“Trump Is Entering a Dark Season”

Summary

---

Podcast Summary: "Trump Is Entering a Dark Season"

To The Contrary with Charlie Sykes – June 30, 2026
Host: Charlie Sykes
Guest: Peter Wehner (Contributor, New York Times & The Atlantic; Trinity Forum Fellow)

---

Episode Overview

In this episode, Charlie Sykes and Peter Wehner take stock of Donald Trump’s second term as President during the lead-up to America's 250th birthday. They discuss the mounting incompetence and chaos in the Trump administration, the deepening cultural impacts of Trumpism, the rise of right-wing media extremism, the troubling intertwining of politics and pseudo-religion, rising disillusionment with American ideals, and warning signs in the Democratic Party as socialists gain momentum. Throughout, they reflect on the darkening landscape of American democracy—and the urgent necessity for voices of reason.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Trump’s Incompetence and the “Fyre Festival” State Fair

• Timestamps: [01:52–10:40]
• Charlie opens with the Supreme Court’s recent decisions, Trump's botched attempts at symbolic celebrations (notably the failed “State Fair” for the 250th anniversary), and widespread public embarrassment.
  • “Trump’s hijacking of the nation’s 250th birthday lurches from botch to humiliation to farce...” – Charlie Sykes [02:20]
  • The “UFC match on the South Lawn” is ironically the one successful spectacle—a sign, Peter argues, of how far norms have shifted under Trump.
  • Peter: Trump’s second term strips away any pretense of competence: “He’s hollowed out the federal government, taken out people that know what they’re doing. And the people who are left...their powers are limited. It’s farcical…But the stakes are high, so the comic element’s pretty limited.” [04:24]

2. Trump as Showman — Not Statesman

• Timestamps: [06:26–10:40]
• Peter emphasizes Trump’s decades-long pattern of failure, noting that even his “businessman” image was always an illusion: “He’s never succeeded at anything except being a showman.” [09:06]

3. The “Vibe Shift” and Trumpian Realignment — Was It Ever Real?

• Timestamps: [10:40–15:40]
• Discussion of David Wallace-Wells’s NYT column questioning whether the supposed “MAGA vibe shift” was a mirage.
  • Charlie Sykes: “If it was up to me, I would ban the word vibe from any discussion of politics. I still have PTSD from all the vibe talk in 2024.” [10:40]
• Peter points out that Trump’s world is now “collapsing”—with poll numbers tanking and the MAGA base fracturing:
  • “He’s entering sort of a dark season, a dark period in his life when his age has caught up with...his sociopathy. They’ve now fused together.” [12:54]
• The supposed realignment was never permanent: “The whirligig of time brings in his revenge, as Shakespeare said. And that is what is happening with Donald Trump.” [14:47]
• “As his collapse and his descent happens, what does that catalyze in him and how much can he be controlled?” [15:40]

4. Legacy of Trumpism: Lasting Cultural Damage

• Timestamps: [15:40–24:46]
• Even as Trump stumbles, Charlie warns, “the damage he has done to the culture has been profound and it’s going to be lasting.”
• Example: The Supreme Court allows Trump to end protections for Haitian and Syrian refugees, and right-wing influencer Megyn Kelly uses explicitly racist language celebrating the decision (audio clip played)—
  • Kelly: “Go home. Get out. We know our country’s better than yours... You being here only dilutes it for us…We don’t want you.” [17:47]
• Peter Wehner: “That’s a grotesque soul…She may be doing this for viewers, for clicks for attention, or it may be that she is becoming what she's been pretending...Sometimes you become the mask that you wear.” [18:16]
• They discuss how influencers radicalize their audiences by competing with other right-wing figures to offer ever-more “potent” forms of hate (the “drug dealer” analogy).
  • “They don’t want to be outflanked on the right...the more they feed it, the more the appetite grows.” – Peter [20:39]

5. Culture, Faith, and the Collapse of Moral Guardrails

• Timestamps: [24:46–32:45]
• Trump’s effect is to degrade the civic and moral standards once upheld by both parties and especially by religious conservatives, whose allegiance is now shaped more by politics than by faith.
  • Peter Wehner: “Their core identity is actually not linked to faith. It’s linked to other things. And what they’ve done is they’ve backfilled and proof-texted the Bible to validate very unbiblical, un-Jesus-like sentiments.” [26:43]
• Discusses the dangers of mandated Bible readings in schools as a partisan weapon.
• “If your dispositions or sensibilities have been corrupted... then you engage in this kind of proof texting. And that’s what we’re seeing. And that for the church, is a real warning sign... This will take generations to undo, if we undo it at all.” [29:16]

6. National Identity Crisis: Loss of Shared Narrative

• Timestamps: [32:45–37:52]
• Polls show American pride in country at historic lows; Trumpism’s cult of personality undermines shared patriotism.
  • Charlie Sykes: “You can’t have a cult of personality and then also love the idea and the reality of America, can you?” [34:45]
• Peter Wehner: “If we’re going to recover our fidelity... to American ideals, that requires us to be able to say that this is not what this country should be.”* [34:45]
• Acknowledges recent years are “a very, very dark part of the American story.”

