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Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome back to Carol Markwitz Show on iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 1: My special guest today for the short segment where I

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Speaker 1: answer listener questions is my friend and co host of Normally,

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Speaker 1: Mary Katherine Ham. Hi, Mary Katherine. It's so nice to

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Speaker 1: have you on.

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Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.

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Speaker 1: So we're going to do a quick question answer for

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Speaker 1: a listener who wrote in. I like this question because

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Speaker 1: it really does hit on some issues that I talk

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Speaker 1: about a lot. The question is, Hi, Carol, I've been

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Speaker 1: following you since the Alarming News days. By the way,

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Speaker 1: side note, Alarming News was my old blog. It's how

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Speaker 1: I got into the media world, and so this person

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Speaker 1: has been following me for many, many years, like twenty.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much for that. I'm sixty one years

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Speaker 1: old and my wife died of cancer ten years ago.

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Speaker 1: We have three grown children. I only started dating again

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Speaker 1: about a year ago, and I'm seeing a woman in

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Speaker 1: her early forties. I wasn't looking for I'm one so

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Speaker 1: much younger, but we met through mutual friends and hit

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Speaker 1: it off. The problem is she wants children of her own,

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Speaker 1: and I feel finished with that part of my life.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes I think I should just have a child with her,

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Speaker 1: but the idea of a thirty year age gap with

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Speaker 1: my other children feels ridiculous. I don't want to lose her,

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Speaker 1: but also don't want to waste her time. I feel

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Speaker 1: like I need a woman's advice and I trust you well,

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Speaker 1: thank you for that. I don't know what do you

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Speaker 1: think about that, Mary Catherine.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, here's what I think is that congrats by the way,

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Speaker 2: for finding love again. And that's exciting, and given that

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Speaker 2: it sounds like a healthy relationship, I think you guys

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Speaker 2: need to have a very frank discussion about this because

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Speaker 2: time is of the essence.

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Speaker 1: Time is a ticket, Yeah.

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Speaker 2: For both of you, frankly, particularly for her. If she

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Speaker 2: really wants this, it would be need to it would

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Speaker 2: need to be acted upon quickly, and for you, which

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Speaker 2: I think. Look, I'm an older mom and I understand

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Speaker 2: and taking that I sort of restarted the clock on

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Speaker 2: myself as well. And it can be challenging because you

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Speaker 2: do have less energy and you do have you feel

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Speaker 2: like the challenge is sometimes hurt your health more or

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Speaker 2: you lose more sleep or whatever it is right when

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Speaker 2: you're dealing with young children. So that's something to consider.

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Speaker 2: So for both of you, the clock is ticking in

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Speaker 2: a way. Yeah, so you've got to have that honest

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Speaker 2: conversation now because you really don't want to end up

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Speaker 2: in a place where she feels like her time did

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Speaker 2: get wasted.

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Speaker 1: Right, That's exactly where I am on this. I think

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Speaker 1: that it's very important not to waste her time. So

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Speaker 1: you need to make a decision, and you need to say,

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Speaker 1: do I care about that age spread between my older

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Speaker 1: kids and potential new baby. Do I want this woman

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Speaker 1: in my life? Do I need her in my life?

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Speaker 1: Will I care about losing her if I can't give

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Speaker 1: her what she wants? I will say, you know, a

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Speaker 1: lot of people focus on the age or the mom,

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Speaker 1: but my husband always makes this point that having kids

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Speaker 1: as a young man's game, it's not that easy for

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Speaker 1: the dads either, you know, and for every and I

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Speaker 1: know if you listen to my show you've heard me

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Speaker 1: say this, But everybody who's always like, well, Mick Jagger

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Speaker 1: had a baby at seventy five, like you are not

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Speaker 1: mc jagger, and you will not have a team, You

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Speaker 1: will not have a squad taking care of your kids.

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Speaker 1: It'll be you with your kid in the backyard. So

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Speaker 1: figure out how important it is to you and then

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Speaker 1: follow Mary Catherine's advice and you know, make the decision

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Speaker 1: together obviously, but first figure out where you want to

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Speaker 1: go on this.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And I would note he uses the word ridiculous

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Speaker 2: is the thing that he uses to characterize this age gap,

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Speaker 2: which yes, is out of the ordinary, But ridiculous isn't

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Speaker 2: that strong a word, And it indicates that his concern

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Speaker 2: is how it would be viewed exactly, not how it

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Speaker 2: would feel to have the kid. And I guarantee you

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Speaker 2: that having a beautiful kid is probably going to override ridiculous.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I also noticed ridiculous. I feel like you're absolutely

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Speaker 1: right that word is for the outword world, how it

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Speaker 1: would look to other people and what they would think

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Speaker 1: of him, Like, oh, but nobody's thinking of anybody. That's

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Speaker 1: the other thing. It's like we think that people are

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Speaker 1: judging us or thinking about what we're are, the choices

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Speaker 1: that we make or what we're doing.

