What To Listen To Next: Dan Taberski's Manifesto

Summary

Podcast Summary: Dr. Death – "What To Listen To Next: Dan Taberski’s Manifesto"

Podcast: Dr. Death
Host: Laura Beale (Dr. Death), Dan Tabersky (Manifesto)
Date: July 13, 2026
Featured Clip: Dan Tabersky’s Manifesto, Episode 1

Episode Overview

This special episode of Dr. Death serves as both a conclusion to the current season and a recommendation for listeners seeking their next podcast obsession. Host Laura Beale introduces Dan Tabersky’s Manifesto, a podcast exploring what drives people to challenge broken systems and how manifestos—those raw declarations of intent—fuel societal change, for better or worse. The included extended clip from Manifesto blends personal, historical, and modern accounts, asking: What makes a manifesto? And when does righteous rage tip into dangerous territory?

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Systemic Frustration and the Need for Change

• Laura Beale introduces the theme: Both Dr. Death and Manifesto scrutinize individuals exploiting or challenging broken systems. While Dr. Schneider is an example of abusing the system, Manifesto explores how anger can motivate people to demand change.
  • "Dan Tabersky’s Manifesto is a podcast about what to do when you want to change a system that isn’t working." [00:20]

2. Personal Reflection and Societal Rage

• Tabersky’s emotional intro: Dan shares his own simmering anger at society’s dysfunction, setting up the show’s core question: How do we transcend the urge to “burn it all down” and instead build something better?
  • "I'm not an angry person. I am a relatively happy guy. But I find myself seething underneath all the time." [04:13]
  • He describes manifestos as “an artful scream” and a “call to action.” [04:47]

3. The Anatomy of a Manifesto

• Reviews a wide range of manifestos—from the Communist Manifesto to personal rants about shopping carts and anti-cussing schools kids.
  • "Manifestos can demand just about anything. A new world order, or a new way to milk cows." [06:57]
• Kale Lawson’s supermarket moment: A seemingly trivial annoyance (needing a coin for a cart) becomes the emotional tipping point for one man, inspiring defiance and his first manifesto.
  • "It felt like a moment of liberation." [08:56]

4. Manifestos and Action

• Tabersky and his interviewees argue that writing a manifesto isn’t enough; action must follow.
  • "The writing of a manifesto isn't anywhere near as important for me as a carrying out of a manifesto." —Kale Lawson [07:18]

5. Manifestos in American History and Pop Culture

• The Black Panther Ten Point Program is cited as a classic example of organized, impactful activism (audio clip of Bobby Seale reading it in 1968) [09:24].
• The Declaration of Independence itself is recognized as America's foundational “manifesto,” played both seriously (The Fifth Dimension) and satirically (movie "Network") in pop culture.
  • "America, for better or for worse, was built on a manifesto." [28:27]

6. The Manifesto-Violence Nexus

• Christopher Dorner case (2013): The episode details Dorner’s killing spree after he posts a lengthy manifesto blaming his LAPD firing on systemic racism and vowing retribution.
  • "Reports of a homicide in neighboring Orange County..." [02:02]
  • "A particular interest...is a multi-page manifesto in which the suspect has implicated himself in the slayings." [03:47]
• Tabersky notes the disturbing rise of manifestos attached to mass shootings—manifestos as tools to justify and publicize violent acts.
  • "Manifestos and violence began to become synonymous..." [10:40]
  • "Most aren't really manifestos at all...just a last-ditch grab for attention on the shooter's way out." [11:12]
• The police response to Dorner and public fears (mistaken identity, police shooting at bystanders) showcase unintended, real-world consequences ignited by rage-filled manifestos.
  • "For black men especially, the fear of mistaken identity gets real big real quick." [16:42]
  • "Not Chris Dorner, Please do not shoot." —Jerome Hilliard (on his handwritten T-shirt) [17:35]

7. Public Reaction and the Ethical Quandary

• Tabersky interviews people who, while not condoning violence, admit to understanding or even empathizing with the grievances behind violent manifestos.
  • "What he did was awful...but when you read his manifesto...he wasn't entirely crazy." [18:13]
  • "Many people aren't rooting for him to kill innocent people. They're rooting for somebody who was wronged to get a kind of revenge against the system." [18:26]

8. Contemporary Manifestos and Martyrdom

• A fictional modern case: Luigi Mangione, who shoots a health insurance CEO and leaves a short, pointed manifesto. His act, though violent, strikes a chord and inspires public displays, memes, and awkward support.
  • "So it's just our man's here...there's a halo behind him." [22:24]
• Protesters and observers play verbal gymnastics to support the message behind the violence without endorsing the violence itself.
  • "We don't advocate going out and shooting CEOs." [24:01]
  • "If you're one revolution, somebody's going to get hurt. Somebody has to die." —Protester [25:21]