7. Warning Signs in the Democratic Party

• Timestamps: [37:52–42:01]
• Discussion of the rise of Democratic Socialists, concern over a purge of centrists, and parallels to the Republican Party’s far-right lurch in 2016.
  • Charlie Sykes: “If this spreads to places like Michigan and my home state of Wisconsin...this could lead to a generation or more of MAGA dominance…” [38:44]
• Peter Wehner: “Now, whether the Democrats can find a candidate...will really be decisive, who they nominate in 2028.” [41:49]

8. Lessons from American History & the Role of Reason

• Timestamps: [44:50–49:48]
• Peter references Lincoln’s Lyceum speech (1838) warning about mob passions overwhelming reason—“It was a speech that he gave on the perpetuation of our political institutions...A nation of free men will survive for all time or it will die by suicide.” [44:53]
• Charlie warns the voices of reason and nuance are overwhelmed by algorithm-driven extremism. “Maybe we are like the medieval monks...hoping that at some point there will come a time when people will appreciate that.” [48:22]

9. Final Thoughts: Keeping Hope and Faith

• Timestamps: [49:48–50:43]
• Peter concludes:
  • “Virtue is its own reward. None of us has the capacity to guarantee success. All of us have the capacity to be faithful to what we believe to be right.” [49:48]

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Charlie Sykes: “Trump’s hijacking of the nation’s 250th birthday lurches from botch to humiliation to farce...” [02:20]
• Peter Wehner: “He’s entering sort of a dark season, a dark period in his life when his age has caught up with...his sociopathy. They’ve now fused together.” [12:54]
• On media extremism: “Sometimes you become the mask that you wear.” – Peter Wehner on Megyn Kelly [18:16]
• On the culture war: “Their core identity is actually not linked to faith. It’s linked to other things. And what they’ve done is...to validate very unbiblical, un-Jesus-like sentiments.” – Peter Wehner [26:43]
• On American identity: "You can’t have a cult of personality and then also love the idea and the reality of America, can you?” – Charlie Sykes [34:45]
• On defending reason: “You have to come back to reason and prudence and discernment to keep this country alive and well. We’re in that moment now.” – Peter Wehner [47:00]
• Final reflection: “Virtue is its own reward...All of us has the capacity to be faithful to what we believe to be right.” – Peter Wehner [49:48]

---

Conclusion

This episode is a sober, penetrating look at the collapse of political and civic norms under Trump’s second term—not just as a matter of policy but of national character. Sykes and Wehner warn of the dangers posed by both right- and left-wing extremism, the hollowing out of institutions, the rise of “bread and circus” politics, and the ongoing corrosion of civic and religious values. Amid the darkness, they call for steadfastness, a return to reason, and a renewed appreciation for the core ideals of American democracy.

---

Transcript

[SoFi Advertiser]

Today we'll attempt a feat once thought impossible, overcoming high interest credit card debt. It requires merely one thing, a SoFi Personal Loan. With it you could save big on interest charges by consolidating into one low fixed rate monthly payment. Defy high interest debt with a SOFI personal loan. Visit sofi.com stunt to learn more. Loans originated by Sofi Bank NA member FDIC terms and conditions apply. NMLS 696891

[Charlie Sykes]

acast powers the world's Best Podcasts Here's a show that we recommend.

[Minouche Zumarodi]

Go Touch Grass. You have probably heard this phrase, maybe you have even said it. But beneath the sort of light hearted nature of this meme is something very real and important. A growing sense that staying in touch with our humanity and being present in our bodies matters more than ever in today's digital world. My name is Minouche Zumarodi and I am taking over as host of TED Talks Daily this week to explore what technology is actually doing to your body and mind. In special interviews with scientists, doctors, parents, artists and more, we're going to dig into your physical and mental health on tech how we think about our body's different differently now, how we relate to new innovations that are amazing but also a little scary and how we can live a healthier life in this high tech era. Tune in on TED Talks Daily. Wherever you listen to podcasts,

[Peter Wehner]

ACAST helps

[Charlie Sykes]

creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere.

[Peter Wehner]

Acast.com

[Charlie Sykes]

I'm Charlie Sykes. Welcome to this episode of the to the Contrary podcast. As we start the week, the Supreme Court is going to have a big week. A lot of big decisions coming down. They handed Donald Trump a couple of big wins last week and actually a couple of big wins this week. But the court rejected Trump's appeal of the $5 million jury verdict in the E. Jean Carroll case. This, of course, is the woman that he sexually abused and then defamed. So hide the ketchup in the Oval Office. Meanwhile, Trump's hijacking of the nation's 250th birthday lurches from botch to humiliation to farce, especially with his fyre festival of failure, the big state fair that where nobody showed up because one manga influencer who was dressed up in an Uncle Sam costume was arrested for committing lewd acts in public. And you can read the details of that in my newsletter because I'm going to try to keep this somewhat family friendly. Meanwhile, the on again off again ceasefire with Iran is off. No wait, it's on again. Since this is a war that apparently we only fight when the markets are closed. Right. And of course, we get news stories about Trumpian corruption because it's another day that ends with why. And joining me to talk about all of this on the week of the nation's birthday is our good friend Peter Wehner, contributor to the New York Times and to the Atlantic magazine and a fellow at the Trinity Forum. Peter, welcome back on the podcast.

[Peter Wehner]

Great to be with you. Thanks, Charlie. I always look forward to the conversation.

[Charlie Sykes]

So I don't actually know where to begin this this week, except that, you know, let's just talk about this, the state fair. I mean, a lot of other other things that are going on here. But David Frum had an interesting observation saying, you know, we don't have all the details about how Donald Trump managed to lose the war with Iran, but we are seeing these hilarious failures at the Reflecting Pond and with the state fair, which does basically suggest that, you know, that maybe it is this administration, bear with me here, is actually kind of incompetent. And if they botch the small things, it shouldn't be a surprise when they botch the big things. But this is really extraordinary, the extent to which Trump has hijacked the 250th birthday of the country, made it all about himself and just turned it into one clause cluster, you know, what, after another. What do you make of this?

