Nicolle Wallace: Why MAGA Went Ballistic Over Epstein & The Bear Heals All Wounds
John welcomes his bestie Nicolle Wallace, host of MSNBC’s Deadline White House, back to the show to discuss the intra-MAGA fallout from Donald Trump and Pam Bondi’s Trump failure to release the long-rumored list of Jeffrey Epstein’s clients; Nicolle’s new podcast, The Best People, and why its approach to politics is so different from than her daily TV show; and their shared enrapturement with the fourth season of The Bear.
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1:16:13
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1:16:13
Andrew Sullivan: Trump as King, State Terror Tactics & The Anti-Trans Backlash
John welcomes Andrew Sullivan—former editor of The New Republic, first-wave blogger, current Substacker, pioneering gay marriage advocate, #BritishGayCatholicConservative public intellectual, and controversy magnet for nearly 40 years—to discuss the Trump 2.0 era and Sullivan’s recent New York Times op-ed, “How the Gay Rights Movement Radicalized and Lost its Way.” Sullivan argues that Trump is less an aspiring dictator than a wannabe monarch; that, even so, his enthusiasm for state terror tactics is ominously authoritarian; and that the gay rights movement has gone astray with its embrace of the trans agenda. Sullivan also explains his adoration of Pet Shop Boys, and why “Being Boring” is their greatest song.
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1:26:53
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1:26:53
Ben Kweller: Love, Loss, Grief, Hope & The Healing Power of Music
In a special July 4th weekend episode, John welcomes the country rock/indie folk/Americana musician Ben Kweller to talk about his remarkable new record, “Cover The Mirrors,” and the journey of love, loss, and recovery that inspired it. A musical prodigy who burst on the rock scene nearly 30 years ago as a teenaged phenom, Kweller explains the role that music played in the wake of the death of his 16-year-old son Dorian in a freak car accident in 2023, carrying Ben from shock and grief through acceptance and back to something approximating the kind of joy that's long characterized his work—and resulting in a transcendent record that’s at once profoundly sad, sublimely beautiful, and deeply hopeful.
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1:15:24
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1:15:24
Angus King & Jason Crow: Casus Belli & Caveat Emptor re Iran
John welcomes Independent Senator Angus King of Maine and Democratic Congressman Jason Crow of Colorado to discuss the strategic and political fallout from America’s bombing of Iran. In back-to-back conversations, King and Crow—both members of the intelligence and armed services committees on their respective sides of Capitol Hill—contend that they have more questions than answers regarding the impact of U.S. air strikes on Iran’s nuclear program; raise red flags concerning the Trump administration’s politicization of intelligence; and critique the White House’s intention to curtail the sharing of classified material on matters of war and peace with Congress. King also offers his assessment of the Supreme Court’s ruling on nationwide injunctions and birthright citizenship, and Crow weighs in on Zohran Mamdani and the implications of his primary victory in New York City for the Democratic Party writ large.
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1:17:51
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1:17:51
Ron Chernow: Forever the Twain Shall Meet
John is joined by National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize winning author Ron Chernow to discuss his new, best-selling biography, “Mark Twain.” Chernow explains why Twain, whom he argues was America’s original political pundit, exerts a powerful and enduring hold on America’s imagination; why his insights and humor remain not just relevant today but timeless; and how Twain, in the course of his life, became “de-southernized.” Ron also reflects on how Percival Everett’s award-winning novel “James” is less a corrective to than an expansion of Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” which, despite its copious use of the n-word, stands as perhaps the greatest of all anti-slavery novels.
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Join Puck’s chief political columnist, MSNBC/NBC News national affairs analyst, and best-selling author John Heilemann as he roams the corridors of power and influence in America on this twice-weekly interview show, taking you behind the scenes and beyond the headlines with the people who shape and shift our culture: icons and up-and-comers, incumbents and insurgents, moguls and machers in the overlapping worlds of politics, entertainment, tech, business, sports, media, and beyond. The conversations are rich and revealing, unrehearsed and unexpected … and reliably impolitic. A Puck-Audacy joint, new episodes drop every Wednesday and Friday.
Ireland