The Fifth Column

Hooman Majd comes from a family that reads like a parable about modern Iran: a grandfather who was an ayatollah, an uncle who worked for the Shah, and a folk-singing aunt. Everyone’s family has a version of this, right?
-Iran is a tragedy
-the sense of triumph has already faded
-is Hooman happy the Supreme Leader was killed?
-Trump’s motive: regime change, or only regime adjustment?
-a ring of fire around Israel
-hijab mandates, strict social rules, and the morality police using facial recognition
-did the 1979 Islamic Revolution fail on its own terms?
-MEK is a cult
-is there room for a homegrown anti-regime revolution, or does war smother it?
-who ends up in the IRGC?
-the girls’ school bombing, and the propaganda machine
-internet shutdowns, VPN life, and tweeting through a war
-if you want to be an authoritarian, you cannot tolerate a free press
-how to consume war info without getting played
-outlets reporting on the new Ayatollah
-sanctions: efficacy, blowback, and who they actually punish
-Can Iran function like a normal state, and can it have workable relations with Israel?
-Oct. 7 and Iran’s role
-concerns about civil war
-the mullah stereotype
-“translating” for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
-death threats, anonymous phone calls, and “don’t ever come back”
-defending against charges of being a regime apologist
Buy Minister Without Portfolio: Memoir of a Reluctant Exile (Bookshop | Amazon)
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-Matt takes off his glasses, Kmele panics
-Moynihan is furious we started a war during his aggressive vomiting window
-The Great Unwrapping of Liberated Iranian Women as the most convincing reason for war
-Marco Rubio sells the rationale in Möbius-strip logic
-the Dee Snider Doctrine
-The Death of the War Powers Resolution
-Is Rep. Anna Paulina Luna serious r…

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Journalist Nadav Eyal joins Welch and Moyniahn to game out the Iran strikes, why Gaza’s endgame is still murky, and why the “no boots on the ground” promise matters more than most hot takes admit.
-Zen and the Art of Strategic Surprise
-Everyone who’s anyone in the region knew this was going to happen.
-Why the US was convinced this was a good idea
-Death to America…

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I first met Ken Layne sometime in 1991, back when Vanilla Ice ruled the pop charts, the Soviet Union was still a thing, and Canadians still had a reasonable expectation of winning the Stanley Cup.
We have been collaborating and experimenting ever since -- a little newspapering here, some music there, various dot-com shenanigans, all of it in a spirit of …

-Matt Welch’s Caribbean identity crisis at Da Pig Beach
-The State of the Union aka a two-hour hostage note
-A greatest hits, lowest lights compilation for President Camacho
-The futility of “speeching” your way through a math-defying approval rating
-You can’t talk your way through a 38% approval rating
-Let the hockey boys drink
-Dan Crenshaw is allowed to be mad
-The RNC’s new guard of real fucking bozos and sycophantic dick-tots
-JD Vance as anti-corruption czar and populist beard for the crypto-regime
-Tariffs and The Gilded Age corruption engine, now with “ballroom fund” exclusions
-Drug prices are down 600%,….so do you owe me money?
-Moynihan screaming drug questions at his glitching phone
-Marxist Republicans and the gobbledygook of corporate housing bans
-Maybe let’s just abolish the State of the Union
-Dispatches from the Purple State: An interview with Senator Elissa Slotkin
-Stop kicking allies in the teeth to play grab-ass with dictators
-Walking out on Lindsey Graham’s Danish disdain
-AI thinks Moynihan is a neo-folk neo-Nazi
-Four years of war and Ukraine gets a one-sentence hand wave
-Anthropic vs. Hegseth: Code is speech until the Pentagon wants a frictionless kill-switch
-We tried collectivism once. Everyone starved. The end.
-Gemini identifies the mystery caller as Friedrich Nietzsche, chimney sweep
-About that BBC BAFTA N-Word Drama….
-“You’re acting like Israel” is the ultimate Park Slope breakup trump card
Prefer to watch & chat live with other members of the Fifdom? This episode premieres over on our YouTube channel NOW.
The Fifth Column (A Podcast) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Follow The Fifth Column
YouTube: @wethefifthInstagram: @we.the.fifthX: @wethefifthTikTok: @wethefifthFacebook: @thefifthcolumn


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.wethefifth.com/subscribe