Best Dynamite In The Brain Podcasts (2024)

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Episode 2070: John R. MacArthur warns that reading digital screens might be shrinking our brains 42:32

3h ago42:32

42:32

The digital revolution has few more persistent critics than John (Rick) MacArthur, the legendarily outspoken publisher of Harper’s Magazine. His skepticism about Silicon Valley, he confesses, came at the turn of the century when he overheard the gibberish sales talk from a rabble of start-up entrepreneurs in a San Francisco restaurant. In the quart…

1
Episode 2069: KEEN ON America featuring Bobi Conn 42:45

1h ago42:45

42:45

Bobi Conn’s life is an American story. Growing up in a desolate Kentucky holler, her father a drug addicted outlaw who abused her mother, Conn has reinvented herself as a successful writer and mother. But for all Conn’s unflinching honesty about her brutal upbringing, she remains proudly America - both in her love of the Kentucky land and her unwil…

1
Episode 2068: Jacob Kushner on the National Socialist Underground's plot to kill German immigrants 40:12

4h ago40:12

40:12

Is it time to start worrying about the Germans again? Perhaps, at least according to Jacob Kushner, the author of LOOK AWAY: A True Story of Murders, Bombings, and a Far-Right Campaign to Rid Germany of Immigrants, a book about an eleven year terror campaign by the National Socialist Underground (NSU). Kushner is ambivalent about the broad appeal i…

1
Episode 2067: Jordan Elgrably on richly complex stories about the Middle East and North Africa mostly ignored by Western media 32:55

1h ago32:55

32:55

Jordan Elgrably, the Morrocan-French editor of the Markaz Review, wants us to read complex stories about the Middle East and North Africa that our simplistic newspaper headlines mostly ignore. In his new anthology, Stories from the Center of the World, Elgrably includes short stories from writers as diverse as Leila Aboulela, Amany Kamal Eldinn and…

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Episode 2066: Steven Johnson on the invention of dynamite, anarchist violence and the rise of the 20th century surveillance state 43:14

1d ago43:14

43:14

I’ve always been a big admirer of Steven Johnson, whose prolific work focuses on the disruptive role of new technologies in shaping our past and future. In his new book, The Infernal Machine, Johnson writes about the turn of the 20th century, a period of feverish technology innovation and no less febrile political unrest. Our conversation focuses o…

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Episode 2065: Craig Whitlock explains how an overweight Malaysian contractor known as Fat Leonard bribed, bilked and seduced the U.S. Navy 41:45

2h ago41:45

41:45

It’s a mind blowing story. In Fat Leonard, the Washington Post’s prize winning investigative journalist Craig Whitlock tells of a Malaysian contractor called Leonard Glenn Francis who successfully seduced up to a thousand US naval officers with prostitutes, fancy dinners and expensive gifts. The most astonishing thing of all, he explains, is that m…

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Dynamite Review 05/16/2024 - Dax vs Okada 1:11:44

5h ago1:11:44

1:11:44

Kazuchika Okada vs. Dax Harwood (Continental Championship)Toni Storm vs. Harley CameronThe Young Bucks vs. Christopher Daniels and Matt SydalHook returnsAdam Copeland calls out Malakai BlackBryan Danielson and Jon Moxley vs. Jeff Cobb and Kyle FletcherWillow Nightingale and Mercedes Moné sign their DoN contract…

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Episode 2064: Chris Gavaler explains how How Stars Wars, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings and Marvel determine how we view reality 41:27

1h ago41:27

41:27

Ever wondered why the never-endingTrump show seems simultaneously like a reality show remake and sequel? According to Chris Gavaler, the self styled Patron Saint of Superheroes, it’s because our view of reality itself has been shaped by all those “sequels, remakes, retcons and rejects” endlessly spewing out of Hollywood. Our addiction to the Stars …

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CITCZ 42 - H8 Club: Dead? - 14/7/2001 1:03:38

3d ago1:03:38

1:03:38

This week the Comics in the Combat Xone attempt to answer the question: H8 Club, Dead?It's an odd show with a violent ending. A show that features a massive title change, new battle lines drawn between warring factions, and a legendary promo from Zandig to cap off the show!Give it a listen, tell your friends, and support the Wrestling Brain…

