For example the Washington Post writes, shes a professor of history, Heather Cox Richardson, she explains goldwater, as a modern conservativism in her masterful work. Shows slight in what was perhaps the most important Political Coalition of the 20th century. As Publishers Weekly says, though richardson under emphasizes racism and equality and other parts of the country following the civil war. She is an amount of evidence to support the books provocative title. Liberal readers will be persuaded by this lucid germ onion. Night really am excited to be here. But first i want to invite those out there in the world listening, to share your questions. You can do that by going into the q a box that you will see at the bottom of your screen. We will take as many as we can and sing part of our program. And that will last about an hour. Now is my great pleasure to introduce introduce Heather Cox Richardson and. Professor, author of six books about american politics. And writer of the very popular newsletter, letters from an american. Welcome heather. Heather hi i am trying to unmute myself. On a star by thinking from the historical site for doing this but also to say to people watching that im incredibly excited about this. This the first of the joanne and i have been able to do our own history think today together. I have asked her to open this way beyond my book, not only to talk about her new book as well, but also to talk about how the past comes into the current moment and to talk about what is going on in the american politics today. So we certainly will talk about my book. And i want to be able to talk about her book and also the present moment. In the fact that we are limited to an hour, will be challenging. Joanne i am excited to be here too. This will be fun. What started, but probably one question that a lot of people wondering about right now. Even just a few little bits that i read about promise of your book, that you for the factum provocative and entirely. That you came to write this book. What brought you to it given how timely it is. Heather we never know its going to be timely when you start writing. But one of the things that i study is sort of wasted call, politics all the time and i would say, how are people thinking about things. Alex played a little bit later about where i came to end up on that. One is writing my last book, when i read conscious of conservative, i was just mad because it was so similar to hammonds from 1958 in which he talks about how really dominant othe government cant get involved in things because they will be strikes certain liberties. They were very very very similar. Im never seen the comparison. I was also teaching. Those teaching the trail of tears. 1830 movement with pushing out of the 19th americans out of the southeast into oklahoma. So that particular week, in the congressional conversations about why it was a good thing for the indians to list the lands be forced on this deadly march in which so many of those died and why they had to do this. And what is good for the indians brendan have to be the same way that some Football Player and i dont remember which one it is. Was caught in a video driving his girlfriend out of an elevator fire head at by her hair. But what hit me about those things is that the language was the exact same thing. The same excuse was meant begging his girlfriend out of an elevator biker hair. She was not listening to him. It was for the good. She had, the same thing in progress. About why the unions deserve to be pushed into oklahoma. There was something about today now that echoed all of the powers struggles in the past. And what i wanted to get to was what created those power struggles and how to beat invest in a moment today that landed so much are sounded so much like but what they confederates and said. And then of course reinfg my mind, and what i decided is it and do the language. It is how language creates power structures and create societies that allows certain people to take power. That to me speaks very much to the steals of old talking about the importance of emotion and how the coming of the civil war would you kind of focus on the earlier part than i did. Really has to do with emotion. So how did you end up writing backlog. Joanne youre right, then in a sense although the book is about physical violence in the u. S. Congress, and logical an impact event. What struck me when it began the book, i knew it was going to be about congress, i knew it was going to be about violence. I didnt know how much violence it was. But the language that people were throwing around in the response to the language. Justin even in the historical records, you can see how in the case of my book, southerners were excluded strategically and deliberately using language to intimidate or manipulate people who disagreed with them. It works really well. And in part its because it really relied on emotion. And is something that often works. Fear, hearing congress and performing before a national audience. If you can watch it, you can manipulated to really shape for somebody is able to do. So on and along the same lines what youre talking about, but i was really interested in doing in my book was looking at the real dynamics what was going on in congress and how that was shaping politics overall. Heather new use the word bullying. And what i would say is the way bullying takes shape, at least initially is through language. The way you put things. Though you say things. Nowadays we talk about gas lighting. But really what you are doing is shaping a world through the use of language to establish dominance over somebody else. To bully them. Joanne is astonishing to me the parallels between the past, we dont always do it but the 1850s. And where we are right now. For sure. What bullying is about the reason why, particularly effective in politics, is because you have to know that if you could exert force we want to. Speech of it is about the threat. If you are a bully, youre suggesting that you could do really ugly things. But you dont have to do them. It is have me sure that the person being bullied, understands that i will respond to that it is a brilliant way to manipulate people and when it works, it works. Joanne i need you to do a favor though. The threat that, ill