The Godzilla Effect

Shadi Hamid returns to the Remnant to discuss America’s role in maintaining a safe global ...

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Shadi Hamid returns to the Remnant to discuss America’s role in maintaining a safe global order. For years, many on the far left and isolationist right alike have argued that the United States should withdraw from the world stage and take a self-limiting approach to foreign policy. But Shadi believes Russia’s aggression has proved that Western power is essential. Will we soon see renewed support for Pax Americana? Should a no-fly zone be imposed over Ukraine? And how many bingo card items can Jonah insert into such an inappropriate conversation?

Show Notes:

– Shadi’s page at The Atlantic

– Wisdom of Crowds

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  1. Avatar photo
    Kevin Johnson

    Great one. A calm, informed, sincere, smart guy on the left who openly engages with how facts might undermine policies his allies have pursued. Good for Jonah for laying down a marker against the facile “US has been awful abroad” line without being drawn into a debate about that while his interlocutor was engaging in revealing discussion of current events. How to deal with Iran would be a good topic for return appearance, which I hope comes soon.

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  2. LucyTrice

    I'm new to The Remnant. Interesting discussion and it left me rather hopeful.

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    Bill Dyer (aka Beldar)

    Mr. Hamid was entertaining and well-mannered, and I hope you'll have him back as a guest, Mr. Goldberg.

    He struck me very much as the proverbial former atheist in a foxhole. Good for him for that.

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    Gabrielle G

    SHADI! Awesome episode.

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  5. Bob Rogers

    I think it's legit to say that Obama in not "far" left. I work on a (admittedly relatively conservative) college campus, but I know a lot of people to Obama's left. Basically, if you can get elected to statewide (or national) office in the US, it's really hard to stick on the "far" label if you know much about the entire US political spectrum.

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    1. Avatar photo
      George.Skinner

      You can think of it in terms of a normal statistical distribution. Obama was definitely to the left of the mean, probably by a greater multiple of standard deviations than previous Democratic presidents and candidates, but still in the meaty part of the bell curve. The far left is many standard deviations away from where Obama was, but in a very thin tail relative to total population. Still. the total part of the population to the right of Obama vs. the total part to the right of the far left isn't all that different.

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        rlritt

        This is exactly why Biden has the poll numbers he has. The left wing says he is NOT pushing their agenda. The right wing says he IS pushing the left wing agenda. The 45% in the middle thinks he right on some things, wrong on some things, but they're satisfied.

        He isn't afraid to get blasted for making hard decisions. I.E. Afghanistan. We had to get out after 20 long years. It was always going to be ugly because the Taliban would never leave because they lived there. So Biden was willing to take the heat.

        In terms of the invasion of Ukraine, his measured decisions and his ability to provide support and guidance for the NATO opposition shows he can handle foreign affairs. Most people think he's right except for the Far Left and the Far Right. That's pretty good evidence of Fair and Balanced, even if the pro Putin writers at Fox News disagree.

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      rlritt

      I agree.

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  6. That's Hedley!

    Really good podcast, Jonah. For what it’s worth, I generally prefer podcasts where you’re looking at issues through very or somewhat different ideological (or other) perspectives as opposed to those where your guest is like-minded in most respects. One reason is because it makes you – and usually the other guest -- spell out in some detail the rationale or background behind a point of view or the point of disagreement as means of trying to persuade the other person or your audience. In contrast, when you have guests on where you are fairly in sync on the issues, it’s much less interesting because there is more in-the-know shorthand and less background on the points of agreement that are often glossed over. This just tends to be much less interesting. By the way, this is a standard critique of all political podcasts and not just yours.

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      Seth B

      Hear, hear. I really enjoy those Remnants on which Jonah's guests are left of center. Here's hoping Jonah talks again soon with Shadi Hamid's fellow Brookings scholar Jonathan Rauch.

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    Ben Connelly

    I was surprised to discover that Shadi wasn’t eligible for a gold jacket yet! Sounds like you’ll need to have him back sometime sooner rather than later.

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    Rev Snow

    "...this wasn't just a far left perspective. This extended to Barack Obama himself."

    The LOL acronym is overused, but boy did I.

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    1. Sam

      Genuine question: what was far-left about him? Especially considered to current standards?

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      Chris Jenkins

      I like Shadi, but I rolled my eyes at this.

      There's a certain blindness to how far left Obama was, and also how partisan and divisive he was, that many people on the center-left have. Jonathan Haidt, who I also really like, and generally think is incredibly fair-minded, has said things that indicate he has the same blindness.

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    3. Photo of Jonah Goldbergcircle-angle-nib
      Jonah Goldberg vertical-nib Author

      Yeah, I know. I meant to take that bait but it got lost in the mix.

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