Today's #ListenFirst Friday video focuses on the importance of overcoming political divides and coming together to combat climate change.
Video: #ListenFirst Friday Ellis Watamanuk
#ListenFirst Friday Ellis Watamanuk
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U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick (C along fence) listens as U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a visit to the Fort Bragg U.S. Army base on February 13, 2026 in Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
Getty Images, Nathan Howard
Speak Now or Forever War
Mar 02, 2026
Trump may have just started the next forever war. If you were a casual listener of last week’s State of the Union, you’d have heard the president offer some forceful words about Iran without mentioning he had already amassed an armada outside Iran so big it is the largest show of U.S. naval power in the Middle East since Iraq. Only a few days later, against the counsel of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, despite having neither a clear rationale nor a plan for involvement, let alone presenting one to Congress or the American public, the U.S. began reckless and illegal strikes on Iran. For weeks prior, rumors had been circulating that Trump was considering a fully fledged, enduring conflict. Former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s response on X summed up what many of us were thinking: “Americans do not want to go to war with Iran!!!…And they voted for NO MORE FOREIGN WARS AND NO MORE REGIME CHANGE.” None of this registered with a President who had already bombed seven countries since returning to power. With Trump and Hegseth so hellbent on hellfire at our expense, we all must speak up to stop them. That’s why they’re coming after our freedom of speech–and starting with the troops on purpose.
The U.S. military’s weaponization of poverty presents a financial incentive to stay in line. By design, the military is one of the most foolproof ways in America to get education, healthcare, a steady paycheck, and even citizenship. In return, young servicemembers risk their lives while oligarchs profit. This is the military industrial complex, and it is not a secret. As long as Trump can extract and exploit, he doesn’t see a cost to war. He’s a draft dodger who has called fallen American soldiers ‘losers’ and ‘suckers’ and “finds the notion of military service difficult to understand, and the idea of volunteering to serve especially incomprehensible.” Those of us who have served or are serving see it differently. But unfortunately, when the consequences can be cuts to rank, pay, or benefits, dishonorable discharge, court-martial, or getting deported, what 18-year-old enlisted kid is prepared to disobey or speak out against the officers above them?
To the regime’s chagrin, veterans are trying to help. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro attempted to convince a Grand Jury to indict several members of Congress–who are also all veterans–after they posted a 90-second video reminding servicemembers they could refuse to follow an unlawful order, which is–and this is true–the law. Trump’s response was swift and chilling; he called the video “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL,” branded the lawmakers “traitors,” demanded they be “ARRESTED AND PUT ON TRIAL,” and called their actions “punishable by DEATH!” That a Grand Jury refused to indict hardly lessens the blow that a sitting American president is weaponizing our justice system to intimidate dissenters.
Obviously, this wasn’t sedition. If anything, reciting American laws ought to be considered patriotic. But for a man who believes his will is the only law that matters, those who would amplify the existence of an actual law that does limit him are, naturally, “traitors.” More than the speakers or their speech, however, Trump might have blown a gasket over their video’s potential audience; the simple notion that soldiers could learn about lawfully challenging orders sent Trump on a tirade so unhinged that he threatened sitting Congressmen with death. Clearly, between an unprecedented firing spree of leaders that continues to destabilize the military and Secretary Hegseth’s attempt to muzzle the press at the Pentagon, the regime is in overdrive to reduce the military to Trump-loyalists while also reducing oversight and accountability.
To be clear, servicemembers already accept limits on speech, but memos instituted under Trump have threatened greater consequences for certain criticisms of the president or other superior officers. In fact, one Air Force lawyer, who spoke only under the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, called the new guidance both troubling and threatening. Now, retired General Keane, former Vice Chief of Staff of the Army, claims Hegseth just wants to “spoon-feed information to the journalists.” He adds, “That’s not journalism.” No kidding. That’s propaganda.
Notably, CEO of Anthropic Dario Amodei said of this topic: “The constitutional protections in our military structures depend on the idea that there are humans who would — we hope — disobey illegal orders. With fully autonomous weapons, we don’t necessarily have those protections.” Now, Trump and Hegseth are threatening that Anthropic better let them use its AI tools for “all lawful purposes” or else. They want to make fully autonomous weapons and conduct mass surveillance on Americans, and they already admitted they used Anthropic’s Claude in Maduro’s kidnapping. With a man famous for violence and uncomplicated celebrations of death at the helm, and a plan to ramp up the unlawful orders as he wages an illegal war, solidifying silence for those with a front row view is an important preparation step to getting away with it. Of course, the regime is hoping to decrease disobedience. Most humans have a conscience but AI is programmed.
Servicemembers may soon find themselves stuck between a rock and Fascism. Our military is not Trump’s private muscle, but there is currently immense pressure on servicemembers to make that distinction. Unfortunately, insubordination–even of a feckless authoritarian demagogue–takes courage. So, call your elected officials and tell them to step up. Military personnel have a duty to disobey unlawful orders, and we should make sure they know that. Threatening the lives of Americans for exercising their rights under the First Amendment should not be tolerated, and we should make sure Trump knows that. And if striking Iran, or anywhere else, were ever truly necessary, then at least the American public could have been persuaded through a proper Congressional debate. We must scrutinize the military now more than ever, and pay attention to who stands to gain from the next war. It is time to support the troops against their Commander in Chief.
Julie Roland was a Naval Officer for ten years, deploying to both the South China Sea and the Persian Gulf as a helicopter pilot before separating in June 2025 as a Lieutenant Commander. She has a law degree from the University of San Diego, a Master of Laws from Columbia University, and is a member of the Truman National Security Project.
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President Franklin D. Roosevelt addressing congress, December 8, 1941.
Getty Images, Fotosearch
Four Freedoms: What We Are Fighting For
Mar 02, 2026
The record of the Trump 2.0 administration is one of repeated usurpations and injuries to the body politic: fundamentally at odds with the principles of democracy, without legal or ethical restraint, hostile to truth, and indifferent to human suffering. Our nation desperately needs a stout and engaging response from the party out-of-power. It’s necessary but not sufficient for Democrats to criticize Trump, rehearsing what they are against. If it is to generate renewed enthusiasm among voters, the Democratic Party must offer a compelling positive message, stating clearly what it stands for.
Fortunately, Democrats don’t need to reinvent this wheel. They can reach back to a fraught moment in our history when a president brought forward a timely and nationally unifying message, framed within a coherent, memorable, and inspiring set of ideas. In his address to Congress on Jan. 6, 1941 – a full 12 months before Pearl Harbor – Franklin Delano Roosevelt termed the international spread of fascism an “unprecedented” threat to U.S. security. He also identified dangers on the home front: powerful isolationist leanings and, in certain quarters, popular support for Nazi ideology. Calling for increased military preparation and war production (along with higher taxes), he reminded citizens “what the downfall of democratic nations [abroad] might mean to our own democracy.”
Roosevelt framed his speech by naming four “essential human freedoms,” applicable not just domestically but “everywhere in the world”:
- “Freedom of speech and expression.”
- “Freedom to worship God in one’s own way.”
- “Freedom from want.”
- “Freedom from fear.”
The first are First Amendment guarantees. The last two spoke directly to a nation still emerging from the Great Depression and anxious about international turmoil. The idea that Americans could escape the stain of want and the paralysis of fear resonated across the country. The popular artist Norman Rockwell executed a series of four paintings illustrating each idea. When they appeared as covers on the Saturday Evening Post, the magazine received 25,000 requests for reprints. After we entered World War II, all four ideas served as touchstones, illuminating what we were fighting for.
