My first We The Builders conversation with @thechrisbuskirk, Cofounder and Chief Investment Officer at @1789Capital and author of America and the Art of the Possible. Now available wherever you get your podcasts. We explore his investment thesis for American renewal: backing technological innovation, rebuilding industry, and creating the conditions for a thriving middle class. We discuss defense tech, China, political conviction, charter cities, and what the people at the top of society owe the country. What we cover: • Inside 1789 Capital: the ambition to build a multi-strategy asset manager and why Chris backed defense technology before it became a popular investment category. • Reindustrializing America: critical minerals, dependence on China, and why rebuilding manufacturing requires capital and supportive policy. • Politics and investing: whether alignment with an administration creates risk, and why Chris believes key parts of reindustrialization have bipartisan support. • Charter cities, aristocracy, and oligarchy: why Chris thinks building a new city may not be ambitious enough, and what distinguishes public-minded leadership from extraction. • The cultural conditions for progress: resisting excessive risk aversion, preserving the freedom to fail, and bringing people together around a meaningful purpose. TIMESTAMPS 00:00 Introducing Chris Buskirk 00:52 One project: renewing America 02:55 Why the middle class is the measure of national health 05:08 The master plan for 1789 Capital 06:35 A generational shift in asset management 08:45 Technological stagnation and the search for fundamental innovation 12:46 Investing in defense tech before it was popular 15:07 Rebuilding America’s manufacturing capacity 16:10 China, trade, and American industrial policy 19:12 Tariffs, critical minerals, and forcing China’s hand 20:32 Why reindustrialization needs more than venture capital 22:23 The risks of mixing politics and investing 25:38 Political conviction versus hedging your bets 26:15 Can reindustrialization survive a change in administration? 30:20 Deregulation and letting builders build 32:13 The case for charter cities 33:56 Why charter cities may not be ambitious enough 36:06 Brasília and the challenges of building new cities 39:05 Why cities need an economic reason to exist 41:34 Singapore and the modern city-state 42:25 Aristocracy versus oligarchy: who should lead? 45:28 Identifying talent and encouraging public responsibility 47:40 How stagnation creates a scarcity mindset 49:11 Exporting the American dream 53:26 Innovation, concentrated power, and national decline 56:25 Meritocracy, gatekeeping, and the cities that attract talent 58:44 How AI brought talent back to San Francisco 59:49 “Sociopathic risk aversion” and the freedom to fail 1:03:20 Rockbridge and the art of convening people 1:06:00 Why a gathering needs a meaningful purpose 1:08:14 Rituals, community, and serving the people you bring together 1:10:43 Chris’s favorite meal and fasting routine