Immigration Changed the Demographics of the US

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In some ways, German Jews had better access to the US than Jews in other parts of Europe at that time. The problem is that mass immigration to the United States really begins around 1880. Once you have these steam-powered ships that were much, much larger and could travel much more quickly, it became much cheaper for immigrants. By 1920, labor had shifted strongly against immigration because of cost competition from new immigrants. And then once you hit the Depression, as European persecution of the Jews gets worse, there was no political consent for migration generally.

A leading expert in foreign policy, Walter Russell Mead believes his lack of a PhD—and interest in actually going places—has helped him avoid academic silos and institutional groupthink that’s rendered the field ineffective for decades. Mead’s latest book, which explores the American-Israeli relationship, is characteristically wide-ranging and multidisciplinary, resulting in “less a history of U.S.-Israel policy than a sweeping and masterfully told history of U.S. foreign policy in general”, according to a New York Times review.

He joined Tyler to discuss how the decline of American religiosity has influenced US foreign policy, which American presidents best and least understood the Middle East, the shrewd reasons Stalin supported Israel, the Saudi secret to political stability, the fate of Pakistan, the most likely scenario for China moving on Taiwan, the gun pointed at the head of German business, the US’s “murderous fetishization of ideology over reality” in Sub-Saharan Africa, the inherent weakness in having a foreign policy establishment dominated by academics, what he learned from attending the Groton School, and much more.

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Recorded August 31st, 2022 Other ways to connect

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