It’s Casual Friday! Sam and Emma host Heather Digby Parton, contributing writer at Salon.com and proprietor of the blog Hullabaloo, to round up the week in news. Then, Sam and Emma are joined by Francesca Fiorentini, host of The Bitchuation Room podcast! First, Digby, Emma, and Sam get into yesterday’s SCOTUS decisions, the first blocking the testing mandate with a vaccine opt-out in businesses over 100 people, and the second approving the healthcare worker mandate, explaining the stupidity of the first decision, which hinged on the view that OSHA could only protect against threats unique to the workplace, and the obviousness of the second. Parsing deeper into the first decision, Sam gets into an administrative-state-state of mind, as they explore the potential impact the decision could have on the Chevron Doctrine, and look at it as a climax of the GOP agenda of the last couple of decades, which amidst countless culture war talking points has held one policy ideology at their core, the dismantling of the capacity of the government to do practically anything. Next, they check in on Jan 6 prosecutions, diving into the half-century-long GOP project of sowing doubt in democracy and priming voters to think that election fraud was a genuine issue, helping bolster their argument that there are debatable questions on the validity of this moment, before concluding with the abject failure of the Biden administration on practically every front, with almost a year gone by without any substantive legislation for COVID, infrastructure, or voting rights. Emma and Sam also expand on the power this Supreme Court could end up having, and the pointlessness of a discussion on SCOTUS abolition when we can’t even get filibuster abolition.

Then in the second half, Francesca joins Sam and Emma as, beyond shedding some lightheartedness on the show, they tackle the upcoming the Bitchuation Room live show (featuring one Sam Seder), and ponder the efficacy of poop surveillance in getting accurate COVID numbers, before moving onto Joe Rogan’s falling right into a trap of “correct and concise COVID data,” and One America News turning to Jesus Christ’s love of prostitutes to parallel Donald Trump’s love of prostitutes, despite their subtle yet key differences. They also touch on the absurdity of petty-crime fear-mongering, and a Jan 6th attendee takes on his Fox News idols for calling him a Fed, plus, your IMs!

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