Afleveringen
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Happy Memorial Day! Nancy and Sarah discuss a Columbia Journalism Review bombshell about the alleged sexual misdeeds of journalist Wes Lowery, who shot to fame during the Black Lives Matter era and is perhaps best known for popularizing the idea of journalism guided by âmoral certainty.â
This is hot one! Sarah gets kneejerk over blackout confusion, Nancy doesnât understand âsituationships,â and they argue over the definition of âglory hole.â Whether Lowery is guilty of these misdeeds we canât say, but we both hope #metoo stories start to pivot away from âtearing someone downâ to pointing to a better way to engage with people you love/bone/covet/teach/mentor/etc.
Also discussed:
* The latest Mission: Impossible â wanna guess who liked it?
* A blender full of stunts, frappéd
* When did we start celebrating Memorial Day?
* The smell of a nuclear submarine (letâs ask Sarahâs brother)
* SLEEP BUFFET!!!!
* Ken Burnsâ theory on binary thinking shaped by computer code
* Fifth Column + Lowery = âexactly what you want from mega-mindsâ
* Buying a woman a drink: Predatory behavior â or kick-ass?
* Do people get roofied? Yes, but way less than hype suggests
* How dating fell apart
* Assholes vs. criminals / regret sex vs. rape
* The sad and endless hamster wheel of the compulsively sexual male
* When Sarah was a drunk bully âŠ
* Slutdom during Nancyâs âEddie Vedder yearsâ
* Rise of violence on on the left: To be continued!
Plus, Nancy has a request for sociopaths, Sarah makes a hopeless pass at Douglas Murray â and much more!
Memorialize the day you became a paid subscriberâŠ
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Ethan Strauss is a straight shooter in a (slightly) crooked profession. As a writer who follows sports and culture, the Substacker and podcaster has a land grab on pointing out things that others have become reluctant to acknowledge. He talks with Nancy and Sarah about the contradictions of the WNBA, the popularity of Caitlin Clark and the reluctance of sneaker brands to give her a shoe (at least first), how men have changed the audience for womenâs sports, and NBA teams as a mini-Game of Thrones, replete with palace intrigue. We also discuss Bill Belichick and his very young girlfriend Jordon Hudson, third-runner-up to Miss Maine.
REMINDER: Donât forget our whisper-soft launch over on YouTube! Please subscribe to the SMOKE EM channel, which costs you nothing and brings us joy.
Also discussed:
* âNancy knows sheâs a narcissistâ
* When selfies kill (mostly men) âŠ
* Do all sports announcers sound like Marv Albert?
* Why authors hated when Stanley Kubrick made movies of their books
* Sports betting meets the WNBA
* âGirls can do anythingâ era meets âGirls canât winâ era
* Vanessa Bryant, Kobe Bryantâs widow, may NOT the best person to negotiate the future of her late husbandâs brand, but please donât aggregate this.
* Sorry, Dirk, we donât buy shoes for centers
* Luka, the hot girlfriend Dallas lost
* Why people canât leave Bill Belichickâs age gap relationship alone
* âDid he get a real blowjob, and lose his mind?â
* The most romantic philosophy book Belichick ever signed
* Viagra, the body hack with consequences
* That time Sarah matched with a silver fox who was 72 âŠ
* The Boomers wonât leave!
* Did Kerry really love Logan on Succession?
* The problem of an aging father who is also single
* Which former NFL superstar hangs around Dallasâs Katy Trail without his shirt on, chatting up the ladies?
* The surprisingly tender story of Anna Nicole Smithâs old rich husband
* The best role Tom Cruise ever played, and itâs not Magnolia
Plus, why Nike should have made an ad about girl dads, that time Nancy discovered Steve Nash, Ethan doesnât know how Australians learn to read, and much more!
NOTE: Ethanâs new show, RANDOM OFFENSE, premieres this Friday at 4pmET/1pmPT. Fancy Pommelmann will be there, and you come too!
LOVE WINS, when you become a paid subscriber.
