The Mona Charen Show

Will Saletan guest hosts as Tom Edsall joins the panel to discuss rising political polarization, Biden’s latest moves on immigration, and the crackdown on social media and kids using smartphones.

Highlights / Lowlights

Tom: The book 'Wolves of K Street' by Brody and Luke Mullins and a story from 
his weekly poker game.

Linda: Experts Handicap the Trump-Biden Debate (Karl Rove, WSJ)

Damon: No, I Don't Want to Protest (Pamela Paul, NYT)
Why Activists Keep Failing the Causes That Fire Them Up (Sarah Isgur, NYT)

Bill: The Return of Peace Through Strength by Robert C. O'Brien (Foreign Affairs)
Biden and Trump tied in the Emerson Poll in... Minnesota.

Will: Louisiana Requires All Public Classrooms to Display Ten Commandments (NYT)
Bibi's shameful Biden attack video

Tom Nichols joins the panel to discuss the rise of the right in Europe (and here), the Hunter Biden verdict, and the Israel hostage rescue.

Mona: The Big Lie's Bad, Very Bad Week by Charlie Sykes.

Linda: No, You Don’t Have the Power to Stop Climate Change by Quico Toro (Persuasion)

Bill: American journalist Evan Gershkovich to stand trial on espionage charges in Russia (NPR)

Damon: John Ganz's new book "When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s"

Tom: John Bolton going through exhaustive detail about Trump's manifest unfitness and then saying he won't vote for Biden on MSNBC.

Tom's referenced item "The Jimmy Clean Hands Election" at The Atlantic.

Sasha Havlicek and Philip Bump join the panel to discuss online disinformation, the GOP reaction to Trump guilty verdict, and the Fauci follies in Congress.

highlights / lowlights

Sasha- The 80th Anniversary of D-Day at Normandy American Cemetery.

Damon- The Tower and the Sewer by Mark Lilla (NYR)

Linda- This Catholic leader shelters migrants. Texas says he runs ‘stash houses.’ (WaPo)

Philip- Two years later, Dinesh D'Souza's obvious misinformation is finally taken down

Mona- World War II Veterans meeting with Ukrainian President Zelensky at Normandy and "The Biggest War on the Small Screen" by Benjamin Parker (Bulwark)

Famed presidential photographer David Hume Kennerly joins Bill Kristol and regulars to discuss the Ford Library's cowardly refusal to honor Liz Cheney, how Democrats should handle the Trump verdict, and Biden's standing with the young and old.

highlights / lowlights
David: In closing, Trump’s team takes the jurors for idiots (Dana Milbank, WaPo)

Mona: Why Trump is hobnobbing with rappers facing gang-related charges (MSNBC)

Bill Kristol: The impressiveness of the Manhattan Trump Trial (NYT).

Linda Chavez: Mexican Democracy Hangs In The Balance (Enrique Krauze, Persuasion)

Bill Galston: Highlight: NATO’s boss wants to free Ukraine to strike hard inside Russia (The Economist)

Lowlight: Almost 6,000 Dead in 6 Years: How Baltimore Became the U.S. Overdose Capital (NYT)

show notes:
The Danger of a Small Act of Cowardice by David Hume Kennerly. (Includes the Cheney / Ford photo referenced in the show.)

David's Resignation Letter from the Ford Presidential Foundation

Joe Klein joins the panel to discuss Haley's Trump support, Alito's freak flags, and polls showing Americans are deeply misinformed about the state of the economy.

highlights / lowlights

Damon: Is the Biden Campaign Running on False Hope? (Isaac Chotiner, NYer)

Linda: Three Books to Help You Understand Nations in Transit 2024 (Freedom House)

Joseph: The U.S. assembles the pieces of a possible Gaza war endgame (David Ignatius, WaPo)

Mona: The Birth of a MAGA Conspiracy Theory (Andrew Egger, The Bulwark)

Bill: If Trump wins, what would hold him back? (Andrew Prokop, Vox)

Sarah Longwell, Chris Cillizza, Will Saletan join Mona and Bill to discuss the upcoming debates, the polls (and Biden's response to them) and how to spend a record $61 million on a Senate primary and still get trounced.

highlights / lowlights

Mona: Thousands sign petition urging canceled concerts by Israeli ensemble to go ahead in Amsterdam (Times of Israel)

Sarah: GOP Sen. Mitt Romney says Biden should have pardoned Trump (NBC)
Biden killing the presidential debate commission.

Chris: The beauty of no audience at the Presidential debate.

Bill: Can the Declaration of Independence’s Ideals Hold America Together? (Colin Woodard, Washington Monthly)

Lowlight: The reports from the battlefield in Ukraine, after the GOP delayed aid for so long.

Will: RFK Jr.’s Rich Running Mate Just Added $8 Million to His Effort. 
The hypocrisy of Congressional Republicans who voted against aid to Ukraine and Israel but lectured Biden over withholding 2,000 pound bombs for Rafah.

The Society for the Rule of Law's Gregg Nunziata joins to discuss the NY and other cases against Trump; Biden's pivot on weapons to Israel, and RFK, Jr's brain worm.

highlights / lowlights: 

Mona: In Letter, 540 Jewish Columbia Students Defend Zionism, Condemn Protests

Gregg: Highlight: This Is Peak College Admissions Insanity by Daniel Currell, Lowlight: Speaker Mike Johnson and Trump allies who tried to overturn the 2020 election roll out voting 'integrity' bill

Linda: The New Propaganda War by Anne Applebaum

Bill: Liberland: Populism, Peronism, and Madness in Argentina by David Rieff

Damon:  The curse of presentism by Brink Lindsey

FT's Ed Luce joins the group to discuss campus protests and whether Biden is losing.

highlights / lowlights:

Mona: Country Music, a film by Ken Burns

Ed: The Colombia student asking that the protestors be brought food in their encampment.

Linda: MTG's bizarre defense of her anti-Semitism vote.

Bill: Netanyahu: Israel will invade Rafah — regardless of hostage deal

Damon: The new Steve Martin documentary.

Anne Applebaum joins the panel (with Philip Bump) to discuss Ukraine's war effort, Russian disinformation, campus protests, and a change of pace for final segment.

What would you have put on the Voyager Spacecraft?

Mona: Images of human love: parents interacting with babies (joy), a dog reacting to being reunited, humans taking care of other humans with a handicap (compassion).

Damon: Holy texts of major religions, Plato's Republic, Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, and the Beatles.

Philip: The vessel itself is a message, and a Haiku by Issa.

Linda:, a reproduction of Aphrodite of Knidos Sculpture by Praxiteles, Michelangelo's David, Gorecki and Beethoven.

 Lawfare's Ben Wittes joins the group to discuss Iran's attack on Israel, Congress's action on Ukraine, Trump's NY trial, and the Supreme Court.

highlights / lowlights

Mona: The Great Hypocrisy of the Pro-Life Movement (David French, NYT)

Bill: Efforts to reform the insurrection act.

Linda: Restoring Civics in Higher Education (Wilfred McClay, AEI)

Ben: Mona is given an award, but Chatham House Rules.

Damon: The Retconning of January 6 by people who knew better