Against the backdrop of Trump’s breathtaking snatch-and-grab operation against Venezuela’s nasty dictator Nicolás Maduro, Shadi and Damir debate the complexities of global politics, focusing on the tension between power and morality. They explore the implications of U.S. foreign policy decisions and debate the role of values in international relations. Shadi pushes Damir about the implications of his commitments, who in turn says ugly things you probably won’t like. Required Reading: * “Venezuel...
Jan 09, 2026•1 hr 13 min
As the year winds down, Shadi and Damir hosted Michael McFaul , a professor at Stanford University and former special assistant to President Obama and U.S. ambassador to Russia. His new book, Autocrats vs. Democrats: China, Russia, America, and the New Global Disorder is as good a start as any in trying to figure out how U.S. foreign policy could — and should — develop in the wake of a second Trump presidency. Required Reading: * Autocrats vs. Democrats: China, Russia, America, and the New Globa...
Dec 29, 2025•58 min
This week, we have a special live episode for you. Wisdom of Crowds, in cooperation with Aspen’s Philosophy and Society program, threw a holiday party in DC, celebrating the release of our friend Osita Nwanevu ’s new book, The Right of the People . Samuel Kimbriel sat down with Osita and the great Sam Goldman of the Hamilton School at the University of Florida, to kick off our celebration of America’s 250th with a debate of whether the constitution was a bad idea. Osita argues that it is time fo...
Dec 24, 2025•1 hr
This week, the great Nils Gilman joined Damir Marusic and Samuel Kimbriel on the pod to unpack the complexities of American foreign policy and its implications for Europe — and beyond. The conversation starts by trying to make sense of Trump’s latest National Security Strategy as a jumping off point, before pivoting into a discussion of populism. Why do some causes, projects — and people — provide meaning while others fall flat? For example, why is Trump’s nationalism more politically effective ...
Dec 15, 2025•1 hr 14 min
Damir’s back from Ukraine, still buzzing — and feeling weird about it. He and Christine talk about the thrill and guilt associated with reporting from war zones, the ethical implications of war tourism, and the psychological toll on both journalists and civilians. The conversation then shifts to Trump and a possibly looming war with Venezuela. The Trump administration has cowed many a politician, but the fear seems to be ebbing. But have we gotten over our addiction to the thrill of political po...
Dec 08, 2025•1 hr 21 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live A few years ago, Lea Ypi was scrolling through Facebook when she came across a family photo she had never seen before. Someone had discovered a photograph of Ypi’s grandparents on their honeymoon and posted it on a public Facebook group. Ypi — a philosophy professor from Albania who teaches at the London School of Economics — was dismayed by the comments on the photograph, which ranged from inaccurate to judgmental...
Nov 30, 2025•46 min
After Friday’s meeting between Donald Trump and Zohran Mamdani , everyone is asking: who is Zohran Mamdani really? What motivates him: is it progressive cultural issues, or economic populism? Is he woke, or a pragmatist? He won the mayor’s seat in New York City with just over fifty percent of the vote , when even the leaders of his own party refused to endorse him . What makes this guy tick? Today’s guest is one of the best people, apart from Mamdani himself, to answer these questions. Ross Bark...
Nov 22, 2025•58 min
This week’s episode is a live recording of Wisdom of Crowds , where we celebrated a very special occasion: the publication of Shadi Hamid ’s new book, The Case for American Power . The book is a soul-searching study about American power as a force for good in the world, and it combines memoir and foreign policy analysis. Shadi’s thesis is that if we want to make the world “more just and more moral, more democratic and more respectful of human rights,” then backing the United States is both the “...
Nov 15, 2025•1 hr 5 min
With Shadi out promoting his new book, Damir sat down with WoC friend Jamie Kirchick to debate the influence of media figures like Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes on conservatism on America. Anti-semitism may be the oldest hatred, something different feels afoot today. Generational shifts in attitudes on Israel, partly fueled by the Gaza war, have given unscrupulous charlatans an opening into the mainstream. But why are mainstream conservative institutions not fighting back? And what does this s...
Nov 08, 2025•56 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live Are human beings by nature suspicious of each other? Or is harmonious communal life our default mode? The answer to this question has implications for politics. Today’s episode is a live discussion about just this question, recorded last summer at the Aspen Ideas Festival. The guest is philosopher Tamar Gendler of Yale University, whose work deals with …...
