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**Unf*cking The Republic**

Unf*cking The Republic® (UNFTR) is dedicated to progressive politics, leftist economic theories, and social justice in the United States. Join us for deep dives into socialism, labor rights, climate justice, and the fight against inequality. Whether you’re curious about Marxist ideas, modern social movements, or progressive policies, UNFTR delivers thoroughly sourced critiques, analyses, and interviews with the historical context mainstream media won’t provide. Subscribe for informative and unabashedly progressive coverage of the leftist political and economic landscape.

Latest Episodes:

Show Notes. Jun 17, 2025

Show notes

Max and 99 return to answer Unf*cker emails, talk Discord episode topic suggestions, and cover current events. Enjoy!

Chapters

Intro: 00:00:20

Headlines: 00:09:10

Discord: 00:24:09

Emails: 00:59:40

Memberships: 01:36:38

Outro: 01:37:59

Resources

FMF Day Deals

Politico: Mamdani surges in new poll, leading Cuomo for first time in New York mayor’s race

Video: Zohran for NYC Mayor: The Democratic Socialist Taking Over Gotham

Maintenance Phase: The Bulletproof Diet

AP: RFK Jr. is targeting ultraprocessed foods. What are they, and are they bad for you?

Bryant Research: A Drop in the Bucket: Comparing the Water Footprint of AI and The Cattle Industry

If you like #UNFTR, please leave us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify: unftr.com/rate and follow us on Facebook, Bluesky, TikTok and Instagram at @UNFTRpod. Visit us online at unftr.com. Join our Discord at unftr.com/discord.

Become a member at unftr.com/memberships.

Buy yourself some Unf*cking Coffee at shop.unftr.com.

Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

Access the UNFTR Musicless feed by following the instructions at unftr.com/accessibility.

Unf*cking the Republic is produced by 99 and engineered by Manny Faces Media (mannyfacesmedia.com). Original music is by Tom McGovern (tommcgovern.com). The show is hosted by Max and distributed by 99.

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Protests in LA: Posse Comitatus is Long Over. Jun 14, 2025

Show notes

Donald Trump overrode Governor Gavin Newsom to federalize the California National Guard to police the streets of Los Angeles. Protests over ICE’s deportation tactics are growing, prompting the Trump administration to leverage extreme authority over the protests, with Pentagon head Pete Hegseth warning that he will call in the Marines if necessary. All of this calls into question the limits of presidential authority in domestic civil disturbances and whether Posse Comitatus is still the law of the land. While it’s still on the books, it has been effectively gutted over the past 30 years by multiple administrations through procedural changes to the U.S. Code that have gone largely unnoticed.

Access the episode resources.

Chapters

Intro: 00:00:52

Chapter One: Defining Presidential Authority. 00:03:15

Chapter Two: Timeline to Total Authority. 00:09:45

Chapter Three: Handing the Keys to the “Fascist in Chief.” 00:16:08

Epilogue: De Facto Nullification of Posse Comitatus. 00:18:48

Post Show Musings: 00:21:01

Resources

Public Intelligence: DoD Directive 3025.12 Military Assistance for Civil Disturbances (MACDIS)

Department of Defense: DoDI 3025.21, February 27, 2013, Incorporating Change 1 on February 8, 2019

Gov Info: Federal Register, Volume 78 Issue 71 (Friday, April 12, 2013)

Department of Defense: DoD Directive 3025.12

AP News: What to know about the protests over Trump's immigration crackdown in LA and other cities

POLITICO: Newsom blasts deployment of National Guard to LA as ‘purposefully inflammatory’

TIME: Trump Sparks Backlash Ordering National Guard to LA Protests

U.S. Code: Positive Law Codification

Legal Information Institute: 19 U.S. Code § 1677 - Definitions; special rules

U.S. Code: uscode.house.gov

The New York Times: Newsom Criticizes Hegseth for Saying Marines Could be Mobilized in California

Legal Information Institute: 18 U.S. Code § 1385 - Use of Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Space Force as posse comitatus

Bonnie Baker: The Origins of the Posse Comitatus

NPR: Trump expands military use at the southern border. Are there legal limits?

UNFTR Resources

Video: LA Protests: Is this the END OF POSSE COMITATUS?

