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Truth Over Tribe: An Interview with Cornell West & Robert George | 3.15.25
00:15:44
Progressive scholar Cornel West and conservative philosopher Robert George discuss their book "Truth Matters," sharing insights on fostering unity, fruitful disagreement, and trust across partisan lines in a polarized America. Get the facts first on Morning Wire
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- [00:03]
Georgia Howe
Despite a divided media landscape, most Americans say they're ready to be united. In today's episode, we speak to the conservative and progressive co authors of the new book Truth, Cornel west and Robert George about what it takes to maintain relationships across partisan divides and where the two parties should go from here. I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire Editor in Chief John Bickley. It's Saturday, March 15th, and this is an extra edition of Morning Wire. NetCredit is here to say yes because you're more than a credit score. Apply in minutes and get a decision as soon as the same day. Loans offered by NetCredit or lending partner banks and service by NetCredit. Applications subject to review and approval. Learn more at netcredit.com partners NetCredit Credit to the people Joining us now to discuss their new book and to comment on the current state of the parties is scholar Democratic presidential candidate and self professed progressive, Cornel west and current Princeton professor and conservative political philosopher Robert P. George Cornell. And Robert, thank you both for coming on.
- [01:11]
Cornel West
Absolutely. Thank you so very much for having us.
- [01:14]
Robert P. George
Yeah, thank you, Georgia.
- [01:15]
Georgia Howe
So first off, I'd like to hear an overview of your book before we get into some of your perspectives on some current things. Robert, let's start with you.
- [01:23]
Robert P. George
The title says what the book is about. The title of the book is Truth A Dialogue on Fruitful Disagreement in an Age of Division. So Brother Cornell and I are both dedicated. It's our vocation to get at the truth of things, to try to get in touch with reality. At the same time, we recognize that we, like every other member of the human family is fallible. We get things wrong. We never know the truth perfectly, we never know it fully. Nevertheless, it's our calling as professors, but it's also the calling of every member of the human family to try to get at the truth of things. Not to live in error, not to live with lies, not to live with falsehoods, but to try to get the truth of things. It's intrinsic to our flourishing as human beings. So in this so called post truth society, or this society in which people think there's my truth and your truth, but really no such thing as the truth, Cornell and I are putting forward the proposition that in fact there is a truth. It's hard to get to sometimes can never know it perfectly. But there is a truth and we should be about the business of knowing it and knowing it really matters.
- [02:31]
Cornel West
Absolutely. I think that Brother Ravi and I view ourselves as being part and parcel of great traditions. The Socratic Legacies of Athens, where we try to muster the courage to think critically for ourselves, to examine ourselves, examine our society and world, do it in the spirit of intellectual humility, but also tenacity. So we're in pursuit of the truth, but also the prophetic legacy of Jerusalem, the courage to love. And because justice is what love looks like in public, to actually be justice seekers. But we recognize that truth capital T and justice capital J, they're bigger than any of us, any of our groups, our tribes, our nations, our races, our genders, our sexual orientations. So we have a certain sense of acknowledging we're both fallible. But we do believe that we've got to get beyond any kind of narrow relativism and any kind of sense of not being deeply concerned about courage, courage, courage to think, courage to love.
- [03:33]
Georgia Howe
So, just getting to the brass tacks of it, what are some of your top suggestions for actually getting to those fruitful conversations in an age like this?
- [03:41]
Robert P. George
The first point I think that it's important to understand is we think you need to get beyond tribalism. You need to abandon tribalism. You need to think for yourself and anybody who thinks for himself. Although he may, by virtue of his views, belong to a certain community of conviction, there will always be points on which he disagrees, where he's critical of his own tribe, his own ideological group, his own comrades in arms in political and cultural struggles. And you need the courage to be able to and willing to dissent when you think your team has gone wrong on this point or that. Point number two, you need to be open to the possibility that your side isn't always in the right. Your side can be wrong about things, you can be wrong about things. So you need intellectual humility and a self critical attitude that's all part and parcel of truth seeking. And then the third thing, and this is so very important today, is we need to get beyond the idea that if someone disagrees with me, they are waging an assault on me personally. In this identitarian age that we live in, people confuse their beliefs, their convictions with their very selves. And so if you challenge someone's view on something, that person will perceive it as a personal insult, a personal attack. But that is toxic to truth seeking and it just further deepens us in the mire of ideology. So we need to be willing to be challenged, open to be criticized. We need to be willing to engage others, yes, with a spirit of trying to teach what we think we know, but also with the spirit of trying to learn from our critics.
