There is no “liberal Joe Rogan” because Joe Rogan is not a political commentator. His political leanings are a SYMPTOM, not a cause.
Really, I bet Rogan himself can be won back. I don’t know if people get how non-ideological that meathead really is. (He might be too “audience captured” at this point though, I dunno.)
What we need is for Rogan to piss off Trump somehow so that Trump goes off on him. That’s the kind of thing that moves guys like Rogan, many of whom did, genuinely, start voting Republican for no reason except a liberal being mean to them.
The liberal Joe Rogan has to be someone who also is not be a political commentator. That's the whole appeal. You need someone that when people call him a liberal, other people will say "well he's not really a _liberal_, he's just a guy who doesn't agree with a lot of what Republicans are doing", but will gently and consistently promote and talk about stuff that encourages people to hear our Democrat-friendly arguments, and to and to think Republicans are lame.
I will say that to whatever extent there could be a “liberal Joe Rogan” it’s Jimmy Kimmel. Rogan even took over for Kimmel when he left “The Man Show” on Comedy Central.
Kimmel doesn’t seem to move the needle much. Being stuck on a dead medium might be the problem. His ABC show has been on over 20 years, maybe it’s time for him to retire, start reading some squarespace ads, and maybe make more impact than he does now.
Anybody who replaces Rogan has to be a comedian FIRST.
Restricting things like doing your job or conducting your business in order to take an experimental medicine that was only mandated because it was sold as something it didn’t do (prevent the disease) is a little more than “being mean”. & when the government starts weighing on social media companies to restrict speech in a new & rapidly developing situation, that does tend to turn some people away from your overall cause too.
Well, semantics I guess. I don’t think you can take anybody over the age of 12 or so completely seriously when they describe somebody as “being mean.”
Anyway - you are implying that Rogan’s transition has more to do with Covid restrictions than “wokeness.” That’s not the impression I’ve gotten, but I’m not a listener. Would you say that was his prime motivator?
Yeah, fairly avid listener (& I’m one of those registered independents) since ‘11 or so…the woke thing played a part, for sure. But that was the self-inflicted wound the left performed on themselves in going after him: he’s pro-LGBTQ, not a racist, & not a misogynist. So you’ve got this macho kind-hearted guy & you excommunicate him from polite society because he wasn’t down 150% with fairly extreme & pretty new progressive viewpoints. Turns out he represented more of America than not on all that, why when presented with a binary choice & Kamala cast her lot with “‘hate speech’ isn’t free speech”, he being a Lenny Bruce/George Carlin free-speech absolutist felt he needed to take a chance on the rebel.
Yeah - I think Covid restrictions are a complicated thing, because while I understand how people felt imposed upon the restricts saved tens of thousands of lives (at least).
Remember that there were also people strongly in favor of restrictions who were just as frustrated by people who couldn't follow them, who they saw as worsening or extending the pandemic. Really, a lot of anger about how this or that group of people handled the pandemic is just an artifact of sadness that the pandemic happened at all. There was no winning for any of us there.
But I think your overall read of Rogan makes sense. It might actually be good for Democrats if they have their "white male" problem so well-represented by an individual who talks in a pretty unfiltered and nonpartisan way for 3-4 hours a week. We just need some people in the party to notice.
I think what "we need a liberal Rogan!" takes show, first and foremost, is that the person making the suggestion has never listened to Rogan. Brian makes the key point here which is that "liberal Rogan" is not a political host, he's somebody entertaining, non-judgmental and relatable to a large swathe of men, who talks about shit men like, 95% of which is not politics.
People who have established niches, like Bill Simmons with basketball, could be effective micro-messengers within those communities. But there's no alt-Pod-Save-Bros that are going to appeal to your average man on the street, it's gotta be something totally different.
