from WNYC Studios. I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Tuesday, May 26th.

We're happy to have as our first guest for this week, Senator Chris Murphy, who comes on to speak both

through his Connecticut constituents locally

and to our national politics podcast audience, often mentioned as a potential 2028 Democratic

presidential candidate. Senator Murphy has a very thought-provoking new book. He is also one of

three Democratic co-sponsors who have forced to vote every week since March on a resolution

to stop the war in Iran. And last week, for the first time, this barely cracked the news cycle,

but a preliminary vote on that got enough Republican support to pass. So we'll talk about that.

Also, the widely panned DNC autopsy report released last week on why

they did so badly in 2024 and what they should change. And the book, which is called Crisis of the Common

Good, the Fight for Meaning and Connection in America. And I'll say, as a little bit of an introduction to the

book before we bring on Senator Murphy, it includes his framing of six cults. He uses the word

cults that he thinks Americans have fallen prey to. A cult of profit, a cult of everywhere,

meaning rootlessness and globalization, a cult of technology, a cult of consumption, a cult of everywhere, meaning rootlessness and globalization, a cult of technology, a cult of

consumption, a cult of credentialism, and a cult of corruption. And he's got solutions to

propose for each one that he hopes can restore some of that meaning and connection that the

subtitle references, and who knows, maybe fight political polarization and the threats

to democracy that we face in the bargain. Senator, always good to have you on here. Welcome back

to WNYC and our national politics podcast. Always great to be with you. Thanks for having me.

Let me start with something from the book that might surprise people, that you concluded a few years ago that right-wing thinkers, you cite J.D. Vance as an example, we're having a more honest conversation about America's spiritual emptiness than anyone on the left. More honest than what ways?

Yeah, when I say spiritual emptiness, I don't mean, you know,

religious emptiness. I mean, um, the lack of purpose and meaning that many Americans feel

...