June 25, 2026
Michael Murphy is a systems administrator from Chicago's Austin neighborhood running for Cook County Board President - and he's taking on a Democratic machine where the current president has held power for 16 years and several races run completely unopposed. So what happens when an IT guy looks at the second-largest county in America and decides the whole thing just needs a reboot? In this episode, Brian sits down with Murphy to break down his community-first approach to county government - pushing power down to churches and local organizations instead of the county, capping property taxes at 1% of purchase value, and giving police "the teeth" to keep streets safe without militarizing them. Brian pushes him hard on the libertarian purity-test problem too... when do you stop leading with the carrot and bring out the stick? And what's the day-one plan against a bureaucracy with 16 years of relationships built in? They get into the property tax crisis crushing Black and Latino neighbo…
