The Gist

On the Gist, red-string theories and conspiratorial last-ditch efforts. In the interview, Mike and Slate's national correspondent Will Saletan recap the final presidential debate. They discuss the Trump camp's thwarted strategy of practicing restraint to expose Biden, the self-congratulatory and attacking exchanges between the two candidates, and why this debate might only make a difference for Tr...

On the Gist, our civic obligations in 2020. In the interview, Mike talks with journalist and veteran broadcast anchor Dan Rather about his decades-long career in covering elections, highlighting a few cautionary tales learned from the 2000 race between George W. Bush and Al Gore. Rather explains that for some major networks, making the right call in 2000 was marred by corporate interference in the...

On the Gist, Mike checks in with this Lawfare piece, and the U.S. Elections Project . In the interview, Mike talks with Brian Rosenwald , a media historian and fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, about how election night might play out. They discuss the idea of a red mirage, how Republican governors can bring order to things, and how far-right talk radio is going to digest the results. Rosen...

On the Gist, network news election branding. In the interview, Mike talks with Julie Pace , Washington Bureau Chief for the Associated Press , about the AP's history in counting the vote since 1848, how they've traditionally declared winners, and an explanation on how they will be going above and beyond in 2020 in sharing the race calls that they are and aren't making. In the spiel, local politica...

On the Gist, we're launching a week-long focus on election night and how different news organizations handle making the winning calls. In the interviews, Mike talks with NBC News' national political correspondent Steve Kornacki about his network's decision desk, their processes in tabulation, and how they will be closely monitoring the votes coming in days after Tuesday, November 3. Kornacki is th...

On the Gist, the price of corn. In the interview, former senior strategist for the NRA Joshua L. Powell is back for the second half of his conversation with Mike. They run down a series of NRA opinions and he and Mike go back and forth about how much NRA members believe things like "the only solution to a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun," and whether we should own AR-15s. Powell's book...

On the Gist, David Ruffin. In the interview, former senior strategist for the NRA Joshua L. Powell is here to discuss his new book, Inside the NRA: A Tell-All Account of Corruption, Greed, and Paranoia within the Most Powerful Political Group in America . During the first half of this two-part conversation, he and Mike talk about the nefarious ways Wayne LaPierre used the NRA to push forward polar...

On the Gist, an Alaskan drama. In the interview, Mike talks with Robert Cahaly, head pollster of the Atlanta-based Trafalgar Group . Cahaly explains their polling methodology in gathering accurate opinion data, why social desirability bias comes into play, and how his team was able to predict Trump's win in 2016. Now he posits that in 2020 Trump has more support than the polls could be showing. In...

On the Gist, uniting with your would-be kidnappers? In the interview, Mike talks to former Obama staffer Elliot Williams about his new podcast Made to Fail , a show where he explores the different ways governmental institutions across have been made intentionally dysfunctional, like the Florida unemployment system, and the impact it has on people in need of such infrastructure. All episodes of Mad...

On the Gist, mishegoss in Michigan. In the interview, Mike talks with Stephen Dubner, host and co-author of Freakonomics , and Angela Duckworth, a psychologist and best-selling author of Grit . Dubner and Duckworth are the hosts of the new podcast No Stupid Questions , where in each episode they take turns posing a question, and give each other the chance to puzzle out their responses. The questio...

On the Gist, the vice presidential debate and expanding SCOTUS. In the interview, Mike is joined by author, comedian, podcast host, and actor Michael Ian Black to talk about his latest book, A Better Man: A (Mostly Serious) Letter to My Son . Black was persuaded to write the book after publishing a New York Times op-ed on school shootings and gun control in 2018. Part advice and part memoir, A Bet...

On the Gist, a vice presidential debate starring plexiglass. In the interview, Mike hosts a roundtable discussion with journalist Richard Kreitner and Vox's Matthew Yglesias to talk about how each of their new books address the problem of an ever-increasing American population. They debate if the U.S. should split into more manageable nations, or if the country should keep pushing population growt...

On the Gist, a buffet of bad takes from Joe Piscopo. In the interview, CNN chief legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin is here to discuss a topic the Gist can't seem to get enough of recently, the Mueller investigation. Toobin's new book, True Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Investigation of Donald Trump , explores the investigation and analyzes its failures, and he talks with Mike about Mueller's misplaced t...

