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In this episode Dave and Jon discuss two new books about the 1960s, the Vietnam War and political struggle. They are Quiet Protest by Effie Karageorgos and Cold War Kid by Rowan Cahill. There is a Brisbane book launch of Cold War Kid on Saturday August 22nd The recording software crashed when we were recording - this  means there is an echo in some sections. You can, and should, buy the books: Cold War Kid Quiet Protest

Living the Dream is back! Jon and Dave are trying to work out what’s going on with the Crisafulli/ Janetzki Queensland state government. Why is it criminalising simply speaking up against the genocide in GAZA? Why is it criminalising children? What’s its plan for capitalism in Queensland? Why has it launched a commission against the CFMEU? How is it balancing the culture war hunger of its aging base against the need to win elections and manage society? And what does this all mean for those of us committed to emancipation? Stuff we reference includes: Inflation & the Cost of Living Crisis   Field Notes   Could the Liberals’ Deakinite dilemma reshape the party system? Frank Bongiorno   Antony Loewenstein Podcast   Queensland’s renewable energy ‘whiplash’: how the shift from coal stalled in Australia’s most polluting state     The LNP’s phrase-banning law is wide open to constitutional attack. Is it a victory for the people, or a smart political play? Anne Twomey

In this episode, recorded in October 2024, Jon and Dave chat with friend of the show and all-around good egg Elizabeth Humphrys about the Labour Movement’s (both the ALP and Trade Unions) actions to put the CFMEU under administration. Just what is going on?   You can read more of Liz’s prolific output here.   Listeners may be interested in this building industry rank and file newsletter Hard Hat

In this episode Dave chats with Nick Southall about his new book Disaster Communism and Anarchy in the Streets   You can buy a copy of Nick’s book from the publisher Kembla Books   Nick’s blog is Revolts Now . Here you can find a collection of his work: including that on the Wollongong Out of Workers Union, his PhD thesis, reflections on his life in the Communist Party of Australia, his experiences on being on the last fraternal delegation to the USSR and much much more!

Well it’s been a while, but Living the Dream is back!   Jon and Dave welcome in 2024 by discussing how in 2023 the Albanese Hegemony disintegrated. We discuss what the Laborist project looked like coming out of the 2022 election, and how over 2023 between the costs of living crisis and the failure of the Voice referendum the wheels fell off and more importantly why we should or should not care.   Jon has been very busy being a historian you should follow him on the social media formally known at Twitter - @jonpiccini. Dave has been largely occupying himself with table top games but also has contributed to this research project Class and Capital in Australia   Stuff we read, listened to etc and may have discussed in this episode include:   Megan Davis Truth After the Voice Irene Watson There is No Hope in a Voice to Parliament Noel Pearson Boyer Lectures Laura Tingle Regaining control over the national political conversation will be Anthony Albanese's one great challenge in 2024 Jonathon Green Wither Progress? Jim Chalmers Capitalism After the Crises

Hi All Long time no listen! Dave has launched a game on Kickstarter and is using Living The Dream to shameless promote it! Go here and pledge Share the link with your friendshttps://www.kickstarter.com/projects/babyboomer/baby-boomer-have-it-all-relaunch

In this episode Dave (@withsobersenses) and Jon (@jonpiccini) discuss The White Possessive by Aileen Moreton-Robinson. Aileen Moreton-Robinson is a Goenpul woman from Minjerribah (Stradbroke Island), Quandamooka First Nation (Moreton Bay) in Queensland, Australia and is Professor of Indigenous Research at the University of Queensland. Moreton-Robinson’s work provides a root-and-branch critique of modernity from the perspective of Indigenous Sovereignty and produces a set of critical concepts to think against the operation of race and whiteness both within Australia and beyond. Other sources mentioned include The Act of Disappearing (meanjin.com.au) by Amy McQuire and the work of Onyeka Nubia, David Roediger and Noel Ignatiev Listeners should be aware that this show discusses racism, including racist violence. Music by Chasing Ghost

Recorded just before Xmas in this episode Jon (@JonPiccini) and Dave (@withsobersenses) talk about 2021. Unsurprisingly we talk a lot about the global pandemic and the attempts to manage it. We discuss the continual rise of an insurgent Right that seems to have become the pole for much of social rebellion at the same time large sections of the Left have further invested in fantasies of the state, the current condition of global capitalism beset by a logistics crisis, labour insubordinations and inflation and more!   Stuff we mention include Conspiracy and Social Struggle – Wu Ming The Specific Character of Today’s Crisis – Sergio Bologna Immunodemocracy Dear Agamben, I write to you – Donatella Di Cesare

