleasure reading I do these days, which is to say virtually none. And I was the kid. It sounds like I was like you, Megan. I was with a book from the time I could read until the time I graduated from college. I just read everything all the time, and I don't anymore. And mostly it's because when it comes time to go to bed at night, if I try to read a book, I'll be asleep in two minutes, even if it's a great book. So I don't read much for pleasure.

Megan McArdle (20:17)

Isn't that good?

Steve Hayes (20:18)

It is, but then it's frustrating those.

Megan McArdle (20:20)

Of us who have insomnia.

Steve Hayes (20:22)

Yeah, you like that? Yeah. It just takes too long to get through a good book. And I don't. Haven't carved out time to read, so I don't have many. I mean, I was looking back at the books that I've read this year, and they fall into one of two categories. Most of them are books I've read for work. And then there were a couple of. And I don't even know what you'd call them. I guess we would put them in the self help category, which, again, not a big genre for me.

Jonah Goldberg (20:54)

But the need is so strong that.

Steve Hayes (20:57)

If you have any recommendations, Jonah, please send them my way. No. One book that I had recommended, I think it was a combination of my brother and a friend of mine who's also a pastor, is called the Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. And it's by a young sort of rising star preacher in the evangelical world who's racing through life, growing his churches, doing all these things, and realizes sort of, hey, you know, it might be better for me to take a step back to do the kind of work that I actually want to do. And it was. It's a terrific book. I mean, it tells a story, but the lessons are kind of obvious and sort of, I guess, in the ultimate tribute to the book. I started it in, I think, June, and I'm not yet done. So I am eliminating hurry. I'll finish it whenever I damn well want to finish it. And it won't be any time soon, in all likelihood. All right, we're going to take a quick break, but we'll be back soon with more from the Dispatch podcast. You know, every year when we hit December, I start thinking about everything in my work life that could be running just a little smoother. I spend a lot of time thinking about that. And honestly, payroll and HR tasks are always high on that list. I know our team spends more afternoon than I'd like to admit buried in forms, double checking, taxes, details, tracking down onboarding documents. It's the kind of stuff that eats up your entire day before you even notice. And that's why I really appreciate what Gusto brings to the table. It gives you that, okay, we're getting our business act together this year. Feeling like starting with a clean desk and an organized inbox. Gusto is online payroll and benefits software built for small businesses. It's all in one remote, friendly, and incredibly easy to use, so you can pay, hire onboard and support your team from anywhere. And here's a big one for small businesses. Unlimited payroll runs for one monthly price. No hidden fees, no surprises. You know exactly what you're paying for, which is pretty rare in this space. It's also genuinely quick to switch to Gusto. You just transfer your existing data and get up and running fast. You don't pay a cent until you run your first payroll. Try gusto today@gusto.com dispatch and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll@gusto.com dispatch one more time. Gusto.com dispatch let's jump to either films or series that you watched in 2025 that you. That were your favorites or that you would recommend. And Megan, I'll start with you again.

Megan McArdle (23:47)

So for series, I have a really oldie but a goodie, which is that I had never watched the original Perry Mason from Raymond Burr. So I went back and they were on Amazon and then you had to get part of them through one of the services that has commercials and like the, it was like, it was like the drug dealer.

Steve Hayes (24:09)

Right.

Megan McArdle (24:09)

The first two seasons are ad free and then you got to go to the ad supported. It was surprisingly good. And then I watched the follow up series he did called Ironside, which almost no one has ever heard of except for the. Except for Mike and Jonah, who are nodding enthusiastically.

Michael Warren (24:29)

Can I just say very quickly, we were discussing with my parents last night the TV schedule in like 1972 or something along those lines. Several years when my mom was younger and I mentioned Ironside and she said, yes, I know that show. So there you go.

Megan McArdle (24:47)

Yeah. So I really surprisingly enjoyed it. It's definitely a period piece. But Raymond, it's sort of like, you know, Hugh Laurie in house. That show would not have been good without Hugh Laurie. It would have been. It would have lasted a few seasons and gone off the air. But Hugh Laurie is just magnificent. And so you don't care about the lackluster acting by people and. Or silly plots. I've been getting really into I've been rereading Vince Kanato's the Ungovernable City. I have been going back and thinking about urban disorder and why it happened and why all these social changes in the late 60s, early 70s. I've also reread another candidate for an oldie but goodie book reread is David Frum's How we got here, the 70s and the making of Modern American Life. And so it's. It's really interesting to watch how people doing television in the late 60s and early 70s. That is. That is prestige, the prestige TV of its day, right? They have one of the most successful actors from a prior series who is doing a kind of the same but different now. It's in color now. It's got, you know, it's got mod, hip young people, you know, a female police lieutenant, a black. It's about a paralyzed detective, a black personal aide who I intuit, is eventually going to become a cop. And it's just really fascinating, but also surprisingly well done. It's not perhaps as good as a modern prestige TV drama, but I've really been enjoying it so far. If you're looking for something more modern, I've been enjoying Landmine. I've been enjoying Pluribus, which just finished up on Apple tv.

Jonah Goldberg (26:37)

All right, so I have so many thoughts on all that, I don't know where to begin, but I'll get to mine in just a second. So, vincanato, who wrote the Lindsay book that you're. That Megan referred to one of my oldest friends.

Steve Hayes (26:50)

What's the Lindsay? But give people a brief description of the book.

Megan McArdle (26:53)

It's called the Ungovernable City. There are a couple of books in urbanism that I. I've read more than once because I find them so rich. But the Ungovernable City is about John Lindsay, who was the great progressive Republican mayor of New York and who, I mean, just presided over total chaos and its descent into madness. And this is the. The, as far as I know, by far the most detailed record of how that happened, why it happened, the mistakes that were made. I think, as we look at Zorani Mamdani coming in, and the question is, of course, is he going to make the same kinds of mistakes? Now, look, Lindsay was in many ways the victim of circumstances wildly beyond his control. The city, you know, the cities were going nuts in the 1960s for reasons that didn't necessarily have a lot to do with John Lindsay's policies. At the same time, he mismanaged a bunch of crises. He presided over a massive deterioration in New York and also set the city up for what would be the famous fiscal crisis chronicled in the Netflix documentary, which is also very good. Watch that this year. Drop dead, city. And as a side note, my father started working for the city of New York under John Lindsay, so as a budget analyst at the Health and Hospitals Corporation, and would eventually become assistant to the mayor, to Abe Beam, and then to Ed Koch. He became Ed Koch's Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner. So there's like a little personal lore in there. And it's really funny because, like, reading these things through, there were a couple spots where I'm like, I wonder if my dad was like, in that room. But. And alas, he died last year, so I can't ask. Anyway, it's a great book and high recommend.

