Know Your Enemy

Matt and Sam talk to Max Alvarez—writer, editor, and host of Working People, an excellent podcast—about growing up working-class and conservative in a mixed race household.Matt and Max compare experiences as we try to answer some basic but tough questions: what attracts some members of the working class to conservative politics? How do the cultural and economic aspects of conservatism interact for working class conservatives? And what can the left learn from working-class conservatism's appeal?Support Max's Patreon here!Further Reading:Max Alvarez, "Can the Working Class Speak?" Current Affairs (2018)Stuart Hall "The Toad in the Garden: Thatcherism Among the Theorists," (1988)Charlie Post's two-part essay from the early aughts in Against the Current (and Sebastian Lamb's response)Bethany Moreton, To Serve God and WalmartThomas Frank, What's the Matter with Kansas? (2005)Larry Bartels' review of Frank.John Jost, "Working Class Conservatism: A System Justification Perspective," (2017)Oh and please support our Patreon!

With the help of Jane Mayer's essential 2016 book, Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, your hosts explore the world of right-wing philanthropy and the institutions—from centers at universities to think tanks in Washington, DC—it has funded. What emerges is a startling history of how a small group of incredibly rich families used novel techniques to shelter their wealth from taxation and fund a right-wing takeover of American politics. Other sources cited and consulted: Theda Skocpol, "Who Owns the GOP?" (a critical review of Mayer in Dissent) Theda Skocpol and Vanessa Williamson, The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism Amanda Hollis-Brusky and Calvin Terbeek, "The Federalist Society Says It’s Not an Advocacy Organization. These Documents Show Otherwise." Politico Mark Schmidt "The Legend of the Powell Memo," The American Prospect Honoré de Balzac, Eugénie Grandet (1833)

Matt and Sam's first ever guest, Patrick Blanchfield, is an Associate Faculty member at the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research and author of the forthcoming book Gunpower from Verso books, which you can and should pre-order here. In the wake of the massacres in El Paso and Dayton, we turn to Patrick—a truly brillant writer and thinker—to help us understand how these traumatic reptitions of spectacular violence are rooted in American history and ideology. Patrick's work: "The Market Can't Solve a Massacre" (Splinter) "Recoil Operation" (New Inquiry) "Ghosts of 2012" (N+1) "The Gun Control We Deserve" (N+1) "Thoughts and Prayers" (N+1) "'They're Coming for the Ones You Love': My Weekend of Gun Training in the Desert" (The Nation) Declaration of War: The Violent Rise of White Supremacy after Vietnam (The Nation) Other sources cited: Evan Simko-Badnarski, Condition Yellow (Images from Patrick and Evan's trip to a firearms training institute in Nye County, Nevada) Thomas Meaney "White Power," London Review of Books Adam Kotkso, Neoliberalism's Demons: On the Political Theology of Late Capitalism Jonathan M. Metzl, Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland Toni Morrison, Nobel Lecture (1993) Okkervil River "Westfall" Kathleen Belew, Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America Benjamin Madley, American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873 PS If you haven't already, please subscribe to Know Your Enemy on Patreon! For $5/month, you get additional episodes and other subscriber-only content. For $10/month you get the bonus content + a digital subscription to Dissent magazine!

The first National Conservatism conference was convened at the Ritz Carlton in Washington D.C. two weeks ago. It was a coming out party for the rising nationalist wing of the conservative movement, with attendees laying the groundwork for a more intellectual version of Trumpism. Many mainstream conservatives were in attendance, along with paleoconservatives, figures from the religious right, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, and a popular Fox News host. In the era of Trump, mainstream conservatism is making room for hardcore nationalists, economic populists, illiberal theocrats, and others—this conference was a chance for them to find common ground. Matt and Sam discuss the conference, what it means for the present and future of conservative politics, and how the left can combat the nationalists' appeal—which is, in many ways, much more powerful than that of the dying Reaganite consensus. Here's what we read and watched: Video and text of Senator Josh Hawley's speech Alexander Zaitchick's profile of Hawley in the New Republic. National Conservatism 2019 YouTube channel (videos of many but not all speeches) Zach Beauchamp's original write-up at Vox. NYT's write-up. Osita Nwanevu (New Yorker), Conservative Nationalism is Trumpism for Intellectuals Jacob Heilbrunn (NYRB), National Conservatism: Retrofitting Trump’s GOP with a Veneer of Ideas Daniel McCarthy's (TORY ANARCHIST) take. Damon Linker's contrarian take. David Walsh's take on the conference and fascism Douthat's NYT column. Daniel Luban's profile in the New Republic of Yoram Hazony. Criticism from the right: The Federalist and Jacobite takes.

Interested in the background reading we did for this episode? There's a lot of it. But we want to show our work and give you the chance to dig deeper. Below are the articles we referenced, read, or drew upon for our conversation on the illiberal right. Primary Sources: Against the Dead Consensus, First Things Sohrab Ahmari, Against David French-ism, First Things David French, What Sohrab Ahmari Gets Wrong, National Review R.R. Reno, What Liberalism Lacks, First Things Romanus Cessario, O.P., Non Possumus, First Things Edmund Waldstein, O. Cist., Integralism in Three Sentences, The Josias Ross Douthat, What are Conservatives Actually Debating?, New York Times Rod Dreher, The Meaning of the Benedict Option, The American Conservative Adrian Vermeule, Integration from Within, American Affairs Adrian Vermeule, A Christian Strategy, First Things Commentary: Matthew Sitman, Liberalism and the Catholic Left (a review of Patrick Deneen's Why Liberalism Failed), Commonweal Emma Green, Imagining Post-Trump Nationalism, The Atlantic Jane Coaston, David French vs. Sohrab Ahmari, Explained, Vox Damon Linker, How the Intellectual Right is Talking Itself into Tearing Down American Democracy, The Week Sam Adler-Bell, With Census Decision, Trump's GOP Falters in March to White Minority Rule, The Intercept Isaac Chotiner, Interview with Ross Douthat on the Crisis of the Conservative Coalition, New Yorker Eric Levitz, Oregon Republicans Flee State to Block Action on Climate Change, New York Patricia Mazzei, Florida Limits Ex-Felon Voting, Prompting a Lawsuit and Cries of ‘Poll Tax’, New York Times Adam Liptak, Supreme Court Bars Challenges to Partisan Gerrymandering, New York Times

Special thanks to Will Epstein and The Downtown Boys for providing music for these two episodes. Check them out. Ronald Reagan's televised "A Time for Choosing" speech in support of Barry Goldwater in 1964: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBswFfh6AY A choice excerpt: "Those who ask us to trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state are architects of a policy of accommodation. They tell us that by avoiding a direct confrontation with the enemy he will learn to love us and give up his evil ways. All who oppose this idea are blanket indicted as war-mongers. Well, let us set one thing straight, there is no argument with regard to peace and war. It is cheap demagoguery to suggest that anyone would want to send other people’s sons to war. The only argument is with regard to the best way to avoid war. There is only one sure way—surrender."

Sam Tanenhaus's original 2009 essay in The New Republic, the basis for the book we're discussing today: https://newrepublic.com/article/61721/conservatism-dead Whitaker Chambers's 1957 dismantling of Ayn Rand in the pages of National Review: https://www.nationalreview.com/2005/01/big-sister-watching-you-whittaker-chambers/ And here's Buckley's 1955 mission statement for National Review: https://www.nationalreview.com/1955/11/our-mission-statement-william-f-buckley-jr/

In episode two of KNOW YOUR ENEMY, Matt and Sam discuss economist Albert O. Hirschman's 1991 book The Rhetoric of Reaction: Perversity, Futility, Jeopardy. Along the way, they identify the persistent patterns in conservative rhetoric from Edmund Burke to Friedrich Hayek to Paul Ryan. They finish off by examining some of the rhetorical tics of the progressive left, and Sam reminisces about the good old days when DSA was comprised exclusive of young nerds and old Jews.

Read Matt's Dissent essay, "Leaving Conservatism Behind" Read Sam's essay about Jonah Goldberg's Suicide of the West, "The Remnant and the Restless Crowd"