Advertise on podcast: News Weakly with Sami Shah
Rating
4.7from
This podcast has
248 episodes
Language
EnglishPublisher
Sami ShahExplicit
Yes
Date created
2021/09/08
Latest episode
2026/10/23
Average duration
30 min.
Release period
9 days
Description
News Weakly is the sharpest, funniest, and most professional news satire podcast in Australia—where we punch the news in the headlines… weakly. Hosted by multi-award-winning comedian, journalist, and author Sami Shah, the show delivers a fast-paced, fiercely intelligent breakdown of the biggest stories in politics, global affairs, and culture. With a background that spans stand-up comedy, radio broadcasting, and serious journalism—including bylines in The New York Times, The Guardian, and ABC RN—Sami cuts through the noise with biting satire, relentless wit, and just enough sarcasm to keep us all from screaming into the void. News Weakly isn’t just about the headlines—it’s about the hypocrisy, the absurdity, and the sheer chaos behind them. Whether it's Australian politics, international disasters, or billionaires doing dumb things, Sami delivers a fresh, fearless take that keeps listeners informed and entertained. With a growing and engaged audience of news junkies, comedy lovers, and politics obsessives, News Weakly is the perfect space for advertisers looking to reach smart, curious, and highly engaged listeners. Get in on the conversation. Stay ahead of the spin. And never trust a headline again. New episodes every week. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Podcast episodes
Check latest episodes from News Weakly with Sami Shah podcast
Saudi Arabia Executes Two Bangladeshis: Migrant Worker Abuse & a Hajj/Umrah Boycott
2026/10/23
Saudi Arabia has executed two Bangladeshi nationals for an unspecified “immoral act” inside a mosque in Mecca. Bangladesh says it wasn’t warned, the families are still seeking answers, and the viral story that they were newlyweds executed for kissing doesn’t appear to be true.
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah looks at what we actually know about the executions, Saudi Arabia’s treatment of South Asian migrant workers, the monarchy’s expensive effort to rebrand itself through sport and tourism, and why Muslims should consider using pilgrimage spending as political leverage.
If boycotts are supposed to be an ethical tool, why should Saudi Arabia be exempt just because the booking is religious?
News Weakly is independent, ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Malala, Gaza, Conspiracies & the Collapse of Trust
2026/10/16
NEWS WEAKLY 232 – Malala, Gaza, Conspiracies & the Collapse of TrustWhy do people with perfectly good reasons to distrust governments sometimes end up distrusting the victim instead?
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah starts with the strange hostility towards Malala Yousafzai in Pakistan, then follows the same logic through Gaza, Trump’s “alternative facts”, Flydubai false-flag conspiracies and the rise of One Nation.
What happens when justified scepticism turns into a worldview where disbelief itself feels intelligent — and every piece of evidence becomes a loyalty test?
News Weakly is independent, ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
October 7 Mourning, Flydubai Conspiracies, Coalition Migration Cuts & OpenAI’s Medicare Breach
2026/10/09
NEWS WEAKLY 231 – October 7 Mourning, Flydubai Conspiracies, Coalition Migration Cuts & OpenAI’s Medicare Breach
This week on News Weakly: three years after October 7, Israelis and Palestinians are still being told their grief needs the correct political disclaimer.
Then a Flydubai attack becomes a false-flag conspiracy before investigators have finished working out what happened; Angus Taylor unveils the Coalition’s plan to cut migration to 100,000 a year; and OpenAI apologises after one of its experimental agents accessed Australian government systems without authorisation.
Mourning, misinformation, migration and the strange new world where AI hacks Medicare and then helps write the apology email.
News Weakly is independent, ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Australia’s New Student Visa Rules, Nyadol Nyuon & Macklemore’s Palestine Controversy
2026/09/19
This week on News Weakly: Tony Burke tells international students to leave the family at home, while British backpackers discover the migration system has a loyalty program.
Also, Nyadol Nyuon gets Yassmined for saying she has no intention of assimilating, despite apparently doing more for Australia than most of the people demanding she leave it.
And Macklemore gets booted from Ed Sheeran’s tour for saying “Free Palestine”, while an award-winning Israeli documentary about Gaza sparks an argument over who is allowed to tell Palestinian stories.
Migration, belonging, censorship and the increasingly complicated application process for having the correct opinion.
News Weakly is independent, ad-free and supported by listeners through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
The Blast Radius: How 9/11 Remade Pakistan
2026/09/11
Twenty-five years after 9/11, everyone knows where Ground Zero was. But where did the blast radius end?
This special edition of News Weakly follows one country through the aftermath: Pakistan. From the CIA-backed Afghan jihad and the rise of the Taliban, through Musharraf’s alliance with George W. Bush, suicide bombings, Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, drone warfare and the growth of Pakistani television news, all the way to the night Osama bin Laden was found living in Abbottabad.
Pakistan didn’t carry out 9/11. No Pakistani was among the nineteen hijackers. Yet its modern history became almost impossible to separate from what happened that morning.
The physical blast lasted seconds. The political blast radius is still expanding.
News Weakly is independent, ad-free and supported by listeners through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Getting Shot: Antisemitism and the Loyalty Test
2026/09/04
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah revisits a 2022 argument about the Sydney Festival boycott after The Shot brands him a “liberal Zionist coward” for criticising two of its headlines as demonstrations of antisemitism.
From Israel and Gaza to Mossad-payroll conspiracies, white saviour politics, audience capture and the invisible damage of online pile-ons, this episode asks what happens when political disagreement becomes a test of whether you are still allowed to belong.
Criticising Israel and recognising antisemitism are not rival positions. So why does saying both increasingly get treated as evidence of betrayal?
News Weakly is independent, completely ad-free and supported by listeners through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
The End of the World with Flared Pants
2026/08/28
Everyone agrees the world is ending. The only disagreement is which catastrophe gets top billing.
Starting with Jimmy Carter’s 1979 “crisis of confidence” speech, Sami Shah travels through Bangladesh, Munich, Chile, Watergate, oil shocks, coups, terrorism, information overload and nuclear panic to ask whether the present is uniquely doomed—or whether every generation mistakes its own crisis for the final shape of history.
This is not a cheerful TED Talk claiming everything is secretly better. Gaza, democratic decline, antisemitism, climate change and AI-generated misinformation are real dangers.
But helplessness is the con.
News Weakly is independent, completely ad-free and supported by listeners through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
What Is The Sentence?
2026/08/15
NEWS WEAKLY 226 – What Is The Sentence?
Last week, News Weakly opened with Jason Arday. This week, after his sudden death, Sami Shah asks a harder question: what is public accountability actually supposed to achieve?
From Arday to Louis C.K., Warren Ellis and Neil Gaiman, this documentary looks at public shame, misconduct, cancellation, comeback and whether punishment without an end point eventually becomes something closer to appetite than justice.
When should someone be allowed back? Who gets to decide? And if suffering itself isn’t the point, what is?
Content note: this episode discusses death, possible suicide, sexual misconduct and public shaming.
News Weakly is independent, ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
The Story Machine: AI, Fabulism & What We’re Really Buying
2026/08/08
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah goes long on artificial intelligence, authenticity and the increasingly difficult question: how was this thing actually made?
From Cambridge professor Jason Arday’s disputed biography and Mahmood Fazal’s anonymous-source scandal at the ABC, to novelist Jerry Falade’s collapsed $2 million publishing deal and Hank Green reconsidering his own use of AI, The Story Machine asks what journalism, academia, publishing and creativity are really selling us.
Is AI the problem—or has it simply exposed how willing institutions already were to reward compelling outputs without checking their provenance?
News Weakly is completely ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Kmart Keating, Douglas Murray's wet dream & Hamas’s Gun Garage
2026/08/01
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah watches Victorian Labor replace Jacinta Allan with her own deputy and announce a fresh start from inside the same government.
Meanwhile, tens of thousands cross from Morocco into Spain’s African enclave of Ceuta, producing a humanitarian emergency, unstable statistics and some highly selective European geography.
Plus, Trump announces Hamas’s complete disarmament—while Hamas, Israel and the English language remain less certain.
News Weakly is ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Rise of the Cockroaches
2026/07/25
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah follows India’s Cockroach Janta Party from a Supreme Court insult and viral meme to mass youth protests over examination leaks, unemployment and corruption.
How did a cockroach holding a mobile phone become the symbol of a generation losing faith in education, employment and government? And why might satire be better at organising political anger than political parties are?
Plus: India’s crackdown on comedians, the youth movements spreading across South Asia, and why Australians should understand the politics shaping the people they live and work alongside.
News Weakly is completely ad-free and listener-supported through Patreon.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Reading Between The Headlines
2026/07/17
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah follows two news stories through the online outrage machine.
An ABC report about climate disasters increasing the risk of child marriage becomes “the ABC defends Muslim child brides”. Meanwhile, a review of the Committee to Protect Journalists’ Gaza casualty database becomes both “all Palestinian journalists are terrorists” and “CPJ erased twenty murdered reporters”.
It’s an episode about missing qualifiers, invented context, tense laundering, viral screenshots and why reading beyond the headline may now qualify as civic service.
All that, and more.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Modi, Telstra & Iran’s Martyr Machine
2026/07/10
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah looks at how disasters become PR opportunities.
Telstra somehow fixes a nationwide outage by creating another one, Narendra Modi gets the rock-star treatment in Melbourne while human rights concerns barely get a mention, and China reminds the Pacific what "friendly" military exercises look like.
Plus, the Royal Commission into Antisemitism turns its attention to the ABC, and Iran transforms Ayatollah Khamenei's funeral into a masterclass in authoritarian image-making.
All that, and more.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
America at 250 needs more Street Hawk
2026/07/03
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah marks America's 250th birthday by asking what its greatest populist, Huey Long, can teach us about Donald Trump, democracy, and why every generation keeps looking for a king.
Plus, Australia's aged care system discovers that maybe humans should assess human beings after all, and the debate over journalists killed in Gaza descends into another battle over who counts as a journalist in the first place.
All that, and more.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Bloodsport of the Deal
2026/06/26
This week on News Weakly, Sami Shah explains why Donald Trump's favourite movie might also explain his foreign policy.
From Jean-Claude Van Damme's Bloodsport to the Iran war, this episode explores the dangers of confusing spectacle with strategy, humiliation with victory, and refusing to flinch with actual courage.
How did America win every battle but still end up negotiating over the Strait of Hormuz? And what can an '80s martial arts movie teach us about modern geopolitics?
All that, and more.
Sami Shah is a multi-award-winning comedian, writer, journalist, and broadcaster.
For more: http://thesamishah.com
Theme music 'Historic Anticipation' by Paul Mottram
This podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Sami Shah.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Podcast reviews
Read News Weakly with Sami Shah podcast reviews
ShannynF 2026/02/27
Newsworthy and hilarious
Sami reminds me a bit of Mehdi Hasan - such an excellent command of language, but also much funnier than Mehdi
Across the Cold Pacific 2025/12/20
Excellent, thought-provoking, and funny
Sami Shah does a great job of presenting the news in a way that is funny. He does not shy away from difficult topics. Rather, he give us context and p...
Liberal Austin Hawk 2025/11/24
Sunlight is the best disinfectant
Sami added “I love you” to his fundraising pitch.
That’s gross.
Latho717 2025/05/31
Oh no you dit int
I still can’t believe you Rickrolled us! Best laugh of the week.
JABinTexas 2024/05/26
Political satire that’s funny and true
Loving it from Dallas Even without all the insider info—I’ve never been to Australia.
JT33333 2023/09/04
The only news you need
Sami is excellent with a sharp satirical look at the top stories of the week.
The Shadow Nose 2023/08/21
Considerable Anti-Conservative vitriol
Focus is on emotional issues and not on information that listeners could use. I know there’s a big market for right wing bashing and this podcast wil...
mxyplyzyx 2023/05/03
Smart and funny
News the way it should be. Sami Shah is hilarious and very, very smart.
eagerly awaits 2022/11/27
Weakly reviewed
Fun and funny take on news. makes me smile here in the always ridiculous Silicon Valley USA.
Stormsdream 2022/09/18
Wonderful, Insightful, Informative
Wonderful, insightful and informative, I look forward to News Weakly every--ummm--week.
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