We Want Our Rules Based Life Back: A Conversation with Heather Cox Richardson

Summary

Podcast Summary:

The PoliticsGirl Podcast
Episode: We Want Our Rules Based Life Back: A Conversation with Heather Cox Richardson
Date: September 30, 2025
Host: Leigh McGowan (PoliticsGirl), Meidas Media Network
Guest: Heather Cox Richardson, Historian & Author

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Overview

This episode delves deep into the current threats to American democracy, the rise of authoritarian impulses in the executive branch, and how the American public—across all political leanings—can defend democratic norms. Historian Heather Cox Richardson provides perspective on historical parallels, the psychological underpinnings of authoritarian leaders, the complicity of political elites, and strategies for collective resistance. The tone is urgent but hopeful, with clear calls to action for listeners.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Current State of American Democracy

• Leigh McGowan opens by framing the “country on fire” reality—political violence, government dysfunction, international embarrassment, and civil rights under threat ([00:28]).
• Trump’s administration is characterized by gaslighting, propaganda, and division.

“We are being gaslit, lied to, propagandized. Our president said he hates 50% of this country... and his deputy chief of staff gave a Nazi level hate speech.” – Leigh McGowan [00:40]

2. The Authoritarian Playbook and Presidential Behavior

• Heather attributes Trump’s erratic leadership to deep fear, diminished mental capacity, and lack of a stabilizing inner circle ([02:52]).
• The administration relies on spectacle and manufactured chaos to retain power, using media manipulation in ways reminiscent of McCarthyism.

“You see a person who’s making impetuous decisions without much guidance...and who is trying to get it to conform to the fantasy world in his head.” – Heather Cox Richardson [03:10]

• Indicting figures like James Comey is less about justice and more about intimidating opposition and flooding headlines with scandals ([06:16]).

“The goal was not to convict him...but to indict him and slather the news...even if there is no evidence.” – Heather Cox Richardson [06:27]

3. Free Speech, Demonization, and Political Rhetoric

• Both host and guest draw direct lines between authoritarian regimes and the current crackdown on dissent—removing figures like Jimmy Kimmel for perceived criticism ([07:20]).
• The administration paints all non-MAGA individuals as “enemies” or extremists—a hallmark of authoritarian politics ([08:02]).

“That’s a really important rhetorical device to say you’re either with us or you’re the enemy.” – Heather Cox Richardson [09:50]

• Reference to Carl Schmitt, whose theories of friend-enemy politics influenced the Nazis and are resurging on the American right.

4. Economic Parallels & Unpopularity of Authoritarian Leaders

• Unlike Orban or Putin, whose authoritarianism was buoyed by popularity, Trump faces historic unpopularity and economic backlash ([10:47]).
• The administration’s performative politics distract from failing policies—tariffs, mishandled bailouts, misallocation of resources ([11:47], [14:48]).

“He’s now trying to grab [power] anyway...they tried to grab power very, very quickly to take advantage of his early popularity, but those numbers are collapsing.” – Heather Cox Richardson [13:30]

5. Institutions, Complicity, and Corporate America

• Some institutions appear to “bend the knee” but are really buying time, waiting to see how the political winds shift ([20:22]).
• The Jimmy Kimmel/Disney moment was meaningful resistance: corporations cared more about market share than appeasing the president’s authoritarian whims ([16:39], [20:46]).

“It clearly shook him that he thought he had silenced Kimmel and he hadn’t.” – Heather Cox Richardson [20:22]

6. The Looming Government Shutdown & Military Destabilization

• Multiple destabilizing events coincide: looming shutdown (no 2026 appropriations bills), military maneuvers (calling all generals to DC), global unrest (Russia, Middle East), and mass firings ([25:22]).

“If you pull the US Military brass from all over the world...and put them in a room in Quantico, Virginia...you have disrupted that military project at the same time the United States may or may not continue operating.” – Heather Cox Richardson [26:24]

7. International Impact & Historical Parallels

• The destabilization at home—and the intention behind it—is deeply connected to creating global instability ([27:41], [32:36]).
• Heather: “We’re focusing a little bit too much on what’s happening internally versus what’s happening externally because I think they’re both inter-connected in our 21st century world.” [32:36]

8. Republican Complicity and the Weakening of Democracy

• The greatest blame rests with Republican elites in Congress who abdicate their constitutional responsibilities ([35:00], [38:18]).

“The blame for me will always come down to the Republicans, to the Republican senators who could have stopped him.” – Heather Cox Richardson [35:00]

• The comparison to Weimar Germany is discussed but nuanced; America’s federalist, more robust democratic traditions offer advantages, though reactionary movements are part of U.S. history as well ([38:18], [40:09]).

9. The Power and Tradition of Popular Organizing

• America’s strength lies in “we the people organizing”—historical moments of coalition-building against anti-democratic forces ([42:53], [44:22]).

“That’s what America has a tradition of. That’s what I see happening. And if I were someone trying to stand against 341 million people...I’d be nervous.” – Heather Cox Richardson [44:08]

10. What Should People Do – Stay or Leave, Resist or Despair?

• For those despairing or thinking of emigrating, Heather says: Most people can’t leave, and America has always required marginalized communities to struggle for true democracy ([45:20]).
• Coalition-building and learning from marginalized communities are crucial (“Black history IS American history”), as is recognizing that chaos and distraction are tactics of authoritarianism ([48:27]).

“America is really about struggling to make the promise of the Declaration of Independence come true for a huge multicultural country.” – Heather Cox Richardson [47:00]

11. The Need for Solidarity and Honest Conversation

• The economic policies of recent decades have harmed many—including historic MAGA strongholds. The divisions are stoked deliberately, but actual commonalities can help build a new, more inclusive democracy ([49:27]).

“The trick is to figure out how to get beyond this period of friends and enemies and into us versus the very few people who are holding the reins.” – Heather Cox Richardson [50:38]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the exhaustion of constant crisis:
  “It’s, like, a perpetual onslaught...it is, frankly, exhausting.” – Leigh McGowan [05:11]
• On propaganda over prosecution:
  “The goal was not to convict him. The goal was to indict him and slather the news with the idea that yes, indeed, he did something wrong, even if there is no evidence.” – Heather Cox Richardson [06:27]
• On authoritarian rhetoric:
  “That’s a really important rhetorical device to say you’re either with us or you’re the enemy. And that’s actually straight out of the playbook of any kind of an authoritarian.” – Heather Cox Richardson [09:50]
• On American organizing traditions:
  “We the people organizing, that’s what America has a tradition of.” – Heather Cox Richardson [44:08]
• On black and women’s history as American history:
  “America is really about struggling to make the promise of the Declaration of Independence come true for a huge multicultural country.” – Heather Cox Richardson [47:00]
• On Republican abdication:
  “They took an oath to do it, and they are choosing not to. That, to me, is freaking unconscionable.” – Heather Cox Richardson [37:35]
• On hope and coalitions:
  “On the other side of this, it’s going to make very strange bedfellows...what will come out of this will not be like we went into it.” – Heather Cox Richardson [43:05]

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Important Timestamps

• 00:28–01:55: Leigh sets the stage: chaos, division, and need for perspective.
• 02:52–06:16: Heather analyzes Trump’s psychology and the spectacle strategy.
• 07:20–10:47: Attacks on free speech, friend-enemy rhetoric, Nazi-era theorists.
• 11:47–16:11: Authoritarianism vs. popularity, economic collapse, Argentina analogy.
• 20:22–22:19: Disney/Kimmel as a resistance flashpoint; institutional complicity.
• 25:22–27:02: Looming government shutdown, military maneuvers, global implications.
• 32:36–34:33: Global interconnectedness and the risk of national embarrassment.
• 35:00–38:18: Republican responsibility and historical lessons.
• 42:53–44:22: Popular organizing as the American tradition.
• 45:20–48:27: Advice for Americans: staying, resisting, building coalitions.

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Conclusion & Calls to Action

• Heather’s final message is a blend of caution and hope: This moment calls for collective action, learning from marginalized communities and historical moments, and building bridges across old divides.
• Leigh echoes that “we have to work together to get it,” reminding listeners that unity—not division—is the path forward ([53:14]).
• Listeners are urged to engage with their representatives—especially Republicans—and to remain informed and active in defense of democracy.

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Final Note:
This conversation is a powerful reminder that democracy isn’t self-sustaining—it requires organized effort, cross-ideological coalition, and the willingness to stand up for genuine rule of law. The stakes have never been clearer, and the responsibility, as always, falls to “we the people.”

Transcript

[A]

We the people organizing. That's what America has a tradition of. That's what I see happening. And if I were somebody trying to stand against 341 million people who are saying we are the people and we want our rules based life back, I'd be nervous.

[B]

Hello and welcome to the Politics Girl podcast. I'm your host, Lena McGowan. Let's get into it Today I'm very happy to be joined by my friend Heather Cox Richardson, the absolutely brilliant writer and intellect, author of the wildly successful substacked Letters from an American and my go to for a sense of calm amidst the chaos. The author of seven books on history and politics, Heather is a historian and professor of American history at Boston College, having previously taught at MIT and the University of Massachusetts Amherst. The country feels like it's on fire right now. For the thinking people of America and anyone who actually knows the definition of fascism and authoritarianism, every day feels like an attack. We are being gaslit, lied to, propagandized. Our president said he hates 50% of this country in a live televised memorial while his deputy chief of staff gave a Nazi level hate speech at the same event. We have political violence from the right being blamed on the left. Our president humiliated our country on the world stage at the UN Our government could be shutting down. We wars are imminent around the world and our generals are being called in for an emergency meeting and no one knows why. Overall, it is a mess with the American leader dividing the country and the world into friends and enemies. And I wanted to share Heather's insights with you about where we are and where we go from here at this very important moment in time. So without further ado, please welcome my guest, historian, author and my personal smart lady guru, Heather Cox Richardson. Welcome back, Heather.

[A]

It's always a pleasure to be here.

[B]

Oh, thank you for coming. I was definitely stalking you for a while there, trying to get you back on the show, but you're so damn smart. That makes you very, very busy these days. So thank you for coming. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for bringing some insight to these terrible times. I was recently reading Jennifer Rubin. She was writing in her contrarian substack that watching Donald Trump in his second term shows that he has, quote, learned nothing and forgotten nothing. That the defining feature, aside from his narcissism, are his willful, cringeworthy ignorance and his unremitting hunger for vengeance. And I actually thought that was a pretty apt description and a good way to kind of describe this hellscape we're living through. Eight months in, especially after watching the Department of Justice just indict the former head of the FBI, James Comey. What's your take right now on where America sits with this man and the people he surrounded himself with in charge of our nation?

[A]

The one thing I would add to what Jen Rubin wrote, there is fear. I think that this is a man who lives an extraordinary fear, and I do think that his mental capacity is diminishing pretty dramatically, which is increasing that fear. And what that means for us in this moment, at least from where I sit, is that you see a person who's making impetuous decisions without much guidance. Because if you think about the way that he's operated in the past, there has always been someone to whom he could defer to protect him. You know, his father, the people who used to run the Trump Organization, some of the more senior people in the relationships that he has had, although they were not friendships, they were people to whom he could look to protect him if that needed to happen. And, of course, this time around, he does not have that even think about who is with him in the White House. Where's his family that was around him in the first administration? So where that's left us is with this incredibly impetuous man who is of diminished mental capacity and who is making incredibly poor decisions about the United States of America because he is trying to get it to conform to the fantasy world in his head. And as those things are not playing out, as, in fact, he is accepting the help, I guess you'd call it, of people like Russell Vogt, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, who is determined to decimate the United States government, and of Stephen Miller, who is the Deputy White House chief of staff, who is determined to create a white nation. If you watch this and you can see the extraordinary plummeting of his popularity numbers and the chaos that is currently here and the chaos that is coming, I think you have this weird place where we can sit there on the one hand and say, this is one of the weakest presidents we have ever had. And yet, though, him and the people around him are doing all they can to subvert the United States government, to grab all the power into their own hands. So there's this weird thing. It feels like some people are saying, oh, don't worry about him. He's falling apart. And other people are saying, oh, my God, he's a dictator already. And you sort of vacillate between those two things, and it is, frankly, exhausting.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You didn't expect me to say that. Did you?

