Fever Dreams

On this episode of FEVER DREAMS, hosts Will Sommer and Asawin Suebsaeng discuss the ongoing war for consumers that’s raging between two MAGA-style coffee companies, with one of the companies landing in hot water with its fans for trashing the Proud Boys. “I love how Black Rifle Coffee is his perfect little metaphor for what has happened to the Republican Party over the past four years,” Suebsaeng said. Elsewhere on the episode, Suebsaeng and Sommer welcome actor, comedian, and Conan O’Brien sidekick Andy Richter, who dishes on his philosophy on late-night comedy and politics—and how eye-rollingly lame it was that one time Donald Trump actually dropped a condom right in front of him and Conan. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Outlandish sunglasses company Pit Viper has a problem: white nationalists love them. This week, Fever Dreams hosts Will Sommer and Asawin Suebsaeng talk about Pit Viper’s attempts to push back on their alt right fanbase, after the reflective shades popped up during the Capitol riot. Salon reporter Zach Petrizzo talks his appearance at CPAC Texas, where the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys were out in full force and Rep. Matt Gaetz had to throw a party all his own. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 1978, an American neo-Nazi published The Turner Diaries, an infamous race-war novel that went on to inspire so many far-right and violent extremists in the subsequent decades. So it wasn’t a huge shock when anti-democratic rioters showed up at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC, on Jan. 6, casually recommending that people read the atrociously racist book. “Please don't go buy this book. The money can still go back to white power groups, if you do,” Kathleen Belew, a University of Chicago assistant professor of history, told hosts Will Sommer and Asawin Suebsaeng on this week’s episode of the Fever Dreams podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week’s episode of Fever Dreams features the brilliant Atlantic columnist Adam Serwer, whose new book—The Cruelty is the Point: the Past, Present and Future of Trump’s America—builds off a 2018 essay to examine how President Trump weaponized racism and white identity politics to build in-group belonging among his supporters, as has happened countless times before in U.S. history. Meanwhile, DOWN IN ARIZONA... Our intrepid co-host Will Sommer recently traveled to the Copper State to hang out with QAnon promoter “Baby Q” and see the premiere of former Overstock CEO and amateur election-fraud hunter Patrick Byrne’s new election movie, "The Deep Rig." Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Now that COVID is waning, Tucker Carlson and the rightwing hysteria machine have to find a new culture war. Heads up, Concerned Parents, there’s a new moral-panic bogeyman—fomented by the far right and Fox News—that’s coming for America’s children, and it’s called critical race theory. n this week’s episode of Fever Dreams, Daily Beast reporters Asawin Suebsaeng and Will Sommer talk to senior NBC News reporter and Daily Beast alumnus Brandy Zadrozny about how the battle over CRT has become the “new obsession of the rabid right,” one that Tucker Carlson and well-connected conservative activists are trying to foment in towns nationwide. And don’t miss our discussions of the rise of the Barstool Republican and whether it’s fair to kink-shame the Proud Boys, as well as a behind-the-scenes look at how Trump tried to shut down Saturday Night Live. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Far-right activist Ammon Bundy is running for governor of Idaho—despite being legally banned from the Idaho statehouse. “He’s prepping a run for Idaho governor, to the dismay of the Idaho Republican Party, which really does not want that affiliation,” said The Daily Beast reporter Kelly Weill. Elsewhere on the episode, The Week national correspondent Ryan Cooper talks about a government report claiming that the U.S. Park Police didn’t clear protesters outside the White House—and how its claims that the Trump administration didn’t act just to set up a presidential photo-op have been overblown in the media. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this episode of FEVER DREAMS, hosts Will Sommer and Asawin Suebsaeng sit down with Canada-based comedian and “Not Even a Show” host Chris James, a man who spends his days figuring out ways to prank prominent conservatives and MAGA luminaries, such as Rudy Giuliani and Dan Crenshaw, on-air. “These people are in positions of power and they are acting in this incredibly reckless way,” James says. Elsewhere on this episode, Suebsaeng and Sommer dig into how the false idea of Donald Trump’s August “reinstatement” in the White House worked its way up from MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, all the way up to the ex-president’s delusional ears. And if you’ve been wondering how Fox News host Greg Gutfeld’s new paid-subscriber venture is going… Sommer has discovered that it mostly feels like a lazy effort to prove to his fans just how dumb they are for giving him their cash. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You thought Michael Flynn calling for a coup was the most exciting thing to happen at the QAnon conference in Dallas over Memorial Day weekend? Think again, Fever Dreams fans, for just before the wacko retired general longingly wished for a Myanmar-style crackdown here in the U.S. of A., our very own beloved host Will Sommer got kicked out of QCon to a standing ovation. Also on this episode of Fever Dreams, our hosts talk to The Washington Post’s Dave Weigel about the massive GOP push to crackdown on voting rights at the state and local levels, and they discuss how Trump’s associates are trying, and failing, to get the former president to care about encouraging his base to get vaccinated. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A tough-talking anti-human-trafficking organization with ties to Donald Trump relied on a tip from a psychic for at least one of its failed “raids” in Haiti, according to reporters who have tracked the group. “They have defended the use of psychics and made it sound like something that law enforcement does all the time, which they might do, but that doesn’t make it a good idea,” Vice senior staff writer Anna Merlan said on the latest episode of The Daily Beast’s Fever Dreams podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this episode of FEVER DREAMS, hosts Will Sommer and Asawin Suebsaeng welcome writer/director Larry Charles, a Sacha Baron Cohen collaborator who also wrote some of the darkest and most beloved episodes of Seinfeld. According to Charles, if Seinfeld were on the air today, Kramer would definitely be a “QAnon believer”... but also somehow in Antifa, too? Charles also opens up about what he sees as mainstream comedy and “very corporate” satire’s major failings in confronting Donald Trump over the past half decade. Elsewhere on this episode, Suebsaeng and Sommer introduce listeners to a former Survivor contestant and a falconer—yes, a falconer—and explain their efforts to take down Joe Biden and the all-powerful “Deep State.” (The duo have not been entirely successful.) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.