The Intercept Briefing

How to Really Resist


Listen Later

Safety net programs like Medicaid and SNAP are in peril after the House Republicans passed a budget resolution this week that proposes massive $4.5 trillion in tax cuts, alongside $2 trillion in spending reductions. The math doesn’t add up: There is no realistic way to achieve the necessary savings without slashing entitlement programs that the most vulnerable Americans depend on.

While the Republicans claim they won’t cut these programs, they are simultaneously setting up eventual changes. House Speaker Mike Johnson characterized Medicaid as "hugely problematic" with "a lot of fraud, waste, and abuse." This rhetoric echoes that of Elon Musk, who labeled those affected by federal program cuts as the "parasite class."

On this week’s episode of The Intercept Briefing, Anat Shenker-Osorio, a political messaging expert, and Sunjeev Bery, a foreign policy analyst and Intercept contributor, discuss how Republican messaging is previewing what’s to come and why Trump and his allies have been successful in the court of public opinion.

“One of the most persuasive tools that we have in our arsenal is repetition. Messages that people hear over and over, irrespective of their actual content, are rated to be more credible,” says Shenker-Osorio. “Familiarity gives our brains what we call cognitive ease, they give us what's called the illusory truth effect that if you've heard something over and over, like if you've heard government is wasteful, government is wasteful, government is wasteful … then the next time that you hear it, you're like, oh, yeah, that sort of seems true.”

Bery believes the way to fight back is by first changing our language. “Republicans are very good at trapping our country and our society with their language. You take something like the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, simply to repeat that phrase is to be trapped by its false logic and by the fraudulent claims of its master, the billionaire Elon Musk,” he says. “We need to use different language entirely. This is an attempt to steal from the American people and hand a fat check to Elon Musk and all the billionaires who stood on stage with Donald Trump during his inauguration. That's what this is.”

And while the speed of change and upheaval seems dire, both Shenker-Osorio and Bery remain optimistic. 

Shenker-Osorio thinks Americans who disagree with the Trump administration’s actions should step up in this moment. “The opportunity, if we were to seize it, is a recognition that the only thing that has actually toppled autocracy, I would argue both in the U. S. past and also, most certainly, in other countries, is civil resistance. It is a sustained, unrelenting group of people showing, not telling, being out in the world, demonstrating their resistance, their refusal, and their ridicule,” she says. “The future is still made of the decisions that we take together. That is what makes the whole thing crumble. And the possibility, not the inevitability, but the possibility of a very different kind of governing regime.”

To hear more of the conversation, check out The Intercept Briefing wherever you get your podcasts.


Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

The Intercept BriefingBy The Intercept

  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7

4.7

6,051 ratings


More shows like The Intercept Briefing

View all
Democracy Now! Audio by Democracy Now!

Democracy Now! Audio

5,641 Listeners

CounterSpin by Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting

CounterSpin

496 Listeners

Jacobin Radio by Jacobin

Jacobin Radio

1,407 Listeners

Ralph Nader Radio Hour by Ralph Nader

Ralph Nader Radio Hour

1,180 Listeners

The Electronic Intifada Podcast by The Electronic Intifada

The Electronic Intifada Podcast

271 Listeners

The Katie Halper Show by Katie Halper

The Katie Halper Show

1,449 Listeners

The Dig by Daniel Denvir

The Dig

1,487 Listeners

Citations Needed by Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson

Citations Needed

3,858 Listeners

Deconstructed by The Intercept

Deconstructed

4,260 Listeners

Murderville by The Intercept

Murderville

2,002 Listeners

Useful Idiots with Katie Halper and Aaron Maté by Useful Idiots, LLC

Useful Idiots with Katie Halper and Aaron Maté

4,414 Listeners

Bad Faith by Briahna Joy Gray

Bad Faith

2,650 Listeners

American Prestige by Daniel Bessner & Derek Davison

American Prestige

685 Listeners

Lever Time by The Lever

Lever Time

507 Listeners

The Chris Hedges Report by Chris Hedges

The Chris Hedges Report

39 Listeners

Drop Site News by Drop Site News

Drop Site News

295 Listeners