The Way

The eccentric world renown terrorist. The man who paved the way for bombings, hijakings, and kidnappings for others like Abu Nidal and Osama Bin Laden. This is the story of Carlos The Jackal.

Bio: A former journalist, Christina Hoag has had her laptop searched by Colombian guerrillas, phone tapped in Venezuela, was suspected of drug trafficking in Guyana, hid under a car to evade Guatemalan soldiers, and posed as a nun to report from inside a Caracas jail.

She has interviewed gang members, bank robbers, thieves and thugs in prisons, shantytowns and slums, not to forget billionaires and presidents, some of whom fall into the previous categories.

A graduate of Boston University, she's a former staff writer for the Miami Herald and Associated Press, and wrote from Latin America for Time, Business Week, The New York Times, Financial Times, Sunday Times of London, Houston Chronicle and other news outlets. She won prizes for enterprise reporting and interpretive writing from the New Jersey Press Association. A native of New Zealand, Christina grew up as an expat around the world. She now lives in Los Angeles, where she has volunteered as a creative writing instructor at a maximum-security prison and to underserved teen girls and as a domestic violence support group facilitator.

Dr. Jonathan McDowell is an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, MA. A staff member of the Chandra X-ray Center, he studies black holes, quasars and X-ray sources in galaxies, as well as developing data analysis software for the X-ray astronomy community. Dr. McDowell has a B.A in Mathematics (1981) and a Ph.D in Astrophysics (1986) from the University of Cambridge, England, and has previously worked at the Royal Greenwich Observatory, the Jodrell Bank radio observatory and NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.

Dr. McDowell's scientific publications include studies of the cosmological extragalactic background light and the possibility that massive black holes contribute to the dark matter problem; the X-ray emission from the merging galaxy Arp 220; the nature of the broad emission line region in quasars, and the broad-band spectral energy distributions of quasars. He helped design the CIAO data analysis package and the software infrastructure for the Chandra X-ray Observatory data processing pipelines.

Dr. Jonathan McDowell is also the editor of Jonathan's Space Report, a free internet newsletter founded in 1989 which provides technical details of satellite launches, and a contributing editor to Sky and Telescope Magazine. Dr. McDowell's web site provides the most comprehensive historical list of satellite launch information starting with Sputnik, and he carries out research on space history topics using original sources including declassified DoD documents and Russian-language publications.

Jonathan is a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society (1985) and an American Astronomical Society Fellow (2020). He won the Sir Arthur Clarke Award for Individual Space Achievement in 2019. the Prix Alexandre Ananoff of the French Astronomical Society in 2020 for contributions to astronautics culture and popularization, and the Geoffrey Pardoe Space Award of the Royal Aeronautical Society for service to the space industry. The asteroid (4589) McDowell was named after him in 1993.

1666 was a watershed year for England. An outbreak of the Great Plague, the eruption of the second Dutch War, and the devastating Great Fire of London all struck the country in rapid succession and with devastating repercussions.

Shedding light on these dramatic events and their context, historian Rebecca Rideal reveals an unprecedented period of terror and triumph. Based in original archival research drawing on little-known sources, 1666 opens with the fiery destruction of London before taking readers on a thrilling journey through a crucial turning point in English history as seen through the eyes of an extraordinary cast of historical characters.

Bio: Rebecca Rideal is a historian, a bestselling author, award-winning producer, and the director of the history festival, HistFest.

How is history written? How did women shape it? Today's episode was a great chat with Dr. Jenina Ramirez, about her just recently released book "Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, through the Women Written Out of it."

Bio: I’m a cultural historian, broadcaster and author based at the University of Oxford with a passion for communicating ideas about the past. As a lecturer and course director, I want to share ideas, information and inspiration with every student. And also open up the subject to anyone and everyone who cares to listen, through the wide reach of television, radio, publications and new media.

My research began with a degree in English literature at Oxford, followed by an MA and PhD at the Centre for Medieval Studies in York on the art, literature and culture of Anglo-Saxon England. But my interests have constantly branched outwards in all directions as I have taught more broadly on everything from classical architecture to the work of Tracey Emin. 

