The Close Read Podcast

Enemies abroad and unrest at home: Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan discuss the wide range of spring’s new CRB, including Mark Helprin’s in-depth analysis of the war in Ukraine, Nathan Pinkoski’s careful examination of how Spain’s republic self-destructed, and Dr. Kesler’s own comments on the precarity of Court-made rights. Plus: an excerpt from Klavan, Sr.’s new book.

Nathan Pinkoski, research fellow and director of academic programs at the Zephyr Institute, joins Spencer to discuss the Spanish Civil War and its implications for modern America. Contrary to the simple morality tale most people learn in school, the history of Spain’s Civil war was a complex demonstration of how a republic can die from self-inflicted wounds. Americans would do well to take note.

Chris Flannery, Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute, contributing editor of the Claremont Review of Books, and author of The American Story podcast, joins Spencer to discuss the enduring wisdom and meticulous composition of Abraham Lincoln’s speeches. These are words that were intended for posterity, so it pays to turn to them in our perilous moment as we fight for America’s future.

In his latest editor’s note, Dr. Kesler identifies an emerging conflict between the anti-American Left, and the “post-American” Right. Spencer and Dr. Kesler discuss the conservative movement’s past and future as illustrated in essays from the issue. Plus: the CRB takes on the delicate subject of race in America.

Is there a God? Can we believe? Or has science disproven all that? A prevailing assumption in the academy is that your life means no more than that of a jellyfish. Dr. Leonard Sax joins Spencer to explain how that mindset is crippling young adults, and to discuss a new book by Dr. Stephen C. Meyer on the Return of the God Hypothesis.

Mark Helprin, novelist and senior fellow of the Claremont Institute, joins Spencer to discuss America’s—and the West’s—apparent death wish. By making us as vulnerable as possible abroad, while simultaneously mimicking the authoritarianism of our supposed enemies at home, our leaders are flirting with disaster. What will come next—and is there any hope for the future?

Dr. William Voegeli, senior editor of the Claremont Review of Books, joins Spencer to analyze the Left’s increasingly dangerous relationship with crime. Urban Democrats have embraced a counterintuitive policy preference, enabling astonishingly high crime rates rather than working to reduce them. At the heart of it all is an urgent need to explain away violent crime as a cry for help from the perpetrators, rather than an offense against justice in need of redress.

Jeffrey Anderson, former Trump appointee to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, joins Spencer to analyze the dubious science of mask mandates. Anderson’s essay, which was featured on Tucker Carlson Tonight, identifies how masks have been used to make Americans more submissive and erode our form of government.

Glenn Ellmers, Claremont Institute senior fellow and author of the new book The Soul of Politics, joins Spencer to discuss the enduring relevance of Harry V. Jaffa’s life and scholarship for our challenging political times. Plus: is the modern academy unmaking our best and brightest?

The CRB’s Summer edition is wide-ranging, covering topics including masking, crime, and a prescient editor’s note about the fiasco that is Afghanistan’s fall. Join Dr. Kesler and Spencer as they discuss the significance of the collapse of Kabul, a brief history of how we got there, and what lessons can be gleaned from it all. Plus: an overview of the whole edition.