Question Everything with Brian Reed

Apr 03 2025 19 ep. 37 mins 825
Question Everything with Brian Reed Podcast artwork

Propagandist? Truth teller? Influencer? Question Everything unravels the contested work of journalists and the moral complexities surrounding the stories that impact us all. 

Hosted by Brian Reed (S-Town, This American Life, The Trojan Horse Affair). 

For outtakes and an inside peek inside the editorial conundrums that confront journalists every day, sign up for our newsletter at www.kcrw.com/questioneverything.

Question Everything is a production of KCRW and Placement Theory. 

  Society & Culture
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He quit journalism to fight authoritarianism. How’s that going?

Apr 03 2025 25 mins  
Last year, we did an episode with Barton Gellman, who talked about the war games he was running with high-level military leaders and government officials to prepare for a second Trump term. A bunch of you have been asking us to have Barton back, to find out what he’s doing, now that the second Trump term is here. So we called him up. Barton works at the Brennan Center for Just

A Rant or a Slant: When Should Reporters Speak From the Heart?

Mar 27 2025 41 mins  
It’s easy to get frustrated with the charade reporters are supposed to keep up, where they pretend they don’t have opinions or feelings or any kind of human thoughts about a story they’re telling. Plenty of journalists have been trying to break out of that charade. But the decision to do that: it can be a fraught one, with real implications. Dana Ballout struggled with this

Do you want to be on Question Everything?

Mar 26 2025 1 mins  
Do you have questions for us? If so, we want to talk to you! If you have thoughts about Question Everything, critiques of our episodes, or anything you're curious about, that we're covering, or not covering…please tell us. We want to set up some conversations between listeners and Brian and our staff for an upcoming episode. Write to us at [email protected] and someone fr

A Teen, a Reporter, and a Grand Jury Leak (Over BBQ)

Mar 20 2025 34 mins  
Journalists jailed for an article they published. In America. How did this happen? Brian tells the story of a reporting trip he took to Alabama, where two small-town journalists had been locked up, which led to one of the most honest - and surprising - conversations about journalism he’s had in a long time. Sign up for our newsletter to see some stories and pictures from a re

The News is Coming from Under the Desk… on TikTok (live from On Air Fest)

Mar 06 2025 52 mins  
As trust in traditional journalism plummets, social media content creator V Spehar of Under the Desk News is ascendant, with over 3.4 million TikTok followers. But recently, V found themself in a public dustup with NPR over, in part, how the outlet had classified V in an interview. In this special episode of Question Everything–largely recorded live at On Air Fest–Brian and V t

Not Like Us: How Billionaires Think

Feb 27 2025 40 mins  
As billionaires hoard more control over our politics, it seems more important than ever to ask: What makes them tick? Four reporters gather after hours at a wine shop to discuss – over drinks – what they’ve learned from covering billionaires for years, and how it can help us hoi polloi make sense of what the ultra-rich are doing right now. Featuring Vicky Ward, who has covere

And The Award Goes To...The Circuit Court of The Nineteenth Judicial Circuit In and For Okeechobee County, Florida

Feb 13 2025 37 mins  
Ben Smith tells the story of the strange controversy over a journalism award that’s been going down in a Florida courthouse. Ben is Editor-in-Chief of Semafor and co-host of the Mixed Signals podcast. He used to be The New York Times media columnist and was founding editor-in-chief of Buzzfeed News. Sign up for our newsletter to read the lengthy listener criticism that helped i

A reporter? A spy? Or something else? Israel arrests its first American journalist.

Jan 31 2025 58 mins  
Locked up, alone, accused of being a spy, reporter Jeremy Loffredo has to defend the fact that he’s a journalist. To the Israeli courts. And then…to our reporter. Part two of our special series about Jeremy Loffredo, who in October became the first American journalist arrested by Israel. If you haven't listened to part one, check that out first in your feed: "Blindfolded And

Blindfolded And Arrested On Assignment In Israel

Jan 16 2025 58 mins  
Just a few months ago, Israel did something it has never done before. It arrested an American journalist. His name is Jeremy Loffredo. This is his story. Part one of a special, two-part series. “Question Everything” is a production of KCRW and Placement Theory. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When Hollywood Tells The Truth: with Tom McCarthy, Antonio Campos, Tina Satter, and Tobias Lindholm.

Dec 19 2024 49 mins  
Four Hollywood directors gather after hours at a wine shop to drink and commiserate about the perils – and power – that come when you’re straddling fact and fiction. With behind the scenes stories about documentary romance, regret, and pirates. Featuring Tom McCarthy, who won an Oscar for Spotlight; Antonio Campos, creator of The Staircase for HBO; Tina Satter, who directed