Pod Save the World - Kim Jong Un-healthy?

Episode Date: April 22, 2020

Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu cuts a deal that allows him to stay in charge. We explain how the price of a barrel of oil briefly becomes negative. Rumors about North Korean leader Kim Jong Un���s health and who might come next. Hong Kong leaders face more attacks on democracy and heavy-handed tactics from China. Parliaments around the world figure out how to meet virtually, and new polling on Trump’s handling of national security. Then former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright joins.

Welcome back to POTSave the World. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Ben Rhodes. Ben, another big show today, man. Another big guest. I don't want to rank all of our guests, but two big guests in a row. This week we have former Secretary of State, former Ambassador of the United Nations, Madeline Albright. She's coming on to talk about her book, Hell and Other Destinations, a 21st Century memoir. We just spoke to her. She is smart, funny, engaging. The book sounds great. So don't miss that interview because you will be mad at yourself. For the news portion of this, we got a bunch of ground to cover. So there's a long-awaited political agreement finally in Israel, and we'll talk about that. We will try to explain how the price of oil could turn negative. Very confusing headlines yesterday. There are a bunch of rumors about Kim Jong-un's health and what that might mean for North Korea's future. There's a bunch more attacks on democracy in Hong Kong in our ongoing series of stories about how despots are using the coronavirus to do terrible unrelated things. We'll talk a bit about China's economic recovery and some interesting polling that your group did, Ben, on national security and Donald Trump in elections.

So a lot of good stuff today, a little less coronavirus focused because I imagine it's as depressing for you guys sometimes as it is for us. So we're trying to cover everything. Yeah, yeah, definitely. One quick thank you before we get to the news. More than 1,500 of you have used the call tool on Votesaveamerica.com slash call to get connected with your representatives in Washington and tell. them that they need to include funding to make elections safe and accessible as part of the next coronavirus relief package. That is so amazing and it's really important to do while that package is still being negotiated. Now we want one more thing, which is to hear from you guys directly

about why you need safer voting options, including vote by mail. It could be because you have a pre-existing condition that puts you at risk. It could just be that you don't feel safe volunteering at the polls or being in a crowd, but we want to hear your story. We want to hear your stories. So send a video to us at 323405-9944 so we can hear your story, share your story, and send a message to Congress and state governments about how important this is. Again, that number is 323-405-99-44. Tell us your stories. We want to hear from you. All right, let's start with this political agreement out of Israel. So after three elections, a year or more of instability, Israel's political leaders finalized, finally, a deal that will ostensibly allow Israeli Prime Minister B.B. Netanyahu to stay in that job for

at least another 18 months. Now, that's assuming the deal doesn't fall apart, which these things tend to do. But under the terms of this agreement, Netanyahu's chief rival from several elections from the blue and white party, Benny Gantz, he will be named deputy prime minister. And then in 18 months, Gantz is supposed to be elevated to the top job. But if you believe that is going to happen, I would like to wager some bets with you. So the way they're splitting up responsibilities is basically the Lycud, Bibi's party will get to control education, transportation, housing, security, health, and finance ministries. Gantz will control defense, foreign affairs, culture, justice, media, and Gantz himself

will be the defense minister. The plan reportedly papers over some of the more divisive issues by basically saying, this is an emergency government, let's spend six months focused on the coronavirus, and let's punt all these hard questions like military service for ultra-Orthodox down the road to later. BB's trial for fraud, bribery, breach of trust will start on May 24th, so we'll have to watch all the ways he tries to obstruct that. Predictable then, but still pretty disappointing is where they landed on a Palestinian state. Netanyahu and Gans have both talked about annexing Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Apparently, they're going to take that proposal to the Knesset in July and move out on

it. And since the Trump administration has endorsed that plan and the broader international community seems to have lost interest in fighting for the Palestinian state, it seems like it could go forward. So, you know, this race over the past year got really ugly. B.B supporters called Gantz a terrorist sympathizer. And Netanyahu's son, who is the Don Jr. of Israel, spread rumors that Gantz had created sex tapes that were hacked by Iranian agents. So really ugly, and which led to blue and white party members being furious about this agreement. I don't know how the party survived this, but we'll see, you know, this week in Tel Aviv, these thousands of mask-wearing Netanyahu protesters or opponents stood two meters apart in a socially

distanced protest, which was a pretty amazing visual. So, Ben, a couple questions for you. Do you agree with this analysis that basically this was the best Gantz was going to get in this environment, given the coronavirus, given the polling, given Bibi's power? And what do you think this means for people like us who still hope one day that there is a two-state solution. I mean, I'm sure it was a really hard environment, but I don't think that this was the best. You know, we've been through three elections. What Beebe's basically been able to do is kind of, you know, protract a stalemate so that he's the last man standing. And, you know, part of what worries me about this, Tommy, is if you look at the history of BB's elections, he,

often has succeeded in, you know, neutering, if not ending the political careers of his opponents. Yeah. By bringing them into his government. Yeah. And then kind of outmaneuvering them, blaming them for things, using their, you know, their awkwardness of being kind of half in with Bibi and half out to undermine their public support. And so if you go back and look, you know, Zippy Livney ran against Bibi in 2000. nine actually got more votes than him, couldn't form a coalition, ended up coming into a BB-led government as foreign minister, and that was kind of the end of her political career. Ahud Barak, who'd been prime minister before, and a political opponent of BB, comes in as defense minister, you know, ends up kind of not a viable politician on the back end. You have Yair Lepid, who is seen as one of the leading kind of centrist challenges to Bibi.

Similarly comes in, same thing happens. And so there is a pretty clear pattern here where Bibi kind of runs the coalition game. He doesn't have like majority support for him, but he makes it, you know, difficult for anybody to amass a coalition bigger than the, essentially the far right block of parties that he can assemble. He kind of co-ops and brings in the political opponent and that person ends up being kind of chewed up. And so I think we should look for signs over the next 18 months if that's the play that's happening again. if Gantz's stars being diminished and Bibi's somehow undermining him or blaming him for things, I'd look for that. I'd also look for whether or not any other opposition to Bibi emerges, does this energy that

the Blue and White Party tried to harness of people who just want to move past Nanyahu? Does that coalesce around somebody else other than Benny Gans? I thought Lepid, who was kind of one of the other important figures in Blue and White, it was pretty blunt in how he described this as, you know, essentially, you know, a betrayal in a way. Yeah. And so I think that, you know, to me, it's a, it's an unsatisfying outcome that kind of preserves this stalemate. It's unclear what it means for Beebe's corruption trial. I think the suspicion is that, you know, as he's sitting, prime minister, that will be more difficult for, to for prosecutors to effectively move forward. We'll have to see on that.

