The Glenn Show

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In this episode, in conversation with Robert Patton-Spruill, Nikita Petrov, and Mark Sussman, I pay tribute to Tom Schelling’s major contributions and the personal affect he had on me, as a colleague, friend, and, at times, surrogate father figure. We talk about Schelling’s understanding of battlefield commitment strategy, signaling, interstate conflict, and the nuclear weapons “taboo.” We watch a clip of Tom talking about helping Stanley Kubrick to conceptualize his film Dr. Strangelove by gaming out how a doomsday machine capable of launching ICBMs would affect the decisions made by the US and the USSR. I often find myself asking, “What would Tom think?” about one question or another, and here I try to answer that question as it pertains to the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza. And finally, Tom died before AI developed to its present state. He would have had a field day thinking through its implications, and we try to do him justice.

The Glenn Show is almost entirely viewer supported, so to those of us who are already full subscribers, let me extend a heartfelt thank you. And if you’re not yet a full subscriber, please consider becoming one. The Glenn Show can only do what it does through the generosity of viewers and listeners. For a mere $6/month or $50/year, you’ll get weekly episodes of The Glenn Show earlier than their public release, monthly Q&A episodes with John McWhorter, access to the full Substack archives, and other exclusive bonus content.

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This is a free segment from a two-hour livestream of The Glenn Show. To watch the whole thing, become a full subscriber. You’ll get access to all TGS content, including video of livestreams, audience Q&As with me and John McWhorter, and lots of other great content. The Glenn Show is almost entirely audience supported. Thank you for all you do.

In this TGS Live segment, Glenn Loury and TGS contributor Robert Patton-Spruill discuss Larry Summers's withdrawal from teaching at Harvard and expulsion from the American Economics Association. Glenn and Rob talk about how Glenn's own experience with public disgrace shapes his thinking about Summers's case.

Watch the video here.

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On this recording of last week's livestream, we discuss my conversation with a Nigerian development economist, Trump's moves against Venezuela, Pete Hegseth's boat strikes, flooding and winter weather in Gaza, and Bernie Sanders's call for government regulation of AI.

Last week, Larry Summers stepped back from teaching at Harvard and was banned for life from the American Economics Association after it was revealed that he maintained a friendship with Jeffrey Epstein even after Epstein pleaded guilty to solicitation of prostitution with a minor in 2008. I talk about my own experience with public disgrace, and explain why I think the AEA has acted too hastily in this instance.

This recording of the stream is available to full subscribers. We’ll make a long-ish clip available for free subscribers on Friday. But if you want the whole thing, consider becoming a full subscriber. The Glenn Show is almost entirely viewer supported, so to those of us who are already full subscribers, let me extend a heartfelt thank you. And if you’re not yet a full subscriber, please consider becoming one. The Glenn Show can only do what it does through the generosity of viewers and listeners. For a mere $6/month or $50/year, you’ll get weekly episodes of The Glenn Show earlier than their public release, monthly Q&A episodes with John McWhorter, access to the full Substack archives, and other exclusive bonus content.

The Glenn Show is almost entirely audience-supported. Become a subscriber and join the conversation at https://glennloury.substack.com

Video Links

0:00 Paul: The past shows us there’s a basis for hope for this country3:40 The origins of Paul’s new book, American Contradiction: Revolution and Revenge from the 1950s to Now11:07 Is the push-pull between liberation struggles and institutional resistance a uniquely American phenomenon?13:31 Ground News ad15:39 The black freedom struggle as a template for change21:37 From civil rights to progressive overreach24:31 Can the Democrats take back lost ground? 30:58 Paul: Trump’s immigration crack-downs are acts of political revenge 35:53 The social triumph and political tragedy of immigration45:54 How modern media fragmented American society52:59 Paul: We need to restrain executive power57:39 The importance of remembering our past without being shackled by it

Recorded November 20, 2025

Links and Readings

Paul’s new book, American Contradiction: Revolution and Revenge from the 1950s to Now

Anne Case and Angus Deaton’s book, Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism

Pauli Murray and Mary Eastwood’s article, “Jane Crow and the Law: Sex Discrimination and Title VII”

Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s book, Abundance: How We Build a Better Future

Paul’s American Prospect article, “The Social Triumph and Political Tragedy of Immigration”

Paul’s book, The Creation of the Media: Political Origins of Modern Communication

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Since we’ve got the Thanksgiving holiday at the end of the week, I’m releasing the first half of the conversation to everyone today instead of this Friday. For access to the entire conversation, including the Q&A, become a full subscriber.

