Politicology

Host Ron Steslow talks to Isaac Stone Fish (founder and CEO of Strategy Risks and author of America Second) about Jensen Huang’s resignation from Nvidia, the alleged Chinese intelligence operation at the center of the scandal, and what it reveals about corporate America’s exposure to Beijing. 

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Mike Madrid (author of The Latino Century) joins host Ron Steslow to explain why a historic Democratic sweep is a repudiation, not a realignment. 

They begin with the scale of the midterm results, from the House to the Senate to statehouses, and why the moment reads as a verdict on Trump and MAGA rather than an embrace of the Democratic Party. 

Then, they dive into why Latino voters, who swung toward Trump in 2024 and back again this week, are shedding partisan loyalty altogether and why that might be closer to what the founders intended. 

Next, they unpack what fueled the wave, as corruption fused with economic pain for a generation that feels its future was stolen. 

Finally, ask whether MAGA outlives the Republican Party’s collapse and why politics may be shifting from coalitions to transactions. 

In Politicology+, they discuss the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, why the Electoral College’s anti-majoritarian design matters more in an era of dealignment, and a fractured fight heading toward the 2028 Presidential Election. 

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In this episode, Ron talks to Isaac Stone Fish (founder and CEO of Strategy Risks) about four new reports examining American university relationships with Chinese institutions and the risks they may raise. 

They explore the party’s United Front Work Department and a curated 2024 trip that two Yale scholars took to Xinjiang, where the U.S. government has determined the CCP committed genocide. 

Then, they turn to Wisconsin-Madison’s agreement with Southeast University, a Chinese school tied to the People’s Liberation Army, and the connected-vehicle technology that grew out of China’s national standards. 

Later, they examine Michigan State’s joint degree with a Chinese university that calls itself a stronghold of party propaganda. They close on why universities should be debating these partnerships in public, and why China may be the next crisis for American higher education. 

They discuss:

00:00) Why university ties to China deserve scrutiny

(04:23) How the United Front recruits influence

(07:08) The Yale scholars’ curated Xinjiang visit

(09:14) Xinjiang repression and the purpose of staged tours

(15:58) What the Xinjiang paramilitary corps does

(17:40) Why Chinese universities answer to the CCP

(21:42) Wisconsin’s connected-vehicle research partnership

(27:41) Tencent, warning lists, and rising compliance costs

(30:01) Xinjiang telescope research and dual-use concerns

(34:51) Washington’s cryopreservation research and Origin Cell

(39:53) Talent programs, disclosure, and technology-transfer concerns

(43:37) Michigan State’s ties to a propaganda-focused university

(50:48) Public-opinion monitoring and party orthodoxy

(57:24) The broader case for public debate

(1:01:18) Universities face a possible China crisis

Check out the reports: https://strategyrisks.com/press/

Follow Ron on Twitter:https://twitter.com/RonSteslow

Follow Isaac on Twitter: https://x.com/isaacstonefish

Email your questions to [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at ‪(202) 455-4558‬ 

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Molly McKew (writer and lecturer on Russian influence and information warfare) joins Host Ron Steslow to examine twelve consequential days in U.S.-Russia relations and whether Washington is switching sides in Russia’s war on Ukraine. 

They begin with the diesel deal, separating the real driver of soaring fuel prices from the Trump-Putin arrangement.

Next, they examine the pressure campaign on Kyiv, from a refinery truce that costs Moscow almost nothing to disrupt intelligence sharing and reported throttling of Starshield service.

Then they unpack Steve Witkoff’s visit to St. Petersburg, his effusive praise for Putin, the Lukoil asset sale, and the Graham Act waiver that dwarfs the diesel story. 

Finally, they debate whether the language of "competition" obscures a fundamentally adversarial relationship, and how the way Americans talk about China became a partisan question.

In Politicology+, unpack the death of a young scientist at a Siberian anti-plague institute and the Kremilin’s suspicious response.

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Hagar Chemali (Former spokesperson for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations) joins Host Ron Steslow to unpack Xi Jinping's state visit to Washington—and why the two powers keep meeting more often while agreeing on less.

They begin with the administration's turn from tariffs to hospitality, and why a quickening calendar of summits signals not warming ties but a conflict neither side can resolve—with Beijing playing the longer game.

Next, they examine the fragile trade truce beneath the pageantry—why rare earths and chip controls are ultimately questions of military advantage, and what it means that a crisis-communications pact remains unsigned.

Then they compare the two governments' diverging readouts on Iran, Taiwan, and trade, and Xi's offer to host 100,000 young Americans—a soft-power play that could complicate the pipeline of future U.S. China experts.

Finally, they debate whether the language of "competition" obscures a fundamentally adversarial relationship, and how the way Americans talk about China became a partisan question.

