If You're Listening

Pod Save America on the endless escalation of Trump

02 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Jon Lovett has been following the daily minutia of U.S. politics for a decade on his podcast Pod Save America. Ahead of their Australian tour, Jon jo...

Steven Pinker thinks we're too worried about the future

31 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Matt is joined by psychologist and science writer Steven Pinker to discuss doomsday predictions, climate anxiety, and how best to split the balance b...

04 Black Swans | Countdown to Doomsday

28 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

In the midst of the Cold War, it was a very real fear that a nuclear winter would obliterate life as we know it. Now, fortunately, that never happene...

Did a 1981 book correctly predict the future?

26 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Matt and Kara discuss the book that inspired the Black Swan series… but didn’t make it into the final cut! Can experts, soothsayers, and psychics...

Did a 1981 book correctly predict the future?

26 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Matt and Kara discuss the book that inspired the Black Swan series… but didn’t make it into the final cut! Can experts, soothsayers, and psychics...

03 Black Swans | Burning Hill

21 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

In 1959 a flight to London took days and cost half a year’s average salary.  But things were changing rapidly. The invention of the Concorde meant...

The city that ten beers built

19 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Matt and Kara delve deeper into the story of town planner Alex Ramsay, and the bizarre deal he struck to purchase the land that would become Elizabet...

02 Black Swans | The Australian Dream

14 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

In the 1950s three quarters of Australians were homeowners,  most lived on a quarter-acre block, with a mortgage that could be covered with one inc...

01 Black Swans | The Population Bomb

07 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Until recently people were scared our planet would be outstripped by the weight of a colossal population. Experts feared that by 2026, there would be...

Matt got lost on his way to the costume department

06 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

We made a TV show! Kara and Matt take you behind the scenes of putting the series together, and how hard it is to find a iron when you need one.The B...

Trump’s playbook for Nicolás Maduro and Venezuela

05 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

In a post on Truth Social, US President Trump announced that he had captured the Venezuelan president, Nicolas Maduro and his wife, and that the pair...

NEOM: The world's dumbest megaproject

31 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The massive infrastructure project NEOM sits in the Saudi Arabian desert, and the jewel in its crown is The Line, a futuristic city which looks insan...

What's the deal with fluoride?

24 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Putting fluoride in drinking water has often been called one of the most successful public health measures in human history. But since the very begin...

How good are Australia’s gun laws really?

17 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australians are very proud of our gun laws, and we have good reason to be. The laws are world famous and frequently referenced in the wake of almost ...

24 hours after the Bondi shooting

15 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On Sunday the 14th of December, two men; a father and son, used a range of firearms to attack a large Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach playground....

Why is Venezuela falling apart?

10 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

During a 15 minute phone call, US President Donald Trump offered the Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro safe passage for him and his family to the c...

This robot will shoot you and steal your wife

08 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We have always been obsessed with stories about killer robots. But where do stories about malevolent machines with a mind of their own originate? Mat...

Where’s my robot butler?

03 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tech bros are racing to develop the first mass-produced humanoid. But despite billions of dollars in investment, these robots require a great deal of...

Is internet piracy making a comeback, me hearties?

01 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

You wouldn't steal a podcast!After meeting the founder of Sweden's Pirate Party, Rick Falkvinge, we decided to take a closer look at the world of pir...

Is China’s plan to invade Taiwan inevitable?

26 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Currently, as many as 5000 Chinese spies are operating in Taiwan. Many of Taiwan’s allies are concerned that these spies, along with the increasing...

The time Andrew Denton tried to hire a bounty hunter

24 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 90s, Australia’s most wanted fugitive was Christopher Skase. He was hiding on the Spanish island of Mallorca, to avoid the corporate c...

The truth about China’s social credit scores

19 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For the last decade or so, there’s been a lot of talk about how the Chinese government uses technology to issue social credit scores to its citizen...

maTt and kaRa address yoUr conspiracy THeory

17 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Get ready as Matt and Kara address a whole lot more listener questions. All things from Elon Musk’s impending trillionaire status to the mystery of...

So you’ve robbed the Louvre… now what?

12 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On the 19th of October at 9:30am, two thieves parked a truck at the Louvre. They carved a hole in the window, climbed into the gallery, smashed two d...

Was the CIA involved in Whitlam's dismissal?

10 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On 11 November 1975, Prime Minister Gough Whitlam was sacked by Governor-General Sir John Kerr. For the past 50 years, people have speculated about t...

