The Fairfax Files

A country this size has never won a World Cup. Marc Edelman says the reason starts with who can afford to play.New episode out now. Michael J. Hershman sits down with Marc Edelman, nationally recognized sports law scholar, attorney and commentator, for a conversation about who really controls American sport and who pays for it.Inside this one: whether political controversy had anything to do with the United States losing to Belgium; how the Ted Stevens Act of 1978 handed a single association quasi government power over Olympic and World Cup sport, whatever the official line about politics and sport being separate; why smaller soccer nations like Norway and Cape Verde keep producing players the United States does not, and what early specialization and a pay to play youth system do to the kids who cannot afford the travel team; how non revenue college sport quietly became a second admissions route into elite schools; and the point where Hershman and Edelman openly disagree, which is Name, Image and Likeness, defended here as a correction to a system Edelman calls an antitrust violating cartel.They also get into the commercialization that has taken the fun out of youth sport, what free agency did and did not do to fan loyalty, and close on a wager about which arrives first, a World Cup for the United States or another title for the Washington Nationals.🎧 EP8 of The Fairfax Files Podcast - "Pay to Play: Politics, Money, and the Business of American Sports" - host Michael J. Hershman in conversation with Marc Edelman (nationally recognized sports law scholar, attorney and commentator).Chapters:0:00 The World Cup, politics, and the US team3:11 Where government and international sports intersect6:59 Why US men's soccer trails smaller nations9:29 Pay to play youth sports and unequal access13:30 Commercialization, parental pressure, and lost fun16:59 NIL, college sports, and the antitrust case21:45 Transfers, fan loyalty, and financial guardrails27:31 Free agency and the myth of declining fan interest30:43 Sports as a social outlet and universal language33:50 FIFA corruption and the limits of self-governance38:30 Transparency, independent oversight, and reform#MarcEdelman #MichaelHershman #SportsLaw #TheFairfaxFiles #NewEpisode

Crypto promised money that needs no trust. Ben McKenzie thinks that promise is the con. New episode out now. Michael J. Hershman sits down with Ben McKenzie, actor turned author, known for The O.C., Southland and Gotham, and now one of crypto's best known skeptics, for a conversation about fraud, money and what happens to a country that stops trusting its own institutions. Inside this one: why an economics graduate watching crypto ads around live sport in 2021 decided he had a duty to warn people, and what it felt like to be proved right in 2022; what he learned interviewing Sam Bankman Fried and Alex Mashinsky before both went to prison, and why he thinks most frauds start with one small lie rather than a plan; how Trump coin worked, and why the family reportedly cleared 1.4 billion dollars while investors lost multiples of that; the 42 percent of young men who have bought crypto and the advertising that put them there; and why he argues money cannot be trustless, because trust is the only thing money has ever been. He also makes the case that the 40 trillion dollar national debt and the crypto boom are the same problem wearing different clothes, and that neither gets fixed until the system looks fair enough to believe in. 🎧 EP7 of The Fairfax Files Podcast - "Crypto, Con Men, and the Golden Age of Fraud" - host Michael J. Hershman in conversation with Ben McKenzie (actor turned author, known for The O.C., Southland and Gotham, and now one of crypto's best known skeptics). ▶️ Watch the full episode: https://youtu.be/YYB2hHaZU3Y #BenMcKenzie #MichaelHershman #Crypto #TheFairfaxFiles #NewEpisode

"She spent 12 years inside the rooms where America decides who to sanction and who to fight. She is not sentimental about any of it.New episode out now. Michael J. Hershman sits down with Hagar Chemali, former spokesperson for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, former Treasury and White House official and host of Oh My World, for a conversation about power, extremism, influence and accountability across the Middle East.Inside this one: why she thinks there is no lasting peace with Iran while the regime survives, and why she still has hope for the country behind it; how October 7 became, in her words, the biggest strategic mistake Iran and Hamas could have made, and why more countries are quietly exploring peace with Israel because of it; what she saw of Hamas treating its own people as weapons in an information war; the countries outspending Israel on influence in Washington and the parts of that spending that never look like lobbying; the new Lebanon Israel Peace Alliance she co-founded and the first signed agreement between the two countries in over 40 years; and why she believes the UN needs to be burned to the ground and rebuilt.She also tells Hershman what actually differs between the Bush and Obama administrations she served in, and what her Columbia graduate students are telling her about a generation walking away from patriotism.🎧 EP6 of The Fairfax Files Podcast - ""Power, Propaganda, and a Reshaped Middle East"" - host Michael J. Hershman in conversation with Hagar Chemali (former spokesperson for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, former Treasury and White House official and host of Oh My World).#HagarChemali #MichaelHershman #MiddleEast #TheFairfaxFiles #NewEpisode"

He was the man who made problems disappear. Then he became the man who brought the secrets into the light.New episode out now. Michael J. Hershman sits down with Michael Cohen, Donald Trump's former personal attorney and fixer, who testified before Congress, cooperated with federal prosecutors and served time in federal prison, for a conversation about loyalty, power, and what all of it actually cost.Inside this one: what a fixer really does and where the line sits, the 2011 newspaper poll and the ShouldTrumpRun.com experiment that helped set a presidential campaign in motion, how the National Enquirer story about Ted Cruz's father came to be and why the tactic was so hard to fight, why Cohen says he would accept a pardon and what a felony record costs in ordinary daily life, and what genuinely frightens him now about political chaos at both extremes and a generation walking away from patriotism.Nobody can say he doesn't know what happens behind closed doors in American politics and power.🎧 EP5 of The Fairfax Files Podcast - "The Fixer: Inside Loyalty, Power, and Prison" - host Michael J. Hershman in conversation with Michael Cohen (Donald Trump's former personal attorney and fixer, congressional witness, bestselling author and podcast host).▶️ Watch the full episode: https://youtu.be/dtDTdUDaNUU#MichaelCohen #MichaelHershman #Trump #TheFairfaxFiles #NewEpisode"

Michael J. Hershman sits down with Brittany Kaiser, the human rights lawyer turned Cambridge Analytica whistleblower turned tech CEO, to trace her journey from the Obama campaign's pioneering use of social media data to the moment she decided to testify before Parliament and cooperate with dozens of government investigations - a story later told in her bestselling book "Targeted" and the Netflix documentary "The Great Hack."Inside this one: how sitting next to Facebook's co-founder on the Obama campaign showed her data could reshape elections, why she believes you should own your data like property and put it on the balance sheet, the coordinated disinformation campaign she says is really behind the AI data center backlash, how algorithm-driven outrage is radicalizing people to the point they feel justified in political violence, and her best advice for parents on protecting kids from AI and social media. It's a deep dive into who owns our information and what it will take to build an internet worth handing to the next generation.