Agreed! Quickly on the Covid thing, the majority of society Rogan (& Trump) included were on board about most of the restrictions at the beginning (especially during the worst variant). It was when the vaccine was sold as a panacea (& Rogan heard not only cases were still getting through, but some of his friends started having heart/circulation problems post-vaccine) was when he started being the “pariah” of the “we can vax our way out of it” crowd, which at that point even during a weaker strain the government & media were on the side of.
That was another self-own by the “liberal left”…Joe Rogan wasn’t anti-vax, he still said take it if you were old or vulnerable. But what he was really doing was kinda fighting for blue-collar workers (including truckers, police, & medical personnel) who were being thrown out of work & seen as poxes on society. So the powers that be decided he had to be brought down (I’m not conspiracy-minded but it was creepy). But they missed he’d become “the purple podcast”, the reasonable middle. So Elon convincing him about Trump meant that endorsement was a big deal (doesn’t make him a Republican, it makes him powerful enough to hold Trump accountable. Even Elon bent the knee).
It's worth remembering that the two worst variants were fully post-vaccine, and are the reason that the vaccine wasn't as sterilizing as was initially hoped.
Joe Rogan is heterodox. He has views that comport with either party identity, and has specifically been favorably disposed towards Bernie Sanders, Andrew Yang, and (gulp) Tulsi G when she was a "Democrat." He has said negative things about Trump over the years, including being critical of tariffs and antagonism of Canada.
I think this post also mischaracterizes the thrust of the effort to build up Democratic influence. I have met directly with organizers of these efforts. They are specifically *not* trying to create "the next Joe Rogan." They are trying to 1) empower existing voices popular with the base (the Brian T Cohen's you cite)), 2) identify influencers across various tech platforms and cultural areas (sports, food, health, etc.), 3) understand better what political "content" works best in these diffuse channels. Of those 3, the first one is the least important and smallest amount of funding.
Joe Rogan’s appeal stems, in large part, from the fact that he says and thinks what he wants. Heterodox, as others have said. He is his own man, mentally, physically, financially. Men may not always agree with Rogan but they respect him. He fits within the right wing galaxy presently because the right is really just a coalition of groups staunchly opposed to the progressive cultural and political project.
The discourse in the left is constantly subject to shifting trends and dogmas; what will move the project furthest at this juncture? It’s all about being attuned to your fellow travelers and not making a faux pas. You can’t be in good standing on the left if you publicly disagree with or even question certain elements. That sort of fealty/people-pleasing, borne out of a fear of being banished, does not appeal to many men.
The closest thing to Rogan on the left is Bill Maher, but most Democrats don’t want to hear that, because Maher won’t toe the line.
The problem is that most people with big followings (social media or otherwise) - people like musicians, actors/actresses and athletes - are already outspoken lefties and don't move the needle much at all (indeed, I think a lot of the celebrity endorsements are negatives for Democrats).
Simmons, BTW, is already a pretty outspoken Democrat. He's not going to persuade many people by becoming more outspoken.
I know this sounds elitist as fuck, but it’s the truth.
Joe Rogan appeals to young men who have yet to step up to maturity. There’s no Democratic equivalent because a certain degree of critical thinking is required to see the benefits of Democratic policies plus a willingness to sacrifice for the greater good. They haven’t developed that yet, and until they do, gimme-gimme Rogan appeals to them far more than “think of the children!”
Dems are chasing fireflies here. There’s never going to be a liberal Joe Rogan. That’s not how we access information.
It sounds less "elitist as fuck" than "lacking self-awareness about own-arrogance, blindness"
Snobbery and snide looking down the nose by the professional class at the working classes is quite old, and generally in broad Democracies, Political Death.
So while you doubtless feel quite Virtuous about your 'better' critical thinking etc. you show rather ... only a different form of lack of maturity, a more elite form.
What a goofy column. Rogan STILL promotes many liberal causes on his show. The fact you think the modern Republican Party is bizarre & contradictory is because it’s some Republicans but some Dems & some independents. I.e., the modern Dems represent 30% of the populace. & it’s weird you think a guy discussing the most interesting topics in-depth with actual experts for hours at a time is “anti-thought”. The only one that description applies to here is you and your read on JR.
