Speaker 1: Alson media.
Speaker 2: Order in the court order in the court Justice Robert
Speaker 2: Evans presigning, I see we have a fine jury here
Speaker 2: to take questions from the audience of our of our
Speaker 2: daily news show, which is also my court room. Everybody,
Speaker 2: everybody get it because I'm a judge now, really, because
Speaker 2: that's how the legal system works.
Speaker 3: All those rubers are partly have come true.
Speaker 2: Huh No, municipal Judge Garrison.
Speaker 3: That's okay, okay, let's get You're right, You're right, You're
Speaker 3: right here.
Speaker 2: I will now for the rest of my life be
Speaker 2: able to say when people ask questions well as a
Speaker 2: man of the law, which I'm very much looking forward to.
Speaker 4: No able to say, Robert quite likely to say.
Speaker 2: Anyway, that's all I got.
Speaker 5: All right, this is that you could happen here Q
Speaker 5: and a episode we've got. What are we calling you now,
Speaker 5: Robert Evans? What's your title?
Speaker 2: The Honorable Robert Evans? And I actually dished. The judge
Speaker 2: who made me a judge sent me a gabble, but
Speaker 2: I didn't grab it for this one, so I just
Speaker 2: used I have a the the barrel and lower receiver
Speaker 2: from an antique sought off shotgun that belonged to a
Speaker 2: bootlegger and I just sort of slammed that into my table.
Speaker 3: I'm sure our editor will love that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, right, but before we broadcast, so you have
Speaker 6: a sort of shotgun.
Speaker 2: It's not it's not functional. It's been destroyed.
Speaker 4: I see, I see good. Didn't want to little rebe
Speaker 4: reach moment.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we've got Mio Wong, Garrison, Davis, James Stout and
Speaker 5: the dishonorable Robert Evans.
Speaker 3: And Sophy Lichterman.
Speaker 4: Oh yes, it mean yeah.
Speaker 5: We're gonna do the We're gonna do some questions. We
Speaker 5: posted it on our Blue Sky for not following us
Speaker 5: on Blue Sky.
Speaker 3: We are on there Blue Ski.
Speaker 4: One does not post on Blue Sky.
Speaker 5: So if you want skeets, I really hope that's not true,
Speaker 5: because that's relliant, embarrassing.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, they really tried to get that off the ground.
Speaker 2: I don't see anyone actually using skeet.
Speaker 4: I saw someone using it in French. Was a real
Speaker 4: moment A Garrison.
Speaker 3: Instead of saying send a tweet, now, I just say
Speaker 3: send skeat in conversation. Everyone loves it.
Speaker 4: M de reskeat Is that a thing?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I guess you do. I guess you do.
Speaker 5: M hm, and we're moving on. I'm just gonna throw
Speaker 5: out some of the questions we received on online. I'm
Speaker 5: not even gonna say the name of the app again
Speaker 5: because I'm afraid being labeled as an old Garrison's embarrassed
Speaker 5: by me. I can tell I didn't say that, but
Speaker 5: you thought it.
Speaker 1: But you thought it.
Speaker 3: I didn't think that you did.
Speaker 5: Any advice for someone with a desire to do some
Speaker 5: hobby or freelance journalism in the coming few years, I
Speaker 5: want to actively fight for equality. Also, thank you for
Speaker 5: your questions.
Speaker 1: Everyone.
Speaker 2: HM, I don't thank you for your questions. I'm actively
Speaker 2: angry at you for your question.
Speaker 1: That's why you're the dishonorable.
Speaker 6: Yeah, start rich if you want to be a freelance journalist,
Speaker 6: because you'll progressively become poorer.
Speaker 2: I have funded my journal I get I love whatever
Speaker 2: people ask me questions like how did you convince Krack
Speaker 2: to send you to Iraq? I didn't. I bought plane tickets.
Speaker 2: Like being an entertainer has always been what's funded my journalist.
Speaker 3: I guess my advice would be get really autistic.
Speaker 4: About something oh problematic, just like one.
Speaker 3: Thing, this one thing, I get like really into it
Speaker 3: to the point where it kind of takes over your life.
