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Modern Age with Dan McCarthy

Modern Age with Dan McCarthy

By: Intercollegiate Studies Institute
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Join Dan McCarthy, editor of Modern Age, as he cuts through the noise of today’s politics and draws timeless insights from the great books and enduring traditions that have shaped the West. Each episode offers a principled perspective that links the headlines of today with the permanent things that matter most.

© 2026 Intercollegiate Studies Institute
Political Science Politics & Government
Episodes
  • EP. 035 - Why Libertarianism and Traditionalism Keep Colliding
    Feb 5 2026

    If conservatives favor limited government, how limited should it be?

    In this episode, Dan McCarthy explores that unexpected convergence on the American Right. We revisit the late-20th-century debates between libertarians, paleoconservatives, and neoconservatives over trade, borders, national sovereignty, and the growing power of the federal state and why those arguments are resurfacing today in the New Right.

    The discussion turns to a deeper question: whether either the market or the modern bureaucratic state can sustain the families, churches, and local communities conservatives seek to preserve. Drawing on thinkers like Robert Nisbet and the idea sometimes called “Tory anarchism,” this episode asks how much authority a healthy society really needs.

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    56 mins
  • EP. 034 - The Left Misunderstands the American Revolution
    Jan 29 2026

    What if the story you’ve been told about the American Revolution is backwards?

    Dan McCarthy argues that the Founding was not a revolt against law, authority, or order. It was a conservative revolution, aimed at defending inherited rights, lawful government, and constitutional liberty.

    In today’s protests against immigration enforcement and law enforcement in places like Minneapolis, the Left often claims the mantle of 1776. But the Founders, especially George Washington and John Adams, feared mob rule, condemned extra legal “democratic societies,” and even used federal force to suppress lawless rebellion.

    This episode revisits what the American Revolution actually meant and why the Founders would likely side with enforcing the law, not undermining it.

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    52 mins
  • EP. 033 - Is This the End of the Conservative Era?
    Jan 29 2026

    Has Donald Trump brought the conservative era to an end, or has he exposed something deeper about what conservatism has been for the past eighty years?

    Dan McCarthy responds to a recent argument that Trump marks a break with the Reagan, Buckley, and Goldwater tradition. Instead, Dan argues that much of modern conservatism lived in the shadow of Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, defined more by opposition than by a full vision of conservative.

    This episode explores how the New Deal reshaped American government, foreign policy, and the administrative state, and why Trump’s presidency challenges not just the welfare state, but the broader legacy of Roosevelt era liberalism. Is this the end of conservatism, or the beginning of something older and wider?

    For an in-depth read on the topic, check out Dan's article:
    https://tomklingenstein.com/the-first-republican-since-fdr/

    🔔 Subscribe for more episodes diving deep into the ideas behind modern conservatism.

    📖 Visit ModernAgeJournal.com
    for thoughtful essays and analysis.

    #ModernAge #Conservatism #DanMcCarthy

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    51 mins
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