Welcome to Marc! And thank you, Matt! This has been a wonderful place to read your work and I’ve really enjoyed reading the smart, insightful (and often funny!) comments from your subscribers. It’s a nice little corner of the internet, thanks for creating it.
As a parent of a UD graduate, who will be paying student loans until the day I die, I could not have asked for a better experience for my daughter. She graduated 3 years ago, and now owns a house, and can work at home. Money well spent!
Thank you, Matt for writing One Billion Americans. As someone who agrees with you and often ponders how to make versions of that argument to voters in general, I was very glad to see you do it, even at potentially a big risk of looking silly (and I don’t mean that you did!).
Today is also a good day to consider the worst Thanksgiving in living memory; unfortunately, most Americans living have no memory of it, if they ever knew it, which most of them don't since this history mostly doesn't get taught.
I'm talking about Thanksgiving 70 years ago, in 1950. The day that 400,000 Chinese troops forcibly educated America that we weren't the biggest boy on the block, as we thought (and still mistakenly think) we are. Secretary of State Dean Acheson called the Chinese intervention in the Korean War "the greatest defeat of American arms since the Second Battle of Bull Run." British historian Sir Martin Gilbert called it "the greatest defeat of a previously-victorious army in recorded history."
A month earlier, when questioned about Chinese warnings of possible intervention if the US continued to advance into North Korea, General MacArthur responded "I would remind the Chinese leadership that no Asian army has ever successfully stood against a Western army." That was the day the first Chinese troops crossed the Yalu, carrying everything on their backs, hiding in the forests by day, "invisible" to American reconnaissance since they didn't move like we did.
The US units retreated out of North Korea in what was called at the time "The Big Big-out" so fast that they outran their pursuers. Those that didn't suffered the fate of Second Division in "the death ride to Kuni-ri" in which the division was caught in a 2-mile long pass with a single dirt road for all their vehicles, with the Chinese in the hills on either side after they had moved through US lines. 3,000 Americans died in the 24 hours it took to get out, and the division took six months to rebuild.
70 years later, China has been celebrating this year as the anniversary of the "return" of a China the rest of the world was forced to respect. In their view of the Korean War, they won. That's because ever since, the United States has been forced to take them seriously, and has never come close to provoking them again. (Throughout the Vietnam war, every decision about "escalation" was framed through the question, would this provoke China? "American intelligence" - there's an oxymoron! - being unable to discover that China in the throes of the Cultural Revolution was incapable of doing anything)
And the US still hasn't learned the lesson of that Thanksgiving 70 years ago, as witness all the wars since.
Thanks for taking the time to read this. "The Forgotten War" is one that should be remembered.
MacArthur was wrong on just about everything, ever. He "forecast" that the Japanese wouldn't invade the Philippines until April 1942, despite the fact that the weather in SE Asia dictated that they do so between December 1941-January 1942 in order to avoid the monsoon, and then when they did invade he decamped to his bedroom in his quarters above the Army-Navy Club in Manila, and wouldn't talk to anyone but his CoS for the crucial two weeks it took for the invasion to become a disaster. "The Bataan Gang" as they were known, the staff that surrounded him from 1940-1951 when he was finally gotten rid of, were known throughout the army as incompetent sychophants. The reason he's so well-regarded historically is because - as Dwight Eisenhower (who served under him in the Philippines until 1941) noted, 3/4 of his staff worked in the public relations office. He's the most overrated general in American military history.
Matt - thank you for having the courage to create this forum. The comments section here is the first internet discussion I've taken part in since 2008. It's not only because of the depth and clarity of your analysis but also because of its underlying humanity and humility that leaves it open to further discussion and persuasion that comes from an underlying moral center (and patriotism!).
So I'm maybe even more thankful to everyone who's reading this comment section and participating and supporting Matt on this endeavor. Thank you to you all. I came (paid) for the writing and stayed for the comments.
Welcome Marc - excited to see your contributions and what's next!
