Can the US Survive Donald Trump? With Pod Save the US’ Ben Rhodes (Part Two)

Summary

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Intelligence Squared: "Can the US Survive Donald Trump?" With Pod Save the US’ Ben Rhodes (Part Two)

Date: August 4, 2026
Host: Intelligence Squared
Guest: Ben Rhodes (former White House Deputy National Security Advisor, co-host of Pod Save the US)
Moderator/Co-host: Coco Khan

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Episode Overview

In part two of this live Intelligence Squared event, Ben Rhodes reflects on the current state and future of American democracy as the US marks 250 years since its independence. Rhodes explores the behavioral and institutional changes that have both enabled Donald Trump’s rise and tested American democracy to its limits. Conversation topics range from political communication and institutional rot, to the aftermath of American foreign policy, generational change in politics, and prospects for reform. The evening features audience Q&A and candid insights into Rhodes' personal journey within and beyond government.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

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1. Political Communication and Truthfulness

[02:00–05:53]

• Authenticity Over Slogans:
  Rhodes notes how historically, powerful political communication has always faced immediate criticism. If politicians fear criticism too much, they end up saying nothing interesting, which leads to disengaged citizens.
  • “If you're so afraid of that scenario, you will never say anything interesting and people will lose interest in what you're saying.” (Ben Rhodes, 03:22)
• The Importance of 'Why':
  Politicians should lead with personal motivations and authenticity, rather than empty optimism or sweeping slogans.
  • “Before you get to what you want to do, you've got to bring people into that sense of, why do you want to do it?” (Ben Rhodes, 04:18)
• Example of Trump’s Rhetoric:
  Trump’s bluntness about a ‘broken system’ resonated not because it was true, but because it felt true to many Americans.
  • “That was one of the things Trump realized... people are like, yeah, that sounds right. That feels right to me.” (Ben Rhodes, 05:14)

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2. Moral Reckonings on Foreign Policy

[06:35–12:29]

• Connection Between Foreign and Domestic Policy:
  Rhodes shares a personal story from his time in Laos, witnessing firsthand the legacy of American bombing. This experience deepened his skepticism about the narrative of American benevolence abroad.
  • “I went up to a site where they were finding unexploded bombs that the United States has left behind in Laos... Kids are still getting blown up by these cluster munitions.” (Ben Rhodes, 07:23)
  • “It was also easy to tell myself a story that, well... we're better than the alternatives and we're doing it a little bit better than someone else might do it.” (Ben Rhodes, 06:54)
  • “When I got out of power and started talking to people who were on the other end of the bombs... I could no longer hide behind my alleged good intentions.” (Ben Rhodes, 08:51)
• Hypocrisy and Denial:
  Rhodes criticizes U.S. officials who rationalize or ignore American complicity in foreign suffering, particularly regarding Gaza.
  • “When I watch people I know who are in the Biden administration making arguments that we got more aid into Gaza than Trump did... they provided every single weapon that was dropped on a child in Gaza, they won't even look at that.” (Ben Rhodes, 10:29)
• Domestic Consequences:
  Rhodes draws a parallel between foreign abuses and domestic policies, arguing that oppressive tactics abroad inevitably return home.
  • “How you treat people in other countries is also how you end up treating people at home.” (Ben Rhodes, 11:56)

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3. Where Hope Resides: Grassroots Action & Breaking the Spell

[12:29–15:52]

• Don't Wait for Politicians—Organize:
  Recalling a New York Times piece he wrote, Rhodes reiterates that waiting for establishment figures to save democracy is futile.
  • “Do you really want Chuck Schumer to be the one trying to save us?” (Ben Rhodes, 13:13)
  • “The way you get out of things like that is you grab one another's hand.” (Rhodes, as quoted by Moderator, 12:30)
• Minneapolis as a Turning Point:
  Rhodes points to community response in Minneapolis—post-George Floyd's murder—as a turning point against fear, noting that real political change began at the grassroots level.
  • “What the people did in Minneapolis... is they did exactly that. People, ordinary people, like people that are not involved in politics, grabbed each other's hands. They self organized, they protected daycare centers, they protected their neighbors.” (Ben Rhodes, 13:38)
  • “When the fear breaks, the Wizard of Oz is revealed to be behind a curtain with no real powers.” (Ben Rhodes, 14:48)

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4. Audience Q&A Segment (Institutional Failure, Reform, and Future Leadership)

[19:46 onwards]

Q1: How Did Democratic Institutions Fail So Completely?

[20:24–29:04]

• Failure of Institutional Will:
  Rhodes discusses the rot in American institutions, drawing from Benjamin Franklin's warnings.
  • “There is a line... [Franklin] said, this system of government will only end in despotism... when the people shall become so corrupted that they will be incapable of any governance except despotism.” (Ben Rhodes, 21:56)
  • “I don't necessarily think that all Americans... have become corrupted... I do think that our institutions have become that corrupted. There's a rot in those institutions.” (Ben Rhodes, 22:16)
• Checks and Balances Aren't Automatic:
  Checks and balances only work if those in power enforce them; otherwise, they’re meaningless.
  • “What we've learned is that the checks and balances are not self-executing.” (Ben Rhodes, 23:40)
• Structural Reforms Needed:
  Rhodes advocates for campaign finance reform, limiting presidential powers, and systemic changes to rebuild democracy.
  • “We need to change the laws to strengthen the checks and balances. That should start with getting the money out of politics, because I think money is the most corrupting thing.” (Ben Rhodes, 25:39)
• Federalism as a Buffer:
  Surprisingly, the ultimate check on federal tyranny has been state and local governments, though their effectiveness varies greatly by state.
  • “The ultimate check in the United States against fascism has been that we have a federal system... The biggest check and balance in this decade... has been, you know, at the local and state level.” (Ben Rhodes, 27:54)

Q2: What Should the Next Generation of Democratic Leadership Look Like?

[29:08–33:55]

• Generational Change:
  Rhodes criticizes Democratic Party elders' reluctance to pass the torch and highlights the historical appeal of younger, reform-minded leaders.
  • “It'd be helpful if the person was, like, under 70, I mean, and frankly under, I don't know, 55.” (Ben Rhodes, 29:14)
  • “The unwillingness of a generational cohort of Democratic politicians to let go is a big reason why we're in this mess.” (Ben Rhodes, 29:21)
• Connecting Corruption to Everyday Struggles:
  Effective messaging should connect systemic corruption to tangible hardships for ordinary citizens.
  • “The process of how the government and political system works is directly connected to the outcome. We gotta clean up and clean house in the whole system in order to have the outcomes that we want.” (Ben Rhodes, 31:32)
• Speed of Change is Possible:
  Rhodes observes that the Trump era proved rapid transformation is possible, and decisive action is needed from reformers.
  • “One of the things Trump's shown is you can change things pretty fast... We can come in, we can break up big tech companies if we want to. We don't have to wait.” (Ben Rhodes, 32:54)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

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• On the Dangers of Complacency:

  • “If you're so afraid of that scenario, you will never say anything interesting and people will lose interest in what you're saying.”
    —Ben Rhodes, 03:22

• On US Foreign Policy and Moral Clarity:

  • “It took me far too long to begin to recognize this... there needs to be far more of a reckoning.”
    —Ben Rhodes, 10:51

• On Institutional Corruption:

  • “What we've learned is that the checks and balances are not self-executing.”
    —Ben Rhodes, 23:40

• On Political Hope:

  • “People, ordinary people... grabbed each other's hands. They self organized, they protected daycare centers, they protected their neighbors.”
    —Ben Rhodes, 13:38

• On Generational Leadership:

  • “The unwillingness of a generational cohort of Democratic politicians to let go is a big reason why we're in this mess.”
    —Ben Rhodes, 29:21

