Podcast appearances and mentions of Jesse Helms

In this special recess episode, Skye and Brian sit down with Jimmy Broughton, former Chief of Staff to U.S. Senator Jesse Helms, for a rare and candid conversation about his time working for one of the most important and controversial political figures in North Carolina and American politics. Broughton shares behind-the-scenes stories from Capitol Hill, offers personal insights into Helms' style and friendships, and reflects on the senator's legacy. Whether you admired Sen. Helms or were turned off by him, this episode offers a firsthand look at the man behind the headlines and political cartoons, told by someone who knew him best. The Do Politics Better podcast is sponsored by New Frame, the NC Travel Industry Association, the NC Beer & Wine Wholesalers Association, the NC Pork Council, and the NC Healthcare Association.  

Looking back at the first round of the Culture Wars, with Jesse Helms discussing a crucifix submerged in urine on the floor of the senate, one figure remains misunderstood: Thomas Kinkade. The "Painter of Light." The guy your alcoholic grandmother who would never admit she terrorized you really loved. Kinkade's career combines the worst of American culture -- multi-level marketing schemes, Jesus Christ kitsch, and televangelism -- into one product. Jessa and Nico discuss Art for Everybody, the new documentary seeking to rehabilitate Kinkade's image, and whether if Kinkade were alive today he would be appointed the new head of the NEA or Kennedy Center (yes).  Shownotes and references: http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

Raleigh-based Republican consultant Carter Wrenn has had a front-row seat to decades of political history. He's worked for the campaigns of U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms and Ronald Reagan starting in the 1970s.He's now written a book on his experience that offers an inside look at some key moments and controversial figures in politics. He spoke with WUNC's Colin Campbell about the book, “The Trail of the Serpent: Stories from the Smoke-Filled Rooms of Politics,” and on some aspects of his political work that he's come to regret.

Longtime Republican consultant Carter Wrenn, who spent decades shaping North Carolina politics, has witnessed a dramatic shift in the political landscape since he began his career in the 1970s. Wrenn, a senior advisor to the late U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms, helped build the National Congressional Club, a fundraising powerhouse that revolutionized political outreach and advertising.In a recent interview on The Charlotte Ledger Podcast, Wrenn noted that while politics has always been “rough and tumble,” a key difference today is the public's tolerance for dishonesty. “Politicians were afraid to tell lies because they paid a price,” Wrenn said. “People didn't approve of that, and that's changed today. You hear politicians telling tales all the time, and a lot of times, people cheer them.”In this episode, Wrenn — who recently authored “The Trail of the Serpent: Stories from the Smoke-Filled Rooms of Politics,” a book recounting his political career — talks with retired N.C. political reporter Jim Morrill about his front-row seat in North Carolina politics and shares stories and perspectives from the 1970s through today.They discuss Wrenn's work with Sen. Jesse Helms and their eventual falling out, how the political landscape has changed since the 1970s and the use of race in political campaigns — including the famout "white hands" commercial Helms ran against former Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gantt in the 1990 Senate race.For more information about The Charlotte Ledger, or to sign up for our newsletters, visit TheCharlotteLedger.com.This episode of The Charlotte Ledger Podcast was produced by Lindsey Banks. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charlotteledger.substack.com/subscribe

A figure in conservative politics in North Carolina, he helped Ronald Reagan win the Republican presidential primary here in 1976, and worked closely with U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms. But Helms' legacy is tied to his support for racial segregation, and his “White Hands” TV ad is infamous in political history. In a new book, Wrenn gives an inside perspective into decades of conservative politics.

Senior Strategist Morgan Jackson & Campaign Manager Jeff Allen helped guide Democrat Josh Stein to a historic win in the 2024 open-seat North Carolina Governor's Race over GOP lighting rod Mark Robinson. In this conversation, they both discuss how Stein went from trailing in many of the early polls to winning on Election Day by a historic 15-point margin. They talk the initial phase of the race with Robinson leading the polls, the Stein strategy to define Robinson early, the power of using Robinson's own words against him, the infamous "Nude Africa" scandal, the impact of storms and massive damage in Western NC, what is replicable for other campaigns from Josh Stein's victory, & much more digging into the signature gubernatorial race of the 2024 election.IN THIS EPISODEThe political origin stories of both Morgan and Jeff...How NC politics has completely transformed over the past 20 years...The early machinations that led to a Josh Stein vs. Mark Robinson '24 campaign...What led to Jeff managing the '24 Stein campaign...The potential political strengths of Mark Robinson...The initial core strategy and approach of the Stein campaign...The story behind the impactful first TV ad showing voters Mark Robinson in his own words... (link to ad)The Stein strategy to prioritize communications to Black voters...The story & fallout of the "Nude Africa" disclosures that forced national GOP donors to cut Robinson loose...The impact of the Hurricane Helene storms that hit Western NC...How the big Stein margin helped NC Dems win other races downballot...Their expectations heading into Election Day and reactions from the 15-point Stein victory...Both Jeff and Morgan share some of their favorite spots around The Tarheel State...AND...Roy Cooper, crazy uncles, the DCCC, Scott Falmlen, Pete Giangreco, Bill Graham, Bill Hefner, Jesse Helms, Jim Hunt, I-95, Jesse-crats, Mt. Rushmore, Pat McCrory, Myspace, Trey Nix, Barack Obama, Stephanie Pigues, RLG Media, shithouse rats, storm machines, Thom Tillis, Trump-proofing, visceral reactions, Mark Warner, water jets, Kathleen Williams & more!

It's bathroom bigotry all over again.  We remember just how racist Jesse Helms was, and how perfectly okay the Republican Party was with all of that bigotry.  There's likely to be lots of Cabinet-appointment drama in the next little bit, but please keep your eyes on the corruption and grift.  What music is Bluegal listening to? Link for this episode:  "Franciscan Blessing"  More at proleftpod.com. You can help us pay for DG's eye doctor expenses athttps://www.gofundme.com/f/help-ease-dgs-medical-financial-burdenBlue Gal's knitting podcast!  https://www.youtube.com/@flangumOur podcast YouTube Channel:  https://www.youtube.com/@ProfessionalLeftSupport the show:PayPal |  https://paypal.me/proleftpodcastPatreon | https://patreon.com/proleftpodSupport the show

TO WATCH ALL FLYOVER CONTENT: www.flyover.liveTO WATCH ALL FLYOVER CONTENT: www.flyover.liveCarter WrenCarter WrenTWITTER: https://x.com/carterwrenn TWITTER: https://x.com/carterwrennhttps://x.com/carterwrenn WEBSITE: https://talkingaboutpolitics.com/ WEBSITE: https://talkingaboutpolitics.com/https://talkingaboutpolitics.com/ BOOK: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Trail-of-the-Serpent/Carter-Wrenn/9781645720942 BOOK: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Trail-of-the-Serpent/Carter-Wrenn/9781645720942https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Trail-of-the-Serpent/Carter-Wrenn/9781645720942 In 1976, Carter Wrenn managed Ronald Reagan's campaign in North Carolina's Republican Presidential Primary. For twenty years, along with respected Raleigh Attorney Tom Ellis, he led Senator Jesse Helms' national political organization – leading two national independent campaigns to elect Reagan, and supporting Jack Kemp and Steve Forbes in their campaigns for President.In 1976, Carter Wrenn managed Ronald Reagan's campaign in North Carolina's Republican Presidential Primary. For twenty years, along with respected Raleigh Attorney Tom Ellis, he led Senator Jesse Helms' national politicalSend us a message... we can't reply, but we read them all!Support the show► ReAwaken America- text the word FLYOVER to 918-851-0102 (Message and data rates may apply. Terms/privacy: 40509-info.com) ► Kirk Elliott PHD - http://FlyoverGold.com ► My Pillow - https://MyPillow.com/Flyover ► ALL LINKS: https://sociatap.com/FlyoverConservatives

On this week's episode of Tying it Together, Carter Wrenn joins host Tim Boyum to talk about his new book “The Trail of the Serpent”. Carter has been a fixture in Republican circles for over four decades, starting with Ronald Reagan's 1976 campaign in North Carolina. His most famous work follows the path and career of U.S. Senator Jesse Helms in the 70s, 80s and 90s. Carter transports listeners back in time with his extraordinary accounts of North Carolina's historic campaigns.

In this episode of "No Fair Remembering Stuff," we embark on a fascinating journey into the complex and evolving history of acceptance and resistance towards Martin Luther King Day as a state and national holiday.We remember the declaration of Martin Luther King Day as a state holiday in South Carolina and unravel the factors (really only one factor, ahem) that led it to become the last state to recognize the occasion as a paid holiday for all state employees.We also talk about Jesse Helms and his claims that Martin Luther King Jr's opposition to the Vietnam War and insistence on equal rights for Black people made him a  communist. We also confront the legacy of the Confederacy and the southern states which, and we are not making this up, posed an alternative choice to celebrate a Confederate holiday instead of MLK Day.  Again, we are not making that up. And then we discuss Arizona's resistance to an MLK day and what finally got them to relent (hint: the NFL sure is WOKE). And if you think we're past all of this nonsense wait until you hear what Charlie Kirk is up to in 2024. Tune in to "No Fair Remembering Stuff" for this captivating exploration of the history of acceptance and resistance to Martin Luther King Day.Support the show:PayPal |  https://paypal.me/proleftpodcastPatreon | https://patreon.com/proleftpodOur YouTube ChannelOpening and Closing Music:Jumpin Boogie Woogie by Audionautix | http://audionautix.com/|Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported — CC BY 3.0Free Download / Stream: https://bit.ly/jumpin-boogie-woogieMusic promoted by Audio Library | https://youtu.be/S2wYQlC0UswCreative Commons Music by Jason Shaw on Audionautix.comSupport the show

Meg explores the discreet gay bars of Sutton Place and finds a Staten Island interloper, Richard Rogers, The Last Call Killer. Jessica remembers the establishment of MLK Jr. Day and the proud New Yorkers who helped make it so.Please check out our website, follow us on Instagram, on Facebook, and...WRITE US A REVIEW HEREWe'd LOVE to hear from you! Let us know if you have any ideas for stories HEREThank you for listening!Love,Meg and Jessica

In this episode of the podcast, I talk to and Gary Kornblau about the 30th anniversary edition of Dave Hickey's seminal 1993 book The Invisible Dragon: Four Essays on Beauty. Blake is currently a fellow with the Center for Advanced Study in Sofia, Bulgaria, as well as the author a great (which is to say, very flattering) review of my 2021 book on Hickey, and he was a stalwart participant in the Substack “book club” I organized on the new edition of Dragon. Gary is faculty at the ArtCenter College of Design. More pertinently, he was Dave's great editor, having plucked him out of obscurity to write for art Issues, the small LA-based journal that Gary founded and edited. He was the one who gave Dave just the right amount of rein to do his best work, and also the one who conceptualized and edited both Invisible Dragon and Dave's subsequent book Air Guitar. The episode covers a lot of ground, including the impact of the original version of the book, the reasons why Gary decided to put out a 30th anniversary edition, and Gary's decision to use the opportunity to try to “queer” Dave. It's a blast. I hope you listen. I also wanted to take the opportunity to run the below excerpt from my book on Dave. It covers the background to the writing and reception of Invisible Dragon, and is, IMO, a mighty fine piece of writing in its own right. Hope you enjoy.On June 12, 1989, the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, announced that it was cancelling Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment, its scheduled exhibition of photographs by the celebrated American photographer, who had died of AIDS in March. The Corcoran's primary motive in cancelling was fear.Only a few months before, a long-simmering debate about the role of the federal government in funding the arts had boiled over in response to Piss Christ, a photograph of a small icon of Jesus on the cross floating in a vitrine of urine. Its creator, Andres Serrano, had received a small chunk of a larger grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), and the offending photograph had been included in a touring exhibition that was also funded by federal money. During that tour, the photograph caught the eye of the American Family Association, a conservative Chris­tian advocacy group dedicated to fighting what it saw as anti-Christian values in entertainment and the arts. They rang the alarm.Soon after, New York Senator Alfonse D'Amato called out Piss Christ from the floor of the Senate. He tore up a reproduction of the photo and denounced it as a “deplorable, despicable display of vulgarity.” North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms, who would soon lead the charge against Mapplethorpe, added: “I do not know Mr. Andres Serrano, and I hope I never meet him. Because he is not an artist, he is a jerk. . . . Let him be a jerk on his own time and with his own resources. Do not dishonor our Lord.” Patrick Trueman, president of the American Family Association, testified to Congress that governmental support of work like Piss Christ would make it less likely that prosecutors would pursue or win cases against child pornographers.The ensuing congressional battle, over funding for the NEA, became the first in a series of broader cultural and political battles that would come to be known, in retrospect, as the “culture wars” of the 1990s. These battles would range not just over sex and politics in the arts, but also over issues like gays in the military, federal funding for abor­tion, and control over history and social studies curricula in the public schools. It was “a war for the soul of America,” as Pat Buchanan framed it at the 1992 Republican Party convention, a contest over whether the nation would continue to secularize and liberalize or would return to a more conservative social equilibrium.The full contours of the conflict weren't immediately evident in the aftermath of the Serrano affair, but it was very clear, right away, that the Mapplethorpe exhibit was another grenade ready to go off. Its orga­nizers at the University of Pennsylvania had received NEA money, and the Corcoran Gallery, walking distance from the White House, was too visible an institution to slide by the notice of people like Helms and D'Amato. So the Corcoran begged off, hoping to shield themselves from the shrapnel and avoid giving conservatives another opportunity to question the value of federal funding for the arts.Instead, they got fragged by all sides. By fellow curators and museum administrators, who believed the Corcoran's appeasement would only encourage more aggression from haters of contemporary art. By civil lib­ertarians, who saw the Corcoran's actions as an example of how expres­sive speech was being chilled by the culture war rhetoric of the right. By a major donor, a friend of Mapplethorpe, who angrily withdrew a promised bequest to the museum of millions of dollars. And, of course, by the conservatives they had been hoping to appease, who accurately recognized the blasphemy in Mapplethorpe's federally funded portraits of sodomites doing naughty things to each other and themselves.Piss Christ had been useful to the conservative cultural cause as an example of how homosexual artists were taking taxpayer money to spit on the values that decent Americans held dear, but it wasn't ideal. How blasphemed could a good Christian really feel, after all, by an image of Jesus as reverential as what Serrano had in fact made? His Christ was bathed in glowing red-orange-yellow light, the image scored by dots and lines of tiny bubbles that come off almost like traces of exhumation, as if the whole thing has been recently, lovingly removed from the reliquary in which it's been preserved for thousands of years.“I think if the Vatican is smart,” Serrano later said, “someday they'll collect my work. I am not a heretic. I like to believe that rather than destroy icons, I make new ones.”Mapplethorpe's pictures, though, were something else entirely, a real cannon blast against the battlements of heterosexual normativity. Where Serrano was mostly using new means to say some very old things about the mystery of the incarnation and the corporeality of Christ, Mapplethorpe was using orthodox pictorial techniques to bring to light a world of pleasure, pain, male-male sex, bondage, power, trust, desire, control, violation, submission, love, and self-love that had been ban­ished to the dark alleyways, boudoirs, bathhouses, and rest stops of the West since the decline of Athens. And he was doing so masterfully, in the language of fine art, in the high houses of American culture.There was Lou, for instance, which could have been a photograph of a detail from an ancient bronze of Poseidon except that the detail in question is of Poseidon's muscled arm holding his cock firmly in one hand while the pinky finger of his other hand probes its hole. In Helmut and Brooks, a fist disappearing up an anus plays like an academic exercise in shape and shadow. And in the now iconic Self-Portrait, Mapplethorpe has the handle of a bullwhip up his own rectum, his balls dangling in shadow beneath, his legs sheathed in leather chaps, his eyes staring back over his shoulder at the camera with a gaze so full of intelligence and vitality that it almost steals the show from the bullwhip.In response to these kinds of beautiful provocations, the outrage, which had been largely performative vis-à-vis Serrano, became rather genuine, and the whole thing escalated. By July, a month after the exhibition at the Corcoran had been cancelled, Congress was debating whether to eliminate entirely the $171 million budget of the National Endowment for the Arts. By October, a compromise was reached. The NEA and its sister fund, the National Endowment for the Humanities, would get their usual rounds of funding, minus a symbolic $45,000 for the cost of the Serrano and Mapplethorpe grants. They would be pro­hibited, however, from using the monies to support work that was too gay, too creepy in depicting children, or just too kinky. Exceptions were made for art that violated these taboos but had “serious literary, artis­tic, political, or scientific value.” But the point had been made, and the enforcement mechanism, in any case, wasn't really the articulated rules. It was the threat of more hay-making from the right and, ultimately, the implied promise that if NEA-supported institutions kept sticking their noses (or fists) where they didn't belong then it wouldn't be too long before there wouldn't be any NEA left.A few months later, in April 1990, the Contemporary Arts Cen­ter in Cincinnati, Ohio, took up the Mapplethorpe baton by opening their own exhibition of The Perfect Moment. Hoping to head off trouble, they segregated the most scandalous of the photos in a side room, with appropriate signage to warn off the young and the delicate. They also filed a motion in county court asking that the photographs be preemp­tively designated as not obscene. But the motion was denied, and the separate room proved insufficient buffer. When the exhibit opened to the public, on April 7, its attendees included members of a grand jury that had been impaneled by Hamilton County prosecutors to indict the museum and its director for violating Ohio obscenity law. Of the more than 150 images in the exhibit, seven were selected out by the grand jury for being obscene. Five depicted men engaged in homoerotic and/ or sado-masochistic acts, and two were of naked children.The trial that followed was symbolically thick. Motions were filed that forced the judge to rule on fundamental questions about the mean­ing and political status of art. Art critics and curators were called in to witness, before the largely working-class members of the jury, to the artistic merit of Mapplethorpe's photography. The indictment read like an update of the Scopes trial, captioned by Larry Flynt, in which “the peace and dignity of the State of Ohio” was being ravaged by bands of cavorting homosexuals.The jury issued its verdict in October 1990, acquitting the museum and its director. It was a victory for the forces of high art and free expres­sion, but a complicated one. The exhibition could go on. And Map­plethorpe's photographs—indeed, the most outrageous of them—had been designated as art by the State of Ohio and by a group of decent, law-abiding, presumably-not-gay-sex-having American citizens. But the cost had been high. Museums and galleries everywhere had been warned, and not all of them would be as willing as the Contemporary Arts Center of Cincinnati to risk indictment and the threat of defunding for the sake of showing dangerous art.Perhaps most significantly, the National Endowment for the Arts, and its new director, announced a shift in funding priorities in order to take the institution out of the crossfire of the culture wars. Less and less of their money, it was decided, would go to individual artists and exhibitions, and more of it would go to support arts enrichment—to schools, outreach programs, arts camps, and educational campaigns. Mapplethorpe and Serrano were out. Sesame Street was in.For Dave Hickey, a critic and ex-gallery owner, it was, finally, all too much. Not the opportunism of the Hamilton County sheriff and his allies. Not the predictable huffing from the bow-tied brigades, who took to the pages of their tweedy magazines to bellyache, as always, about what a precipitous decline there had been in cultural standards since the 1960s ruined everything. Not even the rednecking of the senator from North Carolina was the problem for Hickey.Each of these parties was performing its assigned role in the passion play of American cultural politics. Narrow-minded prosecutors would always try to run dirty pictures out of town. New Criterion-ites would avert their eyes from new art. Senators from North Carolina would dem­agogue about queers from New York City. You could be angry at having to contend with these actors, but you couldn't genuinely feel betrayed. You knew where they stood from the get-go, and half the joy of art, and of the artistic life, lay in trying to figure out how to shock, outwit, or seduce them.The betrayal, for Hickey, came from his colleagues, from the crit­ics, curators, gallerists, professors, and arts administrators with whom he had been uneasily mixing since the late 1960s when he dropped out of his doctoral program in linguistics to open an art gallery in Austin, Texas. They had been handed a rare opportunity to represent for all that was queer and decadent and artsy-fartsy in American life, to make the case that this—beautiful pictures of men seeing what it felt like to shove things up their asses—wasn't the worst of America but the best of it. And they had whiffed.“The American art community, at the apogee of its power and privi­lege, chose to play the ravaged virgin,” wrote Hickey, “to fling itself pros­trate across the front pages of America and fairly dare the fascist heel to crush its outraged innocence. . . . [H]ardly anyone considered for a moment what an incredible rhetorical triumph the entire affair signi­fied. A single artist with a single group of images had somehow managed to overcome the aura of moral isolation, gentrification, and mystifica­tion that surrounds the practice of contemporary art in this nation and directly threaten those in actual power with the celebration of margin­ality. It was a fine moment, I thought . . . and, in this area, I think, you have to credit Senator Jesse Helms, who, in his antediluvian innocence, at least saw what was there, understood what Robert was proposing, and took it, correctly, as a direct challenge to everything he believed in.”The Corcoran had been bad enough, throwing in the towel before an opponent had even stepped into the ring. But far worse, for Hickey, were the ones who had shown up to fight but had misread the aesthet­ical-political map so badly that they had gone to the wrong arena. The fight, he believed, should have been over whether it was okay or not in our culture to make beautiful the behaviors that Mapplethorpe had made beautiful. The fight should have been over what Mapplethorpe had done with his art. Instead, the public got bromides about free expression and puritanical lectures about the civilizing function of arts in society. Worst of all, in Hickey's eyes, was how quickly the art experts ran away from the rawness of Mapplethorpe's work, characterizing him as though he were a philosopher of aesthetics, rather than an artist, as though he chose and framed his subjects for the sake of what they allowed him to say, propositionally, about the nature of light and beauty and other such things.“Mapplethorpe uses the medium of photography to translate flowers, stamens, stares, limbs, as well as erect sexual organs, into objet d'art,” wrote curator Janet Kardon in her catalogue essay for the exhibition. “Dramatic lighting and precise composition democratically pulverize their diversities and convert them into homogeneous statements.””When it came to it on the witness stand in Cincinnati, even the folks who had curated the exhibition, who surely knew that Mapplethorpe would bring the people in precisely because he was so titillating—Look at the dicks! Hey, even the flowers look like dicks!—couldn't allow them­selves even a flicker of a leer. So Hickey called them out.In a series of four essays written between 1989 and 1993, which were assembled into the sixty-four-page volume The Invisible Dragon, he launched a lacerating critique of American art critical and art historical practice. It was so unexpected, and so potent, that by the time he was done, his own intervention—a slim, impossibly cool, small-batch edi­tion from Art issues Press—would be as transformative in the art critical realm as Mapplethorpe's photographs had been in the photographic.The Invisible Dragon began with a story. It wasn't necessarily a true story, but it was a good one. So good, in fact, that it has conditioned and, in significant ways, distorted perceptions of Hickey ever since.“I was drifting, daydreaming really,” wrote Hickey, “through the wan­ing moments of a panel discussion on the subject of ‘What's Happening Now,' drawing cartoon daggers on a yellow pad and vaguely formulating strategies for avoiding punch and cookies, when I realized I was being addressed from the audience. A lanky graduate student had risen to his feet and was soliciting my opinion as to what ‘The Issue of the Nine­ties' would be. Snatched from my reverie, I said, ‘Beauty,' and then, more firmly, ‘The issue of the nineties will be beauty'—a total improvisatory goof—an off-the-wall, jump-start, free association that rose unbidden to my lips from God knows where. Or perhaps I was being ironic; wishing it so but not believing it likely? I don't know, but the total, uncompre­hending silence that greeted this modest proposal lent it immediate cre­dence for me.”Hickey, an experienced provocateur, had been expecting some kind of pushback. (Beauty?! That old thing? The issue of the '90s? You gotta be kidding me.) When he got none, he was intrigued. His fellow panelists hadn't jumped in to tussle. The moderator didn't seem ruffled. No one from the audience harangued him after he stepped down from the dais. Rather than setting off sparks, he had soft-shoed into a vacuum, which meant he had misjudged something, and in that misjudgment, he sensed, there lay potential. (“I was overcome by this strange Holme­sian elation. The game was afoot.”) He began interrogating friends and colleagues, students and faculty, critics and curators for their thoughts on beauty and its role in the production, assessment, and consump­tion of art. What he got back, again and again, was a simple and rather befuddling response: When asked about beauty, everyone talked about money. “Beauty” was the surface glitz that sold pictures in the bourgeois art market to people who lacked an appreciation for the deeper qualities of good art. It was a branding scheme of capitalism and the province of schmoozy art dealers, rich people, and high-end corporate lobby deco­rators. Artists themselves, and critics and scholars, were more properly concerned with other qualities: truth, meaning, discourse, language, ideology, form, justice. There were high-brow versions of this argument in journals like Art Forum and October, and there were less sophisticated versions, but the angle of incidence was the same.Hickey was stunned. Not by the content of such an argument— he knew his Marx and was familiar with left cultural criticism more broadly—but by the completeness of its triumph. He hadn't realized the extent, almost total, to which beauty had been vanquished from the sphere of discursive concern.“I had assumed,” he wrote, “that from the beginning of the sixteenth century until just last week artists had been persistently and effectively employing the rough vernacular of pleasure and beauty to interrogate our totalizing concepts ‘the good' and ‘the beautiful'; and now this was over? Evidently. At any rate, its critical vocabulary seemed to have evap­orated overnight, and I found myself muttering detective questions like: Who wins? Who loses?”The quest to reconstruct what had happened to beauty soon evolved for Hickey into a more fundamental effort to understand what even he meant by the term. What was he defending? What was he trying to res­cue or redeem? The critical vocabulary and community he had assumed were there, perhaps fighting a rearguard battle but still yet on the field, had winked out of existence without even a good-bye note. It was left to him, in the absence of anyone else, to reconstitute its concepts and arguments, restock its supply chain and armament.So he did, and he called it The Invisible Dragon. The issue, he wrote, is not beauty but the beautiful. The beautiful is the visual language through which art excites interest and pleasure and attention in an observer. It is a form of rhetoric, a quiver of rhetorical maneuvers. Artists enchant us through their beautiful assemblages of color, shape, effects, reference, and imagery, as a writer ensnares us with words and sentences and para­graphs, as a dancer enthralls us with legs and leaps, as a rock star cap­tures us with hips and lips and voice. The more mastery an artist has of the rhetoric of the beautiful, the more effectively he can rewire how our brains process and perceive visual sense data. It is an awesome power.Beauty, in this equation, is the sum of the charge that an artist, deploy­ing the language of the beautiful, can generate. It is a spark that begins in the intelligence and insight of the artist, is instantiated into material being by her command of the techniques of the beautiful, and is crystal­lized in the world by its capacity to elicit passion and loyalty and detes­tation in its beholders, to rally around itself constituencies and against itself enemies. Like all arks and arenas of human value, beauty is his­torically grounded but also historically contingent. In the Renaissance, where The Invisible Dragon begins its modern history of beauty, masters like Caravaggio were negotiating and reconstructing the relations among the Church, God, man, and society. They were deploying the tools of the beautiful to hook into and renovate primarily theological systems of meaning and human relation. In a liberal, pluralistic, commerce-driven democracy like America, the primary terrain on which beauty was medi­ated, and in some respects generated, was the art market.To dismiss beauty as just another lubricant of modern capitalism, then, was to miss the point in a succession of catastrophic ways. It was to mistake the last part of that equation, the creation and negotiation of value on and through the art market, for the entirety of it. It was to mistake the exchange of art for other currencies of value, which was a human activity that preceded and would persist after capitalism, for capitalism. It was to believe that the buying and selling of art in modern art markets was a problem at all, when, in fact, it was the only available solution in our given historical configuration of forces. And it was to radically underestimate the capacity of beauty to destabilize and reorder precisely the relations of politics, economy, and culture that its vulgar critics believed it was propping up.Beauty had consequences. Beautiful images could change the world. In America, risking money or status for the sake of what you found beautiful—by buying or selling that which you found beautiful or by arguing about which objects should be bought or sold on account of their beauty—was a way of risking yourself for the sake of the vision of the good life you would like to see realized.The good guys in Hickey's story were those who put themselves on the line for objects that deployed the beautiful in ways they found per­suasive and pleasure-inducing. They were the artists themselves, whose livelihoods depended on participation in the art market, who risked poverty, rejection, incomprehension, and obscurity if their work wasn't beautiful enough to attract buyers. They were the dealers, who risked their money and reputation for objects they wagered were beautiful enough to bring them more money and status. They were the buyers, who risked money and ridicule in the hopes of acquiring more status and pleasure. They were the critics, like Hickey, who risked their rep­utations and careers on behalf of the art that struck them as beautiful and on behalf of the artists whose idiosyncratic visions they found per­suasive or undeniable. And finally they were the fans, who desperately wanted to see that which they loved loved by others and to exist in com­munity with their fellow enthusiasts. The good guys were the ones who cared a lot, and specifically.The villains were the blob of curators, academics, review boards, arts organizations, governmental agencies, museum boards, and fund­ing institutions that had claimed for themselves almost total control of the assignment and negotiation of value to art, severing art's ties to the messy democratic marketplace, which was the proper incubator of artis­tic value in a free society. The blob cared a lot, too, but about the wrong things.“I characterize this cloud of bureaucracies generally,” wrote Hickey, “as the ‘therapeutic institution.'”In the great mystery of the disappeared beauty, the whodunnit that fueled The Invisible Dragon, it turned out that it was the therapeutic institution that dunnit. It had squirted so many trillions of gallons of obfuscating ink into the ocean over so many decades that beauty, and the delicate social ecosystems that fostered its coalescence, could barely aspirate. Why the therapeutic institution did this, for Hickey, was simple. Power. Control. Fear of freedom and pleasure and undisciplined feeling. It was the eternally recurring revenge of the dour old Patriarch who had been haunting our dreams since we came up from the desert with his schemas of logic, strength, autonomy, and abstraction, asserting control against the wiles and seductions of the feminine and her emanations of care, vulnerability, delicacy, dependence, joy, and decoration. It was the expression of God's anger in the Garden of Eden when Eve and Adam defied Him to bite from the juicy apple of knowledge and freedom.In one of the most extraordinary passages in the book, Hickey turned Michel Foucault, a favorite of the blob, back on the blob. It was Fou­cault, he wrote, who drew back the curtain on the hidden authoritarian impulse at work in so many of the modern institutions of social order, particularly those systems most committed to the tending of our souls. Such systems weren't content with establishing regimes of dominance and submission that were merely or primarily external. Appearances canbe too deceiving. Too much wildness can course beneath the facade of compliance. It was inner consent, cultivated therapeutically through the benevolent grooming of the institutions, that mattered. Thus the disciplined intensity with which the therapeutic institution had fought its multi-generational war to crowd out and delegitimize the market, where appearance was almost everything and where desire, which is too unpredictably correlated with virtue, was so operative.“For nearly 70 years, during the adolescence of modernity, profes­sors, curators, and academicians could only wring their hands and weep at the spectacle of an exploding culture in the sway of painters, dealers, critics, shopkeepers, second sons, Russian epicures, Spanish parvenus, and American expatriates. Jews abounded, as did homosexuals, bisex­uals, Bolsheviks, and women in sensible shoes. Vulgar people in manu­facture and trade who knew naught but romance and real estate bought sticky Impressionist landscapes and swooning pre-Raphaelite bimbos from guys with monocles who, in their spare time, were shipping the treasures of European civilization across the Atlantic to railroad barons. And most disturbingly for those who felt they ought to be in control— or that someone should be—‘beauties' proliferated, each finding an audience, each bearing its own little rhetorical load of psycho-political permission.”After getting knocked back on their heels so thoroughly, wrote Hickey, the bureaucrats began to get their act together around 1920. They have been expanding and entrenching their hegemony ever since, developing the ideologies, building the institutions, and corralling the funding to effectively counter, control, and homogenize all the unruly little beauties. There had been setbacks to their campaign along the way, most notably in the 1960s, but the trend line was clear.In this dialectic, Mapplethorpe proves an interesting and illustra­tive figure. He was so brilliant in making his world beautiful that the therapeutic institution had no choice but to gather him in, to celebrate him in order to neutralize him, to pulverize his diversities and convert them into homogeneous statements. But it turned out that he was too quicksilver a talent to be so easily caged, and the blob was overconfident in its capacity to domesticate him. It/they missed something with Map­plethorpe and made the mistake of exposing him to the senator from North Carolina and the prosecutor from Hamilton County, who saw through the scrim of institutional mediation. All the therapeutic testi­mony that followed, in the case of Cincinnati v. Contemporary Arts Center, wasn't really about defending Mapplethorpe or fending off conservative tyranny. It was about reasserting the blob's hegemony. In truth, Senator Helms and the therapeutic institution were destabilized by complemen­tary aspects of the same thing, which was pleasure and desire rendered beautiful and specific.“It was not that men were making it then,” wrote Hickey, “but that Robert was ‘making it beautiful.' More precisely, he was appropriating a Baroque vernacular of beauty that predated and, clearly, outperformed the puritanical canon of visual appeal espoused by the therapeutic institution.”Confronted by this beautiful provocation, the conservative and art establishments, whatever they thought they were doing, were, in fact, collaborating to put Mapplethorpe back in his place. The ostensible tri­umph of one side was the secret triumph for both. It was beauty that lost. The Invisible Dragon was a howl of frustration at this outcome. It was also a guerrilla whistle. Not so fast . . .Eminent Americans is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Eminent Americans at danieloppenheimer.substack.com/subscribe

