The Fifth Column

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**The Fifth Column**

Your weekly rhetorical assault on the on the news cycle, the people who make it, and occasionally ourselves. Kmele Foster (Freethink), Michael Moynihan (Vice), and Matt Welch (Reason) talk and laugh and drink their way to at least quasi-sanity in a world gone mad, often with the aid of clean and articulate guests. Weekly Members Only subscription edition often comes with listener mail and professional-quality (if inappropriate) singing. Analysis. Commentary. Sedition.

www.wethefifth.com

Latest Episodes:

Members Only #192 - Second Sunday Replay (12/10) Dec 17, 2023

Show notes

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com

* It wasn’t a debate

* Moynihan loves islands. Who doesn’t?

* University stuff

* “Late capitalism”

* Walt Disney wasn’t a Nazi

* Backfilling history

* Massaging numbers

* On the Qataris….

* And a bunch of listeners chime in!

#435 - TFC's Holiday Racism Spectacular! Dec 15, 2023

Show notes

* Ron Karenga

* Handel’s Messiah and stock portfolio

* Musicology is dumb, says Matt

* Hip-hop is appropriation and it’s great

* Method Man thinks the Stones and Bootsy are the same

* The Fall of Minneapolis

* The Fifth’s verdict

* Some good things, some bad things

* Revisiting the Chauvin trial

* An 800,000 word reflection from James Bennet

* Fanaticism and forgivenness

* How is this plagiarist surviving?

* How about firing these dopes

* LP and AJ

* The many, many, many dead in Ukraine

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

#434 - Crazed Conspiracies, Moral Mulligans, and Indecent Ivies (w/ Shadi Hamid) Dec 07, 2023

Show notes

* The editorial board of the Washington Post

* What what wrong with the cease fire

* On culpability

* Can there *be* a negotiated settlement?

* Is it really “the occupation”?

* That wild 2022 video from Jenin that Moynihan mentioned

* You’re going to be defrocked

* Being handcuffed by “the Nahkba”

* The insane rape conspiracy theories—and why they exist

* Are all these people pro-Hamas?

* Mrs. Gay Goes to Washington

* Choose different words, dummies

* Are you allowed a moral mulligan?

* The Calvin Principals

* And much, much more

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

#433 - The Body of a (German) American Dec 02, 2023

Show notes

* We ain’t gonna play Sun City

* RIP Shane

* George Santos: genius

* Gavin v. Ron

* Why would you do this, Gavin?

* This awful presidential race

* Hating WFB

* Be friends with and “platform” your political opposites

* RIP Kissinger?

* Dictatorships and double standards

* The forever war with Iran

* An awful, awful hostage video

* On hostages and peace partners

* The future of Gaza

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

Members Only #191 - Can We Be Trusted? (Ummm...) Nov 29, 2023

Show notes

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com

* A shooting in the hood

* The Oakland Politburo speaks. The world is appalled.

* The free speech issue vs. the university infection

* Knowing nothing but propaganda

* Gaza Facebook is pretty wild

* Sir Humphrey says: “This is the most insane answer ever”

* What Epstein got right. And you gotta bring Bill Clinton

* A weird story about Hillary’s shushing

* UFO nonsense

* What’s th…

#432 - Worse Than Hitler (A Fifth Column Thanksgiving!) Nov 23, 2023

Show notes

Family beckons. Booze beckons. So we’re going to forgo the bullet points that we’re pretty sure you don’t read anyway and just say…Happy Thanksgiving, from your friends at the Fifth! And while you shamelessly celebrate genocide, listen along while the lads bemoan the racism of the Black Plague; the deadline to file charges against Kmele; the quote-invention of ChatGPT; the hostage deal in Israel; and the extreme awfulness of Holocaust historians Joe Scarborough, Mike Brzezinski, and Claire McCaskill.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

Members Only #190 - Tantric Drummers for Freedom Nov 22, 2023

Show notes

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com

* Javier Milei, tantric drummer

* The hideousness of modern Peronism

* A brief digression on Aerosmith

* So how did we all meet?

* Start fighting, Moynihan

* Another digression on Sam Altman’s awfulness (two examples now available at Moynihan’s Instagram)

* When Israel decided against killing the entire leadership of Hamas

* Well, they tried anyway

* Fiction that changed our lives

* I don’t want to read about who I am and where I came from

* Another Fifth drinking game

* And so very much more….

#430 - The TikTok Jihad w/ Mary Katharine Ham Nov 18, 2023

Show notes

* Live from Oakland

* Sex strikes

* Loving OBL

* Stop deconstructing stuff

* Seeing your friends spinout online…

* They’re not sending anyone anywhere

* Drunk Kathy Hochul and her bad, drunk ideas

* Not drunk Nikki Haley and her bad ideas

* Hate speech isn’t a thing in America

* Israel and propaganda

* MKH on evangelicals, Israel, and the supposed “left behind” vision of Zionism

* TikTok you don’t stop

* And so much more!

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

Members Only #189 - "Thank You for the A-Bomb" (Second Sunday Rebroadcast) Nov 16, 2023

Show notes

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com

* “She’s reasonable in person” (🤔)

* In praise of…Estonia

* Are any expressly political comedians funny?

* Meetings interrupted by death

* Listener question: On the 1619 Project

* Indonesian guys loves America, nuclear weapons

* Family friends with Carlos the Jackal

* Israel asks: “Kmele, what should we do?”

* Stars and Bucks (Correction: Bethlehem not Ramallah)

* Why not get a…

#429 - The Kevin Hart Resource Curse Nov 12, 2023

Show notes

* One hell of a night, one brutal morning

* Kevin Hart kills

* Judy Gold and college comedy

* The Washington Post says sorry for being mean to Hamas

* Be brave, get fired?

* There’s been a bunch of recent Islamist attacks in the West, actually

* New York City’s hate crimes leader board

* The pointless Republican debate

* Vivek is the worst (and also was kinda good for three seconds)

* Reaganism without Reagan (and Bannon’s Reagan film)

* Only in New York, kids

* Trust the kids, kids

* Teaching about vs. proselytizing for…

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

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