What if school could be reimagined from the ground up? This week, Mike sits down with entrepreneur and education innovator MacKenzie Price , the founder of Alpha School , a model that's attracting global attention for helping students learn twice as much in half the time. Using artificial intelligence, personalized learning, and an unconventional approach to education, MacKenzie is challenging nearly every assumption about how kids should be taught. She also makes the case that meaningful change...
Jun 23, 2026•1 hr 56 min•Ep. 491
In honor of Father's Day, we're sharing several hilarious chapters from the audio version of Peggy Rowe's bestselling book About Your Father. Buy all three audiobooks from bestselling author Peggy Rowe for $30 or $15 individually at: https://bit.ly/MomsAudiobooks Tip o' the hat to our excellent sponsor PureTalk.com/Rowe Pure Talk is matching donations dollar for dollar until they hit two hundred fifty THOUSAND DOLLARS for America's Warrior Partnership, who is on the frontlines of supporting our ...
Jun 20, 2026•30 min•Ep. 490
Why do so many of the things that make us stronger, healthier, and happier require doing things the hard way? Mike sits down with bestselling author, journalist, and researcher Michael Easter to explore the surprising benefits of discomfort, challenge, and voluntary hardship in a world engineered for convenience. Easter, whose work has appeared in Men's Health , Outside , Esquire , and Scientific American , discusses the ideas behind his bestselling books The Comfort Crisis and Scarcity Brain , ...
Jun 16, 2026•1 hr 57 min•Ep. 489
Spontaneous Order might sound like a contradiction, but according to author, entrepreneur, and educator Connor Boyack, some of society's most important innovations emerge without a master plan. Mike sits down with Connor, the bestselling co-creator and co-author of The Tuttle Twins book series that inspired the hit animated show, founder and president of the Libertas Network and a leading advocate for teaching the principles of liberty, entrepreneurship, personal responsibility, and free markets...
Jun 09, 2026•1 hr 51 min•Ep. 488
Mike Rowe sits down with Blake Scholl, the former Amazon software engineer turned aerospace entrepreneur who walked away from Silicon Valley to revive supersonic passenger travel. As the founder of Boom Supersonic , Blake explains the century-long pursuit of faster flight. From the Cold War race to break the sound barrier to the rise—and fall—of the Concorde, Blake explains why supersonic travel disappeared just as it seemed destined to change aviation forever. He also shares how Boom Supersonic...
Jun 02, 2026•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 487
Mike sits down with master card mechanic and sleight-of-hand expert Jason Ladanye , whose impossible demonstrations of gambling moves and psychological deception have earned him a reputation as one of the best card handlers working today. Jason explains how a childhood obsession with cards—and an influential mentorship with legendary magician Darwin Ortiz—shaped his career performing around the world. Along the way, Jason shows Mike how magicians secretly track cards through a shuffled deck, dem...
May 26, 2026•1 hr 54 min•Ep. 486
Founder and president of Montana Knife Company Josh Smith sits down with Mike to discuss his unlikely path from working as a lineman to becoming one of America's premier master bladesmiths. The conversation dives into the grit, craftsmanship, and obsession with quality that helped turn a small operation into one of the fastest-growing knife manufacturers in the country. The two also talk about the grand opening of MKC's brand-new 50,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Missoula, where Josh ...
May 19, 2026•1 hr 30 min•Ep. 485
In this episode Mike explores the growing race for critical minerals hidden deep beneath the Pacific Ocean with mining executive Tom Albanese, Chairman of American Ocean Minerals and former CEO of Rio Tinto and Vedanta Resources. Tom has spent more than four decades in the global mining and metals business, overseeing some of the largest resource projects on earth. Now he's focused on something even more ambitious: harvesting polymetallic nodules from the ocean floor—potato-sized rocks packed wi...
May 12, 2026•1 hr 32 min•Ep. 484
In this special LIVE edition of Coffee with Mome, Mike heads home for Mother's Day and sits down with the woman who taught him everything worth knowing — his mom, Peggy Rowe. Recorded in front of a live audience at the place Peggy refers to as The Home, this episode is filled with the warmth, wit, and wonderfully sharp observations fans have come to expect from America's Grandmother. From family stories and hard-earned wisdom to laughter that only comes from decades of shared history, Mike and P...
May 08, 2026•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 483
Mike sits down with author and Cultural Revolution survivor Xi Van Fleet for a conversation that's equal parts personal history and cautionary tale. Xi recounts her childhood under Mao Zedong's China, where conformity wasn't encouraged—it was enforced. As a schoolgirl, she watched teachers publicly humiliated, neighbors turn on each other, and young people mobilized as ideological foot soldiers. Education gave way to indoctrination, and individuality was crushed in favor of collective obedience—...
