A Letter from Peter Munk
Since we started the Munk Debates, my wife, Melanie, and I have been deeply gratified at how quickly they have captured the publics imagination. From the time of our first event in May 2008, we have hosted what I believe are some of the most exciting public policy debates in Canada and internationally. Global in focus, the Munk Debates have tackled a range of issues, such as humanitarian intervention, the effectiveness of foreign aid, the threat of global warming, religions impact on geopolitics, the rise of China, and the decline of Europe. These compelling topics have served as intellectual and ethical grist for some of the worlds most important thinkers and doers, from Henry Kissinger to Tony Blair, Christopher Hitchens to Paul Krugman, Peter Mandelson to Fareed Zakaria.
The issues raised at the Munk Debates have not only fostered public awareness, but they have also helped many of us become more involved and, therefore, less intimidated by the concept of globalization. It is so easy to be inward-looking. It is so easy to be xenophobic. It is so easy to be nationalistic. It is hard to go into the unknown. Globalization, for many people, is an abstract concept at best. The purpose of this debate series is to help people feel more familiar with our fast-changing world and more comfortable participating in the universal dialogue about the issues and events that will shape our collective future.
I dont need to tell you that that there are many, many burning issues. Global warming, the plight of extreme poverty, genocide, our shaky financial order: these are just a few of the critical issues that matter to people. And it seems to me, and to my foundation board members, that the quality of the public dialogue on these critical issues diminishes in direct proportion to the salience and number of these issues clamouring for our attention. By trying to highlight the most important issues at crucial moments in the global conversation, these debates not only profile the ideas and opinions of some of the worlds brightest thinkers, but they also crystallize public passion and knowledge, helping to tackle some of the challenges confronting humankind.
I have learned in life and Im sure many of you will share this view that challenges bring out the best in us. I hope youll agree that the participants in these debates challenge not only each other but also each of us to think clearly and logically about important problems facing our world.
Peter Munk
Founder, Aurea Foundation
Toronto, Ontario
Copyright 2018 Aurea Foundation
Newt Gingrich, Kimberley Strassel, E. J. Dionne, and Andrew Sullivan in Conversation by Rudyard Griffiths. Copyright 2018 Aurea Foundation.
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Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Is American democracy in crisis? : Dionne and Sullivan
vs. Gingrich and Strassel / edited by Rudyard Griffiths.
(The Munk debates)
Issued in print and electronic formats.
ISBN 978-1-4870-0451-4 (softcover).ISBN 978-1-4870-0452-1 (EPUB).ISBN 978-1-4870-0453-8 (Kindle)
1. DemocracyUnited States. 2. United StatesPolitics and government2017-. I. Gingrich, Newt panelist II. Sullivan, Andrew, 1963- panelist III. Griffiths, Rudyard, editor IV. Strassel, Kimberley A panelist V. Dionne, E. J., Jr panelist VI. Series: Munk debates
JK1726.I8 2018 320.473 C2017-907407-5
C2017-907408-3
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017961328
Cover design: Alysia Shewchuk
Text design and typesetting: Sara Loos
Transcription: Transcript Heroes
We acknowledge for their financial support of our publishing program the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund.
Contents
A Letter from Peter Munk
Pre-Debate Interviews with Moderator Rudyard Griffiths
Newt Gingrich in Conversation with Rudyard Griffiths
Kimberley Strassel in Conversation with Rudyard Griffiths
E. J. Dionne in Conversation with Rudyard Griffiths
Andrew Sullivan in Conversation with Rudyard Griffiths
Is American Democracy in Crisis?
Post-Debate Interviews with Moderator Rudyard Griffiths
Newt Gingrich and Kimberley Strassel in Conversation with Rudyard Griffiths
E. J. Dionne and Andrew Sullivan in Conversation with Rudyard Griffiths
Acknowledgements
About the Debaters
About the Editor
About the Munk Debates
About the Interviews
Pre-Debate Interviews with Moderator Rudyard Griffiths
Newt Gingrich in Conversation
with Rudyard Griffiths
RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Joining me to share his thoughts on the current state of American democracy is former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Newt Gingrich. Its a real pleasure to host you here in Toronto for your third Munk Debate.
NEWT GINGRICH: Its great to be back with you.
RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Lets get your views on the state of American democracy today. Do you acknowledge that there is a crisis underway?
NEWT GINGRICH: I think there is a very profound shaking of the system on both the Right and the Left. I think part of it is something were seeing happen all over the world, in the elections in Catalonia, Austria, Britain, and Germany. There is a pattern right now of people being unhappy, people wanting a level of change, people feeling that government is failing them and that their leadership is failing them.
America is part of a worldwide phenomenon. Part of it is that there has been a mutation of the American Left into a remarkably hostile and in many ways racist system in which you have a repudiation of the very concept of America. And on the right you have a smaller but strong movement that is also anti-politician and against the system at large. So you have, on both extremes, forces that are deeply hostile to the existing system and that are, I think, going to cause a very substantial conflict over the next ten or twenty years.
RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Your opponents tonight are going to try to push the case that Donald Trump is an accelerant of these tensions that are tearing at the fabric of American society. His comments on race, on American culture, on American nationalism they are going to portray these as exceedingly negative, exceedingly divisive, fuelling this so-called crisis. Whats your push-back?
NEWT GINGRICH: Well, Im not sure Im going to push back. Im prepared to say that Trump is the great clarifier; he describes what already exists. He didnt invent the fight over the National Football League people taking a knee or in some way repudiating the American flag and the national anthem. What he did was clarify that for two-thirds of all Americans that was unacceptable behaviour.
