Tim Miller and guests discuss the latest political news for the flagship podcast of the Never Trump movement and the reality-based community. Every weekday we provide insightful analysis, political hot-takes, an unabashed defense of liberal democracy and long-form interviews that cut through the "both-sides" BS. Plus a few laughs to help you wash down the crazy. Bulwark+ members can get a totally ad-free version of the show delivered right to their favorite podcast player.
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Here's the elevator pitch: It's "Left, Right, and Center" meets "Siskel and Ebert." Three friends from different ideological perspectives discuss the movies and controversies (or nontroversies!) about them. Featuring bonus episodes for Bulwark+ members.
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Sonny Bunch hosts The Bulwark Goes to Hollywood, a new podcast featuring interviews with folks who have their finger on the pulse of the entertainment industry during this dynamic—and difficult—time.
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On this week’s episode, I’m rejoined by writer/director Philip Gelatt and novelist Paul Tremblay (author of Horror Movieand The Cabin at the End of the World, among other scary books) to discuss the new Substack-hosted docu-horror series Etch. The concept is pretty cool: Philip has interviewed a quintet of horror authors—Tremblay, Stephen Graham Jo…
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Ezra Klein: The Resistance, Back from the Dead
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57:11Partly because of the courts and partly because the White House keeps stepping on rakes or trying to break everything, the Dems who were too chill about Trump pre- and post-election have fully moved into 'threat to the Republic' mode. Meanwhile, angry bureaucrats, particularly at the FBI, are digging in. But don't be sanguine because the administra…
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‘The Brutalist’ (MovieStillsDB) Some websites and podcasts start putting out their best-of lists on December 1. Not Across the Movie Aisle. We want to make sure you had plenty of time to see all the award-season stuff. If it takes until February, well, so be it. If you enjoyed this episode, share it with a friend! Share…
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Michael Steele: Gum Up the Works
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51:43After the dumbest member of the Senate, Tommy Tuberville, was able to block military promotions for months during the Biden administration, Dems should not back down from slowing the roll of Kash and the other remaining abominable nominees. Meanwhile, more federal workers are going to have to speak up—lawsuits don't make good visuals. The nation ne…
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Ben Stiller: 'Severance,' but Real Life
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1:02:36With Elon's 20-something operatives running the Treasury Department, it's hard not to feel that we've been severed from reality and a better Earth someplace else. Ben Stiller talks with Tim about metaphysics, avoiding politics in public, and advocating for the millions of people displaced around the world. Plus, the origin story of Severance, Adam …
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Anne Applebaum: Outside the Rule of Law
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56:33If the Chinese hacked the U.S. government the way private citizen Elon has, it would be a major act of cyber warfare. And since Elon is a government contractor, he's now in a position to make policy calls that benefit his own companies and hurt his competitors—following the Russian oligarch model. We are in a completely lawless realm, and this is l…
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Will Saletan and Scott Lincicome: A Crime Boss Has Taken Over
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1:15:54The president of the United States is putting his Jan 6 accomplices in charge of the Justice Department and the FBI, and clearing out any officials who would be willing to investigate the administration. It's anti-democratic, it's a coup, and it's allowing Elon and his 20-something DOGE buddies to act with impunity as they illegally access classifi…
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How Tariffs Will Make Movies More Expensive
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45:18On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch is rejoined by Jesse Nelson of DiabolikDVD and Cauldron Films to discuss the state of home video. We get to the tariff discussion around 32 minutes in, but before that, Jesse dispels some of the concerns about Sony’s recent announcement that they’re discontinuing recordable media like Blu-ray, what collectors are…
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Andrew Weissmann: A MAGAtocracy and a Babytocracy
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53:40While Republican senators worked to protect Kash Patel from answering some ver-wee hard questions at his confirmation hearing, not one of them had the audacity to suggest that he is the best person to lead the FBI. Meanwhile, the new administration is clearing out some of the most seasoned and effective veterans at the bureau who will be needed dur…
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Tommy Vietor: Deniability Is All That Matters
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1:05:37Republican senators don't care that Trump's nominees are lying—like Kash pretending he didn't know a Nazi-adjacent podcaster whose show he's been on eight times—because the confirmation process to them is all a game and truth is irrelevant. And nominees are also mad-flipping on their signatures issues: RFK, Jr. on vaccines, Tulsi on Edward Snowden,…
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Mona Charen: A Moment of Truth
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40:53Trump is trying to seize powers he doesn't have—like unilaterally rewriting laws and deciding on his own how he wants to spend money Congress appropriated for a particular purpose. Will the Supreme Court stop him? And if it rules against him, will he obey the court's orders? Plus, the money angle behind RFK, Jr.'s conspiracies, and Elon's attempt a…
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Chris Hayes and Alex Kantrowitz: Trying To Break the Whole Thing
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1:09:47The directives putting a pause on federal grants and the firing of career DOJ prosecutors is about trying to make the entirety of the federal government the tool of the man occupying the presidency. And it's all illegal and unconstitutional. Meanwhile, Trump is exactly the kind of broken sociopath who can dominate the war for attention—the defining…
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On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch (The Bulwark), Alyssa Rosenberg (The Washington Post), and Peter Suderman (Reason) discuss the, frankly, bonkers number of nominations received by Emilia Perez. Will the Academy favor it for best picture as a way to stick it to Trump? Then they review Presence, Steven Soderbergh’s new haunted house movie told fro…
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Bill Kristol: Trump Loves Fraud
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52:12Gullible Republicans have really been proving what they're made of recently, including Susan Collins, who claims Trump wants to root out corruption, even though his whole life has been a fraud—the water, the university, and "The Apprentice," just for starters. Meanwhile, the presidents of Mexico and Colombia are showing that they're not going to be…
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Why Is Gaming Underperforming Expectations?