Yeah, the comments here are right up there with the comments at Heather Cox Richardson's substack community (I highly recommend "Letters From An American" to you all).
Always enjoy your work Matt, glad you have found the energy to be actively thankful. I feel like being thankful is like being happy. It isn’t easy most of the time (for some it’s chemically impossible or very nearly so) but it’s an obligation we have to one another as members of a community. Trying to embed positivity in our communities (online or otherwise) makes them stronger and nicer places to be. I’d like to say thanks to the other commenters here. This is one of the few places where I find the comments section almost as good a read as the article itself. Welcome Marc!
Thanks to essential workers makes me feel squeamish the same way that people who say “Thanks for your service” do when they find out I’m a Veteran. (If anyone replies with that phrase, I will scream}
Mark,
I read a few of your articles. And I was reading the one one Racial Justice... thinking, good points...
Until... all the sudden you referred to LatinX families. Seriously, why do white people make up names for other people.
I stopped reading.
I’m going to assume it was the Dartmouth Hipsters that influenced you. Hopefully on your Gap Year back in LA you have shed bad habits like that.
I just noticed that! It was a longer quote so missed that.
You are forgiven.
Hope u are enjoying your Gap Year. I don’t blame any student for doing it this academic year. Why pay Ivy prices if you aren’t going to get an Ivy experience.
How do you like the East Coast?
I grew up in LA and New Zealand. Live in Boise now. But travel for work. Spend lots of time on East Coast.
I'm a big fan of Hanover, but haven't been around the rest of east coast very much. I think the frontier stuff is just that I worked on some frontier history about a year ago
I'm not Hispanic myself, but am gender-conscious (was a "too femme" boy as a kid, grew up to be pan, married a trans* person), and did a degree in linguistics in which I did most of my advanced work studying Spanish. So I started talking to hispanohablantes _about_ "what would it look like if Spanish had a neutral gender" back in the '90s. The use of an -e ending has been floating around _at least_ since then, and has been picked up pretty widely by activist youth in Argentina, and apparently some segments of Mexico.
But as somebody that just reads as "white dude", mostly I'm just trying to accommodate talking to people in terms of what they identify with, and also to recognize that "Hispanic" or "Latino/a/e/x" is a _ridiculously_ broad category, and we're much better off recognizing that Americans of Cuban descent in Miami have completely different concerns from Americans of Mexican descent in Texas.
I don’t really identify the term Hispanic or Latino with an American thing.
I work a lot in Latin America. Argentina, Brazil, Columbia, Peru, Venezuela, Dominican republic and Mexico.
I’m sympathetic to the gender neutral terms on a personal level.
If I met someone and they wanted to be called they, I’m not going to be a dick. We should treat each other with respect.
But the whole announcing pronouns in peoples bios, it’s sort of annoying.
But when we’re trying to call or refer to a whole group of people buy a phrase that they don’t identify with, it just comes across as condescending and out of touch.
I grew up with, work with, I have many Hispanic friends. It’s just rude.
I worked with this Mexican engineer three weeks ago. I asked him about the term LatinX. He had never even heard of it.
His response… “Pinche gringos”
I think that sums it up.
You’re absolutely right about painting broad brush is towards Hispanics in the US. It’s my impression that for a while, Cubans have sort of dominated the political landscape as far as Hispanics go.
Which to me is very weird having grown up in the West Coast and in the military. The vast majority of Hispanics I meet our of Mexican descent, with maybe a few Central Americans.
It’s very weird when I work on the East Coast, to realize that many people in the US just aren’t that familiar with Hispanics. I just took it for granted, that Hispanics were part of every day life in American culture.
People out West really don’t bat and eye if you’re Mexican, or Latino or whatever for the most part.
Not sure what I’m trying to say, except when anybody uses the term LatinX, it just annoys the fuck out of me.
I’m actually supporting a job in Argentina remotely right now. The gender neutral term might be en vogue among a certain subset of activist Argentinians, but it is definitely not widespread.
Whenever anyone thanks me for my service, I want to say to them, "Oh, so you're thankful that I was young and stupid enough to go fight a war that permanently damaged our country?" And then I don't, because I realize that most of them are sincerely trying to connect to something larger, even though they mostly don't understand or realize that. But I'd still like to scream it.
I come to it from being a (very minor) part of the Ur Lie of the War of Lies, the (alleged) Tonkin Gulf (non) Incident, which it turns out (according to research in 2006) had the parties involved who were shooting at "lights in the water" identified as North Vietnamese PT boats, actually shooting at the reflections of moonlight and lightning on an enormous school of flying fish that annually transits the Golf of Tonkin at that time. LBJ was more right than he knew when he said upon being informed of the event, "Those poor dumb sailors were probably shooting at flying fish." So 58,000 Americans and untold millions of Southeast Asians died because of flying fish. And Vietnam did more to wreck this country, to destroy American self-confidence, than any other event of the 20th century. So, given that I actually love the country my ancestors fought to found, I am bitter over the actions of the imperial morons who run things now.
Yes, I met many fine people in the service. I was also around more white male morons in one place at one time than any other time in my life.
I think you’ve earned a day to be thankful, Matt. Thank you for taking a risk and creating this exciting community, and also for being one of the people who did your part over the last 4 years. Welcome Marc- you seem like quite the catch for Matt and we are all thankful we will get to see your work in this forum. Hope both of you, and everyone else here, enjoy the day!
I'm very thankful for you Matt. After Sean Spicer's first press conference in January 2017, the world didn't seem to make much sense anymore. I have read your Twitter nearly everyday since and it grounded me in voice that is rational, thoughtful, human, funny, and willing to question orthodoxy of any kind. You speak for those of us who want ideas, pragmatism, and basic human goodness to win the day. Thank you.
I'm thankful that Republican judges still follow the law, and not the whims of Republican politicians.
I'm thankful that our distributed, federalist, chaotic election system does seem to produce reliable election results, at least when people are patient enough to let them finish counting.
Most of all, I'm thankful that over 80 million Americans made it a priority to vote Trump out of office.
Thankful for Matt, whose work on the Weeds in particular has given me a window into interesting political discussions. Can’t wait to keep up with SB.
Matt:
I just wrapped up 1B Americans and am keen to learn more about the network effects of cities. I’ve read both Triumph of the City and Scale, which were both incredibly interesting. Any recommendations?
I'm not sure this is exactly along those lines, but if you are interested in urban development, I highly recommend "Downtown: Its Rise and Fall 1880-1950" by Robert Fogelson. Explains a lot about how we got the cities we have in the US!
Welcome to Marc. Glad to see you are in California. One of the great weaknesses of thoughtful journalism in this country is that it derives so overwhelmingly from that foreign land on the east coast. Now if you'd been in Hanover ...??
Welcome to Marc! And thank you, Matt! This has been a wonderful place to read your work and I’ve really enjoyed reading the smart, insightful (and often funny!) comments from your subscribers. It’s a nice little corner of the internet, thanks for creating it.
I agree and am looking forward to being part of the space Matt has created.
Thanks for the warm welcome
It's great Matt is giving an opportunity to someone from Dartmouth. America has been dominated by University of Delaware graduates for too long.
As a parent of a UD graduate, who will be paying student loans until the day I die, I could not have asked for a better experience for my daughter. She graduated 3 years ago, and now owns a house, and can work at home. Money well spent!
Thank you, Matt for writing One Billion Americans. As someone who agrees with you and often ponders how to make versions of that argument to voters in general, I was very glad to see you do it, even at potentially a big risk of looking silly (and I don’t mean that you did!).
I mean it’s at least a little silly
Ex ante optimally silly, then. That’s the meaning of life.
As long as this is an open thread...
Today is also a good day to consider the worst Thanksgiving in living memory; unfortunately, most Americans living have no memory of it, if they ever knew it, which most of them don't since this history mostly doesn't get taught.
I'm talking about Thanksgiving 70 years ago, in 1950. The day that 400,000 Chinese troops forcibly educated America that we weren't the biggest boy on the block, as we thought (and still mistakenly think) we are. Secretary of State Dean Acheson called the Chinese intervention in the Korean War "the greatest defeat of American arms since the Second Battle of Bull Run." British historian Sir Martin Gilbert called it "the greatest defeat of a previously-victorious army in recorded history."
A month earlier, when questioned about Chinese warnings of possible intervention if the US continued to advance into North Korea, General MacArthur responded "I would remind the Chinese leadership that no Asian army has ever successfully stood against a Western army." That was the day the first Chinese troops crossed the Yalu, carrying everything on their backs, hiding in the forests by day, "invisible" to American reconnaissance since they didn't move like we did.
The US units retreated out of North Korea in what was called at the time "The Big Big-out" so fast that they outran their pursuers. Those that didn't suffered the fate of Second Division in "the death ride to Kuni-ri" in which the division was caught in a 2-mile long pass with a single dirt road for all their vehicles, with the Chinese in the hills on either side after they had moved through US lines. 3,000 Americans died in the 24 hours it took to get out, and the division took six months to rebuild.
70 years later, China has been celebrating this year as the anniversary of the "return" of a China the rest of the world was forced to respect. In their view of the Korean War, they won. That's because ever since, the United States has been forced to take them seriously, and has never come close to provoking them again. (Throughout the Vietnam war, every decision about "escalation" was framed through the question, would this provoke China? "American intelligence" - there's an oxymoron! - being unable to discover that China in the throes of the Cultural Revolution was incapable of doing anything)
And the US still hasn't learned the lesson of that Thanksgiving 70 years ago, as witness all the wars since.
Thanks for taking the time to read this. "The Forgotten War" is one that should be remembered.
McArthur was also wrong on this history, unless he considered Imperial Russia to not be Western.
MacArthur was wrong on just about everything, ever. He "forecast" that the Japanese wouldn't invade the Philippines until April 1942, despite the fact that the weather in SE Asia dictated that they do so between December 1941-January 1942 in order to avoid the monsoon, and then when they did invade he decamped to his bedroom in his quarters above the Army-Navy Club in Manila, and wouldn't talk to anyone but his CoS for the crucial two weeks it took for the invasion to become a disaster. "The Bataan Gang" as they were known, the staff that surrounded him from 1940-1951 when he was finally gotten rid of, were known throughout the army as incompetent sychophants. The reason he's so well-regarded historically is because - as Dwight Eisenhower (who served under him in the Philippines until 1941) noted, 3/4 of his staff worked in the public relations office. He's the most overrated general in American military history.
Matt - thank you for having the courage to create this forum. The comments section here is the first internet discussion I've taken part in since 2008. It's not only because of the depth and clarity of your analysis but also because of its underlying humanity and humility that leaves it open to further discussion and persuasion that comes from an underlying moral center (and patriotism!).
So I'm maybe even more thankful to everyone who's reading this comment section and participating and supporting Matt on this endeavor. Thank you to you all. I came (paid) for the writing and stayed for the comments.
Welcome Marc - excited to see your contributions and what's next!
Yeah, the comments here are right up there with the comments at Heather Cox Richardson's substack community (I highly recommend "Letters From An American" to you all).
Thanks for the welcome and glad you're enjoying it so far!
Always enjoy your work Matt, glad you have found the energy to be actively thankful. I feel like being thankful is like being happy. It isn’t easy most of the time (for some it’s chemically impossible or very nearly so) but it’s an obligation we have to one another as members of a community. Trying to embed positivity in our communities (online or otherwise) makes them stronger and nicer places to be. I’d like to say thanks to the other commenters here. This is one of the few places where I find the comments section almost as good a read as the article itself. Welcome Marc!
Hear, hear!
Thanks to essential workers makes me feel squeamish the same way that people who say “Thanks for your service” do when they find out I’m a Veteran. (If anyone replies with that phrase, I will scream}
Mark,
I read a few of your articles. And I was reading the one one Racial Justice... thinking, good points...
Until... all the sudden you referred to LatinX families. Seriously, why do white people make up names for other people.
I stopped reading.
I’m going to assume it was the Dartmouth Hipsters that influenced you. Hopefully on your Gap Year back in LA you have shed bad habits like that.
https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2020/08/11/about-one-in-four-u-s-hispanics-have-heard-of-latinx-but-just-3-use-it/
Other than that, I look forward to your writing.
Hi Rory! Thanks for reading some of my stuff. I think I was quoting Ibram X Kendi (no pun intended), and I didn't want to change his own words.
I just noticed that! It was a longer quote so missed that.
You are forgiven.
Hope u are enjoying your Gap Year. I don’t blame any student for doing it this academic year. Why pay Ivy prices if you aren’t going to get an Ivy experience.
How do you like the East Coast?
I grew up in LA and New Zealand. Live in Boise now. But travel for work. Spend lots of time on East Coast.
I prefer it out west.
What’s this frontier stuff?
I'm a big fan of Hanover, but haven't been around the rest of east coast very much. I think the frontier stuff is just that I worked on some frontier history about a year ago
I found this article a really thought-provoking read, on that topic...
https://www.thepullrequest.com/p/latinx-plaining-the-election
I'm not Hispanic myself, but am gender-conscious (was a "too femme" boy as a kid, grew up to be pan, married a trans* person), and did a degree in linguistics in which I did most of my advanced work studying Spanish. So I started talking to hispanohablantes _about_ "what would it look like if Spanish had a neutral gender" back in the '90s. The use of an -e ending has been floating around _at least_ since then, and has been picked up pretty widely by activist youth in Argentina, and apparently some segments of Mexico.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2019/12/05/teens-argentina-are-leading-charge-gender-neutral-language/
https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/10/15/20914347/latin-latina-latino-latinx-means
But as somebody that just reads as "white dude", mostly I'm just trying to accommodate talking to people in terms of what they identify with, and also to recognize that "Hispanic" or "Latino/a/e/x" is a _ridiculously_ broad category, and we're much better off recognizing that Americans of Cuban descent in Miami have completely different concerns from Americans of Mexican descent in Texas.
I don’t really identify the term Hispanic or Latino with an American thing.
I work a lot in Latin America. Argentina, Brazil, Columbia, Peru, Venezuela, Dominican republic and Mexico.
I’m sympathetic to the gender neutral terms on a personal level.
If I met someone and they wanted to be called they, I’m not going to be a dick. We should treat each other with respect.
But the whole announcing pronouns in peoples bios, it’s sort of annoying.
But when we’re trying to call or refer to a whole group of people buy a phrase that they don’t identify with, it just comes across as condescending and out of touch.
I grew up with, work with, I have many Hispanic friends. It’s just rude.
I worked with this Mexican engineer three weeks ago. I asked him about the term LatinX. He had never even heard of it.
His response… “Pinche gringos”
I think that sums it up.
You’re absolutely right about painting broad brush is towards Hispanics in the US. It’s my impression that for a while, Cubans have sort of dominated the political landscape as far as Hispanics go.
Which to me is very weird having grown up in the West Coast and in the military. The vast majority of Hispanics I meet our of Mexican descent, with maybe a few Central Americans.
It’s very weird when I work on the East Coast, to realize that many people in the US just aren’t that familiar with Hispanics. I just took it for granted, that Hispanics were part of every day life in American culture.
People out West really don’t bat and eye if you’re Mexican, or Latino or whatever for the most part.
