

The Nation Podcasts
The Nation Magazine
Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Oct 20, 2025 • 23min
Trump’s Theory of Politics w/ Kim Phillips-Fein | The Nation Podcast
"Are Trump and Trumpism best understood as the consolidation of an elite economic program, as a nostalgia-laced brew of prejudice and rage, or as a coherent, forceful new style of authoritarian rule—and if it’s the latter, why is this happening now?" That's the question that historian and Columbia professor Kim Phillips-Fein asks in her latest piece for The Nation, which you can read in our November issue.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 19, 2025 • 39min
The Political Consequences of Gaza w/ Yousef Munayyer | The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer
The fragile ceasefire negotiated between Israel and Hamas hasn’t ended the violence, but it hasfor now lessened it. But even if the ceasefire holds, the need for a political solution toPalestinian dispossession remains. To discuss the issue of accountability, I spoke to YousefMunayyer, who is the head of the Palestine/Israel Program and Senior Fellow at Arab CenterWashington DC. We talked about how the shocking events of the last two years have shiftedglobal public opinion, including in the United States. Both parties are heading towards a long-delayed debate about the value of the US/Israel relation.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 18, 2025 • 31min
The Water Remembers with Amy Bowers Cordalis | A People's Climate
For the first time in over a century, the Klamath River flows free again—thanks to the vision, courage, and determination of the Yurok Tribe. In this episode of A People’s Climate, Shilpi Chhotray talks with Amy Bowers Cordalis, a member of the Yurok Tribe and leader in the largest dam removal project in U.S. history. From devastating fish kills and lost salmon runs to confronting corporations and navigating the law, Amy shares a story of environmental restoration, Indigenous sovereignty, and the power of nature-based solutions. This is a story of rivers, resistance, and the multi-layered fight—legal, political, and cultural—to heal the land and its people.Learn more at apeoplesclimate.org Resources:- “The Water Remembers” by Amy Bowers Cordalis (Bookshop) (Amazon)- Yurok Tribe Celebrates 50-year Anniversary of Mattz v. ArnettPresented by Counterstream Media and The NationPowered by Wildseeds FundAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 17, 2025 • 1h 3min
Gaza Ceasefire, CIA in Venezuela, Madagascar Coup w/ Nathaniel Powell | American Prestige
Lead might be in our protein supplements, but Danny and Derek bring you the news free of most heavy metals. This week: the ceasefire in Gaza begins with prisoner exchanges (1:38), but controversy arises over deceased captives (5:30), plus Israeli violations and Hamas clashes with armed factions (9:35), and a summit in Sharm El Sheikh (14:36); a United Nations report shows a record-breaking spike in atmospheric carbon levels and growing evidence that natural feedback loops are worsening climate collapse (17:14); border clashes escalate between Afghanistan and Pakistan following a failed Pakistani airstrike on a Taliban leader (19:39); Japan’s ruling coalition collapses after Komeito breaks with the LDP (23:06); Nathaniel Powell joins Derek to break down the military coup in Madagascar sparked by Gen Z-led protests and a mutiny within the elite CAPSAT unit (25:16); in France, Macron re-appoints PM Lecornu and the government survives no-confidence votes (45:04); Peruvian president Dina Boluarte is impeached amid corruption scandals and rising crime (48:59); Trump authorizes CIA covert action inside Venezuela and bombs another boat in the Caribbean (50:35); the U.S.-China trade war re-escalates as Beijing restricts rare earth exports and Trump responds with tariff threats and diplomatic chaos (54:27); and finally, Trump’s bid for the Nobel Peace Prize fails while the winner dedicates her win to him (59:04).Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 16, 2025 • 55min
Smart Glasses Are Ushering In An Anti-Social World w/ Chris Gilliard | Tech Won't Save Us
Paris Marx is joined by Chris Gilliard to discuss how tech CEOs are pushing a new generation of AI-powered smart glasses by promising they’ll be stylish and indispensable to workers in a desperate attempt to convince us we should want their luxury surveillance gadgets.Chris Gilliard is the co-director of the Critical Internet Studies Institute and is working on a book called Luxury Surveillance.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 15, 2025 • 35min
No Kings Day: “It’s Gonna be Fun,” plus “One Battle After Another” | Start Making Sense
