Podcast appearances and mentions of George Will

American conservative political commentator

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Best podcasts about George Will

Latest podcast episodes about George Will

The Seth Leibsohn Show
May 28, 2025 - Hour 2

The Seth Leibsohn Show

Play Episode Listen Later May 29, 2025 36:27


CNN's Jake Tapper and the "has been" story of his recently-released book, Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again. George Will's column in today's Washington Post, "The Trump administration is pure progressivism in action." CBS's Scott Pelley's commencement speech for graduates at Wake Forest University.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
San Tanenhaus On Bill Buckley

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later May 23, 2025 55:49


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comSam is a biographer, historian, and journalist. He used to be the editor of the New York Times Book Review, a features writer for Vanity Fair, and a writer for Prospect magazine. He's currently a contributing writer for the Washington Post. His many books include The Death of Conservatism and Whittaker Chambers: A Biography, and his new one is Buckley: The Life and the Revolution That Changed America.It's a huge tome — almost 1,000 pages! — but fascinating, with new and startling revelations, and a breeze to read. It's crack to me, of course, and we went long — a Rogan-worthy three hours. But I loved it, and hope you do too. It's not just about Buckley; it's about now, and how Buckleyism is more similar to Trumpism than I initially understood. It's about American conservatism as a whole.For three clips of our convo — Buckley as a humane segregationist, his isolationism even after Pearl Harbor, and getting gay-baited by Gore Vidal — head to our YouTube page.Other topics: me dragging Sam to a drag show in Ptown; the elite upbringing of Buckley during the Depression; his bigoted but charitable dad who struck rich with oil; his Southern mom who birthed a dozen kids; why the polyglot Buckley didn't learn English until age 7; aspiring to be a priest or a pianist; a middle child craving the approval of dad; a poor student at first; his pranks and recklessness; being the big man on campus at Yale; leading the Yale Daily News; skewering liberal profs; his deep Catholicism; God and Man at Yale; Skull and Bones; his stint in the Army; Charles Lindbergh and America First; defending Joe McCarthy until the bitter end and beyond; launching National Review; Joan Didion; Birchers; Brown v. Board; Albert Jay Nock; Evelyn Waugh; Whittaker Chambers; Brent Bozell; Willmoore Kendall; James Burnham; Orwell; Hitchens; Russell Kirk; not liking Ike; underestimating Goldwater; Nixon and the Southern Strategy; Buckley's ties to Watergate; getting snubbed by Reagan; Julian Bond and John Lewis on Firing Line; the epic debate with James Baldwin; George Will; Michael Lind; David Brooks and David Frum; Rick Hertzberg; Buckley's wife a fag hag who raised money for AIDS; Roy Cohn; Bill Rusher; Scott Bessent; how Buckley was a forerunner for Trump; and much more. It's a Rogan-length pod.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson on the Biden cover-up, Walter Isaacson on Ben Franklin, Robert Merry on President McKinley, Tara Zahra on the last revolt against globalization after WWI, N.S. Lyons on the Trump era, Arthur C. Brooks on the science of happiness, and Paul Elie on crypto-religion in ‘80s pop culture. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Q&A
Syndicated Columnist George Will on His Life & Career

Q&A

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 31, 2025 69:56


Author and writer George Will, whose nationally syndicated column has been running since 1974, discusses his life and career in the opinion business. Mr. Will talks about the impact of his work on U.S. politics over the past 50 years, conservatism in the age of Donald Trump, his love of baseball, and other topics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

C-SPAN Bookshelf
Q&A: Syndicated Columnist George Will on His Life & Career

C-SPAN Bookshelf

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 31, 2025 69:56


Author and writer George Will, whose nationally syndicated column has been running since 1974, discusses his life and career in the opinion business. Mr. Will talks about the impact of his work on U.S. politics over the past 50 years, conservatism in the age of Donald Trump, his love of baseball, and other topics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Now I've Heard Everything
Batter up! Columnist George Wills Tribute to The Genius of Baseball

Now I've Heard Everything

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 26, 2025 21:40


Why has baseball remained America's pastime? In this 1990 interview Pulitzer prize-winning columnist George Will analyzes the extraordinary nature of the game.Get your copy of Men At Work by George willAs an Amazon Associate, Now I've Heard Everything earns from qualifying purchases.You may also enjoy my interviews with Cal Ripken and Mickey Mantl For more vintage interviews with celebrities, leaders, and influencers, subscribe to Now I've Heard Everything on Spotify, Apple Podcasts. and now on YouTubePhoto by Gage Skidmore#MLB #Baseball #Opening day #Cal Ripken

Times Like These
E86: If You Build It, He Will Come

Times Like These

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 25, 2025 52:53


In this episode, the fellas give a nod to the sports lovers by breaking the crowd with some of our favorite memories of great sports moments. They then shift gears to have a fantastic discussion around a more delicate watch topic: What to do when you buy a new watch but don't love it? They finish by celebrating MLB Opening Day with a chat about what makes baseball special. And with some great audio from James Earl Jones, and writing from George Will, they hope you enjoy it too!

Luke Ford
LA Surrounded By A Ring Of Fire (1-10-25)

Luke Ford

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 10, 2025 223:11


01:00 Variety: Netflix's ‘American Primeval' Is a Brutally Violent Western Led by a Compelling Taylor Kitsch, https://variety.com/2025/tv/reviews/american-primeval-review-netflix-taylor-kitsch-1236267125/ 04:00 Hugh Hewitt: Anger, Blame, and Accountability, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOh2Ug4KNFg 14:00 LAFD run by a lesbian mafia, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=158539 25:08 Political earthquake will come in wake of LA wildfires: George Will, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-ohYtQ4eYE 32:00 Trump Transition, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExZeJqGl6uU 1:13:30 Commentary magazine podcast: Progressives and Fire, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpLxRKp1Hq8 2:39:00 Elliott Blatt joins to discuss San Francisco's third earthquake of the morning 2:56:40 Bobby Kennedy Jr and vaccines, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CvHS6JVexg 2:58:30 Kip joins 3:22:00 The media and vaccines

Carnegie Connects
A Conversation with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell

Carnegie Connects

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 26, 2024 50:49


Beyond Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, the Biden administration has faced significant international challenges over the president's four years in office.  President Biden and his team have contended with a range of issues including strategic competition, growing threats to democracies, climate change, critical minerals supply chains, and shaping the transformative potential of emerging tech to solve global problems without exacerbating regional economic inequality. When it comes to foreign policy, as George Will quipped, the American public wants as little of it as possible, but that hasn't been the case over the last four years.  What are the key principles and assumptions that have underscored its approach to foreign policy? And what kind of world does it leave for its successors? U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell has served in the Biden administration from the beginning, first at the White House and more recently at the State Department. Join Aaron David Miller as he sits down with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell to discuss these and other issues.

Chicago's Morning Answer with Dan Proft & Amy Jacobson

0:00 - Hakeem Jeffries declares victory with pared down CR 10:29 - George Will on NewsNation: Musk will be gone in 6 months 27:18 - Most Disgraceful Person in Politics 2024 Award goes to… 52:12 - David Marcus, journalist living in West Virginia and the author of Charade: The Covid Lies That Crushed A Nation, breaks down how Trump's handling of shutdown threat was a masterclass. Follow David on X @BlueBoxDave 01:04:31 - Steven Bucci, visiting fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies, admits there is logic behind Trump’s desire for the Panama Canal 01:20:45 - Radio Manager/On Air Fundraiser for Food for the Poor, Paul Jacobs, joins Dan & Amy to bring awareness to life saving work of Food for the Poor and to give you the opportunity to help feed children & families in need. To give to Food for the Poor call 844-862-4673 or visit 560theAnswer.com/FoodForThePoor 01:35:19 - Rob Pastore & Family bring Christmas spirit and Christmas Music to the AM 560 studio, featuring: Rob Pastore- vocal Vicki Pastore- Piano Julia Pastore flute and vocal Max Pastore- Tenor Sax Louie Pastore- percussion 01:54:05 - Political Song of the Year See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

C-SPAN Radio - C-SPAN's The Weekly
George Will: Five Decades at the Washington Post, Four Decades on C-SPAN

C-SPAN Radio - C-SPAN's The Weekly

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 19, 2024 32:10


The Washington Post recently published a 10-page special section called, "A half-century of George F. Will: The Iron Man of America's op-ed pages."… George Will's first syndicated column for the Washington Post was January 4, 1974….   Inspired by the Washington Post marking five decades of reading George Will …. the C-SPAN podcast “The Weekly” is marking mark four decades of hearing about George Will…    Like from Republican Illinois Congressman Henry Hyde –– during the Iran-Contra hearings … July 1987:   “There's another saying and that's all lies are reprehensible. Some lies are just reprehensible than others. For instance, we politicians We practice what's called political hyperbole. We don't lie. We practice political hyperbole. George Will has a great phrase: He has an emancipated view of the facts.”   • What have Congressmen said about George Will? • What have Senators said about Georgia Will? • What have presidents and presidential candidates said about George Will? • And what do other top writers and columnists think about George Will? Find out in the latest episode of C-SPAN's “The Weekly” – it's a best-of mentions of George Will – on C-SPAN Find C-SPAN's “The Weekly” wherever you get podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Beg to Differ with Mona Charen
Is the Press Preemptively Caving to Trump?

Beg to Differ with Mona Charen

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 6, 2024 63:19


Matt Bennett joins to discuss the most dangerous Trump appointments and the worrying signals of fear by MSNBC and others. Highlights / Lowlights Mona: The Iron Man of America's op-ed pages (David Von Drehle, WaPo) and Mona's contribution to the George Will tribute symposium, ‘Conservatism's Vital Champion.' The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America by Jeffrey Rosen Matt: The attempted Martial Law coup in South Korea (lowlight) and the response of South Korean politicians and citizens (highlight). Bill: The DOGE versus the NED by James Piereson (The New Criterion) Linda: Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth See the Same Enemies (Carlos Lozada, NYT) Damon: The killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and the perverse glee of some on the very online left. (Lowlights)

The Bulwark Podcast
George Will: Democracy Rests on Persuasion

The Bulwark Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 26, 2024 50:46


For those living under a gray cloud because of what the American electorate has done, it's time to get to work on changing opinions. People who follow the news and read op-eds may be in a minority, but salient minorities have propelled history. On the 50th anniversary of George Will's tenure at The Washington Post, George joins Tim to discuss the power of criticizing presidents and saying what you think. Plus, Tim reads from the mailbag and serves up some advice for dealing with Trump-supporting relatives at the Thanksgiving table. George Will joins Tim Miller show notes George on his first 50 years as a columnist George's first column for The Post An appreciation of the Iron Man of America's oped pages Mona's tribute to George 

Keen On Democracy
Episode 2247: David Masciotra on how the Boss and the Dude can save America

