There’s a lot to talk about: the State of the Union address, Kanye, the future of Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine. We try to get to it all on this episode of KK&F. And we’re helped by our special guest, Matt Duss, a foreign policy expert who’s worked with Bernie Sanders and can provide insight into the conflict at the front of our minds.

Watching jeen-yuhs, the documentary capturing the life of rap icon Kanye West, gave us the opportunity to reflect on how consumer culture fetishizes individual brilliance and celebrity — at the expense of mental health, privacy, and often safety. While the media is happy to exploit Kanye’s most personal or difficult moments for entertainment value, as Kyle argues, it’s not just the person behind the celebrity who gets hurt, but also those closest to him. Our society has taken a rightfully critical look at media treatment of early-aughts stars like Britney Spears, who lost freedom and privacy as their lives were treated as tabloid fodder. Now, we’re left wondering who’s enabling Kanye’s current struggles, and doubting that they have his best interests in mind.

Then it’s time for us to dig into foreign policy with Matt Duss. We consider the imperialist ambitions driving Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, compare the rollout of Putin’s war to his expectations, and take a look at the resistance that is unfolding on Russian soil. After over fifteen hundred Russian protesters were arrested this past weekend, with many more lining the streets in the past week, it’s impossible to say that Putin is acting on behalf of the popular will. While Putin paints the invasion as his nationalist vision for the revival of a Russian empire, massive public resistance shows that it’s a vision the Russian people don’t share.

What comes next? Matt is wary of the calls to sanction, ramp up military action, and escalate the conflict — after all, so many of these calls are coming from the Beltway, where war hawks and defense contractors would love to see a World War III. To him, the question for this moment is “How do we protect human life most effectively?” That doesn’t mean plunging millions more people into financial destitution through sanctions, or creating a no-fly zone that will launch us into a much more dire situation. Instead, the moment for diplomatic discussion and resolution is here. We hope that the most will be made of it.