The reactionary centrists made me listen to this.

I deeply enjoyed a recent listen on “reactionary centrism.” It was a podcast collaboration between the Volts Podcast and Newsletter’s David Roberts, one of the nation’s premier climate -related science, technology, business and policy reporters, and Michael Hobbes, whose “If Books Could Kill” debunking podcast is a must-have for anyone interested in a snarky, evidence-based take on how to avoid the herd mentality around the latest fad books. He has another popular podcast called “Maintenance Phase” that picks apart health fads too. 

Together they tackled the topic of “reactionary centrism,” the overwhelming instinct to turn to both-sidesism (“yes, Trump is cutting hundreds of millions from universities to force them to teach how he wants, but some random lefties no one has ever heard of were mean to someone on Twitter”) to the constant “the left made them do it” crap that comes from so many ostensibly “liberal” pundits. Their ability to capture vapidity masquerading as sophistication was, to put it mildly, refreshing. 

It’s a must-listen or, if you prefer, read. You can do both at the Volts website. I listened to it on my favorite podcast app (Overcast), but you can find it wherever you get your podcasts.