Jonah Goldberg (28:47)

Vin will be very excited about this conversation. So when. And so we don't need to dwell on this too much, but Lindsey was a liberal Republican and there's a vast mafia of. I mean, now they're all aging out, but like, no offense, like your dad.

Michael Warren (29:05)

Right.

Jonah Goldberg (29:05)

I mean, it's just given the time frame, but vast mafia of Lindsay loyalists.

Megan McArdle (29:10)

My dad, by the way, not a Lindsay loyalist.

Jonah Goldberg (29:13)

Fair. Okay.

Megan McArdle (29:14)

Was very, very critical of.

Jonah Goldberg (29:18)

So when Vin's book came out, which was, you know, the adaptation of his PhD thesis, and people have heard me tell this story on the Remnant and on Glop a few times, he would do these book panel things and book event things at like, the Barnes and Noble on 83rd and Broadway or 82nd Broadway and at other places in New York City. And the Lindsay mafia would show up and just give him hell, you know, and. And he had answers for all of it. But like the one, the one that always sticks out, which is also the most germane here is they would always say Lindsay brought Hollywood back to New York, which. And Vin would be like, that's true. Like, people forget. Like, there was like a 10, 15 year period where they usually didn't make a lot of movies in New York. And Lindsay did one of the first tax credit things to bring Hollywood back. And so Vince says, yes, that's true. Now let's look at the movies that came out from that program. Dog Day Afternoon, Taxi Driver, the French Connection, Death Wish, Serpico, Panic in Needle Park.

Michael Warren (30:21)

Right.

Jonah Goldberg (30:21)

All of these dystopian movies that depict. Which are fun for me to watch because it's the New York of my childhood, but, like, are so grim and gritty and dark and all about how the city is overcome with crime. And prostitution and muck. And he's like, okay, good for you. You brought in film crews to document.

Michael Warren (30:42)

The destruction you visited on your city.

Jonah Goldberg (30:45)

Anyway, the only other thing is you can't talk about classic books about urbanism without mentioning Ed Banfield's the Unheavenly City. So mine is very different. There are a lot of things I rewatched or watched this year and we could do a whole episode on just shows from the year I'm currently rewatching for the first time in years, the man in the High Castle, which it's reinforcing my view about what an unbelievable missed opportunity was to make it better. But it was good. And pilot problem, as me and John Podort talk about this a lot. The real problem is that the book was kind of crappy. Kudos to Philip K. Dick for basically creating contra factual history. And there's a lot of fun stuff there, but the. The core of it with all this nonsense about the I Ching is just. It just doesn't work. Anyway, TV series I want to congratulate particularly because it came out in 2025 and it is so contrary to the rest of the franchise these days. Was Andor. Andor was a two season Star wars sort of prequel kind of series. It was dark, it was morally really serious. It was kind of tragic, given that we don't have to get into all the weeds about it. But like, it basically takes a fairly minor character from one of the sequel movies who dies in the movie and then gives his backstory. And like, what's the most remarkable thing about it is that it doesn't really need to be science fiction. It could very easily be about, you know, I don't know, 1941, Western Europe after the top falling of France or Prague or something like that. And it's really compelling and it expects the audience to be adults while the rest of the star. We just had a very good piece at the Dispatch by Oliver Ja. Is that how you pronounce his name? About how Disney has frittered away the Star wars franchise and this is the great counterexample? Well, you have to say, but what about Andor? Because it was so unbelievably well done, they told the story they wanted to tell, which is very rare, and then said that's it, it's over. And it came out in 2025 and it's great.

Steve Hayes (33:08)

Mike.

Michael Warren (33:09)

Well, I selected two because I had a feeling somebody would pick one or the other. So I just want to associate myself with the remarks of Mr. Goldberg on Andor but my other, My other alternative was the show Severance, which came back for its second season on Apple TV plus in 2025. I love the idea of this show. For anybody who's unfamiliar with the show Severance, it is created and sort of run by Ben Stiller, although he's not. He's not in front of the camera. He's only behind the camera. In the show, the idea is that there is a company where a number of its employees live their lives outside the company, and then when they go to work in the morning, they walk onto an elevator. The elevator goes down into the basement where their offices are, and by some bit of TV magic, their brain is rejiggered and a separate consciousness emerges. Once they reach the bottom floor, they are sort of severed from what in the show's terminology is called their outies, who live outside. And they. They have no knowledge or memory of what that is going on on the outside. They are simply there to work. And these Innies, once they go back up the elevator, forget everything that they've done at work and go about their lives. So as an Audi, you essentially walk into an elevator. It's like falling asleep. The next thing you know, you wake up and you are walking off that same elevator. At the end of the day, the second season really sort of continues the high quality of the first season in sort of exploring how the Audis and the Innies know and learn more about each other and about this kind of shady company. I love all of the mythology, I suppose, of the show. It's sort of built around a. One of those kind of intentional communities that cropped up in the late 19th century in America, like the Oneida Community. Community and these things. It's. It's, you know, sort of quasi religious. There's a kind of work ethic tied to it that gets into very cult, you know, areas.

Jonah Goldberg (35:31)

It's like you're describing the Heritage foundation in 2025.

Michael Warren (35:34)

It's really amazing. That's why it spoke to me so much. Jonah. So it's a. It's a terrific show. If you haven't seen it, it's great, great, great performances and terrific writing. And I can't wait to see where season three. Three takes us.

Steve Hayes (35:49)

I just feel so out of this conversation. I haven't watched andor this whole show is your idea.

Michael Warren (35:54)

I mean, there's all of these topics were your idea.

Steve Hayes (35:57)

It's great. I just don't. I will watch a few of them. I'll definitely go back. I'm. I'm Intrigued by Perry Mason. There's no chance I'm going to watch Andor I don't. I. I think I stopped Star wars at the Empire Strikes Back severance. I've tried like three times. It just doesn't click for me. And I know that that makes me an outlier. Other people love it.

Michael Warren (36:16)

Steve was like this. This makes sense. Why don't we do it at the Dispatch? Why don't we sever our employees?

Megan McArdle (36:21)

I've watched two seasons of it and I'm in between you two where, like, it was fine. I was like, happy enough to watch it, but my husband really liked it, But I didn't. I didn't respond to it. I think it is one of those things where either you really click with it or you don't.

Jonah Goldberg (36:37)

I agree. I agree. To me, it feels like there's a Lost problem. Brimming, like they don't know how to end it. If Lost had managed to stick the landing, I would have thought that was one of the best TV shows ever made. Instead, I think Lost was like, ha, ha, you suckers. We got you to watch this thing for four years. We had no idea what we were doing.

Megan McArdle (36:59)

By the way, if people have not watched the new, like the new Vince Gilligan show Pluribus, let me again put a plug in for that because it really is quite good.

Steve Hayes (37:08)

And it is also science fiction.

Michael Warren (37:11)

Sort of.

Megan McArdle (37:11)

Sort of. But it's. It's not really about the science fiction element. It's basically the. The premise is that there is. We get a. A, like a transmission from another planet. We figure out that it is a recipe for a virus or for a DNA segment. We engineer escapes the lab. This all happens in the first, like, four minutes, by the way of the show. I'm giving nothing away, like. And then it, in fact. And then it basically turns you into. It allows like the hive mind, humanity to become a hive mind. And then there are 11 people in the world. It doesn't affect. Also a bunch of people die. But so it's about one of those people who is a very unlikable romance writer. Science fiction, romance, actually, just to. Just to punch you in the face.

Steve Hayes (38:08)

Keep going.

Megan McArdle (38:09)

No, but it's, it's actually, it's. What it's really about is like how. How one wrestles with the. With being alone, with being with. Dealing with people who turn out to be very. They'll do anything for you. And so it's. It's a really, really interesting show because, like, you have seen Invasion of the Body Snatchers. You have seen a bunch of these apocalyptic movies. Vince Gilligan has seen them too and has decided to do something completely different.

Jonah Goldberg (38:43)

I like it for those reasons more than the I like it for sort of meta reasons in that I'm and this annoys my wife a great deal. I am very good at predicting what happens in TV shows and movies and it drives her crazy. And so I will often email her while we're watching a show. Here's my prediction so that she can look at it later without me. It doesn't spoil things.

Steve Hayes (39:09)

And you do that just because you want to be right.

Jonah Goldberg (39:11)

I want to say I called it right and she won't believe me if I say I knew that was going to happen. And there are only really two shows that I'm largely They're sort of like lead lined for me with that kind of thing. I mean, I'm sure there are others, right? I mean there are surprises and Better Call Saul I didn't see coming and that kind of thing. But like the Bear, which is a fantastic show, particularly the first season and Pluribus, like Pluribus kept going ways that I was like, oh, this is a thing about AI. Oh, this is. This, this is. And like no, it's kind of different. And so like that I find it's sort of like the golden path in Dune. Just its ability to surprise me, I really find compelling. But I have problems with it too. But we can discuss those another time.

Steve Hayes (39:55)

Well, I will do the same thing on this topic that I did last topic, which is be very brief because I don't probably plainly watch as many of these things as you all do. I don't watch movies and I don't bring sort of the level of sophistication and understanding that you all do. But a movie that I've greatly enjoyed was not from 2025, apparently was from 2022. I looked this up when I decided to share it and it it's a film called Living starring Bill Nighy. And I may have mentioned this once before here, but without giving too much away, he is a the main character is a grumpy bureaucrat in London in the 1950s who either doesn't do his job, doesn't do it well, and is angry and is sort of indifferent to the repercussions of his not doing his job until he has been given a terminal cancer diagnosis and and then as one imagines, starts paying more attention to the consequences of his actions and the people he meets and people he's neglected for much of his life and the rest of the movie sort of follows him as he has a series of epiphanies and begins to change his behavior. And I thought Bill Nighy was spectacular in the film, but the movie itself and the themes it explores, it did so at least to a tired guy watching it on a I think it was a Southwest flight across the country seemed to be in a more sort of textured and sophisticated way than one is accustomed to. All right, time for a quick break, but we'll be back soon with more from the Dispatch podcast.

Jonah Goldberg (41:48)

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Steve Hayes (42:18)

To quitting Quitting the couch for a quick run. Quitting the snooze button for a morning workout. Quitting giving up after two weeks. You see, staying committed to your fitness goals isn't easy. But with Apple Watch you don't have.

Megan McArdle (42:32)

To do it alone because Apple Watch.

Steve Hayes (42:35)

Gives you real time motivation plus advanced.

Megan McArdle (42:38)

Metrics that track all your workouts so you can stick to your New Year's fitness resolutions.

Steve Hayes (42:43)

And once and for all, quit quitting Without Apple Watch iPhone 11 or later required. Next category is the best meal you had in 2025 and I will start with you, Jonah.

Jonah Goldberg (42:58)

I really struggled with this because, well, you'll see why. So probably the best ambitious home cooked meal I have two my wife and I when we were driving back from the west coast over Thanksgiving, we stayed in a nice hotel where they had and I ordered cassoulet and I love cassoulet and I was like, you know, we should try and make this at home. And it turned into a three day process where we confeed our own duck. We did the whole thing the right way and it was great. We had a lot left over. And so my wife had this epiphany to turn the leftovers into a terrine and which you sort of slice like a loaf of bread and have with some salad and some balsamic dinner and it's fantastic. So that in terms of chefly stuff, the best away game meal I had. You know that scene where Vince Vaughn tells his kid to do earmuffs so that the kid can't hear what the grownups are saying. I kind of want Steve to go on earmuffs right now because this was my wife's suggestion. And at the beginning of 2025 in January, we were staying in Door County. And I love diner food. I love good breakfasts. My family don't eat breakfast. I like big, serious, hearty breakfasts. And in Door county in January is a really stupid place to be because it's like windy and freezing cold and even the dogs are like, what are we doing here? But there's this place, Al Johnson's, famous for having goats on the roof, that has this Swedish breakfast of Swedish pancakes. And I had a massive Swedish pancake breakfast with a side of Swedish meatballs and gravy. And it was fantastic. It is exactly the kind of breakfast you want when it's six degrees outside and windy in northern Wisconsin. And for an away game break, away game meal, particularly because it was a breakfast, it's the one that stands out.

Steve Hayes (44:59)

It's funny that you say that because I was talking about the food at Al Johnson's with my sister and my brother in law within the last two days. And our universal take, I won't dispute. I could see that it sounds very good. What you say Al Johnson's is. It's sort of like, you know, one of the main tourist attractions in it's kitchen. That part of Door County.

