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A Conservative from Cleveland in Boston · Q & A, Hosted by Jay Nordlinger

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hello, everybody, and welcome to Q&A.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Jay Nordlinger, and my guest today is Jeff Jacoby, a columnist.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: He has written a column for the Boston Globe since 1994.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: That is extraordinary longevity in the media.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: You can find him in the Globe or at jeffjacoby.com.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: Jeff is, by the way, an old friend and comrade of mine.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I was going to say good morning, Jeff.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Let's see.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's about 12.07.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's morning somewhere.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Nice to see you, my friend.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Not only are we both media people and
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: old comrades,
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: but we're both Midwesterners,
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  SPEAKER_00: so I always get pleasure in connecting with a fellow Midwesterner.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in Cleveland,
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: and you're a Michigander,
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  SPEAKER_00: but differences like that bring people closer together.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yes,
• 0:56
  and you have such a Boston identity that people identify you
• 1:01
  with Boston and
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: Massachusetts and New England,
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: but I know that you are,
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: in fact,
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: a Clevelander.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: I have said for years that,
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: though I've now lived here most of my life in Boston,
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: I have never become,
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: I've never gone native.
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  To my dying day,
• 1:18
  I will consider myself a Midwesterner in Ohio,
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  and I will have Cleveland pride.
• 1:25
  And the proof I tell people that I've never gone native is that
• 1:28
  to this day,
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: I couldn't care less what happens to the Boston Red Sox.
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  SPEAKER_00: Which would be saying something by itself.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: But in my case,
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: it's really saying something since I work for the Boston Globe,
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: which is owned by John Henry,
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: who is also the owner of the Boston Globe,
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: the Boston Red Sox.
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  SPEAKER_01: I know that your readers forgive you.
• 1:53
  Uh,
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  some,
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  but mostly because they know perhaps that I married a diehard
• 1:58
  sports fan.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, good.
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  SPEAKER_00: So if I ever have to drop a sports analogy into my writing,
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  SPEAKER_00: uh,
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  SPEAKER_00: you know,
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  SPEAKER_00: I've got,
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  SPEAKER_00: I sleep with a sports metaphor consultant.
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  SPEAKER_01: Wonderful.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, well, I, I really consider myself a transplant here in New York.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: I'll always be a Michigander and a Midwesterner.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: I, uh,
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: I don't pretend to be a real New Yorker.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a guy who lives here in New York and enjoys it.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: By the way, Jeff, who's that fellow over your right shoulder?
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: Looks like a president, a portrait on the wall.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's a portrait of the Estimal Calvin Coolidge.
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  a real new englander a real new englander right the presidents
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  who understood well
• 2:45
  he understood many things he got many things right and one or
• 2:48
  two serious things
• 2:49
  wrong but one of the great things that calvin coolidge
• 2:52
  understood and preached was
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  that it is more important for people in public life to kill bad
• 2:59
  legislation and bad
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: ideas than than to enact new ones that are good
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  The whole media discussion about politics is always about the
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  need to create this
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  SPEAKER_00: program or increase this budget or pass a new government commission,
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  SPEAKER_00: but people who are conservative
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  SPEAKER_00: in their constitutional,
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  SPEAKER_00: political,
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  SPEAKER_00: ideological essence,
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  SPEAKER_00: as Calvin Coolidge certainly was,
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  have always understood that government is so dangerous that
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  even more important
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  SPEAKER_00: than passing good laws is preventing bad laws from coming into effect.
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  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: I love an old expression.
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  SPEAKER_01: I learned it from Bill Buckley.
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  SPEAKER_01: Don't just do something, stand there.
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  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes that's very useful and applicable.
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  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
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  I've been telling people for years that I'm both politically
• 3:56
  conservative,
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  and I'm sure we'll find time this conversation discussed us
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  what that means these
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  SPEAKER_00: days,
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  SPEAKER_00: if that's possible to nail down any longer,
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  SPEAKER_00: but also temperamentally conservative,
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  SPEAKER_00: which means that I...
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  believe i i have it goes to my core to feel and to believe that
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  that which it is
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  not necessary to change it is necessary not to change yes you
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  know the credo of a
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  of a traditionalist who appreciates tradition was it chesterton
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  i think uh
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  SPEAKER_00: who talked about the fence in the world.
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  The fellow buys the land and he sees the fence and he wants to
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  knock it down.
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  The advice that's given to him is don't knock things down until
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  you find out
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  SPEAKER_00: why they were put up in the first place.
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  And that increasingly seems to be a lesson that so many people
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  in this country and
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  SPEAKER_00: our time don't seem to understand.
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  SPEAKER_00: Knocking things down has come into great vogue.
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  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_00: For knocking things down,
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  not a whole lot of passion for learning why they were put up in
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  the first place and
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  SPEAKER_00: what use they might serve.
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  SPEAKER_01: I think the current expression is burn it down.
