Wtf? Kamala Harris’s whole career comes down to DEI (despite being a lawyer, a senator, and current veep) and the awful, smarmy, deeply inauthentic JD Vance is an entertaining, smart man whose “jokes” have been misunderstood?? I don’t discount some of this critique, especially of the left and the publishing industry, but do you not hear the misogyny of Trump et al? I guess it’s all good as long as he’s upsetting the left. Ugh. What a snarky, ugly, cooler-than-thou hate-fest of a conversation. So done with this podcast.
p.s. I’m sad that A Special Place in Hell is shutting down, but I would really be devastated if The Unspeakable ended. Please keep going Meghan, your voice is needed.
"Democrats ran everything" - well, except for Elon Musk who relentlessly tweeted Trump propaganda to his 200million followers, and Daily Wire, and Peter Thiel and a bunch of other Silicon Valley scions, and Joe Rogan, and the podcast brosphere. And pro-choice advocacy is "advocacy for women to kill their babies"? What a strangely unnuanced, smug and black-and-white conversation, in which you just echoed shared opinions back and forth.
I had to turn it off when Lionel was talking about how many more people voted for Trump without any push back. Even if the all those counties voted for Trump, the total number of votes were not a landslide.
Yeah, this was recorded less than 48 hours after the election was called. (It took a frustrating amount of time to turn this episode around.) I think the perception was a little different at that time.
This just shows the pattern of modern elections. The truth is that the swing states are linked. Nate Silver's simulation said this was the most likely pattern, the second most likely pattern was Harris winning all the swing states. People talking about like a sports shutout are why we have lousy understanding of elections.
...that said, it definitely was not a "landslide" in terms of the popular vote—that doesn't make sense.
As far as JD Vance, frankly, I haven't paid enough attention to hear anything that has come out of his mouth, so maybe he is intelligent, and I do find it strange that he wears the eyeliner, but maybe that's sexist—or transphobic—of me?
I share the experience that this election came with a sigh of relief, not just for Kamala Harris as you two discuss here, but think for a lot of people. For one reason, just because it's OVER because our process is so lengthy and tiresome and noisy and broken—and certainly not because Trump has been elected... I don't like the man, I don't trust him, I'm not interested in him, I don't think he's gonna be a good president, etc. — but I am a fairly progressive traditionally 'democractic' citizen who also has been _very_ fed up with the whole DEI thing, with the trans kids fad, with the ever-increasing emphasis on 'safety'—as if safety could be achieved by way of _talking about safety_, with the ever-increasing progressive hysteria overall.
So I find myself relieved. I feel freeer to say some of these things myself, and I think that's a relief for a lot of people. And—it's also a relief because I was holding a lot of animosity and resentment towards people that were, you know, 'stupid enough to fall for' Trump's line. In the months leading up to the election, among many other things, I happened to be working with my friend Loren Marsh editing a piece of his about, of all things, Aristotle's theory of _muthos,_ and among several examples, he had developed a case study analyzing Trump's narrative style in light of the theory of muthos. Working through this with my friend Loren began to give me some further insight into the persuasive power of Trump's argument. It's not that I became convinced to vote for Trump, no, not at all, but it gave me some more insight into what the 50.15% of American voters who voted for him were perhaps actually voting _for_, and I began to realize that (of course) it's stupid of _me_ to write off all those people as "stupid." And that also, of course, is what the progressive left was doing and what the Democrats were doing—kind of gaslighting everybody, expecting people to sign up for this simplistic and reductive idea that all 'those people' were such fucking idiots.
As fun as it is to cynically write off half of the country as dipshits, of couse, it's not really possible that's actually the case, and it's prejudicial, in the same way that expecting people to sign up to vote for Kamala Harris just because she's black and a woman. I totally get why Meghan finds that insulting as a woman. We should all find that insulting. Clearly, a lot of people did find that insulting.
So part of the result for me is also a sense of relief in that hey, I don't have to hate all these people so much or just be frustrated with them or think they're stupid or whatever, and I actually do have more common ground with them than I thought. and less in common with some progressives who are just banging the gong about the rights of children to decide to have sex changes or the right of the government to force employers to hire at certain DEI ratios, et cetera. I don't agree with those ideas and I never have. So now it's more okay to say that—as Lionel said, it's okay to say "retarded" again (which I guess means it's also okay to say 'gay' again, right?)
I never bought into having my speech constrained in a PC, let alone 'woke' way, and so—another reason I feel a bit of relief.
More personally, on the subject of not having kids, as a man who has chosen or ended up not having kids for what I imagine are a lot of the same reasons as Megan and Lionel, seeing as we are of the same general age range (I'm 54, and I read Selfish Shallow and Self-absorbed and identify with a lot of those experiences), I find myself doing the same thing when talking with younger men—that is, encouraging them to have kids and to do so earlier in life.