Fast-forward to the present, which bears an uncanny resemblance to Roosevelt’s world. Along with a terrible disconnect: For FDR, the threats to our nation and its values overwhelmingly emanated from abroad. He could scarcely have imagined that 85 years later the menace would reside in the White House. The 32nd president would be aghast at how the 47th has, in the words of Fareed Zakaria, “declared war on civil society.” Trump has normalized criminal behavior and criminalized constitutionally protected actions – systematically undermining each of the Four Freedoms:
- Freedom of speech and expression: Trump has attacked those who would exercise their right of free speech when that speech is critical of him. He has labeled critics “internal enemies” and protesters “domestic terrorists.” He has denigrated the working press as a foe: mocking, belittling, and attacking journalists; spreading falsehoods to confuse the public; and undercutting a vital safeguard of democratic accountability. He has sought to intimidate colleges and universities into restricting academic freedom and campus speech.
- Freedom to worship: He has sided with the forces of Christian Nationalism, which favor selected religious groups over others. Undermining the First Amendment’s establishment clause, he has encouraged efforts to interject sectarian Christian content into public education and has multiplied attacks on Islam in the pretext of opposing anti-Semitism. And of course, he gives no quarter to those whose choice not to worship enjoys equal constitutional protection.
- Freedom from want: Trump has assailed the social safety net that provides material assistance to those in greatest economic need – both domestically and internationally. DOGE’s reckless assault on governmental offices and civil servants, the demise of USAID, and the stunning incompetency of Trump’s cabinet have undercut the ability of key agencies to fulfill their statutory functions on behalf of the American people. Trump’s ill-considered tariffs have demonstrably weakened the U.S. economy, costing jobs and raising prices for domestic consumers. By reversing measures addressing climate change, he has weakened future economic prospects for everyone on the planet.
- Freedom from fear: Roosevelt focused on international arms reduction. But Trump has brought this concern home by his agents’ continued disregard of the Fourth Amendment, the Eighth, and, arguably, others. He has repeatedly threatened his perceived political enemies with deportation, imprisonment, and even death. His campaign of political retribution features both selective prosecutions and economic intimidation. He has encouraged physically aggressive tactics by inadequately trained ICE agents deployed in targeted communities. (The recent killings of two Minnesota citizens by ICE have raised the level of alarm.) He has scorned crucial constitutional safeguards for people in custody. He has ignored court decisions and the need for judicial warrants. It is hard to imagine any undocumented immigrant – or anyone pursuing the legal process of naturalization – feeling safe right now. It is hard to imagine any non-violent dissenter experiencing solace. But in fact, every U.S. citizen is potentially at risk.
Democrats must not lose sight of pressing kitchen table issues and, above all, the existential threat facing our democracy. But they need to put forward a clearly drawn and detailed plan – couched in the kind of unadorned language Roosevelt used so effectively – to demonstrate how a properly functioning government can restore and extend each of these four fundamental freedoms; How a new generation of enlightened, ethical, and compassionate political leaders can repair the Trump administration’s damage through legislation and responsible governing; And finally, how this “Project 2029” can spark a rebirth of liberty, equality, and prosperity. If properly articulated, such a pledge will resonate with everyday citizens, as it did in Roosevelt’s era. The American people thirst for a forward-looking, hopeful, and elevating message to reawaken faith in our institutions and our deepest values. The scaffold is here, just waiting to be given voice.
Philip A. Glotzbach, Ph.D. is president emeritus of Skidmore College. He is the author of Embrace Your Freedom: Winning Strategies to Succeed in College and in Life, a book of guidance for college students and their parents in these troubled times.
Beau Breslin, Ph.D. holds the Joseph C. Palamountain Jr. Chair in Government at Skidmore College.
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U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivers a keynote speech at the 62nd Munich Security Conference on Saturday, Feb. 14, 2026, in Munich, Germany.
(Johannes Simon/Getty Images/TNS)
Marco Rubio is the only adult left in the room
Feb 25, 2026
Finally free from the demands of being chief archivist of the United States, secretary of state, national security adviser and unofficial viceroy of Venezuela, Marco Rubio made his way to the Munich Security Conference last weekend to deliver a major address.
