Know Your Enemy
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Break Glass in Case of Emergency
🕑 Added 2025-11-03 11:30:05 +0000 UTCThis is a different kind of episode than is typical; there's no book, no central text, not even a single, central event that guides the conversation. Instead, we begin with a few recent news items—speculation about Trump 2028, Speaker Mike Johnson's refusal to swear in a Democratic congresswoman, the stunning abdication of Congress as the shutdown continues, and, incredibly, a secretive billionaire and Mellon heir donates over a hundred million dollars to pay the military, among others—and then lay out our profound worries about Trump ruling by decree, and the coming of MAGA-style Caeserism. How and when might that occur? We discuss troubling signals the Trump administration is sending about upcoming elections, and especially the 2026 midterms; the ticking time bomb that is the Insurrection Act; how the right thinks about executive power (then and now), and more.
Sources:
Peter Rothpletz, "Trump's Third Term?" Zeteo/First Draft, Oct 24, 2025
Dana Milbank, "How Reactionary is MAGA? Try the First Century B.C.," Washington Post, Sept 7, 2022
Steve Bannon interview with The Economist, Oct 23, 2025 (YouTube)
Shawn Hubler & Laurel Rosenhall, "Justice Department Will Monitor Elections in California and New Jersey," New York Times, Oct 24, 2025
Steve Contorno & Ashley Killough, "Frustrated Arizonans Have Waited More Than a Month for Their New Congresswoman to be Seated," CNN, Oct 25, 2025
Yoni Applebaum, "America's Fragile Constitution," The Atlantic, Oct 2015
Abraham Lincoln, "Speech to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield," Jan 27, 1838
Bob Bauer & Jack Goldsmith, "Here’s What Trump Could Unleash by Invoking the Insurrection Act," New York Times, Oct 18, 2025
Damon Linker, "The Surest Path to Dictatorship: A Quick Plug for a Short Primer about the Insurrection Act," Notes from the Middleground, Oct 18, 2025
"Discussing Caesarism," New Founding Podcast, Oct 21, 2022.
Harvey Mansfield, Taming the Prince: The Ambivalence of Modern Executive Power (1989)
James Burnham, Congress and the American Tradition (1959)
Garry Wills, Bomb Power: The Modern Presidency and the National Security State (2010)
Comments
West
I must say that intro amounts to “we were skeptical of those hysterical commentators but almost a year in maybe they had a point” has a horrid stink of gender chauvinism on it. It’s a vibe with this podcast that is wearing thin.
Joseph Markus
Thanks for this one Sam and Matt. I always listen but this episode in particular was such a dot-connector for many friends and fellow travelers. In a future episode I would love to learn from y’all’s read on the regime’s propaganda operation. The DHS’s social media, the department of labor, and others are dominated Bronze Age Pervert style posting and other nonsense that tips which exact sects and configurations of the fascist intellectual spectrum have been given the keys. The centrality of AI is also notable. I wonder if it’s something that’s crossed y’all’s radar.
Nadine F Riopel
You know how sometimes international observers are called in to certify that elections are free and fair in other countries? Could the US do that? I feel like this deligitimization project they've been doing might bring you to the point of needing that kind of independent oversight. Greetings from Canada
