The Majority Report with Sam Seder - 2718 - Economy Slowing; RIP Dolly Parton; How Police Seized Political Power w/ Stuart Schrader

Episode Date: August 26, 2026

Welcome back to The Majority Report On today's program: Data shows that core inflation rose 3.7% in July, which is higher than anticipated, and spending is down as well. Not good for the Republicans heading into the midterm elections CBS News reports on the Ludwig Institute for Shared Economic Prosperity's analysis of "functional unemployment", a metric created by LISEP that includes the unemployed, people earning poverty-level wages, and those involuntarily working part-time to create what they call a true unemployment rate. The LISEP determines that the true unemployment rate is at 24.9%. Not good for the Republicans heading into the midterm elections. Dolly Parton, American icon, dies at the age of 80. In 1995 Dolly Parton started the Imagination Library, a child literacy program inspired by her father whom she described as the smartest man she ever knew but was unable to reach his dreams due to his illiteracy. Since then, the Imagination Library has distributed over 300,000,000 books to children. In her honor, please consider donating to the program. RIP Dolly! Dr. Stuart Schrader, Associate Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University, where he directs the Chloe Center for the Critical Study of Racism, Immigration, and Colonialism, joins the program for a conversation about his book "Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves".  In the Fun Half: As the economy continues its inflated, downward spiral and more hospitals shut down and the war on Iran drags on and everything else that the Trump administration has put the country through Democrats keep their eye on the prize...condemning Hasan Piker. Jesse Watters can't help how much he likes Abdul El-Sayed, reaffirming his affinity for the Michigan candidate on two different Fox News shows in one day. Rob Schneider joins The Daily Heretic to pontificate on Hollywood and masculinity. All that and more. To connect and organize with your local ICE rapid response team visit ICERRT.com The Congress switchboard number is [phone]. You can use this number to connect with either the U.S. Senate or the House of Representatives. Follow us on TikTok here: https://www.tiktok.com/@majorityreportfm Check us out on Twitch here: https://www.twitch.tv/themajorityreport Find our Rumble stream here: https://rumble.com/user/majorityreport Check out our alt YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/majorityreportlive Gift a Majority Report subscription here: https://fans.fm/majority/gift Subscribe to the AM Quickie newsletter here: https://am-quickie.ghost.io/ Join the Majority Report Discord! https://majoritydiscord.com/ Get all your MR merch at our store: https://shop.majorityreportradio.com/ Get the free Majority Report App!: https://majority.fm/app Go to https://JustCoffee.coop and use coupon code majority to get 10% off your purchase Check out today's sponsors: ROCKET MONEY: Let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster: RocketMoney.com/MAJORITY SUNSET LAKE CBD: Head to SunsetLakeCBD.com and use the code HERBAL26 to save 25% on the new Sunset Lake Farms Herbal Tinctures now through September 1st at 11:59 ᴾᴹ ET. Please fill out this form to request Bryan to come to your town to do stand-up comedy @SamSeder @EmmaVigeland @MattLech On Instagram: @MrBryanVokey Check out Matt's show, Left Reckoning, on YouTube, and subscribe on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/leftreckoning Check out Matt Binder's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/mattbinder Subscribe to Brandon's YouTube channel: https://ww.youtube.com/Th3Discourse Check out Ava Raiza's music here: https:/www.youtube.com/@avaraiza

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sure is now through September 1st, up to 11.59 p.m. Eastern. Now, time for the show. The Majority Report with Sam Cedar. It is Wednesday, August 26th, 2020. My name is Emma Vigeland and for Sam Cedar, and this is the five-time award-winning majority report. We are broadcasting live Steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, USA. On the program today, Dr. Stuart Schrader, Associate Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University, joins us to talk about his book, Blue Power, How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves, and he also wrote a book called Badges Without Borders, How Global Counterinsurgency transformed policing.

Also on the program in Georgia's 13th district, progressive Everton Blair has defeated the daughter of the deceased congressman in a special election upset. Took no APAC money as well. Sitting Senator Darlene Graham. I'm sorry. I'm such a coastal elitist with that, but it's very hard not to say her name like that.

Darlene Graham. She wins. I lived in Georgia for 13 years. I give you permission. Thank you, sir. She wins the Senate runoff in South Carolina. And we'll be on the ballot in November. Despite Trump's backing, she only won by like five points.

Interesting story. The other Dan Sullivan will officially make it to the Alaska General Election ballot. It's amazing. Joining Senator Dan Sullivan, the Republican, and Mary Peltole. in a key Senate race where flipping the Senate could potentially hinge. Canada announces retaliatory tariffs

as high as 50% on hundreds of U.S. products, most notably steel and aluminum, which are important for building homes that we don't have enough of. This comes as the inflation numbers from July are worse than expected. CIA director John Rackcliffe is in

Moscow today, which is highly unusual. Meta just settled its social media addiction case for $17 billion after it was found that they downplayed child-related mental health harms. Ice arrests hit a monthly high in July. Nearly 50,000 people were taken by our American Gestapo. A federal judge finds that the Trump administration violated a nationwide injunction by directing the Postal Service to create new rules for mail and ballots. The Washington Post reports that Hegs have fired the Army's top officer, a top army officer, after he started investigating the helicopter flyby of Kid Rock's Tennessee home. I love paying taxes to pay for that sort of stuff. Yeah. Or, and we're paying taxes to make sure that anybody that choose.

chooses to investigate it is purge from the army. At least 75 people have been killed by flash floods in Nepal and China. And lastly, rest in peace, Dali Parton, American icon. Working class hero, mother to us all,

Supreme Talent, LGBTQ ally. All this and more on today's majority report. Welcome to the show, everybody. It is Hump. as a reminder tomorrow Matt is going to be in the hosting chair

but you will hear a pre-recorded interview that I did as well and we will have a show on Friday Sam will either be live or pre-recording a casual Friday episode I'm leaving for a wedding tomorrow morning so thank you to Matt for taking over and you know what will you cover it'll be very exciting people will have to tune in

Probably the stacking of the Foreign Affairs Committee with Zionists. Oh, I'd have to guess. Yes. And Anthony Edwards. That too. That too. We've got to get the basketball quota up. Let's start here.