Jonah Goldberg (45:20)

It's the Mama Leones of Door County.

Steve Hayes (45:22)

Yes. And you know, the goats on the roof thing is all the kids want to go there and they want to eat there. And we were saying that we had not had a great meal at Al Johnson's, but we have other relatives who are in the Jonah camp who think it's sort of the best, best place to go eat in indoor county. Very interesting. I will have to give it another shot. I'm open to it.

Jonah Goldberg (45:46)

I don't know about the dinners. I mean, like, the dinners seem farther conventional and like I'm not a huge scandal.

Steve Hayes (45:50)

I've had the meatballs there and the meatballs there are very good.

Jonah Goldberg (45:53)

Meatballs are solid.

Steve Hayes (45:54)

Yeah, yeah, Mike.

Michael Warren (45:57)

All right. So in terms of we meet, eat most of our meals at home. So this was also very difficult for me. So the only thing I could come up with that I just remember because it's so hard to remember, even though I enjoyed so many meals, I actually had to go back through my camera roll to see was something so good that I had to take a picture of it. But actually the thing that I keep thinking about from this year is something called a Mississippi pot roast. It is essentially you take just a big cheap piece of chuck roast, you put it in the slow cooker, you add pepperoncini peppers, you add some other. It's like the only thing where we use like pre packaged spice mixes. You know, it's like a gravy mix and ranch dressing mix. Essentially you put it all in there with some broth and, and you, you cook it until it's falling apart. And it is versatile, it is spicy. You can, you can. I think we had it with mashed potatoes and vegetables one night and then the next night we put it on a, on a sandwich. Meals out I was split between two different coasts. I had a dinner in San Francisco this year at a place called Burma Superstar, which is a Burmese restaurant in, in the, in Richmond in that district of, of San Francisco. I went there with a friend, a very good friend of mine who lives in San Francisco, recommended it. If. If you've never had Burmese, which I had not. It's essentially a slightly, a slightly spicier Thai cuisine and it was excellent and I really enjoyed that, that meal. Not just for the food, but also the experience of trying a new cuisine on the other side of the coast. I was in New York a few times this year, but one trip that I went, I had dinner with another old friend, very good friend at a just a diner, Jonah Montague Diner on Montague Street. It is sort of a classier level up than like a greasy spoon kind of diner. And it was sort of a late night dinner. Got a cheeseburger and it was delicious. And once again the, the company was, you know, was, was what was as enjoyable as the food.

Steve Hayes (48:13)

Meghan, this can be something you prepared as, as I should have specified. Yes.

Megan McArdle (48:18)

For restaurant meals. Honestly I did. I traveled so much. I ate a lot of restaurant meals, but none of them were super memorable except for there is a wonderful cocktail bar in Woburn, Massachusetts in a Sichuan restaurant. I seriously, if you are in the greater Woburn area, it's near Boston. It is worth driving to this place on the north. It. I can't explain. The cocktails are amazing. The food is great and it's in Woburn. It's delightful. You can usually not. Not like super hard to get a table there and the food's really good. But. And also we went for lobster with my aunt at Woodman's of Essex when we were up there. And this is also like, it's like an hour drive from the little town we Were staying in. It was terrific. I really enjoyed that. But my favorite meal of the year is so every Christmas we have the same menu, which is we have prime rib and we have some squash, little asparagus, Yorkshire puddings, gravy. This year we added an old fashioned dessert that I think is due for a revival. It's delicious. Even my husband, who does not like fruit based desserts now is a convert on this. It's called snow pudding. It is a gelatin stabilized egg white foam with lemon juice and zest. It is. It looks like its namesake. It has the same, like, delicious kind of bite when you get the lemon against this cloudy softness. Served it with raspberry sauce and a little. It's traditionally served with custard. I also added raspberry sauce because I think lemon and raspberry are always amazing together. But this is not actually my favorite meal of the year. My favorite meal of the year is that after Christmas dinner, the next day, in the next couple days, I take a bag of frozen cubed potatoes and I chop up the remains of the prime rib and I make roast beef hash, which is like my favorite food. You top it with little gravy and a fried egg and then you have snow pudding for dessert after that. That, folks, that is some fine eating.

Steve Hayes (50:34)

Can we have that? Can we have that for the second time? You can invite us over after we have the short ribs.

Michael Warren (50:40)

What.

Steve Hayes (50:40)

What do you call them? The perpetual short ribs with perpetual gravy.

Megan McArdle (50:45)

Yeah, the. The infinity. The infinity.

Steve Hayes (50:47)

Infinity. Infinity. Infinity. Yes. Okay, good. Okay, well, we have to get those two dates now on the books since we've invited ourselves over.

Megan McArdle (50:55)

No, calm. I'm serious. On the books.

Steve Hayes (50:58)

We can do an entire podcast reviewing the meal. My best meal. Everybody gave two or three, which is good. I wasn't sure that this would.

Michael Warren (51:06)

Would.

Steve Hayes (51:07)

Would work as a topic, and I think it has because we can't narrow it down. I'll briefly. The one thing I did at home that I hadn't done before, and I don't cook this way hardly ever, but it turned out great, was a green hatch chili pork butt that we made into carnitas in the crock pot, which I just don't. I'm not. I am a grill and a smoker guy. I don't do crock pots. And it was spectacular. And it was a ton of food for like 25 bucks. It was crazy. But the best meal I had of the year was at my favorite restaurant in the entire world, which is a place in central Madrid called Angelita and it was when my family lived in Madrid in 2018, 2019. Sort of our neighborhood wine bar, but had great food back then and has grown into a just an outstanding restaurant, really my favorite restaurant in the world. It's been written up in the New York Times as a great place to go get wine, which was unfortunate because now there are long waits. It's hard to get a table there. I went there in November. I took a 10 day trip to Spain with a group of friends, went there in November. And I've gotten to know the owner is a great gregarious host named David, who also oversees the kitchen. Terrific cook. And we basically, when we go there now, we just say, sort of make us dinner, bring us dinner. And he prepares the courses. He chooses what we're having. We don't order from the menu. He does the wine pairings. And he did this for our group. And the reason it was great. I won't go through each of the six courses, although I'm tempted to do so, is that he presents stuff that there's no chance I would ever order it if I were ordering it on my own. And the first of the courses was they were sort of blanched red peppers that were doused in olive oil and then some other creamier sauce. They were soggy is the only way I can describe them. And then they had little chunks of sardines in them. Again, I would never. I never order sardines. I'm not a big fan of sardines. I would never order this, this dish. And the same was true with the other five gentlemen I was with. And it was spectacular. Like, on another level, the combination of the flavors was unbelievable and obviously memorable because I can describe it today. The very best thing at that meal, which was, I think our third or fourth course, was his steak tartare, which was incredible on a crispy piece of toast. It was almost creamy in substance. And it had, on either side of it, sort of three sections. On the left side was a homemade Tabasco on top of it. On the right side was a homemade Sriracha. And in the middle was just the steak tartar plain. So you took three separate bites and had three totally different taste experiences. And it was. I mean, it might. It's one of the best things I've ever put in my mouth anywhere, ever, under any circumstances. And everybody at our table agreed with it. It was incredible. And then we followed that up with grouper three ways, which included grouper cheeks. And then the final course was a suckling pig, which was done the way that the Spanish do suckling pigs.

Megan McArdle (54:37)

You say that like, everyone knows. Like, like, as you know, in the Spanish fashion, as we all know.

Steve Hayes (54:44)

Well, okay, I'm sorry. You're right. So the Spanish do suckling pigs very, very well, particularly in and around Madrid and Segovia, which is famous for its suckling pigs. The oldest restaurant in the world is a restaurant called Botine, which is, you know, it's a bit of a touristy place now. They've had a fire going. I think it's like, since the United States was founded, the fire has been going continuously. And their specialty is suckling pig. And as they do this is typical in Segovia and elsewhere, they don't use a knife or fork to cut the suckling pig. They use the edge of the plate to demonstrate to you how tender. How tender it is a suckling pig is. Yeah. And that's what they did here. And so the outside was just extraordinarily crispy, almost like you were biting into a very flavorful piece of balsa wood. And then it was just an explosion of juices and flavor and everything. When you got into it, it, it. It really was a remarkable, remarkable meal. I've sent many, many people to this restaurant, Angelita, and nobody has even written back and said, yeah, my meal was really good. Thanks. Everybody writes back and. And says, this is one of the best meals I've ever had in my entire life. You know, I can't wait to go back. That kind of a thing. So if you are wandering through what was your town? Megan Woburn. If you're wandering through Woburn, go to Megan's place. If you're wandering through Madrid, I recommend to stop at Angelita and Al Johnson's. If you're going through Door, Al Johnson's if you're going through Door, county and.

Michael Warren (56:22)

Mike's Burmese Place in Richmond, San Francisco.

Jonah Goldberg (56:25)

We'll put them in the show notes. I will say, when I hear about a fire that's been going for three centuries or something like that, all I can think about is the pressure on the intern to keep it going. Like, screws up and lets it go out.

Michael Warren (56:43)

Like what?

Jonah Goldberg (56:44)

Like, do you just not tell anybody?

Michael Warren (56:48)

Light another match.

Steve Hayes (56:49)

And it's a good place. That place, Restaurant Botin. It is very, you know, it's. It's touristy and typical. I don't get the sense that a lot of madrilineos eat there, but it is also very good. The food is. Is actually very good. Okay, we've got two categories left. We're gonna move through these more quickly than we have because we're running long. Talk about the ruthless elimination of hurry. We are not hurrying through. But. But now we're gonna work.

Jonah Goldberg (57:12)

Anybody with this, anybody who's still listening wants to hear it to the end.

Steve Hayes (57:16)

Fair.

Jonah Goldberg (57:17)

That's true.

Steve Hayes (57:18)

Okay, so the next topic I horned in entirely because I want to tell people about something so you'll forget.

Michael Warren (57:26)

You should go first.

Steve Hayes (57:27)

Then the self indulgence here. The topic was is there a new product you encountered or acquired that you now can't live without? And by product I mean, you know, take an expansive view of these things. Can be sort of anything and everything that you got in 2025 that you can't live without. So mine also came from this trip to Spain. The beginning part of the trip. I went and saw some good friends in southern Spain in a town called Estepona, which is near Marbella, it's between Marbella and Malaga. And we spent an afternoon in Marbella, which is a super ritzy, upscale, fancy, fancy town. Russian Fiosos there, lots of yachts in, in Spain. And. And we were walking through the it's old town and we came upon an olive oil shop. And I love olive oil, I love all kinds of olive oil, but I particularly love Spanish olive oil. And this olive oil shop was huge. It had a wine tasting shop next to it, attached, same owner and you could do tastings. And I'm sorry to report that we spent I think nearly two hours, maybe an hour and a half in this olive oil shop doing tastings and we tasted every kind of olive oil imaginable from the sort of every day to the really spectacular sort of, you know, price of gold kind of olive oils that there was one kind that this place made itself and I'm going to call up the name of the shop is d' Oliva is the name of the place in Marbella. And they have their own sort of flavor infused olive oils. And there was one that is a smoked habanero olive oil that is one of the greatest flavors you can have of anything, anywhere, under any circumstances. And as we were in the shop and we were tasting it, the only thing I could think of was taking, you know, a huge Delmonico or rib eye and just dousing it in this olive oil, rubbing it all over with the olive oil and then sprinkling huge chunky salt, flashing it on the grill for a very rare steak, which I still have yet to do. I only bought one of these because we went to this olive oil shop immediately after landing. And so my basic philosophy is don't over buy in your first stop. So I only bought one container of this olive oil. And I have spent the better part of the past two months writing to the owner of the shop asking if he could please import this or export this to the United States. He sends it to Asia, he sends it to the Middle east, he sends it throughout Europe, but they do not send it to the United States yet. Anyway, the thing that I've done with it, that is now my sort of go to at home is avocado toast with this olive oil drizzled on the top, sourdough bread, crunchy avocados that the chunky salt. I use a chunky lemon salt, and then the smoked habanero olive oil. And it is again, you can tell from the reaction. I serve it to my son and his buddies who are not big, let's say avocado oil guys. They're not avocado oil bros or avocado toast bros. And, you know, they don't just react to it by like, oh, that's good. They react to it with the sort of, oh, dude, you know, hitting each other's shoulders. That kind of reaction, which I take to.

Michael Warren (61:04)

That's high praise.

Steve Hayes (61:04)

The ultimate sign that it hit. So that's it. Diol of a smoked habanero olive oil. If anybody's going through Marbella and then coming through D.C. let me know. I'll meet you at Dulles Airport and we can do some kind of a handoff because it's really, really great. Jonah, you want to go next? Sure.

Jonah Goldberg (61:24)

I don't have anything as grandiose. You know, I. I tried to form attachments to people and not things I will say.

Steve Hayes (61:32)

It is totally. By the way, it is totally. It is totally revealing that I'm like, ah, yeah, the book thing, here's my 10 seconds. The movie thing, here's my 10 seconds. But the food.

Jonah Goldberg (61:42)

Yeah. So first of all, I have to say, because some of us care about the business, that aura frames really are a game changer.

Megan McArdle (61:51)

Can I actually, can I I tell you a story about that? So I, of course, am an avid listener to various podcasts at the Dispatch, long before I joined. And Sarah, some spiel Sarah did on advisory opinions with no. With no shade on other people who may have sung the praises. But I was desperately. When a couple years ago, I was desperately trying to find a gift for my dad, and I could not. He was on a. He just moved to a nursing home. He was like. And we were going to do Christmas there, but I couldn't think what to get him. And finally Sarah's doing this thing. I was like, screw it if he hates it. Like, what have I lost? I can't think. He loved that frame. He. Every time he called, he talked about that frame. And because it turned out to be the last year of his life, that was every day he would call and tell me about the pictures. We loaded. We loaded all the pictures we could find on it. And it was really special. So anyway, sorry. Sorry, Jonah.

Steve Hayes (62:56)

No, no. My parents talk about it the same way. And we gave. This is true. We gave our two kids in college aura frames for Christmas. One of them is going to be overseas, one of them is going to be away at college here in the US and we gave them aura frame, script Christmas. And I can tell you that the way that they responded, it wasn't the, you know, slap each other on the shoulders, like, oh. But you could tell that they were genuinely excited.

Megan McArdle (63:23)

Yeah.

Jonah Goldberg (63:23)

So I should also say we got my daughter a subscription to ExpressVPN. And it really was. But we don't need to get into all that.

Megan McArdle (63:37)

No.

Jonah Goldberg (63:37)

So, like, people who attend the editorial meetings will notice that I'm often outside if I'm not in my car for the editorial meeting when we're on zoom and stuff. And I'm in my backyard. And I like fire pits, outside fire pits. But the problem with the low ones is they throw off so much ash and you get bathed in smoke and you smell. You know that. And my wife got. I had to look up the name of it because it's not a fire pit. The company that makes it is called Terrain, as in the ground. Right. And the actual product is called an angled Obelisk Chimenea. And it is basically an out. It looks like an outdoor stove kind of thing where it's like a. It's sort of like a teepee on a pedestal. And then it goes out to be a pipe and it pushes all the smoke someplace else. And we'll put it in the show notes. It throws off an amazing amount of heat. So there have been some accidents where chairs have been damaged because I left them too close to the thing. And I would be. For people with backyards and little kids, I would just be a little cautious because if they want to go up and touch it, they will burn themselves. I can be outside in 30 degree weather if I'm close to that thing. And. And it's great. And I like burning things, you know. But the other product I thought about talking about was I have a culinary blowtorch that I love. I like fire. I guess that's the problem. So like, like when there's an arson investigation, this podcast is going to be problematic for me. But anyway, that's my product and I use it constantly.

Michael Warren (65:18)

This is not a new discovery, or I should say it is not a new product, but it is a new discovery for me. An acquired sort of product for me. A OXO brand steel double jigger, which I use in cocktail making. And the reason I love this little thing is it's got two cups, you know, and, and a sort of a rubber connector in between. So it's easy to use and, and handle in your fingers to pour in different levels and the ounce gradations, the for each level, quarter cup, sorry. Quarter ounce, half ounce, full ounce on one side, third ounce, three quarter ounce, one and a half ounce on the other side are etched into the steel. It will never rub off and you won't be able to read those graduations. And so it's terrific. It's easy to use. I use it. Well, I shouldn't say I use it all the time, but. But I kind of do.

Steve Hayes (66:22)

I brush my teeth and I get it out.

Michael Warren (66:24)

Exactly. But I love it. And of all the. The new gear that I've gotten in my home bar, it's the one I love the most.

Megan McArdle (66:31)

This is a new product. And so I can't really say I can't live without it because until like four days ago I did. But I was wandering through a charming little neighborhood in D.C. called Dakota Crossing and I stumbled across this little shop called Costco and I went in.

Michael Warren (66:53)

I was like, dakota Crossing. I think I know what that is. Can't be a charming neighborhood.

Steve Hayes (66:58)

Yeah.

Megan McArdle (66:58)

Where the Costco and the lows are. So I was in Costco getting. So once a year Costco does bone in prime grade prime rib. They only do it around the Christmas season. They might still have a few left if people want to get it high. Recommend roast it low and slow and then reverse sear at the end just like a couple minutes under the broiler to get the crust.

Jonah Goldberg (67:22)

Or with a blowtorch.

Megan McArdle (67:23)

Yeah, that's true. Or with a blowtorch. Yeah, you can roast it at like 175 and just do that. It's amazing. But so as I was wandering around picking up all the stuff for Christmas dinner, I saw a robot vacuum mop. And I'd just been reading for no particular except because so. So Roomba Irobot, the Makers of the original robot vac is now bankrupt and being bought out by its Chinese supplier. And I had been vaguely interested in this, and somehow my rabbit hole ended at a wire cutter article on robot vacuums, which testified that indeed, Roomba is no longer the best robot pack. But. So I'm reading about this and then I see it, and I was looking at it, and I was like, should I? Should I? And then finally I was like, I guess I should. This is my Christmas gift to me. And so I texted my husband before I did this, because he often has very strong opinions about my decisions to bring home gadgets, but he gave me the tentative go ahead. It's a robot mop combination. And I have in full disclosure, Wirecutter does not recommend the robot mop, But I have had a very good experience with it. They say, just get a vacuum. We have two large dogs now. I do mop. I have a. Like. In fact, we don't even. We don't have any closets on our first floor. So I just keep stuffed in a corner, a mop and a little Dyson stick vacation. It's like I've suddenly realized how dirty our floors were most of the time because, like, you're just not mopping constantly. So I now just set this thing together. The dogs initially, I have to say, were. Were extremely skeptical, bordering on murderous towards this thing. But they've gotten used to it.

Jonah Goldberg (69:10)

Well, they're known Luddites.

