Slate Daily Feed

We’re re-running some of our favorite episodes from the past year. This episode originally aired in June 2021. The Las Vegas Raiders’ defensive end, Carl Nassib, came out in an Instagram post back in June, making him the first openly gay active player in NFL histroy. The league immediately posted in celebration of Nassib’s announcement. But given the NFL’s sorry history of standing by players on t...

After the largest civil disturbance in American history, Los Angeles faced a daunting task. Dozens of people had been killed and thousands injured. The city had sustained more than a billion dollars in property damage. And the riots had exposed that much of the population faced grinding poverty and hostile policing. Los Angeles would need to be rebuilt in more ways than one. The question was, what...

We’re re-running some of our favorite episodes from the past year. This episode originally aired in October 2021. Colin Powell, known as a “trailblazer” and “pathbreaker” in his military career, leaves behind a complicated legacy. The four-star general became a household name during the first Gulf War as the first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and later the first Black secretary of s...

Josh Levin and Joel Anderson are joined by ESPN’s Kevin Arnovitz to talk about Christmas Day in the NBA. Washington Post health reporter Dan Diamond also joins to discuss the past, present, and future of COVID in sports. Finally, Josh, Joel, and Stefan Fatsis interview Mitchell S. Jackson about his award-winning story on Ahmaud Arbery and running while Black.   NBA (3:37):  How did the Warriors an...

We’re re-running some of our favorite episodes from the past year. This episode originally aired in September 2021. Who are the people seeking a religious exemption to the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate? What are their religious claims? And how do workplaces decide who has a real claim to belief versus a convenient letter from a pastor-for-hire?  Guest:  Ruth Graham , reporter for The New...

Martha Stewart loves to tell people on Instagram about the products she likes, but these posts look suspiciously like ads. On today’s episode, Madison and Rachelle scroll through Martha’s feed to look at all the things she raves about, talk about why she might be breaking the rules, and discuss how the social media advertising guidelines are much more flexible than we realize. Podcast production b...

This week, Felix Salmon, Emily Peck and Stacy-Marie Ishmael talk all about retirement with  Teresa Ghilarducci , retirement expert and professor at the New School for Social Research. They dig into what’s wrong with the retirement system and who is currently benefiting from its brokenness, how people can get the most out of retirement investments and the role gender plays in retirement planning. ...

This episode originally aired in September. In the U.S., the PCR test is the gold standard for COVID testing. Common knowledge would have it that the test is more accurate—and therefore more effective at containing the spread of the disease—than the rapid antigen test.  What if that isn’t quite true?  Guest: Michael Mina , assistant professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Publ...

This episode originally aired in September. In the U.S., the PCR test is the gold standard for COVID testing. Common knowledge would have it that the test is more accurate—and therefore more effective at containing the spread of the disease—than the rapid antigen test.  What if that isn’t quite true?  Guest: Michael Mina , assistant professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Publ...

We’re re-running some of our favorite episodes from the past year. This episode originally aired in July 2021. Brittany Hogan worked in diversity and inclusion for the Rockwood School District for eight years. As public debate intensified over the way race is discussed in schools and threats were made against her, Hogan eventually was pushed to resign. Guest: Brittany Hogan , former director of ed...

On this week’s episode: Elizabeth, Jamilah, and Zak advise a mom who is feeling hurt that her mother-in-law has swooped in and taken over traditional “mom moments” behind her back. Is there a way to politely tell her that she needs to stay in her own lane? Then the hosts share the most useful piece of advice they received this year. In Slate Plus, they play a round of holiday hot takes which inclu...

Custer's Revenge is widely considered one of the worst video games ever made. Originally released as part of a series of Swedish Erotica-branded adult games for the Atari 2600, Custer's Revenge involves moving a pixelated General Custer across the screen to rape an Indigenous woman tied to a post. It's unfathomably racist, sexist, and un-fun to play. Today on Decoder Ring we tell the story of how...

Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson and David Plotz discuss the future of the Democratic party's agenda, Omicron's spread across the United States and they're joined by investigative journalist Azmat Khan to talk about the deaths of civilians overseas and the lack of accuracy from the U.S. military. Give the gift of Plus to a fellow Slate fan and they’ll receive all the benefits of membership: unlimited...