Speaker 3: Your your personal life starts fading away, it kind of
Speaker 3: blends into your whole state of existence. And only then
Speaker 3: will you actually get good at that that thing. Yep,
Speaker 3: that's my advice. And then you just take one thing
Speaker 3: at a time and every few years you kind of
Speaker 3: change the scope of the thing if you're getting really
Speaker 3: autistic about But that's kind of how I've rolled, and
Speaker 3: it's been it's been Okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you just finished thirty six hours of digging into
Speaker 2: the life of a school shooter. And I also built
Speaker 2: the back of my career spending hours and hours digging
Speaker 2: through the online lives of mass shooters. And you don't
Speaker 2: have to do that, but you do have to do
Speaker 2: that thing, which is, yeah, exactly what Garrison said. You
Speaker 2: have to pick a very narrow thing and make it
Speaker 2: your life and not just a random thing, but like
Speaker 2: a thing that you think is important. Yeah, and that
Speaker 2: people don't other people don't understand how important it is.
Speaker 2: And if you make yourself there's a fella. His blog
Speaker 2: is called We Hunted the Mammoth. Dave Foutrell, who's been
Speaker 2: covering what we call the manosphere for like more than
Speaker 2: a decade before anybody else in journalism was taking it seriously. Yep,
Speaker 2: you got to do that kind of thing. If you
Speaker 2: do that kind of thing, you build a name for yourself,
Speaker 2: and that can allow you when that the thing that
Speaker 2: you're obsessed on becomes a big story, being first to
Speaker 2: have something meaningful to say about it can provide you
Speaker 2: eventually with the opportunity to cover other things.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's good advice.
Speaker 6: I would say if you want to get started freelancing,
Speaker 6: it's a good idea to join that BW Freelance Journalist Union.
Speaker 6: You can learn a lot from people who are freelancing there.
Speaker 6: You can learn who not to pitch, which editors are
Speaker 6: toxic as fuck, which is a surprisingly large amount. Yeah,
Speaker 6: you can learn which email to send your pitches to
Speaker 6: and how to pitch if you're not familiar with how
Speaker 6: to pitch. I also teach sometimes journalism workshops at a
Speaker 6: community college, So if you have a community college.
Speaker 4: Near you, you.
Speaker 6: Might be able to get some either free or very
Speaker 6: cheap sort of advice and the real like nuts and
Speaker 6: bolts of journalism, like sending pitches and stuff like that.
Speaker 4: Cool.
Speaker 5: What is the consensus on what the next Trump administration
Speaker 5: will do on the first day or first week, all
Speaker 5: of us just look like we're in pains.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not for seeing good things. There'll be a
Speaker 3: lot of executive orders that are you know, probably bad,
Speaker 3: you know, things that aren't great.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think that he's going to try to do
Speaker 2: as much of what he's promised to do in terms
Speaker 2: of particular not in terms of everything he's promuded, but
Speaker 2: in terms of going after immigrants. Yeah, he's going to
Speaker 2: do as much of what he's promised to do as
Speaker 2: he possibly can't. Now, that doesn't mean he's going to
Speaker 2: actually deport millions of people. There are like some just
Speaker 2: practical limitations based on the capacity of the institutions he'll
Speaker 2: be using to do this, and he could get there's
Speaker 2: a very good chance things will get bogged down and whatnot,
Speaker 2: but like he will try. Yeah, that's that's my take.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think I think the other thing that's gonna
Speaker 7: happen pretty quickly is I think he's gonna start moving
Speaker 7: on tariffs very very fast.
Speaker 2: Yeah. If you're planning to buy a computer, go ahead
Speaker 2: and grab that fucker now if you can.
Speaker 3: If you're getting anything from overseas, you should get it
Speaker 3: in the few weeks that you still can.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it has a battery made here.
Speaker 5: I had my annual physical today because otherwise our insurance
Speaker 5: screws us over. And my doctor was like, you should
Speaker 5: try to get as many prescriptions filled before the end
Speaker 5: of the year before things things come up, just in case.
Speaker 4: There you go, and you.
Speaker 1: Know that's not terrible advice.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I think in terms of executive orders, he will try
Speaker 6: and further restrict access to asylum, try and further change that.
Speaker 6: There are things he can do by executive order with
Speaker 6: ICE and CBP in terms of how they operate that
Speaker 6: he will try and do. It's not impossible that they
Speaker 6: will try and again immediately mobilize public health law against
Speaker 6: migrants like he did in twenty twenty. Right, Yeah, those
Speaker 6: things could all be done without congressional support. We made
Speaker 6: a whole on us about this, but Steven Miller suggested
Speaker 6: that they might do some of those things.
Speaker 4: So, yeah, not impossible. Probably won't be a great day.
Speaker 5: Somebody's getting fired the first week, probably first day.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I've seen the fact that the FBI
Speaker 2: director is stepping down pushed as like an act of
Speaker 2: resistance because it means that Trump now has to actually
Speaker 2: go through like Congress to get it done. I don't
Speaker 2: know how much I buy that, how much I think that.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of what I'm seeing right now
Speaker 2: from establishment people And maybe this isn't true of Ray
Speaker 2: because I did find some of the arguments they're compelling,
Speaker 2: But a lot of what I've seen from establishment people
Speaker 2: in politics is they're scared and just really try and
Speaker 2: not to make waves. Yeah, and I think that's what
Speaker 2: you're going to see overwhelmingly. I think that he's going
Speaker 2: to probably probably will not immediately act against the press,
Speaker 2: and in a legal sense as the president, they will
Speaker 2: do that. But I think he's he's going to He's
Speaker 2: already suing differently, and I think that that's going to
Speaker 2: be kind of his his focus there for a while,
Speaker 2: just because there's a lot on his plate. But I
Speaker 2: think he there there will be attempts like the fuck
Speaker 2: with libel laws and stuff, especially as things go on.
Speaker 5: Okay, several of you have asked about the Android ad
Speaker 5: free version subscription channel, and I want you all to
Speaker 5: know that it will happen next year. I have been
Speaker 5: trying to get this to happen for two years now,
Speaker 5: and for unforeseen reasons, it just keeps getting roadblocked. But
Speaker 5: it is happening. We're just waiting on a couple final
Speaker 5: things to get into place, so that will be happening,
Speaker 5: hopefully very soon into twenty twenty five. I will update
Speaker 5: everybody as soon as that's possible. And I'm so sorry
Speaker 5: it's taken so long. I want you to know. I
Speaker 5: have worked so unbelievably hard on this, miserably hard.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we've seen it, Sophie has. It's been a nightmare,
Speaker 2: harder than I have worked on anything else this year. Like,
Speaker 2: it's been nuts.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And here's the thing that sucks for no reason, no reason,
Speaker 2: not that there's no reason to launch the app, there's
Speaker 2: a great reason. There's no reason it should have taken
Speaker 2: this long, correct, But we can't say anymore for reasons
Speaker 2: that are also equally frustrating. I'd like to say in general, folks,
Speaker 2: there's a few things that get brought up a lot.
Speaker 2: It's like, why haven't they done this yet? Why haven't
Speaker 2: they've done this yet? We're talking like technical things or
Speaker 2: like you know, things like like a paid subscription, and
Speaker 2: they're like, why haven't they gotten around to it yet,
Speaker 2: and the answer is always some infuriating bullshit.
Speaker 1: Based on some bureaucracy bullshit.
Speaker 2: Some be rocks, some legal shit where you're like, you
Speaker 2: don't actually realize it's illegal to do this if you
Speaker 2: do it this way or whatever, like some sort of
Speaker 2: bullshit that makes it impossible. It's not that we want
Speaker 2: to make this is. It is easy as possible for
Speaker 2: people to have the best listening experience that we can
Speaker 2: afford to provide them. But there's a lot of annoying
Speaker 2: bullshit that exists for reasons beyond our comprehension.
Speaker 5: Sorry, anyways, here's ads unless you have an iPhone and
Speaker 5: subscribe to color Zone Media on Apple.
Speaker 1: All right, we're back.
Speaker 5: How do you each motivate yourself to right or do
Speaker 5: your jobs? I get asked that question all the time,
Speaker 5: but I'll let each of you tackle it. While this
Speaker 5: is a communally hosted show, I feel like each of
Speaker 5: you do very different things, so your answers are going
Speaker 5: to be all over the place.
