[TLDR: Pivot and Gaslight]
I listened to Waking Up Podcast #123 — Identity & Honesty | Sam Harris and I can't recommend it unless you want to hear two people talking past one another.I did not know Ezra Klein very well head of listening to this podcast but I found him to be smug and evasive... and also well-rehearsed. He barely answered anything directly but was really quick pivot and make his own tangentially related point. And I was impressed with how little it costs for him to say how he “…just talked to so-and-so just a couple days ago…” any time a name was mentioned.
Instant credibility!
Overall, I was bothered on a subconscious level by his manner of engagement and it took me a while understand the nature of the crime... to fully grasp that his entire tactic can be analogized to the following:
"I'm not an alcoholic! If anything, you're the alcoholic!"
(me: but I don't even drink!)
Sam says Klein is operating from a notion of identity politics? Klein says Sam is also operating on identity politics.
And... It's a pretty slick maneuver to be able to smear Murray as a racist and then to tell Sam Harris that he has a blind spot because he's an "Anti-Anti-Racist". Seriously... WTF is that? A false dichotomy, I think.
gas·light
/ˈɡaslīt/
verb
manipulate (someone) by psychological means into questioning their own sanity.
Harris would do well not to invite gaslighters like Klein onto the show and I fully support him choosing not to talk to T. Coates for exactly the same reasons. You can only hope to talk past a gaslighter because playing by their rules is a no-win situation. (Heads, racist... Tails anti-anti-racist).