Although he'd become a George W Bush booster and Iraq War fan shortly before he died. So. . . maybe not the guy we'd want to rally behind? He was trending the wrong way for sure.
He said Bush was the dumbest president and yes, he was always a fan of the Iraq War. He sounds like the perfect guy to rally behind, especially if conservatives are taking Rogan and Musk.
As I said once before, all this reminds me of the search for "The Next Elvis"--didn't happen, never will.
This is a complete waste of money and energy.
It is, in its own way, a lazy and feckless response to real problems like the Democratic Party refusal to do the hard work to develop a COHERENT, positive and humane immigration and border policy instead of constantly reacting weakly to awful Republican initiatives. (This does not mean 'open borders" or the like!)
All this money would be much better spent building up state parties and backing state legislature and court candidates who are authentic and not burdened with the reputations that might turn off low info voters.
DNC types and their consultants have ignored the imporance of state legislative politics for decades. It was a big flow of Obama and his crew.
Meanwhile the Republicans through groups like ALEC took over state after state, gerrymandered state and federal districts, packed state courts and otherwise built from the ground up much of the foundation for MAGA success (and excesses).
Dem policy has to have some real border controls and they have to be demonstrably effective to be credible. Achieving this is not easy, but the Dems have not even been trying to put together a comprehensive new approach: just stepping up certain aspects of the current system and adopting ad hoc remedies (DACA) when they can.
I’m afraid it’s not the podcaster, it’s the ideas. Democrats simply need to give up on trans men fighting women or permitting looting and drug use on the streets of LA. Give up on reparations for slavery and white shaming. These are the ideas that drive away so many people. Democrats need to stick to talking about money, healthcare, taxes, law, process, etc…I feel like it’s the ideological progressive push that people cannot accept.
Dave Portnoy? Voted for Trump but doesn’t like him, supports abortion rights, seems like he easily could be won back by the Dems if they were a bit more chill on culture war issues.
Not really? The meta-point the writer I’m not even sure is addressing is the hard left is ready to cancel anyone out of line still…& Israel for that youth vote is still a no-no. If the point is “we’re looking for dudes who don’t care about that shit”, the dudes who hear Dave thinks every offensive joke is fine except the Jewish ones, & hey maybe another foreign war is fine too: he’s not attracting any young guy with that. Dave’s had a podcast for a while, it’s gone nowhere. He even got in a boxing argument with Rogan on the show & showed he was out of his depth there too 🤷♂️
The goal of the article was to identify someone who is a) generally non-political in their content and b) has an audience of people who turned at least somewhat against the Dems in 2024 but c) has at least some Dem-leaning views that they might be able to layer into their content now and then to help influence the group in (b).
My contention is that Portnoy fits. The stuff you're saying about him potentially getting canceled is totally unrelated -- the point is that the left won't like this person but that's ok.
I vote for Redneck Liberal, Trey Crowder. Check him out.
Rogan is at least showing good righteous indignation about disappearing innocent people to prison hells in other countries, and trampling on fundamental Constitutional rights like due process.
So maybe, just maybe, he is beginning to see more value in democracy, the Constitution, facts, and human decency, than fascism, hate, corruption, lies and incompetence, - putting our Nation, people and the world in peril. OMG, does that mean he’s woke now? Joe, tell us it IS so.🤞🙏🇺🇸
You already have a liberal Joe Rogan. What you cannot have is a Progressive Joe Rogan because part of his appeal is that he listens to and engages with people he disagrees with. He is also willing to change his mind when presented with new information.
I've heard many people talk about the need for a liberal Joe Rogan, and I don't buy it. I think that concern comes from a "vibes" approach to politics; if you seem cool, this or that demographic will vote for you. I imagine that works to an extent, but I'm more confident that the fundamentals--economy, domestic unrest, scandal, foreign wars--are more determinative.
