Lincoln Mitchell Starts a New Project

Lincoln Mitchell is a political scientist and teaches at Columbia University. He has extensive experience in foreign policy and American politics. He’s also a lifelong baseball fan who has lived most of his life in New York or San Francisco.

Mitchell recently launched a Substack called Kibitzing with Lincoln. I got in touch with him to discuss his new project and more.

This interview has been edited lightly.

What does everybody need to know about Kibitzing with Lincoln?

Kibitzing with Lincoln is a Substack for people who want to read a progressive and analytically sharp take on some combination of politics, foreign policy, San Francisco and baseball. I have been writing books, opinion columns, blogs and policy articles about these topics for decades and am now bringing my work together in one place.

My writing is accessible but draws on a deep knowledge and study of politics, history and baseball. If you are interested in a perspective on housing, crime, punk rock or politics in San Francisco that goes beyond the positions of the tech ascendancy that dominates the local media there, of national politics that looks at the crisis of American democracy in a broader and sometimes global perspective or baseball that is grounded in a lifetime of watching, coaching, playing and reading about the game, then Kibitzing with Lincoln is a good fit for you.

Why did you decide to create a Substack account at this time?

There were two major reasons why I decided to create a Substack at this time. The first was a bigger-picture desire to have more control over what and when I write on various topics. For example, I have a deep interest in San Francisco and had been writing a regular column for The San Francisco Examiner. I liked writing there, but I was only contributing one column a month, so I was not able to write as much as I liked or have as much of an impact with that writing. Similarly, I frequently have ideas for columns and know my readers would be interested, but the pitch process is very time consuming and does not always work out.

The second reason was a more practical one. In the first months of 2023, two of the news outlets where I had regularly placed opinion columns experienced…