Conservative Minds
131 episodes - English - Latest episode: over 1 year ago - ★★★★★ - 141 ratingsWelcome to Conservative Minds – a podcast about conservative ideas and thinkers. We explore what it means to call yourself a conservative, where conservatism has been, and where it's going. Each week, we select readings and conduct a discussion to share with you our investigation. Join the conversation by liking us on Facebook or following us on Twitter at @consminds.
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Episodes
Episode 30: David Brooks - The Social Animal
August 11, 2019 00:00 - 49 minutes - 50.8 MBBrooks uses ficticious characters as a vehicle to convey social science research and share his reformicon political philosophy. He focuses on preparing people for jobs in the technology economy.
Episode 29: Allan Carlson - From Cottage to Workstation
August 04, 2019 18:00 - 46 minutes - 46.9 MBCarlson tells us the story of the evolution of the modern family. It has gone from a bedrock assumption shared throughout human history to an institution under seige. Carlson walks us through the challenges and maps the ground shifting underneath the family. He sees industrialization as the most prominent destabilizing factor.
Episode 28: Allan Bloom - The Closing of the American Mind
July 27, 2019 17:00 - 46 minutes - 45.5 MBBloom warns about the moral relativism capturing the American academe. He calls out this movement toward 'openness' as a harmful force that paradoxically has resulted in 'closing' the minds of the students. He sees openness as a broadside attack on tradition and common culture. American history and intellectual heritage have been forcibly removed from school curriculum in favor of ethnic and identity studies.
Episode 28: Allan Bloom - Closing of the American Mind
July 27, 2019 17:00 - 46 minutes - 45.5 MBBloom warns about the moral relativism capturing the American academe. He calls out this movement toward 'openness' as a harmful force that paradoxically has resulted in 'closing' the minds of the students. He sees openness as a broadside attack on tradition and common culture. American history and intellectual heritage have been forcibly removed from school curriculum in favor of ethnic and identity studies.
Episode 27: Ross Douthat & Reihan Salam - Grand New Party
July 20, 2019 18:00 - 53 minutes - 53.6 MBDouthat and Salam propose a new vision of modern conservatism that is ideologically principled but poltically pragmatic. They want a policy agenda for working class swing-voters - what they label the 'Sam's Club Republicans.' These are non-college voters who make up roughly half the U.S. electorate. The authors propose a platform of limited govt and strong cultural solidarity, in which the goods of our national life are distributed as widely and equitably as possible. Voter Study Group liber...
Episode 26: Russell Kirk - Concise Guide to Conservatism
June 30, 2019 15:00 - 48 minutes - 47.3 MBRussell Kirk was an early aggregator of conservative thought. He traced conservative intellectual history from Edmund Burke to Kirk's own lifetime. Writing in the 1940s and 1950s, Kirk was nearly alone in his interest in establishing conservatism as a viable political philosophy in America. In this book, he distills the conservative outlook into a concise and readable volume.
Episode 25: Sohrab Ahmari & David French - Essays: Against David French-ism
June 22, 2019 15:00 - 43 minutes - 44.6 MBSohrab Ahmari published his essay, "Against David French-ism," that criticized David French's civil libertarianism and his use of civilized tactics to fight for social conservative values. David French pushed back. We discuss the essays and the implications.
Episode 24: Charles Murray - Coming Apart: The State of White America
June 16, 2019 13:30 - 54 minutes - 54.7 MBCharles Murray uses sociological research to show how white America is dividing into classes based on cognitive ability. Access to college and the college sorting system has facilitated what he calls a 'new upper-class' with its own culture and tastes unique in American history. He posits that higher-IQ individuals are congregating in high-income areas of the country and are increasingly separating themselves from the rest of society. He explores the ramifications of this new dynamic for the ...
Episode 23: Thomas Sowell - A Conflict of Visions
June 09, 2019 13:00 - 49 minutes - 48.8 MBSowell introduces us to his concept of competing visions in American political life. The constrained vision sees progress limited by human nature. Whatever solutions humans develop to restrain or ameliorate human evils will themselves impose costs or create new social ills. Thus, public policy must always deal in trade-offs rather than absolutes. The unconstrained vision believes human moral improvement has no fixed limits, thus all human problems are entirely solvable. These two visions find...
Episode 22: Francis Fukuyama - The End of History and the Last Man (Part 2)
June 02, 2019 15:00 - 50 minutes - 51.5 MBFukuyama evaluates whether history has moved in a discernable diretion. The "End of History" is a concept introduced by Hegel and Kant. They argued that history will end when no further social progress can be made in society. Fukuyama's task is to determine whether liberal democracy constitutes this best possible society. In Episode 21, we discuss Fukuyama's evaluation of the alternatives to liberal democracy - namely, authoritarianism, communism/socialism, and Islam. In Episode 22, we dive i...
