Breaking History
Sometimes the news moves so fast, you have to look closely to know if you’ve seen it before. And that’s what this show is about. Breaking History breaks down the news, by breaking down history. We cover everything from LBJ and the Roman Republic to Donald Trump and the chaos at Columbia. This twice a month show from The Free Press delivers the best historians, authors, and reporters by mining the archives of human experience to figure out the present. George Santayana wrote, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Tune in to Breaking History to resist the repetition.
Episodes
December 22, 2025 • 50 mins
After October 7, Jews around the world were reminded of an old, unsettling truth: Governments do not always protect minorities when mobs turn violent. From Bondi Beach to New York synagogues, the promise of public order has looked increasingly fragile.
In this episode of Breaking History, Eli Lake revisits the last time Jews in America confronted that reality head-on. In the 1930s, as Nazi sympathizers rallied openly and police of...
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December 10, 2025 • 39 mins
Did you know the soundtrack of Americans’ Christmas was written largely by . . . Jews? Most of the composers behind the holiday canon were the children of immigrants who fled pogroms and conscription in Russia and Eastern Europe between 1880 and 1920.
Sammy Cahn, Frank Sinatra’s go-to lyricist, gave us “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” Mel Tormé, son of a Belarusian refugee, wrote “The Christmas Song”) (a.k.a. “Chestnuts Ro...
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November 26, 2025 • 51 mins
We revisit the scandal-soaked 1990s—Packwood, Thomas, Clinton—and explore how failing to enforce norms around abuse of power helped create the world in which the Epstein scandal could flourish. This episode traces the unraveling of political accountability from the Clinton impeachment to the Trump Access Hollywood moment, and finally the global Epstein reckoning. We show how feminists in the ’90s and evangelicals in the 2010s made ...
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November 12, 2025 • 41 mins
We are coming up on the 50th anniversary of punk, the genre that smashed the old rock gods and stripped down the music to its essence. In this episode of Breaking History, we examine the examined life of the original punk: the loudmouth philosopher who defied the authorities, refused to conform, and paid the ultimate price for speaking the truth. Yes—it can only be Socrates. Grab your leather jacket and your hemlock, we’re going h...
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October 29, 2025 • 60 mins
For 124 years, the American socialist movement has been defined by defeat. From Eugene Debs’ doomed presidential runs to Michael Harrington’s quiet organizing, it’s been a story of almosts: almost mainstream, almost powerful, almost relevant. Until now. In this episode, we look at how Zohran Mamdani’s likely mayoral victory marks the first real crack in America’s century-long resistance to socialism—and why its impact will reach fa...
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October 21, 2025 • 1 min
On October 21, 2023, beloved Detroit community leader Samantha Woll was found brutally stabbed to death outside her home—two weeks to the day after the October 7 attacks on Israel. It looks like an open-and-shut case—a hate crime. But swiftly the police rule that out. Instead they eventually find themselves with two unrelated suspects. When they charge one with murder, the case takes a turn that raises questions about antisemitism,...
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October 15, 2025 • 52 mins
Once, Britain was the cradle of free speech- the land of Milton, Orwell, and John Stuart Mill. But in 2025, police are arresting citizens for tweets, comedians are detained for jokes, and ordinary people are jailed for words deemed “hateful.” In this episode, we trace how the birthplace of liberty became a censor’s paradise - and what it reveals about a Western world that’s forgotten Mill’s warning: that without dissent, truth itse...
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October 1, 2025 • 55 mins
James Comey isn’t a hero. But prosecuting him like this? It’s not justice—it’s political theater. In this episode, we tell the origin story of Comey, the now indicted former FBI chief, and unpack the tangled web of FBI overreach, President Donald Trump’s vendetta, and a system that no longer knows where accountability ends and revenge begins. This is more than a case: It’s a mirror held up to a nation on the brink.
A special tha...
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September 17, 2025 • 44 mins
In a week when political violence has returned to the national stage, we revisit a moment from the 1970s when Shirley Chisholm, the first black congresswoman, visited segregationist Alabama governor George Wallace after he was nearly assassinated. Her act of grace lit a spark that changed him. What can we learn from that moment today, after the murder of Charlie Kirk silenced a voice in mid-debate? This is a story about bullets, ba...
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September 3, 2025 • 71 mins
This week Breaking History dives into a century-old mind game: Russia’s information war against America. More specifically, how it keeps driving us crazy. From Soviet spycraft to this summer’s Russiagate revelations, the story is often familiar: a kernel of truth is then buried in lies.
We look back at the haunted mind of James Jesus Angleton, the CIA’s original paranoia prophet. He spent his life chasing Russian ghosts, and what...
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August 20, 2025 • 29 mins
How did air conditioning go from a niche invention for factories to a force that reshaped cities, industries, and even human behavior?
In this episode of Breaking History, we dive deep into the surprising, often overlooked story of AC with author Salvatore Basile—author of Cool: How Air Conditioning Changed Everything.
Hear how Willis Carrier’s revolutionary breakthrough changed the world.
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Producers: Poppy Damon &...
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August 6, 2025 • 88 mins
In our last episode, we traced the rise of the Pahlavi dynasty and the forces building toward Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.
This week, we turn to the man who brought that monarchy to an end: Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
From exile in a quiet French chateau, Khomeini launched a revolution that shattered 2,500 years of Persian monarchy. But he didn’t do it alone.
Liberals and leftists, both inside Iran and across the West,...
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July 30, 2025 • 69 mins
Do the new Russiagate releases justify Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s accusation of “treasonous conspiracy”? In this bonus episode, Eli Lake and commentator Josh Hammer get into the nitty gritty of the newest document releases in one of the most polarizing political controversies of the 21st century: Russiagate.
Listen to Boundless Insights wherever you get your podcasts for smart, honest conversations about...
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July 16, 2025 • 71 mins
Breaking History dives into the paradox at the heart of modern Iran: How a nation born in revolt, from the tobacco protests of the 1890s to the 1979 Revolution, has time and again empowered autocrats in the name of democracy. This week we trace the cycles of reform and repression that still shape Iran today.
Producer: Poppy Damon
A special thanks to our sponsors:
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July 3, 2025 • 56 mins
As our nation turns 249 this week, we explore the radical and enduring power of the Declaration of Independence. More than just a break from the British Empire, the Declaration was a bold statement of universal human rights, an idea so dangerous it has sparked revolutions and inspired liberation movements around the world ever since, from Vietnam to Israel, from China to the Black Panther Party. We trace its intellectual origins, u...
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June 19, 2025 • 48 mins
Eli Lake and nuclear weapons expert David Albright discuss the Islamic Republic’s arsenal and whether or not Israel can destroy it on its own.
This episode was originally a subscriber-only livestream. Livestreams are one of the many benefits of becoming a paid subscriber to The Free Press. (Thank you to everyone who joined us live!)
Go to groundnews.com/BreakingHistory to get 40% off the unlimited access Vantage plan and stay...
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June 18, 2025 • 57 mins
William F. Buckley, one of the founding fathers of the American right, would have turned 100 this year. He, more than any other figure, is responsible for creating the American conservative movement that fueled the Reagan revolution more than 40 years ago. But what happened to that revolution in the era of Donald Trump?
CREDITSProducer Poppy DamonExecutive Producer Alex Miller
Go to groundnews.com/BreakingHistory to get 40% ...
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June 13, 2025 • 83 mins
This was recorded as a Free Press livestream. To be part of these conversations as they happen live, become a part of The Free Press. You can do that by going to TheFP.com and subscribing now.
The world woke up today to a changed Middle East. Israel struck key nuclear and military facilities throughout Iran. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed retaliation. And Donald Trump urged Iran to agree to a nuclear deal.
As Iran begins its co...
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June 11, 2025 • 69 mins
We’re sharing the latest episode of Conversations with Coleman, a podcast that joined The Free Press network this week. Coleman Hughes engages deep thinkers and curious minds in sharp, surprising, and unfiltered chats. In this relaunch episode he sits down with Free Press founder Bari Weiss and asks her about her critics, rising antisemitism, the woke right, and more.
Hope you enjoy it & stay tuned for more Breaking History here...
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May 28, 2025 • 55 mins
Last month, two nuclear powers exchanged blows after terrorists mowed down 26 tourists in Kashmir, yet it didn’t turn into a hot war. We got lucky. But sadly, the next India-Pakistan war seems like only a matter of time.
In this week’s Breaking History, Eli Lake explores the origin story of the ongoing conflict between India and Pakistan. How did Pakistan become a true ‘deep state nation’ post-partition? And why does it really r...
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