David Klion

Working on a book about the legacy of neoconservatism. Columnist @thenation, contributing editor @jewishcurrents, writer for many lefty mags. KLEE-on

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

Some personal news. Very excited to get to work on this! And if you have stories or insights that might be relevant, please get in touch.

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@JacobHeilbrunn Fair q, I guess you could interpret "political stupidity" a few different ways

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

This is correct and something Irving Kristol (in an essay) and Norman Podhoretz and Batya Ungar-Sargon (in books) all struggled to accept. For most American Jews, liberalism is the religion, the Democratic Party is the synagogue, and everything else is details.

[Sam @halaljew]

American Jews will never become a reliable Republican constituency, aside from the Orthodox. Most Americans Jews are urban and suburban liberals who were raised to look down on the Republican Party and its base of slack- jawed yokels and used car salesmen.

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

In the running “is Bari winning or losing” debate, the *entire* case that she’s winning is that she’s going to make the merger happen by keeping Trump happy. If the merger doesn’t happen, all she’s done is tank CBS’s ratings and destroy 60 Minutes for no reason.

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

The Ellisons are getting sued by investors for hiring Bari https://t.co/Fyz7W9Ri0k

[Brian Stelter @brianstelter]

Today's @ReliableSources lead:

Executives involved in the pending Paramount–WBD deal expect that a judge WILL press pause on the takeover plan in the coming days. They believe a judge will grant the states' request for a TRO...

https://t.co/HiDdk3oirS

[Abe Silberstein @abesilbe]

My review of Batya Ungar-Sargon's "The Jews and the Left" for Shaul Magid's Substack.
https://t.co/I7EilnQf78

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

Fearing the tyrannical regime, Ashley Parker hid esoteric clues in the text of her Lindsey Graham tweet that only the most careful and learned readers can decode

[Jordan Weissmann @JHWeissmann]

I think the reactions to this tweet are a reminder that most of America and the commentariat have entirely lost the ability to read subtext.

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

They're calling it the most heartwarming anecdote of all time

[Ashley Parker @AshleyRParker]

Like anyone who’s spent any time around politics, I have many Lindsey Graham stories. This is perhaps my favorite…

I was covering Congress (Best! Beat! Ever!) for the NYT when the Mother Emanuel shooting happened in Charleston. It was summer, but I was wearing pants and a sweater that day because it was always SO freezing in the Capitol. Anyhow, news of the shooting came down, and the DC Bureau chief called me with an order: Get yourself to Charleston ASAP and glue yourself to Graham’s side. She wanted a piece on the senator grappling with the unimaginable. So I headed straight to the airport, arriving in Charleston with just my backpack and what I’d be wearing to work that day, and linked up with Graham.

He had me meet him at a restaurant, where I told him I needed to shadow him for the next 48 hours. And he looked at me, with amused distaste, and said: “You are sticky. And you are icky. If you want to shadow me, go buy some nice new clothes—maybe a dress—and take a shower, and then we’ll talk.” (He was not wrong; I was sweaty and gross).

So I drove to a local big box store, bought a dress (he seemed to have a strong preference for a dress), and spent the next few days with him, resulting in this piece (which, for reasons not worth getting into, ended up being fairly different than the original assignment): https://t.co/HBHAgNRlEr

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@cd_hooks @Econ_Marshall It was a divisive episode for the Reagan administration because most of them loved Thatcher, but Jeane Kirkpatrick loved Argentina's fascist military junta even more

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

Zohran vs Bari

[Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani @NYCMayor]

Proud that New York is one of 12 states suing to stop Paramount's acquisition of Warner Bros.

This is not a merger that serves the public. It would hand one company nearly a third of the movies and cable channels Americans watch, raise prices for streaming and cable, endanger the livelihoods of thousands of New York artists and entertainment workers, and threaten to shutter theaters across our city.

New York's workers helped build this industry. They should not be sacrificed for the sake of further corporate consolidation.

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@DougHenwood Bill Kristol's reply is a great detail too. Which way, western neocon?

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@RobHafernik That isn't the historic meaning at all, and is pretty arbitrary

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

We need to sort out whether “the working class” is

a. 99% of Americans whose income comes from labor and not capital
b. White guys who work with their hands
c. Poor people
d. People without college degrees
e. Factory workers in Bangladesh or China or thereabouts

[Abe Silberstein @abesilbe]

Appreciate the shoutout from Mitch Abidor in his Jewish Currents Shabbat reading recommendation of Harvey Swados's "Standing Fast. Subscriber only.
https://t.co/noDgyWQpgv

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@mattyglesias It's true, that role was played by the formalized race hierarchies that were only abolished (in theory) in the 60s, which functioned in some ways like European class or South Asian caste. American class consciousness is and always has been a murky and malleable thing.

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@drussellmrichie That's one reason I think it's e!

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@Justin_Vogt It does! (but also it's e)

[David Klion @DavidKlion]

@MattZeitlin As a good Marxist, I think e. is probably the right answer and the vast majority of Americans are overall beneficiaries of proletarian labor that is out of sight and out of mind, but the political utility of this point within the US context is, er, limited