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Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

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The Job Report Is a Lie: The Labor Market Is Falling Apart. Jun 12, 2025

Show notes

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics the United States added 139,000 “non-farm payroll jobs” in the month of May, 2025. These figures came in close to what experts projected and depending upon one’s ideological perspective, it was either evidence of economic strength and resilience under Trump or a sign of a slowing job market as a result of Trump’s tariff policies and economic uncertainty. What the mainstream media didn’t cover as much were the prior month revisions, or how the demographic shifts are artificially boosting labor participation numbers. With an economic slowdown on the horizon, AI already taking entry-level jobs, recent graduates having trouble finding employment, a quarter of the population participating in the gig economy and an aging population, there is trouble brewing. And some of it is already here.

Access the episode resources.

Resources

Bureau of Labor Statistics: Employment Situation Summary - 2025 M05 Results

Tulane: Importance of Data Collection in Public Health

Common Dreams: Hitler’s First 100 Days — And Trump’s

St. Louis Fed: Labor Force Participation Rate (CIVPART)

St. Louis Fed: Labor Force Participation Rate - 25-54 Yrs. (LNU01300060)

St. Louis Fed: Labor Force Participation Rate - 55 Yrs. & over (LNS11324230)

AARP: Are the Last Boomers Ready for Retirement?

CNN: AI company’s CEO issues warning about mass unemployment

Gig Economy Data Hub: How many gig workers are there?

US Census Bureau: Demographic Turning Points for the United States: Population Projections for 2020 to 2060

UNFTR Resources

Iceberg. Dead Ahead.

Building a Civilian Labor Corps: Bracing for the AI Job Apocalypse.

5NN

Video: 2025 Jobs Data is Total BULLSH*T

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Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

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Pulling Apart the GOP Budget: Red States and Deficits. Jun 07, 2025

Show notes

We’re experimenting with something. As we work toward a complete breakdown of the federal budget in a comprehensive essay and companion episode, we’re bringing our audience into the content creation process. We have a feeling this is going to be one of our behemoth entries into the canon (and potentially a two-parter.) So rather than overwhelm everyone with information in one shot, we thought it would be useful to break it apart as we go. The first two entries made it to YouTube already but I’m packaging them up in a single episode today. The first is how the GOP budget disproportionately impacts red states. And not in a good way. The second brings us back to our Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) discussions and reframes the way we think about the national debt. Both are crucial building blocks in our understanding of the federal budget.

Access the episode resources.

Chapters

Intro: 00:00:36

Red State: Fucked. 00:01:30

We Solved the Debt Crisis: 00:06:39

Post Show Musings: 00:21:49

Outro: 00:25:05

Resources

Congress: H.R.1 - 119th Congress (2025-2026): One Big Beautiful Bill Act

Bipartisan Policy Center: Federal Balancing Act

White House: Fiscal Year 2026 Discretionary Budget Request

Jacobin: Trump’s Budget: Starving Everything Except the Military

Bloomberg Television: Millstein on US Downgrade, Tariffs, Trump Tax Bill

PBS News: What’s inside the House GOP’s budget bill? Here’s a look

Congress: H.Con.Res.14

PGPF: Chart Pack: The U.S. Budget

PGPF: What Is Budget Reconciliation?

The Conference Board: Reforming the Broken Federal Budget Process

NACO: U.S. House passes reconciliation bill: What it means for counties

Bipartisan Policy Center: What’s in the FY2025 Senate Budget Resolution

Georgetown CCF: Medicaid and CHIP Cuts in the House-Passed Reconciliation Bill Explained

Reuters: US Treasuries: Who owns US debt?

UNFTR Resources

Modern Monetary Theory.

Stock Buybacks Surge.

Updated Tax Evasion Figures.

Video: GOP Spending Bill is a Red State Bloodbath

Video: Big Bullsh*t Bill adds $2.4 trillion to National Debt

5NN

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Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

Access the UNFTR Musicless feed by following the instructions at unftr.com/accessibility.

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Credit Risk: The Looming U.S. Credit Crisis. May 31, 2025

Show notes

How much credit risk is in the market? Equities get the headlines but the world runs on credit. Jamie Dimon recently declared that credit was a “bad risk” on the heels of Moody’s downgrading the U.S. credit rating and a spike in the 10 Year Treasury yield. Suddenly, the boring old credit and bond markets are all the rage on the financial news channels, and it goes much deeper than treasuries. Today’s episode examines the scope of the global credit market and unpacks the difference between the systemic threat posed in the global financial crisis (GFC) and the looming credit crisis today. And, it shows how the big corporations prepared for the gathering storm by rewriting the rules of the game after the GFC. The big guys are fairly insulated from any sort of looming credit shock, but the rest of us are pretty much toast.

