Ep 218: The Siren Song of Rallying Around a 'Common Enemy' to Promote Progressive Causes
Citations Needed16 Apr 2025

Ep 218: The Siren Song of Rallying Around a 'Common Enemy' to Promote Progressive Causes

"Senate Weighs Investing $120 Billion in Science to Counter China," trumpeted The New York Times in 2021. "A New Economic Patriotism Can Help Unite Our Divided Congress," argued Newsweek in 2023. "US cedes ground to China with 'self-inflicted wound' of USAid shutdown, analysts say," cautioned The Guardian in 2025.

In recent years, we've been exposed to the latest version of a centuries-old geopolitical message: We all have a common enemy, and we all need to unite to fight it by making our own country stronger. That enemy—most commonly China—is threatening to outpace, if it isn't already outpacing, the US in infrastructural investment, educational programs, technological development, and elsewhere, and we need to devote millions, billions, even trillions of dollars to restoring the vitality of our institutions in order to reverse this trend.

But why must defeating an "enemy" be the justification for policy that has the potential to benefit the public? Why should we just accept the premise that there must be an "enemy" to compete against and defeat? Why can't policy be enacted for the sole purpose of improving people's lives? And how does this messaging about the threat of a looming adversary serve the ruling class?

On this episode, we detail the timeworn trope of the common enemy as a "unifying" device, looking at how increasingly so-called progressives are appealing to feel-good sentiments of unity and to the genuine needs for sound infrastructure, robust social safety nets, corporate regulation, and functional institutions in order to sell the idea that there is, and always will be, a shadowy bad guy that must be vanquished.

Our guest is historian, professor and author Greg Grandin.

Det här avsnittet är hämtat från ett öppet RSS-flöde och publiceras inte av Podme. Det kan innehålla reklam.

Avsnitt(374)

Episode 238: The Fictional, Racist, Paranoia-Sowing "Sleeper Cell" Media Construction

Episode 238: The Fictional, Racist, Paranoia-Sowing "Sleeper Cell" Media Construction

In this episode, we detail the vague, baseless racism-sowing media coverage and pop culture obsession with so-called "sleeper cells," a construction that has consumed post-9/11 America but suffers fro...

20 Maj 1h 30min

Live Show: 'How to Sell a Genocide' Book Talk at The Word Is Change Bookstore in Brooklyn, NY

Live Show: 'How to Sell a Genocide' Book Talk at The Word Is Change Bookstore in Brooklyn, NY

This is a live recording between Nima and Adam at the Word is Change Bookstore May 7, 2026. In this conversation, we discuss key findings that can be found in Adam's new book, How to Sell a Genocide: ...

13 Maj 1h 3min

News Brief: "Peak TV," Streamer Studio Accounting Gimmicks, and the Precarity of Hollywood Labor

News Brief: "Peak TV," Streamer Studio Accounting Gimmicks, and the Precarity of Hollywood Labor

In this News Brief, we talk with Miranda Banks and Kate Fortmueller, authors of the new book Boom to Bust: How Streaming Broke Hollywood Workers, about rising inequality and precarity in Hollywood, st...

6 Maj 47min

News Brief: How the Right Invented — and Exploited — the "Liberal Media" Trope

News Brief: How the Right Invented — and Exploited — the "Liberal Media" Trope

In this News Brief, we talk with A. J. Bauer, assistant professor at the University of Alabama, about his new book," Making the Liberal Media: How Conservatives Built a Movement Against the Press". In...

22 Apr 51min

Ep 237: How Selective, Patronizing 'Deradicalization' Discourse Pathologizes Anti-Colonial Struggle

Ep 237: How Selective, Patronizing 'Deradicalization' Discourse Pathologizes Anti-Colonial Struggle

In this episode, we break down the long history of US media reducing recalcitrant populations' grievances to "terrorism," "hate," and "radicalism" in urgent need of re-education.   With guest Prem T...

15 Apr 1h 21min

Ep 236: Manufactured Austerity and the Media Assisted 'Public-Private Partnership' Rip-Off

Ep 236: Manufactured Austerity and the Media Assisted 'Public-Private Partnership' Rip-Off

In this episode we discuss how privatization was rebranded 'Public-Private Partnerships' and unleashed decades of raiding of the public coffers by Wall Street. With guest Donald Cohen, founder and exe...

8 Apr 1h 6min

News Brief: As American Troops Hide in Civilian Hotels, US Media Ignores Pentagon's Use of 'Human Shields'

News Brief: As American Troops Hide in Civilian Hotels, US Media Ignores Pentagon's Use of 'Human Shields'

In this News Brief we examine CNN, the Atlantic, Washington Post and NYT's blatant 'human shields' double standard as reports emerge of US troops hiding from Iranian attacks in civilian infrastructure...

1 Apr 17min

News Brief: How Decades of Media Distortions and Lies about "Iran's Nuclear Program" Lead to War

News Brief: How Decades of Media Distortions and Lies about "Iran's Nuclear Program" Lead to War

In this News Brief, we discuss a recent poll showing 70% of Americans are fundamentally wrong about the nature of Iran's "nuclear program"—including 1 in 4 who think Iran currently possesses a nuclear...

25 Mars 34min

Populärt inom Politik & nyheter

aftonbladet-krim
svenska-fall
motiv
p3-krim
flashback-forever
aftonbladet-daily
politiken
rss-sanning-konsekvens
rss-krimreportrarna
rss-flodet
rss-vad-fan-hande
rss-frandfors-horna
svd-ledarredaktionen
rss-aftonbladet-krim
grans
krimmagasinet
spar
dagens-eko
rss-krimstad
blenda-2