Join Brian McWilliams, John Odermatt, Lou Perez and Brian Nichols every other week for the newest show on the Lions of Liberty Network, the Politicks Podcast!

This week, we talk about newly resigned Cambridge professor Jason Arday, who lied about just about everything while being feted by academia. Also: Fauci brought up for contempt of Congress for pleading the 5th, and Mamdani goes after electric scooters.

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On this week's Mean Age Daydream, Brian the Sophie Cunningham effect has put numerous WNBA coaches on the pro-trans offensive, but they are about to have to put up or shut up with a trans "female" dominating in France who wants to play in the US.

Buy my new card game: WOKE WORD WARS - ⁠https://www.amazon.com/Woke-Word-Wars-Ridiculously-Players/dp/B0FLF8Y16S⁠
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Jon Miltimore is back — writer, commentator, and one of the sharpest guys covering arts, culture, and politics on Substack. This is his second time on the show and we did not run out of things to talk about.

Topics include: why California can't fight wildfires and why Native Americans had better land management practices; the World Cup finally breaking through in the US; what to actually expect at a Bob Dylan concert when you're a Dylan fan (Jon didn't get what he wanted; he has no regrets); Ben Askren's double lung transplant and why elite athletes bounce back from things that would end most people; the new Stallone biopic about how Rocky got made — specifically the part where a broke, dog-selling, parking-car Stallone turned down $1 million because he refused to not play the role himself; the Rocky franchise and what it means that it somehow worked as it became more absurd; working out at 44 and 47 and why exercise is mental health; the case for travel sports (and why Matthew Yglesias is wrong); and why you should never outsource teaching your kid to ride a bike.

Follow Jon on Substack → https://substack.com/@miltimore

TIMESTAMPS:

0:00 — Intro — Jon Miltimore, writer and commentator

0:31 — Canada's wildfires — black skies over New York and Minnesota

2:37 — Why California can't fight fires — federal land, bad policy, and arson

4:38 — Native Americans had better land management — and we stopped listening

5:21 — Private land vs. federal land — the tragedy of the commons

5:38 — Happy Hour Econ — a comedian and an economist walk into a bar

8:50 — The World Cup in America — how soccer finally broke through

10:26 — Bob Dylan at a Bob Dylan concert — what you should actually expect

13:38 — Lou cries at a Bob Dylan concert. He's not embarrassed.

17:21 — Ben Askren's double lung transplant — and why athletes bounce back when others don't

20:44 — Askren retires on his shield — and makes peace with his rival

23:26 — The new Rocky biopic — Stallone turned down $1 million to play the role himself

27:53 — Lou used to go by Rambo as a kid. Old ladies still ask about him.

28:29 — Jon's 13-year-old son shadowboxed like Clubber Lang at age two

29:11 — The Rocky franchise — from gritty 70s realism to superhero movie

32:50 — Working out at 44 and 47 — rowing machines, air bikes, and getting back at it

36:30 — Russell Crowe's comeback — individual agency and why exercise is mental health

41:14 — Travel sports — expensive, worth it, and Matthew Yglesias is wrong

45:34 — Teaching your kids to ride a bike — don't outsource the best moments

51:07 — Auto-deleting tweets and cancel culture — how we need to treat speech differently

52:10 — Outro — find Jon on Substack

Watch full episodes on YouTube → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4Vb53s4I0A&list=PLb5trMQQvT077-L1roE0iZyAgT4dD4EtJ

Listen on Apple Podcasts → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-lou-perez-podcast/id1535032081

Listen on Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/2KAtC7eFS3NHWMZp2UgMVU

 Co-host of Happy Hour Econ → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/happy-hour-econ/id1863476697

 Lou's book — That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore: https://amzn.to/3VhFa1r

 TheLouPerez.com |  [email protected]

 Newsletter: https://substack.com/@louperez

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Most founders build their brand around what looks good instead of what actually works — and it's quietly sabotaging their marketing. In this episode, John sits down with Amber Andrews, founder of Andrews Artistry, to unpack why looking good and being clear aren't the same thing. Amber breaks down the real difference between a brand and a brand system, the biggest mistakes founders make when picking colors and building identity, and why she believes AI should never be used to design a logo. They also dig into when it's time to invest in professional branding and why staying authentically human beats a polished, AI-sounding brand every time.

