Today, we confirm that Dispatch contributing editor Chris Stirewalt has indeed surpassed our gold jacket threshold while engaging in the rankest of punditry. Chris and Jonah discuss how Biden’s “poison pills” (Neera Tanden’s potential confirmation, a dogmatic insistence on a $15 minimum wage policy, et al) are quickly becoming … well, pills, simply put. While the administration continues to add progressive boxes to their checklist, Israel continues to speed ahead with vaccinations and, in the domestic realm, the lingering shadow of Trump still presents obstacles for the GOP. As a bonus, this episode should hopefully make up for the lack of a Ruminant last weekend, as the vocal similarities between Chris and Jonah make the whole thing sound like a gigantic monologue.

Show Notes:

-Chris’ page at The Dispatch

-The WKRP in Cincinnati theme

-The status of the U.S. vaccination rollout

-Israel’s vaccination strategy

-Fauci on normality and masking into 2022

-Jonah argued Biden should run a “return to normalcy” campaign before anyone else

-Brad Pascale: Trump would have won with a different approach to COVID

-Obama calling Bush “unpatriotic” for adding to the debt

-“Out, out, brief candle!”

-NYT: Biden should appoint a “reality czar”

-Will Chamberlain: “Platform Access is a Civil Right”

-Jonah’s college newspaper

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