I also notice that whenever Democrats lose an election there is a national handwringing over what they need to do better, but when Republicans lose...well, nobody's on the hunt for a right-wing Oprah Winfrey.
The tide comes in, the tide goes out, and the forces behind that can't all be found on the beach.
Y’know, it just occurred to me: there already is a liberal Joe Rogan, and his name is *Malcolm Gladwell.*
That might sound a little hare-brained, but hear me out. If Joe Rogan is the “Fox News” of relatively apolitical, right-wing-adjacent podcasters, then Malcolm Gladwell is the [insert mainstream left-wing news outlet here: NYT, Washington Post, whatever] of relatively apolitical, left-wing-adjacent podcasters. And just as even the biggest left-wing news outlet commands only a fraction of the market share of Fox News, so too does Malcolm Gladwell (whose podcast and podcasting empire is huge) only command a fraction of the market share of Joe Rogan.
My point? Left-wing-adjacent media consumption is just too fractured to ever produce a liberal Joe Rogan, and this probably reflects something important about the psychology of left-wing-adjacent media consumers. Malcolm Gladwell is probably just about as successful as one can be in this media ecosystem, and so yeah, he already IS the liberal Joe Rogan.
(Or, to make my point a bit more clearly: the search for a liberal Joe Rogan is a pipe dream in that the psychologies of left-wing-media consumers is too fractured and fractious to ever unite into an audience whose size rivals that of Joe Rogan’s audience. The same forces that prevent MSNBC from being as big as Fox News prevent any relatively apolitical, left-wing-adjacent media figure from being as big as Joe Rogan.)
Yeah, I completely agree, but that’s kinda my point. I’m not saying that Malcolm Gladwell *should* be the liberal Joe Rogan; I’m saying he *is* that, or, rather, the closest thing that liberals could ever hope for given the current media landscape and the varying psychologies of their constituents.
Imagine dividing the electorate this way: 1. high-information liberals, 2. low-information liberal-leaners, 3. high-information conservatives, 4. low-information conservative-leaners.
I assume that Joe Rogan appeals to a good amount of people in groups 3 and 4, which is why he gets so many listeners. Is there anyone that could appeal to a good amount of people in group 1 *and* in group 2? … Probably not, and if anyone does, it’s probably gunna be someone like Malcolm Gladwell, an educated, social-science-y, bookish, pop-sci writer and storyteller (though I’m with you that he probably appeals more to group 1, than 2, though Malcolm Gladwell also has a bad reputation with a lot of very outspoken members of group 1 and so I *assume* that he also has some appeal to group 2).
Anyway, my point, on some level, is that groups 1 and 2 are too far apart from each other (and too internally varying and living in a far-too-saturated of media ecosystem) for anyone to command a market share, among these groups, that rivals that of JR.
Malcolm Gladwell is way too liberal-coded already. He appeals to high-education liberals and not many others. The reason you want a liberal Joe Rogan is to have someone who appeals to low-propensity and disengaged voters who could have gone either way.
There is no “liberal Joe Rogan” because Joe Rogan is not a political commentator. His political leanings are a SYMPTOM, not a cause.
Really, I bet Rogan himself can be won back. I don’t know if people get how non-ideological that meathead really is. (He might be too “audience captured” at this point though, I dunno.)
What we need is for Rogan to piss off Trump somehow so that Trump goes off on him. That’s the kind of thing that moves guys like Rogan, many of whom did, genuinely, start voting Republican for no reason except a liberal being mean to them.
The liberal Joe Rogan has to be someone who also is not be a political commentator. That's the whole appeal. You need someone that when people call him a liberal, other people will say "well he's not really a _liberal_, he's just a guy who doesn't agree with a lot of what Republicans are doing", but will gently and consistently promote and talk about stuff that encourages people to hear our Democrat-friendly arguments, and to and to think Republicans are lame.
Well put.
I will say that to whatever extent there could be a “liberal Joe Rogan” it’s Jimmy Kimmel. Rogan even took over for Kimmel when he left “The Man Show” on Comedy Central.
Kimmel doesn’t seem to move the needle much. Being stuck on a dead medium might be the problem. His ABC show has been on over 20 years, maybe it’s time for him to retire, start reading some squarespace ads, and maybe make more impact than he does now.
Anybody who replaces Rogan has to be a comedian FIRST.
Restricting things like doing your job or conducting your business in order to take an experimental medicine that was only mandated because it was sold as something it didn’t do (prevent the disease) is a little more than “being mean”. & when the government starts weighing on social media companies to restrict speech in a new & rapidly developing situation, that does tend to turn some people away from your overall cause too.
Well, semantics I guess. I don’t think you can take anybody over the age of 12 or so completely seriously when they describe somebody as “being mean.”
Anyway - you are implying that Rogan’s transition has more to do with Covid restrictions than “wokeness.” That’s not the impression I’ve gotten, but I’m not a listener. Would you say that was his prime motivator?
Yeah, fairly avid listener (& I’m one of those registered independents) since ‘11 or so…the woke thing played a part, for sure. But that was the self-inflicted wound the left performed on themselves in going after him: he’s pro-LGBTQ, not a racist, & not a misogynist. So you’ve got this macho kind-hearted guy & you excommunicate him from polite society because he wasn’t down 150% with fairly extreme & pretty new progressive viewpoints. Turns out he represented more of America than not on all that, why when presented with a binary choice & Kamala cast her lot with “‘hate speech’ isn’t free speech”, he being a Lenny Bruce/George Carlin free-speech absolutist felt he needed to take a chance on the rebel.
Yeah - I think Covid restrictions are a complicated thing, because while I understand how people felt imposed upon the restricts saved tens of thousands of lives (at least).
Remember that there were also people strongly in favor of restrictions who were just as frustrated by people who couldn't follow them, who they saw as worsening or extending the pandemic. Really, a lot of anger about how this or that group of people handled the pandemic is just an artifact of sadness that the pandemic happened at all. There was no winning for any of us there.
But I think your overall read of Rogan makes sense. It might actually be good for Democrats if they have their "white male" problem so well-represented by an individual who talks in a pretty unfiltered and nonpartisan way for 3-4 hours a week. We just need some people in the party to notice.
I think what "we need a liberal Rogan!" takes show, first and foremost, is that the person making the suggestion has never listened to Rogan. Brian makes the key point here which is that "liberal Rogan" is not a political host, he's somebody entertaining, non-judgmental and relatable to a large swathe of men, who talks about shit men like, 95% of which is not politics.
People who have established niches, like Bill Simmons with basketball, could be effective micro-messengers within those communities. But there's no alt-Pod-Save-Bros that are going to appeal to your average man on the street, it's gotta be something totally different.
Agreed! Quickly on the Covid thing, the majority of society Rogan (& Trump) included were on board about most of the restrictions at the beginning (especially during the worst variant). It was when the vaccine was sold as a panacea (& Rogan heard not only cases were still getting through, but some of his friends started having heart/circulation problems post-vaccine) was when he started being the “pariah” of the “we can vax our way out of it” crowd, which at that point even during a weaker strain the government & media were on the side of.
That was another self-own by the “liberal left”…Joe Rogan wasn’t anti-vax, he still said take it if you were old or vulnerable. But what he was really doing was kinda fighting for blue-collar workers (including truckers, police, & medical personnel) who were being thrown out of work & seen as poxes on society. So the powers that be decided he had to be brought down (I’m not conspiracy-minded but it was creepy). But they missed he’d become “the purple podcast”, the reasonable middle. So Elon convincing him about Trump meant that endorsement was a big deal (doesn’t make him a Republican, it makes him powerful enough to hold Trump accountable. Even Elon bent the knee).
It's worth remembering that the two worst variants were fully post-vaccine, and are the reason that the vaccine wasn't as sterilizing as was initially hoped.
The best liberal Joe Rogan is Joe Rogan.
Joe Rogan is heterodox. He has views that comport with either party identity, and has specifically been favorably disposed towards Bernie Sanders, Andrew Yang, and (gulp) Tulsi G when she was a "Democrat." He has said negative things about Trump over the years, including being critical of tariffs and antagonism of Canada.
I think this post also mischaracterizes the thrust of the effort to build up Democratic influence. I have met directly with organizers of these efforts. They are specifically *not* trying to create "the next Joe Rogan." They are trying to 1) empower existing voices popular with the base (the Brian T Cohen's you cite)), 2) identify influencers across various tech platforms and cultural areas (sports, food, health, etc.), 3) understand better what political "content" works best in these diffuse channels. Of those 3, the first one is the least important and smallest amount of funding.
You seem to have left off Bill Burr for some reason, which could have saved you the time of writing the rest of the list
Where's George Carlin, when you need him?
Joe Rogan’s appeal stems, in large part, from the fact that he says and thinks what he wants. Heterodox, as others have said. He is his own man, mentally, physically, financially. Men may not always agree with Rogan but they respect him. He fits within the right wing galaxy presently because the right is really just a coalition of groups staunchly opposed to the progressive cultural and political project.
The discourse in the left is constantly subject to shifting trends and dogmas; what will move the project furthest at this juncture? It’s all about being attuned to your fellow travelers and not making a faux pas. You can’t be in good standing on the left if you publicly disagree with or even question certain elements. That sort of fealty/people-pleasing, borne out of a fear of being banished, does not appeal to many men.
The closest thing to Rogan on the left is Bill Maher, but most Democrats don’t want to hear that, because Maher won’t toe the line.
100% agree.
Mr. Beast? Mark Rober? Kelce bros?
The problem is that most people with big followings (social media or otherwise) - people like musicians, actors/actresses and athletes - are already outspoken lefties and don't move the needle much at all (indeed, I think a lot of the celebrity endorsements are negatives for Democrats).
Simmons, BTW, is already a pretty outspoken Democrat. He's not going to persuade many people by becoming more outspoken.
I know this sounds elitist as fuck, but it’s the truth.
Joe Rogan appeals to young men who have yet to step up to maturity. There’s no Democratic equivalent because a certain degree of critical thinking is required to see the benefits of Democratic policies plus a willingness to sacrifice for the greater good. They haven’t developed that yet, and until they do, gimme-gimme Rogan appeals to them far more than “think of the children!”
Dems are chasing fireflies here. There’s never going to be a liberal Joe Rogan. That’s not how we access information.
It sounds less "elitist as fuck" than "lacking self-awareness about own-arrogance, blindness"
Snobbery and snide looking down the nose by the professional class at the working classes is quite old, and generally in broad Democracies, Political Death.
So while you doubtless feel quite Virtuous about your 'better' critical thinking etc. you show rather ... only a different form of lack of maturity, a more elite form.
What makes you think I'm not working class, shithead? I'm the kid from the trailer park, and you're cordially invited to suck my dick.
What you wrote, that's what.
Of course internet commentator warriors can say what they want, but snobbery is snobbery (even if we take the assertion, social climbing snobbery)
As part of the working class, I’m entitled to view them however I please. Think of it like how Black folks get to say the N-word but we don’t.
People are "free" to be stupid and self-harming or just completely ineffective as much as they want.
Others are free equally to tell them they're obtuse idiots.
And internet commentariat do love Drama Llamadom.
I believe I’m in that “free equally” group.
But for some reason, telling you to fuck off doesn’t seem to be working, because you’re still here. Is this that “obtuse” stuff you mentioned earlier?
What a goofy column. Rogan STILL promotes many liberal causes on his show. The fact you think the modern Republican Party is bizarre & contradictory is because it’s some Republicans but some Dems & some independents. I.e., the modern Dems represent 30% of the populace. & it’s weird you think a guy discussing the most interesting topics in-depth with actual experts for hours at a time is “anti-thought”. The only one that description applies to here is you and your read on JR.
