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“The first time I ever really listened to Kyle Kulinski’s show was in the back of a cab last summer. The driver had his phone hooked up through the stereo and was pumping out an episode through the car speakers — loudly, as if looking to convert a captive audience.
“Do you like Kyle Kulinski?”
The driver, Ahmed, was a recent immigrant and apparently a die-hard fan of Secular Talk, the political talk show that Kulinski broadcasts on YouTube. I told him, yes, in fact. I do like Kulinski, had come across his show several years ago, and, all things considered, he seemed pretty good.
“He understands what we’re up against,” Ahmed said. “Like Bernie.”
But I was surprised to hear Kulinski’s name mentioned in the same breath as Bernie Sanders, particularly with such adoration. Because what I did remember about Kulinski’s show struck me as mostly capital-P “progressive” takes on the news — the left wing of the Netroots crowd more than the democratic socialism Sanders has popularized.
It’s an impression that wasn’t entirely incorrect.
“I have no time for philosophical, airy bullshit,” Kulinski tells me from his home in Westchester, New York. “I don’t want to hear about Lenin. I don’t want to hear about Marx. I just want a super plainspoken, straightforward agenda with a straightforward way of selling it.”
With over 800,000 subscribers and nearly 670 million total views on YouTube, selling a progressive agenda is clearly something Kulinski knows how to do — even Democracy Now, the long-standing flagship of progressive media, cannot match his reach on the platform. Chapo Trap House can certainly boast a wildly devoted fan base (and a not insignificant degree of media influence), but their audience is roughly half the size of Kulinski’s.
While Secular Talk might be more likely to be looped in with the progressive networks around Air America and Pacifica alums like Sam Seder than the more resolutely socialist world, Kulinski’s fiery rhetoric, razor-sharp class instincts, and knack for withering takedowns sets him apart from his peers. Judging by his rhetoric alone, he’s closer to a Eugene Debs than a Chris Hayes.
But unlike Hayes, Amy Goodman, or his friend Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks — who began airing Secular Talk on his web network seven years ago — the thirty-two-year-old Kulinski is virtually invisible in the mainstream media. Despite his enormous fan base, his show has never once been mentioned in the obligatory trend pieces on “the Millennial Left” pumped out by the prestige media. Nor has Kulinski’s name ever popped up at all in the New York Times, Vox, the New Yorker, New York Magazine, or the Washington Post, despite his leading role in cofounding Justice Democrats, the organization widely credited with sweeping Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the rest of “the Squad” to power.
Just last week, his Wikipedia page was deleted. The reason? “There is very simply no [reliable source] coverage of this person,” according to one moderator. In new media, he’s king — the Sean Hannity of the Berniecrat left. In old media, he’s nobody.
I suspect there are a few reasons for that. There is nothing “cool” about Kulinski’s show. (As a friend put it, “‘Welcome to Secular Talk’ sounds like something you’d hear on Egyptian radio.”) His no-nonsense social-democratic politics won’t get him much cred with the Full Communism crowd. He records his show not in Brooklyn or Los Angeles, but in a studio he built himself in his modest Westchester home. His hair is too groomed and his taste in clothes too preppy to qualify as “Dirtbag Left.” Nor has he ever attended an n+1 release party. “Not only have I not attended one,” he says, “I have no idea what that means.”
And yet he’s astonishingly plugged-in for a young man in the suburbs. Wondering how Sanders ended up on the Joe Rogan Experience? Kulinski, a frequent guest on Rogan’s wildly popular show, introduced them. “You make the most sense to me,” Rogan told Kulinski on a recent episode. “You’re a normal person.”
Much like Sanders himself, Kulinski’s show has a massive audience that just doesn’t compute with our media’s understanding of “what the kids want” or even “what the left-wing kids want.”
It’s probably for the best — the very woke and very WASP-ish decorum haunting much of the media world is nowhere to be found in Secular Talk. “Corporate Democrats over-focus on identity as a trick to divert you from the issues that unite us all — class issues,” he said on a recent episode. “That Raytheon decided they don’t hate gays or trans people — frankly, I don’t really give a shit what their take on that is…”
Read More Here!:
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If the Republicans want to go back to the usual tactics of Elect a Republican whom looks Sane on the Surface and will play the Fake lie card of I'm a Person of Law Family and the Constitution. Then get power lie and do nothing on what's promised on anything good. Then Republicans will have to swallow the bullet and not try to save Trump let the Justice system go forward without any Republicans interfering then sell Trump to Prison. It's the only way for them to elect a person to fool the American People. Because Trump sure as Hell isn't a Surprise we all know what a Treasonous lying Scumbag Con artist he is and his Life in Prison was Long Long over due.
