Why You're Wrong—and Right—About Abortion
The most honest thing I’ve ever read about abortion is by Caitlin Flanagan. It’s called “The Dishonesty of the Abortion Debate: Why We Need to Face the Best Argument From the Other Side.” You can read it here. On today’s episode, and in light of the new law in Texas, which effectively bans abortion, a conversation with my friend Caitlin. We talk about the best arguments on both sides of this issue, the reality of life before Roe v. Wade, the state of feminism and more. Read all of Caitlin’s work for the Atlantic here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
6 Loka 20211h 2min
Wrongthink on Race With Glenn C. Loury
Four decades ago, Glenn C. Loury became the first tenured black professor of economics in Harvard’s history. Ever since then, he has made waves for his willingness to buck the elite intellectual establishment; for his iconoclastic ideas about race and inequality; and for his incisive cultural criticism. He is a man of seeming contradictions: he rails against the divisiveness of woke politics from his post at Brown University, one of America’s most left wing campuses. He worries about what the death of God means for the country -- though he calls his own past religious beliefs a “benevolent self-delusion.” In the 80s, Glenn challenged his fellow black Americans to combat the “enemy from within,” while he himself battled demons like adultery and addiction. But Glenn’s ability to re-examine his positions and look at his own past with clear eyes is hardly a fault. Glenn is a man who, in a time of lies told for the sake of political convenience, strives to tell the truth even when the truth is hard. Or complicated. Or an affront to our feelings. Or contradicts what we wish were true. In today’s conversation: race, racism, Black Lives Matter, school choice, standardized tests, crack, sexual infidelity, Christianity, the Nation of Islam, neoconservatism, Harvard, groupthink, and pretty much every other hot-button subject you can imagine. Plus, Glenn’s own remarkable life story. Glenn's own podcast, "The Glenn Show" is available through Substack and in video form on his new Youtube channel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
29 Syys 20211h 41min
Vaccine Hesitant? A Doctor Responds
So much of the conversation about Covid-19 is angry and full of finger-pointing. Dr. Vinay Prasad has consistently been able to cut through the noise, the confusion, and the endless bickering. He does this by consistently avoiding the blame game and following the data wherever it leads. Dr. Prasad is an Associate Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the University of California San Francisco. His writing, videos and tweets have been among my most reliable sources for information throughout the pandemic. His positions are nuanced, well-considered, and show exactly the kind of level-headedness and evidence-based decision-making that you want from someone you’re trusting your health to. The conversation covers what the pandemic has revealed about the state of scientific research; policy questions like masking, vaccinating children, and vaccine passports. And, most importantly, vaccine hesitancy. Dr. Prasad explains why shaming, blaming, and censoring the unvaccinated is a losing strategy -- and what might be a better one. Follow Vinay on Twitter, if you like: https://twitter.com/VPrasadMDMPH?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
22 Syys 20211h 33min
The Story of One Teenager's Escape From Afghanistan
It’s been a month since the fall of Afghanistan. And Black Hawk helicopters and Humvees aren’t the only things we left behind. Trapped in a country now controlled by the Taliban are hundreds of thousands of America’s Afghan allies. These are the interpreters, advisers and others who worked with the U.S. government and with American organizations--and who we promised we would never abandon. Their chance at freedom — at life — now relies on normal Americans who are determined to right what the White House has gotten so terribly wrong. They are a rag-tag group of military veterans, human-rights activists, ex-special forces, State Department officials, non-profit organizers and private individuals with the kind of resources necessary to charter planes. And they have formed a 21st-century Underground Railroad. In time, history books will be written about these Americans and the Afghans they saved.Today, the story of one of them. A 15-year-old girl in Kabul named Rahima. And a woman called Esther in East Moline, Illinois, who stepped into the vacuum left by the U.S. government. To learn more about the Underground Railroad: https://bariweiss.substack.com/p/inside-the-underground-railroad-out f you are interested in helping people like Rahima please consider supporting: https://nooneleft.org and https://afghanevac.org Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
17 Syys 202151min
Portland State Sacrificed Ideas for Ideology. So Peter Boghossian Quit.
Peter Boghossian is the first one to tell you: he's no victim of cancel culture. The philosophy professor has long had a taste for stoking debate, questioning orthodoxies, and exposing the brokenness of an academic system that values identity-based grievances over scholarship. He did that, in part, by writing phony papers like "The Conceptual Penis as a Social Construct" and getting them published by respected, peer-reviewed journals. That project and others painted a target on Peter’s back on Portland State's campus, where he was subjected to endless investigations and harassment. This week, Peter resigned in a letter writing to the school's provost: “The university transformed a bastion of free inquiry into a social justice factory whose only inputs were race, gender and victimhood and whose only output was grievance and division.” In this episode, a frank conversation about the culture of higher education, and how to fight back against radicalism without becoming radicalized yourself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
10 Syys 20211h 16min
Courage in the Face of Book Burners
Abigail Shrier is a lawyer, a reporter and author of Irreversible Damage. One way to describe her book would be: controversial. She has been accused of spreading misinformation by GLAAD. A prominent ACLU lawyer called for her book to be banned. A favorable review of the book in Science-Based Medicine ignited an online mob, which led to the journal disappearing that first review and replacing it with a negative one. Amazon and Target have also been pressured to stop carrying Shrier's book. But it hasn’t worked. Despite being ignored by outlets like the New York Times Book Review, Irreversible Damage is an enormous bestseller. Some readers felt so passionately about this book that they took out billboards advertising it on their own dime. Both the subject that Abigail writes about and the treatment of her book deserve your attention. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
8 Syys 202154min
American Decline Is a Choice. Let's Not Choose It.
Between the catastrophic American withdrawal from Afghanistan, an endless pandemic, a broken education system, and competent leaders nowhere in sight, it can feel like America is in a constant state of meltdown. On today's episode, renowned historian Niall Ferguson answers the big questions: how did we get here? Is American decline inevitable? And if not, what can be done to renew the culture and the country? Niall is the author of nearly 20 books. His latest is: "Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
1 Syys 20211h 19min
You’re Already Living in China’s World Pt 2: Beijing's Long Game
In Part II, a diagnosis of the global ambitions of the Chinese Communist Party with Josh Rogin. Josh explains how U.S policy mistakes in the 20th century handed more power to China in the 21st, how the Chinese government wields power over Big Tech, Hollywood, and higher education on U.S. soil, and whether we’re headed for another Cold War. “The global scale of the China challenge is not just about China’s rise, it’s not just about the genocide,” says Josh, “It’s about what kind of world we want to live in.” Plus, a call with Josh to discuss the American withdrawal of Afghanistan, and how the execution of that withdrawal creates a power vacuum for China to fill. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
25 Elo 202153min
