For good or ill, the post World War II era built by the Baby Boomers seems to be rapidly coming to an end. But what will replace it? What might be done to prevent global conflicts and bloodshed as the old order begins to break down? And what should younger conservatives seek to conserve in this era of chaotic change? Joining Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis is Director of Research at the Danube Institute, Calum Nicholson to share how the Anglosphere often misunderstands the way the rest of the world thinks and how that might help us better prepare for what's ahead.

About Calum Nicholson

From the University of Cambridge bio

With a background in social anthropology and human geography, Dr Calum T. M. Nicholson has conducted original research that reconsiders how we understand the societal implications of climate change, notably in the context of its relationship to human migration and international development.

A former development consultant and Parliamentary researcher, at PACE Dr Nicholson teaches courses on international development, international migration, and the politics of climate change. Dr Nicholson also teaches a well-received course on the political, cultural, and historical significance of social media. He is currently Director of Research at the Danube Institute, and was formerly Director of the Climate Policy Institute.

His new book is entitled Climate Migration: critical perspectives for law, policy, and research.

Introducing Conservative Cagematches

Ever since Leo Strauss published his magnum opus Natural Right and History, which ends by heavily implying Edmund Burke opened the door for the evils of historicism in the modern world, a great fissure in conservative nerddom erupted between those who align with either titan.

Were Strauss' criticism of Burke warranted? Did Burke disavow natural rights and pave the way for the evils of authoritarianism, fascism, Marxism, and progressivism to come? Does a careful, esoteric reading of Natural Right and History reveal the Strauss secret family chili recipe?

On Wednesday, March 4 at 6PM EST / 5PM CST, Saving Elephants will assemble an all-star panel to answer these questions and more.

Representing Edmund Burke:

Greg Collins of Yale University and Lauren Hall of the Rochester Institute of Technology

Representing Leo Strauss:

Steve Hayward of Pepperdine and the international woman of mystery, Lucretia of the University of Arizona

You can watch the livestream on YouTube or Facebook

In a world of exhaustive binary thinking sometimes complexity offers relief. Lauren Hall joins the show to offer her alternative living in 4D she calls "radical moderation". In the latter half of the conversation Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis happily takes Lauren up on her offer to geek out on Edmund Burke.

About Lauren Hall

Excerpts from laurenkhall.com

Lauren Hall is an author and professor helping people combat overwhelm in an age of extremes. Her writing rejects binary and black-and-white thinking to help people lead more balanced lives, build stronger relationships, and restore individual and civic well-being.

Hall is a 2024 Pluralism Fellow with the Mercatus Center's Program on Pluralism and Civil Exchange and serves on the Board of Advisors for the Prohuman Foundation. Her Substack and speaking spread the message of radical moderation to new audiences via public writing, speaking, and podcast interviews.

Hall has presented her work on radical moderation at conferences including the Heterodox Academy Conference, the State Policy Network Conference, the Mercatus Center's Pluralism Summit, and various political science and related conferences and has a range of talks and podcast interviews available on radical moderation and other topics.

In her "real" job, she is a Professor of Political Science and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) and author of the books Family and the Politics of Moderation (Baylor U. Press, 2014) and The Medicalization of Birth and Death (Johns Hopkins U. Press, 2019).

Hall has a PhD in Political Science from Northern Illinois University (2007) and a BA in Philosophy from Binghamton University (2002).

Introducing Conservative Cagematches

One of the most invigorating and interesting aspects of conservative history is how often luminaries on the Right disagreed and fought one another. From Strauss' take down on Burke to Frank Meyer defending his fusionist views from the likes of Brent Bozell and Murray Rothbard to Harry Jaffa fighting just about everyone, the Right has gained vitality and endurance through the process of disagreeing well (and sometimes not so well).

In that same spirit, Saving Elephants will soon launch a new venture: Conservative Cagematches. These livestream events will feature experts and acolytes from differing schools of thought on the Right to engage in their differences. We're working now to put together the first panel for an Edmund Burke vs. Leo Strauss debate and can't wait to share the august line-up we have so far. More to come soon!