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, I think that is typical of Trump 2.0. Trump himself, I don't think is fundamentally different when it comes to his incompetence. I think what is different is that the second Trump administration, as compared to the first Trump administration, just is much more incompetent because he surrounded himself with people who are themselves as incompetent as he is in the first term. He had, you know, adults in the room is the same way John Kelly and, you know, Gates and a number of others that isn't there anymore. So we're in a sense seeing Donald Trump unfiltered, nobody around to act as even marginal guardrails, deflecting, preventing bad decisions from happening. And then just the sheer kind of what should be simple execution of government. You know, he's hollowed out the federal government, taken out people that know what they're doing. And the people who are left that do know what they're doing, their powers are limited. And so this is word that you used earlier, it's farcical what's happening. And if the stakes weren't so high, there'd be some comic element to this. But the stakes are high, so the comic element's pretty limited.

[Charlie Sykes]

Well, there are some. And, you know, ironically enough, we may look back on this whole celebration and realize that the UFC match on. On the South Lawn of the White House may have been the high point of all of this, because at least he pulled that off. But you wrote in the Atlantic, it took 250 years and 45 presidents, but Cage fighting has finally come to the White House. And really, that kind of captures it. This almost. It feels like something out of a dystopian novel, but, you know, this is. Donald Trump is making everything about himself, and we're getting to see him the man in full, aren't we?

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, we really. We really are. And. And there was something archetypal about that cage fighting in the UFC fight on the South Lawn of the White House. I should say, just from a personal note, as somebody who worked in. In the White House, the idea that. That the South Law would be turned into something like that is. Is. Is doubly incomprehensible. But it fit the man, right? I mean, that. That is an affiliation, an institutional affiliation, if you will, that Trump has had for 25 years. And in some ways, the UFC and NMA more generally embodies a lot of what he is. It's the carnival barker aspect of his life. There's the brutality of the fighting, the whole kind of toxic manosphere, elements that are there. The fact that on that particular day, during those fights that, you know, it was so brutal that one of the fighters had to be taken to the hospital because he was nearly blinded by the punches that were there. And Trump just seemed to revel in it. He was in his element. His family was there. Dana White was there. So it was an embodiment of a lot of what Trump is and what he's turned this nation into. It's a kind of bread and circus phase of. Of what was once a great American republic.

[Charlie Sykes]

But Donald Trump had pride himself on giving out good bread in circuses. Now, okay, let's leave the UFC aside. I think, with the extraordinary thing about, you know, his obsessions now. He's obsessed with trees, he's obsessed with his arch, he's obsessed with the reflecting pond. He's reflecting, you know, all of these things, and yet they're going very, very badly. Here is a guy who you would think that the one thing he'd be able to get right is like a swimming pool, right? And he manages to botch that. The state fair, which just went from one just pratfall to Another. I mean, there were originally plans for this to begin around the country and Iowa and everything. And then what you saw over the weekend was just like an amateur hour. And I guess that's part of the embarrassment. And of course, you know, Trump can't take this, so he's bleeding out and all that. Could Obama and Sleepy Joe do something like this? The answer is no. I don't know. What do you make of this? The title on your Atlantic piece was the Apotheosis of Donald Trump in his own mind. Maybe this is the Apotheosis of Donald Trump. I would think the other words might apply to what we're actually seeing with Donald Trump.

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, it was the apotheosis in the sense that that moment was core to who he was, and having him there overseeing it all in his own mind was a kind of apotheosis. It was a grand achievement. Yeah. I do want to pick up on one thing that you said, Charlie, which is when you indicated that he should be able gets these things right. These are pretty simple things that running state fairs. It is worth recalling way back in 2016, when the case for Donald Trump was being made, his narrative and the narrative of his supporters was he was a successful businessman. He was never a successful businessman. Remember the counter narrative? The reality was all of the bankruptcies. Trump stakes, Trump Airlines, Trump College. You go through the entire list, and it was one bank bankruptcy after another, one fraud after another. He's never succeeded, really at anything except being a showman. He inherited a lot of money. He's been able to outrun the law. But in terms of the capacity to actually achieve anything, to master anything, to show some element of human excellence in some field, he's never really shown that. But when it happened, and it was Trump Stakes, nobody cared. But. But now, again, we're seeing it, in a sense, unfiltered, unmitigated in the White House. So I think this is just the continued trajectory, the continued arc of his life.

[Charlie Sykes]

No, that's an excellent point. For years now, he's managed to essentially cover up the fact that he had gone from one botch, one failure to another. And now that reality is kind of catching up to all of him. Now, by the way, I wanted to ask you about, I don't know if you saw this column in the New York Times, David Wall Wells, who said, what if the MAGA vibe shift was just a mirage. Now, I want to go on record as saying that if it was up to me, I would ban the word vibe from any discussions of Politics. I still have PTSD from all the vibe talk in 2024. It doesn't make us smarter insight, but I'm willing to go along with all of this. And basically his case was early last year, 2025, after the election, when everybody was so shocked. Well, actually even going back to the middle of 2024, the assassination attempt, his retaking of power that it seemed. I'm just gonna read from this. It seemed as if Trump had managed a generational political realignment, pulling the country's plutocratic elite in Silicon Valley into a new ideological alliance with his legacy base of the left behind in post industrial states and drawing an eye opening number of black and brown and young male voters into the fold as well. And then it just looked like, you know, they were in the cultural driver's seat. Liberals had been ejected. You know, anyone contemplating Project 2025? Trump coined the inauguration. It seemed intuitive that the election told us something profound, not just about the politics, but also about the nature of the country. The vibe shift, so clear and obvious that elite liberal institutions, from law firms to universities and media and entertainment companies race to accommodate it. And then he's saying, but now, 18 months on, we can say that if that first vibe shift was real, it's been followed by another in the opposite direction, with the bottom falling out of Trump's second term and his administration looking again like the same old destructive kakistocracy. So, you know, with due allowances for the use of the word vibe, what do you think? It does feel as if, you know, there was a time when everybody was back on their heels and it felt unstoppable. It doesn't feel that way right now, does it?

