How are you feeling about democracy‪?‬ earlyworm

Eva Burch is a fantastic anomaly in American politics. 
Instead of a lawyer who thinks he's a gynecologist, she's a nurse practitioner with a career of actual medical experience that she has brought into government service.
You probably first heard about this rising star in the Democratic Party, a State Senator from Arizona, this March when she rose to make a speech on the floor of the Arizona State Senate. This was almost certainly the first time in American history that a member of a legislature stood to announce that the member was about to have an abortion.
It was an incredible speech and we’re including the entirety of it at the end of this podcast because it’s that important.
History is often shaped when a perfect person hits an imperfect moment. And this is a very imperfect moment. And we wouldn't say that Senator Burch is perfect. But who she is and what she represents is so badly needed at this time that  just in her existence speaks for tens of millions of us who are sick of lawyers who minored in gynecology. 
She also epitomizes why we're so excited about the change that could happen if Democrats win in Arizona in 2024. It could transform millions and millions of lives. 
And she’s helped inspire us to raise our goal to raise $20,024 to help flip both of Arizona’s statehouses this November. We invite you to join our Giving Circle. We honestly believe this is the best way to spend any extra time and money we have as we fight back against the attacks on our freedom this November.

If we're talking about Dobbs and democracy, there's no one better to talk to than Jessica Valenti, who writes the newsletter “Abortion, Every Day.”
She's also the author of a book that you should pre-order called “Abortion: Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win.” 
Her invaluable reporting and commentary make the case that if you’re talking about “Dobbs and democracy,” you don’t need the word “and.”
Every day, Dobbs makes the case that democracy matters. Every day, we see the horrors that happen when people lose the right to be treated as full human beings. Every day, we're inspired by people who stand up and say, “Hey, I don't care what state I live in. I'm not gonna let anyone be denied rights that I was born with.”
Listen and let us know what you think about Dobbs/democracy.

Catch up on all the episodes of “How are you feeling about democracy?” here. If you want to back this podcast, please join the earlyworm society – free or paid, your support matters.

If your number one goal is to survive 2024 without too many regrets about what you did to help save democracy, this podcast is for you.
Melissa Walker is the Head of Giving Circles at the States Project. She makes a powerful case that the best way for individual citizens to make the best use of their time, energy, and resources to avoid regret is by focusing on America’s statehouses. 
And she believes the best way to do that is through Giving Circles, where you engage your friends and family to elect majority-making candidates who will shift the balance of power in a state legislature.
AND she has the stats to back up how focusing on the right races at the right time can make massive differences to tens of millions of Americans, like the 63 votes that helped shift the Pennsylvania House and elect the first Black Speaker of the House in the state’s history.
¡AND! she makes a convincing case that by supporting top-notch down ballot candidates who are properly funded and guided to research-backed best practices, like knocking on doors instead of ringing up out-of-state-donors, you can also help elect great candidates at all levels of government in the nation’s tipping point states, while possibly helping prevent Donald Trump from stealing the presidency.
She’s so convincing that we’ve started our own Giving Circle “Flipping Arizona” to help win the four seats that will create a Democratic trifecta in the Grand Canyon state. You’re welcome to join us there. Please do. We need your help.
Or, if you want to really burn off some regrets, start your own Giving Circle. The democracy you save may be your own.
Catch up on all the episodes of “How are you feeling about democracy?” here. If you want to back this podcast, please join the earlyworm society – free or paid, your support matters. 

Some say Margaret Atwood wrote the dystopia that best describes America's bleakest future. We say it was Robin Marty. 
Her “The New Handbook for a Post-Roe America” laid out almost exactly that sort of war Republicans would wage on reproductive freedom with their new 6-3 Supreme Court majority, and how to still get health care by any means necessary. 

And she’s living the nightmare of the post-Dobbs South first-hand as the executive director of West Alabama Women’s Center. Please donate to support their life-saving work.

We talked about what her clinic can’t tell their patients. She told us why the blue states have let her down. And she leaves us with a vision of how abortion rights could help spark a movement that inspires a new day in the South.
Catch up on all the episodes of “How are you feeling about democracy?” here. Special thanks to members of this Patreon for sponsoring and sharing this podcast. If you want to back what we’re doing, please join the earlyworm society – free or paid, your support matters. 

Donald Trump's presidency sucked. Everyone agrees.
For you, it may have sucked because he bumbled us into the worst response to the worst pandemic in a century. For the vast right-wing conspiracy, it sucked because we still have pretty much the same government we had before he took and refused to leave office.
That's why the Heritage Foundation has brought together the GOP establishment to craft both a plan to unwind democracy and a growing personnel database of loyalists willing to help stomp out freedom.
Historian Thomas Zimmer has been explaining what's behind Project 2025 in his Democracy Americana newsletter and on the "Is This Democracy?" podcast he co-hosts. We talked to him about Project 2025 and how the right plans to exploit the presidency should Trump grab it, again.
This time they will be ready. And so must we. That's why we started Project 2024.
So thank you, Project 2025.
Thanks to you we know for sure that the right plans to criminalize porn, track every abortion in America, fire just about every expert in the U.S. government... And that's just the beginning.

No one understands the power of real American history more than the right. 
The shameless wars on “critical race theory” and “DEI” and “wokeness” stink of fear. It’s the fear of knowing that anyone who understands the true story of how Black America confronted relentless oppression by demanding that America fulfill its founding promise can’t help being both infuriated and inspired. 
And no one has done a better job of telling real American history than Professor Carol Anderson. Her books White Rage, One Person, No Vote and The Second could be read as a trilogy of how America’s racist past has shaped our reactionary present. 
We spoke to her about how the threats to democracy we face aren’t just named Donald Trump. 
With humor, grace, and depth, she connects today’s attacks on voting rights led by names Ron DeSantis, Jeff Landry and Brian Kemp all the way back to the Mississippi Plan of 1874. And she also identifies how a lack of outrage at the right’s success at rolling back the gains of the Civil Rights Era helped lead to the crisis we face today.