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Episode 2063: Rabbi Shai Held on why Judaism is really all about Love 39:33

3h ago39:33

39:33

Given the situation in Gaza, some might interpret a new book entitled Judaism Is About Love to be either satirical or slightly chutzpahdik. But its author, Rabbi Shai Held, President & Dean of New York City’s Hadar Institute, is all too serious in his argument that the idea of love lies at the historic heart of traditional Jewish life. It’s an intr…

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Episode 2062: KEEN ON AMERICA featuring Ali Velshi 39:55

9h ago39:55

39:55

Last week’s KEEN ON America interview featured a conversation with R. Derek Black, the son of a KKK Grand Wizard, whose all-too-American life has been defined by radical personal reinvention and second chances. In contrast, Ali Velshi, host of MSNBC's "The Last Word", not only chose to come to America from Canada, but also chose to become an Americ…

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Episode 2061: Rafil Kroll-Zaidi on Branson, Missouri, the most American town you've never heard of 41:47

1d ago41:47

41:47

What is the most American town in the USA? Las Vegas comes to mind, of course. And Memphis, with its uniquely American church of Graceland. Or one of Springsteen’s forgotten beach towns in New Jersey. Imagine rolling Vegas and Memphis and one of those sad NJ boardwalk places into a small Missouri town that you’ve never heard of. That’s Branson, Mis…

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Episode 2060: Ferdia Lennon on the tragicomedy of the Peloponnesian War 39:53

2h ago39:53

39:53

I’m just back from five glorious days in Syracuse, the ancient Mediterranean city in the south western corner of Sicily. And to extend my trip, at least virtually, I spoke to the young Irish novelist, Ferdia Lennon, author of the very unusual and much acclaimed Glorious Exploits, a tragicomic novel set in the Syracuse of the Peloponnesian War. We t…

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Episode 2059: Keith Teare on why critics of the iPad Crush advertisement are "haters of the future" 35:30

9h ago35:30

35:30

Apple’s Crush advertisement for their new range of iPads got so crushed by its critics that Apple apologized and announced the commercial wouldn’t go on tv. But according to Keith Teare, author of the That Was The Week tech newsletter, the massive reaction to this ad reflects a troubling cultural hysteria which, he believes, is driven by “snowflake…

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Episode 2058: Timothy Morton searches for a Christian Ecology that will get us out of our Planetary Hell 35:25

13d ago35:25

35:25

Timothy Morton, who teaches English at Rice, has become a bit of a rock star interpreter of our hellishly hot planetary times. And his eclectic work has even gotten the stamp of approval of real rock stars - like Laurie Anderson & Björk as well as the Big Lebowski himself, Jeff Bridges. So it was really fun to have him on KEEN ON to talk about HELL…

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Episode 2057: KEEN ON America featuring R. Derek Black 54:06

5d ago54:06

54:06

How seriously should we take the white nationalist threat in the United States? Very seriously, at least according to R. Derek Black, a young man who knows a thing or two about the US white nationalist movement. The son of a Grand Wizard of the KKK and a close family friend of David Duke, Black believes that white nationalism is no longer a fringe …

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CITCZ 41 - CZW A New Beginning - 7/7/2001 1:13:22

11d ago1:13:22

1:13:22

This week in the Combat Zone we are back in the Soccer Champs arena talking CZW a New Beginning Before we get into that we are treated to two bonus matches featuring Zandig and Wifebeater that happen in Mexico.Then we are back to Sewell as the show begins proper! Featuring the first ever Submission match in CZW, Nick Mondos first Ironman championsh…

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Episode 2056: Kyle Paoletta exposes the 2024 Republican Primaries as "Farce" 42:44

7d ago42:44

42:44

Marx’s 19th century remark that history repeats itself twice, first as tragedy and then as farce, helps us makes sense of the seemingly surreal politics of the contemporary Republican Party. As Kyle Paoletta notes in his insightful Harpers essay “The Race For Second Place”, the 2024 Republican primaries have been a complete “farce” (the tragedy, of…

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Episode 2055: Michael Ignatieff on a history of his privileges 44:10

2h ago44:10

44:10

Pete Townsend said it best. “Hope I die before I get old” he wrote in The Who’s anthemic 1965 hit, “My Generation”. But what Townsend really meant in a lyric that best captured the rebellious Boomer spirit of the Sixties, he later acknowledged, was “hope I die before I get very rich”. Townsend, as it happens, is still alive and, like many other mem…

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Episode 2054: Keith Teare follows the money of the online creative economy 34:12

13d ago34:12

34:12

The more that changes in the digital world, the more that stays the same. For all the disruption of AI, two trends appear totally unchanging. Firstly, it’s the big players - Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple - that appear to be most benefitting from the AI revolution. Secondly, creative individuals continue to struggle to make money in the online…

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Episode 2053: Vince Houghton on how the Cold War transformed Miami into America's most Covert City 41:38

12d ago41:38

41:38

We don’t often image Miami as a city of Cold War subterfuge akin to Berlin or Vienna. But according to Vince Houghton, co-author of COVERT CITY, Miami was as crucial to winning the Cold War as Washington DC or Moscow. The Cuban Missile Crisis was perhaps the most dramatic and dangerous period of the Cold War, he argues. What's less well known is th…

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Episode 2052: Bryan Caplan on the economic and philosophical case for the radical deregulation of the housing industry 37:54

3d ago37:54

37:54

We’ve done several shows on the housing crisis in America, mostly from a progressive perspective in which the solution to the shortage of homes is presented in terms of government investment. The libertarian economist, Bryan Caplan, however, comes at the problem from a more conservative angle. The co-author of the new graphic novel, BUILD, BABY, BU…

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EP. 68 ~ WWEGL Best Sell Award Goes To Tony Khan 48:44

3d ago48:44

48:44

Welcome back to the final episode of WWEGL for the spring semester! The boys are going to take a brief break, but they have one last episode for you before that! after a week off, the boys talk AEW Dynasty, Tony Khan taking a TK Driver and a bump from the scapegoat, the WWE draft, AEW Dynamite and Collision, the road to NJPW Dontaku shows, NFL stuf…

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Episode 2051: Mohamed Amer Meziane offers an ecological and racial history of seculization 37:34

4d ago37:34

37:34

One of Bethanne Patrick’s recommended books for April was Mohamed Amer Meziane’s The States of the Earth. It sounded intriguing, if not entirely coherent, and so I invited Meziane on the show. Even now, I’m not sure I exactly get Meziane’s point. He seems to be saying that secularization is not only behind western racial colonialism but also the de…

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Dynamite Review 05/01/2024 - Elite Production 1:21:36

20d ago1:21:36

1:21:36

Serena Deeb vs. Mariah MayBrian Cage vs. Claudio CastagnoliSamoa Joe vs. Isiah KassidyFTW Championship: Chris Jericho (c) vs. Katsuyori ShibataAEW TNT Championship: Adam Copeland (c) vs. A Member of the House of BlackBy Wrestling Brain

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Episode 250: Andrew J Scott on why we should care about old people 38:42

4d ago38:42

38:42

In today’s stultified American gerontocracy, not everyone is convinced that we should care about old people. After all, aging baby boomers still control most of the wealth and power in an increasingly divided & inegalitarian country. But, in contrast with many of today’s age warriors, Andrew J Scott cares about the old. In fact, the 58 year-old Bri…

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Episode 2049: KEEN ON AMERICA featuring Samyr Laine 51:23

5d ago51:23

51:23

Samyr Laine might be a model for how to become a Haitian-American in the 21st century. Son of Haitian emigrants, Laine was a roommate of Mark Zuckerberg at Harvard, competed at the London 2012 Olympics as a Haitian triple jumper, and is now an entrepreneur and investor in sports and entertainment. It’s quite a remarkable story and will speaks, to s…

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CITCZ 40 - CZW Breakaway Brawl - 9/6/2001 1:00:19

6d ago1:00:19

1:00:19

This week on Comics in the Combat Zone, we discuss CZW's return to Delaware for another outside event!A show with a slow start that builds to a big first encounter for the CZW Tag Titles, a new Iron-man champion is crowned in a match that can only be described as torture porn, and Zandigs return to the ring in a fun main event!Don't miss out this w…

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