Speaker 3: So Garrison, oh, well, I mean paying rents a great motivator.
Speaker 2: Sure, yes, yes, understated this is this is a big
Speaker 2: thing that a lot of people who want to be
Speaker 2: writers but have never done it for a living. Miss
Speaker 2: is that all of your favorite writers who do it
Speaker 2: for a living A big part of how they get
Speaker 2: over fucking writer's block is they have to pay rent.
Speaker 2: It turns out that helps.
Speaker 3: It's it's a quite compelling motivator, and sometimes it has
Speaker 3: required the assistance of you know, caffeine or other things.
Speaker 3: I have a variety of playlists to help me in
Speaker 3: when I'm in like different moods. I definitely will about
Speaker 3: you know, maybe twice a month, I just do a complete,
Speaker 3: like a complete body check to my sleep schedule to
Speaker 3: get a special project finished. And that's just kind of
Speaker 3: part of the deal, at least in terms of how
Speaker 3: I work, and not everyone does it this way though
Speaker 3: maybe maybe people are more healthy than me.
Speaker 2: Yeah for me.
Speaker 7: Okay, So the easiest way something gets done is just
Speaker 7: pure rage. I get I can just do it like it.
Speaker 4: Just comes out.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Anger is a great motivator.
Speaker 7: The other fun one is pure joy as something funny happening,
Speaker 7: like this is the Shinzowabe Assassination. The easiest writing I've
Speaker 7: ever done in my life.
Speaker 2: Sometimes it just flows.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Other times it's just like there's a deadline and everyone
Speaker 7: is counting on me, and I have to get it out,
Speaker 7: and I've gotten to the right level of sleep deprivation
Speaker 7: where I can.
Speaker 4: Just do it. That's right, That's right.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 7: But I also think, you know, there's obviously like health insurance,
Speaker 7: which is sort of a joke given our health insurance.
Speaker 7: But yeah, and the thing, and this is the sort
Speaker 7: of the serious one, is that like this, you know,
Speaker 7: I mean, I do some organizing stuff too, but like this,
Speaker 7: this is the thing that I have to do that
Speaker 7: can materially affect the world, which is a very very
Speaker 7: weird thing to say about a podcast. But I've seen
Speaker 7: it happen, right, I've seen all of you go and
Speaker 7: do things that wouldn't have happened. And I've you know,
Speaker 7: it's it's a weird situation, right, because my motivation for
Speaker 7: doing this stuff is the chance that you will make
Speaker 7: the world better. But I've I've seen it happen, and
Speaker 7: I have to continue to believe that the thing that
Speaker 7: I've been doing for all these years, this project of
Speaker 7: building a very large hammer and deploying it against our enemies,
Speaker 7: can work and will work. And that is you know,
Speaker 7: that's how I get out of bed every morning, is
Speaker 7: we're building the hammer and we're swinging it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great way to put it. Very large.
Speaker 4: Hammer will be a banging name for a podcast.
Speaker 1: I agree, Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a there's a great speech the comic series
Speaker 2: trans Metropolitan about how journalism is a gun that you
Speaker 2: wire up to your eyes and your ears and several
Speaker 2: other organs in order to shoot at the world. And
Speaker 2: that's I think a good way to keep yourself doing
Speaker 2: it when it feels like you're just shouting into a void.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I really like the process of writing.
Speaker 6: I like telling stories like that makes me happy and
Speaker 6: I feel so lucky I can do it for my job.
Speaker 6: I don't particularly likely receiving trauma, which.
Speaker 4: I also do for video, but like, really it sometimes
Speaker 4: I can't sleep.
Speaker 6: So many people trusted me with their stories, especially this year,
Speaker 6: that they didn't have to and sometimes a great personal risk,
Speaker 6: and it's a massive privilege that they trusted me with
Speaker 6: those stories, and I think I owe it to them
Speaker 6: to do my best to tell those stories as well.
