So It Goes: Niall Ferguson on Good Books, Bad Screens, a 1968 Redux, and Hobbits | GoodFellows
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- čas přidán 12. 09. 2024
- In a topsy-turvy election year, does America’s 2024 presidential contest summon ghosts from 1968-or, is a late-breaking 1980-style landslide in the cards? Historian Niall Ferguson, the Hoover Institution’s Milbank Family Senior Fellow, appears solo on this “mini” edition of GoodFellows (or is it GoodFellow?) to discuss the current political landscape, what roles an aging electorate and the “gender gap” will play in America’s election, plus a fondness for tariffs shared by two very different Republicans: Donald Trump and William McKinley (aka “the tariff king”). Niall also discusses the challenges in raising two young sons in the Information Age, and his renewed appreciation for the works of Kurt Vonnegut.
Recorded on July 31, 2024.
ABOUT THE SERIES
GoodFellows, a Hoover Institution broadcast, features senior fellows John Cochrane, Niall Ferguson, and H.R. McMaster discussing the social, economic, and geostrategic ramifications of this changed world. They can’t banter over lunch these days, but they continue their spirited conversation online about what comes next, as we look forward to an end to the crisis.
For more on this series, visit:
www.hoover.org...
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"Reading is the antidote to screen addiction". AMEN! Just finished rereading, Trollope's 6 book Palliser novels.
Intensely welcome, deeply enjoyed. Great conversation. Thx much gents
"Not a political show". Fantastic. You guys are the best comedians.
I can only dream to be as smart as Niall. A great conversation. Cheers from Poland for both interlocutors.
..to tears. Because I am in my 60's and young father too. About reading the books. Really enjoyed this conversation and really appreciate your pure sincerity. Thank you gentlemen!
Mr. Ferguson, I love you. Thanks for this personal sharing. Neil K.
Keep on going guys, and thank you as always!
Good talk. Agree with a lot of it. Have a blessed day all!
I agree with Niall concerning the raising of children. We decided to raise adults -in-waiting; so that our children could cope with big life issues while also participating in the culture around them. We allowed one hour of tv/week. No video games at home until their 16th birthdays. Thereafter, one hour of tv/video games each. One book per week. Dinner at the table each night. It worked. They successfully became adults. They are in their 40s. We are still surprised
We all are 😢
If you can control your children. That does not depend only on you, but also on the environment, peers, partners .... the circumstances vary
I'm a boomer and I'm addicted to screens.. 😅
"International Man Of History" Love that! :^D
Always appreciate the discussion, most especially the book recommendations. Vonnegut wouldn't have been one I'd likely have picked up. Many thanks.
I’m nearly 63 Niall. I have 8 and ten year old boys. My wife and I have always adhered to the upbringing you stated at the start of the programme. It’s almost a relief that we are shadowing a person of your standing. We get a lot of positive comments about our boys which helps!
One of the benefits of modern streaming is that as TV becomes obsolete, parents actually have more control over what their children watch. You also have access to far more content, meaning you can curate your children's experience much more easily.
Thanks again, dudes. You rock!
Niall needs to read Twain's "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" just before reading Vonnegut's "Player Piano." Now that he's reading Vonnegut, he's going to be more American than ever.
Vonnegut. sounds more isolationist. and these days, we need less of that.
Very dated. There was no disruption at DNC and it went off quite well with the base energized and RFK has withdrawn
I admire this Niall. Very glad he's got my name!!!
Cat's Cradle is my favorite Vonnegut book. It is one of the five Vonnegut works I read during downtime between field exercises in my second summer of training at West Point. They provided a unique combination of escapism and deceptively thought-provoking concepts. Bokonon is a sage whose wisdom (and Vonnegut's, by proxy) is timeless:
Tiger got to hunt,
Bird got to fly;
Man got to sit and wonder, 'Why, why, why?'
Tiger got to sleep,
Bird got to land,
Man got to tell himself he understand.
Indeed, it is in our nature to both question the meaning of existence and to assert that we have found the answer. An interesting thought to hold in your head when your job is to understand and explain world events, or when your life is being shaped by them.
I read The Hobbit to my children when the were in middle school. I also read them Ender's Game when they were in high school.
Both of them have been avid readers as they grew up.
Brilliant opening scene. :)
Burgess Meredith was blacklisted by the House UN-American Activities Committee for his liberal views during the 1950s Red Scare.
Thanks. I always enjoy every GoodFellow and GoodFellows.
That has always been my favorite episode, and then at the end, he breaks his glasses!
My wife's and my favorite episode also--seen when we were kids.
