Central Air

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.centralairpodcast.comOn this week's show: Why is Europe poor? Megan wrote about the issue this week, and Sam Bowman of Works in Progress magazine joins us from London to discuss our differences in work culture, leisure, and how we dry our clothes. Plus, we talk about the ignominious unpopularity of Keir Starmer’s Labour, which has not delivered on its promise to build instead of block, even though Britain’s central government has all the authority over planning and zoning that Abundance advocates here dream about.That’s for all free listeners. Yes, the paywall is here — for paying subscribers, we also chat with Sam about Christopher Nolan’s forthcoming film ‘The Odyssey,' the Long Island Rail Road strike, and we discuss central New Jersey’s missing congressman, Tom Kean Jr., who hasn’t been seen since early March. Is he in a mental institution? We discuss that possibility with Ben, who is an alumnus of America’s most prestigious mental institution.Upgrade your subscription (and find instructions for setting up your private paid podcast feed) at www.centralairpodcast.com and RSVP to our D.C. happy hour on June 2 here.

On this week's show: Robinson Meyer, executive editor of the excellent Heatmap News, talks with us about why oil has not gotten even more expensive, if there is hope for permitting reform, why Republicans hate windmills so much, and if there ever been a greater environmental advocate than ‘Degrowth Donald.' And where can we put data centers so they won’t bother anyone?Also this week: Josh's despair at the continued unwinding of the social contract, and Democrats’ despair over the Virginia Supreme Court.Plus, exciting news: we’ll be having a listener gathering in Washington, D.C., the evening of Tuesday, June 2. More details on that soon. Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Gary Leff, author of the View From the Wing blog on the airline industry, joins us to discuss who killed Spirit Airlines — the airline made strategic errors, but it could have been profitably acquired by JetBlue years ago if not for a series of Biden-era anti-trust policy failures. The Trump administration tried to commit its own policy error — it wanted to buy the airline, making Spirit’s troubles into taxpayers’ problem — but fortunately, Spirit’s existing creditors refused to be crammed down, and there was no deal to be had.We have a wide-ranging conversation for you with Gary on the relationship between the government and the airlines — whether United could really be allowed to buy American, what’s going to become of the financially-troubled JetBlue, why Europe has a more robustly competitive low-cost airline industry than the U.S. does, and much more.Also this week: We discuss hopeful federal news on housing policy and a grim housing policy outlook in our nation’s capital.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Sean Trende joins us to discuss the continued devolvement of the gerrymandering wars. Sean is an election analyst for Real Clear Politics and lecturer in political science at The Ohio State University. With this week’s Supreme Court decision in Callais, even more opportunities to seek partisan advantage will arise. We talk with Sean about how to define and measure ‘fairness,’ and about the ways the gerrymandering debate remains stuck in the 2010s.Also this week, we talk about food inflation. Sean had a viral tweet in 2023 bemoaning how a family-size DoorDash order from Outback Steakhouse had climbed to $125. Well, today that same order would be $190, in part due to the spiraling cost of lobster tails. This sounds trivial, but it gets at a key fact about politics — inflation bothers everyone, from those scraping by to those who simply notice that the things they like to buy cost more than they used to.Plus, Ben, Megan and Josh talk about the assassination attempt on President Trump, and the low-intensity public response to it — why is it no longer even that interesting when someone tries to kill the president?Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: We joined in the discourse about whether dog owners have gotten too big for their britches. (Dogs are sycophants, I say — at least cats have self-respect.) We discussed the wisdom of New York’s proposed tax on fancy pied-à-terre apartments. Axios reporter Alex Thompson, who caused a bit of consternation at last year’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, joined us to talk about whether there should even be a White House Correspondents’ Dinner. And we even discussed a controversy that’s literally about air conditioning.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Republican pollster Patrick Ruffini joins to discuss the strength of Trump's multiracial populist coalition amid the Iran war. He offers his take on how the Republican party can avoid a cataclysm in this year’s midterm — it has, in part, to do with the semiquincentennial — and we discuss whether every election is going to be a “change” election from now onward.Also this week, Ben, Megan and Josh discuss what “everybody knew” about Eric Swalwell, and whether we’d be better off with more insider gossip thrown out into the open. And we look at the prospect of a United Airlines-American Airlines merger, which United CEO Scott Kirby reportedly floated to the president himself.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Daniel Biss joins to discuss the changing way Democrats are relating to Israel. Daniel is the mayor of Evanston, Ill., and very likely soon to be a member of Congress representing Chicago’s north side and northern suburbs. He just won the Democratic nomination in a hugely expensive primary election — over $10 million was spent, much of it by AIPAC-linked groups dissatisfied with his positioning as a “progressive Zionist.”Plus: Medicare for All, a check in on the Iran war, and Gavin Newsom’s emergent strategy when fighting Republicans on the internet (calling them gay). Jamie Kirchick sits in for Ben who’s off this week.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Marc Caputo, White House Correspondent for Axios, joins the podcast to help us understand how Trump and his advisers are deciding what to do with the Iran war, and how they are preparing (or not) for the domestic political blowback from an extended disruption in oil markets. We also get his view from south Florida on the ongoing Republican dominance of that state — what the party did right to win solid majorities of Florida voters, and whether they face any danger from Trump’s national unpopularity and a cost of living crisis that, in Florida, takes the particular form of high housing prices and skyrocketing homeowner’s insurance costs.Plus, Megan came in for a two-minutes hate this week for describing how she uses AI in her writing process — primarily, in the way one would use a human research assistant. We talk about the right way to use AI as a journalist, and the roots of the anti-AI fervor among journalists.