The fiendish thing about the iron cage of alienation is that the harder you try to escape, the harder that gets. The more you try to think your way out, the more surely you lock yourself in. A case in point: The Democratic Party recently paid $20 million to study how to talk to men. If Democrats are alienated from men, it might just be because they see them as objects of study, as opposed to human beings they actually know. And it’s not just men who are becoming strangers to the Democratic Party...
Jun 18, 2025•18 min•Season 7Ep. 82
Between 1933 and 1981, there were 24 sessions of Congress. For 22 of those 24, Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate. During the same time there were 12 presidential terms. Eight were served by Democrats. Now Democrats can lose, twice, to a party led by Donald Trump, whose campaigns have been natural experiments in just how bad a candidate can be and still beat the Democrats. What happened? They got caught in what Max Weber called the Iron Cage: stuck in their rationalistic heads, D...
May 21, 2025•12 min•Season 7Ep. 81
Last time, I argued that if liberals still believe in an open society — free, equal, and pluralistic — we must defend reason. It’s the shared “meeting space” that makes the open society possible. But we must also understand that reason alone isn’t enough. If we filter all our experience through rationality, we become separated from it, as if we’re not living life, but observing it with scientific instruments. We become alienated. It’s a condition familiar to anyone who’s had a modern, reason-bas...
Apr 22, 2025•8 min
It’s a fundamental assumption of liberal democracy that we debate our differences with reason. But now that assumption looks like a relic of a bygone age — specifically, the Age of Enlightenment, from the late 17th to early 19th centuries. The Enlightenment produced more scientific progress than all of previous history — the very idea of progress comes to us from the Enlightenment. It had the same impact on the generation of wealth: Compared to economic growth since the Enlightenment, there was ...
Mar 19, 2025•22 min•Season 7Ep. 79
Woke theory aims to liberate our minds, but imposes limits on how we think: Many ideas are judged oppressive, and therefore "problematic." Liberal tolerance is seen as potentially oppressive too, for the same reason. Will liberals stand up for what they believe in? Should they? This episode: We begin to see if liberals can take their own side in a quarrel.
Feb 18, 2025•7 min•Season 7Ep. 78
Liberals and the woke left see many of the same problems in society, from structural oppression to alienation. And yet the ideology of the woke left is incompatible with liberalism. For liberals, it starts with the very idea of wokeness, as an awakening from illusions, or false consciousness. The goal is supposed to be liberation. But it can look more like tyranny. It boils down to this: If I’m woke and you’re not, I see everything more clearly than you do. I have escaped from the prison of oppr...
Jan 15, 2025•11 min•Season 7Ep. 77
As you know if you’ve been following my posts and podcast episodes lately, I’m writing and releasing the chapters of my new book The Liberal Backbone in real time. When Joan Esposito of WCPT Chicago heard about it, she had an idea: a "radio book club," with me coming on her show to talk about the book as it comes together, chapter by chapter, with her and her listeners. On December 13, we had the first episode, and I thought it went great — Joan is one of my favorite interviewers. We explored th...
Dec 21, 2024•50 min•Season 7Ep. 76
The first draft of Chapter 5 of my next book, The Liberal Backbone. It's a brief summary of the roots of woke thinking, which should make the woke left more understandable, especially for liberals trying to sort out what they do and don't stand for. More at Dastardly Cleverness.com/liberal-backbone-chapter-5 and at Substack.com/@spencercritchley. — Spencer
Dec 10, 2024•16 min•Season 7Ep. 75
Are the woke just a bunch of Marxists? No, but that claim isn’t based on nothing. The Theory behind wokeness is complicated, but some of its key concepts are inherited from Marx, in modified form. And it becomes much easier to understand Theory if you understand something about Marx — which few people do, because Marx doesn't make it easy. In this fourth chapter of The Liberal Backbone, I explain two key Marxist concepts I plain language: structural oppression, and how a structure of ideas can m...
Dec 03, 2024•9 min•Season 7Ep. 74
The word "woke" has at least two meanings — and they’re so different, they contradict each other. By one of them, any liberal can be proud to be called woke, because to be woke in this sense is to recognize bigotry and oppose it. But by the other meaning, liberals can’t be woke, even if they want to. That’s because if you’re this kind of woke, you reject liberalism. Spencer explains in this chapter of The Liberal Backbone. Find the full text and links at DastardlyCleverness.com ....
