GoodFellows: Conversations from the Hoover Institution

Back From The Future

Something offbeat this week: the three “GoodFellows” hopping into a DeLorean time machine, à la Back to the Future, speeding two summers ahead and reporting back on what they see. Hoover senior fellows John Cochrane, Niall Ferguson and H. R. McMaster foresee a 2022 in which the coronavirus seems “so 2020,” the cancel culture overplays its hand, China suffers an internal backlash, and America pays a price for its spending and currency choices.

 

Recorded July 21, 2020 1 PM PT

Cruel Summer: The Fight To Preserve Freedom Of Speech

This week the Good Fellows are joined by Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Victor Davis Hanson. The gentleman farmer from Selma, CA (and the author of The Case For Trump) is not known for pulling his punches, and this discussion is no different. The Good Fellows consider the recent resignation by New York Times editor Bari Weiss, the open letter published in Harper’s Magazine supporting free speech,  the scourge of cancel culture in the academy and the media, as well as some ideas for enhancing higher education to make it more relevant for today’s society. And yes, Hanson proffers some unsolicited advice to the current occupant of the Oval Office about how to win in November. 

SPECIAL GUEST:

Victor Davis Hanson is the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution; his focus is classics and military history. Hanson was a National Endowment for the Humanities fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, California (1992–93), a visiting professor of classics at Stanford University (1991–92), the annual Wayne and Marcia Buske Distinguished Visiting Fellow in History at Hillsdale College (2004–), the Visiting Shifron Professor of Military History at the US Naval Academy (2002–3),and the William Simon Visiting Professor of Public Policy at Pepperdine University (2010). In 1991 he was awarded an American Philological Association Excellence in Teaching Award. He received the Eric Breindel Award for Excellence in Opinion Journalism (2002), presented the Manhattan's Institute's Wriston Lecture (2004), and was awarded the National Humanities Medal (2007) and the Bradley Prize (2008). Hanson is the author of hundreds of articles, book reviews, and newspaper editorials on Greek, agrarian, and military history and essays on contemporary culture. He has written or edited twenty-four books, the latest of which is The Case for Trump (Basic Books, 2019).

Recorded July 14, 2020 1 PM PT

Condoleezza Rice On COVID, Russia, And Putin

Tuesday, June 23, 2020

This week on GoodFellows, we tackle a very complex geopolitical topic: Russia and the effects the COVID-19 crisis has had on that country’s economy, internal politics, international relations and aspirations, and ability to influence other countries and regions. To help us, we are fortunate to have one of the world’s foremost experts on the subject, someone who has years of direct experience in dealing with Russia and with Vladimir Putin himself: Hoover fellow (and soon to be director of the Hoover Institution) Condoleezza Rice, the former secretary of state and national security director under George W. Bush. She, along with our other GoodFellows (that’s H. R. McMaster, John Cochrane, and Niall Ferguson), conduct a fascinating conversation on why the COVID-19 crisis is an especially difficult problem for Russia to manage and solve. We also get Secretary Rice’s unique take on the current social unrest in the United States, a perspective informed by her upbringing in the South and her own experiences with racism. 

SPECIAL GUEST:

Condoleezza Rice is a Professor at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business and a Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution where she will become Director on September 1. Rice was the 66th Secretary of State. She is also a founding partner of RiceHadleyGates, LLC. From January 2005 to 2009, Rice served as the sixty-sixth secretary of state of the United States, the second woman and first African American woman to hold the post. Rice also served as President George W. Bush’s assistant to the president for national security affairs (national security adviser) from January 2001 to 2005, the first woman to hold the position.

Recorded June 23, 2020 3 PM PT

The Politics Of A Pandemic

Our guest this week is Francis Fukuyama, the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. His new article in Foreign Affairs, "The Pandemic and Political Order” provides the topic for this edition of GoodFellows. The piece poses a slew of intriguing questions and issues that the GoodFellows opine on: What will the world will look like post-COVID-19 pandemic? How will the global economy recover? Does the pandemic mark the end of Reaganism and Chicago School free-market economics? If so, what comes next? Also, why have some countries dealt with the crisis better than others so far, regardless of their political ideologies? Finally, even though the pandemic originated in China, East Asia has generally managed the situation better than Europe or the United States. Does this signal that COVID is shifting the economic tectonic plates under our feet? It’s a fascinating conversation that attempts to peek around the bend and predict what the world may look like over the next 18 to 24 months.

