Firehose #209: Take Off? Eh.

Also: RIP Kathy Hayes

Hello et bonjour from lovely, whimsical, and also a wee bit shabby Montreal, where I’m currently dropping off the firstborn (pictured) at her frankly pretty swank freshman dorm. “Dad, what is ‘intersectionality?’” was a question I heard yesterday, and hoo boy it will not be the last.

To mark the Welchification of Canada, President Donald Trump on Saturday did another trade war, making Moynihan’s precious hockey sticks and booze cost 50% more. “We’ve recognized from the start that America has changed,” an ashen-faced Canuck PM Mark Carney said. “We recognize that sometimes, its signature is written in pencil.” Meanwhile, the city of Montreal on Monday will vote on whether to sever all ties with Israel, and “recognize and denounce the apartheid regime in Palestine and the genocide being perpetrated there.” Things are going great.

* Huzzah for Stephanie Slade! The book (with link this time) is called Fusionism: Liberty, Virtue, and the Future of the American Right, and here’s a J.D. Vance-tastic clip:

Here’s a baker’s half-dozen Slade pieces that’ll give you a sense of where she’s coming from:

“Against the New Nationalism” (2020)

“Is There a Future for Fusionism?” (2021)

“Both Left and Right Are Converging on Authoritarianism” (2022)

“Trump Doubled Down on Authoritarianism by Selecting J.D. Vance” (2024)

“National Conservatism Has a Bigotry Problem, Whether Yoram Hazony Wants To Admit It or Not” (2025)

“The Book That Explains the Heritage Foundation Meltdown” (2026)

“America’s Founders Blended Liberalism and Religion” (2026)

* Kmele did some CNN things this week. On Thursday it was about national debt, WalMart sales (?), the Trump-Michael Cohen rapprochement, and more:

And on Saturday he was back to yak about Trump’s dismal approval ratings, the sad case of #Resistance Democrats, and ABC suing the Federal Communications Commission:

* Speaking of the latter, free speech hero and FIRE co-founder Robert Corn-Revere came off the top rope this week in giving FCC scumbag Brendan Carr a hearty two thumbs up for jeopardizing his own stupid agency. Excerpt:

It is widely said that you are nothing but a political hack who sold out your previously professed beliefs about free expression and the rule of law for the short-term goal of being named FCC chairman, that you corrupted the agency’s nonpartisan purpose by focusing its efforts on punishing perceived critics of the Trump administration, and that you regularly prostrate yourself with cringe-worthy displays of servility to soothe the president’s fragile ego.

All these things may be true. But the criticism is terribly unfair because it fails to acknowledge your substantive accomplishments. When the dust settles, it may turn out that you have done more than any FCC chairman since the agency’s creation in 1934 to advance full First Amendment protection for the broadcast medium.

* Kmele & the Tanglers this week talked about Woke 1, “Natalie,” and Jon Ossoff:

* This week’s Reason Roundtable covered (surprise!) the DSA, Trump cancelling military exercises with South Korea, and why Harry Truman is underrated:

In the very, very dark days of June 2020, when people (including we three co-hosts) hadn’t seen each other for four months, the mischievous woman in the above pic opened up her marvelous and very airy countryside house & barn to us rabble and our families for a life-saving re-meetup, plus (of course!) a podcast episode. That woman was Kathy Hayes, mother of Nancy Rommelmann, widow of three great men including legendary New York Review of Books caricaturist David Levine. As mentioned in Episode #571, Kathy died Monday after a looong final chapter of broken hip + dementia. She was a funny, stylish, flirty center of attention who loved to regale you with stories about her overseas adventures and exotic ancestors. Her great life’s work was the three gorgeous adjoining properties near Stanfordville, and she loved to see people love the land right back. Even the ones from space.

* Comment of the Week comes from Andrew P:

This is the video form of “Some Idiot Wrote This” and I’m all for it.

Sendoff: Blues singer/songwriter/pianist Latimore died this week at the age of my parents, 87. Had I heard of Latimore before plucking his name off the obit list? Reader, I had not. Did I have time this week to bone up on the recently deceased, maybe even take a stab at a cover? Double negatory. But this slice o’ mid-‘70s soul is tasty, and perhaps even has unplanned resonance with the themes at the start of this Firehose! More depth and more time next week….