Current Affairs
Current Affairs
Categorieën: Nieuws en politiek
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Today we take a dive into the world of "corporate bullshit" with Nick Hanauer, who has become an expert on spotting and debunking it. Nick is a businessman who became known for warning of the devastating social effects of plutocracy, and who now hosts the "Pitchfork Economics" podcast which presents sharp conversations with leading progressive economic experts.
Nick's latest project is the book Corporate Bullsh*t, written with Joan Walsh and Donald Cohen. (Listen to Donald's appearance on the CA podcast here.) The book dives into American history to show how every time a progressive reform was proposed, the corporate PR machine spun the proposal as a job-killer, a socialist plot, the end of civilization, etc. Some of the examples collected in the book are truly galling, as Nathan explains in his review of the book here. On this episode, we look at some of the common tendencies used in corporate propaganda and why they can be persuasive to people. We also discuss how Nick came to be a public opponent of plutocracy, and we have a short digression on the fraudulence of the "MyPillow," since Nick comes from a family of immigrants who spent a century making pillows and bedding.
Over the past century and a half, on a broad range of issues including the minimum wage, workplace safety, environmental regulations, consumer protection—even on morally indisputable issues like child labor and racial segregation—the people and corporations who profited from the status quo have effectively wielded a familiar litany of groundless ‘economic’ claims and fear mongering rhetoric in their efforts to slow or quash necessary reforms. As even a cursory examination of the quotes we’ve included in this book will show, the wealthy and powerful are willing to say anything—even the worst things imaginable—to retain their wealth and power. But while there is simply no bottom to this well of shamelessness, there is a pattern.
Vorige afleveringen
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470 - How to Spot Corporate Bullshit (w/ Nick Hanauer) Fri, 19 Apr 2024
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469 - Your Money or Your Life: A Physician on the Miseries of Medical Debt Wed, 17 Apr 2024
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468 - How Four Billionaires Are Creating A Horrible Future For All of Us (w/ Jonathan Taplin) Mon, 15 Apr 2024
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467 - The Rise and Fall of Crypto Lunacy (w/ Zeke Faux) Fri, 12 Apr 2024
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466 - How The Occupation Shapes Everything (w/ Nathan Thrall) Wed, 10 Apr 2024
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465 - The Current Israel-Palestine Crisis Was Entirely Avoidable (w/ Jerome Slater) Mon, 8 Apr 2024
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464 - Why Wars Happen (w/ Michael Mann) Fri, 5 Apr 2024
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463 - A McKinsey Whistleblower on Life Inside The Secretive Consulting Firm Wed, 3 Apr 2024
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462 - How Big Pharma Makes a Killing From Letting People Die (w/ Nick Dearden) Mon, 1 Apr 2024
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461 - What Makes For a "Strong Town"? (w/ Allison Lirish Dean) Fri, 29 Mar 2024
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460 - How White Supremacist Ideology Made Its Way Into Music Theory (w/ Philip Ewell) Wed, 27 Mar 2024
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459 - Gary Younge's 30-Year Panorama of the African Diaspora Mon, 25 Mar 2024
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458 - Why The Cop City Indictment Threatens Everyone's Freedom (w/ Christopher Bruce) Fri, 22 Mar 2024
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457 - Why We Need Utopias (w/ Kristen Ghodsee) Wed, 20 Mar 2024
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456 - ZINNOPHOBIA - Why So Many Still Fear "A People's History of the United States" (w/ David Detmer) Tue, 19 Mar 2024
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455 - Why Do We Have Any Poverty In America When It's Such a Solvable Problem? (w/ Matt Desmond) Fri, 15 Mar 2024
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454 - Mini-Cast: Ending Period Poverty Through the "Menstrual Equity for All" Act (w/ Grace Meng) Wed, 13 Mar 2024
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453 - There Is No Alternative to Ending Fossil Fuel Use (w/ Lorne Stockman) Mon, 11 Mar 2024
