American Imperialism

It’s an EmMajority Report Thursday! She speaks with Margaret Power, professor of history at the Illinois Institute of Technology, to discuss her recent book Solidarity across the Americas: The Puerto Rican Nationalist Party and Anti-imperialism. Then, she’s joined by journalist **Erin Reed](https...
It’s Hump Day! Sam and Emma speak with Meron Rapoport, editor of Local Call and writer at +972 Magazine, to discuss his recent piece entitled “Surveillance and interference: Israel’s covert war on the ICC exposed”, co-authored with Yuval Abraham. First, Sam runs through updates on Biden’s blatant...
It’s Casual Friday! Sam and Emma speak with Osita Nwanevu, contributing editor at the New Republic, to discuss his most recent piece on free speech and to round up the week in news.
Sam and Emma host Alex de Waal, Executive Director of The World Peace Foundation and Professor at Tufts University, to discuss the ongoing civil conflict in Ethiopia and how it is affecting the Tigrayan people. First, Sam and Emma run through updates on the US funding bill, GOP killing cannabis r...
It’s Casual Friday! Emma hosts Ryan Grim, DC Bureau Chief at The Intercept, to discuss the Intercept’s coverage of the White House pressuring Sen. Bernie Sanders to not introduce a war powers resolution on the conflict in Yemen. Then, Emma’s joined by Lance of The Serfs TV to discuss their recent...
In a pre-taped conversation, Sam’s joined by Eric Alterman, Professor of English and Journalism at Brooklyn College, writer of the ”Altercation” newsletter at The American Prospect, to discuss his recent book We Are Not One: A History of America’s Fight Over Israel. Then, Emma speaks with Javier ...
Emma hosts Jamie McCallum, associate professor of sociology at Middlebury College, to discuss his recent book Essential: How the Pandemic Transformed the Long Fight for Worker Justice. Then, Emma is joined by Gerrit Bruhaug, Ph.D candidate at the University of Rochester and research assistant for...
Sam and Emma host Dale Kretz, visiting assistant professor of history at the University of California, Santa Barbara, to discuss his recent book Administering Freedom: The State of Emancipation after the Freedmen’s Bureau. First, Sam and Emma dive into updates on the US’ sanctions on Venezuela, E...
Sam hosts Mark Joseph Stern, senior writer at Slate, to discuss the recent opening arguments that have come in front of the Supreme Court. First, Sam runs through updates on the Democratic victory in Arizona bringing Kari Lake down, the GOP creeping even closer to a House majority, Biden’s attemp...
Emma hosts Dorothy Roberts, professor of Law, Sociology, and Civil Rights at the University of Pennsylvania, to discuss her recent book Torn Apart: How the Child Welfare System Destroys Black Families–and How Abolition Can Build a Safer World. Emma first covers yesterday’s simultaneous mass shoot...
Sam and Emma break down the latest headlines, from the Democratic Leadership finally stepping in to ask for “reasonable republicans,” which they’ll surely respond positively to, to the continuing organizing movement within Starbucks franchises nationwide. They begin by covering the rapid response...
Sam and Emma host John M. Schuessler, Associate Professor of Government and Public Service at Texas A & M University, to discuss his book Deceit On The Road To War: Presidents, Politics, and American Democracy, and how the blueprint to manufactured consent for US intervention developed over t...
Sam and Emma host Matt Duss, foreign policy adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), to discuss the recent developments in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, as well as the U.S. airstrike in Somalia from a few days ago, the first in the area since last August. Matt, Sam, and Emma begin with a clip of a j...
Sam hosts Suzanne Schneider, Deputy Director and Core Faculty at the Brooklyn Institute, to discuss her recent book The Apocalypse and the End of History: Modern Jihad and the Crisis of Liberalism, on the evolution of jihad as liberalism took over the world. Schneider begins by helping frame the ...
Sam and Emma host Jonathan Levy, professor of History at the University of Chicago, to discuss his recent book Ages of American Capitalism: A History of the United States. Sam and Emma begin by discussing the newly passed defense policy bill and debt limit increase in the House, which includes a ...
Sam and Emma host David Wengrow, Professor of Comparative Archaeology at University College London, to discuss his recent book The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity that he co-authored with David Graeber. They begin by clarifying what the old history was, which Professor Wengrow descr...
Sam and Emma host Tyler Edward Stovall, Professor of History and Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Fordham University, to discuss his recent book White Freedom: The Racial History of an Idea, looking at how the construct of liberty, largely from the French and American perspecti...
Sam and Emma host Ada Ferrer, Professor of History and Latin American and Caribbean Studies at New York University, to discuss her recent book Cuba: An American History, on how the constant pressure of American Imperialism has threatened the people and territory since its independence. They jump ...
Sam and Emma host Craig Whitlock, investigative reporter at the Washington Post, to discuss his recent book The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War. Sam and Emma first touch upon the resounding victory for Gavin Newsom in the California recall election from last night, and discuss New...
Sam and Emma host Samuel Moyn, Professor of History at Yale University, to discuss his recent book Humane: How the United States Abandoned Peace and Reinvented War, on how the evolving face of the American Empire has changed the way we perceive war, and what we can do to get the conversation back...
Sam hosts Russ Feingold, President of the American Constitution Society and former United States Senator from Wisconsin, to discuss the legacy 9/11 has had on the American national security state, and what to expect going forward, to discuss the legacy 9/11 has had on the American national securi...
Emma hosts James Risen, Senior National Security Correspondent at the Intercept, to discuss his recent piece ”A War’s Epitaph: For Two Decades, Americans Were Told One Lie After Another About What They Were Doing In Afghanistan”, on how bad the “good war” has been since it began. James and Emma w...
Sam’s back this week as him and Emma host infectious disease specialist  Dr. MarkAlain Dery, infectious disease physician and epidemiologist at Access Health Louisiana and host of the daily NoiseFilter Podcast, to discuss the fallout from Hurricane Ida making landfall in Louisiana, the evacuation...
It’s Casual Friday! Emma hosts Alex Pareene, contributing editor at The New Republic and author of The AP newsletter on Substack, to wrap up the events of the week. Emma starts off with some righteous indignation towards former Trump National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster saying to resident CNN ...
Emma hosts Orville Vernon Burton, Professor of Pan-African Studies, Sociology, Anthropology, and Computer Science at Clemson University, as well as civil rights attorney Armand Derfner, to discuss their recent book Justice Deferred: Race and the Supreme Court, on the progressions, and regressions...
Emma hosts Dr. Nikki Usher, professor of journalism in the College of Media at the University of Illinois, to discuss her recent book, News for the Rich, White, and Blue: How Place and Power Distort American Journalism, on the troubles of both the supply and demand sides of mainstream US media. D...
It’s Casual Friday! Emma is joined by Benjamin P. Dixon, host of The Benjamin Dixon Show, to wrap up a big week in news. Benjamin and Emma dive right into the really heavy events of the last week in Afghanistan and how Biden has at least proved his ability to hold strong under media pressure. Emm...
Sam and Emma host Spencer Ackerman, author of the Forever Wars newsletter on Substack, to discuss his recent book Reign Of Terror: How The 9/11 Era Destabilized America And Produced Trump. Sam, Emma, and Spencer jump off of a Charlie Kirk nativist clip to dive into the start of the war on terror ...
Sam and Emma tackle a major week in news, starting with the fall of Kabul to the Taliban and the Biden administration’s lackluster, finger-pointing response. They start by taking a bird’s eye view of the fall of Kabul by going back to the beginning, when Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) was the s...
It’s Casual Friday! Sam and Emma host Ben Burgis, columnist at Jacobin, host of Give Them An Argument With Ben Burgis, and author of Canceling Comedians While the World Burns: A Critique of the Contemporary Left, to cover the top stories of the week. Ben, Sam, and Emma start off with a discussion...
Sam and Emma host Adam Weinstein, Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute, to explore the status of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, and what the region might look like moving forwards. They look into why the Pentagon might want a quick withdrawal now that they are committed to withdrawing at ...
Sam and Emma host historian Aviva Chomsky to discuss her latest book Central America’s Forgotten History: Revolution, Violence, and the Roots of Migration on the history of extraction, exploitation, and the root causes behind migration from the Northern Triangle to the southern US border, as well...
Sam and Emma host Daniel Levy, president of the US Middle East Project, and Noah Kulwin, co-creator of the Blowback podcast, to explore two of the US’ messiest and most destructive long-term foreign policy relationships in Israel and Cuba, respectively. Daniel joins to discuss the attacks in Gaza...
Sam and Emma host founder and senior correspondent at the Intercept Jeremy Scahill to discuss his new series Empire Politician on how Biden is the manifestation of US foreign policy over the past 50 years, including Biden’s relationship to the intel community, the on-going apartheid efforts in Is...
Sam and Emma host legal scholar and human rights activist Noura Erakat to discuss Israel’s latest assault on Palestinians in Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood and the larger colonial apartheid project carried out by Israel since its inception and the United States’s blank check to Israel.
Sam and Emma host Joshua D. Rothman, University of Alabama professor of history, to discuss his new book, The Ledger and the Chain: How Domestic Slave Traders Shaped America, the myths around the slave trade industry, the deep ties between slavery and US imperialism, and Racial capitalism’s explo...
Sam hosts Heather Parton, columnist at Salon.com and proprietor of the überblog “Digby’s Hullabaloo,” and friend and known pacifist David Feldman. With the former, they chat about the U.S.’s relationship with both domestic and foreign violence, discussing the devastating tragedies of gun violence...
Sam hosts author Scott Anderson to talk about his new book, “The Quiet Americans: Four CIA Spies at the Dawn of the Cold War — A Tragedy In Three Acts.”
Elaine Tyler May joins Sam to discuss her book, “Fortress America: How We Embraced Fear and Abandoned Democracy.”
Michael Brooks hosts writer Achin Vanaik to discuss his recent piece in Jacobin magazine, “The Escalating Crisis on the India-China Border,” and why each country’s foreign policy deserves blame for the escalation.
Sam hosts journalist Vincent Bevins to discuss his new book The Jakarta Method: Washington’s Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World. Bevins shares the untold story of the US’s role in promoting slaughter across Indonesia in the name of securing western capitalism....
Happy Wednesday! Sam hosts author Stuart Schrader to discuss his new book Badges Without Borders: How Global Counterinsurgency Transformed American Policing. Sam also interviews progressive candidate Andrew Romanoff, who is running in the Democratic primary for Colorado’s Senate seat currently he...
On today’s show the MR team brings you the news and Lori Wallach (@WallachLori) makes the case for the new NAFTA. Wallach who founded the Public Citizen Global Trade Watch explains the valuable parts of the new NAFTA including the gutting of the Investor State Dispute Settlement which corporation...
Journalist Todd Miller (@memomiller) joins Sam to discuss his new book, “Empire of Borders: The Expansion of the U.S. Border Around the World.”
Good morning, on today’s Majority Report, Fernando Tormos-Aponte from Scholars Strategy Network joins Michael Brooks to discuss his recent piece in the Jacobin, “Puerto Rico Rises,” to explain how the Puerto Rican people organized and mobilized for change in their government after leaks of Govern...
Daniel Immerwahr  (@dimmerwahr), an associate professor of history at Northwestern University, joins us to discuss his new book, How to Hide An Empire: A History of the Greater United States.
Author and law professor Khaled Beydoun joins MR to discuss his book American Islamophobia: Understanding the Roots and Rise of Fear. 
Good Thursday morning, joining Michael today is professor Daniel Bessner, author of Democracy in Exile, to discuss his latest piece in the Nation “Foreign Policy Beyond Good and Evil.”  Bessner argues that as the 2020 primaries come into view progressives should be cautious about how Warren and S...
Good Thursday morning, joining Michael Brooks on today’s Majority Report is Richard Beck to discuss his essay, “The Korean Peace Process” published in n+1. Beck breaks down American foreign policy on the Korean peninsula and it hasn’t done any real thinking in two years. Beck explains how all par...
Juan Cole (@jricole), professor of History at the University of Michigan, joins Michael Brooks to discuss the upcoming elections in Israel set for April 9. Meagan Day (@meaganmday), a staff writer at Jacobin magazine, joins Michael to discuss the 2020 election and Bernie Sanders’ launch rally at ...
On today’s show: DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen lies, claims people are not being deported without the chance to get their kids back. Rep. Clay Higgins compares immigration to D-Day invasion. Sam reads an email from a listener, goes in hard on claims that Ilhan Omar’s criticism of Israel is anti-...
On today’s show, historian Greg Grandin (@GregGrandin), joins us to discuss his new book, The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America. At the foundation of America is the idea of expansionism. For centuries the United States has expanded its borders, markets, ...
Digby (@digby56) and Andy Kindler (@AndyKindler ) join us.
Daniel Bessner, professor at Washington University’s Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies and author of Democracy in Exile, joins Michael Brooks to explains his vision of an authentically left-progressive foreign policy. Bessner and Brooks begin by explaining what happened at senator ...
On today’s show, Joseph Cirincione (@Cirincione), President of the Ploughshare Fund, joins Michael to discuss the future of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and why elected officials on both sides of the aisle are pleading with President Trump and John Bolton to keep the 30 year old C...