Iconoclasms Hot Takes: Reviews for My Reading List of Substack Pages, Part One

it's so easy to offer Critique

I’m beginning these reviews with the ones where I presently pay to subscribe. Tempted to do letter grading. But, nahh…

The Atlanta Objective, by George Chidi

As might be suspected, mostly about Atlanta; maybe Substack has a future replacing the disappeared local newspapers and local news sections of large city papers. I don’t live in Atlanta; I subscribed because Chidi writes well and doesn’t subscribe to a boilerplate agenda, and because the problems of “urban” zones pretty much resemble each other in many respects. The coverage of local elected officials and elections only interests me only to the extent that I can find all sorts of things interesting if I read in far enough, but what I signed up for is Chidi’s take on crime, “drugs & gangs”, and policing. Chidi is neither a blinkered Wokist passive-aggressive yutz or a knee-jerk “social conservative” punitive moralist reactionary; he’s a member of the reality-based community. As such, he deserves all the support he can get.

Ecstatic Integration, by Jules Evans

Candid reportage on the 21st century psychedelic renaissance that has picked up so much energy and news attention over the previous couple of decades. Posts often emphasize the hazards of psychedelic experimentation, whether for therapeutic purposes or otherwise. Evans claims to have his own lasting difficulties with the after-effects of journeys induced by powerful psychedelic subtances; somehow this isn’t preventing him from writing lucidly and humorously on the subject as a psychology grad student. Some people would call this “high functioning”, and I think it bodes well for his continuing healing journey. Time (coupled with abstention) is often the most aignificant healing factor for the type of difficulties he’s experiencing. I think he’s well on the road to recovery- and, as is the case with many experimenters with psychedelics who found themselves on a path more complicated than they had initially anticipated, Evans nonetheless finds significant lasting value and therapeutic benefits from using them. As such, his page is a valuable counterbalance to both ends of superficial news media attention on the subject, whether it consists gollygeewhiz pop-science takes or superstitious drug prohibitionist hysteria.

Numb At The Lodge, by Sam Kriss

I’m trying not to give more money to writers who already have plenty of it, but Kriss is just too good to not pay for a subscription. His travel writing is like Paul Theroux and P. J.O’Rourke combined, with extra erudition on top. I shouldn’t even like the guy, really; not only is he non-American, he’s an avowed Marixist with a concentration in Critical Theory…wha’? How can that be a system? But like I said, Kriss is too good to dismiss. I’ve delved into enough cultural anthro to realize that postmodernism has some valid nuggest of insight, if one can manage to excavate them from the jargon and the circumlocution. But almost everyone does po-mo so badly that I’ve taken to referring to the school of thought as faux-mo. Except for Kriss. And I can set aside his allegedly avowed allegiance to Marxism, especially since he takes it none too seriously, which is also one of the attributes that makes him unique. An overducated red-diaper British Jew, dropping Marxian theory- that should be a steep hurdle, especially for reflexively biased libertarian Ammurakins like myself. But, nah, he has his points, and he often makes them. He shoots, he scores, and all I can do is laugh out loud. I view it as part of my recover from fealty to Ideology (any of them.) If Kriss insists on residing in posh-Marxist fantasyland, so be it. Anyway, I can’t touch the books he’s read.

But Kriss’ arch Marxism is the least of his appeal as a writer, anyway. He does social satire like no one else I’ve read since Tom Wolfe; as if that wasn’t enough, he has a way of walking the reader from the naturalistic scenario to the imaginal realm that no one has been able to effectively accomplish since peak-era Hunter Thompson. Yet- he isn’t American! He doesn’t sound American! He writes British English! Aghh…

There are two living English-language writers I’ve found who consistently excel at long-form creative nonfiction; one is James Jeremiah Sullivan, and the other is Sam Kriss. It’s my favorite reading, and also the writing form that I aspire to master. As of now, I’m just a wannabe compared to either of them.

Racket News, by Matt Taibbi

For all of the pretension of my Substack page title, as far as iconoclasm goes, I have along way to go to catch Matt Taibbi. I’ve been reading Matt for who knows how long, ever since his tenure at Rolling Stone. Currently widely dismissed by Officially Approved Thought Leaders on passes for the left end of the dial in Respectable American Politics as a stealth right-winger and Trojan Horse for Donald Trump- although anyone who’s read books like Insane Clown Presidency and other volumes from the Taibbi ouevre knows that shit ain’t that simple. (Most Americans still demand that politics be Simple. If only.) If readers bother to dig a little deeper, they might just realize that Matt is on a mission to save the American liberal tradition from itself- including a Democratic Pary that’s currently foundering on its own contradictions. If enough epople wake up in time, the country might yet be saved. Often makes room for allies in that project- veteran journalist Walter Kirn in particular, but also dissidents like Glenn Greenwald and Michael Shellenberger- and even Joe Rogan, a news personality widely held to be even more radioactive than Matt, at least in the minds of the Right Left People. (Never have bothered to click on Rogan’s show. Not even once. How unhip is that? Even his haters have watched him in action. But news journalism is for print, in my opinion. I go to Youtube to watch great musical performances, like legendary guitarist Wes Montgomery juggling octaves on “Impressions.” Everything cannot be Politics!)

Seymour Hersh (eponymous)

The man is venerable. Having at this point been kicked off of all of the Legacy Media outlets he used to write for, Seymour Hersh is currently dropping Intelligence on a Substack page. Hersh is not a model of journalistic perfection; his chief flaw seems to be that he’s scoop-happy, and he’s been burned more than once by that eagerness to find the Big Story that shakes the corridors of Institutional Power. But- more importantly- he’s also found those stories, at various points in his extensive career as a muckraking investigative journalist. For whatever reason, most big-league reporters of national note don’t have even one such story in their archive of achievements. Sy Hersh found one as recently as last year, with his revelations about the US-aided Ukrainian sabotage of the Nordstream pipeline. Hersh has paid his dues, and he’s still earning his money.

The Upheaval, by N. S. Lyons

Thought-provoking big-picture nonfiction essay writing, by a guy who understand the necessity for checks, balances, and a working brake pedal to the temptations of 21st century Modernity. Sometimes his dystopian speculations get a little carried away; I’m of the mind that the evils to be grappled with are those of the present day. It’s one thing to think five moves ahead, and another to have a gloss that gets head of itself. Nonetheless valuable. Lyons has some comprehension of the shadow side of shiny happy futurism. That Shadow requires exposure, in order to debug the worst features of a future that’s often being passively accepted all too uncritically.

Freddie DeBoer (eponymous)

I’m currently givng DeBoer a break from my paid subscriptions; this is primarily due to my budget considerations, and at some point I expect to subscribe again. (No Substacker should view my lapsed paid subscription as dissatisfaction; I have to figure out ways to afford a heavier habit, that’s all.)

I don’t have much in common with Freddie’s atheist assumptions, his old-line Left politics, his cultural takes, or even his personal temperament; the guy can be sort of an Eeyore at times. But DeBoer is also a very good writer, and his takes are almost always warm, compassionate, personally courageous, and from the heart. I wish that heart wasn’t so heavy, and that his humor wasn’t so entirely mordant. (But much writing is entirely humorless.) I hope that at some point he realizes that it’s possible to lighten up without succumbing to Panglossian fatuity. Meanwhile, at his best, Freddie is capable of summoning the voice of honest outrage, and I commend that. His professional career as a writer and critic is well-earned.