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Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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Before we talk about this episode: Pretty-please go to YouTube and subscribe to our new channel. It costs you nothing! It could give you so much joy! Now, on to the show:
Nancy and Sarah go deep on the Sean Combs case, thus inspiring them to slap the first warning label on a Smoke âEm episode. This oneâs explicit! Itâs also sad, confusing, funny-depressing, one more cautionary tale about fame, money, and power. They talk about the recent conviction of Gerard Depardieu, the one-time Casanova of French cinema who confessed in the course of his trial that he was âill suited for the current era.â
Also discussed:
* Age of consent laws are wild
* France reckons five years later
* Zut alors, the jerk lawyer in that Depardieu case!
* Nancy needs seven showers
* Mise en place, mise en scene âŠ
* Cowboys 4 Angels
* Baby oil, so much baby oil
* Dan Savage, youâre our last hope
* âBut I donât want to go to a Brazilian steakhouse!â
* The backstory behind that violent March 2016 footage in the hotel
* Beware the scared man who fears his woman is getting too powerful
* Does the public have a right to see Diddy freak-off footage? Nancy: Yes. Sarah: No. Wanna guess who would watch it, though?
* Nancy flirts with victim-blaming, pulls back from the brink
* Send hate mail to Gavin de Becker
* But what is sex trafficking?
* Nancy tells a tragic story about an old acquaintance
* A drinking problem starts as a drinking solution
Plus, the book that is blowing Sarahâs mind, Nancyâs magical trip to a land before time, altogether too much freaking off, and much more!
Because weâll never cover you in baby oil (unless you ask nice) â become a paid subscriber
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Poet and author Nick Flynn joins Nancy and Sarah to talk about poems that blew his mind, the destabilizing experience of watching your life re-enacted in a movie (his memoir Another Bullshit Night in Suck City became Being Flynn with Robert DeNiro, Julianne Moore, and Paul Dano), why DeNiro demanded Nick be on set, riding in a limo to said set with the young Dano, and why white male writers are alive and well, at least in the classes he teaches.
âThe poets Iâve met are assholes,â Sarah confesses to Nick, although upon further reflection, itâs more like the assholes really stand out. Nick isnât friends with assholes, but he does know many amazing poets, including Marie Howe, who just won the Pulitzer.
Also discussed:
* Sarah hates poetry, then proceeds to recite poetry
* Nick defends Robert Frost
* Pantyhose vending machines at Hooters
* The surprising diversity, art/dining scene of Houston
* Nick reads âBag of Mice,â blows our minds
* âAristotle did not promise writing would be catharticâ
* The greatness of Lili Taylor, better known to Nick as his wife
* Who will play Nancy in the movie?
* Whatâs Amy Adams doing in, oh-say, two or three years?
* Houston museums! Iranian films! Barn dance!
* Sinners is a must-see, butâŠ
* ⊠not a lot of love for Black Panther on this podcast
Plus, Nick yells at a marriage therapist, why making stuff is dangerous, a rare sighting of Nancyâs daughter in the wild, and much more!
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not become a paid subscriber â oh no, wait you can:
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Stop what you are doing and subscribe to Smoke âEmâs new YouTube! Right now yes thank you. On to our regular program!
Nancy and Sarah are joined by culture critic/novelist Kat Rosenfield to talk about who we can blame for our current morass: Social media? Heterodox thinkers? Everyone? The trio end up discussing the difference between activism and storytelling, what it means to be âdisingenuous,â Katâs Twitter beef with Cathy Young, writerâs envy (or maybe just Sarahâs envy), and Katâs long-promised kimono, a gift for her most-frequent-guest status, which has not been bought yet (ed note: Sarah glares at Nancy).
Trumpâs 100 Days: How did we get here? And if we all got into this together, can we get out together, too?
Also discussed:
* Three votes for the moon
* Surprise cat appearance!
* Trump âcorrupts his allies and deranges his opponents in a way that makes the culture worse.â
* Why categorizing anyone as âanti-anti Trumpâ is axiomatically corrupt
* Ambiguity frightens people.