Megan McArdle (69:12)

Indeed. Dogs really are. The dogs are natural conservatives, except about treats. Then they're natural socialists. But it, like, it actually is. It works really easily. It's just, you know, like, empty out the dirty water once every couple days or every day if you're more anal retentive than I am. But it works surprisingly well. Our floors look so much better. And I'm like, wow, this is what our house looks like when it's clean all the time. It's fantastic. And I'm like, so poor Huckleberry. Our younger dog, who just turned one when I was coming home from a trip, he jumped off the bed in the middle of the night and seems to have given himself a hairline fracture in his arm. So the poor guy has been on bed rest, or I should say cage rest in our living room for three weeks. He's shortly to be sprung from Durance vial. But in the meantime, he, like, he has been shedding because he's so stressed by being in his crate all the time. And of course, we can't explain to him. He's like, why do you Hate me. Why? Sibyl's running around like, what's wrong with me? And I'm like, no, no, no. We love you. We want your arm to get better. But of course, you can't have that conversation with your dog. High, high, high recommend. The company's name is Roborock. Maybe it will break and then I will hate it. But luckily Costco has a very good, very generous return policy, and I of it if it breaks in the next year.

Steve Hayes (70:43)

So how can I ask how much it cost?

Megan McArdle (70:46)

It was like $400, which for a robot vac, is not that. It was. I think it was 420. And this was like. We didn't. We did like, basically almost homemade Christmas presents this year, which we usually do. We don't. We don't gift each other big gifts. Like, partly it's. It's joint money. So, like, I'm not super into jewelry. Peter buys stuff that he need. If he knows he needs something, he buys it. And so we generally do. So this year, for example, I got GPT to make line drawings of all our past and current dogs and write the names at the bottom, and then I put it all in a photo frame and Peter buys me as he has done in previous, many previous years. He scours the web and finds me old cookbooks for, like, promotional stuff for Hotpoint or whatever. I love all this stuff. Can't get enough of it. It's not actually that much more than a good vacuum, and it is. The fact that it will go around and clean my house itself without my having to do anything about it has really been game changing just in the last week.

Steve Hayes (71:46)

So noted. I'm taking notes for future purchases. Final topic is resolutions. And I floated this to you all with some trepidation because I think. I don't know if you're resolutions people or not resolutions people. So I ask about resolutions. If you're not a resolutions person, just tell us that and tell us why, if you are a resolutions person, Was there a 2025 resolution that worked well for you? And do you have any in 2026 that you would be willing to share? And Megan, I'll. I'll come back and start with you.

Megan McArdle (72:22)

I am generally not a resolutions person because I often start, like, New Year's resolution type activities during Lent. So I figure if there's something bad for me, give it up during Lent and then, like, go forward that way. This year, I actually have a bit of a resolution, and it's something I've been thinking about a lot and something that really kind of drove. Was driven home to me watching the argument over the Kennedy Center. Trump is putting his name on the Kennedy Center. This is. I think. I'm not a lawyer, but it seems to be quite illegal also. It's gross. This is. You are not a dictator. We do not name, like, everything in.

Jonah Goldberg (73:02)

The country after you wait till his coin comes out. His coin's coming, too. And that's totally illegal, too.

Megan McArdle (73:07)

So artists are responding by boycotting the Kennedy Center. And the problem with this is that, as we discovered during the pandemic, which really hurt a lot of small theaters in ways they've never recovered from, is that you can't always put the genie back in the bottle, right? Like, if you. If you harm the Kennedy center for the next three years, it may. The damage just may be permanent. And now look. And I said this on. On Twitter, and people were like, well, isn't that Trump's fault? And I was like, huh? So, like. And so, like, a thing that people do and I think has been really pronounced in the last decade, is everyone treating. The interesting question for most people is, whose fault is this and who is a bad person? Rather than, like, what are the consequences of my personal actions? That is not an interesting question at all. Why should I think about any impact? Because the real question is who has responsibility for it? Like, well, but you can control your actions. So at that level, you can control whether you do things that will damage the Kennedy Center. Right. The thing I want to do in the next year is just think more about the impact of my actions rather than, like, who is right and wrong. Which is not to say I'm not thinking about right and wrong. We should all think about right and wrong. We should call out things that are wrong. We should think about things that are right. But, like, that doesn't absolve having identified who is in the gr. Who is at greater fault, does not absolve you from the need to think about. Is the thing I am doing creating an action, a result in the world that I wish to happen, or is it not? And I think that the people, the. The artists pulling out of the Kennedy center, and maybe their answer is, yes, this is what I want, I think, should think long and hard about, like, Trump's going to be here for another three years, but then he will be gone. Whatever damage you do to the Kennedy center may be with us for a long time. Do you want that damage to happen? Or, like, do you prefer that to allowing a performance to go out with the name Trump over it which is illegal and terrible. But like, like, because the thing that you actually want is to, like, signal, this is so disgusting that Trump will stop. But Trump's not going to stop, right? This is not going to have any impact on Trump. The impact is going to be on the Kennedy center and on the people who watch theater. Do you wish to have that impact? If you do, follow your bliss. But you should at least think about that rather than just thinking, like, I am sending a strong and important message. You know what? Let's, like, we are now so polarized. The messages don't matter. Everyone you're sending that message to already hates Trump. Everyone who is you're trying to send that message to doesn't care. I'm thinking about this with my podcast, which is why I called it reasonably optimistic is I think we spend too much time talking about how terrible everything is. Not on this podcast, but on many podcasts. I'm just trying to think about in my life, like, what sorts of things do I wish to see reflected in the world? One could almost say be the change you wish to see, but I really think that's actually.

Steve Hayes (76:08)

You should get that printed on a shirt or something.

Megan McArdle (76:11)

Yeah, no, I mean, I, I, I'm just trying to. Now that I'm in my 50s, hoping, hopefully I've acquired a little wisdom. I am thinking more about, like, what would I like to see in the world? Not what am I angry about in the world. And I, I think so that's my, that's my resolution going forward.

Steve Hayes (76:29)

I like it. Jonah, you're old. You're the oldest person on the podcast, presumably have the most wisdom. Are you doing resolutions this year?

Jonah Goldberg (76:39)

No, I don't really do resolutions. I like to set reasonable goals for myself. That said, I'm falling apart, dude. So I got a, I don't call it a resolution, but I got it. Like, I have a carpal tunnel thing with my arm that is affecting my livelihood in bad ways because it makes typing painful. So I resolved to get that taken care of. I gotta say, when I saw the topics come in, I just rechecked it. I misread it. I was like. Because I saw that there's resolutions, but I also thought there was a thing about, do you celebrate New Year's Eve? And I just want to be really clear. I hate New Year's Eve. I think it's the frigging dumbest. It is a 20 something thing. It is almost as stupid as Valentine's Day. But in some ways, worse people put all this pressure on themselves. To stay up to see a friggin ball drop and watch really terrible television. To me it is just the passage of a day on the calendar and a way to forget what year it is when you're writing a check or something.