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Speaker 3: They're not.

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Speaker 1: They're thinking about themselves and how you're thinking about them

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Speaker 1: and something that they're doing.

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Speaker 2: You.

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Speaker 1: I really liked this question because I think this guy

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Speaker 1: has an opportunity at a second love, second life and

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Speaker 1: all of that, and I kind of hope. He takes it.

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Speaker 1: Understand that there's concerns about the age, and I understand

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Speaker 1: that you have grown kids who I don't know, he

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Speaker 1: doesn't say it in the question, but might not love it.

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Speaker 1: I don't know, but it might really breathe a new

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Speaker 1: sense of purpose into your life and you might find

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Speaker 1: that that's what you needed. But very specifically, I talk

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Speaker 1: about women wasting their time with guys that can't give

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Speaker 1: them what they want. So if that's you, I would,

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Speaker 1: more than anything else say cut her free. If it's

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Speaker 1: not for you.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he's clearly thinking about it seriously, and he needs

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Speaker 2: to think about it seriously quickly.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely. Thank you for joining me on the Carol Markowitz Show.

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Speaker 1: She is Mary Katherine Ham. She is fantastic. Check us

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Speaker 1: on normally watch her on Fox News. Thank you so much,

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Speaker 1: Mary Catherine.

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Speaker 4: Thank you coming up my interview with Greg Easterbrook. But first,

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Speaker 4: it was nearly two years ago the terrorists murdered more

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Speaker 4: than twelve hundred innocent Israelis and took two hundred and

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Speaker 4: fifty people hostage. Today, it seems as if the cries

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Speaker 4: of the dead and dying have been drowned out by

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Speaker 4: shouts of anti Semitic hatred and the most brutal attack

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Speaker 4: on Jewish people since the Holocaust has been forgotten. Yet

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Speaker 4: as the world looks away, a light shines in the darkness.

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Speaker 4: It's a movement of love and support for the people

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Speaker 4: of Israel called Flags of Fellowship, and it's organized by

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Speaker 4: the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. And on October fifth,

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Speaker 4: just a few weeks away, millions across America will prayerfully

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Speaker 4: plant an Israeli flag and honor and solidarity with the

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Speaker 4: victims of October seventh, twenty twenty three and their grieving families.

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Speaker 4: And now you can be part of this movement too.

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Speaker 4: To get more information about how you can join the

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Speaker 4: Flags of Fellowship movement, visit the Fellowship online at IFCJ

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Speaker 4: dot org. That's IFCJ dot org.

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Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Carol Markowitz Show on iHeartRadio. My

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Speaker 1: guest today is Greg Easterbrook. Greg is the author of

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Speaker 1: fourteen books, including It's Better Than It Looks, which shows

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Speaker 1: the condition of the world is steadily improving. Also has

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Speaker 1: a weekly substack at All Predictions Wrong. So nice to

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Speaker 1: have you on, Greg.

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Speaker 3: Thanks Carol, good to be here.

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Speaker 1: So you have fourteen books, and your most recent one

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Speaker 1: is about how things aren't as bad as as they

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Speaker 1: may seem. How did you come up with that?

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Speaker 5: I've actually been writing about that topic for several decades.

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Speaker 5: If you looked at social statistics about the United States,

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Speaker 5: trends in violence and pollution, longevity, discrimination, things that you

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Speaker 5: can measure objectively. In most cases, they started improving around

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Speaker 5: the time that I was born, which was sadly long ago.

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Speaker 5: But they've improved a lot in the last thirty years.

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Speaker 5: Of course, I'm not arguing that things are fine. There's

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Speaker 5: a lot of improvement and reform needed. But we have

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Speaker 5: so much less pollution in the United States than we

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Speaker 5: used to, so much less discrimination, most rates and incidents

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Speaker 5: of diseases during.

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Speaker 3: Long term decline.

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Speaker 5: Longevity has increased every year except the COVID year, and

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Speaker 5: we've always our material prosperity has increased. Per capita income,

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Speaker 5: if you stated in current dollars, per capita income has

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Speaker 5: gotten steadily higher, including in the middle class. You hear

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Speaker 5: people say, oh, the middle class is being hollowed up.

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Speaker 5: The middle class lives significantly better today than it did

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Speaker 5: a generation to go, and those are unfashionable ideas An

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Speaker 5: interviewer once asked me what people react to negatively in

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Speaker 5: my writing, and I said, what I say that makes

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Speaker 5: people angry is I'm an optimist. For some reason, this

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Speaker 5: makes people angry, especially in the New York City environment

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Speaker 5: that you just put. The only thing that's politically correct

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Speaker 5: is to feel despair and anxiety. The world is ending.

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Speaker 5: And if you say no, actually, things are getting better

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Speaker 5: and yeah we need reform, but in the main a

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Speaker 5: lot better off than we used to be, that makes

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Speaker 5: people angry.

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Speaker 1: Weirdly enough, it makes you unpopular.

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Speaker 5: In my case, my popularity has been fine, but I

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Speaker 5: certainly wouldn't be welcome at the Council on Foreign Relations.

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Speaker 1: Why do you think people imagine that their lives are

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Speaker 1: worse and the world is worse. Why do they think

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Speaker 1: things are worse than ever before?

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Speaker 3: There's a couple of reasons.

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Speaker 5: Human beings are prone to self pity, and saying, oh,

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Speaker 5: I'll never live as well as my grandparents did is

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Speaker 5: a form of self pity, even if your grandparents would

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Speaker 5: change places with you in a heartbeat, if only to

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Speaker 5: get modern health care. People are prone to self pity,

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Speaker 5: mythologize the past and think it was much better than

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Speaker 5: it was. You asked me, whoa boy the past things

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Speaker 5: everybody had it so good. Well, yeah, to think about

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Speaker 5: the nineteen fifties. Think about the nineteen fifties when blacks

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Speaker 5: couldn't ride buses and you could be thrown in jail

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Speaker 5: for being gay, and prosperity again in current dollars was

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Speaker 5: but twenty percent of what it is today. You really

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Speaker 5: like to go back and live in that time. But

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Speaker 5: people's knowledge is knowledge of the past. Even the recent

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Speaker 5: past is.

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Speaker 1: Is slight colored glasses.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, it's rose colored glasses. And it's also the relentless

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Speaker 5: negativism of the mainstream media and the two political parties.

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Speaker 5: And Trump is as guilty as this as the Democrats are.

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Speaker 5: You remember Trump's American carnage speech and the day you

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Speaker 5: said American carnage crime had fallen for like twenty years

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Speaker 5: in a row. The Democratic Party, in all of its

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Speaker 5: recent presidential elections, has tried to talk America down, down, down,

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Speaker 5: so bad, so awful, so racist, so sexist, And you

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Speaker 5: going on the street and you see racism and sexism

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Speaker 5: were infraction.

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Speaker 3: Of what they once were.

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Speaker 5: But the elites don't want to say that. The elites

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Speaker 5: think scaring you brings them more money and power, And

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Speaker 5: sadly they're right about that. Scaring you does bring them

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Speaker 5: more money in power. So we get this endless diet

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Speaker 5: of this stuff.

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Speaker 1: So what could be done? How do you get the

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Speaker 1: message out that things are getting better all the time.

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Speaker 5: Well, I've long said my one ament is it long

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Speaker 5: if you and I started a publication called Consensus today,

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Speaker 5: nobody would buy it because what they're buying is scare tactics.

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Speaker 5: You've got to say, if you're thinking simply in terms

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Speaker 5: of the free market, the free market seems to like

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Speaker 5: scare tactics. That's what it's willing to pay for. These

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Speaker 5: news channels that people tune in are the channels that

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Speaker 5: present scare tactics.

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Speaker 3: You don't have to you don't have.

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Speaker 5: To watch CNN or Fox News in PBS and watch

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Speaker 5: a classical music concert.

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Speaker 3: That's not what you do.

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Speaker 5: What you do is you watch the channels that are

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Speaker 5: selling scare tactics. And the same is true with publishers

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Speaker 5: and many others. That people have to stop being eager

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Speaker 5: customers for the doomsday view if they want the behavior

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Speaker 5: of the media, especially to change.

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Speaker 1: Did you get into writing, did you always want to

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Speaker 1: be a writer.

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Speaker 3: I did.

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Speaker 5: I'm relatively rare. It was my youthful ambition. I'm relatively

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Speaker 5: rare and someone who's actually accomplished as youthful ambition. We

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Speaker 5: could talk about that more in a second, but yes,

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Speaker 5: I always wanted to be a writer, and I'm glad

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Speaker 5: I did it.

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Speaker 1: So do most people not succeed in their youthful ambitions?

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Speaker 1: I guess is the follow up to that, because you know,

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Speaker 1: I always wanted to be a writer too. My parents said,

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Speaker 1: don't be crazy. Nobody's a writer. You know, they were

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Speaker 1: immigrants from the Soviet Union. They definitely didn't want a

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Speaker 1: starving artists child. Were your parents supportive and what do

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Speaker 1: you mean by you know, the youthful ambition part?

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Speaker 5: Well, my parents were kind of neutral in this because

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Speaker 5: I put myself through college. I always looked after myself.

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Speaker 5: My parents were fine, loving people, but they kind of

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Speaker 5: had nothing to do with my career choices. I think

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Speaker 5: you can find an awful lot of people who and

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Speaker 5: you say, I want to be a great musician, I

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Speaker 5: want to be a ball arena and they ended up

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Speaker 5: working in Starbucks. And I'm glad that my youthful ambition

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Speaker 5: was realized at least at some level. I'm actually still

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Speaker 5: working on it, but because I have some unpublic just

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Speaker 5: but good luck getting fourteen books out right.