do that but i need you to do me a favor though. Heather that could do this to you. Joanne or i can do something to you. It. Heather yes or we could get along. Joanne as long as you do what i wanted to do. Heather we share this fascination of language and power of language and ways in which we dont take it for granted but is such a force of shaping politics. What is an instance in your book when it really struck you that language in and of itself has shaping influence. Heather a ton of everywhere if you think about it. It is very hard to say this matters. Can quantify it. Never quantify how this talk was important i said i understand i didnt do that we can you stand right now and this was in the 80s may be can you down the right on tommy Rush Limbaugh doesnt matter. While coursing matters but we cant measure it. Does mean we need to study it. 1954 professor because so much happened in 1954. Right after joe mccarthy crashes and burns. People once and for all actually see him. They dont just hear him. Not just the language actually see him rather than saying, in the savior for anti communism, is a bully and we want to have any part of him. After that, shortly after that, William Buckley junior and his brother met with the book mccarthy and his enemies. And that, they say well mccarthy mightve been a little rough around the edge but he was right. We need to conservative. Because Movement Conservatism then was really radical movement under the new deal pretty forcing it play out right now. And we conservatives have to stand against what they called liberalism. By liberalism, event everybody else, all the democrats, will the eisenhower republicans pretty else terrific, were getting the interstate highways not everybody course and hit people of color especially. A lot of people that i grew up with, that would probably not even be skilled workers. Because of the g. I. Bill, involved the bill class, engineers or as printers or any number of things that they could do without an education which was not attend optional both for them during depression. So this moment, we met buckley junior and this other guy and we conservatives are basically everybody else. And something really interesting the book, because that is the time for the first time when they capitalize the conservatives and in the book. And people just talked generally about we are all liberal. The literary critic says he talk about liberalism because everybody is liberal these days. The mixing in this general belief that the government has a role to play in regulating business and providing social is an infrastructure like the interstate highway speed will agree with it. The just because they have different ideas about which parts of that are more important. So everybody thought of themselves as liberal. They capitalize it and these guys are essentially like the communist party in china. No party, youre taking over america. And thats how the powerful construction. At the time, the book itself is not terribly well received. And people were saying like really mccarthy a good guy. He got a lot of attention. But of course by now, the idea of being a liberal, remembering them like the clinical the outward. And that like literally remember that spreads no call him that l word. You can see that being constructed. That was one moment the moment was Newt Gingrich fast literally like they were in charge of part of the indoctrinating but were like that. They were the coaches for the new elected to socialize them into the Republican Party. And they actually circulate a document with all of the words they should use when they talk about democrats. Those words like trader and lazy, and angry know the really negative words. We were patriots, family, happy, all is good stuff. You could literally see the Republican Party in her Newt Gingrich. It was the moment they rode out the real republican moments. And again very powerful language. You could literally seeing them using language to divide the country into and divided in half. After positive half negative. So those are the two touchdowns for me. I am trying to remember, you talked about a similar touchstone. Joanne what youre describing is what i talk about two. Its people created this new thing. If it is fascinating to just capitalize those words. It helps to see that there is in it there. That can superintendents, they capitalize. And the power that in a way they dont even necessarily have an awareness of it. But just by looking at it. And really gets back to the power of language in politics because if youre really acceptable that, in your basically not just creating something up but putting people into a function of an emotion is going to play well for you. Because words, are like wet drill. Right into emotions. One example actual in my first book. Heather affairs of honor is what is called. Joanne okay affairs of honor. But this is saying, in part his one of the factors of democracy and the vulnerabilities of democracy and how important languages because democracy is about negotiating power which is about inflation. So by definition, is the most vulnerable unfixable that could be used for good and bad. So all of the beginning of the republic expanding and try and explain these games with words. And even with the government, the Federalist Party in the 1790s in a sense more elitist and big money driven in discomforted by democracy. If you throw out in the speeches and the public, anyone is aristocrats, you are done. That plugs into so many other things. Elitism and a whole line of cascading things from that one word, from ten years earlier he didnt have the baggage attached to it. Intense power like something the work can have that shapes power and politics. Heather the word was taxes earlier. Another way moment where polls actually sent were not actually concerned about the taxes in the 80s. But if you talk about taxes coming hundred of this idea that somehow the taxes of hardworking white people would go into the pockets of feminists. We even have conversation by one of the political operatives talks about it and he says, i 1968, you cant use racial terms. Although he does. So you cant really say go out and save up for me i going to have to deal with this. So we generalize it. We start to talk about prospects. They said about