I shouldn’t make fun. Rubio, unlike so many major figures in this administration, is a bona fide serious person. Indeed, that’s why President Trump keeps piling responsibilities on him. Rubio knows what he’s talking about and cares about policy. He is hardly a free agent; Trump is still president after all. But in an administration full of people willing to act like social media trolls, Rubio stands out for being serious. And I welcome that.
But just because Rubio made a serious argument, that doesn’t mean it was wholly persuasive. Part of his goal was to repair some of the damage done by his boss, who not long ago threatened to blow up the North Atlantic alliance by snatching Greenland away from Denmark. Rubio’s conciliatory language was welcome, but it hardly set things right.
Whether it was his intent or not, Rubio had more success in offering a contrast with Vice President JD Vance, who used the Munich conference last year as a platform to insult allies and provide fan service to his followers on X. Rubio’s speech was the one Vance should have given, if the goal was to offer a serious argument about Trump’s “vision” for the Western alliance. I put “vision” in scare quotes because it’s unclear to me that Trump actually has one, but the broader MAGA crowd is desperate to construct a coherent theory of their case.
So what’s that case? That Western Civilization is a real thing, America is not only part of it but also its leader, and it will do the hard things required to fix it.
In Rubio’s story, America and Europe embraced policies in the 1990s that amounted to the “managed decline” of the West. European governments were free riders on America’s military might and allowed their defense capabilities to atrophy as they funded bloated welfare states and inefficient regulatory regimes. Free trade, mass migration and an infatuation with “the rules-based global order” eroded national sovereignty, undermined the “cohesion of our societies” and fueled the “de-industrialization” of our economies. The remedy for these things? Reversing course on those policies and embracing the hard reality that strength and power drive events on the global stage.
“The fundamental question we must answer at the outset is what exactly are we defending,” Rubio said, “because armies do not fight for abstractions. Armies fight for a people; armies fight for a nation. Armies fight for a way of life.”
I agree with some of this — to a point. And, honestly, given how refreshing it is to hear a grown-up argument from this administration, it feels churlish to quibble.
But, for starters, the simple fact is that Western Civilization is an abstraction, and so are nations and peoples. And that’s fine. Abstractions — like love, patriotism, moral principles, justice — are really important. Our “way of life” is largely defined and understood through abstractions: freedom, the American dream, democracy, etc. What is the “Great” in Make America Great Again, if not an abstraction?
This is important because the administration’s defenders ridicule or dismiss any principled objection critics raise as fastidious gitchy-goo eggheadery. Trump tramples the rule of law, pardons cronies, tries to steal an election and violates free market principles willy-nilly. And if you complain, it’s because you’re a goody-goody fool.
As White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said not long ago, “we live in a world … that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power. These are the iron laws of the world that have existed since the beginning of time.” Rubio said it better, but it’s the same idea.
There are other problems with Rubio’s story. At the start of the 1990s, the EU’s economy was 9% bigger than ours. In 2025 we were nearly twice as rich as Europe. If Europe was “ripping us off,” they have a funny way of showing it. America hasn’t “deindustrialized.” The manufacturing sector has grown during all of this decline, though not as much as the service sector, where we are a behemoth. We have shed manufacturing jobs, but that has more to do with automation than immigration. Moreover, the trends Rubio describes are not unique to America. Manufacturing tends to shrink as countries get richer.
That’s an important point because Rubio, like his boss, blames all of our economic problems on bad politicians and pretends that good politicians can fix them through sheer force of will.
I think Rubio is wrong, but I salute him for making his case seriously.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.
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U.S. President Donald Trump on February 13, 2026 in Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
(Photo by Nathan Howard/Getty Images)
Autocracy for Dummies
Feb 18, 2026
Everything Donald Trump has said and done in his second term as president was lifted from the Autocracy for Dummies handbook he should have committed to memory after trying and failing on January 6, 2021, to overthrow the government he had pledged to protect and serve.
