Front Burner

In the fourth and final episode of Understood: The Making of Musk, host Jacob Silverman launches into Musk’s ultimate quest, his desire to colonize Mars, and how he went from wanting to save earth to wanting to escape it. 

You’ll hear the origin story of SpaceX. And hear from an astrophysicist who says Musk’s plan is completely delusional. 

You can find Understood wherever you get your podcasts, and here: https://link.mgln.ai/FBxMoM4

And be sure to follow the feed for even more stories that define our digital age.

What does Musk, father of 14, expect from his quote, “legion” of children? In episode 3 of Understood: The Making of Musk, host, Jacob Silverman unravels Musk’s quest for genetic optimization, including alleged embryo screening, and his pronatalist views. And we hear from his estranged daughter, Vivian.

You can find Understood wherever you get your podcasts, and here: https://link.mgln.ai/FBxMoM3

Where did Elon Musk’s epic ambitions begin? In search of clues, the latest season of Understood: The Making of Musk returns to his sheltered youth in apartheid South Africa, a world engineered for white supremacy. 

In this second episode, host Jacob Silverman explores whether Musk’s authoritarian streak traces back to his Canadian grandfather. Before Joshua Haldeman brought his family to South Africa, he made waves as part of the radical 1930s Technocracy movement. And while the two men’s lives only overlapped for three years, we find echoes of Elon’s worldview in Haldeman’s pro-tech, anti-democratic ideology.

You can find Understood wherever you get your podcasts, and here: https://link.mgln.ai/FBxMoM2

Today we’re joined by lawyer and author Bryan Stevenson for a conversation about the historical Mother Emanuel AME church, and what it means to tell the story of American history through a single institution. 

Then Canadian journalist Paul Wells stops by for a look at the rise of The New York Times, and the lessons for news media writ large. 

And finally, Bookends host Mattea Roach chats with Jayme about Ukraine, the power of the novel, and some very endangered snails.

The books:

Mother Emanuel by Kevin Sack

The Times by Adam Nagourney

Endling by Maria Reva

Some of our favourite guests of the year return to talk about books that helped meaningfully explain 2025. 

We talk about the evergreen appeal of Plato as well as Jewish identity with former Yale fascism scholar Jason Stanley. 

The déjà vu of trade wars and Canadian nationalism are tackled by journalist and author Stephen Maher. His pick is a book that details the last election of Sir John A. Macdonald and first election of Wilfrid Laurier.

Then the career works of Herman Melville as a blueprint for modern America with historian Rick Perlstein.

This is part one, in a series that will continue on tomorrow’s show! 

The books:

The Republic Book 8 by Plato 

Being Jewish After Gaza: A Reckoning by Peter Beinart

The History of Canada Series: The Destiny of Canada by Christopher Pennington

The Lightning-Rod Man by Herman Melville

In the 1980s and 90s, Satan and his followers were accused of brainwashing children, sacrificing babies, and infiltrating North American society on a massive scale — yet these thousands of alleged Satanists were nowhere to be found. Even so, the narrative became embedded in our cultural memory, warping everything it touched — including the lives of innocent people… And it never quite died out.

In the new 8-part series, The Devil You Know, Sarah Marshall (You’re Wrong About) explores the tangled web of the Satanic Panic, in a journey that will take you everywhere from Victoria, B.C. to rural Kentucky to San Antonio, Texas. This is a show about the people who experienced the Satanic Panic in real-time — the believers, the skeptics, the bystanders, and the wrongfully-convicted. What was it like to be a psychologist told to look for Satanists in every case; a mother slowly recovering memories of supposed Satanic abuse; a teenager accused of conspiracy to murder? The stories of these eyewitnesses point us toward the real underlying problems — individual and societal — that the Panic was a response to. The fault, as ever, was not with Satanists, but in ourselves.

You can find more episodes of The Devil You Know wherever you get your podcasts, and here: https://link.mgln.ai/TDYKxFB

Forged is a six-part series from CBC in Canada and ABC Australia. Host Adrian Stimson, an artist from the Siksika Nation, travels from Thunder Bay to the Northern Territory of Australia, to reveal what's believed to be the largest art crime fraud in the world.

In this first episode, rock star Kevin Hearn of the Barenaked Ladies is doing rock star things — like buying paintings. And what better painting for an iconic Canadian rocker to buy than one by Norval Morrisseau, one of the most iconic Indigenous artists in Canada? But when Kevin’s Morrisseau painting is featured in an exhibit, it gets taken down because the head curator says it’s “questionable.” Kevin tries to get some answers but every answer leads to more questions. Host Adrian Stimson traces Kevin’s dogged quest to find out the truth about his painting — and learns how this one painting is the key to cracking a whole underworld open. More episodes of Forged are available here: https://link.mgln.ai/ForgedxFB

Today we're bringing you a 2025 Front Burner wrap up, answering audience questions and bringing you behind the scenes of the making of some of our most popular episodes of 2025.

For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

In 2025 news of the biggest, most sensational sports scandals was broken not by ESPN or Sports Illustrated, but by a podcaster named Pablo Torre on his show Pablo Torre Finds Out.

It was Pablo who investigated Kawhi Leonard’s alleged multi-million dollar under the table no show deal. And it was Pablo who uncovered potential collusion involving NFL player salaries.

Pablo Torre is with us today to talk about the year in sports scandal, the state of sports journalism, and gambling grip’s grip on the whole industry.

For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Corruption is a word that’s come up throughout this year in relation to U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term. There have been allegations of personal enrichment, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, through his family’s crypto and real estate ventures. There are also accusations of quid pro quo deals with foreign leaders and convicted criminals seeking pardons.

Is this a bug in Trump’s administration, or a feature?

To put it all into focus, Tommy Vietor is here. He’s been following this issue of corruption on his very popular podcast, Pod Save America. He also co-hosts Pod Save the World.

For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts