Category: 3-SometimeCommentary

Hello from the TTSG drop-out commune!

This week, a longer-than-we-intended show about the TikTok saga, Chinese/US hegemony, and nationalist traps. We also respond to a few of your brilliant emails and DMs.

0:00 – Jay explains his obsession with the history of Jonestown, and we toss around a few theories of left (and right) millenarianisms.

5:30 – After all Trump’s blather about security, TikTok, USA looks to be headed toward Oracle and Wal-Mart, with no promises of Internet liberty. Plus: will $5 billion from the deal somehow fund “The 1776 Project” aka Patriot Education aka Uncritical Race Theory?

14:10 – Enter the American splinternet? Or is that what we’ve been surfing all along? We ask why the past couple generations of US leftists seem so local in their thinking. Is a new kind of internationalist organizing possible?

34:20 – Our humble (and not-so-humble) takes on listener comments and questions:

1) How to support Chinese international students in this xenophobic age? And what to make of parents on conservative WeChat? Bonus: the surprising demographics of GOP Asian America. (Thanks, Elaine!)

2) What to make of the cops’ courting of Asian American communities? (Terima kasi, Megan!)

3) What does it mean to “organize,” and do upper-class people have any right to get involved in labor struggles? (감사합니다, Ollie!)

4) Is ethnic studies a force for good in politics, or does it just produce diversity aesthetics? (Salamat, Jael!)

ありがとう for supporting TTSG (https://goodbye.substack.com), and do reach out any time via Twitter (@ttsgpod) or email (timetosaygoodbyepod@gmail.com)! Get all your friends to subscribe, too.

On the Gist, the pursuit of power through SCOTUS.

In the interview, Mike talks with radio presenter and author, Eric Weiner about his latest book The Socrates Express: In Search of Life Lessons from Dead Philosophers. In it, Weiner opines on the philosophical giants from a place that offers one of the more pleasant environments to philosophize - the railroad. In this travelogue, Weiner discusses their life-enhancing poetry, and explains how their lives were in fact just like ours, except they had more time to think and write than binge on Netflix. 

In the spiel, the politicking around Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Email us at thegist@slate.com

Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Margaret Kelley.

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You do not want to miss this riveting conversation between Andy and The Atlantic's Ed Yong, the journalist Andy thinks has done the best job writing about and analyzing the pandemic. They discuss America's failed response, how this whole thing might end, and why wanting things to go back to "normal" isn't the right mindset. 

Keep up with Andy on Twitter @ASlavitt and Instagram @andyslavitt.

Follow Ed Yong on Twitter @edyong209.

In the Bubble is supported in part by listeners like you. Become a member, get exclusive bonus content, ask Andy questions, and get discounted merch at https://www.lemonadamedia.com/inthebubble/ 

Support the show by checking out our sponsors!

• Livinguard masks have the potential to deactivate COVID-19 based on the testing they have conducted from leading universities such as the University of Arizona and the Free University in Berlin, Germany. Go to shop.livinguard.com and use the code BUBBLE10 for 10% off.
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Check out these resources from today’s episode: 

• Pre-order Andy’s book, Preventable: The Inside Story of How Leadership Failures, Politics, and Selfishness Doomed the U.S. Coronavirus Response, here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250770165 
• Read all of Ed Yong’s COVID-19 reporting in The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/author/ed-yong/
• Check out The New York Times piece “The Pandemic in Six-Word Memoirs” Ed mentions in today’s show: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/11/opinion/coronavirus-pandemic-poetry-memoirs.html
• Read the paper Ed talks about by historian Howard P. Segal on “America as Techno-Fix Nation”: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5325/utopianstudies.28.2.0231

To follow along with a transcript and/or take notes for friends and family, go to www.lemonadamedia.com/show/in-the-bubble shortly after the air date.

Stay up to date with us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at @LemonadaMedia. For additional resources, information, and a transcript of the episode, visit lemonadamedia.com.

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Claudia Rankine, one of America’s leading literary figures, and the double-Booker Prize winner Margaret Atwood look at the world afresh, challenging conventions – with Kirsty Wark.

In her latest book, Just Us: An American Conversation, Claudia Rankine reflects on what it means to experience, and question, everyday racism. Her poems draw on a series of encounters with friends and strangers, as well as historical record. Her work moves beyond the silence, guilt and violence that often surround discussions about whiteness, and dares all of us to confront the world in which we live.

Margaret Atwood recently won the Booker Prize for a second time with The Testaments, her sequel to the 1985 prize-winner The Handmaid’s Tale. Her story of the fictional Gilead’s dark misogyny has retained its relevance after more than three decades. The world of Gilead was originally sparked by an earlier poem, Spelling, and Atwood explores the importance of poetry in firing the imagination.

Producer: Katy Hickman Photographer: John Lucas

Claudia Rankine, one of America’s leading literary figures, and the double-Booker Prize winner Margaret Atwood look at the world afresh, challenging conventions – with Kirsty Wark.

In her latest book, Just Us: An American Conversation, Claudia Rankine reflects on what it means to experience, and question, everyday racism. Her poems draw on a series of encounters with friends and strangers, as well as historical record. Her work moves beyond the silence, guilt and violence that often surround discussions about whiteness, and dares all of us to confront the world in which we live.

Margaret Atwood recently won the Booker Prize for a second time with The Testaments, her sequel to the 1985 prize-winner The Handmaid’s Tale. Her story of the fictional Gilead’s dark misogyny has retained its relevance after more than three decades. The world of Gilead was originally sparked by an earlier poem, Spelling, and Atwood explores the importance of poetry in firing the imagination.

Producer: Katy Hickman Photographer: John Lucas

Emily Bazelon joins Mike for a special episode on the passing of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. After discussing Ginsburg’s history as a justice and legacy on the court, they begin to unpack the future political ramifications of her death. Emily and Mike talk through the ways a nomination could quickly slip through the Senate before January, the impact a conservative court could have on issues besides abortion rights, and if Ginsburg should have stepped down under President Obama.

Email us at thegist@slate.com

Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Margaret Kelley.

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On the Gist, Trump can’t pronounce Mosni, Wisconsin.

In the interview, Mike talks with writers Mary Pilon and Louisa Thomas about their foray into collaborative editing. Their new collection of short sports stories called Losers: Dispatches from the Other Side of the Scoreboard is a curated volume that explores what it means to feel defeated. Pilon, a New York Times bestselling author, and Thomas, a New Yorker staff writer examine why winning isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be, and why losing never fails to reveal life lessons to players and those on the sidelines.

In the spiel, condemning condemnation.

Email us at thegist@slate.com

Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Margaret Kelley.

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Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices