From therapeutic-assisted MDMA to decriminalized psilocybin and microdosing, movements to legalize psychedelics are everywhere. California-based Joe Green is a prominent voice in the movement, as the co-founder and President of the Psychedelic Science Funders Collaborative (PSFC). Kara asks him about the recent unfavorable headlines (including concerns over Elon Musk’s potential drug use and Matthew Perry’s death from ‘acute effects of ketamine’) and poses a question from Investigative Reporter Olivia Goldhill about how proselytizers can be held to account. 

Questions or comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Before the OpenAI Drama which pit AI enthusiasts (accelerationists) against doomers (decelerationists) we had a conversation with Stanford computer scientist and pioneering AI researcher, Dr. Fei-Fei Li. While cognizant of the challenges AI poses — including disinformation, polarization, biases, a loss of privacy and job losses that could lead to unrest — Li is a fierce advocate for the humane development of artificial intelligence and for increased diversity in the field. We taped this episode October 10, 2023 but wanted to re-air it in light of the ongoing debate about AI. 

Questions or comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Trump’s back. Today, we go to a panel of experts to discuss his 2024 legal woes, dangerously escalating rhetoric, and what he might do if he retakes the White House in 2025. 

Our guests are New York Times senior political correspondent Maggie Haberman, Vox senior correspondent Ian Millhiser, and ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl, who recently authored “Tired of Winning: Donald Trump and the End of the Grand Old Party.” Plus: former Trump White House communications director Alyssa Farah Griffin submits a question.

Note: this conversation was taped Tuesday, January 9, as the former president was sitting in a DC court and before the recent Republican debates (and Chris Christie’s announcement that he’d be suspending his campaign for President).

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Four years after the start of the global pandemic, COVID-19 is no longer a global health emergency, but in the U.S., every week, the virus is still hospitalizing 15,000 people and killing a thousand. Today, we look back – and ahead – with former New York Times global health reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr., author of the new book The Wisdom of Plagues: Lessons from 25 years of Covering Pandemics. He and Kara discuss the conflicting findings surrounding the virus origin, including the lab leak theory currently being investigated by Congress, and grapple with whether we need a Pentagon for Disease in the future (addressing a question posed by former White House Chief of Staff and Obama Ebola Czar Ron Klain). Plus – McNeil speaks out about his own controversy: his 2021 departure from The New York Times.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Kara and Nayeema look forward to the characters and moments that may define 2024 by looking back at the coverage of the last year. We unpack the drama at OpenAI, to the contrast between Biden and Trump and Fox News, to Elon Musk and X with the most revealing interview moments from 2023.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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On is off for the holidays, so today we have an episode of friend-of-the-pod Preet Bharara's podcast Stay Tuned with Preet. In this episode, Preet is joined by author Mark Chiusano for a deep dive on our favorite (or least favorite) Washington fabulist: George Santos.

Mark Chiusano is the author of The Fabulist: The Lying, Hustling, Grifting, Stealing, and Very American Legend of George Santos. He joins Preet to discuss Santos’s lifetime of lies, and what his ascension to power says about our political system.

On will be back with a fresh episode on January 4, 2024. Listen to Stay Tuned with Preet every Monday and Thursday: https://link.chtbl.com/staytuned

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Randy Rainbow is a four-time Emmy and Grammy-nominated musical comedy sensation famous for his viral taunts of anti-LGBTQ+ politicians, hateful celebrities and, of course, George Santos. Rainbow (and, yes: that is his real name) talks about his approach to his work, his inspirations, and why he claims his videos aren’t political. Kara also asks Rainbow what “Elon the Musical” would sound like.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Are world hunger, pandemics and climate change “fixable” – or is mitigating their impacts the best we can hope for? Is there any point in making them moonshots? In his new book, Big Bets: How Large-Scale Change Really Happens, Rockefeller Foundation President and former Administrator of USAID Rajiv Shah explains how going big impacts motivation – even if the result is a Big Fail. We speak with Shah about the outcome of the recent UN Climate Conference in Dubai (and the overwhelming presence of Big Oil), why he thinks global institutions like the World Bank and the IMF need to be revamped, and whether billionaire philanthropists are the answer to the world’s woes (spoiler: they aren’t).

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Tim Alberta is a fantastic reporter whose profiles of 2024 hopeful Nikki Haley and former CNN boss Chris Licht proved illuminating and impactful (Licht lost his job days after). In his latest book, Alberta has profiled not a person but a movement: the evangelical church. It’s a community that rallied around Donald Trump in 2016, 2020 and will likely do so in 2024. And it’s one Alberta knows well: his father was an evangelical pastor. Alberta’s new book, “The Kingdom, The Power and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism” takes him back to his hometown church to understand how the evangelical church has reshaped American politics.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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Former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper details the threats and dangers we face. On the agenda: hot wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, a cold war with China, the threat posed by Iran, and the dangers that would come from the potential resurgence of Esper’s former boss: Donald Trump. 

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza

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