Access the episode resources.

Chapters

Intro: 00:01:00

Post Show Musings: 00:28:25

Outro: 00:33:39

Resources

Moody’s: Moody’s Ratings downgrades United States ratings to Aa1 from Aaa; changes outlook to stable

Federal Reserve Bank of New York: Household Debt and Credit Report

Federal Reserve Bank of New York: The Labor Market for Recent College Graduates

Coleman Report: Small Business Loan Defaults Expected to Peak Next Year

Offshoring

Lincoln International LLC: Q1 2025 Lincoln Private Market Index™

Investopedia: Payment-in-Kind (PIK): What It Is, How It Works, Pros and Cons

Axios: Americans are behind on car payments at a record level

MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increase Slightly in the First Quarter of 2025

HBR: U.S. Commercial Real Estate Is Headed Toward a Crisis

J.P. Morgan Private Bank U.S.: Municipal Bonds: Back in the Spotlight

U.S. Department of the Treasury: Treasury International Capital Data for March

Everything Policy: Where are the key Panama Papers figures, seven years later?

Secondaries Investor: Yale sells up to $6bn of its PE portfolio amid federal funding challenge

NBER: The Offshore World According to FATCA: New Evidence on the Foreign Wealth of U.S.

Peter Lang Publishing: Hip Hop Can Save America!

UNFTR Episode Resources

The U.S. Dollar and 10 Year Treasury.

Updated Tax Evasion Figures.

Video: Credit Risk: The looming U.S. Credit Crisis

UNFTR 5 Non-Negotiables

Become a member at unftr.com/memberships.

Buy yourself some Unf*cking Coffee at shop.unftr.com.

Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

Access the UNFTR Musicless feed by following the instructions at unftr.com/accessibility.

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President Pete Buttigieg: Not What We Need. May 29, 2025

Show notes

Pete Buttigieg is a legitimate star in the Democratic Party. Having moved his family to Michigan there was speculation that he might run for the governor’s office or become a Senator. But he turned down both options and instead set his sights on the 2028 Presidential election. In addition to making the rounds on multiple cable shows and podcasts to help rehabilitate the image of the Democratic Party, he recently held a massive town hall in Iowa, where he was victorious in the 2020 Caucus. But who is Pete Buttigieg and why do so many people consider him a frontrunner for the Democratic ticket in ‘28? His experience as a small city mayor and single term as Transportation Secretary in the Biden Administration would still make him one of the least experienced candidates in U.S. history. So why all the attention?

Resources

Win The Era PAC

Washington Examiner: Buttigieg high school essay praised Sanders as courageous for calling himself ‘Socialist’

UNFTR Resources

Video: The Case AGAINST Buttigieg in 2028

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Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

Access the UNFTR Musicless feed by following the instructions at unftr.com/accessibility.

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Stock Buybacks Surge: Another Red Flag for the U.S. Economy. May 27, 2025

Show notes

Corporations announced a staggering $233.8 billion in stock buybacks in April, the second-highest monthly total ever recorded. But unlike previous buyback bonanzas, this isn’t a sign of economic strength or corporate confidence. Quite the opposite. Are buybacks just one big shell game or are they fiscally prudent? Corporate stock buybacks have inspired great debate since a Reagan era tax law change and a Clinton era deal sweetener. On the one hand they have enriched shareholders and made executives extremely wealthy. On the other hand, the growth in buybacks mean companies aren’t investing in innovation, workers, or expansion. Let’s talk about it.

Resources

Longtermtrends: S&P 500 PE Ratio

FRED: Quarterly Financial Report: U.S. Corporations: All Information: Total Cash on Hand and in U.S. Banks

BNN Bloomberg: Corporate America plans record stock buybacks as turmoil mounts – BNN Bloomberg

Bipartisan Policy Center: How the U.S. Taxes Stock Buybacks and Dividends

Congress.gov: Stock Buybacks: Concerns over Debt-Financing and Long-Term Investing

Federal Reserve Bank of Boston: The Great Leverage 2.0? A Tale of Different Indicators of Corporate Leverage

Penn Wharton: Raise the Excise Tax Rate on Stock Repurchases

Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP: Newly Proposed Regulations on Stock Buyback Excise Tax Largely Adopt Approach From Initial IRS Guidance

The New Republic: Bill Clinton Created This Terrible Corporate Loophole. Will Hillary Close It?