So, as I said in headlines, Canada has announced retaliatory tariffs that basically matched the U.S. tariffs over the weekend. Trump is mad about Canada buying Chinese cars. is he doesn't want China to have access to this extremely large automobile market in North America because we're a car country but BYD's

were I meant like in terms of no I know transportation but we're losing it and we're fumbling it and with all this stuff right now of course I mean BYD's electric vehicles are a massive threat to the U.S. auto industry because they are cheap and they are superior on battery life

and electric vehicles are the future and Canadians are going to start buying them. And yeah, China subsidized them and help them out. And so should we have instead we just bailed out the car company so they could start making giant SUVs again. Maybe there's something to central planning that has the eye toward the future instead of just whatever they can maximize, you know, quarterly profits. Right. So the U.S. tariffs, certain goods like grocery goods, I think over the weekend, dairy products, alcoholic beverages, certain things like bedsheets. And then Canada responded with,

like doubling the aluminum and steel tariffs to 50%, which is enormously significant for our economy and for any kind of infrastructure construction or home construction. So this is just another instance of Trump's usage of tariffs as like mafia-style shakedowns, creating a level of uncertainty in the economy that has all these downstream effects, in addition to raising prices, because the way that he's deployed tariffs have functioned as a compounding sales tax, which is a regressive tax, that disproportionately hurts people the lower income that you have, because if the prices rise, that's a higher percentage of your income that you're forced to pay on goods and services that wealthier people can stomach more.

And we have these inflation numbers that came out. The Fed has this preferred gauge that showed that core prices rose annually in July by 3.3%. And consumer spending is slowing. The inflation numbers are bad. The Republicans can't do anything but blame Biden and talk about trans people, I guess. So here's John Berman of CNN asking Pete Sessions, Republican of Texas, about these numbers and the out-of-control prices in this country right now. John, the president was in reference to where it was when we took office. When he took office a year and a half ago, it is lower.

No, no, no, it's not. Inflation was lower when he took office than it is now. It just is. Prices are, you know, inflation is higher now than when he first took office. It was coming down. It was. Can you look at, just pause for saying, the graph on the screen, is contradicting him and you're seeing him,

I guess that this is just looking at it from January on with Trump. But it's just absolutely true. It's increased since Trump took office. Yeah, I mean, it had been at a very, very high after the pandemic, and it had lowered, and then it had been continuing to stay low. Yes. And then Trump started this dumb war. Exactly.

I mean, down, it was. So let's go right to your point. Has the president done things economically? that would lower the cost of doing business. And the answer was, we were until the war started. And once the war started, as you know, the gasoline prices have increased. And the increase in gasoline prices have had a large effect of not only travel, but upon doing business. And that would be correct.

I will only note that the core PCE, which strips out. food and energy is also elevated at 3.3% of price of high even without the fuel prices high. Congressman, well, good job actually there, John Berman, in correcting that. Because also food prices are impacted by the war in Iran, given the fact that something like a third of the necessary materials for certain fertilizers comes through the Strait of Hormuz as well because it's a byproduct of fossil fuels. It is important to note that it's not just the energy because of the war that's stupid and pointless, evil, frankly.

But it's also, these tariffs haven't helped the rest of the inflation either, obviously. Lori Wallach spoke about it with us on Monday, and I recommend everybody check out that interview because she did such a good job of explaining certain technical parts of trade. But, you know, it's now a version of what we saw under Biden with greedflation, where, you know, you. you had supply chain bottle next due to COVID. Prices exploded because of that. There were labor shortages across the world as there were shutdowns. And, you know, it was difficult for trade to flow continuously. Prices went up.

And then after the pandemic subsided and things got a little bit back to normal, prices still stayed high. And then you looked at these companies' earnings reports. And wow, record returns. we're seeing a version of that right now with the tariffs, where they're just blaming even the ones that have been deemed illegal by the Supreme Court, which was a majority of them, the Liberation Day tariffs, that Trump was slapping onto everything.

Well, now you can just raise prices and blame the tariffs, and there's really no control here because there's no cops on the beat right now in the Trump administration. In fact, they're speed running the collapse of small farms with their actions. And I would not be shocked if they're thrilled that their big ag buddies are able to gobble that stuff up on the cheap. This is a pro-consolidation fascistic administration. And Lena Khan, part of why things were going down, as you say, Matt, was there was, and canter in the Biden administration, there was like actually cops trying to enforce this stuff because it's been out of control. We're in a new gilded age in part because of these monopolies. And so

Lena Kong was attempting to combat that, but now we have the opposite kind of posture in the administration. And just to give you a sense of how bad the economy is, CBS News, their streamer, where they still, we've figured out, they can sneak journalism through, and Barry doesn't seem to be paying too much attention to their streaming platform. They analyzed this new, this is a report on this new analysis about the true nature of unemployment in this country, functional unemployment. is how this group looks at the economy. It's their own specific formula. And it's laid out here in the CBS News reporting. Here they explain how bad the actual job market is in this country right now. While the U.S. unemployment rate remains near a 50-year low,

an economic research firm shines a light on a disturbing figure regarding our job market. As of July, the unemployment rate stood at 4.1%. But according to data from the Ludwig Institute for shared economic prosperity, the true rate of unemployment was actually at 24.9%. Now, the economic research firm looks not only at unemployed workers and those searching for a job to capture a relook at the labor market, but also those who are something called functionally unemployed. Now, that includes those who are involuntarily working part-time and who are earning poverty-level wages, or less than $26,000 annually. and that's before taxes. So CBS Money Watch reporter Megan Serulo joins me now. So what does the unemployment rate measure

versus that functional unemployment? The official unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which we all rely on as an indicator of the health of the labor market, measures the share of workers who are 16 and older, who are looking for work and don't have jobs. Got it.

So it's very blunt. The creator of this other alternative measure, which captures the share of workers who are functionally unemployed includes those workers, as well as workers who are involuntarily working part-time so they want full-time jobs. They don't have them. They may only be working a few hours a week, as well as those workers who are earning poverty-level wages. Can you pause for a second? Just to keep that up there. This is important. This is including gig work. This is including poverty wages. Basically, a quarter of the country is,

unable to stay afloat, even if the unemployment rate is staying steady because of how weakened our labor standards have been in this country and how these big tech companies have hollowed out the labor market by circumventing it traditional employment measures with, you know, say, like benefits and stuff for gig workers who have way fewer protections. Let's keep going. helps explain the chasm between the two figures, the 4.1% and the almost 25% of workers who are characterized as functionally unemployed. And it's because it includes these folks who can't afford nutritious meals and maybe don't have adequate shelter. Its creator, Gene Ludwig, told me that, you know, you could be homeless and have worked one hour for the past week.

And you'd be considered as having a job. Okay. So when you look at that functionally unemployment rate, what does it tell you about the labor market in general? It suggests that it might not be as rosy as it seems. The rate of functionally unemployed workers has risen for the past four months. Labor force participation rate is declining. And normally in a strong labor market, if there were good jobs, employers were paying high wages, that would lure folks in. But it suggests that workers are having a hard time finding good jobs.

And we do know that inflation is outpacing wage gains. And so workers are earning raises. But if you get a 3% raise, inflation's at 4%. That's going to feel like a 1% pay cut. It's a race. Yeah. I think about it. I thought that was a shockingly informative segment from CBS News on that particular study.

Yeah. the labor market, it's being held together by duct tape and glue, essentially. The economy and the stock market is overinflating artificial intelligence, which if you were to even buy into the fact that this is going to be the future of the United States economy, that would mean that it would further that very rate of functional unemployment because what it's being advertised as to the investor class, is a way to essentially cut costs, and the easiest way to do that is to cut labor,

just be replaced by AI. Elon Musk was on The Economist's podcast for about 90 minutes, and that's what he said is, actually no one's going to be working in 10 years. The robots are going to become so smart and so competent that even he, as CEO of the company that, frankly, like, takes great pains to make sure that he has sole control over his companies

of supposed to board or whatever. he'll say he'll just turn over his keys to Tesla and SpaceX to the robot because it'll be better than him obviously Oh sure But this was the world's richest man to one of the world's oldest Economic publications And this is the type of fantasy shit that they're talking about It should scare people

But I would imagine that technology is going to be democratized Right? So that workers don't have to work as hard maybe Yeah all the AI company It's not going to be governments that do this It's going to be the CEOs of the AI companies getting together and doing what Elon Musk calls basic high income. Yeah. So, yeah.

Let's now just talk about Dolly Parton for a second. I mean, I normally we wouldn't talk about, you know, an artist or singer passing away like this. But I just think she's so culturally significant and such a great American that it warrants its own segment. I made the mistake this morning of listening to Dolly Parton on the. the subway on my headphones, just fully crying in front of people. If I saw you on the train crying, I would think she's probably listening to Dolly Parton. I'm dead serious. I mean, that's today. That's what I was doing. I would have thought that. I was just had some of her top songs, like on repeat. I was listening in the shower this morning. And then I'm, I chose to cry in public,

as opposed to in the shower in private about Dolly Parton. But I mean, what a great American. She came from a poor background in rural Tennessee, never forgot her roots. Her song, A Code of Many Colors, about how her mother stitched together a co-for-her is really what was getting me on the train this morning. She started an imagination library, which was about, you know, getting kids to read and combating book bands. Her father was illiterate. Oh, wow, I didn't know that. She was part of the premise of that. her musical prowess was incredible, just an amazing artist, and 9 to 5 is this feminist pro-worker anthem, as well as a classic film that she wrote still as relevant today as ever.

She acted to, still Magnolias is kind of a bizarre film that I saw for the first time recently, but she's the best part of it, actually. Weird performance by Julia Roberts. Anyway, also a staunch ally. of the LGBTQ community. Here she is on Larry King defending the LGBTQ community through a lens of like compassionate Christianity. Didn't you recently, though, throw support to the LGBT community?

Oh, I'm always encouraged. They've made me the poster child, I think, only because I'm so outspoken as far as just being accepting of people in general. I do not believe that we should criticize and judge other people. I think we should be accepting and loving. We are all God's children. We are who we are, and we should be allowed to be who we are.

Did any of the faith-based communities that deeply believe the other way take umbrage with you? Oh, absolutely. They did? Oh, yes. I get it all the time. I keep saying, well, if you're the fine Christian that you think you are, why are you judging people? Why are you, that's God's job. We're not God.

We're not judges. You know, we're supposed to love one another. We're supposed to not judge, and we're not supposed to take vengeance on other people. That's God's job. So I got too much to do my own and try to do God's work, too. I mean, not to, you know, to get into trying to do all that. So, yeah, I have to, I suffer for everything I do. I'm not out to make any, you know, I just think that we should be more loving, more caring.

We are who we are. If you're gay, you're gay. If you're straight, you're straight. And you should be allowed to be, you know, how you are and who you are. There's Dolly standing up for queer people, gay people, trans people. Here she is talking about the imagination library that we just talked about. I didn't realize how she got started in the 90s I think was it in response she just wanted it originally started in the county she's from in Tennessee and then it grew and they've donated

over three million books to five and under children that's amazing I mean I another we've been talking about Angie Nixon and her candidacy who also kind of has a bookstore down in in Jacksonville in this spirit it's like one of the most beautiful ways that you could dedicate your resources, educating children and combating censorship. And just in terms of, like, research, it's maybe the most important thing. Just the presence of books in a household for children when they're in their developmental stages is like night and day for what that means for their, you know, lifetime, in, basically lifetime enrichment.

Yes, exactly. Here she is talking about her efforts on childhood literacy. Hi, everybody. This is Dolly. Before he passed away, my daddy told me that the imagination library probably was the most important thing I'd ever done. Now, I can't tell you how much that meant to me because I created the imagination library as a tribute to my daddy. He was the smartest man I've ever known, but I knew in my heart his inability to read probably kept him from seeing all his dreams come true. Inspiring kids to love to read became my mission.

In the beginning, my hope was simply to inspire the children in my home county, but here's the kids. We are today with a worldwide program that gives a book a month to over a million children. Of course, I have not done this alone. The real heroes of our story was the thousands of local organizations who have embraced my dream and made it their own. They raise millions of dollars each year and wake up every day with a passion to make sure that their kids have every opportunity to succeed. It's been quite a journey, but we have so much more left to do. Now, I'd love for your community to join our families. So please take the time to explore our website.