May 05, 2026•1 hr 50 min•Ep. 482
Former congressman Jason Altmire has spent years in Washington—and even more time outside it—making the case that America's biggest opportunity isn't behind a desk, but behind a welding mask, a set of tools, or the wheel of a big machine. Now leading Career Education Colleges and Universities , he's on a mission to close the skills gap and reconnect hard work with real opportunity. In this episode, Mike and Jason dig into why millions of good jobs go unfilled, why the stigma around skilled labor...
Apr 28, 2026•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 481
Matt Ebert didn't set out to build a billion-dollar business—he just wanted to fix cars the right way. Today, he's the CEO of Crash Champions, one of the fastest-growing collision repair companies in the country, valued in the billions and trusted to bring wrecked vehicles back to life. Mike sits down with Matt to unpack what really happens after a crash, why the skilled trades behind collision repair matter more than ever, and how a kid with no grand plan or college degree wound up leading a na...
Apr 21, 2026•1 hr 35 min•Ep. 480
Neon lights aren't supposed to be profound. They're supposed to buzz, flicker, and sell you a cold beer or a bad decision. But Evan Voyles—founder of The Neon Jungle —has made a career out of bending that expectation into something stranger… and maybe a little wiser. Evan is a self-taught craftsman who works with fire, gas, and fragile tubes of glass to make signs that don't just glow—they say something. His work has been commissioned by brands, collected as art, and—on more than one occasion—ma...
Apr 14, 2026•1 hr 49 min•Ep. 479
Numbers don't lie—but they can obscure significant information. In this episode, Mike sits down with economist, demographer, and Harvard-educated brainiac Nicholas Eberstadt to explore a different kind of arithmetic—one that measures not just how many Americans we have, but how we're actually living. In his latest book, America's Human Arithmetic, Nick digs into three uncomfortable truths: first, the steady decline in prime-age labor force participation that persists even in strong economies. Se...
Apr 07, 2026•1 hr 33 min•Ep. 478
Adam Carolla sits down with Mike for a wide-ranging, no-holds-barred conversation on comedy, culture, and California. Adam breaks down his no-nonsense approach to making people laugh, building a podcasting empire, and telling the truth as he sees it—whether it's popular or not. The two also take a hard look at the Palisades more than a year after the fire, the growing frustration with California's regulatory maze, and what Adam really thinks about Newsom. Spoiler alert—it ain't good. Oh, you bet...
Mar 31, 2026•1 hr 54 min•Ep. 477
What does it take to rebuild America's industrial backbone—and who's actually going to do the work? Mike sits down with Michael Cadenazzi, Assistant Secretary of War for Industrial Base Policy, to discuss his role at the Department of War (DOW) and his mission focused on restoring the muscle behind America's might. Cadenazzi makes the case that while the U.S. still produces world-class engineers and cutting-edge weapons designs, there's a growing gap where it matters most—the skilled workforce n...
Mar 24, 2026•1 hr 36 min•Ep. 476
Mike talks with Jan Jekielek , senior editor at The Epoch Times and host of American Thought Leaders , to discuss his new book, Killed to Order: China's Organ Harvesting Industry and the True Nature of America's Biggest Adversary . It's an explosive investigation into allegations of state-sanctioned organ harvesting in China. Jan shares what he's learned from years of interviews with doctors, investigators, and even survivors of this gruesome industry where political prisoners are killed for the...
Mar 17, 2026•1 hr 40 min•Ep. 475
Mike chats with Jeff Childers—the attorney-turned-writer behind the wildly popular Coffee & Covid Substack —for a wide-ranging conversation about media narratives, pandemic politics, and the strange new world of citizen journalism. What began as a daily blog written during lockdown has grown into a must-read for hundreds of thousands of devotees looking for sharp legal insight, media criticism, and a dose of wry humor with their morning coffee. Jeff explains what it takes to crank out 2,000 ...
Mar 10, 2026•2 hr 10 min•Ep. 474
Mike talks with Will Swaim, CEO of the California Policy Center . California has long marketed itself as the future—a place where trends are born and the rest of the country eventually follows. But Swaim argues that when it comes to public policy, that's the last thing America should do. Despite spending roughly $24 billion, California still leads the nation in homelessness. The state ranks near the bottom in education outcomes, while residents face the highest energy and gas prices as well as m...
Mar 03, 2026•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 473
Mike sits down with comedian, voiceover pro, cookbook author, and culinary entrepreneur, Anna Vocino . Anna shares how her Eat Happy journey—from her bestselling cookbooks Eat Happy , Eat Happy Too , and Eat Happy Italian to her podcast Fitness Confidential —grew out of personal health struggles and a lot of hustle. She also pulls back the curtain on her voiceover career and explains why getting a food product onto grocery store shelves is a lot harder than most people think. It's a candid conve...
Feb 24, 2026•1 hr 57 min•Ep. 472
Mike talks with comedy legend David Zucker , the creative force behind the movie Airplane! Zucker shares what it took to make Airplane! —pitching a spoof no one quite understood, casting serious actors to deliver absurd lines with a straight face, and why making his co-writers laugh was the secret sauce to pleasing the audience. He also discusses his new " Master Crash " course, where Zucker teaches the dos and don'ts of spoof comedy writing. Along the way, we learn how John Landis landed Nation...
Feb 17, 2026•1 hr 30 min•Ep. 471
Johnny Carson didn't just host The Tonight Show —he defined late-night television. In this episode, Mike talks with comedian and pop-culture historian Mark Malkoff , author of the book Love Johnny Carson , about Carson's quiet influence, off-camera generosity, and the unlikely ways his legacy still shapes comedy today. It's a short history lesson, a love letter to show business, and a reminder that some icons never really leave the stage....
Feb 10, 2026•1 hr 46 min•Ep. 470
Mike sits down with West Virginia Congressman Riley Moore , whose path to Capitol Hill began with a welding torch. Moore shares why he chose the skilled trades early in life, what that work taught him about dignity and opportunity, and how those lessons now shape his approach to policy. The discussion centers on Moore's new legislation, the Jumpstart Savings Act, a proposal designed to remove financial barriers to apprenticeships, tools, and certifications—and to breathe new life into America's ...
Feb 06, 2026•48 min•Ep. 469
Mike chats with billionaire entrepreneur and producer Thomas Tull, a man whose career has repeatedly put him just one degree away from greatness. Tull talks about his ownership stakes in professional sports teams including his beloved Pittsburgh Steelers, how he helped create a data-driven approach to marketing blockbuster films through Legendary Pictures and why understanding audiences mattered as much as the movies themselves. Along the way, Tull explains how it feels when his rock band, Ghost...
Feb 03, 2026•1 hr 36 min•Ep. 468
After a six-month hiatus from TWIHI and on the occasion of her 88th birthday, multiple New York Times bestselling author Peggy Rowe (a.k.a. Mike's mom, a.k.a. America's grandmother) drops by to tell us where she's been, what she's working on next, and the groin-intruding procedure that took away her double vision. Who says "you can't get there from here!?"
Jan 28, 2026•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 467
Mike sits down with the dean and co-founder of Paul Mitchell Schools to talk about how an industry built on scissors, sinks, and human connection quietly shapes culture, opportunity, and second chances. Known by just about everyone who's met him as relentlessly—and genuinely—nice, Winn shares his improbable journey from former meth addict to one of the most influential educators in beauty, his deep commitment to philanthropy, and the philosophy behind his book Be Nice (or Else!) . It's a convers...
Jan 27, 2026•1 hr 20 min•Ep. 466
Acclaimed actor James Woods joins TWIHI for a candid conversation that goes far beyond his iconic film roles. Woods addresses his cancellation from Hollywood and how it inspired his life's second act, making music. He also recounts a shocking, nearly fatal accident involving a walk through a glass door, and he doesn't pull any punches when it comes to letting us know what he thinks about how Gavin Newsom has handled the aftermath of the Palisades Fire....
Jan 20, 2026•1 hr 54 min•Ep. 465
Tech founder, defense disruptor, and founder of Anduril Industries Palmer Luckey chats with Mike about the strange haircut on America's military bureaucracy—all business in the front, chaos in the back. Luckey explains how Anduril is trying to bring speed, accountability, and modern technology to national defense, often in spite of layers of red tape. Along the way, they discuss why Palmer got into defense contracting, who was pivotal in the Department of Defense becoming the Department of War, ...
Jan 13, 2026•1 hr 58 min•Ep. 464
Mike sits down with adventurer, endurance athlete, and motivational speaker Cyril Derreumaux, a man who has spent an unusual amount of time alone with his thoughts—and the open ocean. Cyril talks Mike through his two 70-plus-day solo treks across both the Atlantic and the Pacific in a kayak. Mike and Cyril explore risk, resilience, and the fine line between careful preparation and total uncertainty. It's a conversation about discipline, humility, and why sometimes the hardest part of moving forw...
Dec 16, 2025•1 hr 21 min•Ep. 463
On this eye-opening episode, Mike welcomes filmmaker and television veteran Del Bigtree of The HighWire to discuss his newest documentary, An Inconvenient Study —a film that investigates what happened to the most thorough childhood vaccinated vs. unvaccinated study ever done. They discuss how Del convinced a doctor at one of the most prestigious health institutes in the nation to conduct the study, the shocking findings, and why the study has never seen the light of day… until now....
Dec 09, 2025•1 hr 33 min•Ep. 462
