Category: 3-SometimeCommentary

On this episode of "The Federalist Radio Hour," Clyde Wayne Crews, the Fred L. Smith fellow in regulatory studies at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, joins Federalist Senior Elections Correspondent Matt Kittle to discuss the expansion of executive action and break down how the resulting overregulation is costing Americans thousands of dollars every year. 

Read Crews' “Ten Thousand Commandments" report here. 

If you care about combating the corrupt media that continue to inflict devastating damage, please give a gift to help The Federalist do the real journalism America needs.

For Harvard students, this year’s graduation ceremony comes amid an intense standoff between one of America’s most prestigious universities and the United States government.

Michael S. Schmidt, an investigative reporter for The Times, explains how the conflict escalated and what it reveals about how far the administration will go to fulfill its agenda.

Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, an investigative reporter for The New York Times, covering Washington.

Background reading: 

• Harvard leaders see only bad outcomes ahead as they battle President Trump.
• The Trump administration says it is halting Harvard’s ability to enroll international students.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

Photo: Sophie Park/Bloomberg

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

In 2023 and 2024, there were many things that were unsayable. Perhaps the most unsayable—at least in legacy media circles—was that the President of the United States was not capable of being president, because he was no longer mentally fit.

Those people who did break the taboo—who dared to notice Biden’s countless gaffes, his stiff gait, those who recognized the reality of old age, including Special Counsel Robert Hur—were written off or smeared. Videos of the president—clips of Biden tripping or misspeaking—were rebranded by The New York Times as “cheap fakes.” People were told to disbelieve their eyes and ears.

It’s now the spring of 2025. Trump is the president. Biden dropped out. And now the unsayable things are being said—most dramatically in Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s new book, Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again.

Tapper, of CNN, and Thompson, of Axios, interviewed more than 200 people for this book, which illuminates Biden’s mental decline, his enablers, and how the country was effectively run by committee in the midst of his clear cognitive impairment.

For those of us who thought it was bad—it was actually much worse than anyone could have imagined.

Alex and Jake have chosen to call the effort to hide Biden’s decline a “cover-up.” Those are choice words from two mainstream media insiders, invoking memories of Watergate and Iran-Contra. And the cover-up they are referring to is that of the Biden family and the close circle of advisers around them, many of whom are still delusional about Biden’s state.

But cover-up might be the word that many Americans would use to describe the press’s coverage of Biden. How did ordinary people see more than people with White House press passes? And, what does it all say about human nature, transparency, and groupthink?

This is a really illuminating conversation about presidential power, the lengths some will go to keep it, and how the media failed to report the story of a lifetime.

Header 6: The Free Press earns a commission from any purchases made through all book links in this article.

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Paris Marx is joined by Casey Johnston to discuss why she pared back on social media, made her smartphone much dumber, and what she learned about how bodies are treated online through her fitness journey.

Casey Johnston is the creator of the She’s A Beast newsletter and author of A Physical Education: How I Escaped Diet Culture and Gained the Power of Lifting.

Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Support the show on Patreon.

The podcast is made in partnership with The Nation. Production is by Kyla Hewson.

Also mentioned in this episode:

• Casey wrote about her DIY Dumbphone Method and reducing social media use.
• Facebook reportedly detected when teenage girls deleted photos so it could serve them beauty ads.

Support the show

Political strategist and author Bradley Tusk joins to diagnose the 2025 New York City mayor’s race—why voters seem fine with Andrew Cuomo’s refusal to reckon with past scandals, and why the race feels like it’s happening in a parallel city only 3% of residents live in. Plus The Rehearsal, not only the best comedy on TV, makes a serious point about pilot mental health while still landing the plane with artistry and pathos. ⁠Cascade PBS Info Produced by Corey Wara
Production Coordinator Ashley Khan
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80 years ago, Smokey the Bear was mostly talking about campfire safety. Now? Things are a little different.

Forest fires have always been a normal part of our landscape – and a tool used by human civilizations for millennia.

But as climate change makes our landscapes hotter and drier, wildfires are getting bigger and more destructive. Fire consumed 8.9 million acres across the U.S. last year. The LA County fires this January are the costliest so far, with some estimates putting the total close to $250 billion in damages.

We discuss how we can better adapt to living with massive fires and how we should think about fighting – and preventing – them.

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