Reimagining Democracy for a Good Life’s Post

Transcript

What's up? I'm Baratunde Thurston, TV and podcast host, writer, occasional comedian, and I am welcoming you to my late night talk show, the first and last episode for now, that I've spun up specially to introduce you to this dope new podcast. Now, my guest is a phenomenal force behind this. She is a visionary attorney, advocate and author. Angela Glover Blackwell. And we are right here in Los Angeles, which is the setting of her series. Reimagining democracy for a good life. A policy link podcast. You series has six episodes. I want to hit you with the title of each of those episodes and I want you to tell me. A favorite highlight of that episode for you. We'll keep it pretty short and move through these starting with episode one. Hmm, Democracy Dreaming. What do you love about this one? I love what we've just been talking about. Democracy Dreaming lays out flourishing that we need to really understand that if we invest in the people who are going to be the future, the nation will flourish. Democracy is not just for voting. Democracy is for an outcome, and that outcome is human thriving. And human flourishing. If we do that, everybody has a shot of the good life, however they think about it. Alright episode 2. There is no I in leader unless you're misspelling things. I am focused on LA in this podcast because there are some leaders in LA who demonstrate a generosity that gives me chills coming out of the uprising. After the officers that beat Rodney King were acquitted, leaders in LA woke up and said we were caught sleeping. That this city is not valuing the diversity that defines LA. That we need to start having a multiracial consciousness that we can build on to include all there is such generosity. No I and leader Leader Episode 3 the we in power Being able to recognize the power of multiracial organizing can only happen if people organize and understand their ability to make change. And so power happens when people get together and see their interconnectedness, the similarities that they share, the common obstacles that they face, and begin to use their numbers to lean into correcting those barriers so that we all can do better #4 labor of love. One of the things that is so exciting about LA is many people think it is the center of the new labor movement. Because the people who have had the low wage jobs, the janitors, the hotel workers, service workers are really flexing their muscle here. But they're not forgetting their roots. The people I've just described come from communities that have deep needs, many of whom have been kept behind. And so the connection that we're seeing is labor is getting strong, addressing not just workplace issues, but community issues and community seeing how important a just economy is. Really showing us something different. Sounds like love. Hmm. Episode 5 is my favorite title, by the way. Shift happens. Were you trying to say something else there, Angela? Was that you slip on the keyboard trying to say just what it says? The shifts are happening not just in terms of demographics, but in terms of who are the people who are governing. Have a fabulous mayor in LA, Karen Bass, but you also have all these people of color in many positions, and shift is hard. Play has been through some rough times. People know that Black and brown people aren't necessarily always on the same page. And that doesn't stop progress. Dealing with it, acknowledging it, being pained by it, but then getting up and continuing to go shift happens. You got to know what to do when that happens. OK? And the final episode? Hope is a discipline. I mean, imagining a Dojo or a gym where you do hope drills. So what is this one about? I learned it from a very wise woman named Miriam Cabba who says that. And it's when I hear her say it, I think of two things. One, it takes discipline to continue to be hopeful. But there is a discipline associated with hope. It is the discipline of the things we talked about in the podcast, letting events like the 92 Uprising be a lesson and say, what can we extract from it? The discipline of. Finding people who are like minded but have differences in working through them. Yeah. The discipline of gathering the data, the discipline of understanding power, doing the analysis, applying that power, and then going back and figuring out how to hold everybody accountable. That kind of discipline gives me hope. Woo, I cannot wait for this show. This sounds so needed. Look, I am just so eager for more of the world to dive in to this series. And I want to encourage all of you check out Reimagining Democracy for a Good Life, a policy link podcast, wherever you get your podcast. And if you have a vision of a reimagined housing or education or transportation or public safety or food or climate system or any of them. Of or some that we left out. Let us know, tell somebody else, and let's reimagine this stuff together.