Nov 01, 2025•35 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live We need to get better at asking for help. So argues author Leah Libresco Sargeant in her new book, The Dignity of Dependence: A Feminist Manifesto . The core thesis of the book is that “women’s equality with men doesn’t depend on their interchangeability with men.” But the book also has many insights that apply to men as well as women. All of us need to get better at asking for help. Hosting this episode are Shadi ...
Oct 25, 2025•45 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live “This is one of the greatest historical eras mankind will ever see.” So says Tyler Cowen, economics professor at George Mason University , renowned author and chairman at the Mercatus Center , a think tank. He is also a writer, and famous podcaster whose books, like The Great Stagnation and Average is Over , which for over a decade have helped readers under…...
Oct 18, 2025•40 min
Yesterday, the philosopher Michael Sandel won this year’s prestigious Berggruen Prize for Philosophy and Culture . The million-dollar prize is a lifetime-achievement award given to an individual “whose ideas have profoundly shaped human self-understanding and advancement.” We were lucky to have Professor Sandel on our podcast last summer, along with his son, fellow-philosopher Adam Sandel, and Wisdom of Crowds ’ resident philosopher, Samuel Kimbriel . To celebrate Professor Sandel’s award, we ar...
Oct 14, 2025•50 min
This week we have a very special guest: Robert Malley , a veteran American diplomat and Middle East expert. From advising President Clinton at Camp David to serving as President Obama’s top White House official for the Middle East and then as Biden’s Special Envoy for Iran, Malley has spent decades at the heart of U.S. diplomacy. Today he joins Shadi Hamid and Damir Marusic to discuss his new book, Tomorrow Is Yesterday: Life, Death, and the Pursuit of Peace in Israel/Palestine . Malley begins t...
Oct 08, 2025•1 hr 15 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live Last week, Wisdom of Crowds philosopher-in-residence Samuel Kimbriel wrote an essay about the political use of Christianity within MAGA, contrasting the sincerity of Erika Kirk’s piety with the propagandistic use of the Lord’s Prayer in a recent military recruitment video. Shadi Hamid reflected on Samuel’s piece and more, writing a column about it for the Washington Post . Today, we bring both men together to discu...
Oct 04, 2025•55 min
Today we have a return guest: Jordan Castro . Jordan is a writer and the deputy director of the Cluny Project , a think tank of sorts for cultural entrepreneurs. The last time Jordan appeared on Wisdom of Crowds , we discussed his first novel, The Novelist . Now Jordan has a second book, Muscle Man , about a disgruntled middle-aged academic who tries to find an answer to his frustrations in weightlifting and strength training. It is a hilarious satire of our time, a novel that speaks to our poli...
Sep 27, 2025•1 hr 13 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live Today’s guest is Geoff Shullenberger , the managing editor of Compact and a writer whose articles and reviews have appeared in American Affairs , The Chronicle of Higher Education , The New Atlantis , UnHerd , and more. Last week, after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, Geoff wrote an incisive piece titled, “The Return of the Assassin.” In it, he observes that the nature of violence has shifted in recent years, aw...
Sep 21, 2025•47 min
Our episode this week is more on the serious and somber side. Shadi Hamid and Damir Marusic discuss the assassination of Charlie Kirk and speculate about its consequences. What are we learning about America and American politics in the wake of that horrible shooting? Is America heading toward low-grade civil war—like the Years of Lead in Italy during the 1970s? Does the Right control the culture and the media—and will it use this event to expand its political power? Does the Left have a problem ...
Sep 13, 2025•49 min
The Lyceum Movement is a nationwide grassroots organization that aims to build a healthier public discourse by bringing diverse groups of people together to investigate first principles. Every August, Lyceum hosts a big event in Des Moines: the Tallgrass Ideas Festival . And for the last three years, Wisdom of Crowds has been there, hosting a live taping of our podcast. This year, the Festival’s theme was trust. We hosted an episode about trust and technology, a topic on everybody’s mind. Our tw...
Sep 06, 2025•1 hr 17 min
A special treat from the Aspen Ideas Festival : a panel discussion about American community and politics, featuring a father–son philosophical duo. Michael J. Sandel is a professor at Harvard University, where he teaches political philosophy. His famous “Justice” course has been viewed by tens of millions worldwide. His son, Adam Sandel , is a philosopher, award-winning teacher, and holder of the Guinness World Record for most pull-ups in one minute . Together with Samuel Kimbriel , Wisdom of Cr...