Keen On Democracy

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 18, 2024 45:09


So how can The Dude and The Boss save America? According to the cultural critic, David Masciotra, Jeffrey "The Dude" Lebowski and Bruce “The Boss” Springsteen, represent the antithesis of Donald Trumps's illiberal authoritarianism. Masciotra's thesis of Lebowski and Springsteen as twin paragons of American liberalism is compelling. Both men have a childish faith in the goodness of others. Both offer liberal solace in an America which, I fear, is about to become as darkly surreal as The Big Lebowski. Transcript:“[Springsteen] represents, as cultural icon, a certain expression of liberalism, a big-hearted, humanistic liberalism that exercises creativity to represent diverse constituencies in our society, that believes in art as a tool of democratic engagement, and that seeks to lead with an abounding, an abiding sense of compassion and empathy. That is the kind of liberalism, both with the small and capital L, that I believe in, and that I have spent my career documenting and attempting to advance.” -David MasciotraAK: Hello, everybody. We're still processing November the 5th. I was in the countryside of Northern Virginia a few days ago, I saw a sign, for people just listening, Trump/Vance 2024 sign with "winner" underneath. Some people are happy. Most, I guess, of our listeners probably aren't, certainly a lot of our guests aren't, my old friend John Rauch was on the show yesterday talking about what he called the "catastrophic ordinariness" of the election and of contemporary America. He authored two responses to the election. Firstly, he described it in UnPopulist as a moral catastrophe. But wearing his Brookings hat, he's a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, described it as an ordinary election. I think a lot of people are scratching their head, trying to make sense of it. Another old friend of the show, David Masciotra, cultural writer, political writer. An interesting piece in the Washington Monthly entitled "How Francis Fukuyama and The Big Lebowski Explain Trump's Victory." A very creative piece. And he is joining us from Highland Indiana, not too far from Chicago. David. The Big Lebowski and Francis Fukuyama. Those two don't normally go together, certainly in a title. Let's talk first about Fukuyama. How does Fukuyama explain November the 5th? DAVID MASCIOTRA: In his. Well, first, thanks for having me. And I should say I watched your conversation with Jonathan Rauch, and it was quite riveting and quite sobering. And you talked about Fukuyama in that discussion as well. And you referenced his book, The End of History and the Last Man, a very often misinterpreted book, but nonetheless, toward its conclusion, Fukuyama warns that without an external enemy, liberal democracies may indeed turn against themselves, and we may witness an implosion rather than an explosion. And Fukuyama said that this won't happen so much for ideological reasons, but it will happen for deeply psychological ones, namely, without a just cause for which to struggle, people will turn against the just cause itself, which in this case is liberal democracy, and out of a sense of boredom and alienation, they'll grow increasingly tired of their society and cultivate something of a death wish in which they enjoy imagining their society's downfall, or at least the downfall of some of the institutions that are central to their society. And now I would argue that after the election results, we've witnessed the transformation of imagining to inviting. So, there is a certain death wish and a sense of...alienation and detachment from that which made the United States of America a uniquely prosperous and stable country with the ability to self-correct the myriad injustices we know are part of its history. Well now, people--because they aren't aware of the institutions or norms that created this robust engine of commerce and liberty--they've turned against it, and they no longer invest in that which is necessary to preserve it.AK: That's interesting, David. The more progressives I talk to about this, the more it--there's an odd thing going on--you're all sounding very conservative. The subtitle of the piece in the Washington Monthly was "looking at constituencies or issues misses the big point. On Tuesday, nihilism was on display, even a death wish in a society wrought by cynicism." Words like nihilism and cynicism, David, historically have always been used by people like Allan Blum, whose book, of course, The Closing of the American Mind, became very powerful amongst American conservatives now 40 or 50 years ago. Would you accept that using language like nihilism and cynicism isn't always associated--I mean, you're a proud progressive. You're a man of the left. You've never disguised that. It's rather odd to imagine that the guys like you--and in his own way, John Rauch too, who talks about the moral catastrophe of the election couple of weeks ago. You're all speaking about the loss of morality of the voter, or of America. Is there any truth to that? Making some sense?DAVID MASCIOTRA: That's a that's a fair observation. And Jonathan Rauch, during your conversation and in his own writing, identifies a center right. I would say I'm center left.AK: And he's--but what's interesting, what ties you together, is that you both use the L-word, liberal, to define yourselves. He's perhaps a liberal on the right. You're a liberal on the left.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yes. And I think that the Trump era, if we can trace that back to 2015, has made thoughtful liberals more conservative in thought and articulation, because it forces a confrontation and interrogation of a certain naivete. George Will writes in his book, The Conservative Sensibility, that the progressive imagines that which is the best possible outcome and strives to make it real, whereas the conservative imagines the worst possible outcome and does everything he can to guard against it. And now it feels like we've experienced, at least electorally, the worst possible outcome. So there a certain revisitation of that which made America great, to appropriate a phrase, and look for where we went wrong in failing to preserve it. So that kind of thinking inevitably leads one to use more conservative language and deal in more conservative thought.AK: Yeah. So for you, what made America great, to use the term you just introduced, was what? Its morality? The intrinsic morality of people living in it and in the country? Is that, for you, what liberalism is?DAVID MASCIOTRA: Liberalism is a system in and the culture that emanates out of that system. So it's a constitutional order that creates or that places a premium on individual rights and allows for a flourishing free market. Now, where my conception of liberalism would enter the picture and, perhaps Jonathan Rauch and I would have some disagreements, certainly George Will and I, is that a bit of governmental regulation is necessary along with the social welfare state, to civilize the free market. But the culture that one expects to flow from that societal order and arrangement is one of aspiration, one in which citizens fully accept that they are contributing agents to this experiment in self-governance and therefore need to spend time in--to use a Walt Whitman phrase--freedom's gymnasium. Sharpening the intellect, sharpening one's sense of moral duty and obligation to the commons, to the public good. And as our society has become more individualistic and narcissistic in nature, those commitments have vanished. And as our society has become more anti-intellectual in nature, we are seeing a lack of understanding of why those commitments are even necessary. So that's why you get a result like we witnessed on Tuesday, and that I argue in my piece that you were kind enough to have me on to discuss, is a form of nihilism, and The Big Lebowski reference, of course--AK: And of course, I want to get to Lebowski, because the Fukuyama stuff is interesting, but everyone's writing about Fukuyama and the end of history and why history never really ended, of course. It's been going on for years now, but it's a particularly interesting moment. We've had Fukuyama on the show. I've never heard anyone, though, compare the success of Trump and Trumpism with The Big Lebowski. So, one of the great movies, of course, American movies. What's the connection, David, between November 5th and The Big Lebowski? DAVID MASCIOTRA: Well, The Big Lebowski is one of my favorite films. I've written about it, and I even appeared at one of the The Big Lebowski festivals that takes place in United States a number of years ago. But my mind went to the scene when The Dude is in his bathtub and these three menacing figures break into his apartment. They drop a gerbil in the bathtub. And The Dude, who was enjoying a joint by candlelight, is, of course, startled and frightened. And these three men tell him that if he does not pay the money they believe he owes them, they will come back and, in their words, "cut off your Johnson." And The Dude gives them a quizzical, bemused look. And one of them says, "You think we are kidding? We are nihilists. We believe in nothing." And then one of them screams, "We'll cut off your Johnson." Well, I thought, you know, we're looking at an electorate that increasingly, or at least a portion of the electorate, increasingly believes in nothing. So we've lost faith.AK: It's the nihilists again. And of course, another Johnson in America, there was once a president called Johnson who enjoyed waving his Johnson, I think, around in public. And now there's the head of the house is another Johnson, I think he's a little shyer than presidents LBJ. But David, coming back to this idea of nihilism. It often seems to be a word used by people who don't like what other people think and therefore just write it off as nihilism. Are you suggesting that the Trump crowd have no beliefs? Is that what nihilism for you is? I mean, he was very clear about what he believes in. You may not like it, but it doesn't seem to be nihilistic.DAVID MASCIOTRA: That's another fair point. What I'm referring to is not too long ago, we lived in a country that had a shared set of values. Those values have vanished. And those values involve adherence to our democratic norms. It's very difficult to imagine had George H. W. Bush attempted to steal the election in which Bill Clinton won, that George H. W. Bush could have run again and won. So we've lost faith in something essential to our electoral system. We've lost faith in the standards of decency that used to, albeit imperfectly, regulate our national politics. So the man to whom I just refered, Bill Clinton, was nearly run out of office for having an extramarital affair, a misdeed that cannot compare to the myriad infractions of Donald Trump. And yet, Trump's misdeeds almost give him a cultural cachet among his supporters. It almost makes him, for lack of a better word, cool. And now we see, even with Trump's appointments, I mean, of course, it remains to be seen how it plays out, that we're losing faith in credentials and experience--AK: Well they're certainly a band of outlaws and very proud to be outlaws. It could almost be a Hollywood script. But I wonder, David, whether there's a more serious critique here. You, like so many other people, both on the left and the right, are nostalgic for an age in which everyone supposedly agreed on things, a most civil and civilized age. And you go back to the Bushes, back to Clinton. But the second Bush, who now seems to have appeared as this icon, at least moral icon, many critics of Trump, was also someone who unleashed a terrible war, killing tens of thousands of people, creating enormous suffering for millions of others. And I think that would be the Trump response, that he's simply more honest, that in the old days, the Bushes of the world can speak politely and talk about consensus, and then unleash terrible suffering overseas--and at home in their neoliberal policies of globalization--Trump's simply more honest. He tells it as it is. And that isn't nihilistic, is it?DAVID MASCIOTRA: Well, you are gesturing towards an important factor in our society. Trump, of course, we know, is a dishonest man, a profoundly dishonest--AK: Well, in some ways. But in other ways, he isn't. I mean, in some ways he just tells the truth as it is. It's a truth we're uncomfortable with. But it's certainly very truthful about the impact of foreign wars on America, for example, or even the impact of globalization. DAVID MASCIOTRA: What you're describing is an authenticity. That that Trump is authentic. And authenticity has become chief among the modern virtues, which I would argue is a colossal error. Stanley Crouch, a great writer, spent decades analyzing the way in which we consider authenticity and how it inevitably leads to, to borrow his phrase, cast impurity onto the bottom. So anything that which requires effort, refinement, self-restraint, self-control, plays to the crowd as inauthentic, as artificial--AK: Those are all aristocratic values that may have once worked but don't anymore. Should we be nostalgic for the aristocratic way of the Bushes?DAVID MASCIOTRA: I think in a certain respect, we should. We shouldn't be nostalgic for George W. Bush's policies. I agree with you, the war in Iraq was catastrophic, arguably worse than anything Trump did while he was president. His notoriously poor response to Hurricane Katrina--I mean, we can go on and on cataloging the various disasters of the Bush administration. However, George W. Bush as president and the people around him did have a certain belief in the liberal order of the United States and the liberal order of the world. Institutions like NATO and the EU, and those institutions, and that order, has given the United States, and the world more broadly, an unrivaled period of peace and prosperity.AK: Well it wasn't peace, David. And the wars, the post-9/11 wars, were catastrophic. And again, they seem to be just facades--DAVID MASCIOTRA: We also had the Vietnam War, the Korean War. When I say peace, I mean we didn't have a world war break out as we did in the First World War, in the Second World War. And that's largely due to the creation and maintenance of institutions following the Second World War that were aimed at the preservation of order and, at least, amicable relations between countries that might otherwise collide.AK: You're also the author, David, of a book we've always wanted to talk about. Now we're figuring out a way to integrate it into the show. You wrote a book, an interesting book, about Bruce Springsteen. Working on a Dream: the Progressive Political Vision of Bruce Springsteen. Bruce Springsteen has made himself very clear. He turned out for Harris. Showed up with his old friend, Barack Obama. Clearly didn't have the kind of impact he wanted. You wrote an interesting piece for UnHerd a few weeks ago with the title, "Bruce Springsteen is the Last American Liberal: he's still proud to be born in the USA." Is he the model of a liberal response to the MAGA movement, Springsteen? DAVID MASCIOTRA: Well, of course, I wouldn't go so far as to say the last liberal. As most readers just probably know, writers don't compose their own headlines--AK: But he's certainly, if not the last American liberal, the quintessential American liberal.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yes. He represents, as cultural icon, a certain expression of liberalism, a big-hearted, humanistic liberalism that exercises creativity to represent diverse constituencies in our society, that believes in art as a tool of democratic engagement, and that seeks to lead with an abounding, an abiding sense of compassion and empathy. That is the kind of liberalism, both with the small and capital L, that I believe in, and that I have spent my career documenting and attempting to advance. And those are, of course, the forms of liberalism that now feel as if they are under threat. Now, to that point, you know, this could have just come down to inflation and some egregious campaign errors of Kamala Harris. But it does feel as if when you have 70 some odd million people vote for the likes of Donald Trump, that the values one can observe in the music of Bruce Springsteen or in the rhetoric of Barack Obama, for that matter, are no longer as powerful and pervasive as they were in their respective glory days. No pun intended.AK: Yeah. And of course, Springsteen is famous for singing "Glory Days." I wonder, though, where Springsteen himself is is a little bit more complex and we might be a little bit more ambivalent about him, there was a piece recently about him becoming a billionaire. So it's all very well him being proud to be born in the USA. He's part--for better or worse, I mean, it's not a criticism, but it's a reality--he's part of the super rich. He showed out for Harris, but it didn't seem to make any impact. You talked about the diversity of Springsteen. I went to one of his concerts in San Francisco earlier this year, and I have to admit, I was struck by the fact that everyone, practically everyone at the concert, was white, everyone was wealthy, everyone paid several hundred dollars to watch a 70 year old man prance around on stage and behave as if he's still 20 or 30 years old. I wonder whether Springsteen himself is also emblematic of a kind of cultural, or political, or even moral crisis of our old cultural elites. Or am I being unfair to Springsteen?DAVID MASCIOTRA: Well, I remember once attending a Springsteen show in which the only black person I saw who wasn't an employee of the arena was Clarence Clemons.AK: Right. And then Bruce, of course, always made a big deal. And there was an interesting conversation when Springsteen and Obama did a podcast together. Obama, in his own unique way, lectured Bruce a little bit about Clarence Clemons in terms of his race. But sorry. Go on.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yeah. And Springsteen has written and discussed how he had wished he had a more diverse audience. When I referred to diversity in his music, I meant the stories he aimed to tell in song certainly represented a wide range of the American experience. But when you talk about Springsteen, perhaps himself representing a moral crisis--AK: I wouldn't say a crisis, but he represents the, shall we say, the redundancy of that liberal worldview of the late 20th century. I mean, he clearly wears his heart on his sleeve. He means well. He's not a bad guy. But he doesn't reach a diverse audience. His work is built around the American working class. None of them can afford to show up to what he puts on. I mean, Chris Christie is a much more typical fan than the white working class. Does it speak of the fact that there's a...I don't know if you call it a crisis, it's just...Springsteen isn't relevant anymore in the America of the 2020s, or at least when he sang and wrote about no longer exists.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yes, I agree with that. So first of all, the working class bit was always a bit overblown with Springsteen. Springsteen, of course, was never really part of the working class, except when he was a child. But by his own admission, he never had a 9 to 5 job. And Springsteen sang about working class life like William Shakespeare wrote about teenage love. He did so with a poetic grandeur that inspired some of his best work. And outside looking in, he actually managed to offer more insights than sometimes people on the inside can amount to themselves. But you're certainly correct. I mean, the Broadway show, for example, when the tickets were something like a thousand a piece and it was $25 to buy a beer. There is a certain--AK: Yeah and in that Broadway show, which I went to--I thought it was astonishing, actually, a million times better than the show in San Francisco.DAVID MASCIOTRA: It was one of the best things he ever did.AK: He acknowledges that he made everything up, that he wasn't part of the American working class, and that he'd never worked a day in his life, and yet his whole career is is built around representing a social class and a way of life that he was never part of.“Not too long ago, we lived in a country that had a shared set of values. Those values have vanished. And those values involve adherence to our democratic norms.” -DMDAVID MASCIOTRA: Right. And he has a lyric himself: "It's a sad, funny ending when you find yourself pretending a rich man in a poor man's shirt." So there always was this hypocrisy--hypocrisy might be a little too strong--inconsistency. And he adopted a playful attitude toward it in the 90s and in later years. But to your point of relevance, I think you're on to something there. One of the crises I would measure in our society is that we no longer live in a culture of ambition and aspiration. So you hear this when people say that they want a political leader who talks like the average person, or the common man. And you hear this when "college educated" is actually used as an insult against a certain base of Democratic voters. There were fewer college-educated voters when John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan ran for president, all of whom spoke with greater eloquence and a more expansive vocabulary and a greater sense of cultural sophistication than Donald Trump or Kamala Harris did. And yet there was no objection, because people understood that we should aspire to something more sophisticated. We should aspire to something more elevated beyond the everyday vernacular of the working class. And for that reason, Springsteen was able to become something of a working-class poet, despite never living among the working class beyond his childhood. Because his poetry put to music represented something idealistic about the working class.AK: But oddly enough, it was a dream--there's was a word that Springsteen uses a lot in his work--that was bought by the middle class. It wasn't something that was--although, I think in the early days, probably certainly in New Jersey, that he had a more working-class following.DAVID MASCIOTRA: We have to deal with the interesting and frustrating reality that the people about whom Springsteen sings in those early songs like "Darkness on the Edge of Town" or "The River" would probably be Trump supporters if they were real.AK: Yeah. And in your piece you refer to, not perhaps one of his most famous albums, The Rising, but you use it to compare Springsteen with another major figure now in America, much younger man to Ta-Nehisi Coates, who has a new book out, which is an important new book, The Message. You seem to be keener on Springsteen than Coates. Tell us about this comparison and what the comparison tells us about the America of the 2020s.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Well, Coates...the reason I make the comparison is that one of Springsteen's greatest artistic moments, in which he kind of resurrected his status as cultural icon, was the record he put out after the 9/11 attack on the United States, The Rising. And throughout that record he pays tribute, sometimes overtly, sometimes subtly, to the first responders who ascended in the tower knowing they would perhaps die.AK: Yeah. You quote him "love and duty called you someplace higher." So he was idealizing those very brave firefighters, policemen who gave up their lives on 9/11.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Exactly. Representing the best of humanity. Whereas Ta-Nehisi Coates, who has become the literary superstar of the American left, wrote in his memoir that on 9/11, he felt nothing and did not see the first responders as human. Rather, they were part of the fire that could, in his words, crush his body.AK: Yeah, he wrote a piece, "What Is 9/11 to Descendants of Slaves?"DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yes. And my point in making that comparison, and this was before the election, was to say that the American left has its own crisis of...if we don't want to use the word nihilism, you objected to it earlier--AK: Well, I'm not objecting. I like the word. It's just curious to hear it come from somebody like yourself, a man, certainly a progressive, maybe not--you might define yourself as being on the left, but certainly more on the left and on the right.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yes, I would agree with that characterization. But that the left has its own crisis of nihilism. If if you are celebrating a man who, despite his journalistic talents and intelligence, none of which I would deny, refused to see the humanity of the first responders on the 9/11 attack and, said that he felt nothing for the victims, presumably even those who were black and impoverished, then you have your own crisis of belief, and juxtaposing that with the big hearted, humanistic liberalism of Springsteen for me shows the left a better path forward. Now, that's a path that will increasingly close after the victory of Trump, because extremism typically begets extremism, and we're probably about to undergo four years of dueling cynicism and rage and unhappy times.AK: I mean, you might respond, David, and say, well, Coates is just telling the truth. Why should a people with a history of slavery care that much about a few white people killed on 9/11 when their own people lost millions through slavery? And you compare them to Springsteen, as you've acknowledged, a man who wasn't exactly telling the truth in his heart. I mean, he's a very good artist, but he writes about a working class, which even he acknowledges, he made most of it up. So isn't Coates like Trump in an odd kind of way, aren't they just telling an unvarnished truth that people don't want to hear, an impolite truth?DAVID MASCIOTRA: I'm not sure. I typically shy away from the expression "my truth" or "his truth" because it's too relativistic. But I'll make an exception in this case. I think Coates is telling HIS truth just as Trump is telling HIS truth, if that adds up to THE truth, is much more dubious. Yes, we could certainly say that, you know, because the United States enslaved, tortured, and otherwise oppressed millions of black people, it may be hard for some black observers to get teary eyed on 9/11, but the black leaders whom I most admire didn't have that reaction. I wrote a book about Jesse Jackson after spending six years interviewing with him and traveling with him. He certainly didn't react that way on 9/11. Congressman John Lewis didn't react that way on 9/11. So, the heroes of the civil rights movement, who helped to overcome those brutal systems of oppression--and I wouldn't argue that they're overcome entirely, but they helped to revolutionize the United States--they maintained a big-hearted sense of empathy and compassion, and they recognized that the unjust loss of life demands mourning and respect, whether it's within their own community or another. So I would say that, here again, we're back to the point of ambition, whether it's intellectual ambition or moral ambition. Ambition is what allows a society to grow. And it seems like ambition has fallen far out of fashion. And that is why the country--the slim majority of the electorate that did vote and the 40% of the electorate that did not vote, or voting-age public, I should say--settled for the likes of Donald Trump.AK: I wonder what The Dude would do, if he was around, at the victory of Trump, or even at 9/11. He'd probably continue to sit in the bath tub and enjoy...enjoy whatever he does in his bathtub. I mean, he's not a believer. Isn't he the ultimate nihilist? The Dude in Lebowski?DAVID MASCIOTRA: That's an interesting interpretation. I would say that...Is The Dude a nihilist? You have this juxtaposition... The Dude kind of occupies this middle ground between the nihilists who proudly declare they believe in nothing and his friend Walter Sobchak, who's, you know, almost this raving explosion of belief. Yeah, ex-Vietnam veteran who's always confronting people with his beliefs and screaming and demanding they all adhere to his rules. I don't know if The Dude's a nihilist as much as he has a Zen detachment.AK: Right, well, I think what makes The Big Lebowski such a wonderful film, and perhaps so relevant today, is Lebowski, unlike so many Americans is unjudgmental. He's not an angry man. He's incredibly tolerant. He accepts everyone, even when they're beating him up or ripping him off. And he's so, in that sense, different from the America of the 2020s, where everyone is angry and everyone blames someone else for whatever's wrong in their lives.DAVID MASCIOTRA: That's exactly right.AK: Is that liberal or just Zen? I don't know.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yeah. It's perhaps even libertarian in a sense. But there's a very interesting and important book by Justin Tosi and Brandon Warmke called Why It's Okay to Mind Your Own Business. And in it they argue--they're both political scientists although the one may be a...they may be philosophers...but that aside--they present an argument for why Americans need to do just that. Mind their own business.AK: Which means, yeah, not living politics, which certainly Lebowski is. It's probably the least political movie, Lebowski, I mean, he doesn't have a political bone in his body. Finally, David, there there's so much to talk about here, it's all very interesting. You first came on the show, you had a book out, that came out either earlier this year or last year. Yeah, it was in April of this year, Exurbia Now: The Battleground of American Democracy. And you wrote about the outskirts of suburbia, which you call "exurbia." Jonathan Rauch, wearing his Brookings cap, described this as an ordinary election. I'm not sure how much digging you've done, but did the exurbian vote determine this election? I mean, the election was determined by a few hundred thousand voters in the Midwest. Were these voters mostly on the edge of the suburb? And I'm guessing most of them voted for Trump.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Well, Trump's numbers in exurbia...I've dug around and I've been able to find the exurbian returns for Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Arizona. So three crucial swing states. If Kamala Harris had won those three states, she would be president. And Trump's support in exurbia was off the charts, as it was in 2020 and 2016, and as I predicted, it would be in 2024. I'm not sure that that would have been sufficient to deliver him the race and certainly not in the fashion that he won. Trump made gains with some groups that surprised people, other groups that didn't surprise people, but he did much better than expected. So unlike, say, in 2016, where we could have definitively and conclusively said Trump won because of a spike in turnout for him in rural America and in exurbia, here, the results are more mixed. But it remains the case that the base most committed to Trump and most fervently loyal to his agenda is rural and exurban.AK: So just outside the cities. And finally, I argued, maybe counterintuitively, that America remains split today as it was before November the 5th, so I'm not convinced that this election is the big deal that some people think it is. But you wrote an interesting piece in Salon back in 2020 arguing that Trump has poisoned American culture, but the toxin was here all along. Of course, there is more, if anything, of that toxin now. So even if Harris had won the election, that toxin was still here. And finally, David, how do we get rid of that toxin? Do we just go to put Bruce Springsteen on and go and watch Big Lebowski? I mean, how do we get beyond this toxin?DAVID MASCIOTRA: I would I would love it if that was the way to do it.AK: We'll sit in our bathtub and wait for the thugs to come along?DAVID MASCIOTRA: Right, exactly. No, what you're asking is, of course, the big question. We need to find a way to resurrect some sense of, I'll use another conservative phrase, civic virtue. And in doing--AK: And resurrection, of course, by definition, is conservative, because you're bringing something back.“Ambition is what allows a society to grow. And it seems like ambition has fallen far out of fashion.” -DMDAVID MASCIOTRA: Exactly. And we also have to resurrect, offer something more practical, we have to resurrect a sense of civics. One thing on which--I have immense respect and admiration for Jonathan Rauch--one minor quibble I would have with him from your conversation is when he said that the voters rejected the liberal intellectual class and their ideas. Some voters certainly rejected, but some voters were unaware. The lack of civic knowledge in the United States is detrimental to our institutions. I mean, a majority of Americans don't know how many justices are on the Supreme Court. They can't name more than one freedom enumerated in the Bill of Rights. So we need to find a way to make citizenship a vital part of our national identity again. And there are some practical means of doing that in the educational system. Certainly won't happen in the next four years. But to get to the less tangible matter of how to resurrect something like civic virtue and bring back ambition and aspiration in our sense of national identity, along with empathy, is much tougher. I mean, Robert Putnam says it thrives upon community and voluntary associations.AK: Putnam has been on the show, of course.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Yeah. So, I mean, this is a conversation that will develop. I wish I had the answer, and I wish it was just to listen to Born to Run in the bathtub with with a poster of The Dude hanging overhead. But as I said to you before we went on the air, I think that you have a significant insight to learn this conversation because, in many ways, your books were prescient. We certainly live with the cult of the amateur now, more so than when you wrote that book. So, I'd love to hear your ideas.AK: Well, that's very generous of you, David. And next time we appear, you're going to interview me about why the cult of the amateur is so important. So we will see you again soon. But we're going to swap seats. So, David will interview me about the relevance of Cult of the Amateur. Wonderful conversation, David. I've never thought about Lebowski or Francis Fukuyama, particularly Lebowski, in terms of what happened on November 5th. So, very insightful. Thank you, David, and we'll see you again in the not-too-distant future.DAVID MASCIOTRA: Thank you. I'm going to reread Cult of the Amateur to prepare. I may even do it in the bathtub. I look forward to our discussion.David Masciotra is an author, lecturer, and journalist. He is the author of I Am Somebody: Why Jesse Jackson Matters (I.B. Tauris, 2020), Mellencamp: American Troubadour (University Press of Kentucky), Barack Obama: Invisible Man (Eyewear Publishers, 2017), and Metallica by Metallica, a 33 1/3 book from Bloomsbury Publishers, which has been translated into Chinese. In 2010, Continuum Books published his first book, Working On a Dream: The Progressive Political Vision of Bruce Springsteen.His 2024 book, Exurbia Now: Notes from the Battleground of American Democracy, is published by Melville House Books. Masciotra writes regularly for the New Republic, Washington Monthly, Progressive, the Los Angeles Review of Books, CrimeReads, No Depression, and the Daily Ripple. He has also written for Salon, the Daily Beast, CNN, Atlantic, Washington Post, AlterNet, Indianapolis Star, and CounterPunch. Several of his political essays have been translated into Spanish for publication at Korazon de Perro. His poetry has appeared in Be About It Press, This Zine Will Change Your Life, and the Pangolin Review. Masciotra has a Master's Degree in English Studies and Communication from Valparaiso University. He also has a Bachelor's Degree in Political Science from the University of St. Francis. He is public lecturer, speaking on a wide variety of topics, from the history of protest music in the United States to the importance of bars in American culture. David Masciotra has spoken at the University of Wisconsin, University of South Carolina, Lewis University, Indiana University, the Chicago Public Library, the Lambeth Library (UK), and an additional range of colleges, libraries, arts centers, and bookstores. As a journalist, he has conducted interviews with political leaders, musicians, authors, and cultural figures, including Jesse Jackson, John Mellencamp, Noam Chomsky, all members of Metallica, David Mamet, James Lee Burke, Warren Haynes, Norah Jones, Joan Osborne, Martín Espada, Steve Earle, and Rita Dove. Masciotra lives in Indiana, and teaches literature and political science courses at the University of St. Francis and Indiana University Northwest. Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe

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The Burn Bag Podcast
Best Of: George Will on What a Conservative Foreign Policy Means (Original Release: 10/4/2021)

The Burn Bag Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 16, 2024 65:41


In this re-release of our popular episode from October 2021 (excuse the old theme music!), A'ndre and Ryan speak with George Will, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and author, on what it means to practice a 'conservative' foreign policy. Dr. Will, who has published a twice-weekly column in The Washington Post since 1974, provides his definition of what it means to be conservative, discussing the intellectual conservative movement that prospered in the post-war era. He then goes into his views on what a conservative foreign policy actually means, why Reagan and Eisenhower were exemplars of it, and why Donald Trump was not, in his view, conservative. Distinguishing between conservatism and neoconservatism, Dr. Will discusses why he believes liberal internationalism is 'armed humanitarianism',  and the mistakes made in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the broader Middle East. Touching on recent events in the news, Dr. Will talks the U.S.-China rivalry, and his thoughts on the Intelligence Community and the equation of whether security trumps freedoms. We close out the conservation with a short conversation on Dr. Will's new book, American Happiness and Discontents: The Unruly Torrent, 2008-2020, and why Dr. Will abhors denim. Yes, denim.

3 Takeaways
Highlight on Politics: 5 of the World's Sharpest Minds in Politics (#216)

3 Takeaways

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 24, 2024 20:00 Transcription Available


Election fever is heating up, and no matter how you plan on voting, these 3 Takeaways excerpts provide valuable insight into our political challenges, plus thoughts on how to resolve them. Guests include Yale Law School Professor Amy Chua; former political consultant and presidential advisor Karl Rove; White House advisor to four U.S. presidents David Gergen; political commentator and Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist George Will; and journalist extraordinaire Fareed Zakaria.

The Brion McClanahan Show
Ep. 1018: George Will Has Spoken. So What?

The Brion McClanahan Show

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 28, 2024 33:17


George Will tells Donald Trump the Constitution is clear on immigration. Period. Except that's not the entire story. https://mcclanahanacademy.com https://patreon.com/thebrionmcclanahanshow https://brionmcclanahan.com/support http://learntruehistory.com --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/brion-mcclanahan/support

Inside Sources with Boyd Matheson
George Will: Framing the 2024 Election

Inside Sources with Boyd Matheson

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 16, 2024 12:57


The presidential campaign is headed into overdrive with only 80 days until the November 5th election. The Democratic National Convention will be held in Chicago next week, as Democrats will try to capitalize on their momentum. Donald Trump has held 3 separate events this week, all over 2 hours long. What is the strategy to win from both campaigns? And what is the state of the American electorate watching this all unfold? George Will from the Washington Post joins the show.

Chicago's Afternoon News with Steve Bertrand
Dean Cain on President Ronald Reagan's impact on America

Chicago's Afternoon News with Steve Bertrand

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 6, 2024


Actor Dean Cain joins Lisa Dent to talk about narrating NewsNation’s original documentary Reagan: Portrait of a Presidency, which takes a deep-dive into the life and legacy of the former president. Reagan: Portrait of a Presidency will air Saturday, June 8th (8-9:30 pm CT). Following the documentary, NewsNation senior political contributor George Will will co-host Reagan: The […]

The Dispatch Podcast
Why Bother to Vote | Interview: George Will

The Dispatch Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 3, 2024 40:49


Washington Post columnist George Will joins Jamie to discuss the Trump verdict, the state of American politics, Israel's predicament, the influence of college campuses, foreign policy, and the future of the Republican Party. Show Notes: —Will's Washington Post column on not voting in November —Will's Washington Post column on nuclear annihilation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Noah Smith: A Second Cold War With China

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later May 31, 2024 46:08


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comNoah is a journalist who covers economics and geopolitics. A former assistant professor of Behavioral Finance at Stony Brook University and an early blogger, he became an opinion columnist at Bloomberg in 2014. He left after seven years to focus on his own substack, Noahpinion, which you should definitely check out.For two clips of our convo — on why we should fear a military strike from China, and the good news about tech and the economy we don't pay enough attention to — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: the amazing story of Fawlty Towers triggering Noah's birth in Oklahoma; raised in Aggie country; his father the psych professor; Noah's clinical depression after his mom died young; trolling X File fans on the early web; the internet as an escape back then, before social media ruined it; joining the early blogs; Jonah Goldberg and Liberal Fascism; Noah living in Japan after Battle Royale gripped him; Yakuza burning down his apartment; the MAX show Tokyo Vice; debunking stereotypes about Japan (e.g. xenophobia); his tech optimism; Ozempic and HIV drugs; wages and wealth growing in the US; tuition falling; inflation leveling; the YIMBY movement; how AI will empower the normies; the collapse of global poverty; the China threat; EVs and tariffs; industrial policy as means for national security; risking global war over Taiwan; Noah downplaying the chips factor; the chance of another Pearl Harbor — from China; TikTok and controlling US media; the woke wars as a distraction; “information tournaments”; debating mass immigration; agreeing about the asylum clusterfucker; questioning whether the US was ever a melting pot; Biden catching up on the border and inflation; how he's more likely to tighten the budget than Trump; debating which nominee is losing his marbles more; and why Ukraine and Gaza are diversions from China.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Lionel Shriver on her new novel, Elizabeth Corey on Oakeshott, Tim Shipman on the UK elections, Erick Erickson on the left's spiritual crisis, Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy on animal cruelty, and the great Van Jones! Send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Bill Maher On Spurning The Likes

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later May 24, 2024 43:58


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comBill needs no introduction, but he's been the formidable host of HBO's Real Time for 21 years now, and before that he hosted Politically Incorrect, which ran from 1993 to 2002. He has a new book out, What This Comedian Said Will Shock You — a collection of his best editorials on Real Time. Also check out his podcast, “Club Random,” which he recently expanded into a pod network, Club Random Studios. Bill manages to do all of that and still perform standup on the road — schedule here.For two clips of our convo — on Bill not caving to political correctness after 9/11, and the two of us debating the credibility of the Gospels — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Bill going to church every Sunday as a kid; his Irish-Catholic dad turning away from the Church after Pope Paul VI; how the left today is bonkers; how Biden is captured by wokeness; the toxicity of the Trump cult; getting his GOP rivals to bend the knee; Ann Coulter's balls in opposing him; the crisis of mass illegal migration; the dickishness of DeSantis on lab meat and rainbow bridges; his sensible approach to Covid; election deniers; the remarkable progress of legal weed and marriage equality; Bill's movie Religulous; his admiration for Jesus as a philosopher; Muhammad the invading warrior; slavery in the Bible; the conflicting accounts of the Resurrection; whether Paul was a closeted gay; Christianity starting as a bourgeois religion; the pagan origins of Christian holidays; Richard Dawkins; the rise of the nones; wokeness as a religion; Bronze Age Pervert; Lauren Boebert on church/state; American exceptionalism as Christian heresy; October 7th; the profound illiberalism of Hamas; their Nazi-like tactics; “Hamas wants to commit genocide but can't — Israel can, but won't”; Rafah as Dunkirk; Biden's Morehouse speech; Trump's insane antics as the ultimate teflon; his humor; wokeness as a gold mine for comedy; comics who cave to PC; Trump's energy on the trail; and Bill's grueling book tour offering insight into campaigning.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Noah Smith on the economy, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Lionel Shriver on her new novel, Elizabeth Corey on Oakeshott, Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy on animal cruelty; and the great Van Jones! Send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Oren Cass On Curbing The Free Market

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later May 17, 2024 52:47


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comOren is a writer and policy advisor. In 2012, he was the domestic policy director for Romney's presidential campaign, and in 2018 he wrote The Once and Future Worker: A Vision for the Renewal of Work in America. In 2020, he founded the think tank American Compass, where he serves as executive director. He's also a contributing opinion writer for the Financial Times.For two clips of our convo — on how China cheats at free trade, and the possibility of Trumpism without Trump — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: growing up in a stable family in suburban Mass; both American parents grew up in Israel; Oren's progressive charter school; turning to conservatism at his very liberal college; studying political economy; working at Bain; the gap between wealth and happiness; the stagnant protectionist UK before Thatcher; Brexit; how London is almost unrecognizable to older Brits; Adam Smith and David Ricardo; how no one predicted the fall of the Soviet Union; Tiananmen Square; neoliberalism's obsession with GDP growth; NAFTA and the WTO; the China Shock; how the success of the free market swung the pendulum too far; the meaning of populism; Oren working for the Romney campaign after the Great Recession; the growing trade deficit; Biden following the Trump playbook on tariffs and industrial policy; semiconductors in Taiwan; the CHIPS Act; the left's disdain for patriotism; the cheap labor of open borders; E-Verify; how the college-for-all model is a “toxic disaster”; Biden's loan forgiveness; Trump's advantage in the 2024 election; his growing multi-racial coalition; his tax cuts and their looming expiration; Republicans rethinking labor unions; reformicons like Reihan and Ross; and me calling out Yglesias for never paying for The Weekly Dish. (Subscribe!)Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Noah Smith on the economy, Bill Maher on everything, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Lionel Shriver on her new novel, Elizabeth Corey on Oakeshott, and the great Van Jones! Send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Adam Moss On The Artistic Process

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later May 10, 2024 49:39


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comAdam is the best magazine editor of my generation, and an old friend. From 2004 to 2019, he was the editor-in-chief of New York Magazine, and before that he edited the New York Times Magazine, and 7 Days — a weekly news magazine covering art and culture in NYC. His first book is The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing.For two clips of our convo — on the bygone power of magazines, and the birth of the great and powerful performance artist Dina Martina — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: his upbringing on Long Island; fantasizing about NYC through the cosmopolitanism of magazines; being a “magazine junky extremely early”; the literary journalism of the ‘60s; Gay Talese; Joan Didion; Tom Wolfe; Adam's early start at The Village Voice; 18-hour workdays; joining Rolling Stone then Esquire; commissioning Frank Rich's groundbreaking piece on gay culture; the visual strength of mags; 7 Days “doomed from the start” because of a stock market crash; the NYT's Joe Lelyveld hiring Adam to “make trouble” with creative disruption; Tina Brown; “the mix” of magazines like a dinner party; the psychodrama of writers clashing with colleagues; how the Internet killed magazines; the blogosphere; podcasting; the artist Cheryl Pope and her series on miscarriages; Tony Kushner's Angels in America; when creation is tedious and painful; Leaves of Grass and its various versions; Montaigne's essays; Pascal and the incompleteness of The Pensées; Amy Sillman painting over her beautiful work; Steven Sondheim; choreographer Twyla Tharp; poetry as the concentration of language and the deconstruction of how we speak; poets Marie Howe and Louise Gluck; the fiction writer George Saunders; how weed suppresses the ego; and Adam's preternatural calm.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Oren Cass on Republicans moving left on class, Noah Smith on the economy, Bill Maher on everything, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Lionel Shriver on her new novel, Elizabeth Corey on Oakeshott, and the great Van Jones! Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Johann Hari On Ozempic And Big Food

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later May 3, 2024 58:50


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comMy old and dear friend Johann just released his latest book, Magic Pill: The Extraordinary Benefits and Disturbing Risks of the New Weight-Loss Drugs. That follows Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs (2015), Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression (2018), and Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention (2022), which we covered on the Dishcast.For two clips of our convo — on the ways Big Food gets us hooked, and the biggest risk of Ozempic — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Johann's struggles with food growing up; how his Swiss dad's healthy eating habits clashed with his Scottish mom's processed food; how the obesity crisis started in 1979; the comfort and convenience of junk food; 78 percent of calories consumed by kids today are ultra-processed; how ads hook them at an early age; why the government should regulate food companies like Japan does; Johann's own experience with Ozempic over the past year; how such drugs boost satiety; nausea and other side effects; the dangers for those with thyroid issues and anorexia; ten other risks he highlights; the ease of getting Ozempic; how people on it lose the pleasure of eating; how the disruption of food habits surface psychological problems; bariatric surgery; Fen Phen and its $12 billion settlement; the dangers of obesity that include diabetes and cancer; how victims of sexual abuse put on weight as a deterrent to abusers; the resilience of fatphobia; why The Biggest Loser is an “evil f*****g show”; why weight-loss drugs feel like cheating; why they might inhibit reform in the food industry; when Johann was fat-shamed by the Dalai Lama; why exercise is great for your health but not really for weight loss; and why I might start taking Ozempic myself.In fact, I just started. Took my first dose yesterday. I'm struck by how utterly simple it is. A teeny-tiny injection from a teen-tiny needle once a week. I'll keep you posted if anything interesting happens.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Adam Moss on the artistic process, Oren Cass on Republicans moving left on class, Noah Smith on the economy, Bill Maher on everything, George Will on conservatism, Elizabeth Corey on Oakeshott, and the great and powerful Van Jones! Please any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Mises Media
Why the GOP Betrayed Its Own Voters on Ukraine

Mises Media

Play Episode Listen Later May 1, 2024


Washington Post conservative George Will trots out every tired slogan and bromide in the book to claim that Putin is Hitler and the Ukraine war is a fight for civilization. Recommended Reading"So, 112 ignoble, infantile Republicans voted to endanger civilization" by George Will: Mises.org/WES_20_A"Piers Morgan vs John Mearsheimer" Mises.org/WES_20_BBe sure to follow War, Economy, and State at Mises.org/WES.

War, Economy, and State
Why the GOP Betrayed Its Own Voters on Ukraine

War, Economy, and State

Play Episode Listen Later May 1, 2024


Washington Post conservative George Will trots out every tired slogan and bromide in the book to claim that Putin is Hitler and the Ukraine war is a fight for civilization. Recommended Reading"So, 112 ignoble, infantile Republicans voted to endanger civilization" by George Will: Mises.org/WES_20_A"Piers Morgan vs John Mearsheimer" Mises.org/WES_20_BBe sure to follow War, Economy, and State at Mises.org/WES.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Kara Swisher On Big Tech And Media

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 19, 2024 41:49


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comKara is a journalist who has covered the business of the Internet since 1994. She was the cofounder and editor-at-large of Recode, and she's worked for the NYT, the WaPo, and the WSJ. She's now the host of the podcast “On with Kara Swisher” and the co-host of the “Pivot” podcast with Scott Galloway, both distributed by New York Magazine. Her new memoir is Burn Book: A Tech Love Story. It's a fun read, and it was good to hang out with her again after many years. We were both web pioneers and it's good to remember those days of the blogosphere. And we get fiery at times.For two clips of our convo — debating how woke the MSM really is, and how readers are smarter than journalists — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Kara's rough childhood on Long Island; losing her dad at an early age and contending with a bad stepdad; her military family and her interest in serving; how DADT made things worse for gays; being an AIDS quilt folder; lesbian tropes; our mutual dislike of Pride parades; her fearlessness as a young reporter; The McLaughlin Group; the condescension of legacy media; tycoons who buy media outlets; Jeff Bezos; Marty Peretz; Friendster, Zip2 and Suck.com; how Facebook was seen as a savior for media; how trolls are chagrined when you talk to them; how Zuckerberg is “lovely but awkward” in person; Bill Gates; Peter Thiel; how gay hookups drove the early internet; how the apps kill serendipity; the power of podcasts for community; how the right innovated direct mail and talk radio; Obama's pioneering with web outreach; how Twitter made January 6 (and Trump himself) possible; Kara watching every single episode of The Apprentice; how Trump's act is getting stale; how social media is not a good business model; Elon Musk; buying Twitter to “make him more interesting at parties”; the Walter Isaacson bio; Elon's vile tweets on Paul Pelosi; his trans daughter; ketamine; Mark Cuban on DEI; abortion in the 2024 election; how social media is fracturing and losing appeal with Gen Z; the decline of cable news; the disinfo on unarmed black men killed by cops; how BLM led to more black lives lost; the grievance-industrial-complex of the right; how its reactionaries just want to “burn s**t down”; why Kara is a China hawk; why she disagrees with Jon Haidt; the TikTok ban; the Twitter Files; Hunter's penis; Tipper Gore and dirty lyrics; and how Kara counsels her four kids about social media and porn.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Adam Moss on the artistic process, Johann Hari on Ozempic, Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Noah Smith on the economy, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Bill Maher on everything, and the great Van Jones! Send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Geopolitics & Empire
James Bovard: The Death of Liberty in America is Not Foreordained

Geopolitics & Empire

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 15, 2024 62:17


James Bovard discusses his new book on the death of liberty in America. The U.S. government has become an oppressive force which steals upwards of hundreds of millions of dollars annually from its citizens through civil asset forfeiture, silences Americans through its Orwellian Ministry of Truth, and imposes burdensome security theater (e.g. TSA) among many other forms of tyranny. He describes the attempts to take guns away and whether he thinks they will succeed, this idea of a second civil war, and how people were stampeded into submission on Covid. There is no substitute for courage and self-reliance is part of that. The death of liberty in America is not foreordained. Watch on BitChute / Brighteon / Rokfin / Rumble / Substack Geopolitics & Empire · James Bovard: The Death of Liberty in America is Not Foreordained #418 *Support Geopolitics & Empire! Become a Member https://geopoliticsandempire.substack.comDonate https://geopoliticsandempire.com/donationsConsult https://geopoliticsandempire.com/consultation **Visit Our Affiliates & Sponsors! Above Phone https://abovephone.com/?above=geopoliticseasyDNS (use code GEOPOLITICS for 15% off!) https://easydns.comEscape The Technocracy course (15% discount using link) https://escapethetechnocracy.com/geopoliticsPassVult https://passvult.comSociatates Civis (CitizenHR, CitizenIT, CitizenPL) https://societates-civis.comWise Wolf Gold https://www.wolfpack.gold/?ref=geopolitics Websites James Bovard Website https://www.jimbovard.com X https://twitter.com/JimBovard Last Rights: The Death of American Liberty https://www.amazon.com/Last-Rights-Death-American-Liberty/dp/B0CP9VCNDH About James Bovard James Bovard is the author of Last Rights: The Death of American Liberty (2023) Public Policy Hooligan (2012), Attention Deficit Democracy (2006), and eight other books. He is a member of the USA Today Board of Contributors, a frequent contributor to the New York Post, and has written for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Playboy, and the Washington Post, and is a fellow with the Libertarian Institute. His books have been translated into Spanish, Arabic, Japanese, and Korean. The Wall Street Journal called Bovard 'the roving inspector general of the modern state,' and Washington Post columnist George Will called him a 'one-man truth squad.' His 1994 book Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty received the Free Press Association's Mencken Award as Book of the Year. His book Terrorism and Tyranny won the Lysander Spooner Award for the Best Book on Liberty in 2003. He received the Thomas Szasz Award for Civil Liberties work, awarded by the Center for Independent Thought, and the Freedom Fund Award from the National Rifle Association. His writings have been been publicly denounced by the chief of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, the Postmaster General, and the chiefs of the Transportation Security Administration, U.S. International Trade Commission, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In 2015, the Justice Department sought to suppress his articles in USA Today. *Podcast intro music is from the song "The Queens Jig" by "Musicke & Mirth" from their album "Music for Two Lyra Viols": http://musicke-mirth.de/en/recordings.html (available on iTunes or Amazon)

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Eli Lake On Israel, Anti-Semitism, Kanye

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 12, 2024 48:55


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comEli is a journalist and friend. He's a former senior national security correspondent for The Daily Beast and Newsweek, and a former columnist for the Bloomberg View. He's now a reporter for The Free Press, a contributing editor at Commentary Magazine, and the host of his own podcast, The Re-Education. I thought I should have a strong Israel supporter to come on and challenge my recent columns.For two clips of our convo — on the West Bank settlements, and Trump's record on Israel — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Eli raised as a latchkey kid in Philly; his leftwing Jewish parents; turning neocon in college during the ‘90s PC wars; Milton Friedman's Free to Choose a formative book; Eli's love of rap from an early age; Tribe Called Quest and the Native Tongue movement of “rap hippies”; Black Nationalism; David Samuels' story on white kids driving hip-hop; Kanye's genius and grappling with his anti-Semitism; the bigotry of Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot; Nietzsche's madness; the persistence of Jew hatred across history and cultures; dissidents in the Catholic Church; Augustine; Jewish mysticism and Kabbalah; the faux sophistication of conspiracy theorists; Bob Dole as a Gen Xer; envy and resentment over Israel's success; the First Intifada; Labor Zionism; Ben-Gurion and Arab resistance; Menachem Begin; Netanyahu's dad; the IRA bombing British leaders; Arafat walking away from Camp David; the Second Intifada; 9/11 and Islamofascism; the Iraq War and Abu Ghraib; the settler movement and Judeo-fascists; Jared Kushner; the Abraham Accords; Arabs serving in the Knesset; Israel withdrawing from Gaza and southern Lebanon; the evil of Hamas; Yossi Klein Halevi; the IDF's AI program; the tunnels and 2,000-lb bombs; Dresden; John Spencer's Understanding Urban Warfare; Rafah; Trump's vanity; Soleimani and the Damascus embassy; and the US supplying weapons to Israel.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Next up: Kara Swisher on Silicon Valley. After that: Adam Moss on the artistic process, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Johann Hari on weight-loss drugs, Noah Smith on the economy, Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Bill Maher on everything, and the great Van Jones! Send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Neil J. Young On The Gay Right

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 5, 2024 46:31


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comNeil is a writer and historian. He used to be a contributing columnist at The Week, and he now co-hosts the “Past Present” history podcast. His first book was We Gather Together: The Religious Right and the Problem of Interfaith Politics, and his new one is Coming Out Republican: A History of the Gay Right.For two clips of our convo — on when the Postal Service snooped on gay men's letters, and Trump's growing support among gays and lesbians — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: growing up a gay kid in a Baptist family in central Florida; college at Duke then Columbia while living in NYC for two decades; how gays are a unique minority because they're born randomly across the US; the Best Little Boy in the World syndrome; the libertarian tradition of gay activists; the Mattachine Society; the obscure importance of Dorr Legg and One magazine; the Lavender Scare; the courage of Frank Kameny; how “privileged” white men had more to lose by coming out; the fundraising power of Marvin Liebman; his close friendship with Bill Buckley; the direct-mail pioneer Terry Dolan; Bob Bauman's stellar career in the GOP until getting busted for prostitutes; Michael Barone; David Brock; Barney Frank's slur “Uncle Tom Cabin Republicans”; the AIDS epidemic; how the virus sparked mass outings and assimilation; gay groups decimated by the disease; why gay Republicans wanted to keep the bathhouses open; John Boswell's history on gay Christians; my conservative case for marriage in 1989; the bravery of Bruce Bawer and Jon Rauch; the early opposition to marriage by the gay left and Dem establishment; HRC's fecklessness; the lies and viciousness of gay lefties like Richard Goldstein; Randy Shilts despised by fellow gays; Bayard Rustin; war hero Leonard Matlovich; how DADT drummed out more gays from the military than ever before; Clinton's betrayal with DOMA; the peerless legal work of Evan Wolfson and reaching across the ideological aisle; how quickly the public shifted on marriage; the Log Cabin Republicans in the early ‘00s; Dubya's marriage amendment; his striking down of the HIV travel ban; PEPFAR; Ken Mehlman; Tim Gill; Kennedy's opinion in Obergefell; Gorsuch's opinion in Bostock; Buttigeig's historic run; the RNC's outreach to gays in 2019; Jamie Kirchick's book; Caitlyn Jenner; the groomer slur; the conflict between homosexuality and transness when it comes to kids; Tavistock; and the new conversion therapy.Coming up on the Dishcast: Eli Lake on Israel and foreign affairs, Kara Swisher on Silicon Valley, Adam Moss on the artistic process, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Johann Hari on weight-loss drugs, Noah Smith on the economy, Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Bill Maher on everything, and the great Van Jones! Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Daniel Finkelstein On Hitler, Stalin, And His Mum And Dad

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 29, 2024 39:19


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comDanny is a journalist, politician, and old friend. Formerly an adviser to Prime Minister John Major, he was appointed to the House of Lords in 2013. He's a former executive editor of The Times of London and is still there as a weekly political columnist. He's also a director of Chelsea Football Club. His latest book is Two Roads Home: Hitler, Stalin, and the Miraculous Survival of My Family (the title in the UK is way, way better: Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad). It's an astonishingly well-researched thriller of a story.For two clips of our convo — comparing the horrors of the Soviets and the Nazis, and whether Anne Frank would have been a Justin Bieber fan — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: growing up in Hendon (“my parents chose it because it wasn't exciting”); his grandfather Alfred as “one of the great archivists of the 20th century”; his work contributed to the Nuremberg and Eichmann trials; The Protocols of the Elders of Zion; the Hitler/Stalin pact; their carving up of Poland; the purging of the bourgeois; “If you spoke Esperanto or had stamp collection you were considered a spy”; the horrific cattle-trucks into the Soviet interior meant to cull the weak; the gulags; the state collective farms; working for your food; keeping captives on the bring of starvation; the Katyn Massacre; the devastation in Ukraine; Danny's relatives who knew Anne Frank as a neighbor in Amsterdam; the dangerous extremes of group identity; “the liberating value of truth”; the main crime of the Jews was their success; the question of Zionism; the Jewish Labour tradition; Danny's experience as a Jewish Tory; and his mum attending his induction into the House of Lords.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Neil J. Young on his history of the gay right, Eli Lake on Israel and foreign affairs, Adam Moss on the artistic process, Johann Hari on weight-loss drugs, Bill Maher on everything, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Richard Dawkins On God, Sex, Race

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 22, 2024 41:36


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comRichard is a scientist, author, and public speaker. From 1995 to 2008 he was the Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford, and he's currently a Fellow of the Royal Society and of the Royal Society of Literature. Among his many bestselling books are the The Selfish Gene, The God Delusion, and his two-part autobiography, An Appetite for Wonder and A Brief Candle in the Dark. He also has substack called The Poetry of Reality — check it out and subscribe!A pioneering New Atheist, Dawkins is a passionate defender of science and denigrator of religion. Who better to talk to about God? For two clips of our convo — on whether faith is necessary for meaning, and which religion is the worst — pop over to our YouTube page.Other topics: Richard growing up in England and colonial Africa; his father serving as an agricultural officer; the paternalistic racism of that period; Orwell's “Such, Such Were the Joys”; genetic variation and natural selection; how evolution is “stunningly simple” but yields “prodigious complexity”; the emergence of consciousness; the crucial role of language for humans; how our intelligence will destroy us; life on other planets; birds-of-paradise and seducing the opposite sex; how faith and the scientific method aren't mutually exclusive; Einstein's faith; Pascal; Oakeshott; religious practice over doctrine; the divinity of nature; Richard's love of cathedrals and church music; Buddhism; virgin births and transubstantiation; Jesus as a moral teacher; his shifting of human consciousness; the Jefferson bible; Hitchens; GK Chesterton; Larkin; Richard as a “cultural Anglican”; gender as “fictive sex”; gamete size; respecting pronouns; science and race; tribalism and “the other”; the complex blend of genetics and culture; the heritability of intelligence; the evolutionary role of religion; the heretical violence of Islam; gays in the Catholic Church; falling rates of religious faith; Judith Butler's new book; and my awful experience on Jon Stewart's now-terminated show.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Next up: Daniel Finkelstein on his memoir Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad, and Neil J. Young on his history of the gay right. After that: Johann Hari on weight-loss drugs, Adam Moss on the artistic process, and George Will on Trump and conservatism. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Abigail Shrier On Therapy For Kids

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 15, 2024 47:28


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comAbigail is an independent journalist and author. Her first book, Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters, was a bestseller, and her new book is a bestseller even the NYT has had to recognize eventually. It's called Bad Therapy: Why The Kids Aren't Growing Up. She also has a substack, The Truth Fairy. Check it out.For two clips of our convo — on the news of UK restricting puberty blockers, and the harm that therapy can do to normal kids — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: the brittle bones and teeth-splitting that result from puberty blockers; their effect on IQ; when blockers are necessary; the suicide canard with trans kids; the radio silence around Bostock; how 40 percent of kids are in some form of therapy — “awash in psychopathology”; kids publicizing their mental health on social media; How to Talk So Kids Will Listen; the work of Haim Ginott; “neurotic hovering parents” who rarely correct bad behavior; parents giving up authority; dysregulated kids; Abigail's upbringing; my tumultuous childhood; Gabor Maté; drug addiction and childhood trauma; iatrogenesis; smartphones; Covid; social emotional learning; why breathwork and mindfulness doesn't work for kids; how SSRIs can kill adolescent sex drive as it's developing; Richard Bing's study on convicts and PTSD; the benefits of therapy for adults; psychotherapy as a literary practice; how therapy has filled the void of religion; kids rushing to become “LGBTQ” because it's valorized; gay kids today are more accepted but more miserable; the parents who use their trans kids as props; the benefits of same-sex schools; the spike in days off for mental health; and the current cover-story by Andrea Long Chu.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Richard Dawkins on religion, Johann Hari on weight-loss drugs, Adam Moss on the artistic process, and George Will on Trump and conservatism. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Countdown with Keith Olbermann
WHO OWNS TRUMP AND HOW SICK IS HE? (HE MISPRONOUNCED 'PUTIN') - 3.12.24

Countdown with Keith Olbermann

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 12, 2024 44:00 Transcription Available


SERIES 2 EPISODE 1XX: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: I would've expected Trump to mispronounce "Melania" as "Melanoma" before he garbled Putin's name. Whether Putin is his blackmailer, his benefactor or just his idol, if he called him "Poten," Donald Trump is a desperately sick man. I mean, Jesus H. Christ in a Hatbox. The evidence continues to mount for either the thesis that he has Fluent Aphasia or what veteran Trump health analyst Dr. John Gartner has identified as Phonemic Paraphasias (an Alzheimer's symptom in what regular words are replaced by nonsense that rhymes with them).  This could also explains Trump, a day after posting his latest bond for the latest money he owes E. Jean Carroll after her latest lawsuit, insisting again that he never met her, and two days after that going live on national television and insisting - as if he has never mentioned before - that he never met her. If his brain is dissolving, he might really have no idea that he met her or raped her or anything else. The bond in the Carroll case (one of them, I forget the number) brings us back to the other question. It was a bond posted by Chubb insurance (irony unbound) and neither Trump nor Chubb will confirm or deny the 91 million was co-signed by anybody else. Chubb has outlets in Russia, Turkey, UAE, Brasil. Trump met with right-winger Jeff Yass (who owns part of TikTok and now Trump DOESN'T want to ban TikTok) and Elon Musk. Did either of them buy Trump? And: today's House Judiciary Committee comedy show with Special Counsel Robert Hur hits differently now that Biden put a dagger in the heart of the MAGA Biden Age Plot during The State of the Union, and that Hur has "left" the Justice Department and is testifying as just a corrupt citizen Trump Stooge (which he was all along). If the Democrats begin to set him on fire, the GOP will turn on him on a dime. B-BLOCK (23:13) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: England's Kate is bad at photoshop and worse at apologizing. Pope Francis just echoed the wartime popes who appeased Hitler, and Marjorie Taylor Greene appears to have given away her plot to sabotage Biden into calling the murder victim "Laken Riley." (28:06) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Funny that Politico, The Washington Post, CNN, the broadcast networks, the AP, New York Times and everybody rushed to the Katie Britt disaster story but almost none of them gave any credit to the independent reporter Jonathan Katz who beat them to it by two days. WaPo actually pretended their guy broke it, and Politico amplified that. It's shameful, and another symptom of broken media. Speaking of broken, there's Mitt Romney, and Bill Maher. We have an explanation for why he turned into an idiot: he reads only the most idiotic political columnists (George Will? Really? I mean other than for baseball?) C-BLOCK (36:35) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: After the audience for our SOTU special was exceeded by only eight television news operations (each of which has, you know, a news operation) a prominent non-news TV executive asked me why I wasn't back on MSNBC. So I had to tell the Maddow story again. Including the part about the $437 with which I hired her for the network out of my own pocket.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Christian Wiman On God And Suffering