SPECIAL GUEST:

Francis Fukuyama is Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), Mosbacher Director of FSI's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL), and Director of Stanford's Ford Dorsey Master's in International Policy.  He is also professor (by courtesy) of Political Science. Dr. Fukuyama has written widely on issues in development and international politics. His 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man, has appeared in over twenty foreign editions. His most recent book, Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, was published in Sept. 2018.

Recorded June 16, 2020 1PM PT

The End of Empathy

In this special edition of GoodFellows, we’re joined by Roland Fryer, Professor of Economics at Harvard University. His work on education, inequality, and race has been widely cited in media outlets and in Congressional testimony. In this wide ranging conversation on the events of the past 10 days, the GoodFellows (moderated by Niall Ferguson - Bill Whalen is off this week) discuss Roland’s experiences with law enforcement as a teenager, which informed his future work researching the use of force by police departments and the disparities in how it is applied to African Americans. They also discuss one of the more radical proposals stemming from the George Floyd murder: defunding police departments. The implications of enacting that idea are wide-ranging, and the GoodFellows have a lot to say about it.  The conversation then takes up other possible reforms:  changing the organizational culture of police departments, engaging departments more with the communities they police, and improving communication —between the police, citizens, community activists, politicians, and yes, academics-- as our best hope to emerge from this tragedy with a better society. 

SPECIAL GUEST:

Roland G. Fryer, Jr. is a Professor of Economics at Harvard University.  Fryer's research combines economic theory, empirical evidence, and randomized experiments to help design more effective government policies. His work on education, inequality, and race has been widely cited in media outlets and Congressional testimony. Professor Fryer was awarded a MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship and the John Bates Clark Medal -- given by the American Economic Association to the best American Economist under age 40. Among other honors, he is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a recipient of the Calvó-Armengol Prize and the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. At age 30, he became the youngest African-American to receive tenure at Harvard.His current research focuses on education reform, social interactions, and police use of force.

Recorded June 5, 2020 NOON PT

Carnivorous Moose

Europe’s pandemic recovery includes a divided European Union struggling for consensus on a COVID relief plan. Hoover Senior Fellows Niall Ferguson, H.R. McMaster and John Cochrane discuss the health of the 27-nation EU, whose population surveys as economically progressive, more trusting of authoritarian states and less America-leaning.

Recorded May 26, 2020 1 PM PT

International Man Of History

Imagine the three “GoodFellows” in charge of America’s government—a modern (and democratic) twist on ancient Rome’s triumvirate. Hoover senior fellows Niall Ferguson, H. R. McMaster, and John Cochrane discuss the coronavirus-related steps they’d take if entrusted with deciding the nation’s health, economic, and geostrategic choices.

Recorded May 19, 2020 1 PM PT

Education, Economics—and Woodpeckers

A simple question for this week: where will we be a year now, assuming the COVID-19 pandemic has been tamed? Hoover senior fellows John Cochrane, Niall Ferguson, and H. R. McMaster debate COVID-19’s lasting effects on the economy, education, and the public’s willingness to risk its health—all while one of the GoodFellows does battle with an invading woodpecker.

Recorded May 11, 2020

A “Wartime” President?

The “war” on COVID-19 continues a trend of affixing that word to life’s miseries (poverty, drugs, cancer). Hoover senior fellows John Cochrane, Niall Ferguson and H.R. McMaster debate whether “war” applies to pandemics, if Donald Trump’s “wartime presidency” is more akin to LBJ’s than FDR’s, plus Joe Biden’s odd fixation with the late Hoover economist Milton Friedman.

Recorded May 5, 2020 1 PM PT

Your Wallet or Your Life?

As the nation’s states start loosening shelter-in-place restrictions developed in response to the coronavirus, governments weigh sometimes conflicting advice from the scientific and business communities. Hoover senior fellows John Cochrane, Niall Ferguson, and H. R. McMaster debate the right balance to strike in restarting a battered economy, COVID-19’s effect on America’s military readiness, and a scenario in which a second pandemic wave strikes shortly before the fall electio strike in restarting a battered economy, COVID-19’s effect on America’s military readiness, and a scenario in which a second pandemic wave strikes shortly before the fall election.

Recorded April 28, 2020 2 PM PT