The Stories Continue (with Kerry Boyd Anderson)

Kerry Anderson.png

Topics Discussed

  • Transgender Day of Visibility

  • Gun Violence and Reform in America

  • Georgia Voting Law

  • Western Asia Dynamics (with Kerry Boyd Anderson)

  • Outside of Politics: Family Dynamics

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Episode Resources

Transgender Day of Visibility from Nik

Gun Violence and Reform

Georgia Voting Law

Kerry Anderson

Transcript

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:00:00] If you're going to use sanctions, you need to have a specific, feasible objective that you're trying to reach and so just imposing sanctions on Iran in the hopes that someday they'll become the country we want them to be. That's really ridiculous and especially because Iran does have this history of feeling like that's exactly what the United States or great Britain or Russia has tried to do to them and they will push back against really hard and they've demonstrated that the regime was capable of surviving pretty severe sanctions.

Sarah: This is Sarah

Beth: And Beth. 

Sarah: You're listening to Pantsuit Politics.

Beth: The home of grace-filled political conversations.

[00:01:00] Hello everyone. Thank you so much for spending time with us today. We are going to process a couple of real traumas that the country is going through right now as we discuss the beginning of the George Floyd murder trial, the shooting that took place in Boulder, Colorado, the legislation that passed regarding voting rights in Georgia.

And then we are going to share a conversation to zoom out to the rest of the world with our friend Kerry Anderson, who is an expert on Western Asia. We'll end as we always do with what's on our minds outside of politics and today we have a really fun advice question that came in. 

Sarah: [00:01:38] We have two quick announcements before we get started. We are extending the deadline for our fan art contest. We're giving all of you through the holiday weekend to submit fan art. The new deadline is now Monday, April 5th. We've gotten such amazing designs so far and a reminder we'll be voting in April and the winner will get a free shirt with their design on it as well as commission from the sale of their [00:02:00] design.

 You can go to Instagram and T public to sign up. The links are in the show notes. 

Beth: [00:02:04] Spoiler. We're not gonna be able to pick one. There's no way we're just gonna pick one. We also are really excited to announce our summer series this year will be about infrastructure. Do we have some like exciting music Simeon that we could put in here?

Sarah: [00:02:17] Maybe the sound of like banging and hammering.

Beth: [00:02:20] We're going to talk about, about sewers and water and electricity and childcare, and just a really broad discussion of the state of infrastructure in America and where we could be going from here. And we want to make sure that we have a really broad discussion that includes a variety of perspectives.

You know, both of us right now live in places without a lot of public transportation. We live in rural or suburban areas. We don't want to miss anything because everything about who you are and where you live influences the way you think about infrastructure so we are really excited to announce an infrastructure contributor program.

We want to [00:03:00] pay some of you to think with us about infrastructure. All of the details can be found at the link in our show notes. It is a project that will take you about 10 hours to work on with us. We are trying to compensate people well for their time. We're excited to work with some of you on your ideas. So check out that link and let us know if you'd like to be an extension of our team for a few weeks as we prepare that series.

Sarah: [00:03:21] Also, Nick wrote in and asked that we recognize the 12th annual transgender day of visibility, which is tomorrow as this episode comes out on Tuesday, March 30th on Wednesday, March 31st. The transgender day of visibility celebrates the resilience and success of transgender and gender nonconforming people while also raising awareness of transgender rights. 

Beth: [00:03:41] Last year, over 350 transgender people were murdered around the world. This year so far 12 transgender people that we know of have been murdered and we also know that there is a real push across the United States for legislation that limits the rights of transgender people.

So it's an important time to [00:04:00] educate yourself about how to be a good ally or to just explore the art created by transgender people and support businesses owned by transgender people. So we'll put some resources in the show notes and encourage you to look into lots more, especially in your local communities.

Sarah: [00:04:16] This is a good transition because I think transgender rights are something we saw on the news as just this ongoing journey we're taking as a country. We have the first out transgender senate confirmed federal official as well as horrific legislation coming up from Arkansas limiting the healthcare rights of transgender people.

And that's what we want to talk about today that these issues that bubble up, be it gun control, be it mass violence, be it voting rights, all these issues, they're never over. It's an ongoing story and our reactions to those stories can sometimes I feel like freeze the story in time. If you see something that really upsets you or really makes you mad a [00:05:00] little bit of what's happening gets frozen at that moment.

That's where the memory is formed. And I think what we're really trying to do is to remind ourselves and to invite all of you into a conversation about how these stories are continuing in both good ways and bad and so that's what we wanted to talk about today. Before we do, we wanted to share a message we received from Chelsea who lives in Boulder and wanted to share her experience of March 22nd. 

Chelsea: [00:05:28] Hi, Sarah and Beth apologies in advance that this is a long email and especially if it ends up being a bit of therapeutic word vomit. My name is Chelsea and I live in Boulder, Colorado. I wanted to share my experience with a shooting that happened yesterday. I wasn't near the King Soopers. I didn't even realize anything was wrong until my friend who was in Texas texted me to see if I was okay.

 I used to live in the same neighborhood as that King Soopers and still have many friends in the area who are thankfully all safe, although shaken by the strong police presence and the neighborhood yesterday, and knowing that it could have easily been them [00:06:00] in the King Soopers. Yesterday felt surreal seeing all those places on the news that I know.

 I've gone shopping for dinner ingredients there. I've bought girl scout cookies there. That's my favorite lunch place. There's the best place to get ice cream in town. I felt numb. I expected anger. I've been part of the moms demand action chapter here for several years, and I've advocated for gun control.

And I wanted to be mad that despite our efforts, this happened again, but I couldn't even feel that. I was depleted, empty, shaken both from the reports coming in and from my own scare that day. During the King Sooper standoff, there was another active shooter warning about half a mile from where I was working.

It thankfully turned out to, I guess, be nothing but for an hour I didn't know if my workplace, a museum, was safe. You mentioned the podcast this year, several times that with the pandemic, it feels like a split screen and I felt that viscerally and literally, literally yesterday, as I was watching the first press conference by Boulder police, when they confirmed there had been fatalities.

 I was also receiving an [00:07:00] email that I could set up an appointment for a COVID vaccine on Wednesday. To have a spark of hope swallowed by such deep tragedy is painful to say the least. I'm also dealing with the aftermath of the shooting in a very specific way. I work at the history museum here and yesterday evening, I knew that today I would need to start thinking about how to respectfully collect objects and tell the stories of this tragic event in Boulder's history.

 How do I even begin to do something like that when I, myself am still grieving? It's a question I've had to deal with for the past year as I worked with my team to collect stories from the pandemic and the racial justice protests, but it feels especially painful right now and this morning, the numbness I felt last night has finally cracked revealing anger, yes, but mostly deep sadness, specifically about how many of us there are.

 An internet friend from LA messaged me offering advice for what helped her after she had friends in the Las Vegas shooting. The history museum and Orlando emailed me and the director of my museum to offer condolences as well as any support and [00:08:00] advice for collecting after an event like this, as they will know from their experience after the pulse night club shooting. I hate that I'm apart of this group now.

 Weirdly it makes me think of an episode of Grey's anatomy. After one characte's dad has died unexpectedly, another character reveals that her own dad died when she was young and describes being a part of the dead dad club but how much it sucks. And the quote from the scene is there's a club, the dead dad's club, and you can't be in it until you're in it. You can try and understand, you can try to sympathize, but until you feel that loss, I'm really sorry. You had to join the club. 

I feel like that now, like I was forced into a club I have no desire to be a part of, and yet I am thankful for the support it has provided, and I didn't even lose anybody I know in the shooting. I can't imagine what other people are going through today. One article quoted a Boulderite saying, it feels like Boulder was in a bubble and that bubble has burst.

It sounds so naive to say that, but it really is what it feels like. [00:09:00] Boulder felt like this tiny paradise, and now we've been shaken to our core. I don't have any deep thoughts or reflections yet, and I am not sure I ever will. I'm just sad and angry and bewildered. I hate that I am a part of this club now and that so many fellow citizens are in it with me, even as I am grateful for their advice and support. I don't know how to end this except to say thank you for letting me write out these feelings, especially since Sarah, I know you are a part of this club as well. Thank you.

Beth: [00:09:39] The country is watching opening arguments while we're recording in the murder trial for the officer who killed George Floyd. We've been reading more about the shooting that took place in Boulder, Colorado, and it's just this really incredible split-screen [00:10:00] of an issue that we've talked about a lot, that police officers are not one thing.

 Because you have this officer on trial for just a horrific act of brutality, juxtaposed against police officers in Denver, who witnesses describe as literally running into their potential deaths and one of them to his death without any hesitation to try to stop the shooter in this grocery store.

And it's hard to take that in, but it's important that we take it in and it's hard to relive, I'm sure for so many members of the community in Minneapolis and so many people across the United States, The details of George Floyd's death. And I think we need to do that because George Floyd's death and its impact are far from over. 

It's hard to consider all 58 minutes of the shooting that unfolded in Boulder. And I think it's important that we do that because gun violence in our country is far from over. 

Sarah: [00:10:58] Yeah. The Denver post [00:11:00] had a very well-reported breakdown of some of the stories on the people inside, staffers, people who encountered the shooter in the parking lot and there's there's footage from a man across the street from his apartment building. And you can see the officers pull up, gather things out of the back of their vehicle and run right in and, you know, reading the, the sort of minute by minute, uh, and the stories of the people inside and how terrifying it is to spend such a long period of time thinking that you are going to die. 

You know, and I read the story and I had such empathy as a gun violence survivor for the stories of the, the victims and survivors in Boulder and I just thought the number of people who can read this and understand [00:12:00] and reflect on their own experiences just grows and grows and grows. The population of people in the United States who know what it's like to cower in a closet or to recognize gunfire and run for their lives just keeps growing.

And I think you see that reflected in the conversation in the media coverage of particularly the Biden administration's response to the violence in Atlanta and the violence and Boulder, is just, you have more and more victims and more and more victims families saying enough is enough, and you can hear their anger and you can hear their frustration and you can hear the growing voices of these advocacy groups saying we want something to happen right now. 

Beth: [00:12:56] One of the details that broke me, there were many in that story [00:13:00] from the Denver post, was that a person in the supermarket who was helping barricade and area was drawing on his experience, doing active shooter drills in elementary school. I read the Denver post piece and then turned to my next browser tab where I had open a piece from Reason which is a libertarian website that I think is very strong on criminal justice issues, because that's what I'm always trying to check in myself.

The fact that I want more gun laws and I also recognize that more gun laws often come at the expense of people who are already disproportionately arrested, convicted, and over sentenced in our system. And so I read the Reason piece that is not a fierce defense of the second amendment. It is just a clear, concise description of what gun laws we already have.

And so if you want to refresh yourself on what gun laws we already have, [00:14:00] I recommend this piece and I thought it would be good for us to spend a minute, sarah, just talking about, cause we've talked about guns and mass shootings so many times, and we'll link those episodes. If you're new here, we'd love for you to spend some time with them and let us know your thoughts. We work through this issue too regularly and are always trying to evolve in our thinking about it and would love the benefit of your perspective. 

But I thought it would be good to spend a couple minutes on what legislation is actually being proposed right now, because we also have the gun debate and hypothetical's so often, so what's actually on the table. And what we think should happen with that legislation. 

Sarah: [00:14:36] The house of representatives has passed two pieces of gun control legislation. The first, the bipartisan background check act of 2021. Eight Republicans voted for it. Three Republicans, representative Upton of Michigan, representative Smith of New Jersey and representative Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania co-sponsored it. So this is a companion to Senator Chris Murphy's background check expansion in the Senate, which has not passed yet, which extends [00:15:00] background check requirements to unlicensed and private firearm sellers before selling a firearm.

And this is the universal background checks that so often come up in conversations about gun control. That's because currently unlicensed sellers do not have to do background checks before transferring firearms and 93% of Americans support an extension of this background check requirement to all gun sales.

So this is the universal background checks that you hear so much about. And then the house has also passed the enhanced background check act of 2021, which was introduced by representative Cliburn to close the Charleston loophole, which allows some gun sales to go through before the background checks are completed.

And this is how those shooter in Charleston was able to buy a firearm in 2015 and murder nine people inside the church. So the two big pieces of legislation that had passed the house, one that has a Senate companion, really work on these issues within the background check system. 

Beth: [00:15:52] Which will not prevent every mass shooting. I want to acknowledge that right up front and also are supported [00:16:00] by between like 70 and 95% of the public, depending on the polling that you look at. So I just want to make the point today that unless you are a slippery slope person, this will lead to that, which will lead to gun confiscation somewhere down the chain. This seems to me to be uncontroversial legislation that just ought to pass in any functioning system. 

Sarah: [00:16:24] In the same way I think conversations about abortion are difficult because we're so often talking about two different things, talking about religion and ethics, and then we're talking about politics and policy. I think the same thing happens in conversations about gun control. 

Often we're talking about mass shootings because they're the ones that get the press coverage. They are the horrific details that, like you said, take your breath away and stop you in your tracks and fill your brain and so they are the ones that often drive the conversation, but it's [00:17:00] always important to remember, especially in the last year where the murder rate has gone up 30%, that gun violence is so much more than mass violence and that gun violence, particularly as manifested in suicides, kills so many more Americans every year than mass violence.

So I think that's part of the, the hard intersection of conversations that we have, you know, I'm encouraged that the CDC is going to begin to study gun violence for the first time in many, many decades. And so that hopefully we'll start to get more information and more data that helps us sort out some of the really difficult emotions surrounding mass gun violence and the difficult reactions to those events of which I have lived through and the hard data surrounding guns and the policy that can shrink not only mass violence, but suicides and domestic [00:18:00] violence and other murder rates.

Beth: [00:18:02] I'm encouraged by that research too. I sat on our Patreon bonus podcast last week that I am open to basically anything. The only thing I'm not open to is this is the price of living in a free society. It's too high a price, but anything else I want to discuss. I would get excited if we just experimented for a year with not making new movies that include gun violence, like what would it do to our psyches to just take a year off from violence, you know, not legislated, but like a group of people coming together and deciding to try that.

I think that would be interesting. Like I will look at the whole range. These bills ought to pass, and I certainly hope that they do because we just, we need some steps here and as you said, it takes sometimes these horrific events to remind us that so many people are dying from guns on levels that don't make the news.

And we have so many more guns [00:19:00] because so many people bought them during the pandemic and I'm not being judgmental of that. You know, I've told Sarah before my thinking during the pandemic, like my daydreaming. Was about 50% luxury vacation and 50% apocalypse. I had many times over the past year when I thought, I wonder if we ought to have a gun and talked to my husband about it several times.

And I imagine that conversation's not over, I am not judging the reaction that people had over the past year and I know that having more people owning guns will lead to more deaths and we've got to figure that out. 

Sarah: [00:19:36] Well, and I think that's the other part, right? We need more data. And also we have the data we need, which is countries and States with fewer guns have less gun violence.

It's just, it's indisputable and so as important as it is to talk about background checks, the way to get at this problem is to have fewer guns. So [00:20:00] then I think the other difficult intersection is that we are talking about lives. We are talking about lives lost, and we are also talking about politics and power and policy and, you know, becoming a victim of gun violence at the age of 16 years old.

Maybe you wouldn't expect me to say that I understand the Biden administration's focus on infrastructure because in many ways, politics is like a love bank. You can't just keep making withdrawals and I think the brilliance of this administration is their focus on legislation and policy. They can get across the finish line with broad bipartisan support among voters, because that builds political capital.

And what I want, of course, I want these universal background checks to go through, but what I really [00:21:00] want is fewer guns, and that's going to take a massive amount of political capital. And so things like roads and bridges and infrastructure and relief and things that have broad bipartisan support and even universal background checks, which have broad bipartisan support are important.

But I think that we always have to keep in mind that the solutions for both mass violence and gun violence generally are difficult and they are a massive political lift and I want to do. I'm going to turn 40 this year. I don't want to continue to live in this reality that I have for 20 plus years.

That it's this intractable political issue that costs people their lives. I want movement desperately, but I think acknowledging that that has to be a strategy, a long-term strategy to do the [00:22:00] really heavy lifting that would see fewer people lose their lives to gun violence is important. 

Beth: [00:22:07] I would like to see them do this now. I would like to see a full court press from the Biden administration right now on these two bills, because about 90% of the public supports these two bills and I think it would help build that political bank to say, Hey, we don't overreach. Maybe you think we overreach on procedure. We're leaning on reconciliationhard. We're talking about reforming or eliminating the filibuster. 

Yeah. We'll we'll lean on procedure hard because we want to get some things done and you won't let us Republicans in Congress, but we're not overreaching on the results. I think part of the reason Republicans did not effectively oppose the American Rescue Plan is because there isn't anything bananas in it.

 When you go through what's actually in it. Yes. Some of it is a stretch from COVID. If you don't want to think too hard about it, but we've talked [00:23:00] about this, like the broad majority of both Republicans and Democrats, if asked about the individual components of that bill would feel pretty good about it and that is very unusual for legislation that is so much federal money going out the door.

And I think that's what the Biden administration is doing really well. And I agree with you, infrastructure ought to be the same way. I think it's going to be harder because the numbers on infrastructure projects are shocking. It's just really expensive and it's going to be a lot of money and there's going to be like a, a psychological lift to get over spending that much money even though when you think about what those dollars will buy, it's not probably anywhere near what our country needs. 

I would like to see them do this now, because I think that most people get it. They support it. They're tired of it and I think the Goodwill of seeing action from a democratic majority on guns, that is not what the vast majority of people would consider a dramatic overreach is really [00:24:00] smart politics.

Sarah: [00:24:01] But getting this done is passing in the Senate. This isn't going to go in her budget reconciliation. They're going to either have to get 60 votes or get rid of the filibuster, which they don't have the votes for that either. So, I mean, I don't, that's a big lift. 

Beth: [00:24:16] It is a big lift. I think this is a good one though, to show the American people if there aren't 60 votes for something that 90 ish percent of the public supports, what are we doing here? Do you care Americans if we get rid of the filibuster for this to do this thing that everyone recognizes, the vast majority of people recognize is as a smart policy step? I think it makes the case for changing the rules.

Sarah: [00:24:38] I don't know. I think that gun control is a really dangerous issue to get rid of the filibuster for. I'll be honest. I mean, maybe that's just my skepticism. Maybe that's my fear talking, but that seems like a really hard, because if they're not going to spin it, this was a universal background checks that everybody loves. It's going to say, see, they got in there and they took the filibuster [00:25:00] away to take your guns.

Beth: [00:25:01] Yeah. I kind of feel like that about something that Pete Buttigieg said way back in the democratic primary is like, they're going to spin anything. They're going to spin anything. They are not going to and this is a good transition point because the other question is, will Congress move on voting rights? And it's the same problem, right?

 You have some ideas that I think the broad majority of the public supports. There's a lot more going on in the, for the people act than that but are you going to just say, well, we have to see how it goes. We got to get those 60 votes. I don't know. I just think the spin can't create the fear that prevents us from moving on things that are just clear emergencies.

And look, my fear is talking here too. It's just a different kind of fear, right? Thinking about emerging from the strict lockdowns into a world where lots more people have armed scares me. Just, I just have a I'm I'm scared about it. I have dreams about it. I worry about putting my kids on the bus because of it [00:26:00] and so while I know intellectually. That passing these two laws, passing these two bills and signing them into law would not eliminate that risk by a long shot, it would make me feel like, at least we're trying.

Sarah: [00:26:15] We have seen though with the American recovery act that they can't spin or are not  willing to spin everything. And there is just a part of me that thinks the really like brick and mortar on the ground, governmental stuff like actual governance, dealing with coronavirus, fixing the roads, building the bridges is good stuff to do this on and that it plays well and it's hard to spin. 

I think part of the reason they couldn't get a message that connected or weren't trying with the American recovery act and I see a similar thread with infrastructure is attacking Democrats as tax and spin doesn't work as good as it used to. [00:27:00] It doesn't have the landing power, but I worry that gun control legislation would.

 I think with regards to the voting rights act, the continuing story there is whatever your political strategy debate may be, Georgia, a little bit played their hands, right? This legislation that's come out of Georgia and particularly the reaction to it, which I think we're going to get into in a minute is going to force this voting rights act discussion vote legislation to happen.

Beth: [00:27:35] Well, let's talk about the election integrity act of 2021 signed into law by Georgia governor Brian Kemp.

It is a 98 page bill. It passed on a party line vote. Only Republicans supported it. There's a lot going on in it. I'm going to go through the details of that on the Nightly Nuance. Uh, we've talked about it a little bit here on the podcast again, we'll link that overview and then I will get into it in depth on Patreon.

[00:28:00] I think that there are different categories of issues covered by this bill and that the, the storyline of it's racist, it's the new Jim Crow, uh, has accuracy in it and is incomplete and I think the story from Republicans have read it and you'll see that it's all neutral and it's mostly about transparency has some accuracy and is very incomplete as well.

There is a category here that is about transparency. There's a lot of public reporting requirements in this bill. I think it's transparency setting out to solve a problem that was manufactured for Georgia in terms of people's trust in the election, but I'm not against, you know, lots of reporting about how many people have voted and how many of those votes have been counted and how many remain. 

Georgia has said, we are going to speed up our election tabulation here. We're going to speed up our certification process. I don't think there's [00:29:00] anything wrong with any of that. I'm sure that County election officials are thrilled to know that they can start processing absentee ballots earlier instead of waiting and having to do all of that on election day. So there's some things like that going on that I think are about transparency and are pretty neutral and are not different than what goes on in other States. 

Then there's a category of things that give the state legislature a whole lot more power in election oversight and a whole lot more opportunities to reach into what's going on at the County level in ways that I think are prone to abuse or just ripe for problems. And then there is a category of actively saying, how can we get fewer people to vote in Georgia and that is where I think the real concern is and should be. 

Sarah: [00:29:49] It is hard to give a legislator power grabbing the benefit of the doubt when one is on a party line vote, and two, they had members of [00:30:00] the executive branch who were, you know, intensely criticized, even though they were members of the same party for not doing enough.

So it just feels like, well, you didn't do enough so we're going to do it this time. And you're talking about a predominantly white Republican legislator reaching into places like Fulton County in Atlanta. Then you start to see the, the narrative take shape that this isn't just about transparency. And then they're doing things like you said, that are just especially the, making it illegal to hand out things to people in line that just, why did you do this to yourself?

Like, why did you make the opposite? Why didn't you make, why did you make the opposition's case for them? And you feel very strongly in particular about some requirements about the absentee ballot and the security involved in the absentee ballot.

Beth: [00:30:53] I do indeed. So absentee ballots now require when you return [00:31:00] them, that you put like in the envelope, that's going in the mail, your name and signature, plus your driver's license or state ID number or the last four digits of your social security number and your date of birth. It's like, hello, anyone who wishes to do identity theft, just rifle through Georgias mail around election time and you're going to find a treasure trove of personally identifying information.

 And I know the response to that would be like, well, there, isn't going to be a secure envelope and it's not going to be transparent. I don't know a lot of people who wish to do crime, who are, um, going to be so lazy that they won't open an envelope. You know what I mean? It's just, I just think from like, whatever your purpose is and your purpose is clearly bad, whatever your purpose is, what are you doing? 

I mean, this is just to me, such an obvious way to say to people we do not want you to vote by mail. Yeah, you [00:32:00] must be and, and then they're like rolling back opportunities to drop those ballots off. So during the pandemic, we saw these drop boxes going lots of places so that you could drop your ballot off, know that it's been received and still not interact with other humans.

And those Dropbox's, like many things that we try in society ended up having a whole bunch of benefits for lots of people besides just avoiding getting Coronavirus. So this legislation now says we can have those, in fact, every County must have at least one, but then it limits the numbers that they may have to either one per hundred thousand people or one per early voting place, whichever is smaller.

So we want as few of those as possible in every County and they are going to be inside the polling places and only accessible as the polling places are open. So it's hard to see the purpose of the [00:33:00] Dropbox if you've got to go in during this limited number of hours anyway, see what I'm saying? Yeah.

Sarah: [00:33:05] You will be dropped. You won't be dropping anything. You'll be entering. 

Beth: [00:33:09] You'll be entering and you'll be entering on the schedule that probably didn't work for you in the first place. Right. And so it's just, there are so many components to this where the purpose is clearly to limit who is participating in these elections and all that said, I have zero confidence that courts will do anything about this because a lot of these requirements mirror what other States do.

 We have seen throughout the pandemic lots and lots of election cases going into court and courts defer to state legislatures about this stuff. And I don't know that the voting rights act, at this point, given what courts have done to it, rolling it back, um, has enough teeth that the, if you could prove the discriminatory intent that I feel strongly is behind this law, I don't know if that's enough to say that it's [00:34:00] invalidated because I think courts will have an easy time finding that these are requirements that have been upheld elsewhere. 

Sarah: [00:34:05] Yeah. I mean, I was comforting myself with the immediate challenges, but. Um, uh, and you know, I'm afraid that you're probably right. The only hope I have is that yes, we have lots of regulations like this across the country, but I'm not sure if we've ever seen, um, this dramatic of a restriction of voting rights. Do you think that will matter at all? 

Beth: [00:34:27] Well, I think we have seen this dramatic of a restriction. I don't think we have seen it contract so quickly right after a bad result for the party that pushed it through. Yeah. I also think that the party did itself a terrible disservice by allowing law enforcement officers to arrest a democratic lawmaker who was simply knocking on the governor's door, wanting to watch him sign the bill along with the white men that he had assembled to stand at his side as he did it.

Sarah: [00:34:59] I think that [00:35:00] there are very important like Turrell implications, I think that we are only beginning to see the judicial impact of this legislation, but there's also a part of me that's like politically, what were you guys thinking? Like arresting her, lining up white guys to sign the bill, outlawing passing out water. Like, what are you, what are you doing? What are you doing? 

This isn't Mississippi, right? Like this state is close and you can make it harder to vote and I'm not saying that won't have impact, but it's really close. And the demographic trends are not in your favor. So, I mean, how long do you think this is going to work? Why don't you ask the Republicans of North Carolina and see what they say? Like I just. 

Beth: [00:35:50] If you have not seen the video of representative Park Cannon knocking on the door and interacting with law enforcement, it's worth your time to watch it. When you [00:36:00] hear that she is charged with obstructing law enforcement and disrupting a general assembly session, I just think the video speaks for itself about what she was doing and how she was doing it. And I agree with you, like the optics of this thing are so obviously terrible, but Sarah, what is giving you hope as we close out a difficult discussion about where we are in American politics right now.

Sarah: [00:36:25] 10 million doses in just three days, that's what's giving me hope. You've got your second vaccine dose, mine is scheduled for this afternoon. I mean, just it's hard. I was thinking about how quickly I've adjusted to the reality of being vaccinated and I just don't want to lose sight of that. I really, really don't want to lose sight of the fact that we have more and more States opening up to everybody over 16.