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 8, 2024 43:19


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comChristian is a poet and author, and, in my view, one of the most piercing writers on faith in our time. He served as the editor of Poetry magazine from 2003 to 2013, and his work has appeared in The Atlantic, Harper's Bazaar, The New Yorker, the NYT Book Review and others. He's the author, editor, or translator of more than a dozen books, and his new one is called Zero at the Bone: Fifty Entries Against Despair. Matt Sitman and I did a pod episode with him 12 years ago; so it was a real delight to reconnect for a second. I think it's one of the best episodes we've yet produced. But make up your own mind. For two clips of our convo — on finding God through suffering, and getting a glimpse of the divine through psychedelics — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: growing up in poverty and trauma in West Texas; his father was a Bible salesman turned doctor but volatile and addiction-prone; murder-suicide in his extended family; Christian's anger over his upbringing; discovering poetry in college was a life preserver; the silence found in the middle and end of poems; Emily Dickinson's dashes; Zadie Smith; how pure joy is destabilizing; C.S. Lewis; how the comforts of modern life insulate us from the ultimate questions; Pascal; the voiceless film Into Great Silence; Terrence Malick; me contemplating the Trinity on MDMA; an argument between Jesus and Nietzsche on magic mushrooms; how Nietzsche drove Christian away from God in college but eventually strengthened his faith; eternal return; “Christ is much larger than Christianity”; my friend Patrick who perished from AIDS; Christian facing oblivion with cancer many times; questioning his own faith constantly; Aeschylus; Rumi; Montaigne; Leonard Cohen; eternity as a release from time; Augustine on time; Job and undeserved suffering; theodicy; Anna Kamieńska's poem “A Prayer That Will Be Answered”; Larkin's “Church Going” and “This Be The Verse”; Auden; Carlo Rovelli and perception; and the profound feminism of Jesus.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children, Richard Dawkins on religion, Johann Hari on weight-loss drugs, Adam Moss on the artistic process, and George Will on Trump and conservatism. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Rob Henderson On Overcoming Trauma

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 1, 2024 39:55


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comRob is a young independent writer. His work has been featured in the NYT, the WSJ, the Boston Globe and others, and he writes a popular substack that coined the term “luxury beliefs.” He had a tumultuous childhood in foster care, joined the Air Force at 17, and went on to graduate from Yale and Cambridge. He tells that story in his first book, Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class.For two clips of our convo — on attending Yale during the Halloween costume meltdown, and how to reform the foster care system — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: born into poverty in LA; an absent father; a drug-addicted mom who grossly neglected him; her arrest and deportation; entering foster care at age 3; having his first beer at age 5; his social worker being the most stable figure in his childhood; seven different homes by age 8; an eccentric foster mom who used Rob for free labor and nearly let him drown in her swimming pool; finally adopted by parents — who divorced 18 months later; the adopted father who cut him off; the adopted mother who partnered with a woman — who suffered a near fatal gunshot; growing up in the working-class Central Valley; constantly getting into fights; constantly using drugs and booze; drunk-driving on the reg; getting terrible grades; barely graduating high school; enlisting in the Air Force at 17 and serving eight years; entering rehab at 24; his life saved by a standardized test in the military; how the SATs are a life-line for marginalized teens; Rob getting into Yale; being mystified by the “luxury beliefs” and victim culture of his privileged peers; micro-aggressions and emotional labor; Orwell on oikophobia of the intelligentsia; the high marriage rates of liberal elites; Google's Gemini trying to indoctrinate the masses with CRT; and the importance of a stable family above all else.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children, Adam Moss on the artistic process, and Richard Dawkins on religion. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Jeffrey Rosen On Virtue And Learning

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 23, 2024 47:13


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comJeff is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, where he hosts “We the People,” a weekly podcast of constitutional debate. He is also a professor of law at the George Washington University Law School, and a contributing editor at The Atlantic. A former house-mate of mine and friend for 40 years, Jeff began his journalistic career writing some stellar essays on the Supreme Court in the TNR when I was editor. The author of many books, his new one is The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America.You can listen right away in the audio player above (or on the right side of the player, click “Listen On” to add the Dishcast feed to your favorite podcast app). For two clips of our convo — on the transcendence of deep reading in the age of distraction, and the hypocrisy of many Founding Fathers on slavery — pop over to our YouTube page.Other topics: growing up in NYC with a father who's a renowned hypnotherapist and a mother who's a social worker; educated at the Dalton School — “a beacon of liberalism”; reconciling faith with reason; the intellectual tradition in Catholicism; God as reason (logos); Jeff's deep reading during Covid; Seneca's essays on time; Cicero's treatise on old age; Aurelius' Meditations; Ben Franklin's 13 virtues; temperance and prudence; Socrates; Plato; Aristotelian balance; Pythagorus; Blazing Saddles; “without virtue happiness cannot be”; Jefferson's 12 virtues; his rank racism and contradictions over liberty; Sally Hemings; George Wythe freeing his slaves; the Founders building a new society based on ancient wisdom; Cicero at the center of that project; the Bhagavad Gita; the Stoics as Taoist; John Adams as tempestuous and striving for humility; treating his brilliant wife as his equal; making up with his enemies (e.g. Jefferson); Madison and the Federalist Papers; Douglass teaching himself to read; Freud and the substitute of character for personality; delayed gratification; “everything goes to s**t in the Sixties”; Gen Z's pursuit of happiness ending in anxiety; the quiet life of the 18th century vs the “dazzling array of distractions” today; regaining concentration through deep reading; how all the great books of the ancient world are free online; balance, deliberation, and equanimity as keys to good government; the preternatural calm of Obama; the danger of demagogues; Trump as the anti-Christ of liberal democracy and the antithesis of the Founders.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Rob Henderson on class and “luxury beliefs,” Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children, Adam Moss on the artistic process, and Richard Dawkins on religion. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Nate Silver On Gambling And Politics

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 16, 2024 39:59


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comNate is a statistician and writer focused on American politics and sports, and a longtime friend from the blog days. He was the founder and editor-in-chief of FiveThirtyEight, and now he writes his own substack, Silver Bulletin. He's the author of The Signal and the Noise, and his forthcoming book is On the Edge: How Successful Gamblers and Risk-Takers Think (pre-order here).For two clips of our convo — on the pluralism of gay social networks, why poker is so male — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Nate growing up in the Midwest obsessed with sports and the debate team; the Best Little Boy in the World syndrome; coming out while living abroad; how the LGBT Society in 1999 was apolitical; gays as heterodox thinkers in media; the joys of code-switching; the diversity of sports fans and poker players; the sexism in poker; Maria Konnikova and Maria Ho; how a poker player can benefit from discrimination by defying stereotypes; Erving Goffman and risk-taking; testosterone; Nate grossing $750,000 in poker; the flow state of gambling under extreme pressure; how Gen Z is more risk-averse than older generations; immigrants as risk-takers; the morality of gambling; addiction; people peeing at slot machines; Fauci's noble lie for masks; the Swedish model during Covid; effective altruism; Obama the poker player being cool under pressure vs. Trump's impulsivity; Truman's gambling mindset and Hiroshima; the online poker boom; how Nate doesn't want to be known as the political forecast guy; the misconception of him as a partisan Dem; Will Stancil; how the economic perceptions of the public are usually accurate; Biden's age; his people blaming the media for his problems; the convention option for switching nominees; the White House not boosting Kamala Harris; her flaming out before Iowa in 2020; Claudine Gay's plagiarism; Twitter under Musk; and, yes, Angry Birds!Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Jeffrey Rosen on the Stoics and happiness, Rob Henderson on class and “luxury beliefs,” Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

We the People
The Founders, the Pursuit of Happiness, and the Virtuous Life

We the People

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 15, 2024 72:30


Jeffrey Rosen talks about his new book, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America, followed by a panel discussion on the influence of classical writers and thinkers on the founding generation. Panelists include University of Chicago Professor Eric Slauter, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist George Will; and Melody Barnes, executive director of UVA's Karsh Institute of Democracy. This program was recorded live on February 9, 2024.   Resources:  Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America (2024)  Cicero, The Tusculan Disputations   Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics   Melody Barnes, et al, ed., Community Wealth Building and the Reconstruction of American Democracy (2020)  Karsh Institute of Democracy, University of Virginia    Eric Slauter, The State as a Work of Art: The Cultural Origins of the Constitution (2009)  Thomas Jefferson's Recommended Reading   George Will, Statecraft as Soulcraft: What Government Does (1984)  George Will, The Conservative Sensibility (2019)  Questions or comments about the show? Email us at podcast@constitutioncenter.org. Continue today's conversation on Facebook and Twitter using @ConstitutionCtr.  Sign up to receive Constitution Weekly, our email roundup of constitutional news and debate, at bit.ly/constitutionweekly.   You can find transcripts for each episode on the podcast pages in our Media Library. 

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Isikoff & Klaidman On Trump's Trial In Georgia

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 9, 2024 56:50


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comMichael Isikoff is the chief investigative correspondent for Yahoo News, where he is also editor-at-large for reporting and investigations. Daniel Klaidman is the editor-in-chief for Yahoo News. The veteran reporters have new a book called Find Me the Votes: A Hard-Charging Georgia Prosecutor, a Rogue President, and the Plot to Steal an American Election.For two clips of our convo — the violent threats spurred by Trump's conspirators, and the hero of the Georgia case — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Mike as head of his college paper during Watergate and then working at the WaPo; Dan growing up with his dad at the WaPo during the WoodStein era; his mother a Holocaust survivor; Georgia as “ground zero for the most undemocratic plot in US history”; the Hugo Chavez conspiracy theory; Sidney Powell plotting a break-in and offering the henchmen preemptive pardons; Giuliani “drunk out of his mind”; the cyber-heist of Dominion software and voter data; Lin Wood and QAnon; the absurd Eastman memo; knowing the 2020 lawsuits would fail but nevertheless pressure the Electors; unfounded claims of ballot stuffing; Ruby Freeman and her daughter; Giuliani's “racial dog whistles”; the infamous call to Raffensperger to “find votes” and “recalculate”; Stacey Abrams; whether Trump cynically or sincerely believed the election was stolen; Mike Flynn; whether the transfer of power was ever really in jeopardy; the principled Pence; the courts holding firm against Trump; autocracy as a “gradual slow burn” (e.g. Hungary); Fani Willis; her Black Panther father who dated Angela Davis; Fani's sexual relationship with a prosecutor in the Georgia case after she hired him; the terrible optics of it all; the tough-on-crime campaign she ran in 2020 and getting endorsed by the police union; Barr and Esper keeping Trump from using the Insurrection Act; Trump fundraising off his mugshot; and whether he will have the same guardrails in a second term.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Nate Silver on the 2024 race, Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, Jeffrey Rosen on the pursuit of happiness, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Saving Elephants | Millennials defending & expressing conservative values
148 – Conservatism in Practice with Gov Mitch Daniels