And I think in general on the Palestinian issue, you know, clearly that didn't feel like something that Gans was, you know, fighting for, you know, to have a more, you know, rational and, well, let me put it in this way. You know, clearly on the Palestinian issue that Gans was not fighting in these negotiations for a radically different policy and approach that could bring about a Palestinian state. The conversation seems to be about when and how fast and how much to annex the West Bank. So again, I think we're not going to see changes on a lot of the issues we talk about,

including the Palestinian issue, unless we get beyond this type of stalemate government. And really, actually, one of the telling signs will be the U.S. election, because if the U.S. moves in a different direction and B.B. had kind of thrown his lot in fully with Trump, you know, I think that might undercut a bit at home too. So that could have some impact on how this plays out. But for me, this is generally a win for Netanyahu. Yeah, that seems right. I mean, look, you know, the one constant about Netanyahu is he is a savvy, smart political operator. He tends to win in the end. It does seem like he may have engineered a series of divisions of labor that will allow him to appoint people to oversee his own prosecution. So, yeah, not ideal.

but what are you going to do? Yeah, and just to be specific on Lapid, you know, again, who was not like a left-wing guy as a centrist, but a post-Naniao, he went out and he said, I apologize to everyone who I convinced over the past year to vote for Benny Gans. I didn't believe your votes would be stolen. There has not been such deceit since the establishment of the state, you know. So, I mean, that's a much more dire diagnosis than even I gave, And that's from someone, you know, who's generally a centrist in the context of Israeli politics. Yeah. So, you know, look, not the outcome.

I think any of us were hoping for, but, you know, we don't get a vote. So it is what it is. I do want to note that we're recording this on a Tuesday, April 21st, which is Holocaust Remembrance Day. According to the Associated Press, there are about 180,000 Holocaust survivors remaining in Israel. There's a similar number elsewhere in the world. You know, tragically, you know, these are obviously people who are extremely old at this point. you're seeing a lot of survivors getting taken by COVID. You know, Ben, I remember vividly, like, taking a class in eighth grade that was called

Facing History in Ourselves, that was about the Holocaust. And that class was punctuated at the end by a presentation from a Holocaust survivor. And it made me think, I mean, that was such a powerful, formative class for me that stuck with me forever. And, you know, it's concerning, given how much Holocaust denial is out in the world. it's unnerving to think that we might soon live at a time where there are no survivors left to offer these firsthand accounts. But, you know, one powerful experience I think you were a part of was the trip Barack Obama took with Elie Wiesel when they toured Buchenwald. Could you just talk a little bit about Elie Wiesel for anyone who might not know who he is and like what that experience was like?

Yeah, it was amazing. So Elie Wiesel wrote, you know, one of the seminal books about the Holocaust, a memoir called Knight, about his experience at Buchenwald when he was a boy and obviously lost a family in the Holocaust and became kind of a leading spokesperson on behalf of Holocaust survivors, you know, and a key figure in the history of Israel and the history of the Jewish people. And, you know, we, we flew into Buchenwald with Angela Merkel. And so it was Obama and Angela Merkel and Elie Wiesel. And they literally walked, a few paces in front of us. You remember that weird feeling of being a staffer

and you're kind of 15 feet behind. But you're touring this camp that Obama's great uncle had actually helped liberate. And so Obama had this weird connection to the camp and Elie Wiesel had been there. And they literally went to the spot where he had been as a boy.

And then to see after that event, Obama and Merkel and Elie Wiesel all spoke, and Elie Riesel spoke very powerfully and eloquently about the need to remember. But so did Angela Merkel. I remember being struck by her remarks, which are kind of off the cuff, about, you know, Germany's obligation. And it was a, unfortunately, it was kind of a, it feels like it comes from a different era, you know, of making sure that we, we learn the lessons from history and the darkest possible lesson of the Holocaust and some of my family. family, my family on my mother's side were European Jews, and so some of them that didn't

emigrate to the United States were in the Holocaust. And I, you know, I had this other vivid recollection of Elie Wiesel coming to have lunch with Barack Obama in the White House, and I got to sit in the lunch. It was just the three of us. And he wanted to talk about, not policy towards Israel, not U.S. foreign policy. He wanted to talk about concepts of love and friendship and how do you find meaning in life and how do you not become despondent from history but learn from it. I mean, this was a man with like a powerful moral compass. And I do think that at a time when, look, on Israel, like we're hard on the Israeli government a lot. I will tell you, I had a conversation for one of my projects recently with an activist in Russia. And I kind of,

I asked the activist, you know, what makes you hopeful and kind of, and dark. way, he said, well, I know that I'm Jewish, so I know that if it really gets bad, I can go to Israel, you know, which was a powerful reminder to me of, again, put aside our criticism of Israeli government, like the achievement of having a state where the Jewish people have that kind of safe haven, is something to be protected. At the same time, you know, you see this nationalism and any Semitism as a part of the nationalism from people like Trump, you know, and people like Victor Orban that has bad echoes of history too. And so it's not a bad time as we're all reflecting, you know, to go back and look at the kind

of moral example of the early results of this world to remind ourselves of what what human beings can do when they get it completely wrong and what they can do coming out of that. Yeah. You know, I've told you, you know, I've been reading Rise and Kill First by Ronan Bergman. It's a great book about the history of target assassination among the Israeli government. And it is, you know, it drives home to you how important it was to all of these individuals to have a state given what it happened and how recent that history is and how it drove policy decisions for better, for worse. You know, thinking about that trip with Obama and Merkel and Elie Wiesel, it gives me chills and really thinking about that whole generation.

I mean, my grandfather was in the OSS and was, you know, doing Intel. My uncle was shot down over Germany and spent the rest of the war in a prison camp, basically. And he wrote a book about it, this wild thing. So it's like, I don't know, I should look back to those, look back to those times about when it was worse, arguably, recently. Yeah, no, much worse. I mean, we didn't know. My family emigrated pretty early. So it's not like they came in the 30s or something.

But, you know, there was still this big family, like, back in Poland and Germany. And my mother has this old black and white photo, I think, of her, you know, her grandfather or somebody in her family at a reunion in Europe with this, you know, dozens of Jews, you know, in my family. And we don't really know them, you know. And so I couldn't even identify who they are in the photo, but you know when you're looking at this, what happened to them, you know. And, you know, I have that, I've always had that photo very much in my mind. And I do think that the Holocaust, you know, it's interesting. It was such a catastrophic failure of human beings that in a way, I've actually been thinking about this a lot.

It kind of shocked the world into trying to not do that again, you know. And so a lot of the infrastructure set up after World War II, the UN, all these things that, we've been talking about the successes and failure of this international order was set up to prevent another World War and another Holocaust. And part of what worries me about the moment we're in is it's now been 75 years, you know, that generation is passing. And we may have forgotten the freshness of how bad things can get, you know. So I think you're right that we should look to the generation of your grandfather and the people who, you know, Obama's great uncle and, and And Ellie Riesel and, you know, and, you know, people who've sought to rectify the wounds

of the past by not repeating them. Yeah, agreed. We got a little deep there, but, you know, like it is, it's a good reminder that all of our country, our world has been through a lot very recently, maybe gives us a little perspective. Yes. That, you know, podcasting from home is not the worst thing that's ever happened to me. So, a slightly different story here.

