In this episode, we talk about a recent book by Daniel Ziblatt and Steven Levitsky, both professors of political science at Harvard, titled Tyranny of the Minority. Ziblatt and Levitsky make a strong argument that the US Constitution has excessively constrained American democracy, and that its counter-majoritarian measures now make the US an outlier in how anti-democratic it is compared to other rich democracies. As they discuss, the threat posed by the Constitution has become much more evident in recent decades as Republicans have radicalized and repeatedly ridden to power as a result of a prominent counter-majoritarian aspect of the Constitution: the Electoral College. Now, they argue, the counter-majoritarianism of the Constitution has become a boon to far right extremists, helping maintain the power of an ethnonationalist Republican party even as that party fails to appeal to a majority of the US population. The time, therefore, is ripe for constitutional reform.

Show Notes

Jamelle Bouie on Trump’s tyrannical deportation proposal: “Trump’s Taste for Tyranny Finds a Target”

Charlie Kirk video: “Liberal College Student ATTEMPTS to Outsmart Charlie Kirk 👀”

Note: We mention an ep that is as of yet unpublished on the book Roosevelt’s Purge, by Susan Dunn. That episode will probably be published in late November.

Credits

The podcast’s theme music was made by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

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