Show Sponsor: Jason Gagne’s Good2GoBody 90-day beginner fitness program - ⁠https://good2go.podia.com/?coupon=LIONSJOHN⁠

Chapters:

Links:

Andrews Artistry: https://andrewsartistry.com/

Andrews Artistry Page for Listeners: https://andrewsartistry.com/podbrand/

Schedule a 15 minute Gut Health Audit with John: https://calendar.app.google/B9fcGdSFjC5caTVu5

SUPPORT LIONS OF LIBERTY: Help keep this podcast going! We rely on listener support to continue bringing you content on freedom, political reform, and personal empowerment. 

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Subscribe, rate, and review wherever you listen – it makes a huge difference!

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Lanny Davis joins Brian Nichols to reveal why as Bill Clinton's lawyer, he now agrees with libertarians on government surveillance and why America's privacy crisis is happening right now.
This isn't a gotcha. Davis was Special Counsel to President Clinton, legal advisor to Michael Cohen, and the only Democrat George W. Bush put on the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board - the panel that watched the government's surveillance programs from the inside. The invitation came from Karl Rove himself.
So what makes a lifelong Democrat go straight to George Orwell's 1984? Flock cameras. License plate readers. Every car in America logged and shared between departments. Davis looked at all of it and said the quiet part out loud... "the bigger government is, the more I feel shared wisdom with libertarians."
His new book, Finding the Third Way, tackles the civility crisis head-on. He and Joe Lieberman once asked 535 members of Congress and 50 governors to sign a civility pledge - three signed. Davis names his own party's labeling problem, pulls a Harry Truman warning from 1948, and makes the case that Democrats and libertarians agree on more than either side admits.
And then Brian does the thing we do... the scorecard. Three things Lanny got right. Three where he lost me. One of them pointed straight at our own side. One standard.
CHAPTERS:
0:00 The Guest Nobody Expected
0:06 "Who Are You, Zelig?"
1:53 The Resignation That Wasn't
2:34 The Karl Rove Phone Call
5:31 Inside the Spy Room
7:21 The Guardrails Are Slipping
8:16 The Empty Oversight Board
10:00 Cameras on Every Corner
11:26 "Big Brother Is Watching You"
12:24 Only 3 Out of 585 Said Yes
15:32 The Socialist Label Trap
17:49 Truman's Warning to Democrats
20:38 Why Voters Snapped
24:14 "The Heck With Your Civility"
26:02 The Empathy Problem
29:52 Lanny's Curveball Close
33:11 The Scorecard
GUEST LINKS
Get the book: ⁠https://lannyjdavis.com⁠
Purple Nation column: ⁠https://www.realclearpolitics.com⁠
SUPPORT THE SHOW
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Website: ⁠https://briannicholsshow.com⁠
Email: ⁠[email protected]⁠
Socials: @BNicholsLiberty
New episodes every Thursday.
Educated. Enlightened. Informed.

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On this week's Mean Age Daydream, Brian looks at the shocking (well, not that shocking) revelations found in Dr. Anthony Fauci's dairies during Covid, and how that perfectly mirrors what is happening with climate science. Also: Mamdani doxxes thousands with his new pied-à-terre tax, and yet another Islam-inspired stabbing.

Buy my new card game: WOKE WORD WARS - ⁠https://www.amazon.com/Woke-Word-Wars-Ridiculously-Players/dp/B0FLF8Y16S⁠
🦁 Support Lions of Liberty: Patreon: patreon.com/lionsofliberty Locals: lionsofliberty.locals.com

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Liza Libes is a writer and literary critic at Pens and Poison. Her parents escaped the Soviet Union. She went to Columbia. She found that Columbia's English Department had replaced literature with Marxist theory, postcolonial studies, and critical theory. She's been pushing back ever since.

We talked about: the teachers who made us both writers; reading Wallace Stevens's The Snowman — out loud, in full — and the seventh grade class that made Liza stand in the snow for an hour to understand it; Hemingway, Ezra Pound, and the fascism problem; what happened to Columbia's English Department and why it matters for publishing; why Marxism is fundamentally an ideology of resentment (Bertrand Russell said it 100 years ago); the novel Yesteryear and what it reveals about contemporary literary self-righteousness; why writing characters who disagree with you is the whole point; the Emily Wilson translation of the Odyssey and what "a complicated man" does to Odysseus's character; and Christopher Nolan's Odyssey film — specifically the Cyclops scene he cut, why it was the scene that defined Odysseus, and why its absence drains the heroism from the entire story.

Follow Liza at Pens and Poison on Instagram → @pensandpoison

TIMESTAMPS:

0:00 — Intro — who is Liza Libes and what is Pens and Poison?

1:20 — Looking back on your 18-year-old writer self

2:51 — The teachers who made us writers — Brother Patterson and Poetry Friday

5:34 — Standing in the snow to understand Wallace Stevens — The Snowman read aloud

10:31 — The Lost Generation: Hemingway, Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot — and the fascism problem

13:03 — Shakespeare and Co., Paris, and missing Notre Dame before the fire

14:57 — Columbia's English Department: literary theory replaced literature

16:58 — Marxist literary theory, critical theory, and postcolonial studies explained

18:28 — Her parents escaped the Soviet Union — why she takes Marxism personally

19:28 — What literature used to be — humanistic inquiry vs. class consciousness

21:41 — Academia made literature esoteric — and publishing followed

23:01 — The DSA voter: overeducated, underpaid, and resentful

24:44 — Yesteryear — the trad wife novel, Anne Hathaway, and literary self-righteousness

26:03 — When the author's voice drowns out the character's voice

27:14 — Dostoevsky, Lionel Shriver, and characters the author disagrees with

30:23 — Writing outside your experience — her trans character, Lou's gay character

33:22 — Lou's story published alongside Joyce Carol Oates and Junot Diaz

35:20 — Her new novel — exploring faith and Jewish theology

37:32 — Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter in Waiting for Godot

39:03 — The Emily Wilson Odyssey translation — "a complicated man" vs. "cunning"

41:10 — What makes Odysseus great — the Cyclops, the cunning, the hubris

43:25 — Nolan's film: the Cyclops scene is gone — and why that ruins everything

45:42 — Greek hubris — Icarus, Arachne, and why pride destroys heroes

47:24 — The sirens scene: what it should have felt like vs. what Nolan did

48:30 — The overall verdict on Nolan's Odyssey — heroism is missing

49:46 — Outro — find Liza at Pens and Poison

Watch full episodes on YouTube → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4Vb53s4I0A&list=PLb5trMQQvT077-L1roE0iZyAgT4dD4EtJ

Listen on Apple Podcasts → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-lou-perez-podcast/id1535032081

Listen on Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/2KAtC7eFS3NHWMZp2UgMVU

 Co-host of Happy Hour Econ → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/happy-hour-econ/id1863476697

 Lou's book — That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore: https://amzn.to/3VhFa1r

 TheLouPerez.com |  [email protected]

 Newsletter: https://substack.com/@louperez

#Literature #LiteraryFiction #LizaLibes #PensAndPoison #Odyssey #ChristopherNolan #Columbia #MarxistTheory #ClassicLiterature #LouPerezPodcast

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Dr. Jeff Gross, a board-certified neurosurgeon and founder of Recelebrate, joins the show to demystify peptides and regenerative medicine. He explains how frustration with the traditional healthcare system pushed him from surgery toward cellular-level healing, and breaks down what peptides actually are, why "FDA approved" is widely misunderstood, and how stem cells and exosomes work in the body. The conversation covers real-world applications — from joint and cartilage regeneration to Parkinson's symptom relief and mitochondrial repair with peptides like SS-31 and MOTS-C. Dr. Gross also tackles misconceptions around legality, telehealth treatment options, and how to vet a regenerative medicine clinic. It's a wide-ranging, myth-busting conversation for anyone curious about the future of longevity and healing.

Chapters:

Show Sponsor: Jason Gagne’s Good2GoBody 90-day beginner fitness program - ⁠https://good2go.podia.com/?coupon=LIONSJOHN⁠

Links:

