In this episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy call out Republicans for avoiding the gun conversation at all costs, including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for his insane mental health hypocrisy. Plus! New York mag correspondent Gabriel Debenedetti tackles the Biden elephant in room: What happens if Joe Biden can’t run for reelection? There are a few people that may be backups for the party, he says. And last up, Pennsylvania Rep. Chrissy Houlahan shares what she thinks are th...
May 27, 2022•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 218
Kellyanne Conway’s new book makes very clear the people she has a grudge against, and the ones she doesn’t, according to Daily Beast media reporter Zach Petrizzo. He read the former Trump aide’s book and tells The New Abnormal podcast host Molly Jong-Fast that there are two people she goes after the most—Jared Kushner and her husband, George Conway III. Plus, Washington Post political enterprise reporter Robert Samuels talks about his new book with co-author T...
May 24, 2022•44 min•Season 1Ep. 217
Nazi Billionaires author David de Jong joins this bonus episode The New Abnormal to discuss the findings from his book, including the ugly, anti-semitic history of German oligarchs, including the family who owns the German car brand BMW. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss Kevin McCarthy’s latest witch hunt that somehow involves Nancy Pelosi and Peloton and roast George W. Bush and Justice Clarence Thomas for being really bad at telling jokes. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/priv...
May 22, 2022•21 min
It’s another week chock full of Republican fuckery, and The New Abnormal is all over it, including a tough interview with Bryan Jones the Republican trying to take down creepy Matt Gaetz in Florida’s first Congressional District, and starting with a conversation between co-hosts Molly Jong Fast and Andy Levy about how Republicans seem more interested in capitalizing on the baby formula shortage to score points against Biden than they are in fixing it and, you know, making sure babies can get fed...
May 20, 2022•1 hr 2 min•Season 1Ep. 216
Congresswoman Elise Stefanik has the “worst luck in American retail politics ever,” declares host Molly Jong-Fast on this episode of The New Abnormal. Stefanik’s past “replacement theory” rhetoric has resurfaced after the “screed” of the Topps shooter Payton Gendron had been reported to contain the same kind of views. Somehow she thinks she’s the victim—and Molly and Andy Levy dive into that on this episode. Plus! Democratic strategist Adrienne Elrod gives Molly the low-down on the Pennsylvania ...
May 17, 2022•53 min•Season 1Ep. 215
Hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast listen to audio clips of unhinged Republicans, including one of Donald Trump crapping on Mitch McConnell’s popularity, and they agreed with him, sorta. Plus! Molly and Andy ask important questions about Dinesh D’Souza’s election-fraud conspiracy film, “2000 Mules,” and Karen Elson, model and fashion activist, tells Molly about her work to unionize models in the fashion industry and the hazards they do face at work. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for mo...
May 15, 2022•20 min
“Despite being the richest man in the world,” Elon Musk doesn’t have enough cash to buy Twitter for $43 billion, podcaster and CNBC contributor Dan Nathan tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast, so he’s selling Tesla stock to get some of that cash in hand and then bringing in private equity and venture capital to cover the difference. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy go in on another week full of conservative fuckery, and Daily Beast senior editor Matt Fuller explains how “the abortion landscape really ...
May 13, 2022•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 214
Media Matters president and CEO Angelo Carusone came on The New Abnormal to talk Elon Musk’s questionable desire to buy and become CEO of Twitter, Tucker Carlson’s reaction to the New York Times’ pieces on him and what’s next for Fox News (it doesn’t look good.) Plus! Co-host Andy Levy has his own theory for why Tucker is horrible. And Robin Marty, Communications Director for the West Alabama Women’s Center, makes predictions on what’s next when it comes to abortion bans in the U.S. (Hint: lots ...
May 10, 2022•55 min•Season 1Ep. 213
A new book by New York Times journalists Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns has gotten lots of attention for its revelations about Donald Trump and the Republican Party. And they get into that on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, but they also tell Molly juicy nuggets about Democratic dysfunction, including texts calling Nancy Pelosi “terrible” and Biden’s struggle with Manchin and Sinema. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
May 08, 2022•25 min
It is a truth universally acknowledged that the podcaster is fated to release an episode right as the news cycle renders them hopelessly out-of-date. That’s the worst thing to come from the revelation that the Supreme Court is essentially set to overturn Roe v. Wade , obviously. Aghast and mind-blown, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy attempt to break down this “new, new, new abnormal” we all find ourselves in as the country teeters on the edge of becoming a post-Roe democracy. How di...
