The following podcast contains explicit language.

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Slate Super Fest East sponsored by Accura.

Hooray!

Or, as we have been calling it around the office, the Gab Fest Fest Fest.

I'm Dan Koyce. I'm Slate's culture editor. I'm the co-host of Slate's parenting podcast.

Mom and Dad are fighting.

My co-host, Alice and Benedict, cannot be here because she is parenting.

I'm really happy to be here with you guys in front of 600 rowdy, drunken fans of reasoned, sober debate.

And today we will determine who is the best gab fester of all time as our three big podcasts discuss three topics.

Three topics. Are you ready to hear what those topics are?

One, the battle over immigration.

Does Obama or the GOP have the upper hand in the coming border skirmish?

Two, sports gambling will the NBA's support of legalization be enough to change things in America?

And three, emoji.

Smiley face, heart, crying face, gun, pile of poop. Plus, we will have a series of whirlwind debates in which pairs of mismatched gab festers face off on the most crucial issues of our time so let's get it started our three gabfest teams are backstage right now they've been doing vocal warmups and gabbing at each other for like two hours. There's been a lot of posturing like Pesca just slate pitched, that contrarianism is just another kind of conformity just to show that he could. But now we are ready to bring them out and determine which podcasting team reigns supreme. So please put your hands together welcome to the stage hang up and listen

Josh Levine Mike Peska and Stefan Fatsin

and welcome to the stage the culture gabfesti, Dana Stevens, and Stephen Metcalf.

And finally, welcome to the stage, the Politics Gab Fest, David Plotz, Emily Bazelon, and John Dickerson.

Thank you. Aslan and John Dickerson.

All right, here's how tonight's show is going to work.

We are going to do those three segments.

I just described one for each Gab Fest,

...