This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com

The Internet knows him as “Chartthrob” and “Map Daddy,” but once upon a time, Sarah knew him as “Snackwells,” the boy-genius politics editor at Salon and sweetheart of a co-worker who bought her a daily Diet Dr Pepper and picked stray vegetables out of everything he ate. The one and only Steve Kornacki joins the pod to talk about his stratospheric popularity as elections analyst on MSNBC (“I don’t fully understand what happened”), the Super Bowl and sports betting, his #1 Spotify listen of 2022 (Bobby Vee, anyone?), his famous Gap khakis, and his fantastic new podcast, “The Revolution,” tracking the rise and fall of Newt Gingrich, whose Nineties’ tenure as Speaker of the House had an outsized influence on American politics.

In the bonus: Sarah and Nancy discuss Rihanna’s fumble of a halftime performance: the pregnancy reveal, the amazing dancers who (unintentionally?) looked like sperm, and the bizarre moment when Rihanna sniffed her own crotch. (Sarah has some hot sports opinions about that one.) But there was one performer going for broke during that show, and we adore her. Also: The Waco siege, 30 years later, and will a Netflix show make Nancy change her mind about Glass Onion?