May 06, 2022•53 min•Ep. 212
According to New Abnormal podcast host Andy Levy, literally, nobody cares about what Jared Kushner has to say. On this episode, Andy and co-host Molly Jong-Fast break down the latest GOP book announcements, Jared’s included, and The Nation columnist Jeet Heer tells Molly why he thinks the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is a bad idea. For one, this dinner was the start of Trump’s villain origin story, he jokes. Plus! If you’ve ever wondered how a person like Trump was elected in the first pla...
May 03, 2022•51 min•Season 1Ep. 211
Michigan State Senator Mallory McMorrow’s scathing speech on the floor in response to being called a “groomer” by a conservative colleague went viral. She joins as special guest on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to tell co-host Molly Jong-Fast how it all went down and what she wants people who are non-marginalized to know. Plus Molly and co-host Andy Levy listen to Fox News proclaim that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is a liberal puppet and Ben Shapiro gets skewered for his “Twitt...
May 01, 2022•27 min
nathan Kott, who worked for Joe Manchin for seven-and-a-half years, joins The New Abnormal, and co-host Molly Jong-Fast gets right to the point: "Are you surprised by what you're seeing right now" from the West Virginia Senator?"No," says Kott. "He's the exact same person he's always been. It's just he's getting more attention in the last year than I think he had before." Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy run through even more Republican fuckery, starting with Trump's fear of fruit. "I...
Apr 29, 2022•44 min•Season 1Ep. 210
There’s only text sent by former First Daughter Ivanka Trump among the 2,319 CNN-obtained text messages between Trump’s inner circle from the days after the 2020 election and something about that feels peculiar to The New Abnormal podcast co-host Andy Levy. He and co-host Molly Jong-Fast tackle those in this episode along with special guests Congressman Ro Khanna (D-CA), who shares his thoughts on Elon Musk buying Twitter, and Amanda Litman, Co-Founder & Co-Executive Director of Run ...
Apr 26, 2022•48 min•Season 1Ep. 209
Hawaii senator Sen. Brian Schatz joins the show to explain why he let Josh Hawley have it on the Senate floor this month and what he thinks his colleague Joe Manchin will do, or not do, about climate change. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy discuss Dr. Oz, listen to clips of Tucker Carlson saying that the “Libs of TikTok” account is real journalism and break down Fox News star Jesse Watters’ creepy meet-cute with his wife. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Apr 24, 2022•27 min
In another jam-packed week of GOP fuckery, The New Abnormal co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy looks at look at the party’s profiles in cowardice, starting with the new revelations about House Minority “Leader” Kevin McCarthy cozying back up to Donald Trump and then shifting to Ron DeSantis’ anti-Disney jihad and what Molly calls the party’s new brand of “unpopular populism.” No one is crying for Disney or its special tax status, says Andy, but it’s still nuts that “the government ...
Apr 22, 2022•47 min•Season 1Ep. 208
Tucker Carlson’s constant pushing of junk science on his Fox News show reached an apex this week when he discussed “testicle tanning” with Kid Rock. Of course, The New Abnormal hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy had to break down that video immediately. Also on the show: Democratic strategist James Carville, co-host of the Politics War Room podcast, holds no punches blaming the Democrats for Biden’s approval rating and Ruy Teixeira, a senior fellow at American Progress, explains why a handful o...
Apr 19, 2022•52 min•Season 1Ep. 207
‘Freezing Order’ author Bill Browder, one of Moscow’s most wanted , joins this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to talk about “evil” Putin and why the former American banker still chooses to speak out against the Russian president despite being targeted and followed for it. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy react to a few very bizarre clips of Republicans and a rap about Matt Gaetz. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Apr 17, 2022•29 min
the focus on The New Abnormal this week is on Donald Trump Junior, as CNN reporter Zachary Cohen breaks down his reporting on the namesake’s post-election text messages to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows scheming on how to steal the election: “We either have a vote WE control and WE win OR it gets kicked to Congress 6 January 2021.” Plus University of California Law professor Rick Hasen, the co-director of the university’s Fair Elections and Free Speech Center and the author of...