9. The Power of Collective Anger as Seen in Media

• The episode contrasts the poppy, sanitized patriotism of America’s Bicentennial (Donny and Marie) with the much rawer cry of Howard Beale in "Network."
  • "We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat...you've got to say, I'm a human being, God damn it. My life has value." —Howard Beale [30:11]
• Tabersky modernizes this speech, capturing the malaise of present-day life and the desperate need for collective agency.
  • "We gotta say, we're human beings, for fuck’s sake. Our lives have value." [32:22]

10. Manifesto as a Path Forward—Not Just Backlash

• Tabersky introduces the underlying promise of his show: yes, the world is broken and anger is justified, but anger—not violence—can fuel true change.
  • "Number one, you gotta get mad. Embrace it. The rage you're feeling isn't the problem. It might just be the solution. Because anger can do some pretty amazing things." [34:32]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Dan Tabersky (on rage and agency):

  • "A manifesto is a call to action. It’s an artful scream." [04:47]
  • "I'm not an angry person. But I find myself seething underneath all the time..." [04:13]
  • "If we’re angry at the people who are letting us die, fuck it." [34:51]

• Kale Lawson (on defiance):

  • "It felt like a moment of liberation." [08:56]

• Public Reaction (on vigilante acts):

  • "Not Chris Dorner, Please do not shoot." —Jerome Hilliard, T-shirt [17:35]
  • "We don't advocate going out and shooting CEOs." [24:01]
  • "If you want revolution, somebody has to die." —Protester [25:21]
  • "Everybody wants revolution, but everybody’s afraid..." [25:21]

• Howard Beale (from "Network", via clip):

  • "You’ve got to get mad. You’ve got to say, I’m a human being, goddamnit. My life has value!" [30:25]

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Important Timestamps

• 00:00-01:14 — Laura Beale’s introduction, setting up the transition from Dr. Death to Manifesto
• 01:14-04:13 — Dan Tabersky’s personal context and the Dorner case introduction
• 04:13-10:36 — Exploring manifestos, motives, and public examples (shopping cart story, Black Panther Manifesto)
• 10:36-16:42 — Manifestos attached to violence; Dorner manhunt, impact on community and mistaken identities
• 18:13-25:21 — Public support, ethical debates, new fictional case (Luigi Mangione, health care shooting), protest reactions
• 25:48-29:34 — Pop culture, the Declaration of Independence, "Network" speech, linking anger to action
• 31:08 to 34:38 — Modern resonance of anger, Tabersky’s call to action: "You gotta get mad"

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Tone and Style

• Conversational yet urgent.
  Tabersky balances dark humor, self-reflection, and blunt social critique.
• Direct and questioning.
  Speakers repeatedly dig into the tension between righteous anger, action, and violence.

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Summary Statement

This episode bridges Dr. Death’s critique of individual malfeasance with Manifesto’s broader quest: What fuels people to challenge, or even upend, a failing system? Tabersky’s Manifesto is a sharp, provocative meditation on anger, activism, the destructive edge of manifestos, and the necessity of channeling frustration into transformative (not violent) collective action.

Recommended for: Listeners seeking to understand the roots of societal rage—and how it might be harnessed for genuine change instead of destruction.

Transcript

[Laura Beale]

This is your host, Laura Beale. I hope you enjoyed this season of Dr. Death and I want to thank you for listening. Now that you're done with this show, you're probably looking for the next thing to listen to. I have a recommendation. It's called Dan Tabursky's Manifesto. In Dr. Death, the cowboy Dr. Schneider took advantage of a broken system. Dan Tabursky's Manifesto is a podcast about what to do when you want to change a system that isn't working. What begins as a historical narrative blends into modern day conversation that asks the question, how do we envision what the future can be? And how can we do it without violence? Manifesto guides the listener through a history of human frustration and collective longing for something better. Ultimately, the series proposes a new approach to history, one shaped by a diverse group of visionaries with nothing to lose but the brighter future that they're demanding. We're about to play a clip from Manifesto. Listen to Manifesto wherever you get your podcasts. Audible listeners can binge all episodes of Manifesto ad free right now. Start your Audible subscription in the Audible app or on Apple Podcasts.

[Dan Tabursky]

February 2013 Venice, California. It's my last few months in Los Angeles before I move back east. I'm in my late 30s, living by the beach, learning to surf the crumbly waves on my longboard. My skin smells like the ocean all the time. I feel amazing, I look amazing, I look amazing. But I'm not taking you back in my time machine because of how good I looked, which was very. It's because of what happened next in Southern California that cut through that dreamy scene and swapped it out with harsh reality.

[News Reporter]

Police in Irvine, California are investigating the double murder of a young couple in the parking lot of their apartment complex.

[Dan Tabursky]

Reports of a homicide in Neighboring Orange County.

[News Reporter]

27 year old Keith Lawrence and his fiance, 28 year old Monica Kwan, were found shot to death in Lawrence's car late Sunday night.

[Dan Tabursky]

Two young people, a couple, recently engaged. The guy was a public safety officer at USC and she was an assistant basketball coach at a local university, murdered while parked in their white Kia Optima.

[News Reporter]

Investigators do not yet have a suspect description or a motive.

[Dan Tabursky]

And immediately the details of the crime begin to add up to something bigger than a one time thing. Like when their bodies are found by the police. The victim's necklace is still on her neck. Her new engagement ring is still firmly on her finger, which means this isn't a robbery. Also, investigators find evidence of 14 shots having been fired. It's a lot of bullets for just Two people cornered in their car, but the number of neighbors who actually heard those 14 shots, zero. So maybe there was a silencer on the gun, which would mean the killer probably isn't new to this, that maybe they're a professional.

[Police Official]

Irvine detectives have been working day and night since this tragedy.

[Dan Tabursky]

The Irvine police chief takes to the podium to tell the people of Southern California that they are going to have to buckle up for a ride today.

[Police Official]

We have identified Christopher Dorner as a suspect in this double homicide because the

[Dan Tabursky]

suspect, Christopher Dorner, is no ordinary suspect.

[Police Official]

Dorner was an LAPD officer through 2009 and a reservist for the United States Navy.

[Dan Tabursky]

Dorner is a former LAPD cop and he's still out there. And there's reason to believe that he's going to kill again, that maybe he already has. And we know this because Christopher Dorner left something behind.

[Police Official]

A particular interest at this point in the investigation is a multi page manifesto in which the suspect has implicated himself in the slings.

[Podcast Guest]

And this manifesto on Facebook is 11 pages long.

[Dan Tabursky]

Trace this manifesto from this suspect who's targeting cops. It's stunning.

[Shep]

It is stunning, Shep.

[Police Official]

And it says he's been very well trained. You know, lapd, some of the best trained officers in the country. And I tell you, this manifesto, it

[Dan Tabursky]

scares the hell out of me. I'm Dan Tabursky from Audible Originals and please and thanks Productions. This is Manifesto Episode 1 2America. Subject Last Resort. I am in the market for a manifesto. I have been for a while now, to be honest. The world is on fire. I'll spare you the details. We've all got our own faves. And I mean, really, what fresh words could be left to describe what fresh hell we're presented with day after day? But even more concerning for me, even more surprising, has been my own reaction to it and how difficult it's been to get a handle on how angry it has all made me. I'm not an angry person. I am a relatively happy guy. But I find myself seething underneath all the time. My patience has become strained, my temper too short. My ability to hear anyone has vaporized while I simmer just under the surface. And I'm afraid pretty soon I'll have slid all the way over to the dark side. Not the right side or the left side, but the burn it all down side. And I'm waiting for someone to tell us, how do we move past this shit show that we have created for ourselves? What do we do now? So, yeah, Wanted Explosive manifesto. A vision for the Future. No font too big or small. A manifesto is a call to action. It's an artful scream. It's words, spoken or written, that are putting the world on notice that the way things are, the way they've been, they gotta change. I've been mainlining manifestos for months. Long ones, short ones, sad ones, mad ones piled on the floor. And in my Google Docs, as many manifestos as there are gripes about the world and big ideas to fix it. I read a manifesto against cussing, written by a middle schooler. Then I read a manifesto that starts, manifest this motherfucker. The painter David Hockney wrote a manifesto for smoking. Death awaits you even if you do not smoke. He lived to nearly 90, smoking two delicious packs a day till the very end. There's hacker manifestos, there's surrealist manifestos, there's polygamist manifestos. The Communist Manifesto that specter haunting Europe inspired revolution after revolution in the 60s and the 70s. There was the Bitch Manifesto, the scum manifesto, the manifesto of 343 slaves. That one's in. French manifestos can demand just about anything. A new world order or a new way to milk cows.

[Commentator]

That's real.

[Dan Tabursky]

But from talking to the people who've written them, most manifestos seem to come from the same simple starting point. A person who has reached the end of their rope.

[Kale Lawson]

The writing of a manifesto isn't anywhere near as important for me as a carrying out of a manifesto. To me, a manifesto is actually an action. It's a. It's something that you decide to do, to think in some new, fresh way.

[Dan Tabursky]

This is Kale Lawson, age 84, originally from Estonia. Think of him as the spiritual grumpy uncle of this project. He wrote one of the most troublemaking manifestos of our lifetime. But he started running manifestos, period, because of something that happened. Something teeny tiny. And teeny tiny can be all it takes to push a guy right over the edge.

[Kale Lawson]

That was one of those moments when I just suddenly had this emotion suddenly welling up inside me.

[Dan Tabursky]

It happens at, of all places, a supermarket where the whole economic order is reduced down to cans on a shelf where you can buy two of crap you don't need for the price of one.

[Kale Lawson]

And then this feeling of discontent that I've had in shopping at supermarkets, you know, for years and years before that, and being dissatisfied with the whole feeling of walking in there and having the choices that they're giving me and the way that I. It just felt like something that I don't want to do. But I kept on doing it.

[Dan Tabursky]

He goes to grab a shopping cart, only it's one of those setups where you gotta insert a coin to get the cart and you only get the coin back if you return the shopping cart. As if none of us can be

[Kale Lawson]

trusted, you know, Basically they asked me to sort of use the shopping cart, put the coin in and take the coin back and put it back to where it belongs. Then all of a sudden there was that one moment when I sat and said, fuck it, I'm not gonna do this anymore and I'm not gonna stop other people from doing it as well.

[News Reporter]

So.

[Dan Tabursky]

So he takes a coin and he jams it into the slot so it won't come out. So now no one's playing this stupid shopping cart game, are they?

[Kale Lawson]

And it felt so good. It felt like, like, it felt like a moment of liberation.

[Dan Tabursky]

That, that space right there where emotion becomes action when you're inspired to just do something already. That is the stuff of manifestos. Individuals, groups, entire swathes of society use it as the funnel to focus their erupting rage.

[Police Dispatcher]

Number seven, we want an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people.

[Dan Tabursky]

This is activist Bobby Seale reading the Black Panther Manifesto in 1968. They called it the Ten Point Program.

[Police Dispatcher]

Number eight, we want all black men held in counties, states, federal jails and prisons to be released because they have not had a fair trial, because they've been tried by all white juries. And that's just like being tried in Germany, being a Jew.

[Dan Tabursky]

Manifestos aren't just pretty poems. They are in a sense, a threat. A hard packed snowball of grievance and timing and nerve and real impact, a sparking of real, honest to God, change is the longest of long shots. But when it happens, when a manifesto catches fire, it can change our world. It can rewrite our future. But there's a hitch. In recent years, a new kind of manifesto has crept into our lives more and more. These manifestos too come with fiery language and big demands.

[Laura Beale]

911, what's the address of your emergency?

[Dan Tabursky]

But they also come with a body count.

[Shep]

911.

[Police Dispatcher]

There was a shooting at.

[Dan Tabursky]

As mass shootings became a recurring national nightmare, they often came with a manifesto. In 2002, at the University of Arizona, a shooter kills three and then himself and leaves a 22 page manifesto. In 2007, at Virginia Tech, 32 dead with an 1800 word manifesto. In 2011 in Norway, Anders Breivik kills 77. His manifesto is over 1500 pages long. Manifestos and violence began to become synonymous to the point where a shooter at an El Paso Walmart just a few years ago, he seemed to feel almost obligated to release one, writing, I figured that an underprepared attack and a meh manifesto is better than no attack and no manifesto. I've read my fill of manifestos like these, and if you ask me, most aren't really manifestos at all. They're more like giant fuck yous. Just a last ditch grab for attention on the shooter's way out. It was posted on 8chan, which is an extremist website, hours before the shooting. It was deleted shortly after the shooting happened. In fact, it's become the norm with news organizations to steer clear of showing the full contents of these manifestos altogether, to not give shooters the satisfaction of the attention they so clearly want. But for a small subset of these shooter manifestos, just ignoring them doesn't quite work. Because sometimes the violence isn't just the endgame of a madman or random bullets fired into a crowd. Sometimes the violence is meant to have purpose. And the manifesto has a point that's not completely divorced from reality. And tonight, NBC has a manifesto police say that Dorner wrote in which he said the murders were a necessary evil. Christopher Jordan Dorner is described as a male African American, approximately 6 foot tall, 270 pounds. He's 33 years of age. Dorner is to be considered armed and extremely dangerous after Christopher Dorner shoots that young couple in their car that evening in 2013. Investigations by journalists and police reports tell us that he then drives towards the coast and checks into a hotel in Manhattan Beach. He figures out the Internet and he uploads his manifesto to Facebook. From Christopher Jordan dorner, badge number 6748, to America. Subject last resort. I know most of you who personally know me are in disbelief to hear from media reports that I am suspected of committing such horrendous murders and have taken drastic and shocking actions in the last couple of days. Is you're saying the manifesto is over 11,000 words. It's about 18 pages long. Anderson Cooper also got a copy at CNN via snail mail, along with a commemorative LAPD coin shot through with three bullet holes, presumably made by Dorner himself. I'm an American by choice. I'm a son. I'm a brother. I'm a military service member. I am a man who has completely lost faith in the system when the system betrayed the slandered and libeled me. Dorner writes that he's a former LAPD Officer who was fired a few years before for misconduct. He says it was a setup by racist cops. It soon becomes clear to investigators that the woman Dorner murdered in the car wasn't a random victim. In fact, she was the daughter of a man Dorner name checks in his manifesto, one of dozens who he blames for his firing and who he says are next on his list. The attacks will stop when the department states the truth about my innocence publicly. There is no negotiation. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. He's quoting Thomas Jefferson there with that blood of patriots bit, aligning himself with a long line of self proclaimed freedom fighters willing to kill for what they believe in. And Dorner meant it. In the hours since the manifesto dropped, reports come in that he may have already struck again, cornering two police officers in their patrol car in Riverside and killing one of them.

[Shep]

Dorner says the LA cops are more racist today than they were during the Rodney King era. He writes, and I'm quoting here, you are aware that I have always been the top shot, highest score and expert in rifle qualifications. In every unit I've been in, I will utilize every bit of science, small arms training, demolition ordinance and survival training I've been given. Police say they believe him because they

[Dan Tabursky]

it was a pretty terrifying scenario and completely open ended. By the time most violent manifestos are found, the violence is over and done with.

[Police Official]

Dorner's whereabouts are currently unknown to law enforcement and we were asking for the public's help in finding him.

[Dan Tabursky]

But for this one, just the beginning.

[Police Official]

We're looking for a vehicle we believe is being driven by him. A blue 2005 Nissan Titan pickup with California license plate 7X031.

[Dan Tabursky]

On day four of the manhunt, Dorner's truck is spotted in Torrance and eight police officers open fire, unloading over 100 bullets into the truck. In fact, it's the wrong make, wrong model, wrong color, and definitely not dorner. It's a 71 year old Salvadorian woman and her daughter delivering the LA Times. The mother is shot in the back. She survives. That same morning, police riddle another truck with bullets. This time it's a white guy headed to the beach for some early morning surfing. And that's old ladies and white guys. For black men especially, the fear of mistaken identity gets real big real quick.

[Jerome Hilliard]

Then all of a sudden I turn around and look back and see another one behind the tree with a machine gun. And I thought, okay, this is not good.

[Dan Tabursky]

This guy was mistaken for Dorner near San Diego.

[Jerome Hilliard]

I didn't even want to breathe. You got guns pointed at you. You don't move. You don't breathe. You don't blink, you don't ask why. You just do what you're told.

[Dan Tabursky]

All while the actual Dorner, who appeared to have murdered three already, is still on the loose and armed to the hilt.

[Jerome Hilliard]

The general consensus, though, wasn't like, oh, God, I hope they get this guy before he gets me. They were more concerned about the police.

[Dan Tabursky]

Jerome Hilliard is a black guy and a big guy like Dorner. So the plan is to lay low at home until it's all over. Eventually, he needs groceries, though. He's got to go out. And so he grabs a plain gray T shirt and a black Sharpie. And how do you decide what to write? Like, what do you. Are you looking at? Are you looking to make a joke, or is this, like, it was as

[Jerome Hilliard]

plain text as possible. Not Chris Dorner, Please do not shoot.

[Dan Tabursky]

In big, black letters. Not Chris Dorner. Please don't shoot. No joke about it.

[Jerome Hilliard]

I did not expect this. Like, I just didn't want to get shot in the back.

[Dan Tabursky]

Someone takes a pic of Jerome and his shirt at the checkout line, and it goes viral. More like it. Pop up around SoCal bumper stickers, too. Facebook groups like Team Dorner and We are All Chris Dorner begin to grow. And it becomes hard to ignore how the grievances that Dorner laid out in his manifesto were playing out for real in the hunt to find him.

[Commentator]

Now, don't get me wrong, what he did was awful. Killing innocent people was bad. But when you read his manifesto, when you read the message that he left, he wasn't entirely crazy. He had a plan and a mission here.

[Dan Tabursky]

And opinions like these become not so difficult to come by.

[Commentator]

And many people aren't rooting for him to kill innocent people. They're rooting for somebody who was wronged to get a kind of revenge against the system. It's almost like watching Django Unchained in real life. It's kind of exciting.

[Police Dispatcher]

Minimum traffic on this channel. We have the suspect holed up in a cabin. We have been trading shots with him for the last 20 minutes.

[Dan Tabursky]

After eight punishing days, the manhunt finally ends in a gunfight, with another officer killed and Dorner ultimately taking his own life.

[Police Dispatcher]

According to.

[Dan Tabursky]

According to the coroner's report, there's no trial, no conviction. At a community meeting in South Los Angeles in the days after the man reportedly stood up and told the police Chief his feelings about Dorner, even after all that went down. Saying, I don't defend what Dorner did, but like many in the community, I believe what he said. I don't remember it being everyone making comments like this or even most Angelenos weren't in the streets egging Dornoran. But a lot of people felt that conflict, me included, of wanting him caught, of wanting no more murdered cops. But also the disbelief at how the manifesto kept proving itself over and over in real time. At the time, it felt like a one off, a remarkably unique, particularly queasy scenario. Today, it doesn't seem quite that novel anymore. On a scale from 1 to 10, how cold are you? I actually just got here wrong. The answer on this blue skied Friday last winter in downtown Manhattan is colder than it has ever been on planet Earth, ever. But the crowd that's amassed in front of the courthouse here is still in oddly high spirits.

[Podcast Guest]

It's so encouraging and heartening to see, especially in times right now where it's like so dark and so heavy. It's very exciting, just the idea of people coming together. And I think that's something that we desperately need right now.

[Dan Tabursky]

I say oddly because the man they're here to support, the one giving them the warm fuzzies, is accused of cold blooded murder. He's coming out now or we don't. I don't think they're going to let him out.

[Protester]

I think there's way too much people,

[Police Dispatcher]

way too much energy.

[Dan Tabursky]

Luigi Mangione is making his first court appearance in New York since his arraignment, since he allegedly gunned down the CEO of United Healthcare outside the Hilton on 6th Avenue and then fled after a five day manhunt. He was discovered in a Pennsylvania McDonald's. There's body cam footage of him eating hash browns right before he was arrested. In his possession, cops say they found a three page 262 word handwritten note to the feds. I'll keep this short. What immediately became known as his manifesto. But it had to be done. Frankly, these parasites had it coming. A reminder. The US has the number one most expensive health care system in the world, yet we rank roughly number 42 in life expectancy. United is the words that gave meaning to what he had done. And they continue to abuse our country for immense profit. Although you could argue that the real manifesto here was even more concise. Police say they recovered shell casings at the crime scene with the word deny written in marker on one, defend, on another depose on the third. It Seemed to be a version of delay, deny, defend. Three words critics use to describe how health insurance companies dismiss legitimate claims. And that message, for better or worse, has inspired people. I like. What is it? A T shirt? I like your T shirt. Kim's here selling Luigi swag to the fans who showed up.

[Podcast Guest]

Yeah, so I have this one for the gays and the girls, and then this one for the heteronormies.

[Dan Tabursky]

I'll take them both. The design for the gays is a collage of Luigi's own shirtless selfies scraped from social media. I like the one where he's taking a picture of his armpit.

[Podcast Guest]

It looks like he's, like, smelling his armpit a little bit.

[Dan Tabursky]

And the T shirt for the heteronormies, there's nothing normie about it.

[Podcast Guest]

Oh, my God. So it's just our man's here. It's obviously like a kind of a spirit spiritual connotation implied in here because

[Dan Tabursky]

there's a halo behind him.

[Podcast Guest]

There's a halo. His fingers, his hands. Positioning is very spiritual.

[Dan Tabursky]

It's like a whole Jesus thing. An image of Luigi as a saint, as a martyr, Our connection to the divine.

[Podcast Guest]

I've never felt compelled, though, to do something like this ever in my life. I just got so excited seeing the response to how, you know, to what he brought to light.

[Chorus/Group]

No argument. Put the system on trial. Put the system on trial.

[Dan Tabursky]

Of all the fiery speeches given about health insurance, all the angry tweets, the essays, the open letters, the op eds, the TikToks that all went in one collective ear and out the other, it was the murder that made it stick.

[Crowd Member]

It's everyone's story. Everyone has been impacted negatively by the healthcare industry. Everyone has gotten to the point where they're feeling helpless and hopeless and like, I don't know what else to do. I've tried every option. I've exhausted every avenue, and this still sucks. At some point, when option A and option B don't work, we need to create a third option.

[Dan Tabursky]

Is the third option violent?

[Crowd Member]

I don't think it needs to be.

[Dan Tabursky]

And for the people in this crowd, for a lot of people, people who aren't psychos per se, who don't seem to thrive on nihilism. For them, embracing the manifesto also means doing a little logic dance along with it to show how you're not also embracing murder outright.

[Protester]

We don't advocate going out and shooting CEOs.

[Dan Tabursky]

So tell me what your sign says here.

[Protester]

It says, counterproductive but not criminal.

[Dan Tabursky]

Free lychee.

[Protester]

In other words, he was trying to strike a blow for all these millions of people that are getting screwed. So it's not a crime from our point of view. That's why we call for his freedom. But we don't advocate killing CEOs. But the CEO himself has killed many people.

[Dan Tabursky]

I approach a woman in the crowd with a T shirt pulled on over her parka that says Cougars for Luigi. Are you a cougar?

[Protester]

Actually, my husband is three months younger than me.

[Dan Tabursky]

So you're sort of a cougar.

[Chorus/Group]

I am, yes.

[Dan Tabursky]

She's holding up a bedsheet with the message Luigi before parasites spray painted in red.

[Protester]

Violence is needed sometimes. Rich people have never moved off their butts and or the government has never given any group anything. We just. If you just ask for it, they have always given it. When they have feared something, they feared the violence. So while I may not do it myself, I may not show them a lot of cocktail. I understand. Yeah.

[Dan Tabursky]

Would you not throw them all cocktails?

[Protester]

I don't know. See, I'm not sure that I have the courage to throw them all off cocktail.

[Dan Tabursky]

I'm not sure either.

[Protester]

But I'm going to turn a blind eye to the person who chose them all.

[Dan Tabursky]

Wow.

[Podcast Guest]

That's intense.

[Protester]

Yeah. If you want revolution, somebody has to die. Nobody wants to be inconvenienced, but they want change. Everybody wants revolution, but everybody's afraid and they're hiding their face and they're inside. They can't come out. If you're one revolution, somebody's going to get hurt. Somebody has to die.

[Dan Tabursky]

Is this just the way things are now? With manifestos where bullets and brain matter aren't disqualifying, but rather marks of seriousness. Manifestos to which many find themselves emphatically saying, what that guy did was wrong, but then add in a whisper, but you know he ain't wrong. This year we're celebrating the 250th anniversary of the United States. Fun, right? Like being invited to a birthday party inside a burning building. But I invite you for a moment to peer into a different time of a more youthful country and a patriotic celebration with a name much easier to say than semi quincentennial.

[Chorus/Group]

Happy birthday, America.

[Dan Tabursky]

The bicentennial, 50 years ago in 1976. And like all celebrations in the 70s, it happened on TV variety shows. This is Donny and Marie in full costume on stage with a kick line of TV celebrities that you won't remember. But if that's too uptempo for you,

[Chorus/Group]

I'm a Yankee Doodle dance. A Yankee Doodle, doodle.

[Dan Tabursky]

Sammy Davis Jr. On Bob Hope's Bicentennial Star Spangled Spectacular, born on the Fourth of July. But the NBC Stars and Stripes Variety show featuring Tennessee Ernie ford and Ed McMahon had them all beat.

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

And now here they are, the young America.

[Dan Tabursky]

And it's not just because of the dancers and patriot hats.

[Commentator]

It's.

[Dan Tabursky]

It's because of a tribute they did, a very strange tribute to a manifesto.

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

And now is a bicentennial special. That truly phenomenal musical group, the Fifth Dimension, as they present their own version of the Declaration of Independence.

[Chorus/Group]

We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal.

[Dan Tabursky]

My first thought is, talk about a big swing. You try putting would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature to music. But then you remember this whole thing. America, for better or for worse, was built on a manifesto, a bit of political poetry, laying out grievances and demanding that things change.

[Chorus/Group]

It is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government for their future security or their future secure.

[Dan Tabursky]

Now you're probably thinking, why do you show me this great spirit? Why show me visions of a happier, more secure time that makes ours seem even less so? Well, not every Yankee Doodle was dandy that year. And the Declaration of Independence wasn't the only manifesto being belted out. There was a new one, one that I think captures the time with a little more candor.

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It's a depression. Everybody's out of work or scared of losing their job.

[Dan Tabursky]

This is the Movie Network, also from 1976. The film centers on Howard Beale, a network news anchor gone off the rails. He's sitting at the anchor desk, breathless and soaked from rain. When he snaps on the air, the

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

dollar buys a nickel's worth. Banks are going bust. Shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter. Punks are running wild in the street. And there's nobody anywhere who seems to know what to do. And there's no end to it.

[Dan Tabursky]

And instead of reading the news, he blurts out his own manifesto.

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat. We sit watching our TVs while some local newscaster tells us that Today we had 15 homicides and 63 violent crimes, as if that's the way it's supposed to be.

[Dan Tabursky]

And the whole country watches it live.

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

I don't know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street. All I know is that fucking you've got to get mad. You've got to say, I'm a human

[Chorus/Group]

being, God damn it. My life has value.

[Dan Tabursky]

And then the anger in his manifesto becomes action.

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window, open it and stick your head out and yell, I'm as mad as hell and I'm not gonna take this anymore. I want you to get up right now. Get up. Go to your windows.

[Commentator]

Open them.

[Dan Tabursky]

Symbolic action at first, but just the beginning.

[Chorus/Group]

I'm mad as hell. How am I gonna take this anymore? I'm mad as hell. I'm not gonna take it anymore. I'm mad as hell. I'm not gonna take it anymore. I'm mad as hell. I'm not gonna going to take it anymore. I'm not going to take it anymore.

[Dan Tabursky]

If you were shooting a time capsule into space to be found by an advanced alien species as a representation of 1976 in America, would you send Donnie and Marie? Or would you send Howard Beale? How about today? What it really feels like to be an American? Those three inscribed bullets would definitely be on my short list. Because, I mean, I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It's depression. People don't have enough work. Scared of losing their jobs to AI. The dollar still only buys a nickel's worth. Banks are still going bust. Schoolteachers keep a gun under their desk. Ice is running wild in the streets and there's nobody anyway or seems to know what to do. And there's no end to it. We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat, while some tiktoker tells us the body count in Gaza or some preschool in Michigan as if that's the way it's supposed to be. We know things are bad. They're worse than bad. They're crazy. I don't know what to do about the oligarchs and the inflation and the Russians and the ice in the streets. All I know is that first we gotta get mad. We gotta say, we're human beings, for fuck's sake. Our lives have value. So I want all you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window.

[Jerome Hilliard]

Open.

[Dan Tabursky]

I'm just kidding. Can you imagine? But we gotta do something. We need a vision for the future that isn't just more of this. This show is called Dan Tabursky's Manifesto. But you can say that title in a couple ways. You can say Dan Taburski's manifesto, as in Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver or Michelangelo's David. That is. It's a project called Manifesto, hosted by me, Dan Tabursky. But you can also say it like, oh, that's Dan Tabursky's manifesto, as in, oh, that's Ted Kaczynski's manifesto. So which is it? I'd like to think we're splitting the difference. This series is my 11 point manifesto on manifestos. Why I think we need them so much. How they've gotten twisted in the 21st century and how we might be able to inspire ourselves again, to let ourselves get inspired again. Why 11 points and not the standard 10? Well, the last point was a surprise. A place I did not expect this journey to land. But from what I've learned so far, the first point on Dan Tabursky's 11 point manifesto on manifestos is this. Number one, you gotta get mad. Embrace it. The rage you're feeling isn't the problem. It might just be the solution. Because anger can do so some pretty amazing things.

[Chorus/Group]

We're going to take it back. We're going to take it back.

[Kale Lawson]

There's something just as fucking wrong happening at Wall Street. You know those coke sniffers who just make money off money off money ad nauseum.

[Dan Tabursky]

There's no bullshit in that manifesto. It's so good, isn't it?

[Actor (Howard Beale)]

It's like holding a bomb.

[Dan Tabursky]

Well, it felt electric. Suddenly it was happening. If we're angry at the people who are letting us die, fuck it.

[Protester]

You know, all people need sometimes is permission.

[Laura Beale]

We're beginning to kill a work punker than you.

[Dan Tabursky]

You get tired of just being acted on by the world, and this is a chance to act on the world. That's this season on Manifesto.

[Laura Beale]

Binge. All episodes of Manifesto ad free right now on Audible. Start your Audible subscription in the Audible app or on Apple Podcasts.