Mass for Shut-ins: The Gin and Tacos Podcast

Dr. Olufemi Taiwo (@OlufemiOTaiwo) joins us with his new book Elite Capture: How the Powerful Took Over Identity Politics (And Everything Else). We talk about the future of organizing and activism an…

This is a quick teaser to let non-Patreon subscribers know that you missed the last Minicast, which I uploaded two weeks ago on Patreon. 

I won't be putting all Minicasts behind the paywall, but this…

In 1989 Kraft held a promotional sweepstakes (grand prize: a new minivan) with game pieces in packages of Kraft Singles and due to a series of errors, every single one was a winner. By the time they …

The Glass-Steagall banking bill was one of the most important progressive reforms of the 20th Century. It's gone now, but as often happens with members of Congress, Glass and Steagall have been almos…

Guest: Steve Mang, college professor and amateur ultra-long-distance runner, joins us to talk about CC Pyle's Bunion Derbies, the informal name of two LA-to-NYC footraces held in 1928 and 1929. Amate…

Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin in 1928 had little immediate impact on the world because it took over 15 years to crack the secret of how to mass-produce the it. Until that happened, peni…

Will the US mint a trillion-dollar coin? Probably not, but in 2001 the tiny island nation (I know, I know) of Vanuatu created $300 million overnight by quadrupling its sovereign debt using as its sta…

In 1975 a right-wing loon purchased 300 acres of swampland outside Cape Canaveral with the dream of building a theme park recreating the experience of a US Special Forces barracks in a rural Vietname…

After a player died from being hit by a pitch in 1920, Major League Baseball banned the "spitball." But it allowed 17 players whose careers were determined to be dependent on it to continue throwing …

In the late Sixties through the Seventies, John Brisker was widely known as the meanest, toughest man in professional basketball. After winning ABA titles in Pittsburgh and punching his way through a…

Guest: Jen Howard (@JenHoward) author of Clutter: an Untidy History on Belt Publishing. Her book looks at the social, economic, and political causes of our addiction to Stuff, and our talk ranges fro…

What if I told you that right now you can get a new car very nearly for free? Sounds like a scam, right? Well thanks to Hydrogen Fuel Cells, the Technology of the Future of 2002, you can. With some c…

Agatha Christie's two most popular characters - Poirot and Marple - can only exist and make sense in a universe in which the police simply cannot solve crimes. If they could, why would they need a we…

Guest: David Parsons (@davidlparsons) from the excellent history podcast Nostalgia Trap joins me to discuss Gerald Ford's disastrous rollout of a nationwide vaccination program in 1976 to combat a sw…

In 1996 a loutish young Briton got drunk and, on a lark, asked a tiny island nation if he could be their poet laureate. Mind you, the nation has no poet laureate and doesn't really do European-style …

Guest: Mike Konczal (@rortybomb) returns with his new book, Freedom from the Market. We take a look at all the great things government used to (or could) do a pretty good job of providing for America…

"A Visit from St. Nicholas" standardized many parts of the Santa Claus story, but one key element of the story bridged a gap between Protestants and Catholics - as well as opening the door for the cu…

I never promised you a Rose Garden, but I can give you a short primer on the how, what, and why of pardons before delving into the murky waters of what Trump does and does not have the power to do fo…

Question Cathy joins me for the post-election tradition of an all-mailbag episode devoted to listener-submitted questions. A partial list of topics covered here: Electoral College reform, rogue state…