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and start learning today This

1:31

week on the Andrew Yang

1:33

podcast We are conflicted against

1:35

our own impulse to make

1:37

government work right, that we

1:39

are simultaneously eager to build

1:41

out this institution so that

1:44

it can solve big problems

1:46

like climate change and dreadfully

1:48

fearful that like powerful officials

1:50

will do things that we

1:52

personally don't like. And that

1:54

sort of puts us in

1:56

this strange position where we're

1:59

selling refrigerators. don't keep the food

2:01

cold. Like if we're going to

2:03

fix these problems, government needs to

2:05

work. And that's something that we

2:08

as progressives need to grapple with

2:10

ourselves. Institute for International Public Affairs

2:12

and the author of the brand

2:14

new book that explains a whole

2:17

lot about a lot of things,

2:19

why nothing works, who killed progress

2:21

and how to bring it back.

2:23

Mark Dunkelman, welcome Mark. Thanks for

2:26

having me. This is great. It

2:28

is great because this book is

2:30

great, not your first book. You

2:32

wrote a book about I think

2:35

the vanishing neighborliness of Americans. You've

2:37

been in politics for quite some

2:39

time. You worked on Capitol Hill

2:41

and that's one reason why I

2:44

enjoyed your book so much is

2:46

that it had the wisdom of

2:48

a battle-heartened veteran who had been

2:50

in the room trying to get

2:53

big things done. So first give

2:55

people a sense of your background.

2:57

So I graduated from college moved

2:59

down to DC. spent a whole

3:02

lot of time bouncing around different

3:04

democratic offices on the hill, worked

3:06

for Joe Biden for a little

3:08

while, various think tanks in DC,

3:11

decided about a decade ago that

3:13

I did not want to live

3:15

the DC life. So on a

3:17

whim, my wife and I, who

3:20

my wife was pregnant with our

3:22

second child, decided to move to

3:24

Providence, and I've been writing now

3:26

for about 10 years. I write

3:29

for myself, I write for other

3:31

people. But like my thinking has

3:33

always been that being in the

3:35

sort of the world of politics

3:37

in DC almost stilts your sense

3:40

of what's actually happening. You're so

3:42

caught in the whirlwind of, you

3:44

know, we've got to get this

3:46

built on or this budget cycle

3:49

or whatever it is and it's

3:51

hard to see the larger... I

3:53

think moving to Rhode Island and

3:55

having, you know, I go to

3:58

DC a bunch, but it's given

4:00

me sort of the sense of

4:02

like, what are non-DC insiders talking

4:04

about when they see politics? How

4:07

do they interpret things? And having

4:09

sort of one foot in both

4:11

worlds has given me a perspective

4:13

that I'm not sure I would

4:16

have had otherwise. Yeah, DC is

4:18

definitely a bubble. You worked on

4:20

Capitol Hill, I believe in both

4:22

House and Senate offices. DC Think

4:25

Tank, so you're definitely a former

4:27

swamp creature, if not a current

4:29

swamp creature. I don't know if

4:31

you ever turn in the credential

4:34

at a certain point. Is there

4:36

a duration at which you lose

4:38

swamp creature status? No, I mean,

4:40

I appreciate you saying swamp creature

4:43

because the like the Ryan reference,

4:45

I think that like a lot

4:47

of those people are trying to

4:49

do their best and and there's

4:52

a lot of wisdom there. I

4:54

wouldn't give up those years for

4:56

anything. I think, you know, I

4:58

would definitely recommend to your young

5:01

listeners, like spend some time down

5:03

there, figure out what it's like,

5:05

and then come outside because there

5:07

are advantages and disadvantages both to

5:09

being in D.C. and outside. And

5:12

the, like, I think to your

5:14

point, there is this chasm between

5:16

what ordinary people think about government

5:18

and what it feels like to

5:21

be in the law of it.

5:23

And so do I don't know

5:25

if you ever give up the

5:27

card. Hopefully I'd never give up

5:30

the wisdom of having spent some

5:32

time traveling on those streets and

5:34

talking to those people because I

5:36

do think like it's a it's

5:39

just very different from the way

5:41

I'll bet you a lot of

5:43

your listeners who have not done

5:45

that understand the world. It's its

5:48

own perspective. I have been in

5:50

DC and I agree that spending

5:52

time there is super valuable to

5:54

give you a. sense of how

5:57

things may or may not get

5:59

done. So you make a very

6:01

very intelligent timely nuanced argument in

6:03

this book that has three. parts.

6:06

And let's see if I get

6:08

these three parts mainly correct. All

6:10

right. So when people think of

6:12

progressivism, they tend to think of

6:15

a political alignment that's toward the

6:17

far left or they think of

6:19

a century-old popular movement that originated

6:21

various progressive in quotes policies like

6:24

let's say social security might be

6:26

a big example a lot of

6:28

the products of the new deal

6:30

and so that there was a

6:33

lot of of stuff that came

6:35

up from that time but what

6:37

you argue is in three parts

6:39

that progressivism actually has two main

6:41

schools of thought embodied by let's

6:44

say Alexander Hamilton on one side

6:46

and Thomas Jefferson on the other.