Speaker 4: As I can.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and like as Mia said, it has materially changed
Speaker 6: the world. Like the amount of people who listened to
Speaker 6: our podcast and came to the border to help last
Speaker 6: year when we really desperately needed help, people who just
Speaker 6: like on Sunday Night, gave their money, which I know
Speaker 6: none of us have enough money right now to help
Speaker 6: people who are displaced in Rushaba. Like, all that stuff
Speaker 6: really makes it feel like if you tell a good
Speaker 6: enough story, people will care. That's always what I felt like,
Speaker 6: if you could just get people to see it, if
Speaker 6: people could be there, they would care, and if they
Speaker 6: care enough, they'll do something. Then I've seen that be
Speaker 6: true with people who listen to the show, and that
Speaker 6: really makes me happy, So I want to keep doing that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, for me, it's two part answer. The first part
Speaker 5: is that I genuinely give a shit about everything that
Speaker 5: we put out, and what we do is not really
Speaker 5: while it is a job, it matters so much. And
Speaker 5: the second part is if I don't do my job,
Speaker 5: the amount of people's lives that that impacts.
Speaker 1: He's a lot of fucking.
Speaker 5: People, and I give a shit about each and every
Speaker 5: one of them. So I'm gonna keep doing my job
Speaker 5: so that everybody else can keep doing their job and
Speaker 5: maybe we make a difference in this world, this fucked up,
Speaker 5: crumbly world. Robert did you have anything to add. You
Speaker 5: were speaking, and then nice talked.
Speaker 2: Did I already not give an answer?
Speaker 1: You gave an answer, that's why, but you were starting
Speaker 1: to speak.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I do it for the fame. Baby.
Speaker 1: Great.
Speaker 5: Next, What episode or episodes were your favorite this year
Speaker 5: to make or otherwise? Yeah, my favorite this year. We're
Speaker 5: definitely James's series from the Darien Gap. That was an
Speaker 5: incredible series. I'm so unbelievably proud of it. Yeah, James
Speaker 5: had been trying to do that work for a long time,
Speaker 5: and I'm happy that we were able to fund it
Speaker 5: and James was able to do the incredible reporting that
Speaker 5: he did. I'm also quite proud of Robert Garrison and
Speaker 5: I surviving the RNC and DNC and C was.
Speaker 2: A good time, like legitimately.
Speaker 1: Great time, pulling the worst people in the world.
Speaker 2: It was the DNC that fucked me up. Yeah, yeah, same.
Speaker 3: I was like destroyed emotionally after the DNC.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the DNC was really a huge bummer.
Speaker 5: And then MIAs covered some of the most important labor
Speaker 5: stories that like nobody covers absolutely yeah, and like without
Speaker 5: those genuinely like nobody covers like small labor stories or
Speaker 5: big labor stories and she's always on.
Speaker 1: Top of that beat.
Speaker 5: And yeah, I also really just like Robert's Don't Panic
Speaker 5: episode something some great writing, my friend, I answered, now
Speaker 5: everybody else has to I'll start with.
Speaker 3: There's weirdly a few this year cool.
Speaker 7: I normally isn't I like the Boeing ones?
Speaker 2: That was fun.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 7: The one that was most emotionally impactful for me was
Speaker 7: getting to interview doctor Julius Serrano, who if you haven't
Speaker 7: listened to that episode, go listen to it.
Speaker 1: Great book.
Speaker 7: Yeah, Whipping Girl is the book that literally created a
Speaker 7: bunch of the like like that the concept of misgendering
Speaker 7: is like from that book, right, like like the language
Speaker 7: that we used to talk about transnist today like is
Speaker 7: directly her. And so few people have ever read the book,
Speaker 7: so a few people even know who she is. And
Speaker 7: getting a chance to talk to her was like incredible.
Speaker 7: And I'm also really happy about the organizing one that
Speaker 7: I did, because I've gotten so many messages from people
Speaker 7: who were just like, I, oh, wait, my knitting is
Speaker 7: useful to organizing, and I'm like, yes, yes it is,
Speaker 7: you're nitting. You're so incredible staggeringly useful.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I'm proud of that one.
Speaker 5: Yeah, let's take a quick break then, Garrison, Robert James,
Speaker 5: you can answer that question.
Speaker 1: And we're back. James, how about you.