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David Osborne joins Brian Nichols to reveal how public sector unions trap members into paying union dues long after they quit - and why leaving your union is nearly impossible right now. Osborne is the former CEO of Americans for Fair Treatment and helped start the Fairness Center, a public interest law firm representing teachers, firefighters, police, and municipal workers against their own unions. This is a throwback to Episode 233, April 2021, with a five-year scorecard on what he got right and what he missed.
Inside, you'll hear the uncensored breakdown of the union resignation window, the restrictive membership forms nobody reads at orientation, and the clause that makes public employees pay dues regardless of membership status. This is the playbook nobody hands you when you take a government job.
And here's the part that should bother you... the union never had to win. They just had to make leaving expensive enough that you stopped trying. What happens to your paycheck when the organization that's supposed to protect you is the one you need protection from?
At 6:00, the Pennsylvania teacher whose own union blocked where her money could go - even after they agreed she'd never pay them a dime. At 10:17, the gym membership analogy that explains the whole trap in sixty seconds. And at 25:30, the specific request David made to the Supreme Court in April 2021 - and the answer he got eight weeks later.
Subscribe for new episodes every Thursday. This episode is powered by Cardio Miracle - lower your resting heart rate, lower your blood pressure, improve your pump. Head to cardiomiracle.com/TBNS and use code TBNS for 15% off. Full episode library at briannicholsshow.com. Reach out at [email protected] or @BNicholsLiberty on X, Facebook, and Instagram. Educated. Enlightened. Informed.

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Michael Angelo Zervos is a Guinness World Record holder — he visited all 195 UN-recognized countries in 499 days. Along the way he interviewed people in every country about the happiest moment of their life. That project became a book, published by Penguin Random House, out February 23rd.

We talked about: how the record works and what actually counts as "visiting" a country; a year and a half of planning vs. the Brazilian who claimed he did it by accident; getting jailed overnight in Liberia for taking a photo of a building; being deported from Nicaragua because they thought he was a journalist; how he got into North Korea during a two-week window that's since closed permanently; what North Korea is actually like (his answer: Plato's allegory of the cave, in real life); Cuba on the ground vs. what the left says about it; traveling through Ukraine, Palestine, Syria, and Sudan; asking people about happiness in active conflict zones; and what his grandfather being forced to fight for communist guerrillas in the Greek Civil War has to do with any of it.

Get the book → The Happiest Moment of Your Life: True Stories from a Journey to Every Country in the World

https://amzn.to/4pHdYav

Follow Michael on Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/theprojectkosmos/

TIMESTAMPS:

0:00 — Intro — who is Michael Angelo Zervos?

0:34 — Greeks in America — diners, Coney Islands, and the varsity jacket problem

5:05 — Christopher Nolan's Odyssey — not a single Greek in the cast

6:25 — 195 countries in 499 days — how the Guinness World Record works

8:04 — A year and a half of planning — and the Brazilian who claimed he did it by accident

9:33 — What counts as "visiting" a country? The Guinness rules

11:08 — Project Cosmos — interviewing people about the happiest moment of their life

13:13 — Brand deals, sponsorships, and the reality of Guinness World Record celebrity

14:35 — Traveling as a man vs. a woman — the real differences

16:37 — Married with two kids — how he pulled this off

20:24 — The happiest moment of the trip — waking up in Ghana

21:33 — The Swiss man who came out as bisexual at a phone-free party in Zurich

23:45 — The worst moments: jailed in Liberia for photographing a building

26:57 — Deported from Nicaragua — they thought he was a journalist

27:41 — Left-wing dictatorships and the memory hole

29:50 — North Korea — getting in through a two-week window that's now closed

32:14 — North Korea as Plato's cave — the allegory of the cave in real life

33:44 — His grandfather forced to fight for communist guerrillas in the Greek Civil War

35:29 — Dennis Rodman's translator was a libertarian

36:44 — Cuba — what it's actually like on the ground

38:40 — Poverty porn, romanticizing socialism, and what Cubans actually think

43:42 — The Facebook argument: "Oh no, Starbucks is going to ruin Cuba"

45:38 — What's actually lost when wealth is generated — community and dependency

47:27 — Traveling through conflict zones: Ukraine, Palestine, Syria, Sudan

49:37 — Asking people about happiness in a war zone

50:27 — The book: published by Penguin Random House, out February 23rd

52:23 — Chicken soup for the soul meets Anthony Bourdain — what the book actually is

54:14 — Outro — follow Michael and get the book

Watch full episodes on YouTube → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4Vb53s4I0A&list=PLb5trMQQvT077-L1roE0iZyAgT4dD4EtJ

Listen on Apple Podcasts → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-lou-perez-podcast/id1535032081

Listen on Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/2KAtC7eFS3NHWMZp2UgMVU

 Co-host of Happy Hour Econ → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/happy-hour-econ/id1863476697

 Lou's book — That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore: https://amzn.to/3VhFa1r

 TheLouPerez.com |  [email protected]

 Newsletter: https://substack.com/@louperez

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