Episode 171: Testing Our Glob of Assumptions

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Too many of us lately seem to assume that the negative forces guiding brains are… a thing. (Well, that’s my assumption.) As a general rule, maybe we all just need to heed the advice found in the title of Episode 171: Testing Our Glob of Assumptions.

In this episode, I read from: a political tract called Caste: A Brief History, a very silly book that attempts to erase biases (without apparently realizing that bias is also the positive force that causes people to accept as well as reject one another); my computer's quickie dictionary; and Michael Crichton's book Eaters of the Dead. I play: elements from two On The Media episodes, first "40 Acres", and then "Well, That Was Some Weird Shit"; the actual BeeGees singing; and DL Myers once again invoking the Powell Movement Stinger. KMFDM backs political economist Mark Blyth in the intro, and I close with Mistle Thrush.

Episode 170: That Great Gray Slurry

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Sometimes companies manage to get really big; but what is too big? When they regard their benefit to society as less important than their profit model, we should consider their future, even if they make the stuff of Episode 170: That Great Gray Slurry.

In this episode, I played: Mark Zuckerfuck himself, testifying to and almost smirkingly making an ignorant ass of Senator Orin Hatch; Alexander Nix, head of Cambridge Analytica; Angry Armani Gnome and 2016 online campaign manager for the former president, Brad Parscale; and CNN's Anderson Cooper completely missing the point with Effin Bee Monika Bickert. Finally, I put three sarcastic greats into my Making America "Great" Again stinger. Three! That's how important I think this is! The "great" voices were: George Hrab from the Geologic Podcast; KMO from the C-Realm Podcasts; and L33t Minion, longest time listener to this here podcast.

I read from: Antonio Garciá Martínez's book Chaos Monkeys; Ian Bogost's Atlantic article FuckBook's "Dystopian Definition of 'Fake'"; my computer's quickie Dictionary; and an installation from Matt Stoller's newsletter Big called "Facecrook: Dealing with a Global Menace."

Musically, I played: Podington Bear doing "Fits"; Matt Stoller warned about the implications of letting companies get too big in the intro, backed by KMFDM; and I'm closing now with Julie & Rolf & the Campfire Gang doing "Over the Rainbow".