Death Panel
Death Panel
Politics, culture, and public policy from the left. Stay alive another week.
w/ Beatrice Adler-Bolton, Artie Vierkant, Phil Rocco and Jules Gill-Peterson.
https://www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
w/ Beatrice Adler-Bolton, Artie Vierkant, Phil Rocco and Jules Gill-Peterson.
https://www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
Episodes
Mentioned books

Apr 9, 2025 • 1h 20min
Lifetime Care w/ William Bronston
Beatrice and Phil speak with lifelong activist William Bronston about his experiences trying to take down the infamous Willowbrook institution from within as a young doctor, his appeal to replace “long term care” with “lifetime care," and how his work towards deinstitutionalization informs his ongoing advocacy for single payer healthcare.
Transcript: https://www.deathpanel.net/transcripts/lifetime-care-dr-william-bronston
This episode was originally released for patrons on August 28th, 2023, as Artie explains in a brief note at the top of the show. To support the show and help make episodes like this one possible, become a patron at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
Find Bronston's book "Public Hostage, Public Ransom" here: www.publichostagepublicransom.org/
and the state single payer plan he coauthored here: caltcha.org/model
Find our book Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' latest book, A Short History of Trans Misogyny, here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Death Panel merch here (patrons get a discount code): www.deathpanel.net/merch
As always, support Death Panel at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod

Apr 7, 2025 • 18min
Teaser - "No Use to the State" w/ Micah Khater
Subscribe on Patreon and hear this week's full patron-exclusive episode here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/126159598
Beatrice speaks with Micah Khater about her award winning article on the intersection of race, disability, and incarceration in the southern US in the early 20th century, and her work documenting the history of how Black women experienced and theorized disability from within Alabama prisons.
Read Micah’s full article, “No Use to the State: Phrasing Escape and a Black Radical Epistolary of Disability in Early Twentieth-Century Alabama Prisons” (winner of the 2024 Toni Cade Bambara Article Prize from the Black Women's Studies Association) here: https://dsq-sds.org/index.php/dsq/article/view/9662/8007
Get Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' new book here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Runtime 1:31:04

Apr 2, 2025 • 2h
Corridors of Contagion w/ Victoria Law
Beatrice speaks with Victoria Law about how prisons and jails have acted as vectors of covid transmission throughout the pandemic, the experiences of people on the inside from early in the pandemic through fights happening now over long covid in incarcerated people, and why it’s still not too late to bring back a common demand from 2020: to free them all for public health.
This episode was originally released for patrons on September 9th, 2024, as Artie explains in a brief note at the top of the show. To support the show and help make episodes like this one possible, become a patron at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
Find Victoria's book, Corridors of Contagion: How the Pandemic Exposed the Cruelties of Incarceration, here:
https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2447-corridors-of-contagion
Find our book Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' latest book, A Short History of Trans Misogyny, here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Death Panel merch here (patrons get a discount code): www.deathpanel.net/merch
As always, support Death Panel at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod

Mar 31, 2025 • 17min
Teaser - Disability and the Ongoing Federalism Revolution w/ Karen Tani and Katie Eyer
Subscribe on Patreon and hear this week's full patron-exclusive episode here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/125620040
Beatrice and Phil speak with legal scholars Karen Tani and Katie Eyer about how the Supreme Court used cases related to disability and deinstitutionalization in the 1970s and 1980s as an opportunity to remake and expand its own powers, the role that these cases had in securing conservatives’ “New Federalism” revolution, and how disability cases continue to be a site of conservative judicial advancement today.
Read Karen and Katie's article, "Disability and the Ongoing Federalism Revolution," here: https://www.yalelawjournal.org/feature/disability-and-the-ongoing-federalism-revolution
Get Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' new book here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Runtime 1:25:44

Mar 26, 2025 • 1h 20min
The Politics of “Risk Assessment” w/ William Boyd
Beatrice speaks with William Boyd about how “risk assessment” became a central focus of health safety and environmental law since the 1970s, and how the political and economic factors that structure how those risks are assessed have resulted in law and policy far less likely to protect against environmental and health hazards.
This episode was originally released for patrons on August 5th, 2024, as Artie explains in a brief note at the top of the show. To support the show and help make episodes like this one possible, become a patron at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
Find William's articles here:
How Environmental Law Created a World Awash in Toxic Chemicals (LPE Blog) - https://lpeproject.org/blog/how-environmental-law-created-a-world-awash-in-toxins/
De-Risking Environmental Law - https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4753197
Find our book Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' new book, A Short History of Trans Misogyny, here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Death Panel merch here (patrons get a discount code): www.deathpanel.net/merch
As always, support Death Panel at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod

Mar 24, 2025 • 36min
Teaser - Disabled Ecologies w/ Sunaura Taylor
Subscribe on Patreon and hear this week's full patron-exclusive episode here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/125073251
Beatrice speaks with Sunaura Taylor about how industrial pollution and systemic abandonment produce networks of disability among people, animals, and what she calls “injured landscapes;” how one community in Arizona organized against longstanding environmental pollution from arms manufacturing; and her new book, Disabled Ecologies: Lessons from a Wounded Desert.
Find Sunaura’s book here: https://www.ucpress.edu/books/disabled-ecologies/hardcover
Get Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' new book here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Runtime 1:32:58

Mar 19, 2025 • 1h 34min
Evictions, Property and the Administration of Racial Capitalism w/ Marques Vestal & Tracy Rosenthal
Beatrice and Tracy speak with Marques Vestal about the history of political conflicts over eviction and property in Los Angeles, the role of removal in producing property value, and using history to help us tell new stories about the past to shape our present.
This episode was originally released for patrons on December 9th, 2024, as Artie explains in a brief note at the top of the show. To support the show and help make episodes like this one possible, become a patron at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
This episode is part of a series in collaboration with Tracy Rosenthal centered around the growing tenants’ movement and their book, co-authored with Leonardo Vilchis, Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis. Find Tracy's book here: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2443-abolish-rent
Find our book Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' new book, A Short History of Trans Misogyny, here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Death Panel merch here (patrons get a discount code): www.deathpanel.net/merch
As always, support Death Panel at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod

Mar 17, 2025 • 8min
Teaser - Death Classic: Injury Impoverished w/ Nate Holdren
Subscribe on Patreon and hear this week's full patron-exclusive episode here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/124584385
Hi listeners — Beatrice and Artie are currently on parental leave. (We were planning to be able to telegraph the announcement more this week, but "baby death panel" had other plans, and came early!). While we're away, we'll still have episodes in the feed, like today's episode; a mix of some old favorites we haven't revisited in a while and some unlocks. We’ll be back as soon as it’s safe and reasonable for us to do so, because with everything going on right now we want to make sure we’re here for everyone.
We also want to thank each and every one of you, because without support from our patrons it wouldn’t be possible for us to take this kind of time. So if you can, now is a great time to support the show at patreon.com/deathpanelpod — either by becoming a patron or increasing your membership.
Original episode description:
In today's episode, Beatrice and Phil speak with Nate Holdren about his book Injury Impoverished: Workplace Accidents, Capitalism, and Law in the Progressive Era, the history of worker's compensation reforms, and the tensions surrounding disablement and the working class.
Find Nate's book here: https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/history/twentieth-century-american-history/injury-impoverished-workplace-accidents-capitalism-and-law-progressive-era?format=HB&isbn=9781108488709
Runtime 1:34:41
🧬

Mar 13, 2025 • 1h 20min
Trust Falls
Bea, Artie, and Phil discuss the pervasive, perennial myth that the Medicare and Social Security trust funds are on the brink of imminent collapse, a myth that feeds austerity in policymaking and false panic that the programs "won't be around" when younger generations grow old--and that Trump and Musk's DOGE are currently taking advantage of to press for cuts.
This episode was originally released for patrons on April 17, 2023, as Artie explains in a brief note at the top of the show. To support the show and help make episodes like this one possible, become a patron at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod
Find our book Health Communism here: www.versobooks.com/books/4081-health-communism
Find Jules' new book, A Short History of Trans Misogyny, here: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3054-a-short-history-of-trans-misogyny
Death Panel merch here (patrons get a discount code): www.deathpanel.net/merch
As always, support Death Panel at www.patreon.com/deathpanelpod

Mar 10, 2025 • 20min
Teaser - Death Classic: A Death Panel History of Medicare
Subscribe on Patreon and hear this week's full patron-exclusive episode here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/124065295
Hi listeners — Beatrice and Artie are currently on parental leave. (We were planning to be able to telegraph the announcement more this week, but "baby death panel" had other plans, and came early!). While we're away, we'll still have episodes in the feed, like today's episode; a mix of some old favorites we haven't revisited in a while and some unlocks. We’ll be back as soon as it’s safe and reasonable for us to do so, because with everything going on right now we want to make sure we’re here for everyone.
We also want to thank each and every one of you, because without support from our patrons it wouldn’t be possible for us to take this kind of time. So if you can, now is a great time to support the show at patreon.com/deathpanelpod — either by becoming a patron or increasing your membership.
Original episode description:
In today's episode, we survey the extremely messy history that led to the passage of original Medicare, the role private insurers and other industry groups played in its creation, and some of its unintended consequences we live with to this day.
Runtime 1:14:40
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