Wisdom of Crowds (Shadi Hamid & Damir Marusic)

Wisdom of Crowds associate editor Matt Winesett joins Damir and Shadi to debate Donald Rumsfeld's legacy and if his mistakes permanently discredited nation building and democracy promotion abroad. They also discuss how younger Millennials perceived the Iraq War, whether Bushism or Trumpism would better serve the GOP's future, how much politicians' personal character ultimately matters, and much more.

Their conversation continues in a bonus episode, out next week. Subscribe here to get it straight to your inbox.

Recommended Reading:

• “The Defense Secretary Who Let Bin Laden Get Away,” by Peggy Noonan (The Wall Street Journal)
• “The Hubris of Donald Rumsfeld,” by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)
• “Oh, the Audacity!” by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)
• Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream, by Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam (Amazon)
• American Conservatism: Reclaiming an Intellectual Tradition, by Andrew Bacevich (Amazon)
• "Dispatches From the Conservative Bubble," with Matt Winesett, Damir Marusic, and Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "The Poetry of D. H. Rumsfeld," by Donald Rumsfeld (Slate)

What’s the nature of our enemy in Ukraine? Is it Putin, Russia, or authoritarianism? What are the sources of the West’s strength and its capacities for revival? And how should we think about evil in the world? The political philosopher Samuel Kimbriel joins Shadi and Damir to help unpack these questions, and many others in a wide-ranging philosophical discussion.

In the subscriber-only portion of the episode, the debate intensifies around whether finitude entails a more confrontational American foreign policy or a more humble one. Will the threat of an external enemy push Americans out of their decadence and towards a new kind of proto-messianism?

Required Reading

- "Death and Morality in the War on Ukraine" by Samuel Kimbriel (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "We Need to Talk About a No-Fly Zone" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)

- “Putin’s Palace: The History of the World’s Largest Bribe,” by Alexei Navalny (YouTube)

- Islamic Exceptionalism: How the Struggle Over Islam Is Reshaping the World, by Shadi Hamid (Amazon)

- Friendship as Sacred Knowing: Overcoming Isolation, by Samuel Kimbriel (Amazon)

- Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets, by Svetlana Alexievich (Amazon)

- "Ross Douthat on Decadence, Wokeness, and UFOs" (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "The (Aggressive) Pursuit of Happiness" (Wisdom of Crowds)

This week, Elisabeth Zerofsky of The New York Times Magazine joins us after recent reporting trips in Paris and Berlin. In Part 1, we talked about the upcoming French election and the rise of the far-right in France. The West is looking on nervously as President Macron tries to fend off a challenge from Marine Le Pen, a populist with ties to Putin. Regardless of the outcome, French voters have veered to the right—with fear of Islam driving public debate and mainstream politicians refusing to disavow the "Great Replacement" conspiracy theory.

In Part 2 of the discussion, available here for subscribers, the conversation shifts to Germany's growing sense of crisis. Is Germany the new "sick of man of Europe"? During the Trump years, American liberals saw Angela Merkel as a sort of substitute leader of the free world. But Merkel legacy's may be in for a not-so-kind reckoning. Also: Damir wonders out loud whether Shadi is, deep down, a crypto-neoconservative.

Subscribers get access to all paid content, including weekly bonus episodes, Q&A features with Shadi and Damir, our full essay archive, as well as members-only conversations with guests like Ross Douthat and Glenn Greenwald. You can subscribe here and cancel anytime.

Required Reading

• "The End of History Dies Hard in Berlin" by Elisabeth Zerofsky (Wisdom of Crowds)

• "France's Far Right Turn" by Elisabeth Zerofsky (New York Times)

• "'Worst crisis since the second world war’: Germany prepares for a Russian gas embargo" by (Financial Times)

• Philly D.A., directed by Ted Passon, Yoni Brook, Nicola Salazar (Amazon)

• Trump's meeting with Germany

This week was a first for the podcast– we welcomed two guests, Michael Wear and Jane Coaston. Michael is a rare fish, an Evangelical Christian and a Democratic political strategist who worked as President Obama's director of faith outreach in the 2012 campaign, going on to lead Evangelical outreach for the Obama White House's faith based initiative. An article he recently wrote for his Substack, "This is How to End Abortion Politics as We've Known It," has sparked vigorous discussion among the online set. In it, Wear argues that what "is needed now is legislation which provides a national framework that would contain our abortion debate, even if it would also mean codifying the nation’s long-held consensus that abortion is not a social good, even if a majority also believe it necessary to (re)establish the right to have one."

Jane Coaston, a New York Times opinion writer and host of "The Argument" podcast, thinks that Wear is mistaken. In her view, both sides see their position as absolute, and any compromise will be seen as an unacceptable betrayal of the cause. We decided to invite them both onto the pod, to hash it out and discuss the political fallout from the Dobbs decision.  

In the full episode (for subscribers), the conversation shifted towards a discussion of first principles and political strategy. We asked Michael how he squared working for President Obama with his own pro-life position, and questioned Jane on whether she thought a "settlement" on abortion was even desirable, let alone possible.

Will Republicans after the fall of Roe v. Wade be like the dog who caught the car, as Damir argues? Will Democrats be forced to moderate their strategy on abortion to meet voters where they are? Will either party be able to extricate itself from the demands of its activist class? And finally, we all debate the extent to which Democrats could, or should, have moderated their views on abortion over the past decade.

Required Reading:

- "This is How to End Abortion Politics as We've Known It," by Michael, on his Substack.

- "Democrats Shouldn't be so Certain About Abortion," by Michael (The New York Times).

- "How Will We Punish Women Who Have Abortions?" by Jane, (The New York Times).

- "The Argument" episode discussing the Dobbs decision, with Ross Douthat and Michelle Goldberg (The New York Times).

- "Making Abortion Illegal and Unthinkable," by Ryan T. Anderson and Alexandra Desanctis (National Review).

- Kevin D. Williamson discussing his email exchange with Jane, in National Review's online blog.

- "The Abortion Stories We Didn't Tell," by Rebecca Traister (New York Magazine).

- The full transcript of 2016's third presidential debate (Politico).

From Leon Trotsky to Sayyid Qutb to the Founding Fathers, Shadi and Damir discuss revolution in all its forms. The guys argue about the importance of ideas, the role of violence, and how order is legitimized. Can democracy keep the peace?

Part 2 of our conversation is available here for subscribers. Shadi and Damir turn their attention to the revolutionary impulses on both the conservative right and the woke left. While the intellectuals behind these movements likely don't consider themselves to be advocating for the overthrow of our system, does that mean they are fine operating in the system? Or are we approaching a tipping point of revolutionary impulse in America?

Subscribe here to listen. Members will also gain access to other paid content, including weekly bonus episodes, Q&As with Shadi and Damir, and our full archive of Friday Essays.

Required Reading

• The Prophet: The Life of Leon Trotsky, by Isaac Deutscher (Amazon)
• The Democracy Essays (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "Am I a Trotskyite?" by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)
• Hitler: A Global Biography, by Brendan Simms (Amazon)
• Terrorism and Communism: A Reply to Karl Kautsky (Revolutions), by Leon Trotsky, Foreword by Slavoj Žižek (Amazon)
• "Taking People as They Are: Islam as a 'Realistic Utopia' in the Political Theory of Sayyid Qutb" by Andrew F. March (American Political Science Review)
• "The Philosopher of Islamic Terror" by Paul Berman (New York Times)
• "Liberalism Has an Unhappiness Problem" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "Sohrab Ahmari on Liberalism, Tradition, and Political Catholicism" (Wisdom of Crowds)

A few weeks back, a book title caught our eye. It was called Two Billion Caliphs, written by Haroon Moghul. Mixing personal narrative and theological ruminations, it promised to offer a bold new vision for Muslims living in the 21st century. Being that we frequently talk about the importance of religion in the modern world, inviting Haroon on was a no-brainer.

A rich episode ensued. We talked about how 9/11 did (and didn’t) change everything for Muslims in America and how secularism and liberalism drive assimilation for good and for ill. If the Islamic tradition is being subsumed under liberalism, particularly in the West, does Islam's future include so-called "atheist Muslims"? And when it comes to politics, does the future of Islam in America include a Trumpist Republican party that, despite its anti-Muslim sentiments, still manages to run candidates like Dr. Mehmet Oz?

In the full conversation (for subscribers), Shadi and Haroon debate whether Islam can (or should) be de-politicized and what that might mean in practice. Haroon then goes on to explain why he has parted ways with Sufism, and why everyone must become a caliph.

Required Reading:

- Two Billion Caliphs: A Vision of a Muslim Future, by Haroon Moghul.

- "American Islam gets this beautiful thing right," by Haroon Moghul (CNN)

Shadi has been curious about whether he has diverged from the left since Bernie Sanders' campaign, so he invited the socialist thinker Daniel Bessner onto the podcast this week for a spirited discussion of first principles. Bessner is one of the most influential and important leftist intellectuals writing on foreign policy today. He is the Joff Hanauer Honors Professor in Western Civilization at the University of Washington and the author of Democracy in Exile.

What followed was perhaps the most contentious episode in Wisdom of Crowds history. Of course, here at the podcast, we see deep difference as a feature and not a bug, so we hope you'll see this as an example of what spirited but civil disagreement might look like in practice. The fundamental question we wanted to ask was whether American hegemony has, on balance, been "good" or "bad" for the world.

This is a question about a world that seems to have been lost. The unipolar moment is quickly coming to an end—that is, if it isn't already gone. Daniel argues that the decline in American power is both an inescapable reality and a net positive for the world. Shadi and Damir both disagree, but for quite different reasons.

