#1732 It's Never Just About the Kids (Online Censorship, Age Verification, and the Project 2025 Agenda)
Air Date: 8-24-2025
The nature of politics and public policy is that there's always a need to balance opposing interests. Almost nowhere is there a more intractable set of opposing interests than in the attempt to protect children from harmful content on the internet while maintaining free access to adults, particularly because people wildly disagree about what qualifies as harmful and what degree of privacy invasion is an acceptable tradeoff.
Read more#1731 Raw Power, the Presidency, the Courts, and Democracy in the Balance
Air Date: 8-20-2025
There's been a faction of conservatives who have been trying to instill king-like powers into the presidency for a long time, so it shouldn't be surprising that Trump is getting so much help from the packed court and the apparatchiks in the states who are more than happy to turn their precious federalism on its head as long as their king is in charge.
Read more#1730 The Axis of the Dark Personality Triad: Unfit Leaders and the Suffering They Cause
Air Date: 8-16-2025
There's the old Douglas Adams quote stating that, "Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job" which is a good general rule to live by. But then there are the real baddies, those would-be leaders who possess one or more of the dark triad of traits that spells real doom for the societies that elevate them to power: narcissism, psychopathy, and machiavellianism. Today we compare and contrast Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Benjamin Netanyahu. Xi Jinping also fits nicely on this list as an honorable mention but happens to not be part of the focus today.
Read more#1729 Monthly-ish Mix: Layers of Authoritarian Control and the Rising Resistance
Air Date: 8-12-2025
The Monthly-ish Mix™ is here to get you caught up on recent news without being overwhelming! This month, we're covering the full spectrum of authoritarian threats—military in the streets, surveillance in our phones, conspiracies in our feeds, and corruption at the top—before turning to the grassroots organizers and Democratic Socialists who are building the resistance and winning.
Read more#1728 The Lawfare Presidency: The Case of Trump v. Journalism
Air Date: 8-10-2025
Trump has been condemning the media for all of his professional life and is pretty open about doing it so that people won't believe the negative press he so richly deserves. Now, with the power of the presidency, he's turned his battle with the press into a protection racket complete with payoffs and side deals in an attempt to turn the media into pro-Trump propaganda.
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