#1690 Oligarchy Unmasked: Why Billionaires Hate Democracy and How They're Dismantling It
Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy
Jay Tomlinson
4.6 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 11 February 2025
⏱️ 181 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Air Date 2/11/2025
The very rich, as has been noted before, are not on the side of regular people. And even if you think that the federal government needs a major reboot, no one but the ultra-wealthy are going to be happy with what they build in the aftermath of the administrative coup currently underway.
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ACTIVISM ROUNDUP
KEY POINTS
KP 1: How Oligarchs Took Over The World - Double Down News - Air Date 1-9-25
KP 3: The Oligarchy's Power is Waking America Up - Velshi - Air Date 1-27-25
KP 5: Why the Tech Bros Allied with Trump - Zeteo - Air Date 2-2-25
KP 6: President Trump and the Power of the Purse - Takes™ by Jamelle Bouie - Air Date 2-5-25
(51:21) NOTE FROM THE EDITOR
On the dream of the accelerationists
DEEPER DIVES
(56:16) SECTION A: HISTORICAL CONTEXT
(1:40:21) SECTION B: GOVERNMENT DESTRUCTION
(2:25:04) SECTION C: THE BROS
SHOW IMAGE
Description: A composite image showing a wrecking ball - with Elon Musk’s face on it - smashes a white wall.
Credit: Composite design by A. Hoffman. Image sourced from Pixabay. | License: Pixabay
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to this episode of the award-winning Best of the Left podcast. |
| 0:07.3 | The very rich, as has been noted before, are not on the side of regular people. |
| 0:13.1 | And even if you were to think that the federal government needed a major reboot, |
| 0:17.9 | no one but the ultra-wealthy are going to be happy with what they build in the |
| 0:22.4 | aftermath of the administrative coup currently underway. For those looking for a quick |
| 0:27.3 | overview, for those looking for a quick overview, the sources providing our top takes |
| 0:31.6 | in about 50 minutes today includes Double Down News, Democracy Now, Velshi, Blonde Politics, Zateo, and Takes by Jemal Bowie. |
| 0:42.7 | Then in the additional deeper dives half of the show, there will be more in three sections. |
| 0:47.1 | Section A, Historical Context, Section B, Government Destruction, and Section C, The Brose. |
| 0:53.5 | But first, your call to action for the week. |
| 1:02.3 | Hey, everyone, Amanda here with your weekly roundup of activism actions. |
| 1:07.0 | The National Grassroots Response Organization Indivisible is reminding us this week that one of the biggest tools Democrats in Congress have right now is the upcoming budget negotiations in March. |
| 1:17.3 | Unfortunately, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries has already declined to withhold Democratic votes. |
| 1:22.6 | While there have been protests outside government agencies, as a party, Democrats are not surprisingly in disarray |
| 1:28.5 | about how to use any leverage they still have. That means our voices are critically important right now. |
| 1:34.3 | The calls and actions last week got Senate Democrats to finally unify against Russell vote |
| 1:38.6 | and use procedural rules to slow things down. So keep calling. The five calls app is a great |
| 1:43.9 | tool and keep showing up at the |
| 1:45.5 | offices of your members of Congress. And it's not just Democrats who need to be pushed. If you have a |
| 1:50.0 | complicit Republican senator, governor, or representative, it is time to shame them. Show up to their |
| 1:55.4 | offices, hold town halls, call them out in every public way possible for not speaking out against Trump and |
| 2:01.2 | Musk's illegal actions and government coup. You can find call scripts and how to find or start your |
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