This time around, putting his name and face to everything he fancies and diverting our attention from anything he touches as soon as it begins to smell or look bad are telltale signs that he is losing the fight to control the hearts and minds of a nation he would rather rule than help lead.
To be sure, in the five years he has spent in the White House, Donald Trump has come closer to bringing autocratic rule to the United States than any previous president. No doubt, he will keep at it until his term in office ends.
For however long that is and well past the time his second term ends, Donald Trump will remain Americans’ avatar for all things autocratic. But his successes won’t come close to those of other past and present autocrats.
True, the list of bright shiny objects catching his attention both internationally and domestically has been impressive. His branding of things already built, eligible for a teardown, or in desperate need of overhauling under his careful gaze has been exhausting and distracting. But tearing things apart wasn’t a downpayment on building something better and longer lasting. It was the only thing he was interested in and good at doing.
The reason why Donald Trump’s second presidency is already showing serious signs of fraying is that he has ignored the two most important lines aspiring autocrats can’t stop themselves from crossing.
They act as if they are at the center of a universe they can push around and shape to their liking; but the breadth and audacity of their ambitions and penchant for corruption exceed their ability to carry out their grandest designs.
It’s no less true for Vladmir Putin and Donald Trump today as it was in the past for the likes of
Stalin, Pol Pot, and Hitler. In the case of Hitler, for instance, had he really been serious about building a thousand-year Reich, the late political scientist Sam Sharp observed, he wouldn’t have moved around so much in the first twelve.
Donald Trump’s attention-grabbing threats to “take over” Greenland, make Canada our 51st state, run Venezuela by proxy, bomb Iran into submission, or turn a post-apocalyptic Gaza into a tourist mecca are more scattered and fleeting than anything that Hitler had in mind to do. But the TACO-infused confusion spilling from Donald Trump’s brain makes his proposed do-overs look sillier and more delusional than they are dangerous.
Then there’s this.
Autocrats don’t fare well when the people they try to bully have had lots of practice and success at saying “no” to their would-be overlords.
Donald Trump has shown no familiarity or regard for this crucial piece of our history. Americans are, for better and worse, well-practiced in showing a cranky and sometimes violent face to leaders who push us harder than we like into places we don’t want to go.
The public anger on display in Minneapolis and elsewhere, limited as it may be, is a preamble to a history that’s already been written. We might dislike all the unrest, decry the loss of people’s lives and property, and scratch our heads at the modest changes our rebelliousness leaves behind. But it is the very evanescent quality of the hard and sometimes dangerous work undertaken by agitated Americans that keeps our unrest fresh and relevant.
Not long from now, the assault on our civic lives and constitutional norms occasioned by Trump’s anti-immigration campaign will be remembered for the same reason we should celebrate the insurrection and attempted coup d’état Trump provoked on January 6, 2021. They were dramatic and conspicuous failures.
We won’t have to defame the men and women who tried to take over the Capital or who want to throw out all our illegal immigrants to recognize that their actions were as historically unprecedented as they were incompetently executed.
The legacy of the everyday Americans protesting ICE arrests, incarcerations, deportations, and killings will be their restraint and programmatic modesty. The only thing they will have forced the rest of us to do is think about ideals we had come to take for granted but now, thanks to the trouble they’re making on the streets of American cities, we are practicing again.
The public fights over Trump’s anti-immigration policies are shocking. But they also make us reflect upon a long history of taking in people we weren’t expecting or thrilled to have here and letting them stay long enough to do better than expected for themselves and for the rest of us.
It would be good to keep all this in mind in the run up to our 250th birthday party. The irony that we would have President Trump to thank for reminding us about these important lessons is a pill I am ready and happy to swallow.
Daniel J. Monti (danieljmonti.com) is Professor of Sociology at Saint Louis University and the author of American Democracy and Disconsent: Liberalism and Illiberalism in Ferguson, Charlottesville, Black Lives Matter, and the Capitol Insurrection.
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Trump & Hegseth gave Mark Kelly a huge 2028 gift