Air Date 12/20/2024

There's no denying that things are about to get bad, Trump and company have had years to prepare  for their next turn in office, but those preparing to resist also have the benefit of past experience resulting in a response to Trumpism that looks very different this time around.

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KEY POINTS

KP 1: The Shallow, Power-Flattering Appeal of High Status #Resistance Historians - Citations Needed - Air Date 12-3-24

KP 2: Can Trump Really End Birthright Citizenship? - Boom! Lawyered - Air Date 12-12-24

KP 3: Rep. Delia Ramirez- Trump's Immigration Plans Are -Un-American, Unconstitutional & Undemocratic - Democracy Now! - Air Table 12-11-24

KP 4: Can Trump Really End Birthright Citizenship? Part 2 - Boom! Lawyered - Air Date 12-12-24

KP 5: Centrists Signal Capitulation After Trump's Victory - The Majority Report - Air Date 12-16-24

KP 6: Trumps Rage at FBI Takes Dark Turn as GOPers Signal They Wont Resist - The Daily Blast - Air Date 12-13-24

(53:43) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

On the importance of scheduled maintenance for democracy

Reference article: 

Reviving the American Tradition of Fusion Voting

DEEPER DIVES

(1:00:59) SECTION A - IMMIGRATION INTIMIDATION

(1:19:46) SECTION B - BENDING THE KNEE

(1:40:16) SECTION C - RESISTANCE

SHOW IMAGE

Description: Composite image of Trump with his arm out admiring a lit match in his hand in front of a burning U.S. Constitution.

Credit: Composite design by A. Hoffman using multiple images from Pixabay | License: Pixabay

Air Date 12/17/2024

Changing the direction of a political party doesn't happen overnight and it usually takes a major disrupting event to shake it out of its well-wore groove. The loss of the Harris campaign to Trump and the evident desperation people have for a new economics that works for people might finally be enough to put Democrats on track to a more full-throated support of economic populism.

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KEY POINTS

KP 1: Jon Stewart On What Went Wrong For Democrats - The Daily Show - Air Date 11-11-24

KP 2: The Democratic Party Is A Rudderless Ship - The Majority Report w/ Sam Seder - Air Date 11-21-24

KP 3: ‘BERNIE WAS RIGHT!’: Corporate Democrat ADMITS DEFEAT - The Kyle Kulinski Show - Air Date 11-18-24

KP 4: Assad Ousted From Syria - The Muckrake Political Podcast - Air Date 12-10-24

KP 5: Can Ben Wikler Fix The Democratic Party? - The Majority Report w/ Sam Seder - Air Date 12-4-24

KP 6: “Get These Incels to Work” (feat. Hasan Piker) Part 1 - Pod Save America - Air Date 11-27-24

(49:33) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

On the Democrats perception gap and Ben Wikler for the DNC

DEEPER DIVES

(1:00:11) SECTION A - WHY DEMOCRATS LOST

(1:32:40) SECTION B - TIME TO FIGHT

(1:56:05) SECTION C - MOVING FORWARD

SHOW IMAGE

Description: Photo of billionaire Mark Cuban speaking into a microphone at a Harris Walz campaign event.

Credit: “Mark Cuban” by Gage Skidmore, Flickr | License: CC BY-SA 2.0 | Changes: Cropped

Produced by Jay! Tomlinson

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Air Date: 12-15-24 Today, Jay!, Amanda, and Deon (Erin was missed) discuss: - Why many people want a village, but most don't act like they do - Some proposed solutions to loneliness and building community - How politicians on both sides lack vision on how to improve peoples lives

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REFERENCES: I’m Starting to Think You Guys Don’t Really Want a “Village”

Stephanie Harrison - The New Happy: To build the communities that we long for, we must change our worldview

Stephanie Harrison - The New Happy: How to stop being lonely

Americans Are Hoarding Their Friends

On Family Policy, Neither Party Has a Vision of the Good Life

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Produced by: Jay! Tomlinson Thanks for listening! Visit us at BestOfTheLeft.com Follow at Twitter.com/BestOfTheLeft Like at Facebook.com/BestOfTheLeft  Contact me directly at [email protected]  Review the show on Apple Podcasts!

Air Date 12/13/2024

The most important thing to understand about authoritarian and dictatorial governance is that it is neither efficient nor competent, contrary to the myth. The problem lies with the need to hire people based on their unquestioning loyalty rather than any kind of demonstrated ability to do the jobs they're tasked with. The results are, unsurprisingly, chaos.

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KEY POINTS

KP 1: Fight Trump With Everything You Have! Shocking Warning From Hungarian Democracy Movement - Thom Hartmann Program - Air Date 11-25-24

KP 2: MAGA 2.0 w Quinn Slobodian & Wendy Brown - The Dig - Air Date 11-29-24

KP 3: A Slew Of A$$hole Nominations...- The Muckrake Political Podcast - Air Date 11-15-24

KP 4: What Pete Hegseth Has Said About Civil War and Whiteness - Brian Lehrer: A Daily Politics Podcast - Air Date 11-27-24

KP 5: Trump goes off the deep end with Cabinet pick - No Lie w Brian Tyler Cohen - Air Date 12-1-24

KP 6: The Trump Trials... Cases Closed - Americast - Air Date 11-29-24

KP 7: MAGA 2.0 w Quinn Slobodian & Wendy Brown - The Dig - Air Date 11-29-24

(54:37) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

On why it's important to stay engaged

Don’t Let Donald Trump Drive You Into Internal Exile - NYTimes

DEEPER DIVES

(58:44) SECTION A: THE LINEUP

(1:27:56) SECTION B: THE PLAYBOOK

(1:52:28) SECTION C: GLOBAL REFERENCE

(2:12:50) SECTION D: CRACKS IN AUTHORITY

SHOW IMAGE

Description: Composite graphic of Trump giving the double thumbs up over black silhouettes of people in suits with the clown face emoji on their heads and “MAGA” on their chests.

Credit: Composite design by A. Hoffman. Various images via Pixabay.

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Air Date: 12-12-24 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon and Erin discuss: - What the orcas are up to  - Confronting the truth about eating meat  - How to not let grief destroy leftist movements - Living a better life by accepting our own mortality

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REFERENCES:

Confessions of a Former Carnivore

For Our Movements to Win, We Must Learn How Not to Let Our Grief Destroy Us

You Are Going to Die

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Produced by: Jay! Tomlinson Thanks for listening! Visit us at BestOfTheLeft.com Follow at Twitter.com/BestOfTheLeft Like at Facebook.com/BestOfTheLeft  Contact me directly at [email protected]  Review the show on Apple Podcasts!

Air Date 12/10/2024

In a moment of darkness, it's important to not only look for light but also understand how to create your own. Today we're exploring the philosophy of Tragic Optimism, the differing frameworks of freedom-from and freedom-to, and the slow progress of democracy but also the organizing strategies that are themselves the best coping mechanisms and path to progress.

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KEY POINTS

KP 1: The Tragic Optimist's Guide to Surviving Capitalistic Nihilism - Dasia Sade Part 1 - Air Date 11-29-24

KP 2: Where Do We Go From Here? Featuring Kali Akuno - Millennials Are Killing Capitalism - Air Date 11-10-24

KP 3: How To Fight Fascism In America - Why, America? with Leeja Miller - Air Date 11-20-24

KP 4: Timothy Snyder: Is Freedom Misunderstood? - The Agenda - Air Date 10-9-24

KP 5: Neoliberalism Borrowed From Lenin, Why Can’t We? - Unf*cking The Republic - Air Date 11-22-24

KP 6: The Tragic Optimist's Guide to Surviving Capitalistic Nihilism - Dasia Sade Part 2 - Air Date 11-29-24

(49:55) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

On holiday memberships

DEEPER DIVES

(52:31) SECTION A - ORGANZING

A1: Organizing in Rural America (w/ Luke Mayville) - Know Your Enemy - Air Date 11-27-24

A2: The Quest for the Offline Left with Cecilia Guerrero: Organizing the South - Fucking Cancelled - Air Date 11-3-24

(1:11:16) SECTION B - COPING

MUSIC (Blue Dot Sessions)

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Original Air Date: 11/29/2023

The movement for universal health care is still underway, though it rarely gets recognized in mainstream discourse. The murder of United Health Care CEO Brian Thompson is an occasion worth using to look at the progress being made to improve our system of promoting the health of all people in the United States as well as efforts to rein in the power of big Pharma that's used to gouge the American people with exorbitant prices. So, that's what we're doing.

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SHOW NOTES

Ch. 1: Healthcare Activist Ady Barkan Dies of ALS; Watch His 2021 Interview on Demanding Medicare for All - Democracy Now! - Air Date 11-27-23

Healthcare activist Ady Barkan has died at the age of 39 of the neurodegenerative disease ALS. His story is told in the documentary Not Going Quietly. In 2021, Democracy Now! spoke with Ady Barkan just ahead of the film’s premiere.

Ch. 2: Why your health insurance is tied to work - The Weeds - Air Date 10-18-23

The wartime policy that changed health insurance forever

Ch. 3: Rethinking the path to winning single payer - Code WACK! - Air Date 4-10-23

Winning Medicare for All in the U.S. may be at a standstill at the federal level, but it's a different story In the states. In 2021 alone, 18 single-payer bills were introduced in states such as Massachusetts, New York, Colorado, and Oregon.

Ch. 4: How Can This Predatory Exploitation Be Considered Health Care - Thom Hartmann Program - Air Date 11-15-23

If Medicare Advantage, the profit-driven entity that is decidedly NOT part of REAL Medicare, could be summed up in three words, they might be: deny, deny, deny.

Ch. 5: Biden vs. Big Pharma Medicare to Begin Negotiations to Lower Price of 10 Costly Drugs & Insulin - Democracy Now! - Air Date 8-30-23

Peter Maybarduk joins us to discuss how the new negotiation process aims to break up drug monopolies and disband the pharmaceutical industry’s profit incentive.

Ch. 6: Inequality Undermines Health & Healthcare in the U.S. - Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff - Air Date 11-14-23

Ch. 7: Big Pharma Explained Why Are Meds So Expensive [& The Solution] - The Laura Flanders Show - Air Date 6-12-23

Ch. 8: The Challenge of Caring for Our Elders - The Brian Lehrer Show - Air Date 11-15-23

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Air Date: 12-6-24 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon and Erin discuss: - The political origins of SimCity and how capitalism warps our choices - A new video game offering a very different vision of societal management - Naomi Klein's insights on the Left's missteps responding to the Mirror World - Applying cynicism and skepticism in moderation

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REFERENCES: SimCity Isn’t a Model of Reality. It’s a Libertarian Toy Land

Build-a-Brrr

Naomi Klein on her doppelganger (and yours)

Be Like Claud Cockburn: Tell Truths to the Masses

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Air Date 12/3/2024

At a time when there are very legitimate concerns about men's place in society, the Manosphere has stepped in to fill the gap in the cultural discussion to give an answer, not a good answer but an answer, to young men about modern masculinity which included a strong push to vote Trump.

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KEY POINTS

KP 1: The Role of the Press in This Moment with Matt Pearce - Why Is This Happening - Air Date 11-19-24

KP 2: The #MenToo Election Catholics, Latinos, and the Manosphere - Straight White American Jesus - Air Date 11-11-24

KP 3: Inside Elon's Twitter Takeover with Ryan Mac and Kate Conger - Factually! with Adam Conover - Air Date 11-13-24

KP 4: The #MenToo Election Catholics, Latinos, and the Manosphere Part 2 - Straight White American Jesus - Air Date 11-11-24

KP 5: Make America Male Again Fifteen years of aggrieved men - It's Been a Minute - Air Date 11-19-24

KP 6: Misinformation, Disinformation, Malinformation ( Feat Esosa Osa)- Gettin' Grown - Air Date 11-12-24

KP 7: How the Fediverse can make social fun again - WordPress - Air Date 8-12-24

(56:23) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

On the slow process of fixing our broken internet

DEEPER DIVES

(1:02:00) SECTION A - MEDIA LANDSCAPE

(1:22:06) SECTION B - MEN ARE NOT OKAY

(1:52:03) SECTION C - WHAT WE CAN DO

SHOW IMAGE

Description: Photo of the back of a young man standing on a subway platform putting headphones on as a silver train whizzes past.

Credit: “People guy man sound music” by StockSnap, Pixabay | License: Pixabay

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Air Date 11/29/2024

Today’s episode is a remix of a 5-part series of episodes we did several years ago about telling native stories beyond what the US tends to share about its history. The series stretched all the way from Columbus to modern day and today we’re sharing the highlights reel of what stuck out to us looking back.

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Ch 1: Historian Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz on Thanksgiving: "It Has Never Been About Honoring Native Americans" - @DemocracyNow - Air Date: 11-29-16

Ch 2: American expansion and violence against Native Americans - @BackStory - Air Date: 01-19-2018

Ch 3: The legal structures that uphold violence against Indigenous people #MMIW - Let's Talk Native... with John Kane - Air Date 2-14-19

Ch 4: Doctrine of Christian Discovery Part 1 - Let’s Talk Native - Air Date 3-18-19

Ch 5: Beyond Tragedy: The Living History of Native America - Ideas from CBC Radio - Air Date 2-20-19

Ch 6: Hawaiian Indigeneity and the theft of Aloha with W. Gerry Ebalaroza - Breakdances With Wolves - Air Date 8-21-18

Ch 7: Confederacy Inc. Donald Trump, Racist Police, and the Whitewashing of History Part 1 - Intercepted with Jeremy Scahill - Air Date 7-1-20

Ch 8: Indigenous historian Nick Estes discusses the trivializing of native people - @Intercepted w @JeremyScahill - Air Date 10-23-18

Ch 9: Sexual Violence and Native American Genocide - @Making_Contact - Air Date 11-26-13

Ch 10: ’Reel' Indians and the invention of Hollywood Indian English - Backstory - Air Date 11-22-14

Ch 11: The moral narratives of colonization as relates to the Western Frontier and Israel - Citations Needed (@CitationsPod) - Air Date 8-22-17

Ch 12: Confederacy Inc. Donald Trump, Racist Police, and the Whitewashing of History Part 2 - Intercepted with Jeremy Scahill - Air Date 7-1-20

Ch 13: What we inherit: Explaining intergenerational trauma - Code Switch - Air Date 6-6-18

MORE CLIPS IN FULL SHOW NOTES

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Air Date 11/26/2024

In a world of infinite information but a finite amount of time to check your facts, we're living the logical conclusion of an online environment that favors false information over truth and the most popular online media reflects that reality perfectly.

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KEY POINTS

KP 1: Aaron Rodgers moment perfectly sums up how fake information spreads - All In with Chris Hayes - 11-14-24

KP 2: Why is everyone suddenly an expert? (Even when they’re not) - The Bunker - Air Date 5-20-24

KP 3: How Right-Wing Media Took Over America Part 1 - Why America? with Leeja Miller - Air Date 11-18-24

KP 4: The Manosphere Celebrates a Win. Plus, M. Gessen on How to Survive an Autocracy - On The Media - Air Date 11-8-24

KP 5: We DON'T need a LEFTIST Joe Rogan - The Kavernacle - Air Date 11-14-24

KP 6: Stop Having an "Open Mind" - Breaking In The Habit - Air Date 5-31-24

KP 7: Birds Aren’t Real? How a Conspiracy Takes Flight | Peter McIndoe - TED - Air Date 9-13-23

(49:25) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

On the nature of skepticism and open-mindedness

DEEPER DIVES

(55:48) SECTION A - THE JOE ROGAN EXPERIENCE AND THE MEDIA

(1:27:00) SECTION B - TRUST AND BELIEF

(1:53:40) SECTION C - CENTRISM

(2:23:47) SECTION D - ROOTS

SHOW IMAGE

Description: A graphic depicting a silhouette of the Thinking Man statue with a chaotic swarm of letters coming from the top of his head. The word “Heterodoxy” is written along the curve of his back.

Credit: Composite design by A. Hoffman | “thinker words thoughts mind white” image by Convegni_Ancisa via Pixabay (Pixabay license)

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