Elon Musk’s polarizing persona and antics have created a toxic cloud around his companies, particularly Tesla. But despite that, Wall Street can’t seem to quit him. Why? 

Guest: Felix Salmon, host of Slate Money and chief financial correspondent for Axios.

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This week, DOGE set its sights  and scythe on the Department of Health and Human Services, with a goal of cutting 10,000 federal workers, once again raising the question: what’s their endgame here?

Guest: Makena Kelly, senior writer for WIRED

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell and Patrick Fort.

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Ketamine has gone from a recreational psychedelic to an approved treatment, and it has caught on in Silicon Valley in a big way. Are the long-term effects of using ketamine—recreationally or therapeutically—sufficiently known? Are we witnessing them right now?

Guest: Shayla Love, staff writer for the Atlantic.

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Memecoins are a niche type of cryptocurrency with no intrinsic value. But they remain a popular form of crypto, as seen earlier this year with President Trump’s own memecoin. And if it worked for him, then why not our little podcast? 

Guests: 

Azeem Khan, advisor to UNICEF’s crypto fund and cocreator of the blockchain Morph.

Nitish Pahwa, Slate staff writer covering business and tech.

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During his first term, President Trump and Jeff Bezos openly sparred with each other. During this second administration, though, it seems like Bezos is trying to endear himself - and his companies - to the White House. So what changed?

Guest: Dana Mattioli, reporter for the Wall Street Journal and the author of The Everything War: Amazon’s Ruthless Quest to Own the World and Remake Corporate Power.

Special thanks to David Maraniss.

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The National Institutes of Health is the primary engine of biomedical research around the world, which makes the Trump administration's dramatic cuts to its grant program both confusing and potentially incredibly harmful.

Guest: Katherine J. Wu, staff writer for the Atlantic.

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With a Trump-friendly Supreme Court and a contentious relationship with the press, could Donald Trump follow through on his 2016 campaign goal of making it easier to sue media companies for libel—and imperil America’s free press?

Guest: David Enrich, business investigations editor at the New York Times and author of “Murder The Truth.”

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The public’s anger towards Elon Musk and DOGE has found an outlet in the form of Musk’s car company Tesla. How long can the company put up with a sinking reputation and stock price? 

Guest: Pranshu Verma, tech reporter for the Washington Post. 

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell and Patrick Fort.

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After the election, Mark Zuckerberg announced that he was doing away with Facebook’s fact-checking apparatus in the US. With content creators getting paid based on reach, and content spreading wider and faster the more extreme it is, is Facebook the perfect environment for misinformation to flourish? 

Guest: Craig Silverman, technology reporter for ProPublica.

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To understand the second Trump administration, you have to understand the internet culture that gave birth to it.

Guest: Elle Reeve, CNN correspondent who reported on the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, VA for Vice News.

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell and Patrick Fort.

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Everyone’s talking about the price of eggs—so why are they so expensive? And when can we expect—if ever—the price to come back down?

Guests: 

Dr. Jada Thompson, associate professor at the University of Arkansas

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