In the longer episode (for subscribers only), the guys dive even deeper into their disagreements over America's role in the world. If the status quo is anything but ideal, what exactly are the alternatives—and are those alternatives plausible?

Damir, looking to press Daniel, suggests that the socialist vision for how the world will improve with an inward-facing Socialist America leaves too many questions unanswered. Shadi bristled at the suggestion of decreasing America's military footprint at the exact time when Russia and China are becoming increasingly aggressive. All the while, Daniel rejects the premise that it's in our interest to militarily aid Ukraine and would prefer that the U.S. take care of its own people and address its own moral disasters instead of pushing its pretend values on the world.

Required Reading

- Daniel Bessner's podcast, "American Prestige"

- Daniel's recent appearance on Glenn Loury's podcast

- Democracy in Exile: Hans Speier and the Rise of the Defense Intellectual, by Daniel Bessner (Amazon)

- "The American Empire and Existential Enemies" by Daniel Bessner (Foreign Exchanges)

- "There Are Many Things Worse Than American Power" by Shadi Hamid (Atlantic)

- "Are We The Good Guys? A Debate with Glenn Greenwald" (Wisdom of Crowds)

- The Communist Manifesto, by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels (Amazon)

This podcast came after a whirlwind few weeks for the Crowd– Damir returned from his odyssey through the Balkans, and Shadi was the recipient of several Twitter pile-ons. Oh, and the Queen died.

Before getting to all that, though, we ramble through a potpourri of other subjects. Damir gives relationship advice.  Shadi tells us why he's against pets and hiking. A conversation about whether animals have souls turns into a discuss of creationism and free speech, touching on some recent arguments in the pages of The Atlantic.

We also continue our conversation about national conservatism from last week, addressing statements made by national conservatives about the nature of rights in the international system. Are rights only real if they're enforceable? And if not, should the very concept be thrown out the window?

In the full episode (for subscribers only) Damir discusses some of the takeaways from his trip to the Balkans: what he saw on his travels made him wonder whether authoritarians like Vladimir Putin imposed themselves on unwilling societies, or if "the people" were more active participants in the process. In other words, are the Russian people as victimized as Western media makes them seem? Finally, Shadi shares his surprise at Britons; depth of feeling for their monarch, as well as his thoughts on what role monarchs play in Western democracies.

Ideas have consequences. From the early 2000s Matt Continetti, the author of the fascinating new book The Right, has worked at some of the leading institutions of American conservatism. He has seen firsthand how many of them fallen or lost their way. But where conservatism's critics see a movement that has become unrecognizable and even dangerous, Continetti sees instead a rich, vibrant, and messy war of ideas, institutions, and personalities.

This week, Continetti—the co-founder of the Washington Free Beacon and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute—offered us a panoramic look at the past and future of the American right and its sometimes odd intellectual evolution. How much do ideas really matter? How might the Republican Party have been different had 9/11 not happened? And would the conservative movement have even been possible without the pervasive threat of communism?

In the full subscriber episode, the conversation zeroes in on the extent to which conservatism and the right have diverged. Conservatism is meant to conserve, where the New Right is defined by populism and radicalism. Shadi pushes Matt by asking a question that is top of mind for many on the left: To what extent is the Republican Party still democratic? What is it drawing young men to such a revolutionary view of American politics? Is there a limit to anti-American ideas in American politics?

Required Reading

- The Right: The Hundred-Year War for American Conservatism, by Matthew Continetti (Amazon)

- Democratic Realism: An American Foreign Policy for a Unipolar World (Irving Kristol Lecture), by Charles Krauthammer

- "The Unipolar Moment" by Charles Krauthammer (Foreign Affairs)

- Trump's American Carnage Innaugural Address (CSPAN)

Ben Judah joins Shadi and Damir for a first attempt at digesting what happened this week in Washington. Was it a coup attempt? Are we at a moment of catharsis where the country can start to rebuild? Or are we in for even more darkness?

Reading List:

• "Japanese Lessons for the American Coup," by Noah Smith
• "The Weimarization of the American Republic," by Aaron Sibarium

Reading List:

• Democrats calling for "deprogramming."
• Shadi's "raw power" first draft.
• Shadi getting back on-side with the Left (members only).

In another sprawling episode, Shadi and Damir talk about Germany's decision to surveil one of its leading political parties and what this says about modern liberalism. They also discuss Shadi's Islam-as-Keto metaphor, the EU's legitimacy problem, and how theodicy relates to democracy.

Required Reading:

• “Germany Places Far-Right AfD Party Under Surveillance for Extremism,” by Katrin Bennhold (New York Times)
• “German Court Suspends Right to Surveil Far-Right AfD Party,” by Melissa Eddy (New York Times)
• “Goodbye to Europe,” by Luuk van Middelaar (London Review of Books)
• “Keto is basically ‘the Islam of diets,’ which probably explains why it’s so effective,” by Shadi Hamid (Twitter)

Why so angry? Shadi and Damir talk about useful idiocy, neoconservatism, and the dangerous temptation of righteousness in politics. Come for Shadi musing about U2 and stay for Damir rhapsodizing about Guy Debord.

Reading List:

• Not the Coen Brothers.
• "On Romance and Being in a Constant State of Alarm," Shadi Hamid (WoC)
• "The Biggest Risk to This Election Is Not Russia. It’s Us." Fiona Hill (NYT)

On today's show, Jason Willick of the Wall Street Journal's Editorial Page stops by to discuss all things representation: Does the filibuster still serve a beneficial purpose?  How can we balance both rural and urban interests? Should representatives mirror their voters' preferences or rely on their personal judgment? And how does the rise of Big Tech factor into all this?

Required Reading:

• The Politics of Size: Representation in the United States, 1776–1850, by Rosemarie Zagarri (Amazon)
• Why Cities Lose: The Deep Roots of the Urban-Rural Political Divide, by Jonathan A. Rodden (Amazon)
• Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America, by Edmund S. Morgan (Amazon)
• Representation in the American Revolution, by Gordon S. Wood (Amazon)
• Representation, by Monica Brito Vieira and David Runciman (Amazon)
• The Concept of Representation, by Hanna F. Pitkin (Amazon)
• Political Representation (Cultural Memory in the Present), by F. R. Ankersmit (Amazon)
• The Democracy Essays (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "Civility and Consensus Are Overrated," with Osita Nwanevu and Samuel Kimbriel (Wisdom of Crowds)

The great Nils Gilman of the Berggruen Institute and Noema joins Shadi and Damir to talk about why the upcoming elections feel existential, why our federal government feels increasingly illegitimate, and why Shadi's most recent piece in The Atlantic has annoyed so many people.

Reading List:

• "Human Rights and Neoliberalism," by Nils Gilman (LA Review of Books)
• "The Collapse of Racial Liberalism," by Nils Gilman (The American Interest)
• "The Democrats May Not Be Able to Concede," by Shadi Hamid (The Atlantic)

The firebrand journalist and author Glenn Greenwald joined us for a broad-ranging discussion on the war in Ukraine and the past few decades of American foreign policy. We tackled the comparisons between Russia's invasion, the Iraq War, and other disastrous American foreign policy failures. Does America's good intent set it apart from countries like Russia, or are we more similar than we care to admit?

In the full subscriber-only conversation, we ask Glenn whether the U.S. should continue arming the Ukrainian resistance, and what an endgame would even look like. Shadi argues that, for all its faults, American hegemony is better than any of the available alternatives while Damir wonders whether "better" is even a relevant category. Perhaps a multipolar world is inevitable. If so, how should we think about such a world and our role in it?

Required Reading

- Glenn's Substack

- "War Propaganda About Ukraine Becoming More Militaristic, Authoritarian, and Reckless" by Glenn Greenwald (Substack)

- "Victoria Nuland: Ukraine Has 'Biological Research Facilities,' Worried Russia May Seize Them" by Glenn Greenwald (Substack)

- "The Ugly Truth About No-Fly Zones" by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "There Are Many Things Worse Than American Power" by Shadi Hamid (The Atlantic)

- "141 countries vote to condemn Russia at UN" by Ivana Saric and Zachary Basu (Axios)

Is America the most successful third world country on earth? Shadi and Damir welcome Samuel Goldman, author of the new book After Nationalism, onto the podcast for a raucous discussion on national identity, the likelihood of another civil war, and the possibility that, because it has more in common with Latin America than Europe, the United States may be the best place on the planet.

Required Reading:

• After Nationalism, by Samuel Goldman.
• A symposium on the book at Law and Liberty.
• Sam's column at The Week.
• Bruno Maçaes on dreampolitik.
• "The Case Against Consensus," by Shadi Hamid.
• "Who Are America's Peers," by Samuel Goldman.

Shadi and Damir sat down to do a quick episode today as Russia commenced its invasion of Ukraine. They talk about how the world got to this point, what we in the West could have done differently, what could happen next, and what it means for the future of America. We hope you find this real-time attempt at analysis useful and helpful.

Required Reading

- "Negotiating with Madmen" by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "America’s role in the Russia and Ukraine situation" (AP)

Much of the freakout about Elon Musk buying Twitter is based on an assumption that social media is integral to democracies and a critical tool for dissidents living in repressive regimes. But what if that assumption is overblown? Are the dustups over Twitter's new ownership really just a proxy war for the broader freedom of speech debate that has been ratcheting up recently?

Just as Elon was talking up Twitter, Barack Obama gave a major address calling for government regulation of social media platforms to curb "misinformation." Here, then, are two contrasting visions that speak to essential differences over freedom and truth—and who determines what constitutes truth in the first place.  

