Slate News

Felix Salmon, Emily Peck and Anna Szymanski discuss the Fed’s new monetary policy announcement, direct listings on the stock market, and all the ways to play Felix’s hypothetical dice game. 

In the Slate Plus segment: The Dow.

Email: [email protected]

Podcast production by Jessamine Molli.

Twitter: @felixsalmon, @Three_Guineas, @EmilyRPeck

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Not long ago, the QAnon conspiracy theory seemed to have lost momentum. Social media mentions had decreased. 8chan had gone offline. But since March, fueled by the pandemic and social media giants, the conspiracy has taken on new life.

What’s responsible for the rapid uptake of the movement? And now that QAnon has spilled over to the mainstream, how far can it go?

Guest:

Ali Breland, reporter at Mother Jones

Host

Celeste Headlee

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Not long ago, the QAnon conspiracy theory seemed to have lost momentum. Social media mentions had decreased. 8chan had gone offline. But since March, fueled by the pandemic and social media giants, the conspiracy has taken on new life.

What’s responsible for the rapid uptake of the movement? And now that QAnon has spilled over to the mainstream, how far can it go?

Guest:

Ali Breland, reporter at Mother Jones

Host

Celeste Headlee

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Republican convention, violence in Kenosha, and whether the Falwell and Conway families’ dramas matter.

Here are some notes and references from this week’s show:

Thomas B. Edsall for the New York Times: “‘I Fear That We Are Witnessing the End of American Democracy’”

Omar Wasow for the Washington Post: “The Protests Started Out Looking Like 1968. They Turned Into 1964.” 

Black Lives Matter Protests in Wisconsin: Charles Franklin Marquette Law School Poll 2020-08-26

Here are this week’s cocktail chatters:

John: Keith Johnston for Independent Voter News: “The 18th-Century Reason Biden's VP Pick Should Be a Night Owl”

Emily: Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of The Dead by Olga Tokarczuk ; Honeyland 

David: Erin Berger for the New York Times: “Meet the National Parks’ ‘Ranger of the Lost Art’”

Listener Qiyu Liu @BlueSuedeQ: the Ikea Museum’s collection of 70 years of catalogues.

Slate Plus members get a bonus segment on the Gabfest each week, and access to special bonus episodes throughout the year. Sign up now to listen and support our show.

For this week’s Slate Plus bonus segment Emily, David, and John discuss what they wanted to be when they grew up and how close they came.

You can tweet suggestions, links, and questions to @SlateGabfest. Tweet us your cocktail chatter using #cocktailchatter. (Messages may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

The email address for the Political Gabfest is [email protected]. (Email may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Podcast production by Jocelyn Frank.

Research and show notes by Bridgette Dunlap.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this Trumpcast Plus preview, Virginia Heffernan talks to prolific author Kurt Andersen about Evil Geniuses, his latest New York Times bestseller.

Only Slate Plus members get to listen to every Trumpcast episode in full. Sign up now to access every Trumpcast episode and support the show. 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last week, the Trump administration used shaky reasoning to pursue additional sanctions against Iran. The proposal was rejected by nearly the entire U.N. Security Council, including close allies like the U.K and France. It was just the latest example of how “America First,” and the rejection of multilateralism under Trump, has turned the U.S. into a loner state on the world stage.

Guest: Fred Kaplan, Slate’s War Stories columnist. Fred is the author of The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War. 

Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For the past two weeks, Belarus has been gripped by political protest. The country’s longtime authoritarian president, Alexander Lukashenko, is courting Russian intervention as a worried European Union looks on. 

Guest: Julia Ioffe, GQ correspondent. Read her latest column on Belarus. 

Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Getting tested for the coronavirus has never been as easy as it should be in the U.S. We’ve seen equipment shortages, long delays for test results, and even mixed messages about who should be getting tested.

But there is a way to fix America’s inadequate testing. And experts say it could return some normalcy even before we have a reliable vaccine.

Guest: Robinson Meyer, a staff writer at The Atlantic. Read his latest story, The Plan That Could Give Us Our Lives Back.

Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The pandemic hasn’t stopped the flow of migrants to the U.S.-Mexico border. But it has prompted an emergency crackdown on asylum seekers, and critics of the Trump administration say the policy is violating U.S. law. 

Guest: Adolfo Flores, reporter for BuzzFeed News. 

Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Anna Szymanski discuss the finances of the USPS, the fate of brick and mortar retail after the pandemic, and Citigroup’s $900 million payment to Revlon lenders...that they sent by accident.

And in the Plus segment: Productivity in lockdown.

Email: [email protected]

Podcast production by Jessamine Molli.

Twitter: @felixsalmon, @Three_Guineas, @EmilyRPeck

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.