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show Tyler Austin Harper joins to talk about his reporting on the Mellon Foundation and its role in pushing humanities academia in the direction of progressive social activism, his on-the-ground take from Maine on Graham Platner’s Senate campaign, what literature can teach us about the politics of human extinction, and why the commentariat is souring on all these polyamory memoirs we keep getting.Sign up for updates from Central Air www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: congressional candidate Alex Bores — he’s a New York state representative and author of the controversial AI regulation law, the RAISE Act — joins us to talk about the fight between the Department of Defense and Anthropic, and about how rules should be made about how AI gets used in the public sector. We also got to talk with him about Ben’s “Free Willy” experiment, how to deal with the electrical demands of data centers, and what Manhattan in particular needs from Congress.Plus: we have an update on Iran — Ben now thinks he may have been a little too optimistic about how this war would go, we check in again on the financial markets, and we discuss the rumors that the new ayatollah doesn’t exactly spend a lot of time in the straight of Hormuz, if you catch our drift. We also talk about the disappointing housing bill working its way through congress with a big, bad idea from Donald Trump and Elizabeth Warren, and we look at McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski and his pride in his hot new product, the Big Arch.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Mike Solana of Pirate Wires joins us to talk about Silicon Valley. He’s been talking with lots of billionaires who are taking steps to exit California in anticipation of a proposed wealth tax. We discuss how credible those threats are, and what makes the wealth tax different from prior soak-the-rich tax proposals. Plus: the alleged “Gay Tech Mafia,” of which Wired magazine says Mike is a member, the gyrating price of oil, and the outrage over Timothée Chalamet saying “no one cares” about ballet or opera.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Jesse Singal, co-host of the Blocked and Reported podcast, joins us to discuss the shift toward more cautious thinking among (some of) the U.S. medical societies about youth gender medicine. (Jesse wrote on this for The New York Times last week.) We talk about how “The Science” got so far ahead of the science on this topic, and the forces that made a change in thinking faster to come to Europe than the U.S. We also talk about the bizarre, totalitarian media environment that has surrounded these issues, and about why the side question of sports has often gotten more media attention than the issue of medical treatment.Plus: Ben, Megan and I discuss Ben’s surprising optimism about the situation in Iran, which I do not share.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: The Bulwark's Tim Miller joins to discuss his recent trip to Minnesota, the apparent continuation of significant but less bombastic ICE operations in the state, and why we differ on the extent to which immigration is a political pitfall for Democrats in 2026, 2028 and 2029 — and on how much is gained by talking a lot about how terrible Donald Trump is.Plus: we talk about the especially lively debate on left-wing Twitter about whether it is pro-social for mentally ill homeless people to pee on the subway, and an undercurrent of discontent that’s driving that debate — New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani is increasingly breaking with the far left. As Tim notes, one thing that’s good about being charismatic is you can defy your core supporters and they let you get away with it.We also talk about the Supreme Court rebuke of Trump’s tariffs, the Citrini memo, and listener feedback on Trump impressions.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Cartoons Hate Her joins us to make her argument that Democrats need a presidential candidate who “fucks.” First we try to figure out what this figurative sense of “fuck” means exactly — “fucking is in your heart,” says CHH — and then we apply the analysis to the field of politics. Some calls are easy — John F. Kennedy fucked; Michael Dukakis did not fuck — but there are closer calls, like Margaret Thatcher, who may have fucked in some weird British psychosexual way, and there are candidates who fucked too much, like Gary Hart. We look at the elephant in the room — Gavin Newsom, who obviously fucks but obviously should not be the Democratic nominee — and we scour the rest of the field for potential fuckage. Perhaps Josh Shapiro would fuck if we got him some contact lenses and a leather jacket? We consider all possible angles.Plus: We have a very special surprise guest who helps us understand the bizarre phenomenon of “looksmaxxing,” recently covered in a 2,800-word New York Times profile of Braden Peters, a.k.a. Clavicular, the famous 20-year-old moron who improves his bone structure by hitting himself in the face with a hammer. (Peters, unsurprisingly, is a Newsom supporter.) And CHH gives her take on one of my favorite questions: are straight people okay?Sign up for updates at www.centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: everyone loves to talk about affordability these days, or more specifically, they love to complain about unaffordability. But what are they actually complaining about? At least four things, we think: inflation, interest rates, real incomes, and income distribution — or, basically, the whole economy. We invited Natasha Sarin, a professor at Yale Law School who co-directs The Budget Lab there, and who previously served as an economic official at the Treasury Department under President Biden, to join us for this conversation. Plus: interest rates, and what might happen to them if President Trump gets his way on monetary policy, grading Fed Chair nominee Kevin Warsh on a curve, and “white people tacos."Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: we’re really excited to have Ross Douthat, columnist for The New York Times and host of the Times’s “Interesting Times” podcast, join us. We give the Epstein Files the Washington Read and make a sincere effort to learn something useful from this Epstein experience.Plus: how Ross got his job as the official explainer of Trumpism to liberal America, why he wants us to pay more attention to AI, and Peter Thiel and his “over-indexing” on his Greta Thunberg theory of the Antichrist.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: we’re joined by Jerusalem Demsas, Editor-in-Chief of avowedly liberal publication The Argument. Jerusalem makes the case for immigration advocates to ride the thermostatic shift toward support for immigration without avoiding the political traps that befell Democrats under Joe Biden.Plus: we talk about what sort of bargain Democrats should try to drive about funding the Department of Homeland Security in the wake of the abuses they’ve perpetrated in Minneapolis, and we look at one aspect of The Argument’s project: getting liberals to stop acting like they’re “temporarily-embarrassed communists” and take pride in their own coherent worldview. We consider Moderna’s announcement that the US policy environment has turned too anti-vaccine to support expensive research into certain mRNA applications for fighting infectious disease. And Ben makes a case for one of the ugliest vegetables around. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