In the subscriber-only version of the episode, Shadi and Damir go on to debate whether low information or high information voters are better for democracy. Ordinary voters say they believe in crazy things, but in their day-to-day lives don't behave as if they believe. Ideologues, on the other hand, tend to be well-educated, so clearly better education or information isn't the answer. But then what is?

Required Reading

- Damir's tweet about Elon buying Twitter

- Obama's speech on misinformation and disinformation at Standford

- "Human rights groups raise hate speech concerns after Musk's takeover of Twitter" by Kanishka Singh (Reuters)

- "To End Foreign Meddling, End Anonymity" by Damir Marusic (American Interest)

- "How Musk could burst Obama’s ‘disinformation’ bubble" by Jason Willick (Washington Post)

- "Bad News" by Joseph Bernstein (Harpers)

- National Terrorism Advisory System Bulletin (Department of Homeland Security)

- "Just Keep It Off My Timeline!" by Freddie deBoer (Substack)

- "READING: H.L. Mencken (December 1933): On Adolf Hitler" by Brad DeLong (Brad DeLong's Grasping Reality)

- The Reckless Mind: Intellectuals in Politics, by Mark Lilla (Amazon)

- The Shipwrecked Mind: On Political Reaction, by Mark Lilla (Amazon)

- "The Texas Lawsuit and the Age of Dreampolitik" by Ross Douthat (New York Times)

- Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government, by Christopher H. Achen and Larry M. Bartels (Amazon)

- "Fantasy and Reality in Biden's America" with guest Bruno Bruno Maçães (Wisdom of Crowds)

This week, Shadi and Damir debate whether the war in Ukraine is breathing new life into the liberal idea. It seemed like liberalism might stage a comeback, but Putin-adjacent rightwing populists are still going strong in France and Hungary. Shadi insists he's a liberal who's critical of liberalism, which pushes Damir to question what exactly that means in practice. When is too much illiberalism too much? Also: Damir wonders whether Prohibition got a bad rap.

In the full subscriber-only episode, Shadi and Damir go deeper into how the challenges to liberalism play out in foreign policy, and debate whether democracies are less cruel during war. Is America a moral power? Does that make us better?

Required Reading

- "Is There Such Thing as the Common Good?" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "Why I Am Not A Liberal" by Liam Bright (Sooty Empiric)

- "A Country of Their Own" by Francis Fukuyama (Foreign Policy)

- "Preparing for Defeat" by Francis Fukuyama (American Purpose)

- "Can Liberalism Thrive Without a Wolf at the Door?" by Ross Douthat (New York Times)

- "The Enemies of Liberalism Are Showing Us What It Really Means" by Ezra Klein (New York Times)

What do Shadi and Damir's divergent responses to the Gaza crisis tell us about questions of morality, idealism, and power? Damir presses Shadi on his recent commentary about Israel's treatment of the Palestinians—and the line between analysis and polemics. Shadi argues the Middle East still matters—and that it's in America's national interest to be moral. Damir counters by saying that it is the job of the analyst to complicate stories, not necessarily to resolve them.

Required Reading:

• "I'm Angry About Palestine. Should You Be?" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "Don’t take the narrow view of what’s happening in Gaza," by Shadi Hamid (The Atlantic)
• "A separate peace? What the Gaza crisis means for Arab regimes," by Shadi Hamid (Brookings)
• The Shadi vs. Dershowitz showdown (The Megyn Kelly Show)
• "Four Perspectives on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict" (Carnegie Connects)

Damir and Shadi return to a familiar topic, but this time with a twist. Damir manages to sound like an optimist. He argues that the fad of wokeness will collapse under the weight of its own contradictions, while Shadi thinks it's probably too late. They also discuss whether justice is possible without God, the rather odd fact that Shadi's first academic article was on feminist theory, why white parents seem nonplussed about indoctrinating their kids, and whether a rising crime wave will undermine the woke revolution.

The debate continues in a special bonus episode, out on Saturday. Subscribe here to get it straight to your inbox.

Recommended Reading:

• "How America Fractured Into Four Parts," by George Packer (The Atlantic)
• "How Michel Foucault Lost the Left and Won the Right," by Ross Douthat (The New York Times)
• "Stop Blaming the Pandemic for America's Violent Crime Wave," by Zaid Jilani (Inquire)
• "Nice Woke Parents, Episode 4," (The New York Times)
• The Harper's Letter

This week we were joined by Sam Adler-Bell, cohost of the Know Your Enemy podcast. We examined the New Right, their earnestly held belief that liberals have already won the battle for the soul of the country, and America's crisis of legitimacy. Is it even worth trying to bridge the gap between left and right on cultural issues?

Required Reading:

- "The Radical Young Intellectuals Who Want to Take Over the American Right" by Sam Adler-Bell (New Republic)

- "Young, Radical, and on the Right (w/ Nate Hochman)" by Know your Enemy

- "Shadi Hamid on Being an Anti-‘Woke’ Progressive" by Matt Lewis

- "Michael Brendan Dougherty on Identity, Culture, and the False Promise of Liberation" by Wisdom of Crowds

- "Ross Douthat on Decadence, Wokeness, and UFOs" by Wisdom of Crowds" by Wisdom of Crowds

- "Sohrab Ahmari on Liberalism, Tradition, and Political Catholicism" by Wisdom of Crowds

- Trump’s Full Inauguration Speech 2017

Is 1/6 our new 9/11? Are we in danger of making decisions in the heat of the moment that we will come to regret? Is the United States splitting apart fatally? And what will there after COVID be like?

Megan McArdle, the person most responsible for the invention of Wisdom of Crowds, joins Shadi and Damir to chew over our post-insurrection reality.

Reading List:

• "Why we should be frightened by tech companies’ censoring of conservatives," Megan McArdle (Washington Post)
• "Trump fed off the establishment’s moral outrage. So did his followers," Megan McArdle (Washington Post)
• "Trump's Exit," Heather MacDonald (City Journal)

On Friday, December 4, 2020, Shadi and Damir went live on Periscope—Damir from Croatia, Shadi from DC. On their minds: how different cultures react, deal with, and adapt to COVID, how even vaccination is becoming a partisan issue in the United States, and how to think about the state of exception in democratic societies.

Check out the video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/l8elM2Bq7TM

An Iranian-born immigrant, Sohrab Ahmari has become one of America's most prominent and controversial Catholic commentators. His new book, The Unbroken Thread: Discovering the Wisdom of Tradition in an Age of Chaos, asks us to rethink our understanding of freedom and choice—and the fact that we have too much of it. What does it mean to be a "political Catholic"? What is the value of a state-imposed Sabbath? Does civilization require heartfelt religious belief, or is there a benefit in simply going through the motions? And can a liberal society avoid enforcing an oppressive orthodoxy of its own?  

Part two of the conversation with Sohrab is available here for subscribers. Part one ends on a bit of a cliff hanger, with Sohrab suggesting the law is not just a reflection of the public's wishes but can be a moral teacher for the public as well. The conversation then moves into other interesting territory, including on how Sohrab has gained more respect for Islam since his conversion to Catholicism.

Subscribe here to listen to the rest of the discussion; you won't want to miss it.

Recommended Reading:

• The Unbroken Thread: Discovering the Wisdom of Tradition in an Age of Chaos, by Sohrab Ahmari (Amazon)
• From Fire, by Water: My Journey to the Catholic Faith, by Sohrab Ahmari (Amazon)

We did something a little unusual for this week: a crossover episode. We sat down with Susannah Black Roberts and Peter Mommsen—the hosts of Ploughcast, from Plough Quarterly, a Christian magazine of ideas and culture—for a conversation about the "post-liberal" movement as well as broader questions of the "common good" (does it exist?).  All four of us are coming from vastly different perspectives and backgrounds, and that came out in our spirited conversation.

Our conversation about the common good led to deep questions about the nature of politics and law. What are the practical implications of saying, as Martin Luther King did, that "an unjust law is no law at all?" If all humans have souls (even Damir) what does that mean about how we should organize political communities? And how can citizens with fundamental differences be reconciled?

We also discussed the recently released National Conservative Statement of Principles: a manifesto signed by many leaders of the post-liberal right. All four of us had significant disagreements with the Statement—but for different reasons. Will its advocacy for a more robust role for Christianity in public life crowd out religious minorities, as Shadi notes? Susannah, as a self-identified Christian post-liberal herself, goes further, wondering if a Christian conception of the good can even be the foundation for an American political movement.

We also talked about how Christian ideas of justice cohere—or don't—with liberalism. Damir makes a bold claim: articulating a "common good" can't be done without reference to religious principles, and anyone claiming otherwise is deluding themselves. Needless to say, everyone else on the podcast disagrees (the word "Satanic" comes up).  

Required Reading:

- The National Conservative Statement of Principles.

- The open letter responding to the National Conservative Statement of Principles (The European Conservative).

- “Our Post-Liberal Moment,” by Susannah Black Roberts (The Spectator World).

- Why Liberalism Failed, by Patrick Deneen (Amazon).

- The AP’s recent report on Canada’s euthanasia policies (The Associated Press).

We welcomed a truly important thinker onto the podcast this week. Walter Russell Mead joined us to discuss his latest book The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People.

Many critics of American foreign policy have long pointed to our long-standing relationship with Israel as proof of the power of the "Israel Lobby" to influence American politics. Mead's latest book shows that reality is far more complicated: the struggles of Zionism in the 19th and 20th centuries have deep resonances with America's self-conception as a nation blessed by Providence. We see a little bit of ourselves in Israel, and act accordingly.

