Diet Soap - a podcast

Adam Proctor is the host of the "Dead Pundits Society" podcast. He took exception to the Critical Cuts video "Supporting Bernie Sanders Was a Mistake" and came on to the Zero Books podcast in order to give voice to his objections. 

This video interview explores how it is that the “End of History” is over. The idea that Western liberal democracy was the “final form of human government” has been exposed as bluster: the old order is crumbling before our eyes. Angry anti-politics have arisen to threaten political establishments across the world. Elites have fallen into hysteria, blaming voters, “populism”, Putin, Facebook… anyone but themselves. They are suffering from Neoliberal Order Breakdown Syndrome.

In this episode of Pop the Left Derick Varn and Douglas Lain discuss Paul Matticks critique of James Burnham's "The Machiavellians, Defenders of Freedom." We ask the question, "Why do right-wing theories of social class so frequently infect the left and Marxism?"

Responding to some recent Zero Books podcasts (The Lenin Legend and Did Marx Hate Liberals?) Chris Cutrone returns to discuss an essay he wrote in 2011 entitled "Lenin's Liberalism."

Relevant Essay

Lenin's Liberalism by Chris Cutrone

https://platypus1917.org/2011/06/01/lenins-liberalism/

Christine Louis-Dit-Sully is a freelance writer, and she is currently researching for a second PhD. Her research is focused on the issues of race, identity, social justice, and the demand for ‘safe spaces’ in US and UK universities. Her book from Zero Books is entitled “Transcending Racial Divisions: Will You Stand By Me” and in it, she examines the origins of racial thinking and the relationship between race and culture.

Paul Mattick's essay "The Lenin Legend" was published in 1935. Mattick's essay begins with these lines: "The yellower and more leathery the skin of the mummified Lenin grows, and the higher the statistically determined number of visitors to the Lenin Mausoleum climbs, the less are people concerned about the real Lenin and his historical significance." In this video Djene Rhys Bajalan and Kuba Wrzesniewski join Doug Lain to discuss the essay and whether Mattick's polemic holds up today.

Derick Varn and Douglas Lain return to discuss Paul Mattick Sr.'s 1939 essay "Roosevelt's 'New' New Deal."

Paul Mattick was a council communist and left critic of Bolshevism. Mattick was heavily influenced by the work of Henryk Grossman, but unlike Grossman, he was a critic of Leninism. His essay on the New Deal argued that support for the New Deal was crippling the workers movement.

Since its emergence in the middle of the twentieth century, the American Empire has been fueled by the search for an enemy. This episode of Zero Squared features a conversation with Daniel Bessner features a conversation about Karl Schmidt, the friend/enemy distinction, the cold war, and American Empire's role in the world today.

Derick Varn and Douglas Lain discuss the failings of a sect of Trotskyism known as "Political Marxism" after discussing just what Chris Cutrone might have meant when he asked Doug to join his effort to create a "Dictatorship of the Proletariat." Can Marx's ideas become politically relevant today? What are the impediments to socialism today?

Relevant Essays:

The ‘Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ in Marx and Engels by Hal Draper

https://www.marxists.org/subject/marxmyths/hal-draper/article2.htm

Is There Anything to Defend in Political Marxism by Neil Davidson

https://isreview.org/issue/91/there-anything-defend-political-marxism

Following up on a panel discussion for the Platypus Affiliated Society, Chris Cutrone stops by to ambush Douglas Lain about whether he'd support a "dictatorship of the proletariat." Other topics include whether Christopher Lasch was a conservative or a socialist, the nature of bourgeoise justice, the political character of Donald Trump, and what it means to be an aging Gen Xer today.