His name was Christopher Hitchens and we lost him much too soon.
Although he'd become a George W Bush booster and Iraq War fan shortly before he died. So. . . maybe not the guy we'd want to rally behind? He was trending the wrong way for sure.
He said Bush was the dumbest president and yes, he was always a fan of the Iraq War. He sounds like the perfect guy to rally behind, especially if conservatives are taking Rogan and Musk.
As I said once before, all this reminds me of the search for "The Next Elvis"--didn't happen, never will.
This is a complete waste of money and energy.
It is, in its own way, a lazy and feckless response to real problems like the Democratic Party refusal to do the hard work to develop a COHERENT, positive and humane immigration and border policy instead of constantly reacting weakly to awful Republican initiatives. (This does not mean 'open borders" or the like!)
All this money would be much better spent building up state parties and backing state legislature and court candidates who are authentic and not burdened with the reputations that might turn off low info voters.
DNC types and their consultants have ignored the imporance of state legislative politics for decades. It was a big flow of Obama and his crew.
Meanwhile the Republicans through groups like ALEC took over state after state, gerrymandered state and federal districts, packed state courts and otherwise built from the ground up much of the foundation for MAGA success (and excesses).
Time to wake up.
When your policy preferences are indistinguishable from open borders, just saying that you don't want open borders remains unpersuasive.
Yes, that's right.
Dem policy has to have some real border controls and they have to be demonstrably effective to be credible. Achieving this is not easy, but the Dems have not even been trying to put together a comprehensive new approach: just stepping up certain aspects of the current system and adopting ad hoc remedies (DACA) when they can.
I’m afraid it’s not the podcaster, it’s the ideas. Democrats simply need to give up on trans men fighting women or permitting looting and drug use on the streets of LA. Give up on reparations for slavery and white shaming. These are the ideas that drive away so many people. Democrats need to stick to talking about money, healthcare, taxes, law, process, etc…I feel like it’s the ideological progressive push that people cannot accept.
you are mistaken; the democratic party line is that trans men should not compete in sports events against women. generally it is red states like texas which require that (see e.g. https://www.texastribune.org/2017/02/26/transgender-wrestler-mack-beggs-identifies-male-he-just-won-texas-stat/)
Dave Portnoy? Voted for Trump but doesn’t like him, supports abortion rights, seems like he easily could be won back by the Dems if they were a bit more chill on culture war issues.
Yet defends Israel to the death & has a million foibles in his past, 2 things for which he’d be canceled for after the first show.
I think you're missing the point.
Not really? The meta-point the writer I’m not even sure is addressing is the hard left is ready to cancel anyone out of line still…& Israel for that youth vote is still a no-no. If the point is “we’re looking for dudes who don’t care about that shit”, the dudes who hear Dave thinks every offensive joke is fine except the Jewish ones, & hey maybe another foreign war is fine too: he’s not attracting any young guy with that. Dave’s had a podcast for a while, it’s gone nowhere. He even got in a boxing argument with Rogan on the show & showed he was out of his depth there too 🤷♂️
The goal of the article was to identify someone who is a) generally non-political in their content and b) has an audience of people who turned at least somewhat against the Dems in 2024 but c) has at least some Dem-leaning views that they might be able to layer into their content now and then to help influence the group in (b).
My contention is that Portnoy fits. The stuff you're saying about him potentially getting canceled is totally unrelated -- the point is that the left won't like this person but that's ok.
I vote for Redneck Liberal, Trey Crowder. Check him out.
Rogan is at least showing good righteous indignation about disappearing innocent people to prison hells in other countries, and trampling on fundamental Constitutional rights like due process.
