When war broke out in his hometown of Sarajevo, Aleksandar Hemon turned what was supposed to be a brief stay in Chicago into an entirely new life — and went on to become a National Book Award finalist, a regular contributor to the New Yorker, and a professor at Princeton University. Now, though, Hemon has also become a political Cassandra, warning in stark terms that he sees the US sliding toward an outbreak of political violence akin to the eruptions that destroyed Yugoslavia.

In this episode, Adam Reilly talks with Hemon about the parallels he sees between Yugoslavia then and the US today. First, though, Peter Kadzis ponders Andrea Campbell’s newly announced candidacy for mayor of Boston, and how the politics of racial and ethnic identity will play out as Campell and Michelle Wu vie to become Boston’s first mayor of color.