Broadcasting has allowed me to see narrative threads stretching across time and disciplines, and to find shared human concerns, themes, problems and innovations throughout time.

I’ve lived, researched, broadcasted and published through a period of great change – the Digital Revolution – where traditional modes of communication are being replaced by new ways of interacting with audiences worldwide. I’m dedicated to embracing ideas, opportunities and advances, moving with the fast flow of modern thought. 

There’s one word that has appeared in every school and university report I’ve ever had: ‘enthusiastic’. I want to share this enthusiasm.

How did SpaceX turn from a scrappy group of engineers in an office in California, into a leading provider of space rocket launch services? What makes Elon Musk unique and how does he run his businesses? Today I dove into the space rocket industry with Eric Berger and talked about his book "Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days That Launched SpaceX".

Terrorist groups attain notoriety  through acts of violence, but threats of future violence are just as  important in attaining their political goals. Today, I talked with Dr. Joseph Brown about how terrorists use threats, true and false, to achieve key outcomes such as social  control, economic attrition, and policy concessions.

America has faced four major drug epidemics, and many argue we're in another epidemic today. Today I spoke with Dr. Beau Kilmer about his research surrounding the problems, and possible solutions, to our drug issues. 

Bio: Beau Kilmer (he/him) is the McCauley Chair in Drug Policy Innovation,  director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center, and a senior policy  researcher at the RAND Corporation. His research lies at the  intersection of public health and public safety, with special emphasis  on crime control, substance use, illegal markets, and public policy.

Some  of his current projects include analyzing the consequences of cannabis  legalization (with a special focus on social equity); measuring the  effect of 24/7 Sobriety programs on DUI, domestic violence, and  mortality; facilitating San Francisco's Street-Level Drug Dealing Task  Force; and evaluating the evidence and arguments made about implementing  heroin-assisted treatment and supervised consumption sites.

Kilmer's publications have appeared in leading journals such as New England Journal of Medicine and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and his commentaries have been published by CNN, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and  other outlets. His coauthored book on cannabis legalization was  published by Oxford University Press and his coauthored book on the  future of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids was published by RAND.

Kilmer  received a NHTSA Public Service Award for his “leadership and  innovation in the areas of alcohol and drug-impaired driving program and  policy research” and his coauthored work on 24/7 Sobriety received  honourable mention for the Behavioural Exchange Award for Outstanding  Research. He received his Ph.D. in public policy from Harvard  University, M.P.P. from UC Berkeley, and B.A. in international relations  from Michigan State University.

What is the draft process like for new Major League Baseball stars? What is life like for these athletes? How do they train? How are they coached? And why are finances such a problem for many players? Today I spoke with former MLB pitcher, and 9th pick in the 2009 MLB draft about his experiences.

Bio: Drafted 9th overall in the first round of 2009 he was one of the highest-paid high school draftees in MLB history at $5,500,000. Before co-founding JL Strategic Wealth, Jacob was a top 10 MLB draft pick.  He played 11 years professionally both at the MLB level as well as internationally in the Korean Baseball Organization.  Upon retiring, Jacob worked as a wealth  advisor at a billion-dollar RIA heading up their work with athletes. Jacob resides in St. Louis, MO with his wife Kristin and their four  children.  Outside of the office, Jacob is passionate about golf,  cycling, the outdoors.

The U.S. Navy SEAL's are the elite Special Operations forces of the US Navy. The SEAL teams are one of the most respected commando forces in the world – they are often cited as the most elite, flexible and highly trained Naval Commando force. Today I spoke with Brandon Webb about what training and experience is like as a member of this elite team.

Bio: Brandon Webb is a combat-decorated Navy SEAL sniper turned entrepreneur.  During his last tour as a U.S. Navy chief, he was head instructor at  the SEAL sniper school, which produced some of America’s most legendary  snipers. Brandon is a multiple New York Times bestselling author,  entrepreneur and Harvard Business School alumni.