If you're an American of a certain age, you undoubtedly remember Jesse Helms. Helms was a North Carolina U.S. Senator from 1973 to 2003 – a period in which he was widely recognized as America's best known and most outspoken arch-conservative politician. On a long and sobering list of issues – race, reproductive freedom, equality […] The post Dr. Ellen Gaddy, granddaughter of NC's famously reactionary U.S. Senator, the late Jesse Helms appeared first on NC Newsline.

Chris Mottola is in his fifth decade as a Republican media consultant, with nearly 400 campaigns under his belt - including seven presidential campaigns and working with eleven US Seantors and six governors. His client list includes the highest echelons of GOP names like Bush, Dole, McCain, Giuliani, Specter, Rubio, Pataki, Sununu, Frist & many more. In this conversation, we talk his nearly lifelong passion for film, the non-political techniques he's brought to his political work, what drew him into campaigns, lessons learned from some of the smartest operatives who preceded him, and the stories behind some of his most memorable campaigns and effective TV ads.IN THIS EPISODEChris's roots as a Philly kid…The movie that ignited Chris's passion for film at age 7…Chris breaks down his embrace of “formalism” in filmmaking…A memorable first press conference in his first real political job…Handling over 50 spots in one cycle as a young NRCC production staffer…Chris tells lessons learned from legendary admakers Bob Goodman and Charles Guggenheim…Chris on the influence of “his favorite person on campaigns" , pollster Arthur Finkelstein…Chris talks some of his signature wins in Wisconsin and Florida as he establishes himself as a media consultant…Chis explains how a narrow loss to Patty Murray in the 1992 Washington Senate race that spurred his growth as a consultant…Chris's work for longtime PA Senator Arlen Specter and the drama around his 2009 party switch…Chris's time riding the campaign bus with Bob Dole in 1996…Chris on his work for colorful Montana Senator Conrad Burns…The story behind Chris's creation of the first gay rights spot for a Republican Senator…Three techniques that make Chris's spots a little different…Chris's 1970s moonlighting as an offensive football guru…How Chris embraced women voiceover artists…Why Philadelphia over-indexes on political media consultants and production talent… AND 80/20 questions, Adagio for Strings, JJ Balaban, the barbers' union, Brian Bellick, Ed Blakely, Don Bonker, Bertolt Brecht, Tom Brokaw, Buckely v. Valeo, the C&S Club, the Capitol Hill Club, Jimmy Carter, Alex Castellanos, Ronald Castille, Rod Chandler, commuter schools, Gary Cooper, Earl Cox, Mouse Davis, Dickens' novels, Fund for a Conservative Majority, David Garth, Tony Earl, Wilson Goode, Rod Goodwin, Bill Green, Gary Hart, Jesse Helms, Bernard Herrman, Edward Hopper, the Houston Gamblers, Asa Hutchinson, Peter Jennings, Andi Johnson, Ted Kennedy, laundry lists of grievances, Connie Mack, Buddy MacKay, Joseph Mankiewicz, David Marsden, George McGovern, Sally Mercer, Michealangelo's Pieta, Jack Mudd, Mike Murphy, Patty Murray, Neil Newhouse, old auctioneers, Neil Oxman, George Pataki, pearl clutching, potato peelers, Hester Prynne, Jerry Rafshoon, Dan Rather, Resonance Theory, the run-and-shoot, Tony Schwartz, Doc Schweitzer, seersucker suits, Judy Shepard, Matthew Shepard, Saul Shorr, Don Sipple, Gordon Smith, Bob Squier, Greg Stevens, stick time, Temple University, Tommy Thompson, Pat Toomey, the Voight-Kampff test, Bill Walsh, the World Football League, you bet....& more!

People widely loved — and hated — legendary U.S. Senator Jesse Helms, not only here in North Carolina, but around the world. Much of that hate centered on his stances on the issues of race and the gay community. However, Senator Helms never knew that he had a gay granddaughter. Fifteen years after his death, his granddaughter, Jennifer Knox, has chosen to speak about it publicly for the first time. It was first reported in The Assembly by John Drescher. Both Drescher and Knox join host Tim Boyum to talk more about this incredible story.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit public.substack.comThis morning, Matt Taibbi asked a question that we've long been struggling with ourselves here at Public: Where have all the liberals gone?The old-school leftists who protested Tipper Gore's parental advisory warnings on records and CDs in the 1980s, the ones that were outraged by the efforts of the late Senator Jesse Helms and then-Congressman Al D'Amato in 1989 to pull funding for the artist who created “Piss Christ,” those that stood with the Dixie Chicks when they became the prototypical victims of cancel culture for their opposition to the Iraq War: Where are all these people now as the government forms an unholy cabal with the social media platforms to censor regular Americans' views on everything from public health to the war in Ukraine?Ruy Teixeira, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a contributor at The Liberal Patriot, has an answer to this question. The Democratic Party, he argues, has abandoned its traditional working-class base and become a party of college-educated elites. For decades, the party has been hemorrhaging white working-class voters. But in recent election cycles, it has suffered big losses among Latinos without a college education, and has started to slide with non-college-educated Asian and even black Americans as well. The Republicans have capitalized on that loss by embracing these exiled voters, creating an inverted political dynamic that has left those of us old enough to remember the traditional pro-worker, anti-war left with our heads spinning.

Legendary North Carolina journalist Steve Crump joins the show. He talks about not only his incredible fight against colon cancer but also his incredible career.  Crump recounts funny stories of interviewing Mother Teresa, Paul McCartney and a visit to South Africa to cover former Gov. Jim Hunt. He also talks about covering one of North Carolina's most famous Senate races between Jesse Helms and Harvey Gantt when race played a big role.

In this week's North American Ag Spotlight Chrissy Wozniak gets an update from Congressman David Rouzer on the #WOTUS ruling and President Biden's recent veto. Congressman David Rouzer proudly represents North Carolina's 7th Congressional District, stretching from the beautiful coastline of Southeastern North Carolina west to the small-town, agricultural communities around Lumberton and Fayetteville.  Elected to the United States Congress in 2014, David is beginning his 5th term in the U.S. House of Representatives. David serves on the House Agriculture Committee and the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee where he currently serves as Chairman of the Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment.  He has served as a ranking member or chairman of a subcommittee on both since his first day in office, which has enabled him to better address the unique needs of his district and state.  He is a member of a number of caucuses in Congress including as a founding member of the Primary Care Caucus and the Supply Chain Caucus, as well as co-chairing the United Kingdom Caucus.Prior to Congress, David formed his own business doing consulting and sales work, predominately in the agricultural arena.  His public service includes two terms in the North Carolina Senate representing Johnston and Wayne counties (2009-2012) where he was consistently ranked as one of the most effective pro-business legislators.  David also served as assistant to the dean and director of commodity relations for the College of Agriculture & Life Sciences at NC State University in between two stints with U.S. Senator Jesse Helms, where he started out as a legislative assistant and later served as senior policy advisor.  He was also senior advisor for U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole.  In 2005, he took a senior level appointment at USDA Rural Development and helped manage a program level budget of more than $1.2 billion and a loan portfolio of more than $5 billion in investments in rural America.  David has garnered a number of awards during his career for his work in each of these capacities as well as a Member of Congress. David, a Southern Baptist, was raised in Durham and spent his summers working on the family farm just outside of Four Oaks, N.C.  The money he earned those summers enabled him to pay his tuition at N.C. State University where he graduated with three degrees in Agricultural Business Management, Agricultural Economics, and Chemistry.  He is also a graduate of The Fund for American Studies.  David resides in Wilmington, N.C. Learn more about the issue at https://rouzer.house.gov#farm #farming #agricultureNorth American Ag is devoted to highlighting the people & companies in agriculture who impact our industry and help feed the world. Subscribe at https://northamericanag.comWant to hear the stories of the ag brands you love and the ag brands you love to hate? Hear them at https://whatcolorisyourtractor.comNeed help with your agriculture based company's marketing plan? Visit https://chrissywozniak.comDon't just thank a farmer, pray Why you should not miss FIRA USA 2023!Join the experts during 3 days of autonomous and robotics farming solutions in action!FIRA USA, the traveling AgTech event is back from September 19-21, 2023 at the Salinas Sports Complex, Home of the California Rodeo SalinasRegister at - https://fira-usa.com/ Sponsored by Tractors and Troubadours:Your weekly connection to agriculture industry newsmakers, hot-button industry issues, educational topics, rural lifestyle features and the best in true country music. Brought to you by Rural Strong Media.Listen now at https://ruralstrongmedia.com/tractors-and-troubadours/Subscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

Richard Norton Smith is a renowned historian, a former director of five presidential libraries, & author whose latest work - Ordinary Man - chronicles the life and career of Gerald Ford. In this conversation, we talk the insurgent rise of Ford as he takes on the local GOP machine, his ascent through the House GOP of the 50s and 60s, the fortuitous events that led him to become Vice President and then President upon Nixon's resignation, his very narrow loss in 1976, & why the Ford Presidency and his enduring impact on America is much more consequential than often realized.(To donate to support The Pro Politics Podcast, you may use this venmo link or inquire by email at mccrary.zachary@gmail.com)IN THIS EPISODEWhat made Ford the “first post-New Deal President”...One of the rare times Ford lost his temper in politics...Ford's “political father figure”, Senator Arthur Vandenberg…The story behind Ford's first insurgent bid for Congress…The secret society within the House that helped propel Ford's career…The story behind Ford's attempt to become Richard Nixon's running mate in 1960…The never before disclosed “deal” that nearly gave House Republicans the majority in the early 1970s…The one politician who could've disrupted Ford's path to become Nixon's VP in 1974…The proposed “constitutional coup” that could have replaced Richard Nixon with a Democratic President…Two meetings with the same influential senator only days apart demonstrate Ford's quick growth in office…The political damage done to Ford by his pardon of Richard Nixon…Two late factors that might have cost Ford in his narrow loss to Jimmy Carter…The political impact of First Lady Betty Ford in the 1976 campaign…Ford's leftward drift after he left the White House…Richard reads a bit of what he feels is Ford's best speech as President…Two of Richard's favorite recommendations for off-the-beaten-path historical sites around DC… AND Bella Abzug, Sprio Agnew, Carl Albert, apartheid, asterisks, Doug Bailey, bar stools, the Bicentennial, Phil Buchen, butcher knives, the CIA, Chevy Chase, Dick Cheney, concealed resentments, John Connally, docile acceptance, Bob Dole, Tom Dewey, English muffins, Barry Goldwater, grizzly bears, Jesse Helms, the Helsinki Accords, Leon Jaworski, Billy Kidd, Leslie King, Henry Kissinger, Tom Korologos, Mel Laird, Henry Cabot Lodge, Russell Long, The Marshall Plan, Sara Jane Moore, non-descript committee rooms, OSHA, Old Bulls, John Rankin, Ronald Reagan, the road to Damascus, Nelson Rockefeller, John Rhodes, Rhodesia, the Rules Committee, Bob Schieffer, Phyllis Schlafly, Hugh Scott, scoundrels, George Shultz, ski chalets, Oliver Sipple, Ted Sorensen, Robert Taft, transitional figures, Harry Truman, the UAW, the Warren Commission & more!

For 30 years in United State politics, North Carolina US Senator Jesse Helms set the bar for this country's social conservatism. Helms was unabashed in his opposition to civil rights, gay rights, disability rights, environmentalism, feminism, affirmative action and access to abortion. Today, one of his granddaughters lives in Asheville and is doing what she can to rebuke his legacy.Ellen Gaddy is using the Helms lineage as a pulpit to fight for causes her grandfather opposed—chiefly women's bodily autonomy and their access to abortion. Matt Peiken talks with her about growing up under the spectre of Jesse Helms' rhetoric and the price she has paid within her family for speaking against the late senator's views.Support The Overlook by joining our Patreon campaign!Advertise your event on The Overlook.Instagram: AVLoverlook | Facebook: AVLoverlook | Twitter: AVLoverlookListen and Subscribe: All episodes of The OverlookThe Overlook theme song, "Maker's Song," comes courtesy of the Asheville band The Resonant Rogues.Podcast Asheville © 2023

A guy named Zed brings guests to his planet so he can chase them to a resting log and then mount their dome on his wall. Free slave bikinis and expensive lingerie for attendees though. Oh boy, where do I even begin with "Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity"? This movie is a wild and bizarre ride from start to finish, and I mean that in the best way possible. From the cheesy special effects to the over-the-top acting, this sci-fi adventure flick is a non-stop riff ride that will keep you laughing and entertained the whole way through. Now, I know what you might be thinking: "But Stinker Madness, isn't this movie just a cheap knockoff of 'The Most Dangerous Game'?" And to that, I say, yes, it definitely is. But it's a cheap knockoff with heart, damn it. The two lead actresses, Elizabeth Kaitan and Cindy Beal, fully commit to their roles as two stranded space adventurers who are forced to fight for their lives against a lusty hunty madman who likes to hang heads...up. Their chemistry is dripping with cheesy deliveries, and their performances are so corny that you can't help but root for them. And let's not forget about the villain of the piece, Zed, played by Don Scribner. His creepy performance as "some dude who has a tractor-beam castle" definitely adds to the corn, and his scenes with the "slave girls" are dubious and oddly philosophical. I mean, who doesn't love a good villain monologue about what man and women's base natures are while wearing slave bikinis? In fact, "Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity" was so bikini-laden that it even was referenced as part of an amendment of the Cable Television Consumer Protection and Competition Act of 1992, which was introduced by Senator Jesse Helms to crack down on sexually explicit content on cable TV. Why on Zed's Green Earth would a US Senator be talking about this very mild flesh film is beyond me. Well it was beyond infinity for Helms too as the amendment was struck down as ludicriously stupid and a violation of the First Amendment. Go back to....uh...well I guess we are still fighting these battles... "Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity" is a hilarious, campy, and surprisingly fun sci-fi adventure that is sure to entertain even the most jaded moviegoer. So if you're in the mood for some old-school B-movie fun, give this one a watch.

Ellen Gaddy, Ph.D., a graduate of Saybrook University, discusses her journey to Saybrook, including her conservative upbringing as the granddaughter of former U.S. Senator Jesse Helms and growing up in a “traditional values” family, and how she began questioning traditional belief systems for transformative change and social justice.Ellen Gaddy has a Ph.D. in Psychology and is a political activist and justice-oriented philanthropist.Visit Saybrook University at https://www.saybrook.edu/Catch up on past episodes of UNBOUND: Saybrook Insights on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you download your favorite shows. Visit https://linktr.ee/saybrookinsights to learn more.#humanisticpsychology #transformativechange #socialjustice

Politics really do make strange bedfellows. Witness here, the odd couple of Bono and Senator Jesse Helms, people so far apart on any political graph that you'd need more than one page to represent the gap between them. Yet somehow, Bono talked Helms into helping him secure money to educate and treat victims of AIDS in Africa. Here's a short piece on division and coming together inspire of it. I hope you'll listen.

Congressman David Price served 34 years representing North Carolina's Research Triangle, leaving the House just this January. Beyond his time as an institution in the House, he's lived a remarkable political life...present on the Washington Mall during the MLK "I Have A Dream" speech...a Senate staffer witnessing key civil rights votes in the mid 1960s...a leading political scientist at Duke University...a Democratic Party leader who helped devise the primary reforms now known as "super delegates"...and an influential House member who's served across parts of five decades in the House and been a witness to - and a part of - some of the most important political moments of the past half century.IN THIS EPISODE...Growing up in the unique political culture of small-town East Tennessee...The Civil Rights Movement inspires an awakening for public service...Memories of being on The Mall during the March on Washington and the MLK "I Have A Dream" Speech...His time as a Senate staffer during the critical 1964 vote to break the filibuster on civil rights... How he merged teaching Political Science at Duke with activity in real-world politics...His time in state party leadership and as part of The Hunt Commission reforming the Democratic Presidential Primary process...The political skill and legacy of North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt...North Carolina's legacy as a progressive Southern state...Remembering the 1984 Senate "race of the century" of Jesse Helms vs. Jim Hunt...His path to running and winning his first race for Congress in 1986...Memories of his first few terms in the House...The story of his loss in the 1994 GOP wave and comeback win in 1996...His thoughts on the legacy of the Newt Gingrich Revolution of the 1990s...His proudest accomplishments from 30+ years in the House...The toughest two votes he took...His analysis on the leadership success of Speaker Nancy Pelosi...The closest Congressman Price came to a statewide race...The advice he gives to new House members...His current work and focuses in his post-House career...AND Lamar Alexander, Howard Baker, Bob Bartlett, Joe Biden, Jack Brooks, C-Span after hours, cabals, Tom Carper, Chapel Hill, church suppers, Joe Clark, Bill Clinton, Jim Clyburn, committee barons, the Confederate Cause, the Contract with America, Harold Cooley, Thomas Dewey, John Dingell, down-home types, Clair Engle, existential questions, Bill Ford, the Gang of Eight, Albert Gore Sr., Jerry Grinstein, Phil Hart, Helms' proteges, Hope VI, Steny Hoyer, inherited Republicanism, inner clubs, the Iran Nuclear Agreement, Jacob Javits, Warren Magnuson, Mars Hill, Kevin McCarthy, the McGovern Commission, metal aprons, Bob Michel, midterm effects, moral suasion, Morehead Scholarships, Mountain Republicans, Ed Muskie, Bill Nelson, Barack Obama, PLEOs, peer pressure, pep talks, Mike Pertschuk, the Political Science Caucus, Edward Pugh, Ronald Reagan, Dan Rostenkowski, rump conventions, Terry Sanford, the Sanford School of Public Policy, Saul Shorr, shouting matches on the House floor, sit-ins, Sputnik, Freddy St. Germain, super-delegates, talk radio, the Tea Party, Donald Trump, turbulent townhall meetings, turnaround artists, Jamie Whitten, Jim Wright, Yale Divinity School, yeoman farmers & more!

Tom Davis served seven terms in the House from Northern Virginia, including 2 cycles as NRCC Chair and as Chair of the House Government Reform Committee. In this conversation, he talks becoming obsessed with politics at an early age, working as a Senate page in the 1960s, playing a small role in the political operation of Richard Nixon, 15 years on the Fairfax County Board, 14 years in Congress, protecting the GOP majority in 2000 and 2002 while helming NRCC, why he left elected politics, the work he's most passionate about now, and his expectations ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. IN THIS EPISODE..One early moment when the lifelong political obsession started to click for a 6-year old Tom Davis…Working as a teenage U.S. Senate page…Tom spends 30 minutes in the Oval Office with President Nixon…Tom's early stint as part of the Nixon political operation…Tom talks the political legacy of Virginia's famed Byrd Machine…Tom remembers his 14+ years on the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors…Tom on the excitement as part of the 1994 House GOP wave…Tom talks the political skills (and flaws) of Newt Gingrich…Early impressions and surprises on his first term in the House…Memories of tough votes surrounding the impeachment of President Clinton…Tom's path to running the NRCC in both the 2000 and 2002 cycles…Inside the candidate-recruitment process of the Tom Davis-led NRCC…Highlights of his tenure as Chair of the House Government Reform Committee…The tough decision to pass on an open 2008 Senate race and ultimately forgo re-election altogether…The two types of lobbyists in Washington…Tom breaks down lessons for Republicans in Glenn Youngkin's 2021 Virginia win…How Tom is thinking about the 2022 midterms…AND Amherst, Appalachian State University, appendages, John Boehner, Harry Byrd, Eldridge Cleaver, Bill Clinger, Carl Curtis, Tom Delay, Harry Dent, Everett Dirksen, David Dreier, Dulles Airport, David Eisenhower, Martin Frost, gay newspapers, George Mason University, Jim Gilmore, Barry Goldwater, Bart Gordon, Bob Haldeman, Jesse Helms, Eleanor Holmes-Norton, Jim Holshouser, Rush Holt, Linwood Holton, John Hostettler, Steny Hoyer, Roman Hruska, Hubert Humphrey, Andrew Jackson, Jacob Javits, Nancy Johnson, Kent State, V.O. Key, lifelong teetotalers, John Linder, Louisiana Smart, Malibu, Mike Mansfield, Terry McAuliffe, Wayne Morse, the Mountain Valley Group, no confidence votes, Oliver North, Barack Obama, Dick Obenshain, Bill Paxon, perfecting amendments, Colin Peterson, Jeffrey Pine, George Rawlings, rental seats, Tom Reynolds, Alice Rivlin, Willis Robertson, Win Rockefeller, the Rotary Club, Antonin Scalia, Chris Shays, slackers, Howard Smith, Billy Tauzin, the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, Charles Thone, Strom Thurmond, Tulane, Fred Upton, Bob Walker, John Warner, Mark Warner, the Washington Post, Watauga County, Roger Wicker, wiffle ball, Frank Wolf, Jim Wright, Dick Zimmer, Elmo Zumwalt & more!

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Ann Lewis has had a legendary career as a Democratic strategist...from her time as Communications Director in the Clinton White House...as a Senior Advisor to Hillary Clinton's 2000 Senate run and both 08 & 16 Presidentials...to her time as a Senate Chief of Staff and working at institutions like Planned Parenthood, the DNC, ADA, & more. In this conversation...Ann talks growing up in New Jersey in the shadow of the Hudson County Democratic machine, key moments in her career path as a woman in politics in the 1970s and 80s, intersecting with Bill and Hillary Clinton in the 80s, her work in both the Clinton White House and Clinton campaigns for 20+ years, and her best practices for smart communication strategies.IN THIS EPISODE…Ann grows up in New Jersey in a family who instilled in her the importance of politics…Ann's early political memories of Harry Truman's upset win in 1948…Ann talks the Hudson County, NJ political machine of her youth…A political light-bulb goes off for Ann when canvassing for JFK…Ann talks the challenges of working up the political ladder as a woman in the 1970s and 80s…Ann goes deep on the her time working for Hillary Clinton's 2000 Senate race…Ann on the importance of Americans for Democratic Action…Ann talks her time as campaign manager and Chief of Staff for Senator Barbara Mikulski…Ann first crosses path with Bill & Hillary Clinton in the early 1980s…Ann gets to know then-First Lady Hillary Clinton in 1994…Ann gets pulled into the 1996 Clinton Presidential…Ann's time as Communication Directions in the White House, including during the Clinton Impeachment saga…Ann's communications best practices…Ann's involvement in the '08 and '16 Hillary Clinton Presidentials…Ann talks Bill Clinton's legendary retail skills and Hillary Clinton's intellect…Ann talks growing up with her brother, and fellow legendary political figure, Congressman Barney Frank…Ann's advice to the next generation of political operatives…AND Aunt Fanny, the Baltimore Museum of Art, basement offices, battlefield promotions, Bayonne, blankety-blank campaigns, George H.W. Bush, chattering classes, childish bullies, the Clinton Library, cocktail parties, the Colossus of Rhodes, Democratic Majority for Israel, Thomas Dewey, Bob Dole, Facebook, Fells Point, flaming parachutes, Boss Hague, the George Washington Bridge, Newt Gingrich, Rudy Giuliani, Margaret Hague, Jesse Helms, Harold Ickes, Jewish Women for Hillary, Junior Advisors, John Kennedy, Rick Lazio, Nita Lowey, Chuck Manatt, Mac Mathias, moderate ethnics, Pat Moynihan, the New York Post, Richard Nixon, NOW, one-and-a-half computers, Norm Ornstein, George Pataki, Planned Parenthood, Charlie Rangel, Joe Rauh, Walter Reuther, Eleanor Roosevelt, Adlai Stevenson, sturdy women, third wives, tugboats, the Unpleasantness, upstate winegrowers, Henry Wallace, Anne Wexler, Maggie Williams, the Women's Political Caucus & more!

Charlie Black is a legendary figure in Republican politics, working his first presidential campaign with Ronald Reagan in 1976 and being involved at a high level with both Presidents Bush and names like Kemp, Dole, McCain, Romney, Kasich and more. In this conversation, Charlie talks his roots in the conservative movement of the 1970s, his work as a political consultant in some of the most famous races of the era, and offers stories, insight, and lessons learned from one of the most impactful political lives of his generation.IN THIS EPISODE                                                    Charlie's roots in Wilmington North Carolina…Barry Goldwater draws Charlie to the GOP…How his early Republican activism leads to his first real campaign job with Jesse Helms first Senate race in 1972…Charlie talks the political strength of Jesse Helms that led to a 30-year Senate career, including the titanic '84 race between Helms and Democratic heavyweight Governor Jim Hunt…Charlie talks the rise of direct mail fundraising, Independent Expenditures, and the development of the conservative movement throughout the 1970s…Charlie's role running several states in the insurgent Reagan '76 primary challenge to Gerald Ford…Charlie talks the strategic decisions that led to Reagan winning the GOP nomination in 1980…Charlie goes into political consulting, working for scores of Senators, Governors, and House members…The question Ronald Reagan asked himself every morning in the White House…Charlie helps George H.W. Bush turn a 17-point deficit in 1988 into a landslide win…Charlie's longtime friendship with George W. Bush…The Charlie Black 101 on effective campaign management…Charlie talks his relationship with Lee Atwater, one of his best friends…Charlie manages Jack Kemp's 1988 Presidential campaign…Charlie on the Democratic politicians who've most impressed him…Charlie talks his work in government relations and former business partners Roger Stone and Paul Manafort…Charlie's take on how the Republican Establishment lost control of the party to the Trump wing…Charlie's best practices for crisis-communication…AND 80% friends, the ACLU, Roger Ailes, American University, John Anderson, Howard Baker, Jim Baker, Bigness, Boston Harbor, Bill Brock, Pat Buchanan, Buckley v. Valeo, the California guys, Bill Clinton, John Connolly, the Conscience of a Conservative, courtroom lawyers, Phil Crane, Michael Deaver, Terry Dolan, Kitty Dukakis, Michael Dukakis, John East, Jim Ely, Newt Gingrich, Bob Graham, the greatest Senate race ever run, Pete Hannaford, Paula Hawkins, the Hill newspaper, Willie Horton, Peter Kelly, Kemp-Roth tax cuts, Jim Lake, the League of Women Voters, C.S. Lewis, little bastards, Trent Lott, Mac Mathias, George McGovern, Ed Meese, Walter Mondale, Nashua, nativists, negative advertising, Nixon's coattails, noblesse oblige, Lyn Nofziger, Scott Pastrick, Pauley Pavillion, Ross Perot, Prime Policy Group, the RNC, Reaganites,  Karl Rove, John Sears, Richard Schweiker, Bernie Shaw, Arlen Specter, Stu Spencer, Bob Strauss, Donald Trump, Tom Turnipseed, University of Florida, Richard Viguerie, Paul Volcker, Paul Weyrich, YAF, Young Republicans…& more!

Robby Mook has managed races at all levels of politics - from state legislative races to the 2016 Hillary Clinton presidential. In this conversation, Robby talks cutting his teeth in Vermont politics, the importance of field work, his time running the DCCC, managing successful races for Jeanne Shaheen and Terry McAuliffe, a deep dive on the 2016 campaign, & much more with one of the smartest thinkers in politics. IN THIS EPISODERobby cuts his teeth in Vermont politics and in the shadow of the next door New Hampshire Primary…The big name politician Robby rung up as a cashier…Robby's memories of Bernie Sanders from the 1990s…Robby's time in the US Senate page program…Robby talks the importance of his background in political field work…The piece of advice from David Plouffe that has really stuck with Robby…The Robby Mook 101 for effective campaign managing…Robby manages the 2008 Senate race for Jeanne Shaheen…Lessons Robby learned atop the DCCC in 2010 and 2012…Robby manages Terry McAuliffe's winning race in 2013…Robby's path to managing the Hillary Clinton Presidential campaign in 2016…How the Clinton campaign almost ended up based out of Buffalo…The two big decisions in the campaign that took up more of his time than he anticipated…Robby weighs in on what the Clinton campaign got right in 2016…Robby talks the political strengths of Trump 2016…Robby rebuts some of the unfair criticisms lodged against the Clinton campaign…Robby clarifies how the campaign used analytics down the stretch…Robby's advice to other campaign operatives facing adversity after an election…Robby's current role at House Majority PAC…AND airport logistics, Kate Bedingfield, Paul Begala, Joe Biden, James Carville, change elections, DC desk jockeys, easy narratives, Facebook, fast cashiers, New Gingrich, the glue between the bricks, U.S. Grant, Jesse Helms, Pat Leahy, mush, Nancy Pelosi, the Roman Republic, Patti Solis Doyle, the Sununus, Syracuse, third terms, Strom Thurmond, Harry Truman, the US Naval Reserves, the Vermont Democratic Party, Paul Wellstone, White Plains, word clouds, & more!

The President of the Jesse Helms Center, Brian Rogers, discusses how the late US Senator from North Carolina entered public office fighting against the abortion industry and the controversial ruling. Get exclusive content here!: https://thepetekalinershow.com/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hillary and Tina cover AIDS activist Larry Kramer and anti-gay activist George Rekers. Hillary's Story Larry Kramer started his career as a writer. BUT when the government failed to act, he sounded the alarm on the AIDS crisis. Tina's Story George Rekers made a name for himself through his controversial theories and studies on homosexuality. BUT when he returns from vacation in 2010 with a young man in tow, he's got some explaining to do. Hillary's Story ACT UP "Larry--The WORD" (https://actupny.com/post-your-remembrances-of-larry-kramer/)--by Timothy Lunceford-Stevens Biography Larry Kramer Captured His Seemingly Hopeless Fight for HIV/AIDS Victims in 'The Normal Heart' (https://www.biography.com/news/larry-kramer-the-normal-heart)--by Rachel Chang Britannica Larry Kramer (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Larry-Kramer) Brooklyn Museum In Conversation: Larry Kramer and Jonathan Katz (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avITb-TZWOQ)--via YouTube History AIDS activists unfurl a giant condom over Senator Jesse Helms' home (https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/aids-activists-unfurl-giant-condom-senator-jesse-helms-home-act-up) Los Angeles Times Letters to the Editor: Larry Kramer, the gay community's ‘Old Testament figure wrapped in righteous fury' (https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-06-02/larry-kramer-the-gay-communitys-old-testament-prophet)--by Steve Martin Making Gay History Larry Kramer (https://makinggayhistory.com/podcast/larry-kramer/) The New Yorker The Benevolent Rage of Larry Kramer--by Michael Specter (https://www.newyorker.com/culture/postscript/the-benevolent-rage-of-larry-kramer) The New York Times Larry Kramer, Playwright and Outspoken AIDS Activist, Dies at 84 (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/27/us/larry-kramer-dead.html)--by Daniel Lewis NPR Larry Kramer, Pioneering AIDS Activist And Writer, Dies At 84 (https://www.npr.org/2020/05/27/512714500/larry-kramer-pioneering-aids-activist-and-writer-dies-at-84) Vanity Fair In One of His Final Interviews Larry Kramer, 84 and Infirm, Still Roared (https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2020/05/in-one-of-his-final-interviews-larry-kramer-still-roared)--by Michael Shnayerson Wikimedia Larry Kramer (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Kramer) Photos Larry Kramer (https://makinggayhistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/KRAMER-1-1989-Ph-Robert-Giard-NYPL.jpg)--by Robert Giard, via Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints, and Photographs at NYPL Larry Kramer at podium (https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/7743f1a/2147483647/strip/true/crop/2048x1270+0+0/resize/840x521!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F32%2F04%2F135df13ef3b9e68582093eca5bdc%2Fla-ca-cm-larry-kramer-20150628-002)--by Ellen Shub/HBO via Los Angeles Times Condom on Jesse Helms Home (https://scontent-mia3-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t31.18172-8/14231223_894749393990379_557753539184204595_o.jpg?_nc_cat=102&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=9267fe&_nc_ohc=fdqSHeAMDAsAX-L8DQq&_nc_ht=scontent-mia3-2.xx&oh=00_AT_gCrElBXPrfENXFBbwbycWCJWux-m4lq3YVhEVyK54vA&oe=62D32155)--via LGBT_History Facebook Page Tina's Story ACLU HOWARD V. ARKANSAS - GEORGE REKERS FACT SHEET (https://www.aclu.org/other/howard-v-arkansas-george-rekers-fact-sheet) The Advocate Escort Revealed in Rekers Scandal (https://www.advocate.com/news/daily-news/2010/05/05/escort-rekers-scandal-revealed) BuzzFeed News George Alan Rekers' Rent-Boy Scandal (https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/expresident/george-alan-rekers-rent-boy-scandal)--by Jack Shepherd CNN Reporters find tragic story amid embarrassing scandal (http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/06/08/rekers.sissy.boy.experiment/index.html)--By Penn Bullock and Brandon K. Thorp Therapy to change 'feminine' boy created a troubled man, family says (http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/06/07/sissy.boy.experiment/)--by Scott Bronstein and Jessi Joseph Constantine Report Second "Rent Boy" Emerges in Prof. George Rekers (Family Research Council) Gay Sex Scandal (https://constantinereport.com/second-rent-boy-emerges-in-prof-george-rekers-family-research-council-gay-sex-scandal/) Daily News Anti-gay activist, Christian minister George Rekers caught in gay escort scandal resigns from NARTH (https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/anti-gay-activist-christian-minister-george-rekers-caught-gay-escort-scandal-resigns-narth-article-1.449343)--By Michael Sheridan Dangerous Minds DR. GEORGE REKERS: AMERICAN MENGELE? (https://dangerousminds.net/comments/dr._george_rekers_american_mengele) Equality Florida Bill McCollum Still Paying for George Rekers (https://www.eqfl.org/how-rent-boy-scandal-brought-down-far-right-favorite) Falls Church News Press George Rekers Delusional Downfall Is A Familiar Tale (https://www.fcnp.com/2010/05/06/george-rekers-delusional-downfall-is-a-familiar-tale/)--by Wayne Besen GLADD "Ex-gay" group NARTH rebrands with dangerous mission (https://www.glaad.org/blog/ex-gay-group-narth-rebrands-dangerous-mission)--by By Joeli Katz Go Pride Chicago George Rekers steps down from ex-gay board (https://chicago.gopride.com/news/article.cfm/articleid/10574644) Miami New Times Christian right leader George Rekers takes vacation with "rent boy" (https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/christian-right-leader-george-rekers-takes-vacation-with-rent-boy-6377933)--by PENN BULLOCK AND BRANDON K. THORP The New York Times Scandal Stirs Legal Questions in Anti-Gay Cases (https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/19/us/19rekers.html)--by John Schwartz Newsweek Left Wing: When Gay Bashers Are Gay, Why Do People Just Mock and Turn Away? (https://www.newsweek.com/left-wing-when-gay-bashers-are-gay-why-do-people-just-mock-and-turn-away-214204)--BY EVE CONANT PFLAG Ex-Gay Leader's Male Escort: Actually, We Did Have Sex (https://pflag.com/focus-on-family-leader-scandal/)--by Rachel Slajda Queerty The Gay Rentboy Scandal That Should Sink Bigot Baptist Minister George Alan Rekers (https://www.queerty.com/the-gay-rentboy-scandal-that-should-sink-bigot-baptist-minister-george-alan-rekers-20100504) Sacramento Post (Gay Escort Scandal) George Rekers (a gay Tiger Woods?) Second Man has come forward (https://sacratomatovillepost.com/2010/05/11/gay-escort-scandal-george-rekers-a-gay-tiger-woods-second-man-has-come-forward/) Sun Sentinel Male escort says he gave 'sexual' massages to anti-gay leader (https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-2010-05-08-mi-rentboy-escort-i-gave-sexual-massa20100508-story.html)--By Steve Rothaus and The Miami Herald Think Progress How The Rekers ‘Rent Boy' Scandal Could Undermine Prop. 8 Supporters' Court Battle (https://archive.thinkprogress.org/how-the-rekers-rent-boy-scandal-could-undermine-prop-8-supporters-court-battle-3099987a55db/)--by AMANDA TERKEL Towleroad Florida AG Bill McCollum Paid George ‘Rentboy' Rekers $87,000 to Be Star Witness for State's Gay Adoption Ban (https://www.towleroad.com/2010/05/florida-ag-bill-mccollum-paid-george-rentboy-rekers-87000-to-be-star-witness-for-states-adoption-ban/)--by Andy Towle The Week Rekers rentboy scandal: The fallout continues (https://theweek.com/articles/494639/rekers-rentboy-scandal-fallout-continues) Wikipedia George Rekers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Rekers) Howard v. Arkansas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_v._Arkansas#:~:text=Howard%2C%20367%20Ark.,housemates%20from%20being%20foster%20parents.) Photos George Rekers (https://www.advocate.com/sites/default/files/2012/04/25/roman_rekersx390.jpg)--screenshot via The Advocate Jo-Vanni Roman (https://www.advocate.com/sites/default/files/2012/04/25/roman_rekersx390.jpg)--screenshot via The Advocate Rekers caught at airport (http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2011/images/06/08/t1larg.rekers.thorp.jpg)--via CNN

There are few more historic political figures than former Senator & Ambassador Carol Moseley Braun - the first Black womzn elected to the US Senate and the first ever Black Democratic Senator. In this conversation, she talks growing up on Chicago's South Side, marching with Martin Luther King at age 16, memories of figures like Richard J. Daley and Harold Washington, the start of her own political career, her history-making underdog Senate win in 1992, memorable moments and lessons learned during her time in the Senate, her tenure as Ambassador to New Zealand, & much more from a truly iconic political life.IN THIS EPISODE…Memories of growing up on Chicago's South Side…Early memories of Chicago politics and the local labor movement…Growing up in the Chicago of Richard J. Daley…A 16-year-old Carol Moseley Braun marches next to Martin Luther King Jr…Memories of her long relationship with the iconic Harold Washington…How Harold Washington “saved” her political career…The college classmate (and now DC uber lobbyist) who jumpstarted her first political race…Recollections of the Illinois legislature of the 1970s and 80s…How being the target of the Chicago Machine actually helped her career…The amazing story of her history-making underdog US Senate race in 1992…Surprises and difficulties in the early days after being elected to the US Senate…The Senators who served as her mentors…The story of facing down Jesse Helms over the Confederate Flag…Her relationship with then-Senator Joe Biden…Her proudest accomplishment in the Senate…Memories of her tenure as Ambassador to New Zealand…The definitive Carol Moseley Braun advice for visitors to Chicago…AND 98-2, the Action Party, Al the Pal, apolitical medical technicians, Bob Bennett, the Black Belt, Barbara Boxer, brickbats, Brown vs Board, George HW Bush, Robert Byrd, Jane Byrne, carveouts, the civil rights imperative, Bill Clinton, Michael Corleone, cumulative voting, the Cutback Amendment, the Daley Machine, demigods, dirty tricks, Alan Dixon, the Dream Team, the DuSable Museum of African American History, Diane Feinstein, Gage Park, Hansberry vs Lee, Howell Heflin, Anita Hill, Independent Democrats, Nancy Kassebaum, Ted Kennedy, Kiwis, Celinda Lake, Landslide Washington, Pat Leahy, Thurgood Marshall, John McCain, Pat Moynihan, Dick Neuhaus, nuclear submarines, Barack Obama, old bulls, Claiborne Pell, Tony Podesta, Michael Shakman, semi-humans, Paul Simon, Clarence Thomas, Transcendentalists, welfare reform, the WWI Memorial, the Willard Hotel, the Year of the Woman… & more!

Hillary and Tina cover US Senator Jesse Helms and Oregon Department of Corrections Director Michael Franke. Hillary's Story Jesse Helms was known for his racism and bigotry. BUT despite that, he maintained his seat for over 30 years allowing him to pass harmful legislation impacting marginalized communities in the US. Tina's Story Michael Francke had a solid legal career in the criminal justice system in New Mexico and was appointed as director of the Oregon department of corrections in 1987. BUT when he's found dead at work, it sparks decades of conspiracy theories. Hillary's Story 60 Minutes From the "60 Minutes" archives: Sen. Fritz Hollings (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvwjRAmGFMg)--via YouTube ABC News BTS joins Karine Jean-Pierre at the White House press briefing (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4bVDQd15-k)--via YouTube Britannica Jesse Helms (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jesse-Helms) CNN Commentary: Don't sanitize Helms' racist past (https://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/09/roland.martin/index.html)--by Roland Martin History AIDS activists unfurl a giant condom over Senator Jesse Helms' home (https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/aids-activists-unfurl-giant-condom-senator-jesse-helms-home-act-up) The Jesse Helms Center Home Page (https://jessehelmscenter.org/) Los Angeles Times Former Sen. Jesse Helms dies at 86 (https://www.latimes.com/news/la-me-helms5-2008jul05-story.html)--by Johanna Neuman Mother Jones On the Record (https://www.motherjones.com/politics/1995/05/record/)--by Eric Bates The Nation Jesse Helms, American Bigot (https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/jesse-helms-american-bigot/)--by Lisa Duggan NPR Remembering Sen. Jesse Holms (https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92241277) The New York Times Jesse Helms Dies at 86; Conservative Force in the Senate (https://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/05/us/politics/00helms.html?hp)--by Steven Holmes Richard Burr Senate Approves Resolution Honoring Jesse Helms (https://www.burr.senate.gov/2008/7/senate-approves-resolution-honoring-jesse-helms) Wikipedia Helms AIDS Amendments (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms_AIDS_Amendments) Jesse Helms (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Helms) National Congressional Club (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Congressional_Club) Photos Jesse Helms (https://media.npr.org/news/images/2008/jul/04/helmscons200-09413be193e1fae758447f0c3c43d9066d68b26e-s1600-c85.webp)--by Manny Ceneta via NPR Helms and Bono (https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5a4e4b09a9db09ee8c3a75fe/1517867709500-8E23OXZYIRXMKC81K5HJ/Compassionate-Conservative.gif?format=750w)--via Jesse Helms Center Screenshot from Helms' Racist Ad (https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2012/09/10/160885683/political-pro-with-race-baiting-past-doesnt-see-it-in-romneys-welfare-charge)--from YouTube via NPR Tina's Story CaseText Gable v. Williams, Civil No. 3:07-cv-00413-AC (https://casetext.com/case/gable-v-williams) Coffee or Die Who Killed Michael Francke? (https://coffeeordie.com/michael-francke/) Correctional Leaders Association Francke Award (https://www.correctionalleaders.com/francke-award) KOIN 6 Interactive: Who's who in the Francke-Gable case (https://www.koin.com/francke-gable/interactive-whos-who-in-the-francke-gable-case/) Oregon DOJ makes case to re-jail Frank Gable (https://www.koin.com/news/oregon/oregon-doj-makes-case-to-re-jail-frank-gable/) MotherJones What You Need to Know about Jesse Helms (https://www.motherjones.com/politics/1995/05/what-you-need-know-about-jesse-helms/) The New York Times PRISONS' DIRECTOR IS SLAIN IN OREGON (https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/19/us/prisons-director-is-slain-in-oregon.html) The Oregonian Brothers of slain Oregon prisons chief both want release of man convicted in case, but disagree on next step (https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2019/04/brothers-of-slain-oregon-prisons-chief-both-want-release-of-man-convicted-in-case-but-disagree-on-next-step.html) Portland Tribune Pamplin Media Group - Francke murder: Gable's attorneys fight to keep him free (https://pamplinmedia.com/pt/9-news/457355-372856-francke-murder-gables-attorneys-fight-to-keep-him-free) Pamplin Media Group - Oregon tries to re-jail Gable on Monday (https://pamplinmedia.com/pt/9-news/535396-428563-oregon-tries-to-re-jail-gable-on-monday-pwoff) Prison Legal News Wrongfully Convicted Man Freed for Murder of Oregon DOC Director, But State Wants Him Back In Prison (https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2021/nov/1/wrongfully-convicted-man-freed-murder-oregon-doc-director-state-wants-him-back-prison/) Statesman Journal Judge orders Frank Gable released from prison Friday in Oregon murder (https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/crime/2019/06/27/frank-gable-released-oregon-prison-judge-orders-directors-murder-michael-franke/1584683001/) Timeline of Michael Francke's murder, Frank Gable's possible release (https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/2019/04/19/oregon-michael-franckes-murder-case-frank-gables-possible-release/3525387002/) United States District Court for the District of Oregon Microsoft Word - JUSTICE-#6912532-v1-Gable0413PLDRESPONSE(ALLPARTSCOMPILED).doc (http://media.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/other/Response11.9.2015.frankgablepetition.pdf) University of Virginia Francke, J. Michael, 1971 - Our History: Featured Alumni/ae (https://libguides.law.virginia.edu/c.php?g=39996&p=254223) - Law Library Guides at University of Virginia Arthur J. Morris Law Library Unsolved Mysteries Michael Francke (https://unsolved.com/gallery/michael-francke/) Unsolved Mysteries Wiki Michael Francke (https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Michael_Francke) Wikipedia Michael Francke (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Francke) Willamette Week Should You Believe This Man? (https://www.wweek.com/portland/article-7724-should-you-believe-this-man.html) For Years, the Murder of Michael Francke Has Been Oregon's Biggest Mystery. Last Week, It Took a New Twist. (https://www.wweek.com/news/courts/2019/04/25/for-years-the-murder-of-michael-francke-has-been-oregons-biggest-mystery-last-week-it-took-a-new-twist/) Photos: Micheal Francke (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/0f/Michael_Francke_photo.jpg)—via Wikipedia (fair use) The Dome Building (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/ODCDomeBuilding1.JPG)—by Katr67 Map of Francke's Attack (https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/2019/04/19/oregon-michael-franckes-murder-case-frank-gables-possible-release/3525387002/)--screenshot via Statesman Journal Frank Gable, alleged killer (https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/2019/04/19/oregon-michael-franckes-murder-case-frank-gables-possible-release/3525387002/)--screenshot from KWO8

Donate to Mercy Corps: Helping with Humanitarian Response in Ukraine and Poland Mike Tyson does his best Will Smith imitation, CNN puts the minus to plus, The Masked Singer, Jesse Helms and the Republican hatred towards the LGBTQ community, the WAR AGAINST DISNEY continues Donate via PayPal: @bradandbritt Venmo: @BBCast Cash App: $bdub336

Dennis connects via Zoom with actor-writer-performance artist John Fleck whose musical satire It's Alive, It's ALIVE! is showing at the Odyssey Theatre in Los Angeles through March 20. John talks about the show's central idea; that COVID is here to save us, not hurt us, where the original idea came from and where he got the inflatable COVID headress he wears through much of the show. He also recalls his experience, along with Tim Miller, Karen Finley, Tim Miller and Holly Hughes, as one of the NEA Four, the four artists who had received grants from the National Endowment of the Arts and whose grants were challenged by conservatives like Jesse Helms and others and whose case went all the way to Supreme Court. He talks about how the notoriety led to his first TV job, as a gay secretary in Steven Bochco's Murder One and how he regrets not being present at the Supreme Court hearing because he was working on TV show. John also recalls his early days in Los Angeles in the 1970's, the "radical change" he made that brought him here and opening for Edith Massey, John Waters' Egg Lady, at the One Way punk bar in Silverlake in 1983. Other topics include: embracing imperfection, how having his own shows makes the Hollywood acting hustle less soul-crushing, being an "age pioneer" at 71, the torture and glory of doing alien makeup for multiple Star Trek series and most recently Orville, appearing on projects like Tales of the City, Weeds, Seinfeld, Waterworld and the upcoming Tina Town, vamping in the dark when the power went out during a performance, and the late, great screenwriter who always came to his shows. 

It was not so very long ago that Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina led the charge against this MLK holiday that we now celebrate. Today, that congressional fight has largely faded from memory as we celebrate the powerful words Dr. King spoke. In Selma. In Detroit. In Washington. From the many great speeches: I have a dream...; Now is time to make real the promise of democracy... so many great words flood our social media threads on this day. We remember the greatness but forget what he fought for. Dr. King's marches began because of segregation and voting rights. This past year, the rights he fought for have been under attack like no time since he began the fight. From Brennancenter.org In 2021, the state legislative push to restrict access to voting was not only aggressive — it was also successful. Between January 1 and December 7, at least 19 states passed 34 laws restricting access to voting. More than 440 bills with provisions that restrict voting access have been introduced in 49 states in the 2021 legislative sessions. These numbers are extraordinary: state legislatures enacted far more restrictive voting laws in 2021 than in any year since the Brennan Center began tracking voting legislation in 2011. More than a third of all restrictive voting laws enacted since then were passed this year. And in a new trend this year, legislators introduced bills to allow partisan actors to interfere with election processes or even reject election results entirely. Unfortunately, the momentum around this legislation continues. So far, at least 13 bills restricting access to voting have been pre-filed for the 2022 legislative session in four states. In addition, at least 152 restrictive voting bills in 18 states will carry over from 2021. Who are we? Are we really who our founding documents say we are, or are we only patriots when it serves us? Gerrymandering, redrawing districts and attempted coups make me afraid of what that answer might be. How will you honor the memory of a man who believed in the America we could be? My ask this week is that you spend some time reading the article linked from the Brennan Center and that you contact your congressional representatives. After that, ask at least 3 friends to do the same. If you'd like additional information on voting rights and redistricting (wtheck do we do that for anyway??), head to Ballotpedia and use the dropdown menu on the left. MLK was not just a Nobel prize winner, not just a man of great words. He was a man of action, arrested 29 times and finally assassinated, shot in the face at the age of 39 for leading the nation into the constitutional promiseland of liberty and justice for all. If you want to honor his legacy, skip the quote post and instead, post a copy of your protest letter. That would be a celebration worthy of a King. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/hedreich/message

Welcome to the Instant Trivia podcast episode 325, where we ask the best trivia on the Internet. Round 1. Category: Celebrity Alma Maters 1: She dropped out of Sarah Lawrence College in 1957 and married John Lennon in 1969. Yoko Ono. 2: This "ramblin' kind of guy" pulled straight A's in philosophy at Long Beach State. Steve Martin. 3: His wife Jane, who he met at the U. of MD., was his 1st partner in puppetry, or shall we say muppetry. Jim Henson. 4: Child star who appeared in her 1st film in 1972 and graduated magna cum laude from Yale in 1985. Jodie Foster. 5: In 1903 future president F. Roosevelt was elected editor of this school paper at Harvard. "The Crimson". Round 2. Category: The "Right" Stuff 1: Cartoon mountie who could "do no wrong". Dudley Do-Right. 2: Opposing the "pro-choice" group, they're anti-abortion activists. right to lifers. 3: A 90° bend, or an appropriate sales technique. right angle. 4: It has only 10 amendments, since 2 on representatives' apportionment and compensation weren't ratified. Bill of Rights. 5: Position shared by Jesse Helms in the political spectrum and Tim Kerr at the Philadelphia Spectrum. right wing. Round 3. Category: Nfl Rules 1: (Hi, I'm Brian Mitchell) A punt returner who waves his hand over his head isn't swatting for flies, he's signaling for this. a fair catch. 2: (I'm Dan Fouts, Hall of Famer) As it should be, there's an automatic 15-yard penalty for roughing the kicker or this person. the quarterback. 3: (Hi, I'm Keyshawn Johnson) This infraction includes but is not limited to hooking the receiver, grabbing my arm, etcetera. pass interference. 4: (Hi, I'm Hall of Famer Dan Hampton) Also a hockey penalty, it's called for using the hands illegally -- hey, it was the only way to stop me. holding. 5: (Hi, I'm Joey Galloway) Only one player at a time may do this, run parallel to the line to confuse the defense. go in motion. Round 4. Category: Merriam-Webster's New Words For 2007 1: This huge new entry is a blending of "gigantic" and "enormous". ginormous. 2: This packing material that's fun to pop is another new addition. Bubble Wrap. 3: Ready, set... It's an event where participants converse briefly with one another to find partners to go out with. speed dating. 4: Hooray for this popular term for India's motion picture industry. Bollywood. 5: Definitions for this compound word include a decisive defeat and a contest in entertainment wrestling. smackdown. Round 5. Category: Quotable Women 1: In "You Learn By Living", this First Lady of the 1940s challenged, "You must do the thing you think you cannot do". Eleanor Roosevelt. 2: This Bronte sister revealed in an 1840s letter, "I am neither a man nor a woman but an author". Charlotte Bronte. 3: This country star said she's not offended by dumb blonde jokes: "I know...I'm not dumb...I also know I'm not blonde". Dolly Parton. 4: While San Francisco mayor, this Calif. senator remarked, "Toughness doesn't have to come in a pinstripe suit". Dianne Feinstein. 5: In "The Second Sex", this French author declared, "One is not born a woman, one becomes one". Simone de Beauvoir. Thanks for listening! Come back tomorrow for more exciting trivia!

Emily Barr is the President and CEO of Graham Media Group and oversees seven local market media hubs/television stations in six cities including 1000 employees. Her experience with male-dominated environments started early as she attended the prestigious boarding school Phillips Exeter Academy during the early days of allowing young women to attend. Emily shares several stories of her career experience involving Oprah, Margaret Thatcher and Senator Jesse Helms. She believes not only in employment diversity yet also fostering feelings of engagement and belonging. What a fascinating podcast with Emily Barr! LeadingShe.com Instagram.com/LeadingShe Facebook.com/LeadingShe https://www.linkedin.com/company/leadingshe/

This is "The Leading Voices in Food" podcast but today we're speaking with a leading voice in tobacco control. "How come," you might ask, "why?" So I believe for many years that the parallels between the tobacco industry and food industry practices are nothing short of stunning, and that our field would do very well to learn lessons learned from the pioneers in the tobacco wars. Our guest today is Dr. Kenneth Warner, Distinguished Emeritus Professor and former Dean of the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan. Ken's research focuses on the economic and policy aspects of tobacco and health. Interview Summary   So Ken, you and I have a long history, and I thought it might be instructive to mention just a little bit of it because you really helped shape some of the ways I think about addressing food policy. So I first became familiar with your work long before I met you in person, when I was teaching classes at Yale. I was assigning papers you wrote on tobacco control and I was especially interested in work that you'd done on tobacco taxes. It really gave me the idea of pushing ahead with food-related taxes. Then finally I got a chance to meet you in person at a meeting that was hosted by the first President George Bush in Kennebunkport, Maine, on cancer control. You and I got to talking about similarities between the tobacco industry behavior and the way the food industry was behaving. We were both struck by the similarities. That led us to write a paper together that was published in 2009 in "The Milbank Quarterly." And I have to say, of all the papers I've published over my career, this was one of my favorites because I really enjoyed working with you. I learned a ton from it, and it really, I thought, made some very important points. And I'd just like to mention the title of that paper because it pretty much summarizes what it found. So the title was, "The Perils of Ignoring History: Big Tobacco Played Dirty and Millions Died. How Similar Is Big Food?" In my mind, the playbooks are still very similar, and that's why it's really interesting to talk to you today, get a little sense of what's happening more recently, and importantly, think about what lessons are learned from tobacco control. I wanted to bring up one thing from that paper that I always found fascinating, which was the discussion about something called "The Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers." Could you describe what that was and what role you think it played in history?   Sure. Just to give you some context for it, the first two major papers that implicated smoking in lung cancer were published in major medical journals in 1950. In December of 1952 there was an article in the "Reader's Digest," which incidentally was the only major magazine that did not accept cigarette advertising, that was entitled, "Cancer by the Carton." And this was the American public's first real exposure to the risks associated with smoking, and it led to a two-year decline in cigarette smoking, a very sharp decline, something that was unprecedented in the history of the cigarette. Following that there was some research published on mice and cancer. And needless to say, the tobacco industry was getting pretty nervous about this. So the executives of all the major tobacco firms met in New York City in December of 1953, and they collaborated on what became a public relations strategy, which drove their behavior for many years thereafter. The first thing they did was to publish "A Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers" in January of 1954. This "Frank Statement" was published in over 400 magazines and newspapers, and it reached an estimated audience of some 80 million Americans, which would be a very good percentage of all Americans in those years. And they talked about the fact that there was this evidence out there, but they said, "We feel it is in the public interest," this is a quote, "to call attention to the fact that eminent doctors and research scientists have publicly questioned the claimed significance of this research." Then they went on to say, and I quote again, "We accept an interest in people's health as a basic responsibility, paramount to every other consideration in our business. We believe the products we make are not injurious to health and," and this is the kicker, "we always have and always will cooperate closely with those whose task it is to safeguard the public health," end quote. They went on to say that they would support research on smoking and health, and, of course, that they would always be the good guys in this story. This was designed as part of a strategy to obfuscate, to deceive the public, basically, to lie about what they already knew about the health hazards associated with smoking. And it was essentially a first very public step in a campaign that, one could argue, in many ways has persisted ever since, although, obviously, now the tobacco companies admit that they're killing their customers and they admit that smoking causes cancer and heart disease and lung disease and so on. But that was kind of the beginning of the strategy that drove their behavior for decades.   You know, that was one of the issues we raised in our paper. How similar were the big food companies in talking about concern for the health of their customers, planting doubt with the science, pledging to make changes that were in the interest of public health, agreeing to collaborate with public health officials? All those things played out in the food arena as well. And that's just one of many places where the food industry behave very, very similar to what the tobacco industry has done. But boy, is it interesting to hear that particular anecdote and to learn of the cynical behavior of the industry. So fast forward from there, and you think about the tobacco industry executives testifying before Congress that nicotine wasn't addictive, and you have that same process playing out many years later. These similarities are really remarkable.   So let's talk about your work and some of the issues that I think apply to the food area, and let's talk about taxes at the beginning. So I worked for years on the issue of soda taxes, and these taxes now exist in more than 50 countries around the world and in a number of major cities in the US, including San Francisco, Philadelphia, Seattle, and Oakland. And these taxes have been shown to have really positive effects, and they seem to be growing around the world. And I'd like to understand what you see as the overall findings from the work on tobacco taxes. But before we do that, you have a very interesting story to tell about how the tobacco control community responded when you first began speaking about taxes. It turns out to be taxes on tobacco have had whopping effects. But what was the initial reaction to people in that field?   Yeah, it is kind of an interesting story. So around 1980, when I first started writing and talking about tobacco taxation as a method of reducing smoking, I used to have public health audiences booing me. If they had rotten tomatoes with them, they would have been throwing them.   You know, Ken, it's hard to imagine because now these taxes are completely routine and accepted.   Yes, they're not only routine and accepted, they are a first principle of tobacco control. They are enshrined in the World Health Organization's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. So they really are kind of the first thing we turn to because we know that they work. We know that they reduce smoking.   But let me give you a story about how I learned that this is not only a phenomenon with people smoking. It's a phenomenon with people using all other drugs, and it turns out it's a trans-species law, the Law of Demand. And that law says, basically, that if you increase price, the demand for the commodity will decrease. Well, in the beginning, the public health audiences believed two things. They believed that smokers were so addicted that they would not be affected by price, so it was ridiculous to even think about it. And they said, you have to have intrinsic motivators to get people to quit smoking. They have to care about their kids. They want to see their kids grow up, their spouses, and so on, and not extrinsic forces like a tax. So those were their two objections. So the story that I think is really kind of fun. I was on a plane flying to a small conference in Kansas City. This is sometime in the early '80s. And I happened to be seated next to Jack Henningfield, who is probably the preeminent psychopharmacologist dealing with nicotine, maybe in the world. And we were talking about price response, the fact that cigarette taxes work. And he said, "You know, I've got something I want to show you here." And he pulled out some what are called response cost curves from the psychology literature. And this is where you take a laboratory animal, in this instance addicted to narcotics or other addictive substances, and you give them a challenge to get their drugs. So first, I should note that these animals are so addicted that if they're given the choice between food and their drug, they will choose their drug, and they will in fact end up dying because they place a preference for the drug over food. But it turns out that when you increase the price of the drug to them, they decrease the amount that they consume. So what do I mean by that? If they have to push a lever, a bar, a certain number of times to get a dose of their drug, and you raise the number of bar pushes per dose, they will dose themselves with fewer doses. I took a look at these curves, and basically, a response cost curve for these lab animals is essentially a demand curve as we economists see it. And I calculated the price elasticity of demand, which is our standard measure of the responsiveness to price. And it turns out that addicted laboratory rats have essentially the same price elasticity of demand, the same price responsiveness that human beings do to cigarettes.   That's an absolutely fascinating story. And, you know, I know Jack, and have admired his work, as you have, and it's amazing to think about that conversation on a plane, and what sort of scientific work it led to, and how that, in turn, found its way into policies that exist around the world. So tell us then about tobacco taxes, and how high do they have to be in order to affect consumption in an appreciable way, and have they worked in reducing tobacco use, and what's your overall take on that?   So we have, quite literally, hundreds of studies in countries around the world, and we know a lot but we don't know everything. So we don't know, for example, if there's a particular price above which, you know, nobody will use the product. We don't have even really good data suggesting of, you know, what's the minimum increase in price that you have to have to have a noticeable impact. Overall, the literature suggests that if you increase the price of cigarettes by 10%, you will decrease the quantity demanded by 3 to 4%. Now, what this means is that roughly half of that decreased demand reflects decreases in the number of cigarettes that continuing smokers use, while the other half represents decreases in smoking, people quitting or kids not starting. So the demand is what we call price inelastic. The price change itself is larger, proportionately, than the decrease in consumption. But that decrease in consumption is still substantial and it's enough to have a large impact.   Now, cigarette prices vary all over the world, and cigarette prices vary primarily because of taxation differences. So if you go to the Scandinavian countries, you'll find that a pack of cigarettes will run $15 or more. If you go to Australia, you're looking at $30 or more a pack. In the US, currently, we're looking at an average price in the range of about 7 to $8. In some jurisdictions, like New York City, it's $10 or more. But the prices in the US are actually relatively low among the more developed nations in the world. Any tax increase will have an impact but obviously the larger tax increases will have larger impacts. And there's some good and bad news in tobacco taxation, particularly in a country like ours, and this is, again, true for most of the developed world. Smoking is now concentrated in marginalized populations. I'm talking about low socioeconomic groups, the LGBTQ community, and racial minorities, in particular. If you think of this as an economic phenomenon, when you raise the price on cigarettes, you're going to hit the worst-off economically segments of the population hard. That's the bad news. The good news is that those people, precisely because they are poor, tend to be much more price responsive than high-income smokers, and more of them will quit. So we have this problem that the tax is regressive, it imposes a larger burden on the poor, but the health effect is progressive. It will reduce the gap between the rich and poor in terms of smoking rates. And of great importance, there's an enormous gap between the rich and poor in this country in life expectancy, and as much as half of that may be differences in smoking rates.   Ken, there's a hundred follow-up questions I could ask, and I find this discussion absolutely fascinating. One thing that came into my mind was that some years ago I looked at the relationship of taxes, state by state in the US, and rates of disease like lung cancer and heart disease. And there was plenty of data because there was a huge range in tobacco taxes. Places like New York and Rhode Island had very high taxes, and the tobacco Southern states, like North Carolina, had very low taxes. But what's the sort of recent take on that, and the relationship between taxes and actual disease?   Well, it's still true. And there are, in fact, what you suggest, the southeastern block of tobacco states have unusually low rates of taxation. And I haven't seen any recent data but one presumes that they are suffering more from smoking-related diseases because their smoking rates are higher. I mean, that has to be true. So I don't know that we have any particularly good data recently, but there have been studies that clearly relate tobacco or cigarette prices to health outcomes associated with smoking.   I'm assuming US scientists have played a prominent role in producing the literature showing the negative health consequences of using cigarettes, and yet you said the United States has relatively low taxes compared to other developed countries. Why, do you think?   I think we're going to get into a very philosophical discussion about the US right here. It has to do with individual responsibility. We know for sure that the initial reason the taxes were so low was that the tobacco block was so influential in the Senate, particularly in the days when Jesse Helms, the senator from North Carolina, was in the Senate. He was the most feared senator by the other senators, and if you wanted to get anything done for your cause, you had to go along with his cause, which was keeping cigarette prices low and doing everything they could to support smoking. So there's clearly been a built-in bias in the Senate, and basically in the Congress as a whole, against tobacco policy. You see a huge variation from state to state in tobacco policies, and it's reflective of basically their political leanings in general.   You brought up this issue of personal responsibility, and boy, does that apply in the food area. You know, the food companies are saying: if you have one sugar beverage every once in a while, it's not going to be harmful. And it's not use of the products but it is overuse of the products. Thereby saying, it's not corporate responsibility we're talking about here, it's personal responsibility. That same argument was made by the tobacco industry, wasn't it?   It was. They would be less inclined to do that today, for a couple of reasons. One is that we know that even low levels of smoking are harmful and indeed cause many of the diseases that we were referring to earlier. And I think all the companies have now admitted publicly that smoking does cause all of these diseases that we've long known it causes. And all of them are claiming that they would like to move away from a society with smoking to one that has alternative products that would give people choices and ways to get their nicotine without exposing themselves to so much risk. I mean, we have to remember, the fact that cigarettes kill their consumers is a real drawback as far as the industry is concerned because they're losing a lot of their consumers, you know, 10, 20 years before they normally would, and they have to deal with all these lawsuits. So it's unfortunate for them. Having said that, cigarettes are the goose that lays the golden egg. They cost very little to manufacture. The industry is sufficiently oligopolistic that the profits are enormous, and their profitability has continued even while smoking has dropped rather precipitously ever since the mid-1960s.   Is that because the markets outside the US have been growing?   They certainly have helped. Although now, and this is only true within the last few years, the aggregate cigarette sales in the world are declining. They've actually started dropping. So we were seeing a relatively stable situation as smoking decreased in the developed world and was rising in the developing world. The only place now where we're seeing increases in smoking are areas in Africa, which, by the way, is the one place in the world where we might be able to forego the tobacco epidemic because smoking rates are still quite low in most of the countries, not all of them, and also parts of the Middle East. But elsewhere we've been seeing smoking declining all over the world. That doesn't mean the profits have to drop because one thing that the companies can do, is, they can raise their prices. Now, if prices go up because of taxes that hurts the companies. But if they raise their own prices because demand is inelastic, what that means is that the percentage increase in the price is larger than the percentage decline in the demand for cigarettes. So they're actually adding to their profitability by doing that. They've always played this very interesting game for years of keeping price below what we would think to be the profit-maximizing price. And I think the reason for that has to do with addiction because they know that they have to have what are called replacement smokers, kids coming in to take the place of the smokers who are dying or quitting. And for years, I think, they kept their prices down because they didn't want to discourage young people from smoking. Now, I think they see the writing on the wall. Smoking is declining very rapidly. Smoking prevalence, which was 45% in the mid, early-1960s, is now a little over 12% in the US, and I think they're raising their prices with the understanding that they want to take as much advantage of the opportunity with the addicted smokers, the adults, as they possibly can, even though smoking among kids is becoming vanishingly small.   I think of so many parallels with the soda taxes that now exists in a number of places, and the companies have responded somewhat differently. And perhaps it's the level of addiction issue that kicks in here, and the need to have replacement customers. Maybe that's another key difference. But with the soda taxes, the companies have not increased prices beyond the level of the tax. You know, to delight of public health experts, the companies have tended to pass along the entire tax so the companies are not eating that difference in order to keep prices the same. Higher tax gets reflected in the ultimate price that they charge, but they're not increasing prices beyond that. Do you think it might be the addiction issue that's different here?   I don't know. I mean, that certainly could be an element of it. The other thing is that they're manufacturing other drinks that are being used in place of some of the sodas. So they've got waters, they've got juices. I mean, obviously these sugary juices are no better, but they do make other products. They make the diet drinks. And to the extent that they can find substitutes for those products within their own companies, it may be that they're content to allow people to make those substitutions.   Interesting comment. The results so far on the soda tax suggest that the most common substitution as people drink less soda, is water, which is of course better than a lot of the alternatives that people might be consuming, so that's a bit of really good news. Even though the companies do sell water, Coke and Pepsi have Aquafina and Dasani, for example, they face a basic problem. Number one is that these companies are the biggest sellers of sugary beverages but not bottled water. That happens to be Nestle. So if people migrate to bottled water, they're likely to migrate from the big companies, like Coke and Pepsi, to Nestle. Also, people tend not to be very brand-loyal to water. They tend to buy whatever is on sale or whatever they find available to them, and that creates a problem for these companies like Coke and Pepsi that do rely on brand loyalty for their marketing. So it's very interesting. And also, I wonder, based on the research on food and addiction, if the companies don't take a hit if people switch from full sugar beverages even to diet beverages that they might sell because there wouldn't be as much addictive potential, and therefore the customers wouldn't have to have as much just to keep the habit going. So it's really interesting to think this through.   That's certainly very plausible. The whole thing would also depend on the price elasticity of demand for sodas, and specifically for the brands that they're concerned about. If there is greater elasticity there than what we observe for cigarettes, then raising those prices aren't necessarily going to help them all that much.   You mentioned that the elasticity estimates for tobacco suggested that a 10% increase in price led to a 3 to 4% reduction in consumption, and the numbers are even more positive in the case of the sugar beverages, where if you get a 10%, 15% increase in price, you end up with 10, 15% reduction in consumption. So that's good news in the food arena.   That's good news but it also means that they can't do as easily what the tobacco industry can do, which is to raise their prices and expect to see profits rise. Because if they're losing as much in sales as they're gaining in price, it's no win.   So Ken, let's talk about product formulation because you mentioned that earlier, and this is a really interesting issue that, again, connects tobacco and food products. So you think about the tobacco companies mainly selling cigarettes, but now there's vaping, there's cigarettes with things like menthol and other flavors, or low-fat foods, or artificial sweeteners. The list of product reformulations in order to attract customers goes on and on and on. So I know a controversial topic in your field has been e-cigarettes. Can you explain what these are?   E-cigarettes have been around now for about a decade, let's say. Basically, they're devices that allow people to inhale nicotine and other substances, but the purpose is to give them their nicotine without combustion. And we know that the major problem associated with smoking is the products of combustion. There's 7,000 chemical compounds in cigarette smoke. 70 of them are known human carcinogens, causes of cancer in humans. Many of them are cardiotoxic. They cause lung disease and so on. The e-cigarettes have about two orders of magnitude fewer toxins in their emissions than do cigarettes. And it turns out that the amount of the comparable toxins, when they are in fact comparable, that you find in the e-cigarette emissions is much lower, usually a 10th to a 400th, of what you find in cigarette smoke.   So logically, and based on a fair body of evidence at this point, vaping, use of e-cigarettes to get nicotine, is substantially less dangerous than is cigarette smoking. However, the controversy here is incredible. This is the most divisive issue that I have witnessed in my 45 years of working in the tobacco control field. It has torn the field asunder. The mainstream of public health, and by that I'm including governmental agencies, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, the Truth Initiative, the American Cancer Society, heart and lung associations, all of mainstream public health is strongly opposed to e-cigarettes, and for one reason. They're concerned about kids' uptake of e-cigarettes, which has been substantial. It's been decreasing the last couple of years, but it has been substantial. And there are a number of things they're concerned about in that regard, and they're completely ignoring the fact that there's pretty good evidence that e-cigarettes are increasing smoking cessation for a subset of smokers. And a number of us on the science side of this, believe that the net effect of e-cigarettes is beneficial, that it's actually, possibly, a tool to add to the armamentarium of things like cigarette taxation, like smoke-free workplaces, like restrictions on advertising, and that it will help a group of inveterate smokers, those who either can't quit nicotine or don't want to, to move to a less dangerous alternative to smoking. I am not saying that e-cigarettes have no risk associated with them. They almost certainly do. But it is substantially lower.   Now, historically, this is divisive within the field in part because all of the earlier attempts at, quote-unquote, tobacco harm reduction have been produced by the major cigarette companies, and they've been fraudulent. So cigarette filters were manufactured and sold, starting in the 1950s, in response to the scare that I referred to earlier about cancer. And they were sold with a message that the filters block the dangerous stuff but let the flavor through. And people bought this. That decrease in smoking in the early 1950s reversed, smoking went up sharply, as sales of filtered cigarettes went up. By the way, the first successful filtered cigarette was Kent, and it used what it referred to as the miracle Micronite filter. Well, that miracle Micronite filter turns out to have been made of asbestos. And there are lawsuits continuing to the present day by workers in the factories that made the filter tips for Kent cigarettes, who themselves ended up with lung cancer or other diseases due to the asbestos. Then came low-tar and nicotine cigarettes, and we actually have ample evidence from the documents that had been revealed by lawsuits, that the industry knew that this was a public relations device. It was not a harm reduction device. And in fact, because people believed that low-tar and nicotine cigarettes were less dangerous, it's likely that it actually increased the toll of smoking because people who would have quit, switched to low-tar and nicotine cigarettes instead. So there's some pretty awful history here that makes people legitimately concerned about alternative products. A critical element of this story is that the alternative products, in this case, the e-cigarettes were introduced by non-cigarette, non-tobacco companies, and their goal was to replace smoking. Now the major companies are all making their own e-cigarettes as well because they have to do it from a defensive point of view, but basically they don't have any great interest in slowing up the sale of cigarettes. They want to benefit from that as long as they can.   So I should know the answer to this but I don't, but are e-cigarettes taxed? And wouldn't it be optimal to tax e-cigarettes but less than regular cigarettes so you discourage use of both but discourage the use of regular cigarettes more?   That is very insightful. Two colleagues and I actually published a paper saying that in 2015 in "The New England Journal of Medicine," that we should be taxing e-cigarettes modestly, the reason being that we want to discourage kids from using them, and kids are far more price-sensitive than our adults. Kids have a very elastic response to cigarette prices. Adults do not, and in particular, older adults have even lower price responsiveness. So yes, there should be some taxation of e-cigarettes to discourage youth use of it but that taxation should be dramatically lower than the taxation of cigarettes. Some states are now taxing e-cigarettes. Not all of them. The federal government is actually looking into a proposal to double the tax, the federal tax, on cigarettes, which would take it up to $2.01 a pack, and at the same time, to establish an equivalent tax, similar to the $2 tax, on all vaping products. This would be a disaster because it would definitely discourage kids from vaping, but it would also discourage adults from using e-cigarettes as an alternative to smoking, and the most addicted, the inveterate smokers, those are the ones that need these alternatives. So that's a bad policy proposal. A much better one would be to increase the cigarette tax by more than a dollar, raise it to 3 or $4 or something, and impose a modest tax on e-cigarettes. This would discourage people from smoking, both adults and kids, but especially kids. It would discourage kids from using e-cigarettes but it would create a price differential that would encourage the inveterate smokers to switch to e-cigarettes. Now, part of the problem, and this has gotten worse over time, is that the American public believes that e-cigarettes, that vaping, is as dangerous and even maybe more dangerous than cigarette smoking. Nothing could be further from the truth but so far the mainstream of public health has sold that message to the public, and the public, including smokers, believe it.   That's a fascinating story about how the public health field might be getting in its own way with this.   And maybe doing damage to public health.   So let's loop back a little bit to the behavior of the tobacco industry. So in 2017, the Phillip Morris Company funded and launched an organization called Foundation for a Smoke-Free World. So I think, hmm, a tobacco company saying they want less smoking, and one could view this with pretty high cynicism but what do you think about it?   I've always shared your sense of cynicism about it. There's an interesting anecdote related to this. The individual who negotiated the deal by which Phillip Morris offered $1 billion over a 12-year period to establish this foundation, that individual was the main actor in the World Health Organization during the development of the global treaty on tobacco control, the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. He also became director of the organization and served in that capacity until just the other day. He has stepped down from being director. But let me give you a little context for it. Philip Morris International that needs to be distinguished from Altria and Philip Morris Domestic, but Philip Morris International sells the leading brand of what is known as heated tobacco products, HTPs. These are products that actually have tobacco in them. E-cigarettes have no tobacco in them but these products actually have tobacco in them. But instead of burning the tobacco, they heat it. They volatilize it, and the nicotine is inhaled. Like e-cigarettes, they appear to be substantially less dangerous than smoking, although it's not clear that they're as less dangerous as, than, e-cigarettes. But they're produced only by the major cigarette companies. Philip Morris is now selling these products successfully in many countries, many cities around the world. While they actually have the authorization to sell an older version of the product in the US, it's not very popular at this point. But in Japan, over the last four years there's been a drop in cigarettes sold of about a third at the same time that there's been this great increase in the use of these heated tobacco products manufactured by Philip Morris International and by Japan Tobacco. They have a product called Ploom. Philip Morris' product is called IQOS, I-Q-O-S, which, I was told, originally stood for I Quit Ordinary Smoking. So they are the leader of the theme song that the industry is singing these days about how they want a smoke-free world and they want to move toward one. But the only way they're ever going to do that, willingly, is if they can sell other products like these heated tobacco products and make large sums of money on them. Philip Morris has a good start at that. They claim that about a third of their revenue now is coming from IQOS, this heated tobacco product.   So whether that foundation ultimately has beneficial effects or not, forget corporate beneficial effects but on the public good, would pretty much depend on who's choosing to use these e-cigarettes, I'm imagining. That if it's people switching from normal cigarettes to them, or using them instead of normal cigarettes, it's one thing. But if they're recruiting new people who otherwise wouldn't smoke, then it would be a bad thing. So how do you think that'll all play out?   That's actually a critically important question, Kelly. And one of the great concerns that the opposition to e-cigarettes has, is that they're addicting lots of kids to nicotine, and that many of them will go on to smoke, and that that will reverse the progress that we made on smoking. Now, it turns out that there is no evidence to support the latter contention. And in fact, there's evidence to the contrary. I think it's entirely possible that some kids who would not have touched a cigarette otherwise are vaping and then trying cigarettes in the future. Whether they become regular smokers, remains to be seen. But I think there certainly are some kids like that. But what we do know is that the rate of smoking among kids, what we call current smoking, and smoking among kids means that they've had at least one puff on a cigarette in the last 30 days, that number has plummeted over the last quarter century, and, and this is the interesting thing, it has gone down at its fastest rate precisely during the period in which vaping has been popular among kids.   So one theory is that vaping is displacing smoking to some extent. That kids who would've smoked are vaping instead. It's a very complicated area and we don't know the answer. Among adults who vape, and they are relatively few in number except for very young adults, we observe mostly dual use, but the question is how much of this is a transition to vaping only, and then, maybe, a transition to nothing after that. In the UK, where vaping has been advertised by the health organizations as a way to quit smoking, and they have encouraged its use, and they use it in their smoking cessation clinics, and you'll even find it in hospitals, in the UK we have seen that more than half of the people who have quit smoking by using e-cigarettes have also quit vaping. So it is no longer the case in the UK that a majority of the people who vape are also currently smoking.   In the US, the data have been moving in that direction but it's still a majority who are dual users rather than vaping only. But we have evidence of four or five completely different kinds of studies, commercial data, other products in other countries, that all lead to the conclusion that vaping is already increasing the rate of smoking cessation in the US and in the UK by probably 10 to 15%. That's a hard thing to see in the data but it is something that, if you dig into the data, you will see it, and as I say, we see it all over the place. Let me give you one example of the tobacco harm reduction story that's fabulous. 40 to 50 years ago, large numbers of Swedish males started using a smokeless tobacco product called snus, S-N-U-S. It's a relatively low nitrosamine product, nitrosamine being a carcinogenic element, and they substituted it for cigarettes largely because cigarette taxes were going way up and there weren't any significant taxes on snus. So what you observe today, some three, four decades or more later, is that Swedish males have the lowest male smoking rate of any country in Europe, and maybe in the world. They do not have a low tobacco use rate. Their tobacco use rate is pretty typical but it consists mostly of snus. And they also have by far the lowest rate of tobacco-related diseases, like lung cancer, of men in all of the European Union countries, and the second lowest is typically a rate twice or more that of what you see in the Swedish males. Swedish females, who did not quit smoking in large numbers and did not take up snus until fairly recently, have rates of lung cancer and other diseases that are average or above-average for the European Union. So that's a great example of tobacco harm reduction in action, and it's one that's been around now, as I say, for decades.   Ken, this is a remarkable history and you're just bringing it alive beautifully. But let me ask you one final question. So given that you've been working in this field for more than four decades now, and have really been a pioneer, a leader, a warrior, and a hero, all those things could be applied to you and your work, if I asked you to sum up what's been learned from all these decades of work on tobacco, what would you say?   There are a lot of lesson. Certainly, we have learned specific kinds of interventions that really matter. You and I spoke about tax at some length. That's the preeminent one. Smoke-free workplaces, including smoke-free restaurants and bars, have not only themselves had a direct impact on health but have also set the tone for a more smoke-free society. So we have seen quite dramatic changes. I mentioned we're going from a 45% rate of smoking for the nation as a whole down to a little over 12%. That, however, has taken us six to seven decades. So it's kind of a good news, bad news story. It's a very complicated area. Tobacco control was ranked by CDC as one of the 10 most important public health measures of the 20th century, and also the first decade of the 21st century. And I think that's completely legitimate, and it is something about which all of us who care about public health can feel very proud about. The problem still remains. It is an enormous problem, as you alluded earlier, in many parts of the developing world, the low- and middle-income countries, and it's a growing problem in some of those countries, and it's just not going to disappear real fast. The lesson that I've taken most recently has been a discouraging one, and that's how divisive our field has become. We really have a chasm between the people who are opposed to tobacco harm reduction and those who are supportive of it. They're good people on both sides, they believe what they're saying, but they can't talk to each other civilly at this point. I hope that that will not become the case for those of you who are fighting the good fight in dealing with unhealthy foods.   Bio   Kenneth E. Warner is the Avedis Donabedian Distinguished University Professor Emeritus of Public Health and Dean Emeritus at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. A member of the faculty from 1972-2017, he served as Dean from 2005-2010. Presented in over 275 professional publications, Dr. Warner's research has focused on economic and policy aspects of tobacco and health. Dr. Warner served as the World Bank's representative to negotiations on the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, WHO's first global health treaty. He also served as the Senior Scientific Editor of the 25th anniversary Surgeon General's report on smoking and health. From 2004-2005 he was President of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco (SRNT). He currently serves on the FDA's Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee. In 1996 Dr. Warner was elected to the National Academy of Medicine. He is a recipient of the Surgeon General's Medallion, the Luther Terry Award for Exemplary Achievement in Tobacco Control, and the Doll-Wynder Award from SRNT. Dr. Warner earned his AB from Dartmouth College and MPhil and PhD in economics from Yale University.  

LaMelo Ball flexed his scoring muscle against Indiana but it was the turnovers that have Doug and Walker's eyebrows raised. Was the Hornets loss against the Atlanta Hawks a schedule loss? Wait, is Terry Rozier actually back or not? Enes Kanter makes a BIG allegation against Hornets owner Michael Jordan on national television, was it a fair one?**Correction: In the 3rd segment, the political race between Harvey Gantt and Jesse Helms is referred to as a "mayoral race." It was a race for a U.S. Senate seat.**Follow & Subscribe to the Locked On Hornets Podcast on these platforms

LaMelo Ball flexed his scoring muscle against Indiana but it was the turnovers that have Doug and Walker's eyebrows raised. Was the Hornets loss against the Atlanta Hawks a schedule loss? Wait, is Terry Rozier actually back or not? Enes Kanter makes a BIG allegation against Hornets owner Michael Jordan on national television, was it a fair one? **Correction: In the 3rd segment, the political race between Harvey Gantt and Jesse Helms is referred to as a "mayoral race." It was a race for a U.S. Senate seat.** Follow & Subscribe to the Locked On Hornets Podcast on these platforms

by Scotty Reid The research company Statista reported recently that the 2020 revenue for the global athletic shoe market or sneaker market was valued at around 70 billion U.S. dollars annually, and it reports that the market is forecast to reach a value of 102 billion U.S. dollars in four years. Sneakers as they're popularly known in the United States became a fashion staple in the Black community around the late 1970s and 1980s owing to their growing popularity in part to the early interactions of hip-hop culture. Not only did break dancers, an athletic form of dancing that included elements of gymnastics, need comfortable shoes to perform but matching the shoes to an outfit, a fashion statement was just as important to the performers. Then in the mid-80s came along one Michael Jeffrey Jordan, who had one of the best NBA careers of his era, and became arguably the first global influencer long before the age of social media. Nike's media campaigns really leaned into a proud Black Identity without overtly showing their hand, by telling everyone to Just Be Like Mike, a Black man in a white-dominated society! It helped that Jordan the man was not one to wade into the social-political sphere once quipping that “republicans buy shoes too” when asked to endorse the Black Democrat Harvey Gannt, the former mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, who hope to defeat the lifelong white supremacist, Senator Jesse Helms. Another bonus for Nike was that Jordan the man would likely not be raising any issues with Nike's labor practices let alone concern himself about where the Jordans sneakers were manufactured. Nike's iconic commercials, one starring, directed, and produced by famed Black film director Spike Lee at the peak of his popularity, somewhat of a Black cultural icon and a basketball fan in his own right, the media campaigns made Nike's Jordans brand its signature shoe driving the majority of its sales and thus profits. Sneakers are still a foundation of Black fashion t

by Scotty Reid The research company Statista reported recently that the 2020 revenue for the global athletic shoe market or sneaker market was valued at around 70 billion U.S. dollars annually, and it reports that the market is forecast to reach a value of 102 billion U.S. dollars in four years. Sneakers as they're popularly known in the United States became a fashion staple in the Black community around the late 1970s and 1980s owing to their growing popularity in part to the early interactions of hip-hop culture. Not only did break dancers, an athletic form of dancing that included elements of gymnastics, need comfortable shoes to perform but matching the shoes to an outfit, a fashion statement was just as important to the performers. Then in the mid-80s came along one Michael Jeffrey Jordan, who had one of the best NBA careers of his era, and became arguably the first global influencer long before the age of social media. Nike's media campaigns really leaned into a proud Black Identity without overtly showing their hand, by telling everyone to Just Be Like Mike, a Black man in a white-dominated society! It helped that Jordan the man was not one to wade into the social-political sphere once quipping that “republicans buy shoes too” when asked to endorse the Black Democrat Harvey Gannt, the former mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, who hope to defeat the lifelong white supremacist, Senator Jesse Helms. Another bonus for Nike was that Jordan the man would likely not be raising any issues with Nike's labor practices let alone concern himself about where the Jordans sneakers were manufactured. Nike's iconic commercials, one starring, directed, and produced by famed Black film director Spike Lee at the peak of his popularity, somewhat of a Black cultural icon and a basketball fan in his own right, the media campaigns made Nike's Jordans brand its signature shoe driving the majority of its sales and thus profits. Sneakers are still a foundation of Black fashion trends, so it's logical that Black consumers are still the foundation of sneaker purchases thus driving the profits for the top global corporate brands like Adidas, Converse, Nike, and Rebook. However, most if not all manufacturing is done in countries like Indonesia, Vietnam, and China. The dollars the Black consumer market spends on these products often do not turn into employment opportunities for the communities where these Black consumers are geographically located. Corporations have long since outsourced manufacturing jobs where the corporations contract with factories in foreign countries where employers pay workers what would be considered slave wages in the US, wages well below the ridiculously low US Federal minimum wage. Enter the Covid 19 Pandemic! The coronavirus pandemic is having an impact despite the 2020 sales, COVID 19 did not arrive in the United States until the last two months of the calendar year. CNBC reports the sneaker giant Nike, the main supplier to Dick's Sporting Goods, a national retailer, is having supply chain issues. The same issues are also affecting other industries that rely on outsourced manufacturing. Despite the upward global trend in the demand for sneakers, with projected sales crossing the 100 Billion per year mark, Nike lowered its internal fiscal 2022 outlook due to the disruption in the global supply chain. Longer transit times, labor shortages abroad with prolonged production shutdowns in Vietnam, a major player in the manufacturing of Nike brand shoes. CNBC also reported that “In a recent conference call, Nike chief financial officer Matt Friend said the company anticipates its entire business will see short-term inventory shortages over the next few quarters.” It stands to reason that if the majority of the sneakers were manufactured in the United States, it stands likely that it would alleviate the pressure on the not being able to meet demand because of a disrupted global supply chain....

One morning in 1991, Senator Jesse Helms' house was covered with a giant fake condom in an act of protest. Helms had been a vocal opponent of funding AIDS research and he had introduced an infamous and popular bill amendment that prevented federal money from being spent on AIDS research. There were few treatments available at the time, and with no help from the government, HIV was actively spreading across the country. In 1991 alone, nearly 30,000 American died of AIDS, and the numbers would keep rising until the late nineties. The condom on Helms' house was courtesy of the protest group ACT UP, which led a number of high profile direct actions meant to call attention to the AIDS crisis and get people angry. UnTextbooked's Jordan Pettiford was curious about queer history. She came out to her family around the same time the Covid-19 pandemic began. While the context of Covid felt different, she noticed some strange similarities between the present day and the history of AIDS—especially the way in which viruses become political. In this episode, Jordan interviews David France, author of How to Survive a Plague. David France was a first-hand witness to the AIDS epidemic in New York City. He covered the unique actions of the protest movement that called out the government's inaction and discrimination. Book: How to Survive a Plague: The Inside Story of How Citizens and Science Tamed AidsGuest: David France, writer and filmmakerProducer: Jordan PettifordMusic: Silas Bohen and Coleman HamiltonEditors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

It's September 5th. This day in 1991, members of the group ACT UP erected a giant yellow condom over the home of North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms to protest his stance on AIDS research and awareness. Jody, NIki, and Kellie discuss the stunt, why Helms was a target, and just how you go about removing a two-story condom. This Day In Esoteric Political History is a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX. Your support helps foster independent, artist-owned podcasts and award-winning stories. If you want to support the show directly, you can do so on our website: ThisDayPod.com Get in touch if you have any ideas for future topics, or just want to say hello. Our website is thisdaypod.com Follow us on social @thisdaypod Our team: Jacob Feldman, Researcher/Producer; Brittani Brown, Producer; Khawla Nakua, Transcripts; music by Teen Daze and Blue Dot Sessions; Julie Shapiro, Executive Producer at Radiotopia

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/aids-activists-unfurl-giant-condom-senator-jesse-helms-home-act-upSupport the show on Patreon

Episode Notes A romp through the memory-holed times following 9/11 and the American war machine on auto-pilot. The American Service Members Protection Act is a direct refutation of the UN's institution of the International Criminal Court. This 2002 Bill sponsored by Jesse Helms in the Senate and Tom DeLay in the House authorized the President to send forces to invade the Hague in the Netherlands if any American is brought before the ICC for war crimes. We also discuss the end of one specific AUMF, the one for Iraq. The Biden Administration has signaled their approval of the repeal because "...repeal of the 2002 AUMF would likely have minimal impact on current military operations." If you have any thoughts, suggestions, angry emotes, or whatever that you'd like to send us, please reach out at UnsociablistPod@gmail.com. I recognize posting this will bring us spam and I dare you to do it. Phil and Kyle would also like to give a shout out to those of us still in the streets fighting for the rights of Palestinians and those fighting for justice and abolition of the American police state. The best way to show solidarity with those struggling against the American empire is to struggle against the empire at home. https://free-palestine.carrd.co/#donations https://www.phillybailfund.org/ https://bailproject.org/

Monimutkaisessa maailmassa ei voi asioita ratkaista pelkällä rockbiisillä, mutta vappuna noustaan aktivismiin ja taistoon mm. apatiaa, laiskuutta, rasismia ja vääränlaista mukavuudenhalua vastaan. Kantaaottavien biisien äärellä studiossa häärivät Sami Ruokangas ja Pauli Kauppila. Levylautasella kieppuvat Rage Against The Machine, Corrosion Of Conformity, Neil Young ja J.B. Lenoir. Jakson soittolista: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5LxgrxqmdJuAUYt7WuLZIX?si=6b5501f48e514902 Menossa ja meiningissä mukana vapun simapatojen ja mahtavien munkkien äärellä ovat myös Tom Morello, Audioslave, Soundgarden, Chris Cornell, The Struts, Def Leppard, Bessie Smith, Gary Clark Jr, Bruce Springsteen, Howlin´ Wolf, Jesse Helms, Harvey Gantt, Voivod, Public Enemy, Pepper Keenan, Faith No More, Down, Pantera, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Nirvana, Dave Grohl, Reed Mullin, Donald Trump, ”Ike” Eisenhower, John Mayall, Martin Scorsese, Wim Wenders, Skip James ja Blind Willie Johnson.

