Can The Senate SAVE America? An Interview With: Ira Shapiro

Progressive Matters: Education Through Conversation

In two previous highly regarded books on the U.S. Senate, Ira Shapiro chronicled the institution from its apogee in the 1970s through its decline in the decades since. Now, Shapiro turns his gaze to how the Senate responded to the challenges posed by the Trump administration and its prospects under President Biden. The Founding Fathers gave the US Senate many functions, but it had one fundamental responsibility—its raison d’etre: to provide the check against a dangerous president who threatened our democracy. Two hundred and thirty years later, when Donald Trump, a potential authoritarian, finally reached the White House, the Senate should have served as both America’s first and last lines of defense. Instead, we had the nightmare scenario: today’s Senate, reduced through a long period of decline to a hyper-partisan, gridlocked shadow of its former self, was unable to meet its fundamental responsibility.
Buy the book:
https://www.amazon.com/Betrayal-McConnell-Republicans-Abandoned-America/dp/1538163977
Ira Shapiro:
Ira Shapiro is a Senior Advisor with ASG’s East Asia & Pacific practice, where he assists clients in formulating trade and investment strategies in Japan, across Asia, and globally. A specialist in trade law and policy, he has extensive experience serving clients in and from Japan. Mr. Shapiro was Chairman of the National Association of Japan-America Societies (NAJAS) from 2012-2017 and was one of a handful of Americans who received Commendation from then-Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida for his work to advance the friendship between the U.S. and Japan.
Ambassador Shapiro served as Chief U.S. Trade Negotiator with Japan and Canada and as General Counsel in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative during the Clinton administration. In these roles, he was centrally involved in completing the negotiations of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the multilateral Uruguay Round and successfully resolved contentious bilateral disputes between the U.S. and Japan on automobiles and semiconductors.
As a partner at a leading global law firm, Mr. Shapiro advised clients on international trade matters, market access, and intellectual property rights. He also played a key role in the legal team that won two landmark victories in World Trade Organization cases against China, representing the U.S. motion picture, recording, and publishing industries.
A veteran of U.S. politics, Mr. Shapiro served twelve years in senior staff positions in the U.S. Senate and was part of the legal teams that helped the Democratic presidential candidates select their vice-presidential running mates in 1992 and 2000. Mr. Shapiro is the author of three critically acclaimed narrative histories of the U.S. Senate, covering the period from the late 1970s to the present time. His articles about U.S. politics and international trade have appeared in the New York Times, U.S. Today, Nikkei Asian Review, Bloomberg, The Hill, Washington Monthly, and other publications.
He holds a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, an M.A. in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley, and a B.A. in politics from Brandeis University. #podcast #interview #politics
Mr. Shapiro is based in Washington, D.C.
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