Matt is an author, pollster, campaigner, and policy advisor. He recently ran for Parliament as a Reform candidate and came in second. He’s also a presenter at GB News and a writer on Substack. He’s the author of many books, including National Populism and Values, Voice and Virtue, and his new book is Suicide of a Nation: Immigration, Islam, Identity.
An auto-transcript is available above (just click “Transcript” while logged into Substack). For two clips of our convo — on the flood of non-white migrants to the UK, and how accusations of racism shape the migration debate — head to our YouTube page.
Other topics: born in Hertfordshire to working-class parents who divorced young and worked for the NHS; addiction in the family; his terrible time at an all-boys school; the first in his family to go to college; Burke and Oakeshott; a semester abroad in downtown Detroit; the losers of globalization; being a conservative in academia; the hounding of Kathleen Stock; Douglas Murray; Charles Murray; the falling popularity of liberal democracy; David Cameron; the migration crisis; Brexit; the Red Wall swinging to the right; Nigel Farage and Euroskepticism; plunging fertility rates; Roger Scruton; Lasch and Burnham; the betrayal of Boris on migration; the rapid influx of Muslims to the UK; assimilation in the US; the disappearance of a shared national memory; the illiberalism of Islamic Brits; same-sex marriage; wokeness; anti-speech laws in the UK; the Iraq War; and the new war in Iran.
Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy. Coming up: Jonah Goldberg on the state of conservatism, Jeffrey Toobin on the pardon power, Derek Thompson on abundance, Tom Holland on the Christian roots of liberalism, Tiffany Jenkins on privacy in a liberal democracy, Adrian Wooldridge on “the lost genius of liberalism,” and Tom Junod on his memoir and masculinity. As always, please send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.
From a fan of last week’s pod with Eli Lake on Israel and the war:
Bravo! I left the conversation stronger in my opinion that this is Israel’s fight and we should get out. Let them get their own weapons. I do not support any further aid to Israel until they seriously negotiate with the Palestinians about a homeland for them. They are clearly not part of the Israel’s final plans.
Some comments in no particular order:
Why is Europe not joining in the war? If Eli is right about this great threat from Iran, the rest of the world would be joining the fight or at least offering some assistance. That is not happening because while the rest of the world may agree it’s a very bad regime, they also agree containment is a better strategy. Netanyahu had pushed for a war for many years and did not convince any other country except for us — once Trump got into power. And more importantly, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and UAE have the resources to join this fight, so why the hell are we paying for it?
If Israel has this amazing spy network (as Eli gushed over), how did they miss the October 7 attack? And why when it happened did the response from the army take so long? I think that is a very important and unanswered question, and it needs to be answered because Israel is doing things they would not have been allowed to do as a result of that attack.
We will, of course, significantly diminish the Iranian regime and perhaps eliminate their ability to develop new weapons. But what Israel should remember is that history is long. The anger and human fury will not abate in any military victory. It will simply grow and continue to cause much pain for both the US and Israel.
Here’s a common complaint this week:
I just finished the Dishcast with Eli Lake, and while it was a good conversation, there were times when I had a hard time listening to it. When the two of you had a sharp difference of opinion, rather than letting Eli finish his answer, you interrupted him with comments of your own — or, most maddeningly, you asked a completely different question. I’m not asking you to be like William Buckley on Firing Line, but there were times I found myself thinking, “Would you please shut up and let him finish!” You control the show, so you’re sure to make your points, which you did, so please try to extend the same courtesy to your guests in the future.
Another adds, “HEY ANDREW — SORRY ALL-CAPS, BUT THIS IS WHAT YOU SOUNDED LIKE IN THE ELI LAKE EPISODE.” Okay, we got a bit carried away but at no point did Eli lose his footing. Another:
I think this interview was terrific, allowing for sharp differences on some points along with strong agreement on others. Differences: nukes for Israel, the current war. Agreement: the Israel subsidy, West Bank settlements, Trump and his cabal. (Did I log this accurately?)
Although my own positions tend to align more with you, I thought Eli articulated his views much better. This is due to your frenetic, nearly hysterical tone.
Another dissenter writes:
First, some common ground: As an ardent American patriot and an ardent Zionist, I think your exasperation with America’s unquestioning support of Israel is mostly fair — and also I trust where it comes from with you (unlike with so many others!). We also share a loathing of Netanyahu. And though I think your criticism of Israel’s response to 10/7 largely fails the test of “what would YOU have done in Israel’s position,” I can tell it comes from a place of pure humanitarianism and not anti-Israel bias, let alone out-and-out antisemitism.
THAT SAID, during your episode with Eli, I was absolutely appalled by your equating Iran’s justification (or lack thereof) for its nuclear program to Israel’s. The latter developed nuclear weapons for one purpose and one purpose only: as a last resort (less than a generation after the Holocaust, mind you) if faced with annihilation at the hands of sworn enemies surrounding it on all sides — every one of them openly, explicitly pledging to exactly that.