Speaker 4: I'm proud of doing the Darien once.
Speaker 6: I think, like, I'm so happy that we finally got
Speaker 6: to a place where like we could do that, where
Speaker 6: we could find that like I've been trying to do that,
Speaker 6: like I said, for million, nearly a decade, and yeah,
Speaker 6: it's been it's been hard, and it continues to be hard.
Speaker 6: Like one of the people you heard from in those
Speaker 6: episodes got deported last week then, so like it continues
Speaker 6: to kind of be emotionally difficult. But I really liked
Speaker 6: how many people messaged me and were like, I sent
Speaker 6: this to my father uncle, not just dude aunts and
Speaker 6: their mums too, I'm sure, and think non binary relatives,
Speaker 6: but like, well maybe not because they sent it to
Speaker 6: their right wing relati and they learned some compassion. That's
Speaker 6: always what you want to do, Like I said before,
Speaker 6: you want people to see it so that they care
Speaker 6: and so they understand it and they don't just get
Speaker 6: this stupid Fox News bullshit racism stuff. And so yeah,
Speaker 6: that made me really happy. The reason we're all different
Speaker 6: on this, by the way, is because we have not
Speaker 6: done a Come twenty twenty four episode, and if we had,
Speaker 6: this would have been a much much shorter segment.
Speaker 2: James, let me just tell you, I think we can
Speaker 2: all look forward to a white Christmas this year.
Speaker 1: Jesus mother.
Speaker 4: Set him up. It's my own fault.
Speaker 3: Wow, I guess I'll go now. I'll just short clean
Speaker 3: out the aftertaste of that. So it's worse. I think
Speaker 3: I started out pretty strong with police drones, even more
Speaker 3: topical as we record this now as New Jersey is
Speaker 3: about to get completely abduct I think by alien aircraft.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no one left in New Jersey now.
Speaker 3: They've all been taken away by these unidentified drove That.
Speaker 2: Actually happened three days ago. It just took a long
Speaker 2: time for the rest of the country to notice or care.
Speaker 2: Bruce Springsteen hasn't made a song of izon.
Speaker 3: We have no way of known besides the mass hysteria
Speaker 3: of the New Jersey drone panic. Police drones are a
Speaker 3: real problem, and those are going to be increasingly so
Speaker 3: I was happy with my reporting on that at CES,
Speaker 3: and then I guess I mean to echo Sophie. I
Speaker 3: had a great time at the RNC. It's fun as sentence.
Speaker 3: I never thought I would say yeah, And particularly the
Speaker 3: R and C Grinder episode, I still think is Bruce
Speaker 3: pretty is pretty good.
Speaker 1: It's pretty great.
Speaker 5: The amount of places that Garrison and I snuck into
Speaker 5: at the r n C a time.
Speaker 3: It was really dangerous too, because I was having to
Speaker 3: like do my rn C research next to Robert and
Speaker 3: Sophie the whole time. And oh boy, it's like a
Speaker 3: minefield scrolling through that app.
Speaker 1: That's an experience, to say the least.
Speaker 5: Any thoughts on the proposed twenty twenty eight general strike,
Speaker 5: how are people feeling about that?
Speaker 3: I'll start with Mia, Yeah, I mean it's a pretty
Speaker 3: good idea.
Speaker 7: Like, there's definitely sort of I'm immediately going into this
Speaker 7: nacaying a little bit. There's definitely problems with it. It's
Speaker 7: going to be extremely hard to execute because we just
Speaker 7: don't have a modern history of doing that in the US,
Speaker 7: and even some of the success ones in the last
Speaker 7: decade that people have pulled off haven't been that effective.
Speaker 7: But on the other hand, as something that we you know,
Speaker 7: a concrete thing that we have to organize, towards that
Speaker 7: has a bunch of like pretty large unions behind it already.
Speaker 7: I did an episode about that a few weeks ago.
Speaker 7: I don't know, a couple months ago. I don't remember
Speaker 7: when I did this episode. I'm sorry, I can't remember
Speaker 7: anything we've ever done. But I think, I think, I
Speaker 7: think it's a good opportunity to connect a whole bunch
Speaker 7: of different kinds of organizing together, both in terms of
Speaker 7: sort of labor and in terms of the support work
Speaker 7: you need for that. So, yeah, cautiously optimistic.
