Breaking History
Sometimes the news moves so fast, you have to look closely to know if you’ve seen it before. And that’s what this show is about. Breaking History breaks down the news, by breaking down history. We cover everything from LBJ and the Roman Republic to Donald Trump and the chaos at Columbia. This twice a month show from The Free Press delivers the best historians, authors, and reporters by mining the archives of human experience to figure out the present. George Santayana wrote, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Tune in to Breaking History to resist the repetition.
The Dissidents Who Defeated Russia
Ronald Reagan’s speech in front of the Berlin Wall in 1987 is legendary for its six simple words: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”And two years later the wall fell. In another two years, the Soviet Union came crashing down. Many factors led to t...
Why We Can't Escape JFK Conspiracy Theories
Every now and again, a work of art is so profound that it breaches the boundary between fact and fiction and affects current events. And if you had to rank the most politically resonant artworks American pop culture has produced in the last 50 years,...
Paradise Burning
Last month, L.A. burned. It was one of the most predictable disasters on record. A century of development on land whose ecosystems were forged in wildfire; years of increasingly regular blazes; months of low rainfall. The National Weather Service eve...
Trump’s Populism Isn’t a Sideshow. It’s as American as Apple Pie.
Donald Trump, just sworn in as the 47th president, was reelected to be a wrecking ball, a middle finger, the people’s punch to the Beltway’s mouth. And while this populist moment feels “unprecedented,” it’s not. The rebuke of the ruling class is enco...
Introducing: Breaking History
Sometimes the news moves so fast, you have to look closely to know if you’ve seen it before. And that’s what this show is about. Breaking History breaks down the news, by breaking down history. We cover everything from LBJ and the Roman Republic to D...
Why Jews Wrote Your Favorite Christmas Songs (From the Honestly Archives)
*This episode originally ran on December 23, 2024 on Honestly with Bari Weiss* Did you know that the Americans who wrote nearly all of the Christmas classics were . . . Jewish? Many of these songwriters were the children of parents who had fled Russi...
Resistance or Opposition: Which Route Should the Democrats Take? (From the Honestly Archives)
*This episode originally ran on November 12, 2024 on Honestly with Bari Weiss* Even your most optimistic Mar-a-Lago member didn’t see Donald Trump winning the popular vote and taking all seven swing states. He even came within five points of taking t...
Trump and the Art of the Bullshitter (From the Honestly Archives)
*This episode originally ran on November 2, 2024 on Honestly with Bari Weiss* Bullshit is an American tradition. Think the theatrics of P.T. Barnum, miracle products sold ad nauseam on television in the 1980s and, of course, politicians. Who can forg...
The Hundred Year Holy War (From the Honestly Archives)
*This episode originally ran on October 12, 2024 on Honestly with Bari Weiss* We all know the horrid tale of what happened in Israel on October 7, 2023. Waves of gunmen attacked families in their homes and young people attending a music festival. The...
How Republics Unravel: From Rome to…America? (From the Honestly Archives)
*This episode originally ran on September 26, 2024 on Honestly with Bari Weiss* In September 2024, a man armed with an assault rifle was apprehended on a southern Florida golf course. He was planning to murder Donald Trump on the links. It was the se...