6:48

where the Hamiltonian impulse is, hey,

6:50

you need government to get its

6:53

act together to be powerful enough

6:55

to, for example, bring together a

6:57

financial system, which was Hamilton's Jam,

6:59

and then the Jeffersonian impulse is,

7:02

hey, government can't be trusted. If

7:04

you can keep it, it's going

7:06

to do something that's not in

7:08

the interest of the people. And

7:11

so if you can find ways

7:13

to hem it in, cordon off

7:15

its power, maybe restrain it, then

7:17

that's a good thing. So you

7:20

have Hamiltonian progressivism on one side,

7:22

and then Jeffersonian on the other.

7:24

So that's part one. Part two

7:26

is that these. Two conflicting trains

7:29

of progressivism have kind of been

7:31

in tension and waxed and waned

7:33

relative to each other over the

7:35

last hundred years, let's say. And

7:38

then the third part of your

7:40

argument is that at this point,

7:42

that this tension has become a

7:44

massive political liability for quote unquote

7:47

progressivism because when you say hey

7:49

we're going to do something and

7:51

let's use something very concrete like

7:53

my friend Bernie Sanders might say

7:56

it's like hey let's give everyone

7:58

health insurance and then there's like

8:00

this real like Do you really

8:02

trust the government to be able

8:05

to do that sort of thing?

8:07

And the mistrust in government has

8:09

held us back from actually doing

8:11

real things and you have some

8:13

concrete examples in there. So when

8:16

someone says the word progressive, what

8:18

are they talking about? So, you

8:20

know, this was actually one of

8:22

the big problems writing the book

8:25

is that these ideas. One, the

8:27

Hamiltonian impulse to pull power up

8:29

so that you can do big

8:31

things, and the other, the Jeffersonian

8:34

impulse to push power down because

8:36

we don't want coercive institutions doing

8:38

bad things to individuals. Like, the

8:40

terminology here is not great, because

8:43

sometimes progressiveism has been a term

8:45

exactly like today, the Congressional Progressive

8:47

Caucus is really just the left,

8:49

the furthest left wing of the

8:52

Democratic Party. There have been times

8:54

where the progressive idea, as was

8:56

originally defined, spanned both parties and

8:58

in fact may have pulled more

9:01

from the Republican Party, like Theodore

9:03

Roosevelt was the first progressive candidate

9:05

for president. The thing that I'm

9:07

trying to get at here is

9:10

that you are a progressive if

9:12

you're not a conservative. Meaning if

9:14

you're not a conservative. Meaning if

9:16

you think that the abiding interest

9:19

in American politics is that we

9:21

should have less government, like that's

9:23

your view, you're not a progressive.

9:25

If on the other hand you

9:28

think that government can and should

9:30

be used in proper measure to

9:32

solve big problems and we ought

9:34

to be thinking about what is

9:37

the right combination of private markets,

9:39

public institutions, regulation, if that's your

9:41

frame of mind, I'm calling you

9:43

a progressive. So that means that

9:45

people wait on the way left,

9:48

but also a lot of people

9:50

who are probably moderate Republicans, certainly

9:52

never Trump Republicans, maybe even some

9:54

Trumpers, could be in this fold.

9:57

and have sort of some sense

9:59

like I just want government to

10:01

work. You know, if you were,

10:03

if you and I were to

10:06

have coffee at some point and

10:08

you were to say to me,

10:10

like, you know, I'm traveling to

10:12

some country in South America or

10:15

Asia or Europe, and what is

10:17

the, you know, what's the political

10:19

dynamic there? And I were to

10:21

say to you, well, you're just,

10:24

there's a center left party and

10:26

a center right party. We would

10:28

have a notion, you and I,

10:30

of what that meant. Like the

10:33

Center Right Party would be the

10:35

party of private enterprise, the Center

10:37

Left Party would be the party

10:39

of government. In my book, I'm

10:42

talking about people who have a

10:44

notion in their minds that government

10:46

has some important role to play.

10:48

And I think that's a complicated

10:51

demographic to define. It's not exactly

10:53

Democrats. It's not exactly liberals. It's

10:55

not exactly right. It's it's a

10:57

it's a I'm trying to be

11:00

as inclusive as possible and that

11:02

that group has changed in wax

11:04

and waned through the decades and

11:06

what that group thinks has changed

11:09

in wax and waned through the

11:11

decades. So I'm trying to be

11:13

a little elusive there in the

11:15

book in defining progressives because I

11:17

do think it's changed. But I

11:20

do think there's a certain thread

11:22

that extends from, you know, passage

11:24

of the Interstate Commerce Act in,

11:26

I think it's 1887, through today.

11:29

So right, like you're looking at,

11:31

you know, nearly 150 years of

11:33

a movement, quote-unquote, and trying to

11:35

understand how that fits together and

11:38

how that evolves through the decades.

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starts now. I

12:56

have sat with a very conservative,

12:58

I'm sure Republican voters in Iowa

13:00

were farmers, we're going to vote

13:03

for Trump. And then if I

13:05

were to say to them, hey,

13:07

do you think the drug companies

13:10

are screwing over the people, they'd

13:12

be like, yes. Are you for

13:14

restrictions on those drug companies, screwing

13:16

people over, yes. You know, like,

13:19

I mean, that's something that you

13:21

would need government to do because

13:23

obviously the drug companies are gonna

13:25

just show up being like, hey

13:28

guys, like we're gonna stop doing

13:30

the things you don't like. It's

13:32

super unfortunate in my mind that

13:34

things have kind of gotten placed

13:37

on this ideological spectrum. because the

13:39

way you're defining is like, hey,

13:41

do you think government should try

13:43

and solve some problems? I mean,

13:46

there are a lot of very

13:48

conservative people who are very open

13:50

to the government solving problems around,

13:53

for another example, be big tech.

13:55

I sat with the same farmer

13:57

and be like, hey, what do

13:59

you think of the big tech

14:02

companies? We're like, oh, I have

14:04

them in, you know, and so

14:06

it's like, well, who's gonna do

14:08

that? I mean, the theory, the

14:11

government, was Democrats and progressives who

14:13

wanted good things, which, by the

14:15

way, also maps to a lot

14:17

of the book buying public, which

14:20

is fine. There was like a

14:22

desire to try and explain things

14:24

to self-identify progressives saying, look, the

14:26

enemy is not just conservatives of

14:29

the other side. The enemy is

14:31

that these factions within. the Democratic

14:33

Party who have these contrarian impulses

14:36

and you know it's not necessarily

14:38

different people's fault. One example you

14:40

used in the book that I

14:42

enjoyed that kind of talked about

14:45

sort of both the coming together

14:47

and then the rein in the

14:49

federal government was the development of

14:51

the airline industry which I thought

14:54

was very apt. So you start

14:56

out with a bunch of crazy

14:58

cowboy type. airline operators and everyone's

15:00

scared to fly and you don't

15:03

know what's going on. Totally, yep.

15:05

And then the federal government had

15:07

to, you know, step in. So

15:09

go ahead and walk people through

15:12

kind of the waxing and waning

15:14

of the government's role. Yeah, I

15:16

mean, so, you know, the airline

15:19

industry is very, very immature in

15:21

the early 30s and like the

15:23

fear is that you know if

15:25

you start an airline if you

15:28

invest that money to start an

15:30

airline at any point one of

15:32

your competitors would come in and

15:34

undercut your your line like right

15:37

if you're going to start flying

15:39

from Denver to Chicago and like

15:41

that costs a certain amount of

15:43

money but there's another airline and

15:46

they decide to come in and

15:48

find that same route like you're

15:50

going to be bankrupt in a

15:52

second with an airplane and not

15:55

know what to do with it

15:57

so the the federal government under

15:59

Roosevelt establishes something called the civil

16:02

aeronautics board And their role is

16:04

to regularize this, to make it

16:06

so that if you invest the

16:08

money required to purchase an airplane

16:11

and hire a crew and do

16:13

all things as... to start an

16:15

airline, which is a fairly capital-intensive

16:17

endeavor, like you're going to know

16:20

that you're going to get some

16:22

return because they're going to protect

16:24

you from like just like a

16:26

new splurge of competition. And so

16:29

this Civil Aeronautics Board is created

16:31

by the New Deal. It's a

16:33

progressive idea and it works, right?

16:35

Like we do develop an airline

16:38

industry that is like big enough

16:40

and safe enough and etc. etc.

16:42

etc. And like it grows over

16:45

the next several decades until you've

16:47

got a bunch of... trunkline, they

16:49

call them trunkline airlines that are

16:51

like, you know, you can get

16:54

almost anywhere in the country to

16:56

another place like, and like they

16:58

regulate prices so that people are

17:00

not, you know, you're in your

17:03

gouge, nor is competition used in

17:05

like an anti, in a monopolistic

17:07

way, so that you're undercutting the

17:09

competition to eliminate it. So it's

17:12

to regularize the whole thing. But

17:14

then you get to like the

17:16

70s. And like you've got this

17:18

weird thing where like this big

17:21

government institution appears to be captured

17:23

by the airline industry itself. And

17:25

so it's the airlineers, it's like

17:27

it's like the airline executives who

17:30

like the cab, they like the

17:32

regulation because it is preventing new

17:34

upstart competition against them and the

17:37

public is paying a price. So

17:39

there's this fight to deregulate the

17:41

airline industry and the like the

17:43

political like. Like people associate this

17:46

now with Reagan, like deregulation is

17:48

a Reagan-era thing, but it was

17:50

like Ted Kennedy and Jimmy Carter

17:52

competing to be the more deregulatory

17:55

Democrat. They were joined by two

17:57

groups in sort of in support

17:59

of them. One was like the

18:01

people that you would expect, the

18:04

Libertarians who believe government is the

18:06

sort of the evil of all

18:08

evils that you would associate with

18:10

Reagan, right? Like this is... the

18:13

Chicago School of Economics. that it's

18:15

really very skeptical about government intervention,

18:17

but also by Ralph Nader, like

18:20

the far left, which is like

18:22

this is a captured government institution

18:24

working on the past of these

18:26

huge corporate elites. But it's sort

18:29

of like it's hard to place

18:31

in the current context of the

18:33

way that we think of progressivism

18:35

and conservatism, because it was the

18:38

progressives who wanted to put put.

