Top 10 Besides The Revolution Videos From The Kennedy Campaign
In the spirit of the New Year and all the lists that are generated, I thought you might appreciate a top 10 list of videos that were created during the campaign and a little history with each.
2024 was a wild adventure for me. I had never been involved in politics, but the Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Campaign stirred something in me. I want a better America for my children, and I’m tired of sitting on the sidelines, hoping someone else will do it. I started in September with a short 3-minute video that caught the attention of the campaign. Obviously, much has changed since this was written, but it captured the sentiments for my support of RFK Jr. Jack, and I have made a commitment that we are not going to go back and correct things or take videos or articles down that might be inconvenient to a position of advocacy or to a candidate. These are the stories that happened in real time, and they should be preserved to help contextualize the history of that moment. The videos presented have nothing to do with the number of likes or re-posts, these are simply the ones that had the most meaning to me as their creator.
This post is free to all subscribers because I wanted these videos to be in the public conversation. Thank you to everyone who has signed up with us. We are so thankful for every subscriber.
10. Trump’s Legendary Instincts
Not everything that I did was an outright advertisement for RFK Jr. In many cases, the videos were created to promote thought and provoke curiosity. One such video that remains a favorite was one about the personal tragedy of Thomas Jefferson and the loss of his wife. I produced this around the time that Mr. Kennedy’s family was attacking him for his independent run as president. I think politicians, and anyone in the public eye, deserve compassion and a remembrance that they are still humans, with very human experiences.
9. The Letter
I met Jack Buckby sometime along the way during the campaign. His book, The Truth Teller, was the inspiration for our podcast as well as the beginning of our friendship together. One of my favorite videos that we collaborated on was a piece that Jack had written called Kennedy and the Hope for A New High Noon. I thought it captured so much about the Empire moment in America, as well as a great historical context to the fading British Empire.
8. Guest Essay - Kennedy and the Hope for A New High Noon.
I had the chance to interview my four sons about their thoughts on politics and the RFK Jr. Campaign. This one is particularly sentimental to me because of their willingness to discuss complex issues and debate together with me about their thoughts on America and its current state.
7. My Four Sons
One of the great honors of the campaign was meeting Mr. Kennedy. The morning I woke up to an email requesting I meet him before a rally in Denver was one of those surreal times in life where you think, “How did this happen to me?” Mr. Kennedy didn’t need to have me come for the visit to secure my vote, which spoke so much to me. I don’t have money to move the needle in politics, and my contributions were small in comparison to others. But his willingness to converse with me and take an interest in my life spoke volumes to me about who he is and what kind of campaign he wanted to run.
6. Meeting Mr. Kennedy
As I have expressed often in my writing, my work has taken me further and further away from home, and so podcasts have become a good friend during long stints of windshield time. One particular podcast with Eric Weinstein gave clarity to a long-held struggle I had with my intellectual curiosities. During the entire campaign, I could never understand why some people were advocating for the blob-style government when it was so antithetical to the life of liberty and American political principles. Mr. Weinstein explained that it comes down to how each group defines democracy. It was a profound way to observe the current state of Washington.
5. Definitions of Democracy
One of my favorite moments of the campaign was when I had the chance to interview Nicole Shanahan. Our time together in discussion was lovely, and I found her to be an amazing voice of reason in a troublesome time. Her ability to discuss politics from the perspective of a warrior mother made her the best voice of the 2024 election season. I was so thankful for her voice and for taking the time out to talk with me.
4. Vice Presidential Candidate Nicole Shanahan
On a trip to Colonial Williamsburg in April of 2024, I heard the interpreter who plays Thomas Jefferson talk about the Greek word Eudaimonia. The interpreter, Curt Smith, believed that Mr. Jefferson replaced the pursuit of property from John Locke in the Declaration of Independence with the Pursuit of Happiness based upon the concept behind this word. It was the best explanation I had heard as to why Jefferson had substituted the word property with the now more famous phrase, happiness. By doing so, he elevated the conversations beyond economics and into the realm of the philosophical basis for a proposition nation.
3. Eudaimonia
This one was one of the first ones that Mr. Kennedy reposted, and it happens to be one of my favorites. Gen X Lament is about the state of our nation from a generation that simply gave up at times on the conversation because the pursuit felt too far to grab. The Boomer generation benefited tremendously from the post-war prosperity, but unfortunately, despite the promises of the system, it never trickled down to their children. My generation is the first one to not have the basic assumption available to them that we will be better off than our parents. That is a fundamental disruption to the American economic premise and Western Civilization’s core principle that the preceding generation has a duty to its heirs.
2. Gen X Lament
Finally, I feel like I saved the best for the last video in a series of 100. I had set out to write or produce 95 essays to match the Federalist papers. I exceeded that in the end with a flurry of writing and video content-making. This was my favorite personally because it captured so much of what had happened in the campaign. The ups and downs of the year made for a wild ride, but ultimately, one that had the best possible outcome in a system designed to award mediocrity. I wanted to see President Trump win expressly to see Mr. Kennedy get the chance he deserved for the health of our nation. I possess my own reasons that have impacted my family and motivated my desires to see him succeed - but more than anything, I never want an America that looks anything like the one we could have seen under another administrative state in a Harris presidency. I want the United States to move in a more liberty-minded direction, not in one that elevates authoritarian control over the individual.
1. Closing Argument
And an honorable mention, too. In the last days of the campaign, I was feeling the weight of the moment and the frustrations of how punitive the American system has become. The way that the self-inflicted prison works is that only good people play by the rules and are typically the only ones punished for their actions. I call it death by paper cut because the punishments are never all at once. Instead, they are daily inflictions of a regulated life that defeats the soul and crushes the spirit of innovation and liberty.