Aug 29, 2025•50 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live American Primeval on Netflix. The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives on Hulu. Ballerina Farm on Instagram. American culture is living through a Mormon moment. It is a sign that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is growing in confidence and strength. But what are the drawbacks to becoming mainstream? What are the trade-offs involved in American liberalism? What can those of us who are not part of the LDS Chu...
Aug 22, 2025•46 min
President Donald Trump federalized DC law enforcement this week, raising all sorts of questions — about democracy, authoritarianism, sovereignty and legitimacy — that are natural fits for us to discuss here at Wisdom of Crowds. Yes, Trump’s use of emergency powers to justify the takeover is constitutional, even if he is stretching the concept of what counts as an emergency. But Damir Marusic feels like things took a much darker turn this week, and nobody seems to have noticed. Weren’t people in ...
Aug 15, 2025•1 hr 4 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live “ ‘Barbarism’ is a word that keeps coming to my lips lately,” writes Damir Marusic in a brilliant new article this week. Barbarism seems to be the only real word that describes what comes after the liberal international order. But Damir isn’t pointing to the supposed barbarism of our enemies. His article points to the ways that we in the West — and in the United States — are becoming coarser and more egocentric. Li...
Aug 09, 2025•44 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live Women and men are having a hard time finding each other. A lot of women are giving up on finding a mate. Some women with mates are worried that their men don’t have any friends. Everyone hates dating apps. People are having fewer babies. These are among the many depressing stories that the media is telling about love and marriage today. How true are they…...
Aug 02, 2025•58 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live Dead almost six years, Jeffrey Epstein is back in the news . The sordid details of his crimes, and the elaborate conspiracy concerning elites that he may or may not have been a part of, have become a central issue within the MAGA coalition. Conspiracy theories in general are now a part of daily political life. None of us can escape them. Most of us probably half-believe in at least one of them. Why is that? Today’s...
Jul 23, 2025•45 min
What is happiness? Why are so many Americans — by their own admission — unhappy? These are the central questions in this special episode, live from the Aspen Ideas Festival . At the festival, our house philosopher, Dr. Samuel Kimbriel, hosted a discussion with three distinguished thinkers. Adam Sandel is a philosopher and assistant district attorney in Brooklyn whose latest book is titled Happiness in Action: A Philosopher’s Guide to the Good Life . Agnes Callard is a philosophy professor at the...
Jul 19, 2025•54 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live It’s the summer doldrums, so this week, Wisdom of Crowds is taking a break from politics and war and Trump. Instead, we are talking about culture. Our guest, Paul Elie , is one of the leading culture and religion writers in the United States. His words have appeared in the New Yorker , the Atlantic , and the New York Times . Paul’s latest book, The Last Supper: Art, Faith, Sex, and Controversy in the 1980s , tells ...
Jul 12, 2025•52 min
Last month, Francis Fukuyama was scheduled to come to Washington, DC for a live taping of Wisdom of Crowds . Unfortunately, as subscribers know, Frank lost his voice the morning of his scheduled appearance, and we were forced to cancel. However, we were able to record a bit of conversation with him and Shadi Hamid the following day, with a few colleagues asking questions. The conversation ended up being a quasi-“state of liberalism” address, perfect for July 4th weekend. The conversation begins ...
Jul 03, 2025•39 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live “War is the father of all and the king of all; and some he has made gods and some men, some bond and some free.” So said the ancient Greek philosopher, Heraclitus . In his essay this week, Santiago Ramos says the opposite: “… war is a necessary evil; it is not what preserves the great achievements of the human race. War threatens those achievements, and we are lucky that more has not been destroyed already.” Santia...
Jun 28, 2025•53 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.live The Israel-Iran war is about to enter its sixth day. As of this recording — Wednesday evening, June 18 — President Trump has not announced whether the United States will join the Israeli war effort. During this unpleasant lull, Shadi Hamid and Damir Marusic invited Sohrab Ahmari to discuss what we can expect from the war and its aftermath. In recent days, Sohrab has emerged as an essential commentator on the Iran I...
Jun 19, 2025•1 hr