Saturday is the second No Kings Day – it should be the biggest single day of protest in American history, with more than 2,500 events planned. Leah Greenberg will explain the preparations – she’s co-founder of Indivisible, the group that called the first No Kings day, June 14 – five million people participated in that one, held the same day as Trump’s birthday parade – the one no one came to.Also: there’s “a forthrightly antifascist film” that critics call “wild and thrilling” -- of course, that’s “One Battle After Another,” the Paul Thomas Anderson movie starring Leonardo di Caprio as a burnt out left wing bomber, targeted by an ICE captain played by Sean Penn. John Powers will comment—he’s critic at large on Fresh Air with Terry Gross.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 14, 2025 • 1h 27min
American Sociocide w/ Charles Derber | American Prestige
Danny and Derek speak with sociologist Charles Derber about how American society is tearing itself apart, as explored in his book Bonfire: American Sociocide, Broken Relations, and the Quest for Democracy. They discuss the decline of civic trust, the rise of atomized “me” culture, the tech-driven Gilded Age, neoliberalism and loneliness, Silicon Valley’s alliance with the national security state, how a country built on expansion and individualism turned those forces inward, and what, if anything, can stop us from destroying the relationships that hold this society together.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 13, 2025 • 50min
Revolutionary Violence and One Battle After Another w/ David Klion | The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer
Few movies have ever been as timely as Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest film One Battle AfterAnother, which traces the battle between revolutionary resistance groups trying to protectimmigrants and an authoritarian government run by racists. There are scenes from the moviethat feel like they are being played out right now on the streets of Chicago, Los Angeles andPortland. Although it presents a stylized version of reality, the film raises important questionsabout different strategies of resistance. David Klion, a frequent guest, wrote about the moviefor The New Republic. David and I talked about the film, its roots in actual history but alsovariance with that history as well as its relationship with the Thomas Pynchon novel Vineland.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 11, 2025 • 29min
It’s Never A Strategy To Remain Quiet with Nick Tilsen | A People's Climate
What does true climate justice look like when it’s rooted in sovereignty, resistance, and liberation? In this powerful episode of A People’s Climate, Shilpi Chhotray sits down with Nick Tilsen—Oglala Lakota land defender and CEO of NDN Collective—to unpack the meaning of LandBack, the historic fight for the Black Hills, the release of political prisoner Leonard Peltier, and the deep ties between Indigenous struggles and Palestinian resistance. From direct action at Mount Rushmore to building legal strategies against unjust laws, this conversation is a call for big, bad bold courage.Learn more at apeoplesclimate.org Resources:- NDN Collective- Nick Tilsen’s Podcast: LandBack for The People- LandBack- The Fallout From The Greenpeace Verdict (The Nation)Presented by Counterstream Media and The NationPowered by Wildseeds FundAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Oct 10, 2025 • 39min
Venezuela-US Escalation, Myanmar Airstrike, France’s Political Crisis | American Prestige
Yes, we will be releasing 25 subtle variations of this news roundup in order to catapult ourselves to the top of the podcast charts, and no, we are not sorry. This week: a ceasefire agreement was reached for Gaza, but there was too much information for us to cover in the news, so please check out our special here. Syria’s interim government handpicks a new “parliament” under tight presidential control (1:01); Iran debates moving its capital from Tehran as drought and other ecological issues worsen (3:24); Myanmar’s junta carries out a deadly airstrike on civilians celebrating a Buddhist festival (6:32); Japan’s ruling LDP turns to hard-right Takahichi to become Japan’s first female prime minister (9:03); Sudan’s RSF shells Al-Fashir’s last functioning hospital amid a deepening siege (12:22); Ethiopia accuses Eritrea and the TPLF of funding militias in the Amhara region, raising fears of another war (14:23); Rwanda-DRC peace efforts stall over mineral deals and a lingering occupation (17:31); Trump muses on sending Tomahawks to Ukraine while cutting a drone-tech swap with Kyiv (20:05); another French prime minister resigns (24:24); the U.S. sinks another “narco-boat” of the coast of Venezuela, then cuts diplomatic ties with Maduro (28:27), and moves to expand the president’s war powers at home and abroad (32:54; and Donald Trump flirts with invoking the 1807 Insurrection Act (35:14). Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy