Robert Wright's Nonzero

Hey hey, my my, Neil Young left Spotify ... Carrots and sticks in the Russia-Ukraine crisis ... What are Russia’s actual objectives in Ukraine? ... Bob: “I haven’t heard a single good argument for expanding NATO” ... Why nominating Kamala to the Supreme Court might actually be a good idea ... Are pundits overthinking Biden’s low approval rating? ... Is universal pre-K on the chopping block? ... Mickey adopts an unsettling new persona ... Parrot Room preview: A Doug Emhoff scandal?, the war in the Pacific, guess the Lou Reed verdict, let’s talk about headlines that start with “Let’s talk about,” Raymond Carver and Gordon Lish, affirmative action goes before the Supreme Court, William F. Buckley, Ilya Shapiro gets canceled, the metaverse and the Matrix, bizarre Black Lives Matter news, money liberalism, and why does Apple delay releasing this podcast? ...

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Does the Russia-Ukraine crisis justify the current sense of alarm? ... How concern for ethnic Russians in Ukraine shapes Moscow’s policy ... What the US and NATO can do to resolve the crisis diplomatically ... Can Europe help Biden by staging a diplomatic intervention? ... Russia’s next military steps if diplomacy fails ... Anatol estimates the odds of a Russian invasion of Ukraine ...

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Looking for signs of decline in Biden’s press conference ... Is the child tax credit what swing voters want? ... Two possible inflation fixes ... What’s on the table in U.S.-Russia negotiations over Ukraine? ... How well is Biden handling the Ukraine situation? ... Mickey: There’s a chance we'll avoid a Trump 2024 run ... Bob’s plan to convince Biden not to run ... Meat Loaf would do anything for love (but would he get vaxxed?) ... Bob: I get why white males are under fire ... Parrot Room preview: The secret to Matt Yglesias’s success, the FBI searches Henry Cuellar’s home, Mickey’s beef with the Salvation Army, how the Parrot Room is like the TV show Yellowstone, Bob’s panel appearance with Jerry Brown, Robert Malone, active shooter drills, war in the Pacific, the Los Gatos Party Mom, exploring Bob and Mickey’s positions on China, Bob issues some corrections, Mickey critiques the Atlantic and David Remnick, and the time Katie Couric interviewed Bob ...

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Richard discusses his new book, Public Choice Theory and the Illusion of Grand Strategy ... Richard’s critique of the field of International Relations ... Why "concentrated interests" capture US foreign policy ... The arms industry executive who has "single handedly ruined the world" ... How the US helped create the Russia-Ukraine conflict ... The pro-militarism bias in the news media and foreign policy think tanks ... Why does the US misperceive Iran as being a threat to US interests? ... Richard: The US should learn to live with a superpower China ... The failures of the human rights lobby and the brutality of sanctions on Afghanistan ... Do autocracies have more coherent foreign policies than democracies? ...

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Mickey’s plan to install Nancy Pelosi in the Oval Office ... Who can convince Biden not to run for reelection? ... Mickey’s comeback strategy for Biden ... Bob takes the Parrot Room into untested waters ... Is Boris Johnson in trouble over Covid protocols or policy failures? ... Are seditious conspiracy charges warranted for the Oath Keepers? What about Trump? ... Mickey: The Supreme Court got the vaccine mandate ruling wrong ... Bob: It will be bad if Russia invades Ukraine, but it won’t threaten U.S. interests ... Bob: China doesn’t have a monopoly on repressive software exports ... Parrot Room preview: Bob takes a Covid test, Mickey catches Bob in an almost-devastating contradiction, Bob tries to catch Robert Malone in a contradiction, Sidney Poitier, Bob Saget, Terry Teachout, Bob v. Andrew Sullivan, Don’t Look Up, Ruth Barrett sues the Atlantic, Bari Weiss on Hollywood, David Remnick claims we’re suspended between democracy and authoritarianism, Mickey has second thoughts about donating to the Salvation Army, Matt Ridley on the origin of Covid, a Jeffrey Epstein update, Maya Angelou gets a quarter, and what’s up with Leon Wieseltier’s journal? ...

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Bob’s early encounters with LGBTQ visibility and invisibility ... How the pros talk about gender ... The uses of “queer” ... A writerly defense of the singular “they” ... Agustín: We need a national conversation about the trans bathroom issue ... What was the intent behind J.K. Rowling’s controversial tweets? ... What counts as an “advantage” when trans women play women’s sports? ...

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Mickey: Biden is too scared of his base ... Bob: Biden privileged loyalty over competence in his staffing ... Are January 6 rioters getting off too easy? ... How can an election get overturned? Bob and Mickey count the ways ... Bob’s January 6 epiphany ... Where’s the love for Sherrod Brown and Cory Booker? ... Can Omicron save us from Delta? ... Is it time to “pivot to normalcy” yet? ... Parrot Room preview: Robert Malone on Joe Rogan, the Ghislaine Maxwell verdict in jeopardy, does everyone want to date AOC, Ben Smith’s new publication, Leonard Bernstein on the Beatles, Nick Kristof may not even reach the Kaus threshold in Oregon, Beverly Hills criminals, what’s wrong with “gaslighting,” Betty White, Peter Bogdanovich, Novak Djokovic runs afoul of Aussie vaccination policy, Greg Gutfeld gets reprimanded, and is the great David Remnick takedown upon us? ...

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Has sociobiology been vindicated? ... Why the term ‘evolutionary psychology’ survived ... Is there room for free will in a modern scientific world view? ... Science, religion, and “provisional deism” ... Is the “theory of intelligent design” even a theory? ... How religion informed Ed's approach to science ... Facing death without hope of an afterlife ... How Ed reconciled work and family ...

Could a bad actor engineer a Delta-Omicron hybrid? ... Bob: Mainstream coverage of Omicron’s dangers has been misleading ... Bob’s three 2022 Covid predictions ... How do decisions get made inside Biden’s White House? ... Bob and Mickey’s Heroes of the Year ... Bob and Mickey’s Villain of the Year ... The Best and Worst Ideas of the Year ... The Year’s Biggest Surprise ... Ditching the metaverse, Pelosi persisting, and other 2022 predictions ... Parrot Room preview: words and concepts that need to go in 2022, Bob and Mickey reveal what “undernews” is, Biden’s cognitive status, 2021’s least deserving media attention-getter, the shortage of good hit pieces, who’s cruising for a bruising in 2022, Bob and Mickey’s worst opinions of 2021, Ghislaine Maxwell convicted, remembering E.O. Wilson, The Expanse, Bob defends his hair, Mickey defends his LSD abstinence, Pacific Crucible, the documentary Ascension, and more reasons why Ron Brownstein’s “coalition of the ascendent” is the worst idea of the decade ...

Why Bob loves Daniel’s Substack Eunomia and Kelley’s work at Responsible Statecraft ... Daniel and Kelley on how their conservative roots led them to anti-Blobism ... Daniel makes a conservative case for supporting international law ... Trump 2.0? Daniel and Kelley discuss Biden’s foreign policy failures ... Bob wonders why Biden didn’t try harder to revive the Iran nuclear deal ... The US is starving Afghans in the name of humanity ... Credit where due: Biden got us out of Afghanistan ... How the military-industrial complex helped create the Russia-Ukraine crisis ... Assessing China’s internal abuses and external ambitions – and how to respond ...