Nov 26, 2024•9 min•Season 7Ep. 73
It’s hard to stand for something if you’re not even sure what that something is. And many liberals have become unsure what liberalism is. For a long time, few of us had to think much about it. Liberalism was just default political reality. It was like water is for the young fish in David Foster Wallace’s famous parable: They can’t see the water, because it’s everywhere. Let’s remember that the word “liberalism” doesn’t only refer to beliefs on the left. It’s also the name of the philosophy of fr...
Nov 19, 2024•9 min•Season 7Ep. 72
With American democracy facing its greatest crisis since the Civil War as a corrupt autocrat returns to the presidency, I want to do my part, however small, to help right now. So I’m going to try an experiment: writing a shorter, more tightly focused book, and releasing chapters as I write them. They’ll appear as posts and podcast episodes, like this one. There are many reasons why we are where we are, and in this little book I’m not going to try to address all of them. Instead, I’m going to try...
Nov 12, 2024•7 min•Season 7Ep. 71
Ernest Hemingway is famous for the terse economy of his writing. And in one of the most resonant examples of that quality, he captured the essence of catastrophic failure in just a few words, in his novel The Sun Also Rises . The alcoholic veteran Mike Campbell is asked how he went bankrupt. “Two ways,” he says. “Gradually and then quickly.” As it is with one person going broke, so it is with an entire economy crashing, or countless other catastrophes. There isn’t only a single failure, but a fi...
Nov 05, 2024•5 min•Season 7Ep. 70
If we believe in democracy, I believe we have a responsibility not only to vote for it but to speak up for it, including to family and friends, despite how hard that might be. That doesn’t mean berating or insulting them. It can be done quietly and respectfully. In my own view it’s a mark of respect and even love to give people the whole truth about what we believe. So I’ve written an appeal to a friend who's planning to vote for Donald Trumo, imploring them, before it’s too late, not to make a ...
Oct 07, 2024•11 min•Season 7Ep. 69
According to my guest this time, the United States is entering a Latino century, and that might be what saves our democracy. Mike Madrid is a top expert on Latino voting, and in recent years he’s become a national leader in the bipartisan fight to save democracy. He’s been the political director for the California Republican Party, a senior adviser to both Republicans and Democrats, and a co-founder of the never-Trump Lincoln Project. Now Mike has a new book, called The Latino Century: How Ameri...
Jul 07, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Season 6Ep. 68
Many liberals are deeply confused about how to respond to the campus protests over Gaza. And I think it’s an example of the confusion liberals are feeling generally over a lot of issues. I believe much of the confusion can be traced to the assumption that all political opinions can fit on a single line, from left to right. For this one-dimensional, one-line model to work, there can only be one left and one right — but there are at least two lefts and two rights. And they’re not different as in f...
May 06, 2024•13 min•Season 6Ep. 67
As we risk obliviously repeating catastrophic mistakes others have already made, Spencer Critchley has some thoughts about memory and freedom, from people who know the precious value of both. Excerpt: "Most of us in the U.S. have been spared the necessity of knowing history, and instead have been able to live as if the world was created at our birth. But people in Central and Eastern Europe have already been trammeled by the history that has just now caught up with us. They’ve been trying to war...
Mar 13, 2024•5 min•Season 6Ep. 66
If you wanted to, you could consume nothing but presidential campaign coverage all day every day. But how much of it would leave you feeling better informed about casting what may be the most important vote of your life? Not better informed about the campaign as a sporting event, with all the expert play-by-play, color commentary, and stats. But better informed about questions that may not have easy, satisfying, or entertaining answers? Better prepared to think, and not just react? On this episo...
Feb 13, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Season 6Ep. 65
By some measures, well over half of charities do little or no good. When similar charities are compared, the most effective ones can be up to 100 times more effective than the least. And there’s often a big mismatch between where donors direct their support and where the need and potential benefits are greatest. A movement called effective altruism aims to make giving work better by identifying the most effective charities in the world and encouraging donors to support them generously and strate...
Dec 22, 2023•1 hr 1 min•Season 6Ep. 64
There are lots of reasons to be cynical about the crisis in our politics. The trouble is, one of the biggest causes of that crisis is cynicism itself. We should always be skeptical about politics. People aren’t angels, as James Madison reminded us. But skepticism involves checking to find out what’s really going on, good or bad. Cynicism is just assuming that it’s all bad. This is often mistaken for savviness, which lends cool-kids credibility to claims like “all politicians are crooks,” or “the...