Biden 24! Let's destroy this racist country
Occasionally Mr. T says something I enjoy, "DeSanctimonious" is one of them.
DeStanis is popular in Florida but gerrymandering played a part in his 20 point win.
I can only guess that Trump's popularity among certain people is tied to the general love of the "outlaw mobster life" that has been gloried in our culture on so many levels.
Remember Kyle said: You are objectively wrong if you like fall and you should be ashamed of yourself.
Thats called blackmail mr. Trumpf
Did crystals kids draw that beard on your face? Just kidding. Maybe.
DeSantis 2024 ‼️ He can win the Presidency, Trump cannot.DeSantis can win, he can get independents, undecided, and Democrats to vote for him. Trump can't win, only his base will vote for him.
Watch it Donnie, you may need a presidential pardon.
I want to know what their supporters think about this whole thing between them, considering they both have the same people who like and support them
While I do think DeSantis is very popular on the Republican side and the current frontrunner for thr 2024 GOP nomination, I think you have to sprinkle a grain of salt on this year's FL Gov election result – that grain of salt being what a massive joke of a candidate Charlie Crist is. The former REPUBLICAN Governor of Florida who is clearly just power hungry running for every seat in FL from both sides of the aisle.
Grabing Popcorn for this Feud!!!
Just heard Jimmy Dore really tearing into Kulinski. I guess he's upset about the election results.
Well, you changed your hair color for some reason.
Yeah Trump and DeSantis may talk trash (bad) about each other but comes 2024 they will be best buddies and running mates. I know how this “Dog and Pony Show” works. These politicians use each other.
Why does everyone forget to mention redistricting?
In addition to Florida and Ohio, the GOP also dominated in Iowa.
1:33 poliTICS poliCY
Man what a fall for Gabbard. She always did feel kinda fake to me.
Trump should be on show have show i saying he stuiped dumb he is jealous of de statis caused he has god spoke to him he lost election selfish trump wants be president forever rest life not give people chance y never leaving he stay forever until 190 until dies
Quit doing that crappy, knockoff, cheesy Trump impression.. it sucks
Kyle. I love you. I have been a subscriber since you had 311 thousand. I wish you the best always.
I wouldn't count Trump out just yet. The Republican Party definitely has an electability problem. Trump has an established cult of personality that DeSantis just doesn't have. Sure DeSantis is popular in Florida but 90% of the rest of America doesn't even know what his voice sounds like. There is a certain percentage of the Republican base that doesn't trust the party leadership and are never going to abandon Trump. The Republican Party is losing football games and calling for the backup qb. This is like football. Republicans are drafting a good college qb into a mess of a NFL franchise. The Republican Party is a mess. They have way more problems than Trump. The demographics are moving away from them and their policies don't appeal to future generations. Republicans are dying off and they're not being replaced with new voters. They have made all the wrong moves. They hitched their wagon to a buffoon who lucked into the White House in 2016. They have ran with the election fraud narrative. They pushed covid policies that literally killed off people in their base. They overturned Roe. They are pushing for raising the voting age. They are trying to kill Biden's student loan forgiveness.
The progressive candidates actually did very well this cycle. As soon as the Democratic Party wakes up and starts pushing for popular policies it's going to make things really difficult for the Republican Party. I remember having conversations prior to 2016 that if we elected Trump it could destroy the Republican Party. Now what? Republicans have let in the white supremacists and the Christian nationalists. They have let in the homophobes. They have let in the conspiracy theorists and flat earthers. They welcomed the science deniers and young earth creationists with open arms. Where do they go from here? They can't win elections without the nutjobs or with them. What am I missing here?
Why when I look at the thumbnail do they see a poster for some funny as fuck Paul Rudd, Will Ferrell spoof movie
Crist should have never run. Should have gone to Fried. And worse of them all, this is the most gerrymandered the Florida Districts have been. Al Lawson lost his seat and he has had it for decades.
What do you get when you mix game of thrones styled political brinksmanship with a Republican party that's figuring out how to respond to the political failures of Trumpism?….House of Elephants
I really think your DeSantis coverage was good, but he only would have a real chance with a weakened Trump. He has that now.