Night Owls

Night Owls

Joe Klein and John Ellis on what's happening and what happens next. Joe Klein is the author of seven books and "Sanity Clause," a Substack newsletter. John Ellis is the founder and editor of two Substack newsletters — News Items and Political News Items. The two friends have covered American politics for a combined 95 years.

Episodes

May 19, 2025 55 mins

A conversation with Brown University’s Marc Dunkelman who has written an important book: Why Nothing Works: Who Killed Progress—and how to Bring it Back.” Dunkelman has written an alternative history of the Democratic Party, a 150 year struggle between top-down and bottom-up progressivism that has led to stagnation. 

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We interviewed Daniela Rus, Director of the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT. She talks about the marriage of robotics and AI; what she calls "physical intelligence." It's a fascinating hour.

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The last part of our interview with the brilliant Wolgang Munchau

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The 2nd in our series where we interview Wolfgang Munchau

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April 24, 2025 55 mins

Larry Summers on Team Trump's economic policies, the attack on academia and the future of artificial intelligence.

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March 25, 2025 51 mins
Capitulation Week 
A major liberal law firm capitulates to Trump pressure. A major Ivy League University capitulates to Trump pressure. Zelensky capitulates to Trump pressure. In Israel, Bibi Netanyahu tries to replicate Trump pressure…and the Dems best response is yesterday’s Bernie singing yesterday’s song. John and Joe revisit last week. 
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A conversation with Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator at the Financial Times, London. 
We discuss his recent book -- The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism -- and recent events. 
 
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Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) talks about his new book -- "Seven Things You Can't Say About China" -- and says most of them. 

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February 22, 2025 50 mins

A world in disarray

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February 9, 2025 68 mins

Al From, the founder of the Democratic Leadership Council, talks about how to rebuild the Democratic Party—and how he did it last time.

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January 25, 2025 58 mins

Inauguration Week in Review! Joe and John on the ascendant Trump, the triumph of the Tech Bros, Dems in disarray, the Lars Anderson Bridge and the whereabouts of Philip K. Howard. 

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January 17, 2025 65 mins
Nobody knows the New York Post like Susan Mulcahy.
She wrote the book. She talked about it with us. 
 
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January 9, 2025 60 mins

Episode Four: A dream assignment: David moves to Shanghai and begins covering China. He goes from "Sock City" to Apple, to the extraordinary changes in China's economy, politics and culture. The final episode covers everything from Wuhan to Taiwan, fentanyl to semiconductors, quantum computing to cyberhacking, to Xi's political standing and how much (and how many of) China's most successful people dislike and distrust Xi. 

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January 9, 2025 16 mins

Episode Three: The not-a-partnership partnership of one of the world's greatest entrepreneurs and one of the world's richest men is a case study in modern China. David describes the "partnership" that became the subject of an extraordinary report co-produced by The New York Times and David's news magazine, The Wire China.

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January 8, 2025 33 mins

Episode TwoWe begin our conversation with David about China and whether the "Thucydides Trap" can be avoided.

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January 8, 2025 31 mins

Episode OneDavid Barboza, former Shanghai Bureau Chief for The New York Times, is building a new kind of media company. Call it Bloomberg for China. 

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December 28, 2024 68 mins

In the final episode of our Cortico trilogy, we talked with the company's founder and CEO, Deb Roy, about the future of "building civic muscle" and his roadmap for a national Cortico network. 

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Part two of our conversations with the senior management of Cortico, the platform for "deeper conversations".
Featuring Deb Roy and Alex Kelly Berman.
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December 11, 2024 38 mins
Cortico, in collaboration with the MIT Center for Constructive Communication (CCC), has built a platform that connects rather than divides communities, and in so doing, helps create a healthier society. We talked to its CEO and co-founder, Deb Roy, and one of its Directors, Prof. Kathy Cramer, about how it works and how it's working. ...
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December 4, 2024 41 mins

Part Two of our interview with Jane Metclafe, a woman who saw the future clearly. Twice. 

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