We then moved on to broader questions. How has the American conception of the "arc of history," and our place in it, changed over time? Have modern Americans really lost faith in the American project to a greater degree than previous generations?

In the full conversation (for paying subscribers), we discussed the future of American engagement with the wider world. How much do we need to pursue human rights abroad? And does a foreign policy based on human rights make us stronger (Damir, of course, is skeptical)?

Mead offers an answer, drawn from his own belief in "Christian realism." In the closing moments of the episode, we talk about the Biden administration's failures and successes in foreign affairs, as well as the reasons recent Democratic administrations have struggled to achieve their geopolitical aims. And finally, how does Providence figure into our future struggles with a rising China?

Required Reading:

- Walter Russell Mead's latest book, The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People (Amazon).

- God and Gold: Britain, America, and the Making of the Modern World, and Special Providence: American Foreign Policy and How It Changed the World, by Walter Russell Mead (Amazon).

- "Democratic Primaries Are Embroiled in Debate Over Support for Israel," by Jonathan Weisman (The New York Times).

- Huey Long: A Biography, by T. Harry Williams (Amazon).

- All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren (Amazon).

- The Jungle Grows Back: America and Our Imperiled World, by Robert Kagan (Amazon).

It used to be called "political correctness." It had its heyday in the 1990s, then it went underground. While we weren't paying attention, an entire architecture of speech restrictions was being built on campuses across the country. Greg Lukianoff, CEO of FIRE and co-author of the bestselling The Coddling of the American Mind, joins us to discuss what he calls the "second great age of political correctness."

When people say cancel culture isn't real, are they arguing in good faith? One part of the story is the lack of diversity in American universities—in disciplines like anthropology, the ratio of liberal to conservative professors is 42 to 1. If we care so much about diversity, why don't we seem to care viewpoint diversity?

Required Reading:

- "The Second Great Age of Political Correctness" by Greg Lukianoff (Reason)

- "How To Keep Your Corporation Out of the Culture War" by Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff (Persuasion)

- "The Polarization Spiral" by Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff (Persuasion)

- The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education

- The Revolt of The Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium by Martin Gurri

- Manliness by Harvey Mansfield

What is driving our current political upheaval? Shadi and Damir discuss a few different theories including the decline of religion, the absence of an aristocracy, and, crucially, modern America's obsession with dogs.

Required Reading:

• "The Weimarization of the American Republic," by Aaron Sibarium (American Purpose)
• "Reflections on What's to Come," by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "The Death of Our Most Cherished Pieties," by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)

We return to a question that the Crowd has been chewing over for the last month or so: why do things– political systems, regimes, parties– change? Do ideas really change the world? And can individual actions really have any effect on larger systems?

Climate change, and whether we think world governments can mend their ways in time to avert the worst of the crisis, begins the discussion. We discuss whether governments will ever be able to cooperate to the extent needed to "solve" climate change (Damir, predictably, is less sanguine) and whether humanity will find some way to muddle through. Have we, as a species, finally run into a Malthusian limit on progress? How much faith should we have in the prospect of progress?

We later move into a wider ranging discussion of the role of ideas in world politics, and whether the modern world is heavily influenced by abstract ideas, as authors like Francis Fukuyama would argue. Shadi also talks about his personal effort to get his own ideas across– and hopefully accepted by– to American policymakers, in the face of political systems that seem unbearably sluggish and unresponsive.

Finally, in the bonus portion of the episode, available here for subscribers, we use the proliferation of diverse candidates in the Tory leadership race as a springboard into a discussion of democracy. Does the handpicked selection of women and minorities for leadership by party leaders in the United Kingdom showcase the virtues of democracy? Or does its top-down nature show how non-democratic means are sometimes needed to achieve social goods?

Required Reading:

A sample of the Matt Yglesias tweets about European appliances.

"One Billion Americans," by Matt Yglesias (Amazon).

"The Great Stagnation," by Tyler Cowen (Amazon).

This week Shadi and Damir sat down to discuss the Uvalde mass shooting and its aftermath. Tragedy has struck the American psyche once again. The murder of innocent children has Americans groping for answers but the seemingly scripted discourse in the wake of such tragedies provides anything but solid answers. Are there really any viable legislative paths to prevent such terrible shootings? Must everyone “read the room” when Twitter is collectively grieving?

As the conversation progresses, the discussion turns to liberals’ squeamishness about appearing patriotic and what to do when one’s political party changes before their eyes.

In Part 2 of their discussion, available here for subscribers, Shadi admits that he feels somewhat perplexed by swing voters—after all, who hasn’t had time to make up their minds by this point—only to find out that Damir is in fact one of these elusive voters. They go on to discuss their voting histories and ask whether Republicans are more antidemocratic than their counterparts. Also, Shadi admits that he views Mitt Romney and John McCain in a new light while Damir explains his concerns about Vice President Harris potentially taking over for an aging Biden.

Required Reading

- "The U.S. has more in common with South America than Europe" by Samuel Goldman (The Week)

- Shadi's controversial Atlantic piece from before the election.

- "How the Left Lost Me" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)

- Pat Buchanan's 1992 speech at the RNC

- Matt Yglessias' initial tweet

- Matt Yglessias' apology tweet

- Elon Musk's tweet about voting for Republicans.

- Elon Musk's tweet about the Democrats moving to the left.

- Ted Cruz's one door for schools idea

- "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" by The Beatles (Youtube)

As Biden struggles to get his massive spending bill passed, WoC's former Associate Editor Matt Winesett joins Shadi and Damir to talk about guns, gentrification, opera, the race for Governor of Virginia, and the sad state of the Republican Party.

Required Reading:

• Matt's essays at WoC.
• "Trump's Look Backward Poses Peril for GOP," by Gerald F. Seib (WSJ).
• The Citizen app.
• "Glenn Youngkin's Viral 'Child' Ad is Missing Important Context," by Glenn Kessler (WaPo).
• "Nice Woke Parents" (Wisdom of Crowds).

In this week's episode, we were joined by our friend Aaron Sibarium, a reporter for the Washington Free Beacon. Aaron recently reported a piece showing how three states were rationing COVID drugs on race-based criteria. The article made a splash. Fox News covered the story, Trump referenced it in a speech (sloppily as always), and Twitter tried to rebrand it as a right-wing talking point.

Prioritizing woke ideology over medical realities can cost lives. But we tried to stay true to the Wisdom of Crowds ethos and made our best faith effort to ask whether race-based triage can ever be justified on practical or philosophical grounds. Is this the result of good intentions going off the rails, or is something more sinister at work?

Required Reading:

- "Food and Drug Administration Guidance Drives Racial Rationing of COVID Drugs" by Aaron Sibarium (Washington Free Beacon)

- "Hospital System Backs Off Race-Based Treatment Policy After Legal Threat" by Aaron Sibarium (Washington Free Beacon)

- "Hospitalization and Mortality among Black Patients and White Patients with Covid-19" (New England Journal of Medicine)

The journalist, author, and firebrand Glenn Greenwald joins Shadi and Damir for a two-part episode ranging from Glenn's investigative work in Brazil to his increasingly contentious relationship with the liberal establishment in America. In part one, Glenn talks about the corruption case at the center of his new book, why respectable middle-class people supported an authoritarian bigot, and how living in Brazil has shaped his views on American politics—including the January 6 riots at the Capitol.

Part two of their conversation, for subscribers only, is available here. The conversation gets more personal, with Glenn discussing if he considers himself a man of the left, why he is disliked by American liberals, what he has against wokeness, and whether he would have considered serving under a Bernie Sanders administration. His answers might surprise you.

Required Reading:

• Securing Democracy: My Fight for Press Freedom and Justice in Bolsonaro's Brazil, by Glenn Greenwald (Amazon)
• Glenn's Substack
• Glenn's Twitter

In recent months, Shadi has drawn a lot of online ire for saying that liberals were needlessly (and harmfully) catastrophizing ahead of the November midterms. We decided to talk to one of Shadi's smartest and most eloquent critics on this count—our friend Damon Linker, a former columnist at The Week and current author of the excellent Substack, Eyes on the Right.

We argue about what's "normal" polarization, and what arguments end up making democracy less workable. Is Shadi really too complacent, or is he just being prudent? Is the Muslim Brotherhood "better" on democracy than the GOP? And why does the center-left have a newfound respect for military and intelligence agencies?

In the full episode (for paying subscribers only) Shadi shares some insights gleaned while attending a far-right birthday party (don't ask). Why does the new generation of young conservatives feel so alienated from American politics, and can their grievances ever be accommodated? What can we learn from populist victories in Israel and Hungary? And can a convincing Ron DeSantis victory be the best thing that could happen to us in 2024?

Required Reading:

- “The ‘Democracy Panic’ of 2022 Was Fully Justified,” by Damon Linker (Eyes on the Right).

- Our first podcast with Damon, “Reassessing the Reactionary Right.”

- Fiona Hill’s podcast with us.

- “General Milley says he wasn’t trying to undermine Trump in China Call,” by Teaganne Finne (NBC News).

How did it all go wrong? Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, a leading scholar of Afghanistan, joins Damir and Shadi to dissect the Taliban's victory and discuss what it tells us about the failures of America's nation-building effort. Why did the Afghan government collapse so quickly? Have the technocrats and NGOs in the democracy promotion industry been completely discredited? And for the sake of the Afghan people, should we now help the Taliban succeed in governing the country? Things get heated.

Murtazashvili is director of the Center for Governance and Markets and associate professor at the University of Pittsburgh and the author of Informal Order and the State in Afghanistan. She lived in Afghanistan for 3 years, conducting fieldwork in rural villages across the country, and previously worked at the US Agency for International Development and the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit.  

