The Atlantic sat by and watched the Fed print trillions of dollars then blamed the result of their actions on America's middle class. Even for a liberal rag, that's a new low.
for some reason, the following line got a loud chuckle out of me -
“...How do I know this? They wrote a fucking article called “Inflation is Your Fault” and titled it in all capital letters, in the douchiest Serif font they could find...”
“...douchiest Serif font...” - genius
The Atlantic, Rolling Stone - they’re the MSNBC/The View - of the print world...
Excellent piece and enjoyable to read. The Atlantic is a liberal pretentious rag I stopped reading years ago, when I gave up on the NY Times. But I'm glad you still read it as it provides fodder and ammunition for your literary column. Hope you get that side mirror replaced soon so you can spot cyclists, like me, before making right hand turns.
I have come to believe that current "liberals" have no defining principles and everything they stand for is grievance and misassigning blame. Below are generalizations, and not every liberal is like this. In fact no true liberal is like this, just the psychos who parade under that banner undeservedly.
Pregnant? The man's fault, and if not that then the baby's fault.
Israel attacked? Israel's fault, and definitely America's fault.
In prison? The police's fault, and if not them, society's fault.
Poor? Rich people's fault.
Black and poor? White people's fault.
Bad schools? Middle class people not being able to afford more taxes fault.
Climate change? Humanity's fault only, no room for cycles+humans
Democrats don't win an election? Republicans holding people down from voting, or Russia's fault.
Name one principled stance taken by the national DNC that doesn't require blaming someone else, making another group bear the cost for another group's benefit, or isn't based entirely upon correcting a perceived wrong? Not all solutions and improvements to society require impairing somebody else, oh but in a democratic society with free speech [propaganda] they can't win elections without making people fired up to cast their vote for grievance. "We demand restitution!!" is a powerful election strategy, as it appeals to the inner child in all of us. Yes that's right, the 5yo in us all crying "that's not fair!", or "mom, brother is being mean!"
Republicans are not better in the grand scheme either. They are the type of parent that won't say no or really do anything, positive or negative, and then they wonder why they have bratty kids.
"Name one principled stance taken by the national DNC that doesn't require blaming someone else, making another group bear the cost for another group's benefit, or isn't based entirely upon correcting a perceived wrong?"
Congrats on a fabulous riposte, certainly a classic! The only importance of the Atlantic piece may be its clear example of the "woke mind virus" that afflicts so many.
I really wonder how the idiocy shared by the Atlantic authors became so widespread. And why?
Is it because 'big government' has become such a benefactor for the masses of useless bureaucrats dependent on it? The legions of lobbyists and congressmen made wealthy by it? And so 'big government' must be defended at all cost, absolved of all error - the blame must always be placed elsewhere: it's the fault of the middle class serfs, or of Covid, or of Russia, or big oil...
What will bring about a cure? A massive sovereign debt crisis? A crushing depression with huge unemployment a la 1928? Another war instigated by governments searching for their next excuse?
I hope I'm wrong.
In the end, the only answer I see is to cut off the money to DC (borrowing, taxes and printing). Don't feed the evil beast.
I absolutely love the way The Atlantic, free for years, is totally behind the paywall. Very socialist.
Still, we are indebted to Chris Irons for analysing this article from La Anna Lowrey, which doubtlessly will become an icon in the future..... of how not to do something.
Brain dead and tone deaf, the politically-favored ruling class. Either they don't understand supply & demand (but still have the hubris to make foolhardy, incompetent claims), or they're just happy to gaslight (and they place no value on their own trust or integrity, now vanquished). I will say, however, perhaps it is our fault -- that we have ceded so much power to the government, letting it stray from the US Constitution with a Fiat rather than Gold standard. It's our fault because we let them marginalize Ron Paul, we took their word that we need big government to save us from boogiemen...
Paper copies of The Atlantic are hazardous waste, but nobody out-douches Vox though.
Here's how Batya Ungar-Sargon introduced Vox to readers in her book, "Bad News: How Woke Media Is Undermining Democracy."
______
If you’ve never heard of Vox, that’s probably because it’s not for you; from its inception, the site had a very specific audience in mind: young, affluent, and highly educated. Klein and his coeditors were writing for urban millennials under thirty-five heading highly educated households that made over $100,000 a year, the New York Times reported.
Vox’s trademark style would be a cheeky, barely concealed smugness that flatters its readers into believing that by reading the website—which, not coincidentally, would sustain all of the liberal opinions that young, affluent, educated people already hold—they can rest assured that they are among the ranks of the correct, the informed, rather than one of the stupids.
