The DSR Network

Representative Ted Deutch (D-Florida) is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Subcommittee on the Middle East, North Africa and Global Counterterrorism. He joined the podcast to discuss the promising first moves of the Biden foreign policy team with regard to international alliances, support for the international system, communication at home and abroad and with respect to the biggest i...

For the second time in as many years, Donald Trump was acquitted by the Senate, this time for inciting insurrection. Even with the overwhelming evidence the impeachment managers brought forth, just 7 Republican Senators voted for conviction. Where does this leave us as a country? Is the U.S. strengthened or weakened in the eyes of our allies? We discuss this, the state of policing in America and m...

The House Impeachment managers proved beyond any reasonable doubt that Donald Trump incited an insurrection against the US government that resulted in six deaths over 140 injuries and profound damage to our democracy. Good as they were, we have to admit, it wasn't that tough to do because we all saw the events unfold. So, ensuring justice will be done should be easy, right? Not so fast. The Senate...

The House Impeachment managers are meticulously making an irrefutable case against former President Trump and they are meeting very little resistance from Trump's almost comically inept defense team. But what then? What if the vast majority of GOP Senators vote to acquit? (As they will.) Where does the party go from here? What will the influence of the small but noticeable Sanity Caucus be going f...

Undoing the policies of our disgraced former president are the low hanging fruit for Biden foreign and national security policy. Allies can be prioritized, executive orders can be reversed, kow towing to foreign dictators can stop. But, what then? What will the Biden team attempt that is complicated or difficult or both? A new deal with iran? A coherent China policy? Pentagon reform? We discuss wi...

MSNBC legal analyst Joyce Vance joins the podcast this week, and we discuss highly unrelated topics such as pet chickens and how necessary judicial reforms can create a more equitable legal system. Vance’s straight talk on the future of the Department of Justice and how current laws can handle domestic terrorism offers hope for the future. Cake helps, and Joyce and Marissa make a British Bake-Off-...

Has the GOP lost its mind? Or is its embrace and defense of lunatics, violent extremists, traitors, sex offenders, racists and the highly corrupt a shrewd, carefully considered political strategy? How should Democrats respond? How do they get accountability for abuses when the GOP absolutely refuses to go along? How do they achieve progress on healing our wounds when the other party actively wants...

This is a complex moment for America and for the world. It is a far cry from the euphoria of the immediate post-Cold War, tech boom era. But there were foreshadowings we would grapple with today's problems and three-time Pulitzer Prize Winner, NY Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman identified them more than two decades ago in his book "The Lexus and the Olive Tree." We talk with Tom about how we go...

"The FBI Way" is a terrific new book from 25 year FBI veteran and MSNBC contributor Frank Figliuzzi. It details the values within the FBI that have enabled it to succeed so frequently in the past as well as discussing where mistakes have been made and how they have been remedied. The book is rich with stories many of which intersect with the headlines of the past few years. We discuss the book wit...

Imagine: A coup attempt in which the coup leaders justify taking power because of massive voter fraud. Or imagine a government using force against thousands of peaceful demonstrators. Now imagine that those things were not taking place in the US on behalf of America's disgraced former president but were instead happening in Myanmar and Russia. Suddenly, the new administration faces its first inter...

Today’s episode features Kavita Patel, practicing physician and former health and economics policy advisor in the Obama Administration. We talk pro-cookie baking tips and Covid, including the pros and cons of the available vaccines, the reality of our shared grief and what to say to someone who’s not wearing a mask. We also talk about more pleasant things, including that most pleasant thing of all...

While some may look at the Trump coup attempt on January 6th as the last desperate act of the disgraced former president to remain in power, it is already being seen among white supremacist groups as a long expected signal of an escalation in domestic unrest leading to a civil war they have long planned and hoped for. The fact that Trump is likely to go unpunished for leading the January 6th effor...