Let's share this dream that all children should grow up in a home full of books. The first step is always the hardest. But you will never know unless you try. Just like, just I don't even, I can't think of a public figure who radiates. Mr. Rogers. I mean, that's what we're talking about here. That's the level we're on. Republicans, of course,

hated her efforts to educate the kids, cut funding for her. This is now. Oh, right now. Oh, my God, I just saw the date. Republicans cut funding for Dolly Parton's child reading programs, reports Newsweek here. Not shocking. Although you will, Trump took credit or at the very least said,

Dolly Parton really liked me. this morning, so classy as always. And if you... She's like, yeah, you actually won the 2020 election, she told me right before she died. Yeah. I mean, I just... And we need to pass a save act.

That was her last words. And she talked about how we should bomb Iranian civilian infrastructure. Yeah, I'll pass that, dagum, save act. Exactly. Her website, or the Imagination Library website is just imaginationlibrary.com. if you feel like giving a donation. It turns out I undersold there. It says 300 million books.

Whoa. You're off by 100 times. I saw the 3 million books gifted to registered children. Holy moly. Can we put this on the screen? Yeah. Look at that. Oh, no, it's all right.

But we'll, there it is. Look at that. Okay, we'll put a link to that down below. It's $3 million a month. That's unreal. And these, uh, And she could have hoarded her money and she gave away a lot of her money, a lot. Go ahead, Brian.

Well, there's just a lot of books that you can get through this, that have been banned for insane reasons. Like, this is a way to circumvent book banning and things you can't have access to your school. And that's not nefarious in any way. Yep. It's just like about like children who aren't white. Exactly. Right. Or maybe gay.

Right. I don't know, she did make she did make all these libraries carry the anarchist cookbook, I heard. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Did Dolly Parton support? Molotov sippy cup. Did Daliparton, what did Dalai Pardin have to say

about the campaign of Kashama Suwan? Did she support Kashama Suan? Anyway, we're making fun of stupid leftist purity testing because Dali Parton was a wonderful, one. wonderful human being. All the nicest people I've ever met in my life live in Blue Islands in the

middle of surrounded by red. Like when I lived in Athens, Georgia, like, especially in the South. Jen Welch is carrying the flame. Yeah. It takes a lot to, I mean, I was just a regular person to just dress like a punk and I would get called slurs all the time and have beer cans thrown at my head on the side of the street. So like the guts it takes to be yourself.

And a lot of those towns is really hard. It usually turns out some mighty fine people. Yes. Exactly. I mean, it's, I remember getting called the F slur wearing a p coat walking down Fargo's Broadway. But it is, Sorry about that.

Every. But, but, uh, but basically it's like college towns often or any sort of area with any kind of a downtown. A lot of those people, I mean, even, you look at the voting data, like, you know, right. Being among people is good for your socialization skills and ability to not. be driven by fear and paranoia and dumb horseshit about like whether enous canter can play in w a well it's why suburban people are so like freaked out by the new york post because then they see crime and they get to you know i feel very uh paranoid in their little kind of fiefdom but um

just a few i ms about because people have are having a strong reaction to this and then i want to get to our guests but i sammy from uh y s says i'm transgender my own mother doesn't accept me my state government wants me dead dolly was 80 years old and from tennessee dolly loved people like me and advocated for people like me she was a good christian she was a good person rest in peace gorge um and uh this is amazing cauliflower writes in secondhand story from a friend a trans woman sent a painted portrait and a letter to dolly letting her know how much her music mattered to her during her transition and dolly paid for her top surgery oh man all right um Love Dolly Parton, rest in peace, and it sucks that she was the only 80-year-old.

She was the 80-year-old who had to die yesterday. There's another one who also loves makeup, also is theatrical, and who's doing a lot of harm right now. For a second, I thought you were talking about Tim Curry. And I was like, take it easy. Sorry, best in peace, Tim Curry as well. In a moment, we are going to be talking to Stuart Schrader. about his book, Blue Power, How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves. But first, a word from one of our sponsors.

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slash majority rocket money.com slash majority we'll put a link down below in the video and episode descriptions and at majority.fm let rocket money help you reach your financial goals faster rocket money.com slash majority quick break and when we come back we will be joined by Stuart Schrader. We are back and we are joined now by Dr. Stewart Schrader, Associate Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University, where he directs the Chloe Center for the Critical Study of Racism, Immigration and Colonialism. His new book is called Blue Power, How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves. Dr. Schrader, thanks so much for coming on the show today. Thanks for having me. Of course. So let's talk about really just the overarching premise of

the book, how American police seized political power. in this country. And maybe we could, it'd be helpful to talk about how policing got started, even as an institution in this country, and also how it connects to America as a capitalist country as well. Sure. Well, the book Blue Power is about a movement that began in the 1960s and continues to this day by police, largely led by their unions and other types of associations. to influence our politics in the country on their own behalf. So police unions in their contemporary form really came into existence toward the end of the 60s as part of a broader shift

to public sector unionization that swept the country. Police were part of that. And they used newfound power and resources that they gained to try to influence the legislation. legislative process. And they really fused this energy for gaining collective bargaining rights with a reaction against the civil rights movement and the black power movement. And even the second way feminist movement, police adopted a kind of reactionary political stance at that time. They endorsed cries for, you know, law and order and getting tough on crime in very self-serving ways.

that would increase their compensation and make their jobs, you know, adhere to variety of preferences that they had. And that would also give them a lot of impunity and protection from accountability. You know, the period of the 1960s was a moment when there was a lot of discussion of how to make police more effective as crime fighters, make police better able to control protests and uprisings that were happening. And, you know, the police reaction to this was that they were being constrained. And certainly calls for greater effectiveness. They worried were calls for more outside external control. And so they resisted this and they used their unions and associations to push back.

