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Freakonomics Radio

614. Is the U.S. Sleeping on Threats from Russia and China?

Freakonomics Radio

Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher

Documentary, Society & Culture

4.632K Ratings

🗓️ 5 December 2024

⏱️ 51 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

John J. Sullivan, a former State Department official and U.S. ambassador, says yes: “Our politicians aren’t leading — Republicans or Democrats.” He gives a firsthand account of a fateful Biden-Putin encounter, talks about his new book "Midnight in Moscow", and predicts what a second Trump term means for Russia, Ukraine, China — and the U.S.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Hey there, it's Stephen Dubner.

0:05.6

Before we get to our episode, I'd like to invite you to come see Freakonomics Radio live.

0:11.0

I will be in San Francisco on January 3rd and in Los Angeles on February 13th.

0:16.7

For tickets, go to Freakonomics.com slash live shows.

0:20.5

They are selling riskly, I believe is the

0:23.1

word, so hustle up. Again, that is Freakonomics.com slash live shows. One more thing. The episode

0:30.7

you're about to hear is what audio people call a two-way, what normal people call a one-on-one

0:36.2

conversation. Most Freakonomics Radio episodes

0:39.1

aren't like this. We typically feature multiple voices, multiple angles, sometimes even multiple

0:45.3

stories, but there is a real opportunity to be had by going deep with one person. So for the

0:51.8

month of December, we are featuring some one-on-one conversations. You will be

0:55.9

hearing about the revolution in the GLP1 weight loss drugs. You'll hear from one of the best

1:01.3

magazine editors of this generation. And in a special episode of the podcast, People I Mostly

1:07.2

Admire, you'll hear a mind-blowing conversation between Steve Levitt and an astonishingly

1:12.2

creative neuroscientist. In today's episode, a conversation with a political figure who,

1:17.9

several times over his career, has been in the room where it happened with Donald Trump,

1:24.2

with Joe Biden, and with Vladimir Putin. And one last reminder about our upcoming live shows with very special guests, San Francisco, January 3rd, Los Angeles, February 13th.

1:37.3

You can get tickets at Freakonomics.com slash live shows.

1:42.1

As always, thanks for listening.

1:54.1

We begin this story on June 16th of 2021.

2:02.0

This is a one-on-one meeting in Geneva, nothing else going on. Both presidents fly in just for this meeting.

2:07.6

The two presidents are Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin. So let me set the scene for you.

...

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