On the Gist, Trump's doctor has reasons. In the interview, former FBI agent Peter Strzok is here to discuss his new book Compromised: Counterintelligence and the Threat of Donald J. Trump . He and Mike discuss the investigation into Trump and Russia, the ways kompromat could push Trump to make decisions based on Russian interests, and how Trump vilified two federal agents over personal text messag...

On the Gist, Trump's mask strategy. In the interview, Mike is joined by David Priess , COO of the Lawfare Institute, an organization and online magazine which focuses on national security issues. Priess posits some worst case scenarios in light of President Trump contracting Covid-19, the unexpected vulnerabilities and uncertainties that lay ahead, historical norms of disclosure for a president ,...

On the Gist, Trump's falsehoods. In the interview, Mikes talks with neuroscientist, Stanford University professor and best-selling author, David Eagleman, about his latest book Livewired: The Inside Story of the Ever-Changing Brain . Eagleman says that the way the brain is able to change and adapt to adversity is still inspiring new developments and new questions. In the spiel, making a political...

On the Gist, there were a great many missteps last night on the presidential debate stage, but despite the rhetorical slips, Biden stayed on his feet to glide past Trump. In the interview, Mike and Slate's national correspondent, Will Saletan , recap the first presidential debate. They dissect the prep and implemented strategies of both the Trump and Biden camps, the gratuitous exchanges between t...

On the Gist, using poker logic to analogize the upcoming presidential debates with Annie Duke. She is a former professional poker player, cognitive scientist and author of the forthcoming How to Decide: Simple Tools for Making Better Choices . In the interview, Mike passes the baton to Annie Duke once more to dig into gerrymandering. Duke talks with Moon Duchin , a mathematician and professor at T...

On the Gist, the attack on the Knights of Columbus. In the interview, Mike talks with Philippe I. Reines , political consultant, longtime aid and former staffer of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. In light of the upcoming presidential debates between Trump and Biden, Reines details his debate preparation in 2016, shares some possible strategies that the Biden camp may be using to pr...

On the Gist, a Twitter bug. In the interview, actor Jeff Daniels and writer Billy Ray are here to discuss the new two-night mini-series The Comey Rule on Showtime. The mini-series focuses on the story James Comey in the fall of 2016, and even though both Daniels and Ray had certain perceptions of how poorly James Comey handled it all, working on this project really revealed the humanity and strugg...

On the Gist, Kelly Loeffler and Atilla the Hun. In the interview, Jonathan V. Last, editor of The Bulwark , talks with Mike about his recent piece which forecasts that after the passing of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, America is moving one step closer to another political crisis. Last walks through some of the nightmare scenarios, particularly on the probability that a conservative justice is appointed, c...

On the Gist, Trump sounds braggadocious. In the interview, it's the second half of Mike's conversation with CNN's Brian Stelter . They discuss why Fox News is losing advertisers, and why executives at the organization continue to stand by their talent, and Mike questions whether news anchors have given up their objectivity with lengthy monologues about the state of democracy under Trump. Stelter's...

On the Gist, nothing is reasonable anymore. In the interview, CNN's Brian Stelter is here to discuss his new book Hoax: Donald Trump, Fox News, and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth . In the first half of his two-part interview, Stelter talks about the ways Fox changed after Roger Ailes' exit in 2016, increasingly abandoning its news coverage in favor of polarizing commentary, and how the cycle of...

On the Gist, the pursuit of power through SCOTUS. In the interview, Mike talks with radio presenter and author, Eric Weiner about his latest book The Socrates Express: In Search of Life Lessons from Dead Philosophers . In it, Weiner opines on the philosophical giants from a place that offers one of the more pleasant environments to philosophize - the railroad. In this travelogue, Weiner discusses...

Emily Bazelon joins Mike for a special episode on the passing of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. After discussing Ginsburg's history as a justice and legacy on the court, they begin to unpack the future political ramifications of her death. Emily and Mike talk through the ways a nomination could quickly slip through the Senate before January, the impact a conservative court could have on issues besid...