Pantsuit Politics

Sarah and Beth talk with Kristin Kobes Du Mez about her new book Live, Laugh, Love, exploring the history and influence of white Christian women's culture in America:

how Live, Laugh, Love traces the roots of white Christian women's culture beyond evangelicalism, including Mormon and positive thinking influences

the intertwining of religion, capitalism, and multi-level marketing, and how corporate power shaped Christian subcultures

the impact of Christian fiction, media, and influencers from Little House on the Prairie to modern blogs and Instagram

the challenges of writing recent history and representing living figures in the Christian women's influencer space

Outside of politics, some easy organizing has improved our lives.

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Sarah and Beth discuss the horror described in Jane Doe's complaint, the campus culture at Cornell, and the challenges of addressing sexual assault in college environments. They cover:

The reporting and investigation into the Cornell 7 case and the role of student journalism

How campus culture, Greek life, and university responses shape outcomes

The complexities of Title IX, criminal investigations, and legal standards in sexual assault cases

Broader questions about prevention, parenting, and the ongoing struggle to change campus safety

Outside of Politics: Sarah and Beth talk about Derek Thompson's essay on the decline of hosting and why fewer people are having others over.
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Sarah and Beth discuss the viral stories that took over the weekend, and what they reveal about conflict, context, and civic life heading into the midterms:

- The New York Times report on Alaska Senate candidate Mary Peltola's treatment of staff
- The Boston Globe story on Last Ditch, a COVID-cautious lesbian bar in Greenfield, Massachusetts
- The Giants game "mom of the year" couple and iced coffee at job interviews
- Taylor Swift's four-song encore to The Life of a Showgirl

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Beth talks with Dr. Robbyn Wacker, a former university president (most recently at St. Cloud State University) with a background in gerontology, about the book she's writing on leadership and values in higher education. They cover:

Robbyn's path from gerontology and legal aid for older adults into higher-ed leadership, and eight years as a university president

The current state of higher education: flipped funding models, the enrollment cliff, cuts to research funding and student loans, restrictions on international students, and a growing public skepticism about the value of a degree

Why Robbyn's book centers on values rather than tactics, and how to choose two or three core values as an actual decision-making tool rather than a platitude

"Values drift" — how leaders rationalize small departures from their stated values until those values stop driving behavior at all

A detour through Lindsey Graham's admission that his real value is "relevance," and what that reveals about naming one value in service of another

Whether organizations — and an entire sector like higher education — can meaningfully hold values, and how to navigate different constituencies without seeming inconsistent

Beth's own reflection on the three values guiding her work this year: honesty, distinctiveness, and joy

A closing story about the real budget dilemmas university presidents face, and how a "North Star" value holds up under pressure

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We're picking back up on artificial intelligence — Mustafa Suleyman's warning about conscious AI, the difference between chatbots and frontier models, recursive self-improvement, kill switches, and what policy response should actually look like at every level of government. Outside of Politics: the foods from our childhoods that still hold up.
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