This is Democracy Now.

Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report.

I'm Amy Goodman with Nermine Sheikh.

As we continue our interview with Omar El Aqad, the award-winning author and journalist, his book is just out, called One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This. He's also the author of two novels, the most recent titled What Strange Paradise.

Omar, thank you so much for staying with us for part two of our conversation. We're speaking to you in Portland, Oregon, about this remarkable book of

yours just out. One day, everyone will have always been against this. So if you could,

I'm going to quote you back to yourself again just because your writing is so beautiful,

and you put things so precisely and also poetically.

You say, what has happened for all the future bloodshed it will prompt,

will be remembered as the moment millions of people looked at the West,

the rules-based order, the shell of modern liberalism,

and the capitalist thing it serves, and said, I want nothing to do with this. Here then,

by which you mean this book, here then is an account of an ending. If you could take it from there.

So, um, a few weeks ago, I was on the road doing the book tour and I was talking to a friend of

mine, a writer who works at one of these universities that's been targeted by the Trump

administration. And he said something that has stuck with me. He said

one of the most dangerous things about this moment is that it requires people of extraordinary

talent, of extraordinary bravery, of extraordinary intelligence, and that a lot of our institutions simply don't have that.

At the top level, at the administrative level, a lot of our institutions, be the academic,

cultural, journalistic, have instead the sort of people who are very well-versed in soliciting

donations, very well versed

at not rocking the boat, but not particularly well versed at standing up to a power center

...