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Timestamps of Important Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |---------------------------------------------------------------------|---------------| | Introduction (skip: ads/intro) | 01:17 | | Communication, Motivations, and Honesty in Politics | 02:00–05:53 | | Rhodes on Foreign Policy, Laos, and Reckoning with Intentions | 06:35–12:29 | | Grassroots Organizing as Hope | 12:29–15:52 | | Audience Q&A: Institutional Failure and the Future | 19:46–33:55 | | Rhodes on Next Gen Political Leadership and Reform | 29:08–33:55 |

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Conclusion

Ben Rhodes offers a sobering yet hopeful account of America’s recent political trajectory. He argues that true reform depends not on waiting for party elites, but on grassroots organizing, honesty about hard truths, generational change, and the courage to undertake systemic reform. Drawing on vivid personal experience and historical perspective, Rhodes’ conversation is a call for both reckoning and renewal in American life—a message as urgent for listeners in 2026 as it is for future generations.

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For more from Intelligence Squared, visit intelligencesquared.com.

Transcript

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[Ben Rhodes]

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[Coco Khan]

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[Mia Sorrenti]

18 welcome to intelligence Squared where great minds meet. I'm senior producer Mia Sorrenti. In this episode we return for part two of our live event with former White House Deputy National Security Advisor and CO host of podsaving the US Ben RHs. As the US marked 250 years since independence Day, Rhodes joined us at Union Chapel to discuss America's past, present and democratic future. He was in conversation with journalist and co host of Pod Save the UK Coco Kahn. If you haven't heard part one, we recommend jumping back an episode to catch up. But now let's return to the conversation live at Union Chapel in London.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

Presumably you know putting this book together you would have seen these wonderful, powerful speeches that told a story about America, but also at the same time seen how criticized they were. And I wonder if currently politics is so afraid of the criticism. So in this alternate timeline, Andy Burnham tomorrow he's going to do his first speech. Tap tap tap. Listen guys, we just need to be honest. Britain is clapped. We're really clapped. We are having a bad time. We're not relevant. No one really likes us. We probably need to get some better friends. Since the global financial crisis. What are we really doing guys? It Just wouldn't happen. It's truthful. It would meet people where they are in their feelings about how much their life has declined since 2008. Certainly for young people. We all felt that. Many of us, my generation graduated into that credit crunch and felt like it's all been downhill since. But the press would eat him up. It would be a field day for him. Not a patriot. Such a negative Nelly. I suppose my question is, has it always been the case that there's been this robust pushback for all these great speakers, or is there something unique now that makes it even harder to do this job?

[Ben Rhodes]

I think that it's always been there. And I'd say that any speech in any political communication, whether by a politician or by an activist, that ended up changing things received that kind of criticism in the time. If you're so afraid of that scenario, you will never say anything interesting and people will lose interest in what you're saying. If you go out and you just tell people how change is coming, we're right around the corner, you know, Britain's back or America's back, It might go down well, but it won't stick. It won't lead into anything else. I mean, my advice would be what communication kind of works in these moments. First of all, don't start by telling people what you want to do. You have to give people a sense of why you want to do it. You have to be the only person on earth who can deliver the message. Why does Annie Burnham want to be Prime Minister? I think that there's a sense, I think, in watching both the Tories in Labor, that these people want to be prime minister. How many of you had six, seven? I've lost track. Because they want to be Prime Minister and, you know, they want this job and there's, you know, and then they want a message that, you know, can keep the job as long as they can. Right? Not like, hey, what in your life led you to want to actually do this and put yourself out there? What motivated you? What happened in your life, where you come from, what movement inspired you to get into this? Right. Before you get to what you want to do, you've got to bring people into that sense of, why do you want to do it then? I think people want to hear the truth about what's going on. They don't want to be sold a false bill of goods. Right. I mean, I think that was one of the things Trump realized. I don't like the things he said, but the idea that he was telling people that the system is broken, that it's rigged. One of his most powerful communications in his first debates was everybody up on the stage has been bought and paid for. I know, because I used to pay people to buy these people. And people are like, yeah, that sounds right. That feels right to me. And so, yeah, will that be disruptive? Will he get criticized for it? Absolutely. But then I think what you need to do is show people, make them believe that there's a different future on the other end of that.