Recommended reading:

• Jen Murtazashvili in the Washington Post
• "Afghanistan is not the Balkans," by Thomas Barfield (ResearchGate)
• Afghanistan: A Cultural and Political History, by Thomas Barfield (Amazon)
• Nassim Taleb on the Taliban's refusal to deadlift
• "When Terrorists and Criminals Govern Better Than Governments," by Shadi Hamid, Vanda Felbab-Brown, and Harold Trinkunas (The Atlantic)

Shadi and Damir get together after a long night of watching the results come in from the 2020 Presidential elections and take stock of where they stand. You'll never guess who's the optimist.

Reading List:

• "Everything in its Right Place," by Radiohead (Kid A)

Damir calls in from a conference in Slovakia and describes what life is like in a land without widely available vaccines. Shadi addresses why he won't just register as a Republican already (or convert to Catholicism). And they both discuss if Europe is in danger of sinking into irrelevance, whether George W. Bush should have sent troops to Crimea, the relationship between America's power and its values, and much more.

Recommended Reading:

• "Biden Talks a Big Game on Europe. But His Actions Tell a Different Story," by Jeremy Shapiro (Politico)
• "Morality is Impossible Without Power," by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "How Liberal Triumphalism Breeds Passivity," by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)
• The Avery James tweet

This week we were joined by Molly Ball, bestselling author of Pelosi, to talk about how the possible overturning of Roe v. Wade will (or won't) change American politics for decades to come. Until a few days ago, Americans could act politically under the assumption that Roe was permanent. But it may not be.

Ending Roe v. Wade would mean abortion would be decided by states, presumably according to the whims, desires—and wisdom—of crowds. To what extent would this be a more "democratic" outcome?

In the full subscriber-only conversation, the discussion turned toward questions of legitimacy and minority rule. The debate over abortion, after all, is a debate about elites and institutions—and whether bodies like the Supreme Court can, or should, ever be neutral. We also debate whether Evangelicals really believe that abortion is tantamount to genocide. Presumably, if they did, more of them would do something about it.  

Also, after Molly raises the specter that "progress" may in fact be real, chaos ensues—featuring a rapid-fire exchange between Molly and Damir on first principles.

Required Reading

- Pelosi, by Molly Ball (Amazon)

- "Overturning Roe would make America more democratic" by Jason Willick (Washington Post)

- "The war that never ends" (Economist)

- "Is This Trump’s World Now? Four Opinion Writers on the Dobbs Leak and Vance’s Big Win." by Lulu Garcia-Navarro, Jane Coaston, Michelle Cottle and Ross Douthat (New York Times)

- "How Southern Baptists became pro-life" by David Roach (Baptist Press)

This week we invited the author Oliver Traldi on the podcast to talk about the role of experts in society and how we assess different kinds of skill, talent, and truth. Oliver, a writing fellow at Heterodox Academy and a doctoral candidate in philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, is one of the most exciting young thinkers and writers around today—as evidenced by his recent tour-de-force of an essay titled "With All Due Respect to the Experts."

The conversation begins with Shadi's half-joking admission that he is being red-pilled in real time, mostly due to the increase in crime and many liberals' inability to concede that it is indeed a problem. This leads to an interesting back and forth about the difficulty of pinpointing truth in a pluralistic and democratic society.

What is the role of experts really? Are "experts" the academic equivalent of pilots flying planes? Would we be better off as a society if we diminished the importance of punditry?

In the full subscriber episode, the conversation zeroes in on the role of elites, and the qualities needed for effective leadership. Would technocracy seem like a more desirable system if our expert class hadn't sullied its credibility so extensively over the last 20 years? Is the horse-sense of normie voters a better guiding light than the prophecies of an elite class that is all to0 often high on its own supply?

Required Reading

- "With All Due Respect to the Experts" by Oliver Traldi (American Compass)

- "The Red-Pilling of Liberal America" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)

- Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction, by Phillip E. Tetlock and Dan Gardner (Amazon)

- Smug Pilots New Yorker Cartoon

- How Propaganda Works, by Jason Stanley (Amazon)

- Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government, by Christopher H. Achen (Amazon)

- "The Point of Political Belief" by Michael Hannon (Academia)

- "A crying shame" by Oliver Traldi (Washington Examiner)

This week we were joined by Christine Emba, a columnist at the Washington Post and author of the fascinating new book Rethinking Sex: A Provocation. What resulted was the longest episode in Wisdom of Crowds history, delving into some uncharted territory. We discuss a lot of big topics—the perils of modern dating, the sex recession, consent, incels, marriage, porn, and Tinder hookup culture. If we have so much freedom, why are we so unhappy about it?

Shadi presses Christine about whether her arguments about sex are a metaphor for broader disappointments with liberalism and the burdens of unlimited choice. Damir wonders if Christine is being a bit Straussian in an attempt to push conservative values into sex discourse.

In the subscriber-only portion of the conversation, we dive deeper into the fraught world of sex culture in America today. When one can "order" the delivery of a sexual partner, like the Tinder Delivery Guy story from Christine's book, is it time to go back to the drawing board? Can a case be made that people were more happy decades (or centuries) ago? Also, Christine lays out her argument that consent is not enough.

Required Reading

- Rethinking Sex: A Provocation, by Christine Emba (Amazon)

- "Consent is not enough. We need a new sexual ethic." by Christine Emba (Washington Post)

- "Victorians, Manners, and the Woke Wars" (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "Cat Person" by Kristen Roupenian (New Yorker)

- "A Manifesto Against Sex Positivity" by Michelle Goldberg (New York Times)

- "Searching for a Mate: The Rise of the Internet as a Social Intermediary" by Michael J. Rosenfeld and Reuben J. Thomas (American Sociological Review)

Damir and Shadi talk about health security theater during this latest phase of the pandemic, before going on to discuss how technocratic approaches tend to worsen and exacerbate polarization in democratic societies. Also: can anyone make a moral case for democracy without recourse to God?

Required reading:

• The Islamic World Today: Issues and Perspectives (Brigham Young University)
• "The danger of bringing religious zeal to the political realm," by Shadi Hamid (Deseret News).
• "One in 5,000," by David Leonhardt (NYT).
• Public Opinion, by Walter Lippmann.
• "Limits to Democracy," by Roger Scruton (New Criterion).
• "Solutionism Is Not the Solution," by Damir Marusic (WoC)

Was Barack Obama America's last "realist" president? Was he even a realist at all? Emma Ashford of the Atlantic Council joins Shadi and Damir to answer these questions and more. They also discuss democracy promotion, whether to confront China, and why Shadi supported Bernie's candidacy even though Shadi is an interventionist.

Required Reading:

"Reality Check #1: Build cooperation cycles, not security spirals," by Emma Ashford (Atlantic Council)

This week we sat down to debate America's greatness—or lack thereof. Somewhat to our surprise, we found a source of agreement between us: our belief in American exceptionalism, even if we have very different conceptions of the role of morality and "progress" in forging the American idea.

Countries in Europe may have a more leisurely pace of life and higher levels of reported happiness, but is that really what Americans want? Should it be what they want? Central to all of this are the questions of the state, democracy, and the double-edged sword of meritocracy. If, contrary to popular belief, a certain degree of dysfunction is what makes American society so dynamic, are we better off being a "failed state" then having a strong, efficient state like in Norway, Denmark, or France?  

In the full episode (for subscribers), we turned to the question of whether the main problem facing American democracy is Trump himself or Trumpism as a movement. If it's the latter, do intellectuals' dire warnings of the threat to democracy really matter, especially if Trumpism is all about resentment? Many American pundits compared the rise of Trump to the rise of Hitler, adding to their sense of urgency in "stopping" him. But, we ask, would a greater awareness of the dangers of Trump really have prevented his rise? Is it possible—or morally appropriate—to stop a criminal before the crime is committed?

The debate over January 6 hinges at least in part on whether it qualified as an "attempted coup." If the coup had succeeded, would it have blocked Biden's transition to power—or was America's messy, dysfunctional democracy a protection against such an outcome?

Required Reading:

- "America is Great Precisely Because it's Not," by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds).

- "Why Live in America?" by Nick Burns on his Substack.

- Damir's Twitter thread on America's supreme adaptability.

- Damir retweeting Garry Kasparov on Europe's struggles with innovation.

- Shadi's Twitter thread on humiliation, resentment, and Jon Stewart's decline.

- William Galston on Tyler Cowen's Average is Over (The Wall Street Journal).

- "How Life Became an Endless, Terrible, Competition" by Daniel Markovits (The Atlantic).

- Shadi's infamous Atlantic piece from before the election.

- Jason Stanley's Twitter.

- Our episode with Bruno Macaes.

- "Notes Towards a Dreampolitik," in The White Album, by Joan Didion.

A wide-ranging episode: a day or so after Damir's birthday, Shadi discusses his longest bout of self-isolation ever, Damir talks about Teddy Roosevelt and how enlightened views on slavery were completely compatible with that old-timey colonial racism. Plus national stereotypes, arranged marriages, and Domino's Pizza!

Reading List:

• A tweet by (Captain) David Ryan.
• Shadi on Riada Akyol's podcast.
• Damir on Michael Weiss' podcast.

Parents in the 1990s believed they were doing their children a favor by instilling in them the ethos “do what you like, follow your dreams, and things will work out.” But Michael Brendan Dougherty, author of  My Father Left Me Ireland: An American Son's Search for Home, argues that sometime in the 2000s, this promise of liberation revealed itself as a curse, feeling more like abandonment than instruction. In a wide-ranging conversation, he, Shadi, and Damir talk about the meaning and importance of identity, where modernity falls short, the promise and peril of nationalism, and much more.