Episode 21: Francis Fukuyama - The End of History and the Last Man
May 26, 2019 11:00 - 44 minutes - 46.1 MBFukuyama evaluates whether history has moved in a discernable diretion. The "End of History" is a concept introduced by Hegel and Kant. They argued that history will end when no further social progress can be made in society. Fukuyama's task is to determine whether liberal democracy constitutes this best possible society. In Episode 21, we discuss Fukuyama's evaluation of the alternatives to liberal democracy - namely, authoritarianism, communism/socialism, and Islam. In Episode 22, we dive i...
Episode 20: Ayn Rand - The Virtue of Selfishness
May 19, 2019 00:00 - 49 minutes - 51.3 MBAyn Rand developed a foundation for morality called Objectivism. Objectivist ethics holds that the standard by which one judges good or evil is one's own life - or that which is required to survive. Whatever is proper to ensure survival is good, while whatever opposes or destroys life is evil. Objectivism carries heavy implications for politics and government. Society should elevate rationality, productivity, independence, and freedom that facilitate survival. It should discount parasites, mo...
Episode 19: Andrew Sullivan - The Conservative Soul
May 11, 2019 01:00 - 50 minutes - 52 MBSullivan believes that conservatism is more a disposition than an ideology. He says the defining characteristic of the conservative is that he knows what he doesn’t know. While not denying that the truth exists, the conservative is content to say merely that his grasp on it is always provisional. He may be wrong. According to Sullivan, conservatism is an anti-ideology, a nonprogram, a way of looking at the world.
Episode 18: Leo Strauss - Natural Right and History
May 04, 2019 12:00 - 40 minutes - 41.5 MBStrauss sees a lowering of the sights of political life from a classical focus on values and the Good to a Modern fetishizing of facts and causes. He believes humans can discern right versus wrong according to Nature. He wants to reclaim Natural Right from the misguided critiques from historicism and social science. Strauss believes that all natural beings have a natural destiny that determines what kind of life is good for them. We also consider whether the text implies anything with regard...
Episode 17: Season 1 Recap
March 30, 2019 21:00 - 49 minutes - 50.9 MBConservative Minds has come a long way since we started this project four months ago. With these first 16 episodes, we declare the end of Season 1. For Episode 17, we talked about our reasons for starting the podcast. And we looked back on what we've read so far, with an eye to finding common threads between thinkers. So far we seem common themes related to federalism/decentralization, individualism, free market capitalism, and tradition. If you enjoy the podcast, please take a minute to prov...
Episode 16: Antonin Scalia - A Matter of Interpretation
March 23, 2019 12:00 - 45 minutes - 48.5 MBScalia believes the plain text of the law governs and not the intent of the lawmaker or the predilections of the judge. A legal text should be interpreted reasonably to contain all that it fairly meant at the time of drafting. Words have a limited range of meaning, and no meaning that goes beyond that range is permissible. The judge's role is not to impose her own prescriptions for social justice. The 'Living Constitution' serves as a license to make policy from the bench. Scalia believes we ...
Episode 15: Alexis de Tocqueville - Democracy in America (Part 2)
March 16, 2019 11:00 - 46 minutes - 47 MBTocqueville travelled across America over nine months in 1831 and 1832. He drew on his observations to produce his two-volume masterpiece, Democracy in America. In the book, Tocqueville characterizes the social, political, religious, and intellectual habits of Americans with such deep understanding that, nearly two centuries later, it’s still foundational reading for the study of politics and sociology. In the words of Harvard political scientist Harvey Mansfield, Democracy in America is “the...
Episode 14: Alexis de Tocqueville - Democracy in America
March 09, 2019 11:00 - 42 minutes - 44.3 MBTocqueville travelled across America over nine months in 1831 and 1832. He drew on his observations to produce his two-volume masterpiece, Democracy in America. In the book, Tocqueville characterizes the social, political, religious, and intellectual habits of Americans with such deep understanding that, nearly two centuries later, it’s still foundational reading for the study of politics and sociology. In the words of Harvard political scientist Harvey Mansfield, Democracy in America is “the...
Episode 13: Friedrich Hayek - The Road to Serfdom
March 02, 2019 12:00 - 45 minutes - 47.5 MBHayek sees a choice between individualism and socialism. He contrasts the Enlightenment project of liberal individualism against the collectivist ideologies of national socialism, fascism, and communism. Communism and fascism are two sides of the same coin - both categorically despise individualism. He warns against the trend away from liberalism in the West. According to Hayek, the very success of liberalism has become the cause of its decline. The liberal principles that made progress possi...
Episode 12: Patrick Buchanan - The Great Betrayal
February 23, 2019 16:00 - 44 minutes - 47.2 MBBuchanan sees an America divided by class. The elite class of professionals benefit from globalization and trade, while the middle class lies forgotten and left behind. Global trade deals put American labor in competition with millions of workers willing to do the same jobs for a fraction of the pay an American family needs for a living wage. Meanwhile, millions of illegal aliens compete with unskilled and semi-skilled Americans for local jobs. Buchanan argues that America’s elite is oblivi...