Look, I was full of hope and I got on here and our newsletter and Patreqon and said, I cannot, I feel things shifting [00:37:00] dramatically when I got my first shot. It kinda came about unexpectedly and I was, you know, preach and preach and preach in that it was going faster and y'all were going to see it and even I'm surprised that we are already at so many States opening up to everybody over 16. 

I would not have told you this would happen before I got my second dose. And yet here we are 2 million doses in three days and it continues to grow and grow and grow. 

Beth: [00:37:29] Next up, we are going to take a hard turn to Western Asia and just a reminder, Western Asia is a term that I prefer to use for the middle East, because I think it's more geographically correct.

You'll hear us talking with expert on that part of the world, Kerry Anderson, a lot about the relationship between Saudi Arabia and Iran, but we get into a broader discussion of the region. It's just a good idea for us to understand what's happening there. And Kerry is a delightful person to share that with us.

[00:38:00] KerryKerry, we're so delighted to have you back with us. It's been too long.

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:38:16] Thank you delighted to be back. 

Sarah: [00:38:17] We're not in the middle of a dumpster fire, fire hose, drinking, trying to drink from a fire hose, like all the metaphors so we can actually inhale and exhale and think deeply about things like Western Asia. Whew. 

Beth: [00:38:32] So as we've been talking about Western Asia lately, feels like you cannot understand much of what's going on in the region without understanding the relationship between Saudi Arabia and Iran and for newer listeners who have not heard you talk about this before, and, and for all of us who need to catch up, can you talk to us about what you see as the defining characteristics of that relationship right now?

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:38:58] Yeah, and I [00:39:00] think it is important to bring in at least a little bit of kind of modern history and explaining that relationship as well. So I'm sure most people know part of this is a asectarian thing. Iran is the predominant Shia power in the world and Saudi Arabia of course, is one of the major Sunni leaders in the world and, and the home of Mecca and Medina.

So there is a bit of a sectarian competition there, but it's also more than then that. They are two of about three or four, arguably five of the natural regional powers. Um, that's always been true for Iran. That's been more recent for Saudi Arabia, of course, since the discovery of oil, but so there's also sort of natural competition there as two regional competitors.

And then of course, much of this goes back to the 1979 Islamic [00:40:00] revolution or what they call the Islamic revolution in Iran, which really set up it really intensified that competition, that Iran through the Islamic revolution was really stating, we should be the leader of the Muslim world. 

They have a particular ideology that goes with that, and that runs in direct contrast to Saudi Arabia feeling that they should be the leader of the Muslim world and they have a very different approach. Um, they are of course, both major oil producers so there is also a natural economic competition. So there's quite a lot of history that sets things up for complicated relationships between these two States. 

Sarah: [00:40:42] As we think about that complicated history, Kerry I was really struck recently by the account as Shi Yu Wang who traveled from the U S to Iran in 2016, he was working on a dissertation. He was arrested by the Iranians. He just published a detailed account in [00:41:00] the Atlantic. And the part that I was really struck by is he said he once thought that the dreadful state of Iran was all because of something we did wrong to them and that a thawing of ties would empower Iranian moderates. But that view relied on what he called a Mirage of moderation within a Iranian government.

I slowly saw, they don't want to be our friends. They don't want to reconcile. During that period he said he met no regime supporters, but to some, my surprise, when I came back to the United States, there were many sympathizers with the regime. Can you imagine how furious this makes me every single day?

 And I thought that was so interesting. I wanted to ask you about it immediately. Like, do we have a misperception of moderation within Iran and are we, you know, functioning based on some assumptions that are incorrect? 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:41:44] Well, I definitely think we're frequently functioning on some assumptions that are incorrect. I will say Iran is very complicated, right? This, this is a big populous diverse country and the people there have lots have a [00:42:00] wide range of views. So there are definitely people who are supporters of the existing regime. Um, there are people who embrace its ideology. There are people who feel that it is defending them.

You know, Iran has a very long history of other foreign powers trying to kind of eat at it and its independence and so they have a very strong sense of kind of defensiveness and there's some historical reasons. Yeah. So there are people who do you feel that the regime is doing the right thing, that it protects them.

There are on the other end of that people who completely disagree with the regime, do not like it's particular interpretations of Isla,. See it as corrupt, see it as you're abusing their fundamental rights. They do have a concept of [00:43:00] democracy and so there is language for saying you were violating your, our rights. You were rigging the election. 

There are. So those are sort of the two ends of the spectrum. There are then a lot of people in between, a lot of people who like some of what the recoverment does and don't like other things. So I think it's a very wide views within the country. And, and of course, you know, there are different ethnic groups and some of those ethnic groups have often a kind of less positive view of the government than the majority, um, Persian group does. So it's a complicated situation. 

Beth: [00:43:37] Kerry the last time we talked about Western Asia on the show, we discussed an op-ed from Senator Chris Murphy about how the United States approach has really been formulated around this idea of protecting oil rich countries from Iran, the OPEC countries, and how we really need to [00:44:00] recalibrate our strategy there.

And I wonder what you think about that and also what you are seeing the Biden administration do in terms of its formulation and its posture towards Western Asia?

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:44:11] Yeah, well, I, I think Senator Murphy raises important points. I do disagree with the, one of the things he says about oil. Um, I think those of us who work on middle East issues have been aware for very long time that United States is no longer ourselves dependent on middle Eastern oil. So that in many ways feels like very much old news to me. 

However, the global economy still remains reliant on oil from the region and we are part of the global economy and so I think one can make a good argument that there is still an interest that the United States has in ensuring that there's no particular country that has a stranglehold over oil out of that region. Of course, eventually we would hope to sort of move away from [00:45:00] fossil fuels, but we're nowhere close to that. 

But I do think it is really important that we regularly question in any region of the world, what are our interests? How are they changing? And I think the Biden administration is trying to recalibrate the relationship there. I think they have learned lessons from the Obama years. You know, Obama famously wanted to pivot to Asia, um, to East Asia. You know, I think he really kind of wanted to be done with the middle East and, and that didn't really work out so well because stuff tends to come up in the region that, that still affects us.

And so I think they've, they're aware of that. You know, obviously they want to take a very different approach than the Trump administration had. So I think they're really working right now to recalibrate. 

That said, while they very clearly want to return to the JCPOA, the nuclear deal with Iran and figure out something there, they are much more focused on [00:46:00] the Asia Pacific region and Europe, and even the Western hemisphere than they are on the middle East. So I think there's a real effort to shift away from the middle East.

 I am not convinced that that's going to happen. I think I've like lots of presidents have tried to do that and it often doesn't work out very well. Uh, but this is certainly a good time to be thinking, what, what can we do in the middle East? What can we not do in the middle East? What are our goals? What are our interests? And it's a good time to recalibrate that. 