* Losing friends for speaking up
* Dick Cavett, the Joe Rogan of his day
* Politics as a litmus test for moral character
* England, donât stick your dick in a box of badgers
* Dad-Bod-Gate
Plus, Sarah offers a poignant quote from Milan Kundera (or maybe Instagram; whatever), Nancy unintentionally inaugurates a âHate Thing of the Weekâ feature, the problem with men wearing teensy-tiny pants, and much more!
REMINDER: Paid subscribers can join us this Sunday, May 4, for our First Sunday Zoom, 5pm PT / 8pm ET, link sent out day-of!
Itâs already May! Looks like the perfect month for you to become a paid subscriber.
Reliable, beautiful and bright candidate that wasnât on the ballot (though Kat wrote it in)
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Just out here, two ladies taking in the view from three years into their podcast on the outskirts of the zeitgeist. The Old 97s make honest women of us. Dave Cicirelli gives us a new look. Nancy and Sarah are making this episode free to everyone, in celebration of 1095+ days of trying to make sense of this crazy world.
Also discussed:
* The Smoke âEm guests that riled up listeners
* Ross Douthat âplaces his finger on the deep woundâ
* We love a dorky wedding!
* Pop quiz for Nancy: Pronounce âswastikaâ
* Our 2025 guest wish list: weâre looking at you, Douglas Murray.
* Conclave, cleavage, whatever
* Mike Pesca and his âNew Substackâ panic button
* âDonât put it down, put it away âŠâ
* Nancy will never lose her contempt for Bernadine Dohrn
* The hotness of Diego Luna
* The hotness of Tom Hardy
* Nancyâs mom
* POP ROCKS!
Plus, things that are sexy: men who take the lead, flying toward the story, pleather, and much more!
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Nancy and Sarah discuss the continuing saga of Luigi Mangione, newly minted folk hero and alleged assassin of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. âHereâs this man who is a revolutionary, whoâs famous, whoâs handsome, heâs smart, heâs a person who seems like a morally good man, which is hard to find,â said journalist Taylor Lorenz on CNN, and while there was some context to that comment, there wasnât much. At Coachella, Circle Jerksâ frontman Keith Morris called for an âarmy of Luigis,â while folk singer Jesse Welles is selling out venues with his Luigi-inspired song âUnited Healthcare.â Nancy and Sarah talk about anti-heroes, the politics of protest music, the catharsis of Netflix, and why our culture has a hard-on for murderers.
Also discussed:
* Would you go to space?
* Why wasnât Oprah on that flight?
* Nancyâs Circle Jerks encounter
* Sarah eats two-week old steak. Pays the price.
* Cody Balmer is no Luigi Mangione â or is he?
* Taylor Lorenz is one strange bird
* Luxembourg, Rosenberg, same diff âŠ
* Missing Ross Perot
* Sarah confuses Dallas Morning News baseball writer Evan Grant with Ryan Murphy favorite/teen heartthrob Evan Peters âŠ
* Weinstein case = can of worms with snakes inside
* Sarah tells a dad joke, stands behind it
* Someone looks like four miles of bad road
* Candace Owens, if we must
* You gotta put batteries in your vibrator
Plus, Clyde Barrow was not impotent, ChatGPT roasts Sarah and Nancy, a special friend-of-the-pod on Bill Maher this Friday, and much more!
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Nancy and Sarah discuss former âShagger of the Yearâ Russell Brand, whoâs been charged with sexual misconduct, a year or two after an explosive documentary landed on British TV about the comedian/entertainer/podcaster/New-Age guru. That show kicked off a criminal investigation, now headed to the courts.
Brand is at once an obvious and peculiar #MeToo target, since he was so outspoken about his misdeeds in real time, including a memoir about his sex addiction called My Booky Wook. The ladies discuss changing cultural climates, why women are drawn to charming reprobates, the logic of age-of-consent laws, and the appropriate legal consequences for someone who behaved badly and got lavishly rewarded for it.
Also discussed:
* Are Americans horny for anger, or is it just our Twitter feeds?
* Disinhibited by a nap, Sarah falls into Twitter spat
* Carrie Coon stans came to win
* The spitfire that is (recent Smoke âEm guest!) Meghan McCain
* Sarah regrets editing out a line about Russell Brand asking about panties
* âAttention hungerâ
* The late great David Carr
* âFeeding the fat kidâ into perpetuity
* Beware the older man saying, âI want to buy you a dress and take you out in it.â Honeytrap!
* Paul Schrader, Taxi Driver screenwriter, should have known better
* Sarah challenges Kmele Foster to an âantic conversationâ
* âItâs dudes all the way down.â
Plus, Sarah tries to explain a âvacation hat,â Nancy nominates Tom Hardy for perennial âSexiest Man Alive,â a pic of where dozens of your favorite podcasters have peed, and much more!
Correction: Nancy said the tariffs had wiped out $10 trillion in âdebt,â when she meant to say âwealth.â Management regrets the error, while thinking she might have been wish-casting âŠ
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Liz Wolfe, Reason writer/podcaster, joins Nancy and Sarah to talk about the mess of politics, the value of free speech, and how to talk about parenting in a world where fewer and fewer women are parents. Wolfe is not your average 28 year old: Unapologetically pro-life and pro-natalist as a time when many in her generation havenât even started contemplating freezing their eggs. Or, in the case of singer Chappell Roan, 27, they might tell an interviewer, âAll of my friends who have kids are in hell. I actually donât know anyone whoâs happy and has children at this age.â
Liz has thoughts!
With her surfboard in the background and her toddler occasionally in her lap, Liz talks about choices, wonders, border chaos, her Catholic faith, reproductive tech, and why sheâs pleased that Grok compared her to Kat Timpf.
Also discussed:
* Happy Liberation Day?
* Grok summarizes your narrators, and Sarah gets grumpy
* Nancyâs alter-ego has a pie in her backpack, with a gun
* Truth Czar, Disinformation Chief ⊠have the American people not suffered enough?
* Sarah is pissed on Matt Taibbiâs behalf
* Talk to your hairdresser about the New York Times âŠ
* Warren Beatty quote: âOne of the nice things God does is, he does not let people who don't have kids know what they're missing.â
* Chappell Roan, a second-rate Lady Gaga
* âAmbiguous lossâ
* Will Sarah have a kid on her own?
* Do NOT call Nancy a single mother
* Unrealistic expectations about our fertility window
* âI bite Mama!â
Plus, sliding out of Obama-era liberalism, the hazards of toxic empathy, poop under your fake nails, and much more!
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Investigative reporter Lee Fang talks with Nancy and Sarah about his latest Substack story, âDemocrats' Dark Money Fund for TikTok Influencers,â about secret forces behind the sudden media enthusiasm of Kamala Harrisâ presidential announcement. âAs it turns out, the tidal wave of enthusiasm was not entirely genuine. Much of the content,â writes Fang, âwas quietly funded by an elusive group of Democratic billionaires and major donors in an arrangement designed to conceal the payments from voters.â
Fang may be familiar to listeners from a kerfuffle in summer 2020, when his colleagues at The Intercept turned on him publicly after he tweeted about riots amid the George Floyd moment. Fang talks about how he came to journalism, how to remain an honest broker, and why heâs fascinated by the money behind power.
Also discussed:
* âTits,â ârack,â and âbosomâ all on-air in record time!
* Fang, raised on WaPo and cereal
* The eerie brilliance of Michael Savage
* On being addicted to conservative radio
* Fitness bloggers and Mommy bloggers go pro-Kamala!
* Nancy has other thoughts about Kamala in the kitchen âŠ
* Why do conservative voices dominate the podcast space?
* Kamala as âintersectional dreamâ and âwhere intersectionality goes to dieâ
* âCall Lee Daddyâ
* Sarahâs been pimping Diet Coke for 20 years and got bupkis
* Going viral on Twitter. (Lee does not recommend.)