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  Before we leave the subject of Coolidge altogether,
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  what things did he get wrong,
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  Jeff?
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  SPEAKER_00: He signed... I'm not sure if you and I will agree on this.
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  SPEAKER_00: Coolidge signed into law the 1924 Immigration Act, which...
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  more or less slammed the gate shut on free immigration into the
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  United States.
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  SPEAKER_00: Jay,
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  SPEAKER_00: you've been reading my stuff for a long time,
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  SPEAKER_00: so you know that I'm a passionate supporter of immigration,
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  both as a good in itself and historically as one of the
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  greatest goods in American
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  SPEAKER_00: history.
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  and on a personal level i'm the son of an immigrant and i'm the
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  father of an
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  immigrant and the father-in-law of an immigrant and uh you know
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  i grew up in a
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  community surrounded by immigrants i i have a a feeling for the
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  value and the the
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  SPEAKER_00: the uh
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  SPEAKER_00: the contribution of immigration to American society.
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  SPEAKER_00: And for the first half of American history,
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  SPEAKER_00: there was essentially no such thing as illegal immigration.
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  SPEAKER_00: You hear the term now all the time as though it's taken for granted.
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  Countries have to have clear rules about who can and who can't
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  come in and there
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  need to be stiff filters and everyone who comes in needs to
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  have the proper
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  SPEAKER_00: paperwork.
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  SPEAKER_00: But for a century and a half,
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  SPEAKER_00: Up until basically the 1920s,
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  SPEAKER_00: anybody who could get themselves to America,
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  SPEAKER_00: with a few exceptions,
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  SPEAKER_00: if you could get yourself to America,
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  SPEAKER_00: you could enter the country.
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  SPEAKER_01: Jeff, back up a little.
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  SPEAKER_01: Did I hear you correctly?
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  SPEAKER_01: Are you the father of an immigrant?
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  SPEAKER_00: My wife and I have two sons,
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  SPEAKER_00: and our younger son,
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  SPEAKER_00: Micah,
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  was an orphan from Guatemala whom we adopted and brought home
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  when he was 11 months
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  SPEAKER_00: old.
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  SPEAKER_01: Gotcha, gotcha.
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  SPEAKER_01: Well, I have a question for you, a Buckleyan question.
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  I know the answer,
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  but I thought I'd put it to you anyway because it's
• 7:12
  interesting.
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  SPEAKER_01: Bill would say something like this,
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  SPEAKER_01: Jeff,
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  are you a conservative columnist or are you a columnist and a
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  writer who is
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  SPEAKER_01: conservative?
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  SPEAKER_01: I know you're the latter.
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  SPEAKER_01: So was he, by the way.
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  SPEAKER_00: Right.
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  And I can't tell you how many times over the course of my years
• 7:33
  at the Globe.
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  SPEAKER_00: As you mentioned, I began at the Globe in 1994.
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  SPEAKER_00: So that's, what am I coming up on next year?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: 32 years writing for the op-ed page.
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  SPEAKER_00: Very soon after my byline and my pieces started appearing in the Globe,
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  SPEAKER_00: I would see myself referred to,
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  SPEAKER_00: or I'd give a speech and be introduced as,
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  SPEAKER_00: the conservative columnist for the Boston Globe.
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  SPEAKER_00: The,
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  because no other regular Globe columnist shared my politics or
• 8:04
  really was anywhere
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  SPEAKER_00: close to it.
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  SPEAKER_00: Which for most of the last third of a century has been the case.
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  SPEAKER_00: Here and there, there have been
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  brief windows when I've had colleagues who were more
• 8:17
  conservative or center-right.
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  But the conservative columns at the Boston Globe label that was
• 8:24
  often hung on me,
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  SPEAKER_00: it didn't keep me awake at night gnashing my teeth with aggravation,
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  SPEAKER_00: but I would point out to them,
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  SPEAKER_00: no one would ever introduce any of my colleagues
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  SPEAKER_00: as the liberal columnist at the Boston Globe.
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  For many years,
• 8:41
  Ellen Goodman was one of the prominent Boston Globe bylines.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: My late colleague,
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  SPEAKER_00: David Nyan,
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  SPEAKER_00: who perhaps encountered,
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  SPEAKER_00: he was a columnist on the op-ed page when I joined.
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  SPEAKER_00: Nobody ever introduced them,
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  SPEAKER_00: as far as I know,
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  as the liberal columnist for the Boston Globe or even a liberal
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  columnist for the
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  SPEAKER_00: Boston Globe.
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  So I would tell people then what I will say to you now,
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  what I have tried to convey.
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  SPEAKER_00: to readers and friends forever, I have an ideological leaning.
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  SPEAKER_00: I have political views and values that have been shaped by my history,
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  SPEAKER_00: by my reading,
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  SPEAKER_00: by my understanding,
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  SPEAKER_00: by reading what Jay Nordlinger has put down on paper over the years.
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  SPEAKER_00: By conventional standards,
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  SPEAKER_00: at least the conventional standards that we grew up with,
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  SPEAKER_00: my politics are right of center.
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  I lean toward skepticism of government and belief in doing
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  things locally that can
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  SPEAKER_00: be done locally and not assigning the power to the federal government.
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  SPEAKER_00: I have got all kinds of philosophical views that
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  SPEAKER_00: would be regarded as conservative,
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  SPEAKER_00: or at least,
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  SPEAKER_00: again,
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  SPEAKER_00: we always have to keep adding this asterisk.
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  SPEAKER_00: At least in the pre-MAGA years,
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  SPEAKER_00: there was no question that I was part of the conservative movement,
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  SPEAKER_00: Young Americans for Freedom when I was in college,
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  SPEAKER_00: and all the rest of it.
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  I've written any number of times about how I sharpened my teeth
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  by reading National
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: Review and reading Bill Buckley,
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  SPEAKER_00: and I also sharpened my vocabulary by doing the same thing.
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  But those are based on,
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  in my mind,
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  truths that don't change regardless of who expresses them.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: Let's talk about newspapers.
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  SPEAKER_01: This morning I read a column by George Will, superb column, of course.
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  It was basically about the death of newspapers and what we lose
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  when newspapers go.
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  SPEAKER_01: And it occurred to me, I'd like to know your reading diet.
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  SPEAKER_01: I, of course, I used to read newspapers and magazines.
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  SPEAKER_01: We all did.
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  SPEAKER_01: I wouldn't read every page of a newspaper,
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  SPEAKER_01: but I read a lot of three newspapers,
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  SPEAKER_01: let's say,
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  SPEAKER_01: four maybe every day.
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  SPEAKER_01: And magazines, my goodness, magazines had their own personalities.
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  SPEAKER_01: They were distinctive.
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  SPEAKER_01: Each magazine was a family of writers and editors, so to speak.
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  SPEAKER_01: So I read
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  SPEAKER_01: commentary on the New Republic,
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  SPEAKER_01: the National Review,
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  SPEAKER_01: and the American Spectator,
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  SPEAKER_01: and the public interest,
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  SPEAKER_01: and the national interest,
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  SPEAKER_01: the nation,
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  SPEAKER_01: I think,
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  SPEAKER_01: Mother Jones sometime,
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  SPEAKER_01: on and on,
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  SPEAKER_01: and so did you,
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  SPEAKER_01: I know.
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  SPEAKER_01: Today, Jeff, I don't read any newspaper or magazine.
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  I read discreet articles that are linked to online,
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  especially in social media.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: I don't sit down with a newspaper or magazine and
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: I read particular writers, authors.
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  SPEAKER_01: You,
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: for example,
• 11:53
  are bookmarked on my laptop and go to Jeff Jacoby whenever I
• 11:58
  want or George Will or
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: anyone else.
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  SPEAKER_01: And so I used to be able to tell you my media diet.
• 12:06
  I read these newspapers and these magazines and I might watch a
• 12:09
  television show or two.
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  SPEAKER_01: I don't think I have a media diet now.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I should.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: What about you?
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  SPEAKER_00: I do read newspapers and magazines in dead tree format.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: Good for you.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: Whether that will continue,
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  SPEAKER_00: uh,
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  SPEAKER_00: once I'm no longer getting the discount that comes to the Boston globe.
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  SPEAKER_00: Although,
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  SPEAKER_00: you know,
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  SPEAKER_00: I,
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: I,
• 12:35
  I get the Boston globe and the wall street journal delivered to
• 12:39
  my home daily.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh,
• 12:42
  globe i get at a for a reasonable amount the wall street
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  journal is very expensive
• 12:46
  but i you know if i'm willing to to pay for it then i guess
• 12:51
  that's indication that
• 12:52
  it that it's worth paying that plus my wife loves it but i i
• 12:58
  know only too well how
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: the landscape has changed and how the business model has changed
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: and how the internet,
• 13:05
  the rise of the internet changed almost everything about the
• 13:08
  journalism and the
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: newspaper business.
• 13:10
  So that when,
• 13:11
  you know,
• 13:12
  when I started 30,
• 13:15
  I began with the Boston Herald actually in 1987.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: So it's at 38 years ago,
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: nearly four decades ago when I got into the newspaper business,
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: began earning a paycheck from a newspaper.
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  SPEAKER_00: I would say easily three quarters of the homes on my street
• 13:33
  you'd go out early in the morning and you'd see the newspaper,
• 13:35
  you know,
• 13:36
  on the,
• 13:37
  on the stoop.
• 13:39
  When I was a kid,
• 13:40
  I never had a paper route,
• 13:41
  but three of my siblings did.