In combining that smugness with a youthful, Whiggish optimism that equates information with progress, Klein figured out how to commodify being in the know in the social media age. After all, the point is not to know things so much as it is to broadcast that you know them. And the folks at Vox realized there was a goldmine to be had if they could turn sharing a Vox article on social media into the method whereby someone signaled their identity, the way a certain kind of person used to walk around with a New Yorker magazine peeking out of her handbag. In other words, Vox capitalized on one of the mainstays of the journalism status revolution: the anxiety members of broader elite classes have about whether they are elite enough.
The confusion of having an elite, educated status with having information, facts, and knowledge should by now be familiar—it is a move that journalists have made repeatedly to capture a high-end market and then clothe that market-driven decision as a journalistic value. But Vox took things one step further, leaning deeply into the view that reality itself has a liberal bias—one that incidentally appeals to and protects the status of progressive elites.
You can see this slippage everywhere in the site’s branding. Vox calls its articles explainers, as though these explanations are happening in a political vacuum instead of confirming the biases of affluent liberals. The Vox gambit was to bet that there were millions of readers like Klein, part of an educated meritocratic elite, who liked intricate policy discussions so long as everything they encountered confirmed their previously held beliefs.
But the Vox explainer was designed to appeal to an even smaller set than simply highly educated people; it was designed for people nostalgic for school. The site was visually crafted to evoke a sentimental response to the gear of the nerd: Its main focus was initially going to be “Vox Cards”—explainers that were “inspired by the highlighters and index cards that some of us used in school to remember important information,” as Klein and the other founders described them in a post introducing the concept of the site.
it strikes me that the best thing they could have recommended was to stop spending money on overly expensive things like...The Atlantic.
spot on article
Thanks Andy.
💯
Folks at The Atlantic and elsewhere literally despise poor and working-class people, Chris. And that makes me very angry. Great piece, once again. 👏👏👏
It's OK. Not a lot of pipe fitters I know from northeast Philly are walking around reading the Atlantic, either.
great article...
for some reason, the following line got a loud chuckle out of me -
“...How do I know this? They wrote a fucking article called “Inflation is Your Fault” and titled it in all capital letters, in the douchiest Serif font they could find...”
“...douchiest Serif font...” - genius
The Atlantic, Rolling Stone - they’re the MSNBC/The View - of the print world...
It's true. It's dripping with pretentiousness.
Excellent piece and enjoyable to read. The Atlantic is a liberal pretentious rag I stopped reading years ago, when I gave up on the NY Times. But I'm glad you still read it as it provides fodder and ammunition for your literary column. Hope you get that side mirror replaced soon so you can spot cyclists, like me, before making right hand turns.
Don’t let up on these AH’s
Roger that.
Great piece.
I have come to believe that current "liberals" have no defining principles and everything they stand for is grievance and misassigning blame. Below are generalizations, and not every liberal is like this. In fact no true liberal is like this, just the psychos who parade under that banner undeservedly.
Pregnant? The man's fault, and if not that then the baby's fault.
Israel attacked? Israel's fault, and definitely America's fault.
In prison? The police's fault, and if not them, society's fault.
Poor? Rich people's fault.
Black and poor? White people's fault.
Bad schools? Middle class people not being able to afford more taxes fault.
Climate change? Humanity's fault only, no room for cycles+humans
Democrats don't win an election? Republicans holding people down from voting, or Russia's fault.
Name one principled stance taken by the national DNC that doesn't require blaming someone else, making another group bear the cost for another group's benefit, or isn't based entirely upon correcting a perceived wrong? Not all solutions and improvements to society require impairing somebody else, oh but in a democratic society with free speech [propaganda] they can't win elections without making people fired up to cast their vote for grievance. "We demand restitution!!" is a powerful election strategy, as it appeals to the inner child in all of us. Yes that's right, the 5yo in us all crying "that's not fair!", or "mom, brother is being mean!"
Republicans are not better in the grand scheme either. They are the type of parent that won't say no or really do anything, positive or negative, and then they wonder why they have bratty kids.
You're right in calling out both sides, but accurate in your assessment of the left...
"Name one principled stance taken by the national DNC that doesn't require blaming someone else, making another group bear the cost for another group's benefit, or isn't based entirely upon correcting a perceived wrong?"
100% Spot on. And not to be negative, but all the possible outcomes that I can see will inflict a lot of pain.
