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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. We'll get some thoughts on the state of the country now from a journalist, essayist and commentator Anand Giridharadas. We'll largely get his take on the debate taking place within the Democratic Party, and more generally on the American left right now, about how to respond to the Trump administration's shock and awe campaign of multiple highly charged actions every day, the specific policies and the larger underlying questions of oligarchy and authoritarianism.

To set this up before Anand comes on, every time we have a Democratic member of Congress on the show lately, one of the most common calls we get is, "Do more than you're doing. Sound more urgent, show more fight." On the other hand, maybe you saw the op-ed in The New York Times that's gotten a lot of attention by the Bill Clinton era, Democratic strategist James Carville urging the Democrats to play possum, as he called it, because as he delicately put it, "The Republican Party sucks at governing." If Democrats lie low for a little while and don't make themselves the issue, Americans will very quickly reject most of the Trump and Musk project.

We heard other argument like that on All Things Considered this week, maybe you were listening, from Matt Bennett, executive vice president for public affairs at Third Way, the centrist Democratic think tank. He did not think it was smart, for example, for Congressman Al Green to get himself thrown out of the chamber on national television on Tuesday night by shouting responses during Trump's address to Congress or if they want to convince convincible voters of anything, for some other Democrats there to hold up protest placards or turn their backs and walk out displaying shirts that said 'resist'. Matt Bennett said this.

Matt Bennett: I really don't think that those kinds of displays are what those voters are looking for. They're looking for a party that is more reasonable in their view than Trump and the Republicans. I think we have an opportunity to win that battle, but probably not through displays like that.

Brian Lehrer: Matt Bennett, executive vice president for public affairs at Third Way, the centrist Democratic think tank. With us now, Anand Giridharadas, among other things, a former foreign correspondent and columnist for The New York Times for more than a decade, author of the bestselling book The Persuaders, author of the bestselling book Winners Take All, for which he was a guest on the show, and more. He is currently an on air political analyst for MSNBC and very present in the public conversation as publisher of the newsletter, The.Ink. Anand, thanks very much for coming on. Welcome back to WNYC.

Anand Giridharadas: Brian, it's always a joy to talk to you even when the times are not joyful.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you. I've been watching you interview Democrats who have been elected, like Senators Chris Murphy and Tammy Baldwin and Congressman Ro Khanna, and you've really been taking on this question of what's the best way to respond and giving voice to constituents who are feeling undefended as you use that word to Senator Baldwin the other day. Before you give your own take, how would you first as a reporter describe the conflictedness that elected Democrats as individuals might be feeling about how to respond and whatever divisions there are among the actual electeds? Obviously, I laid out some of it in the intro.

Anand Giridharadas: I think there are-- When I observe it, before jumping in, that's a good invitation. I think there is a challenge, a conflict over the nature of reality, what this is, and then there is a conflict over what to do about it. The challenge over what this is, there are some Democrats who seem to believe that this is a relatively normal Republican, someone pursuing some ideas. He won an election. This is where people are. There are other Democrats who I think understand that the proper language for what is going on is more in the territory of an anti constitutional coup by an unelected billionaire in Elon Musk, an authoritarian takeover, an autocratic wannabe autocrat in Donald Trump.

There's first of all the conflict of, which of those things do you think this is? Then in the question of what to do about it, we are seeing an enormous difference. You highlighted two examples, James Carville, who I think last won when I was 11 years old. I'm 43 now. I believe in respecting our elders but not outsourcing the future to them. In this country, we often outsource the decisions about the future to them. There is this branch of Democrats that seem to not like fights, not know how to fight. I say to those people, rest, retire, all Godspeed, but do not get in the way of other people fighting.

Don't write op-eds stopping people from fighting because I believe we are an existential conflict in this country and it's going to require fight. We are being failed repeatedly. We're being failed by bullying billionaires, a rampaging right, a lackadaisical left, collaborating corporations, and often, and you're an exception to this, but a mushy media that doesn't know how to call things what they are. The people are all we have left. The opposition are not any of these forces. We're learning that very fast. The opposition is the people. It's going to come down to whether people are willing to rise.

Brian Lehrer: The Carville argument, he would say, I'm sure, is not to be timid, is not to not have fight. He's a scrapper. It's that, from his point of view, the Trump train is going to politically blow itself up really fast. He said maybe as soon as 30 days in one interview that I saw, if the Democrats don't make themselves the issue at the same time. With all this chaos over tariffs that Trump keeps imposing, then pulling back from when he gets burned by the stock market, all this rehiring of fired people because, oops, we actually need nuclear weapons safety employees or thousands of workers were fired by form letter for poor performance when actually their performance reviews were fine and they got rehired. Are they doing just fine at failing in the eyes of the American people, so don't stand in their way by having things that the Democrats do to shoot at?

Anand Giridharadas: James Carville, just for context, in terms of where those ideas come from, James Carville was born in the year that the allies landed in Normandy, so 1944. I think some of those ideas, to me and to many people, I think now read as though they come from a different media environment. A few channels, you could control the flow of information. If a president put something out, Walter Cronkite would lead with it. Yes, in that kind of environment where you have two parties and limited media, if the other party was making a fool of itself, three channels would report that. The meaning would be made, and there you go.

We now live in a completely different world. In the new world that we're living in, 81 years after the invasion of Normandy, the media has incredibly fractured, fragmented to a thousand pieces. People get the sense of what reality is from all kinds of different sources, often sources that are quite motivated in how they frame things. In that world, I strongly believe, and my last book, The Persuaders, was about this, that meaning does not make itself. The nature of reality does not make itself in people's mind. Walter Cronkite is not alive to make the meaning for people.

Republicans doing dumb things and causing problems does not mean that it's going to hurt them. Because if the meaning is made, that this trade chaos, these tariffs, the stock market slump, is part of America finally regaining its footing. That meaning is being made on Charlie Kirk Show and Ben Shapiro Show. That meaning is getting out there and Joe Rogan's helping people make that meaning.

Brian Lehrer: Conservative podcasts.

Anand Giridharadas: People will absorb that meaning of it. People might even think that the tariffs on Mexico are because of Hunter Biden's laptop if that meaning is allowed to be made. If you are not out there 24/7 making an alternate meeting, framing the story, explaining what's happening, you are losing in today's attention economy. I have no shade to people who didn't come up in today's attention economy, but they need to have some humility about what they don't know.

Brian Lehrer: Anand Giridharadas with us talking about the debate within the Democratic Party over how to respond to the early Trump administration. I've seen you mention having something like a shadow cabinet or someone as kind of party leader, if they could figure out who would play that role, to have daily alternatives for the headlines. Am I getting that right? Can you flesh out that idea a little bit?

Anand Giridharadas: It's not my idea. Timothy Snyder has talked about a shadow cabinet. I've talked a bunch in the newsletter, as have others, about this notion of a daily briefing, someone like a Pete Buttigieg or someone who's very gifted at communicating, breaking through the silos. Whichever particular idea you talk about, the idea behind it is the same. It's this meaning-making notion that was at the heart of The Persuaders book, which is that meaning doesn't make itself, particularly now, and that you have to--

Democrats have this problem, and the writer Chris Hayes talks about this in his new book, where they worry more about the quality of attention they get. The right understands that it's actually about the quantity of attention you get in this environment. Negative attention is fine. If they're talking about you, you're winning. Democrats still worry about bad attention, about something looking weird and about something getting taken out of context.

I think it is incredibly important not to just have lots of people doing different things, but to have some sense of like, "All right, what was the most important thing that happened yesterday out of the hundred things that happened? What can you do about it as a citizen?" Again, I'm not, and I think many people are not looking to the Democratic Party to do it anymore. You brought up the newsletter, The.Ink . We have decided, we have 100,000 followers, it's not a nation, but it's enough people to say, "We're going to start doing this for ourselves. We're going to give you--"

We just started a new thing recently. Every morning, big thought, small step, deep breath, morning briefing. We're going to tell you one thing to think about. Today was about the role of ketamine, the drug ketamine, in shaping Elon Musk's idea of governance. We're going to give you one small step, a thing you can do, how to make calls to Congress, how to talk to people in your family who might be on the fence about Trump, and then a deep breath, how to take care of yourself in these times. I think local activism, local power building in your community, engaging in what we talk about in the newsletter, social proof.

Great political strategist Anat Shenker-Osorio, the anti James Carville, she talks about in your community. Right here in New York City, you walk down the street, you wouldn't know that everybody else also thinks it's a constitutional crisis. Let's start visualizing it. Let's start wearing a certain color. Let's start wearing hats. Let's start signaling to others that other people feel this way. That's how movements build. If folks want to join us, it's at The.Ink very simple website, The dot I-N-K. It's free to sign up, but we'll be happy to give away 50 free subscriptions to listeners. If they sign up right now, I'll go in there and just give a bunch of WNYC listeners a free year subscription. How's that?

Brian Lehrer: That's good to hear, The.Ink. In your book, The Persuaders, which you cite, there's a lot in there, obviously, but you wrote about getting past the current culture of mutual dismissal. This is a few years ago, but just like three years ago, that that book came out. The culture of mutual dismissal, getting past that, getting past writing off from a distance, another of your phrases, which was making it harder for anyone to change their minds. You wrote social media rewarded the hunt for apostates more than the conversion of non believers. Is that in a way the opposite of what you think is needed now?

Anand Giridharadas: No, because I make a very clear distinction in the book, which I maintain now, which is you have to treat the leaders of the right differently from the followers of the right. Often we conflate these two. Frankly, often we're not hard enough on the leaders and we're too aggressive to our fellow citizens who are mere followers. I think it's incredibly important in a moment like this to be incredibly tough and bring that sense of fight to the leaders. Whether it's leaders on the political right, whether it's billionaires like Elon Musk trying to turn this into a broligarchy. Whether it's someone like Rupert Murdoch trying to brainwash half of our fellow citizens.

Those are leaders, powerful people. You resist leaders. I actually deeply believe you do not resist your neighbors. You don't resist your fellow citizens. You try to persuade them. When I talk about that openness to changing minds, you need to, and we all need to. I think the left has a problem with insularity here. We need to be much better persuaders of our fellow citizens. That means understanding. As much as you may deplore listening to WNYC, your show, as much as you may deplore some things Donald Trump are doing, it is incredibly important to understand why in this moment in the life of the nation, so many people are attracted to an authoritarian direction, why so many people are baited by these appeals to hate.

There are reasons for it. I maintain the view that almost all people are decent, good family people. When about half the people in your country are drawn to a nightmarish politics, it calls for resistance to those leaders and deep curiosity about the followers. We have to win a great number of our relatives and friends and neighbors and colleagues back from madness if we're going to save this country.

Brian Lehrer: Really interesting framing of the difference between Republican leaders and Republican voters. Let me play one more clip before we run out of time. This is part of the Democratic response to Trump on Tuesday night from Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin, when she sought to make people feel less helpless by listening. It sounds, in a way, you'll tell me, like what you were just saying about looking past the elected leaders, as she listed a few things that many people can do.

Elissa Slotkin: First, don't tune out. It's easy to be exhausted, but America needs you now more than ever. If previous generations had not fought for this democracy, where would we be today? Second, hold your elected officials, including me, accountable. Watch how they're voting. Go to town halls and demand they take action. That's as American as apple pie. Third, organize. Pick just one issue you're passionate about and engage, and doomscrolling doesn't count. Join a group that cares about your issue and act. If you can't find one, start one. Some of the most important movements in our history have come from the bottle up.

Brian Lehrer: I was wondering if she reads your newsletter because she referenced doomscrolling. I know you're always writing, don't doomscroll, bloomscroll. What did you think of Slatkin's speech or that part of it? Is there something there for people? Because there aren't big mass protests either. It's not just the Democratic electeds who might appear passive.

Anand Giridharadas: You're right. I think that message is right. Those steps are correct. I think they're really difficult but in some ways inspiring challenge of this time is we have to do two things at once that feel contradictory but are simultaneously required of us. I think we have it in us. The first thing is to be against. It's really important to be against things that are not right. It's really important to be against bullies and bigots and billionaires and people who are trying to turn this glorious experiment of a country into their personal ATM.

I'm sorry if Elon Musk feels nostalgic for apartheid era South Africa or whatever, but I have no intention of the United States becoming that just because he's homesick. It's important to resist and be against and show in our communities that there are more people against these kinds of things than for. That notion of social proof is really important. Here in New York City, I bet 95% of people feel the way I do in some form. It doesn't look like it if you walk down the street right now. It doesn't look like we might be six months away from irreversible damage to liberal democracy, as Senator Chris Murphy says.

It needs to start looking like it. Activism isn't just toppling a dictator. Activism is demonstration, physical demonstration to people around you that they're not alone so that you get rid of this first mover problem in our communities where everyone else thinks that they're the only one who's mad. That's base level, being against. I think it's really, really important in this moment to also be for. What are we for? What is the idea of America that we are for? We really come to this again and again in The.Ink, because being against only makes you a Debbie Downer.

If you are for, if you are clear that we are for an America that is for everybody, we are for an America that is actually trying to do an awesome thing, which is build a country made of the world, a country made of people from every part of this planet, that it is an awesome pursuit, that no country in Europe is trying to build something like that. No country in Asia is trying to build something like that. We are trying to build a thing that is hard. We're falling on our face because we're jumping high, and that there's life after this cruel and small man.

Brian Lehrer: I'm sure that Musk would not say that he's nostalgic for apartheid South Africa, but I understand where you're going with that. Just tell people, as we run out of time, where they can see your stuff.

Anand Giridharadas: Sign up for my newsletter. It's The.Ink, T-H-E dot I-N-K. it's free to sign up. We'd love to have as many of your listeners as possible. If you sign up right now, I'm going to jump in there and give 50 of you a free paid subscription for a year, so then you get to be in all the comments and participate in discussions. We have things where people help each other with figuring out, "Hey, I did this protest in Bloomfield, New Jersey. Can you teach me how you did it so I can spread that model in Nebraska?"

It's really an amazing community that's developing because people are realizing, having waited for the cavalry for a couple months now, there's no cavalry. The cavalry is them. The people are powerful. We're being failed by lots of people, but we're not going to fail us. I hope The.Ink is one of the places that people can come to figure out how to make the future that we want, that we deserve and to free America from this madness.

Brian Lehrer: Anand Giridharadas, thanks for joining us with your take.

Anand Giridharadas: Thank you, all, for having me.

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