Anne Applebaum: The Loss of 'Democratic Faith'

The Bulwark Podcast

The Bulwark

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 8.9K Ratings

🗓️ 16 October 2025

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The U.S. has been a model for other aspiring democracies since 1776. At the same time, the idea of America as the leader of the democratic world has also had a unifying effect at home. It’s what has kept this diverse country of many faiths and ethnicities together, and it has been our national identity. But with Trump actively undermining those ideals, what will we be unified around? Plus, the potential new whites-favored refugee policy, Trump’s psychological comfort to the Russian war effort, Hegseth got himself a state media press room at the Pentagon, JD is totally cool with lots of Nazi talk—and could the administration be trying to start a war in Venezuela so it can expand its militaristic crackdown on the streets here?

Anne Applebaum joins Tim Miller.

show notes

Anne's new piece, "The Beacon of Democracy Goes Dark"
Anne on the Nobel Peace Prize winner
"Ukraine’s Plan to Starve the Russian War Machine," by Anne
Ian McEwan's "What We Know" — second recommendation this week!
F*%k your khakis and get The Perfect Jean 15% off with the code BULWARK15 at theperfectjean.nyc/BULWARK15 #theperfectjeanpod

Transcript

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0:37.2	Hello and welcome to the Bullwark podcast. I'm your host Tim Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome back, one of our
0:37.6	favorite and most uplifting guests. She's the staff writer at The Atlantic. Our most recent books
0:41.3	include Twilight of Democracy and Autocracy, Inc. It's Ann Applebaum. Hey, Ann. Hi there. Let's do it.
0:47.8	We have quite the outline for today. Lots happening. You've been on a heater. There's some news
0:52.8	that Governor Pritzker made $1.4 million gambling out yesterday, according to his tax returns. And that is a real heater in gambling. And I'm upset. I didn't get to ask him about it and see what his gambling of choice was on Tuesday. But you've been on a writing heater. And I want to go through some of your recent articles, but we have unfortunately some other news first I want to start with I guess we'll start with the the overseas stuff
1:14.7	the uh ap had the story earlier this week that I haven't got a chance to mention that is just brutal
1:20.0	about USAID that's title is starving children screaming for food as USAID cuts unleashed devastation
1:26.2	and death across Myanmar.
1:29.6	I just want to read a little bit from the lead here.
1:32.8	Muhammad clutched the lifeless body of his two-year-old son and wept. Ever since his family's food rations stopped arriving at their internment camp in
1:36.6	Myanmar in April, the father had watched helplessly as his once vibrant baby boy suffering
1:41.1	from diarrhea and begging for food.
1:43.7	On May 21st, exactly two weeks after
1:46.0	the little boy died, Marco Rubio sat before Congress and said no one has died because of his
1:50.0	government's decision to gut the foreign aid program that Mohammed said is a lie. I lost my son because
	...

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