Podcasts by The Long Game

Gillian Laub's Family Almost Split Apart During the Trump Years from 2022-02-05T02:36:08

Gillian Laub has published books of stunning photographs about Listen

Katherine Gehl Talks about Alaska's Voting Experiment from 2022-01-25T14:13:22

My guest today is Katherine Gehl. She is part of the movement to protect and strengthen democracy by restructuring our election rules. Gehl is a former CEO of the food company her father started...

The Way Christians Read the Bible Has Big Implications from 2021-12-21T20:12:23

2021 was a year of whiplash, of head fakes. We thought it would be a return to normal, to the way we lived before the pandemic and before our politics became completely insane. But over the seco...

Robert Costa on "Peril" and whether American Democracy Can Survive from 2021-11-02T11:00

Robert Costa is a national political reporter for the Washington Post, and co-author with Bob Woodward of the new book "Peril." This book has made a lot of news. It is a compelling, authoritativ...

This Republican Strategist Says We're Being Bombarded With Disinformation from 2021-09-24T20:52:02

“I walked into the internet naively in 1995, thinking that it was all altruistic and going to create a better society,” Krohn said. But the Seattle native now is sounding the alarm about th...

The 'Vital Center' of American Politics Needs Heroes & Myths to Beat Back Religious and Secular Extremists, Philip Gorski says from 2021-08-06T17:01:08

I've spent pretty much all of my life fascinated by the interactions between religion and public life. I grew up in a very strict fundamentalist Christian church. I went to Christian music festi...

A New Podcast on Mars Hill Church Dives Deep into Evangelical Subculture from 2021-07-28T21:40:04

I've been taking a little bit of a break this summer from the podcast, but I've been listening to another podcast that was so interesting to me I decided to talk with its creator.

The ...

Is There a Way Out of Information Chaos & Cancel Culture? Jonathan Rauch Shines a Light from 2021-06-08T21:49:20

We are in an information crisis. Viral disinformation predominates on the right, and cancel culture on the left, but Jonathan Rauch says in his new book "The Constitution of Knowledge" that both...

Dean Phillips, a rising star in Congress, thinks America is on the cusp of embracing ranked-choice voting from 2021-05-18T19:28:49

I didn't plan for this episode to be about ranked-choice voting, but when I raised the topic, I was surprised at the degree to which Congressman Dean Phillips, a Democrat from Minnesota, was rea...

Curtis Chang Is Responding to Vaccine Hesitancy With Respect from 2021-05-12T19:29:46

Curtis is a former pastor who is now a consulting professor at Duke Divinity School and a s...

Michael Slaby on Trump & Facebook and the Bigger Problem of Reforming the Internet from 2021-05-05T09:00

One of the dominant themes of the last several years, and especially the last year, is the loss of shared truth, a sense in the country that it's increasingly difficult to talk to one another wh...

A conservative Christian book ignites debate over reparations — and faith itself from 2021-04-24T13:48:57

Duke Kwon is a minister in Washington, D.C., at Grace Meridian Hill, which is part of the Presbyterian Church of America (PCA). Gregory Thompson pastored for 20 years — most of it in Charlottesv...

Will Big Money Donors Get Behind the Move to Get Rid of Partisan Primaries? Nick Troiano Is Working On It from 2021-03-30T09:00

American politics is being held hostage, says a group of reformers with growing access to big-donor money who define their mission as trying to set it free.

The hostage-takers...

Yuval Levin Wants the GOP to stop making it harder to vote from 2021-03-11T09:30

You would think that most people would agree that we should try to make voting secure and accessible, that we should have confidence in the results and that we should make it possible for as man...

Can Americans Still Discuss Their Differences Constructively? David Blankenhorn Is Trying To Make it Happen. from 2021-03-04T13:46:53

David Blankenhorn is co-founder of Braver Angels, which now has 70 chapters around the country, and has hosted more than 1,400 meetings, Blankenhorn said.

The mission of Braver Angels ...

Adam Kinzinger says the battle with Trumpism has to be fought in public (bc he knows political parties have lost their power) from 2021-02-24T22:47:10

Adam Kinzinger, 42, has been in Congress since 2010. He's an Air National Guard pilot who flew over 100 combat missions on active duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. He never said much about Trump pri...

The Congressman Who Became A Qanon Topic Himself: Rep. Tom Malinowski from 2021-02-23T13:22:33

Tom Malinowski, a Democratic congressman from New Jersey who was working on a resolution last year condemning the Qanon conspiracy cult, when suddenly he became a target of the cult himself, wit...

Reducing Big Tech Censorship, Preserving Free Speech, and Fighting Disinformation, with Peter Pomerantsev from 2021-02-18T16:23:55

Peter Pomerantsev is one of the best thinkers on online disinformation. He's the author of two books, "Listen

If Things Are Going to Hell, Let's Talk Structural Reform with Don Beyer from 2021-02-03T20:30:19

Gerrymandering is a major problem. But it's not the only structural cause of radicalization, extremism and polarized politics. I talked with Rep. Don Beyer, a Democrat from Virginia, about some ...

Russell Moore on the Capitol Insurrection and Why He's Willing to Put His Job On the Line to Speak His Mind from 2021-01-16T10:00

Russell Moore is the president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which is the public policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention. The SBC is the largest Protestant denomination i...

Brendan Buck on the Lessons of the Trump Disaster & the Urgent Need for GOP Pols to Tell the Truth to their Voters from 2021-01-13T23:13:41

Brendan Buck worked for two Republican Speakers of the House: John Boehner and Paul Ryan. He's now a partner at the strategic comms shop Seven Letter. I first met him when I was writing about th...

John Dickerson Thinks The Way We Pick Presidents is FUBAR from 2020-12-16T02:03:36

John Dickerson is a correspondent for 60 Minutes, a political analyst for CBS News, a contributing writer for The Atlantic, and one of the three hosts of Slate's Political Gabfest podcast, which...

He Fought Liberal Bias in Media But Then Realized He Didn't Understand Journalism from 2020-12-04T10:00

Matthew Sheffield fought against liberal bias in the news media for years. He grew up in a fundamentalist Mormon family, one of 10 children. His street preacher father watched CBS News. And in t...

Eli Lake Has Hammered the FBI for its Handling of the Russia Investigation. He Weighs In on Trump's Refusal to Concede from 2020-11-30T20:23:31

One of the most common defenses of President Trump's attempts to overturn the election results is that he was undermined for much of his presidency by the media and the so-called "deep state," p...

We Have Entered the "Post-Truth" Era, With Pennsylvania's Lt. Gov. John Fetterman & Gisele Fetterman from 2020-11-24T10:00

John Fetterman is the lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania, and the former mayor of Braddock, PA, which is just outside Pittsburgh. He and his wife Gisele and he have long been involved in commun...

How to Tell Real Conspiracies from Conspiracy Theories, With the BBC's Marianna Spring from 2020-11-23T10:00

The purpose of this episode is to help us think about how do we talk to people who are either confused by conspiracy theories or committed to them. How do we interact with family members who are...

The GOP Needs Fewer Tax Cuts and More Labor Unions, Argues Oren Cass from 2020-11-17T10:00:01

 “Applying conservative principles doesn't mean just keep flipping through the 1980 playbook until you find the right tax cut,” said Oren Cass, executive director of American Compass. ...

Tim Alberta On the Future of the Republican Party from 2020-11-16T13:28:44

Tim Alberta is chief political author at Politico and author of the 2019 New York Times Bestseller, "American Carnage: On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War and the Rise of President Tr...

Mindy Belz on What American Christians Can Learn from Middle Eastern Christians & Emily Belz on Qanon in the Church from 2020-10-25T18:57:41

Mindy Belz has been with World Magazine since its founding in 1986. It’s a publication aimed at evangelical Christians, started by her brother in law, Joel Belz. Emily Belz, Mindy’s daughter, is...

Charlie Camosy Talks Abortion Politics from 2020-10-21T09:00

Charlie Camosy is a professor of theology and social ethics at Fordham University, and has writte...

Kim Wyman, the Republican who oversees all-mail elections in Washington, on the security and integrity of the election from 2020-10-09T17:54:36

Kim Wyman is the Secretary of State in Washington state, which is one of five states that conducts its elections entirely by mail and has been doing so since 2011. 

I talked with ...

Republican Super Lawyer Ben Ginsberg Says When It Comes to Election Fraud, There's No Iceberg from 2020-10-02T09:00

“I've been looking at polling places for 38 years as part of my duties and passion for [the] Republican party doing well in elections. We’ve been looking for fraud and I know what evidence is av...

Judy Wu Dominick thinks if you have wealth and aren't friends with others who don't, you're spiritually poor from 2020-09-18T21:30:32

Judy Wu Dominick comes to the issue of race from a decidedly Christian perspective. As she explains in the first portion of our conversation, she came to this work of writing about race and fait...

Eddie Glaude on his timely book about James Baldwin, Racism, and the Betrayal of the Civil Rights Movement from 2020-09-11T09:00

Eddie Glaude is the chair of Princeton University’s African American Studies program and is a regular fixture on the set of “Morning Joe.” Eddie has written several books over the years, such as...

Stacey Abrams and filmmakers Liz Garbus and Lisa Cortes on their new documentary "All In: The Fight for Democracy" from 2020-09-08T19:36:41

Stacey Abrams is president of Fair Fight Action and was House Minority Leader in the Georgia legislature from 2011 to 2017. In 2018, she ran for governor of Georgia, losing a closely contested r...

Michael Steele on How Biden Should Respond to Trump and to Kenosha from 2020-08-29T09:00

Michael Steele is the former lieutenant governor of Maryland who went on to become chairman of the Republican National Committee from 2009 to 2011. He’s a regular mainstay on MSNBC these days, a...

Frank LaRose, Ohio's Top Elections Official, GOP official, Warns That a Single Law is Going to Delay Election Results in other Midwest Swing States from 2020-08-28T09:00

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, a Republican, said that in his state mail-in ballots will be among the first ballots counted on the night of the election. This is because Ohio law allows e...

Top Republican Elections Official Who Has Advised Vice President Pence Says Trump Voting Fraud Claims are "Not Feasible" from 2020-08-23T14:22:45

Michael G. Adams is Kentucky's Secretary of State, the top elections official in that state. He is a Harvard Law graduate who was a senior lawyer at the Justice Department in the George W. Bush ...

Howard Dean on the Democratic Convention: "All We Have to Do Is Be Ourselves" from 2020-08-17T21:03:13

As Democrats get set to start the first virtual party convention in history, former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean talks about what he thinks the party needs to accomplish th...

The Pure Pleasure of Speaking with Bill Buford, author of "Dirt", about food, writing, and adventure from 2020-08-06T09:00:19

Bill Buford is an author, chef, and adventurer. I've read his two latest books in the last year.

Listen

Nicholas Carr on "The Shallows" 10 Years Later from 2020-07-29T13:29:56

One of the foundational books of my adult life is “Amusing Ourselves to Death” by Neil Postman. It helped me see the ways in which the modern world was driven by entertainment more than informat...

Meet the Guy Who's Hauling All 4 Big Tech CEO's (Virtually) Up to the Hill Next Week, Rep. David Cicilline from 2020-07-23T09:00

Next Monday, the CEO’s of four of the most dominant and important technology companies in the world will testify to Congress: 

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Goo...

The Election Nightmare Scenario that Keeps Rick Hasen Up At Night from 2020-07-14T09:00

Rick Hasen is professor of law and political science at UC-Irvine and author of “Election Meltdown.”

Rick is two things that make him worth your time. First, he knows more about elect...

Tom Ridge: For His Own Good, Trump Should Stop Knocking Mail-In Voting from 2020-06-17T20:56:15

Tom Ridge is the former governor of Pennsylvania, from 1995 to 2001, and went on to become the first ever head of the Department of Homeland Security, which was created by President George W. Bu...

Sen. Tim Scott on the killing of George Floyd and whether violence is a legitimate form of political action from 2020-06-04T00:46:48

Sen. Tim Scott, R-SC, is the only black Republican in the U.S. Senate. When he was elected in 2012, he was only the 7th African-American senator in the nation’s history.

Scott has been...

NIH Director Francis Collins is overseeing the hunt for a COVID-19 vaccine and is concerned about anti-vaccine activists from 2020-05-29T09:00

Francis Collins is the director of the National Institutes of Health, which is the primary U.S. government agency responsible for biomedical and public health research. It’s a giant agency, with...

Religion reporter Terry Mattingly on White Evangelicals and the Qanon political cult from 2020-05-27T09:00

Terry Mattingly, founder of GetReligion.org and a nationally syndicated religious columnist, talks about the ...

Tim Miller on the need to take conspiracy theories and disinformation seriously from 2020-05-26T09:00

Tim Miller worked in Republican politics for many years but over the last few years he's become more of a writer. One of his latest pieces at The Bulwark is titled, "Listen

The Man At the Center of the Red Hot Battle Over Voting Rights: Marc Elias from 2020-05-20T09:00

Marc Elias is leading 32 current lawsuits in 16 states to try to push for more expansive voting...