[B]

That's exactly how. No, that's. No, it's just straight up how I feel. So I'm like. Because that's exactly how I feel. I feel exhausted every day. It's like a, you know, perpetual onslaught. And obviously this Comey thing is top of Mind you and I recording on September 26th. We're gonna learn more about this in the upcoming weeks. But I should point out to people that what you're talking about is true because like even this Comey thing is a rushed job. Right? He was trying to do it before the statutes of limitations ran out. He had to fire the conservative career DA Virginia who refused to do it. Cuz there wasn't just cause. He had to then put in a yes woman to do the job because she'd do whatever he asked him to do, law be damned. You know, it's just sort of like the highest form of government corruption to use the Justice Department, who are supposed to work for the people, I might add, not the President, to target your political enemies. But it also is supposed to, I think maybe expand the fear from himself to other people. He wants people to feel afraid that he's gonna. If he can come after James Comey, he can come after anyone. Right. And you don't have to like James Comey. I personally have very negative feelings towards him to know that what they're doing to him is wrong. And this is not how the American government or the Department of Justice is supposed to be used.

[A]

Well, you know, that's an interesting piece of. This is. So much of this particular administration is designed to portray a strong. And we know that this has been a real goal of the White House is essentially to run the presidency as if it's reality tv so that you're always hanging on for the next thing and to try and show somebody who's strong. So in a way you have to wonder if there's any concern about whether or not the Comey indictment goes anywhere. Certainly seems as if it will not, because the goal was not to convict him. The goal was to indict him and slather the news with the idea that yes, indeed, he did something wrong, even if there is no evidence. And you see this with a whole bunch of things lately where they're putting out stories that really seem to have no factual evidence behind them. But it doesn't matter because as we learned all the way back with Joe McCarthy in the 1950s, so long as you can manipulate the media, you've sold the story no matter what happens. And that portrayal of a reality is central to this administration, I think.

[B]

Well, it's interesting that you bring up McCarthy, because I feel like this is a period of time where we are seeing the most attack on free speech since the McCarthy era, you know what I mean? Where it's like I can just point at you and say, you're a bad person. I can just paint the entire left as, you know, evil demons who are out to kill everyone in America because of the Charlie Kirk murder. You know what I mean? Even though there's no evidence that says the left had anything to do with it, it feels like we can just take Jimmy Kimmel off the air, because, quite frankly, Trump doesn't like him and he doesn't like the jokes he makes about him, but we're gonna say he's putting hate speech out on the air. And this is from the same people who for years have gone on and on about being free speech warriors. I find that very fascinating.

[A]

Yeah, it's a political project, and we've known it's a political project, and it's gone on for quite a while. This idea of demonizing anybody who was not at first a Republican, but now a MAGA Republican as being anti American and dangerous, which is one of the reasons that it was only logical to try to overturn the election that put a Democrat back in the White House in 2020. Because for people who've been steeped and two generations of Democrats are evil, the idea of them being in control of the government is completely unacceptable. That being said, though, there's important limits, I think, to the way we talk about this. And one is that the administration is working extraordinarily hard to define everybody who does not agree with them, which is widespread, by the way. It is not simply the far left, which is how they're trying to identify all those people. And remember that the far left is. Is in many ways an analog to the far right in that both of them believe that the constitutionally based democracy under which the United States has lived for almost 250 years is inherently unviable. So, for example, the right wants to get rid of it because it believes that the emphasis on democracy puts far too much power in the hands of ordinary people and they should have control of everything. The far left believes that the system we have is too corrupted by racism, sexism, and classism ever to create a just society, and they want to replace it with something. The vast majority of Americans are not in either one of those polls. They're in the great middle, which we call liberalism. And that includes Democrats, of course, but also Independents and Republicans and Greens and all sorts of other people who fundamentally believe that the government has a role to play in regulating business, providing a basic social safety net, promoting infrastructure, protecting civil rights, and enforcing or helping to enforce an international order that's based in rules rather than simply in military might. And you can disagree within that great middle, but we believe in those things. And so this rhetorical attempt to say you're either with Donald Trump or you're on the far left is, you know, you're a communist, you're a socialist, which is not the same thing as a communist, but they're using those words interchangeably. That's a really important rhetorical device to say you're either with us or you're the enemy. And that's actually straight out of the playbook of any kind of an authoritarian. But it's actually articulated really well by Carl Schmitt, who was a political theorist who became quite popular with the Nazis and is once again having a resurgence in America's right wing today.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. Paul Krugman just wrote that Trump is nakedly following the playbook of autocrats like Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orban. As his poll numbers fall, he's rushing in to lock in permanent power. You know, he's punishing his opponents and intimidating everyone else into submission. And the Republican Party is complicit in this. Right? Like, they're watching it happen. And they could stop a lot of the things. They could stop tariffs today. They could stop a lot of these things that he's doing by executive order, which really, he has no right to do. But they don't. They're complicit. And then the Supreme Court itself is abetting him as he destroys the Democratic safeguards and our norms. And then Krugman goes on to say that the difference here is that Putin and Orban, when they were consolidating their power, were pretty popular. They were seen by the public as effective, competent leaders. And that's not the same as what Trump has here. Trump is increasingly unpopular, and the majority of Americans see his government as chaotic or inept. What do you think about that as a concept?