* Sarah repeatedly refers to âTwitter Filesâ as âWikiLeaksâ (durr)
* That time Nancy and Lee went to IsraelâŠ
* Sarah dives back into Depp/Heard; comes back with new information!
* The possible Pfizer vaccine hold-up of 2020
Plus, Lee recounts âThe Intercept Incident,â why dark money wonât see the light of day any time soon, Lee dispels conspiracy theories about him, and much more!
REMINDER: First Sunday Zoom is this Sunday, April 6, 8pm ET/5pm PT, for paid subscribers only. Weâll send the link day-of.
Watch the video that caused so much trouble for Lee but made him a better journalist. Become a paid subscriber âŠ
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Nancy and Sarah are joined by Aaron Gywn â paragon of good will on Twitter/X (follow at x.com/AmericanGwyn), literature professor, and author of numerous works of fiction, including The Cannibal Owl â to discuss a recent viral story in Compact Magazine, âThe Vanishing White Male Writer.â We talk about shifts in publishing/culture, the trap of identity, and what great literature can do. Since Gwyn is a Cormac McCarthy expert, we also discuss the controversial 2024 Vanity Fair story about McCarthy and his muse, Augusta Britt.
Also discussed:
* The lost Pop Rocks episode
* St. Louis, cool town
* The epic beauty of Larry McMurtryâs Lonesome Dove
* âJonathan Franzen is too much with us.â
* 2014, the cultural swing year
* The Michel Foucault of it all
* âMost of publishing is throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it sticks.â
* Nancy needs to go to therapy
* Aaronâs message for writers: âIf you want something, go get it.â
* âNICE TITSâ
* Love and admiration for fiction writer Phil Klay
* Male writers trying to âreassure the reader that he is the right sort of white man.â
* On not getting over the 2008 death of David Foster Wallace
* Butt-chugging Infinite Jest
* How Ric Ocasek won Paulina Porizkova
* Drakkar Noir makes Sarah horny
* How Aaron reacts when caught in the tractor beam of beauty
* âI contain multi-toolsâ
* Mary Gaitskill, the honey badger of writers
Also, why Aaron cannot get fired up about anything that happened after 1876, how fiction writing is like ventriloquism, why weâre all broken but still deserve love, and much more!
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Donald McNeil Jr., a 45-year New York Times veteran, comes on the pod to talk with Nancy and Sarah about ⊠so much. The prompt was the recent NYT story, âWe Were Badly Misled About the Event That Changed Our Lives.â As the paper of record tries to come correct on Covid, we wanted to hear from the science journalist, one of the first to tell Americans about this strange thing called the coronavirus. A self-declared âcranky old-schoolâ reporter, McNeil landed the story of his career in 2020 and became part of a team that won the Pulitzer. But by 2021, he was gone, amid scandal and speculation. He talks about the bizarre kerfuffle that led to his resignation, mean girl dynamics at the paper, being misled by scientists, and what we do and donât know about Covid-19âs origins.
As McNeil wrote in Wisdom of Plagues, "Covid coarsened us as a nation... The coarsening cracks our national skin. It makes us more vulnerable to infection."
Also discussed:
* Nancy tries not to fangirl. She fangirls anyway.
* âItâs a great newspaper but itâs a second-rate corporation, and its personnel stuff is particularly bad.â
* The walk McNeil took with James Bennet, a year after both getting booted from the Times, is a play weâd like to see
* âLooks like Don nailed it. Letâs not tell him.â (!!!!!!)
* NYT brass on their writing staff: âWidgets made here.â
* Young turks vs. cranky old-timers in union leadership
* The Daily Beast and Gawker do not cover themselves in glory
* "The Western focus on personal liberty above all can kill."
* The Mike Pesca of it all
* The hope that Covid might âunite us with a common enemyâ like WWII. Awww, what happened instead? We turned on each other.
* âEcstasy is a very good drug to get you talkingâ
* McNeil = not a fan of Jay Battacharya
* Thoughts on RFK!
