We are joined by Jamie Peck and Jorge Rocha of Everybody Loves Communism to discuss the film event of the century so far.

EVERYBODY LOVES COMMUNISM
@ELCpod
@jamie_elizabeth
@linegoesdown
@afrocosmist
https://www.patreon.com/everybodylovescommunism

PAID PROTEST COMEDY
@paidprotest
NEXT ONE IS AUG 11 at SILO in BUSHWICK
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100069066187070

THE WOKE MOB w/ JAKE AND JAMIE
is on SEP 2 at TV EYE in RIDGEWOOD

QUORATORS LIVE
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/quorators-tickets-666294985237
https://donyc.com/events/2023/8/5/quorators-tickets

MERCH
poddamnamerica.bigcartel.com

PATREON+DISCORD
patreon.com/poddamnamerica

Everybody Loves Barbie w/ Everybody Loves Communism

“New Starbucks CEO plans to pull barista shifts in stores every month,” CNN announces. “Uber’s CEO moonlighted as a driver and it changed the way he operates the company,” Fortune insists. “Your DoorDash driver? He’s the company’s co-founder,” the Associated Press smirks.

Month after month or week after week, we seem to hear the same stories about bold corporate executives who’ve decided to roll up their sleeves—metaphorically or otherwise—and join their lowest-level employees as a delivery driver, barista, or retail worker. Their stated goal: to “stay connected” to and “better understand” the company, its customers, and its workers. 

While these attempts to foster and express empathy may appear noble on the surface, they’re anything but. In reality, the CEO-as-worker stunt is an entirely self-serving project, creating a pretext for worker surveillance and a distraction from labor abuses like poverty wages and union-busting, all the while seeking to convince the public that corporate executives are honest, hardworking folks, Just Like You. 

Today, we will be dissecting the past and present of Undercover Boss-style corporate maneuvers, looking at the ways in which the C-suiter-in-the-trenches routine advances the squishy concept of “empathy” in order to obscure and undermine the material needs and demands of labor. 

Our guest is Ligia Guallpa, Executive Director of the Worker's Justice Project, a community-based, workers’ rights organization in New York City.

Episode 187: Undercover Boss, Uber-Driving CEOs, and the "Empathetic Executive" Schtick

This week we're talking about once again about y'all etiquette, Boebert, class distinctions, the Appalachian creation myth, and the UAW strike

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

Episode 309: Appalachian Creation Museum

In this impromptu live show from Oct 30 2023, we break down the four main arguments against a ceasefire in Gaza and why they make no sense. 

Based on this article by Adam
https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/those-who-say-cease-fire-wont-work-are-wrong-heres-why/

Live Show 10/30/23: 4 Arguments Against a Gaza Ceasefire and Why They're Bullshit

Recorded 11/22/23. Clips used in this week's ep (content warning): Annihilation Choir, State Department employee Stuart Seldowitz, and NSC spokesman John Kirby. 

Listen to Part 2 of this episode at Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 318: Cop City On A Hill

“Aging population to hit U.S. economy like a 'ton of bricks',” Reuters reported in 2021. “Aging Is The Real Population Bomb,” the International Monetary Fund cautioned earlier this year. “How an aging population poses challenges for U.S. economy, workforce and social programs,” PBS declared in June. “Why we’re borrowing to fund the elderly while neglecting everyone else,” The Washington Post’s Catherine Rampell wrote just this past November.

Year after year, it seems, American media issues the same warning: The population of the US, due to - among other factors - rising life expectancy and falling birthrates, is getting older, which spells doom for our economy. A graying public, we’re told, will inevitably upend the labor force, destroy productivity, bleed programs like Medicare and Social Security dry, and thus place an undue burden on the younger population.

But the premises for this panic are based on misleading stats, goofy non-sequiturs, and misdirected faux class warfare. So, why do media keep insisting the olds are out for your hard-earned money? Who gets to shape our understanding of what an aging population actually means economically or socially? How does this narrative shift the burden from the state to the individual in terms of managing retirement benefits and systems of care? And what are the real harms of treating people over the age of 65 like they’re a cancer on society?

On this episode, we examine the narrative that an aging population is necessarily dire, looking at how it’s instrumentalized to gut public benefits for seniors and thus for everyone, advance the financialization of retirement, and reframe the conflict between rich and poor as one between young and old.

Our guest is social security expert Nancy Altman.

Episode 194: The "Graying Population" Panic and the 90-Year War on Social Security

We’re joined again by Ben Howard and Aaron Good for part two of our discussion marking the 60th anniversary of the JFK assassination. We discuss what exactly happened to Oswald in Mexico and who knew what at the bureau.

Listen to our previous JFK episodes here: patreon.com/collection/602?view=expanded

Four Died Trying documentary: fourdiedtrying.com/

UNLOCKED: Episode 335: JFK 201 (Part 2)

The first half of today's episode is a discussion on why "rural America" is the political and cultural order of the day. Topics include Yellowstone, Beyonce's new album "Cowboy Carter," and a new book entitled "White Rural Rage." 

The second half of the episode is a look at some of today's Most Ethical Companies, as reported on in a fascinating article for The Nation by writer Jess McAllen, linked here: https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/the-dubious-ethics-of-the-worlds-most-ethical-companies/

Please support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 335: Elbit Horrors

We talk a little bit about our eclipse experiences, then dive into two articles about the so-called "illiberal left"—the first by that sicko Jonathan Chait, the second a reported story in the NYTimes

You can check out Aaron's latest short story here: https://apocalypse-confidential.com/2024/04/08/dreaming-of-europa/

And support us on Patreon here: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Episode 338: The Solutions Tent

This week we're joined by Tracy Rosenthal, who's written a really incredible article for The New Republic about the upcoming Supreme Court case concerning the constitutionality of being homeless in America. Tracy went to Grants Pass, Oregon, to report the story, and found that the town is a microcosm for how towns and cities across America are dealing with this pressing social question. 

Read the article here: https://newrepublic.com/article/181036/new-sundown-towns-grants-pass-v-johnson

Read more of Tracy's work here: https://tracyrosenthal.com/

I'll be reading here: https://www.michlers.com/pages/read

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

Episode 344: Protect The 31 Flavors (w/ special guest Tracy Rosenthal)

We talk to standup comedian and Pod Damn America host Jake Flores about his personal political revolution, how his anarchist ancestor rose (no pun intended) up against Porfirio Diaz, and that time he got visited by Homeland Security for a tweet about cultural appropriation and ICE. Plus we all talk about Amsterdam, the lie that is the cliche about how something is like "riding a bike," sex work and more.

Episode 344: Protect The 31 Flavors (w/ special guest Tracy Rosenthal)

Trillbilly Worker's Party

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