[A]

Well, there's another interesting aspect right now that's happening, and that is, as you say, a number of people who previously would have considered themselves on Donald Trump's side are taking the opposite position because they recognize his attacks on democratic norms threaten them. So, for example, Tucker Carlson coming out against the idea of taking Jimmy Kimmel off the air, who saw that one coming. But that, I think, is weakening this idea that it's Trumpers versus the far left. When you have somebody like Tucker Carlson jumping to the other side, you're starting to mess up those neat boxes, which is gonna matter in terms of Republicans being unified behind Donald Trump. But there's something else interesting about what's happening in the United States compared to what's happening or what happened in Russia and in Hungary. And that is the people that you're identifying rose in part because they promised to make a bad economy better. And Trump certainly talked that way. And one of the things about him being a performative president, if you will, and manipulating the media is that during the Biden administration, the news of what the administration was accomplishing rarely came to the surface, because Trump got all the attention all the time. So his insistence that he had won the election, or his insistence that the economy was terrible and so on, really became a reality for a lot of people. Even though neither of those things were true in this case, Trump insisted he was going to make the economy better. And of course, inflation had been terribly high after the pandemic, but it was coming down and was down into the realm of where the Federal Reserve likes it to be. Well, Trump took off with all these promises to everybody, many of which were contradictory. You can't both have tariffs and have lower cost. It is like saying you can be wet and dry at the same time. Now, in the first seven months of his term, second term, those pigeons are coming home to roost. And rather than taking a good economy and making it better, it is very obvious that he's taken a good economy, or at least one that people recognized at a certain level and is yanking the rug out from under it. So he doesn't have that going for him. He doesn't have this big popular base. So rather than saying, I'm rising because people like what I'm doing with the economy and all the things that an authoritarian can do and then grab power, he's going the other way. And you can see they tried to grab power very, very quickly to take advantage of his early popularity, but those numbers are collapsing. So he is now trying to grab it anyway. And I think an interesting comparison right now is with Argentina and the fact that the United States treasury has recently said that it's going to bail out Argentina's financial situation to the tune of $20 billion.

[B]

Yeah. And if people want to get an idea, somebody did the math, and they said it's about $73 a person in America.

[A]

And why Because Javier Milei took power there in an economic crisis for sure. And he did essentially what the Department of Government Efficiency under Elon Musk tried to do in the United States. And the early numbers looked pretty good. And now, of course, everything's in free fall. So what is the United States government doing? It is saying it's going to prop up that system because, boy, that great future is just around the corner. And that sign, I think, of how people turned against Milei, not just the economy, but also his unpopularity as he's facing this election next month, that, I think, says a lot about where the Trump administration in a second term is facing, what things look like in its future. When people say, I voted for him for X and he did M, and that's not what I wanted, and I want to try something else. And if that happens, there's a lot of stuff that won't go well for Trump loyalists. So they're going to hold tighter and tighter and tighter, tighter to try and make sure they can never lose control of the government and have, for example, an unpartisan, a nonpartisan Department of Justice looking into what they have been doing.

[B]

It's actually quite striking, the need to bolster up Argentina the same way Trump tried to shake down Brazil, to have them not go after their dictator. Bolsonaro is going to jail, as I understand it. He didn't succeed in doing that. David Frum wrote that Trump's unpopularity means he's in a race against time, which I think that makes sense.

[A]

Oh, I love that. I love that. I had not read that.

[B]

That's it.

[A]

That's exactly it. And the question is, are we gonna run faster?

[B]

I just read it because it's a great quote. He said he's in a race against time. He has to consolidate power before he loses the aura of inevitability. And I thought, yeah, that's it, right. He's trying to get the people who run the major institutions, particularly these corporate CEOs, to bend the knee, to do what he wants, to get all the power in his hand. We the people, get it together to fight back. Right. I think that the Jimmy Kimmel thing was actually a far bigger deal than we think, because Disney ended up being more worried about their market share than they were of Trump. And that is something we need to do as the people over and over and over again. While I know that coffee is a go to for most people, myself included, for some people it can cause crazy jitters or a massive crash, which is why I pleased to tell people About Mud Water Mud Water is different than coffee. It's a mix of cacao, chai, turmeric and adaptogenic mushrooms to help you feel focused and balanced but not wired. It's smooth and steady and honestly, according to my husband, it gives tons of energy. Plus it's ridiculously easy to make. It takes about two minutes with hot water or milk and then you're ready to get back to your day. Each ingredient in Mud Water serves a purpose. Their OG blend contains cacao and chai for a hint of caffeine and a hot chocolate flavor, lion's Mane for focus, quadriceps to promote natural energy and chaga and Reishi to support healthy immune system. Maybe you want to try a Starter kit? They have a Matcha Starter kit, a Turmeric starter kit, a rest starter kit which will help you unwind and sleep better at the end of the day. Ready to make a switch to cleaner Energy? Head to mudwtr.com and grab your Starter kit today. Right now, our listeners get an exclusive deal up to 43% off your entire order plus free shipping and a free recharge frother when you use the code politicsgirl. That's right, up to 43% off with the code politicsgirl@m u d w t r dot com and after you've purchased. If they ask you how you found them, please support the show and let them know we sent you. Keep your energy natural and refreshing all year long with Mud Water because life is too short for anything less than clean, delicious energy. Today's episode is brought to you by Oneskin. Oneskin is known for their cult favorites like OS1 body, OS1 face and OS1 eye because they all use the OS1 peptide, the first ingredient proven to target sentient cells, the root cause of wrinkles and crepiness and loss of elasticity. With their science first approach, OS1 delivers hydration, barrier support and longevity benefits with their results validated in five separate clinical studies certified for sensitive skin, Oneskin moisturizers are free from over 1500 harsh or irritating ingredients. They are dermatologist tested and have been awarded the National Eczema Association Seal of Acceptance. There's a reason editors have named Oneskin the brand to watch in magazines like Fast Company or Town and country or on shows like the Today Show. Founded by an all woman team of longevity scientists with background in stem cell biology, skin regeneration and tissue engineering, it's no wonder customers rave about how their skin is smoother or firmer or healthier looking and their products have over 10,000 five star reviews. OneSkin is the world's first skin longevity company targeting cellular aging to keep your skin and scalp looking and acting younger for longer. For a limited time, you can try OneSkin with 15% off by using the code PoliticsGirl at OneSkin co. That's 15% off at OneSkin co with the code PoliticsGirl. And after you purchase, they'll ask where you heard about them. Please support the show and tell them we sent you try one skin today. Future you will. Thank you. Disney ended up being more worried about their market share than they were of Trump. And that is something we need to do as the people over and over and over again.

[A]

I think that's absolutely right. And it clearly shook him that he thought he had silenced Kimmel and he hadn't. And you know, the other piece of that I've been watching for a while is those institutions that appear to be bending the knee to Trump. And CBS did something similar with Stephen Colbert's show earlier, but so have universities. There have been all sorts of places.

[B]

Where law firms, law firms, they haven't.

[A]

Necessarily fully bent the knee. It feels as if they are buying time to see which way they should jump. And the thing is, I think we started here talking about Republicans in Washington and there are certainly true believers among the Republicans. And at this point, yes, they are all enabling him. But I do think there are a bunch that just kept kicking the can down the road hoping that somebody else would take care of the problem and they could figure out which way to jump. And you can see this with people, for example, like Ted Cruz, the senator from Texas, who's very pro Trump some days and not so pro Trump other days and sort of took a stand against Jimmy Kimmel being suspended and so on. And, and the trick there is going to be to make it clear to them that the American people don't want what Trump is doing. And when it becomes more worrisome that voters will turn against them than that Trump will, I think we'll see more changes. And one of the things that I was interested in, I guess it was last week, was the former lieutenant governor of Georgia jumping parties and deciding to run as a Democrat rather than running as a Republican. And, you know, lots of people are quite cynical about that, which is certainly reasonable. But politicians want to be reelected. And he is making the calculation, whether he believes it or not, whether, you know, whatever, that he has a better chance of a political career as a Democrat in Georgia than as a Republican. That, I think is a sign of the times.

[B]

Yeah, that's Pretty interesting. It might also explain why the President is taking such big swings and why it seems like he's so confident when he's really quite underwater in popularity. Like, just so people understand, right now as we're talking, his approval ratings are in the 30s, which is really very low. And unless you're the uber wealthy, the economy is getting worse for you. We are building up the military in the southern Caribbean. I don't think anyone wants to go to war with Venezuela. That seems ridiculous. The Secretary of War is planning this huge meeting with almost every general in our military. He's called them all in from all over the world. What do you make of that?

[A]

Just a quick correction there. It is still the Secretary of Defense. That name change doesn't really. Yeah, that name change doesn't happen unless Congress signs off on it. And to my knowledge, they have not. This is, as I say, it is one of these big things of trying to project something that is not real. And there's a psychological dimension to that, of course, as well, that if they can make people accept their reality in one thing, you know, it just becomes a question of time until you accept it in everything. So if you notice, the newspapers are still referring to Pete Hegseth as the Secretary of Defense, which is the legal name now. They've changed a bunch of the signs on the doors to the tune of. I believe the estimates are that if you changed every sign, it's going to be over a billion dollars.

[B]

Over a billion dollars to change all the logos.

[A]

But, you know, we can't fund health care. Just saying.

[B]

No, no. And we definitely have 70. Whatever it was, $3 a day to pay for Argentina's bailout. But we don't have 73 cents a day to pay for, like. Like feeding children in America, which is.

[A]

Well, which is something we need to be depressed. The thing about the military, we don't know. We don't know what's gonna happen in the future. We simply don't. They could be having those people in to give them fancy commemorative pens and just simply to say I'm important, which is something that both Hegseth and Trump care about a lot. They want to be seen with a whole bunch of brave individuals who have fought in wars and, you know, all those things are true.

[B]

You don't think it's a big loyalty test? They're gonna put them through some sort of squid game thing to make sure they're all, like, completely loyal to the cause?

[A]

I truly don't know what it is. I truly don't know what it is.

[B]

Isn't it dangerous to put all of our military leaders in one place at one time?

[A]

Except that's what I was gonna say. This is unprecedented. It is destabilizing in so many profound ways. And that's actually where I'm gonna go to. Yeah, I wouldn't put all those people in the same room. And I have exactly zero clearances. You just don't do that. It's before. Even in wars, even in nuclear scenarios. I read a lot about this last night. They make sure all the top guys are not in the same place. To have them do that is deeply problematic. But I'm gonna widen the lens a little bit here and think about what we're talking about in the first three days of next week, by the way.

[B]

Which is when this episode is gonna air. So when people hear this on Tuesday, it will be in the middle of these days that you're speaking of.

[A]

Oh, dear. Well, I hope we're all just sitting around. I know.

[B]

It's the worst.

[A]

Making jello. Yeah.

[B]

Sorry, folks. It is what it is. With the podcast schedules, we're looking at.

[A]

A potential government shutdown because the fiscal year runs out at the end of September 30th, and there is not a single appropriations bill that has been passed to fund the government in 2026. And now it looks as if the government is headed toward a shutdown. Of course, we never know until the very end, and often people do run out to the wire. But both sides are pretty deeply entrenched at this point. We have new tariffs that President Trump announced on Thursday, September 25, going into effect on October 1. We have a lot of retirements in the country happening at the end of the fiscal year. People who got pushed out by the Department of Government Efficiency. Now we have this meeting, and I have not been able to find the day of the meeting. I saw one reference to Wednesday, but I have not seen why anybody said it was that day. Other people say it's Tuesday, and we just don't know when that's going to happen. We have all these things crowded into this really short span of time, and they are profoundly destabilizing both of the United States and of the international community. Because if you pull the US Military brass from all over the world, from their ships from wherever and put them in a room in Quantico, Virginia, there's good people still out there. But you have disrupted that military project at the same time that the United States may or may not end up being able to continue operating after that except on a very bare bones level. And of course, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vogt, has said he's just going to fire everybody. Totally illegal, by the way. But that's the position he's taking right now. All those things are happening in the space of two or three days.

[B]

Yep. Which is right in the middle of when you're going to hear this episode.

[A]

At the same time we have just before you and I spoke, Benjamin Netanyahu spoke in front of the UN and of course he is making noises. And I'm being really delicate here about what he intends to do to the west bank and what he is already doing to Gaza is truly horrific. And the rest of the world is saying, you're not doing it, dude, I paraphrase. But that's about what we're saying.

[B]

If you didn't see this, when Benjamin Netanyahu spoke at the UN there was a mass walkout of people. A lot of people left when he got up to speak.

