TLP Week in Review, 8/13-8/19
Your weekly summary of what we've been up to here at The Liberal Patriot.
What We’re Reading (and Watching and Listening To…)
“How Fani Willis Became the Latest Enemy of ‘America First’”: In The Bulwark, writer Matt Johnson explores the continuities between the original America First of Charles Lindbergh and the newfangled version conjured up by Donald Trump. Both men, he argues, ignore foreign threats by shifting “Americans’ attention and hostility toward their neighbors”—American Jews for Lindbergh, the “deep state” and a cavalcade of “horrible USA-hating people” for Trump.
“No One Should Want to See a Dictator Get Old”: Tufts University political scientist Michael Beckley argues in the New York Times that the advancing ages of Chinese dictator Xi Jinping and Russian autocrat Vladimir Putin—both of whom clock in at 70 years old—explain the aggressive policies they have embarked upon over the past decade. The aging autocrats, he observes, “start pondering their legacies and wondering why they haven’t received the global respect they think they deserve or achieved the glory that would etch their names among history’s greats,” making for “a combustible combination: an autocrat who is overconfident and aggrieved and in a hurry.”
Tetragrammaton: A podcast by music producer Rick Rubin with long form, in-depth interviews with a broad range of interesting people from different backgrounds, including filmmaker Judd Apatow, music producer Jimmy Iovine, former NBA coach Phil Jackson, actor Owen Wilson, and WWE figure Paul Heyman.
The Detective Up Late: After a long hiatus, crack crime and thriller writer Adrian McKinty is back with the next installment in the fantastic Sean Duffy series. A Catholic officer serving in the mostly Protestant Royal Ulster Constabulary during Northern Ireland’s “Troubles,” Duffy is a dynamic character who loves good music (all of the book titles are named after Tom Waits songs and lyrics), vodka gimlets, and solving crimes small and large in and around Belfast. Check out the entire series as well as latest edition.
Kolyma Stories: This volume contains some of the most brilliant short stories of the 20th century. Varlam Shalamov was a Soviet writer who spent 15 years in the gulag, including in the notorious Kolyma camp in the Russian Far East where “12 months were winter and all the rest summer” He lived and wrote these spare stories which glitter like diamonds—read them!
Only Murders in the Building: America’s favorite and most unlikely crime-solving and podcasting trio—Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez—returns for the third season of this clever and charming true-crime satire on Hulu. Paul Rudd and Meryl Streep guest star as this season’s victim and starving actress-slash-suspect-slash-Short’s love interest, respectively.
What We’ve Posted
“Republican Voters Don't Particularly Like Ron DeSantis: That’s because they are not sure he likes them,” by Survey Center on American Life director and American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Daniel A. Cox.
“An Insurance Policy for Democrats: Stop Calling the White Working Class ‘Racially Resentful!’”: Welcome to Your 2024 Election” by TLP politics editor Ruy Teixeira.
“Catering to Highly Educated Whites is Disastrous for Housing Policy: Another reason Democrats need the working class,” by Progressive Policy Institute senior fellow Rick Kahlenberg.
“A Path to Institutional Pluralism: A renewal of civil society + better internal norms supporting value pluralism + more political competition.,” by TLP editor-in-chief John Halpin.
“Trump's Indictments Are Good for Democracy, Actually: America needs to see the former president held to legal account for his attempt to nullify the 2020 election,’” by TLP senior managing editor Peter Juul.
“Why U.S. Foreign Policy Needs More Coalition Building at Home: Biden’s re-engagement in the Middle East is more likely to achieve lasting results by trying to build, rather than fragment, domestic coalitions,” by TLP editor-at-large Brian Katulis.
Ruy’s Science-Fiction Pulp Cover of the Week
Just one more thing…
The New York Times surveys fifteen different regional variations of the humble hot dog, including Washington, D.C.’s half-smoke, the Chicago Dog, and the incongruously-named Texas Tommy of the Wilmington, Delaware and Philadelphia region.
