Three stories about the strange power inanimate objects can hold over us.

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• Prologue: Nunzio gets caught in a kind of servile relationship…with a scooter. (8 minutes)
• Act One: Ted was six when he first picked up a rock from the Petrified Forest National Park. Nearly 50 years later, he really wishes he hadn’t. Aviva DeKornfeld talked to him. (15 minutes)
• Act Two: Heavyweight host Jonathan Goldstein leaps in to help a family, who are not entirely sure they want or need his help, get rid of their stuff. (31 minutes)

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Thirteen parole board members decide whether or not one man should be released from prison.

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• Prologue: Henry Dee has been locked up for most of his life, nearly 50 years. Now, he’s up for parole. Reporter Ben Austen tells the story. (19 minutes)
• Part 1: The parole board members puzzle through the pros and cons of releasing Henry Dee from prison and cast their votes. (26 minutes)
• Part 2: Reporter Ben Austen continues the story. (8 minutes)

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Ira Glass shares some news about This American Life

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What happens when people create alternate versions of themselves and release them into the wild?

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• Prologue: Host Ira Glass talks about a recent experience being interviewed and the realization that he was being asked about another version of himself. (4 minutes)
• Act One: Reporter Evan Ratliff creates an AI version of himself and then sets it loose on the world. This story was adapted from Evan's podcast, Shell Game. (43 minutes)
• Act Two: Emmanuel Dzotsi explores the phenomenon of people lying on first dates to project a better version of themselves. Plus, he gets into a very personal example from his own life. (8 minutes)

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When Zohran Mamdani won the primary race for New York mayor, the Democratic establishment's lukewarm response echoed the treatment of another charismatic, unconventional candidate decades earlier. This week, we bring you the story of Harold Washington, the greatest politician you've probably never heard of, and the backlash that ensued when he became Chicago's first Black mayor.

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• Prologue: As New York City’s Democratic establishment attempts to resist the candidacy of Zohran Mamdani, we look back at another mayoral candidate who upset the established political machine. (7 minutes)
• Act One: A history of the brief mayoral career of Harold Washington and its lessons for Black and white America, as told by people close to him. (39 minutes)
• Act Two: Ira revisits interviews with Chicago voters from the 1997 and 2007 rebroadcasts of this episode. In 1997, ten years after Harold Washington’s death, not much had changed in Chicago. By 2007, attitudes had begun to shift slowly, and another Black politician from Chicago was on the rise — Barack Obama. Ira also speaks to David Axelrod, an advisor to both Harold Washington and Barack Obama. (10 minutes)

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A group of immigration judges, who almost never speak to the press, describes the dismantling of our immigration court system from the inside.

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• Prologue: Zoe Chace gives an eyewitness account of what has been happening at 26 Federal Plaza, an immigration courthouse in New York City. (5 minutes)
• Act One: The judges walk us through how different their jobs have become in just the past few months, because of sweeping policy changes by Trump’s Department of Justice. (26 minutes)
• Act Two: It gets extremely personal for the judges. Also, the story of one person who got pushed through the new immigration court system this summer. (23 minutes)

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Things are different on college campuses this year. We see inside the drama, with students and staff.

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• Prologue: We go to orientation at Arizona State University and meet international students who are trying to make friends. (6 minutes)
• Act One: The president of the Black Student Union at the University of Utah fights to keep the B in BSU. (30 minutes)
• Act Two: A definition of antisemitism, canceled classes, and angry professors at Columbia University. (16 minutes)

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Small human plans that run into much larger obstacles.

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• Prologue: Angela's dad, an accountant, made a spreadsheet to prepare for their family trip to a national park. But there are things you never think to put in a spreadsheet. (7 minutes)
• Act One: A young couple, excited to start a new chapter in their lives, is suddenly put on a very different trajectory. (30 minutes)
• Act Two: A sixteen-year-old plans out a prank, and a complete stranger from Honduras ends up in a million-dollar deal. What could go wrong? (25 minutes)

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