buzzing. People knew what you were talking about. And you take one more step back and Start Talking about taxes. People are like oh yeah, i know about this. When you talk about taxes, you write it on paper new study in congress. Securing the baggage of his long history of American Fear of an underclass distributing of wealth. But the reality is, a 1980, when americans here republican leticia where they will never raise taxes and the democrats want to take money from the makers given to the takers. It was absolutely racial language. So all he had to do, and even help to some degree, all they have to do to make sure that theres a social welfare legislation. Do you want your taxes raised. There you go. Hundred and 50 years of history is right on the table with that three letter word. As a key to a certain kind of politics. Joanne is so effective. We see that all of the time now. People say be done with it. Other people will say no, she referred to as x, y, and z. The fact that there could be an argument about that shows power. Speedo is also a diversion. Heather i know what people started using as the okay symbol, and ive been doing that the whole of my life. But they took than ever. It took this period of ambiguity where if he said it was a white power symbol, especially older people, new people are social justice warriors. It is actually way for deploying this is a similar way that it was doubly powerful. Not only recalling your people to you but a video called you out on it, then had involve people who said you are being paranoid. But one of the ways that language works. And talk so much about gas lighting these days. Joanne in the early days of was that sort of weird ambiguity and you stepped forward and said you said something else, by some people, you declare your loyalty to the other side. You planted yourself somewhere. Just by asking the question. But which goes right into the s m creation. Shipping politics. It was he stunned me while i was working on my book. To meet this people of the time, even they understood the kind of power. In the late 1850s, towards the civil war i found a lot of members of congress, saying to each other over and over again we have to control our words. This is a striking thing to hear her talking about people in a crisis. And theyre worried about if the union will collapse nursing watch your words. If testimonies and power and emotional paradigms that they have a high level as well. In this one governor nutley. Who words spoken in congress he referred them asleep afraid dont throw missiles at us. You will help bloodshed if you use those words. Its so easy to not. Heather they studied rhetoric in the 19th century. People like Joshua Chamberlain famous in the 20th century. They literally studied how to use words to mobilize populations. We kind of what they come in the early 20th century. Actually got the back of the show so a whole series of books on famous things in history. The fact that we permitted them to be the study to be forgotten to be deployed by people who are acting in such a way that most americans are not aware of it. Its really deeply automatic. Theres new at out the trunk and pain is really misleading. It is not historically accurate it makes people sound like youre saying things that they are not saying. Give a great example from a book that you and i both know where somebody is a quotation mark and it was entirely accurate except he took out the word not pride well you know. It is true. But something, mannered pretty. If one of the things that i focus on his image and reality and how people can tell if 70 is being manipulated to rot. Someone to get this to my all basins. Largely theoretically on an author who wrote this book called true believers print he was interested in finding money people in 1951, and base were not the rise of hitler. Now they managed he said who cares. Every generation has hitlers news lanes. What you care about is why in certain eras people listen to them. There always there. What you found them, absolutely done by language then you have to what denies it. I came up with in the 1850s with four stages of value go from within my interest to create that to how that turns into versus societal view of, is better than the others. In those thems, it probably shouldnt vote. And then nation really have any power and present, at a point where if the people are defined as the other, are still trying to state something society. Actually killing them. Its a four stage process. In the question of how do you know when youre being manipulated. Have you stop the process. I think it is that speaks directly to this moment. I know you have ideas about that. People know that there being manipulated. Its probably the most consistent question of my students asked me we were studying medical history. And were looking at the late 18 in the early 19th century. Supposedly chrisman is a reliable things. But inevitably talking about the students get to a point where he confused the basically say outright, how do i know with a belief. And when these people knew they were saying and what are they saying things just have an impact. So how can i judge when the being politicians, or when they are being sincere. Now the fact that you have to ask that question tells you a lot about politics. Because it is that fuzziness that is the engine of it so to speak. My answer was has to do with being aware of details surrounding context. Not letting yourself respond in the way they are expected to please god. And get swept up. Rather, if you are able to sit back and think about it. Who do they think they are speaking to. Whatever comes to the water not want to you to really focus on the details. Its in the ascent what i teach. It is all about thinking about evidence and being able to think about evidence and what it is what it means and what the circumstances are. And so it is a tricky question i cant say that i sit here now and think to myself, that is totally, do you really believe thats. Sometimes you can tell and sometimes you cannot predict but you have to think about it before assuming something. And i think now in particular when technology, and annoys shapes democracy in one of the particular ways with the things is doing is making it even harder than normal to decide what facts