Senate "institutionalists" claim the filibuster is a traditional US Senate tool that produces compromise. Nope. It's a tool that was almost never used during the first 200 years of US history. And when it was used it was almost always used to promote a racist agenda. And now that it is used more often, it is used to obstruct and give disproportionate power to Republicans. The first step to elimina...

While some Washington hot take artists are already predicting a backlash against Bidenism (and this even before the first dogs Major and Champ have had a chance to start chewing on the White House furniture), even observers who are disinclined to jumping to conclusions have noticed big changes in Joe Biden's Washington. Our experts--Rosa Brooks of Georgetown University Law Center, Kori Schake of t...

Journalist and former advice columnist E. Jean Carroll joins this week’s episode and we dig straight into all the important issues, while also trying to recreate her favorite birthday cake from childhood. E. Jean, who brought a defamation lawsuit against former (!) President Donald Trump after accusing him of sexual assault, explains how Trump continues to get away with this behavior, and offers h...

The past two weeks are unlike any America has ever seen. In the midst of a national pandemic and economic crisis, we saw an unprecedented insurrection on Capitol Hill incited by our then president, an impeachment and then the inauguration of a new leader. On Capitol Hill it was a traumatic period of highs and lows. But it has left America shaken too and asking what's next. We discuss this with Rep...

The past four years have left deep scars in the United States. Damage has been done. So can a new administration come in and restore America's role in the world overnight? Just because it wants to? Just because it has experienced senior officials leading the way? Just because the new US president is a foreign policy expert? The short and perhaps somewhat surprising answer is...yes. Yes, the change...

Today's episode features a conversation with therapist and author of Too Much and Never Enough, Mary L. Trump. We make brownies -- because if warm brownies were needed any week, this was surely it. Mary, a psychologist who specializes in trauma and psychopathology, shares new insights into why Donald will never concede, how our traumatized nation can heal, and what Donald’s parents would think of...

We have never seen events like those that occurred on January 6. We have never had a president who posed the kind of threat to our security presented by Donald Trump. We are facing new challenges to our society and government associated with social media and widespread radicalization. How do we respond to these challenges? Who must be held accountable? We conducted a webinar with three experts--As...

Will it read "Donald Trump, only president in history to be impeached twice..." or "Donald Trump who presided over the end of American democracy and became it's first king..." or perhaps, "Donald Trump, former president and father of current President Ivanka Trump..?" This question and others about the impact of this week's impeachment vote were put to noted historian Heather Cox Richardson, polit...

While Donald Trump richly deserved the two impeachments that have placed him in the history books, it is arguable that his greatest offenses and failures were associated with grotesque mismanagement of the COVID crisis. Where has that left us and what challenges does it present for the Biden Administration? We discuss with our two regular COVID experts Pultizer Prize winning author Laurie Garrett...

January 6, 2021 is a date few of us will ever forget. On that day, the president of the United States incited a mob to storm the U.S. Capitol. Five people died. Thousands more were terrorized. And now the nation holds its breath to see if the violence has been quelled or new chapters await. Donald Trump now seems certain to become the first president in U.S. history to be impeached twice and to fo...

In the midst of a pandemic, with almost 4000 people dying every day, when the nation should be coming together, the President of the United States once again tore it asunder. Worse, what he did was mobilize the first violent coup attempt in US history on the back of his months long seditious efforts to nullify the November election and steal the sovereign power of American voters. As it happens, h...

A divided US, the future consequences of the pandemic, inaction on climate change, growing tensions between the US and China, the year ahead holds substantial risks alongside its promise. Each year Eurasia Group puts together an outlook for those risks and on this special edition of Deep State Radio we discuss the 2021 list with Eurasia Group founder and CEO, noted commentator and author, Ian Brem...

As we look ahead to the new year, many of us hope to put the constant drama and sleaze and anxiety and pain of the Trump year's behind us. Many hoped that a steady establishment figure like Joe Biden would help to restore normalcy to American politics and to the world. Wouldn't it be nice to be bored with politics again? We asked our experts Rosa Brooks of Georgetown Law, Kori Schake of the Americ...