Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at Background Briefing.org. I'm Ian Masters, and today on the first day of this new year of 2026 we'll speak with Richard

Parker who teaches economics and public policy at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and

is a senior fellow at the Schoerenstein Center.

He is the former managing editor of Ramparts, was a co-founder of Mother Jones magazine and

serves on the editorial board of the nation.

His books include The Myth of the Middle Class and John Kallis Galbraith, his life, his politics,

his economics.

And he joins us to suggest what we might be able to look forward to in the new year after

what was a difficult, if not dark, year of 2025.

And then we'll speak with John Nichols, the Nation magazine's Washington correspondent.

His books include The Fight for the Soul of the Democratic Party, the enduring legacy of

Henry Wallace's anti-fascist, anti-racist politics, and most recently coronavirus criminals and

pandemic profiteers, accountability for those who caused the crisis.

And his latest article at The Nation is,

recent Democratic victories have Republicans running scared,

and we will discuss the likelihood of the beginning of the end

of Trump's reign of ruin in 2026.

And before we begin, as this year ends, and you can make tax-deductible donations for 2025,

I'm hoping you consider backgroundbriefing.org slash donate and publictruthmedia.org

for your charitable giving, since we produce a daily news analysis program

covering the major stories in the news five days a week on a very modest budget and have recently

expanded our production team from two people, that's me and Graham, to five employees as we

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