Hey, everyone. Welcome to October. Today's episode is going to be a little bit different. We spend a lot of

time talking about how there are threats to American democracy on the far right. But sometimes

we forget that American ideology is a game of push and pull. In today's episode, you're going to

hear a little bit different perspective on the

battle that's going on for American hearts and minds. I hope you'll listen to it with an open

mind, and I hope you'll give us your feedback. And now, on with the show.

Welcome back to the Lincoln Project.

I'm your host, Reid Galen.

Today, I'm joined by Yashemunk, a writer and academic known for his work on the crisis of democracy

and the defense of philosophically liberal values.

He's an international affairs professor at Johns Hopkins University,

a contributing editor for the Atlantic, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and the founder of the online magazine, Persuasion, also a great podcast.

Yasha has written a number of books, his latest being the identity trap, a story of ideas and power in our time, which is available wherever fine books are sold.

Today he's coming to us from Baltimore, Maryland.

Yasha, welcome.

Thank you so much.

So I read the book, and first question I had is I'm looking at some of the folks who

commented on it, and some are like Henry Lewis Gates from Harvard, you know, considered I think probably a

pretty public intellectual on the left, gave your book high marks for being someone who's willing to

take on from a philosophical and political perspective. The idea that, yes, we spend a lot of time

talking about Trumpism and the right and all of the things that,

you know, you grew up in Germany and the things that your family experienced from a sort of

...