The Fifth Column

-a pre-obit for the esteemed David Frum
-involuntarily unionized at The Atlantic
-spy novels, bureaucrats and expense reports
-turning down Bill Buckley’s golden ticket
-prosperity, security and how quickly it can all disappear
-Frum is forever a man of 1989
-God makes you lucky, then convinces you you’re smart
-Tucker Carlson was always capable of many things
-falling flat on your back isn’t progress
-the Michigan Senate choice from hell
-Democrats discover Trump’s permission structure
-Midterm Madness in Michigan
-the polling industry has a phone problem
-politics for people who can afford to lose
-“I saw you coming so I could stop you”
-immigration restriction without the Trumpism
-fascism has the better sales pitch than communism
-what Donald Trump loves besides himself
-the conservative future Frum got very wrong and other reflections
Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST.
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Michael Moynihan has returned from his Italian sojourn where he barely escaped arrest…
-Moynihan has the clap or something
-Who exactly is the demographic for this show?
-Moynihan’s European vacation involved bus karaoke, too much drinking, and now the shakes
-Matt went to Cooperstown with Bill Schulz…
-The forgotten insanity of the Peekskill riots
-Paul Robe…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com

So that’s where these Genius Grants come from…
-Most roads lead back to Prague for Matt Welch
-about that letter…six paragraphs, $5 million in free publicity and Harper’s back in the mainstream
-It was NAFTA, not woke, that elected Trump. Or was it?
-Illegal immigration is a wage issue
-Who still believes free trade is the answer to everything?
-Vietnam made …

Jesse Singal of Blocked and Reported and Singal-Minded fills Michael Moynihan’s special diabetic chair to discuss Fauci’s diaries, broken institutions, runaway AI, LeBron and Mamdani Mart.
-Moynihan out, Jesse Singal in
-Bari Weiss hired everyone except Jesse
-The Prince of Science re-enrages everyone (or at least Rand Paul)
-Gell-Mann amnesia and the collapse of institutional trust
-The media needed a COVID daddy
-An OpenAI model escaped the sandbox
-The analogy of the paperclip machine and how it consumed the universe
-Cambridge protected alleged plagiarist Jason Arday
-Midterm Madness, Ohio governor race version
-Kmele feels that LeBron will never love him but he doesn’t want to talk about it
-Three grown men relived their greatest pickup games
-Kmele wanted the gods back in The Odyssey
-Mamdani Mart promised groceries at 30 percent off
-Billy Bob Thornton returns from hell in White Knight (a Kmele Foster joint)
-Nazi dinosaurs stalked Jews through Schindler’s Park
-Jesse discovered second-order effects
-Not every strange obsession with Israel was antisemitism
-Rent stabilization has worked great for millionaires
-No French goodbye for Kmele
Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST.
The Fifth Column (A Podcast) is a listener-viewer supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Follow The Fifth Column
YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com

Frank Dikötter is a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and one of the foremost historians of modern China. His research in overlooked and restricted Communist Party archives has transformed our understanding of Maoist rule.
-Frank Dikötter is kind of Dutch, but not really
-Writing the definitive history of Maoist horror
-Edgar Snow a…