It is difficult for me to characterize what Scott, Elizabeth, and myself discussed on the latest LGM podcast, better known as “the tightest 117 minutes in the history of podcasting.” Our writ was to discuss the latest Paranoid Style album, “Known Associates,” as well as to talk about Elizabeth’s contribution of liner notes to The Replacements’ Let it Be: Deluxe Edition and we did indeed discuss these things, but there were digressions. Some questions that emerged and re-emerged over the course of the pod:

• What is your theory of album sequencing, in terms of where you put the best song and where you put the hardest song?
• Is this album the Paranoid Style’s entry into the Yacht Rock genre?
• Does the presence of a saxophone necessarily imply Yacht Rock, or is some sort of boat reference also required?
• Is Van Halen Yacht Rock? Let’s phone a friend.
• Do you have strong feelings about the remastering of Tim? Elizabeth would like to hear from you.
• Are you offended by aspersions against Soul Asylum?
• Did Rod Stewart sell out? Is selling out even bad?
• How does Donald Trump feel about Kiss?
• What’s the deal with authenticity?
• What would say to Prince if he were using the urinal next to you? What would you say to Jon Langford?
• Would you like to hear a funny story about Keith Richards and drugs? Or one about Wussy?
• Did SEK go on a bender with Keith Richards? Did RFK Jr.?
• What will it be like the day that Sir Paul McCartney leaves us?
• A bunch of songs about Canadian songwriters, where Gordon Lightfoot is asked to be ranked by some metric?
• Is Gordon Lightfoot Yacht Rock?
• Is any expression of admiration for the Drive By Truckers excessive? The answer is no.
• Are the DBTs Yacht Rock?
• What is the demographic profile of an LGM podcast listener?
• Would we mind more of Elizabeth’s review of rock n’ roll books?
• Could Elizabeth be lured to Lexington for the Keeneland Spring Meet?
• Could this podcast have been more effectively edited for content and coherence? Possibly.

Transcript is here.

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On the latest LGM podcast, Dave and I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Michael Strausz, long-term friend of the blog and Professor of Political Science at Texas Christian University. Mike works on Japanese politics, and so the podcast focused mainly on the recent Japanese election, although we digressed into a variety of topics associated with the Japanese political scene, including national defense, housing, and immigration.

Transcript is here.

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Photo Credit: By 首相官邸ホームページ, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=178708232

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On the latest LGM Podcast Erik, Scott, and myself sum up the state of the NFL in the days before Superbowl LX. We talk through the coaching changes that have ensued since Black Monday, ruminate on the failure of Bill Belichick to make the Hall of Fame on his first try, review the games of Championship Weekend, and project some expectations for the least likely Super Bowl in NFL history.

Transcript is here.

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In the latest exciting edition of the LGM podcast, Rob and I join special guest star Dave to discuss the NFL playoffs and Black Monday (including BREAKING NEWS on Black Monday +1). All predictions guaranteed to be true unless they prove to be false.

Transcript is here.

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Photo Credit: By Mike Morbeck – Flickr: [1], CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22199032

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Alex Wellerstein’s The Most Awful Responsibility: Truman and the Secret Struggle for Control of the Atomic Age challenges standard preconceptions of President Harry Truman’s role in using nuclear weapons. It goes on to trace Truman’s role in developing policy around nuclear weapons, including civilian control and sole authority.

It’s an important book. Truman was faced with an utterly new situation that he knew little about. It’s easy for us to forget that there was a time when nuclear weapons didn’t exist. Alex gives a picture of when that changed. There are lessons for today.

Rob Farley and I interviewed Alex last week. Alex talks about how he came to the subject and Roosevelt’s irresponsibility. Check it out.

Rob apologizes for his substandard audio.

Transcript is here.

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On the latest LGM podcast Scott and I were fortunate enough to speak with Hannah Pittard, professor at the University of Kentucky and author of several novels, including If You Love It, Let It Kill You. Hannah was part of a a New York magazine profile that covered the dissolution of her marriage, also detailed in her autobiographical work We Are Too Many. Our conversation ranged from these works to life in Lexington to talking cats to the struggle of engaging with the modern student. Give it a listen, especially if you’re the sort of person who waits until the last last last last moment to finish off your Christmas list…

Transcript is here.

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On the latest LGM Podcast, the National Security Gang (NSG, or me, Dan, and Cheryl) talked through the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy, which Cheryl better characterized as “a long expansion of Fourteen Words.” We discussed its vision of a cultural war against the American left and against Europe, its Utopian aspirations, and what it might say about the future of conflict within the administration.

Here’s a link to the NSS itself, and what some other folks are saying…

• Rick Landgraf
• Meghan Myers on what the longer version included
• Brookings breakdown

Transcript available here.

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On the latest LGM Podcast Cheryl, Dan, and myself talk through the “peace” deal that the Trump administration attempted to foist upon Europe, Ukraine, and possibly Russia last week. We work through what we now know of the several-day process of revealing the plan, discuss its prospects, and then move to a point-by-point discussion of its elements. Time constraints prevented us from getting all the way through, which is probably for the best because the plan has now been reduced to nineteen points. Our assessment? This is less a plan than a mess of contradictory impulses, and it will be a struggle to develop anything useful out of it.

Some links:

• The plan, annotated
• The plan, annotated again.
• Thoughts on the origins of the plan.
• Rubio tries to make the plan make sense.
• Ukraine’s reaction.

Transcript is here.

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Photo Credit: By Dsns.gov.ua, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=173759048

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