Interesting Times

Is the United States still a worthy opponent for China? In this episode, Ross Douthat talks to Dan Wang, the author of “Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future,” about the alarming speed at which China is able to build and could blow America out of the water.

• 01:44 - “A life full of ease and beauty”
• 05:30 - Rule by engineers
• 11:00 - China’s Technological Mastery
• 16:04 - Is autocracy driving innovation?
• 25:00 - What are the real stakes of the competition?
• 35:47 - How could China fail? 
• 53:00 - Advice for America

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

While “Interesting Times” is on vacation, we’re sharing a conversation from “The Opinions” between Meher Ahmad, an editor for Times Opinion, and the Opinion writer Jessica Grose. They talk about the aesthetics of MAGA women — think Kristi Noem and Nancy Mace — and what they signal about femininity and power within the Republican Party. 

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

This week, we’re sharing a great conversation Ross had on “The Ezra Klein Show” this past spring. Ezra asks Ross about his most recent book, “Believe: Why Everyone Should Be Religious.” But along the way, they debate not just how religion influences the Trump administration but also their own lives. Come for their seeking and stay for their thoughts on ayahuasca and mystical encounters.

• 02:39 - Trump: man of destiny?
• 19:55 - Political power, cruelty and Godliness
• 36:13 - Religion and spirituality in the modern world
• 42:53 - The mysteries of the universe…
• 48:38 - Aliens! Fairies! (and some Catholic history)
• 56:51 - Contending with uncertainty and evil
• 1:05:24 - Psychedelic experiences
• 1:20:56 - Official knowledge
• 1:38:58 - Book recommendations

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

For Democrats, President Trump’s victories have revealed the antidemocratic flaws at the core of our government. But could it be an opening for a constitutional revolution as the party searches for its next leader?

This week, Ross explores what that revolution would entail with Osita Nwanevu, the author of the book, “The Right of the People: Democracy and the Case for a New American Founding.”

3:46 - What's wrong with our democracy? 
9:07 - Our undemocratic founding 
17:00 - The case for more U.S. states and a new constitution
23:52 - Where economic reform fits into this problem 
29:26 - Does Trump represent the will of the people?
37:17 - What Trump’s presidency says about democracy
40:30 - The elusive Bernie Sanders moment 
46:29 - The mystical element of our politics

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Would you use an algorithm to select your embryos? Enter Orchid, a company that promises parents the ability to protect their future children through genetic testing for embryos before pregnancy. The founder, Noor Siddiqui, and Ross debate the scientific, moral and ethical implications of designing a “healthy” child and what we lose in separating reproduction from sex.

• 01:27 - Orchid’s vision
• 04:59- The process and benefits
• 17:20 - Noor explains why Orchid was developed
• 22:00- Criticism and skepticism around genetic screening
• 36:21 - Does IVF need to change?
• 44:00 - “The moral status of the embryo”
• 53:36 - How does this technology change us?

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Does America have a moral obligation to the world? The former Department of Government Efficiency staffer Jeremy Lewin, now deputy administrator for the United States Agency for International Development, explains how he is implementing President Trump’s foreign aid philosophy and what it means for humanitarian assistance going forward.

• 01:59 - From the private sector to interviewing with Elon Musk
• 09:18 - The rapid restructuring of U.S.A.I.D.
• 19:44 - Lewin’s critiques of U.S.A.I.D.’s focus
• 25:15 - The most controversial cuts: humanitarian aid 
• 29:50 - America’s interests first, values-based interests second
• 40:14 - What is the future vision for foreign aid?

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

U.F.O.s, fairies and abductions! This week, Ross talks to Diana Walsh Pasulka, a professor of religious studies, about how a deep dive into Catholic archives led her down a path to unravel the connections between religion, extraterrestrial encounters and government secrecy.

• 01:53 - How Pasulka’s religious studies led to the U.F.O. debate
• 06:08 - Modern U.F.O. encounters and telepathic communication
• 13:29 - What are the actual beliefs of the U.F.O. community?
• 19:28 - Whistleblowers and government contradictions
• 31:35 - Angels, demons and “actual things in the sky”
• 45:38 - Disclosure
• 52:51 - “Amazing.”

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Julie K. Brown thinks Jeffrey Epstein didn’t act alone. On this episode of “Interesting Times,” Ross talks to Brown, the investigative reporter whose work ultimately led to Epstein’s re-arrest, about what the government could release that it hasn’t and how the story is bigger than Epstein.

• 2:32 - Brown's initial interest in the Epstein case
• 5:26 - Discovering Epstein's crimes and the plea deal
• 13:13 - Epstein's victims and the impact of Brown's reporting
• 18:20 - Epstein's wealth and connections
• 25:20 - Epstein's social circles
• 35:01 - Certainty and unsolved mysteries
• 45:25 - The role of government in the case
• 51:04 - Trump and the political fallout

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The conservative Christian podcaster Allie Beth Stuckey joins Ross on “Interesting Times” this week to explain why “toxic empathy” has a stranglehold on politics, whether evangelical Christians have a red line President Trump could cross and why her commentary has echoes of Phyllis Schlafly.

• 01:26 “The New Phyllis Schlafly”
• 9:46 Untangling the web of Evangelical Protestants
• 15:50 Female authority in the church
• 22:12 What is “toxic empathy”?
• 30:55 Toxic empathy and cruelty in American politics
• 40:19 Do conservative christians have a red line?
• 57:24 “The mushy middle”

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected].

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

How has the war in Gaza reverberated throughout American politics? Opinion columnist Bret Stephens and Ross Douthat debate the implications of the Israel-Gaza conflict on antisemitism, the morality of war, and why “Monday morning quarterbacking” is not productive when taking stock of military actions in the Middle East.

• 01:56 Israel actions in Gaza
• 04:39 The moral baseline
• 13:31 What is the end game?
• 15:52 The role of Israel in American politics
• 23:44 Can you criticize Israel without becoming antisemetic? 
• 36:05 Does Israel have obligations to the Jewish diaspora?

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected].

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.