There's gifts I've ever received has to be a bike when I was younger, a pedal bike.

It was a sort of slick little road bike and I remember it was all like it was so it was all wrapped up

it was so obvious what it was obviously because nothing shaped like a bike and I had a little ribbon on it and I was so

I guess for that was a life changer and I'm still sort of big on cycling around my area now so for that one change real low.

Join in every sip with red cups now back at Starbucks.

Hey everybody welcome to the Michael still podcast is always joy when you come to the neighborhood and hang out for a little bit.

I'm excited about our conversation day because we've got my buddy Tom Nichols he's a retired now retired professor of national security affairs at the US Naval War College and a contributing writer at the Atlantic and Tom is one of these guys who just keeps it real.

He brings he brings it straight to the street level and I'm looking forward to a great conversation he's a leading specialist on international security affairs, especially Russia US relations, nuclear strategy NATO issues so we're going to get it in that but we're also going to have a little bit of fun on the political side.

It's kind of wipe the dust of the Republican party from his feet he's been trying to pull me out I've been trying to pull him back in will get into a little bit of that as well coming up on the Michael still podcast right after this.

There's something so romantic about winter and I don't know whether that's just because I'm a bit of a homebody and I love a five but I think it's just the holiday period is just for me it's the most romantic period.

And I think anyone who's listened to my records will know that I'm quite a big fan of Ray Bans.

Joy in every sip with red cups now back at Starbucks.

Well everybody welcome again to the Michael still podcast.

This brother that we have one for the conversation day is someone that I have an immense amount of admiration for I've known a long time as you know as said coming in he's one of these guys in the national securities spectrum that you know when he starts talking the only thing you can do is

you know I'm not going to get his knee and take out your no pat because you about to learn something but even more than that you know Tom and I dancing in the political space we're now working together the democracy space is such a joy to have you all man welcome.

It's great to be with you Michael thanks so much for having back.

Absolutely absolutely you know when it's time to get smart gets smart again you know I was like okay let's call Tom because there's some stuff going on in the world we just need to get some clarification on so I think I want to want to set up our conversation is into parts.

I want to set up a conversation with you guys more globally where things are moving at a at a at a I wouldn't say so much rapid but a very interested interesting clip relative to what's happening between Russia and Ukraine with the US now stepping up I guess seemingly it's involvement in sort of pushing or at least applying pressure with a secretary blanket and

the defense secretary going and meeting with Zerolensky what's your what's your take assessment where we are in light of those recent activities.

Well I think the most important thing to understand is that this is still a crisis we haven't settled into some kind of routine here which means that the Biden administration to its credit is improvising everything and improvising it really well but this is basically you know everybody and I'm I mean everybody including our European allies they're all making it up as they go because there's a major war raging in Europe which is the thing we've tried

to prevent from happening since 1945 so where I think we are is we're still waiting to see how hard the Russians are going to push I mean I know that may sound strange because I've heard a lot of people thinking they're pushing as hard as they can bad news as they're not and it could even be worse and of course we're still waiting to see if the Russians are going to rattle more chemical

nuclear sabers and in the meantime I think we've just gotten together with our allies after the initial shock of this nightmare has kind of worn off that we aren't just going to flood the Ukrainians with weapons and assistance and money and screening and and bog the Russians down because that's what that's what the Russians have coming to them.

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