Charlie Cook is a political icon of his generation. Charlie broke ground in the early days of the race-rating and political newsletter industry, starting the Cook Political Report from scratch in 1984 – and he and his newsletter are still going strong.Charlie talks through his fascinating career and is generous with insights as to how politics and campaigns have changed over the years – with plenty of practical tips to help anyone better understand and better navigate our political system.Podcast Website Twitter: @ProPoliticsPod Twitter: @ZacMcCrary Facebook: The Pro Politics PodcastIN THIS EPISODEThe one political book Charlie remembers being in his house as a kid…High-school Charlie helps out on an underdog Louisiana Senate race…How high school debate helped prepare Charlie for a job in elections analysis..Charlie breaks down the politics of his youth in Louisiana of the 60s and 70s…Charlie remembers his first DC job as an elevator operator in the Russell Senate office building…A young Charlie has a memorable encounter with Senator Jesse Helms…Charlie gives the history of the election newsletter industry…Charlie's background in polling and campaigns comes in handy…Charlie learns an important lesson from the infamous "bloody" IN-08 congressional race of 1984…Charlie talks about how he started his newsletter in the mid 80s…The important media break Charlie got that helped put his newsletter on the map…The dramatically different subscriber base today from how the Cook Report started…Charlie and Stu Rothenberg meet with VP Cheney before the 2006 elections…Charlies waxes poetic about the Almanac of American Politics…Which committee staffer (and future Governor) was one of Charlie's best sources of leaks…Charlie gives tips for candidates to prep for meetings with DC handicappers…Charlie's cryptic comment about a 2004 meeting with then candidate Barack Obama…The one Senate committee chair who talked through races with Charlie independent of committee staff…Charlies talks about the responsibility of knowing his analysis is responsible for impacting races…The recent race result that surprised Charlie the most…Charlie talks about “the worst thing” that can happen in his line of work…Charlie's tips for TV appearances…The highest compliment Charlie can get from a reader…Charlie's must-read political books…Charlie talks about the “lost art” of positive political ads…ALSO…Johnny Apple, The Atlantic, Alan Baron, David Broder, Ron Brownstein, Edward Brooke, Bernadette Budde, C-SPAN, CNN, Eric Cantor, Mitch Daniels, Tom Davis, Bob Dole, Jennifer Duffy, Edwin Edwards, Allen Ellender, Rahm Emanuel, Evans and Novak, Vic Fazio, Martin Frost, Cory Gardner, Newt Gingrich, Nathan Gonzales, Phil Gramm, Charles Guggenheim, Bill Hamilton, Peter Hart, Paula Hawkins, F. Edward Hebert, Jesse Helms, Hubert Humphrey, Al Hunt, Laura Ingraham, Bennett Johnston, Gillis Long, Huey Long, Dick Lugar, Sid McMath, George McGovern, Bob Michel, Otto Passman, Kevin Phillips, Roll Call, Stu Rothenberg, Tim Russert, David Sawyer, Bernard Shaw, Bob Squier, Jessica Taylor, Amy Walter, Dave Wasserman, Paul Weyrich, Judy Woodruff, and MORE…!Podcast WebsiteTwitter: @ProPoliticsPodTwitter: @ZacMcCraryFacebook: The Pro Politics Podcast

Filmmaker Ondi Timoner talks with Emmy Winner Charlotte Robinson host of OUTTAKE VOICES™ about the recently released “Mapplethorpe, The Director's Cut” featuring an all-new soundtrack, previously unseen footage and also addresses Robert Mapplethorpe’s important relationship with Patti Smith and his subsequent pivotal romance with powerhouse art collector Sam Wagstaff. The film stars Matt Smith in the title role, best known as Prince Philip in the Netflix series “The Crown.” The stellar cast includes Marianne Rendón as Patti Smith and John Benjamin Hickey as Sam Wagstaff. LGBTQ icon and photographer Robert Mapplethorpe was one of the most important and controversial artists of the 20th Century living his life boldly and authentically until his untimely death 1989 at age of 42 due to complications from HIV/AIDS. Mapplethorpe’s most controversial works documented and examined the gay male BDSM subculture of New York City in the late 1960s and early 1970s. His historic and provocative 1989 exhibition entitled “Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment” generated controversy and even sparked a Congressional debate when Senator Jesse Helms introduced legislation that attempted to stop the National Endowment for the Arts from funding artwork he considered “obscene.” Though Helms’ extreme measures did not pass, a compromise was reached in Congress placing restrictions on NEA funding procedures that’s still in effect today. “Mapplethorpe, The Director’s Cut” also includes restored scenes depicting Mapplethorpe’s childhood love of photography, his embattled relationship with his father and his lingering ambivalent connection to the Catholic faith. We talked to Ondi about her inspiration for creating “Mapplethorpe, The Director's Cut” and her spin on our LGBTQ issues.  Ondi Timoner is one of the most outstanding talents in non-fiction filmmaking. She often takes on the stories of visionaries fighting against all odds with a gripping and unique mixed-media, narrative style. Ondi wrote, directed, produced and edited “Mapplethorpe” that won an Audience Award at the Tribeca Film Festival and was released theatrically by Samuel Goldwyn in 2018. “Mapplethorpe, The Director’s Cut” is now available on Hulu, Amazon and various digital platforms. Currently she’s putting the finishing touches on a new screenplay “A Stroke of Genius” about the life and career of her late father Eli Timoner who in 1971 founded Air Florida an airline that saw remarkable rapid growth both at the time of its inception and afterwards before suffering a stroke and living the next forty years as a hemiplegic. Timoner is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, the DGA, the PGA, the International Documentary Association, Film Fatales and Women in Film. For More Info...  LISTEN: 500+ LGBTQ Chats @OUTTAKE VOICES 

Danielle Pletka is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and co-host of What the Hell Is Going On, having served as the SVP for foreign and defense policy studies there, and is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service. Prior to joining AEI, Danielle was a senior staff member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations as the point person on Middle East, Pakistan, India, and Afghanistan.  Dany discusses how she formed her conservative views, developing an expertise in foreign policy, her experience working on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee including with firebrand Senator Jesse Helms, her candid and nuanced assessment of the Trump Admin's Middle East policy, her concerns about the Democratic Party's "lurch to the left," and what happened leading up to and since January 6th.

Danielle Pletka is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and co-host of What the Hell Is Going On, having served as the SVP for foreign and defense policy studies there, and is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service. Prior to joining AEI, Danielle was a senior staff member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations as the point person on Middle East, Pakistan, India, and Afghanistan.  Dany discusses how she formed her conservative views, developing an expertise in foreign policy, her experience working on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee including with firebrand Senator Jesse Helms, her candid and nuanced assessment of the Trump Admin's Middle East policy, her concerns about the Democratic Party's "lurch to the left," and what happened leading up to and since January 6th.

Matt and Sam have an in-depth conversation with HIV/AIDs activist Peter Staley to get his perspective on Dr. Anthony Fauci's role in America's response to two of the most devastating public-health emergencies of recent decades: the AIDS crisis and the pandemic that began nearly one year ago.  They discuss how Peter got his start in ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) in New York City in the 1980s, what the group was fighting for, his run-ins with Pat Buchanan, Jesse Helms, and other rightwing rogues, and how he came to know Fauci. How does Peter understand Fauci's role in the Trump administration's response to the pandemic? Should Fauci have resigned? What good was he able to do? And how does his experience as an activist inform his views about working with government officials on the "inside"?  Watch:How to Survive a Plague (the 2012 documentary about ACT UP in which Peter figures prominently) Read:Sam Adler-Bell, "Dr. Do-Little: The Case Against Anthony Fauci," The Drift, February 4, 2021"A Timeline of the Coronavirus Pandemic," New York Times, January 10, 2021...and don't forget to subscribe on Patreon for all Know Your Enemy bonus episodes! 

The phony Covid mask and some nostalgic memories of Jesse Helms

We continue the month of October's politically charged Pearl Jam theme with a show that sets the standard for the band's dedication to encouraging their fans to vote. Originally dubbed as a retirement party for former NC Senator, the bigoted Jesse Helms, this show in Charlotte prior to the 1996 election was one where the music was secondary to the mission which was to get the young people in attendance registered to vote. Joining the band on this night was activist Gloria Steinem who made a poignant speech about the importance of voting that can be repeated 24 years later and still have the same importance. On many occasions Ed would repeat that sentiment, even at a point during Porch where he painted a picture of the America that we as people can build together where everyone regardless of their race, gender or sexual orientation could live free of hatred and bigotry. It was a maturing moment for the band as they'd expressed their political beliefs in prior years, but took this time to be proactive in helping achieve their goal in signing up registered voters. Over 1,000 new voters were registered that night. And wouldn't you believe that the music was pretty good too? The band had to deal with a wild crowd that took to surfing and moshing right from the start of Long Road. Yeah, Long Road. On numerous occasions Ed has to calm the crowd down even invoking the two steps back practice to alleviate the rambunctiousness. Key highlights from this show include In My Tree, Immortality, Red Mosquito, Whipping and I Got Shit with the inclusion of Brendan O'Brien on bass. Do you like the show? Want more of the show? Want to contribute to make the show better? Help us out: http://patreon.com/liveon4legs

As we enter debate season in state and national politics, we are looking back at North Carolina's most famous debates and how they compare to today.  U.S. Senator Jesse Helms and former North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt were political heavyweights who squared off in 1984. Both men were in their second terms and could not have been any different ideologically. It made for some intense debates where they grilled each other from across the table.   On this week’s episode of Tying It Together With Tim Boyum, Tim and Ben talk to the men who made those debates happen. Hear all the behind-the-scenes stories of what was, at the time, the most expensive U.S. Senate race in the nation’s history. Gary Pearce and Carter Wrenn's incredible stories and insight are a must listen!     JOIN THE CONVERSATION Do you have any thoughts or questions for Tim? Weigh in on Twitter with the hashtag #TyingItTogetherNC. Afterward, rate the podcast and leave a review to tell us what you think!

Thomas, Toni, and Kendall discuss the life of Lily Tomlin, the legacy of Dr. Evelyn Hooker who advocated to declassify homosexuality as a mental disorder, and the prank on Senator Jesse Helms courtesy of ACT UP.

“What the people want is very simple - they want an America as good as its promise.” ― Barbara Jordan Join Sarah & our guest, Dr Tom Packer as they explore the exception life of Barbara Jordan - American lawyer, educator and politician who was a leader at the heart of the Civil Rights Movement. Barbara Jordan is an inspirational politician and orator who could, in her own word, harness "the voice of god" to command attention and sway the nation. Dr Tom Packer is a Fellow at the Institute for the Study of the Americas, University College London. He has also taught previously at Durham University, Warwick, Oxford and LSE. Dr Packer's areas of expertise includes US political history particularly that of the US political right, the US South and the electoral history of the United States and the Western World. His research focuses on American conservatism in the second half of the 20th century. He is currently working on a book exploring the career of Senator Jesse Helms, the leading ultra-conservative Senator, and the political culture of North Carolina. Sarah can't wait to read it.

In the second of two episodes, Cathryn the Grateful joins Arlia to discuss our societal transformation, the rise of the Divine Feminine and her work in The Living Temple. Topics covered: How she sees our current unraveling and what she thinks will save our world. Why she believes in The Poor People's Campaign The power of women and their sexual energy to shift our society's priorities. The rising of the Divine Feminine and her favorite books about it. The role of the awake men in her life. Returning to simple pleasures, living simply. The legacy we want to leave our children. The faith in the collective awakening to reshape our world Her daily practice at The Living Temple. How to not be discouraged in this process. About Cathryn: Cathryn Davis was born in Macon, GA and raised in Asheville, NC by an artist and a psychologist. When her mother said, “Life isn't fair,” Cathryn responded, “I'm here to make it fair” (to which her mother replied with a grin — “good luck with that”) and from there, a journey of joyful justice work has unfolded. Cathryn's love of community, creativity, and the Earth was cultivated at an early age as a member of Jubilee! Community Church in Asheville (where she was ordained a Minister of Movement in 2018). She trained as a clown in her teens, and was active in theater and debate throughout high school. A graduate of the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, Cathryn moved to New York in her twenties, where she conceived and created FULLY AWAKE, a feature documentary about the legendary Black Mountain College (1933-1957) an experiment in education that birthed the American Avant Garde. The film has screened worldwide from art museums to film festivals to community centers.  Cathryn began her civic work as a 13-year-old volunteer for Senate candidate Harvey Gantt (running against Jesse Helms) and worked on two campaigns in NC, planting a lifelong interest in politics. Aware of the deeply entrenched injustice of unfettered capitalism and systemic racism, Cathryn has taken part in actions as part of Occupy Wall Street, a lawsuit against Monsanto, the SC Poor People's Campaign, as well as creating a WAKE THE NATION documentary film series and other awareness-raising campaigns for justice issues.  A graduate of the Institute of Integrative Nutrition, Cathryn is a committed student of planet, producing public television shows about gardening and permaculture for Growing a Greener World and working for an open-pollinated seed company, Sow True Seed.  A passionate sacred activist, Cathryn strongly believes in the importance of creativity, storytelling, and community as we co-create a just world for all. She served as Executive Director of Enough Pie, a non-profit in Charleston, SC's Upper Peninsula that uses creativity to connect and empower the community for the past six years. Enough Pie (www.enoughpie.org) works with community members to co-create creative, out-of-the-box ideas and partnerships that embolden people to take action. She is also the founder of The Joyful Revolution (www.joyfulrevolution.org), a movement for planet, people & pleasure, inspired by the visionary work of adrianne maree brown (Emergent Stratgey), Octavia Butler (Earthseed), and Tom Robbins.  Cathryn practices movement as medicine, and is follows the vision of dancing through life. She has a movement studio – The Sanctuary – at her home in Charleston SC where she hosts small group dance and individual movement healing as well as Zoom moon cycle dances (New Moon & Full Moon) for a wider audience. Today she co-directs A Living Temple, a non-denominational church that celebrates creation where she leads regular dance & prayer offerings and serves as a celebrant. “Come dance with me. Come Dance.” – Hafiz Where to find Cathryn:  Facebook Instagram Email The Women's Sanctuary Podcast is hosted by Arlia Hoffman. The Women's Sanctuary provides counseling, sacred practice and community for women. Visit thewomenssanctuary.com for more information.

Arlia is joined by Cathryn the Grateful, a fellow priestess and sacred activist in the first of two episodes. Cathryn the Grateful was born in Macon, GA and raised in Asheville, NC by an artist and a psychologist. When her mother said, “Life isn't fair,” Cathryn responded, “I'm here to make it fair” (to which her mother replied with a grin — “good luck with that”) and from there, a journey of joyful justice work has unfolded. Cathryn's love of community, creativity, and the Earth was cultivated at an early age as a member of Jubilee! Community Church in Asheville (where she was ordained a Minister of Movement in 2018). She trained as a clown in her teens, and was active in theater and debate throughout high school. A graduate of the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, Cathryn moved to New York in her twenties, where she conceived and created FULLY AWAKE, a feature documentary about the legendary Black Mountain College (1933-1957) an experiment in education that birthed the American Avant Garde. The film has screened worldwide from art museums to film festivals to community centers.  Cathryn began her civic work as a 13-year-old volunteer for Senate candidate Harvey Gantt (running against Jesse Helms) and worked on two campaigns in NC, planting a lifelong interest in politics. Aware of the deeply entrenched injustice of unfettered capitalism and systemic racism, Cathryn has taken part in actions as part of Occupy Wall Street, a lawsuit against Monsanto, the SC Poor People's Campaign, as well as creating a WAKE THE NATION documentary film series and other awareness-raising campaigns for justice issues.  A graduate of the Institute of Integrative Nutrition, Cathryn is a committed student of planet, producing public television shows about gardening and permaculture for Growing a Greener World and working for an open-pollinated seed company, Sow True Seed.  A passionate sacred activist, Cathryn strongly believes in the importance of creativity, storytelling, and community as we co-create a just world for all. She served as Executive Director of Enough Pie, a non-profit in Charleston, SC's Upper Peninsula that uses creativity to connect and empower the community for the past six years. Enough Pie (www.enoughpie.org) works with community members to co-create creative, out-of-the-box ideas and partnerships that embolden people to take action. She is also the founder of The Joyful Revolution (www.joyfulrevolution.org), a movement for planet, people & pleasure, inspired by the visionary work of adrianne maree brown (Emergent Stratgey), Octavia Butler (Earthseed), and Tom Robbins.  Cathryn practices movement as medicine, and is follows the vision of dancing through life. She has a movement studio – The Sanctuary – at her home in Charleston SC where she hosts small group dance and individual movement healing as well as Zoom moon cycle dances (New Moon & Full Moon) for a wider audience. Today she co-directs A Living Temple, a non-denominational church that celebrates creation where she leads regular dance & prayer offerings and serves as a celebrant. “Come dance with me. Come Dance.” – Hafiz  

Jim Hunt was first elected Governor of North Carolina in 1976 when he was just 39 years old. He served four terms in the Executive Mansion, spanning four different decades. During his time in office, Hunt remained a steadfast supporter of public schools and prioritized education policy. In 1984, Hunt also set his sights on the U.S. Senate, and lost a bitter race to longtime Senator Jesse Helms. On this episode of the Politics Podcast from WUNC, Hunt discusses his legacy as a governor, recent Black Lives Matter demonstrations, and a time he hitchhiked to the Midwest.

Jim Hunt was first elected Governor of North Carolina in 1976 when he was just 39 years old. He served four terms in the Executive Mansion, spanning four different decades.

This week a BUNCH of new music for you AND a megamix from the one and only Omega Sparx!! The playlist is in order and marked as follows: Title by Artist – Album The People Could Fly by Malibu Shark Attack! Everyone's A Little Bit Gay by MC Lars - Nerdcore Family Vol 1 Jesse Helms by MC Hawking (Dark Matter) U.N.I.F.Y. by TekForce Alabaster by Shubzilla & Bill Beats - Boomers V.2 Pronoun Throwdown by Mega Ran Mighty Morphing by Sammus - Infusion Fuck The Police by Hairetsu - B-Sides|FreeSides Black Flags by DZK Too Soon by Kadesh Flow, Atlas - Too Soon / Free People 2-Pack Nerdcore Radio Mix from Gamebreax!Featured Artists: Malibu Shark Attack! - malibusharkattack.bandcamp.com MC Lars - mclars.com MC Hawking - mchawking.com Tekforce – tekforcecentral.com Shubzilla - shubzilla.bandcamp.com Bill Beats - noirgrime.com Mega Ran – megaran.com Sammus – sammusmusic.com Hairetsu - hairetsu.bandcamp.com DZK - dzkonline.net Kadesh Flow – kadeshflow.com Like and follow and whatever the Press Start Socials: Twitter, Facebook, Twitch and now Youtube!! Do you like Video Game Remixes? Check out Press Start to Continue DLC, the FULL two hour show featuring music from all sorts of games, interviews with artists, theme shows, and of course the nerdcore you love! Vist the site to learn more! Please consider supporting Press Start on Pulse by going to tips.pinecast.com/jar/PressStart. Every cent goes to buying new music to play on the show! This podcast is a member of the Planetside Podcast Network. Visit PlanetsidePodcasts.com to find other Planetside Productions! Find out more at https://pressstartpulse.pinecast.co Send us your feedback online: https://pinecast.com/feedback/pressstartpulse/9580dd6e-f8f8-4521-9019-7f7ee2ed665a

This week a BUNCH of new music for you AND a megamix from the one and only Omega Sparx!! The playlist is marked as follows: Title by Artist – Album (Game) Hour 1 The Bubbleologists (OC ReMix) by PsyNES, Elrinth (Mega Man 2) Funk Buster (OC ReMix) by Kamex (Deltarune) Seeing Stars (OC ReMix) by Matt Bounds (Super Mario Land 2) Brave New World (OC ReMix) by jnWake feat. zykO, ilp0, Ivan Hakštok, Trev Wignall, Jorito (Terranigma) Snake's in the Jungle (OC ReMix) by Astral Tales (Metal Gear) Grav'iton's Dream (OC ReMix) by Brink-of-Time (Final Fantasy XI Online: Rise of the Zilart) Teenage Mutant Ninja Koopa (OC ReMix) by jnWake feat. UV Sir J, XPRTNovice (Paper Mario) X Intro (OC ReMix) by Project X (Mega Man 3) Faxanadoom (OC ReMix) by thebitterroost (Faxanadu) Kamomilla (OC ReMix) by Eino Keskitalo (Psycho Pinball) Howling Winds (OC ReMix) by Forest Elves (Final Fantasy 7) Hortus Conclusus (OC ReMix) by Meteo Xavier, Jeremy Robson (Seiken Densetsu 3) Farewell, Beloved Ones (OC ReMix) by Danilo Ciaffi (Pokémon Red Version) Hour 2 The People Could Fly by Malibu Shark Attack! Everyone's A Little Bit Gay by MC Lars - Nerdcore Family Vol 1 Jesse Helms by MC Hawking (Dark Matter) U.N.I.F.Y. by TekForce Alabaster by Shubzilla & Bill Beats - Boomers V.2 Pronoun Throwdown by Mega Ran Mighty Morphing by Sammus - Infusion Fuck The Police by Hairetsu - B-Sides|FreeSides Black Flags by DZK Too Soon by Kadesh Flow, Atlas - Too Soon / Free People 2-Pack Nerdcore Radio Mix from Gamebreax! Featured Artists: Malibu Shark Attack! - malibusharkattack.bandcamp.com MC Lars - mclars.com MC Hawking - mchawking.com Tekforce – tekforcecentral.com Shubzilla - shubzilla.bandcamp.com Bill Beats - noirgrime.com Mega Ran – megaran.com Sammus – sammusmusic.com Hairetsu - hairetsu.bandcamp.com DZK - dzkonline.net Kadesh Flow – kadeshflow.com All songs marked “OCReMix” can be found at OverClocked ReMix (http://ocremix.org) – please show them some support! Download, donate, tell your friends! Ending tune by KeyJayHD -  Check out more of his stuff at keyjayhd.bandcamp.com! Like and follow and whatever the Press Start Socials: Twitter, Facebook, Twitch and now Youtube!! Support Press Start to Continue DLC by donating to the tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/PressStart Send us your feedback online: pinecast.com/feedback/PressStart Press Start is now open to syndication! If you would like Press Start to Continue to air on YOUR station, email PressStartMorlock@Gmail.com This podcast is a member of the Planetside Podcast Network. Visit PlanetsidePodcasts.com to find other Planetside Productions!

This is a recut version of the very first episode of SouthBound, which we put into the world on Nov. 15, 2017. Our guest for this first episode was Harvey Gantt, a longtime pioneer in civil rights in the Carolinas.

For this week's show, Rania Khalek and Kevin Gosztola present a conversation that was recorded several months ago on Angola history: Portuguese colonialism, Black anti-colonial resistance, United States imperialism, and the way in which this history reverberates during President Donald Trump's administration. "Unauthorized Disclosure" welcomed two guests: Prexy Nesbitt, who is a presidential fellow at the Peace Studies Department at Chapman University in Orange County, California where he teaches Southern African History, and Marissa Moorman, who is the author of the book, Powerful Frequencies: Radio, State Power, and the Cold War in Angola, 1931-2002. Prexy was one of Kevin's professors in college, and he wanted to introduce some more people to the history of southern African countries. (Plus, Kevin attributes a significant part of his political awakening in college to Prexy.) Our conversation begins with Marissa, who provides a brief background on Portuguese colonialism in Angola and the rise of black Angolan resistance that ignited a struggle for independence. We pay particular attention to Jonas Savimbi, who was the militant leader of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). Savimbi sought support from the U.S. government, and the government was willing to provide support during the Cold War because they believed Angola was a crucial battleground in the fight against the Soviet Union. The Clark Amendment was repealed in 1985, which removed a prohibition to providing covert or overt U.S. assistance to militant groups in Angola. It was the result of a lobbying effort by conservative organizations like the Conservative Caucus, the Heritage Foundation, and the American Security Council, as well as Senator Jesse Helms, Representative Jack Kemp, and Representative Claude Pepper. Savimbi was as the leader of "true anti-communist freedom fighters." The militant leader even traveled to the United States in 1985 and hired a publicity firm called Black, Manafort, Stone and Kelly for $600,000/year. It was tied to President Ronald Reagan, and one of the partners at the firm was Paul Manafort. The firm was largely successful. Reagan said during the tour, "We want to be very helpful to what Dr. Savimbi and his people are tying to do." Later, Marissa and Prexy talk about the civil rights movement and solidarity work with struggles against colonialism in southern Africa. They address how developments in Angola led to fractures in organizing, including among Black activists. We really have not done a show on this part of the world before so we're pleased to share this conversation.

This week Thomas, Tony, and Kendall discuss these topics: Gay rights activist Craig Rodwell ( ~min 25:00) The classic drag queen pageant documentary "The Queen" (~min 46:00) President George HW Bush declining an invitation to attend the 6th International Conference on AIDS to speak at an event for anti-gay Senator Jesse Helms. (~ min 1:16:00)

Episode Thirty-Three: Danielle and Taikein talk the ESPN 10-part docu-series that has taken the sports world by storm : 'The Last Dance'. Following the lead of episodes 5 & 6 which delved into the international influence of basketball phenom Michael Jordan, they discuss whether or not Jordan should be given a pass for his decisions to remain silent on social issues throughout the ages. Placing him in the context of Craig Hodges and Jesse Helms, the duo bring the heat. #ANFL #aintnofreelunch Follow us on Twitter: @aintnofreelunch @dmgreene18 @TaikeinCooper Two Black millennials discussing how to create change in these streets - an hour episode at a time. Let's Eat. Track features: "Busy School Cafeteria" by SoundEffectsFactory "RSPN" by Blank and Kytt Audio production by: Melissa Vaughan

Still no sports yet, but the show goes on! JP and Hector talk about episodes 5 and 6 of "The Last Dance," including Isiah Thomas' snub from the Dream Team. Was it all on Jordan or was it a team decision? Also, Jordan's faults start to show in the form of his gambling and his refusal to endorse politician Harvey Gantt against well-known racist Jesse Helms. Is he in the right to stay out of the political realm, or is he trying to shape history to avoid looking like a bad person? Afterward, we talk about recent NBA news of practice reopening and the idea of Kevin Durant returning to the Nets if the season resumes. Also, does the shutdown help the Warriors odds of getting Giannis Antetokounmpo? We finish with discussing the Cowboys' 2020 schedule which released during the recording. If we get to see a full NFL season, we think the Cowboys have a good chance of bouncing back. Thanks again for listening! Subscribe, share, and send us questions.

Welcome to LL SPORTS 2!  A sports show for everyone!! – but for the ladies, we’ll get an opportunity each show to teach you some of the fundamentals of baseball, basketball or football.  We promise to never answer your questions with "not right now, the game is on!" "The Last Dance" continues with episodes 5 & 6 highlighting Michael Jordan's controversial stance to not get involved in the North Carolina political race between Democratic nominee Harvey Gantt and Republican incumbent Jesse Helms....now 30 years later...does Jordan's lack of activism hurt his legacy? The episodes also document the biggest question/scandal that surrounded Jordan at that time...does Michael Jordan have a gambling problem, and how the scrutiny nearly drove him out of basketball. The Dallas Cowboys appear to be playing chess with quarterback Dak Prescott....now we await Dak's next move; will he sign the franchise tag? All of this plus the Wednesday Wikipedia, Lucinda's Lyrics, TJ's Motivational Moment, your phone calls, comments, questions and much more! Join TJ Wednesday @8p ET!!!

In the second hour, Dan McNeil and Danny Parkins continued to discuss the latest episodes of "The Last Dance" and how Bulls legend Michael Jordan refused to take a public stand against North Carolina senator Jesse Helms. Jordan wanted no part of being an activist, as evidenced by his "Republican buy sneakers too" comment.

New episodes of The Last Dance on ESPN, Darren McFadden is tired, Debra Messing should stop tweeting, Trump v. Morning Joe, RIP Don Shula, new Cameos, and Drew is mad at America.Don't forget to enter our Death Wish Coffee contest on their website & use Drew15 at check out when you buy your rocket fuel.Sorry about the clutter in the background of our Facebook Live. Drew has some awards piling up including a Marconi Award nomination.The Red Shovel Network has had some issues with the World Wide Web lately, but Marc and his Playboy-Channel-loving cable rep have us covered. Drew and Elrick dueled via text because of questions asked (and not asked) to Big Gretch.Michigan's Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson showed up to the Governor's press conference today. Some people's biggest takeaway is that she's pretty hot.No one ever told us that the Deerfield Testicle Festival was cancelled, but thanks to Ed Teach Drew at least has a festival t-shirt.90 Day Fiance's new episode last night featured a breakup where the ugly guy was happy about being dumped.The Last Dance dropped two more episodes which highlighted the Dream Team, Michael Jordan's Nike deal, and MJ not speaking out against Jesse Helms.President Trump is throwing another conspiracy theory out by seemingly insinuating that Joe (not Joey) Scarborough killed someone.The NFL's winningest head coach Don Shula died at a perfect 9-0.Whatever happened to Jayson Williams? Not that Jason Williams or that Jason Williams. Darren McFadden was arrested after "time traveling" in a drive thru. Thankfully police body cams caught all the great action.New Cameos include Aubrey 'First' Huff, Chris Chelios, Deena from Jersey Shore, Chuck Norris, Chet Hanks and Chaka Khan.When will there be an Austin Harrouff documentary?Tiger King News: Nic Cage will play Joe Exotic in a movie no one wants. Carole Baskin was tediously pranked into doing her first post Tiger King "interview". The Payne Stewart documentary that we asked for is finally being aired.PSA: Elizabeth Hurley is sexy, but Drew is angry at social media accounts with too many selfies.The Debra Messing Twitter Apology Tour Part 5: Tara Reade Edition.Some people are going to start freaking out about the cool Murder Hornet.Remember when Don Lemon wanted some dude to smell his finger after they went below the belt?Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter (Drew and Mike Show, Marc Fellhauer, Trudi Daniels and BranDon).

Sameerah and Jeanne bring you a case of a bitter and incredibly bloody feud. We have kissing cousins, Jesse Helms, old money, new money, sinister Germans, and bunkers. Buckle up kids, life is a terrifying bumpy ride, and you're about to really hate Susie Sharp.

North Carolina continues to make big political moves, especially as the State Supreme Court overturned legislative and Congressional gerrymanders. That means that the state's politics are less predictable and more diverse than people may realize at first.  Pierce Freelon is determined to take advantage of this moment in history for his city of Durham and for his state as he runs for State Senator. In this podcast, Pierce talks about his earliest experiences in politics as he helped his father volunteer for Harvey Gantt vs Jesse Helms and he talks about his father life and subsequent battle with ALS motivated him to run for office. Pierce has a very positive vision for the future and is also very aware of the political situation in North Carolina. Listen to him on the You Should Run Podcast and then learn more about him at https://www.freelonfordurham.com/ 

Public memorials are embedded in our landscape. In this episode we learn the history behind two public memorial benches that bookend the Bolin Creek Trail in Chapel Hill. Learn how two men devoted their lives to making our public spaces more open and accessbile for all of us...and how one man tried to stop such work from ever happening. This episode was produced and edited by Molly Luby, with help from Mandella Younge, Omar Roque, David Felton, and Susan Brown. Audio mixing by Ryan Chamberlain.  Season one of Re/Collecting Chapel Hill was supported by grant funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the federal Library Services and Technology Act as administered by the State Library of North Carolina, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Constitution Day earlier this month reminded us of the importance of the United States’ governing document. Jon Guze, John Locke Foundation director of legal studies, emphasizes constitutional provisions that protect the nation from damaging policies put forward by elected officials. Guze touts the value of these constitutional safeguards. Jesse Helms departed the American political scene long before Donald Trump started his campaign for the White House. But at least one man who worked for Helms believes the late U.S. senator would appreciate much of what Trump is trying to accomplish in the White House. Marc Thiessen followed his work for Helms by becoming President George W. Bush’s chief speechwriter. He’s now a Washington Post columnist and American Enterprise Institute fellow. Thiessen explains how his work with Helms influences his assessment of Trump. During an ongoing state budget impasse, N.C. lawmakers nonetheless moved forward with pieces of the budget dealing with hurricane and disaster relief. You’ll hear highlights from their debate. North Carolina ranks No. 18 among the states when it comes to freedom. That’s according to a report prepared for the libertarian Cato Institute. Freedom in the 50 States co-author Jason Sorens recently shared details during the annual meeting in Winston-Salem of Classical Liberals of the Carolinas. Sorens, director of the Center for Ethics in Business and Governance at Saint Anselm College, explains what N.C. policymakers have done well, along with areas that could use improvement. From the inception of the N.C. state lottery, critics have contended that state-run gambling would thrive only by relying on money from low-income customers in low-income counties. Jon Sanders, John Locke Foundation director of regulatory studies, reviews recent data that suggest critics have been correct.

The Heritage Foundation is honored to host Senator Dan Sullivan (R-AK) for our signature event on U.S. policy in the Indo-Pacific. Heritage’s annual B.C. Lee Lecture on international affairs was endowed by the Samsung Group in honor of its founder, the late B.C. Lee, to focus on the U.S. relationship with the Indo-Pacific. Senator Sullivan continues the B.C. Lee tradition of speakers representing leading voices in America’s Asia policy. Previous lectures have been delivered by Henry Kissinger, Jesse Helms, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Joseph Lieberman, Ed Royce, Robert Zoellick, John McCain, and many others. We look forward to hearing Senator Sullivan’s views on Indo-Pacific policy in what is a very challenging time for American interests. Please join us for another enlightening event in this series. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

If there was a Mount Rushmore of North Carolina politics, former Governor Jim Hunt would sit front and center. Find out how the paving of a road let him to politics and changed North Carolina history. He also gives some love advice after more than six decades of marriage through his personal story of hitchhiking to Iowa to make sure he spent holidays with the love of his life. He also talks candidly about his 1984 loss to Jesse Helms and whether or not the two time, two-term governor could win an election in today’s political climate. JOIN THE CONVERSATION Do you have any thoughts or questions for Tim? Weigh in on Twitter with the hashtag #TyingItTogetherNC. Don't forget to rate the podcast and leave a review to tell us what you think! MENTIONED IN THE PODCAST The Hunt Institute, The James B. Hunt Jr. Library

In this installment of MintCast, Alan MacLeod and Whitney Webb discuss recent MintPress headlines such as efforts to exploit the Sri Lankan Easter bombings, next steps for the Yellow Vest movement in France, and the tightening nexus between social media companies and the U.S. government. Special attention is given to the recent failed coup attempt in Venezuela and its implications for Venezuela, U.S. foreign policy, and Latin America as a whole.After reviewing the latest in current events, MacLeod and Webb discuss the U.S. atrocities committed during the Korean War, sometimes called the “forgotten war.” These include the devastating bombing campaign that resulted in the U.S. committing a litany of war crimes, and Washington’s’ decades-long efforts to cover up the evidence that the U.S. used biological weapons that killed thousands of Korean civilians as well as American soldiers during the conflict. In the last segment, former Vice President and recently announced presidential candidate Joe Biden is added to MintCast’s “Hall of Shame.” MacLeod and Webb examine Biden’s history of whitewashing notorious racists like Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms, as well as his history of opposing racial integration and helping create the current racial disparities in the U.S. criminal justice system.Support the show (https://www.mintpressnews.com/donations/)

Karen Finley started out performing feminist monologues full of vitriol and fury in the punk clubs of the Bay Area in the late 70s. By the 80s, she’d moved to New York where she was a regular at legendary performance venues like Danceteria. And then in 1990, she became a household name as part of the NEA FOUR—a group of four performance artists whose National Endowment for the Arts funding was revoked because conservative Senator Jesse Helms had a hissy fit about decency. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court in 1998 in National Endowment for the Arts v. Finley and Karen Finley became an icon of the struggle for free speech. She’s a professor of Art and Public Policy at New York University and in this episode of BUST’s Poptarts podcast she unleashes on the current administrations and provides creative guidance for feminists trying to keep our heads up in the time of Trump.

In Episode 003 of the Origin Stories: A Podcast About Politics and People, longtime talk radio producer Brent Jabbour speaks Protect Our Care Executive Director Brad Woodhouse about going from being a theatre major in college to working as Communications Director for the Democratic National Committee. Woodhouse also discusses the interesting situation of having a brother who is the Executive Director of the North Carolina Republican Party. Subscribe to the podcast onItunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spreaker, TuneIN, or wherever you consume Podcasts.Again, if you like the project share it with your friends, follow me on Twitter @BrentJabbour and/or like the page on Facebook.Transcript:This is episode three of Origin Stories: A Podcast about politics and People. My name Brent Jabbour and this week we speak with Brad Woodhouse. He is the executive director at Protect Our Care. He is the former DNC Communications Director, he was an Obama surrogate in 08 and 2012. He's what I would consider a Democratic operative, that is just a buzzword, it doesn't really mean anything in particular. It's like a Democratic strategist. It just means what's going on. He knows the inner-workings of what is going on with the party. And, we had a pretty good discussion. I always found Brad pretty interesting because his brother is the Executive Director of the North Carolina Republican Party and he is entering his second cycle there. So, he is this key Democratic operative his brother high ranking Republican in the North Carolina party. They've actually played that up, you've seen them appear on Fox together, on CSpan, there is a famous viral clip of them going at it and their mom giving a call into the program. He's a really personable guy, we've had him on the Ed Schultz Radio show and the Ed Show on MSNBC quite a bit. So I have spoken with him many times and he was always friendly. He was just a guy I thought has a lot of personality and I would love to sit him down and talk about what's going on right now in politics in the United States. So, we touched on that.We talked about his Origin Story, if you will, he started out thinking he could be a big movie star because he was a theatre major in college. Then he saw Bill Clinton accept the Democratic nomination in 1992. And, it just clicked for him. And he decided to go into politics as his family had in the past. We talk about a lot of things. We obviously re-litigate the 2016 election because you can't sit down with anyone today without doing that. But we also talk about what is important for Democrats to win in 2018 and then moving into 2020. He is very critical of President Donald Trump so we will talk a lot about that. I think it was a really enjoyable conversation. Just a little bit of a heads up. Next week, I have already recorded it, but I sat down with my first sitting United States Congressman, that's an elected official, that's a big deal for me. I go to go into Congress and actually sit down with somebody. I sat down with Kevin Cramer of North Dakota who is in a big Senate race and I speak a lot about that race. In fact, we talk about that in this particular episode of the podcast. Looking forward to that.If you like what you hear, remember to subscribe on Itunes or wherever you get your podcasts so you can get it delivered right to your ears. Would love for that to be the case for you every Thursday when we release new episodes. You can follow on Facebook. Facebook.com/podcastoriginstories or follow me on Twitter @BrentJabbour. Here we go. I'm not going to waste too much more time. It's Brad Woodhouse, Democratic Operative from Protect Our care. Origin Stories: A Podcast About Politics and People, Episode three, here we go!Brent Jabbour:I don't know why, but you were in my building one time and I rode the elevator up with you. And, I have this little anxiety issue, where I can never remember somebody's name when I see them. It happens to me...Brad Woodhouse:That happens to a lot of people. Brent Jabbour:I don't want to be like: "Hey there big guy, I know you." Because I am sure you get that regularly, being somebody television. But, I also, I should know. I immediately got off the elevator and I said: "It was Brad Woodhouse. Damnit!"Brad Woodhouse:Man, that happens to everybody. That being on the spot. And you have that classic brain fart, they call it. Brent Jabbour:I also have this new thing where I've realized that you see somebody and you say hello to them and then you realize: "Oh, now I have to have a conversation with this person."Not that I want to be rude or anything. But, I just wanted to say hello. Brad Woodhouse:It's also that question of whether you make eye contact or not. If you make eye contact it's like: "Hey, hello, how are you?" And sometimes it's just better to not make eye contact. Brent Jabbour:So, you grew up in North Carolina. Your brother is the RNC chair of North Carolina?Brad Woodhouse:So, he's the Executive Director of the North Caroline Republican Party. I guess this is his second full cycle doing that. So, he's been there awhile. Brent Jabbour:Let's how you guys got to be. How did you become a key Democratic operative and he becomes a face of the Republican party in your home state? Brad Woodhouse:Well, the long-ago story for both of us, the origin story, is our parents. They were both very involved politically. They went into politics right out of college. They both worked in state government, in state politics. My father went on, he had a myriad of interests. He was Democratic operative back in the sixties and then he went later to work for Jesse Helms, so complete opposite of how he started. And, just as a citizen, he supported Ross Perot for president in 1992. So, he was kind of all over the map. But, he was very engaged politically. My mom was engaged politically. And, another thing was, they really forced us to be engaged politically and to pay a lot of attention to the news. I knew at a very early age who Walter Cronkite was, who Frank Reynolds was, Eric Sevareid, all of these anchors. The anchors for our local television, we took two newspapers a day, back when there was an afternoon newspaper delivered in Raleigh. So, it was a combination of politics and news. So, I think it was inevitable. My brother, originally he got a degree in journalism. Originally he was a television reporter doing all the types of things television reporters do. And eventually went on to become the public affairs director for the NBC affiliate in Raleigh. And, had the local version of Meet the Press. And, then from that, he left and went directly into politics. Ya know, when I graduated from college I didn't think I was going to go into politics. My first job was with Marriott as a management trainee. It was always in the back of my mind. I had majored in political science. I was watching the Democratic national convention in 1992, I was in Birmingham, AL, I was working for Marriott. And, I saw Bill Clinton's speech and I basically quit the next day and moved back to North Carolina and volunteered for a congressional campaign. Brent Jabbour:I think that is what the interesting thing about the world of politics is. If you're interested in it. You don't have to be a professional in the business in any way. I mean, you grew up in that realm, so you had that background. But, you can be interested in it and something like that can just inspire you to say i might give up the next six months of my life to go knock on doors, sleep in an office where you eat pizza 6 nights a week.So, was your brother always leaning conservative and you were always leaning (liberal)? Brad Woodhouse:That's what's interesting. When I was in college, Dallas was still in High School in North Carolina. Frankly, we weren't particularly close. You know, he did some of the same things in High School that I did. He acted, he did musicals, he was in show choir, and he had an interest in being out there and being a performer. And, that is one reason... I did a lot of that in high school and college. I was a theatre major in college originally. And, politics gives you an outlet for people who are not actually that talented in performing arts to be on the public stage in another venue. So, I wasn't really sure what his political leanings were when he was in high school and early in college. Then, when he got out of college, he was a television reporter, so he played it kind of straight. And, when he took over, he was the host of NBC 17's version of meet the press every sunday, and you began to see his political leanings started to come out. You could see he had this antipathy towards governent and government programs, and people who recieve government assistance, and one thing led to another.But, he was probably in his mid-twenties before I realized he was moving in that direction. And then it became stronger and stronger and stronger. And incidently, the same thing happened to me. I didn't feel real ideoligically inclined when I was in college. I didn't volunteer for campaigns, I wasn't involved politically. I was just as likely to be inspired by George H.W. Bush giving a speech as somebody else. It's kind of incredible, that speech I watched Bill Clinton give, just turned me on. I said I want to do politics, I want to do government, I want to do that type of work. And then all my families connections in North Carolina were on the Democratic side. So, I moved home, and the rest is kind of history. Brent Jabbour:I have a couple of things I want to hit on here. First, on the theatre major thing, what really drew you to theatre?Brad Woodhouse:Well look, I had at an early age had an interest in acting. Probably when I was in Junior High school, I asked my mom to sign me up for acting classes. I did improvisation training. And then, whenever there was a little thing to do, we had a 6th-grade sing-a-long, and they needed someone to play Rudolf and I say: "I want to do that." I just was drawn to it. Like a lot of kids, I thought I was going to be a movie actor. Then I became a Springsteen freak and I wanted to sing Springsteen at a school show. Now, I can't carry a tune. So, that was another reason I couldn't continue as a performance artist. I can't sing. So, I never got the chance to play Bruce Springsteen in High School. But, I was really drawn to it. I had some leading roles in theatre in High School and even in Raleigh Little Theatre, Peace College, I did some work. And, you know I had the opportunity to go to the University of South Carolina as a theatre major. I went to the University of South Carolina the day after I graduated from High School and immediatly started in a summer musical. So, I thought I was going to be an actor. Brent Jabbour:And, I think the question I was really going to ask here... Because I think I felt the same way, which was initially the reason I got into radio initially too, because I thought there could be some... I wanted people to hear my voice. Like you said, it's easy to go into the political or punditry world. Not that you don't need talent. People, by the way, underestimate the amount of talent that people like you have. The people you see on television everyday. Believe me, there are a lot of people who show up one time and don't make it because they don't know how to articulate a thought, they don't have any exuberance. You can see Brad Woodhouse on television for three minutes, and you get a pretty good understanding of who you are, your personality. You have that southern, North Carolina draw, that kind of draws you in a little bit.Also, the reason I came up with this idea is because I think there are a lot of people who see you for three minutes and they make an immediate snap judgement on you and they don't really get an idea of who you are, besides, sometimes I see this blowhard on television, not that you are a blowhard. So, you were inspired by Bill Clinton in 1992, and I think a lot of people in my generation, I'm 34, we got inspired by Obama probably in the same way to get politically active. And I think you can see the paralells between those two, because they motivated people to get out, they motivated people who you see getting involved now because they saw Obama give that speech or Bill Clinton accepting the nomination in 1992. Who is going to be the next person in the Democratic party to inspire the masses to get out and do something. Look, I have spent a lot of time re-litigating the 2016 campaign.Brent Jabbour:I've said it a million times, Hillary Clinton was probably the most qualified person to ever run for the office, but she just didn't know how to connect with the people that way. And, we as a Democratic party clearly need that because we can't seem to motivate people on good policy.Brad Woodhouse:Right, yeah. Well, look it's a good question. I don't think we have seen that moment yet, where we know who that next person is. Politics is all about timing. It could be that the next Democrat who wins the nomination and hopefully becomes president and hopefully denies Trump a second term, may not be that person. It may be the person who is just the best person to defeat Donald Trump. And that might be what inspires the masses in the country, on our side, and among right-thinking independents might be OK, we have to defeat Trump. This is the best person to defeat Trump. It could be that we have that. But, sometimes it skips a generation. You don't have a Bill Clinton or Barack Obama type politician in every election cycle. So, it remains to be seen. Look, I think some of the potential that we have on the bench... People like to say Democrats don't have a bench, you look at the number of really talented people thinking about running for office, either in politics or not in politics. It's really impressive. The bigger problem we have is we may have 20 people on stage at some point. But, Barack Obama we knew after that 2004 speech. It was almost inevitable that... maybe not inevitable that he was going to be President. But, inevitable that he was going to lead a cohort of Americans down some type of path towards change. Because he was so inspiring. He captured so many people's attention. And, the interesting thing about Obama of course, is that all of the lucky, I don't want to say luck he is a talented politician. But all of the breaks he got. He had a primary that fell his way when divorce records came out. He had a general election when more divorce records came out. Remember they had to import Alan Keyes from Maryland to even run against him in the Senate race in 2004. But that speech that he gave in 2004 you knew... He wasn't in Senate a day before people started to speculating when he would run for president. There are other people who have that same speculation around them. Senators who are in their first term for example. But we'll see. No one right now has quite captured that imagination. Brent Jabbour:I think that in that particular situation as well. You talk about these first-term Senators, Kamala Harris is who you are mostly referring to. Maybe Elizabeth Warren, but she is in her second term. Not that I want to downplay those women's roles, but the fact is, they don't have that Pizzaz that Obama had. Obama/Biden is the most charismatic two politicians that I can think of ever been near each other. I don't know if they really did... but they looked... Look, I'm a big optics guy. While I perceive the reality of what things are, I also spend a lot of time understanding most people just see things on the surface level. And, Presidential races are popularity contests. They aren't about who has the best policies, they are about who can whip up the most votes in America. And, I think that those two Senators I love them both very dearly, I love their politics, I just don't think they move the dial in a national election in the middle of the Country. You would think that Obama/Biden wouldn't, but Biden speaks directly to your heart so that helps. And, Obama said all the right things. He may not have been the best in acting as a president to some people on the left, however, he, in my opinion, he knew what to say at all times. I spend a lot of time, I was just thinking about this-this morning. I spend a lot of time pretending with other people on the left that I don't just love Obama and every moment of the 8 years he was president of the United States. Sure, there were some issues I didn't really care for, but the fact is, I can wipe all that away because he was charismatic, he won, and I think most of the time he did the right thing. Brad Woodhouse:Well, I think, he accomplished a lot. He inspired millions of people in this country. His election, obviously, in 2008 was as historic anything that has ever happened in this country politically. And almost anything that has happened in the country period. And he is such a popular ex-president. I think this charisma that he had with Biden, and the relationship they have it's real, it's true. I mean you think about the fact that they still do things together.When Bill Clinton and Al Gore left the White House, it may have been years before they spoke or did anything together. Cheney and Bush, these are business relationships in the White House generally. I think it was a real friendship, there was a real kinship there. I do think that Biden is an inspiring figure for a lot of reasons. His life story. The travails he's gone through. His son, his family. And bringing himself up by the bootstraps. But, I think we are blessed a number of great candidates and we just don't know until we see them. There are so many tests. Their announcement speech. Did they move the dial? Did they move the needle? Did they move people to cheer and tear up? And maybe we take too much stock in that. Look, I think the country might be better off if the person with the best policies did win. But that's not realistic. Policies get you through editorial board meetings. They don't get you elected. Getting elected is a combination of smart policies, but really articulation of the American people are and where you want them to go. A really forward vision. And, I think Barack Obama had that. And it may have been an idealistic vision. It may have been an almost unreasonable vision that the country could come together. Washington could clean up its act. But It's what people wanted at the time. And, it was a reaction to people's antipathy towards both big government and big business. And, he had an opportunity, in the campaign, to fuse those strands of populism and idealism together. Democrats will find that person again. Is it the 2020 cycle? It might be. The true test is not some persons performance at a hearing on Capitol Hill or one appearance on Meet the Press or CNN. It's going to be when they are out there on the hustings. Are they connecting with the American People? Are they meeting the American people where they are and where the American people want to go? I think we are going to have it in 2020. Is it Obama redux or Clinton redux? It might not be. But given where we see this president, where we see his numbers, we see where he is taking the country down this path of divisiveness and everything. I am not sure we are going to have to have Obama 2.0 to win in 2020.Brent Jabbour:The more you talk about this, the more I think if Joe wants to run, he has my full support. Because he does have the charisma. We'll get to see a lot of Obama. Which I always appreciate. But, also, he speaks to the heart of people in the middle of the country. And, I know we've talked about all of this so much since the election. And there are a lot of people on the left who say: "Stop calling them working-class Americans, what you mean is white people who are racists in the middle of the country." No that's not what I mean, I mean people who work for a living. It's easy for people in Washington D.C., who are Democratic operatives, to say: "Oh, you guys are just mad because it was a woman who ran." No, while I think there was a little of that, I actually had a union leader tell me: "Look, I'm around these guys every day, some of them just aren't going to vote for a woman." But we will grow out of that. I mean ten years ago, everybody would have said: "Look, nobody's gonna vote for a black guy." And he became the President of the United States. Look, Hillary Clinton had so much baggage from the Bill Clinton years. When I was a kid during the Bill Clinton years, I didn't know much about it. All I really knew was Hillary was a ball buster. That's not actually true, it's just the impression that you are given. And, sometimes perception is reality...Brad Woodhouse:The Clintons were interesting. Because there was this vicious cycle where they distrusted the press. The press distrusted them. It fed more and more distrust. And then when you put on top of it all of the made up scandals. Travelgate, made up. Whitewater, made up. All of these kinds of made up scandals. And there was no reservoir of goodwill for the Clintons to go to the press because of their distrust for the press and the press' distrust for them. And to get the fairest of hearings. And, I get the resentment that the Clintons have about that. If you look at one of their chief antagonists, who came around to them, David Brock later on. Think about how many things David Brock, funded by Richard Mellon Scaife and those folks, fed into the American distrust of the Clintons that was all phony. It was all made up. Troopergate, Whitewater, all this stuff. And then the President ultimately stumbles into the Monica Lewinsky thing, which is on him. But, there is no reservoir of goodwill with the press to help him out of that, even though he won in the end. And ended his presidency very popular. Hillary had to live with all of that mud, so to speak. Brent Jabbour:Did Obama get away from the whole distrust for the press and everything because he had African American press to go to. I mean, you would always see him on the Joe Madison show, or several other...Brad Woodhouse:There was a healthy bit of (distrust) between the Obama White House and the press. I think that is true of all White Houses. It is a balancing act. Reporters want access. Presidents want unfettered ability to deliver their message. And to be covered. And, you will have a lot of reporters who felt like there was a little bit of heavy-handed tactics from the campaign and the White House. And, they think they should have gotten more access. But, I think given the state of affairs in the Trump presidency, it's been like 20 days since Sara Sanders held an on-camera television briefing. The pendulum has swung so far. In retrospect... And look, I don't think the press ever really had any antipathy toward the President. I think they occasionally felt like his spokespeople, or others, or when I was at the DNC and I was vociferously defending the President and his policies. And occasionally I went over the line in taking on journalists that I felt like were being unfair. So, I think there is a little bit of that that goes on. I think by-and-large the press looks back now on the Obama years and feels like that they had it pretty good. Ya know, Josh Earnest and Jay Carney, all of those people who stood at that podium tried to be fair and represent the President they worked for, but also tried to help the press.And, you don't have that. There is no feeling that Sean Spicer before or Sara Sanders now is trying to help the American people or help the press understand what the President is thinking and what the President is trying to accomplish. They are trying to bully the press into not being critical of this president and not reporting accurately on this president. Brent Jabbour:I'll tell you what. The White House Press Briefings are an hour long campaign ad for Donald Trump. Which, technically any press briefing is such a thing. Like you said, she just attacks the press and all that does is feed into the base and those people who love Trump and say: "See, he's not going to be pushed around by the Washington elite, they're not going to let them lie to me." And they win. The Trump Administration, they win on a lot of different fronts. And right now, I'm concerned about the Democrats, and as we talked about that whole thing about who will pick up that mantle. Who is going to be the next candidate to really move the dial. I think we are going to have a hard time running against Trump. Because, he is going to be able to talk to those establishment Republicans who maybe they don't really care for the Stormy Daniels payoff and everything. But he is going to be able to say several things to them that is going to really work to his base and those people who really voted for him. Number one, he nominated two Supreme Court Justices.Brad Woodhouse:It's the holy grail for a lot of Republicans. Brent Jabbour:Any other president who does that. You could start four wars and your going back...Brad Woodhouse:The truth is, the Evangelicals they could live with Donald Trump sleeping with and paying off 25 porn stars as long as they get Supreme Court Justices that will overturn a woman's right to choose. They could care less about the President's morality. Brent Jabbour:And we are in trouble because I hope RBG can hold on. Because he could literally go on stage when he's running in 2020 and say: "She's not going to make it 4 years, so you better re-elect me." He's got that. You can hate tariffs and all the things he is doing on trade all you want, but working-class Americans, not just white Americans, I mean people who work for a living they see that and say whether it works or not, he tried. Something that the Obama administration never did, Clinton put in a bad trade deal. So it's easy for him to say that. Job numbers are still going up, which is a lot of work the Obama Administration did. And, he may inadvertently negotiate peace on the Korean Peninsula. Brad Woodhouse:Yeah, well that I think is a big if. The backdrop of all that is the Mueller Investigation. The backdrop of all that is still Manafort is getting ready to go on trial again. Some backdrop of all that 2020 discussion is what happens in 2018. Do the Democrats take back the house? Do they maybe take back the Senate? How do they handle that? Do they push for partisan impeachment? Do they just investigate, investigate, investigate and let Mueller finish what he is doing? I think the most interesting thing that I see that could be... Look, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama had horrific midterms. So, we shouldn't overread what happens in November. But, if you look at the polls that are coming out now, Trump's approval rating is down into the mid-to-high thirties. He's even losing his base in that regard. And, his approval rating in some of the reddest states is at 50 percent or below. Now, those are not states that we are going to go and grab those electoral votes in 2020. But, if he's having to chase reliably red states to guarantee those electoral votes in 2020 there is something going to be left on the sideline. Maybe it's Michigan, maybe it's Wisconsin, maybe it's Pennsylvania. Brent Jabbour:Oh Brad, let me tell you why you are over analyzing this. Because we did the exact same thing in 2016. We looked at the same exact situation, we said: "He's not doing enough in Florida that's going to be a Democratic win, he's not doing enough here, he's not doing enough there." Meanwhile, we didn't go to Michigan and Wisconsin. We lost those states and he still won Florida. Brad Woodhouse:I agree one hundred percent. I'm not in the camp that believes Demographics is destiny and we should just follow that path. Or, that the entire solution is in the white working class. It's crazy, it's nuts, Obama didn't build a single coalition to win in 2008 or 2012. Bill Clinton didn't either. You've got to build a coalition of people that see in their self-interest and their inspiration and in their forward-looking vision for the country something in a President that will inspire a Latina woman to vote in Tucson and a factory worker to vote in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania. And, that's what we need. And, this either/or is the craziest discussion. It's also this either the Bernie side or the Clinton side. There is no Bernie side or Clinton side. Right now Clinton isn't running for president, Bernie's not running for President yet. If allow that inner seam warfare to continue then Donald Trump could get elected to a second term.Brent Jabbour:I think what you talk about with that Bernie/Hillary divide. And, I think there is a Bernie Sanders wing of the party, and there is a little wing of the party that is even further left than Bernie. And, i think the problem is... And, I'm going to call you an establishment type, I hope that doesn't offend you. Because I would say I'm a little left of establishment although there were many times when I lived in North Dakota running Ed's radio show for many years and I thought I was as progressive as you get then I moved to D.C. and I realized I may be center-left. But, I think that the people on the establishment side are doing as much damage as the people on the far left Bernie-side are to this conversation. Because, those establishment people are saying: "We're not going to let you run our party." Which means: "We're not going to let you be part of our party. We aren't going to appease you in any way." And there are a lot of things going on behind the scenes at the DNC which I don't want to talk about right now. It's just some nuanced nonsense. But, I just think there is a mutual hatred on both sides of this party for those people. I don't know what the solution in 2018 and 2020 is to kind of bring those two sides together. Brad Woodhouse:Well, first thing in 2018 is to focus on the Republicans. It is not to have an all-out war between various factions of the Democratic party. We've had primaries, and there have been a number of Democratic primaries where single payer was the issue. And single payer advocates won. And there have been other primaries where the single-payer advocate lost. And there are other issues like that that have played out in Primaries. We are almost done with Primary season. What we need to focus on is Republicans, they're in charge. And we need to focus on Republicans. And I say Republicans to the exclusion of Trump. Trump is going to be covered every single day. Trump is making negative news for himself and Republicans every single day. On Twitter, Bob Mueller is driving Trump news, Stormy Daniels is driving Trump news. Democrats need to focus on their Republican opponents and Republican Governance. If you look, people don't like the way Republicans have governed in Congress. They don't like what they did on healthcare. The tax bill is unpopular. Can you imagine? How fucked up are you as a party if you pass a tax bill, a tax cut and it's unpopular. I mean, Republicans couldn't sell Kool-Aid to children if they can't sell a tax cut to the American people. I think those are the things we need to focus on. Inevitably after this election, probably days after this election, we're going to start having a conversation as a party about what our priorities are. And you know what? Good. We'll have that fight. We'll have that argument. It will play out in the 2020 primary for President and maybe it will create a divide that we can't bridge but maybe we will have that person who can talk to both sides. This is not a choice between people who supported Hillary Clinton or people supported Bernie Sanders. In 2020 it's going to be about who can best deny Donald Trump a second term. Brent Jabbour:You made me think because I don't believe there is a "Blue Wave." I don't buy it for a couple of reasons. One, there aren't enough Senate seats up. I think Heidi Heitkamp in North Dakota is in trouble. I think Kevin Cramer can win that seat. I've talked about that a lot, I don't know why. It's the one that really strikes me as the one that will probably go Republican. But I think we will get the Nevada seat. Brad Woodhouse:I'll say this. We've done a lot of work with her and her office. And, she is making healthcare the number one issue in that race. She's a cancer survivor. Pre-existing conditions has exploded as an issue on the campaign trail because the Trump administration decided to weigh-in in favor of this lawsuit in Texas that would get rid of all those protections for people. I'll predict on this podcast that she does win. And, I think she'll win because Kevin Cramer can't explain what he would do to make people's lives better, particularly on health care. And I think she can. But, I'm with you in this respect. A blue wave in the Senate is going to be hard because of the map. The truth is we could very well find ourselves with about the same math as we have now. They could knock a Democrat or two. I think the numbers are showing that is going to be increasingly difficult. The President is going to be a drag, even in some of these red states. But, they could knock off a Democrat or two. But, I think there is a good chance that we win Nevada. And that we win either Arizona or Tennessee. But, the map is daunting. We are defending far more seats. But, I think it will be your definition of a wave. If we sweep out 50 Republicans in the House or 40 Republicans in the House and take some state legislative seats, chambers that we don't have, in advance of redistricting. I mean, I feel pretty good about that. Brent Jabbour:Do Democrats not realize that when they talk about the Blue Wave in the House, do they not understand what Gerrymandering is and what has been done to the map in most states. And I'm glad you mentioned House seats. Becaue, I was going to mention that as well. You know, I have strangely spoke with more Republicans than I have Liberals as I have been recording this thing, more scheduling issues than anything. And, a lot of them say, we are really working in the State Houses because we saw the Democrats doing that. And now we're doing better. Democrats aren't focused on those State Houses. We're not winning those State Houses. You've seen what happened, especially since 2010. We're not doing enough. We need to win those legislatures becuase we need to redraw those lines. Brad Woodhouse:There has been a cascading effect of Gerrymandering. People think of Gerrymandering as the U.S. House of Representatives. Remember, Legislative seats, State Senate seats, and it all ladders up. It is not just about winning. We need to win the House. We need to have Democrats in the House be a check on this President, investigate this President, push strong Democratic policies, even if we have a Republican Senate and a Republican President that won't adopt them. We do need to have an agenda going into 2020. Democrats are never going to maintain power in Congress for long if we don't get a hold of these state legislative chambers. Remember, we have a very undemocratic United States Senate. We've got states, where two Republican Senators represent about as many people as a member of Congress does in a Congressional district. Yet, they have as much power in the Senate as two Democrats who represent 40 million people in California. That's the constitution, that's how the Senate is going to be elected, and how it's going to be portioned. So we can do that in the House. We can do that by winning State Legislative chambers and fighting every bit of redistricting legally, legislatively, administratively, anyway we can to make sure we get a better result in this next reapportionment. Brent Jabbour:I just feel... I'm getting jaded even in the middle of my own...Brad Woodhouse:Well look, there is less going on than we'd like, but there is more going on than has been. We have the Holder/Obama group that is doing legislative redistricting. They have a legal strategy, they have a legislative strategy, they have an electoral strategy. That group, along with the DLCC, along with the work that we're doing. Remember, if we win the House of Representatives a lot of those victories are going to sweep in a lot of people below them. Because the turnout machines for some of these congressional races will far exceed anything that a state legislative or State Senate candidate can do. So, we can't count on that. We have to run races all the way down, down to the ZooKeeper level. We need to elect up and down the ballot. But, there is more going to affect the outcome of State Legislative chambers than we've seen in the past. Brent Jabbour:I just think that we need to get to talk about that. I feel like we try to trick people into doing what we need to do. When, if we simply just said: Hey Democrats in Georgia, in North Carolina, in any state that has a purple opportunity. We can say, hey Democrats there, just so you understand we need you to vote, not just because you love this candidate or you love that candidate. We need you to vote because we need to win, and we need to win this State House so we can make this work for everybody. We say "turn out the vote" and almost try to shame people into voting. Not just we, everybody does. There is no explanation of what's going on most of the time. And, normal people do not have an understanding, normal people, but people who are out there...Brad Woodhouse:They're Busy... People running their lives, they don't pay attention to this every day. And, the thing that you're suggesting is exactly right. We need to constantly have a civics lesson with the American people, particularly those we want to come vote for us, about political power. And, I think for too long Democrats across the country felt like political power resided in the presidency. Ask Bill Clinton after 1994 or Barack Obama after 2010. There is a whole lot of political power that resides in Congress, and those things bubble up from redistricting. From districts that are now more favorable to Republicans. You're right. One of the biggest headwinds against Democrats is the actual districts that we're running in. There are those districts that Hillary Clinton won in 2016. There are enough of them, if you turned every single one of them, to win a bare majority. You want a governing majority. But, you're right, we need a civics lesson to the American people. It is as important for Democrats to control the state legislature in Georgia as it is to control the House of Representatives in Washington. Because they all flow one to the other. Brent Jabbour:Also, the Democrats need to understand 51 Senators ain't going to win you anything. Number one, Republicans will obstruct, we saw that during the Obama administration. Essentially, Mitch McConnell should have been elected President of the United States because he is the one that did the most for Republicans over the last 8 years of his presidency. And, also, we can't always count on Democrats. It's funny, Republicans are now starting to face that now in the House with the Freedom Caucus and they can hold them hostage. Democrats don't do it as heavy-handed. But there are, it's a wide swath of a party, they don't fall in line all the time. So you're going to have people in red states, you know in the Senate it is the Joe Manchin, Heidi Heitkamp, Donnelly, Tester, that you will always have to worry about because they have to worry constituents who are constituents in a red state for the most part. Brad Woodhouse:That's exactly right. Now, look, let's be clear, I'll take 51 Democrats in the Senate over 51 Republican Seats in the Senate any day. The biggest impediment to progress in the event we take back the House and the Senate is obviously a Republican administration. This is looking way ahead. But, if you assume we took back the House and the Senate. You know, Trump's a deal maker. There are a lot of Democrats that will dilute themselves into the notion that they can go make deals with Trump. And, I think Trump is an immoral, illegitimate President. And fuck making deals with that guy. We would not need to help him get re-elected by cutting deals that may be in our favor in the short term and risk that long-term. Obviously, if you take back the House and the Senate you do have to cut some deals because you have to fund the military and keep the government open. Brent Jabbour:While I agree with you to a certain extent about screw that guy why would I want to help him, actually I'm sorry, I can say it. Fuck that guy, I don't want to help him. I don't want you to get the idea that I'm not with you here. But, I think there has to be some sort of governance. Brad Woodhouse:No doubt. But we should just impose our will on him instead of the other way around.Brent Jabbour:Right. The Democrats can give themselves trapped into giving him the wall or something. Brad Woodhouse:Right, give him the wall in exchange for something else. And, I mean that's not the approach we should take.Brent Jabbour:I'd like to go back to you for just a little bit before we wrap up for the hour. So, when you left your job at Marriott and were inspired by President Clinton. What was that road like from knocking on doors to...Brad Woodhouse:I was really fortunate because my parents had been involved in politics and state government since they were in college. I was fortunate, they had some really good people for me to lean on in getting a foot in the door. Look, anybody can make it in politics if they are willing to really gut it out. It helps to know people. The first thing that I did actually. I don't remember my parents having any influence on this. I volunteered for a congressional campaign. David Price was running for re-election in 1992. I got home, it was too late to get involved in the Presidential race, so I volunteered for David Price. He was already in Congress, he had a staff. He didn't have anything for me when it was all over with. So, that same year, Jim Hunt was elected again to his third term, non-consecutive, as governor of North Carolina. My parents knew Hunt, they had been in campaigns with Hunt, but also they knew a very influential State Senator who had a lot of influence over the Governor-elect's inauguration and transition. And, one thing led to another, and I worked in his administration. And, after he had served that first term, and was re-elected for a second, I had a chance to come to Washington and work for Congressman Bob Ethridge who spent seven terms here. Went back in 2001 to work in a Senate race. Erskin Boles ran for United States Senate against Liddy Dole, he lost, but I had the opportunity to succeed a friend of mine who had been Bob Ethridge's press secretary at the DSCC, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Robert Gibbs had been in Ethridge's office, he'd gone on to work on Senate campaigns. Eventually, he made it to the DSCC. He recruited me to do my stint in North Carolina in 02. And then in 03-04 I succeeded him at the DSCC and went on from there. Brent Jabbour:What's it like being seen as a surrogate for the sitting President. Brad Woodhouse:It was a rush. So, I came kind of late in 08 to the presidential game. My wife was pregnant in 2007 when Obama started to run. Gibbs was always trying to get me to go to the campaign. He tried to get me to go to Iowa. Tried to get me to come to Chicago. And, I was running an organization, Americans United For Change at the time. A liberal organization. Biggest claim to fame early on was stopping the President's effort to privatize Social Security. So, I was running this. I was the President of it. It was a multi-million dollar thing. We were neutral, obviously, in the primary. My wife was pregnant. I could never get on the campaign. If I had had an opportunity to go work on the Presidential campaign during the primary itself, I would have worked for Obama. And, after he got the nomination, they asked me to come run the rapid response communications efforts over at the DNC on behalf of the campaign during the general election against John McCain. I got over there and I was nuts and bolts. I was hiring people, getting people out in the field, organizing bus tours, crafting web videos, doing all of the rapid response thing that the DNC is involved in, in a really robust way. And then, somebody asked me one day to go on television. And I was like, What? And, for all I know it could have been Ed Schultz's show, I'm sure it was probably MSNBC. So, it was such a rush. And you start doing it and you don't screw it up. I remember some of the moments. It was 2008, I was on MSNBC, probably with Alex Witt on Sunday morning. And the news broke that Colin Powel was going to endorse Obama. Of course, he was going on Meet the Press to announce it. But, I was just by happenstance the first Obama campaign surrogate on TV to react to it and that was a rush. And then at the end, I didn't know this until later. This is an interesting story, I've never even relayed. I believe it's true, but I heard it second hand. But, the Obama campaign stopped putting any of its surrogates on Fox. And, all of a sudden, I noticed I was doing Fox a lot. Karen Finney, who was Communications Director at the DNC at the time, we were like going down to the studio at the DNC doing Fox and Friends, Shep Smith, we were doing all of the Fox shows. Like, why are we doing so much Fox?We found out after the election, that the Obama campaign just made a decision that they were being so unfairly portrayed on Fox that they just weren't going to do it those last few weeks. That was a whole other thing where you got to be out there and have that kind of platform to yourself as a surrogate. So, there is the rush part of it, which is probably why I was in Theatre, to begin with. The kind of rush you get from being in front of an audience getting kind of instant feedback. And, the other part of it, and this kind of went on as I was in the DNC, and later working for the re-elect in 2012 is you take a lot of crap. I mean, you take a lot of crap. It's also very stressful too. It's very stressful to go on television and know that one misspoken word, one mangled word-salad could hurt the President or hurt the President's chances. Fortunately, I don't think I ever screwed up that badly. But, you do get a lot of incoming. Especially, I got on Twitter in 2010 and just getting killed by these conservatives, Obama haters. Brent Jabbour:It's funny because I have friends who go on Fox and go on a lot of other networks too. But, they go on Fox and they will say I go on MS, I go on CNN, they do some international news here and there. And Honestly, I get positive reaction. And, they are Democrats. And they will go do a Fox hit with Tucker Carleson and they say their voicemail will explode, their office email will get destroyed, their Twitter is just the nastiest, most disgusting things. And just because I am a liberal. And they have told me, I don't mind, Tucker treats me well on the air, but I get hammered by these crazies who are just followers of his. Brad Woodhouse:And you get it. During the height of the election season. I saw less of this in 08 because I wasn't on the campaign trail. But in 2012 and then in 2016 I was running Correct the Record which was a Super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton. I was appearing, basically, as a surrogate, or talker on her behalf. And, that went off the rails. Because all of a sudden, it was nothing like the period where I was at the DNC for Obama's first term, or during the re-elect. I mean, the level of nastiness... And then you know supporters of Trump on 4Chan put all of our addresses out from the FEC report. Our home addresses, our phone numbers. Of course, my phone number was in Wikileaks. And then, you start to really get blown up. So, then, you have these moments where you ask: Is it all worth it? Fuck yeah, it's worth it. I mean I've had death threats on my voicemail. "I wish you would die, and you should crawl off and die." That type of thing. It kind of shakes you up at first. But then you are like fuck this. It's a voicemail. Brent Jabbour:When do you start taking that death threat seriously? I mean, I know people call and they say... They will word it vaguely like: "You should die."Brad Woodhouse:I think you always want to take that type of stuff seriously. Where I think people got a little shook up in 2016 in particular... Never in 2012, I never felt like... I had nasty people on Twitter and voicemail, but never felt unsafe. In 2016, at Correct the Record, we had people doing things to just shake up the staff, because we were so vociferously supporting Hillary Clinton. They would send... You know you can order from the U.S. Postal Service boxes to be delivered to your house and then you paid for them. Well, we had people just getting massive delivery of these boxes to their home. And, it was all meant to freak them out. We had people getting Pizza deliveries to their house. We had a woman who lived out in Maryland who had a nasty note left on her doorstoop. So, some crazy ass person came to her house and left a note. I don't know what the tradition was. I don't know why everytime someone got paid in a campaign their home address had to be on the FEC report, so we just paid people at the office. Of course, it was out there by then. And we took people's names off the FEC report. We took people's names off the website unless it had to be on there. We tried not to release people's cell phone numbers widely to the press unless it was a spokesperson who had to be out there. And we at Correct the Record, at the building on Massachusetts, we hired extra security during the election. We put up extra firewalls for internet security. We know that during that period of time the hacking was going on at the DNC and of John Podesta's emails that there were attempted hackings over there. We don't know the source. But, we can assume, if all this other stuff was going on, that those hackings were coming from the same source. 2016 did more to shake me up, so to speak than 2008 or 2012. The level of nastiness, intrusion, and personal attacks... And then these tactics of things coming to your physical home. Never to mind. This is interesting... This strategy was even discussed on 4Chan, go after the junior people. The senior people have been through this, they know how to handle this. Go after the junior people, freak them out, make them not come into work, disrupt their activity. It was really insidious. Brent Jabbour:Do you expect that to continue. Not just with Trump, but as we move on. I mean, now that people have seen these dirty tactics. Look, probably not the first people in political history to order a bunch of pizzas to a campaign headquarters.Brad Woodhouse:These were going to people's homes. So the signal there is that hey, we have your home address. But, I don't see any end to the level of nastiness of the extremes on both sides. I don't see any end of the nastiness coming from the sitting President of the United States. He got elected dividing the country against itself. He got elected playing the race card, the sex card, everything. So, I have no doubt that that's going to continue. I'm not going to bullshit you and say "oh, I think it will get better." I just don't. I just think we are in a period here where we are essentially in political warfare and it's over the future of... It's not over the future of the country like the direction we will take, whether we have tax cuts or not. It's kind of over the future of our democratic institutions. I mean you have a President who is saying the FBI should investigate someone who submitted a fucking OpEd to the New York Times. It's a police state he wants. And, the people who support him... If the police state defends their interest, particularly what they believe is their birthright for the country to be more like them, and more like the way they look and the way they talk, than the diverse nation that we really are. Then they are going to live with that. And, it's going to be an existential fight. So, I think it's going to stay as nasty as it is. The hope on our side is... I like to believe that when they go low, we aim high. Michele Obama's famous phrase. I would like to believe we can do that and win. I do think, whoever is our candidate in 2020, should not try to out-Trump Trump. We need to be tough on Trump, but we can not divide and win. We have to put together a coalition and win. We can't divide and win. Brent Jabbour:I think we will wrap it right there. I always try to wrap on a solid moment and that one was dire and scary so, we will keep it there. Brad, did you have fun? Brad Woodhouse:Yeah, this was great. And, I'm thrilled. This might be my first podcast. Brent Jabbour:I don't know why I ask everyone if they had fun. Because that is the most important thing.Brad Woodhouse:No, it's great. I enjoy it. I look forward to hearing it and sharing it and lifting it up.Brent Jabbour:Thank you so much, Brad Woodhouse.