Saving Elephants | Millennials defending & expressing conservative values

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 6, 2024 48:20


The Saving Elephants podcast has welcomed a wide array of incredible guests who are on forefront of the conservative political movement.  But most of the guests discuss conservatism from the perspective of a theory or set of principles or idea.  Few have had the opportunity to enact political conservatism as a practice.  And few ex-politicians have been as successful as former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels in advancing conservatism as a practice.  While Daniels is reticent to label his approach “conservative” or identify as part of red team vs. blue team, his practices in executive offices from the governor's mansion to serving in presidential administrations to leading a university have all displayed a strong tinge of conservative prudence and small-government grit.   Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis welcomes former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels to the show to discuss his experiences as governor, advisor to Ronald Reagan, Director of OMB for George W. Bush, president of Purdue University.  His accomplishments in these offices and no-nonsense approach towards governing has earned him recognition among many on the Right.  Some leading conservatives—from George Will to Jonah Goldberg to Ross Douthat—have clearly stated he would have been their preferred presidential candidate in recent elections.  While Daniels isn't a presidential candidate then or now, his story provides a roadmap in our politically bleak wilderness for what qualities we should be looking for in a leader.   About Mitch Daniels from Purdue University   Mitchell E. Daniels, Jr. is the 12th president of Purdue University and the former governor of Indiana.  He was elected Indiana's 49th governor in 2004 in his first bid for any elected office, and then re-elected in 2008 with more votes than any candidate in the state's history.  During his tenure, Indiana went from an $800 million deficit to its first AAA credit rating, led the nation in infrastructure building and passed sweeping education and healthcare reforms.   After a series of transformations, which included the biggest tax cut in state history, the nation's most sweeping deregulation of the telecommunications industry and a host of other reforms aimed at strengthening the state's economy, Indiana was rated a top five state for business climate and number one for state infrastructure and effectiveness of state government as Daniels exited office.  Indiana's business climate is now rated among the nation's best.   At Purdue, Daniels has prioritized student affordability and reinvestment in the university's strengths.  Breaking with a 36-year trend, Purdue has held tuition unchanged from 2012 through at least the 2022-23 academic year.  Simultaneously, room rates have remained steady, meal plan rates have fallen about 10%, and student borrowing has dropped 32% while investments in student success and STEM research have undergone unprecedented growth. It is less expensive to attend Purdue today than it was in 2012.   In recognition of his leadership as both a governor and a university president, Daniels was named among the Top 50 World Leaders by Fortune Magazine in 2015 and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019.   Prior to becoming governor, Daniels served as chief of staff to Senator Richard Lugar, senior advisor to President Ronald Reagan and Director of the Office of Management and Budget under President George W. Bush.  He also was the CEO of the Hudson Institute, a major contract research organization.  During an 11-year career at Eli Lilly and Company, he held a number of top executive posts including president of Eli Lilly's North American pharmaceutical operations.   Daniels earned a bachelor's degree from Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and a law degree from Georgetown.  He is the author of three books and a contributing columnist in the Washington Post.  He and his wife Cheri have four daughters and seven grandchildren.  

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Justin Brierley On The Rebirth Of Belief In God

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 2, 2024 45:11


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comJustin is a writer and broadcaster who creates dialogue between Christians and non-Christians. He co-hosts the “Re-Enchanting” podcast for Seen & Unseen, and is a guest presenter for the “Maybe God” podcast. He also contributes to Premier Christianity magazine, where he used to be editor. His new book is The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God, and he has a documentary podcast series of the same name.You can listen right away in the audio player above (or on the right side of the player, click “Listen On” to add the Dishcast feed to your favorite podcast app). For two clips of our convo — on what killed the New Atheist movement, and the infinitesimal odds that life ever emerged — pop over to our YouTube page.Other topics: his parents the “hippies who found Jesus” at Oxford; his early childhood in a Christian commune; the left and right brains of faith; conversion moments; Pascal; Augustine; the evolutionary need for religion; Hitchens and me debating the meaning of life; our disdain for proselytizing; Dawkins and the “mind virus”; atheism and why people “need more than a negative to live on”; my falling away from the Church after the sex-abuse crisis; the quasi-religious movement of BLM and wokeness; its need for purity without grace; the Trump cult; evangelicals drifting from the church-state divide; Christianism; my atheist ex-boyfriend; Ayaan's conversion; Tom Holland; Game of Thrones as medieval Europe without Christianity; how Jesus changed human consciousness forever; Bart Ehrman; debating the details of the Resurrection; the #MeToo movement and the dignity of women; monogamy as a way to protect women from polygamist men; Louise Perry's Case Against Sexual Revolution; how ISIS brought back crucifixion; the chasm between Christianity and its leaders; the many messiahs of the ancient world; psychedelics; sensing my friend Patrick after his death; scientific materialism; Alex Rosenberg's The Atheist's Guide to Reality; the problem of consciousness; panpsychism; Harari on human rights; Paul Davies and the “directionality of life”; logos as logic speaking into chaos; and why “Christianity has to stay weird.”Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Isikoff and Klaidman on Trump's trials; Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, Nate Silver on the 2024 race, Jeffrey Rosen on the pursuit of happiness, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Jonathan Freedland On Anti-Semitism And The Left

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 26, 2024 41:44


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comJonathan writes a column for The Guardian, hosts their “Politics Weekly America” podcast, and is the co-host of the “Unholy” podcast with Israeli journalist Yonit Levi. He's also the author of The Escape Artist: The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World, along with several thrillers under the pseudonym Sam Bourne.For two clips of our convo — on “white supremacy” shifting to “Jewish supremacy,” and a character study of Keir Starmer — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Jonathan covering US politics since the 1992 election; how Hamas didn't expect the IDF failures on 10/7; the PR battle over Gaza; Israel in a “desperately bad place”; Hamas wanting the deaths of civilians on both sides; disturbing quotes from the settler movement; the impossibility of a two-state solution; the crude worldview of the woke left; how progressives have often been “on the wrong side of history” (e.g. eugenics); Jeremy Corbyn and anti-Semitism; his meeting with Hamas and Hezbollah; the hooked-nose mural in East London Corbyn defended; Corbyn insidiously trashing a piece by Jonathan; the abuse hurled at Margaret Hodge as a child of Holocaust survivors; inherited trauma; Keir Starmer's stand against the anti-Semitism in his party; his “Eliot Ness” persona as a chief prosecutor; the likelihood of him being the next PM; Tony Blair's unflattering portrayal in The Crown; Brexit and migrants; the Rwanda Plan; how Biden is fatally weak on immigration; Iowa evangelicals deifying Trump; and Trump as the favorite for winning in the fall.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Justin Brierley on his book The Surprising Rebirth of Belief of God, Nate Silver on the 2024 race, Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, Jeffrey Rosen on the pursuit of happiness, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Jeff Greenfield On Trump And History

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 19, 2024 40:31


This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comJeff is a TV journalist and author focused on politics, media, and culture. He's been a senior political correspondent for CBS, a senior analyst for CNN, and a political and media analyst for ABC News. He has authored or co-authored 13 books, including If Kennedy Lived, When Gore Beat Bush, and Then Everything Changed: Stunning Alternate Histories of American Politics.For two clips of our convo — on how dangerous a Trump reelection would be, and how Biden trapped us with terrible prospects against Trump — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: growing up in NYC; working on the RFK campaign in ‘68; leaving a lucrative consulting job for journalism; the populist appeal of Pat Buchanan; Newt's pivotal role in polluting politics; how Trump totalized the GOP; his cult following among evangelicals; why he won't be as restrained during a second term; the civil service in his crosshairs; how Haley and DeSantis failed to deploy dissenters who worked for Trump; Mike Lee's surrender as a constitutionalist; Mike Flynn wanting to use the military on Jan 6; the congressmen who didn't vote to impeach out of fear of death threats; our plummeting trust of institutions; Trump countering Jeb over “my brother kept us safe”; Trump priming his base to disbelieve any media reports; the “pathetic miscalculation” of the Resistance that he was finished; the Dems' lost opportunity to take seriously the concerns of his voters; Obama's firm stance on illegal immigration; why legal immigrants dislike open borders; how crime has “bedeviled” the Dems since the '60s; why non-white voters are moving toward Trump; Fetterman changing his tune as a progressive; protesters today don't understand civil disobedience like MLK did; Reagan as a “senior stud” compared to Biden; why Biden is stuck with Harris; how the Ivy League hearings could have been a “Sistah Souljah” moment for Biden; famous moments in debate history; people who could have been great presidents; and Jeff detailing many other counterfactuals from history.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Jonathan Freedland on anti-Semitism and UK politics, Nate Silver on the 2024 election, Christian Wiman on resisting despair, Justin Brierley on his book The Surprising Rebirth of Belief of God, Jeffrey Rosen on the pursuit of happiness, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms kids. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Our American Stories
Yogi Berra, an American Success Story (by George Will)

Our American Stories

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 22, 2023 7:59 Transcription Available


On this episode of Our American Stories, "I never said most of the things I said." ... Well, even if that's so, Yogi Berra's quotes are just the entrée to the man's contribution to American sports and culture. George Will is here to bring us the main course! Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Our American Stories
Joe DiMaggio, Ted Williams, and the Summer of ‘41 (by George Will)

Our American Stories

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 1, 2023 10:49 Transcription Available


On this episode of Our American Stories, George Will tells the story of Ted Williams. He also tells the story of a San Francisco fisherman, Joe DiMaggio, his “Streak” of a hit in 56 consecutive games, and his steely determination.  Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Civics 101
The Republican and Democratic Parties

Civics 101

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 29, 2023 41:30


Today we look at the creation and evolution of the two major parties in the US; the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. How did they come about? How did their ideals shift over the last 200+ years? And where might they go next?These episodes originally aired in 2020, and feature Keneshia Grant, George Will, Kathryn DePalo-Gould, Heather Wagner, Paddy Riley, and William Adler.Listen to all our episodes and support our show at our website, civics101podcast.org. 

The Ricochet Audio Network Superfeed
Q & A, Hosted by Jay Nordlinger: George F. Will, Classically Conservative

The Ricochet Audio Network Superfeed

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 26, 2023


In this conversation, Jay asks George Will about issues that both have been thinking about: the GOP presidential race; Ukraine; our fiscal house (wobbly); abortion; affirmative action; drug legalization. What else? Well, baseball, and Shohei Ohtani in particular. And books—books that left a political mark. And Jim Buckley, who passed away last week at 100. […]

Take One Daf Yomi
Gittin 70 – In Praise of Moderation

Take One Daf Yomi

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 25, 2023 9:05


Today's Talmud page, Gittin 70, shares a list of eight items that the body and soul should enjoy in moderation. Rabbi Dr. Stuart Halpern gives advice on ways to enjoy life, while also living in moderation. As an example of this, he shares the story of when George Will entered the Beit Midrash, the Study Hall of Yeshiva University, and wondered how anyone could learn in the cacophony of noise the came from the students as they studied together. How do you enjoy a baseball game during the nine days? Listen and find out. Like the show? Subscribe to our weekly newsletter. Send us a note at takeone@tabletmag.com. Follow us on Twitter at @takeonedafyomi and join the conversation in the Take One Facebook group. Take One is a Tablet Studios production. The show is hosted by Liel Leibovitz, and is produced and edited by Darone Ruskay, Quinn Waller and Elie Bleier. Our team also includes Stephanie Butnick, Josh Kross, Robert Scaramuccia, and Tanya Singer.  Check out all of Tablet's podcasts at tabletmag.com/podcasts.

Real Coffee with Scott Adams
Episode 2170 Scott Adams: Find Out Who Ended Their Political Career Yesterday, And Lots More Fun

Real Coffee with Scott Adams

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 15, 2023 68:55


My new book LOSERTHINK, available now on Amazon https://tinyurl.com/rqmjc2a Find my "extra" content on Locals: https://ScottAdams.Locals.com Content: ----------- Coffee time Politics, Liberal Mental Health, Peer Pressure, Andrew Tate, The Hill, Apple Mood Tracking, Biden European Trip, John Heilemann, President Trump, George Will, Tucker Carlson, Tim Scott, Vivek Ramaswamy, VP Harris, X-energy Nuclear, Scott Adams --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/scott-adams00/support