On US politics being stuck.
 
[This was originally a subscriber exclusive. Sign up now at patreon.com/bungacast]
 
We talk to political theorist Benjamin Studebaker about his new book, The Chronic Crisis of American Democracy: The Way is Shut. Studebaker holds that hope is a problem because it's used by professionals to keep people engaged in a system that simply doesn't deliver. Hence the culture wars and the focus on various 'vices'.
 
How are both left and right complicit in this situation? What's the solution? Are we dependent on oligarchs going rogue to shake the system? Do we need to hit rock bottom to rekindle our political imaginations?

UNLOCKED: /361/ A Nightmare on the Brains of the Living ft. Benjamin Studebaker

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On Alex Garland’s new film, Civil War.
 
[Patreon Exclusive]
 
The boys discuss a film that seems designed to say something in the context of a US election year. But what? We ask:


What kind of film is this: a dystopian fantasy, a war movie, a road movie?


Why the focus on the media? Does the film celebrate or satirise journalists?


Does Garland’s dystopia tell us anything about the landscape of US politics today?


Why is political polarisation between liberals and populists seen in terms of civil war? 


What would a civil war look like in geopolitical terms, along the lines Garland suggests?


What side would you choose?


Links:

Where will America's Civil War be fought?, Michael Lind, UnHerd


The Civil War Will Not Be Mediated, Nina Power, Compact


Civil War is a terrifying film, but Trump: The Sequel will be a real-life horror show, Simon Tisdall, The Guardian

/411/ What Kind of American Are You?

On Isaac Deutscher's classic Stalin: A Political Biography.
 
[Patreon Tier III & IV Exclusive]
 
We start off dealing with your questions from the first two Reading Clubs of the year, before Phil takes us through the famous biography of the Soviet leader. We discuss:


Deutscher's work in historical context


Stalin’s parents' experience as serfs and the significance of his boyhood education in an Orthodox seminary


How the oppression of the Russian Empire and the promises of Soviet industrialisation shaped young Stalin's lifecourse


Whether, compared to other Bolshevik leaders, Stalin would have succeeded anytime, anywhere


Was Stalin honest in his commitment to the revolution? Was Trotsky right that Stalin was just a cynic?


How did Stalin compare to the other leaders at Yalta, such as the aristocratic Churchill?


How do we compare Stalin to Cromwell or Napoleon?


And what's behind cheeky internet Stalinism today?


Links:


Message of the Non-Jewish Jew, Isaac Deutscher, Marxists.org


On Orwell: 1984 - The Mysticism of Cruelty, Isaac Deutscher, Marxists.org


I must start completely alone: Gonzalo Pozo on Isaac Deutscher’s wartime years in London, LRB

/410/ Reading Club: Deutscher's Stalin

On US campus protest, the brutalisation of Gaza, and whether this is an age of war.
 
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Bunga boys Alex, George and Phil debate the matter of the day. We ask:


Is the police repression and associated censorship (the anti-semitism bill) a reflection of the fact the content of the protest unsettles the establishment? Why?


Why is the Left breaking with Biden and the Dems over this and not before?


How do these student protests compare to BLM? And how do they compare to those of the late 60s and Vietnam?


What should those in Western countries do in response to Israel’s war?


Is the Palestinian struggle dead?


What are the risks of regional war? And does Israel's assault on Gaza presage a new era of warfare?


 
Links:

The Triumph of American Idealism, Alex Hochuli, Damage


Like it or not, the politics of war is upon us, David Jamieson, Conter


Express Train to Nowhere: Class and the Crisis of the Modern Jewish Soul, Samuel Biagetti, American Affairs 


Is this How We Can STOP Genocide Joe?, Doug Lain interviews Dr. Elektra Kostopoulos & Dave Fox, Sublation Media


The Left Cannot Make Use of the Gaza War, Benjamin Studebaker, Sublation Media


Meet the new Left, who think Hamas are good and that Swastikas are woke, Ryan Zickgraf, Telegraph


Their Fight, Not Ours, Alex Gourevitch, The Northern Star

/409/ Palestine, Protest, Repression: The Wider Context

On the earth-shaking events of the 20th century, through a personal lens.
 
Regular contributor Alex Gourevitch sits down with political scientist Peter Gourevitch to talk about their shared family history.


Why did their grandparents/great-grandparents become Mensheviks?


How did one half of the family leave the USSR and the other half remain?


What was life like in exile in Berlin before the Nazis took power? And how did the family know to flee?


What was distinctive about fascism and the terroristic assault on democracy?


How was the escape from Paris just like the film Casablanca?


What happened to those who remained in the Soviet Union and how did one member meet death via torture?


What is the legacy of Menshevism – and what is the relationship between socialism and democracy?

Links:
Who Lived, Who Died? My Family's Struggle with Stalin and Hitler, Peter Gourevitch, Dio Press
 
Full episode for subscribers only. Go to patreon.com/bungacast. Members who sign up for $7/mo get 4 original paywalled episodes a month and a free subscription to Damage magazine.

/408/ Was It Raining When You Fled Paris? ft. Peter Gourevitch

On saving society from the antisocial-ists. In partnership with Damage magazine.
 
[Patreon Exclusive]
 
Trade unionist and researcher Dustin "Dino" Guastella joins us to talk about the deficiencies of a libertarian or antinomian approach to social problems. We start off with Dino telling us about the Teamsters union, before moving on to:


How have American cities developed such problems?


What are the pros and cons of the 'Portuguese Model' of drug decriminalization?


What is the problem with harm reduction, and how does it connect to notions of 'bare life'?


How are insecurity and precarity changing people's political demands and expectations?


Is there something to be learned from the Christian tradition? Should we all be reading Alasdair MacIntyre?


How do we build a politics of human flourishing?


Links:

Making the Present the Enemy of the Future, Dino Guastella, Damage


Anti-Social Socialism Club, Dino Guastella, Damage


Christianity, Morality, and Socialism, Dino Guastella, Jacobin


The left must embrace law and order, Slavoj Zizek, New Statesman


After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory, Alasdair MacIntyre

UNLOCKED: /361/ A Nightmare on the Brains of the Living ft. Benjamin Studebaker

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