Politics feels louder than ever and somehow emptier too. We open the hood on liberalism—what it claims to be, how it actually behaves, and why Trump’s rise didn’t just bend norms but exposed tensions baked into the system. With Dillion from Untrodden, we trace the fault lines between liberal commitments to stability and civil discourse and the gravitational pull toward executive power, media spectacle, and anti‑politics.

Step by step, we chart the historical map: from the 18th Brumaire and Bonapartism to today’s illiberal temptations, and why figures like Orban or Berlusconi echo past crises more than they break from them. We ask whether liberalism’s best asset—pragmatic governance—can survive without a clearer core, and whether the left’s sharpest critiques can help rebuild a coherent center of gravity rather than just tear it down. We also examine identity politics’ moral heat with little policy light, the post‑pandemic sorting of temperaments over ideologies, and the unsettling ease with which tech billionaires switch lanes as incentives shift.

Rather than rehearse stale talking points, we get practical about coalitions. What can Marxists and liberals realistically build together? Where do alliance models like the united front make sense, and where do they fail? We argue for a new baseline: mutual recognition, radical honesty, and a shared willingness to protect civil society and institutional checks as nonnegotiables. From unions to city budgets, the places where people shoulder common obligations are where trust can be rebuilt and rhetoric can give way to results.

If you’re tired of vibes posing as politics and want a serious, good‑faith reckoning with liberalism’s crisis and the left’s role in solving it, this conversation is for you. Listen, share with a friend who disagrees with you, and tell us: what principle would you refuse to compromise in any coalition? Subscribe and leave a review to keep these cross‑currents alive.

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Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

Start with a simple question: if investment drives productivity and growth, what happens to a society that keeps choosing consumption over capacity? We trace a straight line from Marx’s core mechanics to Kalecki’s equations, then use that line to cut through fashionable theory detours—value-form shortcuts, communization fantasies, and techno-feudal hot takes. The result is a clearer picture of why profits can soar while real investment sags, why the dollar’s “miracle” masks fragility, and why printing more money can’t manufacture machine tools, skills, or energy.

We lay out four regimes that help decode the past 70 years: Fordist reinvestment that pushed productivity up, extractive reinvestment that scaled capacity through coercion, subsistence stagnation where neither investment nor exploitation rises, and neoliberalism’s defining mix—low investment, high exploitation, and asset hoarding. From there, we unpack how U.S. trade deficits and financial inflows fed capitalist consumption while weakening the incentive to build. Debt and soft budgets smoothed the ride, but they didn’t fix profitability on new capital or reverse the long slide in productivity growth. The numbers point to a coming snap-back to trend, not a new golden age.

China’s path raises the stakes. Sustained high investment, tighter discipline on capitalist consumption, and strategic upgrading are pushing the global cost curve down and forcing others to respond. That doesn’t make China post-capitalist; it does show how targeted capacity-building can escape the stagnation trap. The practical lesson isn’t romantic—it’s logistical. Real constraints matter: inputs, machine tools, power, training, and time. Risk management beats magical thinking; autarky is a myth, but resilience is a plan. We argue for redirecting surplus toward compounding productivity, treating statistics as instruments not idols, and rebuilding the industrial backbone that reduces market domination over everyday life.

If you’re tired of theories that skip the engine room, this conversation connects the dials: profits, investment, productivity, debt, trade, and class incentives. Subscribe, share with a friend who loves charts more than slogans, and tell us: what’s the first capacity you’d rebuild?

Links referenced: 
https://open.substack.com/pub/nicolasdvillarreal/p/contra-capital-as-abstract-domination?r=2m9aw&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

https://open.substack.com/pub/nicolasdvillarreal/p/an-economic-theory-of-maximalist?r=2m9aw&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

https://open.substack.com/pub/nicolasdvillarreal/p/a-sketch-of-a-revision-to-orthodoxy?r=2m9aw&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

What if America’s “anti-intellectualism” isn’t a decline in smarts but a culture built to distrust theory? We trace that paradox from Puritan moral rigor and pragmatist “cash value” truths to the postwar professional class that speaks in a neutral tone while hiding its class origins. With Hofstadter, Lasch, and Gouldner as our guides, we unpack how speech codes, funding models, and media ecosystems shape who gets to be an “intellectual” and whose knowledge counts.

We dig into Lasch’s portraits of turn‑of‑the‑century radicals—Jane Addams, Randolph Bourne, Lincoln Steffens—showing how bohemia, policy reform, and romantic revolt often masked a middle‑class distance from worker life. Hofstadter helps explain why theory gets cast as elitist, how evangelical charisma and “common sense” produce a populism that can slip into conspiracy, and why so many bright people end up suspicious of abstraction. Then Gouldner reframes the post‑WWII landscape: a technical‑professional new class whose legitimacy depends on universality, even as its language quietly excludes working‑class speech and experience.

From there, we get practical. We compare elite “neutrality” to the hard realities of endowments and medical revenue, and we explore what counter‑publics look like now: labor clubs that teach Robert’s Rules and strike strategy alongside Marx, Bourdieu, and Joe Burns. We talk code‑switching without erasing origins, and we sketch ways to build worker‑centered study that doesn’t pander—spaces where rigor and relevance live together. Gramsci’s “organic intellectual” still matters here: every worker thinks and theorizes, with or without credentials.

If this resonates, help us grow the counter‑public: subscribe, share the episode with a friend who loves big ideas, and leave a review with one question you want us to tackle next.

 These are the primary readings we discuss:

-The American Intellectual Elite by Charles Kadushin
- Anti-Intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter 
- The New Radicalism in America: The Intellectual as Social Type by Christopher Lasch 
- The Future of Intellectuals and the Rise of the New Class  by Alvin Gouldner
-  The Missing Generation: Academics and the Communist Party from the
Depression to the Cold War by Ellen Schrecker

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

The hardest problems don’t fit into a slogan. We invited the editors behind Heatwave Magazine to unpack why national fixes can’t solve planetary crises, why tariffs and “reindustrialization” won’t restore a high‑wage equilibrium, and how social democracy keeps running headfirst into profitability and energy limits. We talk plainly about China’s energy transition and youth unemployment, Mexico’s narco‑capitalist dual power, and why so much left media looks away from contradictions that actually shape daily life.

Our conversation moves from print as a living hub—short, sharp pieces that travel through bookstores, Discords, and reading groups—to the strategic dead ends of culture-only union optimism and Twitter-only militancy. Riots are real—often the form class conflict takes when every other route is blocked—but without institutions that bridge street power to social reproduction and production, movements burn out. We explore what those institutions could be: not a party blueprint, not a co‑op panacea, but durable infrastructures for shared analysis, care, and coordination across borders.

We also cut through the growth vs degrowth stalemate by asking different questions: what forms of energy and production reorganize land, labor, and life without reproducing domination? How do we build imagination when most people have never known another way to live? From beavers and watersheds to logistics chokepoints and labor’s changing composition, we map the terrain as it is—messy, global, and unforgiving—so we can act with clarity instead of wishful thinking.

If you’re tired of easy answers and ready to engage the hard constraints shaping our future, this one’s for you. Listen, share, and tell us where you think the real leverage lies. And if the conversation sparks something, subscribe, leave a review, and pass it to a comrade who needs a sharp tool, not a shiny slogan.

Send us a text

Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

What if the renewed fascination with Domenico Losurdo says more about our appetite for stability than about Marxism’s future? We sit down with Ross Wolfe to unpack how a Verso‑to‑Monthly Review pipeline, a revived faith in China’s statecraft, and the polemical stretching of “Western Marxism” built a Dengist common sense on the contemporary left. The story runs through publishing politics, bad categories, and a philosophical move that recodes the twentieth century’s defeats as proof that the state must be forever.

We press on the scholarship: where Losurdo distorts Perry Anderson, ignores Russell Jacoby’s tighter frame, and sidelines entire currents like British Marxism, the Situationists, and Johnson–Forest. We reopen the Italian debates—Operaismo, Tronti, Althusser—and ask whether Sartre’s and workerist priorities were really blind to anti‑colonial struggle or simply refused to romanticize models that never fit advanced capitalism. From there, we tackle the hinge: Hegel’s Philosophy of Right. Does it license a permanent state, or did Marx and Lenin get it right that the state’s existence tracks class antagonism and should wither as class society is abolished?

The conversation widens to strategy. We examine the labor‑aristocracy thesis, the quiet third‑worldism that relieves organizers of responsibility at home, and the way China’s present contradictions—major trade with Israel, BRICS diplomacy, GDP slowdown, regional rivalries—undercut claims that socialism can be national. If history “could only go this way,” what is left to change? We make the case for rebuilding class independence and international coordination in the core and periphery alike, not lowering horizons to match yesterday’s outcomes.

Subscribe, share, and leave a review to keep these long‑form dives alive. Then tell us: should the left reclaim the withering of the state—or retire it?

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

What happens when a Protestant Christian delves into the philosophy of Russia's most controversial thinker? Jay Rogers, a heart transplant survivor and longtime student of Russian culture, takes us on a fascinating journey through his engagement with Alexander Dugan's Fourth Political Theory.

Having traveled extensively throughout Russia and Ukraine during the pivotal post-Soviet years, Rogers brings unique firsthand experience to this conversation. He explains how his observations of Christianity's revival among the Russian intelligentsia and his disillusionment with mainstream Western media narratives led him to explore alternative political perspectives.

Rogers artfully unpacks the connections between Dugan, Samuel Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations," and Alexander Solzhenitsyn's prophetic warnings about Western liberalism. He argues that these thinkers anticipated our current global shift from nation-states to civilization-states—a transformation reshaping international relations before our eyes.

At the heart of this discussion lies a profound critique of liberalism's impact on Christianity. Rogers suggests that the liberal emphasis on individual autonomy fundamentally contradicts the community-centered teachings of scripture. This realization helped him understand why traditional values are making a comeback across political lines, creating unexpected alliances between previously opposed groups.

Perhaps most compelling is Rogers' nuanced view of cultural diversity. Drawing from his experiences as a teacher in Florida, he rejects both xenophobia and liberal multiculturalism, instead advocating for a world where distinct civilizations can coexist and learn from each other while maintaining their unique identities.

Whether you're politically conservative, progressive, or somewhere in between, this conversation challenges conventional categories and offers fresh perspectives on our rapidly changing world. Discover why engaging with challenging thinkers like Dugan might be essential for anyone seeking to understand—and shape—our collective future.

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

What defines Iranian identity, both within Iran and across its global diaspora? In this thought-provoking conversation with historian Keanu Heydari, we peel back layers of complexity surrounding one of the world's most politically fragmented diasporic communities.

Heydari, a PhD candidate at the University of Michigan specializing in Iranian student activism in post-war France, offers a refreshingly nuanced perspective that avoids both regime apologetics and demonization. The Iranian diaspora, he explains, represents a fascinating anomaly – unlike other immigrant communities that typically organize around cultural markers, Iranians abroad primarily define themselves through political discourse coalitions. From hardline supporters of the Islamic Republic to advocates of monarchy restoration, these political positions often prevent meaningful dialogue between community members.

We trace the historical trajectory of modern Iran through pivotal moments like the 1953 CIA-orchestrated coup against Mohammad Mossadegh and the 1979 Islamic Revolution, exploring how these events triggered waves of migration and shaped distinct political consciousnesses. Particularly fascinating is Heydari's analysis of how Iranian nationalism occupies a liminal space between European nationalism and anti-colonial struggles, making it simultaneously attractive and repellent to Western leftists.

The conversation ventures into provocative territory when discussing Michel Foucault's misunderstood writings on the Iranian Revolution. Rather than dismissing Foucault as naively romanticizing a repressive regime, Heydari connects Foucault's interest in "Islamic political spirituality" to his broader intellectual project concerning self-transformation and political practice.

Whether you're interested in diaspora politics, Middle Eastern history, or the complex interplay between religion and leftist thought, this conversation challenges simplistic narratives and offers fresh perspectives on Iran's place in global politics. Share your thoughts about this episode and let us know which aspects of Iranian diaspora identity you'd like us to explore further.

Here are the two articles discussed: 

Threads of Belonging, Echoes of ExileIran, Israel, & the Logic of Escalation

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

A shock win feels like a movement—until the math starts. We dig into Zoran Mamdani’s ascent with a clear-eyed look at why voters broke for him, what “anti-politics” actually signals, and how a mayor’s bold promises get squeezed by bonds, taxes, and thin state capacity. The story here isn’t a fairy tale of revival; it’s a patient autopsy of party cartels in decline, activist narratives colliding with ordinary voter motives, and a political entrepreneur who read the room better than the machine.

We unpack the split between the activist layer and the broader electorate: one sees a springboard for a project; the other wants rent relief and competent delivery. That tension meets hard constraints. Cities don’t print money. They borrow or tax, and capital reacts. We trace why progressive mayors post-1950s hit the same wall, why LaGuardia needed Roosevelt’s federal cash, and why Dinkins and de Blasio serve as useful mirrors for what comes next. If national headwinds return—especially a Trump-era reset—does combat raise Mamdani’s profile while shrinking his room to maneuver, or does conciliation cost him the left while buying breathing room?

We also zoom out: unions that poll well but feel managerial on the ground, populism as a political strategy rather than a mass social force, and the broader void where anti-politics thrives. Mamdani’s early refusal to dignify culture-war bait showed how composure builds legitimacy in an era of institutional mistrust; later moralism was safer but weaker. The stakes now are concrete: visible affordability wins without tripping fiscal tripwires. If he threads that needle, he sets a new urban playbook. If not, the void stays open for the next savvy reader of the moment.

If this lens helps you see past the noise, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review with the one question you want answered next.

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

What happens when the revolutionary fervor of Marxism meets the probing depths of the psychoanalytic couch? In this intellectually stimulating conversation, Andrew Flores (host of The Parallax Viewer) explores the fascinating and often contentious relationship between psychoanalytic theory and left politics.

The discussion begins with a fundamental question: why should Marxists care about psychoanalysis at all? Flores argues that psychoanalysis doesn't just treat individual symptoms but addresses the "bourgeois subject"—the psychological effects of living within capitalist social relations. As he eloquently explains, "What psychoanalysis does is deal with a bourgeois subject, the effects of bourgeois consciousness... Marx invented the symptom, not Freud." This provocative claim opens a pathway to understanding how our internal psychological conflicts might reflect broader social contradictions.

Delving into Lacanian theory, Flores unpacks the three registers—Imaginary, Symbolic, and Real—that structure our experience, showing how they relate to political formation and revolutionary potential. The conversation weaves through structuralism, Althusserian Marxism, and contemporary thinkers like Alain Badiou and Domenico Losurdo, revealing the complex theoretical lineages that continue to shape leftist thought.

Perhaps most relevant to our current moment is the discussion of social fragmentation, paranoia, and what might be called our collective psychosis. As conspiracy theories proliferate and ideological certainties dissolve, psychoanalytic concepts offer valuable tools for understanding how individual and collective delusions form in response to social trauma.

Whether you're a seasoned theoretical traveler or new to these intellectual territories, this conversation offers fresh insights into how we might understand the relationship between our inner lives and the social structures that shape them—and perhaps how we might transform both.

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic

What does it mean to build a socialist party in America today? The Marxist Unity Group, a left caucus within the Democratic Socialists of America, offers their perspective on this critical question while unpacking the complexities of DSA's internal dynamics, electoral strategy, and revolutionary vision.

Fresh from DSA's national convention, MUG members celebrate significant victories including the passage of their "Principles of Party Building" resolution and the election of three caucus members to national leadership. They explore how the convention demonstrated both DSA's growing maturity and the ongoing tensions between different political tendencies within the organization.

The conversation takes a fascinating turn when examining DSA's relationship with electoral campaigns, particularly Zoran Mamdani's potentially historic mayoral run in New York City. As Mamdani's messaging shifts toward the mainstream, the panelists wrestle with fundamental questions: How should socialists approach executive office? Can reforms be won without compromising revolutionary principles? What happens when elected officials begin to distance themselves from the very organization that helped elect them?

What emerges is a thoughtful analysis of the challenges facing socialist politics in America today. The MUG members articulate how winning reforms must be connected to a broader revolutionary program and party-building strategy. They highlight how declining trust in institutions creates openings for socialist politics, but only if socialists can offer genuine alternatives rather than simply better management of the existing system.

Whether you're a DSA member, a curious observer of left politics, or someone trying to understand how socialists navigate America's difficult political terrain, this conversation offers valuable insights into building working class power in challenging times. Listen now to explore these crucial strategic questions with some of DSA's most thoughtful organizers.

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Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to Bitterlake

Support the show

Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn

Links and Social Media:
twitter: @varnvlog
blue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.social
You can find the additional streams on Youtube

Current Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan, Parzival, Adriel Mixon, Buddy Roark, Daniel Petrovic