And when that cordon began to collapse after the 1973 war and the peace deal with Egypt in 1978, as if on cue, the Islamic Republic stepped forward to fill the void. Ever since, Israel has been subjected to a ceaseless stream of solemn pledges from Tehran to turn the Jewish State into a parking lot. Before 10/7, Israelis could content themselves that this kind of bravado was just that. But afterwards? Should Israel not take that threat seriously? How has complacency worked out for the Jews in the past?
Israel developed nuclear weapons strictly as a deterrent and has never once threatened to use them. Iran for nearly half a century has openly, explicitly talked about nuclear weapons as the offensive means to destroy Israel, as a regular taunt. And you construe Iran’s quest for nukes as defensive? And then blame Israel for its determination to nip that danger in the bud, smearing its campaign against Iran as “imperialism”?
Tell me, what would Iran be defending against, precisely? If tomorrow Iran’s leadership said, “You know what, we’ve thought about it and we’re going to put down our animus toward Israel, stop threatening a second Holocaust, and instead direct the resources we’ve put into our nuclear program toward developing our economy and bettering the lives of our people,” the conflict with Israel would dry up instantly. And you must know that.
Yet another dissent:
As an Israeli subscriber to the Dish, I have struggled with your unwillingness or inability to apply your usual nuance and sophistication to any discussion of my country. You seem to have made up your mind that Israel is a bad actor and that anything Netanyahu does must be nefarious.
I’m not used to defending my prime minister — I’ve spent the past three years as an activist against his corrupt, far-right, government — but on Iran, he has the support of some 80 percent of the country.
It’s not because we’re all a bunch of war-mongers; it’s just that we’ve lived with this genocidal regime for 40-odd years and understand, as Eli said, that Iran is the source of most of the threats to our security these days. While much of the world saw on Oct 7 as just the most extreme iteration of Palestinian resistance to the occupation, Israelis saw it as part of the Iranian-led war against our existence (not least because we relinquished our occupation of Gaza in 2005, and Hamas turned it into an Iranian-backed terror base).
Also, it’s funny hearing you so incensed at Netanyahu for pushing/persuading Trump into this war, because here in Israel, we all know that it was Trump who decided whether this war could happen; and he will decide when it will stop. Israeli commentators are often having to reconcile their appreciation for Trump’s support with their understanding that he has shown more willingness than any president in recent times to force our government to act according to his demands. One example: it’s not incidental that the war in Gaza ended under Trump, not Biden, since Trump forced Netanyahu to go against his far-right coalition partners in a way that Biden couldn’t.
I don’t know if you can get over whatever has caused your animus against Israel, but I would urge you to read (and invite onto the Dishcast) some of the excellent Israelis writing in English who take the same critical, nuanced view of their government as you do of yours. Suggestions: Nadav Eyal, Matti Friedman, or David Horovitz.
Another guest rec:
I’m still catching up your episodes with Michael Pollan and Kathryn Paige Harden, but if you want to touch on the topic of consciousness (and free will/moral responsibility) again, you might consider speaking with Erik Hoel. You and Pollan touched on Integrated Information Theory, and Hoel was, as a graduate student, literally on the team that developed the idea, so I don’t think it’s a stretch to say he understands the current state of consciousness research at a level only matched by a dozen or so people on earth.
Hoel is also similar to Kathryn Paige Harden; despite his technical bona fides, he’s a talented writer and an imaginative thinker. His book The World Behind the World drifts into some technical territory, but he also covers the history of how humans have described their own experience with consciousness and explains his ideas on the “causal emergence” of consciousness. A good representative sample of his writing is “Exit the Supersensorium” — a piece that explains recent dream research and things like the Overfitted Brain Hypothesis in the context of why art and literature are important.
By the way, this week marks the 500th installment of the View From Your Window contest, which started way back in 2010. To commemorate it, here’s our postcard-making reader known as A. Dishhead:
Happy VFYW #500! Wow, what a milestone! After all these years, I still get an electric rush when the clues come together and a window comes into view. And contributing is all the more fun thanks to the community you’ve built over the decades (!) — from the Daily to the Weekly Dish. Thank you!
In honor of this momentous occasion, I made a collage of A. Dishhead postcards and miscellanea — from movie posters and magazines to maps and almanacks (uh, I mean substacks). I’m low-key impressed how much content I’ve submitted over the years : )
Here’s to 500 more?!
The full write-up for contest #500 will land in your in-tray later today. Here’s a reader on last week’s column, “The Christianism of the Left”:
Okay, a hit piece on James fucking Talarico? Are you kidding? Out of all the people right now in the Texas Senate race, this guy is the top of your concern?
If you were concerned about Christianism, you could have discussed Talarico’s opposition to Christian nationalism — and Ken Paxton and John Cornyn’s strong endorsements of it. You could have discussed why my daughter has the Ten Commandments posted in her Pre-K class in a Texas public school that she shares with numerous Hindu and Muslim children.
If you were concerned about the Texas Senate race, you could have discussed the disgusting spectacle in the GOP primary:
Continue reading this post for free, courtesy of Andrew Sullivan.