Sarah: [00:46:38] Well, I was fascinated by the amount of recalibration inherent in a new administration. Seems apparent particularly from the Trump administration to the Biden administration and I think they were assuming a certain amount of that. And I was kind of surprised and intrigued by Iran's reaction. I think the Biden ministration was assuming they were going to come in and [00:47:00] Iran was going to be like, great, we've got new players. We want to get back into the JCPOA. And Iran was like, no, I don't, we don't want to right now. 

And I think they were caught off guard by that and I'm wondering what your thoughts were like with, you know, I think you're right. I think that there is a desire to sort of pivot and that the realities of the region would allow for that. And there seems to be this, this real inherent conflict, not just with Iran, but with Saudi Arabia, between everything is different because we're not the Trump administration and still the assumptions about what would happen because they're not the Trump administration are not playing out in exactly the way they anticipated.

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:47:41] Yeah. So I think to kind of simplify it, I think there's a couple possibilities of what's going on with Iran right now. And in regards to JCPOA, One is, I think it's possible that we're just in a stalemate over who [00:48:00] goes first. So the Biden administration wants Iran. Well, so sort of rewind just a little bit. So of course, in, in 2018, Trump pulled out of the JCPOA. He reimposed. 

Sarah: [00:48:12] Popularly known as the Iran nuclear deal. 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:48:15] Yes. He reimposed very significant sanctions on Iran that had been lifted as part of the, of the nuclear deal. And I should be clear, not all the United States did not lift all sanctions as part of the deal, but we did lift some very important ones.

So Trump reimpose those sanctions as well as adding a bunch more. And for a year, Iran remained in compliance with the nuclear deal, but after a year they said, okay, you know, you're, you've put all these sanctions on us. So they began reversing some of the restrictions that have been put on their nuclear program as part of the deal.

So we're now in a place where the Biden [00:49:00] administrations wants Iran to undo those changes and to come back into compliance with the deal and then Biden would lift sanctions or we have a discussion Iran is saying, no, no, no, no, you guys are the ones who violated the deal. You're the ones who pulled out. You go first, you lift those sanctions and then we can come back into compliance and then we can talk about things further.

 So one possibility is that we're just in a game of kind of like who goes first. The other possibility and I don't know, but I think this is very interesting idea that's come out with some Iran experts. Um, so Iran is going to have presidential elections in June. And so on the one hand that puts some pressure on the United States to deal with the JCPOA before the elections. Because right now the president of Iran is president Rohani and his whole thing was the JCPOA. So he definitely wants to get back [00:50:00] into it.

But there is some possibility that the Supreme leader of Iran is hoping that a conservative candidate is going to win in those elections. And it is possible that he and he did, of course has a final say over any of this, it is possible that he might want to wait until after those elections and hope that a conservative candidate wins.

And then I think from his perspective, you'd be negotiating from a stronger position. So I don't know exactly what's going on. There's a lot of tea leaves reading going on in Washington about this right now, but I think those are some of the factors at play. 

Beth: [00:50:41] How would you help American citizens understand our interest in getting back into the JCPOA? Why should we care about this? 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:50:50] Well, and, and, uh, full transparency. I think that JCPOA was a good deal. I think we should not have left. I, I would like to see us and Iran get back into [00:51:00] it. So I'm coming from that perspective. There are people that disagree. So I think one of the main big issues that we have to think about in the middle East is nuclear proliferation.

The only country in the region right now that has nuclear weapons is Israel. Iran has in the past, made some moves toward a nuclear weapons program. They say their program right now is primarily for nuclear power, which maybe, but there are reasons for concern about that. There is concern that if Iran got nuclear weapons that then Saudi Arabia and other countries potentially would also acquire nuclear weapons.

And it feels to me that nuclear weapons are so dangerous and so de-stabilizing that it makes sense to make that the priority and the JCPOA significantly slow down Irans nuclear program and put it under, um, a whole new level of international monitoring than it had been before. So it seems to me that that's just [00:52:00] a good thing. 

So to me, if you take that off the table, you still of course have a lot of other security concerns regarding Iran's ballistic missiles, regarding their behavior and the region but my view is let's, let's take care of that. Let's take that nuclear risk off the table for now while we try to deal with other things, like why not.

The other thing is to, in my view, sanctions were effective in trying and getting Iran to the table for the JCPOA but the Trump administration's approach to sanctions was just throw sanctions on Iran and eventually they'll what do whatever we want. I mean, I feel like if you're going to use sanctions, you need to have a specific, feasible objective that you're trying to reach.

And so I also kind of feel like if we're just pose imposing sanctions on Iran and the hopes that someday they'll become the country we want them to be, [00:53:00] that's really ridiculous.

 And especially because Iran does have this history of feeling like that's exactly what the United States or great Britain or Russia has tried to do to them, and they will push back about it really hard against it, really hard and they've demonstrated that the regime was capable of surviving pretty severe sanctions.

Sarah: [00:53:22] Shifting from Iran and the questions surrounding the JCPOA, you know, the big conflict in the region is between Iran and Saudi Arabia. What do you see as the Biden administration's approach to Saudi Arabia, how that is changing things in the region and that ever important like what is, what is the relevance to all of us in this? 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:53:46] Maybe just to go back a little bit on the US relationship with Saudi Arabia, which goes back to the 1920s and was absolutely originally based in oil and in the US [00:54:00] needed to make sure that we can access Saudi oil and in a business relationship. Saudiramco  initially was a relationship between US businesses and Saudi Arabia. So there's a long running relationship there.

 And obviously today is very different because we are not dependent on Saudi oil anymore. Um, the world in many ways still is. Um, and so as I said before, I think that's an important point, but the United States individually is not. 

But I think there are some other reasons why we try to maintain a relationship with Saudi Arabia. One is because to push Saudi Arabia out into the cold has a lot of risks that come with it and very little benefits. Also since around 2005, they've been a pretty close counter-terrorism and intelligence partner and I think that remains an important issue.

We solve a lot of business relationships with them and they remain one of the major players in terms [00:55:00] of balancing geopolitics IN the region, and trying to prevent any one country from completely dominating the region. So I think those are our ongoing interest in Saudi Arabia.

 Now, of course, there are a lot of complications and I'm happy to talk a lot more if you want to about, uh, Mohammed bin Salman, the crown Prince, otherwise known as MBS.

Sarah: [00:55:21] I was going to say, when you said there were lots of complications, I was like, I can think of one big one, Ms. Mohammad Bin Salman. 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:55:28] Well, and I think it's important to remember we had complications with Saudi Arabia well before he came to power. Yeah. Um, so he came to power basically in 2015 when his father became King and he became a crown Prince in 2017, but he's essentially been kind of running things since 2015. And so we we've had long, we've had human rights concerns for saudi Arabia way before MBS. We've had concerns that Saudi Arabia was promoting Sunni extremist views in the region, which is actually something he [00:56:00] is really trying to roll back and push back on. 

So he's a very complicated figure today because internally he's pursuing a lot of reforms. Now we need to always be careful about not taking that too far. I'm not trying to hold him up as a reforming hero, but he is reforming. He's trying to change some very important things in ways that really affect normal Saudi's lives and I think this is saying we need to think about a lot. 

I think a lot gets overlooked in Washington. Uh, what are normal Saudis lives like, and for many of them they're better under MBS and that's often hard for us to kind of accept because again like he's, you know, he's just not somebody who cares a lot about human rights in many ways, but women, most women, not all female activists, but most women in Saudi Arabia today have more freedoms than they did before.

Young people definitely have more ability to go to a concert or something [00:57:00] than they did before. And he is trying to push back on extremism. Now. Yeah, there's a lot of other internal political things that are complicated. I think the bigger issue with him has been his foreign policy where he was much less experienced. He's very experienced in internal Saudi politics. He's not experienced in foreign policy when he came to power and you know, he immediately launched the war, the Saudi part of the role in Yemen war in Yemen, Yemen was already in the midst of a civil war, but he launched the Saudi rule and that he was one of the major factors behind the Qatar, the blockade of Qatar that just ended in January.

And of course there's the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. So I think for the United States perspective, he's going to be a very important player internally in Saudi Arabia, probably for a very long time. And so we need to find ways to work with him and to acknowledge some of the things he's doing [00:58:00] in the country that are good while also trying to find ways to say like, Hey, you need to understand that the United States is not going to remain a close ally if you're doing some of these things in your foreign policy that were just completely not okay with.

Beth: [00:58:16] What do you make of president Biden's decision to speak with the King, but not with MBS? I 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:58:21] think that was very interesting. It was a clear, clear way of sending a message that MBS has been demoted in terms of his relationship with the white house from the Trump years. So Biden was saying, you know. 

Sarah: [00:58:34] As he should be, because of Khashoggi, in my personal opinion, not that anybody asked me. I mean, if there's no consequences, as little as like a diplomatic consequence for something like that, then what are we doing? 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:58:47] Well, there's a lot of people in Washington who agree. I mean, Khashoggi was a well-connected person here and it is personal to people who are involved in policy here.

Um, now I, you know, we could say [00:59:00] maybe some of the people in policy should have cared more about what's happening in Yemen and to other people they didn't personally know, but we're human beings and this is how we work. And I think it also showed how I think Saudi Arabia did not fully understand the United States was it going to be coming from, with this. 

Sarah: [00:59:15] And it was particularly gruesome too. 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [00:59:18] Well, and furthermore, it was a significant violation of diplomatic norms. So, I mean, I think we tend to focus on how horrible the killing was, it was. Also, it was done in a consulate. That Alone, that's a pretty big violation of classic diplomatic norms.

So I think the Biden administration has actually been really calibrated in saying, you know, you don't get regular access to the white house anymore, that the president interacts with the King and MBS is the minister of defense in Saudi Arabia and so his natural counterpart is our secretary of defense.

And so I think it's a way of saying like, we, we acknowledge that you're a person we're going to be working with and he will [01:00:00] probably, we don't know for sure. He will probably be King someday, maybe for decades. So we need a relationship with MBS and, you know, we have to work with Putin and we have to work with GE and we have to work with a whole lot of world leaders who do bad stuff.

Right. And so we have to go to work with them, but I think it was an interesting way of saying, you know, but you don't have the kind of access anymore that you did under the Trump administration. 

Sarah: [01:00:24] After we spoke, Kerry wanted to add some more context to the relationship between Iran and Saudi Arabia. And so she recorded a quick voice memo that we're inserting here before we jump back into our conversation.

Beth: [01:00:33] She also wanted to say, after she reflected on her comments, that she hopes that she didn't sound callous about Jamal Khashoggi, which did not occur to either of us because we know Kerry well, but she recognizes that a lot of people are listening here that, that don't know her well and she said she just wanted to say his death matters, as does the death of every individual who has suffered and died in Yemen, and as a political [01:01:00] prisoner in Egypt or in Syria or China with the Uyghurs.

 She said, you know, it is a really hard, moral and security issue to recognize human rights violations, even beyond the high profile cases and she just wants us to remember that for every one of those high-profile cases, there are thousands more people suffering and thousands more people suffering at the hands of governments that need to be held accountable.

 And so human rights cannot be our only foreign policy priority because we would only be doing human rights violations, but it is critically important and this is just, it just makes it very complex. And part of what we really enjoy in talking about Kerry is that she helps us see the complexity in so many issues. 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [01:01:49] So in terms of our competition is between Saudi Arabia and Iran today. So they both really try to hit at each other, but they [01:02:00] primarily do it through proxy battles.

Um, and we can perhaps trace this back to 2016 Saudi Arabia, along with a bunch of other executions, executed a well-known she as Saudi Shaikh, who had very strongly criticized the Saudi monarchy and people around were really furious about this. And it led to mobs storming the Saudi embassy in Tehan and also conflict.

And response, Saudi Arabia broke off as diplomatic relations. So it's sort of a point to maybe start the modern competition. But of course at that point, Saudi Arabia and Iran were both already involved in the war in Yemen. So Iran supports the Houthis, or one of the factions fighting and Yemen.

 Uh, Saudi Arabia specifically opposes the Houthis and so has supported other proxies in Yemen as well as [01:03:00] supporting the internationally recognized government in Yemen. And, um, Saudi Arabia also has launched a major air campaign and very importantly has an Iran sea blockade of the Houthi controlled portions of Yemen. So that's where it's really been playing out right on Saudi Arabia's border.

But the two countries have also competed in Iraq and Lebanon. Um, some extent in Syria, um, in the past, least in Afghanistan, uh, and Bahrain. So they compete for influence on sometimes such as an aim  that takes place in terms of direct military conflict. Often it's more of a competition for influence, but it is of course, very notable that the Houthis have been striking targets in Saudi Arabia, primarily oil installations.

 They had two major successes with that in September of 2019. But they've also stepped that up a lot in the [01:04:00] last few months, Saudi Arabia has increased their air campaign in Yemen in the last few weeks and today actually, um, has called for a ceasefire. I think Saudi Arabia would like to wrap up the war in Yemen in a way that saves some safe, some of their face, but also ensures the security of their borders and their territory.

Uh, I think, you know, for Iran, the Yemen war works out pretty well. It's a way to just constantly poke at Saudi Arabia right across the border.

Beth: [01:04:47] Well, recognizing that we could spend hours upon hours talking just about this specific part of Asia. I want to also ask you about its interplay with the African [01:05:00] horn. I am watching and learning as much as I can about what's going on in Ethiopia with Tigray and also the tension between Ethiopia and Egypt around the grand Renaissance Ethiopian dam.

And I am just interested in your perspective, on what, again, kind of what's the American interest here? What should we keep our eyes on as American citizens watching this unfold beyond of course, that we care about genocide and you know, kind of the moral piece of we're all connected with this, the more strategic piece of it.