He served with SEAL Team 3, Naval Special  Warfare Group One Training Detachment sniper cell, and the Naval  Special Warfare Center west coast sniper course manager.

Over his navy career he completed four deployments to the Middle East and one to Afghanistan. He deployed to  Iraq in 2006–7 as a contractor in support of the US intelligence  community.

An accomplished and proven leader, he was  meritoriously promoted to the rank of E6 when ranked #1 at the training command sniper cell.  Shortly after he was promoted to Chief Petty Officer while serving as the sniper course manager.

Brandon has received numerous  distinguished service awards, including Top Frog at Team 3 for best  combat diver, the Presidential Unit Citation, and the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation medal with “V” device for valor in combat.

He ended his navy career early to spend more time with his family and to focus on entrepreneurship and writing.

As an Entrepreneur Brandon crashed and burned his first start up in 2009, then went on to and create two brands: SOFREP Media (SOFREP.com) and Crate Club. He bootstrapped these to eight-figure revenue and successfully exited the Crate Club in 2020. He continues to oversee SOFREP Media as its founder.

SOFREP is a Military Culture, Defense & Foreign Policy News site read by millions monthly.

Webb is multiple New York Times bestselling  author of nonfiction. In 2020 Brandon and his long-time writing  partner, and award winning author, John David Mann, released their first  collaborative work of fiction, STEEL FEAR. This has now turned into the  Finn series with Random House which includes Cold Fear, and Blind Fear  (2023 release).

He enjoys spending time with his tight circle of amazing kids, family and friends.

Like the never-ending war on terror, the drugs war is a multi-billion-dollar industry that wont go down without a fight.

The war on drugs has been official American policy since the 1970s, with the UK, Europe, and much of the world following suit. It is at best a failed policy. Its direct results have included mass incarceration in the US, extreme violence in different parts of the world, the backing of dictatorships, and surging drug addiction globally.

Pills, Powder, and Smoke investigates the individuals, officials, activists, victims, DEA agents, and traffickers caught up in this deadly war. Travelling through the UK, the US, Australia, Honduras, the Philippines, and Guinea-Bissau, Loewenstein uncovers the secrets of the drug war, why its so hard to end, and who is really profiting from it.

Bio: Antony Loewenstein is the author of Pills, Powder, and Smoke: Inside the Bloody War on Drugs. He is also an Australian/German independent, freelance, investigative journalist, author and film-maker. He’s written for the The Guardian, New York Times, Washington Post, New Statesman, Al Jazeera, The New York Review of Books, Vice, Huffington Post, Salon, The Nation, and many many more. 

For decades, New York Times best-selling author John Allen Paulos has enlightened readers by showing how to make sense of the numbers and probabilities behind real-world events, political calculations, and everyday personal decisions. Who’s Counting? features dozens of his insightful essays—original writings on contemporary issues like the COVID-19 pandemic, online conspiracy theories, “fake news,” and climate change, as well as a selection of enduring columns from his popular ABC News column of the same name.

With an abiding respect for reason, a penchant for puzzles with societal implications, and a disarming sense of humor, Paulos does in this collection what he’s famous for: clarifies mathematical ideas for everyone and shows how they play a role in government, media, popular culture, and life. He argues that if we can’t critically interpret numbers and statistics, we lose one of our most basic and reliable guides to reality.

Facebook tried to disrupt the world — and the world says “no.” Facebook launched Libra in June 2019. Libra would be an international currency and payment system. It would flow instantly around the world by phone. It could even “bank the unbanked.” But Libra would also make Facebook too big to control— and lead the way for Facebook’s Silicon Valley fellows to swing the power of their money as they pleased. Facebook and their friends could work around any single country’s rules. Libra could shake whole economies and Facebook would become the “digital identity” provider to the world. Governments looked at Libra — and saw another 2008 financial crisis in the making. Facebook’s plan would have made the company even more entrenched  — at the cost of broken economies worldwide; starting with toppling the US dollar.

“Libra Shrugged” is the story of a bad idea.

This episode is one of the first podcasts I ever recorded, and I'm re-uploading it today. Lyle May called in from death row to answer questions about his experiences and what his researched has told him about our prison systems. Also a part of the interview, Tessie Castillo published her book Crimson Letters: Voices From Death Row which was co-written by Lyle and other inmates who have been living on death row. The book is compiled of writings from prisoners on  death row. 

A growing number of Americans don't trust drinking our tap water. Manny Teodoro came on the show to discuss this phenominon.

In warzones, ordinary commercially-available drones are used for extraordinary reconnaissance and information gathering. They can also be used for bombings - a drone carrying an explosive charge is potentially a powerful weapon. At the same time asymmetric warfare has become the norm - with large states increasingly fighting marginal terrorist groups in the Middle East and elsewhere. We are entering the age of the drone terrorist - groups such as Hezbollah are already using them in the Middle East. Today, Grossman explains the ways in which the United States, Israel and other advanced militaries use aerial drones and ground-based robots to fight non-state actors (e.g. ISIS, al Qaeda, the Iraqi and Afghan insurgencies, Hezbollah, Hamas, etc.) and how these groups, as well as individual terrorists, are utilizing less advanced commercially-available drones to fight powerful state opponents.

Marc Polymeropoulos worked for 26 years at the CIA before retiring at the Senior Intelligence Service level. He was one of the CIA’s most highly decorated operations officers who served in multiple field assignments for the U.S. government. He specialized in counterterrorism, the Middle East and South Asia, including extensive time in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The first attempt on Everest took place in 1922 by a British team led by George Leigh Mallory. What happened is an extraordinary story full of controversy, drama, and incident, populated by a set of larger-than-life characters straight out of an adventure novel. I spoke with Mick Conefrey about this story.

Bio: For thirty years I’ve made documentaries for the BBC and all the major  British and US channels. I’ve been everywhere from the Arctic to the Himalayas to Angkor Wat and written books on mountaineering and exploration.

I’ve been lucky to have been able to film all over over the world  from Cambodia to K2, from Puerto Rico to Spitsbergen. I’m particularly  interested in films about exploration and mountaineering, and have  filmed in the Alps, the Himalayas and Alaska. Several of my films have  won international and British awards, at festivals such as Trento,  Telluride, Banff and Kendal.

As both a film maker and a writer, I’m fascinated by the art of  narrative. I love to find good stories with complex characters dealing  with even more complex situations. My definition of good drama is what  happens when people are put under pressure, and exploration and  mountaineering provide plenty examples of this. My heroes: John Hunt,  Graham Greene, Robert Siodmak, Tom Woolfe, Alexandra David Neel, Tom  Wolfe, Orson Welles, Ella Maillart, Sir Richard Burton, John Banville,  Don Cherry, Lucinda Williams. My current squeezes: Jeanette Winterson,  Bobby Womack, Jo Nesbo, Carla Bley.

I'm sure you've heard the name; El Chapo. In today's episode, we talk about the environment that allowed El Chapo to thrive and prosper at the expense of others. One example of this environment; how the war on drugs was actually successful to certain people/organizations.

Bio of Noah Hurowitz: I am a freelance reporter based in New York City. I originally started covering domestic drug policy in the U.S., and began covering the drug trade and war on drugs in Mexico when I covered the trial of El Chapo for Rolling Stone. My goal in the work I do is to find innovative and engaging ways to illuminate the stories of people impacted by larger structures and policies while showing how those structures and policies function, who profits from them, and how a better world might emerge from the wreckage of this one.

The vinyl record renaissance over the past decade has brought new fans to a classic format. Sales grew a whopping 61% in 2021 as this dinosaur is coming back from the dead. Why is the vinyl record so appreciated and loved by music lovers? 

I was happy to welcome Kevin Smokler and Christopher Boone on todays show. They have recently finished their documentary "Vinyl Nation." A film that dives into the history and appreciation behind the oldest music format.

How did an architect help pioneer blood transfusion in the 1660s? Why did eighteenth-century dentists buy the live teeth of poor children? And what role did a sausage skin and an enamel bath play in making kidney transplants a reality?

In today's episode, I talked with Dr. Paul Craddock about the history of body transplants. We think of transplant surgery as one of the medical wonders of the modern world. But transplant surgery is as ancient as the pyramids, with a  history more surprising than we might expect.

Shortened Bio: Dr. Paul Craddock is a cultural historian and award-winning author  based in London. His debut book, Spare Parts: A Surprising History of  Transplants was a Daily Mail Book of the Week and won the Special  Commendation of the Royal Society of Literature Giles St Aubyn Awards.

Paul  is a Science Museum Group Senior Research Associate (SMGSRA), an  Honorary Senior Research Associate of UCL’s Division of Surgery, and a  Visiting Lecturer at Imperial College London.

He is represented by Jenny Hewson at Lutyens and Rubinstein Literary Agency.

What is Solar Physics? What are sunspots, how does the suns magnetism work, and how does this affect us? I was glad to welcome Dr. Maria Weber on The Way to talk about Coronal Mass Ejections, Solar Dynamo, Red Dwarfs and much much more.

Shortened Bio: My name is Maria Weber, and I’m an  astrophysicist. I study the Sun and other cool, low-mass stars. Through  computer models and simulations, I explore the processes taking place  deep in stellar interiors, well beyond the reach of telescopes. These  internal processes ultimately lead to the remarkable magnetism observed  on stellar surfaces. In the case of our Sun, this magnetism is the  source of the ‘solar storms’ that occasionally impact our planet, simultaneously wreaking havoc on earth-orbiting satellites while spawing beautiful aurora. We still don’t have a complete theory to describe,  and ultimately predict, the Sun’s magnetic behavior. My work is an  important piece of this intricate and complicated puzzle.

I began my career as a solar physicist. Recently, I have extended my  work to include other cool, low-mass stars – from F-type stars as large  as 140% of the Sun’s mass to M-type (or red dwarf) stars as small as 10%  of the Sun’s mass. Red dwarfs are statistically the most abundant and  magnetically active stars in our galaxy. Many of these stars have  orbiting planets in the habitable zone, located at just the right  distance from the host star to sustain liquid water. It is still unclear  how these small stars build such strong magnetism, with energetic  events often rivaling the magnetic storms of our own Sun. Tackling this  problem is another crucial part of my on-going research.

War is an unrelenting undercurrent of human civilization and has always been so. Today, economist and political scientist Chris Blattman, author of Why We Fight, offers an explanation as to the psychological and strategic forces that propel nations to opt for such ruinous violence. 

Bio: Chris Blattman is an economist and political scientist who uses field  work and statistics to study poverty, political engagement, the causes and consequences of violence, and policy in developing countries. He is a professor in the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago.

Background: Most of my current research is with armed groups, gangs, organized  crime, and the people who join violent organizations. This work involves  a blend of qualitative interviews, large-scale surveys, statistical  analysis, and field experiments.

I also want to bring big ideas  and research to a general audience, which is why I wrote Why We Fight:  The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace.

A groundbreaking investigation of how the Nazis helped German tycoons make billions off the horrors of the Third Reich and World War II—and how America allowed them to get away with it. 

Bio: David de Jong is a journalist and author. His first book, Nazi Billionaires, is published in the US and the UK by HarperCollins. He spent four years reporting from Berlin while researching and writing this book. David previously covered European banking and finance from Amsterdam and hidden wealth and billionaire fortunes from New York for Bloomberg News. His work has also appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg Businessweek, and the Dutch Financial Daily. A native of the Netherlands, he currently lives in Tel Aviv.

When a massive asteroid struck Earth 66 million years ago, a devastating  mass extinction followed, taking with it more than half of the world's  species. The consequences, both immediate and long-term, of this disastrous event are detailed by author and paleontologist Riley Black in her latest book, The Last Days of the Dinosaurs: An Asteroid, Extinction, and the Beginning. Today she joins me to further discuss the incredible evolutionary opportunities that arose out of the worst day in history.