In Part Two, available here for subscribers, the conversation continues with a discussion about immigration in America and Europe, if Islam is the religion of the future, whether white Americans have a distinct identity, and if right-wing governments in Poland and Hungary are harbingers of the future or the last gasps of a dying ideology.

Subscribe here to listen to the rest of the discussion. Members will also have access to our recent two-part conversation with Ross Douthat as well as our weekly Friday Essays.

Recommended Reading:

• My Father Left Me Ireland: An American Son's Search For Home, by Michael Brendan Dougherty (Amazon)
• "Critical Race Theory as Metaphysics," by Michael Brendan Dougherty (National Review)
• "Why the Fight Over Critical Race Theory Matters," by Michael Brendan Dougherty (National Review)

“What fascinates and terrifies us about the Roman Empire is not that it finally went smash,” W. H. Auden once wrote, but rather that “it managed to last for four centuries without creativity, warmth, or hope.” In his latest book, The Decadent Society, Ross Douthat suggests contemporary America may be in a similar spot. He joined Shadi and Damir to discuss the factors contributing to our present state of decadence, and possible avenues out—from wokeness to a new post-liberal politics to UFOs.

In Part Two, available here, the conversation continues with Damir asking Ross if wokeness will burn itself out or if it must be countered with a new, more compelling faith. Shadi, Ross, and Damir also discuss why more and more elites are no longer Christian, if meritocracy has failed, the role of rationalism and faith in sustaining the American project, and why—despite his religious conservatism—more liberals don't hate Ross.

Recommended Reading:

• The Decadent Society: America Before and After the Pandemic, by Ross Douthat (Amazon)
• "Can the Meritocracy Find God?" by Ross Douthat (The New York Times)
• Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, by Ross Douthat (Amazon)
• "Sohrab Ahmari on Liberalism, Tradition, and Political Catholicism" (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "Sohrab Ahmari on Liberalism, Tradition, and Political Catholicism—Part Two" (Wisdom of Crowds)

This week, we were excited to have author Luke Burgis on the pod, to talk about a hot topic: desire. Specifically, mimetic desire—the idea that desires are often generated through our human propensity to copy each other. He's written an excellent book, Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life, that affected both of us deeply.

First theorized by the French philosopher Rene Girard, and present in everything from The White Lotus to the writings of Peter Thiel, mimetic desire is everywhere around us.

We talked about how to identify the power of mimetic desire in our society: in ever more adversarial politics, in an economy increasingly focused on attention, and especially in social-media-mediated quests for collective scapegoats (Shadi shares how he became a scapegoat for Philadelphia sports fans last week).

We discussed if it was possible to ever break the cycle of scapegoating, and how knowledge of this dynamic should change how we view politics. What does it mean to be a "political atheist," as Girard, a Catholic, called himself? And is Damir going to Hell?

In the full episode (for paying subscribers only), we also pondered what the more pessimistic conclusions of the theory of mimetic desire might be. What does it mean that societies are to some extent bound to engage in cycles of mimetic imitation, rivalry, and scapegoating? Do citizens in democracies really deliberate rationally, or are they just following the leader? Is Shadi's insistence that democracy is an end in itself in peril?

We closed by asking what implications this could all have for our personal lives. How can we determine which of our desires are "thin"—mimetically taken from others—or "thick"—coming from a deep sense of self? Do we have to consciously restrain our own choices? And what might our lives look like if we regain our sense of self-possession?

Required Reading:

- Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life, by Luke Burgis (Amazon).

- Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, by Rene Girard (Amazon).

- Shadi’s bad sports tweet.

Does rhetorical escalation among our elites belie the stability of the nation today? With Amy Coney Barrett nominated for the Supreme Court and partisan rancor at an all-time high, Shadi and Damir pick apart their doubts about the health of our democracy.

Reading List:

• Shadi's prescient tweet
• "Resisting the Juristocracy," Samuel Moyn (Boston Review)

With artificial intelligence threatening to take over our imaginations, Shadi and Damir this week decided to talk through some of the philosophical quandaries with none other than political philosopher and Wisdom of Crowds contributing writer Samuel Kimbriel. The Crowd takes on ChatGPT, existential risk, "the simulation", navigating uncertainty and whether we can know what is real.

After a recent encounter with ChatGPT, Damir is impressed that AI is now well on its way to modeling language, an advancement he thinks could upend the elite publishing world. On the potential existential threat posed by AI, Shadi's faith leaves him less than panicked about technological doomsday. Meanwhile, Sam reminds us that humanity lives in a state of uncertainty subject to inquiry which can breed distrust with political institutions that insist they have it all figured out.

In the full episode (for paying subscribers only) Damir and Sam differ on whether ChatGPT is a new version of an old mechanism or whether it's something more sophisticated. Shadi asks whether such a technology can ever feel longing, wistfulness, and regret. How do we seek to understand human consciousness let alone that of artificial intelligence? A rich conversation ensues.

Required Reading:

- "You’re Better Off Not Knowing," by Shadi Hamid (The Atlantic).

- "ChatGPT and Me," by Damir Marusic. (Wisdom of Crowds).

- "Why I Am Not (As Much Of) A Doomer (As Some People)," by Scott Alexander (Substack).

- A very politically incorrect tweet about ChatGPT and Joe Biden.

This was one of the richest conversations we've recorded in a while. Our guest this week is Robert Nicholson, the founder of The Philos Project, an organization that promotes Christian engagement with the Middle East, and host of The Deep Map, a new podcast that explores the religious and historical roots of conflict in the region.

We asked Robert about what he thinks Westerners misunderstand the most about Middle Eastern politics: the role religion does, and doesn't play in the region's conflicts. Will countries need to craft collective identities that rise above religion for societies to progress? Robert thinks that goal is wildly unrealistic, and not even necessarily desirable.

Veering from from minimal democracy to forced population transfers, the conversation only gets more contentious—and weirdly philosophical—from there.

In the full episode (for paying subscribers only) Damir tries to push Shadi's fundamental commitments to a breaking point. If democratic minimalism requires that we respect the basic outcomes of the democratic process, then why should we be particularly concerned about illiberalism in Middle Eastern countries (or France, for that matter)? What higher principles can we appeal to, other than notions of liberal universalism that voters in the Middle East may not respect? And finally, we close out the discussion by asking Robert about the incoming Israeli coalition government—and the likelihood of things getting seriously ugly on the ground in the coming months.

Required Reading:

- Shadi’s appearance on Robert’s podcast, The Deep Map.

- “Benjamin Netanyahu: What Drives Israel’s Incoming Prime Minister?” by Michah Goodman (The Jerusalem Post).

- The Problem of Democracy: America, the Middle East and the Rise and Fall of an Idea, by Shadi Hamid (Amazon).

- The Mossawa Center, an advocacy organization for Arab citizens in Israel.

Hours into the Biden administration, Shadi and Damir sit down with author Bruno Maçães to talk about Trump, January 6, the future of world order, and the sources of American exceptionalism.

Reading List:

• Bruno on Substack.
• History Has Begun: The Birth of a New America, by Bruno Maçães (Oxford University Press)
• "The Roleplaying Coup," by Bruno Maçães (City Journal)

New York Times justice reporter Katie Benner joins the show to talk about January 6, the FBI and DOJ response, the limits of 9/11 comparisons, and if the threat posed by right-wing militias is overstated.

This week, Berlin-based journalist and New York Times Magazine contributing writer Elisabeth Zerofsky joins us to discuss how Russia's invasion of Ukraine has changed Europe. What explains the righteous fury of previously pacific Germans? Shadi asks Elisabeth and Damir what a "red line" in Ukraine could possibly be—or if it even exists. For example, how might the United States respond in hypothetical scenarios of large-scale massacres and the leveling of entire cities.

In the subscriber-only portion of the conversation, we debate whether Europe has a preference for white—and specifically non-Muslim—refugees. "Anti-immigrant" leaders on the far-right are, all of a sudden, discovering a soft spot for migrants. Are Europeans racist? Perhaps, the argument goes, it's easier to integrate Ukrainians because they are secular, culturally similar, and look like "us." Can that ever justify the double standard? Shadi decides to do away with caution and make a rather controversial argument.

Required Reading

- "Negotiating with Madmen" by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)

- "On Putin, Rationality, and Believing In Heaven" by Shadi Hamid (Wisdom of Crowds)

- Is EU Concerned? Twitter account

- "Gerhard Schröder Casts a Dark Shadow over Berlin's Foreign Policy"  (Spiegel)

- Benjamin Wittes' tweet

- "Why John Mearsheimer Blames the US for the Crisis in Ukraine" by Isaac Chotiner (New Yorker)

- Michael Cecire and Damir's Twitter exchange

Shadi thinks Damir is getting more worried about our institutions. Damir reveals the depths of his relentless fatalism. All because NPR thought it was a good idea to interview a radical apologist for rioting and looting.

Reading List:

"One Author's Controversial View: 'In Defense of Looting'," by Natalie Escobar (NPR)

"Between Orientalism and Postmodernism: The Changing Nature of Western Feminist Thought Towards the Middle East," by Shadi Hamid (Hawwa)

The Reckless Mind: Intellectuals in Politics, Mark Lilla (NYRBooks)

"The Free Floater," by John Gray (TNR)

What was it like to live through the fall of Kabul? How should we think about the American withdrawal from Afghanistan? And with famine enveloping the country amid an unprecedentedly severe state collapse, how should we approach—and deal with—the ruling Taliban authorities?

