Interesting Times with Ross Douthat

As a moderate, I see this as a good step in the right direction. The New York Times has an essential resource of both liberal and conservative columnists. Ross Douthat has published in National Review and been on Jonah Goldberg's The Remnant. Michele Goldberg (no relation to Jonah Goldberg) is more on the liberal side, and David Leonhardt is perhaps somewhere in between, and in the columns I have read, has an educated technical sense. So there is a healthy balance of political, cultural and economic sense being exchanged and debated in a civil and thoughtful way. To put them together to discuss these issues is probably challenging, but it puts together the flavor of informed discussion as in Commentary or National Review podcasts but with people who have stronger ideological differences in their points of view. Sometimes, I have seen joint work between Bret Stephens and Gail Collins, but it is very irregular. Hence, this weekly podcast appears to be a helpful way for us to understand why people of different ideological bend are thinking they way they are. I’m not sure that it will do anything bridge the divide, but even if it helps people understand that the issues are very complex with undesirable consequences whatever policy is employed, this would be far better than to listen to people who preach fear and claim to know how everything works and how to fix it. In that respect, it’s an encouraging start.