So, Ben, our listeners might have been confused this week when they saw. headlines reporting that the price of oil had become negative, negative $37.63 to be exact, you might ask, why would anyone pay me to take their oil? And the answer is a combination of a bad economy, a supply glut, a lack of storage, and then how it's traded. So I'll try to explain this for you a little background first. So consumption of oil is obviously way down because of the pandemic, because of the resulting economic shutdown. No one's driving. Nobody's flying. Factors are closed, et cetera. of that, and we've talked about this on the show before, in early March, the Saudis and the Russians,

they broke a longstanding agreement to limit the production of oil that was able to keep the price pretty constant. And so both the OPEC countries and the Russians, they ramped up supply and just started like drilling tons more oil. That was a price war we've talked about. So as demand is crashing, the supply is increasing. After about a month, the Saudis and the Russian realized this is a very bad time to have this fight. Trump intervened. tried a referee and break some agreement where the U.S. also cut production. But the damage was basically done in the near term in terms of the market being flooded with this oil. So that gets us to Monday, and then we have to talk about how oil is traded. And so what we're talking about, we talk about

the negative price for a barrel of oil, is a futures contract on a May barrel of West Texas intermediate crude oil. So oil is traded in this very complicated hedged way. I can buy contracts for delivery of a barrel of oil for like several months from now to hedge against a price increase or what have you. So if you own a May futures contract right now, this week, you either have to accept the physical delivery of that barrel of oil or sell it. And that's how you get to a negative price. Like a lot of the people buying and selling oil are just traders. They don't have the infrastructure to actually do anything with it. And as a country and as a world, we are literally running out of places to put the oil. One of the main U.S. storage locations is in Oklahoma. It

estimated to be completely full in May. Traders rent these massive tankers called VLCCs that can hold up to 2 million barrels of oil for temporary storage. But these things cost like a hundred grand a day. So you try to rent them for as little time as possible or else you can end up losing money on the deal. And so because most economists and oil traders expect that the economy will pick up over the next couple months and demand will increase, a barrel of oil, a contract for a June barrel is actually like 15 bucks, 20 bucks. But the May oil is negative. So very confusing. But the gist is this just shows how much this pandemic has collapsed economic activity, how deep the shock is going to be to our economy. And the big,

big risk here, which Trump clearly knows because he's talking about this, is that if the price stays really low, like under 20 bucks a barrel, a huge percentage of U.S. oil companies, maybe 80% by some estimates, will just go bankrupt. Like they cannot produce oil at a rate. that can be profitable for them. And so you can see hundreds of thousands of people lose their job. So today I saw him tweeting about how the U.S. might start making big purchases of oil for the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve. You might hear talk about a bailout.

But man, Ben, like this really drove home to me just how brutal the economic damage from this shutdown of the economy has been. Well, the good news is that the three people who have the most agency on the city, issue are Muhammad bin Salman, Vladimir Putin, and Donald Trump. Great. So that makes me feel really confident about this. I also think I was thinking about this last night, you know, sitting in quarantine here. And just thinking that, you know, this whole pandemic is in interesting ways revealing things that were already broken about, you know, our society and how our world works.

we talked about the thing I wrote about 9-11 and our overwhelming focus on terrorism. I think another thing is there's just something wrong with a world in a global economy that is hurtling towards a climate change future that has this much oil being produced. Basically, to deal with climate change, we should be reorienting the entire global economy to run on things other than fossil fuels. And instead of doing that, it's kind of a symbol of how much we're not doing that, that in a pandemic, there's literally more oil than people can store or do something with because consumption is down. I mean, no, there should not be bailouts of fossil fuel companies. Like, why? I mean, the reason we have this glut in a way is because of how much fossil fuel companies have had special privileges from governments. Like what we need to do is get to a place where this is not the lifeblood of the global economy. So it's a bigger point.

I mean, the short term, yeah, you're going to see shocks. I wonder what this does for like a Vladimir Putin who served to power in part because oil prices were so high that the coffers were full in Russia and he could kind of spread the money around. I think, you know, there's serious questions about, you know, what kind of Russian economy there is on the back end of this. and how he's going to manage through that. And we've talked a little bit about how that might lead to other provocations. So I think, you know, there could be geopolitical fallout that flows from an enduring period of low oil prices. There also, I think, should be yet another wake-up call that, you know, it's time to get on to some new forms of energy here because the next pandemic that is coming towards us is climate change.

You know, we know what the science tells us. We know what the results will be if we don't prepare. and we're not preparing. Yeah, we need to create a new form of renewable energy that we produce here, so that we're dependent on any foreign countries ever again. And we need to figure out it real fast because this is a little ugly. I don't want to be dependent on the Saudis. Yeah, and what's interesting, Tommy, is it like, you know, in a way, this massive boom in U.S. production, again, you know, some of this happened under Obama with fracking, made people feel like, oh, this means that we're not dependent on foreign oil. Well, yes and no, because

these giant producers like Saudi Arabia and Russia can still mess with our economy. You know, they can still mess with people's jobs in this country. They can still, you know, hold us over a barrel to use the obvious pun. And I think it suggested a more durable, sustainable model for job creation is not in fossil fuels. It's in a transition to renewable energies. Yeah, one to watch for sure. Here's another pretty amazing story that popped up overnight. So late Monday, CNN reported.

that the U.S. is monitoring intelligence that suggests North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is in grave danger after a surgery of some sort. The source on this story was a U.S. official with direct knowledge of said intelligence. So if true, it's quite a scoop. It's obviously still far from confirmed. Some other countries are knocking down this theory. The South Korean news outlet reported that Kim is receiving treatment after undergoing heart surgery last month. So it's hard. Like, you know, we talk about this with Secretary Albright. It's very hard to get any good news or intelligence. out of North Korea. It's close to impossible. So experts spend all this time examining state news outlets for clues, basically. And there's a big one here, which is that on April 15th,

Kim Jong-un missed a celebration of his grandfather, late-grandfather's Kim Il-sung's birthday, which is the biggest event of the year in North Korea by far. There's fireworks, song and dance events, like competitions. Kim Il-sung is revered like a god because he's the country's founder. So Kim Jong-un missing this event was more than a little conspicuous. observers note that his health has been a question for a while. He disappeared for a month back in 2014 for like six weeks. He reemerged with a limp. Anna Fiffield, who's a fantastic reporter at the Washington Post, reported that experts think Kim Jong-un is 5-7, 300 pounds.

He's a smoker, so not a healthy guy. So, Ben, I mean, Kim doesn't have a successor that we know of with his sister started floating around and doing more stuff. There's all these generals who, you know, we don't know. what they do. But I don't believe the country has a standard line of succession. It's this cult of personality. Do you care to wildly speculate on what Kim Jong-un's departure might mean and what could come next? Yeah. Well, first of all, I think we have to take this with a dose of caution. A lot of these reports had like a single U.S. intelligence source. And in 2014, we never really knew what happened. I think what's going on here is, as you say, he's like 300 pounds and smokes. And

I think he probably has some other habits that aren't good for him and he disappears and people start speculating. If there is a succession issue, I think it would, you know, any succession in that country, even in the succession to Kim Jong-un, who was in the family line, led to purges and increased provocations, you know, and a lot of bloodletting. You have a situation where you have his sister who's taken a more prominent role and is really the only member of the family that could take up the mantle. You know, Kim killed his brother. Right. And, you know, doesn't have a child, you know, who can step in. And yet this is a very patriarchal country, you know, very male-dominated country. And so then you've got these kind of generals. He's got a, you know, he's got a number

two guy. And you could see like, you know, some jockeying, some competition. Because for it to, on the one hand, for it to not stay in the family would go against everything about this country. This country exists as a cult of personality around this one family. And it's gone from the grandfather to Kim Jong-il to Kim Jong-un. And so for it to leave the family, I think would open up a Pandora's box of competition. But, you know, whether the male-dominated hierarchy there would accept a woman is an open question. So I think in any event, if there is a succession crisis, it is likely to bring about some bloodletting, some competition, some jockeying, probably more likely a degree of competition, perhaps flows of refugees into China or into South Korea, so hard to manage. So it's one

of these situations where, you know, Kim Jong-un, it's not that he's a great guy. It's just that we don't know there's an uncertainty with what comes next, and it would probably be, at least in the short run, a bumpy ride. But I would take these reports with a big grain of salt until we see anything more definitive. Big, big, grand assault, single-sourced U.S. official monitoring intelligence that suggests is, you know, it's not entirely locked down. And, you know, that's not a criticism of the reporters. It's just hard to get information out of there. You know, Trump would have to find somebody new to send letters to, but that's a whole other story. So one coronavirus story that I did think we should talk about this week was the World Food

Program estimates that the pandemic is going to double the number of people facing acute hunger this year. They estimate that around 265 million people in low and middle-income nations could face starvation by the end of 2020. That's double the 2019 number. You know, that's not just because of the coronavirus. It's a confluence of factors like conflict and famine and climate change. But I just think it's, again, important to keep in mind that as hard as this is for people in the U.S., these crises tend to impact poorer countries even worse. And, you know, at some point when we're, you know, reasonably close to feeling like we've managed the crisis at home, donor countries are going to have to step up to prevent a horrific humanitarian outcome,

one, but also to try to prevent more economic and political crises in places like Africa, wars from breaking out, right? I mean, like these events tend to spiral into worse and worse scenarios if left unchecked. Yeah. You know, I think that this is a space to watch in terms of how this plays out among the most vulnerable communities in the world. You know, I checked in a few days ago with a friend of the pod, Zarlaashtalamsai, you know, who we had on to talk about Afghanistan. And, you know, she has this NGO that works with refugees. And she said, people don't even know what's happening in refugee camps. You know, like, there's just, there's no visibility. Like, a lot of the aid workers had to leave because people were kind of pulled out. And so some of these

places, it's a black box. Like, people don't even know what is happening in these camps. You know, you look at a country that's talking to someone the other day, who works on South Sudan. And, you know, there's less than 200 doctors in South Sudan, right? And at the same time, donor money, whether it's international, it's governments or international organizations or just private individuals, is drying up for things like refugees or famine because, you know, understandably, people are giving in their own countries again. So, you know, if you're, you know, the U.S. is spending two trillion dollars to prop up our own economy. Wealthy individuals are probably donating for, you know, combating the coronavirus, in their countries. And so I think there's going to be this double shock where vulnerable

communities that are at risk of famine or risk of public health collapse already are going to get hit by that at the same time that there's going to be less funding for them. And so as we climb out of this thing, I don't know how you begin to try to make that hole. The U.S. government is going to have very little money to work with. You know, when Obama came into office, we had a promise in our campaign to double foreign assistance. And as soon as the financial crisis happened, we scrapped that promise because we knew we were going to be running a trillion dollar deficit and we're going to have to be, you know, trying to prop up the U.S. economy. And so I think it's going to take, you know, wealthy individuals who have plenty of money, frankly, and other

creative sources of funding to make sure that some of these places don't go off a cliff. And it bears watching. Yeah, it really does. Okay. One other thing that bears watching is honk. Kong. So we spent a lot of time last year covering the incredibly brave protest movement in Hong Kong. Obviously now, because of the coronavirus, it's no longer safe to take to the streets. You're not seeing protesters. But the Chinese government is cynically using COVID as cover to increase their efforts to crush pro-democracy efforts in Hong Kong, basically. So Hong Kong authorities recently arrested more than a dozen pro-democracy activists. And then the Chinese government, they're being increasingly assertive about what they believe is their right to supervise, in quotes, the city,

to weigh in on these political matters, to publicly come out in support of these arrests. And they are undercutting the semi-autonomous nature of Hong Kong's government. And they're blaming the U.S. for the protest movement, right? It's like the typical playbook. So, Ben, I mean, could you just remind listeners of, you know, how the Hong Kong government works in relation to China and why the arrests of these activists is seen as such a big deal? Yeah. So Hong Kong is supposed to have one country, two systems. So it's a part of China, but it has its own system with civil liberties and its own legal system, importantly, for the people of Hong Kong. And they have their own government, their own Hong Kong governing authority

that has a legislative chamber and a chief executive. China has already chipped away at essentially the democracy that Hong Kongers believe that they're entitled to under one two systems because, for instance, China gets to pick who they can vote for to be chief executive. And I think the reason this is so important is, you know, you had this momentum through the protest movement that, you know, was able to beat back some laws, particularly a law that would allow China to extradite people to Hong Kong. And the sense that the democracy camp was gaining strength. There were local elections in December for, you know, a relatively powerless body of district council members who deal with concerns like traffic and, you know, things in

neighborhoods. And overwhelmingly, the result went to people who were in the pro-democracy camp. And now you have, you know, the protests obviously are not happening in the same manner that they were. And there's a legislative election in the fall that is a chance for the pro-democracy camp to actually try to acquire some meaningful power. And I think there's a sense that with the world's attention elsewhere with people not able to turn out in the street, that they can deploy a playbook that is a combination of chipping away at the autonomy of Hong Kong, so giving more power to the Chinese government to control events in Hong Kong. There's something called the liaison office for the Chinese Communist Party in Hong Kong that has grown increasingly powerful relative

to the Hong Kong government. And so they've been granted some additional powers, some efforts to mess around with Hong Kong's basic laws so that they're brought more in line with the Chinese Communist Party's view of how things should go, and also to try to decapitate some of the leadership of these movements through these detentions. And so they've been arresting not just some of the young people who've been protesting, but some of the older people who are established political figures and pro-democracy figures, perhaps to just kind of shape the environment coming out of the coronavirus, heading into those legislative elections. And so it definitely feels to me like the Chinese Communist Party is going on offense in this moment in a very cynical

way to try to demoralize in some ways decapitate the pro-democracy camp in the country, not literally, but through detention and harassment, while also getting back to chipping away at Hong Kong's legal autonomy. And so, you know, I think what I would look for is if and when life can return to normal, is there another. explosion of momentum for the protest movement, or does China kind of slowly demoralize and strangle that movement? My sense is that there'll be another explosion of momentum in reaction to what China is doing, but it's another example of we just don't know how long this will endure in terms of life not returning in normal and what these governments can do in the meantime to give

themselves greater power and leverage. Yeah, that is exactly right. Look, just one note on some data I saw out of China. So Hube province, where Wuhan is located at the epicenter of this outbreak, they released some economic data showing that the economy in that region shrank 40% in the first three months of 2020 compared to a year ago. So I just thought that that was an interesting indicator of how much economic pain a lot of countries will probably end up finding that they have dealt with. I also saw that China's handing out cash in the form of these shopping coupons in an effort to help out retail. but according to this Reuters report, it's not really working. People are spending on necessities. They're not going to restaurants. They're not doing the tourist activities, luxury items.

And so, you know, it's probably foolish to compare sort of consumer spending trends across countries. Like, I don't know how Chinese citizens spend their money typically. But I just do think it's like another data point that shows the whole weren't is deeper. It's going to take longer to bounce back, even with government stimulus. So this thing is going to play out over a long time. Yeah. And we're probably going to have a, let's just say, not a very nuanced discussion of China. in this country in our politics for the next six or seven months, with, you know, Trump yelling about the China virus and, you know, blaming China for all this and kind of apocalyptic rhetoric and conspiracy theories

that this is like a bioweapon. And, you know, Biden, you know, hitting back and, you know, being tough on China, but it's all in the context of this virus. You know, we have a bigger conversation that we do need to have as a country about, you know, what our view of the Chinese Communist Party is and how do we both work with them when we can but stand up for our values in places like Kong Kong and stand up for our interest when they're pushing people around. And I do think that China is going to emerge from this like everybody, like us too, with some real vulnerabilities. I think some other countries are

resentful about how they've handled this. I think there is a sense that Xi Jinping and the Communist Party under him has pushed too far into people's comfort zones. So when we come out of this and if we come out of an election and we can spend some more time in future episodes talking about this, I think that there needs to be a real, you know, thoughtful, you know, reconsideration of what, you know, the U.S. view of China should be that gets beyond Trump's demagoguery or Biden defending himself to some of these core questions. Yeah. A few more quick things here. So, you know, there is this debate in the U.S. Congress about how lawmakers could meet remotely, apparently, according the Politico this morning. Lawmakers are trying to negotiate a way to do proxy voting where a

lawmaker can vote on another's behalf, but it's not there yet. But I just want to raise that I saw that lawmakers in the UK are now meeting virtually. So the House of Commons met with 50 of 650 members of Parliament physically in the chamber. The rest were basically zoomed in. They were doing what we're doing right now. It is obviously an imperfect solution. Hopefully they don't get zoom bombed. They also haven't figured out a way to vote on legislation. So that part's on hold. But, you know, this AP story also notes that lawmakers in Germany and Poland are meeting with social distancing measures. Canada is doing a mix of digital and in-person meetings. In Lebanon, lawmakers are meeting in a big theater to allow for appropriate space. So I just was like, you know, look, if a 700-year-old institution in the UK can find a way

to modernize, for God's sake, the U.S. Congress should be able to, too. I'm just so floored that there wasn't already a plan for this in Congress. Yeah. You know, it's absurd. It's absurd that with all the threats of, you know, pandemics or cyber attacks or something that nobody thought through kind of contingency plans. I do think it's important, though, because, you know, we are a country that is already kind of rattled by all this.

What if there's some other big event on top of this one, you know? And so this is something where there should be a fix. they're going to have to be able to move swiftly under any circumstance given the pace that things are going. If another crisis emerges on top of this crisis, how are we going to handle that? So this is something they got to get their act together. Yeah. We talked about this with Secretary Albright, but I just want to briefly raise with you. So on Monday night, Trump tweeted that he plans to issue an executive order temporarily suspending immigration into the United States. Like, no big deal. Oh, hey, I'm just going to tweet this out. He cites the coronavirus.

they need to protect American jobs as the rationale. Immigration had all been ground to a halt already by him, Trump and Stephen Miller and, you know, their efforts to end political asylum and restrict travel and other bureaucratic steps. The State Department, as a practical matter, hasn't been processing visas for weeks because of COVID. So the Times, New York Times reported that a formal order temporarily barring new green cards and work visas could come in the next few days. It would likely be coupled with an expansion of these travel restrictions. this is no surprise to me. It shouldn't beat anyone. Like Trump's, uh, main political strategy is demagoguing immigrants. Xenophobia is like a core Republican strategy. Um, but, you know,

it'll get contested in court. I guess just like the thing I was thinking allowed to myself to play devil's advocate for a second is I assume that any long term coronavirus mitigation plan is going to have to be coupled with a pretty intensive restriction on international travel, right? Because we can't get our house in order with testing and everything here and then allow people just to fly in and out of the country if they're not doing it in those places. So I don't know what that would mean. It could mean quarantine upon arrival or some other ways short of ending immigration entirely. But I'm just like trying to think through in my head what the new normal might be for just purely medical reasons while I obviously find the way Trump treats immigrants to be disgusting and probably

illegal. Well, I think to your last point there, Tommy, the first thing about this, it doesn't make sense is more people come to this country just traveling to this country than because they're emigrating to this country. Exactly. So if there's a problem that has to be solved, it's basically how do you resume the international travel that is the lifeblood of the economy, and that takes place in numbers, it absolutely dwarfs immigration to this country. And, you know, in past situations, in Ebola, you know, there was screening. certain airports, people came from certain countries. I mean, you've already seen, in this case, I think Singapore has done quarantine at airports

for a period of time. You could do testing. But that's about travel. And what worries me here is that, you know, you take a step in a crisis. And just because it's political, it doesn't mean he doesn't believe in it and might not want to follow through in it. We've already seen them chip away at nearly zeroing out the number of refugees, trying to eliminate asylum as a tool for people to come here.

trying to cut, you know, think foreign students from coming here. And now, you know, perhaps just ending immigration, if he's reelected, who's to say what the new normal is that emerges on the other end of coronavirus? And, you know, there's so many angles to that, apart from just the horror of changing who we are as a country, which is a country built by immigrants, changing the fact that we benefit from the best and brightest coming here. You know, it's funny, this guy likes to rail about China. Trump, well, you know where like these people are going to go to study? They're going to China.

You know, all these foreign students and engineers and people who come to live and work here and study here in some state and started companies and some went back to their countries and became, you know, the leaders of their countries and had good feelings about the U.S. They're not going to come here anymore. And so it's going to have an impact on us in that way, too. So I, it's not the right instrument for dealing with the coronavirus. You know, dealing with testing is much more important than suspending immigration. Managing travel flows is much more consequential than just suspending immigration. And I do worry that even if it's just kind of a symbolic political step in a way, given that there's not a lot of incoming anyway right now, what is the

normal on the back end? And so to me, as soon as I saw it, I just thought, well, this is the stake in our election, because if he's reelected, you know, God knows if we ever return to normal levels of immigration. Yeah, that's exactly right. And it's also, unfortunately, probably the fight that he wants because he would rather be able to demagogue Mexican citizens or whomever than actually talk about his response. But we'll see how the political fight plays out. And to that end, Ben, so the group you helped found National Security Action, you guys did some interesting polling this week on key swing states. So I think it was 1,200 voters in 12 battleground states. And some of the numbers that jumped out of me from the report you guys did. So voters disapprove of Trump's

handling of relations with other countries by a 14-point margin. By a 22-point margin, voters think he has increased the risk of getting the U.S. into a war. 56% think Trump has made us less respected. A plurality thinks he's made us less safe. Seventy percent, nearly 70 percent, said they preferred a president who emphasized diplomacy over military strength. You guys also tested to messaging like, you know, some of the most effective messaging against Trump was that he refuses to listen to experts that were less respected. in the world because world leaders don't take him seriously and that his behavior, like the recklessness, the impulsiveness, raises the risk of war. Looking at the poll and sort of all the

