Episodes
Reform the Courts!: Chris Kang
Chris Kang is the Co-Founder and Chief Counsel of Demand Justice. He served in the White House for nearly seven years as Deputy Counsel to President Obama and Special Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs. We talk about court reform from diversifying the bench of judges to expanding the Supreme Court.
Include the Independent Voter: Jackie Salit & Thom Reilly
Jackie Salit and Thom Reilly are co-directors of the Center for an Independent and Sustainable Democracy at Arizona State University and co-authors of The Independent Voter. Independents are making a statement about the culture, the practice, and the destructiveness of the current political culture. You have almost half the country identifying themselves as independents, but you have a system which is completely embedded with partisan bias.
Ballot Initiatives For Direct Democracy: Chris Melody Fields Figueredo
Chris Melody Fields Figueredo is the Executive Director of the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center, which seeks to strengthen democracy by building a national progressive strategy for ballot measures. We discuss ballot initiatives and how they put the issues directly into the hands of voters and out of the two-party system. It can really flip the script!
Organizing Powers Democracy: Cecile Richards
Cecile Richards is the co-chair of American Bridge, former president of Planned Parenthood, a co-founder of Supermajority, and author of the book Make Trouble. We make sense of the midterms, take away some gold nuggets for democracy, and are reminded that grassroots organizing is all about the long game.
The Appeal of Libertarianism: Andrew Koppelman
Andrew Koppelman is the author of Burning Down the House: How Libertarian Philosophy Was Corrupted by Delusion and Greed. It’s a fascinating history of this idea and an excellent lens for understanding so much of American life and politics.
The Truth About Disability Rights: Rebecca Cokley
Rebecca Cokley is a disability-rights advocate and the first U.S. Disability Rights Program Officer for the Ford Foundation. From 2009 to 2013, she served as an appointee in President Barack Obama’s White House. We discuss the lived experience of being disabled in America. It's an important conversation that truly exposes the inequities of our society.
Police and Public Safety: Thaddeus Johnson
Thaddeus Johnson is a former police officer, a Senior Fellow at the Council on Criminal Justice, and Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice & Criminology at Georgia State University’s Andrew Young School of Policy Studies. This broad-ranging conversation discusses law enforcement and empowering communities and citizens so we can all be safer.
Indictment Is Accountability: Allison Gill
Dr. Alison Gill is a veteran, former federal government executive, and Host of Mueller She Wrote and the Daily Beans Podcast. We discuss democracy, accountability and all the legal troubles the former president is facing, and the power of your vote.
Flexing the Women’s Vote: Amanda Brown Lierman
Amanda Brown Lierman is the Executive Director at Supermajority and Supermajority Education Fund, which builds women’s political power through efforts to inform, train and organize women across age, race, and background.
AI for Equality: Orly Lobel
Orly Lobel is the Warren Distinguished Professor of Law and the Director of the Center for Employment and Labor Law. Her latest book is The Equality Machine: Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future. We discuss reframing our public discourse around technology in order to proactively use it as a tool for equality.
How the NRA Radicalized America: Ryan Busse
Ryan Busse is a former firearms executive, Senior Policy Advisor to Giffords, and author of Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America. We discuss how guns are intricately interwoven through our democratic division and radicalization in our everyday lives and in our politics.
Gen Z for Change: Aidan Kohn-Murphy & Jack Petocz
Aidan Kohn-Murphy is the founder and Executive Director of the organization Gen Z for Change, a youth-led nonprofit working to educate and create change on issues that affect young people. Jack Petocz is a political strategist who also mounted a campaign to recall his local school board in Florida to fight back against anti-LGBTQ board members.
Stop Banning Books: Jonathan Friedman
Jonathan Friedman is the director of free expression and education programs at PEN America. He oversees research, advocacy, and education related to academic freedom, educational gag orders, book bans, and general free expression in schools, colleges, and universities. We discuss the driving forces behind campaigns to ban books and silence teachers.
Fascism Is All Around Us: Jason Stanley
Jason Stanley is the Jacob Urowsky Professor of Philosophy at Yale and the author of 5 books, including How Propaganda Works and most recently How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them. We discuss the logic of fascism and why we need to use it as a concept to make sense of our times.
Fight for Democracy: Steve Pierson
Steve Pierson is the host of the How We Win podcast. He’s an activist, community organizer, and trainer, who started as a “class of 2016” volunteer. He’s currently an elected California Democratic Party Delegate and chairs their Organizing Committee. We discuss the nitty gritty of Get Out the Vote, phone banking, and a whole host of other boots on the ground politics as we head toward the midterms.
The Power of Crisis: Ian Bremmer
Ian Bremmer is a political scientist and he’s the founder and president of the research and consulting firm Eurasia Group. We discuss his latest book, The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats -- and Our Response -- Will Change the World. He argues that the major challenges humanity is facing are spurring us to create a new world order that works against these common threats.
Democratic Thinking and Acting: Christopher Beem
Christopher Beem is Managing Director of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy, co-host of the Democracy Works podcast, and the author of The Seven Democratic Virtues: What You Can Do to Overcome Tribalism and Save Our Democracy. We discuss vices and virtues in the context of democratic thinking, democratic acting, and democratic belief.
The Taxpayers’ Watchdog: Rob Sand
Rob Sand is Iowa’s State Auditor, which is the taxpayers’ watchdog in the state. He’s the first Democrat to beat an incumbent Republican in Iowa in 50 years. We discuss putting public service above politics, delivering good governance, and how to get stuff done even when you are part of a political minority.
Economic Crimes of the Powerful: Jennifer Taub
Jennifer Taub is a lawyer, advocate, and author of Big Dirty Money: The Shocking Injustice and Unseen Cost of White Collar Crime. We revisit our discussion on who gets a pass for committing such crimes, what the actual consequences are to our society, and how to hold the perpetrators accountable.
Break Up Monopolies: Zephyr Teachout
Zephyr Teachout is Senior Counsel for Economic Justice for the New York Attorney General and law professor at Fordham University. We revisit our conversation with her about her book, Break 'Em Up: Recovering Our Freedom from Big Ag, Big Tech, and Big Money. We discuss how monopolies are deeply anti-democratic, how we can break them up by enforcing existing anti-trust laws, and protect our democracy.