Interesting Times with Ross Douthat – Details, episodes & analysis

There’s a saying that comes to mind these days: May you live in interesting times. It’s understood to be a curse, even though it sounds like a blessing.

“Interesting Times With Ross Douthat” is a new weekly podcast from New York Times Opinion. Every Thursday, he will map the new world order through interviews and conversations. Answering questions like: What does our new political era really look like? What is the future of democracy around the world, with American empire in retreat? What happens to movies and books — all of culture — in our digital and A.I.-dominated age?

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected].

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The conservative Christian podcaster Allie Beth Stuckey joins Ross on “Interesting Times” this week to explain why “toxic empathy” has a stranglehold on politics, whether evangelical Christians have a red line President Trump could cross and why her commentary has echoes of Phyllis Schlafly.

• 01:26 “The New Phyllis Schlafly”
• 9:46 Untangling the web of Evangelical Protestants
• 15:50 Female authority in the church
• 22:12 What is “toxic empathy”?
• 30:55 Toxic empathy and cruelty in American politics
• 40:19 Do conservative christians have a red line?
• 57:24 “The mushy middle”

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected].

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Julie K. Brown thinks Jeffrey Epstein didn’t act alone. On this episode of “Interesting Times,” Ross talks to Brown, the investigative reporter whose work ultimately led to Epstein’s re-arrest, about what the government could release that it hasn’t and how the story is bigger than Epstein.

• 2:32 - Brown's initial interest in the Epstein case
• 5:26 - Discovering Epstein's crimes and the plea deal
• 13:13 - Epstein's victims and the impact of Brown's reporting
• 18:20 - Epstein's wealth and connections
• 25:20 - Epstein's social circles
• 35:01 - Certainty and unsolved mysteries
• 45:25 - The role of government in the case
• 51:04 - Trump and the political fallout

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

U.F.O.s, fairies and abductions! This week, Ross talks to Diana Walsh Pasulka, a professor of religious studies, about how a deep dive into Catholic archives led her down a path to unravel the connections between religion, extraterrestrial encounters and government secrecy.

• 01:53 - How Pasulka’s religious studies led to the U.F.O. debate
• 06:08 - Modern U.F.O. encounters and telepathic communication
• 13:29 - What are the actual beliefs of the U.F.O. community?
• 19:28 - Whistleblowers and government contradictions
• 31:35 - Angels, demons and “actual things in the sky”
• 45:38 - Disclosure
• 52:51 - “Amazing.”

(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)

Thoughts? Email us at [email protected]. Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Interesting Times with Ross Douthat.

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.