ProPublica: The Executive Pay Cap That Backfired

Harvard: Short-Termism And Capital Flows

Roosevelt Institute: Regulating Stock Buybacks: The $6.3 Trillion Question

ICIJ: The Panama Papers: Exposing the Rogue Offshore Finance Industry

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Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

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OPEC, Oh Sh*t! Crude Oil Tanks as OPEC+ Floods the Market. May 24, 2025

Show notes

Crude Oil tanks as OPEC+ floods the market with product. Russia and Saudi Arabia just did the unthinkable by announcing that they’re increasing output by 411,000 barrels per day starting in June. With demand forecasts going down every day as the world braces for a Trump induced global recession, it’s the exact opposite move from what everyone expected. This episode tackles what this means for the economy, the future of energy, Trump’s tariff gambit, inflation and unemployment.

Access the episode resources.

Resources

OPEC

OilPrice.com

U.S. EIA: Advances in technology led to record new well productivity in the Permian Basin in 2021

EnergyNews: OPEC maintains its forecast for oil demand growth in 2025 and 2026

Reuters: US agrees to sell Saudi Arabia $142 billion arms package

Responsible Statecraft: Lobby Horse: Trump’s ‘trillion dollar' visit to Saudi Arabia

Deloitte: 2025 Renewable Energy Industry Outlook

World Economic Forum: 5 trends shaping the energy world in 2025

AInvest: JPMorgan Cuts 2025 Oil Price Forecasts 12% on Weak Demand, OPEC+ Output

ExxonMobil: ExxonMobil Announces First-Quarter 2025 Results

Reuters: OPEC output hikes, trade wars have US oil producers wary of 'drill baby drill'

Trading Economics: United States Exports By Category

St. Louis Fed: Breakeven Fiscal Oil Price for Saudi Arabia (SAUPZPIOILBEGUSD)

UNFTR Episode Resources

Peak Oil: It's a Crude, Crude World.

Bitcoin & Crude Oil.

The Energy Independence Myth.

Iceberg. Dead Ahead.

Video: Oil Prices TANK as OPEC Floods the Market

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Buy yourself some Unf*cking Coffee at shop.unftr.com.

Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

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The End of Capitalism: A Journey Into the Unknown. May 17, 2025

Show notes

Is this the end of Capitalism? If so, what comes next? Does it even matter what we call it? Today Max pauses to reflect on the speed and totality of damage wrought by the Trump administration, and whether it’s bringing about the end of Capitalism on purpose in order to return to a state reminiscent of the industrial era when the working class lived to serve the elite and the poor thrown to the streets.

Resources

Marketplace: Higher income Americans drive bigger share of consumer spending

Book Love

Jacob Riis: How the Other Half Lives

UNFTR Resources

YouTube: The End of Capitalism: What comes next is worse.

YouTube: Phone A Friend: Yanis Varoufakis

Become a member at unftr.com/memberships.

Buy yourself some Unf*cking Coffee at shop.unftr.com.

Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

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Show Notes [Mixed Bag.] May 13, 2025

Show notes

Max and 99 return from their Show Notes hiatus to discuss the 5 Non-Negotiables, global events, and share some genuinely insightful tangents (for a change lol). Enjoy!

Chapters

Intro: 00:00:21

Discord Comments: 00:06:46

5NN: 00:10:04

Emails: 00:33:34

Memberships: 01:58:40

Outro: 02:01:41

Resources

Only 3 days left in our Spring Fund, Friend, and Hell Raiser! Become a member today.

Subscribe to the YouTube Channel.

Visit our 5NN homepage.

Save PBS and NPR!

Unf*cker Recommendations

Sarah Smarsh: Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth

Timothy Snyder: On Tyranny Graphic Edition: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century

Jason Stanley: How Fascism Works:The Politics of Us and Them

Ilan Pappe: A Very Short History of the Israel–Palestine Conflict

Sayash Kapoor + Arvind Narayanan: AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can't, and How to Tell the Difference

Become a member at unftr.com/memberships.

Buy yourself some Unf*cking Coffee at shop.unftr.com.

Visit our bookshop.org page at bookshop.org/shop/UNFTRpod to find the full UNFTR book list, and find book recommendations from our Unf*ckers at bookshop.org/lists/unf-cker-book-recommendations.

Access the UNFTR Musicless feed by following the instructions at unftr.com/accessibility.

Support the show: https://www.unftr.com/memberships

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.