Speaker 1: Anyone else have anything they want to add.
Speaker 3: The time to start figuring out those logistics, like is now,
Speaker 3: it's not it's not waiting till twenty twenty seven.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree, Garrison. I think that the fact that
Speaker 2: there are serious people who represent serious unions talking about
Speaker 2: it is part of way. It's one of the things
Speaker 2: that does give me a degree of hope. We're going
Speaker 2: to have to start working now towards it. It's not
Speaker 2: going to be simple in any way, shape or form.
Speaker 2: If they see it coming, they are going to start
Speaker 2: trying to criminalize things preemptively. If it is something that
Speaker 2: even looks like a real possibility, they're going to come
Speaker 2: after it with everything they've got. And it's one of
Speaker 2: those things where maybe if the midterms go well for Democrats,
Speaker 2: maybe Democrats stop that, But it's just as plausible and
Speaker 2: probably more plausible that Democrats line up with Republicans to
Speaker 2: attempt to criminalize something like that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's strained to be seeing something like this will
Speaker 6: going to I so far off, Like it's like, yes,
Speaker 6: it's not something where any of us are familiar with, which.
Speaker 2: It has to be to be clear. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it.
Speaker 4: Has to be barring, like an actual coup.
Speaker 6: That's the only way you get a general strike, right, Like,
Speaker 6: either something so earth shattering that everyone so everyone's ready
Speaker 6: to risk it because they're already in danger, or you
Speaker 6: take the time and you plan that you do it properly.
Speaker 6: But it's just not something we're familiar with it. I
Speaker 6: love the general strike. I'm always going to support a
Speaker 6: general strike. I'm excited to see a general strike. But yeah,
Speaker 6: we have to put in the work now.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The only responsible way to characterize the organized Left
Speaker 2: in the United States is a complete and utter failure
Speaker 2: like it is. It has been a calamity for the
Speaker 2: causes that it seeks to represent and a lot of
Speaker 2: that is because of like fucking bullshit online clicktivism. You know,
Speaker 2: we're all going to do a general strike. Everybody get
Speaker 2: ready next week, We're going to do it.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: Shit like that is is it's just so deeply unseerious.
Speaker 2: And if we're going to take the momentu and the
Speaker 2: energy that exists in the number of people who are
Speaker 2: angry and who you know, and that number of people
Speaker 2: will be increasing as the consequences of conservative policies hit
Speaker 2: home by twenty twenty eight, like it has to be
Speaker 2: something taken deadly seriously by very serious people who are
Speaker 2: thinking through the consequences and what's necessary in order to
Speaker 2: make this feasible, you know.
Speaker 5: And lastly, do each of you have you know, a
Speaker 5: movie or a book or something you would like to recommend.
Speaker 6: In twenty twenty five, when I finished my books, you
Speaker 6: should buy it, yes, but read General Strike. I've been
Speaker 6: reading a book called Pretent Tape, which is in English,
Speaker 6: but it's about how San Francisco doc workers block to
Speaker 6: a shipment of weapons to El Salvador and it just
Speaker 6: seems a very relevant book. And they did it to
Speaker 6: Pinochet as well. It's easy to read and like. It
Speaker 6: just reminded me how important labor organizing is going to
Speaker 6: be and then four years and how powerful it could
Speaker 6: be too. So I'll give that one a little plug.
Speaker 2: Excellent.
Speaker 6: There's a film called The End Will Be Spectacular which
Speaker 6: is about the Kurdish use movement in Northern Kurdistan in Turkey.
Speaker 4: It's a really good film.
Speaker 6: I think of understand to help you understand the Kurdish
Speaker 6: freedom movement, and it's worth a watch. It's not like
Speaker 6: a necessarily a happy, feel good film, but I think
Speaker 6: it's worth a watch. Is fifty if you've recently become
Speaker 6: interested in that because what you've heard on the podcast.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, I have a couple. So I'm trans fiction
Speaker 7: pilled right now. Given you've given you fiction for trans authors.
Speaker 2: Would you say you're transfixed? Wow?
Speaker 3: I walked.
Speaker 7: I walked right into that one, like drove directly into it,
Speaker 7: like JFK's head into that bullet.
Speaker 2: Oh my god. Wow.
Speaker 1: We spent a lot of time with each other.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 7: The first one I wanted to talk about is The
Speaker 7: gun Runner and Her Hound by Maria Ying, which is
Speaker 7: the pen name of a couple of authors. Okay, so
Speaker 7: this is a This is an absolutely unhinged lesbian book
Speaker 7: about a lesbian crime lord and her new bodyguard who
Speaker 7: is also a lesbian, and it rules. Uh, there's a
Speaker 7: whole sort of like post apocalypse US thing going on,
Speaker 7: but they're still in like civilized Hong Kong. It's awesome,
Speaker 7: it's great. It's you need war on hinge lesbians in
Speaker 7: your life, go read this. The the other one is
Speaker 7: one of the boys. This is forthcoming is we want
Speaker 7: to release May thirteen, twenty twenty five by Victoria Zeller,
Speaker 7: and it's about a trans girl who's like the kicker
Speaker 7: on her football team and she has to like leave
Speaker 7: the team because she transitions, but then the team needs
Speaker 7: her back they don't have a kicker. And it's it's fun,
Speaker 7: it's it's a good time. So you should you should
Speaker 7: get that when it comes out.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So I'm actually right now in the middle of
Speaker 2: a book that I found myself surprised by how much
Speaker 2: I've liked. It's called When Paris Went Dark and it
Speaker 2: is a history of the occupation of Paris under the
Speaker 2: Nazis That is a really fascinating social history by Ronald
Speaker 2: rose Bottom that I found very like emotionally affecting, especially
Speaker 2: in light of you know, some things going on, and yeah,
Speaker 2: just kind of a fascinating look at the psychology of
Speaker 2: a people of like a of an entire people kind
Speaker 2: of grappling with what's about to happen to them in
Speaker 2: the wake of the failure of the French army and
Speaker 2: then what happens next. And then I would also recommend
Speaker 2: Setting the Desert on Fire by James Barr, which is
Speaker 2: one of the books about te Lawrence that I cited
Speaker 2: in the t Lawrence episodes, if you are at all
Speaker 2: interested in the realities of needing to fight an insurgent war.
Speaker 3: Here, I guess just two recent things I've enjoyed. Finally
Speaker 3: finished The Steppenwolf by Hermann Hess. Yes, I enjoyed that deeply.
Speaker 3: It kind of it kind of picked my picked my
Speaker 3: twin peaks the Return Brain. So that was that was pleasant.
Speaker 3: And for a more recent release, Luca Gudaghino's a new
Speaker 3: movie Queer, adapting the short story by William S.
Speaker 2: Burrows.
Speaker 3: I found this movie to be utterly fascinating and transfixing,
Speaker 3: to use the term from me Robert. I don't have
Speaker 3: much else to say about it because I would rather
Speaker 3: people just watch it and take away what they want
Speaker 3: to themselves. But it got me thinking a lot about
Speaker 3: the lack of meaning inherent to identity and why I
Speaker 3: hate the term queer bodies.
Speaker 4: So yeah, good.
Speaker 5: Movie, awesome. I just have one movie to recommend it.
Speaker 5: It's one of my favorite movies of all time, the
Speaker 5: original nineteen seventy three seventy two, so seventy three seventy three,
Speaker 5: The wicker Man, not the fucking Nicholas Cage version, the
Speaker 5: original version. And if you have a local theater that
Speaker 5: plays old movies a lot of times, they'll play it
Speaker 5: in theaters. I highly recommend that experience. It's really fun,
Speaker 5: especially at the end. I see it in theaters or
Speaker 5: watch it at least once or twice a year, and
Speaker 5: vibes are good. Yeah that's it for a Q and
Speaker 5: a episode. Thanks for submitting, and goodbye.
Speaker 1: It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 5: For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Speaker 5: Coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 5: Apple Podcasts, or wherever.
Speaker 1: You listen to podcasts.
Speaker 5: You can now find sources for It could Happen Here
Speaker 5: listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening,