The Long Game

The Supreme Court today issued a decision on partisan gerrymandering, the practice of politicians drawing maps that give themselves an advantage over other parties by manipulating an increasingly sophisticated understanding of who votes how and where you live to guarantee the most seats in Congress and state legislatures. You can read the ruling here. Chief Justice John Roberts and the court's other four conservatives — Brett Kavanaugh, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch — found that the court does not have standing to intervene even in the most extreme examples of gerrymandering. "Partisan gerrymandering claims rest on an instinct that groups with a certain level of political support should enjoy a commensurate level of political power and influence. Such claims invariably sound in a desire for proportional representation, but the Constitution doesnot require proportional representation, and federal courts are neither equipped nor authorized to apportion political power as a matter of fairness," Robert wrote. "It is not even clear what fairness looks like in this context." Roberts did admit that "the districting plans at issue here are highly partisan, by any measure. The question is whether the courts below appropriately exercised judicial power when they found them unconstitutional as well." The Roberts majority did not find that the lower court's decisions were constitutional. Justice Elena Kagan wrote a dissent representing herself and the three other liberal members of the nation's highest court. It was a very strongly worded dissent, in which she called the majority's decision an "abdication" that is "tragically wrong." "The partisan gerrymanders here debased and dishonored our democracy, turning upside-down the core American idea that all governmental power derives from the people," Kagan wrote. "Is this how American democracy is supposed to work," she asks rhetorically. Tom Wolf from the Brennan Center for Justice talked three weeks ago about what he expected from the court, and today he comes back on the show to give his thoughts about the court's ruling. Outro music: "There Goes My Miracle" by Bruce Springsteen Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

"Transformation requires people changing. And I don't think most people change when they're defensive," Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove told me. Wilson-Hartgrove is a leader in progressive Christianity, but as a young man he was a conservative Republican in rural North Carolina. And he talks in this episode about how the debate over systemic racism is uncomfortable and intimidating for many white people, and how to reduce those tensions. Jonathan was an organizer of the "Moral Mondays" protests in North Carolina in 2013, and is a leader in the Poor People's Campaign movement that's co-chaired by Rev. William Barber and Rev. Liz Theoharis. Jonathan has co-authored a book with Barber called "The Third Reconstruction: How a Moral Movement is Overcoming the Politics of Division and Fear." He's written several other books on his own, including his most recent, "Reconstructing the Gospel." He talks about the Poor People's Campaign candidate forum with nine presidential candidates and how Rev. Barber has tried to maintain some separation between their movement and the Democratic party. We discuss the concept of keeping a "prophetic distance" in order to be able to speak truth to power, and whether progressive Christians are capable of that on issues like abortion. Outro music: "Life's Railway to Heaven" by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Peter Wehner's new book "The Death of Politics" is a plea to everyday Americans not to give up on politics. "So many things that we love and treasure and care for can be swept away if you get your politics wrong. On the flip side, if you get your politics right, it can allow for the conditions of human flourishing and human dignity to be protected and prevailed," said Wehner in this interview. Wehner served several years as a senior White House adviser to former President George W. Bush. He has deep roots in the world of conservative policy-making and ideas, having also worked as a White House aide to two other Republican presidents: Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Wehner began writing a regular column for the New York Times in 2015, which gave him a prominent perch from which to espouse a conservative critique of Trump. He is also a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. In this interview, Wehner talks about his own spiritual journey, and how he has been disappointed to see the ways in which religious faith is often "twisted into a pretzel" to fit into people's preexisting political ideologies and identities. Wehner says he wrote the book as an "alarm bell in the night" to warn about the impact of Trumpism. But he said Trump's threat to American democracy is not chiefly one of authoritarianism. Rather, he says, it's that we all become like him in our own conduct. On impeachment, Wehner is conflicted. After reading the Mueller report, he believes Trump obstructed justice, but thinks impeachment would make him a "martyr" to many voters. Outro music: "Days of Decision" by Morrissey Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

A Supreme Court ruling is expected any day on one of the biggest drivers of our broken, polarized politics: gerrymandering. Thomas Wolf is counsel with the Democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice, out of New York University. Wolf talks us through the basics of gerrymandering and what the potential outcomes from the court might be. And he explains how a series of rulings by federal courts in the last decade have laid the groundwork for the Supreme Court to issue a ruling of substance this month. Gerrymandering is a big contributor to our polarized politics. The more that dominant state parties — in conservative and liberal states — can maneuver their districts in their favor, the less meaningful the general election becomes. And that is a big reason why so many members of Congress don't show any inclination to work with the other side, to find meaningful solutions to big problems, because they are only concerned with pleasing the most extreme members of their own party. They are worried about being primaried, losing their seat to another member of their own party who runs even more to the extreme than they already are, to win over the primary voters, who tend to be much more in the purist camp than they are of the mind that most voters are, who simply want the government to function and solve problems for all people. It's a complicated issue, but it has big impact. Congressional districts will be redrawn after the 2020 census, and so from 2022 onward, the maps shaped by the court's decision this month will impact the entire universe of policy issues to be hashed out by lawmakers across the country, from tax policy to climate change to gun safety. Outro music: "Absolute Zero" by Bruce Hornsby Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

As Congress returns from its Memorial Day recess, Democrats face a choice: stay united on taking their time to consider whether to impeach President Trump, or begin a massive political fight internally and in the country by rushing ahead with such a move now. Paul Kane is the senior congressional correspondent for The Washington Post, and has covered Congress for 19 years. Pelosi has been trying to hold her party back from pursuing impeachment because there is not enough public support for it, Paul explains, but Mueller's statement has made her job much more difficult. This week will be a crucial test of whether Pelosi can keep House Democrats united. Paul also explains that earmarks might not be dead after all, despite the Senate's vote last week to ban them "permanently." He said the last 10 years in Congress have been a "lost decade," and that part of the reason is the loss of an ability by lawmakers to show their constituents that they are delivering for them. You can read Paul's most recent journalism here. Outro music: "Father Mountain" by Calexico & Iron & Wine Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Michael Steel, spent years as a top aide to Republican leadership on Capitol Hill, namely House Speaker John Boehner, has worked on a number of presidential campaigns, and is now a managing partner at Hamilton Place Partners, a public affairs firm in Washington DC. We talked about how the current uproar among House Democrats pushing for impeachment proceedings to begin mirrors some of the challenges that Boehner faced with a restive Republican conference when the GOP was in the majority from 2010 to 2015, when Boehner resigned and handed the reins to Paul Ryan. We discussed what's causing the dysfunction in Congress that is now the new normal over the past decade. His most provocative idea? Basically to get rid of the Speaker of the House by making it a ceremonial position, turning over real control of House leadership to the Majority Leader position. To understand why he thinks that would make such a big difference, you'll have to listen to the rest of the episode, or you can read my write up of this interview, which is linked to here. Outro music: "All of Our Yesterdays" by Mac DeMarco Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Peter Hamby is host of "Good Luck America," a weekly political show on Snapchat that he said is watched by 2 million young people (the majority of Snapchat users are between 13 and 24 years old). And he writes a regular political column for Vanity Fair's "The Hive," which reaches a more establishment audience. We talk about what he's learned from three years of speaking with, and to, younger Millennials, Gen Y and Gen Z. How do they think, and who and what do they pay attention to? And then we talk about Peter's column in Vanity Fair from a few months ago where he talked about the ways in which the generation gap in America is going to play a role in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary. Outro music: "Grown Nothing" by Stephen Malkmus Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Reid Epstein has covered Beto O'Rourke extensively, as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal the last few years, and now a newly minted member of the New York Times 2020 coverage team. Epstein talks about what it was that made O'Rourke a phenom to begin with, and how the playbook that got him thus far may be more difficult to execute in a crowded Democratic primary. Outro music: "Sisyphus" by Andrew Bird Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Jonah Goldberg is a longtime conservative pundit and author who is in the process of leaving his positions at National Review and the American Enterprise Institute to start a new conservative media enterprise, along with Stephen Hayes, who until last year was editor-in-chief at the conservative Weekly Standard magazine. Jonah has been thinking quite a bit about some of the themes of this podcast, and its specifics around political parties. He had good insights about the ways that many modern media outlets — on the left and right — now actually are political parties, or at least are functioning as part of a what are modern parties. And Jonah said he and Steve Hayes were setting out to create something that does not fall into that trap. We talked about whether their as-yet-unnamed venture will have anti-Trumpism as part of its core DNA, since both Jonah and Steve have been among the most vocal and persistent critics of Trump on the right. Jonah said it would not be anti-Trump in nature, but rather "post Trump." In a style that won't surprise those who have followed Jonah's work over the year, however, he couldn't resist making the comment that the rise of Trump is fundamentally "a story about old people." We talked about how he and Steve are envisioning this new venture will work, what reader or market demand it will satisfy, and how they are intent on avoiding a click-based business model. And he talked about how as they have talked to investors, they have shifted away from a traditional model where a central website is the focus, to a different model where the central website is a hub and the landing page for the brand, but the activity and focus of the work is centered around newsletters, podcasts, and events. Outro Music: "Sow Good Seeds" by Mavis Staples Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Last episode, we talked with Joe Trippi, who played a key political role in the 2004 Howard Dean campaign, which was the first Internet-driven campaign. This week, we have Nicco Mele, who was part of the team helping to run Dean's cutting edge digital operation. Nicco has had an eclectic and distinguished career for someone who is only 42. He has been deputy publisher of the Los Angeles Times, and is now the director of the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. But in 2012, Mele wrote a book called "The End of Big: How the Digital Revolution Makes David the New Goliath." It's an innocuous sounding title, and at the time, I think Mele's warnings about the dangers of the Internet were lost in what was generally still an optimistic time. But early in that book, he wrote that the Internet was opening the door to "chaos, destabilization, fascism and other ills." "Radical connectivity is altering the exercise of power faster than we can understand it," he wrote. Now, he says, many of the dark prophecies from his book have come truer than he had anticipated, and there is a long way to go to repair the damage. "In many ways since I wrote the book things have come more apart," Mele said. We are stuck, currently, with a reality where there are "two worlds" existing side by side as it relates to power and influence, he said. There is the old institutional world, where hierarchy, experience, expertise and tradition are core values. And there is the new connected world that is tearing down the old, where power and influence are far more diffuse and broadly shared. The two need to be connected and fused, he said. Mele said there remains a deep need for new institutions to be built that embody the values of the modern online world, but resurface some older values as well. For example, the idea of an "establishment" existing at all is often decried as inherently undesirable, and institutions are then vilified as tools of a corrupt elite. But, Mele said, that is a bad bargain for everyone. He called for a "new establishment." As I thought about Mele's comments, it put the candidacy of Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg in a new light. I have been skeptical that someone as young as 37 can have the experience needed to run the executive branch. But the paradigm that Mele and I explore here is food for thought to push back against that skepticism. Mele in fact talked at some length about this to Vanity Fair's Peter Hamby in a piece that ran in December, which I recommend. Outro Music: "Avant Gardener" by Courtney Barnett Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/thelonggame. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.