Steve Hayes (77:47)

I'm entirely with you on New Year's Eve, Mike. Are there, do you do resolutions or if there are topics that you'd like to introduce that were not in the email that I sent?

Michael Warren (77:59)

Topics, yeah, let's. Let's talk about 19th century Russian history. No. So I am a life.

Jonah Goldberg (78:06)

The Decemberists get a bad.

Michael Warren (78:09)

Progressive rock band. Though I am a lifelong practicing Catholic with the emphasis on the practicing part. And, and one of the many merits to my faith is that the concept of, as Megan suggested, the concept of a New Year's resolution sort of. I wouldn't say it's meaningless, but it's a little superfluous because not only does the liturgical calendar, whether it's Lent or really Advent now as well or even Christmas, gives us all these opportunities to sort of make resolutions to improve ourselves and be better Christians than what we have been. Really. Every time you go to confession, which is a sacrament, provides that opportunity as well. So I will not be making a New Year's resolution. I will simply be continuing to make and failing to achieve the resolutions that I am making throughout the year to live healthier, to be more studious when it comes to my job, to be a better husband, a better father. So it's an ongoing process, Steve, and that's the way I guess it's supposed to be.

Steve Hayes (79:32)

Those are all worthwhile goals, even if they're permagoals. My resolution is to be nicer to Jonah in 2026.

Michael Warren (79:40)

You got a few more. You got a couple more days left, Steve.

Jonah Goldberg (79:43)

Nicer is such a low bar. Like if you'd said you resolved to be nice to me, that would be one thing.

Steve Hayes (79:50)

But like Nicer, only one of us has in his bio that he likes to blame the other for stuff and then tried to deny it. So I'm, I'm not a hardcore resolutions guy. I've done a few of them. We had to do them back when on Special Report. When we would do the New Year's Eve show, Brett always asked us. Bret Baier always asked us to come with a resolution. I started doing them then. I think I've told this story here before, but the funniest one ever was when Chris Wallace was sitting in for Brett that night and had Charles Krauthammer on the show. And we all had to go around and give our New Year's resolutions. And Charles was famous for going last and being able to use up whatever precise amount of time there was left. So if there was a minute 14 seconds that Charles had, he would hit a minute 14 seconds. It was pretty remarkable. But on this night, Chris asked him, with a lot of time left, what his New Year's resolution was. And Charles just said to be concise. And that was it didn't say anything more, and there was just dead air. And then we all fell over each other laughing. So I had a good resolution in 2025. It was a simple one, and it was to be early. I would say I didn't hit it 100% of the time, but I was pretty close 95ish percent of the time. And it was really great mental lift. In 2026, I'm recycling a resolution that I had five or six years ago that we talked about on Special Report, which is to say no more often. I get myself in a situation where I say yes to way too many things. At work, at home, elsewhere, and then I'm overextended and frustrating and racing around and don't do anything well. So I'm heading into 2026 with a resolve to say no more often. So if you ask me for something, any of you listening, ask me for something and I tell you no, don't take offense. Just know that this is part of me and my new goal for 2026.

Megan McArdle (81:51)

I have actually made the same not New Year's resolution. Because what I realized was, like, I've ma maxed out my capacity, and I don't want to do any of the things I do badly. And so I just have to, like, start saying, no, I cannot do that. I just turned down a writing opportunity that I really wanted to do, but it was just like, nope, I am now, like, I'm out of extra things. That's it. We have done all of the things.

Steve Hayes (82:15)

That's exactly where I am. And the thing that was when I did this, I did this for a year. I mean, I did it for longer than a year, but I really focused on it for a year. And the thing that I realized was that it would require saying no to things I actually wanted to do. The reason I did it was to sort of free me up to say no to things I didn't want to do, but did out of obligation. And, you know, I found that that was a huge part of my schedule, was just doing stuff I felt like I had to do. But what it made me do was say no to things that I wanted to do. But the the upside of doing that was tremendous because you could actually think and do the things that you did better than you otherwise would have. Speaking of doing things better than we otherwise would have, we will aim to do better in 2026 with this podcast. We're glad to have had you along in 2025 and we will be back to our twice weekly schedule on the other side of the New Year. So Happy New Year everyone.

Michael Warren (83:19)

Happy New Year.

Megan McArdle (83:19)

Happy New Year everyone.

Jonah Goldberg (83:21)

It's another day.

Steve Hayes (83:27)

If you like what we're doing here, there are a few easy ways to support us. You can rate, review and subscribe to the show on your podcast player of choice to help new listeners find us. And we hope you'll consider becoming a member of the Dispatch. You'll unlock access to bonus podcast episodes and all of our exclusive newsletters and articles. You can sign up@thedispatch.com join and if you use my promo code Roundtable, you'll get one month free and help me win the ongoing, deeply scientific internal debate over which Dispatch Podcast is the true flagship. And if ads aren't your thing, you can upgrade to a Premium membership. No ads, early access to all episodes, two gift memberships to give away, exclusive town halls with the founders, and more. Shout out to a few folks who recently joined as premium members. Mark Stabby, Beatrix Kiddo and Jennifer Strait. We're glad to have you aboard. As always, if you've got questions, comments, concerns or corrections, you can email us@roundtabledispatch.com we read everything, even the ones from people obsessed with science fiction. That's going to do it for today's show. Thanks so much for tuning in. And a big thank you to the folks behind the scenes who made this episode possible.

Michael Warren (84:42)

Possible.

Steve Hayes (84:43)

Victoria Holmes and Noah Hickey. We couldn't do it without you. Thanks again for listening. Please join us next year.

Michael Warren (85:25)

And Doug, here we have the Limu.

Steve Hayes (85:28)

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Megan McArdle (85:33)

With Liberty Liberty Mutual.

Steve Hayes (85:36)

Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us. Cut the camera. They see us.

Michael Warren (85:45)

Only pay for what you need@liberty mutual.com Savings very unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company affiliates excludes Massachusetts.

Steve Hayes (85:53)

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Jonah Goldberg (85:59)

And more places that can could expose.

Steve Hayes (86:00)

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Jonah Goldberg (86:02)

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Steve Hayes (86:09)

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Jonah Goldberg (86:10)

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