conversations you've had about it, like what did it teach you about how the electorate views Trump when it comes to foreign policy and national security and how Joe Biden might run against him in the most effective way? Yeah. So when we were out and we intentionally did this, we've done polls before that were nationwide, but because we're heading into presidential election, we really focused on just the battleground states to have this be most relevant. And I think what jumped out to me, and I should add, this was done kind of right before social distancing, you know, so coronavirus was the thing, but it wasn't the dominant thing, which in a way I think is useful because it was a snapshot of where the elector was as we headed into this. Part what stood out to me is that, you know,

voters did say that standing up for American values matter to them and in a healthy majority, they feel that Trump doesn't do that, but they also feel like he's not even taken seriously around the world. There's this sense that not only do we not stand for the things that we used to stand for, but that we're kind of an embarrassment, that this guy's just not taken seriously. And so I think the opening for Biden is that core message of, you know, we need to be for the things that Americans have stood for throughout our history, and we need to be respected in the world again, which is a basic message to one he can drive. I think another thing that stood out to me is that people understood, and this gets to the point that they're worried about him getting us

under war, that he's reckless. Like the language that voters kept using and the messages that they've responded to in this poll were around the fact that Trump is reckless. He doesn't listen to experts, as you said. I think that for Biden, connecting the things that voters already think to be true about Trump to his coronavirus response is really important, right? So people were already inclined to think that this guy is a little too reckless with our security, inclined to think that he doesn't listen to the experts in the room. And you have to take that thing that they know to be true about Trump and say, this is why they're not tests. This is why we were behind the curve on the coronavirus. this is why he's made us less safe in his handling of the coronavirus.

I think a couple other things that jumped out to me, where he had a slight advantage is on the sense of national security, you know, that he could be trusted to deal with our national security. Interestingly, foreign relations, he scored much worse than national security. And I think that's a window into how much Trump has securitized the debate around immigration and just being belligerent is still a slight advantage for Republicans on issues like terrorism. But I think with the coronavirus, Democrats have to make the argument. Joe Biden has to make the argument that this is about keeping us safe too. The national security isn't just about terrorism or building a wall at the border.

It's about are we preparing to deal with pandemics that come to our borders too? So in a way, you know, there has to be a changing of the frame around national security. One other thing that I'll just highlight Tommy because it stood out to me because we talked to about on this podcast. It was very real concern in the testing with the way Trump has politicized the military and the ways in which he, you know, has gone against traditions respecting, you know, the role of the commander chief vis-à-vis the uniformed military interfering in the chain of command, the disrespect at times for uniformed officers. That may be an opening that Democrats don't necessarily fully appreciate they have. That this guy, you know, if you're talking to veterans,

if you're talking to base communities, the way which this guy has broken all kinds of norms. And look, the Trump fans there will be fine with it. But the sense I get from this polling is there's a very real concern that he's just not handling the job of commander in chief appropriately. And I think that's an argument that Joe Biden can make too, you know, that this guy's betraying the tradition of how the commander chief function. vis-a-vis the military, both in how he's politicized them and how he's kind of interfered in some of these chain-of-command issues. Yeah, I mean, look, the story of Captain Crozier and I think the USS Theodore Roosevelt and how disastrously the Navy handled a crisis of like hundreds, if not thousands

by now of sailors getting sick on that boat, one of them actually dying. It's probably a pretty good understandable story to tell about the problem of Trump just like willy-nilly interfering. into the military justice system. Yeah, and people understand that, you know, obviously, especially veterans and people in base communities, but I think Americans understand that that's troubling, you know? And I haven't heard the Democrats make that argument. I haven't heard Joe Biden make that argument. But I think it's a, given how much respect people have for the institution of the military,

I think that's an argument to make that essentially this guy is unfit to be commander-in-chief and he's betrayed, you know, the sense of value. and decorum that we expect in a commander-in-chief. Yeah, agreed. Okay, that's it for the news. But stick around because after the break, we are going to talk with former Secretary of State, Madeline Albright. We are thrilled to be joined now by a former Secretary of State,

former ambassador of the United Nations, an author of the new book, Hell and Other Destinations, a 21st Century memoir. Madeline Aubright, thank you so much for joining the show. Glad to be with you. Thank you. Could we start with some breaking news? So there's been some reporting overnight and this week that North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un might be gravely ill.

He might be recovering from surgery. It might all be wrong. Who knows since it's so hard to get information out of that country. But it's so great to speak with you because you are one of the few human beings I've ever met who's been to North Korea. And I was wondering if we could just start there and you maybe could tell listeners a little bit about what that experience was like. And whether, you know, you have a sense of what a leadership transition might look like out of North Korea or if that's one of those black box components of their leadership that we just don't know yet. Well, I think you really hit the story on the nail here because basically we didn't know very much about North Korea. And that's the whole problem because we have no embassy there, nobody on the ground.

we had to operate through those that were telling us something, like maybe some South Koreans or whatever. And what happened was that when I went there initially, this guy, Kim Jong-un's father was the head of it, Kim Jong-il, and I was told basically that he was crazy and a pervert. I talked to Kim Daigang, the president of South Korea, and then I went there myself. He clearly wasn't crazy.

but there were some weird things that went on in terms of when I got there, I just sat in the guest house because I had no idea what I was supposed to do. And I knew that they were listening to me and taping me. And then I didn't know at the time, though, I was told that when you type on a laptop, they can just tell by the strokes what you're doing. Wow. So literally, we sat there.

And then I get a call saying I had to go to see his embond father, which is harder and more complicated than it looks because if you bow too low, then the American press says you're being obsequious. If you don't low enough, you haven't accomplished anything. So I'm not the right angle because when I got back to the guest house, they said the dear leader will see you. So we have a press conference, which was like something out of the 50s, and Kim Chong-Ill and I were the same height.

So I look over and I know I had on high heels and so did he and his hair was a lot poofier than mine. And it was a pretty crazy press conference. Now the only thing we did know, therefore I take complete responsibility for Dennis Rodman because we knew was that Kim Chong Il liked basketball. So I took over a basketball autographed by Michael Jordan, which is in their holy of holies. But the bottom line is that we didn't have much information then, and we have no information now about what's going on, because not having any representation. I think we don't know what will happen because the question is, you know, how is this even decided? There had been some discussion of some succession when Kim Chong-il was still alive.

But I've been trying to follow this today, and I think that we don't know. And Kim Jong-un has a sister who's been doing a lot of talking, but we don't know. And so given all the things that are going on, it makes it very difficult when we have no eyes on the ground. So I wanted to ask you, one of the things that's so interesting about your book, which characteristically is a great, both entertaining and motivating read, is, you know, you've had this career in public life and then, you know, continuing to be a public figure after, you know, leaving the State Department. And you've really been at the center of, I think, the effort to connect kind of America's standing in the world, what we represent, the values we advocate for, the relationships we build abroad, you know, to make that relevant for people, to make that relevant both to our foreign policy and how Americans think about the world. And you and I ended up, you know, crossing paths in some of those initiatives in the Obama years,

where you're always pressing us to do more in that space. And I'm wondering just how you reflect on where America's standing is today with President Trump kind of vacating his leadership role and also setting, you know, a very different example than past American presence of set. You know, how deep is the loss been in terms of America's standing and what we represent in the world? and what might we do to try to recover that? Thanks for asking that, but what I want to do is put it into a little bit of context because one of the things that I always say is people are very much a product of their backgrounds. And the intelligence agencies provide product,

but the decision maker is the customer and you bring your own story with it. So in my case, I think people may know I'm an immigrant. And my father was a Czechoslovak diplomat who spent World War II in London. I write about this in the book. And then I came to the United States when I was 11 years old after the communist took over Czechoslovakia. And I have grown up with the idea that the United States is the most important country in terms of determining what policy is like.

That when the U.S. is not present, terrible things happen. and when we are present, things change. So, I mean, that's a short way of describing it, but I really, I'm a very grateful American. And so one of the incredible things about my life is it never occurred to me that I would someday sit behind a sign that said United States, first at the United Nations and then a Secretary of State

and recognizing the power that the United States had and what should be done with it in a very, kind of nebulous situation in my case after the end of the Cold War. So, and as you know, President Clinton is the first one who said that we were the indispensable nation. I just said it so often that it became identified with me, but there's nothing about the word indispensable that says alone. It just means that we need to be engaged. And so I believe in American engagement in the world, in a positive way with partners. And so, I don't even know what the right words anymore.

Deeply troubled is too mild in terms of what is going on now. We're AWOL. And I think we can see that. Not only are we AWOL, we're blaming everybody else for what is going on. And so I think it's an irresponsible way to approach foreign policy. And so I am very troubled. I was, for instance, a perfect example. and I think you've been to the Munich Security Conference.

And basically, we weren't playing a role. I mean, the Secretary of State came and kind of was like somebody from another planet. And they are just kind of looking at us, like, what are you talking about? And I think that's dangerous for America, and it's certainly dangerous in terms of dealing not only with a pandemic, but with the other issues, nuclear proliferation. and issues of climate change and military relationships or lack of with all kinds of countries. So I think this is not a good time in terms of how we are viewed in the world. And I also wanted to get at, there's the absence in solving problems, as you mentioned.

There's also that example. And your own story, you've done such a remarkable job in your books of connecting your story as someone who came to this country, as you just said, with your service to this country. And we heard just yesterday, President Trump announced via Twitter that he was suspending all immigration into the United States. That obviously comes after efforts to cut the numbers of refugees who could come here as low as possible to limit asylum.

What is that, for you personally, what is the impact of a president taking these steps? And how should Americans think about how those things? are received around the world. You know, it's beyond our foreign policy, to have someone suspending immigration, you know, trying to limit or eliminate refugees, what does that do to how people around the world think about us and how people like you who came to this country

because of our openness? How do you think about that? Well, I actually think it's un-American in so many ways. And I've said in shorthand that the Statue of Liberty is weeping. I am, I was asked to recently, to describe myself in six words. And I said, worried, optimist, problem solver, grateful American. And I am a grateful American because who knows what would have happened to us.

My father was tried in absentia in Czechoslovakia, you know, and after the communist took over. But speculating about that is not as interesting as the life that I've been given, and which is why I am grateful. And I do think that what is important is to understand how America can play the role of being an engaged partner and understanding that we benefit from it. And we benefit from, and this sounds self-serving, but basically people that have come to this country

because they want to contribute and be grateful. And so, first of all, I do think what Trump just did is kind of, it's a political action because he's already limited everything in terms of who's coming in and the system isn't set up to interview people or anything. So it's just kind of one more finger in the eye and making it worse. The bottom line is that there are a lot of doctors and a lot of the people that are the first responders now that are people that are immigrants. And I have to say that one of the great honors for me was when President Obama gave me the Medal of Freedom. And I have it in my office because I tell my American story.

I have the manifest from when we came to the United States in 1948, and it ends up with getting the Medal of Freedom. And one of my favorite activities is to give out naturalization certificates. And the first time I did it was July 4, 2000 at Monticello. I figured since I had Thomas Jefferson's job, I could do that. And so I give this man his naturalization certificate, and he walks away, and he says, can you believe it? I'm a refugee, and I just got my naturalization certificate from the Secretary of State.

And I couldn't help it, and I went up to him, and I said, can you believe that a refugee is Secretary of State? And I do think that I'm very honored, grateful American, and what is happening now does not make any sense on any level at all. Once again for folks listening, the book is Hell Another Destinations's 21st Century Memoir. So you can pick up a copy probably online. It's probably the best bet right now, but all kinds of places. The current Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, is a close friend of this show. Just kidding. We dislike him greatly.

He seems to be missing. He seemed to be missing an action during this crisis. Maybe that's a good thing, seeing his performance on other issues. But I guess can you help listeners understand what a competent Secretary of State could or should be doing right now to manage what is obviously a global crisis? Well, I think that it's a key role, frankly. I mean, the Secretary of State is the most visible person going abroad or having contacts with other countries. to try to solve problems. I do teach a course at Georgetown,

and I talk about this in the book. But basically, I think that my course is say, I'd say foreign policy is just trying to get some country do what you want, so what are the tools? And it's called the National Security Toolbox. And diplomacy is the basic tool. It is the way that we talk to other countries. And sometimes it's in small groups and sometimes

in large groups, but it is the language. of one country talking to another. And there are issues, some very serious problems, even short of the virus, but basically you need to be out there. You need to be able to establish relationships and to, they aren't just pleasant visits when you go abroad. I used to say, I mean, you go through, you know, the weather's nice and everything. I like your tie. But basically after the small talk, you are there to say what you think. And I would often and say, I have come a long way, so I must be frank. So you try to solve problems,

but you also talk about what are the national interests of your country. I can see no visible sign of that going on. Maybe it is, but I can't see it. The part that I think is also really depressing, the State Department is composed of foreign service officers and civil servants and people that are dedicated to the United States.

And they serve in different administrations. They have basically been kind of decommissioned, frankly, because they have been on the front lines. And many people have been asked to leave. Many people have left. Pompeo said that he was going to go to the State Department to return his swagger. I sure can't tell. And not only that, but he doesn't defend his diplomats when, in fact, they are summoned to go and testify, and they tell the truth, and then they are kind of put in the doghouse. So I don't understand what's going on, and not in terms of, and I, by the way, I have to tell you, there is an excellent relationship among former secretaries of state.

And I do have another life that I write about, which is I love being, I was on Gilmore Girls and Parks and Recreation, but I was also asked to be on Madam Secretary. And what happened recently was that Colin Powell and Hillary Clinton and I were on it together. And the scene was that something terrible had happened in the White House. And so Taylor Leone summons us. And everything was scripted. But I was able to get an unscripted line in as we sat down. And I said, isn't it nice when the current Secretary of State calls her predecessors to consult.

We used to do that all the time. I love it. I love it. So one other concerning trend seemingly is over the last few decades, we have gone through what felt like an inexorable push towards globalization in a more connected world. There's the internet. There's air travel. There's trade, global supply chains, all of which binded countries together, whether

the leaders liked it or not, Trump would probably put himself in the or not category since he's always hammering globalists. But, you know, you saw the rise of Trump and these nationalists that were trying to to reverse that trend. Are you at all worried that the coronavirus and the potential need to actually shut borders for health reasons might actually help them succeed in disconnecting the world and disconnecting America from the world? I'm very worried about that because all the blame placing that's going on and trying to explain why we weren't doing what we were doing is meaning the Chinese are going to have to explain what happened, but we need to look at the future

and how to solve this. And even though Trump might be saying things, the virus knows no borders. And so there is that kind of aspect of the interconnectedness because of the supply chains and a variety of other aspects to this. But I am worried about the following thing, which is that, by the way, globalization is not a four-letter word. I mean, it is basically, basically just talking about the relationships that have taken place as a result of the potential of travel and all kinds of things. But basically what it has done is faceless. And so people want to know what their identities are, which is important and fine. But if my identity hates your identity, then it becomes nationalism and hypernationalism is very dangerous. And so that is what I really wrote about in fascism.

And now I see it as worse, frankly, because we have a president who somehow has to blame everything either on Ben's boss, our president before, or on somebody else, but never taking responsibility for it. And I think that that is creating this kind of sense that it's their fault. have to have nothing to do with them. And I think it's very dangerous because you don't have to be

a genius to figure out that this problem cannot be solved without the help of others, not to speak of climate change and nuclear proliferation and various other issues that are out there. It is so counterproductive. I cannot believe that a functioning political figure is advising this kind of thing. Well, and you mentioned nationalism, you've written a lot about it in the sense that, you know, there's been this series of movements in different countries where leaders have kind of taken that sense of dissatisfaction with globalization and channeled people to the kind of more traditional form of national identity in opposition to somebody else. And that leads to these efforts to disrupt or rollback globalization. The other thing I've noticed is it can lead, particularly to young people, and we have a lot of young listeners to this show, to kind of an apathy. You know, why should I get involved? And I guess in reading the thing about your book, you make such a case for living kind of a full, engaged, and public life in trying to make a difference, you know, even after you'd finished your government service. What do you say to younger people who, you know, are wondering, is it even worth caring about these things? Or if I want to make a difference on something like what America's foreign policy is, I wouldn't even know where to begin beyond just voting in an election. Like, what is it that has compelled you to stay engaged all these years. And how would you want, you know, particularly the younger people listening to think about their role that they can play in a world in which things are not going in the direction that, frankly, a lot of us wanted to be going? Well, in my case, it really is

my background and my gratitude. But I really, I look at my children and grandchildren, and my grandchildren are in the college age group for the most part. And I think that the bottom line is that I have said, we are all beneficiaries of democracy, and democracy is not a spectator sport. And if you don't do something, somebody else will do something that really has an effect on your life that you're not going to like. And one of the things you said, what can they do beyond voting? Actually, voting is a very important part. I'm chairman of the board of the National Democratic Institute. And I have gone abroad a lot to observe elections. watch people that have never had a chance to vote, stand in long lines, either in the heat or the

rain, in order to vote, and we take it for granted. And I do think that's the first part, and I hope very, very much that our young people go out and vote. And so that part is important. And then also, I think understanding that there are, when this is over, the younger generation is the one that's going to have the tools to deal with the issues. Because I really do think that technology is going to play a very large part. We have kind of made fun of young people by saying that they spend too much time online and that they don't know how to socialize or that they have no sense of privacy. They tell everybody on Facebook who they are and then they want to know why people know who they are.

But I think in many ways, they will have a lot of the skills that will allow them to operate in what is going to be a completely different world. And if they don't do something, then I can assure you somebody else will that will not be in their favor and they will regret it. Those are great words of advice and a fantastic place to end. The book, again, is Hell and Other Destinations, a 21st Century Memoir. Secretary Albright, thank you so much for your time. Thanks for all your service to the country and for joining the show today. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Enjoyed it very much. Thank you. Thanks to Secretary Albright for joining the show today. Ben, one silver lining out of this coronavirus nightmare is that we might not have to shake hands anymore because it's not hygienic and it's gross and it's weird and we're done with it. So I did a little research and by a little research, I mean I googled one of those clickbait articles that are usually spawn con from something to figure out how other countries. greet people. And so I wanted to run some of these by you as a post-interview little Easter for the people who stick around. So in Tibet, people greet each other sometimes by sticking

out their tongue. Now, that might be work at a very socially distanced level, but maybe not the best idea. In the Philippines, young people sometimes press an older person's knuckles into their forehead, clearly worse. Greenland, France, there's some cheek kissing that's clearly out. This one might work. Thailand, greeters place palms together on the chest and sort of like a mini bow. Some Bedouin tribes rubbed noses as a greeting. That's a hard no. This one's great. There's some parts of Southern Africa where people just greet each other with like clapping. Yeah. Like that sounds perfect for social distancing and culturally pretty seamless since we used to, we clap for each other. A micronnesia, the rock inspired just an eyebrow raise.

That one might work when you enter the room. And then. And my favorite was there's a tribe in Nigeria. They greet each other just by like shaking their fists by their heads like this. Yeah. Which feels kind of perfect and aggressive and very American. I just say I was in New Zealand, the Maori, the way they, the indigenous peoples in New Zealand, they greet by kind of a forehead. You know, you put your foreheads together. And we had this big ceremony in Jacinda Ahern was there.

And she literally greeted every person, including me, with this forehead bump, you know. kind of seamlessly. I thought it was very cool, actually, but I think that probably doesn't answer the mail. I will tell you what I'm deeply against, which is the elbow touch. Like that just feels, I feel like a total loser when I do that. Namaste. Perfect. Frankly, maybe that may be the answer to all this, because I've always kind of thought that was cool anyway, and socially distance and the rest of it. So I agree, you know, not checking hands and washing your hands more may be the, uh, yeah, it's a future. the public health benefit on the back end here. Were you with the little barbecue that Joe Biden threw for Katie Johnson,

one of our colleagues who left the White House when I sat next to him. There was this little group of us. And I actually got forehead to forehead contact from him while he was telling a story. Yeah. So Joe Biden actually did the Maori greeting. Yeah, he's a fan of it. Yeah. I don't know if he ever met any Maori.

But yeah, I do remember that. It's, what was funny about it is on the way in, I called my shot and I said to the people in my car. I was like, look, if I don't get a forehead to forehead, greeting and a story about like some old senator I've never heard of like this is a this is a bust and lo and beholds yeah I got those a couple times too they're intense like when you really wanted to drive home a point you know yeah you get the forehead bump yeah I did not forget yeah that maybe I never drew the connection to the Maori though people should Google that the Maori they have these amazing and kind of greeting ceremonies too it's very cool stuff very cool

well that's all I got for this week good to see you and talk to you soon yeah awesome crooked media. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our assistant producer is Jordan Waller. It's mixed and edited by Chris Basil. Kyle Seglan is our sound engineer. Special thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Malkonian, and Milo Kim, who film and share our episodes as videos every week.