18:40

guardrails around government, right? Like to

18:42

dismantle this government institution, the Civil

18:44

Aeronautics Board, and it was the

18:47

corporate elite and like the sort

18:49

of the old, the old, some

18:51

old school that wanted to maintain

18:53

it. And so like, just here

18:56

is like, we in the, we

18:58

on the left don't think about

19:00

this much, we don't like to

19:03

talk about it because it doesn't

19:05

fit our existing mold. of understanding

19:07

the left is wanting more government

19:09

and the right of wanting less.

19:12

Like here is a situation where,

19:14

you know, this applies all sorts

19:16

of different realms. We on the

19:18

left were really skeptical of government

19:21

power and wanted to shave it

19:23

down. And you know we can

19:25

we can we people can have

19:27

honest conversations about what the impacts

19:30

were whether it was good or

19:32

bad or whether we should have

19:34

found a different way to regulate

19:36

airlines other than dismantling that civil

19:39

air and arts war entirely which

19:41

is what Carter and you know

19:43

Ted Kennedy did sort of in

19:46

cahoots and almost in competition with

19:48

each other right this is before

19:50

Kennedy challenges Carter for the Democratic

19:52

nomination at 80. But but you're

19:55

you're right to pick up on

19:57

this example because it it You're

19:59

pulling back a layer of policy

20:01

making, sort of the brain dead

20:04

notion that we are for government

20:06

and they are for private corporations

20:08

is... exposed here. It's like it's

20:10

much a much more complicated story

20:13

that we are ourselves intellectually divided

20:15

about who should actually get to

20:17

make decisions. Yeah, I love the

20:19

airline industry example too because people

20:22

can understand it. And it's like,

20:24

yeah, you would need more government

20:26

to help the industry mature to

20:29

a point where everyone's feeling perfectly

20:31

safe, getting on a plane and

20:33

their roots to Iowa City and

20:35

wherever the heck and the rest

20:38

of it. And then people then

20:40

look at it decades later and

20:42

say, oh, like, you know, this

20:44

is... corporate power, like too concentrated,

20:47

and then it's anti-consumer, and then

20:49

they turn against it. One of

20:51

the interesting parallels to me was,

20:53

let's say, social media as an

20:56

example. You kind of skipped the

20:58

entire government. figuring it out and

21:00

helping it mature phase. You were

21:02

just like, you just let them

21:05

do whatever. And then now data

21:07

is coming out about how it's

21:09

not so good for the mental

21:12

health of teenage girls in particular.

21:14

And then, but now the social

21:16

media giants are so powerful, they're

21:18

just like, yeah, like nothing to

21:21

see here. I mean, you kind

21:23

of skipped like the good part

21:25

of the government being involved. Yoni

21:27

Applebaum on the podcast a couple

21:30

weeks ago talking about his book

21:32

stuck, which now I think is

21:34

getting included with your book Why

21:36

Nothing Works as like an explainer.

21:39

And I thought that there were

21:41

some similar ideas for sure. And

21:43

you use the word vitocracy, which

21:45

I quite enjoy. So that this

21:48

is this actually is one of

21:50

the most important points of I

21:52

think your book is In a

21:55

primitive overly simplistic and in my

21:57

view totally inaccurate picture of the

21:59

world you have the progress you

22:01

want to do all of this

22:04

stuff. And then on the other

22:06

side of the conservatives, keeping them

22:08

from doing it. And if all

22:10

the progressives just got, you know,

22:13

51% of that legislature, then like

22:15

all of the good things would

22:17

happen. But Yoni's point is like,

22:19

look, what's keeping you from affordable

22:22

housing in the big blue cities?

22:24

Zoning laws, which by the way,

22:26

you know, liberals love. Because they

22:28

got it there. We're like, well,

22:31

don't do anything. And then the

22:33

net impact is. that housing values

22:35

go up to the sky in

22:37

various blue cities and you know

22:40

that that makes people sad in

22:42

ways. You had this very compelling

22:44

example of the Obama administration trying

22:47

to do big renewable power projects

22:49

as a response to the 2008

22:51

collapse. It's like, okay, we have

22:53

to spend a lot of money.

22:56

So let's go build like a

22:58

giant wind power line because, you

23:00

know, like this will be win,

23:02

win, win, win. It'll help us

23:05

green the grid. It'll get some

23:07

money out there in the ground

23:09

infrastructure. And then it doesn't happen,

23:11

not because the conservatives block it.

23:14

There are actually some conservatives who

23:16

are into it because it was

23:18

going to be in their neck

23:20

of the woods. it from happening

23:23

like along the construction line that

23:25

now there are all of these

23:27

points of objection that people can

23:30

raise and that that and that

23:32

these are not things that conservatives

23:34

typically employ it's it's quote-unquote liberals

23:36

who are dubious of government building

23:39

or projects and so they impede

23:41

it. And so this is like

23:43

progressive stopping. government from actually achieving

23:45

many big things. Yeah, I mean,

23:48

I think in certain cases, it's

23:50

progressives who use these tools, these

23:52

vetoes, within the system to block

23:54

things that they don't want happy.

23:57

in their neighborhood, conservative use of

23:59

tools too. Everybody uses the tools.

24:01

The big shift here is that,

24:03

you know, a generation ago, three

24:06

generations ago, we progressives thought the

24:08

problem, the meta problem in American

24:10

politics was that smart, publicly minded,

24:13

wise people didn't have enough power

24:15

to make decisions for the whole

24:17

of us. Like we wanted like...

24:19

real experts who understood the big

24:22

picture, who thought about all the

24:24

competing priorities, who like were really

24:26

well-versed to be empowered to choose

24:28

what we're going to do, where

24:31

a highway was going to go,

24:33

where a bridge was going to

24:35

be built, how we were going

24:37

to get power, how the powers

24:40

can be delivered. Like we had

24:42

an image, progressives did, of like

24:44

generally like white men in gray

24:46

suits wearing sort of frowns and

24:49

fadoras and like they were the

24:51

quote-unquote establishment and they were wise

24:53

and smart and they had you

24:56

know shown us the way out

24:58

of the great depression and they

25:00

had beaten the Nazis and they

25:02

won the second rule of war

25:05

and like in the 50s like

25:07

the solution to big public problems

25:09

seemed to be in empowering those

25:11

types. to do more at their

25:14

own behest. So like the establishment

25:16

took all sorts of forms in

25:18

the world of foreign policy, took

25:20

the form of the Georgetown set,

25:23

which was like sort of like

25:25

a bunch of like. investment bankers

25:27

and rich old people and they

25:29

were like the wise men at

25:32

the State Department and they were

25:34

going to fashion the martial plan

25:36

and do containment and they had

25:39

all sorts of ideas we were

25:41

going to empower them like don't

25:43

listen to what ordinary people think

25:45

like give the experts control and

25:48

the same notion applied in the

25:50

world of infrastructure like how are

25:52

we going to string up wires,

25:54

who should get to control the

25:57

utilities? It should be the Public

25:59

Utilities Commission. Again, the establishment, and

26:01

who should get to choose what

26:03

house you went up? Like, there

26:06

was this phrase that was prevalent

26:08

during those days, that you can't

26:10

fight City Hall, which is like

26:12

a, that didn't mean you couldn't

26:15

unseat an incumbent mayor. Like, incumbent

26:17

mayors were unseated all the time.

26:19

The issue was that behind the

26:22

mayor was the real power. generally

26:24

older men who met in a

26:26

you know it's not exactly you

26:28

know in the back of a

26:31

of a saloon it's like they

26:33

met in like a boardroom and

26:35

they were the powerful people at

26:37

the Chamber of Commerce and in

26:40

the business community and right like

26:42

the union leaders and they were

26:44

like they they made decisions they

26:46

were the power elite and our

26:49

thought was as progressives we're all

26:51

better off if they are given

26:53

more latitude to make the right

26:55

decisions. And then we wake up

26:58

in the 60s and the 70s

27:00

and realize, oh man, that these

27:02

guys aren't necessarily so wise. They're

27:05

not necessarily so publicly minded. They're

27:07

making often bad decisions. They're making

27:09

decisions that benefit them. They're setting

27:11

us into a war that we

27:14

can't win. They're raising whole parts

27:16

of cities. through urban renewal in

27:18

ways that are terrible for poor

27:20

people and people of color, you

27:23

know, they're polluting the environment with,

27:25

you know, inefficient generating plants, they're

27:27

spraying, you know, pesticides on plants

27:29

to help big ag in ways

27:32

that cause birth defects. Like there

27:34

are all these things that the

27:36

establishment has done poorly. And so

27:38

our impulse as progressives switches from

27:41

a Hamiltonian to the Jeffersonian impulse

27:43

in the Maine. and we begin

27:45

thinking to ourselves we are going

27:47

to put in new mechanisms so

27:50

that ordinary people can say stop

27:52

when these sort of dark establishment

27:54

figures begin trying to impose their

27:57

will. And so exactly to the

27:59

point that you just brought up,

28:01

by the time Obama is president-elect

28:03

and they're having a meeting in

28:06

Chicago about is there some way

28:08

to get wind power in the

28:10

upper Midwest into Chicago where that

28:12

wind power would be expended? Like

28:15

even people on Obama's team are

28:17

like, listen. Mr. President, elect. It's

28:19

a great idea in theory, but

28:21

like the process of both erecting

28:24

the wind farms and then building

28:26

transmission lines that are going to

28:28

cross all of these farms and

28:30

suburbs and people who are not

28:33

going to like the idea, and

28:35

who, by the way, probably also

28:37

won't benefit directly from the electricity,

28:40

right? Because the electricity is going

28:42

to Chicago and Milwaukee. Those people

28:44

are going to stand in the

28:46

way and so we need to

28:49

look to different sorts of projects

28:51

if we're going to get this

28:53

recovery money out quickly and so

28:55

like the challenge here is not

28:58

to say We need to go

29:00

back to the old way where

29:02

like you know grizzled oil We

29:04

need to build something we want

29:07

and you know get out of

29:09

the way Correct and it but

29:11

but we've now so over corrected

29:13

that in all these realms we've

29:16

created the opportunities and this sort

29:18

of the bureaucratic infrastructure that anyone

29:20

who wants to say no, even

29:23

to a good project, can get

29:25

in the way. Each spring, 23

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who've risked their lives to speak

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road premiered March 10th. Follow and

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listen on Apple podcasts, the Odyssey

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app, Spotify, or wherever you get

30:33

your podcast. Yeah, there's a lot

30:35

of frustration around the country that

30:37

we can't seem to... do a

30:39

lot of things that, you know,

30:42

it seemed like we could do

30:44

a few generations ago. You know,

30:46

it's like when you go around

30:49

the country and they talk about

30:51

how great the Golden Gate Bridge

30:53

is and you just think, oh

30:55

wow, like we tried to do

30:58

that now, it would, you know,

31:00

they contrast it with the California

31:02

High Speed Rail project where, you

31:04

know, conservatives mock it and then

31:07

you look at it and you

31:09

know, I can see why you

31:11

are mocking it. You know, and

31:13

then it puts progressives on the

31:16

back foot. because it's hard to

31:18

defend a government that can't get

31:20

various things done. I think, you

31:22

know, you tell a story about

31:25

repairing an ice rink in New

31:27

York where these couldn't get it

31:29

done. And then these gave it

31:32

to a developer who got it

31:34

done for a fraction of the

31:36

cost because they got to hire,

31:38

you know, like, hire the same.

31:41

team to do it, whereas the

31:43

government had to break it up

31:45

into multiple teams. And I think

31:47

that developer's name was Donald Trump,

31:50

which is like a very tough,

31:52

like a tough pill to swallow

31:54

for a lot of people, but.

31:56

you know, like that you do

31:59

have this patchwork type of system

32:01

and people get frustrated by it.

32:03

And then, so you wind up

32:05

thinking, how can you, how can

32:08

you get back to government capacity?

32:10

I think there was like, there's

32:12

a passage in one of you,

32:15

you've all know, Harari's books, which

32:17

really stuck with me. He said

32:19

that everyone's concerned about. someone else

32:21

having too much power, someone else

32:24

has too much power, when in

32:26

reality, everyone's like, where did the

32:28

power go? Like, you know, no

32:30

one, like, no one could do

32:33

the thing anymore because we've been

32:35

trained to your point in this

32:37

Jeffersonian impulse is like to fear

32:39

the power, speak truth the power,

32:42

like power is a bad thing.

32:44

And so what we've done is

32:46

we've kind of gutted government capacity.

32:48

And then that is the liability

32:51

that progressives are faced with politically

32:53

now, because if you're a conservative

32:55

saying, like, do you really trust

32:57

the government to do that, then

33:00

progressives have to argue, yes, we

33:02

do, even though, like, you know,

33:04

they themselves the next day might,

33:07

might be the opposite. Yeah, that's

33:09

exactly right. Like, the reason that

33:11

New York City couldn't rebuild this

33:13

rink. was because a previous generation

33:16

of progressive reformers had been worried

33:18

that, like, you know, the Mara

33:20

Schenectady might, you know, create some

33:22

bunk public works project and then

33:25

give the contract to do the

33:27

work to his brother-in-law. And it

33:29

was in the invitation to corruption.

33:31

So they decided to make it

33:34

so the government, when they were

33:36

going to do big projects, we're

33:38

going to have to split up

33:40

the, you know, the electrical work,

33:43

the concrete, the... plumbing, etc., etc.

33:45

like good, right? But it made

33:47

it impossible for government to function.

33:50

And so exactly to your point,

33:52

like, what was Donald Trump's great

33:54

insight in the midnight? was that

33:56

even in a very liberal city

33:59

like New York, liberal people were

34:01

also pretty skeptical of government so

34:03

that he could be outrageous but

34:05

be effective in this case and

34:08

or claim to be effective. He

34:10

could run against the government without

34:12

being necessarily like a small government

34:14

conservative. I could say I'm going

34:17

to get you a better deal.

34:19

That would be politically appealing. even

34:21

in a liberal city, right? Like

34:23

there's this terrific quote from I

34:26

think like Joyce Pernet column at

34:28

the time, like right after the

34:30

Woolman rank has reopened, that Trump

34:33

succeeds, where some ordinary New Yorker,

34:35

like who you and I would

34:37

presume would be an Obama Biden

34:39

voter, right, or maybe a Yang

34:42

voter, right? But he, but this

34:44

guy says, you know, whoever can

34:46

get anything done in this city

34:48

deserves a take or take a

34:51

parade. Right and like you can

34:53

imagine Donald Trump reading that in

34:55

Trump tower just like you know

34:57

You know what I don't know

35:00

what he would do but but

35:02

he would he would he would

35:04

have liked to be you know

35:06

ushered down the canyon of heroes

35:09

and confetti certainly at that time

35:11

and certainly probably at this time

35:13

too and Like you're absolutely right

35:16

like we have become so focused

35:18

on screaming over and over people

35:20

who supported Trump saying like this

35:22

guy's a monster and he's a

35:25

monster and he's a You know,

35:27

he's a convict and he's a

35:29

zenaphob and a racist and he's

35:31

incompetent and he's a snake oil

35:34

salesman and we've been attacking him

35:36

without looking inside ourselves to see

35:38

that we are conflicted against our

35:40

own impulse to make government work,

35:43

right? That we are simultaneously eager

35:45

to build out this institution so

35:47

that it can solve big problems

35:49

like climate change and dreadfully fearful.

35:52

that like powerful officials will do

35:54

things that we personally don't like

35:56

and that sort of puts us

35:59

in this strange position where we're

36:01

we're we're selling refrigerators that don't

36:03

keep the food cold, right? And

36:05

then trying to get a refrigerator,

36:08

Mark. The problem that we need

36:10

is to create a refrigerator that

36:12

works. The problem is the underlying,

36:14

the underlying, the underlying, the underlying

36:17

problem is that the thing that

36:19

we're selling, is a thing that

36:21

we are telling people doesn't work

36:23

and doesn't work. And so rather

36:26

than being focused on every Trump

36:28

outrage. Like, this is a moment

36:30

where we don't have any power.

36:32

So we ought to spend it

36:35

thinking about, like, what, let's get

36:37

this right, let's think about how

36:39

are we going to create an

36:42

agenda that would give it the

36:44

average voter, the impression, and the

36:46

reality that once power is handed

36:48

to a government official, they will

36:51

be able to expeditiously, solve some

36:53

big public problem. Ryan

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38:01

Yeah, and that leads to your

38:04

recommendations and hope for the future

38:06

where you say, look, this is

38:08

not a bad thing because what

38:11

this means is that if we

38:13

can figure out what we are

38:15

doing, both in terms of our

38:17

anti-power slash government mindset sometimes like

38:20

the Jeffersonian impulse, like we start.

38:22

like approaching things a bit differently

38:24

and then actually maybe look at

38:27

the rules and regulations that comprise

38:29

the the vitocracy like maybe we

38:31

can change this like this is

38:34

actually more within our power to

38:36

change than perhaps changing the hearts

38:38

and minds of you know millions

38:40

of other on the other side.

38:43

Yeah I mean I'm sure you

38:45

have this experience like when you

38:47

talk to progressives today They're sort

38:50

of out weeks in. They feel

38:52

like they've spent the better part

38:54

of a decade yelling and screaming

38:56

about Trump, trying to get people

38:59

to pay attention to the things

39:01

that he's lied about, that he's

39:03

wrong about, that he's a, you

39:06

know, that he doesn't actually care

39:08

about the people that are voting

39:10

for him in the working class.

39:13

We've been so focused on that

39:15

and the sort of the notion

39:17

is like how many times do

39:19

we have to tell people that

39:22

he's bad until they believe us?

39:24

As if we are powerless? to

39:26

do anything but you know post

39:29

another example of Trump being duplicitous

39:31

on Facebook or Twitter or whatever

39:33

we're going to do like the

39:35

sort of notion is like you

39:38

know I I voted for the

39:40

other guy I'm going to keep

39:42

telling the truth but like until

39:45

these people you know begin to

39:47

don't reality dawns on them they're

39:49

going to send our country into

39:51

a tailspin and what I'm saying

39:54

here is like The upshot of

39:56

my argument is that this is

39:58

something that we can fix. Like

40:01

we don't have to wait for

40:03

Donald Trump. Like we, to the degree

40:05

that we are our own impediment, we can

40:07

solve this. Like there have been moments

40:09

in progressivism's history where we've done

40:12

amazing things where we've had a

40:14

really clear vision and we've accomplished

40:16

incredible things. Like the Tennessee

40:18

Valley Authority, which I think is

40:21

the apotheosis of Hamiltonian progressiveism, like

40:23

here is an entire region of

40:25

the country that was. you know,

40:27

50, 100 years behind technologically, like

40:29

there were poor farmers who couldn't

40:32

get electricity to their farms, so they

40:34

were farming in the manner of the

40:36

19th century here in the middle of

40:38

the 20th. And the private companies, the

40:40

utilities in the South, largely a

40:43

company called Commonwealth Wealth and Southern,

40:45

didn't believe that the return of

40:47

wiring up these poor farms was

40:50

going to be worth... the

40:52

expenditure that they would have to lay

40:54

out. So they were leaving these people

40:56

to live in poverty. And the FDR

40:58

and the people that he hired to

41:00

run this authority said, no, like if

41:02

the market doesn't work here, we are

41:05

going to fix it. And so they

41:07

did, they damned a bunch of rivers,

41:09

they built these wires, they reforested, you

41:11

know, barren land, they created reservoirs, they

41:13

created new industry, like, like to the

41:15

degree that the new, the upper south

41:17

today is sort of, you know,

41:19

in keeping with, Yeah, like, yeah,

41:22

that is a, that is something

41:24

that we, the progressives, have done.

41:26

There is no way that the

41:28

progressivism of today with its anti-government

41:30

overlay would ever seek to do

41:32

anything so ambitious. And it wouldn't get

41:35

done, even if Obama or Biden

41:37

or anyone, even if they proposed

41:39

it, like the system simply wouldn't

41:42

allow it to get done. We

41:44

need to focus on ourselves and

41:46

create a place where... Government

41:49

is capable of doing big

41:51

things again, high-speed rail, transmission

41:53

lines that take advantage of the

41:55

clean energy revolution, new housing, etc.,

41:57

like when we can make decisions.

42:00

fairly quickly, even when there are

42:02

environmental objections, even when there are

42:04

local objections, even when someone is

42:06

going to pay a heavy cost,

42:08

like these are public goods, like

42:10

we've got an asteroid, you know,

42:12

coming towards earth, proverbiality in climate

42:14

change. Like if we're going to

42:16

fix these problems, government needs to

42:18

work, and that's something that we

42:20

as progressives need to grapple with

42:22

ourselves before we can continue to

42:24

sort of... Instead of being so

42:26

exclusively focused on trying to convince

42:28

people that the other side is

42:30

the root of all evil. I

42:32

love it. That's a great message.

42:34

No, there was a Twitter slash

42:36

X thread that made this argument

42:39

and said, look, Democrats, if you

42:41

want us to vote for you,

42:43

all you have to do is

42:45

make all of your blue cities

42:47

incredible examples of prosperity and people

42:49

living well and, you know, not.

42:51

have homeless people or drug addicts

42:53

on the street and like have

42:55

housing be affordable. Like all you

42:57

have to do is just make

42:59

all of your blue cities awesome

43:01

and then we'll all come running

43:03

and be like, oh, it turns

43:05

out those guys were right. And

43:07

I thought that was, you know,

43:09

like that thread went viral and

43:11

I thought it was like, oh,

43:13

it's a reasonable argument because like

43:15

frankly, people are leaving both New

43:17

York and California out of affordability

43:20

concerns at the state level and

43:22

the numbers are very real. I

43:24

mean, New York lost a member

43:26

of Congress in part because of

43:28

the population shift. You know, maybe

43:30

it's because of my general approach,

43:32

but it's like you want to

43:34

look inside yourself first. I think

43:36

you've done a really, really powerful

43:38

job of making this case, like

43:40

not in like, you know, it's

43:42

like a... I mean, you document

43:44

it and break it down in

43:46

a way that to me is

43:48

very, very inarguable. I think what

43:50

you've made is a very valuable

43:52

contribution to how progressives can think

43:54

about making the changes that they

43:56

want in real life. Like not

43:59

in like, you know, like the

44:01

social media battle of the day.

44:03

But in our communities and neighborhoods.

44:05

I mean, the most remarkable thing

44:07

to me in writing the book

44:09

has been the degree to which

44:11

it's so clear that we are

44:13

vexed against ourselves, right? That if

44:15

you were to go into a

44:17

coffee shop. in October of last

44:19

year and asked a young voter

44:21

like what are your two top

44:23

voting issues and they were to

44:25

say climate change and reproductive rights

44:27

like you and I wouldn't have

44:29

thought twice about that that would

44:31

seem totally normal but but on

44:33

the our solution on the climate

44:35

change things is clearly Hamiltonian right

44:38

we want to instill in some

44:40

bureaucracy the ability to tell carbon

44:42

emitters to stop. And our concern

44:44

on right to the right to

44:46

the right is clearly Jeffersonian, right?

44:48

We don't want some bureaucrat telling

44:50

some woman what she can do

44:52

with her body. And so like,

44:54

it's just that like we would,

44:56

with absent the sort of us

44:58

thinking about it in the way

45:00

that I'm trying to get my

45:02

book to do, we don't see

45:04

how those two things are. It

45:06

doesn't mean that anyone whose pro

45:08

choice has to be against. of

45:10

fighting climate or that someone who's

45:12

for fighting climate needs to be,

45:14

you know, throw reproductive rights outside,

45:17

but we just understand our own

45:19

thinking if we're going to, if

45:21

we're going to point our way

45:23

outside of this box, it seems

45:25

to be allowing the populist mechanical

45:27

wing of the American populace to

45:29

wield a lot of input. Yeah,

45:31

the way I've explained it. Mark,

45:33

as I've said, look, you have

45:35

like the pro-institution people and the

45:37

anti-institution people and the anti-institution people

45:39

are winning. They've just had a

45:41

better argument. They can just be

45:43

like, hey, you're full of shit.

45:45

This TV channel is full of

45:47

shit. Like those people are full

45:49

of it. And more and more

45:51

Americans, like, oh yeah, like I'm

45:53

done for that. And then the

45:56

Democrats have become the de facto

45:58

defenders of the institutions, but the

46:00

institutions are faltering, and so it's

46:02

like a losing argument. And so

46:04

you need a different argument, either

46:06

make the institutions work at a

46:08

much higher level, maybe revamp them

46:10

meaningfully, maybe modernize them meaningfully, but

46:12

saying, hey, it's working, is not

46:14

working, which is pretty much a

46:16

reasonable summation of why nothing works,

46:18

who killed progress, and how to

46:20

bring it back. Congratulations, Mark. How

46:22

can people catch up with you

46:24

or keep up with you in

46:26

your work? I'm on all the

46:28

regular socials, but really all of

46:30

my wisdom has been poured into

46:32

that book. So if any of

46:35

these ideas are appealing, it's right

46:37

there. You don't even have to

46:39

quick click follow on on X

46:41

or anything like that. You heard

46:43

it here first. Mark would rather

46:45

you buy and read his book

46:47

than that you follow him on

46:49

social media. Mark Dunkleman. Why Nothing

46:51

Works? Congratulations, my friend. You really

46:53

have made like a very, very

46:55

big contribution. I know it was

46:57

a lot of work. And I

46:59

learned a lot. You know, I

47:01

mean, I consider myself pretty savvy,

47:03

but I learned a lot from

47:05

your book. Thanks for having me

47:07

on. This has been a great

47:09

conversation.