In this News Brief, we are joined by Ashley Bohrer and Ben Teller of Jewish Voice for Peace Chicago to discuss media indifference to the US and Israel-imposed starvation of Palestinians, how sectarianism is central to the ADL's strategy, and why six JVP activists have decided to hunger strike to draw more attention to the Israeli and US-made famine in Gaza.

News Brief: Natural Disaster-izing the Deliberate US-Israeli Starvation Campaign in Gaza

"Facebook’s Zuckerberg backs online political ad regulations forwarded by Sen. Amy Klobuchar," reported the Associated Press in 2018. "CEO Sam Bankman-Fried says crypto needs to embrace regulation," announced Business Insider in 2021. "AI leaders: Please regulate us," read an Axios headline in 2023.

In recent years, major U.S. companies, especially in the tech industry, have given new life to a longstanding corporate PR strategy: self-regulation. It's a common tactic. After a scandal — say, revelations about pollution, rampant scams, or large-scale invasions of privacy — corporations rebrand as repentant and disciplined, ready to pay their debts to society and embrace the public good. "No need for oppressive and overly burdensome regulation", they insist, "we can handle it ourselves."

This, of course, isn't the real intention. Historically, this corporate voluntarism has generated little more than a few cosmetic reforms, if that, and allowed the continuation of business as usual in every industry from slavery to oil to tobacco to crypto, save for the occasional sacrificial lamb. So why, and how, do media keep assuring their audiences that, This Time, It's Different? That this time corporate America has learned its lesson and can be trusted to regulate itself?

On this episode, we examine the centuries-old damage-control strategy of industry self-regulation, looking at how corporate claims of self-policing, aided by news media, buy time and goodwill while concealing an agenda of weakening pre-existing regulations, manipulating new laws to the benefit of the private sector, or, often, preventing regulation altogether. Our guest is the Revolving Door Project's assistant director Timi Iwayemi.

Episode 224: Corporate Self-Regulation and the Fine Art of 'Preempting" Public Outrage

AOC? Trump? Street Fighter? Pubes? We once again tackle the news of the week.

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The Ironic Dome

We start off this week with some light discussion regarding a few items in the news lately, then pivot to a more serious discussion expanding on Monday's Patreon episode about the ongoing catastrophe and genocide in Gaza. We end with a lighthearted but still somewhat concerning article about a new AI school in Texas.

Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 403: War Boy Academy

Ep 226: The Importance of 'Seriousness,' or Why Palestinians Can't Be Witness to Their Own Genocide (Part I)

"Exclusive Look at Life in War-Ravaged Gaza," reads the title for a CNN interview with correspondent Clarissa Ward. "'It's a Killing Field': IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid," report Yaniv Kubovich and Bar Peleg for Ha'aretz. "I’m a Genocide Scholar. I Know It When I See It," argues Omer Bartov in The New York Times.

These stories have something in common: they’re vital pieces of journalism about Gaza, or Palestine more broadly, published in Western and Western-aligned outlets. This is, obviously, important. Reporting like this keeps Western audiences informed about Israel’s genocide in Gaza, fortifies sympathetic Westerners’ solidarity with Palestine, and serves as an essential counter to the pro-Israel PR machine powering so much other Western media coverage.

But while these pieces have made a splash among their audiences, in many cases, they’re building upon points that Palestinian journalists, writers, and activists had been making weeks, months, even years before. So why is the reporting of Palestinian journalists–especially their reporting on what’s happening within their own country and cities–so often ignored, only to be heeded after it gets the Western stamp of approval?

On this episode — our Season 8 finale and also the second part of our two-part series on “The Importance of Seriousness, or Why Palestinians Can’t Be Witness to Their Own Genocide” — we explore the discrepancies in the alleged credibility between Western and Israeli journalists and Palestinian and other Arab journalists, especially when it comes to reporting on Israel’s genocide in Gaza. We’ll look at how, by Western standards, journalists don’t build legitimacy by being correct, so much as by being in close proximity to the political and media establishments.

Our guest is writer and organizer Kaleem Hawa.

Ep 227: The Importance of 'Seriousness,' or Why Palestinians Can't Be Witness to Their Own Genocide (Part II)

James Dobson (Rest In Piss Bozo), trumpet or sax?, phones in schools, AI data centers, and the data center mine in eastern Kentucky

Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 406: Performing American Life

Will Sommer of The Bulwark returns to Chapo to talk about the right’s reaction to the assassination of Charlie Kirk as well as his funeral proceedings in Arizona. We recap the Groyper War that preceded the assassination and the pressure it put on Kirk to move right, as well as the conspiracies surrounding his shooting. Was Israel involved? Why was there no exit wound? Did Charlie have a late-in-life conversion to Catholicism? And which faction of the right will be able to define the man’s legacy?

Follow Will Sommer on Twitter/X: https://x.com/willsommer 

971 - The Years of Whatever feat. Will Sommer (9/22/25)

Ep 228 - Billionaires as Insta-Experts: How Our Media Conflates Extreme Wealth with Expertise

We’re joined by Jasper Craven to talk DoD Chief Peter Brian Hegseth, warfighting, women, mothers, fathers, alcoholism, infidelity, and more.

Check out Jaspers new article on Pete Hegseth's war on women in the Baffler: https://thebaffler.com/salvos/battle-of-the-sexes-craven

Hit the tip line: (646) 801-1129 | tips@trueanon.com

Discover more episodes at podcast.trueanon.com

Episode 491: One Bottle After Another

We cover Petro, Netanyahu, and the UN; then we talk to David Adler from the Sumud Flotilla about breaking the naval blockade, international incidents, and drone attacks on civilian vessels. 

Hit the tip line: (646) 801-1129 | tips@trueanon.com

Discover more episodes at podcast.trueanon.com

Episode 492: Sumud Flotilla

Citations Needed is a podcast about the media, power, PR, and the history of bullshit. It is hosted by Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson, and produced by Florence Barrau-Adams.

Ep 228 - Billionaires as Insta-Experts: How Our Media Conflates Extreme Wealth with Expertise

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