The Fifth Column

Kmele Foster, Michael Moynihan, and Matt Welch
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Your weekly rhetorical assault on the on the news cycle, the people who make it, and occasionally ourselves. Kmele Foster (Freethink), Michael Moynihan (Vice), and Matt Welch (Reason) talk and laugh and drink their way to at least quasi-sanity in a world gone mad, often with the aid of clean and articulate guests. Weekly Members Only subscription edition often comes with listener mail and professional-quality (if inappropriate) singing. Analysis. Commentary. Sedition. www.wethefifth.com

  1. 2 hr ago

    The Loyal Republican w/ Scott Jennings (#576)

    And is he gonna get that press secretary job or not? -Jennings the teetotaler -wtf happened to Moynihan’s hair? -Jennings’ working-class Kentucky origin story -back when Kentucky + West Virginia were swing states -Rush Limbaugh + Paul Harvey University -what would Rush make of $9K for stay-at-home moms? -what kind of Republican is Scott Jennings anyway? -why is Trump so unpopular? -tariffs, potash + the new Republican orthodoxy -the Greenland victory (?) lap begins -Scott’s muscular Republicanism meets the universities -Van Jones vs. his own side -Trump vs. CNN and the White House press pool -Scott Jennings, future press secretary? -Trump + Mamdani, together again -Texas gets way too interesting -Georgia gets weird -trying to have the one pundit take nobody else has -do not get in Scott Jennings’ personal space -does Trump have a corruption problem? -Trump crypto + the Kentucky coffee can -whatever happened to Republican “family values”? -Mitch McConnell is alive -has Tucker left the MAGA coalition? Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST. The Fifth Column is a viewer/listener supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Follow The Fifth Column YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

    The Loyal Republican w/ Scott Jennings (#576)

  2. 4 days ago

    Academically Unserious With Authoritarian Bureaucratic Aspirations (w/ Tyler Austin Harper) Members Only #344

    This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com Tyler Austin Harper, staff writer for The Atlantic and co-host of the Time To Say Goodbye podcast joins Michael C. Moynihan & Matt Welch to talk about extreme fishing, picking socialsts as your fighters, and his recent pot-stirring essay “Why I quit the tenure track.” •It’s morning in America, or is it Japan? •The Night Fisher •Worse than Al Qaeda•A pro-America leftist •Why Tyler Austin Harper quit the …

    Academically Unserious With Authoritarian Bureaucratic Aspirations (w/ Tyler Austin Harper) Members Only #344

  3. 6 days ago

    AI Might Kill Us. Here’s Why It Matters: w/ Jim VandeHei (#575)

    -Simplify, simplify, simplify… -Do people like Jim as a boss? -The two things to screen for in prospective employees -The humility of Mike Allen -AI and the newsroom -The way you consume news is about to completely change -Are we at the Napster stage of AI? -The demand for local news didn’t die -DEI without the corporate activism -Axios refuses to take a stand -Moynihan’s Vice postmortem -Jim used to be a hothead. Mostly. -AI might kill us. Why it matters -Kmele vs. the AI doomers -Hugging Face and the runaway AI problem -Stuxnet was the dumb version -Midterm Madness goes off-script -Who should actually be Person of the Year? -Too much Trump porn at the New York Times? -Jim simplifies Trump’s three biggest precedent breaks -Why Trump does it anyway Read Simplify: Do 50 Percent More with 50 Percent Less by Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen, and Roy Schwartz (Bookshop | Amazon) Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST. Follow The Fifth Column YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

    AI Might Kill Us. Here’s Why It Matters: w/ Jim VandeHei (#575)

  4. 11 Sept

    The Things We Thought After 9/11 (#574)

    -RIP Andrew Wimsatt, a true friend of the show and beloved member of the Fifth Column community -And in lighter news, it’s the 25th anniversary of 9/11 -Trump’s 9/11 story -Why we’re called The Fifth Column -When Matt Welch welcomed us to war -Moynihan moved to New York on September 10, 2001 -How much of your memory of the day is actually real? -Mary Beard and other “the US had it coming” takes -Little Eichmanns and the root-causes Olympics -Did we win the War on Terror? -You get $5,000! And you get $5,000! -Midterm Madness and the two Dan Sullivans -Hunter Biden’s $LAPTOP speedrun to zero Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST. Follow The Fifth Column YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

    The Things We Thought After 9/11 (#574)

  5. 9 Sept

    The Department Formerly Known as Justice (w/ Devlin Barrett) MO 343

    This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com As well as Epstein, and the conspiracy theories that refuse to die -the most famous person from Troy, NY? -shut your whore mouth, Producer Jason -we actually do have a serious guest today -a radical re-purposing of the Justice Department -James Comey and the seashells -lowercase justice -Tom Homan and the $50,000 CAVA bag -Abscam and the lost art of government …

    The Department Formerly Known as Justice (w/ Devlin Barrett) MO 343

  6. 4 Sept

    Conspiracy Theories Never Die (w/ James B. Meigs) #573

    Jim is a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a Wall Street Journal columnist -The tractor beam of sexuality -James B. Meigs is here -Tucker Carlson is just asking questions. He’s less interested in the answers -It’s 9/11 season. Call in the OG debunker -Jet fuel didn’t have to melt steel -Death threats for… Popular Mechanics -Tucker finds Israel in the JFK files -Revisiting Loose Change, 20 years later -Conspiracy theories thrive in the ruins of journalism -Data centers or, hear us out, server farms -The mailbag interrogates Mr. Science Man -Hugging Face and the AI agents chatting amongst themselves -Midterm Madness goes to Texas -Talarico vs. Paxton, somehow a toss-up -Flock cameras solve crimes. They also know where you’ve been -Nature, Jason Arday, and the death of fact-checking -UFOs are real. The aliens remain elusive Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST. The Fifth Column (A Podcast) is a viewer/listener supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Follow The Fifth Column YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

    Conspiracy Theories Never Die (w/ James B. Meigs) #573

  7. 2 Sept

    It Was All Just a Joke (Members Only #342)

    This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.wethefifth.com Look who decided to come back for this episode! (for the visually impaired, it’s the one and only Kmele Foster) -A Caribbean anti-colonial fantasy -A gay Lady Chatterley’s Lover… and hockey -Oh, Milo -Because it’s funny. It’s a joke -Milo, the Tates, and the “it was all a bit” defense -ICE, deportations, and discovering empathy the hard way -He gave as good as…

    It Was All Just a Joke (Members Only #342)

  8. 28 Aug

    Canada Calls Trump’s Bluff (#572)

    Holy shit, The Moynihan Report has RETURNED. Watch the episode, subscribe on YouTube, and sign up for Moynihan’s Substack while you’re at it. Now, back to the Fifth: -why you have to watch this podcast -Sanna Marin…for the policy -Finding Kmele Foster -Welch returns from Montreal to report that the French lost -life in the time of Trade War -NPR finally solves reparations -tariffs, hockey sticks, and remedial economics -JD Vance is still not funny -Polymarket bets on Canada -Tucker discovers Christian Russia -Clip Roulette returns -Tim Curry, Richard E. Grant, Producer Jason’s inexplicable defense of Hudson Hawk -Bret Weinstein solves the Charlie Kirk assassination -Ana Kasparian keeps making new friends -Mamdani, Muhammad and the death of secularism -a bit more Clip-O-Rama -Tuck and the Short King discover 107 million illegal immigrants Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel at 12PM EST. Follow The Fifth Column YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe

    Canada Calls Trump’s Bluff (#572)
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Hosts & Guests

About

Your weekly rhetorical assault on the on the news cycle, the people who make it, and occasionally ourselves. Kmele Foster (Freethink), Michael Moynihan (Vice), and Matt Welch (Reason) talk and laugh and drink their way to at least quasi-sanity in a world gone mad, often with the aid of clean and articulate guests. Weekly Members Only subscription edition often comes with listener mail and professional-quality (if inappropriate) singing. Analysis. Commentary. Sedition. www.wethefifth.com

Information

  • Creator
    Kmele Foster, Michael Moynihan, and Matt Welch
  • Years Active
    2016 - 2026
  • Episodes
    698
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © The Fifth Column
  • Show Website
    The Fifth Column