My the way, my piece about this experience 'not having kids' entitled The Man Pays was recently trad-published in an obscure lit journal (hey, neat!) and teased here on my 'stack
Gimme a break - “Russia Russia Russia” was not folderol. It was a legitimate investigation that found dozens of contacts between the Trump campaign and people from the Russian government. It also found about a dozen instances of obstruction that were on the level of Watergate. The behavior there was entirely consistent with how he tried to pressure the Georgia Secretary of State.
And it came after we spent more than a year obsessing about Hillary’s email server. If national security means anything at all, those ties had to be investigated.
Excellent episode. Lionel Shriver is so thoughtful and fearless. My 22-year-old daughter gave me Louise Perry’s The Case Against the Sexual Revolution which treats some of these topics brilliantly, should be read by all young women AND men, and for some reason isn’t available through either of my libraries on Libby?!? How awful if sanity can only flourish under a Trump administration…
Yet another excellent interview with someone I've not heard of -- and yet another reason I'm happy to be a paid subscriber.
I hadn't considered it, but I think you might be right that Harris is secretly relieved (especially in contrast to Hillary Clinton.) It never seemed that she was really up to this job.
I voted 3rd party so I was always going to be disappointed in the results, but I fear Trump/Vance a lot less than I do Harris/Walz. The smartest person in this group of 4 is Vance by a country mile, so we'll see what happens in 2028.
What a fantastic conversation! And I had the same thought, Kamala seemed relieved. Her concession speech was her best speech ever because she was so much more relaxed.
Yes!!!!! I love when you have her on!
Holy moly she is such a privilege to listen to. What a sharp and thoughtful person.
Wtf? Kamala Harris’s whole career comes down to DEI (despite being a lawyer, a senator, and current veep) and the awful, smarmy, deeply inauthentic JD Vance is an entertaining, smart man whose “jokes” have been misunderstood?? I don’t discount some of this critique, especially of the left and the publishing industry, but do you not hear the misogyny of Trump et al? I guess it’s all good as long as he’s upsetting the left. Ugh. What a snarky, ugly, cooler-than-thou hate-fest of a conversation. So done with this podcast.
p.s. I’m sad that A Special Place in Hell is shutting down, but I would really be devastated if The Unspeakable ended. Please keep going Meghan, your voice is needed.
I'm not going anywhere!
"Democrats ran everything" - well, except for Elon Musk who relentlessly tweeted Trump propaganda to his 200million followers, and Daily Wire, and Peter Thiel and a bunch of other Silicon Valley scions, and Joe Rogan, and the podcast brosphere. And pro-choice advocacy is "advocacy for women to kill their babies"? What a strangely unnuanced, smug and black-and-white conversation, in which you just echoed shared opinions back and forth.
I had to turn it off when Lionel was talking about how many more people voted for Trump without any push back. Even if the all those counties voted for Trump, the total number of votes were not a landslide.
Trump 75,492,424 votes (50.2%)
Harris 72,350,340 votes (48.1%)
Maybe I'll try the podcast again next time.
Yeah, this was recorded less than 48 hours after the election was called. (It took a frustrating amount of time to turn this episode around.) I think the perception was a little different at that time.
Yeah to call it a landslide is hyperbole. After all the votes are counted it looks like the margin will be abut 1.5%
Be that as it may, Trump won every swing state.
and the popular vote. it was decisive if not a landslide.
This just shows the pattern of modern elections. The truth is that the swing states are linked. Nate Silver's simulation said this was the most likely pattern, the second most likely pattern was Harris winning all the swing states. People talking about like a sports shutout are why we have lousy understanding of elections.
So did Biden in 2020 and Trump in 2016. They weren’t landslides.
50th out of 55 presidential elections by %
Meghan, your podcast is the one that I listen to most consistently, thank you for this conversation and great to hear Jordan Peterson on your show!
...I mean, Lionel does sound a lot like him—maybe she's JP in a pant-suit ;?
The map of election results by county is striking indeed
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_presidential_election#Maps
...that said, it definitely was not a "landslide" in terms of the popular vote—that doesn't make sense.
As far as JD Vance, frankly, I haven't paid enough attention to hear anything that has come out of his mouth, so maybe he is intelligent, and I do find it strange that he wears the eyeliner, but maybe that's sexist—or transphobic—of me?
I share the experience that this election came with a sigh of relief, not just for Kamala Harris as you two discuss here, but think for a lot of people. For one reason, just because it's OVER because our process is so lengthy and tiresome and noisy and broken—and certainly not because Trump has been elected... I don't like the man, I don't trust him, I'm not interested in him, I don't think he's gonna be a good president, etc. — but I am a fairly progressive traditionally 'democractic' citizen who also has been _very_ fed up with the whole DEI thing, with the trans kids fad, with the ever-increasing emphasis on 'safety'—as if safety could be achieved by way of _talking about safety_, with the ever-increasing progressive hysteria overall.