[Commercial Narrator]

Right.

[Ben Rhodes]

The why are you doing this? The what is happening now? And then the where can we go? How can we get out of this? I think people are really ready to hear that.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

I'm conscious we haven't even spoke about Iran and actually I would say maybe if people have questions, that would be a good place to do it. But given that this is my stage and I get to ask the questions, I really want to talk to you about you. I know, sorry. I'm a millennial. I like to have a deep and meaningful. I want to talk about your journey. This is how I think of you. And maybe I'm wrong, but I think of you as quite a candid critic of American exceptionalism, foreign policy. I think of you as, at times, one of the only few voices who is willing to say, hey, guys, have you thought that war is maybe bad? Have you thought about that? Has that been a lonely journey? Or do you feel that people have finally come around to your view?

[Coco Khan]

Yeah,

[Ben Rhodes]

it's been a journey. I guess the way I'd put this is when I was in the US Government, I wasn't always comfortable with everything that we were doing, particularly when it entered into this space of war and killing. It was sometimes easy to not look at that. You know, I'm going to not go to that meeting. I'm going to go work on something else instead. You know, I'm going to work on the nuclear deal instead of the war. But I was still a part of that apparatus then. It was also easy to tell myself a story that, well, those things are happening, but we're well intentioned people and we're better than the alternatives and we're doing it a little bit better than someone else might do it. In the net of everything we're doing, we're trying to do good. But the more I got out, I'd say there were a couple phases of this journey. To me, the quick story I tell is late in the Obama administration, I went to Laos, and I was the highest ranking government official to go to Laos. A white House official to Laos after the war. And the quick story I tell is that I went up to a site where they were finding unexploded bombs that the United States has left behind in laos. There are 80 million of them. There are 80 million kind of cluster munitions, ball shaped weapons on the ground in Laos. Israel's dropping those on Lebanon today. Kids are still getting blown up by these cluster munitions. And they had me in this kind of big, kind of ceremonial way go to this field where some women with metal detectors had found one of these 80 million. And then I was meant to detonate this thing. And I thought it looked small and so it would make a little sound. The whole ground shook underneath my foot and like a sonic boom went up and clouds of smoke went up in the air. And I went back to a place where I'd been dropped off. There was almost like a 30 minute drive away where my then assistant was with a group of children who kind of greeted us when I got off this boat to go to the site. And she said, ben, when that bomb went off, not a single one of those children looked up. And I realized that the people that dropped those bombs were people who sat in the same rooms that I sat in when I was going to go back to the White House. The precise same rooms. And they tell themselves the precise same stories that they were trying to help the people of Laos, that they were trying to stop the communists in Vietnam. There was an enemy to defeat and a people to help. And here's the result of that war. And then when I got out of power and started talking to people who were on the other end of the bombs that I'd been a part of dropping, I could no longer hide behind my alleged good intentions, that the structures that I was a part of, the machinery that I helped operate, did this very same thing. And that how can I look at the results of these countries and think that we've done anything but break them and kill people in them? And you know, what some people do is they blame the people from those countries, you know, for. Well, they didn't, you know, the Vietnamese, you know, didn't want our democracy or the Iraqis, they're sectarian, or the Afghans didn't fight hard enough. It's never our fault, right? And it's been a journey to recognize the centrality of if there is a country in the world that is trying to dominate other peoples around the world through force and violence, it's always going to end in the same way with suffering and chaos and Bombs left behind. And I don't think I've seen people. And I'm not. This is not a. I'm truly not virtue signaling, because it took me far too long to begin to recognize this. But I think there needs to be far more of a reckoning. I mean, when I watch people I know who are in the Biden administration making arguments that we got more aid into Gaza than Trump did and ignore the fact that they provided every single weapon that was dropped on a child in Gaza, they won't even look at that. They won't even engage with that. And unless and until they do, it's what we were talking about earlier. Who is going to ever trust them again or who's ever going to believe that, you know, that you understand that part of what is so broken in the world is that we not only allowed that to happen, but we're a part of it. And this, I believe, truly how you treat people in other countries is also how you end up treating people at home. And so to be surprised that ICE is going community to community and disappearing people, well, that's what we've done in other countries. And so we have to see that this is all connected. We can't say, well, we'll be progressive at home, but we'll drop bombs on people abroad. You have to be consistent, or else the whole thing is going to end in the same way that I saw it ending in Laos.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

So just finally, before we go to a water break, I wanted to read a quote. You wrote it in the New York Times, and you said, my point is, don't wait for a Democrat to save Washington. But people just need to get in the streets or businesses need to start binding together. Institutions need to stop capitulating. I mean, the way you get out of things like that is you grab one another's hand. To read that from someone who worked in the White House might make you think you're disillusioned about the power of politics. And I wanted to hear a, Are you? And if so, what is giving you hope?

[Ben Rhodes]

Yeah. So, first of all, I remember I wrote that early in the Trump administration, when all these people are like, when are the Democrats going to stand up to this? Where are the Democrats? You know, like, what's the strategy to stop what Trump's doing? And I remember thinking, like, do you really want Chuck Schumer to be the one trying to save us? You know, like, we're really just going to sit back here and wait for, like, you know, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries to give the right press conference, and that's going to stop what Trump's doing. You know, however, I think it's already happened. I truly believe that when we look back at the history of the United States, that turning point is going to be what happened in Minneapolis. Because what the people did in Minneapolis and not because they read my piece, because they probably didn't, is they did exactly that. People, ordinary people, like people that are not involved in politics, grabbed each other's hands. They self organized, they protected daycare centers, they protected their neighbors. Like what is more fundamental than saying, I'm going to protect my neighbors, I'm going to organize my community to push back against these people. I'm in the case of Renee Goode and Alex Preddy, literally gonna put my body on the line. Right. And people around the country saw that. And I'm telling you, it broke some of that fear. If these people can do that, we can start to do that, too. And that was the moment you started to feel like the curtain falling from around Trump. And again, that is politics. I wouldn't say that it's politics or that nothing is more political than what happened in Minneapolis. That's far more political than having the right talking points in Washington. And there's another thing that gives me hope, which is the Pope, right. When Trump attacked the Pope, not a good idea. The next day he gave a press conference on his plane and the first thing he said is, I'm not afraid of this administration. And I think that was very carefully chosen words because that was a message to foreign leaders. Note to Andy Burnham, that was a message to the law firms and the universities and the institutions. Right. And just to people like, we don't need to fear them. When the fear breaks, the wizard of Oz is revealed to be behind a curtain with no real powers. And so it's Minneapolis, I think, that has given me the most hope. And I feel like the trajectory of American politics since Minneapolis has been a steady diminution of Trump's kind of grip on the American psyche.

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[Ben Rhodes]

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[Coco Khan]

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[Ben Rhodes]

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[Ben Rhodes]

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[Audience Member / Moderator]

This is the bit where I really enjoy it. I just get to sit back and let you guys do my job. How fun. So, listen, no pressure. I've got so many questions I didn't get to ask Ben. So listen, if you don't have any questions, I have many questions I might have. As a hint, I might want to ask, should Andy Burnham separate himself from the legacy of Tony Blair? Just saying. It's an idea. I might also want to ask whether this Iran deal will hold and whether an element of Islamophobia has informed our decision making around the Middle East. I'm just saying, just putting it out there. Who would like to start first? So I've looked at this hand here

[Coco Khan]

at the back first, I guess, look from over here. As someone who sort of, like, watched the rise of Trump over the last decade, I think one thing I'm particularly stunned by as someone who sort of studied American politics when I was at school, is you guys are supposed to have checks. Well, you guys are supposed to have checks and balances that fundamentally undermine the possibility of someone like Trump coming to the fore. You know, Congress, you know, judiciary, you guys are literally supposed to have guns to prevent guys like Trump coming to the fore. And yet, and I was just discussing with two ladies here, like, I'm not. So I'm not shocked at the rise of someone like Trump as much as I'm shocked by how easy it was for someone like Trump to rise up. Like, if I don't call him a fascist, because, like, fascists have ideologies. He's corrupt and he's out, he's self interested and that's it. But I'm just stunned at how easy it was for him to become president in a country that's supposed to have so many checks and balances to prevent these kinds of individuals rising to the top. So my question is, how did all of your democratic institutions fail at the exact same time so badly? And when Trump leaves, which everyone's waiting for what prevents someone, an actual fascist with real ideologies coming back to sort of mobilize this populist movement. Sorry, that was long. Thank you.

[Ben Rhodes]

That's a great question. And we could talk about that all night. I think that. There's a line in the first speech in this book. Benjamin Franklin gave a speech, there was a closing argument for the Constitution when we set up all the checks and balances, in which he defends the virtue of compromise. He doesn't even talk about the Constitution itself. He just defends the idea that we need to compromise in order to have a Constitution. And he acknowledges that it's not perfect, but his whole idea was, we need to set this up and then we can have all the arguments within these agreed upon boundaries with checks and balances. And actually, Franklin then ended up modeling the behavior that he wanted to see, because the first thing he did when there was a new government is petition Congress to abolish slavery, right? So he's kind of signaling like, this is the first draft, we got the checks and balances, and we'll fight it out here and we'll amend this Constitution. We'll make these changes, but we'll do it within these agreed upon structures. There is a line, though, that haunted me when I read it in that speech. He said, this system of government will only end in despotism, as other governments have before, when the people shall become so corrupted that they will be incapable of any governance except despotism. Now, I don't necessarily think that all Americans, or even a majority of Americans, have become corrupted to the point that Franklin was warning about. I do think that our institutions have become that corrupted. There's a rot in those institutions. When I have the last speech in the book is Trump's second inaugural address, and I make a point of starting it with the tableau at the inauguration. There behind him is Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg and all these guys, right? And even American cultural figures like Dana White, the head of UFC and the guy who ran Marvel Entertainment, right? Those are the corrupt guys. And actually it's all guys. And they're part of the groups of people that have dumped the money into the Congress, right? Or spent decades buying the Supreme Court that they wanted, right? And I think what we've learned is that the checks and balances are not self executing. If the people in Congress are so corrupted by lust for power or desire for political contributions, they're not going to lift a finger to exert their powers so Trump is literally ignoring the Constitution when he launches a war on Iran or when he destroys usaid, a congressionally established agency of government that is funded by Congress. If Congress doesn't say, wait a second, you can't do that, he apparently can do it. The Supreme Court, if they don't step in to say it is actually illegal to disappear people like ICE is doing without a court order, if the Supreme Court is not going to step in and say, like, hey, this is against the law and we're going to stop you, then the check and balance doesn't really matter. And so at the end of the day, we can't count on the org chart to be the checks and balances. Like, you need people in these institutions that are willing to enforce them. Now, I do think if you look at American history, it's not the first time that something like that has happened, Right? The Gilded Ages kind of was an interesting time to read about and write about. This is like late 19th century, when capitalism was run amok. There's robber barons, there's railroad magnates. They're controlling the economy, they're buying the politicians. Politics became very corrupt. That created a populism that didn't just say, we need to redistribute wealth and set up a social safety net. They said, hey, we need to build some new institutions here. We need a Federal Reserve so that the economy has an institution running it, not just a bunch of rich guys. And that's when we got the direct election of senators, so people could vote for their senators and just instead of having some back room where the rich guys could buy a senator, that's when actually we got women's right to vote. Because people were like, well, maybe if women can vote, we'll end child labor in this country and things like that. And so I think that what we have to do coming out of this, and you see some Democrats like a Jon Ossoff in Georgia, Chris Murphy, talking about this, well, we need to change the laws to strengthen the checks and balances. I mean, like I said, that should start with getting the money out of politics, because I think money is the most corrupting thing. We should get away. But there's other things, right? We should do away with the power of the president to just pardon people. You know, we're going to have to strengthen the obligation of a president to come to Congress to go to war. There's all manner of reforms that I think we're going to have to make coming out of this. Maybe we have to change how the Department of Justice is administrated. So it can't become a kind of personal extension of the President's interest. Because, you know, I think what to go easy on our current moment a little bit every, you know, there's periods of American history where, you know, they, people start to test the checks and balances and they find the weaknesses in them, you know, and then they kind of, they focus on those weaknesses. Like there could not be a Trump today. And here I'm going to be partisan. If for the last 40 years the Republican Party wasn't testing the weaknesses of that system. You know, we're going to gerrymander congressional districts, we're going to put people on the Supreme Court who will do away with laws that limit money in politics. Like they plowed the. I have a lot of ambivalence about some of the kind of never Trump Republicans because a lot of those are the same people that spent decades softening the checks and balances so that when Trump came along, he had a much more of an open field to play with. But I think the simple answer is that the checks and balances aren't self executing. People have to enforce them and if they don't, like, you have to get in there and you have to strengthen them. I will say the one thing that I did learn is that I always learned that checks and balances were like Congress and the Supreme Court. The ultimate check in the United States against fascism has been that we have a federal system, that we have state governments, we have local governments, we've got a big, complex, weird country. And he actually doesn't really govern the whole country. Right. And so the biggest check and balance in this decade, and particularly in the second Trump term, has been, you know, at the local and state level. Now, if you live in Texas or Florida or Tennessee, like you don't have checks and balances like I do in California or New York. Right. But the short answer is like, we're going to have to kind of rebuild the checks and balances on the back end of this thing.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

Okay, I'm going to go here.

[Ben Rhodes]

So this question about the Democratic Party, what attributes themes to look for in the next presidential election without names necessarily being the focal point, I'd say it'd be helpful if the person was like under 70, I mean, and frankly under, I don't know, 55. Like, the unwillingness of a generational cohort of Democratic politicians to let go is a big reason why we're in this mess. And it's not just Joe Biden. Although that was the most acute manifestation of it because people are tired of the establishment of both parties. They're tired of the past. They really want to see the future. And by the way, if you look at the Democratic Party, like, who's won in the last 75 years, right? John F. Kennedy, young guy telling a different story. I won't count LBJ because he came in under weird, you know, circumstances. Obviously, Jimmy Carter came out of nowhere, outsider cleaning things up after Watergate. You know, Bill Clinton, young governor outside of Washington, reformer Barack Obama. Like, we tend to elect the outsider who's younger, who's telling a different story. And so that should be the, it should be someone like that who is not like a longtime insider who's younger, who has a kind of reform message, a future oriented message. I also think Democrats, in terms of the themes, I think they need to connect all these forces that we've been talking about tonight. There's been a debate in the Democratic Party for the last 10 years. I've been in way too many of these discussions, like do we talk about democracy or do we talk about kitchen table issues? As if those are like these two separate things. And if you talk about democracy, you're some kind of nerd or process person. And the smart people who listen to the focus groups just show up and talk about, quote, unquote, kitchen table issues. I see something happening that's interesting now, and I'm going to throw a name out there. And I'm not saying that's who I'm supporting for president, but it's just someone who's doing this. Well, Jon Ossoff, who I mentioned from Georgia, is having a little moment now, and it's because of his speeches he's giving. But beyond just that, he's a good speaker. He's doing away with that and he's connecting all these dots for people and saying it's not a choice. Actually, when you have a system that has become this corrupt, that can be controlled by a very small number of people, Trump, his family, his cohort, that can basically use the federal government to enrich themselves and their friends, whether that's through direct corruption or whether that's through a tax cut for the richest people in the country, well, that's why you can't afford groceries. That's why you never get affordable health care. The process of how the government and political system works is directly connected to the outcome. And so we gotta clean up and clean house in the whole system in order to have the outcomes that we want. And I think that message, and it's very much the same message that came out of the Gilded Age. Like I was saying, like, that the outcomes of lower prices, of kitchen table issues is tied to the capacity to reform this entire system is the message people want to hear. It's frankly what people thought they were voting for Trump for. You know, he was going to break the rigged system, but they just didn't know he was going to break it and loot it. You know, now the opportunity is that we can rebuild it, you know, like, and Biden got this wrong. Like, his message was America's back, you know, but that's not happening again. Like, the hurricane's come through, it's blown down the House. But we can build something different. And frankly, we can be. One of the things Trump's shown is you can change things pretty fast. You know, we can come in, we can break up big tech companies if we want to. You know, like, we don't have to wait and ask permission. Right. Like we don't have to go to the editor. Right. To use your analogy, Coco. So I think that generational change and that message of reform and that ability to connect things and make people believe that we can change how politics and governments functions to get the outcomes that we want, I think that that's what people are responding to. Because if you look, it's not just ideology. Mamdani and say a Graham Platner in Maine are doing this on the left, but look at James Talarico and a Jon Ossoff or a guy named Rob sand who's running for governor, Iowa, doing it more to the center, but they're younger and they're telling this story. And I think that's the main question, right, is that capacity to put forward a different face that is reform oriented.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

Thank you so much, everyone for coming this evening. Ben is going to be signing books. He'll be doing it on stage. And I think the only thing left to do is thank you to Ben.

[Ben Rhodes]

Wait a second. Thank you to Coco, too.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

Oh, yeah.

[Ben Rhodes]

Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.

[Mia Sorrenti]

And thank you to you. Yeah. Thanks for listening to Intelligence Squared. This episode was produced by me, Mia Sorrenti and it was edited by Mark Roberts. For ad free episodes and full length recordings. You can become a [e-mail] membership and if you'd like to join us at future live events, you can find our full program and buy tickets [e-mail] for forward slash attend. You've been listening to Intelligence Squared. Thanks for joining us.

[Ben Rhodes]

Have you seen any dinosaurs? What kind of question is that?

[Audience Member / Moderator]

On August 14th I think that our neighborhood has moved.

[Ben Rhodes]

We're in the past.

[Coco Khan]

Summer ends on Oak street run from producer J.J. abrams, Anne Hathaway, Ewan McGregor. We're gonna survive the end of Oak Street. Directed by David Robert Mitchell. Rated PG13 may be inappropriate for children under 13.

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[Ben Rhodes]

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[Coco Khan]

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[Ben Rhodes]

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[Audience Member / Moderator]

I see you.

[Coco Khan]

Fire and Ash is now streaming on Disney. It's the film critics are calling the best avatar yet. A true epic and completely jaw dropping.

[Audience Member / Moderator]

This is the only pure thing in this world.

[Coco Khan]

Return to Pandora on Disney plus.

[Ben Rhodes]

It will be an adventure for the

[Coco Khan]

whole family and watch the Oscar winning phenomenon at home.

[Ben Rhodes]

This is sick.

[Coco Khan]

Avatar Fire and Ash now streaming on Disney plus rated PG 13.