Lever Reruns is a series of one-off interviews and live chats recorded during the old Daily Poster days. We probably won't add any new episodes, but please enjoy these in perpetuity.
The Lever is reader-supported investigative news outlet that holds accountable the people and corporations manipulating the levers of power.
The Daily Poster recently published a deep-dive report on Wall Street executives skimming billions of dollars of fees off the retirement savings of teachers, firefighters and other government workers. The relationship between public pensions and alternative investment firms has become one of the biggest upward transfers of wealth in America - and much of it is happening in secret. That's because pension officials and the firms collude to keep the investment contracts secret, even to the workers and retirees whose money they are managing. On this episode, Sirota talks to former SEC attorney Ted Siedle, whose forensic investigations of major pension funds are exposing this enormous scandal. Siedle is the author of the books Who Stole My Pension? and How To Steal A Lot Of Money, Legally.
12 Jul 2021
The Leak Exposing The Billionaire Tax Scam
Sirota talks to ProPublica's Jesse Eisinger about the recent leak of IRS data showing how billionaires are able to accumulate vast wealth while paying so little in taxes. Recent analyses have estimated that every year, the richest 1 percent are not paying between $174 billion and $250 billion of taxes they owe. The documents leaked to ProPublica illustrate how tax loopholes, preferences and shelters allow moguls such as Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffett to pay a lower effective tax rate than everyone else. Eisinger also reviews the story of how right-wing billionaire Peter Thiel used stock valuations and a Roth IRA - which was designed for middle-class Americans - to tax shelter roughly $5 billion of wealth. The discussion concludes with a review of new legislative proposals to rebuild the IRS so that the agency can better police billionaire tax avoidance.
9 Jul 2021
Inside The UFO Mystery
With the government recently issuing a new report on UFOs, Sirota talks to journalist Laura Krantz, whose new podcast series is called "Wild Thing: Space Invaders." It looks at our culture's obsession with the idea of extraterrestrial life. They discuss the government's renewed interest in UFOs, and what science suggests is the most likely explanation for the unidentified phenomena. They also discuss whether or not the recent UFO mania is being driven by a military-industrial complex looking for more justification for even larger Pentagon budgets.
2 Jul 2021
The Whistleblower Who Exposed An FDA Scandal
Sirota talks with Dr. Aaron Kesselheim, the Harvard researcher who last month touched off national headlines when he resigned from a panel that advises the Food and Drug Administration on drug approvals. Kesselheim resigned because the agency approved a pharmaceutical company's unproven Alzheimer's treatment, even though the panel of overseers was nearly unanimous in finding that the therapy had not displayed compelling evidence that it worked. In a co-authored New York Times oped, Kesselheim warned that "in recent years, under steady pressure from the pharmaceutical industry and the patient groups it funds, the F.D.A. has progressively lowered its standards of effectiveness and safety required for drug approvals."
11 Jun 2021
Elite Groupthink And The Lab-Leak Theory
Sirota and Tom Frank begin by discussing some of the Daily Poster's financial reporting on the housing market this week. Then, they move into a larger discussion of Frank's controversial Guardian oped about the power of elite groupthink and the pushback against even scientifically reviewing the theory that the coronavirus leaked from an American-funded lab in China.
29 Apr 2021
Biden's First 100 Days
Photo credit: Getty Images
This week is President Joe Biden’s 100th day in office, and so The Daily Poster’s latest podcast takes a look at Biden’s personnel appointments to see whether or not his administration has been captured by corporate interests.
On the podcast, Sirota talked with Max Moran of the Revolving Door Project and David Segal of Demand Progress, two groups that have been pressuring Biden to stock his administration with progressive appointees, rather than corporate cronies. The Revolving Door Project recently issued a report card on Biden’s first 100 days, which you can find here.
This newsletter relies on readers pitching in to support it. If you want to help expand this kind of journalism, consider becoming a paid subscriber by clicking this link.
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5 Apr 2021
Are We Winning A New Political Era?
A few weeks ago, The Daily Poster noted that the exclusion of a $15 minimum wage from the American Rescue Plan was a missed opportunity and a tragic failure. Then again, our reporting also pointed out same bill’s direct aid to millions of people was an enormous victory and a huge success for a grassroots movement that has so changed politics that even a former longtime austerian like Joe Biden ended up signing legislation that included those investments.
On this podcast, I talked to author Anand Giridharadas about the idea of losing and winning — and whether or not we are finally moving out of the Reagan Era and into a new epoch of positive change. He is the author of the fantastic book Winners Take All and has a great newsletter called The Ink.
During the discussion, we talked about how to simultaneously remember the awful and unforgivable parts of Biden’s senate record, remain circumspect about his commitment to progressive change, criticize his ongoing capitulations, but also acknowledge some of the victories that are being won during the early weeks of his presidency.
As you listen to this podcast, please know: I’ve spent a lot of my life standing up to Biden. As a young person, I was ostracized by powerful Democrats for daring to criticize his bankruptcy bill. As a reporter, I wrote one of the definitive pieces exposing his pernicious role in the student debt crisis. As a campaign staffer, I spotlighted his efforts to cut Social Security. And now as the founder of The Daily Poster, I’ve been leading a team of reporters that has continued to scrutinize his actions.
The point is: I’m under no illusions about who Biden is. But I also know that politics is much bigger than any one politician — and that the best reporting is the kind that focuses on the policy.
I hope you’ll listen to this whole podcast because it delves into lots of issues that so many Daily Poster subscribers have raised over the last few weeks.
Rock the boat,
Sirota
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8 Mar 2021
How They Killed A $15 Minimum Wage
This week, Sirota and Tom Frank discuss the campaign for a higher minimum wage. Joe Biden campaigned on a promise to enact a $15 minimum wage and as recently as six weeks ago, the White House and top Democrats were signaling that they were determined to make sure it was included in must-pass COVID relief legislation that needed only 50 votes to pass through the reconciliation process. Conservative Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin signaled he would support at least an $11 minimum wage. And yet, the compromise between a $15 minimum wage proposal and an $11 minimum wage proposal ended up being no minimum wage increase at all. How did that happen?
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15 Feb 2021
The Insurrection Was A Warning
Photo credit: Brent Stirton/Getty Images
This week, Sirota and Tom Frank discuss the rise and fall of the Lincoln Project, and how the Republican group is merely the latest iteration of “political entrepreneurs” turning democracy into a business opportunity. They also discuss the larger context of the January 6th insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, and how it was the latest expression of conservative grievance politics that goes back decades and intensified during the Tea Party era. Finally, they discuss Democrats’ lack of urgency in fulfilling their promises to help the country during the current economic crisis.
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6 Feb 2021
Liberal Wonks Are Trying To Blow It
During a new subscriber-only podcast this week, Sirota and Tom Frank discuss:
• The troll phase of Larry Summers career, and the Biden administration’s surprising rejection of his latest attempt to undermine the stimulus.
• Democrats latest attempts to complicate the promised $2,000 checks — and how the behavior spotlights party elites’ belief that any initiative must be bad just because it is simple.
• The Washington Post’s weaponization of “fact checking” and Pinocchios to inject economic ideology into the political discourse.
• The insidious economic message of the most talked about Super Bowl ad.
Here are some of the articles Sirota and Frank refer to in the podcast:
Biden’s Promised $1,400 Checks Are Even Dividing the White House (Bloomberg)
A Dystopian Sales Pitch On Super Bowl Sunday (Daily Poster)
Lies, Damn Lies, And Fact Checking (Daily Poster)
Can President Joe Biden Mend A Torn America? (Le Monde Diplomatique)
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31 Jan 2021
Make The Game Stop
Why do Democratic politicians try to means-test every social program to the point where they become incomprehensibly complex? Will stock market populism save the republic from the predators on Wall Street? The Daily Poster discussed these topics and more this week with Thomas Frank, the famed author of classics such as What’s The Matter With Kansas and Listen, Liberal.
Tom and Sirota review The Daily Poster’s reporting over the course of the last week, and focus in on Democrats’ obsession with means testing and how that undermines universalist social programs. They also discuss the GameStop controversy and how it at once threatens Wall Street kingpins but also celebrates the kind of market populism that was first touted in the boom-bust 1990s.
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10 Oct 2020
Q&A With Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro
The entire election could come down to the state of Pennsylvania. Donald Trump won it in 2016 and the polls this time around are close. As Democrats have been requesting more ballots than Republicans under the state’s new vote by mail system, Trump and Republicans have been trying to limit that system in ways that critics say are designed to suppress turnout. There are also fears that Republican lawmakers in the state legislature will try to steal Pennsylvania’s Electoral College electors for Trump.
For insight into what’s happening in the state, I caught up with Pennsylvania’s Democratic Attorney General Josh Shapiro. He is running for his second term there, and has been in court in a series of cases about the election.
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27 Sept 2020
Thomas Frank On The Democrats
As part of the exclusive content we offer to supporting subscribers, I am going to periodically publish some podcast interviews I’ve done that still remain relevant today. This is the first.
Back in 2017, I talked to author Thomas Frank about how the Democratic Party had lost so much power over the previous decade. Though some of the topics are a bit outdated, the overall themes are a constant. Frank has a new book out today that updates much of what he was reporting on back then. It is called The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism. Listen to this podcast and then check it out.
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