So I find myself relieved. I feel freeer to say some of these things myself, and I think that's a relief for a lot of people. And—it's also a relief because I was holding a lot of animosity and resentment towards people that were, you know, 'stupid enough to fall for' Trump's line. In the months leading up to the election, among many other things, I happened to be working with my friend Loren Marsh editing a piece of his about, of all things, Aristotle's theory of _muthos,_ and among several examples, he had developed a case study analyzing Trump's narrative style in light of the theory of muthos. Working through this with my friend Loren began to give me some further insight into the persuasive power of Trump's argument. It's not that I became convinced to vote for Trump, no, not at all, but it gave me some more insight into what the 50.15% of American voters who voted for him were perhaps actually voting _for_, and I began to realize that (of course) it's stupid of _me_ to write off all those people as "stupid." And that also, of course, is what the progressive left was doing and what the Democrats were doing—kind of gaslighting everybody, expecting people to sign up for this simplistic and reductive idea that all 'those people' were such fucking idiots.
The piece on Muthos btw, by @lorendavidmarsh
https://theconversation.com/trumps-speeches-are-chaotic-rambling-and-extremely-effective-aristotle-can-explain-why-242339
As fun as it is to cynically write off half of the country as dipshits, of couse, it's not really possible that's actually the case, and it's prejudicial, in the same way that expecting people to sign up to vote for Kamala Harris just because she's black and a woman. I totally get why Meghan finds that insulting as a woman. We should all find that insulting. Clearly, a lot of people did find that insulting.
So part of the result for me is also a sense of relief in that hey, I don't have to hate all these people so much or just be frustrated with them or think they're stupid or whatever, and I actually do have more common ground with them than I thought. and less in common with some progressives who are just banging the gong about the rights of children to decide to have sex changes or the right of the government to force employers to hire at certain DEI ratios, et cetera. I don't agree with those ideas and I never have. So now it's more okay to say that—as Lionel said, it's okay to say "retarded" again (which I guess means it's also okay to say 'gay' again, right?)
I never bought into having my speech constrained in a PC, let alone 'woke' way, and so—another reason I feel a bit of relief.
More personally, on the subject of not having kids, as a man who has chosen or ended up not having kids for what I imagine are a lot of the same reasons as Megan and Lionel, seeing as we are of the same general age range (I'm 54, and I read Selfish Shallow and Self-absorbed and identify with a lot of those experiences), I find myself doing the same thing when talking with younger men—that is, encouraging them to have kids and to do so earlier in life.
My the way, my piece about this experience 'not having kids' entitled The Man Pays was recently trad-published in an obscure lit journal (hey, neat!) and teased here on my 'stack
https://open.substack.com/pub/bowendwelle/p/the-man-pays
Cheers!
Gimme a break - “Russia Russia Russia” was not folderol. It was a legitimate investigation that found dozens of contacts between the Trump campaign and people from the Russian government. It also found about a dozen instances of obstruction that were on the level of Watergate. The behavior there was entirely consistent with how he tried to pressure the Georgia Secretary of State.
And it came after we spent more than a year obsessing about Hillary’s email server. If national security means anything at all, those ties had to be investigated.
Love me some Shriver!! Woman has guts.
Lionel speaks the truth! She articulates the issues so clearly and her views are bang-on. Great interview Meghan.
Excellent episode. Lionel Shriver is so thoughtful and fearless. My 22-year-old daughter gave me Louise Perry’s The Case Against the Sexual Revolution which treats some of these topics brilliantly, should be read by all young women AND men, and for some reason isn’t available through either of my libraries on Libby?!? How awful if sanity can only flourish under a Trump administration…
A great interview. I wish it had been longer!
Lol . . . you don't hear that everyday.
Hahaha! 🩷
Enjoyed the conversation, but there was something with the audio picking up all the dog barking…distracting.
Those were Lionel's neighbors' dogs!
👏 great conversation!
Yet another excellent interview with someone I've not heard of -- and yet another reason I'm happy to be a paid subscriber.
I hadn't considered it, but I think you might be right that Harris is secretly relieved (especially in contrast to Hillary Clinton.) It never seemed that she was really up to this job.
I voted 3rd party so I was always going to be disappointed in the results, but I fear Trump/Vance a lot less than I do Harris/Walz. The smartest person in this group of 4 is Vance by a country mile, so we'll see what happens in 2028.
What a fantastic conversation! And I had the same thought, Kamala seemed relieved. Her concession speech was her best speech ever because she was so much more relaxed.