Parallax Views w/ J.G. Michael

On this edition of Parallax Views, Creamhound's Walker and Z. Behl joins the show to discuss their TrueAnon-approved, controversy-stirring, and darkly humorous board game Storm the Capitol. Described cheekily as "Insurrection in a Box!", Storm the Capitol allows you to relive the madness of the January 6th Capitol attack as either a MAGA "patriot" that needs to help Donald Trump "Stop the Steal" or a member of the Capitol police trying to stop them. Needless to say, some have been offended by the game, even assuming that it's a pro-MAGA board game. A look at the game, however, reveals that it's a satirical poke-in-the-eye to our politics-as-pro-wrestling media circus spectacle with its darkly, even gallows-esque, sense of humor rather than an endorsement of MAGA or the January 6th insurrection. We'll discuss the game, its mechanics, how it came to be during the days of the pandemic, the reactions to and controversy stirred up by the game, the lameness of moral tut-tutting about the game, the influence of punk rock on the game, and some of the game's jokes about QAnon, MAGA's alleged obsession with Alexandria Ocasio Cortez's feet, indie rockers (cough... Ariel Pink... cough) who participate in the January 6th Capitol attack, the QAnon shaman, and more. Yes, a lot of horrible things happened on January 6th. But it was also a day where a guy dressed in face paint carrying a spear and animal headdress stormed the capitol building. It was like something out of a David Lynch movie. A completely surreal, absurd moment in American history. And there's something darkly comical about that absurdity. Which is what made it perfect fodder for a satirical board game. We'll discuss all that and much more on this edition of the show.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Emily Peterson-Cassin of the Demand Progress Education fund joins the program in the first segment to discuss the landmark decision made in the Google antitrust lawsuit that saw a judge declare that Google is a monopolist. This is a major win for the antitrust movement and those seeking to challenge monopoly capitalism in America. We'll discuss what this means as well as why anti-trust is important for consumers and workers as well as society as a whole. Additionally, we'll discuss the billionaire attacks on FTC chair Lina Khan by billionaires like Reid Hoffman who dislike her antitrust agenda. Recently, Hoffman donated millions to the Kamala Harris campaign and then went on TV to talk about how he'd like to see Khan sacked form the FTC. Supporters of Khan have accused using his status as a mega-donor to curry favor with the Harris campaign in the hopes that a Harris administration will repay him by removing Khan from her position. We'll discuss all of this as well as the work Khan and Jonathan Kanter of the DOJ's Antitrust Division have done over the past four years of President Joe Biden administration. We'll also discuss how Khan, Kanter, and others have inspired a new generation of antitrust enthusiasts that want to break up concentrated corporate power's grip on America. In the second segment of the show, The American Prospect's Macy Stacher joins the show to discuss his article, "Waffle House Workers Challenge the Southern Economy". Waffle House workers are fighting back against ridiculously low, non-livable wages as well as lack of safety at their jobs, wage theft, meal deductions policies, and, overall, labor policies of the Jim Crow-era that have persisted in today's American South. You may have heard about the phenomena of "Waffle House Fights" that go viral on Twitter and garner chuckles in social media, but what is happening to Waffle House workers who face safety risk and a lack of concern from corporate office in Atlanta when it comes to their needs and rights is no laughing matter. We'll discuss how the Union of Southern Service workers are changing all that and the struggles that Waffle House workers like Cindy Smith, who is prominently featured in Macy's article, face regularly. Macy will also explain how the Atlanta HQ of Waffle House locked out protesting workers and threw out their petition. But even with all the grimness of what these workers face, we'll also delve into the successes they've been able to achieve especially in regard to wages recently. All that and more on this edition of Parallax Views.

On this edition of Parallax, "America's angriest political cartoonist" Eli Valley joins the show to discuss his upcoming book The Museum of Degenerates: Portraits of the American Grotesque, available for pre-order now from OR Books, and his savage comics/cartoons that offer biting, scathing, acidic critiques of American political life and public figures like Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ben Shapiro, Joshua Shapiro, Abe Foxman, and many others. Although the focus of this episode isn't on Israel/Palestine and what is happening in Gaza or the West Bank specifically, it certainly lingers in the background and informs the discussion given how Eli's own views on the matter. In this conversation we'll discuss the influence of horror comics like EC Comics' Tales from the Crypt & the pulp-noirs of the 20th century on his cartoon style, Jewish authenticity and the influence of Jewish culture and intellectual thought on Valley's work, the Jewish American radical/progressive tradition, Netanyahu's speech to Congress, the rage that informs Eli's cartoons, right-wing American Jewish public figures aligning themselves with antisemites, the ADL, the role of the grotesque aesthetic in Eli's work, Eli's infamous cartoon lampooning Meghan McCain's appropriation of Jewish identity, Joshua Shapiro comparing pro-Palestinian protesters to the KKK, the Jewish American right-wing vs. Jewish American progressives, misconceptions people have about Eli's work, the disingenuousness of claims that Tim Walz was chosen a Kamala Harris' VP pick over Shapiro because of the antisemitism in the Democratic Party, has Eli paid a price for the approach he's taken to political cartoon (and, if so, has that price been worth it), and much, much more! A sampling of Eli Valley's cartoons. These lampoon, in order, Donald Trump, Ben Shapiro, Joshua Shapiro, and Meghan McCain:

On this edition of Parallax Views, New York University Gallatin School of Individualized Study's Prof. Alejandro Velasco, author of Barrio Rising: Urban Popular Politics and the Making of Modern Venezuela, joins the show to discuss the controversial Venezuela elections and the ways in which analysis of the elections and the modern history of Venezuela from U.S. commentators of the Left, the Rigth, and the Center has proven facile. Prof. Velasco, argues that the picture is more complex than either those on the Right who believe Maduro is being couped by an orchestrated color revolution, those on the Right who believe Biden's easing of sanctions has led Nicolás Maduro to consolidate more power in Venezuela, and Centrists who argue all Venezuela's problems are contingent on the legacy of Hugo Chavez. The recent Venezuelan election resulted in much controversy, with even Chavistas being upset with Maduro and footage of resident of the Venezuelan barrios, the urban streets from which Chavismo have traditionally garnered much support from ordinary people, dissenting after the election results were announced. The election results which led to Maduro being declared victorious are believed by a number of different parties. The Carter Center, for example, has said that the elections "cannot be considered democratic". Protest have erupted in the streets of Venezuela's capitol, Caracas. Given the history of coup attempts in Venezuela, many Leftists in the U.S. and internationally the controversy around this election is actually just U.S.-directed dirty tricks. Prof. Velasco offers a different analysis while also directly addressing the problems with the virulently anti-Chavista elements that lay the blame for all of this on the deceased Chavez. We'll discuss all of this as well as the effect of U.S. sanctions in Venezuela, how Maduro ignored warnings from left-wing economists about how his policies would cause inflation in Venezuela, why Prof. Velasco takes issue with historian and pundit Anne Applebaum's analysis of Venezuela and Hugo Chavez, how this year's election in Venezuela is different than previous elections, the National Electoral Council and the lack of precinct-by-precinct data released in the aftermath of this election, Hugo Chavez's concept of a "socialism for the 21st century", misperceptions about private property in Venezuela, Venezuela's economy and oil, Chavez vs. Maduro, the continuities between Chavez and Maduro and the even more important differences between Chavez and Maduro, material incentives for the Maduro government clinging to power, police raids and discontent in Venezuela, and much, much more.

NOTE: Record 5/29; Released 8/2/24; subject matters deal with history as well as current events that are still unraveling before us now; also Producer's Credits on this episode were recorded in July so if you are a new $10 or above tier subscriber on Patreon you'll hear your producer's credit on the next episode. On this edition of Parallax Views, Paul R. Pillar, a 28-year veteran of the CIA and a non-resident fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, returns to discuss his incredibly interesting book, Beyond the Water's Edge: How Partisanship Corrupts U.S. Foreign Policy. You're probably thinking that's an incredibly academic title that indicates a rather dry survey of how Republicans and Democrats have handled U.S. foreign policy over the years in ways that were more driven by ideological concerns rather than National Security interests. But while Pillar's book is a scholarly examination of those issues, one should not mistake the book for being a boring look at these matters. Which is to say that Pillar exposes all kinds of skullduggery related to how political partisans, especially on the Republican side of the spectrum but also encompassing the Democratic Party as well, when it's come to U.S. foreign policy over the years. Case in point: there's an entire section on the October Surprise. For those unfamiliar the October Surprise was an alleged plot by the Ronald Reagan campaign to pay of the Iranians to not release the hostages of the Iran hostage crisis until after the election in order to sabotage Jimmy Carter's reelection chances. Paul and I will cover that as well as skullduggery related to Richard Nixon and the Vietnam war. And by the end of the conversation, we'll delve into the ideological underpinning of the neoconservatives that made up the George W. Bush administration and pushed America into the Iraq War. Additionally, we'll discuss Donald Trump, Russiagate, George HW Bush's showdown with AIPAC on Israel, how Wilson and FDR dealt with WWI and WWII, Israel/Palestine, and a number of other issues. I won't give away all the subjects we cover because this is one you really just need to listen to.

