This is exactly it. These articles offer an ultimately vacant catharsis in place of change. Afterwards, the type of people who read the New Yorker can go about

This is exactly it. These articles offer an ultimately vacant catharsis in place of change. Afterwards, the type of people who read the New Yorker can go about their business, feeling full of rectitude and seriousness and even, perversely, a kind of pride in their country.