Tuesday, May 23, 2023

Episode 223: The Counterintelligentsia Strikes Back!

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I've described before how ideas originated in academia have caught society’s collective popular vision. How much of that content, though, was intended to benefit only the wealthy? I explore this in Episode 223: The Counterintelligentsia Strikes Back!

In this episode, I read from Nancy MacLean's book Democracy In Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right's Stealth Plan For America. I also mentioned in passing Benjamin Hunnicutt's book Kellogg's Six-Hour Day and Arlie Russell Hochshield's book Strangers in Their Own Land.

I played: bits of two online videos featuring a mash-up of newsreels from 1957's Arkansas integration fight. D. L. Myers voiced the stinger for the Powell Movement.

Musically, I finished the body of the episode with Lee Rosevere's appropriately named "Intervention". KMFDM backed Henry Giroux in the introduction, and I'm closing today with Mistle Thrush.

Tuesday, May 9, 2023

Episode 222: FOB The Most Important Invention Ever

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Too few realize that answering the cocktail party question “what’s the best [something] ever?” requires taking into account how many on earth are affected by it. I attempt to answer this question in this Episode 222: FOB The Most Important Invention Ever.

In this episode, I read from: Michael Pollan's book The Omnivore's Dilemma; Vaclav Smil's book Enriching the Earth: Fritz Haber, Carl Bosch, and the Transformation of World Food Production; my computer's quickie dictionary; and Peter Zeihan's book The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization. I played: Political Economist Mark Blyth backed by KMFDM; and I'm closing now with Julie & Rolf & The Campfire Gang doing "Over the Rainbow".

Oh, for the show notes pages I'm including a brand-new TLA of FOB, which stands for Feeding Our Bellies. That will go into the title at the show notes so you can find… or avoid… all of my diversions from advertising that concern agriculture and global warming.