This week commemorates the two year anniversary of October 7, 2023. That morning, Hamas invaded Israel. They slaughtered some 1,200 people and took another 250 hostage. Forty-eight hostages, some alive and some dead, are still being held in Gaza.
In these last two years, the world has changed. In many ways, the past two years have felt like two decades. The world feels like it has tilted on its axis.
There is nobody better suited to make sense of this moment—the lessons learned, the harsh realities that have been revealed, and America’s changing role in the world—than Niall Ferguson.
Niall is a columnist at The Free Press. He is also senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, the author of 16 books, and one of the most influential historians of our time.
This conversation with Niall was a Free Press livestream. To never miss those conversations, and to be able to join them as they unfold, become a subscriber at thefp.com.
Today we’re talking the media business, the news that Bari Weiss will now be the Editor in Chief of CBS News, and what we think will happen during a period of inevitable fracturing and consolidation. Our guest is longtime listener and excellent reporter Maxwell Tani of Semafor.
Enjoy!
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit goodbye.substack.com/subscribe
Eliana Johnson joins the podcast today to talk about the unprecedented attack-dog performance on Tuesday in a Senate hearing by Attorney General Pam Bondi, who decided to treat her oversight committee as though they were enemies whom she had every right to attack in personal terms. Is this a new model going forward? And what's this with the idea that a Harvard professor shooting a gun near a synagogue was just hunting rats? Give a listen.
More than 67,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s retaliatory war. On Monday, Israeli and Hamas negotiators met in Egypt to discuss President Donald Trump’s 20-point plan to end the war in Gaza.
What do we know about the U.S.-backed plan to end the war in Gaza? And what does this plan mean for Israelis and Palestinians two years into this conflict?
Find more of our programs online. Listen to 1A sponsor-free by signing up for 1A+ at plus.npr.org/the1a.
Over the past week, ICE and border patrol agents have clashed with Chicago residents, and federal guard troops arriving in the city might inflame tensions further.
Julie Bosman, Chicago bureau chief for The Times, and Mattathias Schwartz describe the situation on the ground and explain how the city fits into a broader political fight.
Guest:
Julie Bosman, the Chicago bureau chief for The New York Times.
Mattathias Schwartz, who has reported on the tension between President Trump and the courts.
There’s a serious high-stakes policy fight at the heart of this.
The Democrats didn’t pick a fight over authoritarianism or tariffs or masked immigration agents in the streets. They picked one over health care. And the issue here is very real. Huge health insurance subsidies passed under President Joe Biden are set to expire at the end of this year, threatening to make health care premiums skyrocket and kick millions off their insurance.
Neera Tanden was one of the architects of the Affordable Care Act and has worked in Democratic policymaking for decades. She is the president of the Center for American Progress and was a director of Biden’s Domestic Policy Council. I asked her on the show to lay out the policy stakes of the shutdown and what a deal might look like.
This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Rollin Hu. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris and Kate Sinclair. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Aman Sahota. Our executive producer is Claire Gordon. The show’s production team also includes Marie Cascione, Annie Galvin, Kristin Lin, Jack McCordick, Marina King and Jan Kobal. Original music by Pat McCusker. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The director of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser.
Let’s close out Season 7! Zachary and Emma look back on seven months of thought-provoking positive conversations, from global politics to the depths of sci-fi, exploring how to stay hopeful in a world hooked on negative news. They dive into protecting your mental health by controlling your news intake while also celebrating how social media platforms empower 8 billion voices to be heard! What Could Go Right? is produced by The Progress Network and The Podglomerate. For transcripts, to join the newsletter, and for more information, visit: theprogressnetwork.org Watch the podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/theprogressnetwork And follow us on X, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok: @progressntwrk
Nate and Maria discuss how and when the government shutdown is most likely to end. Then, they turn to OpenAI’s newest release: Sora 2, an AI video generation app that allows users to create a video from a text prompt. As Maria struggles to think of some possible positive uses for this app, Nate considers what its release tells us about Open AI's goals for the future.
Proposition A on the November 4th ballot is asking Bexar County Voters to approve an increase to the hotel occupancy tax to generate just under $200 million to revitalize the Bexar County rodeo / coliseum / expo grounds on the East Side. The proposal is to turn the area into a year-round destination for rodeo, livestock, exhibitions, conventions and other uses.array(3) {
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The former CDC director lays out his “See, Believe, Create” playbook from The Formula for Better Health: How to Save Millions of Lives—Including Your Own. He separates settled facts (hypertension control, PM2.5, tobacco) from guesswork, owns early COVID failures, and argues vaccine mandates and long school closures were mismatched to risk. Practical levers follow, rebuild primary care, mind your potassium-to-sodium ratio, and scale what actually works. Also: a withering look at Pam Bondi’s Judiciary Committee testimony on the still-sealed Trump–Epstein files and that Qatar jet ethics tangle.