On this edition of Parallax Views, I was asked by a listener to have a guest on that could offer a critique of Lichtman, who appeared on my show recently, and his model. So on this edition of the program, The Postrider's Lars Emerson joins the show to discuss Allan Lichtman's 13 Keys to the White House model for predicting Presidential elections. The Postrider is a small media outlet run by two American University alumni, but has recently gained some attention for their critique of Lichtman's model. We'll discuss the nature of their critique in this model. Additionally, Lars and I will discuss his writing on the "Rust Belt or Bust" mentality talked about by Democrats during election seasons dn whether this will hold true in coming elections, especially by the 2030s. We'll also discuss the Sunbelt in this regard. And finally, we'll talk about the Postrider's tool for determining what potential Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate would make for the strongest ticket alongside Harris this election. Links: Allan Lichtman is Famous for Correctly Predicting the 2016 Election. The Problem? He Didn’t (thepostrider.com) Letter: Allan Lichtman’s Response (thepostrider.com) Is the Biden Campaign Really Relying on the Debunked 13 Keys to Make This Decision? (thepostrider.com) When Will the Rust Belt’s Electoral Supremacy End? (thepostrider.com) Is the Rust Belt Still the Lowest Hanging Fruit for Biden? (thepostrider.com) The 2024 (Emergency) Democratic Vice Presidential Power Index (thepostrider.com)

On this edition of Parallax Views, Pulitzer Prize winning reporter David Cay Johnston has becomes widely known for his reporting on Donald Trump. He first reported on Donald Trump in 1988 and his since written three books on the former President: The Making of Donald Trump (2016), It's Even Worse Than You Think: What the Trump Administration is Doing to America (2018), and The Big Cheat: How Donald Trump Fleeced America and Enriched Himself and His Family (2022). Before writing those books on the MAGA movement leader, however, David wrote about what he refers to as the "hidden-in-plain sight system we have that takes from the money and redistributes to the very few". Turns out, there's a connective tissue between Davide's books on Trump and his reporting on that hidden system. Namely, David says, Trump is the embodiment of that system. In this interview, David and I will delve into how his books Temples of Chance: How America Inc. Bought Out Murder Inc. to Win Control of the Casino Business (1992), Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich—and Cheat Everybody Else (2003), Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense and Stick You With The Bill (2007), The Fine Print: How Big Companies Use "Plain English" to Rob You Blind (2012), and Divided: The Perils of Our Growing Inequality (2014). We'll delve into Trump's pro-corporate, anti-working class agenda; some of the specific mechanism that have been used to make massive wealth transfer to the rich at the expense of the working class and poor since Reagan; the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025; the Build the Wall charity scam; President Joe Biden, the U.S. economy, inflation, job creation, and wage increases; Trump's views on minimum wage not being pro-worker; Trump's reverse Robin Hood tax policy and tax cuts to the rich; the problem with big mainstream media today and why the legacy media outlets don't intensively cover issues effecting everyday Americans enough; the warping of the campaign finance system since the Watergate scandal; how the donor class became so powerful in the American political system; a history lesson going back to the Civil War through to the Nixon years and beyond on how we got to this moment; the Supreme Court decisions that helped shaped politics in favor of big business; the poverty found in low-tax societies and David's reporting on "hidden taxes" in Singapore; the modern world's need for investments in public infrastructure and the creation of common wealth that benefits all; issues facing the education system today and how failing literacy rates in America are ruining the American political system; China's innovations in education and what it means for America; and much, much more! This is by far the best interview of had with David Cay Johnston.

UPDATE: Intro fixed; made a mistake in editing some of the extracted audio that's used to introduce the first segment. Brief sample from another show that I edited incorrectly and ended up being longer than it was supposed to be. On this edition of Parallax Views, another double feature with two guests. First up, if there's any interview you listen to on my show this week make it this one, folks. David Dayen, executive editor of The American Prospect and author of Monopolized: Life in the Age of Corporate Power, joins the show to discuss his important article "The Corporate Wishcasting Attack on Lina Khan". Lina Khan was apponted by President Joe Biden to chair the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). In this role Khan, alongside the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department's Jonathan Kanter and others, has attempted to take on big tech, corporate power, and monopoly capitol in America. Billionaire LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman is apparently not happy about this because after donating $8.6 million to Super PACs supporting Democratic Presidential candidate Kamala Harris has claimed Khan is “waging war on American business” and pushed for a Harris administration to dump her as FTC chair. Dayen and I will discuss why billionaires like Hoffman are so opposed to Harris and those who support strengthening antitrust laws and their enforcement in the U.S. We'll also discuss what Dayen argues the billionaire anti-antitrust crowd are leaving out about how Khan's agenda benefits working people over corporate profits. Although some reports indicate that Harris is skeptical of Khan's antitrust agenda and may as a result remove her, Dayen cautions that we don't know what a Harris administration will do with the antitrust agenda that has been ushered in by the Biden administration in recent years. Nonetheless, he argues that supporters of the antitrust movement should mobilize in support of Lina Khan now. Recently, a number of organizations, including the AFL-CIO and NAACP, signed a letter in support of Khan. At the end of the conversation we also discuss Dayen's latest article in "The Only Member of Congress Who Has Worked for Kamala Harris" in which he interviewed former Rep. Katie Porter who worked with Kamala Harris about her thoughts on how Harris will deal with big business and corporate interests. In the second segment of the show, the Revolving Door Project's Chris Lewis joins the show to discuss his American Prospect article, "The Dangerous Authoritarian Gunning to Serve as Trump’s Grand Vizier". Chris and I take a closer looks at the figure of Trump loyalist and Christian nationalist Russ Vought, founder of the Center for Renewing America. Vought worked for the Trump administration from the director of the Office of Management and Budget from July 2020 to January 2021. Since then, he has become involved in the saga of the controversial Project 2025. Chris explains Vought's beliefs and rather authoritarian, even anti-constitutional or post-constitutional views on America. Additionally, Chris and I delve into the Project 2025 Schedule F scheme that would allow the President to sack numerous civil servants in various federal agencies to replace them with loyalists. Theoretically, this could lead to cranks with no knowledge in an agency's expertise in key positions they are not equipped to be in. In other words, imagine Infowars' Alex Jones, who has promoted using colloidal silver as supplement to counter coronavirus (despite the dangers of colloidal silver consumption), in a key position at the FDA.

On this edition of Parallax Views, a double feature edition of the show featuring returning guests Eli Clifton and James W. Carden. First up, Eli Clifton joins the show to discuss his article in The Guardian entitled "Netanyahu is presiding over a sharp decline in the US’s pro-Israel consensus". We discuss Netanyahu's speech to Congress and the fact that almost of the Democrats in Congress did not attend. We'll also discuss Republican figures like Sen. Rand Paul and Rep. Thomas Massie introducing conservatives to a more critical/skeptical view of the reigning U.S. consensus on the U.S.-Israel special relationship. It leads us to the question: Will this U.S. consensus change in the future due to fracture in the Democratic Party on Israel over its conduct in Gaza as well as potentially emergent fractures in the GOP over unconditional U.S. support for Israel? In the second segment of the show, James W. Carden, a former advisor to the State Department and a regular contributor to The American Conservative, joins the show to discuss article he recently co-wrote with former Trump appointee Col. Douglas MacGregor entitled "Neoconservatism by Another Name". We'll discuss the movement known as "National Conservatism" that has been backed by prominent figures like Peter Thiel and JD as well as its origins in the form of an Israeli philosopher, Yoram Hazony, who was a youthful admirer of the late far-right wing American-born Israeli political extremist Rabbi Meier Kahane. Carden discusses this from a particular perspective. He himself is a conservative. But he's put off by both the hawkish tendencies of National Conservatism on China and Iran and very akin to that of the Bush-era neoconservatives of the Wolfowitz Doctrine and the Project for a New American Century, and what he judges to be their desires for a "theocratic revolution". He also argues that NatCons would do well to distinguish between patriotism and national, and offers an analysis of why ethno-nationalism, on even simply pragmatic grounds, is a fool-hardy endeavor for conservatives to pursue and would be disastrous in America. Moreover, James will go over the interest NatCons have in Israel and Hungary as a model for their vision of America, and why this will not work for the U.S. We'll also go over what could be described as "Caesarist" tendencies within the National Conservatism and adjacent integralist movements, as pointed out in 2021 by Rod Dreher, and his views on the NatCons interest pushing for, again, what he judges to be a plan for Christian theocracy in the United States.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Israel commentator Ori Goldberg joins me from Tel Aviv to discuss the rocket that hit a soccer field in the Druze village of Majdal Shams within the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Israel has blamed the attacked on a Hezbollah strike. Hezbollah denied being behind the attack. Speculation arose that it was actually due to a malfunction of Israel's Iron Dome. That said, there is evidence that this was likely a Hezbollah rocket. In any case, 12 Druze children perished due to the rocket. At the funeral for the dead children, members of the Druze community protested the presence of Israeli ministers. Meanwhile, a number of Israelis are turning "We Are All Druze Now" into a slogan as fears of a full-blown war between Israel and Hezbollah grow. Ori offers his thoughts on the incident, and makes the case that the deaths of the Druze children was likely accidental based on Hezbollah past history and concerns that any false move could start a war. He DOES NOT deny that Hezbollah conducted strikes. Nor does he seek to deny the tragedy of children being killed. Additionally, he questions/challenges the conspiracy theories arising that this was an Israeli false flag and gives his reasons for believing this is not the case. With that in mind, he cautions against drawing any firm conclusions about whether this was a mistake or intentional until there is further investigation. Ori also argues that this will not lead to a war between Israel and Hezbollah because, in his analysis, neither the IDF or Hezbollah want a full-blown war at this time. In addition to all of this we'll also discuss the death of Mohammad Bhar, a young Palestinian man afflicted with autism and Down syndrome who was mauled by an Israel Defense Forces attack dog and bled out in the aftermath. Moreover, we will discuss the Israeli psyche at this moment, the situation of the Bedouin and Druze minorities in Israel and discrimination against them, the Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People that was passed by the Israeli Knesset in 2018, why Ori believes the Gaza war is slouching towards an inevitable close/end, Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to U.S. congress, post-war Gaza and "The Day After", Netanyahu announcing the he's "postponing" the departure of sick children from Gaza who need life-saving therapy because of the Majdal Shams indecent, the blowing up of Rafah's water reservoir, Israeli hopes of introducing "de-radicalization" into Gazan education post-war, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views we've got a double feature. In the first half hour of the program historian Allan Lichtman of American University discusses his The Keys to the White House model for predicting Presidential election. This model has proven extremely robust at getting election predictions right and is based on 13 true/false statements about the candidates and/or their parties preceding the election. According to the model, "If five or fewer of the following statements are false, the incumbent party is predicted to win the election. If six or more are false, the incumbent party is predicted to lose." We'll discuss a number of issues related to this election including Joe Biden recently dropping out of the election and Kamala Harris becoming the presumptive Democratic Party Presidential candidate. What does it entail for the election? Find out in this conversation with Allan Lichtman! In the second segment of the show, a segment yours truly recorded a few months ago with Ukrainian lawyer Kateryna Busol. In a recent edition of the Journal of Genocide Studies, Busol penned a peice entitled "When the Head of State Makes Rape Jokes, His Troops Rape on the Ground: Conflict-Related Sexual Violence in Russia’s Aggression against Ukraine". We'll be discussing the issue of conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) in relation the Russo-Ukrainian war, the worrying rhetoric of Timofey Sergeytsev's "What Should Russia Do With Ukraine?" that was published in Russian state-owned outlet RIA Novosti, reparations for victims of CRSV, Kateryna's work on destruction of cultural heritage in war, and the importance of applying international law to other issues like the Gaza War.