And they've been extremely successful. The history I chart in the book is a story of local state and federal level gains in the kind of influence and power of police to the point that I would say in many cities, it's really been the case that rather than police answering to elected officials, it's really the other way around that many elected officials are answering. to police because they're intimidated and scared of the both political muscle they have, the resources they have, the electoral influence they have, and the ability they have to disrupt the regular everyday functioning of city government by slowing down their enforcement or even illegally going on strike. So is that what makes American people?

policing unique? There was a stat in your book that that was jarring to me that U.S. police are responsible for 13% of global police killings and were 4% of the global population here in the United States. So obviously, it's more lethal than other forms of policing, certainly on average. Is it that organizing power that makes it unique? What are the characters of American policing versus, say, the rest of the world? Yeah, absolutely. And to get back to your original question, it's certainly true that police and other parts of the world are deeply integrated in protecting the smooth functioning of capitalism, you know, protecting private property, making sure that workers don't go on strike or people don't protest. You know, that's true everywhere.

But when we start to look at, you know, other highly developed countries like the United States, the police here really are an outlier, just as the United States is an outlier in terms of of incarceration rates. And so, yeah, one of the reasons I started to do this research into the political power of police was to try to make sense of this. You know, on the one hand, I think we do, especially in the aftermath of Black Lives Matter

and the protest waves of 2014, 2015, 2020, you know, there's been a lot of really great scholarship, journalism, and other analysis of how police operate in the streets and their kind of everyday operations all the injustices that go along with that. But I think there's been less attention to their political organizing kind of behind closed doors. And that was what I wanted to make better sense of. I think lots of people will know, you know, in their own city, there might be a police

union president who's boisterous, who gets a lot of attention from the local news media. But I think people are a little bit less attuned to the way, and I certainly was when I began the research, to the way that these folks. are part of a large, organized movement that's been persistent and consistent over decades. And they're, you know, they're really talking to each other, sharing best practices, trying to figure out what works in one place, whether it's going to work in another place. And so I trace this history. And I do think that this is something that distinguishes the police in the United States

as compared to other places. Certainly, you know, there are, because of the federal decentralized systems, that the United States has, there are many, many police departments and therefore many, many police unions and other types of associations that wield political power. And there isn't really a comparable equivalent in other countries because the police departments and agencies are not organized the same way. And so when you have police in towns and cities who are then organized into statewide federations, which are then organized into national organizations, they really bring quite a lot of political heft and are able to marshal a lot of resources.

And this is, I think, one aspect of trying to make sense of policing and the kind of bigger picture of the criminal punishment system that we have not paid sufficient attention to. And so I hope that, you know, this book is, is alerting readers to a kind of hidden dimension of our political system. You know, in some ways, it's kind of been hiding in plain sight. Right. That their political power is key to understanding why we've been unable to do comprehensive criminal justice reform in this country. Let's then go back to their origin. And you talk about police unions and they're beginning to really organize themselves in a more

militant way being a response to the civil rights movement. Tell us a bit about that. Yeah, absolutely. So the book starts in Detroit where there was in the 1960s a quite progressive mayor who was getting a lot of national attention. He was on the cover of magazines like Time because it seemed as though Detroit, not only was at this, industrial powerhouse, but it was a city where some of the promises of kind of urban, progressive liberalism were being borne out. It was a city where people thought that poverty was being reduced, you know, racial tensions were declining. Of course, that turned out not to be true. And the rebellion in

1967 is the best proof of this. But at the same time that the mayor, whose name was Jerome Kavanaugh was gaining this kind of national profile as a standard bearer for kind of progressive urban liberalism. The police union, which came into existence some decades earlier, but was really a social club. By the 1960s, it became a political organization. It really self-consciously became a political organization. And so it was trying to get a contract. And in the history, many people will know the history of the uprising that happened in 1967, which was, you know, really devastating to the city. But what's been forgotten is that this happened in the midst of the police union trying to obtain its contract. And it actually did finally get the contract it was desiring, which

Kavanaugh had been resistant to signing. It finally got it right after the 1967 rebellion. And once the union got this contract, it really went on the war path against urban liberalism. And so what I would argue is that it wasn't just the idea of gaining representation, signing a contract, getting a really good salary of the Detroit police officers were able to get one of the highest salaries in the country at this point. It wasn't just that. It was that they also saw their mission as destroying the political career,

of this progressive mayor who really saw himself as somebody who could try to heal some of the trauma and divisions in the city that both led to and resulted from the rebellion. And I just, can I pause there for a second for a modern analog? This is part of why perhaps Zoran Mamdani

has yet to pick a fight with the police commissioner Tish here in New York City. as he attempts to get his agenda items across. He, as a student of history, he's quite adept at that stuff. I would imagine he was aware of this example. Well, yeah, and the Detroit Police Officers Association really created what I would consider a blueprint. It wasn't just get a contract, get good benefits, get a good salary.

It was high the demand for that type of remuneration with a demand to destroy a kind of progressive political program. And it's the book shows that over and over again across the country, police unions follow this sort of blueprint. And it's absolutely true that even in New York City, you know, people will point to the mayoralty of Bill de Blasio, which is where the book ends as another example of this, where he was a progressive who was elected on promises to rein in some of the abuses that the NYPD had been engaging in through its stop and frisk practices that Bloomberg and the police commissioner Ray Kelly had overseen. And he was immediately challenged by the police unions in the city and to the point that, you know,

they were basically an open rebellion. Now, the question of Mamdani is, is an interesting one because some of the political situation has changed. The police unions are not led by the same type of firebrands who were very, very successful police union leaders as under de Blasio. And, you know, the state government is different. There are more progressives in the state legislature. So some of the ways that the police unions has succeeded in New York was to, you know, to try to get what they wanted from the state rather than through the city because they thought,

well, we can rely on maybe some more conservative elected officials in Albany. And that's less true. But it is still the case that the current, the contract for the police officers of the NYPD has expired. And the police union said that it could not come to an agreement. with the Mamdani administration, and it has asked for the state to intervene, and it's going to arbitration. And this is a very traditional tactic of this police union to try to get state-level intervention because they don't think they can get what they want from the city. And, you know, I show in the book that, again, these types of mechanisms that are intended to benefit police,

you know, they came out of concerted political mobilization, fighting legislative battles, fighting court battles, if the legislation was challenged. And this is really what Blue Power is about, is this kind of very complicated behind the scenes political maneuvering, both to get the right candidates into office, who will do more or less what police unions ask them to do, and then, you know, get the legislation passed,

wage the court battles, work, with the arbitrators if it comes to arbitration. And so it's complicated to make sense of, and it's not necessarily all that flashy, but then when a very high-profile incident does occur, the killing of Eric Garner or George Floyd, something like that, you know, these police unions and the organizations that police belong to are ready to spring into action,

consolidate and speak, with a unified voice and they know how to pull the levers of power of, you know, in legislation, legislature, in the courts, et cetera. So, I mean, pulling the levers of power, it's fascinating how you explore this, particularly when dealing with Democrats versus Republicans. You write about how Democrats have traditionally tried to cooperate with commanders in police departments and the Republicans are more working with the rank and fight. cops. And I was struck by how that mirrors the current class dynamics of both political

constituencies right now. Can you describe that and even bring in some national figures into your description and examples? Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, the history of policing in the 20th century in the United States is a history of attempts at reform, kind of rest of, responding to crisis. And these have often been led by the commanding officers. They tend to be kind of technocratic, you know, oriented toward reform, oriented toward improving training, introducing new technologies, and so forth. And going back to Lyndon Johnson and even earlier, these chiefs were broadly aligned with Democrats. And when Republicans in the 1960s started, you know, spouting law and order rhetoric and talking about getting tough on crime,

many of the rank and file police organizations, the Fraternal Order of Police, which is the biggest one, you know, they saw themselves as more aligned with the Republican Party, which, you know, really did not want to brook any criticism of police. They were not really interested in reform, and police officers were happy to hear that. But it came to be the, the case that over time, particularly in Washington, if police wanted to get major legislation passed, they needed to have bipartisan support. And so the most important figure who I talk about in the book, who was able to kind of figure out how to not only get every type of police officer to agree to things, you know, say sheriffs, urban police officers, state troopers,

et cetera, et cetera, not only get all the different types of police officers to agree, but also to get both sides of the aisle to agree, that was Joe Biden. And Joe Biden, from the beginning of his career in the 1970s, all the way through to the 1994 crime bill, which he really largely crafted and oversaw its passage, you know, he was the one who said, I'm going to find a way to kind of bridge these divides, get the commanders and the rank and file to agree because we will offer, particularly in the 94 crime bill, amazing amounts of resources for the police. The tagline for the 94 crime bill, the way it was sold to the public by Biden and by the Clinton administration, was that it would provide 100,000 new police officers across the United States. There would be

so much money available that the crime problem would be ameliorated because there would be so many new cops on the streets and they would be engaging in community policing and other types of proactive measures. And so, you know, Biden was really explicit. I say in the book that he says in his speeches on the floor of the Senate, you know, he says, when I tried to figure out the best way to deal with crime. I did not think about, you know, root causes. I didn't think about poverty. I didn't think about the trauma that young people were experienced saying. Nice. Flex. Yeah. Instead, I called the cops. He literally says this. I called the cops. And what he means is that he spoke to these organizations that I've been mentioning from the Fraternal Order of Police to the National

Sheriff's Association to the International Association of Chiefs of Police, these professional representatives of of police all over the country and said, what do you guys want? And what can Congress do for you? And it turned out it was to basically throw money at police. He's, uh, Biden perfected that calling, uh, what do you guys want, both with cops and with Israel, interestingly. Um, now, I mean, you're, uh, I mentioned that you are at Johns Hopkins University, which is in Baltimore, Maryland. And, um, I'm struck by that because, of course, the war on drugs kind of follows shortly after this period that you talk about of the proliferation of police organizing themselves, the late 1960s, and then really the war on drugs begins in the 1970s. How do you connect those two dynamics?

And I would imagine you'd say that, like, they were obviously linked and feeding off. of one another. Yeah, for sure. You know, I would say two things. I mean, one is that the war on drugs, the war on crime, the war on terror, you know, all of these so-called wars have showered money on the police departments across the country. They've, you know, also provided money for, you know, jails and prisons. So, you know, when we think about what they actually entail, in large part, they're kind of rhetorical devices that kind of cover the just dissemination of money from Washington, you know, from the budget that the Congress approves. Now, police oftentimes were really thrilled to kind of lean in to the rhetoric. Yeah, crime is going up.

Yes, drug abuse is getting worse and worse. Yes, there is a threat of terrorism because they knew that they stood to benefit from this. And I think that one of the kind of hallmarks of Blue Power, as I discuss it in the book, is that on the one hand, if there is a increase in crime or there is an increased, say, in drug overdoses, as has happened in recent years, you know, cops respond and say, well, look, we need more. money. We need more resources. We need more protection from meddling oversight in order to get the job done so that we can bring these, you know, horrific rates of crime and death and destruction down. And if those rates do actually go down, which may or may not have anything to do with the

activities of police, then they say, well, you know what, we should be rewarded for the good job we've done. And so the discourse of blue power is they always find a way to say, look, at the end of the day, we need more. We need more freedom to do our jobs without the oversight of civilian complaint review boards or, you know, prying prosecutors who might be looking for evidence of corruption or malfeasance or internal affairs. bureaus, we need to get rid of all that stuff. And we also need, you know, more money so that cops are rewarded with good pay and benefits for the work that they do. And, and it certainly is true that in big cities, and especially in wealthy suburbs across the country, cops are, you know, very handsomely compensated with a lot of benefits that regular workers in other professions and even in other public sector professions, you know, would would be thrilled to, to, to, to, you know, would be thrilled to,

receive. And, you know, I think that the kind of takeaway from that is that these funds from the government to give public sector workers, you know, good compensation, good benefits, you know, they are available. Right now, they're generally just confined, you know, to police and sometimes firefighters who, you know, get much better public approval than police. But, you know, that they, It does provide a model for how we could treat, you know, workers a lot better. Yeah. Absolutely. Any public sector worker.

Yeah. It's, it is amazing to think about how we could redirect resources in a way that helps, you know, our other public sector workers and not just exclusively the police. But, you know, part of what's so striking about this, I think, is how policing is, you know, profitable in its current construction to a lot of different industries. I mean, the connections, I think, with the war on terror are really important in the post-9-11 policing ecosystem. Can you talk about how the militarization of police and that level of militarization was put on steroids in the post-9-11 America?

Yeah, absolutely. the Department of Homeland Security came into existence, you know, a little bit after 9-11, and it, you know, provided grants to police all over the country. And the, there was already the practice that many of your listeners will be familiar with of the Pentagon giving surplus material to police departments. But that also really ramped up in the aftermath. of 9-11 and certainly during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan when there was a lot of surplus material to be distributed.

And so that hasn't really abated all that much. But now I do think that we're in a moment when some of the technologies available are starting to change the scenario for police because the attractiveness of drones, the attractiveness of different types of digital surveillance technologies and certainly AI. You know, these technologies are always offered as a kind of like magic bullet. They will make policing more precise. It will reduce the likelihood of, you know, villains getting away with crime or other malicious acts. And it will also make it so that the job of police is easier.

safer, et cetera. You know, I'm very wary of those types of promises, but that's the selling point. And I think that, you know, police representatives know to endorse those types of selling points because it always seems like a win-win. You know, we're going to fix the crime problem or the public safety problem and it's also going to provide a benefit to police. You know, the argument for, you know, armored vehicles is largely about, you know, protecting police, the arguments that are being made right now for surveillance drones and potentially even armed drones in the future, you know, AI types of fueled types of surveillance technologies, you know, these, they're, the promises are, you know, kind of utopian and they

are made as like kind of science fiction come true. And, you know, the questions that I think we we have to ask just the most basic questions. Like on the one hand, our questions about our rights and your right to privacy and so forth. And then on the other hand, about the costs, you know, where is the money for all of these going to come from? And where is the money for them going to go? It's going to go largely into the hands of the most kind of, you know, evil kind of character billioners. Well, I mean, they are behind these tech overlords that are now trying to sell drone, surveillance technology and AI surveillance to police departments are the ones that talk about how San Francisco is a hellhole, how these urban centers are dangerous. And I don't think it's a coincidence that social media giants elevate some of that kind of inflammatory crime content to make it go viral to increase that perception. This is really after the George Floyd protests, this was for years, I think, and I don't have to make it go viral. I'm

have, this is just from observation, I don't have data to back it up, but it seemed abundantly clear to me that this was being elevated by these tech giants that want to sell surveillance technology, the police department. So gin up panic about crime. Yeah, yeah. I think that's exactly right. And I think we've all seen it, you know, with our own eyes that there is, there is just so much fear-mongering content available, you know, and in some, in some ways, it's, it's an old story, also it's just ramified and intensified by the, you know, availability of, of these social media technologies and other types of technologies to put it in right

in front of our face. Right. Like previously it would just be on the New York Post or in your local news, if it bleeds, it leads kind of thing. But now it's at the top of your algorithm. And so before we wrap, now that I mentioned the New York Post, it occurs to me that we should probably touch on two central figures. in the world of American policing on the Republican side,

Donald Trump and his buddy, Rudy Giuliani, very much a creature of the NYPD himself. What did you find in your research about those two figures in American politics and their relationship to policing? Well, for both of them, goes back quite a long way. I mean, Giuliani, I think, many people sort of know that in the 1990s, he was a tough-on-crime mayor, but he was a tough-on-crime official all the way back in the 1970s. He worked in the Ford administration, and then he worked in the Reagan administration.

He was largely in charge of Reagan's approach to street crime, which was somewhat inconsistent. because, you know, again, Biden always had the idea of sending money to police, and the Reagan administration, at least at first, wanted to cut government spending. And so, you know, again, like Biden kind of figured out how to how to break through, break that sort of impasse. But Giuliani was at the center of it. He was always spouting really very acerbic rhetoric that we know him for from when he was mayor. And I write about him a bunch in the book, in part because he had a very close relationship with the Patrolman's Benevolent Association, the Officers Union in New York City.

And they helped to actually get him into office. And some people may know that there was this really outrageous incident that's kind of referred to as the City Hall riot that Giuliani was at the center of. And it was all about criticizing the mayor David Dinkins, the first African-American mayor of New York City, because he wanted to institute more civilian review of the NYPD. And so the PBA in concert with Giuliani led a protest that devolved into total mayhem on the steps of City Hall. And that was really when Giuliani,

made clear that he, you know, had sort of figured out how to campaign on this, this kind of tough on crime mantle with sort of thinly veiled racism behind it. And that was going to propel him into City Hall. And it was quite successful. And then, you know, Donald Trump, too, has, he appears throughout this history, you know, the PBA and other organizations like that. They've been giving him awards since, you know, the 80s. He's been going to their banquist. He loves those. That's a pretty, pretty great way to get to his heart we've figured out. Absolutely. Absolutely. Every world leader and FIFA, what have you. Yeah. And, you know, and of course,

one of his first forays into politics was an attempted intervention into the so-called Central Park Jogger case where, you know, he demanded the death penalty for the, you know, men who were arrested for that crime, which they ultimately were shown not to have committed. And so, you know, he always has been trying to espouse, you know, tough on crime rhetoric. And he and Giuliani, I think, really saw something in one another. And the PBA as well, they're all, it's a kind of triumvirate of reactionary power in New York City that has had really national level implications. And I explain a bunch of this in the book as I bring it up to the present in the conclusion. Lastly, we just have an I AMER, a viewer who has a question for you.

Jay Tingle writes, please ask your guest about San Francisco Mayor George Mascone. I'm not sure if you have a story about that. I do, in fact, I have a couple chapters about San Francisco in the book. The San Francisco Police Officers Association became a very militant police union in the 1970s. It went on strike. And it also kind of was one of the first police unions to figure out how to leap from the city government to the state government to get its way. You know, the city government in San Francisco was, you know, not fully progressive, but full of progressives. it had a few.

And that was frustrating to the police officers association. So they said, all right, we're going to see what we can do in Sacramento and get our way there. And that became, again, a blueprint for other police unions. Moscone was a liberal mayor who he came in in the aftermath of the strike. and the police union absolutely did not like him. And, you know, the story, which you may be familiar with, it's a really horrific story. He was assassinated along with Harvey Milk by a former police officer. And that former police officer, whose name was Dan White, after he committed this assassination,

you know, he went and turned himself in. and he said, you know, I want to turn myself into somebody who I trust, and the person he trusted was a police union official who was very powerful. I think to this day is maybe still active in the police union. And, you know, the politics of this history of blue power, there's a lot, that's maybe the most grotesque incident, but there's a lot of really grotesque incidents that I trace in the book where the opposition to, again, urban liberalism takes really dramatic and intense and pointed forms.

You know, nowadays we're accustomed to seeing maybe tweets from police union heads that are really outrageous. And certainly that happened with de Blasio in 2020 when his daughter was doxed by a police union head. but it's it's it's it's gone far beyond that to you know threats of physical violence and intimidation and so forth and and the book is is full of examples of this throughout the decades well uh i really encourage people to check it out the book is called blue power how police organized to protect and serve themselves and uh steward trader uh you can read his other work as well badges without borders how global counter insurgency transform policing but we'll put a

link to Blue Power down below wherever people are listening to or watching this. Thanks so much for your time today. I really appreciate it. Yeah, thank you for having me. Of course. With that, folks, we're going to head into the fun half shortly. I did want to just say, since I won't be in tomorrow, Lilliana, our intern, last day, tomorrow, shout out, I'm giving you a shout out, been doing incredible work, doing

awesome work, amazing, amazing intern helping us out here on the majority report. majority report origins. Exactly. Dealing with our 12 to 15 year old equipment. You'll have Liliana to thank for when on the best ofs for like Christmas or whatever for members have archive, deep archive inclusions. That's really kind of what this is about, at least as far as I know. They've been awesome.

Thanks so much, Lillianna, for all of you help this summer. As a reminder, this show relies on your support. Join the Majority Report.com. Oh, look what I found. Oh, Jesus Christ. ...campaign with the man Tim Cain. Ah, Tim Cain and the membrane. Tim Cain and the brain!

You're aware that this causes me psychic damage, right? Every time you do it. Every time you do it. I'm glad I remembered what page this is on. Right. I mean, honestly... Yeah, that made me feel really bad. Yes.

I got a rush out of it. Every time... Every time you play that, it's like a year's worth of meth use. That's the damage that is like being inflicted upon my body right now. I'm bleeding from my brain. Watch Hillary examine the terrain. Oh.

I love to watch Hillary examine the terrain. I put a Hillary clip, by the way, in Slack, right? Did I not? I don't know if we have that on our sound sheet. She weighed into the current political discourse. No, she said what? Do you have something to say about Hassan Piper? No, it's okay.

Maybe we'll just pull it up and if we feel like it in the fun half. Hassan Piker's bad. Is that what she said? Or what is she talking about? Well, I sent it in Slack, but again, you just made my brain atrophy. So I need a second. Join the Majority Report.com. You get access to the fun half.

You can I am the show, all that good stuff. Also, shoppedat majority report radio.com. You can get the Jeffrey's Cycle shirts for a limited time. Those are available. Shopped up majority report radio. I mean, you've got to be flying off the shows now after, one day after meeting with Jared Kushner, he both decides that Hassan Piker is the thing we need to be talking about again and puts a bunch of Zionists like Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wassiman Schultz and Wesley Bell on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. A literal murderer's row.

Exactly. Oh, man. All right. So cool stuff. Cool stuff. See you in the fun. Did you not plug Matt's show? Oh, I'm sorry.

Oh, yeah, sorry. I was distracted. Both of you for you. Doing the Tim Kaine drop. What's happening in the Matlekian media universe? Bitter-O-Rourke joined us on Left Reckoning to talk about his project to get low-prency voters out. And we also asked him about A-PAC. Can Democratic Party coexist with the Israel lobby?

And I'm happy to say that he introduced the word genocide into the conversation before we could. And we also talked about Zoram-Dani and, whether there needs to be an exorcism of the far left or if it's actually maybe a source of party finding its principles. So yeah, check that out. Patreon.com says left reckoning to get our Sunday show. All right.

See you in the fun half. Okay, Emma, please. Well, I just, I feel that my voice is sorely lacking on the majority report. Wait, what? Look, Samma's unpopular. I do deserve a vacation at Disney World. So, ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure

to welcome Emma to the show. It is a... Thursday. I think you need the Timpoo for Sam. That's police. Sir, I'm gonna, I'm gonna pause you right there. Wait, what? You can't encourage how much to live like this.

And I'll tell you why. So it's offered a twir? Sushi and poker with the boys. Twer? Sushi and poker with the boys. So it's offered a twerk? Yeah. Sushi and boys.

That's what we call bids. I just think that what you did to Tim Poole was mean. Free speech. That's not what we're. about here. Look at how sad he's become now. You shouldn't even talk about it. I think you're responsible. I probably am in a certain way, but let's get to the meltdown here.

Twir? Ugh. Sushi and poker with the boys. Oh my God. Wow. Sushi. I'm sorry. I'm losing my fucking mind. So it's offered a twerk? Yeah. Sushi and poker with the boys. Logic. Twerp. Sushi and poker with the boys. Boy, boy, boy. Twerp. I think I'm like a little kid. I think I'm like a little kid. Dwer? I think I'm like a little kid.

Add this debate. Some people just don't understand So I'm not trying to be a dick right now But like I absolutely think the U.S. should be providing me With a life and kids That's not what we're talking about here It's not a fun job That's a real thing

That's a real thing Willie Walker. That's a real thing That's a real thing. That's a real thing. That's a real thing. That's a real thing. That's a powerful notch.

Sam has like the weight of the world on the shoulders. Sam doesn't want to do this show anymore. It was so much easier. One of the majority of the majority report was just you. You were happy. Let's change the subject. Rangers and Nick's going right. Now, shut up.

Don't want people saying reckless things on your program. That's one of the most difficult parts about this show. This is a pro-killing podcast. I'm thinking maybe it's time we bury the hatchet. Left is best. Violet twir? Twir. I don't get changed the way Emma is cucked.

We already fund Israel. We're a terrible question. Another incredible theme song. I Bumbler. Emma Viglin, absolutely one of my favorite people. Actually, not just in the game, like period.