Welcome to this episode of the award-winning Best of the Left podcast. Today we examine education as the battleground for democracy itself. We'll hear how authoritarian's erase history to maintain power, why liberal arts colleges don't exist in authoritarian societies, how the administration is punishing universities for

their political views, and what the detention of student protesters reveals about the cost

of dissent in Trump's America.

For those looking for a quick overview, the sources provided in our top takes in about 50

minutes today includes Who, What, Why, the Brian Lerer Show, MS Now, all things considered

right now and Democracy Now.

Then in the additional deeper dives half of the show, there will be more in four sections.

Section A, Education and Democracy, followed by Section B, Education and Money, Section C, Education

and Free Speech, and section D, education and the

Department of Education. But first, a reminder to check out our new show solved on the best

of love YouTube channel. We're really proud of the show we're making. You're going to get real

value out of it. And you checking it out helps us find new viewers on YouTube. So thanks in advance for all of your reviews, likes, subscribes, and comments.

That's all on the Best of the Left YouTube channel linked in the show notes.

And now, on to the show.

Talk first about this nexus in a broad sense between controlling historical narrative and political control.

So this is an, it's an old point, right, due to Orwell, for instance, he who controls the past, controls the future.

But we're seeing right now, so we know how authoritarian's target the courts.

We know that authoritarian target journalists and the free press.

But as Vladimir Putin recently said, wars are won by teachers.

Authoritarians equally target education systems. And so I began with just that as a puzzle.

This needs to be unpacked conceptually. Why is history so threatening to authoritarian? Why do the very same people who say there's voter fraud, who say who like race hysteria about non-existent

voter fraud in order to cut down minority voting? Why do these very same people also attack schools and

...