Christina and Bryan discuss the finer points of new queer Christmas movies—like, how realistic is Netflix’s Single All The Way ?—and why that harness joke in Lifetime’s Under The Christmas Tree was so jarring. We’re also joined by some special guests who share Prides and Provocations from the past year and explore Premonitions for 2022. We close the year with bell hooks and trans triumphs in the G...

I share some of the advice, tools, movies, and TV shows that I savored in 2021. Looking for The Favorites File from Kendra Adachi? Find it here  at The Lazy Genius Collective.  If you're thinking about year-end giving, please consider donating to Death, Sex & Money. You'll be supporting the work we do here at the show, and the community we're building together. Donate now at  deathsexmoney.org...

Neopets, a kid-friendly site from the early 2000s that let users raise digital pets and play games with them, has fallen far from its peak popularity. The nostalgic luster of it also seems to be fading, following the site’s recent failed attempt at Neopet NFTs—not to mention its years-old, mostly broken user interface. On today’s show, Madison and Allegra look back at the happier times of Neopia p...

We’re re-running some of our favorite episodes from the past year. This episode originally aired in May 2021. A year after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, residents near the intersection of 38th Street and Chicago Avenue—now dubbed George Floyd Square—continue to keep the area closed off. The city wants to reopen the intersection, but activists say they aren’t giving in until the commun...

This week, the panel discusses Aaron Sorkin’s Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz biopic, Being the Ricardos . Next, the panel is joined by contributing writer for the New York Times, Jody Rosen, to make sense of Bruce Springsteen’s latest deal and the confusing world of music rights today. Finally, the panel is joined by Slate’s book critic Laura Miller to discuss her list of the best books ( and audiobo...

On April 29, 1992, Los Angeles had erupted into chaos. Over the following days, thousands of people took to the streets. Some were unleashing their anger at the police and the justice system. Some were driven by frustration at living in poverty in one of the world’s richest cities. And some just saw a chance to plunder while law enforcement was scrambling. This is what happened next.  Want more Sl...

In the last few years, New York City’s delivery workers have become a key part of the food industry’s infrastructure, allowing restaurants to do business with customers who are too stressed to leave their desks, or too cautious to leave their homes. But a spate of violent attacks and bike thefts has shown that the people delivering your Grubhub and Seamless orders are deeply vulnerable. Why are th...

Stefan Fatsis, Josh Levin, and Slate’s Ben Mathis-Lilley talk about COVID running rampant through every sports league, again. Next, they discuss the end of Urban Meyer’s very brief career as an NFL coach. Finally, Joshua Neuman joins Stefan and Josh for a conversation about Kenny Washington, who broke the NFL’s color barrier a year before Jackie Robinson broke Major League Baseball’s.   COVID (3:1...

What does a massing of Russian troops on the Ukrainian border mean? And could this conflict be defused yet by diplomacy? Guest: Slate’s Fred Kaplan , author of The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War .  If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slo...

This past week, Nancy Reagan trended for her alleged oral talents, and an orange cat named Jorts kept locking himself in a closet. On today’s episode, High Speed Downloads are back. Rachelle and Madison each deliver some rapid-fire information about Nancy Reagan’s blow job skills and why everyone is obsessed with Jorts the cat—and the woman who keeps slathering him in margarine. Then they speak to...

This week, Felix Salmon, Emily Peck and Stacy-Marie Ishmael talk about the psychic weight of another COVID wave and what it means for the economy, the environmental and employee problems with fast fashion, and what to expect now that Reddit is going public. In the Plus segment: The Block vs Block fight. Mentioned In the show:  “ ’I Was Wrong’: Omicron Wrecks CEOs’ Plans for Office Return ” by Jenn...

Almost a year later, are we seeing signs of some sort of accountability for the Jan. 6 insurrection? And why is that accountability so important and yet so hard to achieve? Dahlia Lithwick is joined by  Walter Shaub , former director of the Office of Government Ethics, Shaub currently leads the Project on Government Oversight’s ethics initiative.  Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Hosted on A...