This week we are joined by Dr. Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili and Dr. Omar Sadr, both of the newly-launched Afghanistan Project at the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Governance and Markets, to talk about what lies ahead for the long-suffering Afghan people.

Recommended Reading:

- "Afghanistan: a Vicious Cycle of State Failure" by Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili- The Afghanistan Project - Center for Governance and Markets, University of Pittsburg- "Afghans at risk of near-universal poverty, UN report warns" by Peter Beaumont (The Guardian)- "In Afghanistan, the threat of widespread famine looms as drought and hunger continues" by All Things Considered (NPR)

This week, we had writer Nick Burns on the podcast. Nick's recent essay, "Why Live in America?" prompted Shadi to write his Monday Note for July 4th. We delve into the ways America is different than Europe, for good and for ill. Size, geography, culture, dynamism—all these twist and disfigure many European imports when they land on our shores.

When educated Americans pine for a more European lifestyle, are they simply reflecting their own class biases? Is the building of high speed rail really a sign of decline? And are democratic values incompatible with the modern university?

We then turned to foreign policy. Nick's recent article in the New Statesman questioning the core assumptions of realism was our jumping-off point for a broader discussion of morality in foreign affairs, and the role of the public's sentiments in states' decision-making. Shadi and Damir of course go at it on the question of a values, with Nick caught in between.

Is arguing for human rights a universalist claim? And is arguing from the vantage point of neutrality its own kind of moralism? And was the 19th century French reactionary Chateaubriand the world's first neocon?

Required Reading:

- The Red Scare podcast.

- The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy, by Christopher Lasch (Amazon).

- "New York's Hipster Wars," by Nick Burns (The New Statesman).

- "America's Medieval Universities," by Nick Burns (American Affairs).

- "What Realists Get Wrong About Putin," by Nick Burns (The New Statesman).

- The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation, by Rod Dreher (Amazon).

- Sam Haselby's Twitter account.

- "Unlearning the Language of Wokeness," by Sam Adler-Bell (New York Magazine).

Shadi regrets not investing in GameStop. Damir thinks that once you say democracy must be saved from the masses, protecting Wall Street from the retail-investing crowds is the next logical step. Finally, does Shadi still consider himself a progressive?

Required Reading:

The Tolerance Dilemma

Joker and Our Leaderless Future

Locke's essay on toleration

Reading List:

• "Brooklyn's Anti-masking Protests Betray a Broken Culture," Yehuda Kurtzer (The Atlantic)
• "Memory Malpractice," Yehuda Kurtzer (Tablet)
• "Stop Being Shocked," Bari Weiss (Tablet)

Damir and Shadi pull back the curtain on the thought process behind Damir's latest essay. The central question: If Europe's social democracies offer far more support to their citizens, why has America weathered both the Great Recession and Covid-19 pandemic better than the European Union?

Required Reading:

• "Selfishness and American Resilience," by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds)
• "Janet Yellen and Mario Draghi Have One Last Job," by Adam Tooze (Foreign Policy)

This summer, the inherent ugliness of the world reasserted itself. And yet we Americans still found a way to make it all about us, who we think we are, and what we think we represent. Shadi and Damir sit down to talk about the remarkable frivolity of our politics today, and whether there's any way out.

Required reading:

• Shadi's recent Friday Essay on Carl Schmitt.
• Damir's recent Friday Essay on the Missionary Position.
• Damir's tweet on politics.

The FBI's surprise "raid" on Donald Trump's residence in Mar-a-Lago this week has been hailed in some quarters as a triumph for the rule of law, and seen in others as signs of a slide into banana-republic status. We invited Jason Willick, a Washington Post columnist who writes on legal issues, to sit down with us and discuss the deeper implications of the event.

True to the Crowd's ethos, we focused on fundamental issues. Jason argued that the polarized reactions to the raid show the difficulty of having federal-level law enforcement in an increasingly divided political climate. Shadi and Damir went back on forth on the question of justice: should law enforcement be entirely impartial, or must prosecutors exercise discretion based on the political context? Does one side bear more blame for our current spiral of mistrust and polarization, or is the problem systemic?

In the subscriber-only part of the conversation, things got a little heated, as we debated what might restore Americans' belief in democracy. Shadi went (in his own words) "unplugged," talking about his hopes for restoring democratic values. Might a South-Africa-style "truth and reconciliation" commission be appropriate? Damir is skeptical.

And finally, the three conclude with a discussion of whether America can pull out of the spiral. Shadi believes that we need a recovery of civic virtue. Damir thinks the national culture is no longer able to sustain democratic values. And Jason raises the point that full scale democratic backsliding is unlikely, given the size of our country. Ultimately, the choice to reject the polarization cycle will be up to voters– a conclusion both optimistic and pessimistic.

Required Reading:

- "An Informer Told the FBI What Docs Trump Was Hiding, and Where," by William H. Arkin (Newsweek).

- Bill Barr's speech at Hillsdale College.

- "The Problem of Donald Trump Didn't Start with Donald Trump," by Damir (Gen, on Medium).

- Jason Tweeting about the Espionage Act.

- Florida Governor Ron DeSantis Tweeting about the American "regime."

- "Is Trump Crazy— or calculating? His opponents have to decide," by Jason (The Washington Post).

Jamie Kirchick joins us to discuss the triumph and sorrow of the gay experience in the nation's capitol. This is the story of The Secret City, Kirchick's genre-defining and panoramic history of the gay men and women who served in the halls of power, all the while in constant fear that they would lose their jobs and perhaps even their lives.

It got worse before it got better. We discuss how the national security state—born after World War II—both brought down immense suffering upon countless individuals (including in a string of shocking suicides), and helped shape the consciousness of the country as a whole. There was the red scare, but there was also the "pink scare," with fears of political perversion driving fears of sexual perversion and vice-versa. But was there progress in the end?

The Reagan Administration, despite its homophobia and failures to act on AIDS, could also claim perhaps the largest number of gay political appointees up until that point in U.S. history. And then the closet began to open, so much so that it is difficult to imagine just how horrific it was mere decades ago for gays serving in government. But is this really "progress"—and does it mean we should be optimistic about America's future, despite everything?

In the full episode (for subscribers), we dig deeper into just how lasting the triumphs of the gay rights movement will be. On one hand, homosexuality has become so normalized that no one (except radical gender activists) even thinks twice about Pete Buttigieg running for national office. On the other, the culture war over trans rights is taking a nasty turn, with room for dissent rapidly closing. We debate whether the LGBTQ+ community can stay united in victory, and whether Queer ideology is actually homophobic.

Required Reading:

- Secret City: The Hidden History of Gay Washington, by Jamie Kirchick.

- "The Long, Sordid History of the Gay Conspiracy," by Jamie Kirchick (New York Magazine).

- "The Struggle for Gay Rights is Over," by Jamie Kirchick (The Atlantic).

- Notes on Camp, by Susan Sontag.

- Virtually Normal: An Argument About Homosexuality, by Andrew Sullivan.

- Masha Gessen on Judith Butler (New Yorker).

This week, we're bringing you something special: our first recording with a live audience! Hosted by the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Governance and Markets and moderated by the center's director, Jen Murtazashvili (a friend of the Crowd), we had a freewheeling discussion about Shadi's new book, The Problem of Democracy.

Shadi made his case for decoupling democracy and liberalism—what he calls "democratic minimalism." Instead of viewing democracy as a means to other ends, it should be seen an end unto itself. In other words, let us lower expectations and like (and perhaps even love) democracy for its more modest pleasures. Democracy is not about delivering economic growth, competence, or consensus. And it may even produce the opposite.

The argument, expressed in its more provocative form, is that democracy is about a way of making choices, while liberalism is one choice among many. Citizens in conservative societies may choose otherwise—including by passing restrictions on abortion, alcohol consumption, and even "blasphemy laws" that prohibit insulting divine texts and prophets.

Losing no time, Damir and Jen (and audience members) pose a series of challenges to Shadi's idiosyncratic view of democracy. Is this minimalistic conception of democracy realistic, even if it were desirable? Jen thinks that there needs to be a classically liberal limited state whereas Damir isn't so sure that ethnically and religiously divided countries are places where democracy flourishes. Is it enough to simply ask citizens to accept democratic outcomes not to their liking? Or must there be a deeper, shared cultural bond before anything else?

On foreign policy, things get even more thorny. Can the United States truly promote democracy without doing damage to its own national security interests? The problem is that reasonable observers no longer agree, if they ever did, on which vital interests are, in fact, "vital." And, if America is a superpower, presumably it could absorb the costs of a democracy-first policy in the Middle East if it really wanted to.

As the event became more of a free-for-all, extending into 2 hours of spirited exchanges with the audience, the crowd debated sharia courts, India under Modi, whether Obama actually had a dislike for Muslims, whether Israel was the ideal "illiberal democracy", what making America "more democratic" means, and the resiliency of American institutions over the last six years.

Required Reading: 

- The Problem of Democracy: America, the Middle East, and the Rise and Fall of an Idea, by Shadi Hamid (Amazon).

- Jen Murtazashvili’s personal website.

- The Center for Governance and Markets at Pitt.

- Full YouTube video of this conversation.

Andrew Sullivan joins Shadi and Damir to try to put the last four years of Trump into some kind of perspective. Was he stopped or did he succeed? Is he a symptom or a source of decay—or both? Is our republic doomed, or will things just go back to normal? And what's the proper role of a writer and intellectual in troubled times: to analyze or be engaged?

