Bill Whalen

Let's talk about one, then I've got to do a little business, and then we'll come back to the other.

Bill Whalen, your somewhat of colleague at Hoover, where he and Leo Hainian do, run that California on your mind.

That's a great

podcast.

It's Wednesday, October 14, 2026, and welcome back to Matters of Policy and Politics, a podcast devoted to the discussion of Hoover Institution research and issues of local, national, and geopolitical concern.

I'm Bill Whalen.

I'm the Hoover Institution's Virginia Hub's Carpenter Distinguished Policy Fellow in Journalism.

I'm not the only Hoover Fellow podcasting these days.

Glazer also reflects on why her research has drawn fire from both sides of the strait, then assesses the second Trump administration's approach to Taiwan and U.S. allies, and what depleted U.S. munitions stockpiles mean for deterrence.

The presidential seal of disapproval, President Trump's name and notoriety loom large over the closing ballot arguments for California's upcoming election, writes Bill Whalen for California On Your Mind.

Whalen points out that Trump is repeatedly invoked in campaign pitches for multiple ballot propositions and, of course, in the race for governor.

He also says that whatever connection might be made between diminished federal support and higher costs for health care and other necessities, one of California's current ballot measures, Proposition 3, derives from a fiscal issue that long predates the current president.

It's Monday, October 19, 2026, and welcome back to Goodfellas, a Hoover Institution broadcast examining history, economics, and geopolitics.

I'm Bill Whalen.

I'm a Distinguished Policy Fellow here at the Hoover Institution, looking forward to a spirit conversation featuring three of my colleagues we jokingly refer to as the Goodfellas.

And you know who I'm referring to, of course.

Now we're going to have to leave it there.

I hope you consider coming back on the show as regulation goes down.

Bill, I've got a quick popular culture reference here, man.

I've got, you know, the moody blues in the beginning.

[upbeat music] It's Wednesday, October 14th, 2026, and welcome back to Matters of Policy and Politics, a podcast devoted to the discussion of Hoover Institution research and issues of local, national, and geopolitical concern.

I'm Bill Whalen.

I'm the Hoover Institution's Virginia Hobbs Carpenter Distinguished Policy Fellow in Journalism.

I'm not the only Hoover fellow podcasting these days.

That's hoover.org, folks, where you can also find Valerie's homepage and more details on her work.

And of course, we have all sorts of great content posted right now on the life and work of Bob Hall, Hoover's newest Nobel laureate.

For the Hoover Institution, this is Bill Whalen.

We'll be back soon with a new conversation.

A defector explains how media brought into North Korea on flash drives and smuggled among the youth there has the potential to undermine the brutal Kim dictatorship.

And Bill Whalen speaks with Tom Church about the financial challenges facing America's entitlement programs.

The US-China AI race, competing models, global stakes.

If the United States and China are in a race to develop advanced artificial intelligence systems, who is winning, and what would victory entail? For China Considered, Senior Fellow Elizabeth Economy sits down with Martin Chorzempa of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, an expert in Chinese financial technology.

Senior healthcare occupies a growing chunk of the federal budget, with Medicare now accounting for one in every seven dollars Washington spends.

Social Security and Medicare are on track to run out of funds by the early twenty-thirties.

Policy fellow Tom Church joins distinguished policy fellow Bill Whalen to discuss why Medicare reform went nowhere a decade ago, policy avenues for driving down costs, and limitations imposed by the current political lineup in Washington.

A Republican president famously averse to entitlement reform and an opposition party championing a single-payer Medicare-for-all alternative.

At first glance, Proposition 5 seems innocent enough, or so its official summary assures us.

Distinguished Policy Fellow Bill Whalen writes at California On Your Mind.

He discusses how Prop 5 would change how recall elections work in the state, so replacements for recalled officials would no longer be selected in the recall vote, but rather by a later special election or appointment.

Whalen notes how this seemingly simple change would effectively close the back door to the California governorship once used by Arnold Schwarzenegger to replace ousted Governor Gray Davis.

It's Monday, October 5th, 2026, and welcome back to Goodfellows, a Hoover Institution broadcast examining history, economics, and geopolitics.

I'm Bill Whalen.

I'm a distinguished policy fellow here at the Hoover Institution.

I'll be your moderator today.