Apr 15, 2022•52 min•Season 1Ep. 206
Rep. Eric Swalwell joins this episode of The New Abnormal to weigh in on the Don Jr. texts and explain what he calls the Costco Effect—and how it relates to the Trumps. Plus, Jodi Hicks, Planned Parenthood California’s President and CEO, explains what happened with the Texas woman who was held on $500K bail for having an abortion. Naturally, co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast have a lot to say about all of the above, and more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Apr 12, 2022•54 min•Season 1Ep. 205
J. David McSwane, author of Pandemic, Inc. shares his reporting on some of the fraudsters who got their hands on PPE contracts during the pandemic. Plus, a fun segment in which co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast listen and respond to the wildest GOP clips from this week—including one in which Josh Mandel tells MLK Jr’s daughter she needs a history lesson Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Apr 10, 2022•28 min
It’s “a sea of performative moronics” ahead of the mid-terms, says New Abnormal Molly Jong-Fast, and we’re all drowning in it. Just look at “the cruelty, the stupidity and the racism” coming out of Texas right now, where Gov. Greg Abbott seems more interested in getting booked on Fox News than getting anything done. Then Jan. 6 committee member Jamie Raskin joins the pod to explain how Republicans transitioned from the party of Lincoln to the party of Trump, “a minority party, a shrinking minori...
Apr 08, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Season 1Ep. 204
You know who’s telling on themselves? The American conservatives cheering about Putin pal and proto-fascist Viktor Orban’s big re-election win in Hungary. “It’s a pretty good litmus test,” says The New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong. “If you are celebrating that, you're probably a bad guy, like the people who are still support Putin.” Speaking of people telling on themselves, Washington Post investigative reporter Michael Kranish joins the pod to run down his reporting on MAGA mutts Madi...
Apr 05, 2022•54 min•Season 1Ep. 203
On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Majority Minority author Justin Guest, a George Mason University professor, breaks down a sociological experiment he conducted to see if Hannity could make his viewers liberal with surprising results. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Apr 03, 2022•26 min
Madison Cawthorn has Republican leaders like Kevin McCarthy deathly afraid that people in his district will start asking him questions using words like “orgy” and “key bump.” Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy, The New Abnormal’s unflappable (seriously—they’re being forced to picture a debaucherous Louie Gohmert and Newt Gingrich) hosts, are ready to parse whether it’s better or worse for him if Cawthorn’s telling the truth. Also on this episode: George Conway, a lawyer and Washington Post contributo...
Apr 01, 2022•53 min•Season 1Ep. 202
Charles Bethea of the New Yorker joins to break down his reporting on all that, and to break down his recent scoop about the very unlikely ballot cast in 2020 by former Trump Chief of Staff and still Big Lie enthusiast Mark Meadows: “He had recently sold in 2020 his and his wife’s house in the state, and as the election neared I think he wanted to vote in North Carolina, partly because he was thinking about and talking about running for Senate and you want to have a record of voting in the state...
Mar 29, 2022•57 min•Season 1Ep. 201
Kid Rock of all damn people is boasting about how Donald Trump would call him up after Sarah Palin introduced him and Ted Nugest to the president, and ask things like “What do you think we could do about North Korea?” “I’m like, What? I don't think I'm qualified to answer this.” Then again, it could always be worse with this set. As Molly asks, “Do you think Kid Rock is stupider than Junior?” And, notes Andy, at least Kid Rock “was self-aware enough to know that he shouldn't be talkin...
Mar 27, 2022•31 min
It’s the 200th episode of The New Abnormal, starting with a wild “flashback” to the very “first” episode in the summer of 1998, when co-host Molly Jong-Fast foresaw a future of “racist babies,” with Molly wishing “if only there was a senator with a ridiculous mustache” to being the issue to light. Jump ahead to 2022, and co-host Andy Levy says Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson “really missed a chance there” when that senator with the ‘stache, Ted Cruz, asked her to define what a woman ...
Mar 25, 2022•52 min•Season 1Ep. 200
Josh Hawley is attacking Biden’s Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and is using the word “pedophilia” to do it. Naturally, The New Abnormal hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy have choice words, and a new title, for him. Also on this episode: NBC News political analyst Susan Del Percio has a very scary midterm prediction involving Jim Jordan and Danielle Carnival, head of Biden’s White House Cancer Moonshot program, breaks down how exactly her team plans to meet the president’s g...
Mar 22, 2022•50 min•Season 1Ep. 199
The war in Ukraine has made Vladimir Putin one of the most hated figures in the world. But any attempt to remove him from office could unleash more violence inside Russia. Moisés Naím, author of The Revenge of Power: How Autocrats Are Reinventing Politics for the 21st Century, tells Molly what that could look like in this bonus episode of The New Abnormal. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy listen to a clip of Trump trying to “teach” Joe Biden about nuclear weapons, and they break down Sean Hanni...
Mar 20, 2022•25 min
