Douglas Murray is a journalist, author and associate editor of The Spectator. Some see The West in decline, others believe we're entering a bold, uncharted era of opportunity. So how do we preserve the foundations of the West while also protecting the cultural values that make it worth saving? Expect to learn what Douglas thinks of Trump's first few months in office, Douglas’ advice for the democratic party if they want to win in the upcoming elections, why the Trump-Zelensky meeting was disappointing, if the West is still trying to ‘erase itself’ according to Douglas or if we have moved past that, what the current state of the UK is like, lessons for the broader world from Ukraine and the middle east, why Douglas sued The Guardian and the fallout of that and much more… Sponsors: See discounts for all the products I use and recommend: https://chriswillx.com/deals Get $350 off the Pod 4 Ultra at https://eightsleep.com/modernwisdom (use code MODERNWISDOM) Get a Free Sample Pack of all LMNT Flavours with your first purchase at https://drinklmnt.com/modernwisdom Get the best bloodwork analysis in America at https://functionhealth.com/modernwisdom Get a 20% discount on Nomatic’s amazing luggage at https://nomatic.com/modernwisdom Extra Stuff: Get my free reading list of 100 books to read before you die: https://chriswillx.com/books Try my productivity energy drink Neutonic: https://neutonic.com/modernwisdom Episodes You Might Enjoy: #577 - David Goggins - This Is How To Master Your Life: https://tinyurl.com/43hv6y59 #712 - Dr Jordan Peterson - How To Destroy Your Negative Beliefs: https://tinyurl.com/2rtz7avf #700 - Dr Andrew Huberman - The Secret Tools To Hack Your Brain: https://tinyurl.com/3ccn5vkp - Get In Touch: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/modernwisdompodcast Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Douglas Murray and what is the episode about?
Douglas Murray, welcome to the show.
Very good to be back with you in your native Austin. Ah, yes, you have. You're here for 24 hours. Salubrious. Wonderful. Watching your success with great admiration. Thank you. And great pride as well, in a way.
I don't know why I feel pride, but I just... Oh, you definitely contributed to it. I think I managed to get you to take a dice roll many, many years ago. Five years ago, six years ago.
That's right. I think I was doing the Madness of Crowns, and you were in your place in Newcastle with a mold on the ceiling. Wasn't mold.
It was because I had... As I explained for a long time, it's because I had a Yankee candle addiction, which also actually is something to be embarrassed about, not quite as bad as mold. And I had to get it repainted. After our episode, the internet shamed me so much that I had to get the ceiling of my old bedroom repainted. And now you're here in Austin. Look at me now. It's great to see you.
You too. Trump's been in office for 78 days. What do you make of his efforts so far?
Um, uh, mixed, I think as with anyone, um, he got the very, very large and considerable mandate, um, won the popular vote, made it pretty impossible for people to criticize him.
from the election onwards um first couple of months there's been very little i think pushback or rallying around against him um then inevitably there are things that are now happening you may have noticed if you keep an eye on the markets or anything like that uh which very much people are uh going for him on um but yes i mean it's it's kind of early days but A mixed bag, I'd say.
It feels like a lot's happened.
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Chapter 2: What are Douglas Murray's views on Trump's first 78 days in office?
There are really impressive people in the Democratic Party, but they're going to need to allow them to come up. Tim Walz. If I was a Republican strategist, I would tell the Democrats to keep going with Tim Walz. The pinnacle of masculinity. I mean, all that stuff is just a disaster. Everyone knows that he was a horrible candidate. Everyone knows that Kamala was a horrible candidate.
You've just got to find the talent and encourage it up. But they've got time. I don't think they should panic or start, you know. But they do at some point have to have a coherent opposition to Trump and Trumpism.
Well, it certainly seems like one of the things that everybody's probably noticed is How much is the blowing with the wind that we're seeing at the moment of Mark Zuckerberg, not only a sartorial rebrand, but a meta policy-based rebrand, getting rid of fact-checkers and opening up conversations specifically around, I think, trans or gender identity was one of the points.
I think, as I understand it, what happened with Zuckerberg was that he discovered that, you know, with whatever it is, 80,000 employees, you set up a philanthropic wing with like 1,000 employees. And then they spend all their time warring on the 80,000 people making money and deranged the whole company. And so...
You get rid of it. But you've seen that, right? Lots of different companies seeming to move in that direction. So BlackRock, they exited climate groups, eliminated diversity targets, ends its ESG stuff. Hexeth says he's eliminating DEI within the military. And then even European companies like Aldi and Santander are rolling back their DEI programs over here. So it does feel a lot like...
I don't know, everyone's blowing with the Trumpian wind, whatever the sort of direction is that things are going in at the moment.
Absolutely. I mean, I said to you many years ago, I'm sure, with Madness of Crowds, I mean, one of the problems with all of that stuff was, you know, at some point it gets serious and the bridges start to fall down, you know. I was never totally confident that if the bridges fell down because of DEI that people wouldn't say that's just yet more evidence of the patriarchy. But it gets serious.
It gets really serious at certain points. It gets really serious with the military. I'm very glad that Pete Hegseth is addressing that. You do want extremely tough, mainly men, at the forefront of your nation's military and your nation's defense. It's not about, you know, to use the most perhaps hackneyed but most extraordinary one, it's not about that, like, CIA...
Recruiting ad where the obese, diverse woman of color who explains how many mental disorders she has is necessarily your ideal poster child. I didn't get to see her. You never get to see her? She was great. She was like a bipolar drone operator or something.
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