A New Iran?
New Thinking for a New World - a Tallberg Foundation Podcast
09/12/24
•36m
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During the summer, Iranians elected a new president: Masoud Pezeshkian, a cardiac surgeon, who is considered to be a political reformer. His victory surprised at least many foreign observers who are skeptical about all things Iranian, not the least that anyone could win an election against so-called hardliners. But Pezeshkian did exactly that.
Did he win in spite of or with the support of Iran’s Supreme Leader and of the powerful Iranian Revolutionary Guards? Can he cope with the profound challenges facing his country, domestically and internationally? Does he have the needed room to maneuver to reduce the crushing Western sanctions that make life so difficult for ordinary Iranians? What does “reformer” even mean in the complicated Iranian context?
The best answers to those questions should probably come from an Iranian. Hossein Mousavian, a scholar and author at Princeton University, was a long-serving Iranian diplomat who worked on his country’s nuclear negotiations with the West, among other assignments. Listen as he describes the new President and assesses the possibility for new directions in Iran’s trajectory.
Tell us what you think: should the West restart negotiations with Iran over its nuclear arms policies and reduce or even eliminate sanctions?
Previous Episode
Best New Thinking: The Art of Dying Well
September 5, 2024
•19m
The Greek philosopher, Epicurus, wrote “The art of living well and dying well are one.” However, most of us spend our lives desperately trying to avoid even thinking about dying, never mind preparing for it.
An exception is Dr. Christian Ntizimira, a Rwandan surgeon, who founded the African Center for Research on End-of-Life Care. He has thought long and hard about the social, psychological, cultural, and spiritual factors, as well as the physiological ones, that shape the final days of someone who is dying. Of course, it's not just the patient about whom he is thinking, but also family, friends, and community.
Admittedly, death is not one of those topics that make for a comfortable conversation or a comfortable listening experience. But as Shakespeare wrote for Julius Caesar, “Death, a necessary end, will come when it will come.” So listen to this episode of New Thinking for a New World and tell us if it helps you think a bit differently about your own inevitable demise.
This episode was originally published on February 1, 2024.
Next Episode
America’s Unhappy Choice
September 26, 2024
•37m
Once again, Americans are getting ready for a presidential election that is widely described as the most important in their lifetimes. That may or may not be true, but two things are certain: the two candidates, former President Trump and current Vice President Harris, are about as different as different could be, and many Americans wish they had other choices.
But they don’t; either Trump or Harris will be elected in November. With a little more than five weeks left to campaign (although early voting has already started in some states) both candidates are desperately trying to break what the pollsters insist is more or less a tie, both in the national polls and in the so-called swing states whose Electoral College votes will in effect select the winner.
How are the candidates trying to persuade voters who haven’t already made up their minds? How do they ensure that their core voters actually cast ballots, in a country where the highest turnout since 1990 saw 1/3 of registered voters decline to vote in the equally tight 2020 Biden/Trump contest? What do voters see in the candidates that attract or repel them?
Scott Miller, an accomplished political and corporate consultant based in the swing state of Georgia, has some answers or at least some well-informed intuitions. Scott, with a long history of advising successful (as well as the other kind) both Republican and Democrat candidates in national and state elections, continues to be a close observer of American politics; he is one of the “go-to” gurus of U.S. elections.
What do you think? Who would you vote for and why?
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