New radio product
Freshly posted to my radio archives: February 25, 2012 back after KPFA fundraising hiatus—if you like this show, please support the station now! and mention Behind the News if you do—there’s a best of BtN premium, consisting of 26 of my best interviews of the last decade, available for a pledge of $75 Gary Weiss, author of Ayn Rand Nation, on her cult and influence • Adolph Reed on Black History Month, the return of the ghoulish Charles Murray, and politics in gloomy times
Austerity & bankers’ coups: the NYC precedent
With the displacement of Greece’s elected government by Eurocrats acting in the interest of the country’s creditors, I thought this would be a good time to reprise the section of my 1997 book Wall Street that covers the New York City fiscal crisis of 1975, which was something of a dress rehearsal for the neoliberal austerity agenda that would go global in the 1980s. Certain celebrity academics are constantly cited for making this argument, but I was there first. You can download Wall Street for free by clicking here: Wall Street. This chapter, and this book, has… Read More
How to stop worrying about class
Today’s New York Times contains a fine example of how ideology works at the high end: report information that might trouble the established order, but conclude on a tranquilizing note that allows the comfortable reader to turn the page (or click “close tab”) without changing his or her worldview. Both functions are important. Outlets like the Times do report tons of important stuff that one would be hard-pressed to learn otherwise. But, as Alexander Cockburn put it long ago, a primary function of the bourgeois press is reassurance. The piece by Sabrina… Read More
LBO News from Doug Henwood 