He fled Lebanon at 19, built a life here, and has strong opinions about what’s happening in the Middle East right now. And he disagrees with some of what I’ve been writing. So he called me.
Bernard Kash is not a politician, a pundit, or a policy expert. He’s a Lebanese-born immigrant who came to this country legally in 1985, built a business from scratch, and has half a family that’s Muslim and half that’s Christian. He has relatives and friends still living in Lebanon and Iran. And when he saw some of what Corey had been writing publicly, he picked up the phone.
That’s the kind of conversation this program exists for.
In this episode, Bernard and Corey dig into the Israel–Lebanon–Iran conflict, media coverage and what it leaves out, the constitutional questions around Trump’s decision to bomb Iran without going to Congress, immigration, and the political tribal warfare that makes it hard to just talk to each other anymore. They don’t agree on everything. They never have. And yet here they are.
Calls to Action
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✅ Watch the full conversation and subscribe on YouTube: youtube.com/@politicsandreligion
Key Takeaways
What people on the ground in Lebanon actually think about Hezbollah: Bernard shares firsthand accounts from relatives still living in Lebanon and Iran — a perspective you won’t find on cable news. Most Lebanese people don’t want war with Israel and see Hezbollah as an Iranian proxy, not a Lebanese cause.
The Article I question: Corey raises a pointed constitutional concern: Trump began bombing Iran within days of the State of the Union, without consulting Congress. Bernard doesn’t entirely disagree on principle, but argues that in practice, the ends and the means sometimes get complicated.
The “best heart surgeon” problem: Bernard puts it plainly: he wouldn’t invite Trump to dinner, doesn’t think he’s a good person, and can still make the case that for certain geopolitical situations, he may be the right instrument. That tension is exactly what this conversation is about.
Media isn’t monolithic: Both Corey and Bernard push back on the idea that “the media” is a single entity lying to us. The reporters on the ground are often doing real work. What makes it onto air is a different question.
Critiquing Trump isn’t critiquing you: Corey makes a point he’s been sitting with: when he criticizes the president, some friends take it as a personal attack. And those same friends assume that because he’s not sufficiently pro-Trump, he must be the worst caricature the right has invented of the left. Neither is true.
“Grow up” as political philosophy: When asked how we talk politics and religion without killing each other, Bernard’s answer is two words: grow up. Rise above the label, the jersey, the acronym. Find out who the person actually is.
About Our Guest
Bernard Kash fled Lebanon in 1985 at age 19, after a decade of civil war. He came to the United States legally, built a life, raised a family, and has owned Earth Wise Nutrition Center in Santa Clarita for many years. He is one of Corey’s good friends, and one of his most reliable sparring partners.
Links and Resources
Earth Wise Nutrition Center: earthwisevitamins.com
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Links and additional resources:
The Village Square: villagesquare.us
Meza Wealth Management: mezawealth.com
Proud members of The Democracy Group
Now go talk some politics and religion but with gentleness and respect.

The U.S. is the only country in a 25-nation study where more than half of citizens view their fellow citizens as morally bad. Jonathan Evans of Pew Research Center joins us to unpack what the data actually says.
Jonathan Evans is a senior researcher at Pew Research Center specializing in international polling on religion and national identity. The most recent report he led surveyed adults in 25 countries on how they rate the morality of their fellow citizens, and the findings about the U.S. sparked immediate conversation. But as Jonathan explains, the headline number is only the beginning. When you look at specific behaviors, partisan breakdowns, and how the same religious identity plays out differently across borders, the picture gets far more interesting and far more nuanced.
Calls to Action
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Key Takeaways
The U.S. stands alone on the big question. Across all 25 countries surveyed, the U.S. is the only one where a majority of citizens rate their fellow citizens as morally bad. Canada, by contrast, ranks among the most optimistic.
But the headline doesn't tell the whole story. On individual behaviors like gambling and marijuana use, Americans are among the least likely in the world to call them morally wrong. On extramarital affairs, they rank among the most likely. The U.S. isn't simply more moralistic across the board.
It's a global pattern, not just an American one. In many countries, supporters of the party out of power are more likely to rate their fellow citizens' morality negatively. In the U.S., 60% of Democrats vs. 46% of Republicans gave their fellow Americans a negative rating, a 14-point gap that aligns with a broader worldwide trend.
Same religion, different conclusions. Christians in France and Christians in Brazil look almost nothing alike on issues like abortion. Regional and cultural context shapes moral views at least as much as religious identity does.
Views on divorce have softened globally. Comparing this study to Pew's 2013 survey of similar questions, one of the clearest trends is a decline in the share of people across many countries calling divorce morally wrong, with notable exceptions including India, where the number moved in the opposite direction.
Rigorous methodology is the foundation. Surveying roughly 1,000 people per country isn't arbitrary. That threshold enables reliable cross-demographic comparisons within each country. Pew's international work uses face-to-face interviews, phone surveys, or both depending on what's standard and safe in each country.
About Our Guest
Jonathan Evans is a senior researcher at Pew Research Center, where he focuses on international polling related to religion and national identity. He has authored studies on religion in India, religious tolerance and segregation, Christianity in Western Europe, and religious belief and national belonging in Central and Eastern Europe. He holds a graduate degree from Georgetown University's Department of Government, where he studied democracy and governance. Before his career in research, he was an organ performance major whose undergraduate thesis involved analyzing original manuscripts of a Charles Hubert Hastings Parry composition at Oxford. Yes, really.
Links and Resources
Pew Research Center - pewresearch.org
Fantasia and Fugue in G Op. 188 - Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry - www.youtube.com/watch?v=1O0lBYic6DY
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Proud members of The Democracy Group
Now go talk some politics and religion but with gentleness and respect.

Bono once said, before launching into Helter Skelter: “This is a song Charles Manson stole from the Beatles. We’re stealing it back.” That line describes exactly what’s been happening to some of the most important words in the English language, and exactly what we need to do about it.
Calls to Action
✅ If this conversation resonates, consider sharing it with someone who believes connection across difference still matters.
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✅ Watch the full conversation and subscribe on YouTube: youtube.com/@politicsandreligion
Key Takeaways
Words Shape How We Think: When powerful words get hijacked and attached to behaviors that contradict their meaning, it distorts our ability to reason about reality. This isn’t semantics. It’s about preserving the architecture of accountability.
 
“Christian” Belongs to Those Who Follow Jesus: The word has nothing to do with political allegiance. The Jesus of Matthew, the one who called down blessings on the meek and the peacemakers, is not interchangeable with any flag or party symbol.
 
“Conservative” Means Responsible Stewardship: Edmund Burke. William F. Buckley Jr. A tradition built on civil order, distributed power, and fiscal responsibility. Adding $5.5 trillion to the national debt while weaponizing the executive branch is not that tradition.
 
“Patriot” Means Defending the Constitution: Peggy Noonan, whose work was shared by the Heritage Foundation, defined American patriotism as the reaffirmation of founding ideas: free speech, free press, freedom of religion, equal protection. Real patriots protect speech, especially speech they disagree with.
 
“Truth” Is Not a Brand: A platform built by someone with a documented record of tens of thousands of public lies does not get to claim the word. Truth belongs to those who actually pursue it.
 
We’re Stealing Them Back: Truth. Christian. Conservative. Patriot. These words carry centuries of weight and intention. They were made with moral substance. That’s what TP&R is all about: restoring the words to those who live them.
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Proud members of The Democracy Group
Clarity, charity, and conviction can live in the same room.

What do voters actually want? And does what happens on social media have anything to do with it?
David Drucker spent his twenties running his parents' manufacturing businesses in East LA. He was paying workers' comp, dealing with state regulations, signing the checks. Then he became a political journalist. That backstory turns out to matter.
In this conversation, the senior writer at The Dispatch joins Corey to talk about what it means to cover American politics from the ground up. Drucker has built his career on getting out of Washington and talking to actual voters, and what he finds there consistently upends the assumptions of the media and political class. Most people are not as angry as your social media feed suggests. Most people have nuanced, complicated views. And most of them are voting on one thing: whether their lives are getting better or worse.
The conversation ranges from the craft of journalism and the culture of The Dispatch to the internal fault lines of the MAGA coalition, the 2026 midterms, and the U.S. war in Iran. Drucker's analysis is sharp, his sourcing is deep, and his instinct, shaped by years of traveling the country, is to trust voters more than pundits.
David Drucker is a senior writer at The Dispatch, based in Washington, D.C. Before joining in 2023, he was a senior correspondent at the Washington Examiner, a reporter at Roll Call, and covered California politics and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger from the Sacramento bureau of the Los Angeles Daily News. He is the author of In Trump's Shadow and a regular presence on cable news and nationally syndicated radio.
Calls to Action
✅ If this conversation resonates, consider sharing it with someone who believes connection across difference still matters.
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✅ Watch the full conversation and subscribe on YouTube: youtube.com/@politicsandreligion
Key Takeaways
Twitter Is Not the Town Square: The loudest voices online represent a small and unrepresentative slice of the electorate. Most Americans hold more nuanced, less partisan views than social media suggests, and they vote accordingly.
The Ground Truth: There is no substitute for traveling and talking to voters in their own communities. Drucker has built a career on it. The alternative is reporting from inside an echo chamber.
MAGA Voters Are Not Isolationists: They're against wars we lose. They're perfectly fine with projecting American power against bad actors. The vocal anti-war voices on the MAGA right are a minority within the coalition, not its center of gravity.
The Economy Is the Election: Voters put Trump back in the White House expecting him to replicate his first-term economy. They don't think he's done that. That perception will drive the 2026 midterms.
Politicians Are in the Service Business: They do what they believe they must to keep their jobs. Voters who complain about dysfunction are often sending contradictory signals, demanding results while simultaneously demanding that their representatives refuse to deal.
The Dispatch as a Model: Drucker describes a publication built on being correct rather than fast, on traveling to where the story is, on editing everything twice, and on a business model not driven by clicks.
AI and Journalism: Drucker doesn't use AI in his writing or drafting, and he doesn't trust it yet. He wants to see the original source material, not a summary.
The Coalition Problem After Trump: Trump is just populistic enough for the populists and just normal enough for the normies. That is a unique skill. The next Republican nominee will not automatically inherit the coalition he built.
Links and Resources
The Dispatch: thedispatch.com
David M. Drucker on Twitter: x.com/DavidMDrucker
David on Bluesky: bsky.app/profile/davidmdrucker.bsky.social
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Proud members of The Democracy Group
Clarity, charity, and conviction can live in the same room.

62% of Trump voters say being MAGA is not an important part of their identity. So who, exactly, did we just elect?
Stephen Hawkins has been trying to answer that question with data for nearly a decade. As Director of Research at More in Common since its founding in 2016, he helped author the landmark Hidden Tribes study and now leads the Beyond MAGA project, the most comprehensive look yet at the psychology of the 77 million Americans who voted for Donald Trump in 2024.
In this conversation, Corey and Stephen dig into the four distinct types of Trump voters, the emergent phenomenon of "traditionalism" among Gen Z, the widening gap between MAGA hard-liners and the reluctant right, and what any of this means for a country that our guest describes as feeling "pre-hot conflict." Stephen brings the rigor of a public opinion researcher and the perspective of someone who has lived, worked, and changed his mind on both sides of America's ideological divide.
This is not a conversation about demonizing Trump voters or excusing them. It is about understanding them, and about what that understanding demands of the rest of us.
Calls to Action
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Key Takeaways
Coalition, Not Cult. The Beyond MAGA study surveyed nearly 11,000 Trump voters and found four distinct segments: MAGA Hard-liners (29%), Anti-Woke Conservatives (21%), Mainline Republicans (30%), and the Reluctant Right (20%). Three out of five Trump voters say being MAGA is not a central part of their identity.
The Exhausted Majority Under Pressure. Stephen expects Hidden Tribes 2.0 to show the wings have grown, not shrunk. The exhausted majority may be moving from exhaustion toward something closer to despair.
New Traditionalism and the Logic of Transgression. Among younger Trump voters, traditional or religious identity functions as a form of rebellion in a secular culture. For some Gen Z voters, Christianity is more countercultural than secularism. Supporting Trump taps the same energy as defying the teacher everyone dislikes.
The Respect Gap. 84% of Trump voters feel respected by Trump. Only 21% feel respected by Democratic politicians. That 63-point gap is why even reluctant Trump voters are unlikely to migrate to the other party, regardless of policy grievances.
No Inflection Points. The Epstein files, Greenland threats, Medicare subsidy rollbacks, military actions in Venezuela and Iran: none of them meaningfully moved Trump voter support. Reconsideration is happening among those who were already hesitant, not among convinced supporters.
Stories, Values, Listen. Corey and Stephen both land on the same framework for better cross-divide conversation: surface the other person's story, understand their underlying value system (not just their policy positions), and listen with genuine curiosity rather than loading up your rebuttal.
The Case for Clarity. More in Common is nonpartisan and does not have electoral ambitions, but Stephen does not mince words: the country feels pre-hot-conflict, and what it needs is not more outrage but more precision about who is actually out there and what they believe.
About Our Guest
Stephen Hawkins is Director of Research at More in Common, a nonpartisan organization working to understand and address the forces driving political division in nine countries. He has overseen the organization's research since its founding in 2016, including the landmark 2018 Hidden Tribes study and the 2026 Beyond MAGA project. Prior to More in Common, Stephen conducted public opinion research for Fortune 100 companies, United Nations agencies, electoral campaigns, and political movements. He has appeared on C-SPAN's Washington Journal and regularly on Colorado Matters. He holds a master's in public policy from Harvard's Kennedy School and a B.A. in political science and international affairs from George Washington University's Elliott School.
Links and Resources
Beyond MAGA report: beyondmaga.us
More in Common on Substack: moreincommon.substack.com
More in Common: moreincommonus.com
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Proud members of The Democracy Group
Now go talk some politics and religion with gentleness and respect.

What does it look like to grow up in a city running power cords between neighbors' houses just to stay warm — and then spend your career trying to rebuild that ethic everywhere else?
Fred Riley is the Executive Director of Weave: The Social Fabric Project at the Aspen Institute, where he leads a national effort to fund, highlight, and connect the grassroots leaders who are stitching communities back together. Fred grew up in Saginaw, Michigan, shaped by a mother who "kneaded the dough" of her kids like bread — and by teachers, pastors, and neighbors who saw something worth nurturing. That formation is the whole story of why Weave exists, and why Fred is the right person running it.
This conversation goes deep: from the Baltimore neighborhood that got a symphony performance because one woman cleaned out a vacant lot, to the moment Fred lived for months with his boxes packed — because he wasn't planning to stay. And somehow it circles back to why, at the end of the day, the most radical thing any of us can do is knock on a neighbor's door.
Calls to Action
✅ If this conversation resonates, consider sharing it with someone who believes connection across difference still matters.
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✅ Watch the full conversation and subscribe on YouTube: youtube.com/@politicsandreligion
Key Takeaways
Weave the Social Fabric Project: Founded by David Brooks at the Aspen Institute, Weave identifies and resources "weavers" — people living counter-culturally in their communities by showing up for neighbors, organizing mutual aid, and building trust where it's been lost.
Connected Service: Not volunteering for a community, but with one. Repetitive, in-person, relational — the kind of service that actually builds bonds rather than just checking a box.
The Trust Map: Weave's tool at trustmap.org lets you find your community's trust score and connect to stories and resources that can help shift it.
The Whole-Self Prerequisite: You can't show up for a community when you're not whole yourself. Fred's personal journey — weight, identity, a period of planning to end his life — is inseparable from the conviction he brings to this work.
Cement the Relationship First: Fred's answer to the TP&R question: don't go in leading with politics. Find the shared humanity first. If the relationship is solid enough, the disagreements become manageable — or irrelevant.
See People as Kids in Adult Clothes: A framework from Fred's own therapy: if you can picture the childhood behind someone's adult behavior, you unlock a level of empathy that makes even hard conversations possible.
About Our Guest
Fred Riley is the Executive Director of Weave: The Social Fabric Project at the Aspen Institute. He previously served as Chief Advancement Officer for the YMCA of Greater Cincinnati and built his career in youth development and community organizing. He lives in Washington, D.C.
Links and Resources
Fred Riley / Weave
Weave: The Social Fabric Project: weavers.org
Trust Map: trustmap.org
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Meza Wealth Management: mezawealth.com
Proud members of The Democracy Group
Clarity, charity, and conviction can live in the same room.

What do you actually mean when you say the Pledge of Allegiance? And are you still willing to mean it?
For years, Corey stood in silence during the Pledge of Allegiance, troubled by what looked too much like idol worship. Then something shifted. Reading the words instead of performing them, he realized the pledge was never about the flag or the man holding the office. It was about the republic for which it stands. In a moment when that republic is under genuine pressure, this episode is about the difference between supporting a policy and cheering the dismantling of the constitutional constraints that govern how it gets carried out. Those are not the same thing, and the confusion between them is where democracies go wrong.
Calls to Action
✅ If this conversation resonates, consider sharing it with someone who believes connection across difference still matters.
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Key Takeaways
Republic, Not Ruler: The Pledge of Allegiance is a pledge to a constitutional order, not to a flag, a party, or a person. Reading those words carefully changes everything about what it means to say them.
Policy vs. Method: You can support stronger border enforcement and still insist on due process. You can back economic protectionism and still insist Congress holds the commerce power. Supporting a goal is not a blank check for any method of achieving it.
Article I Is Not Ambiguous: The Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to declare war and regulate commerce with foreign nations. This isn't interpretation. It's the plain text, and conservative and liberal scholars alike have been raising the alarm for years.
The Gap Is Real: Trump won with just under 51% of the vote. His approval is now below 40%. That gap consists of real people who voted for a sane border policy and lower grocery prices, and are now watching something different. They are not the same people as those applauding masked agents conducting raids with minimal judicial oversight.
Authoritarianism Begins with Exceptions: It doesn't begin with troops in the streets. It begins when citizens decide constitutional limits are optional when the right person is in charge. That logic, extended to the next administration, is what's actually on the table.
Jonathan Rauch Said the Word: One of the most careful, fair-minded political thinkers in America, someone who literally wrote the book defending free inquiry from both the left and the right, used the word "fascism" for the first time after concluding the resemblances had become too many and too strong to deny. The question isn't whether he went too far. The question is why so many others are still hesitating.
A Declaration, Not a Reflex: What was once a civic ritual has become something else. Saying those words in a moment when the republic is under pressure is not nationalism. It's resistance.
Links and Resources
David French (referenced)
Constitutional scholar, First Amendment advocate, columnist - www.nytimes.com/2026/03/01/opinion/trump-iran-congress-approval.html
Jonathan Rauch (referenced)
Kindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free Thought — press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/K/bo18140749.html
Yes, It's Fascism - www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/01/america-fascism-trump-maga-ice/685751/
Justice Neil Gorsuch (referenced)
Concurrence in the recent tariff case, arguing for the constitutional role of Congress as deliberative body - www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/24-1287#writing-24-1287_CONCUR_5
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Proud members of The Democracy Group
Clarity, charity, and conviction can live in the same room.

What does it look like to spend 25 years covering a story you wish you could stop covering — and still refuse to despair?
Gustavo Arellano is an LA Times columnist, Pulitzer Prize finalist, and the son of two Mexican immigrants. In this conversation he covers the Trump deportation machine, Rancho Libertarianism, why Americans hate Mexicans but love Mexican food, and what it actually looks like to stay in relationship across political difference.
Calls to Action
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✅ Watch the full conversation and subscribe on YouTube: youtube.com/@politicsandreligion
 
Key Takeaways
The Deportation Leviathan: This isn’t about policy logic or net fiscal impact. It’s demonization as strategy, funded for decades, borrowed from California’s Prop 187 playbook.
Agents of Their Own Lives: Undocumented people are not a pitiful mass. They are individuals who make this country better. Framing them as victims does them a disservice.
Rancho Libertarianism: The political identity Gustavo coined for Mexican hill-country values: bootstrap mentality, community pride, distrust of government, refusal to be used by either party. It explains a lot about 2024.
Latinos Are Not a Monolith: Every community on his 3,000-mile pre-election road trip had its own story. None of it reducible to a single bloc.
You Eat Their Food, You Start to See Them: Mexican food as cultural bridge. The problem with Chipotle is that it’s a burrito gentrifier, displacing local traditions it doesn’t care about.
Stay in the Friendships: A Trump-supporting friend promised to take up guns for Gustavo if ICE came for him. Gustavo told him to start carrying his passport, “because you’re darker than me.” The friend responded with a thumbs up. That, Gustavo says, was a victory.
These Are Also the Best of Times: During Operation Wetback in the 1950s, the only people fighting back were communists. Today the resistance is broader than anything this country has seen on this issue.
About Our Guest
Gustavo Arellano is a columnist for the Los Angeles Times and the author of Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America. He was a finalist for the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in commentary and part of the team that won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in breaking news. The son of two Mexican immigrants, he has covered immigration, Latino politics, and the American Southwest for 25 years.
Links and Resources
Gustavo Arellano
Newsletter (free, weekly): gustavoarellano.org
LA Times: latimes.com/people/gustavo-arellano
 
“Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)” (referenced at 00:26:00)
Woody Guthrie’s song about the 1948 crash that killed 28 Mexican farmworkers. ICE’s January 2025 post calling the victims “illegal Mexican aliens” is what sent Gustavo to write about it.
Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam (referenced at 00:57:00)
On declining social capital. Gustavo’s prescription: join things, meet people, touch grass.
Born in East LA (1987, referenced at 00:15:00)
Cheech Marin’s satirical classic. Gustavo’s conversation about it with David Chang is what put it on Corey’s radar.
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Thanks to Pew Research Center for making today’s conversation possible.
Links and additional resources:
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The Village Square: villagesquare.us
Meza Wealth Management: mezawealth.com
Proud members of The Democracy Group
Clarity, charity, and conviction can live in the same room.