Eric visits the Miller Center and joins John Owen IV, the Amb. Henry J. and Mrs. Marion R. Taylor Professor of Politics, and a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture and the Miller Center for Public Affairs and Marc Selverstone, the Miller Center's director of presidential studies, co-chair of the Center’s Presidential Recordings Program, and professor of presidential studies. They discus John's new book The Ecology of Nations:  American Democracy in a Fragile World Order (New Haven, CT:  Yale University Press, 2023) and Marc's book The Kennedy Withdrawal:  Camelot and the American Commitment to Vietnam (Cambrdige, MA:  Harvard University Press, 2022). They discuss tensions in JFK's commitment to Vietnam and the question of whether or not he would have withdrawn US forces from SE Asia had he lived, the role of botched withdrawals in Vietnam and Afghanistan on US standing in the world, America's diminished reputation for competence and the defense of global order, the relationship between American democracy and the state of democracy in the international order with the rise of populism globally and much else.

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=the+kennedy+withdrawal&hvadid=676976545333&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9051515&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=1675637251603091413&hvtargid=kwd-1935195859327&hydadcr=22165_13517535&tag=googhydr-20&ref=pd_sl_4mgav3wic7_e

https://www.amazon.com/Ecology-Nations-American-Democracy-Politics/dp/0300260733/ref=sr_1_1?crid=SZU0KJM5NX1F&keywords=the+ecology+of+nations&qid=1702755136&sprefix=the+ecology+of+nation%2Caps%2C93&sr=8-1

Shield of the Republic is a Bulwark podcast co-sponsored by the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia.