Unwashed and Unruly

Why has flying become so crappy? Modern air travel has morphed into a high-altitude endurance test, cramming us into shrinking seats and nickel-and-diming us for every basic necessity. In this episode, we trace the airline industry’s descent from a regulated public utility to a monopoly-driven, irrational oligarchy in the wake of the 1978 Deregulation Act. We look at the war against airline and airport workers, starting with the smashing of the 1981 PATCO air traffic controllers' strike. We discuss exhausted air traffic controllers and pilots struggling under massive debt, grueling work hours, and poverty wages. By examining several crashes and close calls, we look at how profit undermines safety, and how the outsourcing and cost-cutting of maintenance is a danger to the whole flying public. We examine how government agencies like the FAA gave a free pass to airline manufacturers like Boeing in pushing through shoddy engineering, like with the 737 Max. For the airline industry, the “magic of the market” means that profits are privatized but losses are socialized, leading to one government bailout after another. The answer to the airline cartel’s war on its workers is industrialized unions and workers' control of safety.

The "nuclear threat" narrative against Iran is a smokescreen for a decades-long campaign of imperialist aggression designed to crush Iranian sovereignty. In this episode, we strip away the mainstream propaganda and myths to examine how both wings of the U.S. ruling class, working alongside their Zionist partners in Israel, have used murderous sanctions, direct assassinations, and terror to maintain hegemony over the region’s oil-rich resources.Drawing on the history of colonial domination of Iran, from WWI to the 1953 coup that installed the Shah, to the 1979 Islamic Revolution and beyond, we show that the true madmen aren't in Tehran, but are the ones steering the American war machine. We also highlight how nuclear technology is a cornerstone of Iran’s national identity and scientific independence.We take a detour into the “U.S. or Israel: Who’s Daddy?" debate that framed our very first episode, challenging the notion that the U.S. is simply a victim of the Zionist lobby and was coerced into this losing war. The U.S. remains the only power to have used nuclear weapons in combat, and Israel is the only country with a nuclear weapons arsenal in the region (and the insanity to use it). That’s why Iran needs nukes as a deterrent in a struggle for survival against the most destructive force on the planet. Finally, we connect the carnage abroad to the crisis at home and rippling outward. The global working class is left to pay the bill for an economic crisis, with soaring energy and food costs, that has only barely begun. 

The Epstein files offer a raw glimpse into how the U.S. rulers and the entire global capitalist class run society: through sexual and geopolitical violence, criminal exploitation, and legal impunity. The buying and selling of young women, the decadence, and the denigration of all who are not part of their club – this is the “morality” of those in power. In this episode, we discuss how the Epstein scandal isn’t just about a corrupt sex trafficker, his victims, and a mysterious “suicide.” The real story is the entire financial and political infrastructure around Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, made up of billionaires, shell companies, “philanthropic” foundations, and a world of espionage and blackmail. From the gutter media to the highest echelons of government, they’re all behind a massive Epstein cover-up. The rest of us are told to move along.We talk about the insights of a handful of journalists who followed the money. Whitney Webb and Nick Bryant point to something far bigger than a trafficking ring: a system of dark money and surveillance linking Wall Street, organized crime, and intelligence. Epstein was a cog in the machine, set up as a fall guy. We’ve seen only a tiny fraction of what the ruling class does in secret, but what it gets away with in the open is far more sinister: marauding the globe, war against Iran, genocide in Gaza, eviscerating rights at home. The crimes and horrors in the Epstein files are not aberrations, but the very nature of a rotting capitalist system. Clips included in this episode: George Carlin: "It's a big club, and you ain't in it"⁠CIA Whistleblower John Kiriakou on The Diary of a CEO⁠⁠Nick Bryant on The Chris Hedges Report⁠⁠Whitney Webb on The Nick Bryant Podcast⁠  “To the man of the bourgeois class, the woman of the working class is not a human being. She is either a beast of burden or a source of cheap pleasure.” – Alexandra Kollontai, 1909

In this episode, we break down how anti-immigrant repression, which has been bipartisan for decades, has escalated into open paramilitary terror under Trump 2.0. We examine the daily raids and deportations by ICE and how they’re also an attack on citizenship and political dissent, acting as a warning shot against the entire working class. We connect the dots between an empire in decline, domestic scapegoating, and authoritarian control, from the War on Terror to the dragnet targeting pro-Palestinian voices and leftist dissidents, to the killing of Rene Good, Alex Pretti, and countless others rotting in detention centers. The ruling parties have always conjured up an “enemy within” during moments of economic and social crisis to carry out a war on the population.We dismantle the myth of the US as a so-called welcoming melting pot, and trace the “whites only” history of citizenship, from before the 14th Amendment to today. Basic rights won through struggle are being clawed back in real time. The fight over who belongs is ultimately a fight over who holds power.

In this episode, we’re joined by a special guest, Hamilton Nolan, a journalist, author on labor and politics, union organizer, and activist. We talk about how journalism survived the death of print only to be swallowed and spit out by Big Tech, private equity, and monopoly capitalism. We trace the rise and fall of online media, digging into Hamilton’s early days at Gawker. We discuss how corporate greed and tech oligarchs crushed newsrooms, turned mainstream media into compliant mouthpieces, and left independent reporting fighting for air. If you’ve ever wondered why layoffs hit newsrooms every few months, or why your favorite journalists are drifting onto Substack, or why AI summaries answer your questions without sending you to the article, this is why.We delve into how Google’s algorithms and collapsing ad revenue triggered a traffic apocalypse, and how generative AI now threatens to replace the very labor it feeds on. We also talk about why unions are critical for the last remaining scraps of editorial independence and why journalism still matters in an era where "everything is content and nothing is read." Finally, Hamilton shares his take on solutions that might stop the ship from sinking, before the internet finishes eating itself.To learn more about Hamilton Nolan, check out his website How Things Work and his book The Hammer: Power, Inequality, and the Struggle for the Soul of Labor. 

In this episode, we discuss how the latest U.S. assault on Venezuela and the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro are part of a centuries-long project of American imperial domination in Latin America. The goal isn't just to take over Venezuela’s oil reserves. The deeper objective of a new Monroe Doctrine is to control the Western Hemisphere and block China and other rivals from gaining influence. What happened in Venezuela also reveals something bigger: An empire in decline, without a mask, using brute force to discipline its "backyard." At stake is the future of sovereignty and whether any other country can refuse submission to U.S. power.We break down why Venezuela has been relentlessly targeted, from the moment Hugo Chávez asserted control over the country’s oil and challenged local elites and foreign capital. We place Venezuela within the longer history of U.S. coups, dictatorships, and dirty wars across Latin America.We also talk about the political power of a reactionary, white upper-class opposition that has repeatedly aligned itself with Washington against the country’s poor and working-class majority.

Why are so many people hungry in the world's richest nation? In this episode, we unpack how food isn’t just something people eat. It’s a tool of power. From food deserts and ultraprocessed diets to collapsing health, we trace how modern food production is organized to maximize corporate profit while punishing the poor, the working class, and the oppressed.We discuss how a handful of giant food conglomerates, like Cargill, quietly control the supply chains behind nearly everything you eat. These global monopolies use food as a weapon, flooding weaker countries with exports, destroying local farmers, and forcing nations into cycles of economic dependence where people go hungry at home.We dive into the long history of food in colonization and racial inequality in the U.S. Drawing from the book Ruin Their Crops on the Ground by Andrea Freeman, we examine how deliberate starvation has been used by the American rulers, from indigenous land theft to the sugar plantations to SNAP benefits. This episode argues that food oppression and inequality are inherent to the capitalist production system.

In our last episode of 2025, we take a look at the American revolutionary John Brown, who believed slavery was a crime so violent and heinous that it could not be ended through patience, compromise, or moral appeals. Brown’s commitment to Black liberation, which was rooted in faith and a keen understanding of American society, led him from “Bleeding Kansas” to the 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry, an act that helped ignite the Civil War (The Second American Revolution, 1861-1865). Brown knew his actions would cost him his life, and on the day of his execution, he wrote that the crimes of the U.S. would only be purged “with blood.”Often dismissed as a madman or fanatic, Brown was in fact one of the few white abolitionists willing to fight to destroy slavery outright. Brown’s life, strategy, and sacrifice should be studied and honored by all those devoted to today’s freedom and resistance struggles. As Malcolm X later put it, “When you want to know good white folks in history where black people are concerned, go read the history of John Brown.” We also touch on the radical abolitionist tradition, including the uncompromising and quirky Quaker, Benjamin Lay. Listen to John Brown's Body, sung by Paul Robeson

In this episode, we speak with Eli Erlick, celebrated author, trans activist, and educator based out of New York City, who recently published the groundbreaking new book Before Gender: Lost Stories from Trans History, 1850-1950. In a time of moral panic when trans people are being turned into political scapegoats, with hundreds of new bills restricting their rights and visibility, Erlick’s book is a powerful reminder that trans people have always been here. Drawing on court files, newspapers, and other primary sources, Erlick uncovers the lives of trans kids, workers, activists, and athletes who lived long before words like “transgender” existed.We talk with Eli about why reclaiming erased history matters now; why there is no such thing as the “first” trans person; how language shapes who is allowed to exist; early gender-affirming care and activism; Magnus Hirschfeld’s legacy; and how trans athletes, youth, and public life became today’s battleground in the culture war.As Erlick writes, “History has always been a malleable tool used for political ends.” This episode is about restoring the past that reactionaries are trying to erase, and using history as a tool for truth, understanding, and future liberation.You can learn all about Eli, order her book, and check out her tour dates on her website elierlick.com.

In this episode, we dig into the origins of the internet as a Cold War surveillance project and trace how Silicon Valley grew up inside the U.S. defense ecosystem. We look at how companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, and Palantir didn’t just partner with the government and state machinery—they were shaped by it. These tech titans provide the cloud systems, predictive algorithms, and data pipelines modern militaries and intelligence agencies depend on. We answer the question: Why are the world’s biggest tech companies American, and why are they so deeply intertwined with the military and intelligence world?Pulling from Yasha Levine’s Surveillance Valley: The Secret Military History of the Internet and Shoshana Zuboff’s The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, we break down how tech giants turned all of us into raw material for trillion-dollar platforms, and how the normalization of constant tracking quietly erased the idea of privacy. From predictive policing and digital profiling to the smart devices that follow us everywhere, we’re living in a system where our clicks, movements, and conversations fuel both corporate profit and government control. The outrage that once met surveillance, from the MIT critics of the 1960s to the Snowden leaks, has faded into passive acceptance.Underneath it all is a bigger question: What does freedom look like in a world built for permanent observation? The tragedy isn’t the technology; it’s how deeply it’s been weaponized for control, inequality, and empire. This episode asks whether a different digital future is still possible, or if we’re already too deep inside the surveillance machine to find a way out.

This Halloween, we open the Bible and uncover the stories Sunday School skipped. From vengeful bears and zombie armies to divine wrath, these are just some of the tales that prove the Good Book can double as nightmare fuel. Every story is straight from scripture, complete with citations, but told with a signature mix of dark humor, skeptical commentary, and spooky sound design. It’s the Bible like you’ve never heard it before.

Conspiracies aren’t fringe anymore. They’re at the heart of American politics. In this episode, we explore how conspiracy theories have taken root in everything from social media feeds to White House discourse. Today, the internet acts as a megaphone for conspiracies, from flat earth theory to racist ideology such as the "Great Replacement Theory.” When there’s declining trust in media, science, and politicians, conspiracy thinking often fills the void. We dive deep into why people embrace false cures and disinformation, seeking hidden forces to make sense of their own powerlessness.  Follow us down the rabbit hole as we examine how Donald Trump has embraced and amplified conspiracy culture, using it as a political tool to manipulate public perception, and how the Trump administration has normalized what was once considered extreme. We also look at a few government coverups and lies (there are far too many to fit in one episode) to argue how historical reality is often far darker than the worst conspiracy."Sometimes paranoia's just having all the facts." – William Burroughs

As the world watches the horror unfolding in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli state, the oppression and displacement of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank has intensified. This episode offers a rare and urgent eyewitness account from the ground. We’re joined by Simone Deckard, a NY-based organizer who works with Palestinian women community organizers in the Northern West Bank. Simone recently returned from towns and refugee camps across the West Bank, including Nablus, Jenin, and Tulkarem. She describes the deepening repression Palestinians face under military rule and settler violence, from daily raids and mass arrests to home demolitions and economic strangulation. We explore how Israel is accelerating its long-standing colonial project of annexing the West Bank with full U.S. backing.We also examine the collapse of the two-state illusion, the complicity of the Palestinian Authority, and the carceral system that tortures and imprisons thousands of Palestinians, most without charge. As settler militias grow bolder and the Israeli government carries out its goal to rid historic Palestine of its Palestinian inhabitants, this is a vital conversation on the realities of apartheid and the ongoing Nakba.

In Part Two of our deep dive on the whitewashing of American slavery, we unpack how right-wing influencers like Candace Owens and Matt Walsh, and platforms like PragerU, are rewriting history to downplay the horrors of American chattel slavery. We explore the false equivalence between U.S. slavery and ancient systems, examine how Nazi Germany borrowed from Jim Crow laws, and discuss how caste, race, and colonial violence continue to shape our present. From revisionist narratives about African complicity to the demonization of Indigenous peoples, this episode exposes the propaganda campaign to erase the legacy of white supremacy in the U.S.

In Part One of our deep dive into the whitewashing of American slavery, we look at the widespread effort to sanitize the brutal history of Black oppression in the U.S., from Donald Trump's attack on the Smithsonian for being too "woke" to Elon Musk’s casual dismissal of slavery as a universal human experience. We explore how this revisionist narrative is aimed at erasing the central role of slavery and the systemic racial subjugation and segregation that continues to shapes this country. We draw the throughline from chattel slavery to Jim Crow to today’s prison labor system, showing how systems of white supremacy evolve but never disappear. We cover the attacks on birthright citizenship, the role of the Civil War, and how racial oppression not only disadvantages black people but the working class as a whole. “The slave went free; stood a brief moment in the sun; then moved back again toward slavery. The whole weight of America was thrown to color caste.” — W.E.B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America

**Labor Day Special!**Are economic statistics just prosperity propaganda by those in power? The labor market numbers are, indeed, lying to you. Unemployment data has always been presented as rosier than real life. Nearly 1 in 4 workers can be considered functionally unemployed or in poverty-wage jobs. This episode cuts through the “healthy labor market” headlines to expose the real story behind labor and inflation statistics. We break down how unemployment is calculated and explore how government stats ignore inequality, rising debt, and the growing wealth gap, We talk about how capitalism (under both Republicans and Democrats) has intensified hardships for working people, with decades of stagnant wages, rising costs, and increasing debt. We also talk about AI and... the great philosopher Homer Simpson. Tune in for a hard look at what the data isn’t telling you.

International football is a beloved sport, but beneath the surface lies a legacy shaped by empire, exploitation, and racial hierarchy. In this episode, we explore how major European clubs and leagues benefit from a global system where talent is scouted, commodified, and exploited, and where dark-skinned players face racist abuse.We dive into the political economy of soccer: the role of FIFA, the Premier League, and global sports markets in maintaining structural imbalances. We look at the ways in which international football mirrors colonial labor systems or even the auction block, and how politics and profit have always been central to the game. Is football still a beautiful game, or a global empire in disguise? We dedicate this episode to Palestinian footballers. Since October 2023, nearly 440 Palestinian football players and support staff in the West Bank and Gaza have been killed.

What’s fueling the rise of the online manosphere, and how different is today’s incel culture from historic forms of misogyny? In this episode, we break down the ideologies driving men’s rights activists, red pillers, MGTOWs, alpha males, and pickup artists. We explore how shifting gender roles, economic instability, and backlash to movements like #MeToo have shaped this toxic digital subculture. What draws so many young, alienated boys into these spaces? From mental health struggles to feelings of powerlessness, we explore the emotional landscape that makes the manosphere so appealing, and so dangerous.

The P. Diddy sex trial exposed disturbing allegations of abuse, but also revealed how race, celebrity status, and systemic misogyny shield powerful men from consequences. In this episode, we unpack the complexities of the charges: Why did prosecutors struggle to apply sex trafficking laws, and what does that say about how those laws are actually used?We explore how the public discourse around "sex trafficking" often misses the mark, and how US trafficking laws are rooted in racist, anti-immigrant moral panics going back over a century. From Cassie as an “imperfect victim” to Diddy as an “imperfect perpetrator,” we break down the legal and cultural narratives that shape how we understand abuse, power, and justice.

U.S. military aid to Israel funds the occupation of the West Bank, the destruction of Gaza, and the genocide of the Palestinian people. The American government's unconditional support for Israel chills free speech and represses pro-Palestinian activism, making open criticism of Zionism taboo. In our very first episode, we explore the power dynamics in the U.S.-Israel relationship and take a hard look at who decides, who benefits, and who pays the price. We examine the influence of the Zionist lobby, the role of evangelical Christian support for Israel, and historical truths of this “special relationship.” Is this a mutual strategic alliance, or a lopsided patron-client arrangement? Who’s really in charge? Is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calling the shots in Washington? Or is U.S. foreign policy based on strategic imperialist interests?