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Speaker 1: I have one and I'm done, I think.

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Speaker 5: Right well, I have two completed books that are not

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Speaker 5: published yet and that I'm arguing them publishers about. So

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Speaker 5: I'm far from finished with this quest.

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Speaker 1: Is there a theme through your fourteen books?

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Speaker 5: I gotta say, Carol, I've bounced all over the map.

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Speaker 5: I've written some books that are serious public policy analysis.

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Speaker 5: I wrote a book about Christian theology. I've written published

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Speaker 5: three literary novels and numbers four and five are coming.

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Speaker 5: And to put our kids through college, I wrote about sports.

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Speaker 5: So my agent has been telling me our entire time

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Speaker 5: together that the way you make money as an author

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Speaker 5: is to pick one subject and write about it fennerlessly,

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Speaker 5: And I'm sure he's right about that. But I've written

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Speaker 5: about whatever's on my mind and done okay. And it

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Speaker 5: keeps your brain fresh when you write about what's on

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Speaker 5: your mind that day.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely yeah. And I hate that. I hate the pick

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Speaker 1: a lane and just just think about this all the

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Speaker 1: time and write about this and this is your you know,

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Speaker 1: this is what you do, and this is what people

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Speaker 1: know you. As you know, people are multifaceted. They have

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Speaker 1: all kinds of things that they want to say to

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Speaker 1: the world. And yeah, I'm glad you're not following that

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Speaker 1: advice to pick a lane and just do one thing.

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Speaker 1: Do you have something that you wish you had written

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Speaker 1: about but didn't feel like it was your lane?

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Speaker 3: No?

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Speaker 5: Actually no, everything that I've every topic that I've chosen

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Speaker 5: was my choice and I've been happy with. Like I said,

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Speaker 5: I have two books that are done and not yet published.

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Speaker 5: So in men's frustration over that, but those books say

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Speaker 5: what I want them to say, and that part of

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Speaker 5: my career has worked out pretty well.

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Speaker 1: So if it hadn't worked out, if your childhood ambition

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Speaker 1: hadn't come to fruition, what would have been the plan.

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Speaker 3: Be I'm not sure.

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Speaker 5: I never I admire the profession engineering, law, medicine. I

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Speaker 5: never felt drawn to them when I was young, especially

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Speaker 5: when I was trying to save money to get back

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Speaker 5: into college. I work as a bus driver and a

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Speaker 5: used car salesman. I'm glad I'm not a bus driver

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Speaker 5: or a used car salesman today, but I'm very proud

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Speaker 5: to say that I'm a Fellow of the American Academy

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Speaker 5: of Arts and Sciences. You have to be elected to that.

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Speaker 5: And when you go to their website and look at

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Speaker 5: these tremendously accomplished people who have chairs at Ivy League

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Speaker 5: universities and have won great prizes all around the world,

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Speaker 5: then you look at my bio. I'm self employed, was

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Speaker 5: a bus driver and a used car salesman. But I'm

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Speaker 5: actually kind of proud of that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think that's it's unusual and it

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Speaker 1: got you to where you are. I feel like and

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Speaker 1: more than ever, people are recognizing that things like that,

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Speaker 1: having jobs like that are actually super helpful in other

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Speaker 1: fields that we don't want people to have no life

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Speaker 1: experience at all. I can think of a handful of

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Speaker 1: politicians that that would describe, you know, taking that path

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Speaker 1: and you know, going from the no life experience at

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Speaker 1: all to either being in charge of us or or

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Speaker 1: telling us what we're supposed to be doing.

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Speaker 4: More coming up with Greg Easterbrook. But first war is everywhere.

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Speaker 4: Debt continues to skyrocket, and the dollar is losing purchasing power.

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Speaker 4: The value of the dollar is falling fast. That's why

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Speaker 4: more people are converting their IRA or four O one

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Speaker 4: K to a gold and silver IRA to protect their

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Speaker 4: retirement savings. In twenty twenty five, both gold and silver

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Speaker 4: have risen an impressive twenty nine percent, and many experts

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Speaker 4: project even bigger gains ahead. Convert some of your IRA,

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Speaker 4: not new money, the savings you already have to a

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Speaker 4: gold and silver IRA with Leeer Capital. Call eight hundred

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Speaker 4: seven eight six eight five zero zero for your free gold,

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Speaker 4: got an IRA transfer kit and with a qualified purchase,

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Speaker 4: get up to fifteen thousand dollars in bonus gold or

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Speaker 4: silver deposited directly into your precious metals IRA. Leear Capital,

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Speaker 4: the nation's leader in precious metals for twenty eight years.

