Garry Wills and the Real Kennedy Curse
On this episode of The Time of Monsters, talking with Sam Adler-Bell and Matt Sitman about the toxic legacy of a famous family.
The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer
The Time of Monsters podcast features Nation national-affairs correspondent Jeet Heer’s signature blend of political culture and cultural politics. Each week, he’ll host in-depth conversations with urgent voices on the most pressing issues of our time.
Garry Wills and the Real Kennedy Curse
For this week's episode of The Time of Monsters, I’m doing a joint podcast with the crew from Know York Enemy (Sam Adler-Bell and Matt Sitman) talking about the legacy of the Kennedy family.
Our talk is based on our shared love for Garry Wills’ The Kennedy Imprisonment, a revelatory book about not just the Kennedy family but the nature of 'great man politics.'
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American financier and ambassador Joseph Kennedy (right) sits on a couch with his son, future American President John F. Kennedy in 1938.
(Pictorial Parade / Getty Images)For this week’s episode of The Time of Monsters, I’m doing a joint podcast with the crew from Know Your Enemy (Sam Adler-Bell and Matt Sitman) talking about the legacy of the Kennedy family.
Our talk is based on our shared love for Garry Wills’s The Kennedy Imprisonment, a revelatory book about not just the Kennedy family but also the nature of “great-man politics.”
This is an in-depth discussion that touches on many topics including the mainstreaming of Catholicism in the 1950s, the appeasement policies of the British ruling class in the 1930s, Cold War liberalism’s embrace of elitism, macho culture and misogyny, and mass movements as an alternative to great-man politics.
Know Your Enemy is one of my favorite podcasts. I very much admire its mixture of scholarly knowledge and political urgency. It was a pleasure to join Sam and Matt for this discussion.
The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer
The Time of Monsters podcast features Nation national-affairs correspondent Jeet Heer’s signature blend of political culture and cultural politics. Each week, he’ll host in-depth conversations with urgent voices on the most pressing issues of our time.
The Dangers of Trump’s Cynical Anti-War Message w/ Matt Duss
Donald Trump and JD Vance have a surprising closing message in the 2024 election: they are the antiwar candidate. About the rising conflict in the Middle East, Trump has said, “I wanna see it all stop, I wanna see the Middle East get back to peace.” On a podcast, Vance criticized the Biden “Even though they say they want to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties, they pursued the pathway that maximizes those casualties. They say that they're pro-Israel. They've pursued the pathway that has prolonged the war as long as possible, which is bad for Israel.”
This message is of course deeply cynical since Trump is planning on staffing his administration with hawks, as he did in his first term. But it might have appeal to undecided voters, who polls show are strongly antiwar.
To discuss why Democrats have ceded the peace vote to the GOP, I talked to Matt Duss, vice president of the Center for International Policy and frequent guest of the show.
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