The American Compass Podcast

• Reassessing Globalization with Former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo

  Globalization was once viewed as economic destiny: it would spread prosperity worldwide, destroy authoritarian regimes, and counterbalance industrial decline with innovation and growth. The reality has been far more negative, with communities hollowed out and a political landscape defined by resentment of elites, strategic rivalry with China, and skepticism that the system was ever meant to support American workers.One of the leading architects of globalization, Ernesto Zedillo, former Mexican president and professor at the Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs, joins Oren to make the case that the old international trade system remains sound and that the real failures lie in domestic policy and the lack of institutional reform. During the conversation, Oren presses him on whether those explanations can withstand the reality of deindustrialization, supply-chain vulnerability, and worker displacement.Together, they examine what went wrong, what defenders of the old order still believe, and whether the next technological wave will intensify the debate rather than resolve it.

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• The Tech Revolution in America's Schools with Brad Littlejohn

  Heading into the holidays, the hottest gifts on the shelf are AI-powered smart toys, leading parents to confront a troubling question: what happens when machines start reading to our kids, teaching them, and becoming their companions? At the same time, schools, already grappling with record learning loss, are rushing to adopt AI tools with little evidence they help children learn or grow.Brad Littlejohn, director of programs and education at American Compass, joins Oren to explore how AI slipped into classrooms and Christmas shopping carts and why smart devices often undermine the very skills childhood and education depend on. They discuss the rise of phone-free schools, the lure of AI tutors, and what it will take to draw real boundaries in a technological world built to erode them.

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• America's Squid Game Economy with John Carney

  For decades, America told its young strivers that the path to economic security ran through degrees, credentials, and a foothold in the professional class. But as housing costs climb and career ladders shrink, even the “successful” are finding the old promise slipping away.John Carney, economics editor at Breitbart, joins Oren to unpack why today’s economy feels like a winner-take-all contest and why rising productivity—not rising population—must anchor America’s next stage of growth. They explore the collapse of old economic assumptions and narratives, the emergence of a new economic paradigm, and what it will take to rebuild broad-based prosperity.Further Reading: "Zohran's Park Slope Populists" by John Carney.

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• Is AI Really Going to Kill Us All? with Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soares

  Artificial intelligence has leapt from speculative theory to everyday tool with astonishing speed, promising breakthroughs in science, medicine, and the ways we learn, live, and work. But to some of its earliest researchers, the race toward superintelligence represents not progress but an existential threat, one that could end humanity as we know it.Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soares, authors of If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies, join Oren to debate their claim that pursuing AI will end in human extinction. During the conversation, a skeptical Oren pushes them on whether meaningful safeguards are possible, what a realistic boundary between risk and progress might look like, and how society should judge the costs of stopping against the consequences of carrying on.

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• Somewheres and Anywheres with David Goodhart

  Western politics has increasingly been shaped by a widening divide between the “Somewheres” and the “Anywheres”—those rooted in place and community versus those defined by education, mobility, and openness to change. This clash has fueled populist revolts, strained national solidarity, and reshaped debates over immigration, work, and identity.David Goodhart, author of The Road to Somewhere and The Care Dilemma, joins Oren Cass to discuss how this cultural split took hold and how to restore balance between these two groups. They also explore how this divide has shaped the rise of populism, the undervaluing of care and family life, and how re-centering dignity, community, and shared purpose could renew modern societies.

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