Gabfest Reads

• The Radical Fund That Rewired American Progress

  Emily Bazelon talks with Yale law professor John Witt about his new book The Radical Fund: How a Band of Visionaries and a Million Dollars Upended America. They explore the remarkable story of the Garland Fund—a small 1920s foundation that bankrolled early work by A. Philip Randolph, and others who would go on to shape the civil rights and labor movements. Witt traces how the fund connected race and class politics, supported the intellectual groundwork for Brown v. Board of Education, and anticipated today’s challenges around misinformation, inequality, and political disconnection. He and Bazelon also discuss what lessons progressives might take from this forgotten story of organizing during political exile. Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at [email protected]. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.) Podcast production by Nina Porzucki. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• The Recent Past of Prison Punishment

  Emily Bazelon talks with author and Yale professor Judith Resnik about her new book, Impermissible Punishments: How Prison Became a Problem for Democracy. They discuss the history of the prison system’s use of punishments like whipping, how the practice came to an end, and more.   Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at [email protected]. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• The Four Years That Changed New York City Forever

  Political Gabfest host Emily Bazelon talks with Jonathan Mahler about his new book, The Gods of New York. They discuss the unraveling of Mayor Ed Koch’s New York City; how the city’s current mayoral race is mirroring the past; and more.   Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at [email protected]. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• A Beach Read for the Outraged

  David Plotz talks with author Carl Hiaasen about his new book, Fever Beach. Fever Beach is a political satire that follows a couple of dimwitted white supremacists, a corrupt congressman, and the people that try to take them all down. They discuss the real-life racist event Hiaasen witnessed that inspired a central scene in the novel, how Matt Gaetz factors into the book, Hiaasen’s next moves, and more.   Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at [email protected]. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• Alison Bechdel Explains Selling Out the Progressive Way

  David Plotz talks with author Alison Bechdel about her new book, Spent. They discuss what’s memoir and what’s less than memoir in the comic novel, David’s own contribution to the book, and more.   Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at [email protected]. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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