On this edition of Parallax Views, James M. Dorsey, whose commentaries can be read at his Turbulent World w/ James M. Dorsey Substack, give one of his regular visits to discuss the latest in regard to the Middle East and Israel/Palestine. This time we examine Israeli Prime Minister's visit to Washington D.C. where he gave a speech to Congress that received multiple standing ovations despite the heavy criticisms Netanyahu has come under for both how the war in Gaza has been conducted and the safety of hostages. Pro-Palestinian activist and hostages' families alike protested Netanyahu's visit. We'll discuss all of that as well as James's upcoming book The Battle for the Soul of Islam, the two-state vs. one-state solution, his views on the Confederation solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (and why he believes it looks good on paper, but has obstacles), the calculus of Netanyahu's speech to Congress, what a second Trump term may mean for Israel, the Israeli far-right, the settler movement, land swaps in relation to solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, presumptive Democratic Presidential candidate/current Vice President Kamala Harris and her rhetoric on Gaza, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Palestinian Muslim writer Abdelhalim Abdelrahman, who has written for such publications as The New Arab, The Hill, and MSN, joins the show to discuss Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Washington D.C. to speak to Congress. Netanyahu received a standing ovation from Congressmen and Congresswomen who attended, with the notable exception of Rep. Rashida Tlaib who held up a sign that read "War Criminal". Interestingly, a number of top Democrats declined to intend, including Nancy Pelosi, who called Netanyahu's speech was "by far the worst presentation of any foreign dignitary invited and honored with the privilege of addressing the Congress of the United States". Meanwhile protests raged outside and a flag-burning, which has taken up much media attention, took place. Additionally, Gaza still faces a humanitarian crisis. Palestinians in Gaza face a dire situation, as exemplified by the tragic death of a 24-year old Gazan man named Mohammad Bhar. Bhar was afflicted with autism and Down's syndrome. He was killed last week after bleeding out from being bitten by an Israeli army dog as reportedly screamed "enough my dear, enough" and/or "let go my love, enough". Worth noting as well, is the fact that it was not only pro-Palestinian activists protesting Netanyahu's D.C. visit. Families of hostages also protested, believing that Netanyahu has exploited them for politics and not done enough to secure the hostages from the October 7th. Hamas attack. In other words, there are a lot of matters to discuss in this conversation. Abdelhalim covered all these issues with me as well as: - The Palestinian Authority - The letter Mahmoud Abbas sent to Donald Trump after the attempted assassination on Trump's life and Donald Trump's seemingly warm, positive feelings (at least in past rhetoric and response to the letter) to Abbas - Elements of the American conservative movement moving away from Israel on "America First" grounds - Thoughts on whether Kamala Harris will take a different approach to Gaza and the West Bank than President Joe Biden - Empathetic rhetoric vs. actual concrete policy that Palestinian American want to see - Abdelhalim's thoughts on the plight of the October 7th hostages - The Fatah-Hamas unity deal that was signed in Beijing - Abdelhalim's personal feelings on the Uncommitted movement and his frustration with the Democratic Party - The Occupation of the West Bank and the issues of annexation and settlement expansion - The question of "synthetic" or "artificial" Arab voices claiming to be "pro-peace" or "pro-Palestinian" but demonstrating a deep bias against Palestinians - Hunger and starvation in Israel - U.S. hypocrisy/double-standards on the situation of Palestinians vs. the situation of Ukrainians; Palestinians who express support for Ukraine and Ukrainians who express support for Palestinians - Abdelhalim's point of frustration with Nancy Pelosi's criticism of Netanyahu's speech to Congress And much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, Stephen Semler of the Security Reform Policy Institute joins us to discuss the Biden administration and the Pentagon's $280 million Gaza floating aid pier boondoggle that promised to get much needed humanitarian aid to Gazans who are now facing hunger/starvation during the Israeli bombardment. The pier became operational in May but was shut down this month, July, in what appears to have been a massive waste of time and resources that didn't even help the Palestinians of Gaza. Stephen, it turns out, was warning about the Gaza pier in Responsible Statecraft back in June when he wrote the article "Washington is not telling truth about the Gaza pier". Friend of the show and multi-time guest Kelley Vlahos also warned of the piers problems alongside others. There were logistical issues amongst much else that was criticized. We'll dive into what happened with the Gaza pier as well as discussing PR stunts and "Humanitarian Theater" being played out during the Gaza war, hunger/starvation in Gaza, the U.S. ignoring Human Rights Watch reports when it comes to the Gaza war but not the Russo-Ukraine war, Palestinian American congresswoman Rep. Rashida Tlaib, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Congress, potential Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate Gov. Josh Shapiro and his reaction to pro-Palestinian protests, free speech and crackdowns on protesters, Donald Trump and the American right-wing's hawkishness on China, thoughts on Kamala Harris as it relates to U.S. policy on Israel/Palestine, families of hostages being held by Hamas protesting Netanyahu's visit to Congress, Palestinians being held in Israeli administrative detention, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, freelance journalist Jacob Silverman, co-author with actor Ben McKenzie (TV's The O.C. & Gotham) of Easy Money: Cryptocurrency, Casino Capitalism, and the Golden Age of Fraud, joins the show to discuss his article in The Nation entitled "It’s Official: Silicon Valley Is Fully MAGA-Pilled". With Peter Thiel associate JD Vance being unveiled as Trump's Vice President pick and Elon Musk officially throwing his endorsement to Donald Trump after the attempted assassination of the former President, this topic is timelier than ever. But Peter Thiel and Elon Musk are far from the only Silicon Valley elites to throw their weight behind Trump's campaign. They've been joined by Marc Andreassen, David Sacks, Shaun Maguire, and Joe Lonsdale. In this conversation will discuss why rich Silicon Valley power players are getting on the MAGA train. Amongst some of the topics covered in this conversation: libertarianism and the Silicon Valley ideology, the late David Golumbia's The Politics of Bitcoin: Software as Right-Wing Extremism, corporate tyranny, Thiel associate Curtis Yarvin aka Mencius Moldbug, Mark Cuban's comments about how Silicon Valley's power player may be getting behind trump as a "bitcoin play", America PAC and crypotcurrency lobbying/lobbyists, cryptocurrency-related organizations like Coinbase and Ripple Labs, the crypto PAC known as Fairshake that's interested in "installing crypto-friendly politicians and ousting those the industry views as a threat", JD Vance, Sam Bankman-Fried, right-wing faux populism, the Silicon Valley right-wing's fascination with J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, artificial intelligence, Silicon Valley apocalypticism, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, Ben Burgis, Jacobin columnist and host of the Youtube show Give Them an Argument, returns to discuss a potpourri of topics and revisit his 2022 article in The Daily Beast entitled "J.D. Vance’s Unbelievably Phony Populism". And, yes, we'll also cover Joe Biden dropping out and his apparent replacement in the race, Kamala Harris. Where should the Democrats go next if they hope to win? And what should Democratic Party messaging be as we head into the heart of election season? We'll also discuss the Republican National convention including the circus like inclusion of pro wrestling legend Hulk Hogan and the speech made by Teamsters union leader Sean O'Brien that has sparked much debate. We'll talk the records of Josh Hawley and JD Vance, rhetoric vs. records, fake antiwar sentiments amongst Republicans (and the hawkish elements in the GOP saber-rattling for a war with Iran and China), Biden's immigration record, Gaza, antitrust lawsuit and labor in the era of the Joe Biden Presidency, the GOP's deregulatory agenda and the impacts it'll have on workers, Ron DeSantis' assault on worker's rights in Florida, forever chemicals (PFAS) and Project 2025, Josh Hawley's copyright reform BUT only to target Disney, why JD Vance doesn't support the pro-labor PRO Act and Ben's response to that, the opioid epidemic and deaths of despair, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, journalist Anne Nelson, author of Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right, returns to the show to discuss her piece in The Washington Spectator entitled "Project 2025: The Latest Plot Against America". Nelson gives rundown of what conservative think-tank The Heritage Foundation's 900-page document "Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise" is all about and what Project 2025 entails for worker's rights, LGBTQ+ people, the economy, food safety, the environment, and more if it is implemented during a second Donald Trump Presidency, in full or part. We'll also discuss Nelson's research into the umbrella network of the American right-wing known as the Council for National Policy, a secretive organization that brings together right-wing billionaires, conservative Catholic, evangelical Christian nationalists, and other elements of American right-wing into a formidable network. The CNP was at the heart of her previously mentioned book Shadow Network and offers a glimpse into the American right-wing's machinations and maneuverings since its founding by conservative activist Paul Weyrich and Left Behind author Tim Lahaye in the era of the Ronald Reagan Presidency. We'll also manage to briefly discuss Catholic right-wing movements like the Opus Day and their relationship to the Supreme Court. All that and much more on this edition of Parallax Views!

On this edition of Parallax Views, Amb. Patrick Theros returns to discuss his The National Herald op-eds "Be Careful What You Wish For…" and "Tribe and Clan Wars – Is Proportional Representation the Solution?". At the beginning of the show, however, we discuss the Israeli Knesset's ruling against a two-state solution in the Israel/Palestine conflict. What does it actually mean and entail? We'll also discuss the expansion of settlements in the West Bank, what the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict means for the U.S. and its standing in the world, Israel's lack of a vision for the future beyond war, and related subject. Then, at around the fifteen minute mark, we will turn our attention to United States domestic politics. Firstly, we'll discuss the American two-party system and how the country's tribal war, between a Democratic "blue tribe" and a Republican "red tribe", are actually not an accurate depiction, in Amb. Theros' estimation, of the political landscape. Instead of just tribal war, Amb. Theros argues, we have clan wars. In other words, voters that are only concerned with specific issues fighting for those issues within the two-parties and often feeling dissatisifed within those parties when other factions win greater favor. This has manifested in the Republican Party, Amb. Theros say, in the abortion debate and in the Democratic Party in regard to the pro-Palestinian activists in the party who are upset with the Biden administration's handling of Gaza. We will also discuss the historic Supreme Court decision in Trump v. United States and the unprecedented power it gives to the President. Moreover, we'll discuss how this could come back to haunt Republicans. Finally, we will delve into the issue of Biden's performance at the first Presidential debate with Trump and whether or not he should drop out of the election.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Prof. Emil Draitser returns to discuss his latest book Laughing All the Way to Freedom: The Americanization of a Russian Emigre. Growing up in a Jewish family in Soviet Union-era Odessa, Emil came to the United States in the 1970s and began a new life in America. His previous books Shush! Growing Up Jewish Under Stalin: A Memoir, Farewell, Mama Odessa: A Novel, and In the Jaws of the Crocodile: A Soviet Memoir are a trilogy that chronicles his experiences in both the Soviet Union and the U.S. Laughing All the Way to Freedom continues that exploration of Emil's experiences, specifically as an emigre. What does it mean to be an emigre from another land with a different culture? And when does one truly become American, in a cultural sense, once they've settled in the U.S.? In this conversation we discuss issues that face emigres like culture shock, Russian humor and Emil's appearance on the Merv Griffin show discussing the subject of Russian humor, working as a satirical writer in Russia, the power of humor to soften barriers between people, the Russian bombing of Odessa and Emil's feelings of PTSD over the Russo-Ukrainian war, what does Americanization mean and what is the road to Americanization, mass emigration from the Soviet Union and the parallels with the biblical story of Exodus, how Americans born of Russian descent view America and the differences between their understanding of America and their parents' understanding of America, America's core values as understood by a Russian emigre, the concept of freedom and law in relation to both America and Russia, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, former Navy journalist and ex-debt collector Jerry Ashton joins the show to discuss the End Veteran Debt campaign. As previously mentioned, Jerry was a debt collector, but Occupy Wall Street changed all of that. Inspired by the Occupy movement, Jerry went from being a debt collector to a "debt for-giver" and helped co-found the RIP Medical Debt (now known as Undue Medical Debt) 501 charity. Now he's turned his attention to the issue of veterans' debts. Believe it or not many veterans from the U.S. armed forces face debt struggles and the VA is unable in many circumstances to provide all that it can for them. As such, Jerry and other have started what they call "Operation D-Day". Not D-Day as in WWII, however. But rather Operation Debt Day to help veterans with their debts. Find out all about it on this edition of Parallax Views!

For those that don't know, Parallax Views has a monthly (sometimes bi-monthly) Patreon exclusive show known as the Parallax Vlog, a crossover show between Parallax Views and Youtube's Varn Vlog, in which C. Derick Varn and I discuss current events and culture. As I've been under-the-weather from a case of food poisoning, I thought I'd offer a preview of the Patreon content by publishing the opening segment of the latest Parallax Vlog in which Derick and I discuss Project 2025, my interview with Adolph Reed, and the upcoming U.S. Presidential election. We'll get into Derick's thoughts on Project 2025, the failures of the Democrats when they're in power, the judicial coup we've seen take place in the U.S., and much, much more. Check out the full show (which will be released in the next day or so) at: https://www.patreon.com/parallaxviews

On this edition of Parallax Views, activist, organizer, academic, and political commentator Adolph Reed, an American professor emeritus of political science at the University of Pennsylvania, joins the program to discuss his article for The Nation entitled "Why I’m Voting for the Enemy". Reed has been a longtime critic of the mainstream or corporate wing of the Democratic Party and its embrace of neoliberalism. He was a rather vocal critic of Barack Obama. And he hasn't been afraid to vote for third party candidates like Ralph Nader in the past. As such, he cannot be accused of always towing a strict "vote for the lesser of two evils" line that other Leftist intellectuals like Noam Chomsky & Howard Zinn have sometimes been criticized as promoting. However, in 2016, Reed penned a piece entitled "Vote for the Lying Neoliberal Warmonger: It's Important" during the tumultuous Presidential election. In that op-ed, Reed outlined why he was voting for Hillary Clinton. Needless to say, the article was a bit provocative for elements of the Left that have sought a break from the Democratic Party. Although Reed has likewise been critical of the Democratic Party for many of the same reasons given by those elements of the Left, he nonetheless viewed Donald Trump as a severe, perhaps even existential, threat that needed to be defeated. The same sentiments can also be found in the more recent The Nation piece Reed penned about the 2024 election. In this conversation we'll cover a number of different issues including electoral fetishism in both its mainstream and Left-wing variants, the need for politics and organizing beyond the electoral realm, the working class and the professional managerial class, the pro wrestling concept of "kayfabe" and why it interests Reed as a political scientist, The Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 (or the Presidential Transition Project) and what it indicates about a second Trump Presidency, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, journalist Albert Lanier, a multi-time guest on the show, just started a Substack called The Final Cut. This new venture from Lanier is a return to his roots. Although he's become known, especially to listeners of this show, for his thoughts on true crime cases and politics, in a previous life he was a film critic/movie reviewer. He even contributed to Ain't It Cool News! And over the years he had an opportunity to meet Hollywood players ranging from Nancy Kwan to Roger Corman. In this conversation, Lanier and I will discuss his work writing about cinema and his experiences going to film festivals. But we'll also discuss his thoughts on the state of the movie industry and the state of film criticism as well. In particular, we will look at the decline of film criticism and what phenomena such as film-focused, anti-woke, culture war Youtube channels have on film criticism as well as the impact of Movie Tok on film criticism and how we understand and appreciate cinema. We'll also discuss the cycles of the film industry, the importance of overseas markets to Hollywood, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, in 2009 a documentary came out entitled Defamation. Directed by Israeli filmmaker Yoav Shamir, the film sought to explore the phenomena of antisemitism, the perceptions of what is an isn't antisemitic, the question of whether criticism of Israel is the same as antisemitism (or, in the words of many Israel supporters "The New Antisemitism" that seeks to dress hatred of Jews up in a critique of Israeli and its policies), and related issues. The genesis of Defamation begins with Shamir's previous documentary, the equally controversial Checkpoint. Checkpoint took a "fly on the wall" approach to examining the interactions between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian citizens along the border of the occupied territories. Despite the cinema verite fly on the wall" approach of the film, some felt that it painted a slanted, negative picture of Israel that in turn led to accusations that Shamir was the "Israeli Mel Gibson". Gibson, of course, had at that point been known for having an antisemitic outburst after a DUI arrest and, before that, his 2004 film The Passion of the Christ was heavily criticized as promoting hatred of Jewish people in its depiction of Christ's death. Yoav Shamir, was surprised that anyone would call him the "Israeli Mel Gibson". He also had not experienced antisemitism himself as someone who lives in Israel. So he ventured out to embark on a journey that would take him from the Brooklyn neighborhood of Crown Heights, where race relations between Jewish and Black residents have long been troubled, to Ukraine and even Poland. He met with the Anti-Defamation League's Abe Foxman and was given unprecedented access to the Anti-Defamation League's office where he got a rare inside look of their operations. Additionally he spoke Jewish academic and noted critic of Israel Norman Finkelstein and the international relations scholar John Mearsheimer, who alongside Stephen Walt co-wrote the book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. And he went with a group of young Israelis to a state-funded trip to Israel in which teenaged Israelis learn about the horrors of the Holocaust in Poland. What Shamir's documentary shows, however, is up for the viewer to decide. From Shamir's purview, victimhood narratives are holding Israel, and perhaps even the Jewish people more broadly, back. However, his documentary nonetheless paints a poignant picture of all its major players and humanizes all the participants from Abe Foxman to his polar opposite Norman Finkelstein. There's moments of the film that are dramatic, but also uneasy moments of what can only be described as comedy or farce, such as when two young Israelis on the Poland trip mistakenly assume that the Polish men they approached in the street were calling them cuss words (it turns out the men simply did not know the Hebrew language and were trying to explain they didn't understand them). It's hard to describe in both the written word or even a podcast what Defamation documents. As such it is highly recommended that either before or after this podcast you view the whole documentary at Yoav Shamir's Youtube channel. You can also watch Yoav's previous documentary Checkpoint on his Youtube channel as well and that too is recommended. At the end of the conversation, we speak a bit about Yoav's latest documentary The Prophet and the Space Aliens about the Raelian UFO cult and discuss Elon Musk's retweeting of Defamation and get Yoav's thoughts on antisemites that have sought to use the film for their own agenda. We'll also discuss strife in Israel amongst it's inhabitants beyond the Palestinians. In other word: Mizrahi vs. Ashkenazi Israelis, etc. There's a lot of ground covered in this discussion and hopefully it supplements Yoav's documentaries well.

On this edition of Parallax Views, investigative journalist Ken Silverstein returns to the show hot off the major story he broke for The New Republic last week: "Off Leash: Inside the Secret, Global, Far-Right Group Chat | The New Republic". Ken has blown the lid off a secret chat group created by Erik Prince, the founder of the controversial private military company Blackwater, that includes a who's who of influential figures of the global right-wing including Congressman Ryan Zinke, Congressman Mark Green, Tucker Carlson, Gen. Michael Flynn, and many others. Silverstein's reporting on this provides an insight into where a number of major figures, including some with intelligence and military connection, stand in 2024 behind-closed-doors on issues ranging including Iran, the Israel-Hamas War/Gaza War, Israel/Palestine, MAGA vs. the Democratic Party, U.S. foreign policy, and much, much more. He's found communications that reveal what friend of the show, American Conservative contributor, and Senior Advisor at the Quincy Institute Kelley Vlahos describes as a "batshit crazy chat group that includes Erik Prince, Lara Logan, and every rightwing grifter, politician, influencer, ex-military psycho" that want to "nuke, napalm, and 'take out' everyone." There was even discussion in the group of rounding up the American right's domestic enemies for Nuremberg-style tribunals. And, on the U.S. foreign policy front, there were calls for covert assassination of political leaders from countries seen as adversarial to the U.S. There were even inclinations in the chat group towards the idea of using nuclear weapons against Gaza. There's also some opaque discussion of Erik Prince having "the right people in place" to deal with Iran, which many of the members of Off-Leash have hawkish foreign policy views on, and some rather interesting discussion pertaining to the plane crash that killed Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. Talk of the need for a MAGA "revolution" and fighting against a cabal of Marxists, Islamists, and globalists that many members of the chat view as destroying the U.S. and Western civilization are also prominent in the communications that Silverstein uncovered. We'll discuss all of this and much more in the conversation, but its highly recommended you consult both Ken's original report on this for The New Republic AND his Washington Babylon Substack which will be covering this further going forward. You'll also hear us discuss Donald Trump and domestic repression, Russiagate, the RFK Jr. connection to Off-Leash, Ken's thoughts on President Joe Biden vs. Donald Trump, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, recorded in May, a lengthy, almost 3 hour conversation with Yakov Hirsch. You can Yakov's writings at his new Substack here. Although Hirsch is perhaps best-known as professional poker player, he has in recent years began commenting on the psychology of what he calls "Hasbara Culture". Hasbara, for those unfamiliar, is more or less a term that means propaganda and apologia for the state of Israel. Hirsch's concept of hasbara culture, however goes far beyond that. He argues that prominent commentators in the U.S. like Bari Weiss, Eve Barlow, Brett Stephens, and The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg have come to internalize hasabara so much that it has become a culture, a mindset, an identity in and of itself that distorts reality in ways that are harmful to not only Palestinians but also Jews, both in Israel and abroad. Hirsch's thinking on these matters first came to prominence through and article he wrote for Tablet Magazine entitled "Hasbara Culture and the Curse of Bibi-ism". Although Tablet is a generally understood as a right-wing and adamantly pro-Israel publication, it nonetheless viewed 's commentary and thoughts on the concept of hasbara culture relevant and important. Hirsch argues that his examination of this hasbara culture is not about left-wing vs. right-wing or even pro-Israel vs. anti-Israel but instead an attempt to look at a phenomenon that is denying ground-level realities in favor of an alternate reality that exists only in the minds of its proponents. Among the topics discussed in this conversation are Benjamin Netanyahu as the embodiment of hasbara culture; sacred macho victimhood and victimhood discourses; Anti-Antisemitism; the Daniel Goldhagen vs. Christopher Browning debates on the Holocaust (Goldhagen's Hitler's Willing Executioners vs. Browning's Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland); Hannah Arendt and the trial of Adolf Eichmann; cognitive empathy and how it is shut down by hasbara culture; the ideology of hasbara culture; the Gaza War and Israel/Palestine; "Never Again" journalists; the "real world" vs. the "separate reality" of hasbara culture; the concept of betrayal in hasbara culture discourse; the Iran nuclear deal and Bibi-ist ideology; John Kerry's warning to Israel about needing to understand the perception of Palestinians; Peter Beinart's The Crisis of Zionism and the significance of Beinart's witnessing the tears of a Palestinian child in the West Bank crying out for his father; the pro-Palestinian protests happening across college campuses; hasbara culture's cultivation of narratives and tactics of agitation; Bill Maher vs. Bill Burr on Hamas, the Gaza War, and the youth; serious people vs. unserious people; the significance of Israeli politician Yair Golan; Ehud Barak's comments on Palestinians and how he'd probably have been a terrorist if he'd grown up as a young Palestinian; Netanyahu's holy war and the coming Jewish schism; pro-Netanyahu demonization of Barack Obama; "us vs. them" mentalities and narratives; the October 7th Hamas attack; the ADL's response to the BDS movement; the question of irrational hatreds vs. legitimate grievances; the "Whataboutism" arguments of hasbara culture discourse; the attacks on Jewish studies culture Derek Penslar, the embattled co-chair of the Harvard's antisemitism task force; the Israel lobby; the IHRA working definition of antisemitism; ethnocentricity and ethnocentrism;

On this edition of Parallax Views, Rutgers University's Director of the Center for Security, Race, and Rights, Sahar Aziz, returns to the program to discuss the recent House Committee on Education and the Workforce hearings on antisemitism and why they resemble something more akin to the McCarthyite witch hunts of the House on American Activities during the Cold War than an honest effort to combat antisemitism. These hearings, she argues, are more about shutting down political criticism of Israel than fighting antisemitism. We'll also delve into some of the key points covered in Sahar's book The Racial Muslim: When Racism Quashes Religious Freedom and discuss the Islamophobia-industrial complex that's especially been prevalent in America since 9/11 and the Global War on Terror. Moreover, Prof. Aziz will offer her thoughts on the Anti-Defamation League, which has received harsh criticism in recent years with Jonathan Greenblatt at its head, and its activities against pro-Palestinian and Arab American political activists. Most importantly, however we focus on how the House Commitee on Education and the Workforce investigations into antisemitism, which involves figures like Rep. Elise Stefanik and Rep. Virginia Fox, have attacked the Center for Security, Race, and Right as well as academics like Noura Erakat and Juan Cole. Sahar will address some of the allegations made by the House Commitee against CSRR and delve into how this is connected to broader Republican Party efforts to tamper down academic freedom and discourse (ie: how it connects to GOP attacks on DEI and CRT, right-wing promotion of book-banning, etc.).

On this edition of Parallax Views, Israeli investigative reporter Meron Rappaport joins the show to discuss a MAJOR story he helped break last week with 972 Magazine, Local Call, and The Guardian: Israel's Covert War Against the ICC. According to the bombshell reporting Meron and others have done, Israel has engaged in a nearly long surveillance program against the International Criminal Court. Surveillance was aimed at both current chief prosecutor and his predecessor Fatou Bensouda. Additionally, Palestinian human rights groups like Al-Haq, Addameer, Al Mezan, and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) were targets of surveillance and there are connections to the controversial and scandal-besieged Israeli private cyber-intelligence firm NSO Group's Pegasus spyware to this story. This story includes allegations of illegal activity, intimidation, and blackmail. Read the story HERE: Surveillance and interference: Israel’s covert war on the ICC exposed We'll discuss a numbe of issues-related to this story including how figures at the highest-levels of Israel's government, specifically Benjamin Netanyahu, figure into the surveillance program as well as the military (ie: IDF) and intelligence services (ie: Shin Bet) tie into it as well. Moreover, we'll look at how Israeli officials were initially enthused about Karim Khan taking over as chief prosecutor at the ICC until "everything changed" with the October 7th Hamas attack and the Gaza War. At the beginning of the conversation Meron will give his thoughts on the state of the Israeli free press in light of the recent attack on Haaretz's Tel Aviv headquarters where the main doors of the HQ's entrance were smashed. In the final portion of the conversation Meron discusses the Land for All movement that he helped cofound which offers a Confederation approach to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Many argue that the Confederation approach amounts to a push for a de facto one-state solution, but figures like Dahlia Scheindlin as well as Meron argue that it is actually a two-state solution for the 21st century that addresses the failures and missteps of the Oslo generation. All that and more on this edition of Parallax Views.

On this edition of Parallax Views, longtime California-based progressive activist Mirvette Judeh tells the story of her only political journey and how she and a group of activists scored a victory for the the #CeasefireNow movement that is seeking to make calling for a ceasefire in Gaza a priority in California Democratic Party politics. Mirvette recently penned a piece that appeared in Antiwar.Com entitled "Our Fight To Get the Democratic Party To Call for a Ceasefire in Gaza" in which she chronicles how the fight to get proper recognition of the Palestinian plight in a call for ceasefire resolution. We'll also discuss Mirvette's experiences as a Palestinian, her family's experiences under the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, what "Free Palestine" means for her and what she wants for the Palestinian people, her experiences at the UCLA encampment and what she witnessed there, the "Progressives Except for Palestine" problem, antisemitism, anti-Palestinian racism and Islamophobia, the brutal nature of Israel's assault on Gaza and the cultural destruction it has wrought on Palestinian society, the importance of speaking to Palestinian voices, settler violence in the West Bank and pogroms against Palestinians in the West Bank, feelings of being portrayed by fellow Democrats who she's worked with over the years when it comes to the past 8 months of Israel's assault on Gaza, why she doesn't refer to what's happening as the "Gaza War", land theft and resource access in Israel/Palestine, Rashida Tlaib and other politicians standing up for Palestinians at this moment, problematic language in the original ceasefire language that Mirvette and other activists fought to change, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, are major US officials like National Security Spokesman John Kirby, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, and Sen. Ted Cruz throwing US military veterans under the bus in an attempt to excuse Israel's conduct in Gaza? This became a question for some after John Kirby said "We did it to" in Iraq and Afghanistan in response to a question about Israel's conduct in Gaza. In the first segment of the show, The Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft's Kelley Vlahos returns to the program to discuss her piece in The American Conservative entitled "‘We Did It Too’: The Ugliest Excuse for Israel ". Kelley interviewed military veterans like Ret. Col. Douglas MacGregor and Ret. Lt. Col. Daniel Davis to get an idea of what men who served in the armed forces may be thinking of the statements being made by Kirby, Milley, and others about Israeli military conduct and comparing it to US military adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan. We'll also discuss the $320 million dollar boondogle that was the Gaza pier project and how that's ended on a rather sour note. In the second segment of the program, James R. Webb, son of Sen. Jim Webb and a former combat veteran in the Iraq War and Marine service infantryman from 2005-2010, returns to offer his own commentary on Kirby's comments, the Gaza war, reports of Israeli soldier's taking lewd pictures of themselves posing with stolen Palestinian Gazan women's underwear, the nature of atrocities and how they happen in warfare, lack of discpline as a driving factor in atrocities, the slogan that "Israel is the most moral military in the world" above and beyond the US military, Benjamin Netanyahu's lack of strategy in the current war, how atrocities and mass civilian casualties can create future security threats/terrorist threats, the IDF, Jim's experiences in Ramadi, a rather funny anecdote about Jim's father's reaction to the Rambo movie sequels, misperceptions about American military veterans, Fallujah and use of excessive force/brutality in war, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, a MASSIVE, wide-ranging conversation with Hussein Ibish, a Senior Resident Scholar at The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington and a contributor to publications like The Atlantic and the UAE's The National, that delves into the history of the Israel/Palestine conflict and where it is headed. We go through the diplomatic failures, the formation of Israeli and Palestinian national identities, the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush era efforts to bring about a political solution, the 2000 Camp David Summit and its controversies, the ongoing Occupation by Israel of Palestinian territories since 1967, the BDS movement and why Hussein considers "Divestment" to be where activists should focus their energies as opposed to "Boycott" and "Sanctions", the two-state solution vs. the one-state solution, riparian rights (ie: issues related to water) concerns related to a two-state solution, the rise and fall of the American Task Force on Palestine, Condoleezza Rice's forgotten approach to Israel/Palestine in the Bush years, Elliot Abrams and how pushes for a two-state solution have been diminished by shifting focuses of administrations over the years, Israeli and Palestinian competing narratives over 1948 (for one it meant independence; for another it meant destruction and the "Nakba" or "Catastrophe"), Hamas and the psychology of rage in Gaza, the Israeli operation in Rafah, cycles of violence, Israeli obstinance and the one-state reality, Benjamin Netanyahu and the Likud Party, the Gaza War, terrorism and how Israel's current approach is creating a recruitment boom for Hamas, the power asymmetry in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), the potentially for explosive violence in the West Bank to lead to an ethnic cleansing campaign, Hussein's close friend the late Christopher Hitchens and Hitchen's stance on Palestine, and much, much more. A note that this was recorded on 5/29/24.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Osgoode Hall Law School of York international law scholar Prof. Heidi Matthews joins us in the first segment to discuss the ICC (International Criminal Court) and its announcement that it will seek arrest warrants for Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's Minister of Defence Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leaders like Yahya Sinwar in relation to the Gaza War. We get into the nitty gritty of what this means for Israel/Palestine and discuss issues such as genocide, war crimes, the breaking news that Israeli intelligence has been engaged in a nearly decade long covert war against the ICC, the massacre in Rafah, international humanitarian law and international criminal law, and much, much more. In the second segment of the show, Quincy Institue for Responsible Statecraft intern Brett Heinz joins the show to discuss his Responsible Statecraft piece "Foreign bribery in Congress: 'The way business is done'?"as well as the Quincy brief he co-wrote with Ben Freeman entitled "Subsidizing the Military-Industrial Complex: A Review of the Secretary of Defense Executive Fellows (SDEF) Program". Recently, two Congressmen, Rep. Henry Cuellar and Sen. Bob Menendez, were indicted on charges of foreign bribery. But that's only the tip of the iceberg, argues Brett Heinz. We look at foreign bribery scandals from Koreagate to Abscam up to the present day and Heinz offers insight into what is needed to combat this problem in the halls of Congress and the political system in America more broadly.

On this edition of Parallax Views, the Uncommitted movement, which seeks to push Democratic voters to vote "Uncommitted" rather than "Joe Biden" in the Democratic primaries over Biden's policies on Israel/Palestine and the Gaza War, has been in the news lately alongside the student encampments and Gaza War protests. The movement has garnered much criticism, but what's it all about? Uncommitted New Jersey's Elektra Kostopoulou and Rutgers University graduate and student encampment participant Kale Yost joined me on this edition of the show for a free-flowing dialogue about the Uncommitted campaign and the student encampments that are in making headlines.

On this edition of Parallax Views, the Middle East Institute's Geoffrey Aronson returns to the program to discuss his Responsible Statecraft article "There is no 'plan for Palestine' because Israel doesn't want one". Also relevant to this conversation is a piece I HIGHLY RECOMMEND reading that Geoffrey wrote for his Substack entitled "The Second War for Palestine". Elements of that Substack piece are covered here, but there's more in there that we couldn't get to in our time together. The majority of this conversation deal with the United States under the Biden administration's talk of the needs for a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict with the creation of a Palestinian state, presumably administred by the Palestinian authority. Problem is, according to Aronson's analysis of the history, that Israel doesn't want that. Thus U.S. talk of the "Day After in Gaza" scenario becomes irrelevant because Israel, whether under Benajmin Netanyahu or a potential successor like Benny Gantz, is not interested in the advice the U.S. is offering. We will also delve into Israeli strategy since 1967, with a particular focus on the words and thinking of the late Foreign Affairs Minister of Israel Moshe Dayan. We'll talk about the failure of the Oslo process, how the day after in Gaza looks like both today and yesterday, the "Three Wars" Israel is fighting right now, the West Bank, strategies of management vs. seeking a long-term solution, Islamist movements like Hamas and the strategy of dividing Palestinians, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Israeli commentator Ori Goldberg, who has become well-known since the Gaza war began for his criticisms of Netanyahu and the state, or mindset, of Israeli society since October 7th. In a previous life he was a Middle East scholar who specialized in studying Iran. We start the conversation off with that as Ori gives his thoughts on the death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and comments on the adaptability of the Islamic Republic in face of crisis. From there we shift to a conversation about the state of Israeli society today. Before October 7th much was made about the internal divisions in Israeli political life that has been summed up as a battle between a secular state of Israel vs. a religious state of Judea embodied by the far-right coalition created by Benjamin Netanyahu. Then the Hamas attack of October 7th happened. And in Ori's estimation it has led to a surfacing of something almost mythical in regard to the Israeli identity. In the course of our conversation Ori attempts to articulate the mindset that and structural make-up of Israeli society and the Israeli psyche. This leads us to a discussion of supremacist beliefs in Israeli society and how Israel sees itself in relation to the world. He argues that his country must go through a reckoning and transformation for a viable future. But he does not argue this from the frame of a mundane political analysis. Rather he seeks to offer what he believes is an intimate and intense portrait of Israel at this moment. Ori will also offer his thoughts on the dehumanization of Palestinians in Israel and how the process dehumanization degrades and dehumanizes even the perpetrator of it. Finally he comments on his statement that, in Israel, "Palestinian blood has become cheaper than air." Ori paints a grim picture of where Israel is at as a society, but maintains that he is optimistic about change and transformation.

On this edition of Parallax Views, noted Dutch-Palestinian Middle East analyst and Jadaliyya magazine co-editor Mouin Rabbani took time out of his busy schedule to discuss a number of topics related to the Gaza War and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict more broadly. We begin the conversation by delving into the news of the International Criminal Court (ICC) seeking arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Israeli leaders as well as Hamas leaders like Yahya Sinwar. From there we branch out into a discussion of Mouin's contribution to the recent OR Books anthology DELUGE: Gaza and Israel from Crisis to Cataclysm. In this regard, Mouin delves into the regional dynamics at play with regard to the Gaza War and argues that the often-repeated analysis that Hamas committed the Oct 7th attack in order to sabotage Saudi-Israeli normalization is in fact wrong. He'll also discuss his analysis of what he believes were the motivations behind the Oct 7th attack. Additionally, Mouin and I discuss the issue of propaganda and how to cut through it when examining the Israel/Palestine conflict, the two-state solution's feasibility, prerequisites for a long-term solution to the broader conflict, Israel's us of artificial intelligence in warfare, the Palestinian Authority's Mahmoud Abbas as an obstalce to ending Palestinian divisions, and more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, the University of Connecticut's Prof. Jeremy Pressman, Director of Middle East Studies at UConn and author of The Sword is Not Enough: Arabs, Israelis, and the Limits of Military Force, joins the show to discuss the myths of the 2000 Camp David Summit and Taba talks. During recent appearances in media programs such as Morning Joe w/ Joe Scarborough, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton brought up the old trope that "the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity" that is often invoked when discussing PLO leader Yasser Arafat and the 2000 Camp David Summit. This is used to say that Arafat failed the Palestinian people and "rejected an offer". It's also a talking point used to justify use of military force rather than pursuing a political solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict. It forecloses on the possibility of a diplomatic solution or peace being achieved by saying the Palestinians are "not ready" for peace. Prof. Jeremy Pressman wrote a researched, footnoted piece entitled "Visions in Collision: What Happened at Camp David and Taba?" that pushes back on this oversimplified narrative of the Clinton-era diplomatic negotiations between Israel and Palestinians. We'll dig into all the different areas of the 2000 Camp David Summit as well as dealing with the pre-history of it, specifically the Oslo Accords and the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. We'll also compared Camp David to the Abraham Accords, cycles of escalatory violence, land swaps and the two-state solution, the Confederation model and the arguments against the two-state solution, the power asymmetry between Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. concessions made by the Palestinians in negotiations, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Prof. Joel Beinin joins the program to discuss his July 2023 972 magazine essay "A century after its founding, the Israeli Communist Party is at a crossroads". In said essay, Prof. Beinin gives a history of Communism and the Communist Party in Israel/Palestine that offers an insight into how the Left dealt with issues such as Zionism, anti-Zionism, Arab nationalism, partition, imperialism, and colonialism as they related to Israel/Palestine and the Middle East during the 20th century. In our conversation Prof. Beinin will give a history on the Communist Party in Israel/Palestine that delves into the splits between Palestinian and Israeli in this history as well as how the Soviet Union, the Cold War, the aftermath of the Holocaust, Egyptian President Abdel Nasser and Arab anticommunism, the formation of Hadash (The Democratic Front for Peace and Equality) in Israel, the Suez Crisis of 1956, the Communist Party successful mobilization against Israeli Minister of Agriculture Moshe Dayan's proposed Consolidation of Lands Law in the 1960s, and more. We'll also discuss the failings of the Communist Party in Israel/Palestine and the lessons that can be gleaned from those failings for the Left today in regard to Israel/Palestine.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Leila Hilal, an international human rights lawyer and the former co-director of the New America Foundation Middle East Task Force, joins the show to discuss her experiences as an advisor to Palestinian negotiators, Israel/Palestine, Israel's assault on Gaza, the situation in the West Bank and settler violence, misunderstandings about UNRWA, the U.S.'s refusal or inability to reign in Israel during this war, dynamics of extremism and containment, Yasser Arafat and the PLO in the era of the Oslo Accords, risks of regional war and the recent confrontation between Israel & Iran, the role of the Arab world in Israel/Palestine going forward, the "Palestinian Never Miss an Opportunity to Miss an Opportunity" trope and dehumanization of Palestinians, the recent settler attack on an aid truck, the one-state reality and Palestinians' struggle for bare life survival/search for dignity in the West Bank, the Second Intifada's effect on Palestinians and Israelis, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Palestinian children's books author Rifk Ebeid, author of Baba What Does My Name Mean?: A Journey to Palestine, You Are the Color, and Birthday Kunafa, joins the show to discuss her books, Palestinian identity and experience, and her animated children's short I Am From Palestine. We'll also discuss how one of her books was censored a Philadelphia library, the need for Palestinians to know their stories and identity, suppression of Palestinian identity, positive and negative feedback she's gotten on her children's books, thoughts on the Gaza protests, centering Palestinian voices, the Nakba ("The Catastrophe" or 1948 Palestinian expulsion) and the Naksa ("The Setback" or the 1967 Palestinian expulsion), Rifk's awareness of her Palestinian identity even going back her early childhood, Ron DiSantis and Republican book banning efforts, the absurdity of being theatened by a children's book, Rif's work in speech language pathology, censorship, and a number of other topics.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Israel has commenced its operation in Rafah. As this was happening I was interviewing Khalil Sayegh, a D.C.-based Palestinian Christian who was born and raised in the Gaza Strip. Khalil is also the co-founder and President of the Agora Initiative, a non-profit that works to promote democracy in the Middle East. Khalil gives a crash course in the Palestinian perspective on Israle/Palestine in the course of our conversation starting with a discussion of his own background and experiences as a Palestinian who grew up in Gaza. We also end up discussing issues related to how the Palestinian cause, the quest for Palestinian self-determination, can advance forward in these turbulent, uncertain, and grim time of war and bombardment. Among the topics covered are: the need for external pressure to be put on Israel, Israeli obstinance on a two-state solution, Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, Marwan Barghouti, Zionism and anti-Zionism, diplomacy, the Occupation, the West Bank, the shrinking Israeli left, Benjamin Netanyahu, the problem with thinking that a figure succeeding Netanyahu such as Yair Lapid or Benny Gantz will immediately lead to optimal outcomes, the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement, the Nakba and Palestinian displacement, Israeli maximalism, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, we've got a trouble feature. First, Jordan Elgrably of the Marza Review and editor of the new volume Stories from the Center of the World: New Middle East Fiction joins the show to discuss Israel and attacks on writers and journalist past and present who forward Palestinian perspectives. We'll also talk about Gaza as a laboratory for laboratory for repressive, surveillance technologies that are then later used in the U.S.; racist depictions of Arabs and Palestinians in U.S. media and the professional Islamophobia industry; social media, the attacks on TikTok, and the way social media has advanced Palestinian perspectives; the killing of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh; and much, much more! In the second segment of the show, reporter Kevin Gosztola from The Dissenter joins us to discuss his latest article "Israel Could Ban Other Media After Banning Al Jazeera". We discuss the raid of Al Jazeera and the 45-day band being placed on the news organization shortly after World Press Freedom Day. In the third and final segment of the show, Jonah Raskin, a legendary figure from late 60s/70s left-wing counterculture and activism, speaks with us about his Counterpunch op-ed "Columbia Protests Now and in ‘68". What are the parallels between the days of rage that were the 1960s and 1970s, when FBI COINTELPRO thought to disrupt student activism and the National Guard was sent in to put down protesters in what became known as the Kent State Massacre, and the incredible moment of protest arising on today's college campuses around the issue of Gaza?

On this edition of Parallax Views, a triple feature on campus protests and the Antisemitism Awareness Act that just passed Congress. First up, Mel Buer, a staff writer for the The Real News, joins us hot off her Democracy Now appearance to discuss her on-the-ground experiences and reporting on the UCLA Gaza protests. Then, Chris Habiby joins the show to discuss the Antisemitism Awareness Act bill that just passed in Congress and other legislation that could muffle Palestinian and Arab voices in America. And, finally, Richard Silverstein of the Tikun Olam blog joins returns to discuss the campus protests and what he refers to as the powerful backlash alliance against them, the ADL's Jonathan Greenblatt, Bill Aickman, Israel-Russia relations and the Russian oligarchs in Israel, his message to liberal Zionists, and much, much more.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Prof. Jodi Dean, who was recently relieved of teaching duties after the publication of her Verso blog post "Palestine speaks for everyone" on April 4th, 2024. In said piece she described the sight of Hamas paragliders breaking through Israel's air defenses to get into Israel as "exhilarating". Although many have condemned her blog post, even a number of commentators who disagree with her, chief among them Sohrab Ahmari of Compact Magazine, have argued that relieving Dean of her academic duties amounts to viewpoint discrimination that goes against standards of academic freedom. This is the basis for the conversation. This is sure to be one of the most controversial episodes of Parallax Views to date. I encourage my listeners to read Dean's original blog post as well as the piece it was responding to: Judith Butler's October 19th, 2023 London Review of Books essay "The Compass of Mourning". Another piece that I would argue is necessary reading for this episode is Judith Butler's response to Jodi Dean that is also at Verso's blog entitled "There Can Be No Critique". My primary reason for reaching out to Prof. Dean was in regard to academic freedom and the issue of viewpoint discrimination. If speech has ideational content, it should be debated freely in the halls of academia no matter how much we may disagree with said content. Since October 7th, I have strived to be sensitive when discussing anything related to Israel/Palestine especially as someone who has friend in both Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. It is my hope that listeners will engage with me in respectful dialogue and critique of this episode but also my episodes in general. Your feedback is welcome.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Middle East scholar Prof. James M. Dorsey of The Turbulent World w/ James M. Dorsey Substack blog returns for another update on the situation of Israel/Palestine and the broader Middle East. This hour and a half conversation delves into many different areas including: - The Gaza War - Violence in the West Bank - The past month of tensions between Iran and Israel starting with Israel's attack on an Iranian consulate compound and Iran's strike in response; the Biden administration's response to the Iran attack; the 7-year-old Bedouin girl injured in the Iranian strike - The U.S. foreign policy establishment and Iran hawks - The Gaza protests at Columbia University and other campuses around the U.S. - Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his policy on Palestine, and related matters related to Bibi - Will the situation of Gazans really fundamentally change in a post-Netanyahu Israel? - Khan Younis mass graves allegations - UNRWA situation and Israel's information war (which Dorsey argues Israel is losing) - The different flavors of both Zionism and anti-Zionism; militant anti-Zionism vs. conciliatory anti-Zionism - The genocide discourse, legal definition of genocide, and war crimes/human rights violations - Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Hamas, and the Arab street - Nancy Pelosi's conspiracy theory about Gaza protests being tinged by the influence of foreign powers - Personal anecdote from James about an experience he had involving Zbigniew Brzezinski and Iran - Extreme rhetoric within Israel, especially amongst elements in Israel's army and amongst religious leaders; Rabbi Mali's comments suggesting the Israel kill Palestinian women to prevent the births of future Palestinian boys - And much, much more

