Don’t Give Up on America Yet
An "The Drive Home" conversation with Kristen Kavanaugh
Excited to share the latest episode of The Drive Home with Kristen Kavanaugh. It’s a conversation about working in high-performance organizations and experiencing/learning how institutions hold up under pressure — and how they don't. The pattern I've seen repeat across decades and institutions is that trust doesn't disappear all at once. It erodes through the accumulation of small distances between what leaders say and what they actually do. At some point, the distance becomes structural, and we talk about it — honestly, without the usual reassurances.
One of the most actionable things from my conversation with Kristen is something I’ll say again here: define your red lines before the pressure arrives. The leaders who haven’t done that are the ones who end up most compromised when events accelerate.
That’s one thread in a larger conversation about what strategic literacy and civic engagement actually require — specifically, what it requires of people who understand what’s at stake and are trying to figure out how to stay in. We covered what accountability demands of institutions that want to rebuild trust and what it demands of citizens who want to hold them accountable.
The episode is called “Don’t Give Up on America Yet.” It’s a conversation I’d want every Reconnecting the Republic reader to hear.
Listen:
Don’t Give Up on America Yet: A Former Pentagon Insider’s Case for Hope with Tony Johnson
— Tony Johnson | Reconnecting the Republic
#StrategicLiteracy #ReconnectingTheRepublic #Democracy #CivicEngagement #Leadership