
Ben Judah joins Shadi and Damir for a first attempt at digesting what happened this week in Washington. Was it a coup attempt? Are we at a moment of catharsis where the country can start to rebuild? Or are we in for even more darkness?
Jan 9
1 hr 2 min

A day or so after Damir's birthday, Shadi discusses his longest bout of self-isolation ever, while Damir talks about Teddy Roosevelt and how enlightened views on slavery were completely compatible with that old-timey colonial racism.
Dec 19, 2020
55 min

Andrew Sullivan joins Shadi and Damir to try to put the last four years of Trump into some kind of perspective. Was he stopped or did he succeed? Is he a symptom or a source of decay—or both? Is our republic doomed, or will things just go back to normal? And what's the proper role of a writer and intellectual in troubled times: to analyze or be engaged?
Dec 11, 2020
1 hr 40 min

On Friday, December 4, 2020, Shadi and Damir went live on Periscope—Damir from Croatia, Shadi from DC. On their minds: how different cultures react, deal with, and adapt to COVID, how even vaccination is becoming a partisan issue in the United States, and how to think about the state of exception in democratic societies.
Check out the video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/l8elM2Bq7TM
Dec 6, 2020
54 min

A glitchy episode (apologies), as Shadi and Damir record across the Atlantic, with Damir in self-isolation and with shaky internet in Croatia. Damir talks about his run-in with the law, and Shadi admits Republicans' rejection of democratic outcomes is bringing out his uncompromising inner partisan.
Nov 22, 2020
47 min

Shadi and Damir get together after a long night of watching the results come in from the 2020 Presidential elections and take stock of where they stand. You'll never guess who's the optimist.
Nov 4, 2020
56 min

Who poses the biggest danger to our country aside from Trump: the wokes, the integralists—or the Never Trumpers themselves? Aaron Sibarium of the Washington Free Beacon joins Shadi and Damir to talk about his new essay about Weimar Germany, polarization, and the allures and dangers of moral certitude.
Oct 31, 2020
1 hr 28 min

What is dissolving the social bonds that tie us together in America? Is liberalism decaying? And is there a "successor ideology" waiting in the wings? Special guest Yehuda Kurtzer, President of the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America, joins Shadi and Damir to talk about Jewish identity and American politics in the waning moments of 2020.
Oct 16, 2020
1 hr 11 min

Why so angry? Shadi and Damir talk about useful idiocy, neoconservatism, and the dangerous temptation of righteousness in politics. Come for Shadi musing about U2 and stay for Damir rhapsodizing about Guy Debord.
Oct 8, 2020
1 hr 6 min

Does rhetorical escalation among our elites belie the stability of the nation today? With Amy Coney Barrett nominated for the Supreme Court and partisan rancor at an all-time high, Shadi and Damir pick apart their doubts about the health of our democracy.
Sep 26, 2020
51 min
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