Failed State Update

In Tumacácori, Arizona, a stone’s throw from the U.S. border with Mexico, roughly 85 “destiny reservists” await their fate. They are the followers of Gabriel of Urantia. Born Anthony J. Delevin in Pittsburgh in 1946, Gabriel’s life work is a community known as the Global Community Communications Alliance (GCCA). They live in a compound in the desert where they raise animals, harvest hemp, and study their prophet’s teachings. This is all in preparation for the end of this world, and the...

We had so much fun doing the Failed State Jukebox a few weeks ago that we thought we'd try it again. Thanks to my (Lenny's) terrific administrative skills, J.G. Michael wasn't on the call. But don't worry, he'll be back next week! With author and journalist Mark Jacobson as our guide, we prevailed through 90 minutes of cult music, including: TaliasVan & the Bright & Morning Star Band: Let's Be Lovers (live) Jeremy Spencer: Can You Hear The Song Charles Manson: Cease to Exist The Beach...

Daniel Muessig is a Pittsburgh folk hero, mostly because of his over-the-top ad for his law practice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_iaugcJW7Q Any day now he will go to prison for five years for conspiring to distribute 100 kilograms or more of marijuana and possession of marijuana. He was busted by an FBI task force who ID'd him through a wiretap. Of course he broke the law, but should we be sending anyone to jail over marijuana? The fact is, even though we live in a world where...

In this episode of Failed State Update, J.G. Michael speaks with Edward Ahmed Mitchell, Deputy Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations about a scandal involving CAIR's Ohio chapter and a right-wing outfit called the Investigative Project on Terrorism. There is evidence that IPT has been spying on Muslim-American activists and working with the state of Israel to target American students activists. It's a bombshell story, one that's only going to get crazier as more details...

Failed State Jukebox is a regular item on the Failed State Update website where we look at dystopian pop music. Usually, it's far-right or conspiracy-themed, which is both disturbing and hilarious. These are fun articles, but there's a point to them. The right-wing culture industry tells us something about a sector of the American public usually ignored by the mainstream. In today's episode of the podcast, co-hosts J.G. Michael and Joseph L. Flatley are joined by Charles Ochelli, the host...

Russia has invaded Ukraine, and what more is there to be said, besides: Fuck war and fuck imperialism. (Well, there is a little more than that to be said, and J.G. Michael has Eric Draitser on the show to say it.) Eric Draitser is an independent political analyst and host of CounterPunch Radio. You can find his exclusive content including articles, podcasts, audio commentaries, poetry, and more at patreon.com/ericdraitser. He can be reached at @stopimperialism on Twitter. Please be sure...

Wayne Madsen is an investigative journalist, the author of twenty-one books, and the publisher of The Wayne Madsen Report. His latest book is The Rise of the Fascist Fourth Reich: The Era of Trumpism and the New Far-Right. Stories about Wayne Madsen on Failed State Update: "Did Wayne Madsen uncover a 2016 ‘Stop the Steal’ Plot?" "Wayne Madsen on the New Fourth Reich" Make sure you check out J.G.'s other podcast, Parallax Views. --- Send in a voice message:...

On February 10, Failed State Update co-hosts Joseph L. Flatley and JG Michael appeared on The Ochelli Effect live to discuss current events, conspiracy theories, JFK, Ozzy Osbourne, and more. Unfortunately, someone messed up the recording of the after-show that we did (that person being Joseph L. Flatley), but we do have the show itself here for your listening pleasure. If you dig it, please check out Chuck Ochelli's podcast, The Ochelli Effect, live at ochelli.com or on your podcast app of...

What do UFOs, the CIA, the conflict in Ukraine, and the Philadelphia Experiment have in common? Tune in to find out! Jack Brewer writes "The UFO Trail", a blog dedicated to publishing credible info on incredible topics. Brewer's research interests include the UFO subculture, the intelligence community, and related social dynamics, and he's here to discuss all these topics as well as his new book Wayward Sons: NICAP and the IC. Jack's Blog, The UFO Trail: http://ufotrail.blogspot.com/ Jack...

In this episode of Failed State Update, Joseph L. "Lenny" Flatley goes toe-to-toe with the hosts of the Boys' Bible Study podcast. The Bible Boys, as we like to call them, wade deep into the murky waters of the Christian pop culture industry, reviewing the weirdest and most interesting independently produced films with a certain message. Since that message often includes far-right and Christian nationalist propaganda, their reviews should be of particular interest to Failed State Update...

You're in for a treat! For this edition of Failed State Update: The Podcast, J.G. Michael interviews author and extremism expert Spencer Sunshine on the Oath Keepers' role in January 6, the militia movement in general, and what happens when antisemites infiltrate leftist politics. Also, Joseph L. Flatley tells you about his recent reporting on sovereign citizens (and Satanists), and JG tells you what you can find on his other podcast, Parallax Views. Failed State Update: The Website:...

Regular listeners of Failed State Update are in for a real treat. Our guest, Alfred W. McCoy, is an American historian and educator. Currently the Fred Harvey Harrington Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, he specializes in the history of the Philippines, foreign policy of the United States, European colonization of Southeast Asia, the illegal drug trade, and CIA covert operations. His most recent book is To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic...

Is the United States collapsing, or is all of civilization collapsing? To explore that question we bring you John Zerzan, an anarchist and primitivist author whose work has been compared to Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, of all people. His books offer an alternative vision of history that focuses on the destructive nature of technology. And more importantly — and this is why we spoke to him — his work suggests a possible future free of the alienation and control of capitalism-run-amok. His most...

Tom Mellett is a retired high school teacher of math and physics who delights in trolling UFO Twitter and Facebook because their emotional maturity is at a 9th grade level (as he puts it). He is also a cat butler in Los Angeles. We got on the phone after my story "The New Intergalactic Cold War" caused a (quite brief) firestorm on Twitter last week, and fortunately I recorded the conversation, because it really is podcast gold. On this episode of FAILED STATE UPDATE Tom and I discuss the...

Anthony Russo is the author of Dragged Into the Light: Truthers, Reptilians, Super Soldiers, and Death Inside an Online Cult, and for the next fifty-three minutes we'll discuss his book about Sherry Shriner, an online cult leader in rural Ohio who preached a bizarre combination of reptilian conspiracies, orgone energy pseudoscience, and discredited "bible code" theories. She briefly made headlines in 2017 when one of her followers was murdered by another former follower. Shriner died earlier...

Havana Syndrome is back in the news. On the one hand, it's clearly a psychogenic illness that's being misdiagnosed as the result of commie death rays. On the other hand, by treating it as an attack by America's enemies, politicians can use it to help further their foreign policy objectives. Which side do you think the media is going to take? Robert E. Bartholomew is a native New Yorker who teaches history at Botany College in Auckland, New Zealand. His many books include The Martians Have...

REPOST: After decades of accusations and a weeks-long federal trial, R. Kelly has been found guilty of charges including sexual exploitation of a child, bribery, racketeering and sex trafficking that will put him in prison from 10 years to life. I figure now is as good a time as any to repost this interview with journalist Jim Derogatis, who did as much as anyone to put him in jail. For fifteen years, DeRogatis was the pop music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times. It was while there that Jim...

The subject of political cults continues with Marley Clements, a writer, producer, and documentary filmmaker whose work includes Active Measures (2018) and QAnon: The Search for Q (2021). Her company Bunker Crew Media is responsible for the Kremlin File podcast. Kremlin File: https://pod.co/kremlin-file Erica Duggan on Lyndon LaRouche & the Mysterious Death of Her Son Jeremiah Duggan (Parallax Views podcast):...

MOVE is a radical Black communal organization founded in 1972 in Philadelphia, best known for the 1985 firebombing in which 11 members (including 5 children under the age of 14) were murdered by law enforcement. These days, the group lives on as a "political cult," as former member Kevin Price reveals in his blog, Leaving MOVE. In part one of the series, Kevin gives the true history of the group as it morphed from what was considered to be a Black liberation group to a political cult. In...

MOVE is a radical Black communal organization founded in 1972 in Philadelphia, best known for the 1985 firebombing in which 11 members (including 5 children under the age of 14) were murdered by law enforcement. These days, the group lives on as a "political cult," as former member Kevin Price reveals in his blog, Leaving MOVE. In part one of the series, Kevin gives the true history of the group as it morphed from what was considered to be a Black liberation group to a political cult. In...