Age of Confusion Sean Munger

The new U.S. President George Romney, elected by a razor-thin margin in 1968, takes office in early 1969 amidst a welter of problems. The economy is tanking, his own party hates him, and the Soviets won't talk about anything. Romney struggles to find his footing as President in the midst of these challenges, but his own legislative priorities and political missteps begin to suggest he's in over his head. Will he get on track, or will the country continue to decline?
Length: 21:36
Show Notes For This Episode
Next Episode: August 15, 2021

The culture and fabric of American life is changing rapidly in the late 1960s. A rock band called Refraction becomes bigger than the Beatles, and helps launch a popular movie, based on a classic of Beat literature, that becomes a cultural sensation. A host of new religious movements begin to challenge the orthodoxy of conservative American religious life; one of them, Scientology, benefits from the involvement of one of the highest-profile celebrities in the world. Meanwhile the Soviets beat the U.S. to the moon, which becomes just one more disillusionment in a confusing decade whose promise of change and renewal seems to be continually thwarted by depressing events.
Length: 22:07
Show Notes For This Episode
Next Episode: September 12, 2021

This episode shines a light on what's happening behind the Iron Curtain from the years 1964 to 1970, shortly after new Soviet leader Alexander Shelepin takes power in the USSR after deposing Khrushchev (episode 5). While at first it looks as if Shelepin, neo-Stalinist though he is, will not be as repressive or heavy-handed as his idol, an early spate of high-level executions of former Soviet leaders indicates otherwise. This proves to be only the beginning of an entirely new set of purges in which hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens are executed, sent to gulags or vanish into mental hospitals. Shelepin is obviously preparing for something...but what?
Length: 21:10
Show Notes For This Episode
Next Episode: September 26, 2021

We turn for the first time to events in the People's Republic of China. Mao Zedong, the aging revolutionary and leader of the PRC, launches a last-ditch effort to ensure his continued relevance in a fractious governing party: the Cultural Revolution. Millions of people, mostly young, fan out through the cities and countryside enforcing the tenets of "Mao Zedong Thought," while other Communist leaders, like Lin Biao and Zhou Enlai, try their best to rein in the chaos from behind the scenes without risking their own necks. The result is years of political and cultural chaos and millions of deaths.
Length: 18:01
Show Notes For This Episode
Next Episode (Bonus, Recap & Explainer): October 3, 2021
Next Regular Episode: October 10, 2021

Soviet leader Alexander Shelepin backs a bold move by Warsaw Pact forces to take over East Berlin as a final solution to the Communist bloc's long-simmering dispute with the West over the city. The move takes U.S. President George Romney by surprise, but immediately sets up the tensest moment of the entire Cold War. The world goes to the brink of nuclear annihilation, even closer than the Cuban Missile Crisis. All of humanity awaits a single decision, made by one man in a small chapel in the West Wing of the White House: will Romney launch the missiles or won't he?
Length: 22:17
Show Notes For This Episode
Next Episode: October 24, 2021

In the aftermath of the nuclear war scare, President George Romney decides his highest calling--and his key to reelection in 1972--is to make peace with the Russians and end the Cold War. But will Soviet leader Shelepin play ball? As the clock ticks down to major political shenanigans at home, and both Senators Ronald Reagan and Robert Kennedy position themselves for the game, Romney throws the dice on a high-stakes summit in Oslo with Shelepin to discuss a comprehensive peace treaty. It could be a new dawn for humanity...or another craven trick by the Stalinist Soviet leader.
Length: 22:10
Show Notes For This Episode
Next Episode: November 7, 2021