Chatter: Rachel Maddow on her book "Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism"

The Lawfare Podcast

The Lawfare Institute

Politics, Terrorism, National Security, News, Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Intelligence, Rule Of Law, Military, Constitutional Law, Current Events, International Relations, History, International Law, Government, Law

4.7 • 6.4K Ratings

🗓️ 9 November 2023

⏱️ 73 minutes

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Summary

When she's not hosting The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, Rachel Maddow has been diving deep into the history of fascism in America. First on her podcast, Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, and most recently in her new book, Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism, she has unearthed the stories for popular audiences both of an earlier era of foreign authoritarian influence in American politics and of those who fought against it.

In this conversation, Maddow sat down with Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes to discuss Prequel and its relationship to the modern fight against populist authoritarianism. They talked about the many striking similarities between then and now, some key differences, the necessity but ultimate inadequacy of law enforcement as a solution to authoritarian movements, the role of journalism, whether grifting is an inherent feature of right-wing authoritarianism, and why so many heroes of that era's fight against fascism are almost forgotten today.

For future reading on this subject, Maddow recommends:

Charles R. Gallagher, "Nazis of Copley Square: The Forgotten Story of the Christian Front"
Steven J. Ross, "Hitler in Los Angeles: How Jews Foiled Nazi Plots Against Hollywood and America"

You can also watch Rachel's full conversation with Ben at https://youtu.be/Y1Yc4Ss8_OI.

Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad.

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The following podcast contains advertising.
0:04.0	To access an ad-free version of the Lawfair Podcast,
0:08.0	become a material supporter of Lawfair at Patreon.com slash Lawfair. That's Patreon.com
0:16.4	slash Lawfair. Also check out Lawfair's other podcast offerings, rational security, chatter, lawfare no bull, and the aftermath.
0:30.0	Attention to all passengers. You can now book your train tickets on Uber and get 10% back in
0:40.3	Uber credits to spend on your next train journey.
0:43.6	So no excuses not to visit your in-laws this Christmas.
0:48.6	Trains, now on Uber.
0:50.4	T's and C's apply.
0:51.3	Check the Uber app. I'm Benjamin Wittis and this is the Law Fair Podcast, November 9th, 2003.
1:04.4	Today we are bringing you an episode of our podcast
1:07.4	Chatter, our forum for long-form conversations
1:11.5	on culture, history, science, and other stuff in connection with
1:16.7	national security.
1:18.6	While we normally run chatter on Thursday afternoons as a kind of bonus episode on the Law Fair Podcast feed.
1:27.1	This one was special so we thought we would just make it the regular Law Fair podcast for today. Enjoy. This week on Chatter, Rachel Madow discusses her new book,
1:50.4	Prequel, an American fight against fascism.
1:56.4	One of the things that I find most chilling in this story from the 40s
2:00.8	is the Justice Department caving to political pressure and removing prosecutors not
2:05.2	because of things they did wrong but because they stumbled into investigations
2:08.8	that implicated powerful people. I think that's very very dangerous.
2:11.6	You know the January 6th investigation in Congress doesn't result in prosecutions directly,
	...

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