The Party Line Podcast

Episode 61 - The Party Line on Labor’s Gambling Addiction

This week’s ep is all about the gambling industry - and the ALP’s refusal to cut it down to size. We start by looking at the sheer scale of money involved, tens of billions of dollars annually. This money is overwhelmingly taken from poor and working class people, and handed over to betting companies and their wealthy shareholders. We then explore the h...

Episode 60 - The Party Line on how the Royal Commission was Hijacked

This week’s episode is once again dedicated to the Royal Commission into why Israel is awesome and not allowed to be protested (sic). In particular, we look at the day of investigation into ‘protests’, where three years of anti-genocide, anti-war activism was condensed into a discussion about a single demonstration which was made famous due to...

Episode 59: The Party Line on Socialists Vs One Nation in Victoria

This week Omar is sick with “not some nothing virus”. So Anneke and Jordy take us through the good news: Andrew Tate is in jail, the news: The coalition has overtaken Labor in Victoria, and the bad news: capitalism sucks. 

We then discuss the incredible launch of the Victorian Socialists election campaign. 800 people squeezed into the Aborigin...

Episode 58: The Party Line on Labor’s leadership crisis

This episode was recorded in the aftermath of the Federal ALP conference and the coup against Jacinta Allan in Victoria, so we decided to take a deep dive into the nature of the modern ALP. But first, we cover a few headlines: the wildfires sweeping France and Spain, the escalating aggression by Israeli forces in the West Bank, the theft of Venezuelan oil revenues, an...

This ep starts with a celebration! Over the weekend your three hosts were part of a delegated national conference that officially voted to establish the Socialist Party as a national organisation. We discussed the crimes of the ALP, the structural injustices facing workers and the oppressed, the threat posed by One Nation, and the need to rebuild our unions and stand against imperialism from Gaza to the Asia-Pacific. 

We th...

Episode 55: The Party Line on how the royal commission justifies genocide

The gang is back together this week! But more importantly, we welcome a special guest Yasmine Johnson, fresh from appearing before the Royal Commission into antisemitism (AKA the royal commission into the Palestine solidarity movement). Widely praised for her calm, incisive and principled defence of Palestinian solidarity movement on the stand, Yas gives u...

Episode 55: The Party Line on how Modi conquered India

It’s Anneke’s turn to have a week off, and she’s been replaced by our favourite temp, Jasmine Duff. Jasmine and Jordy go a little bit rogue during the headlines segment, and spend some time breaking down the horror of the catholic school system’s rampant sexual abuse against children, and the choice made by the Christian Brothers to artificially bankr...

Episode 54: The Party Line on how AI is Destroying the World

This week Omar was replaced by a megaphone - seems fitting! We were joined by Alma Torlakovic, NSW socialists Candidate for Granville and campaigner against data centres, to talk about the harmful community impacts of these huge centres. They emit noise, raise the heat of the surrounding area, and are storage centers for millions of litres of fuel. We discuss the succe...

Episode 53: The Party Line on how Pauline embraced her inner fascist

This ep looks at two big events this week: the Victorian teachers rejecting the shitty deal pushed by the Labor government and their union stooges, and Pauline Hanson’s fascistic press club tirade. The teachers have voted 58/42 percent to reject Jacinta Allan’s offer, and the effort was a product of an enormous rank and file upsurge largely led by c...

This ep features Roz Ward, enemy #1 of the Murdoch Press circa 2016, the Antoinette Lattouf of her era. We talk about the recent polling about One Nation, as well as the important anti-Hanson actions that took place over the weekend (and respond to some of the criticisms from tiny groups of sectarians). We then take a bit of a deep dive into the World Cup, looking at how Trump, FIFA, and capitalism have made this event a profiteeri...

The Party Line on how socialism hit the mainstream in Argentina

The crew are finally back together again, and start by reflecting on some of the listener feedback about the last episode with Jono Srinanganathan discussing the differences between the Greens and the Socialist Party. We then discuss the news, which is filled with mediocrity: Charlie Pickering chatting to a Nazi, Richard Marles celebrating second-hand submarines, an...

This episode is a special interview with two Victorian teachers and trade unionists about the state of play regarding their negotiations with the government. We talk about the fact that Victorian schools are the least funded in the country, despite nearly 26 years of Labor governments, and what that means for the conditions for both staff and students. 

Reading

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The Party Line on Socialists, Greens and the Australian Left ft Jono Sriranganathan 

This special episode is a response to an article written by former Greens councillor Jonathan Sriranganathan comparing the Queensland Socialists to the Greens. So we invited him on to discuss and debate strategies for taking the left forward. We discuss the role of election campaigns in relationship to broader social movements, how left par...

This is a podcast by members of the Socialist Party in Naarm (Melbourne). We hope to bring a radical perspective to a podcast landscape dominated by insipid liberalism (looking at you, The Daily). The pod will come out weekly, and aims to breakdown news and current events from a socialist point of view. While a lot of what’s going on in the world is fairly bleak, The Party Line will try and highlight voices of resistance and ...

Episode 47 - The Party Line on why the Teals are trash

This week is dedicated to the leaning class, those parasites who earn income not by working but by possessing assets. These pampered whinging brats have been out in force across the media this last week, protesting that Jim Chalmers and Anthony Albanese’s move to tax asset-based income at the same rate as wages is an egregious attack on their fundamental human rights. ...

Episode 46 - The Party Line on Labor’s Communist Budget

This week’s ep is all about the state of Australian political life post-budget. We take look at Labor’s BIG NEW DEATH TAX ON AUSSIE BATTLERS and why they’re out to DESTROY our start-up culture, including #inspiring companies/merchants of death like ‘Drone Shield’. More importantly, we look at what the budget does not address - crum...

Episode 45 - The Party Line on Israel’s kidnapping and torture of flotilla activists

For over 15 years, activists have been drawing attention to Israel’s barbaric siege on Gaza via a series of flotillas. These involve boats full of activists and desperately-needed aid sailing to Gaza and highlighting to the world the suffering Palestinians face. This year’s flotilla is the biggest yet, involving over 60 boats a...

Episode 44 - The Party Line on why Hanson and Reform UK keep winning

This weekend saw two important elections take place, one in Farrer (not an important place), and one in the United Kingdom (only slightly more important). The results in both cases saw big swings to the far right and fascists. Hanson’s candidate in Farrer (a very populist, anti-system agribusiness executive) won a huge victory, with some booths returning ...

This episode features the universally loved Jerome Small, an organiser and educator with decades of experience in the union movement and wider socialist . We talk about why parliament is such a dead end for people trying to change the world, but why its still useful for socialists to contest elections when it’s possible. We then take a walk through the radical history of socialist MPs, from the Bolsheviks in Russia through to...