Robert Wright's Nonzero

Always be prepared (for nuclear fallout) ... Is Putin headed for the Baltics? ... Why is the Western media reporting so little about the Azov Battalion? ... Mickey: Zelenskyy should give up parts of the Donbas and Crimea ... Bob: I don’t think Putin will move on to the Baltics ... Trying to see Ukraine clearly from within the Western media bubble ... The political difficulties of ceding territory ... How Russia’s military measures up against the US ... The US’s decades-long mismanagement of its relationship with Russia ... Michael McFaul’s really, really bad tweet to the people of Russia ... Parrot Room preview: the State of the Union, the January 6 Commission alleges they have Trump, the NYT’s “fraudulent” Trayvon Martin video, the latest economic report, big news for Zemmour in France, some Epstein news, the Freedom Convoy keeps on truckin’, trouble for Rick Scott, Bob reports on a biography of Putin, a contrarian take on the OJ Simpson trial, what Bob meant by “natural organic borders,” and an (unrehearsed) harmonica performance of “A Whiter Shade of Pale” ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Steven’s book, Status and the Challenge of Rising Powers ... How concerns about status motivate Russia’s aggressive behavior ... Bob wonders if Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine was based on emotion ... Why Steven thinks Russia’s hostile reaction to NATO expansion was partly about status ... When does a nation's wounded pride translate into dangerous behavior? ... Seeing the rise of China as a bid for prestige and recognition ... Bob: Is the US driven by status considerations? ... Applying Steven’s argument to Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Mickey converts to Bob-ism ... Reassessing the ‘Is Putin Crazy?’ question post-invasion ... Were we *too* understanding of Putin? ... Zelensky—to arm or not to arm? ... How will Americans grade Biden’s handling of Russia-Ukraine? ... Did Russiagate make it harder for Biden to negotiate with Putin? ... The parallels between Russia-Ukraine and the ‘99 Kosovo intervention ... Biden’s Supreme Court nominee ... Mickey denounces Trudeau’s “couch potato fascism” ... Why Bob is queasy about this week’s George Floyd verdicts ... Parrot Room preview: An Epstein associate bites the dust, Jim Pinkerton’s “Mars, Meta, or Meatspace” trichotomy re: humanity’s future, The New Yorker’s Dean Baquet puff piece, Douthat on the “virtuals” vs “reals” divide, are the convoys coming to America?, Un-cancelling Louis CK, Putin and the psychology of status, Douglas McArthur as role model, The Expanse's jump-the-shark moment, and was Bob too mean on Twitter? ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

The grim state of Ukraine and Russia today ... Nikita’s initial reactions to Putin’s Ukraine speech ... Is Putin getting weirder? Or is reality? Or both? ... How did Russians react to the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution? ... Russian views on NATO expansion and the color revolutions ... Nikita: Political life in Russia is (mostly) dead ... Are Putin’s actions savvy politicking or signs of madness? ... Has the West mismanaged the post-Cold War era? ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Mickey sparks up ... Mickey critiques the "Coalition of the Ascendant" ... Have Democratic positions on cultural issues turned toxic? ... Mike Pence’s defense of the RNC’s January 6 resolution ... Will the trucker protests go transnational? ... Bob: I don’t see Putin doing regime change in Ukraine ... Were defense contractors the prime mover of NATO expansion? ... Mickey: The great regreasing of the Biden Administration has begun ... Is Big Pharma funneling money to the CDC? ... Who is funding Sarah Palin’s libel suit against the NYT? ... The proposed changes to the Electoral Count Act ... Remembering P.J. O’Rourke ... Parrot Room preview: A settlement in the Epstein suit, Matt Yglesias and the demise of the Slate Pitch, the rise of Zemmour in France, are people in big cities scared of crime?, Bill Kristof sucks up to Ezra Klein, the previously untold story of how Slate started, how Jeff Zucker’s departure could lead to a better CNN, Bob’s plunge into the war in the Pacific continues, and Mickey discovers gender-inclusive bathrooms ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Ben, author of a new book on Christopher Hitchens, gives us a brief history of Hitch ... Bob: Hitchens's argument in God is not Great was...not great ... Where was Hitchens’s Marxist materialism when it came to religion? ... Assessing Hitchens’s intellectual contributions ... Was Hitchens an “honest” arguer? ... Why did Hitchens become a hawk? ... Hitchens in light of the Intellectual Dark Web ... Ben gives his closing argument for why Hitchens is still worth thinking about ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Inflation takes a toll on Mickey’s supply closet ... Reviewing Jeff Zucker’s “contributions” to American democracy ... Do any Trumpist elites actually want Trump to run for president again? ... Who constitutes Kamala’s base? ... What Biden needs to say about Ukraine and NATO ... How Google is helping people break the law ... Mickey: Trump taking documents to Mar-A-Lago isn’t a big deal ... Why aren’t more people getting their Covid booster? ... Why are Republicans so good at controlling state legislatures? ... Was the Marjorie Taylor Greene “gazpacho police” comment intentional? ... Sarah Palin’s lawsuit against the NYT ... Mickey: How can Andrew Yang lament unemployment among men while supporting UBI? ... If waning Latino support for immigration doesn’t tighten border security, maybe robot dogs will ... Parrot Room preview: Wokeness, Mickey clarifies what he means by “corporatism,” why Mickey is waging war on meritocracy, affirmative action for different cultures instead of different races, birds aren’t real, Putin’s repulsive joke, Robert Trivers’s groundbreaking paper on sexual selection and a related joke, Joe Rogan and Spotify, war in the Pacific, news on the lab leak theory, decoupling from China, Bob becomes the Tom Friedman whisperer, and Bob learns a harsh lesson about Substack ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

How Bob and Tom wound up talking about the Russia-Ukraine crisis ... Tom says NATO should be willing to close its door to Ukrain ... The never ending “age of midgets” in US foreign policy making ... Tilting international relations in a positive direction ... Is Biden’s “democracy versus autocracy” framework counterproductive? ... Analyzing the nature of journalistic objectivity – and how to achieve it ... Bob and Tom agree we need non-zero thinking to solve global problems ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

Did Jeff Zucker resign over business or pleasure? ... Bob: “The new Cold War almost became official today” ... A grand solution to the Ukraine crisis ... George Soros predicts the downfall of Xi Jinping ... Is the killing of ISIS’s leader really a big deal? ... Are we headed toward one metaverse or many? ... Joe Rogan for president? ... Mickey: It’s wrongheaded for the left to focus their animosity on the unvaccinated ... Is Democrats’ commitment to free speech softening? ... The power plays surrounding Stephen Breyer’s retirement ... Parrot Room preview: More Spotify, Bob and Mickey risk cancelation over Whoopi Goldberg, more Jeff Zucker, Howard Cosell, QAnon, corporatism and undemocratic institutions, Democrats lose their majority in the Senate, so what if Mark Zuckerberg gets another $200 billion, waiting for Biden’s Sister Souljah moment, the Biden crime plan, the electoral count plan, Mickey gets transgressive about Joe Burrow, the Washington football team gets a new name, the NFL’s resurgence, why can’t carbon cleaners end the climate crisis, and mail-in voter fraud ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe

How anti-tribal thinking formed the core of Arnold’s “Fantasy Intellectual Teams" (FITs) draft ... Was the pre-internet intellectual era really so great? ... Arnold lays out the details of the Fantasy Intellectual Teams draft ... Grassroots vs. institutional anti-tribal strategies ... Is a social media rebuild possible? ... The challenges in taking FITs to the next level ... Bob and Arnold contrast their approaches to anti-tribalism ... How bad could things get if we can't beat tribalism? ... This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nonzero.org/subscribe