Plus, McNeil explains what âhot-boxâ once meant, where he thinks H5-N1 is going, how cancel culture is like the French Revolution, and much more!
Does McNeil think Covid-19 was engineered in a virology lab or evolved in the wet market? Paid subscribers find out!
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As we mark the fifth (yes, fifth!) anniversary of Covid, Nancy and Sarah look back at the mistakes, the time warp, the lessons. While some of these experiences are collective, some are quite specific, especially in blue states where enforced lockdowns and school closures stretched on longer. Was the misery of that time period a symptom of authoritarianism â or democracy?
Big topic of the day: Ruby Franke, the Mormon mom with a YouTube channel currently serving time in prison for child abuse. A new docu-series on Hulu, Devil in the Family, connects the dots on how she got there. Nancy and Sarah talk toxic fundamentalism, mind control, sexual shaming, child abuse (and how itâs culturally constructed), and the ethics of talking/blogging/profiting from your children. We also watched the Baldwinsâ new reality show, bless our hearts.
Also discussed:
* A crushing piece by a father on how COVID changed his young son
* Hitchhiking!
* The problems of safetyism
* Sarahâs secret petty side
* âSorry I didnât grow up in AppalachiaâŠâ
* JD Vance memes are fun for everyone!
* The ethics of writing/blogging about kids
* How Sarah disappointed Katie Herzog
* The vengeful figure of Jodi Hildebrant, therapist
* Visions of Glory, the controversial Mormon book
* We need to talk about Kevin
* Nancy teaches Sarah the meaning of âMay-Decemberâ romance
* That time Alec Baldwin screamed at his daughter Ireland
* Bad fathers can make good grandfathers
Plus, a new theory on the Manson murders, Steve Kornackiâs secret identity as a Lifetime movie scribe, Senator Bob Kerrey on grace, and more!
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Nancy and Sarah are joined by the Great Mike Pesca, one-time Jeopardy! contestant and host of news podcast The Gist, to talk about dudes and dude-related topics. They discuss menâs-only spaces and whether womenâs workout wear has become hyper-sexualized (and is that a bad thing?). They also break down Gavin Newsomâs podcast debut with his guest, conservative firebrand Charlie Kirk. Good idea? Dangerous idea? Itâs always a good time when Pesca visits the Smoke âEm pod.
Also discussed:
* In this house, we believe in peanut butter
* Booo, Daylight Savings Time
* A Pesca discourse on the copper content of pre- and post-1982 pennies
* Lady Gaga on Saturday Night Live
* High school Sarah had a crush on Mike Myers!
* What Lululemon did to women â and men
* Nancy does not like to see men without their shirts on!
* Curves is the Jenny Craig of gyms
* Why does a man buy a woman a steak?
* Sarah is the whore of Babylon Williamsburg
* Murder podcasts should not be snack food
* The RFK Salon story that had to be retracted
* Why do men dominate the podcast space?
* Theories on Chris Hayes
* Parker Poseyâs Lorazepam accent
* Sadness and horror over Gene Hackmanâs death
Plus, why Sarah said no to Megyn Kelly, the time Pesca thought Lady Gaga was a drag queen, a PSA to take care of your olds, and much more!
Itâs always an hour earlier when you become a paid subscriber.
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âIt was a very bad night for American boobs,â Sarah observed of the 2025 Oscars, where a conspicuous fashion trend has gone mostly unnoticed. Nancy and Sarah are on record for believing boobs are magic, so why did so many gorgeous actresses hide their tractor beams under a bushel? Could it be a sign of fashionâs increasing androgyny⊠or Hollywoodâs increasing irrelevance? Then, Nancy goes on a multi-part rant about the Tate brothers coming back to the U.S., while Sarah ponders how those two became avatars of American manhood. Finally: Body language in the Trump-Vance-Zelenskyy showdown.
Also discussed:
* McDonaldâs serves the worldâs best Diet Coke
* Please donât tell Sarah you appreciate her
* 75% of Eagle Scouts are girls?
* âYour Dune 2 fan is not watching the Oscars.â
* âBoys just want the pretty girl in math class.â
* Is J.D. Vance being cast as the heavy?
* The end of reading?
* Don DeLillo was âa beautiful culmination of the 20th century.â
* Why Sarah shies away from talking politics
* Has news replaced our need to read tragedy?
Plus, Smoke gets a âDear Johnâ letter, the mystery of Gene Hackmanâs death, and much more!
PS: Spare a thought/prayer for Kat Timpf, recently diagnosed with cancer, whose boobs are rightly being used right now only (or mostly!) to feed her newborn son. Love you Kitty Kat, godspeed xx
Actual footage of Sarah watching Oscar dresses on the red carpet âŠ
Oscars fashion fun behind the paywall, only for paid subscribers âŠ
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Eli Lake is not a historian but a âjournalist who loves history.â The former âRe-Education of Eli Lakeâ host and current Free Press contributor comes on Smoke for the second time to discuss his latest pop-history podcast, âWhy Weâre Obsessed with JFK Conspiracies.â As usual, Lake puts his own distinctive spin on a story that may have been told before, yes, but not this way.
First, though, Nancy and Sarah have to talk to Eli about Israel. Eli explains that what happened to the Bibas family has hardened his heart, but heâs trying not to let it radicalize him. We talk morals and ideologies, the horrors of war, and the necessities for civil society.
Also discussed:
* âA rabbit hole the country has never been able to climb out ofâ
* Eli teaches Sarah some Yiddish
* âIf Baruch Goldstein had been Palestinian, theyâd be naming schools after him.â
* Gaza-lago?
* On conspiracy susceptibility: âItâs either, âYouâre a moronâ or, âHow can you be so naive, kid?â And yet we want to believe âŠ
* Eli coins new and helpful word: Mono-cause
* JFK is the âoctopus conspiracyâ
* Even LBJ thought something weird was going on âŠ
* The unspeakable abuses exposed by the Church Committee
* We are a pro-Norman Mailer podcast!
* Nancy says something profound?
* Sarah quotes Timothee Chalamet award speech, nobody cares
* Editorâs note: Hal Ashby directed Harold and Maude
* Second editorâs note: Waylon Jennings sand Dukes of Hazzard theme song
* âWhat happened to normal movies?â
* The Emilia Perez kerfuffle is so 2020
Plus, Eli is such a good guest he brought his own outro (AND wrote Nancy a Sleater-Kinneyesque theme for her new interview series CHEFS TALK), Nancy and Sarah wrassle over what movie wins Best Picture, we imagine a woke Dukes of Hazzard, and much more!
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You might know Meghan McCain from her stints at FOX, The View, SiriusFM, but surely you know her as the daughter of the late Arizona senator John McCain. âNepo baby!â McCain jokes during her podcast introduction, but McCain is much more than that. Sheâs a savvy media fixture who has very strong opinions about, well, everything. Nancy and Sarah like that in a gal! The three of them talk about politics, body image, #MeToo, and the vibe shift that has made conservatives cool for the first time in Meghanâs life.
Also discussed:
* âThe most radical thing Iâve ever done is not dieting.â
* Thoughts on Ozempic
* Megababe for chub rub
* âNobody was cooler than an Obama bro, and my dad tried to stop him.â
* Meghan on her dad: âHe carpied the diem.â
* âThe uptight, HR-department, school-marm dorks are the Democrats?â
* The anchoring sanity of The Fifth Column
* Aziz Ansari and Meghanâs #MeToo breaking point
* The cringe of working for Roger Ailes
* That time the New Yorker claimed Brett Kavanaugh was a gang rapist
* Friends we lost in the culture war âŠ
* Austin: a lost paradise?
* Some love for Mark Halperin
* Immigration and the lack of humanity
* The heartbreak of the Bibas family
* Meghan gives âTexas babe vibesâ
* LETâS GO TO THE RODEO
Plus, Meghan on what happened at Columbia (her alma mater), Nancy has a Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct moment, Sarah doesnât think sheâs a Bad Bitch, and much more!
