Episode 41 - The Three Neophytes Again Discuss Iran and Maybe Some Ideas for Fixing Everything Wrong with our Politics

The Iran War/Conflict continues apace, and whether we have a clear objective and clear, palatable way to achieve it remains up for some debate. President Trump and Secretary of War Hegseth have yet to solve an increasingly severe communications problem, the President is feuding with the Pope and/or our Sovereign Lord Jesus Christ, and gas prices are going to have well-heeled liberals ready to look past that whole DOGE thing and give Elon Musk’s Tesla another chance. Chanman, Mabes, and I talk about all of it—what we lack in focus we make up for in, well, hopefully something.

This episode is not brought to you by Diet Dr. Pepper, some Monster coffee thing Mabes was drinking, and Cafe Rio, Utah’s best vaguely Mexican-inspired food, but it could be (if you known anyone at any of our non-sponsors, let us know).

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Episode 40 - The Three(!) Neophytes Discuss the Ongoing Conflict in Iran

In this episode, recorded Sunday afternoon in Salt Lake City, Thomas and I are joined by our longtime friend Channing Elggren for a robust back-and-forth on the conflagration in the Middle East: we discuss what this means for the United States, what it means for Iran, and what it means for the region writ large.

We don’t claim to be anything more than what we are: three friends, more than 7,000 air miles from danger, trying to figure out what to make of a world we will likely never experience except through a screen or the pages of a book. It is likely that more Iranians were killed during the January crackdown on protests than Americans lost their lives on 9/11 and in the entirety of the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars that followed--I hope we, as Americans, never, ever forget how lucky we are; I hope further that our awareness of that luck informs a sense of responsibility, not one of superiority.

As to what that means, I don’t really know--I suppose that’s for us to figure out together.

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Episode 39 - The Neophytes Think the Feds Should Look into this Epstein Guy

Well, it’s been a tough few weeks for wealthy perverts/possible sex criminals/people who groveled for the money and attention of a definite sex criminal. In the words of not Shakespeare, this kind of seems like much ado about something.

Thomas and I spoke about a number of the people now linked to Epstein, whether there’s anything material in the files the government hasn’t released, whether it’s okay that the government doesn’t seem interested in investigating further, what impact this has on Americans’ faith in their government, and much more.

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