History As It Happens

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The Constitution created what were supposed to be three coequal branches, and only Congress was given the authority to declare war. Yet we are living in the age of the imperial presidency — of endless war, executive orders, government secrecy, and a lack of accountability. These are all fit for a monarchy instead of a republic.
How did we get here? What structures led to the rise of the imperial presidency? What decisions led to this unintended consequence undermining the American democratic experiment?
Our guest is Jeremi Suri, who teaches history at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. He’s the author of The Impossible Presidency and co-host of This is Democracy podcast.
Suri also writes the Democracy of Hope newsletter.

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New developments in Yemen bode poorly for global oil flows or a peaceful settlement of the Greater Middle East's raging conflicts. The Associated Press reports the Houthi rebels have seized two strategic islands in the southern Red Sea, bolstering their ability to control a critical maritime shipping route.
The Houthis’ latest gains in their ongoing conflict with Saudi Arabia follow the seizure of the Red Sea port of Mokha and a strategic island last week. The fighting is putting even more upward pressure on global oil supplies and prices.
Here to untangle events in Yemen is Annelle Sheline, a research fellow in the Middle East program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. She’s an expert on Yemen. Her book “Weaponizing Tolerance: Arab Monarchies and American Support for Moderate Islam” will be published by Cambridge University Press next year.

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History As It Happens is "on location" in this episode. Host Martin Di Caro visits Thomas Jefferson's historic Monticello estate in Virginia to talk to Brandon Dillard, its director of historic interpretation and audience engagement. Their conversation covers Monticello's new America250-related exhibits and the challenge of interpreting the past in hyper-partisan times.

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Twenty-five years ago, on September 11, 2001, nineteen al-Qaeda hijackers working for Osama bin Laden killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Washington, and a Pennsylvania field. The U.S. responded by launching a poorly defined war across the Greater Middle East that led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians, the displacement of millions more, and the destruction of U.S. credibility and prestige. The war would be defined by the failures that flowed from long-term occupations and a preemptive invasion, the use of torture, and official lies.
Did the GWOT — the global war on terrorism — accomplish anything? Is it over? In this episode, Peter Bergen discusses his new book, All the Presidents’ Wars, which covers the past quarter-century.
Peter Bergen is a journalist, documentary producer, and vice president for global studies at New America, a D.C. think tank. He’s a national security analyst for CNN and professor of practice at Arizona State University.
Further listening:
Who Was Osama bin Laden? (podcast w/ Peter Bergen)


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Maybe U.S. presidents need to read a how-to manual on avoiding quagmires. Or maybe it wouldn't make much difference anyway. To understand why the United States keeps being sucked into protracted conflicts in the Greater Middle East, we must look beyond individual decision-making, says Emma Ashford of the Stimson Center in Washington. Instead, we must weigh the structural causes and incentives that have led one administration after another into battle in the name of protecting U.S. interests.
Emma Ashford is a Senior Fellow in the Grand Strategy Program at the Stimson Center and the author of First Among Equals: U.S. Foreign Policy in a Multipolar World.
Further reading:
America's Fatal Attraction to War by Emma Ashford in Foreign Affairs

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