Full episode on Patreon: During WWI, a Chicago ad man pitched the Bureau of Investigation on a volunteer secret police, which grew to nearly 300,000 unpaid agents and foreshadowed strategies of the later US intelligence state. Friend of the show Ben aka @housetrotter joins Bill and Rachel to discuss.
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Description: The sanitized grade school version of Helen Keller removes her lifelong socialism and IWW activism. Kelley, Rachel, and Bill discuss.
Links and notes for Ep. 352 (PDF): http://arsenalfordemocracy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/AFD-Ep-352-Links-and-Notes-Helen-Keller-was-a-Radical-Leftist.pdf
Theme music by Stunt Bird.
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Description: In the late 1940s and 1950s, Republicans desperate to regain control of the federal government and roll back the New Deal launched a massive purge and witch-hunt of gay federal employees. Guest John Leavitt joins Bill and Rachel to discuss.
Links and notes for Ep. 350 (PDF): http://arsenalfordemocracy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/AFD-Ep-350-Links-and-Notes-John-Leavitt-on-the-Lavender-Scare.pdf
Theme music by Stunt Bird.
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Bill and Rachel examine what an 1842 Massachusetts court decision can tell us about the process of industrialization and the emergence of labor unions and what parallels we can draw for modern gig workers. Full episode for subscribers on Patreon.
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Description: Kelley, Rachel, and Bill discuss California’s Prop 22 ballot law against independent contractors and New Mexico’s positive reform for public-sector employee unions. Part II coming to the bonus feed.
Links and notes for Ep. 348 (PDF): http://arsenalfordemocracy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/AFD-Ep-348-Links-and-Notes-State-level-labor-law-part-1.pdf
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Description: In 1930, Depression-era Minnesota elected friendly radical and syndicalist Floyd B. Olson as Governor. In 1934, he was forced to declare martial law to protect communist Teamsters from Minneapolis police and business militias. Bill and Rachel discuss.
Links and notes for Ep. 346 (PDF): http://arsenalfordemocracy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/AFD-Ep-346-Links-and-Notes-The-1934-Minneapolis-Strike-and-Floyd-B-Olson.pdf
Theme music by Stunt Bird.
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Bonus episode: Bill and Rachel discuss the 1948 Wall Street strike by the United Financial Employees union, Wall Street’s first and only financial sector labor strike. Subscribe at Patreon.
Links and notes for Ep. 345 (PDF): http://arsenalfordemocracy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/AFD-Ep-345-Links-and-Notes-1948-United-Financial-Employees-Wall-Street-Strike.pdf
Theme music by Stunt Bird.
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