This episode's central topic: the vulgarity of our present discourse. Though “vulgarity” doesn’t quite capture what we’re talking about on this show. It’s not news to say that the tenor of public speech has coarsened over the decades—words and phrases that would have been utterly taboo in the media of the 1960s hardly give us pause today. But what does seem new is the sometimes shockingly racist, sexist, and homophobic sentiments that have become a part of “ordinary” political debate.

The Overton window is shifting, and it’s not doing it on its own. One force moving it is surely the wide availability of online platforms. Everyone has a camera and a microphone, and as more and more people avail themselves of the communication tools available to them, views that were once filtered out by mainstream and legacy outlets are finding their way to the center of the conversation. But another force moving the window is what’s going on in the world. While I may roll my eyes when, for example, Nick Fuentes touts the virtues of Jim Crow, he’s responding to items in the news, like violent crime committed by black youth, that do need to be taken seriously.

Then it’s on to our subscriber-only Q&A session, where John and I took questions about God and morality, the Democrats’ electoral prospects, Black English vernacular, China’s outpacing of American economic growth, AI and education, Looney Tunes, and socialism vs. social democracy, plus questions from the YouTube chat.

The Glenn Show is almost entirely viewer supported, so to those of us who are already full subscribers, let me extend a heartfelt thank you. And if you’re not yet a full subscriber, please consider becoming one. The Glenn Show can only do what it does through the generosity of viewers and listeners. For a mere $6/month or $50/year, you’ll get weekly episodes of The Glenn Show earlier than their public release, monthly Q&A episodes with John McWhorter, access to the full Substack archives, and other exclusive bonus content.

The Glenn Show is almost entirely audience-supported. To become a full subscriber and receive even more great TGS content, sign up here.

Video Links

0:00 Howard’s new book, The Projects: A New History of Public Housing

5:58 The failed utopianism of American public housing

12:04 The dispossession of urban African American communities

14:54 Ground News ad

16:40 Did reformers have a reason for demolishing the slums?

22:01 Changing the culture of public housing

30:13 What’s working in public housing

33:35 Trump’s plan for a two-year limit on public housing

35:25 Howard’s criticism of Zohran Mamdani’s proposed rent freeze in NYC

41:13 The causes of homelessness

44:21 The “Move to Opportunity” experiments

48:11 What does it take to ensure that poor neighborhoods are also good neighborhoods

Recorded November 19, 2025

Links and Readings

Howard’s new book, The Projects: A New History of Public Housing

Scott Davis’s book, The World of Patience Gromes: Making and Unmaking a Black Community

Le Corbusier’s book, The Radiant City: Elements of a Doctrine of Urbanism to be Used as the Basis of Our Machine-Age Civilization

Catherine Bauer’s book, Modern Housing

Herbert Gans’s book, Urban Villagers: Group and Class in the Life of Italian-Americans

HUD’s Rental Assistance Demonstration program

Zohran Mamdani’s “freeze the rent” ad

Matthew Desmond’s book, Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City

UCSF’s homelessness study

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In my latest livestream, TGS contributor Robert Patton-Spruill and I talk about rising tensions with Venezuela, New York City Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani and his proposed policies, Jeffrey Epstein wreaking havoc from beyond the grave, Nick Fuentes’s appearance on Tucker Carlson’s show and ideological rifts on the right, my conception of Black Patriotism, and the uses and pleasures of AI.

