Invincible Ignorance

Amid the collapse of university humanities programs, the rise of identity politics, and the relentless commercialization of culture, conservatives have revived the claim that great books and artistic tradition can redeem the nation. Lee Siegel and David Rieff aren't buying it. Their argument: treating art as a civilizational rescue mission distorts what makes it valuable in the first place. Art re...

Lee Siegel and David Rieff take on Trump's cult of personality, using a surprising entry point: an American figure skater at the Olympics falling on the ice while skating to the sound of his own voice. For Lee, it's the perfect emblem of a society where people are so wrapped up in their heads that they have no idea what to do when the country is stolen from them. The conversation continues into a...

Lee Siegel and co-host David Rieff discuss charisma in American politics, using Trump's State of the Union and Max Weber's definition of charisma  to explore how Trump's norm-shattering, story-driven persona rivets even his critics. They debate whether right-wing populism can survive without Trump, noting that charismatic leaders rarely pass power on and arguing that figures like JD Vance lack sim...

Lee Siegel and David Rieff take up the U.S. conflict with Iran, asking what kind of war this is and where it goes from here. They dig into Trump's motives (midterm politics, his taste for chaos, his absence of fixed principles) and whether he could hand the campaign off to Israel to avoid deeper entanglement. The conversation moves through Iran's long institutional memory, the threat of retaliatio...

David Rieff and Lee Siegel discuss antisemitism and how it is surging across American politics and culture. They begin with Tucker Carlson's remarks in Turkey claiming that Israelis are persecuting Christians, arguing that such dangerous claims rely on a "kernel of truth." In this case, the small truth that enables a large lie is that church leaders in Jerusalem are taking pro-Palestinian position...

In the debut episode of "Invincible Ignorance", hosts David Rieff and Lee Siegel introduce the podcast and explain they're recording without guests after travel plans fell through. They dive into the major stories dominating the moment, including Trump, Jeffrey Epstein, ICE raids, and the broader political climate, making the case that American culture has reached a point of exhaustion where it ca...