• 13:43
  And,
• 13:44
  you know,
• 13:44
  if you were a little kid in those days,
• 13:46
  they wanted to make some money.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: That was a great way to do it because everybody.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: Was that the, Jeff, was that the Cleveland plane dealer?
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
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  SPEAKER_00: In those days, Cleveland was a two newspaper town.
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  SPEAKER_00: There was also the Cleveland press, which was an afternoon paper.
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  SPEAKER_00: And now the press is long gone.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the,
• 14:03
  you know the plane dealer is a shadow i think maybe it
• 14:05
  publishes in print three
• 14:06
  days a week um here in boston i i can remember when the boston
• 14:14
  globe sunday
• 14:16
  circulation at a time when it was all circulation was all in
• 14:21
  paper was over 800
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: 000.
• 14:27
  now i maybe you know 250 000 in paper i i you know don't hold
• 14:32
  me to the numbers no
• 14:33
  no but instead it's all the all the um inertia you know all the
• 14:40
  the momentum is
• 14:40
  what i'm looking for all the momentum has moved to digital and
• 14:44
  all the push is to
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: you know
• 14:47
  sign up subscribers to get the newspaper the way that you get
• 14:51
  newspapers which is
• 14:52
  online so like you of course i read a tremendous amount you
• 14:56
  know on the internet
• 14:57
  and on and it comes to me digitally but i'm you know i'm still
• 15:02
  among the dinosaurs
• 15:03
  again that which it is not necessary to change it is necessary
• 15:07
  not to change i like
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: actually having uh the paper in print and to this day silly as it sounds
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: If I don't see my column,
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: if I can't get a tear sheet of my column,
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: even if I know that it was in the paper.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Did it happen?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Is it real?
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: It feels like it wasn't real.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Charles Krauthammer felt exactly the same way.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: He and I discussed that.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: Jeff, for a long time, I got a mixture of mail.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I got mail through the U.S.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: Postal Service, but emails in particular were
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: you know, positive and negative.
• 15:46
  When comments came in online,
• 15:50
  the negative mail stopped almost completely.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: And the emails were mainly, not all, but mainly Valentines.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then comment sections, there was just bile, just nasty stuff.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: I wonder, do you think comment sections are a good idea?
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: I myself think people ought to write letters to the editor.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: I, I've thought about this a lot, written about it a few times.
• 16:18
  I want to sort of column addressing the question of what it has
• 16:22
  been like to be a
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: columnist during the era when America went from the old style to digital.
• 16:30
  And as with so many things,
• 16:32
  in some ways things got better and in many ways things got
• 16:35
  worse.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: I,
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: I can understand why online publications provide the comment forum,
• 16:48
  but I don't think that on that they're adding a whole lot of
• 16:50
  value to the American
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_00: civic discourse.
• 16:54
  As you suggest,
• 16:56
  so much of what shows up in these comment forums is,
• 16:58
  it's just vile.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: They're cesspools.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: I rarely, if ever, look at the comment sections under my column
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: I don't fault anybody who enjoys him,
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: but from one of my sisters,
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: for example,
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: I've got four siblings,
• 17:15
  and one of my sisters loves reading the comment section of the
• 17:18
  Boston Globe because
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: she gets a kick out of seeing her big brother,
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: of seeing the ways in which her big brother will be insulted today.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: And what never ceases to amaze her is how...
• 17:28
  things that that i put in a column that she'll she'll be
• 17:32
  reading the column and
• 17:33
  thinking how is anybody going to find anything to criticize
• 17:36
  about that and then you
• 17:38
  know sure enough the you know the regular haters are there i i
• 17:43
  just i don't see
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: that adds a whole lot you know you when i began um it was before
• 17:48
  Before there was an online Boston Globe and online comment
• 17:52
  sections and all the
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: rest of it,
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: the internet age was just getting underway.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: And very quickly,
• 17:57
  the mail that was addressed to me came to outnumber mail coming
• 18:03
  in addressed to
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: every other columnist at the paper.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: And for a while,
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: in fact,
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: the bio that they had of me at the Boston Globe said something like,
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: he gets more mail than all the other columnists combined,
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: which
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it says a couple of things.
• 18:16
  One is that I was giving people stuff to comment on that they
• 18:19
  weren't seeing
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: elsewhere in the paper,
• 18:23
  but also that ideas that people aren't used to hearing can
• 18:27
  provoke reaction.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: But here's the great difference.
• 18:31
  When someone wanted to write a letter in response to a column
• 18:34
  that I'd written,
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: In those days,
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: they first had to get out the piece of paper,
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: they had to write or type the comment,
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: they had to find the address,
• 18:44
  go to the section at the bottom of the paper and look for the
• 18:46
  address to mail it,
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: put it in the envelope,
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: put a stamp on it,
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: drop it in the mailbox,
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: and at every step of the way,
• 18:56
  a better angel of their nature could have said,
• 18:59
  wait,
• 19:00
  do you really want to be doing this?
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: So that the mail that I got was for the most part,
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: at least within the broad mainstream of civil discourse.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: Jeff,
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: I was thinking,
• 19:12
  knowing that I was going to talk with you about some of the
• 19:16
  issues that affect me
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: most.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: And by effect, I mean that an issue that gnaws at me
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: that commands my attention and so on.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, there's so much going on in the world.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people see threats to democracy here at home.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: I see such threats myself,
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: but I have certainly since the full-scale invasion,
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: even before,
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: but definitely since the full-scale invasion in February,
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: 2022,
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've been affected by, consumed with the Ukraine war.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: And what especially,
• 19:56
  it's never stopped bothering me is so much sympathy or an
• 20:00
  admiration of Putin in
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: free countries,
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: including our own,
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: including by Republicans,
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: people in our former party,
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: And really, I think you and I joined a freedom party.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: Not perfect, but by and large, a freedom party.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: A party to which freedom was essential.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: I think that...
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: Who has just spoken?
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: I think Charles Moore was talking with someone in England.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: He was talking about Thatcher.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: He said, you know, our cause was freedom, basically.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: So this is what,
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: there are lots of things to be concerned about,
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: the whole range,
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: a hundred on a given day.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: But that might be my number one.
• 20:51
  And I'd like to hear your thoughts,
• 20:54
  whatever you'd like to say in relation to this.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: I share your horror at what Putin and Russia have been allowed to do.
• 21:10
  I share especially your horror at how so many Americans who not
• 21:16
  that long ago would
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: have been at the forefront of those denouncing
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: the invader from Moscow, now seem to think that he is someone admirable.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_00: I can't help but connect some of that shift of opinion
• 21:38
  to the president of the United States who has had countless
• 21:43
  opportunities and seems
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: to have taken them all to sing Putin's praises.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I constantly warn my friends who think the world of Donald Trump,
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: look at these examples of how he has radically flipped position.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you think that what he says today
• 21:59
  which is so different from what he said yesterday,
• 22:02
  is going to be what he'll say next week.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: The 146th Psalm says,
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: don't place your trust in princes,
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: which to my mind is the Bible's way of saying,
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: don't trust politicians.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: But so many people can't seem to resist.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: They fall in love with a politician.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: And whichever way that politician moves,
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: they follow,
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: which is a circular way of coming back to your point.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder, maybe somebody has done some polling on this question.
• 22:32
  As Trump and Trump supporters began talking more and more about
• 22:39
  how evil Ukraine was and how...
• 22:43
  uh how much uh that they admired vladimir putin and and the the
• 22:49
  righteousness and
• 22:51
  all the rest of it so so many republican rank and file
• 22:53
  republicans for whom party
• 22:56
  mattered more than principle apparently and for whom staying in
• 23:01
  lockstep with
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: donald trump uh
• 23:04
  mattered more than staying in lockstep with their values of
• 23:08
  freedom,
• 23:09
  followed him.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm just wondering,
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: maybe you know,
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: in the last few weeks,
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: as Trump seems to be sending a very different message,
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: have those Republicans changed?
• 23:20
  Or has he permanently changed the thinking within the
• 23:26
  Republican Party so that no
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: matter what he does now,
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: it will never again be a party that defends
• 23:35
  countries that are leaning toward democracy and want to join
• 23:38
  the West and want to
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: be part of Europe and are under threat from a
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: bullying dictator nearby.
• 23:46
  I don't know,
• 23:47
  I see these things and I think of Neville Chamberlain in 1938.
• 23:53
  How horrible,
• 23:54
  fantastic and awful it is,
• 23:56
  he said during the Sudetenland crisis.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: That we should be contemplating,
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: I don't remember the exact quote,
• 24:03
  but that we should be contemplating war in a far off land
• 24:08
  because of a dispute
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: between people of whom we know nothing.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: A quarrel, yeah.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: which was, you know, the Czechoslovak.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: And he was a good man, by the way, who quickly repented.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: It was nothing like our incumbent president.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: But that sentiment so often seems to crop up.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I hear from Americans all the time, what do I care what's going on?
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: J.D.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: Vance,
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: frankly,
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: he said when he was running for senator from Ohio,
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: I don't give a damn what happens in Ukraine.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: That was an honest statement.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: Jeff, here at the end, I have maybe... How much time do we have, Jay?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Because I've got a music question that I want to... Oh, lay it on me.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: Lay it on me.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know massive amounts about music that I can never hope to understand.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: But something I've always wondered,
• 24:59
  and reading your recent pieces from Salzburg and Riew in Vienna
• 25:04
  recently as well,
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: interviewing some of the opera singers,
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: I always wonder,
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: when I...
• 25:12
  if i hear a some operatic music whose language i don't
• 25:17
  understand but whose melody
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: i think is very beautiful and then i go and look up the words and put the
• 25:24
  translation next to the lyrics and there seems to be no
• 25:27
  connection whatsoever at
• 25:29
  least in my ignorant opinion no connection whatsoever between
• 25:32
  the emotion being
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: generated by the music and
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: and the actual phrases that that music is being put to.
• 25:42
  So I just wonder,
• 25:43
  in the world of opera,
• 25:45
  are lyrics merely a vehicle to carry the music?
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't really make a difference whether Pavarotti is singing,
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: in Italian,
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: of course,
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: with a beautiful voice,
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: if he's singing an advertising jingle for,
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: for a right guard deodorant,
• 26:06
  Or do people who care about opera,
• 26:10
  would they say,
• 26:10
  no,
• 26:11
  no,
• 26:11
  no,
• 26:11
  absolutely.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: The meaning of the words is,
• 26:14
  you can't really understand why the opera is so great if you
• 26:19
  don't know what the
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: words that are being sung meant.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: That might be a stupid question.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: Far from being a stupid question, it's a fundamental question.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: And one that has been pondered and discussed for centuries.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: There's an old debate, prima la musica o prima la parola?
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: Does the music come first or the word or the words?
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: And in much Baroque opera and much bel canto opera,
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: the word seems sort of a mere vehicle for music, right?
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: That music is primary.
• 26:57
  Sometimes characters sing of terrible things,
• 27:01
  terrible,
• 27:01
  tragic,
• 27:02
  violent,
• 27:02
  awful things.
• 27:04
  The music doesn't necessarily reflect or reflects it in only
• 27:07
  subtle ways,
• 27:08
  right?
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: Later, as music, including opera, developed,
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: I would say that there was a closer relationship between the libretto,
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: the story,
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: the text,
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: and the music.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: A tighter marriage between the two.
• 27:26
  Well,
• 27:27
  I think you can,
• 27:28
  in Mozart operas,
• 27:31
  certainly in Beethoven and his one opera,
• 27:33
  Fidelio,
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: Giuseppe Verdi, Wagner, and 20th century opera.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: You don't hear,
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: it'd be very rare to hear sort of light,
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: happy music when the words are very dark.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have a favorite opera?
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: No,
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: but,
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: but I don't,
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_01: I have about 30,
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: but I don't duck the question because,
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: one is a bore when one ducks the,
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: the question.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: So I, or a party pooper, um,
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: Not a good sport.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: Not a good sport.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: For someone like me who doesn't know that,
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: what are the ones that you would send me to listen to?
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's a different question.
• 28:16
  I can't answer that word,
• 28:16
  but gun to my head,
• 28:20
  I blurred out Fidelio by Beethoven.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's a very libertarian pro-freedom theme.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: A, it's Beethoven.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Start with that.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: B, it's one of the greatest peons to political freedom in art.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: C, it's one of the greatest peons to marital love in art.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: Marital love is usually not celebrated in art.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_01: Other kinds of love are, including illicit love.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_01: Marital love, no, it's boring.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: But this is a great peon to marital love.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: And Beethoven himself wasn't married.
• 28:56
  It was maybe the great sadness of his life,
• 28:58
  but he respected it a great deal.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a wonderful,
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: wonderful opera,
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: which Beethoven worked very hard on,
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: which he struggled with.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: He wrote, I think, at least four overtures to it.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: But I love it.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: And operas for the sort of beginning operas,
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: Hansel and Gretel by Engelbert Humperdinck,
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: at least excerpts from Carmen by Bizet,
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: La Boheme by Puccini.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: They never disappoint.
• 29:29
  And our own great national opera,
• 29:31
  in my opinion,
• 29:31
  Porgy and Bess by George Gershwin.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: Since I have deftly switched this around so that I'm interviewing you,
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: you mentioned marital love.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: in a few months, my 30th wedding anniversary is coming up.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: I'm all in favor of marital love and long lasting marital love with that.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm also,
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: I've been thinking about it a lot in the last few days,
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: not just because,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_00: our milestone is coming up,
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: but I am reading,
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: currently reading Ron Chernow's new biography of Mark Twain,
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: which I recommend enthusiastically.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: Not only, Chernow was one of the great biographers of our time and
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: Hamilton, John D. Rockefeller.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: His biography of Grant was phenomenal.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I am amazed.
• 30:23
  Things that you never know until you read a historian's deep
• 30:28
  dive into it.
• 30:30
  Mark Twain was a very complicated person,
• 30:32
  and there's a lot in his life that you and I would
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: you know, would raise our eyebrows at it, if nothing else.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_00: But he was passionately in love with his wife and his...
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: All of their married life together until she died,
• 30:47
  and she died actually this morning as I got to the page that I
• 30:50
  was telling him up
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: to.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: So it's particularly in my mind.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: He was just...
• 30:55
  crushed by by the lost and this supreme american cynic he's
• 31:02
  often thought of as a
• 31:02
  humorist but he was really the great cynic of american letters
• 31:06
  that you know one of
• 31:06
  the greatest uh was never cynical about his own marriage he was
• 31:11
  devoted to his wife
• 31:12
  so anyway i i've just been thinking about that and and the book
• 31:15
  is great and i just
• 31:16
  want to ask you um is there something great that you've been
• 31:19
  you know that you've
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: that you're reading now or that you would uh
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_00: urge me and our listeners to read it.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: We might not have gotten to yet.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: Have you read Stefan Zweig's great memoirs, The World of Yesterday?
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: I have not.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: I know the name.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: We often write about him, but I've never read anything that he's written.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: Pardon the cliche, but it's all there.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_01: What's going on now?
• 31:47
  Throughout the world,
• 31:48
  there's just so much life and death and beauty and horror in
• 31:54
  that book.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: Stefan Zweig, Stefan Zweig, The World of Yesterday.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: I read it in about three sittings.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't put it down.
• 32:06
  Jeff,
• 32:06
  I've got about two minutes here,
• 32:08
  and I wonder if here at the end I have a request.
• 32:11
  Would you mind telling the story of your visit to Auschwitz
• 32:15
  with your father and
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: the sound of children's laughter?
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I know that that is one of the best stories I know about anything.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: My father was born in what is today Slovakia, and
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: into a Jewish family, a very poor rural Jewish family.
• 32:39
  And his part of Slovakia was the part that was sliced by Hitler
• 32:43
  and handed to
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: Hungary in the years leading up to World War II.
• 32:48
  And so it was in early 1944 that my father and his family were
• 32:53
  rounded up by the
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: Nazis and sent to Auschwitz.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: I've written about my father's experience as many times.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: My father had a profound influence on
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: my values, my belief, my understanding of the world.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: In 1945,
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: my father was the only member of his family still alive,
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: of all those who had gone into Auschwitz 13 months earlier.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: My father came to this country in 1948 and I grew up,
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: as I said before,
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: grew up the son of an immigrant and
• 33:30
  the awareness of the Holocaust and what it had done and what
• 33:33
  anti-Semitism could lead to.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: I could talk about that for hours.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: In 1997,
• 33:39
  my father and mother and two of my sisters and I went on a trip
• 33:44
  to Eastern Europe,
• 33:46
  primarily to go to the parts of Eastern Europe that had played
• 33:49
  a role in my
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: father's early life.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: So we went to Slovakia,
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: we went to the village that he had come from,
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: we went to Poland,
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: and among other places,
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: we went to Auschwitz.
• 34:01
  You can imagine how moving and jolting and vivid and grim the
• 34:06
  whole experience was.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it was my first time there.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: I've since been back another time.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I was so overwhelmed by what I was standing in the midst of.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: Everything that I had for decades had read about and learned about.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: and the evil that it represented that I was aware of.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: And to know that so many of my close family members had been murdered,
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_00: incinerated,
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: turned into smoke there,
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: it weighed on me very heavily.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: And as we were walking through one afternoon,
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: all of a sudden there was this great clamor of noise.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I saw that there were a bunch of
• 34:52
  jewish kids i guess israeli kids maybe who are on one of these
• 34:56
  um you know they
• 34:57
  call like life march of the living tours they take jewish kids
• 35:03
  israeli kids to
• 35:03
  auschwitz to see it for themselves and they were you know some
• 35:06
  of them were waving
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: israeli flags or they were uh uh you know i don't know maybe uh
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: They were behaving like kids.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: They were cheerful.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: They were laughing.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: They were playing.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: They were doing what you would expect high school kids to be doing.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: And my first reaction was just one of outrage.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: How dare you act this way?
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: You're standing in the midst of the largest Jewish place of death ever.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_00: This is the largest Jewish cemetery in history.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: And you're laughing and you're playing and you're,
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: don't you understand what all of this means?
• 35:42
  and then like a switch was suddenly turned in my mind and i and
• 35:46
  my view completely
• 35:47
  changed on the spot and i said to my father who was always sort
• 35:53
  of placid about
• 35:53
  things he didn't he didn't react the way i had he didn't react
• 35:56
  really very much at
• 35:56
  all but i said to him dad what do you think would be more uh
• 36:04
  who would be more
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_00: offended by by the way these kids are are behaving
• 36:09
  your mother who was gassed to death here and you know was
• 36:13
  looking down from heaven
• 36:14
  and sees these kids behaving this way or who was responsible
• 36:23
  for all the you know
• 36:24
  the the murder of jews that were the the and the point that you
• 36:28
  know had so quickly
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: crystallized in my mind is
• 36:32
  kids behaving like kids and singing and dancing and playing and
• 36:36
  joking around with
• 36:36
  each other at what was then 60 or 70 years after the operation
• 36:43
  of the gas chambers
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: at Auschwitz.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_00: What a triumph for the Jewish people.
• 36:50
  What a defeat for Adolf Hitler and for Adolf Eichmann and for
• 36:54
  Heinrich Himmler.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I've
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: I carry the fundamental lesson of that with me always,
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: even amid all the horror that we've seen over the past two years.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_00: Do what you can to try to murder the Jews.
• 37:11
  Invade their peaceful homes on October 7 and rape and burn and
• 37:16
  murder and take them hostage.
• 37:19
  Go on YouTube and record these videos about how all the Jews
• 37:22
  need to be wiped out.
• 37:23
  Send me emails all the time when I write about Israel and the
• 37:27
  Middle East and
• 37:28
  antisemitism and tell me that Jews like me are the problem with
• 37:31
  the world.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: Do all of it.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: The one thing I can guarantee you is that a century from now,
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Jews are still going to be here.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: 500 years from now, Jews are going to be here.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: I've never yet been to Rome.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: I hope it's a trip that I would like to take.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to go and look at the art of Titus,
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: showing the dispoliation of the temple in Jerusalem 2000 years ago,
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_00: when Rome was the mightiest force in the world,
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_00: in the political world.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: And you see the very artifacts of the holiest artifacts in Jewish life,
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: the menorah from the temple,
• 38:10
  all being carried off into plunder and the notion clearly
• 38:16
  believed by all the
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: people who built that.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: built that arch and who destroyed Judea.
• 38:24
  Judea Capta was written on the back of a coin that was minted
• 38:28
  by the Roman Empire.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_00: Judaism is gone, it's over, the Jews are finished.
• 38:33
  And here we are 2000 years later and the Jews are very much
• 38:36
  here and Roman Empire isn't.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that is just a theme that I think will,
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's been awful,
• 38:44
  especially for those of us who have been touched by what Jew
• 38:47
  hatred can lead to.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: Mark Klein actually famously said,
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: all the great umpires of the world,
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: the Egyptians,
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_00: the Babylonians,
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_00: the Persians,
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_00: the Sumerians,
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_00: the Hittites,
• 39:01
  The Jews saw them all rise and fade away,
• 39:05
  and all of them are gone,
• 39:06
  and the Jew was still here.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: As you know,
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: Jay,
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a religious person,
• 39:10
  and I think that this is not just the normal workings of the
• 39:16
  mere coincidences of
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: the laws of history.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think that there's something...
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_00: something more than that.
• 39:25
  And as awful as it can be sometimes in a world where the hatred
• 39:29
  of Jews can erupt
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: and surge as it has over the past couple years,
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: especially in this country,
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: there's one promise that I have
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_00: that I believe will never be withdrawn or broken,
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: which is that the Jewish people will not be destroyed.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um,
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_00: and for,
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: for those Jews and Christians,
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: and for that matter,
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_00: Muslims who,
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: who look to the,
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: um,
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: to God's message to Abraham 4,000 years ago,
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: uh,
• 40:00
  it's it's it's powerful and it's i find it very hard that
• 40:03
  people can can look at
• 40:03
  the history of jews over these last four millennia and think
• 40:06
  hey you know nothing
• 40:08
  nothing nothing particularly meaningful about that it's just
• 40:10
  just the way it the
• 40:12
  way it worked out it's never been like this for any other
• 40:15
  people and so i wish i
• 40:18
  could have had grandparents you know i wish i could have had
• 40:20
  aunts and uncles on my
• 40:21
  father's side i wish i could have had you know all the cousins
• 40:25
  that i didn't have
• 40:26
  But one thing I do know,
• 40:27
  I might be part of one of the tiniest populations in the world.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_00: Jews are, what are Jews?
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_00: Two-tenths of one percent of the human race.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, next to nothing.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: And yet,
• 40:42
  the influence that the Jews and Judaism and the teachings of
• 40:47
  the Jewish faith have
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: had on our civilization,
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: who could add them all up?
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: And
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 40:57
  we'll talk again a century from now and Jews will still be here
• 41:01
  no matter what
• 41:01
  Hamas wants and no matter what the anti-Semites that are making
• 41:05
  so much noise now
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: are looking forward to.
• 41:08
  So,
• 41:08
  you know,
• 41:09
  Candace Owen,
• 41:10
  do your worst and Nick Fuentes,
• 41:12
  do your worst.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: Tucker Carlson,
• 41:17
  put people on your show who think that the Holocaust was
• 41:20
  nothing terribly serious.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: Do all of it.
• 41:23
  You're only following the footsteps of people who have
• 41:26
  expressed those views for
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: thousands of years,
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_00: and they're gone,
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_00: and my people are still here.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_00: Probably more than you want from here, huh?
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: Not at all.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_01: Ladies and gentlemen, I'm Jay Nordlinger.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: For Q&A, we've been listening to Jeff Jacoby,
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: of the Boston Globe.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: Find him at jeffjacoby.com.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks a million, Jeff, and God bless you, and I'll see you later.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_00: Great pleasure.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Jeff.