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Ron Steslow and Mike Madrid unpack the suspicious four-day push by some of the biggest AI companies begging to be regulated and why it’s less a safety awakening and more a bid to build a moat around who gets to control this technology. 

Then, they turn to an essay by Franciscan sister Ilia Delio’s essay on why our fear of AI is really a fear of confronting what it means to be human.

Read Ilia Delio: “We Will Not Be Killed By Machines. We Will Overthink Ourselves To Death.”

https://iliadelio.substack.com/p/we-will-not-be-killed-by-machines?r=izyvx&utm_medium=ios 

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Mike Madrid (author of The Latino Century) joins host Ron Steslow trace how eroding trust, the kind that backs the electoral map and the dollar, is reshaping American politics and everyday affordability. 

They start with the redistricting wars and how they eroded trust in institutions and how both parties traded credibility by using zero-sum tactics.

Next, they turn to dealignment, the generation of Americans untethering from both parties, and how younger voters’ belief that the American dream was stolen shows their lack of trust in the stewards, not the republic. 

Then they examine affordability through the bond market, where rising yields price mortgages and loans, and why the crisis can’t be understood without it. 

Finally, they weigh the dollars fading neutrality, gold leaving U.S. vaults, reserves diversifying, and a world reorganizing around an America it trusts less. 

In Politicology+, they discuss why some of the biggest AI companies are begging to be regulated and an essay by a Franciscan sister about why our fear of AI is really a fear of confronting what it means to be human. 

POLITICOLOGY+

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Hagar Chemali (former spokesperson for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations) and Nick Anthony (Policy Analyst at the Cato Institute and a Fellow at the Human Rights Foundation) join host Ron Steslow to trace how the financial surveillance regime born after 9/11 is being rebuilt for programmable money.

They begin with the machinery of financial surveillance: reporting, identification, blocking, seizing, and exclusion powers banks and payment companies wield on the government’s behalf, without warrants or recourse. 

Next, they examine how private institutions became the system’s front line with millions of suspicious-activity reports a year, billions in compliance costs, and a public that wrongly assumes Fourth Amendment protection.  

Then they turn to the shift underway, as stablecoins move those controls off intermediaries and onto individual digital dollars that can be frozen, seized, or burned coin by coin. 

Finally, they weigh whether Americans still hold a right to transact privately, and what permissioned money would mean. 

In Politicology+, they discuss an unspoken contradiction in the human rights movement: it backs sanctions that rely on centralized financial choke points while also championing Bitcoin, a currency built to erase that system. 

POLITICOLOGY+

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Zack Czajkowski (co-founder of Civly) joins host Ron Steslow to map the first election of the chatbot era and to ask why the party that once led on campaign technology is now the one recoiling from it. 

They begin with voters already asking chatbots how to vote, perhaps millions directly and tens of millions more nudged by AI summaries without even realizing it. 

Next, they turn to how campaigns are adapting, the next era of search-engine optimization, a fight over how a candidate appears across major AI models, and why Republican operatives have leaned in faster. 

Then they discuss the cultural resistance on the left, from a reflexive disdain for AI-assisted work to the class fault lines beneath the “slop” discourse in prestige media. 

In Politicology+, they break down the abrupt resignation of Army Secretary Dan Driscoll and the bipartisan praise trailing him out the door.

POLITICOLOGY+

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Read Pax Machina: https://paxmachina.ai/welcome-to-pax-machina 

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Katherine Mangu-Ward (Editor in Chief of Reason) joins host Ron Steslow to examine the growing revolt against automated license-plate surveillance company Flock and what it reveals about privacy in the age of AI. 

They begin with the backlash against flock: cameras cut down across dozens of states, communities canceling contracts, and an unlikely coalition uniting against the technology.  They dive into what the anger is really about and whether it channels a broader anxiety about losing control. 

From there, they turn to what these systems can now do, as leaked code points to tools that track people—not just license plates—and invites comparisons to China’s surveillance state. 

Then, they weigh the deeper tension of a company whose only customer is the state, the problem of overcriminalization, and the specter of automated law enforcement. 

Finally, they consider the Supreme Court’s geofence ruling, the data-broker loophole it leaves wide open, and what privacy is ultimately for. 

In Politicology+, they look at a single case that tests how far privacy itself can be treated as a crime: an American Citizen charged with a felony for deleting his phone’s data. 

POLITICOLOGY+

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Related Reading: 

Wired - Flock Has a Powerful New AI Tool for Police. We Got Its Code | WIRED

Reason - Flock Safety’s new privacy rules do little to ease concerns over ALPR surveillance

Reason - America is building a surveillance state like China's

Pirate wires - Flock's Case for the Panopticon

Wired - Flock Has a Powerful New AI Tool for Police. We Got Its Code | WIRED

ACLU - Surveillance Company Flock Now Using AI to Report Us to Police if it Thinks Our Movement Patterns Are “Suspicious”

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