DL Mayfield on her new book, "The Myth of the American Dream: Reflections on Affluence, Autonomy, Safety & Power" from 2020-05-05T09:00

“When I was young, it was so simple. I thought God was good. I thought God rewarded those who obey the rules. I thought my good news was accessible to everyone if only they had the ears to liste...

Jonathan Karl on his "Trump Show" book, media as the opposition, and the "fakest thing" of the Trump era from 2020-04-29T17:22:59

Jonathan Karl is chief Washington and White House correspondent for ABC News. His new book is “Listen

The Only Things Worth Discussing: Testing, Tracing & Therapeutics, with Adam White from AEI from 2020-04-17T20:24:52

Adam White is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a law professor at George Mason University.

He wrote about how we are focusing too much on the president's rol...

Sen. Ben Cardin on Why Democrats Are Holding Up Money for the Small Business Emergency Fund from 2020-04-17T01:22:08

Republicans are hammering Democrats for not automatically approving another $250 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program, a fund set up to help small businesses avoid going out of business. ...

Congressman Patrick McHenry Says Every Small Business Who Needs an Emergency Loan Should Get One from 2020-04-09T01:12:35

Congress authorized $350 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program in its coronavirus rescue package that was passed two weeks ago. Any company with 500 employees or fewer can get a loan of up...

It's His Job To Critique the President. How Do You Do That During a National Emergency? from 2020-04-06T16:25:43

The question of who’s to blame for the mess we’re in with coronavirus is not a fun one. It’s clear that the U.S. response has been pretty terrible on a number of fronts: the testing component ha...

Sen. Ron Wyden on His Push For A Vote-By-Mail Presidential Election from 2020-04-03T09:00

I talked with Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat who has been leading the push with Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota to send at least $2 billion to states to help them get ready for a fall electi...

Yuval Levin on How to Come Back from the Coronavirus Pandemic from 2020-04-01T20:18:52

I talk with Yuval Levin about his article ...

AFSCME President Lee Saunders on a contested convention and how adversity rejevenuated his union from 2020-03-02T10:00

Lee Saunders is the head of one of the country’s largest unions, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

He talks about why union membership has steadil...

Addisu Demissie - who ran Cory Booker's campaign - on the Democratic primary from 2020-02-28T10:00

Addisu Demissie ran Cory Booker’s presidential campaign and has an expert resume in Democratic campaigns. Right now he's an undecided voter in California. We talked about what's going to happen ...

Bakari Sellers On the South Carolina Primary and Joe Biden's Last Stand from 2020-02-19T09:00

Joe Biden’s last stand will be in South Carolina, where he is still expected to retain support from a large number of African-American voters despite his poor showings so far in Iowa and New Ham...

Carl Hulse on What We Learned From the Impeachment Trial & How to Cover Congress and not Lose Your Mind from 2020-02-08T12:00

Carl Hulse is chief Washington correspondent for the New York Times and has been writing about Congr...

What If You Had More Than Just Two Choices For President? Lee Drutman's Argument for Ranked Choice Voting and More than Two Parties from 2020-01-31T10:00

Lee Drutman is author of “Breaking the Two Party Doom Loop: T...

Yuval Levin On His Indispensable New Book "A Time To Build" from 2020-01-21T10:00

Yuval Levin is director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at the American Enterprise Institute and Editor in Chief of National Affairs magazine. This is our third conversation on t...

Justice John Roberts Is Not Going to Decide Impeachment Trial Witnesses - Jeffrey Rosen from 2020-01-14T10:00

Jeffrey Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, a contributing writer Listen

Bob Inglis Wanted to "Destroy" Bill Clinton during the 98 Impeachment. Years Later He Tracked Him Down to Apologize. from 2019-12-06T10:00

Bob Inglis was leading the charge 20 years ago to impeach President Bill Clinton. Inglis was an up and coming Republican congressman from South Carolina, and a self-described bomb-thrower.

Susan Glasser Has Covered Impeachment and Russia Before, But Not At the Same Time from 2019-11-27T13:30

Susan Glasser is a staff writer for The New Yorker, where she writes a weekly column on “Trump’s Washington,” and she is a global affairs analyst for CNN. She founded Politico Magazine and was e...

Jack Goldsmith On Growing Up Around Mobsters, RFK's Abuses of Power, & Trump's Impeachment from 2019-10-18T08:45

Jack Goldsmith is the author of "In Hoffa’s Shadow: A Stepfather, a Disappearance in Detroit, and My Search for the Truth.” It's the story of his step-father, Chuckie O'Brien, and the man h...

"Kanye West Should Not Be President" - Chris Hayes On the Role of Parties In A Democracy from 2019-10-15T08:45

Chris Hayes is the host of “All In With Chris Hayes,” a nightly hour-long show on MSNBC that airs at 8 p.m. He wrote “Twilight of the Elites” in 2011, and a second book “A Colony in a Nation” in...

Stacey Abrams: "I Talk About Power Because You're Not Supposed To" from 2019-10-09T08:00

Stacey Abrams is a 45-year old politician who ran for governor of Georgia last year and lost, but in the process became a nationally known Democratic star. She’s at the top of the list of potent...

Mako Fujimura on Culture Care Instead of Culture War, Painting, & Restoring a Vision of the Common Good from 2019-09-20T09:00

Mako Fujimura is an artist and a philosopher. He’s been blowing my mind for 15 years, first with his painting and then with his writing. 

"Culture is not a territory to be won; it...

Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh Are The Establishment, says Brian Rosenwald from 2019-09-10T09:00

Brian Rosenwald is author of "Talk Radio’s America: How an industry took over a political party that took over the United States.” Rosenwald is co-editor of “Made by History” a daily “Washington...

The Battle to Create Shared Facts - Laura Berlind from The Sycamore Institute from 2019-08-30T17:24:20

Laura Berlind founded and helps run a think tank that is focused on one state and one state only: Tennessee. She’s the executive director of the Sycamore Institute, which on the surface is somet...

He Left Christianity Behind In a War Zone. This Is the Story of Bryan Mealer's Path Back to Faith. from 2019-08-23T09:00

Bryan Mealer is the author of four books: All Things Must Fight to Live — an account of his time in ...

Voter Suppression or Ballot Fraud -- My 5-Month Investigation Into a Case in Georgia from 2019-08-06T09:00

This is a story about a group of 12 African-Americans who were arrested and charged with 120 felonies after they shifted control of a local school board in rural Georgia from a majority white bo...

David Brooks on Not Feeling Like a Convert, His New Book, and Marianne Williamson from 2019-08-02T21:31:26

“Our society has become a conspiracy against joy," writes New York Times columnist and author David Brooks.

The thesis of his new book, "The Second Mountain," is that a meaningful life...

The Democrats Are Losing Faith Voters Because of Their Abortion Stance, with Amy Sullivan from 2019-07-29T09:00:55

In 2008, Amy Sullivan wrote a book called "The Party Faithful: How and Why Democrats are Closing the God Gap." A decade later, ...

Steve Kornacki on "Wishful Thinking" Around Impeaching Trump & His Book "The Red & the Blue" from 2019-07-19T17:29:42

This week the House of Representatives held its third vote in three years on Listen

Fox News' Carl Cameron Is Now Working For a Liberal Website? from 2019-07-13T09:00:41

I talk with Carl Cameron, who was one of the first people hired at Fox News in 1995 and worked at the right-wing cable news channel for 22 years, about what he's doing now working for Listen

The Case for Regulating Facebook & Google - Sally Hubbard from 2019-07-10T09:00

It was a distant echo, but now it’s becoming a drumbeat. The big tech companies — Google, Facebook, Amazon — are increasingly the subject of talk about government regulation. And one month ago, ...

Live from the Miami Debate: How Bad Was It For Biden? from 2019-06-28T05:11:37

Mo Elleithee, former Democratic National Campaign spokesman and current Director of the Institute of Politics and Public Service at Georgetown, joins me in the spin room in Miami to talk about t...

Bonus Episode: Tom Wolf reacts to today's Supreme Court gerrymandering decision from 2019-06-27T21:24:21

The Supreme Court today issued a decision on partisan gerrymandering, the practice of politicians drawing maps that give themselves an advantage over other parties by manipulating an increasingl...

Disarming Fear & Defensiveness around the Race conversation, with Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove from 2019-06-24T09:00

“Transformation requires people changing. And I don't think most people change when they're defensive,” Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove told me.

Wilson-Hartgrove is a leader in progressive ...

Peter Wehner On Trump, Impeachment, and the limits of faith to overcome political ideology from 2019-06-11T09:00

Peter Wehner's new book "The Death of Politics" is a plea to everyday Americans not ...

The Supreme Court Is About to Issue a Massive Ruling on Gerrymandering: Here's What You Need to Know from 2019-06-07T09:00

A Supreme Court ruling is expected any day on one of the biggest drivers of our broken, polarized politics: gerrymandering.

Thomas Wolf is counsel with the Democracy program at the Br...

Paul Kane on Pelosi's Impeachment Challenge and Congress' "Lost Decade" from 2019-06-04T09:00

As Congress returns from its Memorial Day recess, Democrats face a choice: stay united on taking their time to consider whether to impeach President Trump, or begin a massive political fight int...

Let's Get Rid of the Speaker of the House, Says Former Aide to John Boehner from 2019-05-29T09:00

Michael Steel, spent years as a top aide to Republican leadership on Capitol Hill, namely House Speaker John Boehner, has worked on a number of presidential campaigns, and is now a managing...

Snapchat's Peter Hamby Knows the Youth Vote & Sees Trouble Ahead for Bernie Sanders from 2019-05-10T09:00

Peter Hamby is host of “Good Luck America,” a weekly political show on Snapchat that he said is watched by 2 million young people (the majority of Snapchat users are between 13 and 24 years old)...

Is Beto O'Rourke Already Played Out? Reid Epstein of The New York Times Joins to Discuss from 2019-05-03T17:39:13

Reid Epstein has covered Beto O'Rourke extensively, as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal the last few years, and now a newly minted member of the New York Times 2020 coverage team. Epstein ...

Jonah Goldberg On His New Media Venture: 'We Don't Want To Be An Anti-Trump Thing' from 2019-04-26T09:00

Jonah Goldberg is a longtime conservative pundit and author who is in the process of leaving his positions at National Review and the American Enterprise Institute to start a new conservative me...

Nicco Mele: We Are Living In Two Worlds At Once from 2019-04-15T09:47:28

Last episode, we talked with Joe Trippi, who played a key political role in the 2004 Howard Dean campaign, which was the first Internet-driven campaign. This week, we have Nicco Mele, who was pa...

Joe Trippi: Dems Could "Blow It" in 2020, But Here's Why They Won't from 2019-04-05T09:00

Joe Trippi is one of the most experienced consultants in Democratic politics. He's worked on campaigns in six of the last 10 presidential elections. He helped guide Howard Dean's historic 2004 c...

Joe Kennedy III On Mental Health, Packing the Courts, & The Green New Deal from 2019-04-01T09:00

The Kennedy family is one of the most legendary in American political history. It has long been involved in efforts to combat mental illness through public policy since President John F. Kennedy...

Sen. Tim Scott Used Trump's Charlottesville Response To Help Low-Income Communities from 2019-03-15T09:00

When President Trump said there were “very fine people on both sides” after white supremacists and neo-Nazis marched in Charlottesville, Sen. Tim Scott spoke up. He called the president’s c...

Democrats Need a Unifying Candidate in 2020, Jennifer Palmieri Says from 2019-03-01T10:00

Jennifer Palmieri has been one of the party’s most influential operatives for the last decade. Most recently, she was communications director and a senior adviser to Hillary Clinton during the 2...

Trent Lott On Congress, Trump's Qualifications & Chances, & Growing Up in the Deep South from 2019-02-19T10:00

Trent Lott was elected to the House of Representatives in 1972, and to the Senate in 1989, and operated inside the House and Senate at a time when bipartisan cooperation was more commo...

Patrick McHenry Has Some Advice For the New Rock Stars of Congress from 2019-02-07T10:00

"When I got elected, I was the classic young man in a hurry. Classic," said Rep. Patrick McHenry, a Virginia Republican and one of the Republican Party's top leaders in Congress. "I can see it v...

My book CAMELOT'S END is out Today! And a Joe Biden interview excerpt from 2019-01-22T14:16:38

An update on where I've been for three weeks, and on the release of my new book today. And then I share a few clips from my 2015 interview with Joe Biden for the book. When I went back through t...

Al Mohler & The Report on Slavery and Racism in the History of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary from 2019-01-04T10:00

Albert Mohler is president of Southern Theological Seminary in Louisville, the flagship training ground for the Southern Baptist Convention, which is one of the largest evangelical denominations...

Panera Founder Ron Shaich Is Preaching Against Short-Term Thinking In Business & Politics from 2018-12-28T10:00

Ron Shaich, the founder of Panera Bread, the ultra-successful fast-casual chain, resigned from his CEO job in 2017 and is Listen

Senator Michael Bennet Considers A Run for President and How to Rebuild the Senate from 2018-12-19T10:00

Michael Bennet is a 54-year old Democrat from Colorado who was elected to his second full term in the U.S. Senate in 2016. He's deeply disturbed by the demise of the Senate, but he told me he do...

Andrew Sullivan on Christianity's Collapse, the Wisconsin GOP & Identity Politics from 2018-12-07T20:20:19

Andrew Sullivan was editor of The New Republic from 1991 to 1996, and has been a pioneer in more than one sense. He was one of the first writers to start blogging, launching The Daily Dish ...

The Lawsuit Alleging Voter Suppression in Georgia from 2018-12-03T10:00

Last Tuesday, a group started by Stacey Abrams filed a 66-page lawsuit in federal court that listed all the ways in which the Democratic candidate for governor and her allies say Republican Secr...

I Guess We’re Doing Season 2 Now. Here’s What’s Up Next from 2018-11-30T16:45:42

There’s plenty more to do about political parties, and I’ll dip into that topic from time to time. But it’s a good time to move into other topics as well. I’ve done a little of that already. Goi...

The Path to the 2018 Midterm Elections from 2018-11-05T03:21:21

On Tuesday voters will go to the polls to choose candidates for Congress, for statewide office, and in local elections. Here's a look back at the biggest moments that shaped the last 22 months s...

The Gravitron from 2018-10-26T09:00

We often refer to American politics now as a circus. But it's a carnival ride that best illustrates the gravitational forces that created the mess we've made of our politics. Everything now is c...

CBS News' Major Garrett on his new book, "Mr. Trump's Wild Ride" from 2018-10-19T09:00

If you want to read a book about Trump and discuss it with someone who sees the president differently than you, this is the book to buy. “Listen

Brian Kemp Says There Are 'Outside Agitators' in Georgia Election from 2018-10-12T20:35:31

The race for governor in Georgia is intense. You could script a full Netlix mini-series around the two main characters and the history between them. But when Secretary of State Brian Kemp, the R...

BuzzFeed's Charlie Warzel on the Information Wars & Media Gatekeeping from 2018-10-05T09:00

"You can risk going too far. You can risk saying everyone has a right and should see every single piece of everything, no matter how incredulous, how ridiculous, how over the top, how upsetting ...

10 Years Since the 08 Crash, Are We Ready For The Next Big Crisis? from 2018-09-27T09:00

10 years ago, the American economy was on the edge of Freefall. A divided government overcame partisan differences to work together, in an election year. We talked to former Treasury Secretary H...

John McCain from 2018-09-21T18:54:18

Sen. John McCain passed away one month ago at the age of 81. He was an American hero. In 2013, I interviewed him in his Senate office to talk about his place in history. I wrote a profile for Th...

The Man Behind the GOP Data Machine from 2018-09-14T08:45

"In the pitiful early hours of Election Night [it] was the only credible resource Trump advisors had." That's CBS News' Major Garrett's description of the Republican National Committee's data an...

Mitch Daniels On Why Tribalism Opens the Door to Tyrants from 2018-07-13T09:00

It’s intriguing to wonder what might have happened to the Republican Party if Mitch Daniels had run for president in 2012. He was finishing up his second term as governor of Indiana, and was wid...

Yuval Levin on What You Can Do To Help Solve Our Broad Social Crisis from 2018-06-29T16:20:21

“A key part of our task,” Yuval writes, “is simply to see what we lack.”

"And when you step back and listen, an awful lot of what’s distinct about this moment in America seems like a r...

Adam Wren On Finding His Way In A New Journalism Landscape from 2018-06-25T09:00

I talk with Adam Wren about what it's like to be a journalist entrepreneur, covering national politics from the Midwest while also starting a state news-focused newsletter. And Adam shares his o...

Terry Sullivan on the GOP & Marco Rubio's 2016 Loss from 2018-06-18T18:53:52

Republican political operative Terry Sullivan discusses the move away from issue-based campaigns, toward contests based around personality and image, whether Sen. Jesse Helms was a racist, and h...

Lee Drutman on Ranked Choice Voting & Multi-Member Congressional Districts from 2018-06-11T20:00:54

I’m beginning to think that ranked-choice voting might be a way for voters to exercise quality control in a party primary in a way that party bosses used to. The way it works, if no one gets 50 ...

Amy Walter On the California Primaries from 2018-06-05T09:00

Voters in five states will go to the polls today to vote in primary elections, but in California, Democrats are facing an unexpected challenge. They need 23 seats to retake contro...

AB Stoddard Has Watched Congress Collapse from 2018-06-01T09:00

AB Stoddard, associate editor and columnist at Real Clear Politics, has been a working journalist for two and a half decades. She started covering Congress in 1994, and so she has seen the ...

DNC's Ken Martin Says 'Resistance' Has to Mature from 2018-05-25T19:05:35

"At some point, they need to channel that energy into really tangible electoral activity if they're going to actually get power back from Trump and the Republicans, and to do that, the best plac...

Ambassador Tim Roemer on $$$$ in Politics from 2018-05-21T09:00

Tim Roemer is a former Indiana congressman and was President Obama's first ambassador to India. He now represents a group that believes American democracy is broken and is trying to bring Republ...

Reed Galen Likes Sore Losers from 2018-05-14T09:00

“The angrier the electorate, the less capable we are of finding common ground on policies, or even of treating our opponents like human beings," a political scientist Listen

Joel Searby Wants to Take Down the Two-Party System from 2018-05-08T09:00:56

Joel Searby, a former adviser to Evan McMullin's presidential campaign, is now trying to persuade a group of senators -- whom he would not name -- to form a caucus that would elect a bipartisan ...

The Missouri Governor's Scandal from 2018-05-01T19:46:46

Embattled Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens is a textbook case, like President Trump, of the danger of political parties losing control over their primaries. When Greitens ran for governor in 2016, he...

Matt Bai Thinks I'm Crazy (or at least wrong) from 2018-04-20T19:46:25

Matt is one of the best journalists in America. He's a weekly columnist at Yahoo News and author of two books, "The Argument," and "All the Truth is Out." His second book has been turned into a ...

Summary Episode - Everything We've Covered So Far from 2018-04-13T17:51:30

If you're a new listener and wonder what this show is all about, this episode will get you caught up. I go back through why this podcast exists, and what each guest has talked about. There are c...

Steven Levitsky, author of "How Democracies Die" from 2018-04-03T15:32:36

Steven Levitsky is professor of government at Harvard University. He has spent most of his life studying Latin American politics and history, with a focus on political parties, authoritarianism ...

What I'm Reading #2 - Dan Koch - "How to Think" by Alan Jacobs from 2018-03-30T14:19:51

Dan Koch, host of the Depolarize podcast, joins me to talk about his thoughts while reading "How to Think," by Baylor literature professor Alan Jacobs.

Support this show Listen

Seth Masket from 2018-03-05T19:42:55

Seth Masket is the chair of the political science department at the University of Denver. He has dared to say what few will: that for party primaries and maybe all of American politics to be mor...

What I'm Reading #1 - "12 Rules for Life" by Jordan Peterson from 2018-02-23T17:53:10

I'm introducing a new feature to The Long Form podcast, where I'll post short interviews with friends and public figures about the book that they are in the middle of. I don't want polished hot ...

Norm Ornstein from 2018-01-12T20:01:56

He thinks machine politics is a distraction. Norm Ornstein has a different take from Jonathan Rauch and Elaine Kamarck on why our politics is broken. Ornstein believes increasing voter participatio...

Elaine Kamarck from 2017-10-20T17:42:07

"When politicians can't get anything done, it breeds distrust. It breeds anger ... The weakening of parties ... most people think it's a good thing," Elaine Kamarck says. But, she warns that "th...

Jonathan Rauch from 2017-09-19T19:00:46

Jonathan Rauch's 2016 Atlantic cover story, "How American Politics Went Insane," argued that we've reformed our politics into dysfunction. We talk about how telling people to vote or participate...

Jemar Tisby from 2017-08-14T15:44:09

Jemar Tisby is one of the more compelling figures I am aware of when it comes to race and Christianity in America. He is the president of the Reformed African American Network, and is obtaining a P...

Yuval Levin from 2017-07-20T03:02:11

Yuval Levin, one of the most plugged in, influential conservative intellectuals in the country, joins me to talk about how modern Americans often think of institutions as platforms for self-prom...

The Origin Story from 2017-06-21T13:25:33

In this inaugural, introductory episode, I tell the story of standing on the floor of the Republican convention in Cleveland as the GOP squashed an anti-Trump rebellion. It caused me to sta...