[Peter Wehner]

No, not at all. I mean, Trump's world is collapsing, his poll numbers are collapsing, the MAGA base is fracturing. It's engaged in unbelievably angry intermaga fights. Trump's numbers on the most important issues are awful. And he's entering sort of a dark season, a dark period in his life when his age has caught up with, in a sense, his sociopathy. They've now fused together. The sociopathy has been the constant in his life. What is different now is he's 80 years old and that is taking a toll on him. So he's becoming a pathetic, more pathetic figure than he was in terms of that analysis. From what you read of it, I mean, it makes sense. The thing I would have cautioned in terms of anybody that was saying that this realignment with Trump was permanent, it's getting way over their skis. It's the nature of politics that life is a theory of vicissitudes. As John Adams said, things can change so quickly. And I think this is true of you and it's been true of me. I think the question, one of the critiques that we had about Donald Trump 10 years ago going into this is that he was incompetent. And eventually reality catches up with you in politics. It doesn't always catch up to you exactly when it should. But at some point, truth and reality do kick in. Objective circumstances can't be denied. Gas prices in this case can't be denied, grocery prices, inflation and all the other things. So, so Trump did win a lot of those subgroups and made inroads with Latinos and blacks and white working class people and all the rest. But it wasn't permanent. And we're in a situation in which I would say political loyalties, allegiances are unusually fluid. Now. The disorientation that people feel about politics, the disenchantment that people feel, they're very quick on the trigger to vote one way, way one time, vote another way another time. And this is not true just of America. We see it in Europe as well. So I think that the whirligig of time brings in his revenge, as Shakespeare said. And that is what is happening with Donald Trump. What's important for us to be aware of is that as his collapse and his descent happens, what does that catalyze in him and how much can he be controlled?

[Charlie Sykes]

Yeah, no, I've made warned before that the weaker he gets politically, the more dangerous he becomes. And particularly if the Supreme Court continues to hand him vast new powers to fire members of independent boards. That was one of the decisions that came down on Monday that allows him to unilaterally fire many of these commissioners of independent boards. So, so much for that. Carved out an exception for the Federal Reserve. But, but let's just step back for a moment. You know that he may be going into a dark period, but the damage that he has done to the culture has been profound and it's going to be lasting and it's going to last long after he departs. And let me just give you just a little tidbit of what I'm talking about here. And maybe it's just a matter of one distorted, broken mind, but last week, as we know, the Supreme Court by 63 vote, handed him two big victories on immigration, giving him the ability to knock out the temporary protective status of refugees from Haiti and Syria. And we're Talking about the now big question mark over the fate of 350,000 Haitians who are in this country and by the way, who've been the object of sly of slurs lies from the administration during 2024. Remember the whole eating dogs thing? The Haitians were eating dogs in Ohio. Well, let me just play for you a little clip from Megyn Kelly, who used to be a host on Fox News, used to be on Ms. I mean, not msnbc, used to be on NBC, walked away with tens of millions of dollars. Now very popular right wing maga influencer. You probably have heard this, our viewers have probably seen this. But I want to just dwell on it for a moment, that Megyn Kelly, who is always keeping an eye on what helps Megyn Kelly, what grows her audience, this was her reaction to the Supreme Court decision on Haitians. Let's play that.

[Minouche Zumarodi]

And look, this has been going on for over a dozen years.

[Charlie Sykes]

Go home.

[Minouche Zumarodi]

Get out. We know our country's better than yours. That's because we filled it with our work ethic and our culture and our values. You being here only dilutes it for us, those who built it and live it. And half of you people, more than half, you won't assimilate. We don't want you. We don't care if you're offended. Get out.

[Charlie Sykes]

Go home.

[Minouche Zumarodi]

Go back to Haiti.

[Charlie Sykes]

Sorry, Peter Rainer, what do you make of that?

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, that's, that's a grotesque soul. I mean, that is somebody whose soul is, is, is deformed. Now, whether she really believes it or not, we don't know. She may be doing this for viewers, for clicks for attention, or it may be that she is becoming what she's been pretending. That often happens, right? Sometimes you become the mask that you wear. And I imagine in the case of Megyn Kelly, that is happening. She is an illustrative figure in many ways because what you said, I mean, she was a reasonably responsible host on Fox News for many years, clearly an intelligent person. And she, I'm sure for reasons of ambition and monetary gain, but for maybe other reasons as well, you know, she's gone down this road.

[Charlie Sykes]

So it's, that's what I want to, that's what I want to pick up on because it's sort of easy to say, okay, I mean, look, the bigotry and the racism is raw. It's the kind of stuff that, you know, frankly, we would not have seen outside of, you know, some obscure site few years ago. And there's Megyn Kelly, who is a, you know, who's a big deal. Who wants to be a bigger deal? And I'm, I'm going to give her credit that she knows what she's doing. And this is the scary part. If she is doing it for more viewers, if she does think that this is going to help her brand, what does that say about her audience? Now, she thinks that this is what her audience wants to hear. Maybe she's wrong, maybe she's right. But what if she's right? What if, in fact, we have created this world in which Donald Trump may leave, but you have these ideas. I mean, we know you and I have talked about this before. You know, thought leaders can appeal to the better angels of our nature, or they can basically say, you know what, you have permission. You can say any of this stuff. You can say, go back to your country. You people don't belong here. And Megyn Kelly is making the calculation that there are, are hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people out there who want to hear that and will subscribe to her because she is engaging in racist language. And that's what concerns me. If in fact she's right.

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, I completely agree with you. And I think you've honed in on exactly the important point. It's not just Megyn Kelly, it is who she appeals to. And she clearly has an audience. I think her calculation probably makes, makes sense. It's the same calculation that Candace Owen and Tucker Carlson and Jesse Waters. I mean, you just go through it. These people monitor their ratings. They know what sells with their audience and what doesn't sell with their audience. So this is an appetite and they're feeding it. And the more they feed it, the more the appetite grows. So we're in this cycle. It's a downward cycle. And the question is, what can break it? But the trouble with the Trump era in general is I think really what you're getting to. Donald Trump was consistent in the sense that we knew who he was, who he is, what he did. The dark part of this story is that it appealed to 77 million people the first term of Trump. There, you could say it was a one off. There was a lot of unknowns in terms of people were making it a gamble when they voted for him. They believed the narrative that he was a successful businessman. There was a longing for change. I never bought into that. You never did. I think it was pretty obvious who it was. But you could make that argument. You couldn't make that argument in 2024. Everything was out in the open. The man led an insurrection, tried to overturn a free election, encouraged his supporters to kill his vice president. You can go through the list, and 77 plus million Americans looked at that man, looked what he stood for and said, yeah, we're going to try and do this again. And that is an indictment of the. The moral compass of America was demagnetized for an awful lot of people. And in the MAGA world, it's particularly pronounced. They love this stuff. And I do think that there's a very important socially, maybe psychologically social psychology point that needs to be noted in all of this, which is that these dark emotions, these dark passions exist in human beings. They have throughout history. They always will. And what we're finding out is that culture, and this was a deep conservative insight once upon a time. One of the really important things that culture, civic culture, political culture, has on a country is what it honors and what it dishonors, what it allows and what it doesn't allow. And what happened is when Donald Trump got first the nomination and then the presidency, Sir Katie Barr of the door, he began to send very overtly to his supporters. Nothing was off limits. You could say or do anything you wanted. The more hate that you had, the better it was. And when this happens to a country year after year, there's an enormous cost to it. And the cultural reflexes, the moral reflexes, not only are dulled, but they're deformed. And that is what we're seeing. And then the question becomes, in light of that, is there a response to it? Does the virus create its own antibodies? And we're going to find out. But there's no question that if you look across the board, the degradation of a culture, the cruelty of it, the maliciousness of it, the celebration of malevolence, that kind of stuff is really, really bad. And it's being led by members of a party that once believed in traditional family values and by Christians, evangelical and fundamental Christians, who say that their highest obedience is to Jesus. And in fact, they're promoting an ethic that's absolutely antithetical to everything Jesus did. So this is a very weird and dangerous and disturbing moment.

[Charlie Sykes]

I want to come back to that in just a moment, but yes, exactly. And it's like lighting a prairie fire, though. And the analogy that I've used, have you heard my drug dealer analogy for the myga influencer, that they're in a competition with one another to. To sell a more potent kind of meth? I mean, when you go back to Megyn Kelly, what is Megyn Kelly doing? She's looking over her shoulder at her competition on the right. And they kind of, this is the, the, they don't want to be outflanked on the right. So they become more and more extreme. It's like, okay, so Sean Hannity has been selling you this kind of crack cocaine. I have a more potent form of crack cocaine. Oh, wait, there's Megyn Kelly, who has a new, purer form of meth that she's selling. And so that's the competition. And that's going to continue long after Donald Trump leaves because these are all driven by the algorithms which, which they follow. You mentioned Christians and over the weekend I, I did a post about the Texas mandate, the Bible mandate. I believe they are the first state, I may be wrong about that, saying that passages of the Bible Bible need to be taught in school. I haven't seen all of the things that they are going to post. I was suggesting that if you're going to have Bible readings, leaving aside the legal constitutional issues, perhaps you ought to have Matthew 25, what you have done to the least of me and all of that, I'm guessing that they don't. Or the many, many passages about being kind to the oppressed, to the sojourners, to the foreigners, to widows, to visiting people in prison, all of that I don't know. So give me your thoughts about the way that MAGA continues not just to embrace religion, but really they are serious about battering down the walls between church and state with their version of Christianity.

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, I think that's well articulated. It is definitely a conscious thing that's being done. It's an effort to appropriate the Bible and Christianity on behalf of Donald Trump and MAGA world. And it's largely successful and it's also successful in a lot of spaces that many people aren't aware of, just because the Christian subcultures, people don't spend a lot of time there. But that too is a very, very potent drug. And it's really interesting as, as a person of the Christian faith, as I am, to have watched what's happened. And it's probably the most, it's a personally painful thing to witness because I do take the faith quite seriously and to see it appropriate in the ways that it has been. It is a reminder, Charlie, and a revelation, I would say, of some importance, which is, is that the number of Christians who claim fidelity to Christ and I think they do that in many respects uncynically. That is, if you gave them sodium pental and said, what is your top loyalty? What do you most want to do and to be in life. They would probably say, faithful to my Lord. The trouble is that I think that what they don't really realize is that our core identity has not really been shaped by faith. It's been shaped by culture, by politics, by partisanship. And so their core identity is actually not linked to faith. It's linked to other things. And what they've done is they've backfilled and they've gone ahead and then proof text the Bible to validate very unbiblical, unjesus like sentiments. And what that does is a couple of things. One, it gives them a sense of just security, but almost a sort of certainty and confidence that I have God on my side in doing this. Right? So that's one thing. And then the other thing that it does is when you have done that, if you think that you're on the side of God and the people that you're opposing are on the side of Satan, you've taken politics, which has its own intrinsic passions, and added, you know, a lot to it, because then it becomes an existential struggle. Children of light. Children. Children of

[SoFi Advertiser]

darkness.

[Peter Wehner]

Darkness. But this is not a new story. This has happened throughout the history of Christianity and even the history of Judaism before it. And you know, the first great proof texting war was in Luke 4, when Jesus and Satan were battling over the temptation. And how did that play out? Well, Satan is quoting Psalms and Jesus in response is quoting Deuteronomy. Right. So that means that the Bible, knowing the Bible, knowing the verses of the Bible, studying the Bible by itself doesn't do what it needs to do. Underneath that are sensibilities and dispositions and orientations. And that's the thing that has to be cultivated. Because if your dispositions or sensibilities have been corrupted or corroded or deformed, then you go ahead and you engage in this kind of proof texting. And that's what we're seeing. And that for the church, is a real warning sign, which is, and this will take generations to undo, if we undo it at all. But you have to attend to the shaping of the hearts and the minds before you go ahead and say, let's make sure that we memorize these Bible verses.

[Charlie Sykes]

I want to talk to you about the US deal with Iran and the coverage of that story. Look, obviously everyone, including me, has lots of opinions about this deal. But if you also want to get down to the facts of the story rather than getting lost in the hype of the headline, there's an app And a website that can help you do that. It's called Ground News. And they have great tools to help you avoid getting caught in a bias bubble and avoid blind spots. For each story, they'll show you how the left, right, and the center covered it. The Nobel Peace center even called Ground News an excellent way to stay informed, avoid echo chambers, and expand your worldview. Take, for example, this story. A judge denied Joe Biden's bid to block release of transcripts linked to a special counsel inquiry. On the left, on the left, you'll see headlines like, US Judge Rejects Joe Biden's Lawsuit, Asking to withhold memoir Recordings. And on the right, you'll see headlines like, what is the former President trying to hide? But then you can go to each source and see who's funding them and their factuality rating that shows how subjective or objective the source is. Ground News also has a blind spot feed that shows stories disproportionately covered by either side of the media. So. So if you want access to stories you may otherwise never see and the necessary context to make up your own mind, visit groundnews.com tc to get 40% off their unlimited access. That's groundnews.com tc so they know that I sent you. I believe that if you like this podcast and what we do here, you'll like their mission. Visit groundnews.com tc today.

[Peter Wehner]

Jacob this is Jacob Goldstein from what's yous Problem? When you buy business software from lots of vendors, the costs add up and it gets complicated and confusing. Odoo solves this. It's a single company that sells a suite of enterprise apps that handles everything from accounting to inventory to sales. Odoo is all connected on a single platform in a simple and affordable way. You can save money without missing out on the features you need. Check out Odoo at O D O O dot com. That's O D O O dot com.

[Charlie Sykes]

Yeah, I mean, I. This may be. I don't want to be misunderstood here. I can certainly understand the argument that the Bible, you know, ought to be included in curricula as literature, as history, like any other great work of literature. On the other hand, I don't think that that's. The people in Texas are acting particularly with good faith there. I think what they're doing is they're making no secret of the fact that they want to use it to proselytize for their own version. Okay, let's switch back to speaking of values, because all of this sort of connects the 250th birthday of the United States should be an occasion of renewed patriotism, a discussion of our history, of who we are and what we are, obviously, and I'm sorry to go over this ground again, but we no longer have that shared narrative, do we? And we no longer have that shared view. And then there's this really distressing new poll out. The AP story is Americans pride in US History and democracy drops and fewer are proud to be an American. Poll says New Gallup poll finds that only 53% of US adults are extremely or very proud to be in America, the lowest reading in the trend dating back to before 9 11. The findings point to a broad decline in patriotic sentiment over a tumultuous period that included most of Trump's first term. COVID 19 everything. But I mean, this is kind of the tragedy of it, right? Is that as Trump has made this celebration all about himself, you have Americans that ought to be pulled together by this shared tradition or shared love of country and. And are being divided. And this is, I think, the toxic element of their patriotism. Their patriotism does not make most Americans patriotic. You can't have a cult of personality and then also love the idea and the reality of America, can you? And we're seeing that in real time.

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, I agree. I agree with that. I mean, what love of country means is not love of country in every moment in the life of a country. What it means is love of the ideals of the country. And every nation falls short of its best ideals. And America has as well. The reason that America is a special country and the reason that we love it and that there is patriotism properly understood, I think, is because of what America was when it founded, right? It was a new order for the ages. And it changed the trajectory of world history in a wonderful way, because of liberty and so many other things. And the American story has really been the struggle and the battle over those competing ideals. You saw it at the founding of the republic. You saw it during the Civil War. That was the great debate with Lincoln, Lincoln and Douglas. And Lincoln kept coming back to the American founding. And there was a debate among Lincoln scholars. Did Lincoln refound the republic, or did he simply call it back to its original form? But however you answer that question, he understood and personified it at that moment in the way that no other American did. But there were forces that were arrayed against him, obviously, who believed the American idea was something very, very, very, very different. That's the great drama of the American story, which is the push and the pull moving Imperfectly, haltingly toward a more perfect union. What's happened in the last 10 years is that we've taken really large steps backward. We have to say that. We have to be able to say that and acknowledge it. And, you know, to say that you're proud of an American, to be an American. If you're talking about the country at its best and its ideals. Yes. If you're talking about, about its current incarnation in the person of Donald Trump and his administration, you can add caveats to that. We are doing an awful lot of things right now that no person should be proud of. And if we're going to recover our fidelity to and allegiance to American ideals, that requires us to be able to say that this is not what this country should be. It's not at its best what America has been. And Donald Trump is a personification of a very, very dark part of the American story. And Americans feel that that's why that polling is where it should be, it should be low. There are a lot of reasons not to be particularly proud at this moment of what Americans stands for. But the story is still being written. And, you know, there are 330 million Americans who are going to have some say in how it goes going forward.