Episode 11: William F. Buckley - Athwart History
February 16, 2019 14:00 - 51 minutes - 54.2 MBBill Buckley nearly single-handedly initiated the modern American conservative movement. He launched the National Review in 1955 to "stand athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it." From his perch at NR, he led a multi-decade project aimed at remaking the public policy landscape. He pulled together disparate conservative strains, while pushing others - the 'kooks' - outside the tent. He played a leading role ...
Episode 10: Irving Kristol - Neoconservatism
February 09, 2019 12:00 - 44 minutes - 49 MBIrving Kristol is widely regarded as the godfather of neoconservative thought. Kristol and his early campatriots were disillusioned liberals and former communists. Most were social scientists. They introduced a rigorous social science approach to issues that the Right had lacked previously. Kristol founded the Public Interest magazine to stand as a bulwark against New Liberal orthodoxy. Neoconservatism differed from traditional conservatives in that its chosen enemy was contemporary liberalis...
Episode 9: Robert Nisbet - The Quest for Community
February 02, 2019 19:00 - 45 minutes - 46.5 MBNisbet argues that Enlightenment individualism has created a widening gulf between the individual and those social relationships that offer meaning. He says the modern release of the individual from traditional ties of class, religion, and kinship has made him free; but this freedom is accompanied by a sense of disenchantment and alienation. Humans have need for a clear sense of cultural purpose, membership, status, and continuity. He calls for a decentralization of power in society, includin...
Episode 8: Milton Friedman - Capitalism and Freedom
January 26, 2019 20:00 - 42 minutes - 45.4 MBMilton Friedman was the twentieth century’s most prominent advocate of free markets. He argues that the free market - what he labels "competitive capitalism" - is a necessary condition for political freedom. The free market gives people what they want instead of what a particular group thinks they ought to want. For him, government serves as a forum for determining the rules of the game and as an umpire to interpret and enforce those rules. Government is necessary to preserve freedom, yet con...
Episode 7: Edmund Burke - Reflections on the Revolution in France
January 20, 2019 01:45 - 47 minutes - 50.1 MBBurke believed deeply in tradition as the governing principle for human flourishing. He called society a living contract between the living, the dead, and future generations. God willed the state to provide the means for perfecting human virtue. For Burke, political and social life is an expression of god’s will.
Episode 6: Robert Bork - Slouching Towards Gomorrah
January 12, 2019 21:00 - 48 minutes - 50.8 MBBork tells us in the introduction that Slouching Towards Gomorrah is a book about American decline and the mounting resistence to it - what he calls the culture war. The enemy for Bork is modern liberalism. In particular, he warns against the dangers of what he terms 'radical egalitarianism' and 'radical individualism.' Both trends undermine traditional morality. Bork argues that govt should play a role in upholding public morality and stemming the tide of moral relativism. He also sees relig...
Episode 5: George Will - Statecraft as Soulcraft
January 06, 2019 00:00 - 48 minutes - 51.5 MBGeorge Will believes the purpose of politics is to cultivate virtue. He argues that the government has a central role to play in governing the morality of its citizens. Statecraft as Soulcraft describes the political imperative to pursue policies that induce improvement of persons. In particular, he calls for policies that "proscribe, mandate, regulate, or subsidize behavior that will nurture, bolster, or alter habits and values on a broad scale."
Episode 4: John Locke - Second Treatise of Government
December 29, 2018 20:00 - 51 minutes - 54 MBLocke posits an original human state of nature characterized by nominal freedom and equality. People leave the state of nature to form political society to protect their property and ensure their safety. In Locke's view, government has a role limited to the preservation of liberty, the security of property, and the redress of injuries.
Episode 3: Richard Weaver - Ideas Have Consequences
December 22, 2018 15:00 - 52 minutes - 51.8 MBWeaver identified philosophical and cultural trends bubbling in the 1940s that denied absolute truth and higher-ordered values. He saw universal narratives - like God or country or family - that provide meaning and coherence to the world falling under the attack of relativism. The consequence of these ideas, he says, is the cultural decline of the West.
Episode 2: Barry Goldwater - Conscience of a Conservative (Part 2)
December 16, 2018 23:00 - 49 minutes - 43.3 MBGoldwater believed foremost in preserving and extending freedom. He advocated for limited government, lower taxes, and restrained spending. In 1960, he teamed up with influential conservative writer, Brent Bozell, to pen his manifesto: The Conscience of a Conservative. An original bible of movement conservatism.
Episode 1: Barry Goldwater - Conscience of a Conservative
December 10, 2018 19:00 - 47 minutes - 48.7 MBGoldwater believed foremost in preserving and extending freedom. He advocated for limited government, lower taxes, and restrained spending. In 1960, he teamed up with influential conservative writer, Brent Bozell, to pen his manifesto: The Conscience of a Conservative. An original bible of movement conservatism. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Barry_Goldwater_2.jpg