Why Ezra should keep his podcast going

Last time I harped on how our time would be better spent having human-to-human conversations, rather than broadcasting them into the ether. In all honesty, I don't think this applies to everyone. Ezra Klein, the prolific author-once-blogger-opinionmaker-podcaster, should most definitely keep his going. Alive and well. I am biased, outlier-level biased, Spotify-wrap biased. I am one of the sad little creatures that make it onto their favorite podcast's 1st percentile, year on year. This year, Ezra sent us a video message. By the way, I also got one from Mumford & Sons. Concert tickets would have been better - I'm pretty sure I earned them. But I digress.

My gateway into the potentially wonderful world of podcasting was an Ezra episode from when Ezra was Vox, his pre-New York Times era. The best of is self-compiled here. At the top of the living better section is Work as identity, burnout as lifestyle. The header for the living better section distills my experience:

Every so often, a conversation comes along that changes not only how I understand my life, but how I live it. These are some of those conversations.

This podcast episode seamlessly changed the way I consume media. It made me come back for more episodes, with spillover effects on the competitors. It made me spread the word, over and over and over again. And so it made my conversations deeper, fuller, richer. From Ezra, I learned new ways of engaging with people and ideas from across the aisle, whatever that aisle is. I don't claim to have become a top-tier conversationalist, but the exposure alone sifts through daily life when I least expect it.

The New York Times E(z)ra brought new challenges to the fore. The wider, mainstream audience comes at a price - sometimes, priority has to be given to what is topical. If the previous incarnation of the podcast was mostly a hodgepodge of whatever interested (my guess), now the editors have a much bigger say on what the next episode will be about. So we heard quite a lot about politics, unabashedly about politics.

Ezra's podcast is still a safe refuge for those wanting to hear a conversation spreading across that invisible aisle that threatens to engulf dialogue and, perhaps, politics itself. The conversation with Gov. Spencer Cox is in my top 5, Spencer Cox Wants to Pull our Politics Back From the Brink; if you are looking for some hope, 2026 version, have a listen.

Last week brought us two fantastic absolutely-not-about-politics, gift-wrapped gems of an episode. Is Your Social Life Missing Something: This Conversation is For You brought back the outwardly force of Work as Identify, which made me slightly compulsively spread the you have to listen to this word. For some victims of my tsunami, I wasn't the first. Not only did the flood reach Spotify episode counts, it also had a direct impact in how I live my life. It made me get in my car and visit close friends on my way home, after countless empty threats. We Didn't Ask for This Internet will surely make it to my syllabus if I ever teach IO again.

Ezra, please, for the love of God, keep at it. Unabashedly you.