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What Next: TBD | Tech, power, and the future - This Is Your Brain On Ketamine Mar 30, 2025

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Ketamine has gone from a recreational psychedelic to an approved treatment, and it has caught on in Silicon Valley in a big way. Are the long-term effects of using ketamine—recreationally or therapeutically—sufficiently known? Are we witnessing them right now?

Guest: Shayla Love, staff writer for the Atlantic.

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What Next - TBD | This Is Your Brain On Ketamine Mar 30, 2025

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Guest: Shayla Love, staff writer for the Atlantic.

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Amicus With Dahlia Lithwick | Law, justice, and the courts - Trump’s Plan To Put A Chokehold On Voting Mar 29, 2025

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The Trumpian inversion of reality was threaded into so many areas of the law and active litigation this week.

Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Stern joins Dahlia Lithwick to discuss the apparent evaporation of judicial patience for Trump lawyers simultaneously claiming that a signal chat was not classified or subject to record preservation rules, AND the flights to El Salvador that were filmed for posterity on arrival at a prison were in fact state secrets. Together, they also think through the likelihood of the Supreme Court stepping into the Alien Enemies Act case at this early stage by just taking the Trump administration at its word that those summary renditions were totally legal and constitutionally correct.

Next, Dahlia Lithwick talks to Wendy Weiser, vice president for democracy at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School, about another Trumpian inversion of reality: his executive order titled “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections”, which in fact is not about election integrity, but instead an extension of the Big Lie election theory that could disenfranchise millions of eligible voters.

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.

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Slate Money - Illegal Group Chats Are Everywhere Mar 29, 2025

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This week: A leaked Signal message revealed illegal use of the commercial app by the Defense Department. Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Elizabeth Spiers explain how this is a common issue in finance, where employees often defy SEC regulations on secure communication in favor of more convenient ways of communicating. Then, a recent study shows that people are leaving states with anti-abortion laws and other evidence suggests political migration in the US is on the rise. Finally, Dollar Tree is selling Family Dollar to private equity for $1 billion, 10 years after buying it for $8 billion. The hosts discuss what might have led to the end of the disastrous merger.

In the Slate Plus episode: Felix joins What Next host Mary Harris to talk about the godfather of crypto, Satoshi Nakamoto.

Want to hear that discussion and hear more Slate Money? Join Slate Plus to unlock weekly bonus episodes. Plus, you’ll access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Slate Money show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/moneyplus to get access wherever you listen.

Podcast production by Jessamine Molli and Cheyna Roth.

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What Next: TBD | Tech, power, and the future - We Made a Memecoin Mar 28, 2025

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Memecoins are a niche type of cryptocurrency with no intrinsic value. But they remain a popular form of crypto, as seen earlier this year with President Trump’s own memecoin. And if it worked for him, then why not our little podcast?

Guests:

Azeem Khan, advisor to UNICEF’s crypto fund and cocreator of the blockchain Morph.

Nitish Pahwa, Slate staff writer covering business and tech.

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Political Gabfest - Houthi PC Small Group Mar 27, 2025

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This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss the hilarious-if-it-wasn’t-so-terrifying accidental sending of secret attack plans from Trump administration officials to a journalist; the chilling capitulation of big law firms to Trump’s onslaught; and similar aggressive efforts to intimidate higher education in the United States.

For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily and David talk with Michigan State Senator Mallory McMorrow about the path forward for Democrats and her new book Hate Won’t Win: Find Your Power and Leave This Place Better Than You Found It.

In the latest Gabfest Reads, David talks with author Adam Higginbotham about his new book, Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space.

Email your chatters, questions, and comments to gabfest@slate.com. (Messages may be referenced by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Research by Emily Ditto

Want more Political Gabfest? Join Slate Plus to unlock weekly bonus episodes. Plus, you’ll access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Political Gabfest show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or visit slate.com/gabfestplus to get access wherever you listen.

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What Next - The Group Chat Heard ‘Round the World Mar 27, 2025

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How former congressman and Air Force veteran, Adam Kinzinger interprets the leaked Signal chat of top Trump administration officials discussing a military strike on Houthi targets.

Guest: Adam Kinzinger, former Republican Congressman for Illinois’s 11th and 16th districts who served on the January 6th select committee, and author of Renegade: Defending Democracy and Liberty in Our Divided Country.

Want more What Next? Join Slate Plus to unlock full, ad-free access to What Next and all your other favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the What Next show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen.

Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, Ethan Oberman, and Rob Gunther.

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What Next - What Happens To My Student Loans Now? Mar 26, 2025

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Trump’s attempted elimination of the Department of Education has left more than 40 million Americans with student loans wondering how their repayment plans will be affected—and future college students wondering what options will exist when it’s time to go to school.

Guest: Danielle Douglas-Gabriel, higher education reporter at the Washington Post.

Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, Ethan Oberman, and Rob Gunther.

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What Next - A Tea Party for the Democrats? Mar 25, 2025

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders are holding packed rallies on their “Fighting Oligarchy” tour. The energy is there, but what is the message and how could it translate to a win for the down-and-out Democratic Party?

Guest: David Weigel, national political reporter at Semafor.

Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, Ethan Oberman, and Rob Gunther.

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What Next - How Colleges Can Fight Back Mar 24, 2025

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The Trump administration is using federal money—and the withholding thereof—as a way to bring universities like Columbia and Penn to heel. But institutes of higher education have not yet begun to fight, and when they do, they’ve got strong legal arguments against incursions on their academic freedom.

Guest: Lee Bollinger, president emeritus, Columbia University

Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, Ethan Oberman, and Rob Gunther.

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