Wednesday, April 18, 2012

HWX, with Mark Yost


A fresh and FREE, all-access Hinkeraker-Ward Experience podcast is now available for your listening pleasure.


The latest Hinderaker-Ward Experience podcast is up and ready for your listening pleasure, fresh and free, as always.

It’s a rollicking 60 minutes of podcast action in which we discuss:

* John’s recent whirlwind tour of Ricochet headquarters in California

* Updates on our success and/or failure to get out tax returns in by tonight’s deadline

* Senate Democrats dereliction of duty in passing a Federal budget

*Party in the GSA, government employee convention spending bacchanalia

* Mitt Romney, the polls, and how things are shaping up against Obama (extra contentious!)

Then we talk to Wall Street Journal contributor and author Mark Yost about his exciting new thriller Soft Target:


“Soft Target” introduces readers to Nick Mattera, a former Marine Corps bomb squad technician who survived four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. He's come home to his Italian-American neighborhood on Chicago's North Side and becomes one of the fire department's young hotshots. But Nick never expected to run into Abdullah and Jhalil.

The two al Qaeda terrorists have come to Chicago with one goal in mind: indiscriminately kill Jewish Americans and open up a whole new front in the War on Terror. Adding to Nick's troubles are Jack Weinstein, an opportunistic politician who wants to close Nick's firehouse, and Rachel Cohen, Weinstein's sexy legislative aide who has eyes for Nick and doubts about her boss.

The story that unfolds in "Soft Target" is best described as Tom Clancy meets Backdraft. Mark Yost is himself a firefighter/paramedic and gives readers an unparalleled look at life inside a firehouse. More importantly, he shows just how easy it would be for two dedicated extremists to use America's open society against it and carry out these dastardly missions.

The book is terrific, and a bargain at $2.99 (cheap), and Mark is always fun to talk to. It can be purchased here.

We wrap up with some Loons of the Week, Joe Biden on the legal acumen of funnyman Al Franken) and Arlen Specter getting porny. And finally, This Week in Gatekeeping, with a story on how the Daily Mirror mistook a serial killer from 1930s Yugoslavia with a fashion model from 2012. We just report the facts of gross media malpractice, we can’t always explain them.

Many ways to hear the podcast, including over on the mothership at Ricochet. You can be sure to never miss an episode, by subscribing via iTunes or Feedburner. Or just use the player embedded below or in the upper right hand corner of this web site. If all of these fail, send me an email and I'll be happy to come to your house and read from the written transcript.