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1:06:53On this week’s supersized episode of The Bulwark Goes to Hollywood, I’m rejoined by Matthew Ball to discuss his epic examination of the state of the video game industry and how its growing pains reflect what we’ve seen in other entertainment industries like film. I’d recommend at least scanning his report (you can download the pdf here) even if you…
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David French: Vengeance and Rage
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1:02:28Trump launched his first week back in office signaling to loyal followers that they are free to break the law on his behalf, while telling political opponents—including John Bolton and Mike Pompeo—that he'll put their lives at risk. Meanwhile, an office full of white faces is not evidence of a meritocracy, a shortage of VA nurses or prosecutors at …
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Sam Stein and Adrian Carrasquillo: We Are in a Simulation
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59:33Emotionally-stunted video game boys, who are also government contractors and/or quasi government officials, are fighting on Twitter, a POTUS who went all the way to SCOTUS to get immunity for presidents now would like the last president investigated, and America's premiere scientific research institution, the NIH, can't tell us about the bird flu—a…
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Stephanie Ruhle: Unlimited Money and No Rules
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47:43All those CEOs cartwheeled down to Mar-a-Lago and then dutifully lined up at Trump's inauguration because they were fed up with social justice warriors and labor having more power—even if their bottom lines were never harmed in the process. Now, they want their next adrenaline rush and more government money without any pesky regulations hampering t…
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Tom Nichols: A Farce and a Sham
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59:43Trump tried to pencil out literal words in the Constitution and then freed 1,500 violent insurrectionists—while the media attempted to normalize it all. Meanwhile, much attention is being paid to Elon's salute, and not enough to the facts that he has an office at the White House, he's a government contractor, and paid a quarter of a billion dollars…
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‘September 5’ (MovieStillsDB) On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch (The Bulwark), Alyssa Rosenberg (The Washington Post), and Peter Suderman (Reason) ask what, precisely, Trump’s “ambassadors to Hollywood” are supposed to be doing. Then they review September 5, the harrowing tick-tock examination of how ABC Sports covered Black September’s terrorist…
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Bill Kristol: Resist the Nihilism
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43:46Trump wants us to believe that nothing matters, so we'll brush off all his corruption and grifting as though everybody does it. That's what aspiring authoritarians always do, including the guy who didn't place his hand on a Bible when he was sworn in today. Meanwhile, Trump just launched probably the biggest scam in the history of the presidency wi…
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Revisiting 'Inglourious Basterds'
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56:58On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Bill Ryan and Dennis Cozzalio to discuss their contribution to the new Arrow Limited Edition release of Inglourious Basterds on 4K. The booklet features a blog-era (remember blogs?) conversation about the film that occurred when it was initially released, in addition to, among other things, a postcard with a re…
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Ron Brownstein: Don't Take the Bait
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50:02Trump governed as a wartime president against blue America, so expect him to keep stirring up culture battles—but the Dems have to avoid getting drawn into them. Kamala and the party were undone in '24 by looking like they cared more about niche issues than putting food on the table. Meanwhile, Biden has left Trump a lot of room to consolidate a bi…
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Melissa Murray and John Avlon: The Dark Legal Clouds Ahead
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56:32Pam Bondi is likely to sail to confirmation—even if she's an election denier and pretends she was born yesterday—because she meets the simple qualifications of being a lawyer and former prosecutor, and because she's not a frat paddle come to life i.e. Matt Gaetz. But the fact that she wasn't able to clearly state that the U.S. is her client, not Do…
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Adam Kinzinger and Mark Kelly: Dirty Little Secret
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1:04:08Being secretary of defense is one of the hardest jobs on the planet. But after Pete Hegseth was plucked from a part-time Fox & Friends gig, Republican senators could only kiss his ass and act starstruck during his confirmation hearing—all to ensure he takes their calls when they need military equipment or contracts in their states. Meanwhile, Nancy…
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Peter Hamby: The Politics of a Firestorm
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1:07:23Real estate is everything in Los Angeles. Karen Bass's absence from the city when the fires broke out, and now her seeming aloofness, has instantly made her look unfit for the job of mayor. Even Gavin Newsom is distancing himself from Bass. Meanwhile, while we wait on the facts behind the fires, all the Silicon Valley VC guys and Elon need to shut …
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‘The Brutalist’ (MovieStillsDB) On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch (The Bulwark), Alyssa Rosenberg (The Washington Post), and Peter Suderman (Reason) broke down why the PVOD window has settled where it settled. Then they review The Brutalist, Brady Corbet’s three-and-a-half hour portrait of artistry and immigration and assimilation in America. (We…
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Bill Kristol: Cannons All the Way Down
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52:20Trump's favorite judge, Aileen Cannon, has been attempting to exercise authority she doesn't have over Jack Smith's required report on his investigations of the Jan 6 case and the hoarding of classified docs—but she'll be a model of loyalty that Trump will expect for all his judicial appointments. Meanwhile, it's a big week of hearings for his nomi…
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This week I’m joined by Richard Rushfield and Katey Rich of The Ankler to discuss the state of the awards season post-Golden Globes and in the midst of the Los Angeles fires. (Indeed, Los Angeles resident Richard is in the city to give us an on-the-ground update of the state of things from his perspective. Please excuse any background noise/distort…
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Amanda Carpenter: We Are Team Karen (Pence)
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55:52"Mother" Pence is owed an apology. She snubbed Trump so hard and so beautifully at Jimmy Carter's funeral—and wasn't about to make nice with the man who was all-in on Jan 6 rioters trying to lynch her husband. Meanwhile, the catturd crowd is mad at Amy Coney Barrett for not falling in line, and running off to Greenland while American neighborhoods …
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