Can we afford to power AI?

05 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the last decade, the number of data centres worldwide has doubled. As the tech bros spend big to render AI an irreplaceable part of our everyday ...

This town ain't big enough for two dog puppets

03 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This episode is about a lawsuit between two puppet dogs. What more do you need?This past week we’ve been waist-deep in the dot com boom of the 90s,...

Is the AI bubble too big to burst?

29 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

There are no salary caps when it comes to securing the future brains of AI researchers. Mark Zuckerberg recently paid a 24 year old $250 million to c...

The people have spoken and they love mud

27 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Today Matt and Kara are answering your questions, mostly about Trump and mud. They talk about whether Trump could serve a third term, if the rest of ...

Sizing up the Gaza rebuild

22 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On October 8, US President Donald Trump announced that Israel and Hamas had reached an agreement and signed the first phase of the deal. The ceasefir...

The balloon that started the US Air Force

20 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

So, Matt has found a shiny new rabbit hole to get lost in and this time it's balloons. More specifically spy balloons. This is a story about a man wi...

What happens if Trump takes over the Federal Reserve?

15 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

US President Donald Trump has set his sights on the Federal Reserve, his unprecedented threat to fire the Fed Chair Jerome Powell and replace him wit...

The time the US Navy teamed up with the Mafia

13 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Yes you read that right. It's a wild story from the latest series of No One Saw it Coming, a show about people, objects, and accidents that changed t...

Weighing up Ozempic

08 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This episode originally aired in September 2023.For a century, society has bullied and shamed people into trying to lose weight, without much result....

The Montana Mountain King and a conspiracy to clone

06 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Last year, environment reporter Peter de Kruijff stumbled on the case of 81-year-old rancher Arthur “Jack” Schubarth, who was sentenced to six mo...

How dodgy data sent China's economy off course

01 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This episode originally aired in August 2023.How do you plan for a country when you don’t even know how many people live there? That’s the proble...

Florida Man Invades Venezuela

29 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

While working on last Thursday’s episode, Matt had the very sad but familiar experience of cutting one of his favourite parts out of the script.It’...

Why Trump is blowing up boats off Venezuela

24 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The U.S. military has now attacked three boats off the coast of Venezuela in as many weeks. On the surface, it’s hard to see exactly what the admin...

This can't be good for our brains

22 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It’s been almost two weeks since we woke up to the news of Charlie Kirk’s assassination. If you were online that morning, you probably saw rollin...

Charlie Kirk’s murder sparks calls for revenge

17 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the days since the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the internet has been awash with conflicting information about the assassin’s ideological moti...

The Kurdish Fox and the Strawberry

15 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

While researching our last episode on the bizarre wave of Iran-banked anti-semitic attacks in Australia and around the world, Matt ended up somewhere...

Iran’s global network of goons

10 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

There has been a spike in antisemitic attacks around the world, but there was something off about the ones happening here in Australia. The graffiti ...

Matt has been stuck in the mud for seven years

08 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

There’s a story Matt’s been trying to tell on If You’re Listening almost since day one. It’s about the agriculture, soil and water of Ukraine...

Is Putin a master manipulator or a very smart guy?

03 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Donald Trump once said he could end the war between Russia and Ukraine in one day. Well, it’s now been over 200 days and he’s finally admitted th...

Who is the cigar-toting, moustachioed-American named Gunslinger?

01 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1999, a young American called Robert Bogucki dumped his bicycle and walked out into the Great Sandy Desert in remote northern Australia. In 2022, ...

The Art of the Peace Deal

27 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It’s no secret that Donald Trump has his sights set on a Nobel Peace Prize. He already claims to have brokered peace in a number of conflicts aroun...

Does the Chinese Embassy look tacky?

25 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When Palestinian statehood is recognised at the UN General Assembly in September, a small office tucked away in a residential street in Canberra will...

The blueprint for Palestine

20 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australia, the UK, France and Canada intend to recognise Palestine as a state at the UN General Assembly in September. But what does that actually me...

Kara drags Matt back down the rabbit hole

18 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

After an entire week looking into the Oslo Accords, we still had a residual urge to find out more about Mona Juul and Terje Rod Larsen, the Norwegian...

How Middle East peace plans were hatched in the Norwegian woods

13 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Even the most seasoned negotiators can’t agree on how to bring peace to the Middle East. Everyone agrees that - on a personal level - it’s a prob...

The nurse on death row in Yemen

11 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Getting accused of murder is never a good thing. But, hypothetically if you are going to get accused of murder, it’s generally for the best that it...

Are the MAGA podcasters right about Epstein?

06 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The internet is flooded with hour-long podcasts about what really happened to Jeffrey Epstein. Until recently, two of the most high profile Epstein c...

Australia's most dangerous home-grown conspiracy theory

04 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

So Jeffery Epstein probably wasn’t a Mossad spy. But online conspiracies like this pop up closer to home too. Could Israeli intelligence have been ...

Was Jeffrey Epstein a Mossad agent?

30 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Jeffrey Epstein rabbit hole has opened into a cavernous rabbit abyss and it seems no one is safe. Conspiracy theorists and right-wing podcasters ...

How to avoid abduction by a Mossad honeypot

28 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Forty years ago, a man named Mordecai Vanunu came very close to exposing Israel’s secret nuclear enrichment facility in a bible group in the heart ...

Israel’s not-so-secret nuclear weapons

23 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It’s widely accepted that Israel has nuclear weapons. How many? Well, it’s impossible to know because to this day the Israeli government has nev...

How Ayatollah Khomeini changed Iran

16 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

With Iran still in the news, we thought we would revisit the man who created the regime that so many in the Israeli and American political establishm...

How a cancer diagnosis ended the US-Iran relationship

09 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Before Iran was the Islamic theocracy it is today, it was a monarchy for two and a half thousand years. The last Shah or king of Iran was overthrown ...

Has the US busted Iran’s nuclear bomb plans?

02 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The chaotic 12 days of the Israel-Iran war ended with the United States dropping bombs on Iran’s nuclear facilities, then quickly brokering a cease...

Dr Kylie Moore-Gilbert on the bombing of Iran’s Evin prison

30 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Israel recently bombed Iran’s notorious Evin prison, a place that Dr Kylie Moore Gilbert came to know all too well. The political scientist and aut...

Why Israel's drones have changed the future of war

25 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For the last century, since the rise of mechanised and then nuclear warfare, defence budgets are designed to stop big existential attacks. Ships, pla...

Can the US Air Force bust Matt’s studio bunker?

23 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The United States has dropped some very large bombs on Iran, inserting itself into what we are currently calling the Israel-Iran War, despite Donald ...

Have ICE protests cracked Trump?

18 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

There is violence on the streets of America as anti-ICE protesters push back hard against the Trump Administration’s immigration policies. In the ...

Will any Prime Minister “Love Actually” Donald Trump?

16 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It’s been a manic week in global politics. Trump and Musk have officially broken up, Americans have taken to the streets to protest ICE deportation...

Trump and Elon's honeymoon is over

11 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In news that will surprise no one, the big beautiful bromance between Donald Trump and Elon Musk has finally come to an end. Over the last week, the...

Skunk oil and the butcher girl

09 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

While investigating the history of fluoride, Matt Bevan stumbled upon a regional newspaper insert from the 1940s called Modern Weekly News Magazine. ...

RFK Jr v Fluoride

04 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Putting fluoride in drinking water has often been called one of the most successful public health measures in human history. But since the very begin...

How a world leader kept a secret from 1.4 billion people

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A little trivia question for you... is Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi married?He’s gotta be, right? World leaders do tend to be married, and s...

Why Pakistan fights India

28 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

India and Pakistan have agreed to a temporary ceasefire, but tensions between the two nuclear-armed nations are still running high. There are faction...

Why India fights Pakistan

21 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

After a brief moment where two nuclear powers looked to be on the verge of war, India and Pakistan have agreed to a temporary ceasefire. But Indian P...

Howard Lutnick and The Gates of Hell

20 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When two planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers on September 11 2001 Howard Lutnick lost 658 of his colleagues. It was a tragedy of unthin...

The man betting big on Trump's tariffs

14 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The man behind Trump’s trade war is Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and his backstory is extraordinary. He’s been a hero, he’s been a villain...

Australia vs the Internet: Conservative kill screen

07 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Just a few months ago Elon Musk was heralded as a political kingmaker when he had a hand in helping Donald Trump win the US election. Musk has since ...

Australia vs the Internet: Misinformation overload

30 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

To scroll through social media during an election campaign in 2025 is to experience some of the worst misinformation. But an online soup of bots spou...

Australia vs the Internet: RIP your newsfeed

23 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When US President Donald Trump was inaugurated in January, the world’s three wealthiest people stood right behind him, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg ...

The secret weapon that changed war forever

16 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the middle of the 1800s, the Confederate army built a stealth vessel that could travel undetected underwater to give them the military edge over t...

Australia vs the Internet

14 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

You’re not losing your mind, the internet is different now. The 2025 Australian federal election will be the first in a decade where news isn’t ...

How Japan dodged a global housing crisis

09 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Australia’s housing market is in the midst of a crisis that feels like it will never be solved and now housing is one of the major battlefields of ...

Can Tesla survive Trump and Elon's bromance?

02 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It has not been a good year so far for Elon Musk’s car company Tesla. Stocks are plummeting and sales are falling even faster as people around the ...

Why is Trump suddenly obsessed with rare earths?

26 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Donald Trump is talking about rare earth elements like they are magic rings with the power to unlock world domination. The US President is on the br...

Why France isn’t counting on Trump

19 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Donald Trump’s sudden shift on Ukraine has come as a massive shock to most countries in America’s orbit. European leaders who have long banked th...

Russia, Trump is listening

12 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Since he took office, Donald Trump has made a lot of decisions that fly in the face of traditional US foreign policy. He’s left Ukraine high and dr...

Who will say no to President Trump this time?

05 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the United States, there are laws constraining the President’s power. The Attorney General and everyone who works at the Department of Justice a...

How Trump is sending the FBI back to the 1960s

26 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Throughout Donald Trump’s campaign he declared that the Justice Department and the FBI were weaponised against him. Now that he’s US President, ...

What Elon’s DOGE cuts are really about

19 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Billionaire Elon Musk is at the helm of US President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, established to slash massive amounts of go...

Where Trump’s plan to ‘clean out’ Gaza came from

12 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When US President Donald Trump announced his plan for America to take over the Gaza Strip, everyone was stunned. That includes the man standing next ...

Can Trump bully Panama into giving back its canal?

05 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Donald Trump started his presidency by picking a fight with Colombia. The US threatened its Central American neighbour with massive tariffs if it did...

Will Trump's tariffs make America expensive again?

29 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Donald Trump has liked the idea of tariffs for a long time, since before his first term as president. Now that he’s back in office he’s using the...

Putin or the EU? Georgia's big fight

18 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The people of Georgia are in the streets of Tbilisi, protesting the ruling party’s recent election win. At the heart of the fight is whether the co...

The serious ramifications of Hunter Biden’s pardon

11 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We want to know what you think of the show so we can make it better in 2025! Give us your feedback here: https://forms.office.com/r/w0hT5fzuxgHunter ...

Will Netanyahu ever face court for alleged war crimes?

04 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We want to know what you think of the show so we can make it better in 2025! Give us your feedback here: https://forms.office.com/r/w0hT5fzuxgThe Int...

Could Russia turn off the whole internet?

27 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A Chinese-owned cargo ship called the Yi Peng 3 is sitting idle in Danish waters, after undersea internet cables were cut in the Baltic Sea. European...

America's Last Election 6: How Trump’s banishment led to his comeback

20 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

After January 6, many who had stuck by Donald Trump through his presidency condemned his denial of the election, and his failure to stop the attack o...

America’s Last Election 5: Trump demands loyalty

13 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Over the last four episodes we’ve told the story of Donald Trump’s denial of the 2020 election result. It’s a period of time many thought would...

Hello America: Chess at the White House

08 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It’s Matt Bevan’s last 24 hours in Washington DC, and he’s leaving a very different place to the one he arrived in. Donald Trump is going to be...

US Results: Coffee with extra Trump

06 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In this update from Washington DC, Matt Bevan is filling in as host for ABC News Daily to bring you an early morning update on all the events from ov...

Hello America: Trump’s path back to the presidency

06 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

As the night goes on, and key states in the US presidential election are called for Donald Trump, it's becoming harder to see a way that Kamala Harri...

Hello America: Queuing for Kamala Harris

05 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It's election day in America! But in the dying hours of Monday night (and the campaigns), Matt Bevan took a train to Pennsylvania to stand in queue f...

Hello America: Two trains and seven swing states

05 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It's election eve in America, and Matt Bevan is in Washington DC. How did he get there? By train, from Detroit, where he took in the fall foliage fro...

America’s Last Election 4: Pardon the riot

04 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Eight months before January 6, a very similar mob stormed a different government building. Armed men, furious about an extension of COVID lockdowns, ...