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452 - Why "Climate Optimism" Is Irrational and What Global Climate Justice Requires (w/ Jag Bhalla) Fri, 8 Mar 2024
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451 - Is Being "Moderate" Actually How Democrats Win? (w/ Alex Bronzini-Vender) Wed, 6 Mar 2024
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450 - The Many Layers of Injustice in American Criminal Punishment (w/ Stephen Bright & James Kwak) Mon, 4 Mar 2024
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449 - Can The Concept of "Philanthropy" Be Saved? (w/ Amy Schiller) Wed, 28 Feb 2024
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448 - What Would It Take To Have a Democracy? (w/ Thom Hartmann) Mon, 26 Feb 2024
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447 - How Did the Idea of Being "Self-Made" Come About? (w/ Tara Isabella Burton) Fri, 23 Feb 2024
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446 - Our Plan to Make It Actually Enjoyable to Read The News Wed, 21 Feb 2024
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445 - The Role of Drugs in American Life (w/ Benjamin Fong) Mon, 19 Feb 2024
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444 - The History of Arab-Jews Can Change Our Understanding of The World (w/ Avi Shlaim) Fri, 16 Feb 2024
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443 - A HEATED Encounter with Chris Rufo: Critical Race Theory, The Left, and American History Wed, 14 Feb 2024
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442 - The Dark Side of Fashion (w/ Alyssa Hardy) Mon, 12 Feb 2024
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441 - How To Make Schools That Children Actually Enjoy Going To (w/ Lauren Fadiman) Fri, 9 Feb 2024
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440 - How Rupert Murdoch Killed The Only Good Social Media Platform (w/ Michael Tedder) Wed, 7 Feb 2024
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439 - How Labor Can Drive a Hard Bargain (w/ Jane McAlevey and Abby Lawlor) Mon, 5 Feb 2024
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438 - Learning From Neglected Novels By 1900s Radicals (w/ the Rickard Sisters) Fri, 2 Feb 2024
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437 - Why Minimalism? (w/ Kyle Chayka) Wed, 31 Jan 2024
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436 - Is U.S. Democracy Just Going To Be Dysfunctional Forever? (w/ Benjamin Studebaker) Mon, 29 Jan 2024
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435 - What Happens to the Disappointed When Social Movements Fail? (w/ Sara Marcus) Fri, 26 Jan 2024
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434 - The Disaster of Privatizing Everything (w/ Donald Cohen) Wed, 24 Jan 2024
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433 - The Process of Leaving Jordan Peterson Behind (w/ Benjamin Howard) Mon, 22 Jan 2024
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432 - How The Super-Rich Really Live (w/ Michael Mechanic) Fri, 19 Jan 2024
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431 - How to Explain Socialism To People Who Aren't Socialists (w/ Danny Katch) Wed, 17 Jan 2024
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430 - Exposing the Spurious Anti-Semitism Accusations That Helped Bring Down Corbyn (w/ Asa Winstanley) Mon, 15 Jan 2024
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429 - Dreaming of a World Without Wells Fargo (w/ Terri Friedline) Fri, 12 Jan 2024
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428 - How "Influencing" Became an Industry (w/ Emily Hund) Wed, 10 Jan 2024
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427 - Why Americans Don't See Or Talk About Their Wars (w/ Norman Solomon) Mon, 8 Jan 2024
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426 - What "Economic Freedom" Would Look Like (w/ Mark Paul) Fri, 5 Jan 2024
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425 - Can The Love of Menswear Be Justified? (w/ Sam Miller McDonald) Wed, 3 Jan 2024
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424 - On Musical Plagiarism: The Case of Ed Sheeran vs. Marvin Gaye Wed, 20 Dec 2023
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423 - How Socialists Took Over The Cities (w/ Shelton Stromquist) Mon, 18 Dec 2023
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422 - Why Does The Law Fail Women So Badly? (w/ Julie Suk) Fri, 15 Dec 2023
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421 - Are "Family Values" The Problem? (w/ Sophie Lewis) Wed, 13 Dec 2023