Jacobin Radio Folgen

James Comey is liberal America’s favorite cop and now, as a result, a bestselling author as well. Patrick Blanchfield returns to talk about his Baffler review of Comey’s new book. It’s awful, of course. But it’s bad in productively revealing ways. Comey has become an icon of the liberal fetishization of the national security state as a bulwark against Trumpism—when it fact it is that very national security state and its rampant abuses that are deeply implicated in Trump’s rise. The elevation of police as a model of duty and leadership contrasted against Trump’s vulgar monstrosities renders invisible not only why Trump won but why he is so dangerous.Here’s Patrick’s review: thebaffler.com/latest/prig-and-pig-blanchfieldThanks to Verso Books. Check out Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals Turn to Lenin, Mao and Che by Max Elbaum versobooks.com/books/2707-revolution-in-the-air And Deport, Deprive, Extradite: 21st Century State Extremism by Nisha Kapoor versobooks.com/books/2551-deport-deprive-extradite And support this podcast with $ at patreon.com/TheDig

It's yet the latest installment in our ongoing series on the Left and electoral politics. Dan’s guest is Chokwe Antar Lumumba, the mayor of Jackson, Mississippi. Last year, Mayor Lumumba pledged to make Jackson "the most radical city on the planet." Lumumba, who comes out of a decades-old revolutionary black nationalist movement, is serious about that. But he also faces challenges: Jackson is a majority black city which, like many such cities, has much of its wealth appropriated by its largely white suburbs. The human and infrastructural needs are enormous, and the tax base is thin. This is precisely why so many on the Left have found what's going on in Jackson to be so interesting, and why Dan was eager to invite the mayor onto the show.Thanks to Verso Books. Check out Deport, Deprive, Extradite: 21st Century State Extremism by Nisha Kapoor versobooks.com/books/2551-deport-deprive-extradite and Hara Hotel: A Tale of Syrian Refugees in Greece by Teresa Thornhill versobooks.com/books/2713-hara-hotel. And please make a contribution to support the long-run viability of this show at Patreon.com/TheDig!

The CUNY Grad Center's Kate Doyle Griffiths on teachers’ strikes and the crisis in social reproduction. Then, Thea Riofrancos and Daniel Denvir join to discuss Yascha Mounck and zombie liberalism (their review is here).