MONDAY: Wily Odysseus, now wracked with guilt!

MONDAY, JULY 27, 2026

Megyn Kelly unchained: We haven't seen "The Odyssey" yet. We'll probably go next weekend.  

Many commentators have said that, for better or worse, the Christopher Nolan modernizes the ancient culture out of which the Iliad and the Odyssey emerged. In a new critique for The Atlantic, Peter Wehner offers this:   

An Odyssey for Our Own Time 

[...] 

Part of what makes The Odyssey so appealing to a modern audience is that it takes civilizing aspects of Greek culture—hospitality and magnanimity—and adds later concepts, some of them influenced by Jewish and Christian ethics that were, to varying degrees, alien to ancient Greek culture: deep introspection, even confession; humility and empathy; sorrow and guilt for the harm one has done, even in victory; the conviction that the conquered count and have worth; and vengeance tempered with mercy. In the film, Odysseus emerges as a figure haunted by his victory [at Troy] in a way that no ancient Greek would have been.   

According to Wehner, the Odysseus of the ancient poem wasn't a man wracked with guilt. We'll return to that general characterization at some later point.

As he continues his critique, Wehner contemplates our own society's ongoing loss of some of "the more humane virtues" on display in the film:

Much of life in the ancient Greek world was harsh, even barbarous—mass executions in conquered cities, torture, the weak discarded at birth, chattel slavery—which is precisely why the Greek commitment to honor and hospitality was remarkable then and still resonates today. So, too, do the later, more humane virtues the film weaves in.

Those virtues are now under assault. Movements and voices in our own country hold them in open contempt, treat mercy as weakness, and feed on vengeance and grievance. Theirs is a Nietzschean ethic, a “master morality,” the code of the strong that Christianity overthrew when it took the side of the slave, the stranger, and the destitute.

[...]

The world that this ethic is creating is harsh and barren, raw and uninviting. It exists in the daily coarseness, in the anger and the ugliness, and in the isolation. There is a weariness in us, and a sadness, at what we have become...   

Wehner may have written that shortly after watching the White House Correspondents Dinner last Friday evening. Or shortly after reading some of the copy Megyn Kelly is now bringing forth on the podcast beat.  

All reports come from Mediaite. You'll have to assess them yourself:

Megyn Kelly Takes Aim At Ex-CNN Anchor For Writing About Her Sex Life—Falsely Claims the Ex-Anchor Said She Was ‘Banging Four Men in a Month’ 
(for full report, click here)

Megyn Kelly Melts Down in Bonkers Rant Against ‘Scripted and Artificial’ Michelle Obama
(for full report, click here)

Bill And Hillary Clinton’s ‘Weird Marriage’ Slammed By Megyn Kelly
(for full report, click here)

‘Go Back to F*cking Haiti!’ Megyn Kelly Goes on Wild Rant Over Supreme Court Ruling 
(for full report, click here)

There's more where that came from. For the record, some bilious Blue American podcasters are basically like this too. 

Regarding Kelly's false claims about former anchor Brooke Baldwin, her lack of concern about her false statements is simply astounding. As for Baldwin, she may perhaps be on the verge of a lawsuit:

Baldwin Fires Back at Megyn Kelly for False Claims on Her Sex Life: ‘Talk About a Reckless Disregard for the Truth’ 
(for full report, click here)

Kelly has become unchained in these (recent) latter days.  The rise of the new technologies—the so-called "democratization of media"—has created this new world order:

Every venomous podcaster a king or a queen or a royal!

Every furious flyweight a monarch! 

Can a modern society function this way? In our weariness and in our sadness, do we possibly have a need for a new (secular) Awakening, for a "politics of meaning" to which various tribes can subscribe?