How do you know that? How do you read my mind like that?

How do you do that? I'm perfectly open to the idea that this is a midlife crisis or whatever you want to call it and that we're coming out.

I prefer not to think that it's a terminal illness.

I think that there's one huge, put aside AI, which I don't know how it's going to like, how that ball bounces, right? But social media generally, I don't know what you can do contemplatively in that age of social media.

All that being said- if people on the right accept the basic undergirding principles of creedal nationalism, which is like, we're all swear allegiance to a constitution and we love the flag and everybody lives here together and we're a big multicultural democracy and the American idea is that no one is better than me and I'm not better than anyone and we're all gonna create opportunity for those.

and that people on the left have to not talk about identity and division all the time and try to divide based on resentment categories, right? And sort of downplay like, On the right, downplay the nativist impulses that are universal.

And on the left, downplay the things that divide and upplay the things that unite.

I think we have to

Yeah.

Um, I, I, I don't...

I can't understand anymore what's going on.

It, it, it, it, it's, it's impossible to imagine a situation in which an American president facing a group of authoritarian countries that have the upper hand for various reasons in various conflict zones around the world, um, purposely alienating countries that have fought with us for 100 years.

It's much bigger than that because it's, it's already a kind of World War III in the sense that you have the free nations against the authoritarian nations, except that the biggest of the free nations might be partially an authoritarian nation.

So I, it doesn't make sen- I mean, he's at Harvard.

He could probably explain this.

What can we, what can we all do?

So how do you b- as an editor, how do you balance the d- determination to be of no party or clique versus the fact that you say, "We're with the American idea, and the people who hold power over the country are opposed to that American idea"?

The first thing I would say is that I believe embedded in the DNA of The Atlantic is the idea that the country is at its best, and democracy is at its healthiest, when we have, at the very least, a strong party of conservative ideas battling it out in the playing field of public opinion with a strong party of liberal ideas, right? And The Atlantic is meant to be the playing field to some degree.

We live in, again, an anomalous situation in which, uh, the Democrats, for all of their faults and small-minded partisanship, still are putting forward a set of ideas, fitfully, but putting forward a set of ideas.

But right now, the Republican Party, the allegedly conservative party, has built itself, remade itself i- into a almost a cult of personality around a, a maximum leader.

Uh, so you're not getting conservative ideas.

We are publishing, and, and you know this obviously, we publish conservatives all the time.

But we don't right now have what I would consider a normal, healthy situation in America, and, uh, I wish that we did.

We're wearing ties.

Talk about the importance when somebody like Bob Kagan, who [laughs] is not a dove, uh, is, is calling out attack against, I would think, a, a, a country that he probably thinks is one of the worst on Earth.

Look, um, the, uh, Bob Kagan might have certain feelings about I- Iran, uh, and its, and its m- negative effect on world politics, negative effect on American national security.

Um, but, but, but that's the reason he's so angry a- and upset about this, is you, you, you don't want to lose.

The worst, the very worst thing you could do is have a war of choice, right? And this was the timing of this, and the, and the action.

Th- those are choices.

Um, and, uh, you, you, you have this choice, and you don't have a plan.

You don't have a vision.

It was predicted

Exactly

... um, designed to lift up his flock.

But nevertheless, there's something unusual about, uh, not to make this self-referential, but there is something unusual about the fact that The Atlantic has a Jewish editor.

It's happened for 10 years now, which is that several of the editors earlier in The Atlantic's history, they had Jew on the brain, you know, this age-old affliction.

And one of them talked about generalized fear.

Once the Jews...

And this is in the period 1890s, early 1900s, immigration.

It's humiliating, right? That leads us to that being the agenda, but it doesn't incentivize us as a Jewish community to say, what is actually required of us in a moment like this, not just to pursue our own safety, but to be at the front lines of helping the society confront its challenges.

Mm

... uh, to, to Trump, "Hey, you, you, this was, this was a war of choice.

Now it's a war of necessity, so don't leave us in the lurch again." Um, I don't think he'll care very much what they say on that.

So at the end of this war, the Israelis and the Arab states of the Gulf may not have what they were hoping for, which is a completely neutralized Iran.

They might have a hard-edged regime that has a less power to project through ballistic missiles and through a na- nuclear program, but an angrier, more hard line power that could harass shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, just for startersWe don't know because we don't know what Donald Trump's ultimate goal is, because he's listed all of the goals and toggles back and forth among them without rhyme or reason.

Mm-hmm

... over the years about national security and international geopolitics, the post-World War II international liberal order.

And those conversations make sense because we're, we're starting from a shared send- uh, set of facts, and we're also starting from basic, clear ideological streams that aren't that, aren't that different from each other.

Yeah

... that our Pentagon correspondents know what's going on in the Pentagon, whether or not they're sitting in the Pentagon.

It's more convenient to sit in the Pentagon, and in the old dispensation, when you could leave the press room and go to the Secretary of the Army's office or the Secretary of the Navy's office or sit in the mess and talk to people, sit in the cafeteria.

You know, there were-- there was utility to that, but it's not as if Hegseth is gonna be able to stop independent reporting on the United States military because he won't let reporters in the building.

By the way, one other point about this that needs to be made is that, and I feel very, very strongly about this, it's like we have writ large in the mainstream media, I believe, a patriotic press corps.

And by that I mean, let me explain, I mean that the people I know want, as Americans, what's in the best interest of the serving men and women of the United States.

And they are there to, to, to examine and bring to light the decision-making of military leaders, and they are there to be critical when those decisions are ill-advised or if there's corruption or there's this, that, and the other thing.

Yeah

... do you make of that total lack of consequences?

I don't have a broad philosophical conclusion to draw from the fact that there's no accountability in this particular administration.

I can't write that out past this administration.

But it is remarkable that of all the, of all the people not to suffer any consequences for this, it's the person in charge of a large organization where you would be court-martialed for doing what he did.

If he weren't the defense secretary, he'd be court-martialed, I mean, if he were in uniform, for doing what he did.

And, and what annoys me about the fallout of Signal is that literally the inspector general of the Pentagon says that Pete Hegseth endangered the lives of pilots.

Says it.

Was that the last time that you talked to him, or is he, you know, are you guys talking on the phone like many other reporters these days? And also, what's your relationship been like with him, and how has it kind of changed over the years? I feel like a lot of people in media have these now, I guess, you know, d- a decade-plus or many more decades-long relationship with Trump.

But just when you hear that from the administration, I think anyone might see it and say, is it going on longer? Are we done? What's happening here?

Oh, I think it's very clear.

It's the beginning of the beginning of the end of the beginning, but we're in the middle of the beginning of the end.

I don't know why you can't track that.

Obviously, they don't...

I mean, I think this is...

Like anything in the Trump administration, trying to guess is almost fruitless because I don't think Donald Trump knows.

I wonder, you know, what your perspective on that is in the middle of this.

This is the point.

Yeah, well, no, and it, and it's like the, um, having them march in and doing the Medal of Honor ceremonies at the State of the Union, and, and it's literally...

I mean, if he could have trapeze artists there in the dome of the Capitol, he would.

You know, "Are you not entertained?" is the, you know, kind of the Gladiator.

There's a...

I, I always hate when aspects of American politics or American life remind me of late-stage Roman decline.

[chuckles] But if there's n- if there's a-- there's no night that better exemplifies that than, than this.

Yeah.

(laughs) What about the nation itself? Will there be a nation to celebrate in 250 years?

It's funny, you know, when The Atlantic was founded in 1857, they were asking themselves, "Will we have a nation in three years, four years?" And they didn't, right? I mean, they had a union but then they had a- a breakaway.

We're not gonna have that, I don't think.

It's not geographically possible, um.

So, I- I always say, I- I think this is true, I always say that, you know, the- the thing we don't know about this moment is whether it's a mid-life crisis on the part of a country, if it's a nervous breakdown or if it's a terminal disease, right? You hear that hmm, hmm? No.

It's, that- that's the problem.

We don't want, I desperately don't want it to be terminal.

Yes.

(laughs)

... to sap our (laughs) to, to sap our attention, to d- you know, to, to, to provide us with endless mindless entertainments, uh, it's, it's a hard thing, but we're not gonna survive as a country if people don't know why we're a country.

Um, and I can't think of anyone...

You know, the other thing I was thinking of, he didn't, he's, hasn't, he's not paying me to say this, he's not doing anything, I'm saying this on my own accord.

Um, you know, this is a very, it's a, we live in a, a dangerous time, and in my mind, a low time.

Um, (clears throat) some of you saw the recent AI video shared by the President of United States concerning poop.

Um, it, it sometimes it's beyond belief, but, uh, we live in a, in, in, in, it's, it's a low time, and it can be a cynical and dispiriting time.

(laughs)

(laughs)

... we're, we're, you know, everybody's got some work to do here.

The, um...

L- look, look, one of the arguments, uh, uh, about the founders is that they were pessimists, right? They devised...

First of all, they opposed tyranny, obviously, which is why they wanted to be free.

But they, they also understood that, that human beings are imperfect and, uh, seize power and hold onto power when they shouldn't, and impose all kinds of punishments on their fellow citizens when they gain a little bit of power.

That's why we had a bunch of brilliant m- men at the i- i- initiation of this experiment, um, uh, who, who said, "Let's divide up government.

Is that something you ever thought you'd cover?

(laughs)

As I said to Ayad, we don't have to worry...

We don't worry about the FCC.

Look, we don't worry.

I mean, and I have to say this in all seriousness to a group of people who subscribe to The Atlantic and read The Atlantic.

Um, look, you know, there's only two ways to approach...

I'm not trying to sound, like, self-righteous or, or whatever, but I'm not.

So, at what point do the doors open in the mind of average Americans and they're petrified?

... of the eye, the architecture?

Yeah, absolutely.

So light comes in the front, goes through the clear window in the front of our eye called the cornea.

You can have corneal diseases obviously that block that light from coming through clearly but if it's healthy, that light comes through clearly.

The cornea is curved on the front and that curvature is actually responsible for curving most of the light into the back of the eye.

Then the light goes through your pupil so that's the iris which is brown in me but brown, blue, hazel, so that's our iris and the iris can open and close like we were talking about a minute ago.

Comes through the middle of that, the open middle part of that, goes through the lens.

(laughs)

Yep.

Yeah.

I have confidence in...

Let me put it this way.

You know, the, the, the general in charge of Central Command, General Kurilla, who oversaw this operation, highly competent.

There's a lot of competent people still in government.

I have no confidence in Pete Hegseth's management or analytic or moral capabilities.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, you know, segues are overrated.

And, uh, but I- I gotta make it work.

We have an internal debate here at the Dispatch when that whole story unfolded about the worst thing about it, and so, like, Steve Hayes was like, "The worst thing about it is that it shows how unserious these people are about, you know, national security and- and- and all that." And, um, and there were a bunch of different arguments.

My argument was...

And I didn't disagree with any of the others, but the worst thing about it for me was...

If you're a f- an allied leader or a foreign leader, right? But if you're a- if you're a- a foreign minister somewhere, there was a chance before that exchange to think that a lot of the sort of J.D.

Vance talk was public bluster for domestic consumption, and that behind the scenes, they really weren't that hostile to NATO or alliances or Europe or anything like that.

Thanks, Jonah.

Yeah.

But I think we just have to get better and better and bet- and one of the things I tell, this is a little bit of, you know, Goldberg J School, which would take six minutes to, to run.

This is my, you know, my understanding of journalism, and, and people don't seem to understand as much as they should, is that if the story isn't actually interesting to read, people aren't gonna read it.

If their, if your podcast isn't interesting, isn't entertaining, people aren't gonna go to the second paragraph, you know? I mean, there's this expression in journalism, "After the lead, it's just typing." And that, that originally meant work on your lead so that people read the story and then just put the rest of the stuff in.

I interpret that a different way now, which is, like, if your, if your- if you don't have an excellent lead that gets you to the second paragraph and the second paragraph doesn't interest you enough to go to the third paragraph, it's all just typing.

It's meaningless.

So we have to do, we have to do a better job of, of telling our stories and presenting this information in compelling and interesting ways.

What is the first step people do, or, or do you think we are really in a situation of civic catastrophe and authoritarian crisis?

Just pick up the story because of, um, what it says about Donald Trump.

Yeah.

No, so he, so he had the family come in, and it was quite touching, you know, young, poor economically, you know, stressed Mexican American family, they came in.

He said, "Who's paying for the funeral?" And they said, "Well, we don't know." And he said, "I, I'll pay for the funeral," as in kind of, "I'm the big man.