[Charlie Sykes]

Forward, yeah. We have to get through this particular dark period. Okay, one more vibe shift here in our conversation. I haven't had a chance to talk with you since the upsurge of the Democratic socialists on the ballot starting in, well, actually not starting in New York City, but I mean, you had the Mandani sweep in New York with including some extremely far left camp candidates. You have a Democratic Socialist who looks like they're going to be the next mayor of Washington D.C. a democratic socialist makes the runoff in Los Angeles. There is this sense that this is this new energy in the Democratic Party against the establishment. And I'm sorry, before I get to it, I wrote a piece the other day saying I think people are misunderstanding what the Democratic Socialists of America are. First of all, they are very clear that they are, are trying to execute a hostile takeover of the Democratic Party. And I'm just not sure that the Democrats are really prepared for this. Let me get your thoughts on this, because I am. And I have people say, oh, Charlie, you know, stop being alarmed by this. And I want to make it very clear. I am very alarmed because I think that if this spreads to places like Michigan and my home state of Wisconsin, that you may see, you know, this may feel good to scratch your ideological aid, but this could lead to a generation or More of MAGA dominance because. Because what stays in New we know what happens in New York does not necessarily stay in New York. And Democratic socialists are about to nominate the candidate for governor in Wisconsin, you know, which you know in Michigan as well. So give me your thoughts about this because I'm kind of worrying about the purge of center left centrist Democrats across the board and all the people online celebrating. This is like kind of a great moment for the Democratic Party. I think it's scary. What do think you, you think?

[Peter Wehner]

I completely agree. It's a real concern. It's a real concern of the Democratic Party because it's going to alienate them from the majority of the country. And we saw this play out with Defund the police in the past, and this is Defund the police on steroids. So it's a real danger to the Democratic Party. It's a real danger to America, which I care about a lot more than the Democratic Party. And the reason it's a danger to America is we need a sane party in this country. We actually need two sane parties. That would help. But the Republican Party has gone off the deep end for the reasons we've been talking about, we've talked about for 10 years now. If the Democratic Party follows that path just in the opposite way that it becomes the Democratic socialist version of maga, that is going to be really, really bad. It's going to be bad for the country. I do think that it's an indication of how widespread the total collapse of trust in institutions is. We're in a kind of nihilistic period and people are going off in all sorts of very, very dangerous directions. Radicalism is chic in both parties right now. And there's no question that the energy and emotionally satisfying. Yeah, it is emotionally satisfying. I mean, people do get something out of this. The trouble is that the net result is really, really bad. Now we'll have to see Democratic Party. The craziness is not at the advanced stage that it is in the Republican Party right now, but these are real warning signs. And the establishment part of the Democratic Party is being targeted just like the establishment part of the Republican party was in 2015. So we've seen this movie before and whether the Democrats can find a candidate and that will really be decisive, who they nominate

[Charlie Sykes]

in 2028. Well, you know, again, I'm having the PTSD flashback of some of the justifications for extremism that we heard in 2016 on the Republic side that, you know, It's a Flight 93 election and all of that. And also the rhetoric about it being, you know, the insurgents versus the establishment and, you know, rational, mainstream, principled conservatives were dismissed as establishment. And I'm just watching people, you know, Dan Goldman, who was a representative from New York, was the lead counsel in the first impeachment of Donald Trump on the Judiciary Committee. One of the most articulate, one of the most effective critics of the Trump administration. You know, again and again, former U.S. attorney, just incredibly well respected, blown out in the Democratic primary in New York. And I'm sorry, this is not good news for the Democratic Party or for Congress or for the country. And so people are all giddy. And then nominating a candidate in another district who has called Joe Biden a rapist, said, I'm sorry to use this language here. Fuck. Kamala Harris is for not just the abolition of the police, but the abolition of all policing. Open, complete, open borders, no deportation whatsoever, and the abolition of prisons, not to mention other things. And I'm saying, okay, folks, how do you think that will play in Wisconsin? One of the leading candidates for governor in Wisconsin is saying that she is dreaming of a world without prison prisons. Great if you're in Berkeley or you're in, you know, Burlington, Vermont, but in a state like Wisconsin, if the consequences. And by the way, when I say these things, people, your inner, you know, Republicanism is showing. And I'm saying no. The reason I am sounding the alarm is because I do not want these Republicans to win these elections. And I know exactly what is going to happen. Republican people should read my newsletter on Monday because I have a fundraising letter from the leading Republican candidate. Candidate. The Republicans in Wisconsin. This is gonna be a terrible year for Republicans in Wisconsin. They are giddy over the prospect of electing a Republican governor who is a complete election denialist, who has believed the big lie, who has gone along with Donald Trump and Ken Pax and all this. Imagine if there's a Republican governor in Wisconsin in charge of counting Wisconsin's electoral votes in 2020. This is what I'm trying to say is that, you know, make a decision. Do you want to scratch your ideological ID and go full Democratic Socialist, or do you want to actually win these elections and block Donald Trump? And those should not be mutually exclusive, but in this particular case, they are.

[Peter Wehner]

Yeah, I think that's right.

