Brief: The Liver King Crash-Out

“I would pursue transcendence and live with its inevitable close cousins, disappointment and heartbreak, for most of my life.” So writes “Steven” (not his real name) in the first of our six spiritual ...

13 Apr 20231h 19min

JP Sears is selling CBD. His new company, Awaken, recently sent out a marketing email extolling the benefits of CBD. Derek looks at the science behind the claims. Show Notes CBD is everywhere. But is ...

10 Apr 20236min

Why do so many inflammatory culture war issues crystallize around vaccines and masks? What is so compelling about these forms of public health and mutual aid, that they become central to the right-win...

8 Apr 202329min

Is Marianne Williamson’s promotion of A Course in Miracles any more relevant to her political persona than Biden’s Catholicism? If it demonstrably informs her every instinct and communication (as we e...

6 Apr 20231h 16min

Why did Trump kick-off his 2024 presidential campaign in Waco, Texas? Who were the Branch Davidians, anyway? Julian unpacks the incendiary streams of far-right anti-government militia history and rel...

3 Apr 20236min

Listen… Can you hear it? All across the propagandist right and the free speech center, there's a new rallying cry: it's time to fight the “censorship industrial complex!” Researching and documenting d...

30 Mar 202359min

Recording the audiobook at a swanky Toronto studio sends Matthew down a memory hole to wonder about performance, self-awareness, and anxiety, and their relation to charisma. “Whatever charisma I have ...

27 Mar 20236min

Conspiritualists are not wrong that Jeffery Epstein’s downline has so far evaded justice. Or that the highest levels of the Catholic Church aided and abetted child sexual abuse for generations. They a...

23 Mar 202359min