Congrats on a fabulous riposte, certainly a classic! The only importance of the Atlantic piece may be its clear example of the "woke mind virus" that afflicts so many.
I really wonder how the idiocy shared by the Atlantic authors became so widespread. And why?
Is it because 'big government' has become such a benefactor for the masses of useless bureaucrats dependent on it? The legions of lobbyists and congressmen made wealthy by it? And so 'big government' must be defended at all cost, absolved of all error - the blame must always be placed elsewhere: it's the fault of the middle class serfs, or of Covid, or of Russia, or big oil...
What will bring about a cure? A massive sovereign debt crisis? A crushing depression with huge unemployment a la 1928? Another war instigated by governments searching for their next excuse?
I hope I'm wrong.
In the end, the only answer I see is to cut off the money to DC (borrowing, taxes and printing). Don't feed the evil beast.
Great post. Also, your chat with Peter Schiff this morning was outstanding. Thanks for enduring that sauna selfie for us.
LOL he is one of a kind, that’s for sure.
Brilliant; plain, simple and accurate analysis Chris. You da man for this job.
Merry Christmas from Dave in NZ.
Thanks for the support my kind friend.
I absolutely love the way The Atlantic, free for years, is totally behind the paywall. Very socialist.
Still, we are indebted to Chris Irons for analysing this article from La Anna Lowrey, which doubtlessly will become an icon in the future..... of how not to do something.
It’s like they’re cheering this upcoming crisis on. What the hell is wrong with these people?
As crazy as it might seem to some, I choose you. That article had be laughing out loud.
Brain dead and tone deaf, the politically-favored ruling class. Either they don't understand supply & demand (but still have the hubris to make foolhardy, incompetent claims), or they're just happy to gaslight (and they place no value on their own trust or integrity, now vanquished). I will say, however, perhaps it is our fault -- that we have ceded so much power to the government, letting it stray from the US Constitution with a Fiat rather than Gold standard. It's our fault because we let them marginalize Ron Paul, we took their word that we need big government to save us from boogiemen...
Even better than usual. Angrier, too, which of course I love...
Paper copies of The Atlantic are hazardous waste, but nobody out-douches Vox though.
Here's how Batya Ungar-Sargon introduced Vox to readers in her book, "Bad News: How Woke Media Is Undermining Democracy."
______
If you’ve never heard of Vox, that’s probably because it’s not for you; from its inception, the site had a very specific audience in mind: young, affluent, and highly educated. Klein and his coeditors were writing for urban millennials under thirty-five heading highly educated households that made over $100,000 a year, the New York Times reported.
Vox’s trademark style would be a cheeky, barely concealed smugness that flatters its readers into believing that by reading the website—which, not coincidentally, would sustain all of the liberal opinions that young, affluent, educated people already hold—they can rest assured that they are among the ranks of the correct, the informed, rather than one of the stupids.
In combining that smugness with a youthful, Whiggish optimism that equates information with progress, Klein figured out how to commodify being in the know in the social media age. After all, the point is not to know things so much as it is to broadcast that you know them. And the folks at Vox realized there was a goldmine to be had if they could turn sharing a Vox article on social media into the method whereby someone signaled their identity, the way a certain kind of person used to walk around with a New Yorker magazine peeking out of her handbag. In other words, Vox capitalized on one of the mainstays of the journalism status revolution: the anxiety members of broader elite classes have about whether they are elite enough.
The confusion of having an elite, educated status with having information, facts, and knowledge should by now be familiar—it is a move that journalists have made repeatedly to capture a high-end market and then clothe that market-driven decision as a journalistic value. But Vox took things one step further, leaning deeply into the view that reality itself has a liberal bias—one that incidentally appeals to and protects the status of progressive elites.
You can see this slippage everywhere in the site’s branding. Vox calls its articles explainers, as though these explanations are happening in a political vacuum instead of confirming the biases of affluent liberals. The Vox gambit was to bet that there were millions of readers like Klein, part of an educated meritocratic elite, who liked intricate policy discussions so long as everything they encountered confirmed their previously held beliefs.
But the Vox explainer was designed to appeal to an even smaller set than simply highly educated people; it was designed for people nostalgic for school. The site was visually crafted to evoke a sentimental response to the gear of the nerd: Its main focus was initially going to be “Vox Cards”—explainers that were “inspired by the highlighters and index cards that some of us used in school to remember important information,” as Klein and the other founders described them in a post introducing the concept of the site.