Each weekend on Best Of The Gist, we listen back to an archival Gist segment from the past, then we replay something from the past week. This weekend, though, we’re kicking it old school, with two segments from 2014. First up, Mike’s now-10-year-old interview with Casper Kelly creator of the epic and addictive Adult Swim video Too Many Cooks. Then, with endorsements in the air, we listen back to Mike’s conversation with Patrick LaForge from the New York Times, who tells us the origin story behind the expression “retweets don’t equal endorsements.”
We look at the last minute political ads hitting swing states the weekend before the presidential election. We'll also look a at how political divides at work are causing an uptick in workplace incivility and what employers are doing about it. Plus, we'll have the latest from Spain, where deadly floods have ravaged swaths of the country's east.
Hamartia comes from Greek tragedy and refers to a hero or heroine’s fatal flaw.
For Meredith Johnston, it’s self-hatred. This is the focus of her new album Hamartia.
Reset sits down with the singer to talk about the inspiration behind the project and getting a taste of Warm Human’s range from electronic to indie to pop.
GUEST: Meredith Johnston, singer and songwriter, Warm Human
It’s not the people flooding across the southern border affecting Arizonans, but rather what some of the illegal immigrants carry with them.
Illegal aliens don’t stay in his state, according to Pinal County, Arizona Sheriff Mark Lamb. Instead, they travel to “California, Massachusetts, New York, Chicago, Iowa, Alabama,” the sheriff rattles off. “But what we are feeling is, just like every state and every American family, we're feeling the effects of fentanyl,” he said.
An estimated 74,702 people died from fentanyl poisoning in America in 2023, a slight decline from the 76,226 fentanyl related deaths in 2022, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Lamb argues that the fentanyl crisis should be discussed more in the news and during the 2024 presidential election but is not because “to talk about it would mean you'd have to accept responsibility to it, and to accept the responsibility would cost you an election.”
The Harris campaign did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment.
The sheriff joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss what to expect on election night in Arizona, one of seven swing states, and the role the border crisis is playing the way Americans are voting this election.
Bullshit is an American tradition. Think the theatrics of P.T. Barnum, miracle products sold ad nauseam on television in the 1980s and, of course, politicians. Who can forget President Bill Clinton saying “It depends upon what the meaning of the word is is” during his grand jury testimony in the Monica Lewinsky scandal?
And then there’s Donald Trump. He presents as a man with no fact-checking filter, someone happily buying his own convenient bullshit. That’s not quite the same thing as lying.
That isn’t to say Trump doesn’t lie. He’s a politician, after all. But he exists outside the binary of truth and lies. It’s the netherworld of flimflam, hyperbole, sales pitches, and ad copy delivered with all the quiet dignity of a wet T-shirt contest. Donald Trump is a very modern artist, weaving a barrage of anecdotes, fake and real statistics, gossip, and memes into a nebulous and suggestive species of patter.
Democrats have tried to paint Trump as an American Hitler, a Russian agent, a man consumed with evil and hatred. But what they fail to understand is that Trump’s casual relationship to the truth is an echo of past politicians. He is hardly the first bullshitter to ascend to the White House; he’s just the best ever to do it. He paints a picture of a reality he would like us to see, not as it really is.
In this respect, Trump is the crack cocaine variant of many of his predecessors. Ronald Reagan was a folksy, sentimental bullshitter, a president as a Hallmark greeting card. Bill Clinton was a slick bullshitter, perfect for spinning stories at the dawn of the cable news era.
Today, Eli Lake explores the soft spot that Americans have for bullshitters like Trump, and their disdain for liars like Richard Nixon. He argues that if you want to understand why Trump may be on the verge of winning the White House again, you have to reckon with our country’s relationship to the pungent brown stuff. It pervades everything from our economy to our culture. Bullshit is dangerous when it comes to science. But in politics, bullshit is sadly essential.
If you liked what you heard from Honestly, the best way to support us is to go to TheFP.com and become a Free Press subscriber today.
Right now in the Northern Hemisphere, the days are getting shorter, and things are getting colder.
In the southern hemisphere, the opposite is happening.
Regardless of whether you are in the North or the South, there is one thing for certain…in November, there shall be questions, and there shall be answers.
Stay tuned for Questions and Answers volume 25 on this episode of Everything Everywher Daily.
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You probably know Election Day is this Tuesday – and it’s stressing people out. A recent survey found 70% of Americans are feeling election-related anxiety, with even more worried about the country’s future.
But what can you do to manage that stress?
Today, we’re joined by Dan Harris, former ABC News anchor, who famously experienced a live, on-air panic attack that sent him on a journey into meditation and mindfulness. Dan’s here to share practical, actionable steps to help ease election-related anxiety — and offer tips for living a calmer, more balanced life.
Maybe his advice will make you feel 10% Happier (also the name of his popular podcast and best-selling book).
Join us again for our 10-minute daily news roundups every Mon-Fri!
This week’s show is unapologetically long, deep, and hopeful. Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Yale history professor Timothy Snyder to talk about his new book, On Freedom, and to have the audacity to re-imagine freedom on the precipice of an election that could turn the United States hard right into tyranny. Next, Dahlia is joined by Rick Hasen, Director of the Safeguarding Democracy Project at UCLA Law School, for a gut-check about how the election might go, legally speaking, and a reminder that “too early to call” is a pro-democracy posture on election night—even as the former guy almost certainly claims victory before the clock strikes midnight—regardless of the actual results.
Want more Amicus? Join Slate Plus to unlock weekly bonus episodes with exclusive legal analysis. Plus, you’ll access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Amicus show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/amicusplus to get access wherever you listen.
On the "CBS News Weekend Roundup", host Allison Keyes gets an update from CBS's Correspondents Nancy Cordes, Kris Van Cleave and Nicole Sganga about the campaign and ballot issues less than a week before the election. CBS's James Brown looks at when it is time to take the keys from elderly friends and family. In the "Kaleidoscope with Allison Keyes" segment, a discussion about the possibility of election violence.
