The Commentary Magazine Podcast

Today's special holiday podcast provides you with our list of the shows we liked the best on streaming and broadcast in 2024. Give a listen!   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On our last news podcast of the year, we take up the Wall Street Journal story delineating the facts of the Biden cognitive cover-up, which now, it appears, dates back as far as 2020. Aside from the governing crisis the refusal of his cabinet and vice president created by failing to intervene as the Constitution requires, the Biden story also highlights the collapse of liberals and liberal institutions and the loss of legitimacy their behavior over the past four years has engendered. How? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's podcast explores the existential pit in which House speaker Mike Johnson finds himself and whether there's any way out. Also, Israel continues to fight the fight for Western civilization while others scoff and belittle. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Should Donald Trump be paying as much attention to dealing with the problems he actually resolved by winning the election, like his beef with Liz Cheney and the Des Moines Register poll? On the other hand, what if one of the witnesses who testified before the January 6 committee was encouraged to change a story she had already told under oath? Also, how on earth does Mike Johnson get out of his "we gotta pay for the government somehow" pickle? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's podcast notes the extraordinarily different tone and approach taken by Donald Trump in his first press conference as president-elect and what it might tell us about the kind of presidency we might be seeing. And what on earth was going on at the White House Hanukkah party? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's podcast examines the ramifications and emanations and penumbra arising from ABC's stunning decision to settle with Donald Trump after George Stephanopoulos wrongly said he had been found guilty of rape. What does this say about the mainstream media, and how does it connect to the drone story? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What on earth is going on in the skies over New Jersey and why is it so hard to trust the authorities when they tell us there's nothing to worry about? And what on earth is happening with the pardons and clemencies now numbering well over 1,000 from the exiting Biden administration? Give a listen. Also, if you have questions you want us to answer on an upcoming podcast, email us at podcast@commentary.org. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today we discuss Christopher Wray's announcement that he will step down as FBI director and what it means for Trump. How has Pete Hegseth managed to keep his rocky nomination on track (and how much help did he get from his critics in the press)? Also, the hostage deal currently in the works seems to refute the entire Biden approach to Israel's war with Hamas. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's podcast examines the case of Luigi Mangione, the alleged shooter of the health-care executive, and the reasons why some people seem determined to lionize him and take on his cause—one of the most potentially dangerous moments in recent history. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Schanzer joins the podcast to talk about the fall of the Assad regime and why it's not purely good news. What happens next? Is Iran done? And, if it is, does Israel (and maybe even the U.S.) finish off the regime? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's podcast begins with the shocking moment yesterday when Joe Biden spoke of the American hostage in Syria, Austin Tice, and then, 30 seconds later, entirely forgot who Austin Tice was. There are 42 days until the election; isn't there a single responsible person in the Cabinet of the United States willing to organize a 25th Amendment letter temporarily removing him from the chain of command at this epochal moment in world affairs, with Syria having fallen? And a surprising Trump interview. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today we marvel at the liberal habit of protecting democracy with...banana republicanism. Fearing Donald Trump's revenge, the Biden administration is mulling preemptive pardons, and legacy media is normalizing the idea. Plus, we get into the blurring of mainstream and alternative media and why the left can never have a Joe Rogan. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We discuss the astonishing oral arguments yesterday in the Supreme Court about trans medicine and laws to restrict it before turning to the equally astonishing Biden-should-preemptively-pardon-everybody argument that's racing around Washington like the bubonic plague. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today we examine the failed attempt to impose martial law in South Korea and the coming collapse of the French government and ask why it is so many American intellectuals continue to claim we are living through a constitutional crisis when...we're really, really not. Also: trans surgeries before the Supreme Court, and the Defense Secretary kerfuffle continues. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's not going well for Joe Biden in the wake of the sweeping pardon he granted his son. Democrats are discomfited, Karine Jean-Pierre is at a loss, and mainstream media is despondent. Donald Trump, on the other hand, seems to be enjoying a honeymoon. We contrast his bold statement demanding the release of Hamas's hostages with the Biden approach. And we also delve a bit into what's happening in Ukraine. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today John is under the weather, so the rest of us take on Joe Biden's broad pardon of his son Hunter, what it says about the Biden presidency, and how it complements Donald Trump's pick of Kash Patel for director of the FBI. What do we think of Patel? What do we think of Trump's picking his daughter's father-in-law to be a senior adviser on the Middle East? And, finally, how's the Hezbollah ceasefire holding up and what can we learn from the reignited civil war in Syria? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We try to make sense out of Israel's participation in the ceasefire that began today—and which Hezbollah may already have violated. Did Israel actually want this because it needed time to recover its strength? Or did it have to agree because it needed weapons from the United States that were being withheld? Oh, and what on earth was with that weird Kamala Harris video in which she appeared to be, shall we say, not entirely sober? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

According to Israel, it is agreeing to a ceasefire with Hezbollah in large measure to stave off an American assault in the UN on Israel's efforts in Lebanon. We discuss what this reminds us of, why it's outrageous if indeed this is the case, and whether Israel can find a way to benefit from the pause. Also, hijinks with tariffs and fights on the patio at Mar-A-Lago! Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's podcast begins with the horrible murder of a Hasidic emissary in the UAE and the growing institutional anti-Semitism in Canada before moving on to the very interesting political dynamic emerging from the Trump picks for Cabinet and other jobs—a post-conservative-movement ideological and policy free-for-all whose winners and losers will help define the Republican Party for the rest of the century. Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today we talk about AG pick Pam Bondi and why we should take the Trump transition seriously. Then we look back on the Kamala Harris campaign and wonder, What the heck was that? Give a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices