Caving to Trump | Roundtable

The Dispatch Podcast

The Dispatch

News, Politics

4.6 • 3.3K Ratings

🗓️ 29 August 2025

⏱️ 84 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Steve Hayes, Jonah Goldberg, Sarah Isgur, and Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle debate whether Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Donald Trump exhibit similar authoritarian tendencies, discuss the role of elites in democracies, and explore the Democratic Party’s ongoing identity crisis. The Agenda:—Trump’s first and second terms—Can the president do whatever he wants?—Historical context of presidential power—Weak democracies and crisis—Is this all our fault?—The future of Democratic messaging Show Notes:—Nick Catoggio's Boiling Frogs newsletter—Megan McArdle's column on lawfare The Dispatch Podcast is a production of The Dispatch, a digital media company covering politics, policy, and culture from a non-partisan, conservative perspective. To access all of The Dispatch’s offerings—including access to all of our articles, members-only newsletters, and bonus podcast episodes—click here. If you’d like to remove all ads from your podcast experience, consider becoming a premium Dispatch member by clicking here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:30.4	Introducing Dispatch Energy.
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1:15.6	Welcome to the dispatch podcast. I'm Steve Hayes. On this week's roundtable, we'll discuss Donald Trump, claiming he's not a dictator, but that some Americans might want one. Is he right?
1:21.7	Democrats are actually in disarray. They're more unpopular than they've been in decades. What's their
1:27.4	plan to remedy that?
1:29.3	And will it work. And finally, and not worth your time, we'll revisit our heated discussion of
1:34.6	backer inners from last week in light of an overwhelming amount of listener feedback.
1:41.3	I'm joined today by my dispatch co-founder Jonah Goldberg, our colleague Sarah
1:44.8	Isker, and Megan McArdle from the Washington Post. I want to dive right in today by sort of
	...

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