In a classic wide-ranging episode, Shadi and Damir kick things off by noticing that the Ukraine War is no longer capturing “the discourse” as it did a week ago. Does how we consume media make it difficult for us to grapple with the moment’s most important stories? And does the same phenomenon make us overrate the importance of things like wokeness?

As the conversation proceeds, and talk turns to Biden’s democracy-versus-autocracy worldview, Damir asks Shadi if he would have supported the Vietnam War, and whether he might one day end up a politician.

In the subscriber-only portion of the episode, Shadi and Damir talk about religion, legality, war, and the importance of the existence of God for the possibility of justice. Is it better to be a believer than a godless agnostic?

Who poses the biggest danger to our country aside from Trump: the wokes, the integralists—or the Never Trumpers themselves? Aaron Sibarium of the Washington Free Beacon joins Shadi and Damir to talk about his new essay about Weimar Germany, polarization, and the allures and dangers of moral certitude. 

Reading List

• "The Weimarization of the American Republic," by Aaron Sibarium (American Purpose)

Elbridge Colby joins Shadi and Damir to talk about his challenging new book The Strategy of Denial, an unflinchingly clinical argument for confronting China. Does China's authoritarianism make it our enemy, or is confrontation inevitable regardless? Will our allies stick by our side just because China is a bully? And what does Henry Kissinger get wrong about power politics?

Required Reading:

- "Will the Next American War Be with China?" by Benjamin Wallace-Wells (New Yorker).

- Age of Ambition, by Evan Osnos.

- "Diplomacy is a Dirty Business," by Damir Marusic (Wisdom of Crowds).

- Federalist No. 11. 

The liberal idea arose partly as a response to the religious wars of 17th-century Europe. Could something similar occur in the Islamic world today? Mustafa Akyol thinks so—and his new book Reopening Muslim Minds offers a fascinating and forthright case for reinterpreting Islamic history and revisiting Islamic law. Mustafa joined Shadi and Damir to talk about what inspired the book, starting with his arrest by Malaysia's "religion police." They go on to debate Islam's proper role in public life, how to interpret sharia in a modern context, the promise (and dangers) of "rationalism," and what makes Islam attractive in the first place.

Part two of the conversation with Mustafa is available here for subscribers. If the first hour catches your interest, join us as we wade deeper into various controversies. The discussion turns to whether Islam will follow a similar trajectory as Christianity, apostasy laws, the case of Turkey, whether democracy is a means or an end, and what all of this means for American foreign policy. Subscribe here.  

Required Reading:

• Reopening Muslim Minds: A Return to Reason, Freedom, and Tolerance, by Mustafa Akyol (Amazon)
• "Where Islam and Reason Meet," by Mustafa Akyol (The Wall Street Journal)
• Sharia: Theory, Practice, Transformations, by Wael B. Hallaq (Amazon)
• Mustafa's New York Times archive

The boys are back in town! Damir is back from yet another globetrotting trip, so the Crowd is returning to podcasting after a brief hiatus. Beginning with Kanye West's recent antisemitic interview with Alex Jones and dinner with Donald Trump, we discussed the success Democrats have had with pinning crazy candidates and viewpoints on the GOP. Shadi is concerned that overheated rhetoric about the death of democracy may be harmful in the long run, while Damir, ever the cynic, is impressed by the dirty politics.

Of course, propping up crackpot candidates in a primary so that they can be beaten in the general election is a risky maneuver. Will covertly helping Donald Trump stay in the race invite divine judgement? Less theologically, how many people who seriously believed rhetoric about encroaching fascism will ever let that belief go? Shadi and Damir consider whether the "split personality" created by lives lived increasingly online leads to belief in outlandish, alarmist claims.

In the full episode (for paying subscribers only), Shadi, on a characteristically theological tangent, wonders what Heaven will be like. Will we be able to know the deepest thoughts of our friends and acquaintances? Will we even have the identities and selves that we do now?

Damir, also considering a (relatively) "undiscovered country" fills the Crowd in on his recent trip to Japan. What about Japan do Westerners not understand? Is it a modern, "Western" country, or some other, stranger, form of modernity. And are the media's representations of Japan as a deeply dysfunctional society all that accurate?

Required Reading:

- “Can You Pair Bond During Cybersex?” by Katherine Dee (Default Friend).

- “Why Liberals Should Support a Trump Republican Nomination,” by Jonathan Chait (New York Magazine).

- Patrick Stewart’s scene with Ricky Gervais on Extras.

In the inaugural episode of this ongoing experiment, Shadi and Damir talk about how inherent tensions in American identity—between inclusion and assimilation—are being tugged apart in perhaps unhealthy ways.

Author and essayist Peter Pomerantsev and Karina Orlova of Echo of Moscow Radio join Shadi and Damir to talk about the Russian soul, imperialism, historical memory, opioids, and bad cocaine. (It’s a lot less depressing than it sounds!)

Reading List:

This Is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality, by Peter Pomerantsev

Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia, by Peter Pomerantsev

Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets, by Svetlana Alexievich

“The Dying Russians” by Masha Gessen

Shadi and Damir talk about how racism, virtue signaling, the fundamental illegitimacy of the Chinese state, and how both consensus and irreconcilability can be fatal for democracy.

Reading List:
“China is the Real Sick Man of Asia” by Walter Russell Mead

“Birth of the Nations” by Damir Marusic

“It’s Not About Britain. It’s About Europe” by Damir Marusic

“The dark side of consensus in Tunisia: Lessons from 2015-2019” by Sharan Grewal and Shadi Hamid

“After Europe” by Ivan Krastev

In the shadow of Bernie Sanders’ underperforming on Super Tuesday, Shadi and Damir welcome author Ben Judah to the podcast to talk about the enduring promise of left-populism in an Age of Trump.

Relevant Reading:
“Left Populism and the Rediscovery of Agonistic Politics,” by Shadi Hamid

“Traditional ‘foreign policy’ no longer exists. Democrats are the last to know,” by David Adler and Ben Judah

“Hawks say Sanders will be weak on Russia. But Putin should fear a President Bernie,” by Ben Judah and David Adler

“Is Joe Biden the American Brezhnev?” by Ben Judah

“The Emergence of Foreign Policy,” by Halvard Leira

Catastrophe and resilience, human and economic costs, and the future of democratic politics: Shadi and Damir hunker down for an intense coronavirus podcast (while of course observing appropriate social distancing protocols).

Reading List:
“Pandemics Kill Compassion, Too,” by David Brooks

“The Wuhan Virus and the Imperative of Hard Decoupling,” by Andrew Michta

“The Coronavirus Called America’s Bluff,” by Anne Applebaum

In the third week of lockdown, Shadi and Damir talk about the Beatles versus the Stones, how the 1960s represent a kind of dangerous idealism grounded in universal values, and how there’s no escaping politics.

Reading List:
“The Coronavirus Killed the Revolution,” by Shadi Hamid

“It’s imperative for the U.S. and China to work together on the coronavirus pandemic,” by Michael McFaul

Jennifer Rubin’s Political Mathematics

“National Identity is Made Up,” by Max Fisher and Amanda Taub

The Atlantic Council's Benjamin Haddad joins Shadi and Damir to talk social distancing, the coronavirus response on both sides of the Atlantic, and how elites' ever more fervent love of experts could lead them to political disaster.

Reading List:

Le paradis perdu: L'Amérique de Trump et la fin des illusions européennes, by Benjamin Haddad (Grasset)

"The Coronavirus Killed the Revolution," by Shadi Hamid (The Atlantic)

"Social Distancing Isn't Going To End Soon. So How Do We Live With It?" by Gaby Hinsliff (The Guardian)

Shadi and Damir talk about their conflicted feelings about recording the previous episode in a room together, the dangers of optimism about the recovery, what the "new normal" in successful South Korea looks like, why America in all likelihood won't ever be able to get there, and why that might or might not be OK.

Reading List:
Shadi's tweet thread about why America can't be like South Korea.
Michael Kim's tweet thread about the reality in South Korea.
Man lectures BoJo in a park.

Shadi and Damir discuss how Trump's unabashed contempt for expertise has encouraged his opponents to latch onto expert opinion—and how this could boost Trump if the economic opening goes even tolerably well.

Reading List:

"What a Maskless Trump Says About His Re-Election Strategy" by Henry Olsen (WaPo)

"In Search of Lost Time" by Peter Pomerantsev (The American Interest)

"Pandemics Kill Compassion, Too" by David Brooks (New York Times)

Very special guest Michael Signer joins the podcast to talk about his new book recounting his time serving as mayor of Charlottesville during the violence of August 2017. With America in upheaval, it's an appropriate time to revisit that sad bit of recent history, but also an opportunity to think about what's gone wrong with our politics, and what, if anything, can be done to fix it. A rich discussion.

Reading List:
Cry Havoc: Charlottesville and American Democracy Under Siege, by Michael Signer

Shadi and Damir live-streamed an episode as a weekend of violent protests around the country wound to a close. Our episodes are never scripted or prepared, but in this case we are interacting with our audience on Twitter's Periscope in real time to help guide the conversation. Also, please excuse the audio quality.

In the wake of last weekend’s twin mass shootings, Shadi and Damir discuss radicalization, social media, and how the Left’s of denial of religion is creating dangerous blindspots for itself and for our democracies.

The former President of Georgia joins Shadi and Damir to talk about how tricky reforms—such as police reforms—can succeed (and fail), about how identity is a slippery thing in the post-Soviet space, about liberalism, illiberalism, and Western haughtiness, and about his encounters with Donald Trump when he was just another rich guy with a political itch.