I'll take care of the funeral." Weeks later, he asks his staff, "Did they ever have that funeral for that soldier?" And they said, "Yes." He had not...

It, it's, it's a very confusing timeline.

I'm trying to contract it down to its essence.

Do you have similar levels of confidence?

But first I wanted to know what happened when Jeff, who wrote one of the biggest stories this year about the Trump administration, met Trump, the guy who called him a sleazebag.

We go over to the Resolute desk, and he stands up, and forget the exact words, but it's like, "Oh, this is gonna be interesting." And he shakes hands with Ashley Parker, Michael Shearer, and gives me a big handshake, big warm handshake, and, you know, we just sort of sit down right in front of him.

Steven Cheung is still sitting on the same row.

And kind of launch into it.

I thanked him for seeing us, and I made my sincere point that it's better for us to talk than not talk, and then it was off to the races.

But he was charming, focused, and mainly I was there with two writers who were actually writing a very large piece for us, so they had to drive the, the interview, but there was no hostility.

I mean, you've read the Truth Social post about our visit that w- he posted like four hours before that was filled with (laughs) hostility and nonsense, and, you know, I said to him, or one of us said, "What was that about?" He's being Mr.

So did your impression of him in an overall way change after this meeting? Like, in any way? Did you come away thinking differently broadly about Trump than before the meeting?

In, in, in, into what we are saying." Um, do you think that by publishing the texts, you injected that little dose of reality into the conversation?

I hope so.

I mean, you know, it's, it's...

Look, and, and Anne, as you all know, is one of the great experts in the world on authoritarian behavior.

I mean, wrote the book on the Gulag, uh, on the history of the Gulag, uh, and has been writing about totalitarianism and authoritarianism ever since.

So, um, not, not telling you, certainly, anything you don't know.

Um, the, their goal, the goal of people who are authoritarian minded is to force compliance, right? They can only do what they want to do if no one fights them, if no one argues with them, if no one counters it.

(laughs)

Is it all of one piece? Is this part of this massive culture war that they believe that we are in some way delinquent, degenerate, backward looking, whatever.

Look, it's a contempt for, if you're Donald Trump, I think you have a certain contempt for people who engage in self-restraint, right? Self-restraint is a prerequisite for participation in a democracy.

You don't get to do everything you want to do.

There's oversight.

You have to restrain your, even if you have freedom of speech, you have to restrain your tongue.

You can't just call everybody names just because you're mad at them.

He sees that, what I would call mature self-restraint, as a sign of weakness.

Ireland can't.

And while Waltz maintains that Goldberg somehow got sucked into this super secret Signal chat, Jeffrey Goldberg explained exactly how it likely happened over the weekend.

This isn't the Matrix.

Phone numbers don't just get sucked into other phones.

I don't know what he's talking about there.

Uh, you know, very frequently in journalism, the most obvious explanation is the explanation.

Um, my phone number was in his phone because my phone number is in his phone.

He's telling everyone that he's never met me or spoken to me.

I know you've been asked this before, Jeffrey, but just to clarify, do you believe the information on that group chain was classified?

Well, let me answer it this way.

When, when the texts were coming over, as I'm watching them unfold, um, it's 11:44 AM, a- on a Saturday, Pete Hegseth is promising that, that US war planes are taking off in 30 minutes to bomb enemy targets that we know are protected by anti-aircraft batteries.

Okay? So, if that's not the most sensitive information, the most secret information in the world, I simply don't know what the meaning of classified or secret or top secret is.

Because American pilots were about to fly into possibly a deadly situation and the Secretary of Defense is telling everyone on the group chat, which by the way included me, uh, that these pilots were about to go into harm's way.

Talking about them going after they come back is a different thing entirely, but letting that information out on a commercial messaging app seems very odd.

So, I was sort of aghast when I'm, when I'm watching this unfold on my phone.

Are you concerned that this administration will come after you?

It has been a busy few days of news, to say the least, for moderator Jeffrey Goldberg, and he joins us now with a preview of what to expect tonight on the program.

Thanks, Geoff.

Tonight on Washington Week, my all-star panel and I will explore the legal, political, and national security consequences of the Signal group chat read around the world.

That's tonight on Washington Week.