Listeners: join Josh, Megan and Ben on Friday at 12:30 pm Eastern / 9:30 am Pacific for a video chat on Substack. Go to centralairpodcast.com for more details. This week: we discuss our exasperation at Greenlandpolitik and consider an endgame where Trump simply declares that he has Greenland without actually doing anything besides coloring in the map. Plus: the Shapiro-Harris feud, defining a woman (harder than you'd think!), and the already-backfiring California billionaire tax.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

This week: the bombshell at the Federal Reserve — the bank was served with subpoenas related to a criminal investigation into Jerome Powell’s congressional testimony about renovation cost overruns, and Powell's direct-to-camera video pledging to resist this use of a pretextual criminal investigation to pressure him and the bank to lower interest rates. We also discuss the Minnesota ICE shooting.Plus: Steve Morris of The Long Run joins us to discuss the groveling apology that gay liberal comedians Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers had to offer for showing insufficient respect to our lord and savior Jasmine Crockett, and we discuss at the problems facing straight people — who these days seem to talk a lot about how awful the opposite sex is while having very little sex with the opposite sex. This is sad!Leave a comment on this episode at centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: the arrest of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela and President Trump’s statement that we’ll be “running” the country now. What does the US stand to gain?Plus: a fraud scandal brings down Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, and why both parties love to hate a VP figure. Megan makes the case that arts professionals should be wary of boycotting the “Trump Kennedy Center" — while Ben and Josh argue that this is exactly the sort of low-stakes issue where symbolic anti-Trump politics are healthy and welcome — and Josh's on-the-ground dispatch from communist-occupied New York, one week into the Mamdani administration.Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

Listeners: join Josh, Megan and Ben on Friday at 1pm Eastern/10am Pacific for a video chat on Substack. Go to centralairpodcast.com for more details.This week: we discuss President Trump’s gross and remarkably self-centered response to the murder of Rob and Michele Reiner, and the strangely candid interview that Trump’s chief of staff Susie Wiles granted to Vanity Fair. We look at reporting from The New York Times on how Jeffrey Epstein rose to prominence and success on Wall Street, despite very early signs that he shouldn’t be trusted, and we consider an essay in Compact arguing that diversity mandates at academic, arts and media institutions have been designed by older generations to fall solely on the backs of white men who are millennial and younger, producing institutions staffed by old white guys and very few young white guys. Plus: bad ideas about backyard gardening, and our predictions for 2026. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: Warner Brothers Discovery is up for sale, and Netflix and Paramount are fighting over the opportunity to buy it. We discuss the fate of CNN, the future of moviemaking and theaters, the Trump administration’s apparent intent to interfere on Paramount’s behalf, and who's really competing with the streamers for our attention.Next we talk about Ezra Klein’s search for “the good”: a framework that will allow liberals to say — without reference to charts and statistics — that building a community is better than staring at your phone all day or, replacing your spouse and your therapist with an AI chatbot, or, God help us, living in the “goon cave.” Is it better to more freely pass moral judgement on each other, or should we trust individuals to figure out what’s good for them?Finally, we discuss a report that almost 40% of undergraduates at Stanford are officially “disabled."Join our comments section and sign up for updates about the show at centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week’s show: is $140,000 a year the new poverty line? Is $400,000 a moderate income? Is the softening in car buying an indication that middle-income Americans have grown more financially pressed in recent months?Plus: we revisit the “you must refuse illegal orders” video in light of news reports about an awfully illegal-sounding “double tap” strike on a suspected drug boat off Venezuela, and we discuss the Trump administration’s crackdown on Afghan migrants. We also talk about casinos in New York City and two environments that bring Americans together: the craps table, and the Benihana table. Finally: Josh angers people on the internet. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

In the spirit of Thanksgiving gatherings, Megan brought her husband to visit with us this week. Peter Suderman joins us to discuss holiday cocktails, an overly sympathetic story about an illegal immigrant who stole a man’s identity so he could work, the controversy over the “illegal orders” video from Democratic members of Congress (with reference to a useful op-ed by David French), and your dad/Sean Duffy’s campaign to get air travelers to behave themselves. About those holiday cocktails: go to centralairpodcast.com for a special Christmas-y mai tai recipe Peter helped Josh develop, and other links to holiday libations (and you can sign up for our newsletter there too). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

We finally have word that the Epstein files will be made public, but is that a mistake? Ben and Megan offer their arguments for keeping the secrets secret, and Josh isn't sure about that — what is in there? And doesn't President Trump, who campaigned on releasing the files, deserve whatever happens once that happens?Also this week: the effort to rehabilitate the reputation of price controls (ew), a celebration of the end of the penny, and the TikTok proposition that “the new American dream is to leave.”Sign up for updates from us (and support the show) and www.centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

Josh, Ben, Megan and special guest Nate Silver stress-test alternative ends to the government shutdown. What outcomes were actually available to Democrats? Then: Donald Trump’s poll numbers have materially deteriorated in the last month, and Democrats way outran their polls in elections last week. Are national polls understating Democrats’ national strength?Also in this episode: Nate’s take on the strange debate over whether moderate candidates win more elections, and yet another pro-sports betting scandal. Is gambling undermining sports as a civic institution? And finally: Teen Vogue.Feedback? Questions? Leave a comment at centralairpodcast.com or email us at [email protected]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

Josh, Ben and Megan take stock of the lessons for Democrats from Tuesday’s strong election result — and a look at how Republicans failed to speak to voters’ concerns about the cost of living. Also this week: hopes and fears for Zohran Mamdani, the ongoing meltdown at the Heritage Foundation, the ongoing meltdown on Nancy Mace’s Twitter feed over her treatment by TSA and airport staff at the Charleston airport, and a couple of stories about Ben and Josh's less-than-finest hours at the airport.Feedback? Questions? Leave a comment at centralairpodcast.com or email us at [email protected]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

This week, we’re Deciding to Win, or at least talking about a new manifesto about how to improve and moderate the Democratic Party’s image. Liam Kerr, one of the report’s authors joins us to talk about it.Also this week: the demolition of the East Wing of the White House and those who are very offended by it (not us), Karine Jean-Pierre’s very weird interview with The New Yorker, some lessons from an election in Argentina, and signs that the president’s trade war is starting to do significant economic damage in at least some parts of the country.Feedback? Questions? Leave a comment at centralairpodcast.com or email us at [email protected]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

Matt Yglesias joins Josh, Megan and Ben to discuss immigration: why (and how) the Biden administration bungled the issue so badly and how the Democratic party could start to regain voters' trust on the issue.Also in this episode: the problem of “the algorithm” and how it's really a problem of the audience with its bias toward negativity; Helen Andrews’ essay for Compact, which alleges that key institutions are suffering from an epidemic of “feminization”; the efficacy of the “No Kings” protests; and ...does Italy have too many restaurants?Sign up for updates from Central Air here. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

This is the first episode of Central Air, a weekly politics podcast from and for the political center. Every other part of the political spectrum has a podcast — so, why not us?Josh Barro, Megan McArdle and Ben Dreyfuss talk about the state of the political center, and the exciting new initiatives that focus on what centrists are for, not just what we think is too extreme. Also this week:The oddly low-key government shutdown, and Democrats’ uphill fight to use the shutdown to get voters to focus on expiring Obamacare subsidies, naked cyclists in Oregon and the political trap of fighting Donald Trump over immigration, the overwrought freakout over Bari Weiss’s installation at CBS, and finally, did it make any sense that the Nakatomi Corporation would have had $640 million worth of bearer bonds in a vault in its new Los Angeles skyscraper?Learn more about Central Air — leave comments, sign up to support the show and receive updates on this new podcast — at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe