‘Fear is the Tool of a Tyrant’: ‘BradCast’ 9/29/2025

Catching up with three months of news from just the past three days; Also: Callers ring in...

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I couldn’t even come close to getting us all caught up on today’s BradCast to all that has happened since our last show late last week. The madness of the Trump Era — in fact, the madness of Trump — continues to quicken in pace and grow more intense each day as our sick and twisted President grows more sick and twisted, literally, with each passing hour. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Still, we covered quite a lot of ground, with stories you may have heard about, such as the weekend shooting and firebombing at a Mormon church in Michigan, but with background and context you may or may not have heard. For example, the fact that it was the 5th mass shooting of the weekend in the U.S. and the 324th of the year so far — in a year that was just 272 days old as of Sunday. Oh, and also that the alleged assailant, a 40-year old former U.S. Marine and Iraq War veteran is being described as a “MAGA MANIAC” today by the rightwing Drudge Report, citing guy’s apparent support of Trump in 2020, with Trump-Pence signs on his house and a photo of him proudly wearing a camouflaged Donald Trump campaign shirt with the slogan: “Make Liberals Cry Again”.

For some reason, the Trump Administration and Republicans — hell bent in recent weeks on pretending Democrats are responsible for political violence in the U.S. — would rather you don’t notice those details, or the fact that violent domestic extremism from the Right, has, for decades, far out-paced violent extremism from the Left. And the fact that Republicans haven’t done a damn thing about gun violence, no matter where it comes from. And, oh yeah, the fact that they, with a lot of help from Fox “News” at the time, forced the Obama Administration’s DHS to retract a draft report on domestic rightwing extremism, warning about veterans like the shooter in Michigan this weekend, and another U.S. Marine and Iraq war vet who carried out one of two mass shootings in North Carolina over the same past weekend. Like the shooter in MI, he also used an easily-purchasable assault rifle for his massacre.

But we covered much — much — more on today’s show than I can possibly hope to share with you here, along with callers ringing in. So I’ll post some links to some of the stuff we covered, and let you tune in for the full stories and critical context in a nation only now beginning to figure out that pushing back against bullies like Trump seems to work. Cowering in fear does not.

As former FBI Director James Comey said in his remarks after being maliciously indicted at Donald Trump‘s orders last week, in a ridiculous case virtually guaranteed to be laughed out of court by either a judge and/or jury: “Fear is the tool of a tyrant. … But I’m not afraid and I hope you’re not either. I hope instead you are engaged, you are paying attention, and you will vote like your beloved country depends on it — which it does.”

Among the stories covered and/or touched upon on today’s show, before opening up the phones to listeners…

I’m sure I missed a few in that list, but you get the idea. Please tune in to “enjoy” all of the above in amusing and informative BradCast format, along with a few thoughts on what we all can, should and will do about it…

The BradCast with Brad Friedman 9/29/2025
‘Fear is the Tool of a Tyrant’: ‘BradCast’ 9/29/2025  |  Catching up with three months of news from just the past three days; Also: Callers ring in...   · · · · ·   ‘Fear is the Tool of a Tyrant’: ‘BradCast’ 9/29/2025  |  Catching up with three months of news from just the past three days; Also: Callers ring in...
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‘Fear is the Tool of a Tyrant’: ‘BradCast’ 9/29/2025

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