Conversations with Bill Kristol
Conversations with Bill Kristol Guest: Jonathan Rauch, Author, Journalist, Senior Fellow Brookings Institution Taped June 17, 2021 Table of Contents I. Polarization and Disinformation (0:15 – 33:00) II: Cancel Culture and Illiberalism (33:00 – 1:21:25) I. Polarization and Disinformation (0:15 – 33:00) KRISTOL: I am Bill Kristol. Welcome to CONVERSATIONS, and I'm very pleased to be joined today by Jonathan Rauch, a longtime friend and someone I've admired a lot and very much looking forward to hearing from. Author of an excellent new book. I should hold this up here, that's what you're supposed to do, The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth, published by the Brookings Institution where he's a senior fellow. In a way this book, John, I think is a follow-up to a book you wrote, God, it's hard to believe almost three decades ago, Kindly Inquisitors: Attacks on Free Thought, which I remember well reading at the time. So, John, thanks for joining me today. RAUCH: It's a special pleasure. I love the podcast and your father helped me with the Kindly Inquisitors at AEI all those years ago. So this, in that way, closes the circle. KRISTOL: Oh, that's great. I didn't know that, so that's good. That's good to hear. You also wrote an excellent piece last year, I thought — I might just begin with that for a couple of minutes before getting into the things you particularly focus on in the book — in National Affairs, I think was about a year ago, two years ago, I guess, on polarization and partisanship.
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