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What Next: TBD | Tech, power, and the future - How Spyware Mercenaries Hack Your Phone Jul 23, 2021

Show notes

This week, Amnesty International and a French journalism nonprofit named Forbidden Stories revealed that technology from a spyware firm called NSO Group is being deployed on a massive scale. The spyware, called Pegasus, gives the user access to every part of a victim’s smartphone -- notes, messages, photos, and recordings.

What’s it like for security researchers to see their worst fears about digital spying play out? And what are they worried about next?

Guests:

John Scott Railton, Senior Researcher at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto

Siddharth Varadarajan, Founding Editor of the Wire

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What Next - TBD | How Spyware Mercenaries Hack Your Phone Jul 23, 2021

Show notes

What’s it like for security researchers to see their worst fears about digital spying play out? And what are they worried about next?

Guests:

John Scott Railton, Senior Researcher at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto

Siddharth Varadarajan, Founding Editor of the Wire

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Political Gabfest - Actually It Is ‘Infrastructure Week' Jul 22, 2021

Show notes

Emily, John and David discuss the Delta variant and the vaccination decline, the bipartisan infrastructure plan living another day, and the pandemic Olympics.

Here are some notes and references from this week’s show:

David Leonhardt for The New York Times: “Why Aren’t the Vaccines Approved?”

Matthew Yglesias for Slow Boring: “Let's Get More People Vaccinated”

Ross Douthat for The New York Times: “How to Reach the Unvaccinated”

John Dickerson for CBS News: “Governor Asa Hutchinson on ‘Face the Nation,’ June 27, 2021”

Here’s this week’s chatter:

John: Jack Thomas for The Boston Globe: “I Just Learned I Only Have Months to Live. This Is What I Want to Say”; Susan B. Glasser for The New Yorker: “‘You’re Gonna Have a Fucking War’: Mark Milley’s Fight to Stop Trump from Striking Iran”

Emily: Eliza Apperly for The Guardian: “‘Stumbling Stones’: A Different Vision of Holocaust Remembrance”; Atlas Obscura: “The Bebelplatz, Berlin, Germany: The Site of the Famous Nazi Book Burning Campaign of 1933 Remembers It’s ‘Night of Shame.’”

David: The Quiet American, by Graham Greene; Catherine Bosley for Bloomberg: “Women Are Still Suffering More Than Men in Pandemic Job Hit”

Listener chatter from Ragav Venkatesan: “W Series: Off Track”; Giles Richards for The Guardian: “Hamilton Commission Report Aims to Improve Diversity in Motorsport”

If you enjoy the show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Danny Lavery's show Big Mood, Little Mood and you’ll be supporting the Political Gabfest. Sign up now at slate.com/gabfestplus to help support our work.

For this week’s Slate Plus bonus segment, Emily, David, and John discuss billionaires in space.

Tweet us your questions and chatters @SlateGabfest or email us at gabfest@slate.com. (Messages may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Podcast production by Jocelyn Frank.

Research and show notes by Bridgette Dunlap.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What Next - The Rise of Kristi Noem Jul 22, 2021

Show notes

South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem has a problem. She’s ready to get beamed up to national political stardom, but she’s polling near the bottom among 2024 GOP presidential hopefuls. What issues can she use to raise her political profile? The answer came swiftly this year: anything and everything.

Guest: Joe Sneve, political reporter for the Argus Leader in South Dakota.

If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on What Next. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to help support our work.

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What Next - Punishing the Capitol Rioters Jul 21, 2021

Show notes

Six months after the Capitol riot, plea deals from cases against the rioters have begun to trickle in. Will the courts be able to do what Congress couldn’t, and insist on a shared version of events on January 6th?

Guest: Zoe Tillman, senior legal reporter at BuzzFeed News.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Slate Money - Slate Money: Movies: Parasite Jul 20, 2021

Show notes

Welcome to Slate Money Goes to the Movies, a miniseries in which Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and a different guest each week discuss popular business-themed movies.

Dodai Stewart of The New York Times joins Emily and Felix to discuss the stunning winner of the 2020 Best Picture Oscar, Parasite. They discuss class solidarity (or lack thereof), how the film’s themes translate to America, and why only the rich can afford luxuries like planning, trust and using all their senses.

Email: slatemoney@slate.com

Podcast production by Jessamine Molli.

Twitter: @felixsalmon, @EmilyRPeck

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What Next - The Right Wing War on Vaccines Jul 20, 2021

Show notes

It’s becoming harder to get all Americans vaccinated. While millions of people still get the shots each week, some conservatives are becoming more difficult to convince, and some politicians are increasingly hostile towards the public health departments tasked with helping fight COVID-19.

Guests: Michelle Fiscus, former medical director for vaccine-preventable diseases and immunization programs at the Tennessee Department of Health, and Dan Diamond, health policy and politics reporter at The Washington Post.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What Next - The Unhoused Don’t Want to “Go Back to Normal” Jul 19, 2021

Show notes

At the height of the pandemic, New York city put up some of its homeless population in the city’s empty hotels. Now, as the city comes back to life, the program is ending -- but the city’s unhoused population doesn’t want to go “back to normal”

Guest: Jacquelyn Simone, Senior Policy Analyst for the Coalition for the Homeless.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Amicus With Dahlia Lithwick | Law, justice, and the courts - A To-Do List for Senate Democrats Jul 17, 2021

Show notes

In the first of Amicus’ summer season of conversations, Dahlia Lithwick tackles one of the major challenges of this moment: how to fix American democracy. Dahlia is joined by the Nation’s Elie Mystal and former chief of staff for Sen. Harry Reid and author of Kill Switch, Adam Jentleson. In a discussion that was taped as part of the Crosscut Festival, they discuss the filibuster, voting rights and court reform––and whether the Biden administration has left it too late to tackle all three.

Podcast production by Sara Burningham.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Slate Money - Normalize Venison Jul 17, 2021

Show notes

This week, Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Stacy-Marie Ishmael discuss the inflation spike, Felix’s favorite solution to the deadly deer problem, and Netflix getting into video games.

In the Plus segment: French pastry.

Mentioned in the show:

“How Do You Measure Inflation?” on The Indicator by Planet Money

“How to Solve America’s Wild Deer Problem? Eat Them” by Frank Hyman for the Wall Street Journal

“The Market Solution to the Deer Problem” by Felix Salmon for Axios

Email: slatemoney@slate.com

Podcast production by Jessamine Molli.

Twitter: @felixsalmon, @EmilyRPeck, @s_m_i

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.