Political scientists Hyrum and Verlan Lewis discuss the 2024 election and the power of self-narratives in American politics.
0:00- Introduction
0:53- The Myth Of Left And Right
7:19- Politics is getting more rigidly polarized
9:50- Has the Republican Party become ‘far right’?
14:09- Politics are granular, not binary
19:20- People are more loyal to parties than positions
21:41- Trajectory of the Democratic Party
26:40- Democrats must embrace pluralism to win
31:05- Pluralism vs. Monism
32:37- Ad: ZBiotics
34:23- Trajectory of the Republican Party
37:33- How do RFK Jr and third parties fit into all this?
42:02- Backgrounds of the Lewis brothers
43:38- Political parties today function like churches
48:06- Why do the major parties flip flop so much?
53:47- There has never been a liberal or conservative consensus
58:51- Does the left hate America?
1:02:28- Finding hope against cynicism in American politics
reason.com/podcasts
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In the wake of massive victories by Donald Trump and Republicans, here's a question worth asking: What does today's GOP really stand for? Longstanding support for free trade and overseas wars seems to have been replaced with tariffs and non-interventionism.
Hyrum Lewis and Verlan Lewis are the authors of The Myth of Left and Right. They argue that the way we talk about the political spectrum misleads and confuses us because it reduces complex special-interest coalitions to one or two issues that really aren't representative of what the parties actually stand for. As a result, they say that the next four years will be as fractious within the GOP (and the Democratic Party too) as the last four.
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