Category: Interviews

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Mike talks with historical anthropologist Nicholas Dirks, Chancellor of UC Berkeley from 2013-2017, about his book City of Intellect: The Uses and Abuses of the University.

Topics Include:
– the public’s decline of faith in higher education
– if higher ed is focused on the right kind of diversity
– free speech as privileging dominant views
– what elite institutions are doing with their massive endowments
– rising education costs and administrative bloat at universities
– if public universities should take positions on political issues

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The Politics Guys is part of The Democracy Group, a network of podcasts that examines what’s broken in our democracy and how we can work together to fix it.

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Trey talks with constitutional law professor Maxwell Stearns about his new book Parliamentary America which argues the U.S. needs to adapt the U.S. House to include proportional representation.

Topics Trey and Max Cover Include
– how the median voter theory is inaccurate
– why American parties are tending in extreme directions
– proposals to double the size of the House of Representatives
– proposals to transform the selection of president and vice president
– proposals to change how to remove a president
– the historic necessity of convincing relevant actors to agree to these changes.

Follow Max on X, and check out Parliamentary America

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Mike talks with George Laws Garcia, a former acting director of the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration and Executive Director of the Puerto Rico Statehood Council.

Topics Mike and George Cover Include:
– how Puerto Ricans are second class US citizens
– Puerto Rico and federal income taxes
– independence as opposed to statehood
– how Puerto Ricans feel about statehood
– US domestic political considerations
– what making Puerto Rico a state might cost
– short and medium-term prospects for statehood

Follow George on X, and check out Puerto Rico 51st

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Kimberly talks with Mary Chung Hayashi, national healthcare advocate, former California State Assembly member, Principal of Public Policy & Advocacy Solutions, and author of Women in Politics: Breaking Down the Barriers to Achieve True Representation.

Topics Kimberly & Mary discuss include:

• Why we’re still having the same discussions about increasing the number of women in politics, even though not only women—but Americans as a whole—benefit from having women in elected government positions
• Why women shouldn’t focus on what they’re lacking, but instead focus on what they can ‘bring to the table’
• How Mary’s personal experience as an immigrant woman of Asian descent has brought her face-to-face with the plethora of challenges all women face running for—and serving in—public office, and strategies to overcome these barriers
• The often-invisible biases against women of color running for office
• Why it’s important for women with political ambitions to cultivate the support of men
• The many ways in which men seeking or in political office benefit from a societal double standard for men and women
• Why women should be encouraged, regardless of their political affiliation, to participate in politics
• The importance of breaking down the imagination barrier to encourage both men and women to rethink their own preconceived notions about women’s roles
• While money matters, and men almost always have more financial support, deep pockets aren’t necessarily the only way to win an election

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Kimberly Weir, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Northern Kentucky University talks with Martin Daunton, Professor Emeritus of Economic History at the University of Cambridge. Professor Daunton is a former president of the Royal Historical Society and author of The Economic Government of the World From 1933-2023.

Topics Kimberly & Martin discuss include:

• Why considering the economic events of 1933 is necessary for understanding the multilateral policies and institutions that emerged out of World War II
• That food and labor security—not economic policies—were much more immediate concerns for policymakers in the first international conferences at the end of World War II
• How domestic considerations are imperative to successfully coordinate international economic policies
• Dealing with autocratic governments and increased populism when pursuing global economic governance
• How global institutions (particularly the IMF, World Bank, FAO, and WHO) can aid developing countries, rather than just perpetuate a global economic divide advantaging developed countries
• How China and Russia, along with the BRIICS bloc, impact global economic governance
• How resolving countries’ debt is unquestionably tied to tackling climate change

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Mike talks with Alexander Ward, a national security reporter at Politico and anchor of National Security Daily. He’s the author of the recently released book, The Internationalists: The Fight to Restore American Foreign Policy After Trump, which they discuss on this episode.

Topics Mike and Alexander Cover Include:
– why post-Trump foreign policy needed restoration
– comparing Biden and Trump’s Secretaries of State
– Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan
– meeting the rising threat from China
– Russia and the war in Ukraine
– Middle East policy
– North Korea
– climate change

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Mike talks with Juliet Hooker, the Royce Family Professor of Teaching Excellence in Political Science at Brown University. Professor Hooker is a political theorist specializing in racial justice and has authored multiple books, the latest of which is Black Grief/White Grievance: The Politics of Loss, which is the topic of their discussion.

Topics Mike and Juliet Cover Include:
– the meaning of Black grief and white grievance
– justified and unjustified political loss
– why the context of a loss is important
– differing responses to political loss
– the baseline entitlement assumptions of whites in America
– the politics of refusal
– racism and the narrowing of the political imagination
– the ‘dominant official romantic narrative’ of the civil rights movement
– repairing vs salvaging American democracy
– reasons for optimism

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Mike talks with Michael Gerhardt, a professor of jurisprudence at the University of North Carolina Law School and a long-time student of presidential impeachment. He’s the author of the just-released book, The Law of Presidential Impeachment: A Guide for the Engaged Citizen, which is the topic of their discussion.

Topics Discussed Include:
– why impeachment is in the Constitution
– if impeachment has been underutilized
– the threat of impeachment as a check on abuse of power
– the misconception that impeachment is a political process
– presidential due-process rights in an impeachment
– Senators breaking their oaths during impeachment trials
– the five presidential impeachments
– if impeachment can be made less partisan

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In Part 2 of this crossover episode between The Politics Guys and Beyond Politics, Mike and Beyond Politics host Matt Robison consider potential solutions to the problems plaguing Congress. They cover a lot of ground, including the influence of money in politics, the impact of media on political discourse, and the intricacies of the voting system. Specific reforms they discuss include a voucher system for campaign finance, the restoration of the talking filibuster in the Senate, approval voting, and rank choice voting.

Be sure to listen to Part 1 of the conversation on the Beyond Politics podcast.

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Mike talks with Richard McGahey, an economist and senior fellow at the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis and the Institute on Race, Power, and Political Economy, at The New School. He’s served as executive director of the Congressional Joint Economic Committee, assistant secretary for policy at the U.S. Department of Labor, and in senior governmental positions in New York State and New York City. He’s also the author of Unequal Cities: Overcoming Anti-Urban Bias to Reduce Inequality in the United States, which they discuss on this episode.

Topics Mike and Rick discuss include:
– the economic importance of cities
– cities vs. metropolitan areas
– why we should care about inequality
– causes of anti-urban bias in American politics
– how to address anti-urban bias

Rick McGahey on X

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