So maybe, just maybe, he is beginning to see more value in democracy, the Constitution, facts, and human decency, than fascism, hate, corruption, lies and incompetence, - putting our Nation, people and the world in peril. OMG, does that mean he’s woke now? Joe, tell us it IS so.🤞🙏🇺🇸
Yeah, I like Trae Crowder too.
👍Thanks for the diplomatic correction on the spelling of his name. Did you see Al Franken’s interview of him?
Nope, is it worth a watch? I had tickets to see him when he came to Seattle, but something came up and I had to give my ticket away
I thought so.
I’ll check it out
You already have a liberal Joe Rogan. What you cannot have is a Progressive Joe Rogan because part of his appeal is that he listens to and engages with people he disagrees with. He is also willing to change his mind when presented with new information.
I've heard many people talk about the need for a liberal Joe Rogan, and I don't buy it. I think that concern comes from a "vibes" approach to politics; if you seem cool, this or that demographic will vote for you. I imagine that works to an extent, but I'm more confident that the fundamentals--economy, domestic unrest, scandal, foreign wars--are more determinative.
I also notice that whenever Democrats lose an election there is a national handwringing over what they need to do better, but when Republicans lose...well, nobody's on the hunt for a right-wing Oprah Winfrey.
The tide comes in, the tide goes out, and the forces behind that can't all be found on the beach.
Y’know, it just occurred to me: there already is a liberal Joe Rogan, and his name is *Malcolm Gladwell.*
That might sound a little hare-brained, but hear me out. If Joe Rogan is the “Fox News” of relatively apolitical, right-wing-adjacent podcasters, then Malcolm Gladwell is the [insert mainstream left-wing news outlet here: NYT, Washington Post, whatever] of relatively apolitical, left-wing-adjacent podcasters. And just as even the biggest left-wing news outlet commands only a fraction of the market share of Fox News, so too does Malcolm Gladwell (whose podcast and podcasting empire is huge) only command a fraction of the market share of Joe Rogan.
My point? Left-wing-adjacent media consumption is just too fractured to ever produce a liberal Joe Rogan, and this probably reflects something important about the psychology of left-wing-adjacent media consumers. Malcolm Gladwell is probably just about as successful as one can be in this media ecosystem, and so yeah, he already IS the liberal Joe Rogan.
(Or, to make my point a bit more clearly: the search for a liberal Joe Rogan is a pipe dream in that the psychologies of left-wing-media consumers is too fractured and fractious to ever unite into an audience whose size rivals that of Joe Rogan’s audience. The same forces that prevent MSNBC from being as big as Fox News prevent any relatively apolitical, left-wing-adjacent media figure from being as big as Joe Rogan.)
Yeah, I completely agree, but that’s kinda my point. I’m not saying that Malcolm Gladwell *should* be the liberal Joe Rogan; I’m saying he *is* that, or, rather, the closest thing that liberals could ever hope for given the current media landscape and the varying psychologies of their constituents.
Imagine dividing the electorate this way: 1. high-information liberals, 2. low-information liberal-leaners, 3. high-information conservatives, 4. low-information conservative-leaners.
I assume that Joe Rogan appeals to a good amount of people in groups 3 and 4, which is why he gets so many listeners. Is there anyone that could appeal to a good amount of people in group 1 *and* in group 2? … Probably not, and if anyone does, it’s probably gunna be someone like Malcolm Gladwell, an educated, social-science-y, bookish, pop-sci writer and storyteller (though I’m with you that he probably appeals more to group 1, than 2, though Malcolm Gladwell also has a bad reputation with a lot of very outspoken members of group 1 and so I *assume* that he also has some appeal to group 2).
Anyway, my point, on some level, is that groups 1 and 2 are too far apart from each other (and too internally varying and living in a far-too-saturated of media ecosystem) for anyone to command a market share, among these groups, that rivals that of JR.
Malcolm Gladwell is way too liberal-coded already. He appeals to high-education liberals and not many others. The reason you want a liberal Joe Rogan is to have someone who appeals to low-propensity and disengaged voters who could have gone either way.