Summer Friday: History of Capitalism; Air Conditioning; Black Lung's Return; Elie Mystal

For this "Summer Friday" we've put together some of our favorite conversations this year:

• John Cassidy, staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of Capitalism and Its Critics: A History: From the Industrial Revolution to AI (Macmillan, 2025), talks about his new book that traces the roots of criticism of today's global capitalism to its beginnings.
• From our centennial series "100 Years of 100 Things," Eric Dean Wilson, Queens College writing instructor and the author of After Cooling: On Freon, Global Warming, and the Terrible Cost of Comfort (Simon & Schuster, 2021), walks us through the promise of air conditioning of the past 100 years -- how it relieved people of warming temperatures and how they have eventually contributed to climate change.
• Black lung had largely been eradicated by the end of the last century. Now, the disease has reemerged in coal country, and federal cuts threaten at-risk miners. Kate Morgan, Pennsylvania-based freelance journalist, talks about her reporting on black lung for the New York Times.
• Elie Mystal, justice correspondent and columnist for The Nation magazine and host of the podcast, Contempt of Court with Elie Mystal, and author of Bad Law: Ten Popular Laws That Are Ruining America (The New Press, 2025) talks about the ten laws he calls a "Bill of Wrongs" - like felony murder and immunity for gun manufacturers.

These interviews were lightly edited for time and clarity and the original web versions are available here:

The Long History of Critiquing Capitalism (May 12, 2025)

100 Years of 100 Things: Air Conditioners (Jul 24, 2024)

How Black Lung Reemerged (Jun 24, 2025)

Elie Mystal's List of Laws that Need to Go (Mar 27, 2025)