- [05:24]
Cornel West
Yes, I would Just add that I think we're living in a moment of such spiritual decay and moral decrepitude was not just polarization. What is gangsterization, obsession with the eleventh commandment, thou shall not get caught, rather than the ten. And so Robby and I are simply trying to make the case that integrity, honesty, decency ought to be at the center of our sense of what it is to have civic virtue. And civic virtue is about public interest and common good. That, again, like Robby says, goes beyond tribe, goes beyond region, race or gender or what have you, is something profoundly human. And we are missing that in this moment.
- [06:07]
Georgia Howe
Now, I want to ask both of you some questions about current events just to hear your perspective. We'll start with this last election. And we'll start with you, Ross. Robert, what are some of the takeaways for you just watching this past 2024 election?
- [06:21]
Robert P. George
Well, the goal of a political campaign is to win. But my worry is that and this last election is a very good example of it, people are willing to win at any cost, and truth can simply be thrown out the window. And so often in this past campaign it was and you could both point to examples on both sides. But I think what we have to demand of our politicians is, is at least some minimal threshold level of truth telling. We have to make sure that politicians pay a price when they just egregiously lie to the public. And we've seen this time and time and time again. Now, all the polling data, Georgia, show that there's a massive loss of trust by the American people in their institutions. That's not the fault of the American people. That's the fault of the institutions, which means it's the fault of the people who lead and run these institutions. They earned the distrust that they now have. Whether we're talking about the media, whether we're talking about government and politics, whether we're talking about the judiciary, whether we're talking about the presidency itself, whether we're talking about religion. Look at all the great institutions on which we rely for a healthy society who have lost the trust of the people.
- [07:34]
Cornel West
And as you know, I actually ran for president, so I have a particular kind of bias here, but it has to do with the lens through which I look at the world. You see, as a Christian and a black freedom fighter, I look at the world through the lens of morality and spirituality. And what I saw was corruption in both parties, mendacity in both parties, hypocrisy in both parties, big money playing a disproportionate role in Both parties. And I'm concerned about the moral quality and the spiritual content of our citizenry. And if they're feeling cynical, if they're feeling nihilistic, if they're feeling as if they're choosing thrasymachus over Socrates might makes right rather than right having its own gravitas, then it means we're sliding down a slope toward chaos in terms of both our society and culture as a whole.
- [08:29]
Georgia Howe
Now, Cornell, you mentioned that your identity as a Christian is at the forefront of how you approach these things. I just want to get your opinion on this. Do you think there's still a place for Christians on the left?
- [08:41]
Cornel West
I mean, as a Christian, I'm always tied to ways of spiritual awakening which have to do with how do we get beyond our egoism and narrow tribalism and be tied to a love with the blood at the bottom of a cross that can transform our lives so we recognize the ways in which we are all human beings made in image and likeness of an almighty and loving God, and therefore have a fundamental commitment to the least of these. Now, I would want fight for the rights for my Muslim brothers and sisters, my Jewish brothers and sisters, my Buddhist brothers and sisters, my agnostic and atheistic brothers and sisters, because in a democracy, I want them all, in the language of Walt Whitman, to be able to enter public space without humiliation and engage in dialogue. I fight for people's right to be wrong theologically and politically. And I do not believe in imposing my Christian views. I argue in that public square and try to make a case. But I don't want to be authoritarian. I don't want to be in any way coercive in that sense.
- [09:47]
Georgia Howe
Now, for the past few cycles, we've heard presidential candidates claim to be the champion of common sense and unity. Those are words you hear thrown around. But what is it going to take to actually get unity? And what would President Trump need to do over these next four years to achieve that?
- [10:02]
Robert P. George
The only way to get unity is to rebuild trust. And the only way to rebuild trust is for people in leadership positions in politics, in journalism, the corporate world, in religion to actually be honest with people. You can't please everybody. We are a deeply divided society. We are legitimately divided over very, very important issues. Deep moral questions, questions of the human good, human dignity, human rights, fundamental justice. That's the reality we have to deal with. But we can trust each other despite our differences, if we can rely on each other to be honest. Say what you mean, mean what you say. Have integrity. Don't just Jerk us around, tell us one thing today when it's convenient for you politically or some other respect, and then tell us another thing tomorrow to shift with the winds. We need people in leadership positions, and not just politics more broadly. We need leadership that will be honest with us. We can respect that even if we disagree.
- [11:05]
Georgia Howe
And, Cornell, in your opinion, what would it take for Trump to achieve unity?
- [11:09]
Cornel West
I'm not sure that unity is the goal here. I think that in any society, what you really want is to have citizens who cultivate enough character and integrity that they can learn how to disagree with respect for each other. And with that kind of respect, they're still able to live together even as they disagree and therefore will not generate any kind of specious unity. And so I think there's a need for a profound moral renaissance and spiritual awakening that gets us beyond the hatred and the greed and that sense of putting each other down. Personal attack was so wonderful about Brother Robbie and myself, is that even though have deep political and ideological disagreements, I rebel in his humanity, he rebels in mine. We recognize that we're seeking a truth and a justice that's bigger than ourselves, and we're able, therefore, to not so much reach a unity, but reach a respect for each other in our common humanity.
- [12:18]
Georgia Howe
All right, Robert, this is a question for you. What do you think about the new gop? Obviously, this is not your father's Republican Party. Do you feel like MAGA represents you?
- [12:29]
Robert P. George
Well, I've been a critic of President Trump since he came down the golden escalator. A lot of my criticism has been focused on character issues. Back when Bill Clinton was president and the Lewinsky scandal happened, I was one of the people who said, you know, this has got to be taken seriously because character matters for leadership. I oppose those people who said, well, person's personal private life makes no difference to his public leadership abilities. And I said, no, in the long run, it does. In the long run, character really matters. So I haven't been a Trump supporter. Now, I certainly was not a Hillary Clinton supporter or a Biden supporter. But here's my attitude toward President Trump. He was elected President of the United States. I didn't vote for him, but he was elected president. That means he's my president as well as everybody else's president. And what that means is that I have an obligation to support him when I can and oppose him when I must. So I'm looking for every opportunity to support him. But there are issues on which I simply cannot support him. And in that case, I'm going to have to oppose him. I think Donald Trump is right about some things and some concerns that he has voiced have been genuine concerns of the American people, people. And there are concerns of people who are concerned about the least well off sectors of our society. So I will support the president and do support the president when I can, and I will only oppose him when I must.
- [14:01]
Georgia Howe
Now, Donald Trump, though, has broadened the diversity of the Republican voter base significantly. He performed better with Latinos, with college students, with black men. Do you think he has some unique merits that have helped him draw those voters in?
- [14:15]
Robert P. George
Oh, there's no doubt that Trump has hit a nerve. He perceived the problems, let's be honest about it, the problems that working class Americans have been experiencing now, really literally for decades. Wage stagnation is a long standing, serious problem. So he's tapped into that. He's tapped into the concerns that a lot of people have with WOKE ideology, so called wokeism. And those concerns are not just concerns of white male people. They're concerns of people in the African American community, in the Latino community, in the Asian community. The chaos of our immigration system, the huge problem of illegal immigration which benefits nobody except bad guys, that is the cartels in Mexico and then greedy corporations in the United States who want to take advantage of illegal immigrant labor that they can compensate the low minimum wage age and so forth and so on. Trump noticed that that's an issue that people really do care about and not just white males. So he won legitimately, I would say, those increases in the votes of minorities that he got. He noticed issues that others had left on the table.
- [15:34]
Georgia Howe
All right, well, thank you both for coming on today and good luck with your book.
- [15:38]
Robert P. George
Thank you so much, Georgia.
- [15:39]
Cornel West
We deeply appreciate you taking this time with us.
- [15:42]
Robert P. George
Yes, indeed.
- [15:43]
Georgia Howe
That was scholar and former Democratic presidential candidate Cornel west and current Princeton professor and conservative political philosopher Robert P. George. And this has been an extra edition of Morning Wire.