Podcast Recommendations part 3
I recently discovered another new batch of podcasts, so I wanted to make sure these eight reviews got out the door in a post.
5–4
Comments on the past and present Supreme Court, begun in February 2020. I think this is targeted to law students (?) but can help anyone go behind the headlines. [Jan 2021 edit: I started picking specific episodes to listen while waiting for things, and now like it a lot. A producer is an alum of ‘Slow Burn’. The show has a bent toward liberal opinions, criticizing police powers, and talking shit about questionable decisions (such as criticizing Bush v. Gore and Scalia)]
An Invitation to Tea
This American Life’s one-hour packaging of conversations between former Guantanamo detainee Mohamadou Ould Slahi (subject of The Mauritanian) and three of his former guards and interrogators. Released in 2021.
I say ‘packaging’ because the interviews came about through a documentary being directed by John Goetz.
This was meant to be something really touching about forgiveness, but I think this covers the surreality of detainees and soldiers waiting out an indefinite detention, and coping with their new lives in a post-war world.
Bag Man
Spiro Agnew case, late 2018, by Rachel Maddow / MSNBC
Really the main takeaway for this podcast is that Agnew resigned from the vice presidency due to a separate corruption scandal, which he had been blatantly running in Baltimore and then continued on as Vice President.
Maddow and researchers for this podcast were credited with discovering evidence that George H. W. Bush, then GOP leader, pressured a witness not to testify against Agnew.
Falling Out
An ongoing podcast started in January 2021 about the Unification Church — Moonies — as told by former members. This gave a look into a little-discussed and very politically influential church, the experience of growing up in a personality cult, and the splinter groups.
ICRC Humanitarian Law & Policy Blog
An audio accompaniment to the Red Cross’s blog. Frequent discussions of cutting-edge topics such as AI and cyberattacks.
Inside Trader Joe’s
OK, this is about 80% monthly marketing content, but if you have gotten groceries from Trader Joe’s and want to hear about pasta and olive varieties and food trends, then here you go. This was a 5-episode series in 2018 which kept on going.
I was interested to hear that dry pasta was developed by nomadic people. In my DIY research, I suspect that the writers of the show are doing a Google but not going in-depth on history. Is there another grocery store podcast which I should try?
https://www.traderjoes.com/home/podcast
Shiny Epi People
This is one of my favorite freelance podcasts. It started in late 2020. The description reads “Lisa Bodnar talks to a diverse group of epidemiologists about everything except epi.” The guests are generally talking about the challenges of succeeding in academia, scientific research, and handling personal challenges in their professional lives (in other words, very little talk about Covid).
Dr. Bodnar is a nutritional and perinatal epidemiologist, so you hear from epidemiologists outside of the virology world. She doesn’t specifically qualify it this way, but almost all of the guests are women or minorities in research. It’s interesting to hear everyone’s different pathways into science; for me that’s about getting perspective; and if you’re in the field this could be a good source of mentors or Twitter follows.
https://shinyepipeople.buzzsprout.com
What Went Wrong at uBiome
A two-parter released in 2021 by The Journal / WSJ Podcasts.
I did a uBiome microbiome / poop test in 2018 and was surprised when they got shut down. It was interesting to hear the inside story and the founders’ escape to Berlin.
I noticed when I participated that uBiome charged an accessible amount for the initial test, and then offered to get a doctor to prescribe a more in-depth medical test which could be billed to insurance. I could pick up that insurance was the company’s route to profitability, but I didn’t know that any test like this was clinically questionable and that their practices were a financial fraud.
