Why It Matters - Podcast Rankings and reviews

I really enjoy this podcast. They cover the latest current events that keep you educated beyond the major news media headlines. Fairly unbiased too which is great, albeit not perfect (but honestly what is these days). Highly recommend their coverage of interesting and often complex topics in a digestible manner!

Love the content but the host needs to learn best practices of podcasting and be aware that the mic picks up every nonverbal response. While these responses are natural in daily conversation they are distracting when played on a podcast. Host severely distracts from the guest speakers. Stop interrupting with affirmative “uh huh” and just let people talk. It’s not pleasant for listeners!

Although I only recently discovered this podcast and am just two episodes deep thus-far, I am impressed with the topics being covered as well as the depth and attention of their coverage. Am recommending this to my friends and family as a podcast to go deeper and more thoughtful on issues we all already know something about, but could benefit from additional perspectives and expertise on.

Informative with a wide range of topics. Love diving deep into things I might not otherwise consider.

I was a loyal Foreign Affairs subscriber for a decade or more after college, but over time the content and impartiality eroded. This podcast is a great example. Take the recent episode about abortion where the views of the Guttmacher Institute were represented as objective truth rather than arguments from an advocacy group. The podcast consistently argued the US was one of a handful of countries reducing abortion and was thus swimming against the tide, without acknowledging Roe created one of the most unrestricted environments in the world. Most post-Roe state laws are actually far closer to policies across Europe than they were before Roe was overturned. Yet, at no point in the podcast did the host or any of the guests acknowledge this.

While this was a particularly glaring example of CFRs political bent, it’s consistent with the general trend.

CFR needs to get out of the politics business and back into the objective forum business. Abortion is almost an entirely domestic issue and has no place at CFR. Foreign Policy used to be an invaluable place to debate policy, but now it is just a place to regurgitate the same staid arguments.