I've built myself a mighty backlog of New Yorker issues. There are some things I definitely want to read, and to write about here. I'm going to have this page be entirely back issues, and focus on whatever I read over the span of multiple magazines.
Nov.18, 2024
The Family Plan
The pro-life groups got rolled. And then they were asked to praise this thing that they got rolled on.
- Are we supposed to feel bad for these folks at this point?
- That they're being tossed aside by a weirdo who sees everything in selfish terms, and to whom they can no longer dangle a bloc of persuadable voters?
In 2023 there were more abortions reported in the U.S. than there had been in a decade…
Pro life is out. Pro family is in.
And it's creepy as all get out.Let us retreat into the womb of American exceptionalism, to lick our wounds, and rear and raise a new generation of flag waving strongmen.
Under Roberts, a new generation of young staffers has joined Heritage—'very talented people who know that time it is in America,' he told me. Many of them are pro-family conservatives who are practicing what they preach: theres been a baby boom at the foundation, with showers seemingly every other week … He took down the donor portraits hanging outside his office and replaced them with the kind of photos you might find if you Googled 'Americans': kids in Stetsons hanging out on a ranch, a veteran in fatigues hugging his daughter. p.18
- Discussion of pro-family policies being enacted in Mississippi. Occurs to me that Gov Kim is also in this boat, riding the wave of the tide toward pro family.
If you were to draw an informal map of where young conservative politicos go to have their families, there would be a little crucifix over the Catholic hot spot of Hyattsville, MD.
We have done a horriffic job in envisioning and paiting for women a life that's achievable with children.
American Fascist
A liberal has to tell a hundred stories, or a thousand. A communist has one story, which might not turn out to be true. A fascist just has to be a storyteller. Because words do not attach to meanings, the stories don't need to be consistent. p.33