Dr. Daniel Pitt and his imposing mustache joins Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis to explore the similarities and differences between American and British conservatism, proto-Burkean "conservative" thinkers, Pitt's personal relationship with Sir Roger Scruton, and the importance of unchosen obligations in a free society, all offered up in a wonderfully meandering conversation that nonetheless stays within the broader parameters of some conceivable structure analogous to the conservative vision of ordered liberty. Undoubtedly, Michael Oakeshott would have been proud.

About Daniel Pitt

Dr. Daniel Pitt is an honorary research fellow at the University of Buckingham and is also a member of the Centre for British Politics at the University of Hull. He was a former graduate student of Sir Roger Scruton and the co-editor of Intellectual Conservatism: From Burke to Scruton. You can follow Daniel on Twitter @DanJTPitt

While Saving Elephants defends the classical conservative position, the loudest voices on the Right today coalesce around different policies, priorities, and goals. Those that form the dissident Right are comprised of multiple sub-groups with overlapping and, at times, incompatible views. So who is this disparate group of dissidents? What holds them together, and how do they differ from conservatives? Joining Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis is Stephanie Slade to explore the contours of the dissident Right.

About Stephanie Slade

From reason.com

Stephanie Slade is a senior editor at Reason, the magazine of "free minds and free markets," and a fellow in liberal studies at the Acton Institute. Her writing has appeared in America magazine, The New York Times, U.S. News and World Report, the Online Library of Liberty, and elsewhere. She covers the intersection of religion and politics.

Slade is best known for her piece "Why I Am a Pro-Life Libertarian," her magazine feature on booze-producing monks, and her defenses of "fusionism" (which probably isn't what you think!). Don't miss her discussing the differences between comprehensive and political libertarianism on The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie.

In 2013, Slade was named a finalist for the Bastiat Prize for Journalism. In 2016, she was selected as a Robert Novak Journalism Fellow. She serves as a member of the board of advisors for Young Voices and has been a guest on a variety of podcasts, including Jonah Goldberg's The Remnant, Charlie Sykes' The Bulwark Podcast, and The New York Times' Ezra Klein Show.

Prior to joining Reason, Slade worked as a speechwriter and pollster. She's a proud graduate of the University of Florida, where she studied economics and political science. Follow her on X: @sladesr.

Does the fractious stupidity of our politics, the rapid advancement of AI, and the release of the final season of Stranger Things portend making America great again or the coming apocalypse? Join our panelists for a (definitive, obviously) glimpse into what's in store for us all in 2026.

Panelists include:

Jonah Goldberg makes his triumphal return to Saving Elephants where host Josh Lewis peppers him with unyielding questions on what his fourth and forthcoming book will be about, the practicality of setting lottery winnings as a life-goal, what a post-Trump GOP might look like, whether it makes sense to even "save" the elephants, and whether we should welcome human enslavement to our future AI overlords.

Remnant fans, have your bingo cards at the ready!

About Jonah Goldberg

From The Dispatch

Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief and co-founder of The Dispatch, based in Washington, D.C. Prior to that, enormous lizards roamed the Earth. More immediately prior to that, Jonah spent two decades at National Review, where he was a senior editor, among other things. He is also a bestselling author, longtime columnist for the Los Angeles Times, commentator for CNN, and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. When he is not writing the G-File or hosting The Remnant podcast, he finds real joy in family time, attending to his dogs and cat, and blaming Steve Hayes for various things.

In 2019 Caylan Ford resigned her political candidacy in Canada after controversy over allegations of her echoing white nationalist rhetoric. In spite of her resignation—and continual insistence she held no such views—the mobs of cancel culture demanded "justice". She was blacklisted from employers, unable to continue work with organizations that seek to liberate people living under the yoke of totalitarianism, ostracized by friends and colleagues, attacked and trolled online, and shunned by her community.

Caylan joins Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis to share her firsthand experience with cancel culture, including her insights on how to keep one's soul intact even as you are grievously wronged and competing notions of "justice". Be forewarned, this conversation gets DEEP!

About Caylan Ford

From caylanford.com

I am a documentary filmmaker, writer, researcher, charter school founder, and a former political candidate. I'm interested in the problem of political and philosophical evil, and most of my work is animated by a desire to help people recover their roots in reality and their orientation toward the divine.

I was born in Calgary, Canada, and earned a Bachelor's degree (Hons.) in Chinese history at the University of Calgary. From there I obtained a Master's degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and worked on and off as a senior policy advisor for Canada's foreign ministry for about ten years. Between the birth of my two children I earned another Master's in International Human Rights Law at the University of Oxford. If ever I can afford a life of leisure, I hope to return and do a real degree studying comparative eschatology.

A very large part of my life has been spent working, volunteering and consulting in the international human rights field, including by increasing access to anti-surveillance and censorship tools in Iran, China, Myanmar, and elsewhere; working with civil rights lawyers representing political dissidents; supporting refugee and asylum claimants; and conducting and publishing original research on the repression of religious minorities in China (I've also published on this topic for more popular audiences). It's a country that I love, but only in the abstract; I was blacklisted at 16 and cannot obtain a visa. I've also written and co-produced two feature documentary films on the themes of religious and political persecution, censorship, forced labour, scapegoating, and mass persuasion under totalitarian regimes.

A few of these topics recur in my most recent documentary, which focuses on my experience of 'cancel culture' following a catastrophic bid for political office in 2019 (read my contemporaneous account of events here). Relatedly, I'm the plaintiff in an ongoing $7 million defamation claim against several Canadian media and political institutions, and my case has so far resulted in the recognition of a new tort of civil harassment in Alberta. You can read about or support my litigation efforts by clicking here.

In 2022 I founded Canada's first tuition-free classical charter school network, Alberta Classical Academy. Having drawn more capable people to the project than myself, we now have three campuses, including one in Edmonton. This is a short video introduction to our work and how we aim to promote knowledge of things that are true, good, and enduring.

Sometimes I also write and speak about arts and culture, biopolitics, education, family and childcare policy, post-liberalism, and whatever else seems interesting. But mostly I prefer to spend time reading or meditating in silent contemplation of the Dao.

William F Buckley was one of the most important figures in the conservative movement over the past century. His posthumous 100th birthday is Monday, November 24. Come celebrate the life and legacy of Buckley as our Saving Elephant panelists pay tribute to a conservative life well lived.

Panelists include:

Returning to the Founders' blueprint for dividing power across federal, state, and local governments may be the greatest weapon we have to reverse the appalling state of our politic divisiveness. What is federalism? And what would a recommitment to federalism look like? Saving Elephants welcomes panelists from the State Policy Network and the Acton Institute to discuss what it means to take federalism seriously again. The panelists include:

Brooke Medina - VP of Comms with the State Policy Network

Jenn Butler - Sr Policy Advisor with the State Policy Network

Dan Hugger - Librarian and Research Associate with the Acton Institute

There are four faces on the Saving Elephants' Mount Rushmore of great conservatives: Edmund Burke, Russell Kirk, Thomas Sowell, and William F. Buckley. While the first three have each had fully episodes dedicated to their life and works, William F. Buckley has yet to be explored at length. And with Buckley's posthumous 100th birthday happening later this month, now is the perfect time to reflect on his long and remarkable life.

Sam Tanehaus' decades-in-the-making biography of Buckley was published earlier this year and he joins Saving Elephants host Josh Lewis to cover a multitude of ground in sketching out a life well lived. Sam discusses who Buckley was as a personal friend, his impact on the conservative movement, his flirtation with radicalism and maturing into his role as conservative gatekeeper, and many of the colorful characters Buckley interacted with throughout his life. Sam also addresses some of the criticisms of his book, Buckley: The Life and the Revolution That Changed America.

About Sam Tanehaus

Sam Tanenhaus, the former editor of The New York Times Book Review, is the author of the national bestsellers Whittaker Chambers: A Biography (winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and a finalist for both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize) and The Death of Conservatism. His feature articles and essays have appeared in The Atlantic, The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, and Vanity Fair.

Buckley Turns 100

Come join the Saving Elephants livestream on November 23 at 8PM EST as we celebrate the life and legacy of William F. Buckley on the eve of his posthumous 100th birthday. Your questions and comments welcome during this live event.