We support our Publishers and Content Creators. You can view this story on their website by CLICKING HERE.

So your three bartenders weren’t able to assemble even virtually this week for our usual format and topical review of the leading news; John is away on a clandestine mission stalking the elusive McRib (he says he was over in Zurich, but wink, wink. . .), while Lucretia and I were also largely indisposed.

But fear not! We decided that in lieu of our usual snappy brickbats, we’d share with our insatiable fans the talks we gave a couple weeks back at the University of Florence about the American election. It was great fun and the student questions were great, but we’re just offering here our introductory remarks. I gave a general theme I called “The End of Lukewarmness,” which was inspired by a passage from chapter 6 of Machiavelli’s Prince (seemed appropriate for an Italian audience), while Lucretia offered a thumbnail analysis of how Trump broke through with so many voting groups that were supposed to hate him. The student questions were great, but we weren’t able to record them clearly, alas.

This a short episode—barely over 20 minutes. But never fear: we plan to be back with our usual format midweek, probably Wednesday or Thursday.

So listen here, or from your usual outlets:


Meanwhile, I was also back behind the cohost microphone once again at the Ricochet podcast along with anchor James Lileks and restaurant explosion survivor (seriously!) Charles C.W. Cooke, where we explore the amazing story of the sudden Syrian revolution with Noah Rothman, along with the other big stories of the week, especially the arrest of Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Has the left found a new low in their reaction to this incident?

  1. An Explosive Week