Matters of Policy & Politics

Matters of Policy & Politics is a Hoover Institution podcast devoted to matters of governance and balance of power at home and abroad. It is hosted by Hoover fellow Bill Whalen.As the successor to Hoover’s Area 45 podcast, which focused on Trump-era issues and controversies, Matters of Policy & Politics will examine the direction of federal, state, and local leadership and elections, with an occasional examination of national security and geopolitical concerns, all featuring insightful analysis provided by Hoover Institution scholars and guests.Podcasts will be released weekly, with engaging topics and fellows.

Matters of Policy & Politics is a news podcast hosted by Hoover Institution, with 100 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Hoover Institution hosts Matters of Policy & Politics, a news show with 100 episodes published.

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  Episode #504

  Weathering the Storms: Steven Koonin on Data Centers, Energy Strategies and Climate Change

  Oct 2, 202647 min

  A divided America agrees on one thing: most folks don’t want new data centers in their communities. But do data centers live up to their sour reputation as water and electricity gluttons? Or are they, in fact, a 21st Century version of the automobile – an innovation deemed dangerous at first, but eventually a means to community advancement and prosperity? Steven Koonin, the Hoover Institution’s Edward Teller Senior Fellow and an energy policy expert, discusses what’s behind data-center NIMBYism and whether America will rise to the challenge of a greater demand for electricity in the near future as artificial intelligence and the needs of an increasingly information-intensive society and economy continue to reshape the nation’s landscape. Also discussed: the US Energy Department’s embrace of a “golden age of nuclear energy” (speaking of technology that once spawned NIMBY discontent), an evolving climate change debate (why does the UN bother to celebrate “climate weeks”?) and an emergency-mode California bracing for an El Niño event that’s expected to submerge vast portions of the Golden State in the coming months.

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  Episode #503

  California Update: Did Bonta Get Rolled? Is High-Speed Rail Doomed? Is Newsom Angling for 2028?

  Sep 25, 202651 min

  Among the latest happenings in the Golden State: choosing California-based “winners” and “losers” in the aftermath of the settlement of the state attorney generals’ antitrust suit blocking the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger (a good day for Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison, not one of California AG Rob Bonta’s better moments, and mixed results at best for Hollywood-based entertainment); what an audit exposing consultants’ expenses says about the troubled state of the Golden State’s high-speed rail project (life’s been good for tiki bars and “escape rooms”); and a river-wading Gavin Newsom fishing for attention in Montana (though California’s governor looked like a fish out of water while fly-fishing). Also discussed: what’s at stake in the upcoming gubernatorial debate between Democrat Xavier Becerra and Republican Steve Hilton and a California governor’s race that’s been mostly quiet since a contentious June primary.

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  Episode #502

  AI in the Classroom: Promise or Peril?

  Sep 18, 202650 min

  The beginning of a new K-12 year across the United States means the continuation of a learning-loss problem that predates COVID’s disruption of America’s educational system, as well as a new concern in more recent times: artificial intelligence interfering with students’ intellectual curiosity and development and teachers’ ability to do their job. Eric Hanushek, the Hoover Institution’s Paul and Jean Hanna Senior Fellow and an education policy expert, revisits a paper he recently co-authored on AI’s promise and perils. Also discussed: lessons learned from Texas’ decade-long experiment with teacher merit and unions’ reluctance to go along with said reform, plus how to close a learning gap that ultimately will compromise future workers’ earning potential.

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  Episode #501

  Amidst “A World of Generational Change”: 9/11’s Lessons and Legacy

  Sep 11, 202657 min

  Twenty-five years ago, the Free World was shocked by an attack on America in which three airliners struck New York’s World Trade Center and the Pentagon – a fourth plane crashing in rural Pennsylvania presumably on its way to strike the US Capitol. What did we learn from that attack, and is America better prepared to handle terror that can take more sophisticated forms? Philip Zelikow, the Hoover Institution’s Botha-Chan senior fellow and executive director of the bipartisan panel that examined the root causes of 9/11 and ways America could better defend itself, discusses the 9/11 Commission’s findings and the challenges in preventing future attacks from occurring (terrorists possibly taking advantage of emerging technology and finding safe haven in the likes of northern Africa). Also: Zelikow’s role in launching Hoover’s ambitious Commons Initiative, which studies how America can lead free societies to adapt and survive in a changing world.

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  Episode #500

  Keeping a Cold War Chilled: Mobilizing the Modern Defense Industrial Base

  Sep 11, 202652 min

  A recent AI analysis conducted by a team of Hoover fellows finds the US at greater risk of great-power hostilities with China than in recent decades, thus necessitating America to step up its deterrence capabilities. That includes the interaction between the Pentagon and venture capitalists who finance defense-related start-ups and ventures, the topic of a Hoover Institution briefing entitled Mobilize the Modern Defense Industrial Base . Co-authored by Hoover distinguished research fellow Dan Berkenstock, the briefing concludes that the US government needs to learn how to “talk the language of capital markets” and better connect America’s venture-backed industrial concerns with broader US goals in hopes of avoiding a hot war with devastating consequences at home and abroad. Also discussed: Berkenstock’s background in space-imaging, the “1491 moment in outer space featuring a new race to the moon by the decade’s end, and the significance of China’s “SpaceSail” satellite-constellation alternative to Starlink.

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