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Speaker 4: Call today eight hundred seven eight six eighty five hundred.

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Speaker 4: That's eight hundred seven eight six eighty five hundred eight

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Speaker 4: hundred seven eight six eight five zero zero. Keep in

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Speaker 4: mind that any investment has a certain amount of risk

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Speaker 4: associated with it, and you should only invest if you

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Speaker 4: can afford to bear the risk of loss. Before making

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Speaker 4: investment decisions, you should carefully consider and review all risks involved.

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Speaker 1: What do you worry about?

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Speaker 3: I worry, Carol, I have two words.

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Speaker 5: I have a national worry for the United States and

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Speaker 5: an international worry for the world. My national worry for

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Speaker 5: the United States is our debt cycle. I think you

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Speaker 5: know that debt is a gloomy topic, and people say, well, look,

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Speaker 5: we've been borrowing money hand over fifth nothing's gone wrong. Yeah,

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Speaker 5: but where's it going to leave. The shocking statistic is

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Speaker 5: that the United States, again, if you adjust the current dollars,

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Speaker 5: the United States is borrowed and we're money in the

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Speaker 5: last fifteen years that it borrowed in the previous two

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Speaker 5: hundred and twenty five years combined, two hundred and forty

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Speaker 5: five years, I guess, and thirty five years combined. That's

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Speaker 5: the right number. Boy, it's amazing how much money we've borrowed.

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Speaker 5: We've gotten away with it so far. It's not gonna last.

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Speaker 5: It's not sustainable. There's going to be a reckoning for

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Speaker 5: all that borrowing.

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Speaker 3: And with the exception of.

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Speaker 5: The COVID year, the borrowing has occurred when things were

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Speaker 5: basically normal, right, The economy was outputting pretty good, when

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Speaker 5: people unemployment was low. In other words, it wasn't an emergency.

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Speaker 5: And we've borrowed money anyway, and it's not going to last. Forever,

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Speaker 5: and we're not going to be happy.

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Speaker 3: When it ends.

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Speaker 1: I'm very afraid of that issue because I feel like

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Speaker 1: we've lost that argument. I also, I care very much

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Speaker 1: about our spending and are borrowing and all of that,

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Speaker 1: and I just feel like there's nobody to argue with anymore.

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Speaker 1: There's nobody to tell that to anymore. Even people on

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Speaker 1: the right who used to kind of agree with me,

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Speaker 1: just it doesn't matter anymore. And Culter described national debt

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Speaker 1: as the similar to what the left does on climate change, like, oh,

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Speaker 1: it's going to be real bad any minute now. It's

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Speaker 1: going to be real bad any minute now. A good point, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but how do we convey to people what it will

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Speaker 1: actually be like?

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Speaker 5: But nobody wants to deal with this, and the pressure

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Speaker 5: points are coming on Social Security and Medicare. Social Security

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Speaker 5: runs out of money in twenty thirty three, the day

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Speaker 5: before this happens. Everyone in Congress will say they were

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Speaker 5: never warned and had no way of knowing at the

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Speaker 5: very least soci Security, Medicare. Each year that we put

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Speaker 5: off reform, the problem gets worse. Right with it now,

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Speaker 5: it'll be better, less bad than if we deal with it.

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Speaker 5: At three o'clock in the morning and in twenty thirty three,

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Speaker 5: which is how Congress is going to do.

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Speaker 1: How they're going to do it, right, we can make

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Speaker 1: that prediction right here, right now. That's how it's going

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Speaker 1: to be. I had some hope that Elon I really,

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Speaker 1: I know maybe it sounds naive, but Elon Musk gave

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Speaker 1: me some hope that there was going to be actual changes,

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Speaker 1: and him being so despondent and disappointed in our government

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Speaker 1: showed me that nothing is going to change.

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Speaker 3: That's because even the right wing wouldn't support him.

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Speaker 5: Right the right wing in the House of Representatives is

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Speaker 5: not in any way serious about it. They just want

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Speaker 5: to borrow, borrow, borrow. They're indistinguished. People say there's no

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Speaker 5: bipartisanship in Washington. Yeah, total my partisan agreement on borrowing

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Speaker 5: more and being irresponsible.

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Speaker 3: Both parties do it now.

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Speaker 5: The thing that I worry about for the larger world,

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Speaker 5: most trends are going pretty well. The reduction of poverty,

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Speaker 5: especially in Asia, on the global scale in the last

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Speaker 5: twenty five years is just phenomenal. It's one of the

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Speaker 5: best thing that's ever happened to the human family. And

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Speaker 5: most Americans don't even know that it's occurred, so I'm

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Speaker 5: pretty happy about that. I think environmental trends are mainly positive.