Not sure what I’m trying to say, except when anybody uses the term LatinX, it just annoys the fuck out of me.
I’m actually supporting a job in Argentina remotely right now. The gender neutral term might be en vogue among a certain subset of activist Argentinians, but it is definitely not widespread.
Whenever anyone thanks me for my service, I want to say to them, "Oh, so you're thankful that I was young and stupid enough to go fight a war that permanently damaged our country?" And then I don't, because I realize that most of them are sincerely trying to connect to something larger, even though they mostly don't understand or realize that. But I'd still like to scream it.
Woah dude.
Me. I feel sorry for people who were never in the military. It was a privilege. And I’m met the best people in the world.
Sincerely sorry that you feel bitter.
Have a great Thanksgiving.
I come to it from being a (very minor) part of the Ur Lie of the War of Lies, the (alleged) Tonkin Gulf (non) Incident, which it turns out (according to research in 2006) had the parties involved who were shooting at "lights in the water" identified as North Vietnamese PT boats, actually shooting at the reflections of moonlight and lightning on an enormous school of flying fish that annually transits the Golf of Tonkin at that time. LBJ was more right than he knew when he said upon being informed of the event, "Those poor dumb sailors were probably shooting at flying fish." So 58,000 Americans and untold millions of Southeast Asians died because of flying fish. And Vietnam did more to wreck this country, to destroy American self-confidence, than any other event of the 20th century. So, given that I actually love the country my ancestors fought to found, I am bitter over the actions of the imperial morons who run things now.
Yes, I met many fine people in the service. I was also around more white male morons in one place at one time than any other time in my life.
That explains it. I’m from the more recent generation. Military has changed a lot.
Once again. Forgive the grammar. On my phone.
I think you’ve earned a day to be thankful, Matt. Thank you for taking a risk and creating this exciting community, and also for being one of the people who did your part over the last 4 years. Welcome Marc- you seem like quite the catch for Matt and we are all thankful we will get to see your work in this forum. Hope both of you, and everyone else here, enjoy the day!
Thanks Mark! You've got a cool first name
I'm very thankful for you Matt. After Sean Spicer's first press conference in January 2017, the world didn't seem to make much sense anymore. I have read your Twitter nearly everyday since and it grounded me in voice that is rational, thoughtful, human, funny, and willing to question orthodoxy of any kind. You speak for those of us who want ideas, pragmatism, and basic human goodness to win the day. Thank you.
I'm thankful that Republican judges still follow the law, and not the whims of Republican politicians.
I'm thankful that our distributed, federalist, chaotic election system does seem to produce reliable election results, at least when people are patient enough to let them finish counting.
Most of all, I'm thankful that over 80 million Americans made it a priority to vote Trump out of office.
Best wishes to you, Marc. Thanks for taking a risk and starting this new venture, Matt.
I feel like you try to be intellectually honest and also gracious to colleagues with whom you disagree. Those are both good qualities.
Thanks for the wishes!
Hello Marc!
Thankful for Matt, whose work on the Weeds in particular has given me a window into interesting political discussions. Can’t wait to keep up with SB.
Matt:
I just wrapped up 1B Americans and am keen to learn more about the network effects of cities. I’ve read both Triumph of the City and Scale, which were both incredibly interesting. Any recommendations?
I'm not sure this is exactly along those lines, but if you are interested in urban development, I highly recommend "Downtown: Its Rise and Fall 1880-1950" by Robert Fogelson. Explains a lot about how we got the cities we have in the US!
Cool, I’ll check it out. Thanks!
Welcome to Marc. Glad to see you are in California. One of the great weaknesses of thoughtful journalism in this country is that it derives so overwhelmingly from that foreign land on the east coast. Now if you'd been in Hanover ...??
Thank you for the welcome!
Thanks for sharing your fresh and original perspectives with us, Matt! And welcome to the team, Marc! You've got a great gig.
Happy to be here!
Thanks for making me think
Congratulations, and welcome, Marc!