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âWould you have Elon Muskâs baby?â Sarah texted Nancy the other day, to which she responded, âFuck no.â Thus launches the latest Smoke âEm debate, in which our co-host who is without child confesses sheâd take some of that SpaceX sperm. Has she lost her mind, or is she merely responding to natureâs imperative? We discuss this, as well as Muskâs new babymama, Ashley St. Clair.
Then itâs on to a double-dip from New York Times Magazine: âWhy Gen X Women are Having the Best Sexâ and âHow I Learned That the Problem in My Marriage Was Me.â Is 20th-century licentiousness dead? Has therapy bled too far into the culture?
Also discussed:
* Diet Pepsi > Diet Coke
* âOn accidentâ vs. âby accidentâ?
* Sperm ice cubes at the 7-Eleven
* Milo Yiannopoulos has entered the chat
* Can you make yourself sexy or nah?
* Netchix and flill
* Nancy declares she does not like declarative sentences
* The saddest divorce book
* Why does Nancy get so annoyed when people talk about their sex lives?
* Sarahâs string of younger men
* Moynihanâs not kicking those bikini-clad girls out of bed
* Women have rage problems, too
* Announcement: CHEFS TALK!!!
* âThe thing about Led Zeppelin songs is, none of the names make sense.â
Plus, the speedball of intimacy, the obsession with being obsessed, Nancy gets a crush on Jimmy Page, and much more!
Correction: Listener Mavis wrote: âIn âIphigenia in Forest Hills,â she killed her childâs father, not her daughter!â Absolutely correct! Nancy regrets the error, and for more Janet Malcolm, see this weekâs hot boxes
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This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com
Nancy and Sarah celebrate Valentineâs Day with a civil disagreement on how stupid the holiday actually is. Also: Sex trivia! The conversation ranges from how people can masturbate in an MRI to Super Bowl controversies and the greatness of Janet Malcolm. Also discussed:
* All New Yorkers go to Miami?
* Sarah explains women to Nancy
* Gifts are not meant to be manipulations
* Kanye and AI nonsense
* âSwat-stickerâ (!!!!!)
* Bill Gates on the upside of AI
* The low rattle of unhappiness
* Salmon sperm facials
* Tafv, we want your blood
* Something strange is afoot at the Kinsey Institute
* How often do people over 45 masturbate, and why is that number a lie?
* Orgasms in your sleep
* âHow are you masturbating in an MRI?â
* Taylor Swift booed
* Farewell to the penny!! You served us well.
* Great new Janet Malcolm story by Katie Roiphe
* People vs. the story: A journalism debate!
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This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com
âReady to go ten rounds?â Nancy asked Sarah, when Sarah asked her to watch Emilia PĂ©rez, a Spanish-language musical for which there is no shortage of agitation on both the right and the left. Trans activists hate it, Ben Shapiro called it garbage, Mexican film goers are apparently asking for their money back. And yet, the movie got a whopping 13 Oscar nominations. What gives?
Nancy reluctantly watched Emilia PĂ©rez, and â was completely surprised. Her reaction was, in fact, very similar to Sarahâs. (Thatâs why Sarah wanted her to see it.) Is this wild, unconventional movie a triumph, a âglittering disaster,â a âtrans Mrs. Doubtfireâ? The answer is all of the above.
Also discussed:
* âHappy Monday!â
* Nancy fat-shames the poor widdle groundhog
* New coinage: âWestern Timeâ
* Sarahâs pre-flight soul inventory is arduous
* âThe denial of death shapes most peopleâs lives.â
* âHouse of Straussâ has the best theme music (and, ahem, the best guests)
* General Hospital, remembered
* We hate lecture films
* Why Emilia Perez makes sense as an opera
* Selena Gomez is like watching fourteen cupcakes shimmy around in a dress
* Johanne Sacreblue!
* The Pope version of Survivor
* Kieran Culkan is a bad-ass
Plus, Nancy writes a nice essay, Sarah is up for an award, what the hell is Groundhogâs Day, and much more!
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