Pete Wehner: What Happens When Morality Leaves U.S. Foreign Policy? Venezuela, Greenland, and "Might Makes Right"
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Show Notes
Can Christian Americans Resist Authoritarian Drift?
Pete Wehner—The Atlantic columnist and former Reagan and Bush administration staff member—joins host Curtis Chang to ask the uncomfortable question: in Trump's America, is morality a loser that's been replaced by the "law of the jungle"—especially in U.S. foreign policy? From Venezuela to a looming Greenland/Denmark showdown that could fracture NATO, Wehner argues we're watching "might makes right" go mainstream. The antidote, he says, isn't vibes—it's resistance: stop living within the lie and start living within the truth.
00:04:23 - Explaining the U.S. Foreign Policy Shift
00:06:36 - What Is America's Moral Aspiration in Foreign Policy?
00:07:57 - Trump's "Will to Power" Ethic
00:11:34 - Do We Have Historical Amnesia?
00:16:36 - Contrasting Trump and PEPFAR
00:19:09 - The Disconnect Between Christian Identity and Policy
00:26:34 - Demagogues and Moral Erosion
00:34:19 - President Trump's Unique Amorality
00:37:10 - Primacy of Human Dignity and Christian Ethics
00:41:01 - Venezuela, Greenland, and Moral Implications
00:44:02 - The Value of Beauty and Creation
00:47:14 - What Are the Limits and Possibilities of Action
More about the Religious Landscape Study pewresearch.org/rls
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Mentioned In This Episode:
- Pete Wehner's article Trump's Folly
- More about PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief)
- Anne Applebaum's Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism
- William Galston's Anger, Fear, Domination: Dark Passions and the Power of Political Speech
- Jeane Kirkpatrick's essay Dictatorships and Double Standards (Commentary)
- Václav Havel's The Power of the Powerless
- David Brooks' article America Needs a Mass Movement—Now Without one, America may sink into autocracy for decades (The Atlantic)
- C.S. Lewis' idea of active obedience is found in Mere Christianity
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich"
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's Nobel Prize Lecture (literature, 1970)
More from Pete Wehner:
- Pete Wehner's articles at The Atlantic
- Pete Wehner's opinion pieces at The New York Times
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