[A]

At the same time, Russia is invading other people's airspaces, other countries air spaces. Europe is extremely concerned. As of this morning, Poland pulled back its citizens from Belarus because of rising tensions. So you've got Russia poking, as you say, we're building up in the Caribbean and you have noises that other things could happen in Asia. All just noises. And I'm not going to, you know, I'm not a foreign affairs person. I'm just a old lady sitting here in Maine reading the news. But if you are thinking about why you would want both to shut down the US Government and bring all the military in in the space of a couple of days, the destabilization of the international community certainly seems like it should be on your radar screen. And again, maybe this is just Hegseth wanting to beat his chest in front of a bunch of guys and show him that he's got big muscles. And Trump is so insecure after what happened at the UN that he needs to have his generals around him. But the destabilization of the entire globe by the moving of the US Military people and the trouble within the US Government is not good in terms of maintaining international stability. And that I worry that we focus, I mean, listen to me, an Americanist, I worry that we're focusing a little bit too much on what's happening internally versus what's happening externally because I think they're both really interconnected in our 21st century world.

[B]

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[A]

We'Re focusing a little bit too much on what's happening internally versus what's happening externally because I think they're both really interconnected in our 21st century world.

[B]

Yeah, we are a globalist world. It is all interconnected. I mean, look at how Trump behaved at the UN last week, how ignorant he sounded, talking about everything from childhood vaccines or telling the entire world that climate change is a hoax, or speaking to every other world leader like they were children and telling them their countries were going to hell. But he's doing really good stuff. I mean, it's hard not to see Trump as a national embarrassment when he stands up in front of people and acts like that and no one is there to tell him no. Like you said at the beginning, where is his family? Where are the people that were around him before? He's surrounded himself now with exclusive, exclusively. Yes. Men and women. People who either don't know better or don't care. And they're never gonna stop him from saying these utterly stupid, inaccurate things. And. And then he feels embarrassed and then he lashes out again. Right. So he seems to have refused to learn anything. That the consumers pay the tariffs, that Russia is the aggressor in Ukraine, that. I don't know, windmills don't kill the whales. Right. That immigrants aren't responsible for rising crime. Right. That the crime actually isn't even rising. I still think he thinks asylum seekers are from asylum. Right like, he, it's, it's. And there's no one left to tell him no. And that is a problem because there are people behind him, like you're saying, people like Russell Vogt who have their agenda for the Heritage foundation and really want the Christian nationalism to move forward. And people like Stephen Miller who literally did like a Goebbels style speech at the Charlie Kirk Memorial that was basically like, you create nothing, you do nothing. You are nothing. We are everything. We will take the power. It was terrifying. And those are the people behind Trump whispering in his ear, he doesn't have an angel and a devil on his shoulder. Got a bunch of devils and he's very malleable and he's very thin skinned, and it's a terrible combination with someone with that much power.

[A]

The one thing I think I might push back on is he is, you know, he's like a toddler, really. And America has had really bad presidents before. I mean, we tend not to focus a lot on them. But just don't even start me on Benjamin Harris. But in the, in the. And you didn't see that one coming, did you?

[B]

Get me started on Benjamin Harrison. But everyone is like, who?

[A]

Yeah, exactly. You know why you don't know about him? Because they've largely written him out of the history books because he was such a profound embarrassment. And honestly, now you've started me on Benjamin Harrison, but I will try not to continue anyway in those circumstances. And perhaps less with Benjamin Harrison than with, say, Richard Nixon. You had people in Congress who protected the prerogatives of Congress and who believed in the good of the United States, even if they didn't like each other, and so on. And so what Trump is doing is terrible. What the people around him are doing is exactly as you say. They are people who could never have risen to power in a meritocracy. So they are tied to this rising authoritarian figure because, you know, without him, they're never going to have the kind of power that they have now. And that makes them willing to do anything for him. And then, of course, he may or may not have implicated some of them in crimes, and then they can't move away from him. And you saw that, for example, with Walt Nouda in Florida over the classified documents case. That's pretty standard. But the blame for me will always come down to the Republicans, to the Republican senators who could have stopped him. I mean, we could keep up. We could go back all the way to 2016. But the fact that under then Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a Republican of Kentucky. The Republicans, who, according to Ted Cruz, all thought he was guilty in 2019, 2020, acquitted him because they wanted to win the 2020 election, and then they acquitted him again in 2021 is completely unconscionable. Now, that being said, like you started out by saying, they could wake up this morning and say, Or I guess I hope they're already awake because it's one o', clock, as we're recording, but they could walk into Congress and say, we're done. We're taking back our power. Not trying to take us, but taking back our power to stop the unlawful prosecutions, to stop the unlawful tariffs, to stop the pulling in of all our military from all around the world into what seems, at least, at the very least. And so far, they are choosing not to do it. And that, to me, you know, if I had to write the history of this moment, it's really not the history of Trump. It's the history of the US Media enabling the rise of an authoritarian. And it is the story of people who were elected to protect and swore an oath to the United States Constitution who are simply refusing to do it, whether because they're waiting for somebody else to do it or whether they no longer believe that they should do it, I don't know. But it is there. They took an oath to do it, and they are choosing not to. And that, to me, is freaking unconscionable when you got people like me and you who are just, you know, I'm a historian. I want to sit in a basement and read things that nobody else will ever read and write books that nobody will ever read. And I did not get elected to this position to defend the Constitution, they did. And it seems unconscionable to me that they're putting the weight on people like you and me instead of taking it themselves.

