The Imperial Presidency

The Lincoln Project

Society & Culture, Daily News, News, Politics

4.7 • 8.4K Ratings

🗓️ 1 January 2025

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Timothy Naftali, presidential historian for the Nixon Presidential Library, Columbia Scholar, and prolific writer/author, sits down with host Rick Wilson to discuss the possibility of an imperial presidency and what that means for the US on the world stage. Follow Timothy Naftali on X at @TimNaftali and read the article Rick mentions in this episode here: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/01/trump-worst-president-history/617730/ Follow Rick Wilson at @TheRickWilson on X or at https://bsky.app/profile/therickwilson.bsky.social at Bluesky, and subscribe to his Substack at therickwilson.substack.com. Join the fight with Lincoln Project at www.lincolnproject.us and follow us on X at @ProjectLincoln. And please subscribe, rate and review this podcast, thank you! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	How long is Donald Trump going to share the stage with Elon Musk?
0:03.6	And how long is Elon Musk going to share the stage with Big Bangu Svami?
0:09.0	I mean, come on.
0:10.2	Okay.
0:10.7	Are they all going to take the oath of office together on January 20th?
0:14.0	What about J.D. Vance?
0:15.5	Your task will not be an easy one.
0:17.7	Your enemy is well trained, well equipped, and battle hard. There is not a liberal
0:22.6	America and a conservative America. There is the United States of America. Good night and good luck.
0:32.1	Hey folks, welcome back to the Lincoln Project podcast. I am your host. As always, Rick Wilson,
0:36.1	and I want to welcome a very
0:37.6	special guest today. Tim Naftali is a historian, a guy who understands our presidents, both in
0:44.1	their historical context and in how former presidents and prior presidents have shaped the office today.
0:52.3	He is the author of one of my favorite books about my old boss, George, H.W. Bush,
0:56.6	which was a, you know, it wasn't, it wasn't a puff piece, but it certainly caught, I think,
1:05.1	H.W. in a lot of ways that not everybody did. And he's also the author of one of the greatest articles of the last few years
1:13.3	about Donald Trump being the worst president. He wrote that right in the wake of January 6th.
1:20.0	And I'm going to guess a lot has changed. So I want to welcome you to this show, Tim. Thank you so
1:25.3	much for joining us today. My pleasure. Thank you for having me on, Rick.
1:29.4	Talk to me about the question that people are going to ask me, if I don't ask you.
1:33.8	Talk to me about the question of Donald Trump in historical context.
1:39.0	And give us some perspective not only in the sweep of our 250 years, but in the, in the modern era where, you know, you can't always compare apples or oranges and presidents, but in the modern era.
	...

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