Making the Case for Liberalism Without Apology: A Video Roundup

Our late-October collection of clips

Oct 24, 2026

U.S. President Donald Trump (Creative Commons / *The UnPopulist*)

Dear Readers:

Saturday is roundup day, and this week’s video roundup has a lot to offer. We open with The New York Times’ Ezra Klein, one of the most influential voices in American politics today, laying out his three ingredients of liberalism during his closing fireside keynote with Danielle Allen at LibCon2026. The full conversation (video + transcript) is here.

Also in this roundup is our editor-in-chief, Shikha Dalmia, who joined liberal YouTuber Ryan Geddie on his show and made a sharp case for why it is absolutely critical for liberals to win the battle of narratives against the populists. At a time when liberals face intense pressure to borrow from the populist playbook, Dalmia warns that they must resist, because populism is antithetical to liberalism.

Next is a clip featuring our own Berny Belvedere and The Argument’s Jeremiah Johnson from this week’s episode of The UnPopulist Live. Johnson had just debunked a recent story about Russian bots, and Belvedere noted that while Russian interference in our elections is real, Russia isn’t responsible for America’s political dysfunction. Trump is a different matter, the two agreed: he is both a product of our broken politics and a major driver of it.

We also have a selection from exiled Hong Kong democracy advocate Nathan Law’s deeply moving LibCon2026 dinner keynote, in which he tells the story of his father learning to swim so he could escape Mao’s China. The full keynote, with an intro from Belvedere, is here.

Finally, as a bonus, a preview of tomorrow’s excellent Zooming In episode, guest-hosted by Brookings’ Jonathan Rauch with Alexandre Lefebvre, author of the wonderfully readable Liberalism as a Way of Life. In this clip, Rauch explains why he’s had it up to here with the liberal apology tour (a theme he has explored in our pages before).

Enjoy—and don’t forget to share these clips far and wide!