I only know it from the Simpsons because i am a millenial 😂
I like Vonnegut. Been a long time since I read any of his work. As a historian, Niall might enjoy the work of Tom Steinbeck, John's son. One book of his I'm familiar with is "Down to a Soundless Sea," a collection of short stories and a small novella. They're fictional vignettes woven through historical fact of early life among mariners, traders and others along the California coast. California's unique history provided Steinbeck a rich backdrop from which to draw. An enjoyable read -
There is an alternative: balance bikes. Which are a great analogy to why excessive help is bad (I.e training wheels).
Interesting the comment that 1892 was the only other time in American history when a "current and former president faced off". How about 1912, when William Howard Taft (current) and Theodore Roosevelt (former) president faced off, leading to Woodrow Wilson's victory?
An EXCELLENT innings!!!!
Always a delightful show! Thanks for that
Loved that episode of “Twilight Zone”.
Dated on arrival.
RFK Jr. assures that!
Please keep going!
Niall is all we need. All meat no fat
Good advice about the screens and kids, Niall! I’m about to become the step dad to a couple of small children, so I’m taking this advice to heart.
Just a joy.
Love Niall Ferguson but I didn't like the way he dismissed RFK. I wouldn't necessarily vote for him but I saw enough the other night to know that no other recent candidate for president could give a speech like he did. Not fair to sum him up as weird.
In the last Goodfellow, it was stated that Tariffs always hurt the country issuing the Tariffs. Tariffs and outright refusal to let others compete don't seem to be hurting India or China. Nor did they hurt the fledgling US. Running a constant trade deficit seems a fast path to poverty to me. For the US it has lead to a truly staggering national debt that will destroy the US faster than any salvo of nuclear weapons when a large creditor decides that they will not only lend no more but asks that they be repaid.
I'll preface my comment by saying that I'm not a fan of his, but RFK Jr. has been pretty clear about his vax stance. He's not anti. Although I would venture to inquire how exactly Niall defines "anti-vaxx."
When was this recorded? The DNC is over, and RFK endorsed Trump.
"Why does this duopoly continue when there's such demand for a third option?"
That's a very simple question to answer. Majority rules. You need 50% of the electoral college to become president. You need 51 votes to pass something in the senate. You need more than 50% of the votes to pass something in the house. You need more than 50% of the delegates to win a primary (or at least a plurality).
Because of that, even without formal party structures, the vote naturally falls into demanding an approximate bisection. When there IS a big enough demand for a third option, what usually happens is one party or the other has an enormous blowout victory because they take whatever policy stance is so popular (FDR 1932, Nixon 1972, Reagan 1980) but then afterwards tend to splinter under its own weight because either the demand for the issue has passed
(FDR won 1932 and 1936 in landslides, but won by smaller majorities in 1940 and 1944 because the issues that made him so popular- economic reforms and the New Deal, became subordinate to the Second World War; he still won by a large majority, but overseas wars were extremely unpopular- still are, usually- unless there's an EXTREME moral need to engage in them such as WW2 or Afghanistan after 9/11, and ultimately Truman couldn't keep that New Deal coalition together and Eisenhower came in afterwards)
or because some other issue divides the party, which is swollen beyond its usual capacity to win, such as Vietnam dividing the Democratic party in 1968 and 1972.
That's why people say there are party switches. TECHNICALLY it's not the parties that switch, it's the constituencies of the parties that move from one side to the other, but for practical reasons it's better described as a party switch, because for all intents-and-purposes the parties MAY AS WELL have switched- the best example being that while the Republican party was the party that abolished slavery, it was then also the party that actively opposed the civil rights movements. Also, the actual people that voted in the 1860 election were obviously all dead by the 1960s, so while the names of the parties were the same, they completely changed on the inside.
I'm fully ok with if someone disagrees with me on this one, (please don't thumb me down,) but I'd say Mr. Ferguson looks way better with a beard.
Anyways, would be great to see more of GoodFellows light-editions like this one in addition to the usual ones. 👍
Good talk. Agree on the internet, reading book and a lot of the Trump discussion. Have a blessed day!
Excellent interview!
This was recorded nearly one month ago...A week in politics is a long time. Quite a lot has happened during the last 3 weeks. RFK dropping out and endorsing Trump...Riots all over England and Labour becoming extremely authoritarian...A pity this episode wasn't released a couple of weeks earlier...Greatly enjoyed nevertheless.
Lots here - but - the Culture series is excellent!
Also a decent number of audiobooks
are it is since I've been a subscriber, to be able to listen and enjoy the Distinguished Hoover Fellow, Mr. Whalen conduct an interview.
Thank you for this One-Off, somewhat Out-of-the-Norm opportunity.
Irreplaceable even by Niall. Great show.
I wish John Cochrane had been around to correct Niall Ferguson’s assertion that a tight labor market causes inflation.
Growing up I was also mostly either in the library else playing football, both the real game with the oblong ball and what they play elsewhere (I say this with humor as I loved both).
3 TV channels!!?? Luxury. We didn't even have a TV..we had few pieces of coal and whatever else in the streets.
The greatest podcast of them all
That Twilight Zone clip was the saddest most heartbreaking thing I had ever seen on television as a kid!
The screen on my laptop broke the other day, but my God, I have calmed down so much I'm really considering not repairing it.
The key to teaching children to ride a bike is not "running along behind holding the saddle" but trainer wheels.
Trainer wheels teach them to lean the wrong way at a corner. The original way is far faster and teaches them the right things
I like this but it's 3 week old news.
Good nightime book for young boys, summer book Last Bus to Wisdom
Niall, you are welcome in Easton, PA (county seat of Northampton County) anytime.
I'm far from agreeing with the leftists, but if Trump is regarded as a 19th century "nativist," then you can.be sure that the left will call that fascist, largely because they regard the American experiment as fascist. They're wrong, of course, but the woke rhetoric about U.S. history is pretty consistent.
It really should also be noted that the money raised for Biden's reelection could only be transferred to his VP. If anyone other than Harris ran as the Democratic Party nominee, they would have had to start over raising funds. That surely played a role in the donor class deciding who the candidate would be. (Hilarious "typo" in the captions here at 19:02 )
I hope Niall listens to the phil dragash audio version of lotr trilogy, available on the internet archive
In my case at 56 I am among the 1st of Gex X, we are both sort of near the boundaries.
The Education of Carey McWilliams (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979). (autobiography)
Extensive Tariffs never work, Adam Smith, in the US especially in 1828, 1890, and 1930. Trump is talking about 10-20% on all imported goods except Chinese which will get 60%. A recipe for inflation, product shortages, international retaliation, and economic weakness. They will impact middle-class families to the tune of $4000.
Not available from my public library was the book "The year that broke politics."
Then I looked for the Karl Rove book "The Triumph of William McKinley" which I was able to reserve. I associate Karl Rove with being a Republican political knife man.
So I used Wikipedia to revisit that era. My opinion is the 12 or 14 years starting with William McKinley was a decade of banking experimentation. The idea of a square deal put the business community on a stable plane. The Federal Reserve System stabilized banking.
Wikipedia says McKinley was the start of a Progressive era. This association does not carry over to Karl Rove. I am going to read his book the same way I approached the Kissinger book (which I did not read through) to try and understand the cluster of ideas he holds.
I’m liberal democrat but listening to goodfellows I agree with most of their positions 😄. Can’t wait for there to be normal Republican as a candidate.
Uniparty is so fun
What?
Is keeping southern border open normal?
100 billion usd for sustaining Ukrainian government and its employees is normal?
supporting Hamas and hating white people is normal?
De criminalizing petty theft/rioting is normal?
Men acting like women and forcing others to accept them as women is normal?
I could list 10 more things..but I am from India so it's not my place to say..
American society is lost hope you get normal
What one with a brain doesent work for you?
Yes! I am a lifelong Republican/libertarian. Trump ruined the party. I am shocked at the far right radicalism. I thought radicalism was only on the Left. I am a George H W Bush and Mitt Romney republican. I despise Bush jr. and Trump.
1980 I agree it is, whether voters get it remains to be seen….
Thank you for not being completely dismissive of the candidacy of Kamala Harris. It will be a close election--until it isn't.
Comments on Rfk are off based...
18:52 "A new thing is generally preferred to an old thing in American life." While the statement is true, I doubt that it applies to Kamala, who, after all, is a sitting Vice President and will continue the policies of her predecessor. I think this election is more about anti-establishment vs status quo or, if you will, "change" vs "more of the same".
"goodfellow, singular"
constant disrespect against my man-fellow bill
Peace through strength? 10 GOP Senators who voted against the Foreign aid bill for Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan including Hawley, VANCE, Lee, and Cruz. Harris had a strong "strength through strength tone at the Convention. Looks more like 2020.
God bless bedside books.
Iain Banks and the Culture series are awesome .... and The Wasp Factory is truly weird (non-Culture).
I would characterize Trump as a "classical" populist in the 19th century nativist tradition not the 20th century variety that aligns with socialism.
RFK has joind with Trump .... I am very very happy about that
Every leftist on earth would dismiss this entire podcast immediately based on the identity of the participants.
As usual, you underestimate us.
Witch hunt: the revival of heresy
by McWilliams, Carey
Austons gain as well
What’s wrong with Cincinnati?
If you have to ask , you’ll never understand 😂
17:33
45:30
???
“How Israel Made AIPAC: The most harmful foreign influence operation in America”…By Grant F Smith
Would you be willing to consider that just because RFK is an anti-vaccine advocate (research the depth and significance of his history in the industry, it is impressive), that does - in all fairness, not mean he should be called, “Weird”?