The Gist

Latest Episodes:

Not Even Mad: The Commercial Break's Bryan Green and Carine Hajjar Apr 17, 2025

Show notes

Boston Globe columnist Carine Hajjar and The Commercial Break's Bryan Green debate whether Joe Rogan's platforming of antisemitic conspiracies signals a deeper rot—or just the cost of open conversation. Plus: should Harvard be defunded? And will Kilmar Abrego Garcia stay in a Salvadoran prison? In Goat Grinders, we take aim at student driver bumper stickers, White Lotus star Aimee Lou Wood's biting critique of SNL, and nothing left to stream.

Theme by Max Kerman

Produced by Corey Wara

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The Fight for the White House in 2024 Apr 16, 2025

Show notes

In their new book chronicling the 2024 election, Fight, Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes document the disarray inside the Democratic camp during Biden's final months and Kamala Harris's precarious rise. Also some items from the debut of The Gist List: Cuomo's one-handed housing expert explains the typos, and a modest proposal not to euthanizing monkeys.

Produced by Corey Wara

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Four More Years? Apr 15, 2025

Show notes

Can Trump run for a third term? Someone who has contemplated that is Bruce Peabody author of the law review titled The Twice and Future President Revisited: Of Three-Term Presidents and Constitutional End Runs who joins us to discuss. Plus, Mike questions the political upside of detaining an innocent man, especially when Trump's allies haven't mustered a coherent narrative to justify it. And in the Spiel: The SAVE Act is stirring fears that it could disenfranchise tens of millions of married women—but Mike breaks down why, while flawed, the bill is unlikely to actually change voting access.

Produced by Corey Wara

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Trump's Trade Tactics: Betwixt Chaos and Coherence Apr 14, 2025

Show notes

Donald Trump just walked back key tariffs on Chinese electronics — but his Commerce Secretary, Howard Lutnick, is still out on a full-throated pro-tariff tour, as if nothing happened. To make sense of Trump's strategy (or improvisation), Mike turns to Yale Business School professor Barry Nalebuff, who finds the approach confusing because it doesn't align with what appear to be Trump's actual goals. Meanwhile, in the Spiel, the British are squawking about a different kind of chicken — the chlorinated kind — with tabloids clucking and trade talks at risk of being deep-fried.

Produced by Corey Wara

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Today's Show is About a Different Show That is Not About Tapirs Apr 12, 2025

Show notes

Today on The Gist. We go back to the The Colin McEnroe Show where Mike was on as a guest not talking about Tapirs. Then We end with Wednesdays Spiel on Trumps press conference about tariffs.

Produced by Corey Wara

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The Ongoing Black Mark of the Red Scare Apr 11, 2025

Show notes

Clay Risen, author of Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism, and the Making of Modern America, joins to discuss the era when suspicion was a political tool and civil liberties were sidelined. Today we have echoes—and outright repetitions—of McCarthyite tactics, from loyalty oaths to immigration crackdowns. Also- there may be three plastic spoons' worth of microplastic in the average human brain—according to science, which Mike neither trusts nor understands, on account of his 0.5% spoon brain.

Produced by Corey Wara

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The Bond Market Doesn't Do Ayahuasca Apr 10, 2025

Show notes

The bond market—stodgy, suit-clad, and deeply un-Instagrammable—has the economy feeling either "yippy" or "queasy," Plus, Republicans are eager to wield the issue of trans athletes, especially when stocks are tumbling. And linguist John McWhorter returns to discuss the beauty of borrowed Yiddish verbs, the aesthetics of the letter X, and why "My wife, she…" is pure Rodney and pure syntax.

Produced by Corey Wara

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Then They Came For They Apr 09, 2025

Show notes

John McWhorter joins to discuss his new book Pronoun Trouble, which unpacks the politics and poetry of tiny words. Also, Trump touts his tariff triumph by jabbing Canada, walloping China, and baffling Wall Street into bullishness. He riffed on trade deficits, finger amputations, immigration, mental ward discharge, and compared economic instinct to Indy car strategy. Markets cheered, economists jeered, and Trump took a victory lap after hitting the wall.

Produced by Corey Wara

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The Brand Is the Business: Devon Archer on Biden, Burisma, and Being the Fall Guy Apr 08, 2025

Show notes

Devon Archer, Hunter Biden's former business partner, joins to detail Ukrainian gas deals and what he calls the "Biden brand." From paper mache with the Vice President to secretive dinners in Paris, he describes selling access, sidestepping scrutiny, and eventually being left holding the legal bag. Also, "10% for the big guy"? Archer says that wasn't just a turn of phrase—it was the deal.

Produced by Corey Wara

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Devon Archer, Recently Pardoned, Reflects Apr 07, 2025

Show notes

Before diving into tariff turmoil and Senate map math, The Gist features the first part of an in-depth conversation with Devon Archer—former Hunter Biden business associate, House Oversight witness, and recipient of a Trump pardon. Archer discusses Burisma, the fallout with the Bidens, and how his legal saga became a political flashpoint.

Produced by Corey Wara

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