Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy

#1828 The Cornell 7 and How Rape Culture Runs on the Men Who Don't Rape Oct 14, 2026 04:12:13 Air Date: 10/13/2026 Today we look at rape culture as a system that contains far more than the crimes. This topic was prompted by the Cornell 7 story but it starts with little boys annoying girls and having it excused as affection, runs through the "nice guy" who treats kindness as a down payment, and ends with the false claim that men can't be expected to control their sexual urges. We're organiz

#861 More Reasons Than You Should Need to Oppose the Death Penalty (Throwback) Oct 10, 2026 54:47 Publish Date: 10-11-2026 Original Air Date: 9-16-2014 Today we dig through the archives to give context to the news that the Pentagon plans to execute the Fort Hood shooter by firing squad, the first U.S. military execution in more than 60 years. Full Show Notes BestOfTheLeft.com/Support Link in Bio - Everything in one place! (Support, contact, socials, books + merch) SHOW NOTES Ch. 1: Death Pen

#1827 Deep Cuts: Exxon Knew - The History Behind the Case to Make Polluters Pay Oct 7, 2026 03:29:04 Air Date: 10/7/2026 Today we trace the "Exxon Knew" story through a decade of our own archive, because that history is what the Supreme Court is weighing in Suncor v. Boulder in their first case this term. Exxon's scientists confirmed the climate science in the early eighties and the company chose to manufacture doubt. Communities like Boulder County have paid ever since and the question before th

#1826 The Mechanics of Complicity from Nazis to Newsrooms to Fandoms Oct 4, 2026 02:58:38 Air Date: 10/3/2026 Today we examine the mechanisms of complicity. We're not all complicit in the worst atrocities but we are complicit in something so it's good to know how it works. Good people go along with bad ideas and thoughtful people allow themselves to be thoughtless all the time. The reasons are often structural but they can be resisted on both the personal level and collectively. Full S

#1825 We Are Still the 99%: Occupy Wall Street's Unfinished Business, 15 Years Later Sep 29, 2026 04:27:42 Air Date: 9/30/2026 Today we look at the legacy of Occupy Wall Street, which was in full swing 15 years ago and changed how the country talks about inequality and the 1%. In the meantime, the cumulative wealth of the 1% in the US has roughly tripled and Trump has the wealthiest cabinet in history running the country, so the concerns expressed at Occupy have only come into sharper relief. This mini

#1824 The Next Gilded Age: AI Doomsday and the Insatiable Business Model https://www.bestoftheleft.com/1824 Sep 26, 2026 03:51:43 Air Date: 9/26/2026 Today we explore the layers of chaos surrounding the AI industry, including the idealistic nerds-turned-nazis, the grift, bubble, and doom-marketing business model, and what people are doing to fight back. Full Show Notes Transcript BestOfTheLeft.com/Support (Members Support and Get No Ads!) Everything in one place! (Support, contact, follow, books + merch) TOP TAKES KP 1: Do

Monthly-ish Mix #12 The Great American Heist Sep 23, 2026 03:22:03 Air Date: 9/22/2026 The Monthly-ish Mix™ is here to get you caught up on the news from July and August without being overwhelming! Organized around a single idea: ask who the system is for, and every story this summer gives the same answer. The administration rewrites the national story while libraries lose their funding. Corporations fence off ideas as private property. Latin America gets treated

#1823 Deep Cuts: Occupy Wall Street in Real Time, 15 Years Later Sep 19, 2026 03:30:39 Air Date: 9/18/2026 Today we're doing something new and different but also very old. Occupy Wall Street just hit its 15th anniversary this month and we thought we'd do something that only we can, which is dip into our archives and pull out the best of the Occupy coverage we played in real time as it was happening as well as some other retrospective coverage that aired 10 years later. Full Show Not

#1822 The State Media Playbook: The FCC and Billionaires Are Waging a War on the Free Press Sep 15, 2026 03:07:24 Air Date: 9/13/2026 Today we trace the two-front war on the American press. On one side, government regulators and members of Congress are going after news outlets for the stories they choose to run. On the other, politically friendly buyers are taking ownership of major networks to turn them into free-market versions of state media. Full Show Notes Transcript BestOfTheLeft.com/Support (Members Su

#1821 Election Sabotage, Voting System Vulnerabilities, and the Defense of the 2026 Midterms Sep 10, 2026 02:50:19 Air Date: 9/9/2026 Today we look at the strategies being deployed by the Trump administration and their enablers to undermine the midterm elections and what it actually takes to fight back. The lawyers fighting in court against the efforts to destroy our democracy are clear-eyed that you cannot litigate your way to a free election. The most durable defense is a turnout margin too large to plausibl

SOLVED! #39 - Why You Should Care About Prisons in the Fight for a Better World (Throwback) Sep 6, 2026 01:29:10 Re-Air Date: 8/5/26 Original Air Date: 4/24/26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch. 1 - Why victims of crime are underserved and actually prefer rehabilitative, root-case approaches to justice Ch. 2 - How cashless bail reform has shrunk jail populations and fueled momentum to block new jail construction Ch. 3 - The local fight over a proposed mega-prison in Arkansas making some c

#1820 Science and Public Health Under Attack by Our Own Government Sep 3, 2026 03:01:51 Air Date: 9/2/2026 Today we look at how public health is being gutted by a system that took ordinary parental worry and organized, radicalized and monetized it into an anti-science "wellness" movement large enough to seize real political power. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLeft.com

#1819 Coerced Sterilization, Abortion Bans, and the New Pronatalism: Who Controls American Reproduction (Transcript) Aug 31, 2026 03:25:57 Air Date: 8/29/2026 Today we examine what happens when the state wants to decide whether a person reproduces. A century ago, American courts sanctioned the forced sterilization of women deemed unfit to reproduce. 60 years ago, a communist dictator ran a pronatalist experiment with disastrous results. Now, abortion access is collapsing and a new pronatalist movement is rising to wreak havoc. Full S

#1818 Flock Cameras, ICE, and the Surveillance State Targeting Everyone Aug 26, 2026 03:26:47 Air Date: 8/25/2026 Today we explore the resistance to Flock cameras and mass surveillance as a whole. Communities across the country are voting to cancel their tracking-camera contracts, others are filing records requests to drag secret police deals into daylight, and some people stopped waiting and went out at night with wire cutters. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice

#1817 Worse on Purpose: Trump is Killing Our Response to the Climate Emergency Aug 22, 2026 03:31:44 Air Date: 8/22/2026 Today we look at how the Republican Party made climate denial its policy more than twenty years ago and is now removing the government's ability to see the problem at all. The Environmental Protection Agency under Bush refused to regulate carbon in 2003, and now the Trump administration is dismantling the science that would help us both avoid worsening the climate emergency and

#1816 IP'd to Death: How Intellectual Property Law Went from a Protection to a Weapon Aug 20, 2026 03:31:16 Air Date: 8/19/2026 Today we trace the corporate capture of ideas themselves. What began as a brief legal incentive granting fourteen years of exclusive rights to a creation has become a system that kept a pandemic vaccine from reaching poorer countries and where entertainment conglomerates and technology giants fence off and sell our own culture back to us. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of t

#1815 Sanctioned Ignorance: The Assault on Museums, Libraries, and American Memory Aug 16, 2026 03:14:12 Air Date: 8/16/2026 Today we look at what Toni Morrison called "sanctioned ignorance," the deliberate manufacture of a version of the past that keeps citizens from connecting the dots between what their government did then and what it's doing now. They're doing it by attacking museums, libraries, and everyone dedicated to ensuring that people have access to accurate information because that's what

#1814 Open Imperialism in Latin America: Trump Says the Whole Hemisphere Is His to Run Aug 13, 2026 03:11:19 Air Date: 8/12/2026 Today we follow the latest in Western Hemisphere imperialism. American presidents from Theodore Roosevelt to Donald Trump have invoked the Monroe Doctrine and its claim on the whole hemisphere to justify coups, sanctions, and now an outright military abduction in Latin America. Trump, as always, is bragging loudly about the parts most before him knew to keep quiet. Full Show No

#1813 Suffering is the Strategy: ICE, Mass Deportation, and Demographic Engineering Aug 9, 2026 03:32:28 Air Date: 8/8/2026 Today we examine the mass deportation machine that's been intentionally designed to inflict suffering, from the conditions inside immigration jails to the reckless actions of ICE agents, and the systematic dismantling of accountability. All of this in service of a blatant demographic engineering program to forcibly Whiten the country. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the sh

#1434 Confronting Climate Chaos Through Time (Throwback) Aug 5, 2026 01:06:43 Publish Date: 8-5-2026 Original Air Date: 8–13-2021 Today we dig through the archives to give context to the news of the 2021 IPCC report ringing the alarm bells for the climate crisis. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLeft.com BestOfTheLeft.com/Support (Members Get Bonus Shows + No Ads

#1812 Democracy or This Supreme Court, But Not Both Aug 2, 2026 02:58:22 Air Date: 8/1/2026 Today we investigate how the argument moved from what the Supreme Court decides to whether the Court should be rebuilt. Only about one in five Americans has strong confidence in the Court, and the proposals on the table would end lifetime seats, set fixed terms, and add judges across the federal bench. We're arguing that these reforms are necessary for a functioning democracy. F

#1811 Country for Old Men: Gerontocracy By Design and the Democracy Problem Jul 29, 2026 03:04:02 Air Date: 7/25/2026 Today we look at the idea that America has become a gerontocracy, a country run by the old, and then interrogate the premise a bit. The wealth, the politicians, and the voting electorate really do concentrate at the top of the age ladder, and benefits for the old tend to stay protected while younger people wait their turn. But several of our sources argue age is the wrong name

Monthly-ish Mix #11 The Loneliest Superpower: What America Gets for Pushing Everyone Away Jul 26, 2026 04:58:37 Air Date: 7/25/2026 The Monthly-ish Mix™ is here to get you caught up on the news from June and July without being overwhelming! Organized around a single idea: the same politics that left America friendless abroad is keeping Americans apart at home. The war with Iran ends and America's word counts for less around the world, so Europe starts building its own software instead of buying ours, NATO w

#1810 Post-American Europe: How to Lose Friends and Influence People to Protect Themselves Against You Jul 23, 2026 03:31:32 Air Date: 7/22/2026 Today we look at how three things Europe thought were features turned out to be leverage that could be held against them: American military protection, Silicon Valley software, and cheap Chinese goods. From a French government office running Linux to a secret European defense coalition that bypasses Washington, Europe is quietly swapping out the old architecture rather than dis

#1809 Democrats Seek a Blue Wave, Progressives Push Democratic Socialism, GOP Revive the Red Scare Jul 19, 2026 03:56:37 Air Date: 7/18/2026 Today we examine recent primary elections and how the political smear of crying 'socialism' has been dusted off and aimed at a new generation of candidates. What's changed is that the people being smeared are actually winning elections, and the more the establishment called them dangerous, the stronger their numbers got. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a v

#1634 Abortion as the Tip of the Iceberg (Throwback) Jul 15, 2026 02:21:13 Re-Air Date: 7-14-2026 Original Air Date: 6-7-2024 Banning abortion is wildly unpopular and also one of the primary motivators for the group most strongly supporting the Republican Party and Donald Trump, the Christian Right, which has transformed both the party and politicians into extremists made in their own image, threatening the lives and health of millions and sacrificing democracy in the pr

#1808 Billionaires vs. Democracy: They're Not Coming For Your Job, They're Coming For Your Government (And The Entire Economy) Jul 11, 2026 04:19:44 Air Date: 7/10/2026 Today we look at what it means to live in an economy that has quietly split in two with a soaring stock market driven by AI on one side, a collapsing job market on the other, and the subtle shift in the right to own things, from your music and movies to your car's software, which all underlie the slide toward technofeudalism. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leav

#1807 What the World Cup Exposes: Identity, Colonialism, and Racism in 2026 Jul 7, 2026 03:37:40 Air Date: 7/7/2026 Today we use the 2026 World Cup to pull everything that runs under the game up into the light. Nearly a quarter of the players are representing a country other than the one they were born in, praised as national heroes when they score but scorned as foreigners when they lose. The history of colonialism built the machinery that turns immigrants into targets, and the results are p

#1806 America at 250: The Declaration, the Constitution, and our Crisis of Democracy Jul 4, 2026 03:55:58 Air Date: 7/4/2026 Today we examine what America has celebrated for 250 years and what it keeps refusing to look at. The Declaration promised government by the consent of the governed, but the Constitution protected slavery, concentrated power in elites, and left the definition of "the people" deliberately vague. Every generation inherits that same unresolved contradiction and has to address it fo

#1805 Trump Giving Iran $300 Billion to End His Own War Jul 2, 2026 03:14:38 Air Date: 7/1/2026 Today we examine how four months of American bombardment accomplished what decades of diplomacy never could, making Iran, still run by oppressive theocrats, a regional superpower. An Iranian woman told a reporter she endured the bombing hoping it would topple the regime. Instead, it entrenched it. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us

#1804 Elon Musk, the First Trillionaire, and the Broken System That Made Him Jun 28, 2026 03:49:05 Air Date: 6/27/2026 Today we trace how one man went from receiving a $278 million government grant to becoming the world's first trillionaire who spent .025% of his wealth to get Trump elected, then used his position to slash programs that help people while stoking race riots overseas. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoft

#1803 Monthly-ish Mix: Manufactured Legitimacy and the Fight to Reclaim It Jun 25, 2026 04:38:55 Air Date: 6/24/2026 The Monthly-ish Mix™ is here to get you caught up on recent news without being overwhelming! If you've been pulling back from the news for your own sanity, this one's built for you — a quick recap and reference guide to the past month or two, organized around a single idea: when power can't earn legitimacy, it manufactures it. The performance. Spectacle, religion, and health br

#1802 Department of Injustice: Revenge Prosecutions, Judges Threatened, and Incompetence All the Way Down Jun 20, 2026 03:02:54 Air Date: 6–20-2026 Today we explore how political revenge became official government policy. The Department of Justice has dropped fraud cases while opening vindictive investigations into Trump's critics. Judges who rule against him face death threats at home with no federal protection and thousands of DOJ lawyers have walked out the door, leaving the agency hollowed out by loyalty tests and bent

#1801 Counterfeit Populism: Trump, the 2026 Primaries, and the Era That's Ending (Transcript) Jun 18, 2026 03:48:17 Air Date: 6/17/2026 Today we trace a pattern that repeated across half a dozen states this primary season: working-class candidates running on the cost of living beat the opponents party leadership hand-picked and funded. It looks like ordinary election news, but it's more pieces of a larger shift already underway; away from a politics of left against right and toward a new era of the elite vs wor

#1800 How Capitalism Created Loneliness and How To Joyfully Organize Our Way to Community Jun 12, 2026 03:56:36 Air Date: 6/12/2026 Today we examine how America caused a loneliness epidemic by tearing down the places where people used to find each other, how big tech is offering AI as a lackluster substitute for connection, and how people are building the opposite of loneliness with block parties, labor unions, and community gardens. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, mes

#1799 The US and China Are Fighting Over Taiwan, Semiconductors, and Africa's Minerals Jun 10, 2026 03:02:49 Air Date: 6/10/2026 Today we explore how Taiwan's own people are stuck between the US and China. Fewer and fewer of them want to rejoin China but their faith in America is sinking just as fast as Trump treats them as a bargaining chip. Their own leaders are split on how to respond. And the place that makes most of the world's advanced chips has almost no seat at the table where its future is being

#1798 FIFA Sportswashing Fascism: The World Cup from Mussolini to Trump Jun 6, 2026 02:53:45 Air Date: 6–5-2026 Today we explore sportswashing past and present, from fascist dictators who first weaponized the World Cup to FIFA's modern extractivism model of corrupt capitalism, and why workers, unions, and fans are now organizing to reclaim the game from those profiting off it. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoft

#1797 AI Spent $540 Billion to Make You Lonelier: Betting Against Jobs, Art, and Community Jun 3, 2026 03:22:22 Air Date: 6–3-2026 Today we examine the AI industry's economic house of cards, the ideology Silicon Valley uses to sell a broken product, and the very real human costs being paid by workers, the lonely, and communities bulldozed for data centers nobody asked for. Direct Download Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.

#1796 1.8 Billion for the Mob and a Kill List for Dissent: Trump's payout fund and counterterrorism strategy, decoded May 30, 2026 02:44:33 Air Date: 5–30-2026 Today we examine how Trump turned a sham lawsuit into a $1.8 billion reward fund for his political allies who attacked the Capitol on January 6th while implementing a counterterrorism strategy that erases right-wing extremism from the threat landscape, refocuses on left-wing violence that hardly exists and threatens to "find and kill" those they deem enemies. Full Show Notes Tr

#1795 You Say You Want A Revolution: Successful Revolutions are the Boring Ones May 27, 2026 03:55:12 Air Date: 5–26-2026 Today we examine what separates successful revolutions from failed ones, ask why so many revolutions of the 2010s fell short, understand how revolutionary energy gets neutralized, and explore the strategic case for nonviolent resistance. Full Show Notes Transcript Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestO

#1794 From MAHA to Measles: RFK's Public Health Purge Will Make America Sick Again May 24, 2026 02:58:22 Air Date: 5–23-2026 Today we examine the real-world cost of dismantling America's public health infrastructure, the dangerous pseudoscience driving RFK Jr.'s health agenda, and the contradictions fracturing the MAHA movement from within.And now on to the show Full Show Notes Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLeft.

#1793 Anti-Immigrant Brutality Costs Countries More Than Their Morals: ICE, Mass Deportation, and the Global Far-Right May 21, 2026 03:45:45 Air Date: 5/20/2026 Today we examine how the Trump administration is quietly reshaping its unpopular immigration crackdown by moving enforcement out of public view. Plus, we explain how anti-immigration politics is spreading through the post-colonial world, highlighting how it's reshaping political parties and public debate in the UK, Canada, and Australia. Full Show Notes Be part of the show! Lea

#1792 Capitalist Class Warfare: AI, Billionaire Capture, and the How to Fight Back May 16, 2026 03:18:23 Air Date: 5/15/2026 Today we examine what it would actually take to claw back democracy from billionaire capture — and why some people think it's more possible than it looks. We'll hear about California's proposed billionaire wealth tax, AOC's vision for change that doesn't depend on positional power, and why Peter Thiel's new "AI Tribunal of Truth" may have accidentally revealed exactly what the

#1791 Jim Crow 2.0 — SCOTUS Kills the Voting Rights Act and Unleashes the Gerrymandering War May 13, 2026 03:10:27 Air Date: 5/12/2026 Today we examine the redistricting scramble unleashed by the Supreme Court's gutting of the Voting Rights Act. We'll hear how Southern states moved within days to crack majority-Black districts, how Tennessee banned public input to rush through new maps, and why every governor's race, state legislative seat, and secretary of state contest in 2026 is now a redistricting fight. F

#1790 Assassin Nation: How Political Violence Got Normalized And How To Reverse It May 10, 2026 03:06:13 Air Date: 5–9-2026 Today we examine how political violence has always been woven into the fabric of American life and who gets to decide what counts as violence in the first place. We'll hear about presidential assassinations, the assassination of Fred Hampton, the MOVE bombing in Philadelphia, and the long history of state-sanctioned violence. And I'll discuss the only real way to bend the curve

#1789 Boomcession: Why the Economy Looks Great on Paper and Hurts in Real Life May 6, 2026 03:13:55 Air Date: 05-06-2026 Today we examine how the U.S. war on Iran is producing an economic crisis with echoes of the 1970s stagflation era which explains why Trump is now less popular on inflation than Jimmy Carter. We'll also be exploring various element of the structure of our economy, including how GDP became a deeply misleading measure of welfare, why consumer spending increasingly goes toward

#1788 Monthly-ish Mix: The America That Almost Was—Empire Abroad, Control at Home, and the Long Arc of Resistance May 1, 2026 04:37:57 Air Date: 05/01/2026 The Monthly-ish Mix™ is here to get you caught up on recent news without being overwhelming! This month we open with Jesse Jackson's death as a reckoning with the multiracial coalition America chose not to build, trace the American playbook from the 1953 Iran coup to Cuba to the current war on Iran, examine how the same logic of control operates at home through AI monopolies,

#1787 The American President vs The American Pope: Leo XIV, Trump, and the MAGA-Catholic Rift Apr 29, 2026 03:16:24 Air Date: 4–29-2026 Today we explore the extraordinary clash between Pope Leo XIV and the Trump White House — a feud involving military threats, medieval papal history, and an American-born pope who refuses to back down. We'll hear why analysts say MAGA's religiosity is pure aesthetic, and what that hollowness means for the millions of Americans still taking their faith seriously. Full Show Notes

#1786 Defeating Viktor Orbán in Hungary and the Authoritarian Playbook Worldwide Apr 24, 2026 02:26:59 Air Date: 4/24/2026 Today we explore how Viktor Orban spent 16 years transforming Hungary into a blueprint for 21st-century autocracy, how that blueprint traveled directly to the United States and what Hungary's stunning defeat of Orban can teach Americans about fighting back against authoritarianism. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01,

#1329 Our Longest War Has Been a Lie All Along (The Afghanistan Papers) (Throwback) Apr 21, 2026 01:03:44 Re-Air Date: 4-21-2026 Original Air Date: 1–18-2020 Today we take a look at The Afghanistan Papers which reveal in stark detail much of what the anti-war movement has known or strongly suspected since the beginning. Going beyond the scope of The Pentagon Papers of the Vietnam War era, The Afghanistan Papers feature interviews and documentation from top-ranking officials admitting from the start th

SOLVED! SAMPLE! #38 - Keepin' it Class-y: How Class Structure and Wealth Inequality Keep Us Stuck Apr 20, 2026 23:32 Air Date: 4-8-26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch. 1 - The history of the war on poverty in the U.S. Ch. 2 - How the wealthiest 9.9% are keeping the rest of us down with their heads in the sand Ch. 3 - The history and revival of the workers' education movement SOLVED! BACKSTAGE: Beyond the Algorithm (Members Only!): How your class impacts your tastes. Leave us a message on our

#1785 Iran and the Chain Reaction: The War Nobody Thought Through (Or, Bomb First, Think Never) Apr 18, 2026 03:32:37 Air Date: 4/17/2026 Today we examine how the U.S. war with Iran has exposed the deep structural rot at the heart of American power, the global economic catastrophe quietly building beneath the surface, and the cuts felt at home in order to pay for it all. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLeft.com Full Show Notes

#1784 Who Gets to Be American, Who Gets to Vote, and Who Decides Apr 14, 2026 02:39:55 Air Date: 4/14/2026 Today we examine the legal battles shaking the foundations of American citizenship and voting rights as Trump's legal team uses the courts as a weapon against democratic participation — and how advocates are fighting back. We'll hear about the three-D playbook of deceive, disrupt, and deny used by authoritarians and being deployed by Trump ahead of the midterms, and what ordina

#1783 The Ideology of a Cancer Cell: AI, Surveillance, and Silicon Valley's Psychopath Problem Apr 10, 2026 03:13:00 Air Date: 4/10/2026 Today we examine the ideology quietly driving Silicon Valley — a worldview that treats growth, extraction, and the erasure of human messiness as virtues. We'll hear how tech leaders from Sam Altman to Larry Ellison embody a kind of corporate psychopathy, why Zuckerberg never understood what Facebook actually is, and how the cult of "go for its own sake" may be the most dangerou

SOLVED! SAMPLE! #37 - Solidarity Forever: Boycotts, Strikes, & the Labor Movement We Need Apr 9, 2026 23:31 Air Date: 4-1-26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch. 1 - How to boycott better Ch. 2 - Why REI workers have voted to boycott the upcoming May sale and how you can help Ch. 3 - Why meatpacking workers are striking in Colorado Ch. 4 - Comparing the US labor movement with the Canadian labor movement Ch. 5 - Strengthening, and expanding the vision for, today's labor movement SOLVED! BA

#1683 Oligarchy Unmasked: President Musk, the crackup of capitalism, and the MAGA meltdown (Throwback) Apr 7, 2026 02:29:14 Re-Air Date: 04-07-26 Original Air Date: 1-15-2025 Elon Musk is leading the way for his class of tech broligarchs anxious to take over the MAGA movement and shape it to their own ends of deregulation, tax cuts, and lucrative government contracts. The disappointment that is inevitable for the MAGA populists is coming even faster than expected. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us

#1782 Cuba's Crisis: Trump's Deadly Embargo, Blackouts, and Dream of Regime Change Apr 3, 2026 03:07:26 Air Date: 4/3/2026 Today we examine how decades of U.S. policy toward Cuba set the stage for the current crisis, we explore the human cost of the U.S. oil blockade on Cuba's 11 million people, and how the U.S. justifies an illegal siege while claiming to act in Cuba's interest using time-tested propaganda tactics. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle best

#1781 Your Team Is a Hedge Fund Now: How Gambling and Billionaires Captured American Sports Apr 1, 2026 03:49:54 Air Date: 3–31-2026 Today we examine how money and power have captured American sports from every angle — gambling platforms operating as unregulated casinos, private equity turning franchises into financial assets, leagues suppressing player pay while selling access to politicians, and a sports media apparatus too compromised to report any of it. It's almost all the problems with America on displ

ALMOST SOLVED! SAMPLE! #1 - Liberation Theology & What Redemption Really Looks Like Mar 31, 2026 22:30 Air Date: 3–26-26 Welcome to ALMOST SOLVED!, the show that's almost like SOLVED! but one or more things are missing, namely the guarantee of a solution at the end and possibly also one of our cohosts. Today, Jay!, Amanda, and Deon discuss: Ch. 1 - Deon's research for his recent Best of the Left episode #1779: "Community After God: Why the Left Needs What Church Provided" Ch. 2 - Listener voic

#1780 Cynicism Is a Scab: Hope, Solidarity, and the Labor Fight That Never Stopped Mar 28, 2026 03:30:17 Air Date: 3/27/2026 Today we examine the relationship between labor education, moral ambition, and the possibility of a better world. We'll hear about IWW members building a "Philosophy 101" for organizers, a historian's argument that humanity is fundamentally cooperative rather than selfish, and why getting labor history into public schools may be one of the most important organizing projects of

#1779 Community After God: Why the Left Needs What Church Provided Mar 24, 2026 04:01:57 Air Date: 3/24/2026 Today we explore what happens when people reject religious dogma but still hunger for ritual, meaning, and the concrete benefits of community. We'll hear from secular assemblies building "church without creed," atheist Quakers finding silence sacred, and a Caribbean thinker designing a naturalistic pagan practice built around science and seasonal ritual — all asking what religi

SOLVED! SAMPLE! #36 - Bribery Jazz - Corruption is the Water We Swim In Mar 23, 2026 21:40 Air Date: 3–18-26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch. 1 - The dark history of money in politics, aka: corruption Ch. 2 - What the left must do to actually win Ch. 3 - What the rest of the world can teach America SOLVED! BACKSTAGE: Beyond the Algorithm (Members Only!): The reports of Christian fundamentalist "talk" in the military as the US attacked Iran Leave us a message on our n

#1778 AI, the Pentagon, Labor and Capitalism: The Fight Over Who Controls the Future Mar 19, 2026 03:36:56 Air Date: 3/19/2026 Today we explore the long history of technological disruption — from the Industrial Revolution to the rise of software engineering — and ask whether AI is genuinely different this time, all while autonomous weapons dissolve accountability for the militaries using them and capitalism prevents AI companies from maintaining their ethical aspirations. Be part of the show! Leave a v

#1777 How Christian Nationalism, Oil, and Zionism Built The War Against Iran Mar 16, 2026 03:44:14 Air Date: 3/15/2026 Today we examine how a century of foreign intervention created incompatible national memories between the US and Iran and how Netanyahu exploited that history to maneuver Trump into a war he didn't understand, promising a quick decapitation strike while knowing full well it would become a months-long regional conflict, at minimum. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, mes

#1776 Trump's Pharaoh Complex, Our Flawed Constitution, and the 250th Anniversary Mar 12, 2026 03:39:09 Air Date: 3/11/2026 Today is episode 1776, in the year of our nation's 250th birthday, and we thought the occasion called for something big. So, we're tracing the full arc — from the constitutional compromises that made this country possible to the authoritarian vanity project that those compromises eventually also made possible. We're talking about the history, the structures, and the insecure cu

SOLVED! FROM THE ARCHIVES - "Collaborators, Internal Exiles, and Dissidents" (Original Air Date: 01-26-25) Mar 9, 2026 01:04:24 Re-Air Date: 01–26-25 Unless you were a member in January of 2025, this episode of SOLVED! will be brand new to you! If you were a member back then, THANK YOU and this one is worth a re-listen. We're working on slowly increasing our production again, but, for now, enjoy this episode from our archives (and before YouTube) where Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: 00:00:00 - Ch. 1 - The mindset of

#1775 Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition and the Remaking of American Politics Mar 7, 2026 03:21:55 Air Date: 3/7/2026 Welcome to this episode of the Award-Winning Best of the Left Podcast. Today we examine the life and legacy of Reverend Jesse Jackson civil rights icon, two-time presidential candidate and one of the most consequential political figures of the 20th century. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLe

#1774 Monthly-ish Mix: Who's in Charge?—The Scramble for Control of Nations, Bodies, and Minds Mar 3, 2026 04:29:44 Air Date: 3/3/2026 The Monthly-ish Mix™ is here to get you caught up on recent news without being overwhelming! This month we examine the multi-front struggle for control: military force and economic coercion seizing resources abroad, institutions weaponized to constrain bodies at home, platforms and propaganda capturing minds, and the democratic resistance proving that organized people can still

#1615 Envisioning a Leftist Economic Future of Postcapitalism, High-Tech Automation, Universal Basic Income and a World (Mostly) Without Work (Throwback) Feb 28, 2026 01:01:59 Original Air Date: 3-1-2024 We don't have to think too hard to understand the fears of a world in which work, and the ability of millions to support themselves, are lost to automation and artificial intelligence. But that is only a capitalist future in which the benefits of technological advancement are hoarded by the already-wealthy. Today we imagine a different path. Be part of the show! Leave a

#1540 The Grift of Life (Scam Culture™ and the Economy it has built) (Throwback) Feb 26, 2026 01:10:21 Original Air Date: 1/31/2023 Today, we take a look at just some of the nearly infinite ways in which our society, culture and economy are infused from top to bottom with Scam Culture™ that is bleeding us dry both financially and mentally. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLeft.com Full Show Notes Check out our ne

SOLVED! SAMPLE! #34 - Understanding The Dual State: Life Under Authoritarianism and Your Role in Fighting It Feb 25, 2026 22:40 Air Date: 2-17-26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch. 1 - The "dual state" concept coined by German Jewish political scientist and labor lawyer Ernst Fraenkel in his 1941 book "The Dual State: A Contribution to the Theory of Dictatorship" Ch. 2 - Navigating the psychological toll of living under authoritarianism Ch. 3 - "Woke 2.0" as a movement, and dismantling conservative critiqu

#1773 How Big Tech Captured Attention, Kids, and Democracy Feb 24, 2026 03:26:08 Air Date: 2/23/2026 Today we examine how the platforms that monetize your attention are merging with state power. We'll hear how TikTok's new owners include Trump ally Larry Ellison, how DHS sent hundreds of subpoenas to unmask anonymous ICE critics, how Ring's Super Bowl ad cheerfully introduced AI-powered neighborhood surveillance, and how the social media addiction trials that are being likened

#1772 From Fragile to Fascist: How Broken Masculinity Feeds Authoritarianism Feb 21, 2026 03:16:29 Air Date: 2/19/2026 Today we trace the pipeline from masculine grievance to fascism. We'll hear how ICE agents' own family members describe them as low-IQ bullies chasing signing bonuses, why a former white nationalist explains that the alternative to unpacking discomfort is becoming overtly racist, how incel culture evolved from lonely forums into a MAGA recruitment tool, and what researchers fou

#1771 They Need You in the Dark: Information, Journalism, and the Fight Against Fascism Feb 15, 2026 03:33:38 Air Date 2/15/2026 Today we explore the gap between free speech rhetoric and the reality of arrested reporters. We'll hear how a decade of cancel culture panic over college students gave way to actual government suppression of journalists, why the DOJ is perverting a law designed to fight the Ku Klux Klan to prosecute Black journalists, how the administration that promised to "bring back free spee

SOLVED! SAMPLE! #33 - Be a Mosquito in a Swarm: How to Put Cracks in Authoritarian Power Feb 13, 2026 24:04 Air Date: 2-3-26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch. 1 - Trump's Pillars of Support, and plugging into community building & local support networks Ch. 2 - Case studies in success: Avelo Airlines & Spotify and why they matter Ch. 3 - Pressure campaigns at home and abroad and why they are important Ch. 4 - The new cracks in MAGA, and building up the political opposition party w

#1770 Getting in the Fight Against ICE and Authoritarianism Feb 10, 2026 03:07:38 Air Date 2/10/2026 Today we explore what effective resistance actually looks like. We'll hear why Jamelle Bouie says the panic of those in power signals that opposition is working, what abolitionists teach us about fighting without knowing the ending, and how Minneapolis proved that democratic force can overwhelm physical force. Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at t

#1128 Confronting Fascism in the Land of Free Speech (Throwback) Feb 6, 2026 59:58 Original Air Date: 8-25-2017 Today we look at the constant struggle between the freedom to speak and the necessary limits placed on that freedom due to the rights of others to not be substantially harmed by that speech Be part of the show! Leave a voice message, message us on Signal at the handle bestoftheleft.01, or email Jay@BestOfTheLeft.com Full Show Notes Check out our new show, SOLVED! on

SOLVED! #32 - How the Left is Always Right Too Soon (With Receipts) Feb 5, 2026 24:47 Air Date: 01-28-26 Today, Jay!, Amanda, Deon, and Erin discuss: Ch 1 - Why it's not actually "fun" to be right too early (despite being called 'insufferable') Ch 2 - The political elites and neoliberals who are frantically changing their tune now that a left-wing populist movement is here Ch 3 - The Cassandras of the Left who knew and tried to warn that Trump would be a fascist Ch 4 - The Anti-

#1769 Politics Beyond the Ballot Box: Elections and the Movements that Power Them Feb 1, 2026 02:55:49 Air Date 2/1/2026 Today we examine what's actually working against the Trump regime and the role of this year's elections. Unsurprisingly, his own voter fraud investigation just proved him a liar, Democrats are overperforming expectations in House special elections, and Zohran Mamdani's campaign based on having fun in community needs to be a model for every movement against authoritarianism. Be pa

#1768 The End of an Era: The International Rules-Based Order Gives Way to Trump's Might-Makes-Right Plutocracy Jan 30, 2026 03:37:03 Air Date 1/29/2026 Today we examine the collapse of the American-led, rules-based world order (such as it was) in real time. Canada's Prime Minister pointed out that the emperor has no clothes and declared US hegemony over while Europe called Trump's bluff on Greenland... all the more reason why he would prefer a fake "Board of Peace" that he can rule over as a worldwide plutocracy. Be part of the

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