[B]

Thanks for saying that, because that would explain why I'm so goddamn exhausted all the time. Like, just do your job. You've advocated your responsibility. I mean, we are told that autocracies flourish when democracies are weak, Weak. And it's these people who are making the democracy weak. We have all the steps that we could take to stop this rising authoritarian, this wannabe dictator who never wanted to be just for one day. And we all knew it. Right? We are watching the capitulation of people that could easily stop him. And I have to say, aside from the Supreme Court, I think the other courts are still holding the line very well. You know, if we look at something like, you know, people Often compare it to, you know, Weimar Republic, Germany. And you are a historian and I am not, so I'll put this to you. But World War I, like, if we're thinking Germany of the 1920s and 30s, they didn't have a long history of democracy. They didn't have a constitution that they could fall back on that they'd had for 200 plus years. They had this kind of weak population that had been destroyed in a war. They were sort of compliant. They had a weakened central government, they had a weak judiciary. So that was easier for the Nazi party to rise up and do what they did. We have a much stronger system, a federalist system where the states have power. We have all these different court systems. We have, have the Supreme Court, which is obviously corrupted, but we have all these other things. And then we also have the people. And I think the people in America by nature are not willing to just roll over and have all their constitutional rights trampled, which is why we keep returning to the Kimmel thing and why it mattered that that many people canceled their Disney plus subscription and shocked those corporations into reversing their mind. They're changing their minds. But what are your thoughts on this? Because I really do think that it's only in a weak democracy that an autocracy can flourish. And it's really one party that's allowing us to be this weak. I mean, them and democratic leadership.

[A]

Yeah. So I think you're right that America has an extraordinary advantage both because of our traditions and also our size. You know, it's hard to make 341 million people all do the same thing. There's and this huge country all do the same thing. I would caution against though, thinking that the United States does not have a reactionary history as well. You know, we had Nazis, we had former Confederates in the American south who created a one party anti democratic system that lasted for almost 100 years after the system that lasted from even before 1619 to 1865 of human enslavement. So we do have that history as well. And one of the things that was I was thinking about this morning while I was pouring my coffee, as one does, was that this idea that you can sort of shame people into seeing the world your way is completely belied by the fact that a lot of people tried to convince Southern enslavers before the Civil War that they were headed for a brick wall and that they had to support the idea of ending human enslavement and they simply could not see it. And there was nothing that one could do to make them see it. And I think trying to convince somebody like Stephen Miller that he's on the wrong side of history is going to go exactly nowhere. So there is that difference. But one of the things that I see around us nowadays is it is part of the authoritarian project, as you and I discussed, to divide the world into friends and enemies. You're either Donald Trump's friend or you are an enemy. Even if you are a far right activist who happens to think that you disagree with Trump's stand on something that suddenly makes you one of the enemies. And that has, first of all, helped to expand the size of those enemies. But also, one of the changes that I see happening right now is this long standing attempt to divide the country in two, which goes, by the way, all the way back to William F. Buckley, Jr. In 1954, but really gets weaponized in politics under Nixon's Vice President, Spiro agnew in the 1970 through 1972 period. For all that attempt to divide us in two, what it looks to me like I am seeing is an increasing emphasis on us, we, the people, versus you, him, that one person trying to become a tyrant. And when you do that, it's a really interesting moment because it's exactly what we saw in the 1930s. It's exactly what we saw in the 1890s. It's exactly what we Saw in the 1850s. And when you do that, what happens is you bring into cooperation a whole lot of people who otherwise would not cooperate. And that changes the way that people think about what the issues are about, how to solve the issues, about how politics work, about how the government should work. And what will come out of this will not be like we went into it. And what I mean by that is, in any of these periods, you saw people starting to organize because they wanted to go back to where we were before the bad guys tried to take everything over. But those new bedfellows came up with new issues and new ways to solve them. And what came out, the other side were not the same people who went in. And I could give you all kinds of historical examples, but in the present, I'm going to just point to Bill Kristol. Bill Kristol, who worked in the George W. Bush administration, was an early and very vocal neocon, as they were known, neoconservative. And now, if you follow Bill Kristol, you will know that he is one of the most vocal progressives on social media in this moment. And if you had told me 30 years ago that I would be quoting Bill Kristol as a model. I would have been like, not in my universe. And yet here we are. So that idea of we the people organizing, that's what America has a tradition of. That's what I see happening. And if I were somebody trying to stand against 341 million people who are saying, we are the people and we want our rules based life back, I'd be nervous.

[B]

Yeah, we want our rules based life back. I think that's it, really. I think people don't want to live in a world that is without rules. I think it's too disorienting. And even if you're like, well, my team's winning, you're like, but for how long? And how long are you going to be on the right team? Right. I mean, I think people are really discouraged right now because they're watching how fast things are happening and the speed is done deliberately. Right. How outside of the law or the Constitution, this administration is allowed to play. And I think that if you don't have a grounded sense of history and you don't realize that this has happened in the past before, it just feels like it all feels new. It's never happened to us. I often say we're such a young nation that we don't realize that this is something that happens to all nations. It just hasn't happened to us yet. And so we're in sort of a blind panic. We were sort of soft. This is very scary for a lot of us. I'd love to figure out what we say to the people who just want to pack up and leave, who say, America's cooked, it's over, we have to go. What do you say to those people.

[A]

If the instability in the United States spreads to the rest of the world? First of all, there is no place that will be safe. But second of all, and mind you, I'm speaking from a really safe position, as in, my children are grown, I don't have anyone I have to protect, and so on. And my take is always as a parent, do whatever you need to do to keep your kids safe. Don't even question it. Not, don't feel shame, don't even question it. And I suspect you would agree with that. But for somebody like me, there is that there is also the idea that it's actually not easy to move to another country. So, you know, maybe some people can do it, but an awful lot of people have to stay where they are. And I again would dig back into our history to say that. Well, I think since World War II, or at least since 1965, which is the lifespans of most people who are are alive today, it has looked as if American democracy's guardrails were strong. And that perhaps we have gotten complacent about that. But if you are somebody who is from a marginalized population, if you're a person of color, a black American, a woman, an immigrant, a gender minority, an ability minority, and so on, you've always known that democracy was going to take work. And one of the reasons that historians talk about, if you will, black history being American history, it's not that old idea of, oh, well, they contributed. Historians actually don't, like, we call contribution history, that there's like this mainstream of American history. And other people came along and they did stuff too. You know, that was kind of the first wave of histories, you know, called contributions history. But that black history or women's history is American history in that America is really about struggling to make the promise of the Declaration of Independence come true for a huge multicultural country. And the lessons of how one tries to expand the protections of democracy and the rights of democracy and the responsibilities of democracy to people who are otherwise excluded from it throughout our history has a lot to teach us today about how you form coalitions, how you use language to remind people that it's their government and that they don't have to put up with the king, how you participate in a civic space even if you don't have the right to vote, how you protect communities. All of those things are literally written in our history by marginalized communities. And that is, I think, also part of our story and work, remembering that other people have been here before, and it is thanks to them and the fact they stayed, that we did manage to expand our democracy to the point it is. And then also to remember that always in our past, we have overcome those reactionary minorities. Just now they have managed to seize the entire government rather than taking their marbles and going home the way they did in 1861.

[B]

Right. And I think we should probably remind people that this chaos and confusion are tactics. They're meant to distract us. They're meant to keep us divided. You know, I do think you're speaking to this idea of people who contribute to history rather than it being the history. There's a great meme of a black woman looking side eye at the camera. And it says, when we say, but democracy was working and we have to fix it. And they're like, for who? Like, democracy was not working for everybody. Every and in Many ways. We shouldn't look at it like we need to fix democracy. We need to build the democracy that we once promised to everyone that has ever actually never been accomplished. A truly multicultural, pluralistic democracy with all of these different religions and races and lifestyles under one set of rules where we all belong and we all have the same protections. And I think there is a group of people who now have, you know, grabbed all reins of power, who want nothing to do with that, but there are way more of us that do, and we need to stand up and say, this is what we're for.

[A]

Well, and as I say, on the other side of this, it's going to make very strange bedfellows because the truth is that the American economy has really not worked for the mass of ordinary people since the arrival of Reaganomics in 1981, when at least $50 trillion moved from the bottom 90% of the. Of the top 1%. Well, a lot of the MAGA voters in rural communities are those people who were left behind. And the trick is that they, again, they have been watching right wing media since at least hearing it since 1987 and watching it since the 1990s. And so they have learned to blame the Democrats for those economic policies that have concentrated wealth among a very small group of people. But if we can get to the other side of this and say, hey, listen, and we'd actually like your kids to have an education and we'd like everyone to have healthcare and we'd like people to have clean water and clean air, those are not things that ordinary Americans are gonna turn against. They're simply not. The trick is to figure out how to get beyond this period of friends and enemies and into us versus the very few people who are holding the reins. And it becomes clearer and clearer when you look at, for example, the president taking a gift of. I forget how expensive that plane was. And then the fact we're $500 million.

[B]

And then we're gonna retrofit it for a billion.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, the way I just. Honestly, the use of our tax dollars, I mean, aside from everything else, you look at them just throwing money around like it's freaking water without any.

[B]

We're building a ballroom, Heather. We're building a ballroom.

[A]

Well, and I mean, I just. That. And again, one of the things that is frustrating about this moment is people seem to think that ordinary people don't care about that. And honestly, I look at how they're spending tax dollars and I look at this, my big thing, the 20 billion to Argentina, while You're sitting there saying that we can't give people SNAP benefits. That was a real stick in my craw. And the freaking cost of coffee. Maybe I'm not an ordinary person, but man, there's a couple of things that just seem to illustrate. And obviously the administration has done far more corrupt things than. And the crypto world is a mess and all that sort of thing. But I'm like, really? Like we're gonna bail out Argentina while our kids can't, in some states can't even go to school five days a week? Like, what is wrong with that picture anyway? I'll stop ranting, but I suspect that this not suspect. I know because I live in a very purple, if not red area that these are concerns very widely spread regardless of what ballot you put in the ballot box.

[B]

Yeah, and this is why we can't stop talking to one another. We have to keep talking about things because this is a president who outwardly has no interest in his own people. Right. It's all about criminality and corruption. And he seems to have zero desire to improve the lives of anyone who isn't in his inner circle. And we have to keep reminding people of that. And he does it himself by showing the things that he prioritizes. I want to thank you so much for coming and talking to me today, Heather. Please tell people how they can follow your work if they aren't already.

[A]

The usual places. Letters from an American is free on Substack and on Facebook. I have a YouTube channel, I'm on Instagram. I'm kind of trying to be in a lot of places for the simple reason that we have identified that most of our social media is owned by right wing billionaires. And I have every expectation that it's a good thing to have a lot of different outlets. The trick to remember about my stuff is that it's all free. And if anybody asks you for a donation or whatever in my name, that's that's a scam because that's actually been going around.

[B]

Ugh, how disgusting. Well, you know, this is a helic of a moment that we're in. I think the old quote is, history doesn't repeat itself, but it sure does rhyme. And we have to learn from what came in the past and try and build something much better in the future. Thank you so much for talking to me today, Heather. So that was Heather Cox Richardson reminding us that the majority of the US want our rules based life back, but we're going to have to work together to get it. We better get comfortable with the old phrase, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. If we want to return to stability in our country and in the international community, right now we are dealing with a government who has captured all levels of federal power and is working overtime on their long standing plan to divide us so we don't unite to fight back. Trump wants America to conform to the America he has has in his head, but he can't do it himself. So he defers to people like Russell Vogt and Stephen Miller who want to burn it all down and rebuild it in their own image. We simply cannot allow that. I want to thank Heather for joining us today and you for caring enough about democracy to be here now. Stay informed, stay engaged, and stay hopeful. And if you have a Republican senator, start harassing them to protect our rights immediately. Until next week, PG out. Before you go, I want to ask you to support my work. As Heather said, those of us in independent journalism who aren't owned by billionaires are the ones out here really doing the work to bring you the truth. So if you are already a premium member of this podcast, thank you. And if you're not, I would like to encourage you to join. If you see worth in what we're doing here, please consider becoming a member of the Politics Girl Premium family by going to politicsgirl.com and signing up. You will get this podcast ad free along with my rants sent directly to your inbox. So even if my work is silenced on social media, you will still get access to the truth. There is a link to sign up in the bio of this episode but [e-mail] and as always, please like follow and share this podcast so we can grow our audience. Because the more people who have access to real information, the better chance we have to unite in truth and fight back in solidarity. As always, thank you for your time and support. The Politics Girl Podcast is written and performed by me, Lee McGowan and produced and edited by Happy Warrior Entertainment. All rights reserved.