[Charlie Sykes]

I'm not sitting this one out.

[Peter Wehner]

No, no, you shouldn't. And you should keep saying what you're saying. I mean, the Democratic Party is important because it's the only political check on the Republican Party, right? Now. And the Republican Party is the main danger to America. I would say. Just pulling the lens back, Charlie. And in some respects, I suppose this ties into the 250th birthday of the United States. And it also touches on some of the issues that we've been talking about. Your listeners would do themselves a favor if they go back and read a speech that Abraham Lincoln gave. Gave in 1838, the young men's Lyceum speech. Lincoln at the time was only 28 years old, and it was a speech that he gave on the perpetuation of our political institutions. And he has a line in there in which he said that a nation of free men will essentially survive for all time or it will die by suicide. It's really, really, it's really up to us. And when Lincoln gave that speech, the context was that there was mob violence and mob passions that were spreading. An abolitionist editor had been killed. Lovejoy was his name. And Lincoln saw what was happening and he saw that these dark passions were being tapped into, that there was kerosene that was being poured and flames that were being lit up. And he understood the human nature and the dark side of human nature as well as the glorious side of human nature. This was one of the great insights of the Founders, which is they had such a clear eye view of both the virtues and vices that exist really in every human soul. And Lincoln understood the power of political leadership to shape those sensibilities and to keep those passions in check or not. And his fear was that if these dark passions were unleashed, it would give an opening for what he called a towering genius. He meant by that both a demagogue and a dictator. And the reason I mentioned that is that to learn from this, what we're in right now is a moment in which a lot of the antipathy and anger and frustration is overwhelming reason and judgment and prudence. And you can understand, as you were alluding to earlier, there is a psychological satisfaction that people get from it, otherwise they wouldn't do it. But there have to be other voices, voices of reason. And that's again, is what Lincoln ultimately appealed to. You have to come back to reason and prudence and discernment to keep this country alive. And well, we're in that moment now. It's, in some respects, I'd say, helpful to know that this isn't the first time this has happened and there are things that we can learn from it, but we do have to be clear eyed. This is a difficult moment in the American story, but it's not the final chapter. And, you know, there can be good and glorious days ahead, but it's going to take a lot of work.

[Charlie Sykes]

Well, and you hope that those voices are not intimidated or shouted down, because we see how that happens, is that this appears. This seems like a very, very difficult and dangerous time for folks who want to, you know, be those voices of reason and prudence and nuance, because the voices on both extremes are so loud. And quite frankly, the algorithms do not reward nuance anymore, do they? And this is kind of a reality. So maybe we are like the medieval monks who, during the Dark Ages, are going to have to keep the light of civilization alive. Sort of hoping that at some point that there will come a time when people will appreciate that. And maybe we should have a longer discussion of all of that, because I do think that, you know, when I think about the new Pope, for example, and I know you're not Catholic, but I think that the church has played this role before, right, when things were very, very dark, and they were the keepers of these ideas for centuries and centuries that resulted in enlightenment and renaissance later. And maybe that's the role of the Church once again in this dark age, not just the political dark age, but who knows what AI is going to be ushering in that maybe there will become a time when people are going to be interested in these principles again. You and I, Peter, can only hope, right? We can only hope.

[Peter Wehner]

Amen. I completely agree. And, you know, just remember that, you know, virtue is its own reward. None of us has the capacity to guarantee success. All of us has the capacity to be faithful to what we believe to be right. And that's all that anybody can do. It's all you're called to do. And from there, you see how it unfolds.

[Charlie Sykes]

What a great place, Dan. And by the way, just a reminder to everybody that if you want to read more about these things and some of the stuff we haven't talked about, including the amazing stories about the corruption of the Trump family, go to my newsletter, to the Contrary newsletter. And if you are so inclined to support independent journalism, we are extremely grateful for any of you who subscribe, free or paid. Peter Wehner, thank you so much for all of your time kicking this off, and I hope you have a great July 4th weekend in spite of everything.

[Peter Wehner]

Thanks, Charlie. We will. And thanks for what you're doing, and we're going to get through this.

[Charlie Sykes]

And thank you all for listening to this episode of to the Contrary podcast. We do this. Oh, come on. You know why we do this. Do this because it is so important, especially this week, but especially every week to remind ourselves that we are not the crazy ones. Thank you.

[SoFi Advertiser]

Today we'll attempt a feat once thought impossible, overcoming high interest credit card debt. It requires merely one thing, a SoFi personal loan. With it you could save big on interest charges by consolidating into one low fixed rate monthly payment. Defy high interest debt with a SOFI personal loan. Visit sofi.com stunt to learn more. Loans originated by Sofi Bank NA member FDIC terms and conditions apply. NMLS 696891

[Charlie Sykes]

acast powers the world's Best

[Peter Wehner]

Podcasts Here's a show that that we recommend.

[Minouche Zumarodi]

Go Touch Grass. You have probably heard this phrase, maybe you have even said it. But beneath the sort of light hearted nature of this meme is something very real and important. A growing sense that staying in touch with our humanity and being present in our bodies matters more than ever in today's digital world. My name is Minouche Zumarodi and I am taking over as host of TED Talks Daily this week to explore what technology is actually doing to your body and mind. In special interviews with scientists, doctors, parents, artists and more, we're going to dig into your physical and mental health on tech, how we think about our bodies differently now, how we relate to new innovations that are amazing but also a little scary, and how we can live a healthier life in this high tech and era. Tune in on TED Talks daily. Wherever you listen to podcasts,

[Peter Wehner]

ACAST helps

[Charlie Sykes]

creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere.

[Peter Wehner]

Acast. Com.