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [01:05:36] There's definitely a moral piece. There's definitely. I mean, anytime you have massive refugee flows, which is you know, a potential, um in this area of the world, if you have really a serious conflict or famine or, you know, something, um, like some of the economic consequences of the dam project. You know, that's de-stabilizing and we already know that that can in certain circumstances, [01:06:00] um, lead to things like terrorism.

So I think we, I think it's hard to say that the United States has super obvious direct interests, but I think we clearly have interests in that stability, um, avoiding kind of major conflict and refugee flows. That's all very much our interest. And furthermore, the horn of Africa has increasingly become a very busy security area.

So we have a base in Djibouti. China now has a base in Djibouti. I think it was several other couple of middle Eastern countries basis in Djibouti. And these waterways are becoming important. Um, this is to middle Eastern countries, including for example, Iran and Saudi Arabia have competition in the horn of Africa. Um, this is an area that we would maybe like to say, ah, it doesn't really matter to us, but it matters to a lot of other countries that matter to us that are playing a role there and are [01:07:00] competing there. 

And so I think this is one of those kind of examples of a geo strategic as well as humanitarian situation, where it's easy to feel like we can avoid it because we're on the other side of the world and we're behind this ocean, but it just seems to me, there's so many cases where as you say, we, we are interconnected, we live in a global environment and if the pandemic didn't teach us that, then nothing will.

 You know, we need to, I'm not saying the United States should like waltz in with our military and try to clean everything up, but we need to be involved and we need to be diplomatically involved. We need to be involved in terms of humanitarian aid and trying where we can and we won't always succeed, but trying to keep things stable and you make things better for people where we can.

And I think we so often, I think, especially after the Bush years and our [01:08:00] forever Wars, we have a tendency to look at the world and say, well, look when we intervene, it fails so let's not, let's not do it. And I think instead we need to look at the world and say, sometimes we do stuff that's really good and is successful and it, they tend to be the unsung things that we didn't really hear about.

 Like, like aid programs. Like the Bush administration did amazing work to combat HIV in Africa. You don't hear about it that much. The United States has important things around the world. Sometimes we mess it up royally and we need to learn those lessons and be careful and question our motivations. 

But I think we have an interest in trying to prevent massive economic loss and famine and refugee flows and large scale death, because I feel like even if it takes 20 years, it eventually comes back to us because we [01:09:00] are the global superpower. 

Sarah: [01:09:02] Oh, Kerry, lay down that gospel. Thank you so much that I think that's a perfect place to end and thank you again for coming on, we've missed you. We hope to have you on more regularly now that again, not drinking out of a fire hose constantly. 

Kerry Boyd Anderson: [01:09:13] Uh, well, thank you so much. And I'm so grateful for you guys, especially for your voices in the last four years. I think it helped a lot of us get through it.

Beth: [01:09:23] Thank you so much to Kerry for spending time with us and to all of you for giving foreign policy, your attention even when there is a lot to process at home.

 Outside of politics today, Sarah, we have an advice question. I know that you love advice questions. 

Sarah: [01:09:36] I do, you know, we wrapped up our other podcasts, the Nuanced Life,  where we took advice questions regularly and we promised when we did that, we would incorporate some of that in the show here. And I thought this one was a really good one. 

We heard from Nicole. She is in her mid thirties and her immediate family includes two siblings and an aunt and an uncle and lots of complicated family dynamics, but she would describe her immediate family as close but she [01:10:00] says, by that I mean, they are close. In passing, I hear references to family group chats I'm not in and inside jokes I wasn't present for. I'm the person who needs to initiate conversation with my family or else conversation will not occur. To see them I need to visit them because they can not take the time to visit me.

Beth: [01:10:15] She says, I tried just once to open up about this topic to my oldest sibling, but I regret even broaching it. She said I did this to myself by not making an effort to be part of the family union, even explaining that I hadn't shown up for a birthday dinner. That was when I explained that no one told me about the dinner plans.

This is not the first, nor the last time that I've been unintentionally forgotten. Put simply, we have not connected the way they have. I'm a fifth wheel to the family unit. How do I move on? How do I learn to stop expecting equality in a family unit that doesn't see me as an equal?

Sarah: [01:10:44] Well, Nicole, I, my heart is just breaking for you. That is such an intense feeling when you have it with just friends and acquaintances, to feel that way amongst your own family I know must be incredibly difficult, but I will say this. I think [01:11:00] a lot of people feel this inside their families from time to time. I don't know if this is an identity that you should adopt or maybe I hope just a season that you can acknowledge.

Beth: [01:11:15] One of my favorite strategies for making change is to decide what I think the new reality ought to look like and then just kind of set up camp in my head and move into that new reality and try to create a sense of inevitability around it. And I think that is very, very hard in any circumstance and especially with family, but I just wonder if you get really clear on what you want from a you perspective, not of them perspective. So you, you can't create a sense of inevitability about them, including you on plans. 

But if this is really important to you and you, you know, what you want out of these relationships, I just wonder what it would be like to be the person who [01:12:00] says, Hey, we getting together for Memorial day? You know, what have we decided? What are we doing? And really not have a lot of conversation about what you're doing and why just do it and see how it goes.

 I think family dynamics can shift a little faster than sometimes we believe or tell ourselves that they can, if we just determined to change them and kind of muscle that change through. Now, that might not be right for you. There are all kinds of things that could be at work here that make it a lot more complicated than that. If it's not a lot more complicated than that and you really want it, that's the direction I would go.

Sarah: [01:12:36] Yeah. Cause I just think it's hard with families so much is set in childhood or so much is set around certain family struggles or family tragedies or just family moments and we just get stuck inside these relationships. I mean, I think the smartest thing Nicole has done is just articulate that she feels stuck. That's farther than most [01:13:00] people ever get, right is to articulate this hurts my feelings. This is what I see. This is how I feel. I think that that is hugely important and shows a great deal of self-awareness.

And so I think leaning into that and like you said, saying, okay, if this is where I am, and I can articulate that, where do I want to be? And maybe that won't work, right? We don't, we don't know the dynamics of your family enough to understand that the full complexities, but if it, if it's continuing to be a situation where you feel stuck in a hurtful place, well, then that's something different.

But I do think that even though family dynamics can feel set in stone, that often that's just because we never talk about them and we never acknowledge our hurt feelings and we never sort of bring some self-awareness to the space and once we do, it is shocking in a way, how quickly things can, can shift and we can change the [01:14:00] dynamics a little bit.

Beth: [01:14:01] Thank you, Nicole, for trusting us with your question and to all of you for trusting us with your time and attention. We'll be back here in your ears on Friday. Until then, we hope you have the best week available to you.

Beth: Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production.  

Sarah: Alise Napp is our managing director. Dante Lima is the composer and performer of our theme music. 

Beth: Our show is listener supported. Special thanks to our executive producers. 

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