This recording of the stream is available to full subscribers. We’ll make a long-ish clip available for free subscribers on Friday. But if you want the whole thing, consider becoming a full subscriber. The Glenn Show is almost entirely viewer supported, so to those of us who are already full subscribers, let me extend a heartfelt thank you. And if you’re not yet a full subscriber, please consider becoming one. The Glenn Show can only do what it does through the generosity of viewers and listeners. For a mere $6/month or $50/year, you’ll get weekly episodes of The Glenn Show earlier than their public release, monthly Q&A episodes with John McWhorter, access to the full Substack archives, and other exclusive bonus content.

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Video Links

0:00 Charles’s new book, Taking Religious Seriously

8:31 Why Charles finds the idea of divine creation plausible

13:54 Charles’s “road to Damascus” moment

19:25 The appeal of Christianity

24:51 The evidence for life after death

31:38 Charles: “The relative positions of science and religion have flipped”

36:42 The trouble with scientism

40:17 Glenn’s steps toward and away from religion

51:04 Was The Bell Curve putting making a deterministic argument?

Recorded November 4, 2025

Links and Readings

Charles’s new book, Taking Religious Seriously

Charles’s book, Losing Ground: American Social Policy, 1950-1980

Richard Herrnstein and Charles’s book, The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life

Charles’s book, Human Diversity: The Biology of Gender, Race, and Class

Charles’s book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010

Martin Rees’s book, Just Six Numbers: The Deep Forces That Shape the Universe

James Q. Wilson’s book, The Moral Sense

C.S. Lewis’s book, Mere Christianity

Raymond Moody’s book, Life after Life: A Groundbreaking Exploration of Near-Death Experiences and the Transformative Insights into the Afterlife, Backed by Scientific Study and Personal Testimonies

Steven Pinker’s book, The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature

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

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The first half of the show consists of a pre-recorded interview with political scientist Charles Murray. He’s best known for books like Losing Ground and The Bell Curve—controversial though they may have been, they were grounded in the empirical methods that characterize modern social science. His new book, Taking Religion Seriously, is a somewhat surprising departure from social science into the realm of religion and religious experience. Murray has had, if not a conversion experience, then a kind of awakening regarding the claims of religion: the existence of a divine creator, miracles, and life after death. In this conversation, I ask him how a staunch materialist who, by his own account, doesn’t have a natural capacity for religious feeling has come to value metaphysics.

After that I bring on Robert Patton-Spruill to talk a little more about religion, the death of Dick Cheney, Zohran Mamdani's win in the NYC mayoral race, the government shutdown, and Tucker Carlson, Nick Fuentes, and the conservative schism over U.S.-Israel policy.

The Glenn Show is almost entirely viewer supported, so to those of us who are already full subscribers, let me extend a heartfelt thank you. And if you’re not yet a full subscriber, please consider becoming one. The Glenn Show can only do what it does through the generosity of viewers and listeners. For a mere $6/month or $50/year, you’ll get weekly episodes of The Glenn Show earlier than their public release, monthly Q&A episodes with John McWhorter, access to the full Substack archives, and other exclusive bonus content.

Support The Glenn Show at https://glennloury.substack.com

Watch and listen to the full, 2-hour episode: https://glennloury.substack.com/p/tgs-live-democrats-leadership-crisis

Video Links

0:00 John’s misgivings about Zohran Mamdani’s anti-Zionism

7:22 Is anti-Zionism reducible to “good black people vs. bad white people”?

11:53 Ground News ad

13:40 Democrats try to pull out of a death spiral

20:05 John: If Trump can end some wars, I’ll take it

22:49 What do Kamala Harris fans see in her?

30:09 Here’s what Obama should be doing in his post-presidency

40:11 Mourning the end of race

50:15 Glenn: Eliminating racial disparities requires developing communities

Recorded October 31, 2025

Links and Readings

Tressie McMillan Cottom’s NYT column, “A Nazi Tattoo Exposes Democrats’ Greatest Weakness”

Michelle Goldberg’s NYT column, “I Thought Graham Platner Was Finished. What I Saw in Maine Changed My Mind.”

Kamala Harris’s book, 107 Days

David Brooks’s NYT column, “Hey Lefties! Trump Has Stolen Your Game.”

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