On this edition of Parallax Views, the University of Maryland's Prof. Shay Hazkani, a former Israeli journalist turned historian, joins the show to discuss the major themes of his book Dear Palestine: A Social History of the 1948 War and documentary The Soldier's Opinion in light of the Gaza War, settler violence in the West Bank, and the October 7th Hamas attack. Prof. Hazkani provides a fresh, illuminating perspective on the 1948 Arab-Israeli War that contributes a great deal to discussion of Israel/Palestine. Specifically, he takes the approach of looking at how non-elites, especially soldiers, viewed/perceived the war compared to elites on both the Israeli and Arab sides of the conflict. We'll delve deep into this as well as Prof. Hazkani's battles with the Israeli Supreme Court over the fight to declassify documents in Israel's archives; how Prof. Hazkani's work overlaps with that of the Israeli New Historians like Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim, and Ilan Pappe (as well as how it differs from those works); propaganda and the mythologies of war (and how said propaganda and myths are generated); some of the myths that Prof. Hazkoni specifically busts in the book; the damage books like Joan Peters' From Time Immemorial have caused to properly understanding Israel/Palestine; the Arab Liberation Army; how then-recent American Jewish immigrants perceived events unfolding at the time compared to Jews who had immigrated prior; and much, much more. And yes, we will discuss all of this within the context of the current Gaza War and violence in the West Bank. Prof. Hazkoni will delve into his fears about what is transpiring currently, especially with regards to messianic right-wing elements in Israeli society like the Religious Zionists, as well as how the parallels between 1948 and today. All that and more on this must-listen edition of Parallax Views!

On this edition of Parallax Views, Project Censored's Mickey Huff joins us to discuss Project Censored's State of the Free Press 2024, the media watchdog group's annual round-up of the most censored news stories in the United States. However, rather than just a straight rundown of this year's annual Project Censored offering, Mickey and I use this conversation to take the opportunity to discuss the recent controversy over the Columbia University pro-Palestinian Gaza protests, John Fetterman's comparing those protests to the Charlottesville "Unit the Right" rally, and Senator Tom Cotton calling for vigilante violence against protesters. With calls for the National Guard to be brought to Columbia University to put an end to the protests, Mickey and I reflect on the Kent State Massacre of 1970, the anniversary of which will be on May 4th. Additionally we'll discuss: - Mainstream media coverage of the Gaza war as well as the leaked New York Times memo telling journalists to avoid words and phrases like "genocide", "ethnic cleansing", and "occupied territories" when covering Israel/Palestine-related issues. - The importance of the right to protest to a functioning democracy - The lack of trust in corporate media and the worrying state of journalism today - Remembering Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg - Project Censored's coverage of PFAS or toxic "forever chemicals" and why this environmental story needs more coverage - And much, much more EDIT - NOTE: I used the term "outside agitators" at some point in the conversation when I was thinking more about isolated bad apples and agent provocateurs. Misuse of words on my part.

On this edition of Parallax Views, Sean Tomilson, a PhD candidate in Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Arizona, a graduate of West Point, and a U.S. Army veteran, joins the show to discuss his March 2024 Responsible Statecraft piece entitled "What the French evisceration of Algeria has to do with Gaza today". We'll discuss the "Philippeville massacre" of 1955 and the reaction to it during the Algerian War of Independence and its parallels with the October 7th Hamas attack and Israel's response to it. Sean argues that the military logic of "total victory" may not be achievable for Israel in Gaza and that there's many lessons to be gleaned from the French experience in Algeria in this regard. We'll also look at the systemic roots of both conflicts and the errors made strategically by France in regards to Algeria. What can this tell us about the Israel-Palestine conflict and how Israel has waged its military operations in Gaza since October 7th? Also, where does the logic of total victory lead and how can the brutal civilian causalities inflicted actually inflame future conflict? All that and more on this edition of Parllax Views.

On this edition of Parallax Views, in the first segment Karen Dolan, a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies who heads of said institute's Criminalization of Race and Poverty project, stops by to discuss Biden's policies in relation to the economy, the border/immigration, and Gaza/Israel-Palestine. In the course of this segment we'll delve into where Biden appears to be leaning into the progressive base's goals and where he is wildly out-of-step with the progressive base. During the conversation Karen and I go through her two most recent articles: "Parsing Biden’s 2024 State of the Union Address" and "Biden’s populist budget marks the overdue end of trickle-down economics". Some of the key issues we cover our green energy policy, corporate price-gouging, inflation, child tax credits, the Pentagon budget, taxation of the wealthy, and more. In the second segment of the show, UCLA law professor Richard Abel, known for his work on apartheid South Africa (his work was even promoted by Nelson Mandela!), joins the show to discuss his trilogy of books on autocrats and autocracy. The third entry in this series Prof. Abel has penned is entitled How Autocrats Seek Power: Resisting Trump and Trumpism and deals heavily with the events of and leading up to the January 6th insurrection. We'll discuss a number of issues, have a respectful back-and-forth about the U.S.'s own relations with autocratic states that the U.S. consider allies, get Richard's thoughts on people who are conscientiously abstaining from voting for Joe Biden over Gaza, chat about Trump and conspiracy theories, and much, much more. Prof. Abel will also talk about his work criticizing the Bush and Obama administration during the War on Terror and why he considers Trump more dangerous than previous presidential administrations.

On this edition of Parallax Views, we delve into the controversial world of deathmatch wrestling with deathmatch wrestler Mike Krueger. For those unfamiliar with deathmatch wrestling, it is by far the most extreme variant of professional wrestling imaginable. When watching a deathmatch promotion like Game Changer Wrestling (GCW), Combat Zone Wrestling (CZW), Xtreme Pro Wrestling (XPW), Underground Empire Wrestling (UEW), or any number of others similar promotions you can expect to see things that you'd never see in a mainstream pro wrestling promotion like WWE. This includes wrestler diving off balconies into glass, wrestler being thrown into flaming tables, and competitors using objects like light tubes and barbed wire bats as weapons. It is, in other words, the "outlaw" form of pro wrestling that is often heavily criticized for it's blood-n-guts gruesomeness. And yet, deathmatch wrestling has cultivated a rather diverse audience. On one hand there's the "anti-woke" fans of Rob Black's notorious XPW. On the other there's Game Changer Wrestling, which has become popular especially with some in the LGBTQ+ community for its inclusiveness. Additionally, despite its violence, deathmatch wrestling also has some famous fans. The Muslim gonzo punk novelist Michael Muhammad Knight, for example, is on record as being a fan of legendary deathmatch wrestler Necro Butcher. And then there's the RackaRacka Brothers aka Danny Philippou and Michael Philippou, known for directing last year's A24-distributed sleeper horror hit Talk to Me, who are not only making a documentary on deathmatch wrestling, but have actually participated in deathmatches. And they aren't the only celebrities who have been involved in deathmatch wrestling. Actor David Arquette, known for the Scream movies (as well as his infamous stint in mainstream wrestling as the short-lived World Heavyweight champion of WCW), did a deathmatch with one of the genre's biggest names: Nick Gage. Additionally, rock stars like Glenn Danzig, Korn's Jonathan Davis, Slayer's Kerry King, and former Danzig bassist Josh Lazie as well as rap duo the Insane Clown Posse made appearances or were involved with XPW in the late 90s/early 2000s. The deathmatch performance art shows of New York's Casanova Valentine have gained the attention of punk rock and urban hipster youths at bars. And VICE has tackled the topic in multiple documentaries, most notably in in season 3 of the popular TV show Dark Side of the Ring's "The Ultra-Violence of Nick Gage" episode. Violent as it may be, deathmatch wrestling is, against seemingly all odds, arguably breaking through to the mainstream. The widely listened to Joe Rogan Experience podcast devoting an entire segment to the subject with the aforementioned Phillippou Bros. should attest to that fact. What is the appeal of deathmatch wrestling though? Is there more to it than the elements of ultra-violence? And what is it like being a deathmatch wrestler? Mike Krueger will help answers those questions and more. We'll discuss a number of topics including: - The punk rock nature of deathmatch wrestling - The connection between deathmatch wrestlers and the smaller, more intimate audiences they perform for - The Mount Rushmore of death match wrestling - The trendiness of deathmatch wrestling in the past few years - What drives deathmatch wrestlers? - The dangerous nature of deathmatch wrestling and the fact that the damage the wrestlers' bodies take in deathmatches can't be fact even if the results are predetermined - Trauma, psychological issues, and deathmatch wrestlers - The psychology of deathmatch wrestling - Old school deathmatch wrestling from Japan: Frontier Martial Arts Wrestling (FMW) and their infamous barbed wire exploding death match between Terry Funk and Atsushi Onita - Storytelling in deathmatch wrestling - The wear and tear Mike's body has endured from deathmatch wrestling - The cut-throat nature of the independent wrestling scene; backstabbing in the scene; promoters that don't pay the talent - The story of Mike getting hit multiple times with a weed whacker in a match - The role of muscle memory in pro wrestling - How do deathmatch wrestlers protect themselves when being hit by glass or lighttubes? - Has deathmatch wrestling gotten too violent since the time it began? How has the deathmatch wrestling scene changed since Mike got involved in it? - Mike Krueger's background in amateur wrestling and answering the question of how many deathmatch wrestlers are properly trained - Why Mike quit pro wrestling and why he more recently made a comeback - Deathmatch wrestling and how its violence combined with the type of wrestlers it attracts makes people question the "is this fake?" question more so than other forms of wrestling? How wrestlers like the late New Jack made people believe that they may be watching a "shoot" (a real fight) - The craziest thing Mike has ever seen in a deathmatch - The falls from high heights that deathmatch wrestle