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Speaker 5: I think global warming is real, it's been proven, but

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Speaker 5: it's nowhere near the threat that people make it out

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Speaker 5: to be. What worries me is that there are still

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Speaker 5: eleven thousand nuclear bombs in the world. Someday one of

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Speaker 5: those damn things is going to go off, and on

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Speaker 5: the precipice of the main nuclear arms control treaty between

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Speaker 5: the United States and Russian Federation expires in February, and

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Speaker 5: there's no sign that either side is trying to renew it.

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Speaker 5: There's no sign that we're trying to bring the Chinese

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Speaker 5: into that treaty. Chinese building nuclear bombs like crazy. You

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Speaker 5: can now there are fewer nuclear bombs in the world

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Speaker 5: than before the treaties between Washington and Moscow. That's been positive,

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Speaker 5: but there's still way to There's plenty to eliminate human life.

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Speaker 5: Human beings. Yeah, most people who run big countries are rational.

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Speaker 5: They know that you sing a nuclear bombas suicide. But

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Speaker 5: not everybody who runs a big country is rational, right,

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Speaker 5: because one and then the human family will will be

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Speaker 5: no more, and we're not doing anything about it. Yeah, much,

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Speaker 5: we're concerned about cracker barrel than eleven thousand nuclear warheads.

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Speaker 1: It's funny because as you say this, I mean not

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Speaker 1: that I forgot that there's a nuclear war threat, but

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Speaker 1: you know, it's sort of in the background. Cracker barrels

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Speaker 1: in the news. I mean, the old man in the

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Speaker 1: cracker barrel logo has been, you know, front and center,

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Speaker 1: and the nuclear threat is very, very very in the

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Speaker 1: shadows and in the background of our concerns. I know,

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Speaker 1: you know, people used to be asked, you know, what

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Speaker 1: do you worry about? Nuclear war would be number one?

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Speaker 1: But I think that hasn't been the case in a

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Speaker 1: very very long time. How do you Yeah, I was

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Speaker 1: gonna say, how do you think people should think about it?

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Speaker 2: Like?

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Speaker 1: Should they be pressuring their governments to do more to

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Speaker 1: have these treaties? Especially would the average person?

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Speaker 5: Do you think that you think there's nothing I can

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Speaker 5: do about this? There is something I can do about this.

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Speaker 5: You can lobby your members of Congress and the White

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Speaker 5: House to renew the treaty between the United States and

439
00:23:13,280 --> 00:23:18,040
Speaker 5: Russian Federation. It's not a panacea, but it prevents.

440
00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:20,600
Speaker 1: Right because it also makes me think like, if they're irrational,

441
00:23:20,640 --> 00:23:22,600
Speaker 1: if it's an irrational leader, what are they going to

442
00:23:22,640 --> 00:23:23,560
Speaker 1: care about the treaty?

443
00:23:24,480 --> 00:23:28,760
Speaker 5: Well, so far, the US, Washington, Moscow have observed that

444
00:23:28,800 --> 00:23:32,080
Speaker 5: were on the fourth Nuclear Arms Control treaty, and all

445
00:23:32,160 --> 00:23:36,280
Speaker 5: four of them have been strenuously observed by both parties.

446
00:23:36,840 --> 00:23:41,040
Speaker 5: I think there's embedded wisdom in Washington and Moscow, and

447
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:43,080
Speaker 5: I think there's no wisdom they said, is there is some?

448
00:23:43,840 --> 00:23:46,520
Speaker 5: And one of the wisdoms is we were right on

449
00:23:46,560 --> 00:23:51,119
Speaker 5: the brink of obliterating the world, and we were able

450
00:23:51,160 --> 00:23:54,480
Speaker 5: to step back from that brink by observing the treaties.

451
00:23:54,840 --> 00:23:57,000
Speaker 5: So I think there's a lot of sentiments and both

452
00:23:57,160 --> 00:24:00,399
Speaker 5: capitals for continuing to observe the treaty, and must be

453
00:24:00,440 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 5: sentiment in Beijing for entering into the treaty and observing

454
00:24:04,480 --> 00:24:06,560
Speaker 5: the same rules. But because it leaders have to be

455
00:24:06,640 --> 00:24:10,080
Speaker 5: pressured to do this, and we're's certainly not. There's nothing

456
00:24:10,119 --> 00:24:12,159
Speaker 5: going on in Congress right now to pressure Trump to

457
00:24:12,200 --> 00:24:12,919
Speaker 5: renew the treaty.

458
00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:15,000
Speaker 1: It just seems like a lot of other things going on.

459
00:24:15,080 --> 00:24:17,520
Speaker 1: I didn't even realize, you know, I think that I

460
00:24:17,520 --> 00:24:20,760
Speaker 1: haven't seen any news at all about the treaty expiring and.

461
00:24:20,880 --> 00:24:24,200
Speaker 5: Eleven thousand strategic nuclear warheads in the world. That's fewer

462
00:24:24,200 --> 00:24:27,080
Speaker 5: than there used to be, but studies show that you

463
00:24:27,160 --> 00:24:28,840
Speaker 5: really only need a couple hundred.

464
00:24:28,600 --> 00:24:31,000
Speaker 3: Of them to go off to pretty much.

465
00:24:30,920 --> 00:24:33,880
Speaker 5: End human life because of the nuclear winter that would

466
00:24:33,880 --> 00:24:36,000
Speaker 5: because crops would fail all over the even if you

467
00:24:36,040 --> 00:24:37,840
Speaker 5: weren't in the place where when the bombs went off,

468
00:24:38,040 --> 00:24:41,160
Speaker 5: crops would fail globally for a decade. And how many

469
00:24:41,160 --> 00:24:43,080
Speaker 5: people would still be alive at the end of that.

470
00:24:43,760 --> 00:24:46,000
Speaker 5: And so I don't mean to sound like a doomstate type.

471
00:24:46,200 --> 00:24:49,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're a little bit like a doom'sdare I'm not

472
00:24:49,119 --> 00:24:50,800
Speaker 1: gonna sleep tonight, Greg, And.

473
00:24:51,520 --> 00:24:53,840
Speaker 5: I don't worry for a minute that global warming is

474
00:24:53,840 --> 00:24:55,280
Speaker 5: going to kill us, even though, as I say, it

475
00:24:55,320 --> 00:24:58,200
Speaker 5: is a real problem. I do worry that nuclear war

476
00:24:58,240 --> 00:25:03,160
Speaker 5: will kill us. And so there's there's the doomsday part

477
00:25:03,160 --> 00:25:04,000
Speaker 5: of my personality.

478
00:25:05,119 --> 00:25:08,880
Speaker 1: Well, as you look back on your life, what advice

479
00:25:08,920 --> 00:25:11,720
Speaker 1: would you give your sixteen year old self, what a

480
00:25:11,760 --> 00:25:13,879
Speaker 1: sixteen year old Greg need to know about his future?

481
00:25:14,160 --> 00:25:16,200
Speaker 5: Here's what I would have told sixteen year old Greg.

482
00:25:16,240 --> 00:25:18,760
Speaker 5: As we mentioned that my youthful ambition was to be

483
00:25:18,800 --> 00:25:22,679
Speaker 5: a writer, and I've accomplished it. But my main ambition

484
00:25:22,800 --> 00:25:25,440
Speaker 5: was to be a fiction writer, to write serious literary fiction,

485
00:25:26,080 --> 00:25:29,639
Speaker 5: and I didn't start. And I have published three serious

486
00:25:29,680 --> 00:25:32,480
Speaker 5: literary novels, great reviews in the New York Times, and

487
00:25:32,520 --> 00:25:35,679
Speaker 5: so I've gotten farther than most professors of creative writing

488
00:25:35,720 --> 00:25:38,639
Speaker 5: ever get. But I didn't start till I was forty.

489
00:25:39,119 --> 00:25:41,800
Speaker 5: And I would tell my youthful self start right away,

490
00:25:42,119 --> 00:25:46,560
Speaker 5: don't wait till your forty Hemingway remember, Hemingway started as

491
00:25:46,560 --> 00:25:49,280
Speaker 5: a journalist and then he went into serious fiction. And

492
00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:53,000
Speaker 5: he said later, if you're in journalism when you're young,

493
00:25:53,040 --> 00:25:56,639
Speaker 5: there's no problem. You'll help learn the craft of writing.

494
00:25:56,960 --> 00:25:59,720
Speaker 5: But you've got to quit journalism by the time you're

495
00:25:59,720 --> 00:26:02,919
Speaker 5: third where it will suck you in and pull you out.

496
00:26:03,359 --> 00:26:05,639
Speaker 5: And he was pretty you know, in my key. So

497
00:26:05,800 --> 00:26:09,280
Speaker 5: I've done journalism for The Atlantic Monthly, which is pretty

498
00:26:09,520 --> 00:26:12,120
Speaker 5: pretty high on the status bull, but still it does

499
00:26:12,200 --> 00:26:14,399
Speaker 5: kind of suck you in and pull you down. And

500
00:26:14,520 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 5: we was right about that. So I would tell my

501
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:20,200
Speaker 5: young self just to switch to fiction, only much younger

502
00:26:20,240 --> 00:26:21,080
Speaker 5: than I actually did.

503
00:26:21,560 --> 00:26:25,320
Speaker 1: There's definitely the instant gratification with doing news of the day,

504
00:26:25,440 --> 00:26:31,280
Speaker 1: and you know, things that aren't pressing and matter today

505
00:26:31,320 --> 00:26:34,040
Speaker 1: and going to expire by tomorrow. Especially with our one

506
00:26:34,119 --> 00:26:37,240
Speaker 1: day news cycles, I could see where the general journalism

507
00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:41,440
Speaker 1: would absolutely take over the fiction. I have trouble even writing,

508
00:26:41,480 --> 00:26:44,320
Speaker 1: you know, my substacks, because it's not news of the day,

509
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:46,439
Speaker 1: it's not happening right the second. It doesn't have to

510
00:26:46,480 --> 00:26:47,600
Speaker 1: be out immediately.

511
00:26:47,840 --> 00:26:51,119
Speaker 5: So a great anecdote about that The Atlantic Monthly. I

512
00:26:51,160 --> 00:26:54,480
Speaker 5: worked for a sainted editor named Bill Whitworth, who was

513
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:57,680
Speaker 5: a great guy who passed away a year and a

514
00:26:57,720 --> 00:27:01,320
Speaker 5: half ago, and this would this would have been maybe

515
00:27:01,400 --> 00:27:02,119
Speaker 5: nineteen ninety.

516
00:27:02,119 --> 00:27:03,040
Speaker 3: I'm sitting there with Bill.

517
00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:07,080
Speaker 5: We're looking at recent issues of Atlantic Monthly, and I say, Bill,

518
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:10,000
Speaker 5: I don't know. This magazine's pretty light on current events.

519
00:27:10,040 --> 00:27:12,440
Speaker 5: This is all about things that happened in the nineteenth

520
00:27:12,520 --> 00:27:17,600
Speaker 5: century for literary writers or dance companies. Where's the current events?

521
00:27:17,880 --> 00:27:20,040
Speaker 5: Well said, I don't want any current events in the

522
00:27:20,040 --> 00:27:23,439
Speaker 5: Atlantic Monthly. My goal is to produce a magazine that

523
00:27:23,520 --> 00:27:26,399
Speaker 5: you could put the copies into the attic, find them

524
00:27:26,480 --> 00:27:29,439
Speaker 5: twenty five years later and still be interested. So after

525
00:27:29,520 --> 00:27:32,520
Speaker 5: Bill died, I went up to the attic above me

526
00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:36,119
Speaker 5: got out the box of magazines from that year, and

527
00:27:36,200 --> 00:27:38,920
Speaker 5: they were still interesting twenty five years later.

528
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:42,040
Speaker 1: It's amazing. I've evergreen. The kids call it right.

529
00:27:42,240 --> 00:27:45,000
Speaker 5: Yeah, but that's the goal you go for in literary

530
00:27:45,040 --> 00:27:47,960
Speaker 5: fiction or serious play writing. You want something that will

531
00:27:47,960 --> 00:27:50,560
Speaker 5: be of interest and a value regardless of what's happening

532
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:51,600
Speaker 5: in the news.

533
00:27:52,000 --> 00:27:54,959
Speaker 1: Well, I've loved this conversation. I love getting to know you.

534
00:27:55,000 --> 00:27:57,720
Speaker 1: I've followed you on Twitter and then X for many

535
00:27:57,760 --> 00:28:01,399
Speaker 1: many years. Leave us here with your best tip for

536
00:28:01,520 --> 00:28:04,000
Speaker 1: my listeners on how they can improve their lives.

537
00:28:04,680 --> 00:28:08,160
Speaker 5: I once wrote an article for The Atlantic called Selfish

538
00:28:08,200 --> 00:28:11,639
Speaker 5: Reasons to become a Better Person, and the thrust of

539
00:28:11,680 --> 00:28:14,879
Speaker 5: that article was the things your grandmother told you to do.

540
00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:20,600
Speaker 5: Be grateful, to be alive, be optimistic, be forgiving. We

541
00:28:20,720 --> 00:28:23,959
Speaker 5: think of those things as virtue. Actually they're good for you.

542
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:29,200
Speaker 5: They improve your own life. To be grateful, optimistic, and forgiving, yeah,

543
00:28:29,280 --> 00:28:32,040
Speaker 5: makes you a better person, but it improves your experience

544
00:28:32,040 --> 00:28:34,000
Speaker 5: of life. Also, there's a fair amount of data and

545
00:28:34,080 --> 00:28:38,360
Speaker 5: psychology that backs that up. So my main advice would be,

546
00:28:38,560 --> 00:28:40,880
Speaker 5: don't be angry at the world, don't be cynical, don't

547
00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:44,239
Speaker 5: be anxious. Yeah, you're gonna have moments like this, but

548
00:28:44,360 --> 00:28:47,800
Speaker 5: in general you should be optimistic, grateful, and you should

549
00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:48,640
Speaker 5: forgive others.

550
00:28:49,480 --> 00:28:52,200
Speaker 1: I love that. Thank you so much, Greg Easterbrook. Check

551
00:28:52,200 --> 00:28:55,080
Speaker 1: out his book It's better than it looks. Thanks so much,

552
00:28:55,120 --> 00:28:55,920
Speaker 1: Greg for coming on.

553
00:28:56,080 --> 00:28:56,640
Speaker 3: Thanks Carol,