show episodes
 
For 20 years, the Claremont Review of Books has been the gold standard for conservative criticism and political analysis. Now the CRB comes to the podcast world with a new interview show hosted by Dr. Spencer Klavan, the magazine's assistant editor. As each new issue comes out, Spencer phones up authors whose essays have prompted deeper reflection and discussion. Over a drink and a copy of the latest CRB, he'll chat with the leading minds on the Right about what's going on in politics and li ...
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show series
 
With election day creeping ever closer, political predictions are everywhere already. Spencer takes the opportunity to sit down with Dr. William Voegeli, senior editor of the Claremont Review of Books, to survey the history and prospects of realignment. Voegeli gives an incisive explanation of the current electoral landscape and what both parties n…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan meet the afternoon before the first 2024 presidential debate to discuss the new Spring CRB. Kesler and Spencer spin insightful short-term prophecies--and Kesler calls Biden's flop in advance--using the editor's note as a starting point. Meanwhile, Lee Edwards' tribute to Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag…
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Now that COVID is effectively behind us, it's increasingly easy to throw the hazy blur that was late 2019-2022 down the memory hole. Jeffrey Anderson's latest CRB essay shines a light on the COVID craze: government overreach, popular complacency, and collective amnesia. Spencer sits down with Anderson to continue the post mortem analysis and ask ho…
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For a country that features so prominently in the news and so wildly in many conspiracy theories, Russia is a country that many Americans—especially many in the press—scarcely understand. Dan Mahoney’s new review essay in CRB gives a clarifying survey of major trends, challenges, and attitudes in Russian politics since the days of the Tsars. Withou…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan meet to discuss the winter CRB. Kesler’s cover essay covering the intellectual differences between national conservatism and Trump's brand of nationalism takes top billing. Michael Knowles's insightful review of Chris Rufo's new book invites us to consider where Rufo's project may be headed.…
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Celebrated journalist Lord Charles Moore joins Spencer to discuss his CRB essay on the history and prospects of Thatcherism and its implications for modern conservative movements on both sides of the pond. On the one hand, the forces arrayed against Thatcher's legacy have never been stronger. On the other hand, the attitudes she represented--includ…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan meet to peruse the fall CRB. Kesler’s editor’s note about the intellectual legacy of Henry Kissinger considers whether foreign policy realism is gaining steam on the world stage as multiple wars rage on. Mark Helprin’s essay on the grinding conflict in Israel takes a practical look at the si…
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Algis Valiunas, a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and contributing editor at The New Atlantis, joins Spencer to discuss the great modernist and Anglican convert T.S. Eliot. In the spirit of the season, Valiunas explores how a mixture of tragedy, heartache, and providence led Eliot gradually from the sorrow and discontent expressed in …
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Martha Bayles, frequent contributor to the CRB and prolific author and essayist, joins Spencer to discuss the perils and pitfalls presented by AI, especially as it pertains to the entertainment industry. Bayles elucidates the challenge of AI in entertainment as it emerged during the SAG-AFTRA strike. Will the strike’s goals be met in the long term,…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan convene to survey the summer CRB. Kesler's editor's note about the decline of West Virginia University proves timely as universities across the country reveal their funding priorities. Christopher Flannery’s cover essay on President James A. Garfield introduces a neglected American statesman…
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Wilfred M. McClay, the Victor Davis Hanson Chair of Classical History and Western Civilization at Hillsdale College, joins Spencer to discuss the virtues and the public perception of the Midwest. Professor McClay illuminates the "reservoir of idealism" hidden away in the Midwest's often unexplored but fascinating history. Plus: a deep dive into why…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan sit down to rifle through the Spring CRB. There's lots to unpack, including but not limited to: Kesler's editor's note on the growing ideological divide among the states, Christopher Caldwell's investigation of unrest in France, and a new biography of MLK, Jr. Plus: incisive commentary on th…
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Spencer is joined by Jesse Merriam, a Washington Fellow at The Claremont Institute’s Center for the American Way of Life who specializes in anti-discrimination and affirmative-action law, for a very timely episode. The two discuss the playing field of affirmative action and how diversity came to define our constitutional order, as well as possible …
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Spencer is joined by Michael Knowles, celebrated host of “The Michael Knowles Show” at the Daily Wire, “The Book Club” at PragerU, and “Verdict with Ted Cruz.” They discuss the manic decline of the West and its long history, as well as its present manifestation in the form of trans radicalism. Fortunately, Knowles and Spencer also talk about how to…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan discuss the stimulating new winter 2022/23 CRB. Listen in for reflections on Dr. Kesler's own editor's note and the speech from which it was adapted, discussing the continuity between today's "New Right" and the young conservative movement of the 1950s and '60s. Plus: a survey of ten more CR…
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To close out the Fall 2022 issue, Spencer is joined by Anthony Daniels (pen name Theodore Dalrymple), a British physician, psychiatrist and prolific author of excellent books. They discuss the history of psychiatric treatment in the West, particularly its blatant barbarism until recently, where we've moved from barbarism to aggressive apathy as the…
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Dr. Charles Murray, F. A. Hayek Chair Emeritus in Cultural Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, joins Spencer to expand on his most recent essay for the CRB on how diversity and ethnic differences affect large democratic countries like the U.S. Dr. Murray discusses some of the evidence for his argument, as well as some ways in which these …
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Cornell Professor and Hoover Institution Corliss Page Dean Fellow Barry Strauss joins Spencer to discuss his newest essay for the CRB on Caesar and the fall of the Roman republic. Strauss analyzes Caesar’s character and political calculations within the larger Roman political world. This naturally turns to contemporary discussion of what conditions…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan discuss the thought-provoking new fall 2022 CRB, including Michael Anton’s retrospective on the nuclear near-misses of 1983, Douglas Jeffrey's thoughtful insights into Merle Haggard's life, and Dr. Kesler’s own discussion of what 2022 might mean for 2024. Plus: how closely does the Late Roma…
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Harvard Professor and Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Harvey C. Mansfield joins Spencer to discuss the state of woke dogma and groupthink at American universities. Mansfield reflects on the value of dissent for students who may be privately reconsidering the group mentality, which leads to broader discussion about the morality of equality and what…
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Claremont Senior Fellow Christopher Caldwell joins Spencer to discuss Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and America’s involvement in it. Caldwell’s brief outline of Ukraine’s history with Russia leads them to a broader discussion of why Ukraine became the flash point for Russia’s ire, and how Americans are inclined to narrativize the war. As the…
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Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan discuss the wide range of summer’s new CRB, including Chris Caldwell’s thorough analysis of America’s oblique but profound involvement in Ukraine, Michael Anton’s notes from quarantine in Dubai, and Dr. Kesler’s own essay on the several distinct generations of “voting rights”—a term which is…
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Professor Daniel J. Mahoney joins Spencer to discuss his thorough rebuttal to The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story. Exposing the Project’s willful ignorance and spiteful misinformation leads the two into a broader assessment of American education. The 1619 Project’s architects have engineered a comprehensive assault upon American history teaching f…
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Professor Allen C. Guelzo joins Spencer to discuss his review essay on Alan Taylor’s deflationist histories of America. Along the way, the two discuss the nature of history as a discipline in America and Europe, the true character of the United States, and the moral responsibilities of the historian.…
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Enemies abroad and unrest at home: Editor Charles Kesler and Associate Editor Spencer Klavan discuss the wide range of spring’s new CRB, including Mark Helprin’s in-depth analysis of the war in Ukraine, Nathan Pinkoski’s careful examination of how Spain’s republic self-destructed, and Dr. Kesler’s own comments on the precarity of Court-made rights.…
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Nathan Pinkoski, research fellow and director of academic programs at the Zephyr Institute, joins Spencer to discuss the Spanish Civil War and its implications for modern America. Contrary to the simple morality tale most people learn in school, the history of Spain’s Civil war was a complex demonstration of how a republic can die from self-inflict…
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