Oct 25, 2023•1 hr 2 min•Season 6Ep. 63
A three-way conversation featuring host Spencer Critchley, Kevin Lewis, and Zach Friend on leadership lessons from the ouster of Kevin McCarthy, as compared with far better examples set by Hakeem Jeffries, Nancy Pelosi, and others. It turns out, to the shock of cynics everywhere, that character matters! Kevin was the post-presidency spokesman for former President Barack Obama. During the Obama administration he served at the White House and at the Department of Justice, where he advised Attorney...
Oct 05, 2023•50 min•Season 6Ep. 62
If you want to know more about the risks and rewards of artificial intelligence, you could hardly do better than to consult with someone who’s been a senior communications advisor for Facebook, lately known as Meta, the US Department of Justice, and a President of the United States. And that’s what Spencer did for this episode. Kevin Lewis was the post-presidency spokesman for former President Barack Obama. During the Obama administration he served at the White House and at the DOJ, where he adv...
Sep 19, 2023•1 hr 12 min•Season 6Ep. 61
If you have children in your family, you’re probably worried about what technology might be doing to them. And maybe there’s some hope about what tech might do for them. In this episode, you can get guidance from one of the world's top experts on the subject. Dr. Katie Davis is a researcher and associate professor at the University of Washington, and the director of the university’s Digital Youth lab. She’s been studying technology and children for nearly two decades, starting with her time at H...
Jul 11, 2023•57 min•Season 5Ep. 60
The episode before last, Spencer was the guest for a change, interviewed by Joan Esposito, who hosts a liberal talk radio show originating at WCPT-AM in Chicago. This time, Spencer interviews Joan about how she manages to conduct smart, in-depth, live political conversations three hours a day, five days a week — sometimes devoting a full hour to a topic when the standard is a few minutes. We hear what Joan has learned as a radio host, as a TV news anchor, and in other roles, helping people under...
Feb 01, 2023•1 hr 9 min•Season 5Ep. 59
Sam Farr devoted 44 years of his life to elected office at the local, state, and federal level. That included 24 years as the Congressman for the Central Coast of California, where he grew up in the seaside village of Carmel. Among his inspirations were his father, longtime state legislator Fred Farr; President John F. Kennedy; and the Peace Corps, which he joined as a young man. If that makes him sound like an idealist, that’s accurate, but it’s only half the picture. The other half is very pra...
Dec 21, 2022•1 hr 29 min•Season 5Ep. 58
Spencer often talks with Joan Esposito, who interviews him about politics for her show on Chicago's WCPT-AM. This episode of Dastardly Cleverness replays one of those conversations that's especially relevant now. Joan and Spencer focus on why democracy, after all its successes, is now in so much danger from authoritarianism. They talk about: Why so many people are choosing authoritarianism over democracy, mostly on the right but on the left too How the sources of America's division go back to th...
Nov 29, 2022•44 min•Season 5Ep. 57
Even with democracy in grave danger, Democrats are in a close race against the people who are trying to finish it off. How can that be, and what should they do about it? Questions like that have been dominating discussions among a group of some of the country's most senior Democratic Party veterans, including former House Democratic Leader Dick Gephardt, one-time presidential favorite Gary Hart, and until her recent death, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. And our two guests this tim...
Oct 27, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Season 5Ep. 56
In many ways, addiction has become a defining feature of life in America. More and more of us have become addicted to drugs like alcohol, heroin, cocaine, and opioids, and to other things increasingly recognized as addictive, like sugar, junk food, and social media. The problem has been growing for decades, but in recent years it has exploded. A record for deaths by overdose was set in 2020, at a level six and a half times higher than just 10 years before. The 2020 record was smashed last year, ...
Oct 11, 2022•59 min•Season 5Ep. 55
One way of thinking about democracy is as a game — a game in which freedom, equality, and even lives are at stake. And one way of thinking about the state of our democracy is that one of the two main competitors is no longer playing the game, but trying to destroy it. As with any game, the rules of democracy only matter if we agree they do. Ultimately, we can’t prove that things like civil debate, fair elections, and following the law are good things, we just agree that they are, like we might a...
Sep 08, 2022•49 min•Season 5Ep. 54
It's not just Democrats who need the Democratic Party to remember how to win elections. Democracy does. Spencer's guest this time has some great ideas on where to start, based on his unique, decades-long experience studying politics from the inside and out. Walter Shapiro has reported on 11 presidential campaigns, going back to Ronald Reagan’s landslide defeat of Jimmy Carter in 1980. He’s written for the Washington Post, Newsweek, Time, USA Today, Roll Call, and The New Republic among others, w...
Jun 16, 2022•59 min•Season 4Ep. 53
