Should we be nostalgic for machine politics?

There’s a lot of talk lately about patronage politics returning to Washington – a system based on loyalty, relationships, favors and transactions – but this kind of system is not new. Patronage was once the beating heart of the Democratic Party, and of course, the Massachusetts state lottery. So what changed? How did the party of patronage become the party of technocrats? In this second interview episode, host Ian Coss speaks with historian Lily Geismer, co-editor of a new book about the evolution of the Democratic Party: “Mastery and Drift: Professional Class Liberals Since 1960.”

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Never in American history has it been so easy to gamble, legally at least. We’ve got casinos, sports betting, online poker, keno — but it was all made possible by state lotteries, which brought gambling out of the shadows and into the public square — into the government itself.  “Scratch & Win” follows the unlikely rise of America’s most successful lottery. We begin in 1970s Boston, with state bureaucrats going toe to toe with mafia bookmakers, and each other, as they struggle to launch the state's greatest innovation: the scratch ticket. But the story reaches all the way to the present moment. How do we feel about the gambling industry that lotteries helped summon into being? And should the state be in this business at all?  “Scratch & Win” is made by the Peabody Award-winning team behind “The Big Dig,” produced by GBH News and distributed by PRX. --------------------------- Credits: Host and scriptwriter: Ian Coss Executive Producer: Devin Maverick Robins Producers: Isabel Hibbard and Ian Coss Story Editor: Lacy Roberts Editorial Advisor: Jen McKim Fact Checkers: Ryan Alderman and Isabel Hibbard Scoring and Music Supervision: Ian Coss Graphic Design: Bill Miller Project Manager: Meiqian He