In this episode Dave (@withsobersenses) chats with two anarchist comrades Tommy (@correnterosso) and Charlie about Tommy’s recent article Anarchy and Its Allies: The United Front and the Groupings of Tendency and the related rise in anarcho-communist organisations in Australia.  We chat about how anarchism is developing andthe current appeal of Platformism and Especifismo . Topics of discussion include the role a theoretical framework plays and where it comes from, class composition and the history of organisations, and the relationship of revolutionaries to class struggle.   A key text mentioned is Social Anarchism and Organisation   Tommy is a member of Geelong Anarcho-Communists  and says sorry for how they pronounced the group TMA Charlie is a member of Black Flag Sydney   They recommend reading Red and Black Notes   You used to be able to find the archives of the Mutiny Zine at Jura but their website is having issues. Music by Ernst Busch

In this episode Jon (@JonPiccini) and Dave (@withsobersenses) continue their discussion about race, whiteness and Australia. This time they are reading Ghassan Hage’s classic of 90s Theory White Nation. We talk through his ideas about Whiteness, White Nationalism and fantasy, his critique of tolerance and multiculturalism and try to work out what these ideas give us and also what they miss. How does Hage’s work reflect the changes in Australian society, its internal conflicts and the ruptures and continuations in radical ideas? We finish this episode with Joe Dolce’s Shaddap You Face – picked as an example of a particular kind of humour produced by 70s/80s multiculturalism. Since then we have discovered that Joe Dolce, a self-declared Leftist, has moved over to writing for Quadrant, largely it seems due as a reaction to cultural debates. So there you go.

In this episode Dave (@withsobersenses) and Jon (@JonPiccini) discuss Humphrey McQueen's A New Britannia. This is the first of three books we are reading as part of a series on race and capitalism in Australia, We try to come to grips with his argument and its explanation for racism arising from the specifics of class formation in Australia, how it challenged established Leftwing thought and its implications for today. We reference Two Radical Legends: Russel Ward, Humphrey McQueen and the New Left Challenge in Australian Historiography   Music by Redgum

This is part 1 of our new reading series on race in Australia and the struggle against it. Over the next 3 or so months Jon (@JonPiccini) and Dave (@withsobersenses) will be reading A New Britannia by Humphrey McQueen, White Nation by Ghassan Hage and The White Possessive by Aileen Moreton-Robinson.  In this episode we set out why we are doing this, our thinking at this point in time and briefly discuss what the White Australia Policy was and wasn’t and the whys and whynots. We encourage all our listeners to read with us and join us in the discussion. Correction: I mention Nelson Peery as being a member of DRUM/League of Revolutionary Black Workers. He wasn’t. You can find an interview with him about his life and works here As for DRUM and the League you can find an interview with Darryl ‘Waistline’ Mitchell and Donald Abdul Roberts here You should read Hard Crackers and its recent offshoot (split?) Gasoline and Grits too Insurgent Notes has a special issue dedicate to the life and works of Noel Ignatiev Music by Wyatt Waddell

In this episode Jon (@JonPiccini) and Dave (@withsobersenses) have a chat with Anthony O’Donnell (@AnthonyODonne13), a Senior Lecturer from La Trobe and author of ‘Inventing Unemployment: Regulating Joblessness in Twentieth-Century Australia’. Anthony shows us how the category of Full Employment was invented and why, and undermines the claim that the low levels of post-War unemployment were due to the magic powers of a white paper written under the Chifley Government rather than say the general dynamics of the boom. At the time it was low levels of unemployment that presented an issue for capitalism and the groundwork of the punitive regime the poor are subjected to today was developed then. Great stuff.

In this episode of Living The Dream Dave (@withsobersenses) talks with Anna Sturman (@anna_sturman) author of ‘Climate Emergency’, COVID-19 and the Australian capitalist state . Anna draws on the work of Nicos Poulantzas to present an understanding of the state, a diagnosis of the contemporary conjuncture of Australian capitalism and suggest ways that we can struggle for dignity and lives worth living.  We talk through the possibilities of the present, the opportunities for creating and using power and cut the gordian knot of  the great debate of 2019 – Jobs Guarantee or Universal Basic Income.   Music by Chumbawamba

In this episode of Living The Dream Dave (@withsobersenses) chats with Godfrey Moase (@gemoase) a director of the United Workers Union.   The UWU, a recent a fusion of the National Union of Workers and United Voice, has been receiving a lot of attention due to the industrial actions of its members, its claims to be revitalising internal democracy and its Workers’ Plan To Survive Covid-19 Crisis : a broad vision to address the immediate impacts of the COVID-19 crisis in a way that points beyond capitalism. This interview with Tim Kennedy the National Secretary of the UWU in Jacobin is very useful: “We Can Use This Crisis to Reconceptualize the Economy” .   Here Godfrey explains the strategy and organisational direction of the UWU, gives a critique of the #changetherules defeat and presents what he thinks is a viable way forward to accumulate class power.   Music by Meatraffle