Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov

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Scott Galloway is back — and so is the Iran war. He joins Jessica Tarlov to discuss the new round of fire between the U.S. and Iran after a month-long lull in military strikes. The resumption comes alongside growing fractures inside the administration: Army Secretary Dan Driscoll resigned after months of tension with Secretary Pete Hegseth, six months into a war with no visible endgame. There are reports that senior military leaders have warned Hegseth that current operations aren't sustainable. Meanwhile, Hegseth was spotted in Iowa looking increasingly like a 2028 presidential candidate, and Trump has now weighed in on the idea.

The Canada tariff deadline is one week away. Canadian retaliatory tariffs kick in on September 8th, focused on politically sensitive goods like steel, dairy, appliances, and construction materials. Scott and Jess debate whether Trump will blink before the deadline, whether Canada is right to hold its ground, and what it means if Canada starts pivoting to new long-term trading partners and strengthening ties with other allies.

With nine weeks until the midterm elections, Scott gets caught up on everything he missed. The odds of Republicans keeping Senate control are 52% on Kalshi, but Jess breaks down the mounting favorables for Democrats headed into November. How will 2026 stack up against the 2018 “blue wave”?

And finally: a particularly funky TikTok trend involves skipping showers, ditching deodorant, wearing the same clothes for days, and — for the truly committed — drinking one’s own urine… all in pursuit of a "natural musk,” supposedly more attractive to women. Scott and Jess ask who exactly benefits from pushing this narrative on social media.

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Jessica Tarlov is joined by Ryan Grim, reporter at Drop Site News and co-host of Breaking Points, for a wide-ranging conversation nine weeks before the midterms.

They open with the state of the races. Democrats have flipped roughly 30 state legislative seats in special elections since Trump returned to office, while Republicans have flipped none. With a wave of progressives and anti-establishment candidates winning primaries, can Democrats make the big tent work in the general? And how would Ryan rate the Republican strategy heading into the fall?

They check in on the race in Michigan with progressive Abdul Al-Sayed. And one primary still to watch: Massachusetts, where 80-year-old Senator Ed Markey is running for another six-year term against Rep. Seth Moulton. In a cycle where incumbents have been falling to younger, more progressive challengers, Markey has uniquely positioned himself as the more progressive candidate — touting his record as coauthor of the Green New Deal. Polling has him far ahead of the younger Moulton. What does Markey's campaign tell us about where the Democratic Party is heading?

Then, according to reporting in The Washington Post, a classified Pentagon planning document revealed that senior U.S. military leaders have warned Secretary Pete Hegseth that sustaining current operations against Iran isn't feasible. Ryan breaks down how dire the situation actually is — and what it means that these officials are putting this on record, knowing how Hegseth treats military leaders who push back.

A New York Times investigation has found that a growing number of political influencers are being paid by campaigns and outside groups to endorse candidates on social media without disclosing those payments to viewers, a practice that is largely unregulated at the federal level. And, more distressingly, the Pentagon appears to also have certain content creators on their payroll. What does this mean for the future of political media?

On the Canada trade war: Google Maps has renamed Lake Ontario "Lake America" for U.S. users, following the Gulf of Mexico precedent. Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers are speaking out against Trump's tariff escalation and his decision to allow 300,000 tons of foreign beef into the country duty-free. Is this another Trump news cycle that ends in a backdown — or something more serious?

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Trump just renamed Lake Ontario “Lake America” as his trade war with Canada heats up. Meanwhile, Democrats face a growing civil war over the party’s future, Trump ramps up deportations of Haitians, and a Florida grand jury finds $10 million was misappropriated by the DeSantis administration.

Plus, Donald Trump Jr. pushes states to back off prediction-market regulations despite his financial ties to the industry, Trump’s new crypto bank gets a massive foreign backer, and Jelly Roll finds himself in the crosshairs of the MAGA mob after joking about Trump.

Jessica Tarlov and Aaron Parnas break down the latest political chaos, corruption, and fights shaping the country.

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Jessica Tarlov is joined by Katie Phang, lawyer, legal analyst, and host of the MeidasTouch podcast Sidebar with Katie Phang. They open discussing Trump’s trade war with Canada, which is now landing squarely on the swing-state Republicans who were hoping tariffs had faded from the headlines. Border state lawmakers in Maine and Michigan are feeling the blowback, as are agricultural strongholds like Iowa and North Carolina. Trump's move to temporarily ease tariffs on imported beef has rural GOP lawmakers worried, especially after the FDA issued multiple meat recalls including one this month on ground beef imported from Argentina. Is this Trump simply not caring about down-ballot Republicans?

Jess and Katie check in on the current civil war in the Democratic party. Will the establishment wing move left, after a number of DSA primary wins across the country? Have the Democratic purity tests gone too far?

The Trump administration has paused immigrant visa interviews at U.S. embassies and consulates worldwide, just days after a federal judge ruled that an earlier blanket visa freeze on 75 countries was unlawful. Simultaneously, the administration is preparing to revoke up to 200,000 business and tourism visas from foreigners who applied for asylum — potentially the single largest mass visa revocation in U.S. history. Katie breaks down the political calculus behind continuing these moves.

Two days after the Supreme Court handed the Trump administration a procedural win on their efforts to restrict mail-in voting, Democratic-led states are back in court, challenging the finalized USPS rule that would restrict who gets mailed a ballot. Katie assesses the true implications of the SCOTUS ruling, in light of the ongoing nationwide injunction that still blocks the rule for November, and whether the real strategy here is simply to sow enough confusion to suppress turnout.

Meta has agreed to settle claims from a bipartisan coalition of state attorneys general that it knowingly designed Instagram and Facebook to be addictive to children — agreeing to pay up to $17.1 billion and committing to new usage restrictions for under-18 users. Is this a genuine reckoning for social media — or a settlement that lets the industry off the hook?

In South Carolina, Darline Graham — sister of the late Senator Lindsey Graham — has won her GOP runoff and will face Democratic nominee Dr. Annie Andrews in November. Kalshi has Graham winning the seat at 86%. Katie weighs in on whether a Democrat could ever realistically compete in this race.

And finally, remembering Dolly Parton. Dolly, you will be missed.

Get your tickets now for our live show at 92NY: https://www.92ny.org/event/scott-galloway-and-jessica-tarlov

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Jessica Tarlov is joined by Michael Grynbaum, media correspondent at The New York Times and author of Empire of the Elite: Inside Condé Nast, for a conversation on media strategy, corporate power, and the political landscape with just over two months until the midterms.

They open with a question Jessica is uniquely positioned to ask: should Democrats be doing more appearances on conservative media? Yesterday, progressive Michigan Senate hopeful Abdul El-Sayed joined Fox News primetime host Jesse Watters. Jessica and Michael break down whether El-Sayed came out on top, and whether the broader strategy of reaching voters outside the Democratic media ecosystem is paying off. Can Democrats appeal to working-class men by embracing “bro-iness”?

The Paramount/Warner Bros. merger is on ice; the $111 billion deal has cleared all required regulatory approvals but remains frozen by an antitrust suit from a coalition of states led by California. Michael, who covers the Ellison family and the media industry closely, breaks down whether the merger might actually be stopped, where media concentration goes next, and if this is a signal of upheaval for Hollywood. They also talk about some recent high-profile personnel moves at CBS, CNN, and The New York Times.

Data centers have become one of the hottest campaign issues in the 2026 midterms. Ads running in Texas, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania are all hammering candidates over their support of data center development. Michael and Jessica discuss why voters are latching onto this issue — and whether it's really about data centers, or a much broader anxiety about AI, inequality, and the economy.

Plus: Michael's book Empire of the Elite: Inside Condé Nast is newly out in paperback — and it comes at a moment when major media companies are settling lawsuits with the president. He talks about what’s changed in the landscape of media and power in just a year since its first publication.

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