This podcast was only ever mediocre, or at best "merely adequate," for the reasons cited in other reviews: Too mired in insider navel-gazing with no effort to translate the topics for listeners; wretched audio; no radio personality whatsoever. The hosts usually sounded more like a group of mildly bored colleagues chatting amongst themselves during a long layover rather than a group of radio journalists offering insights and analysis to the public. That said, it was still worth a weekly listen in my opinion because the hosts clearly were expert in their topics, and so despite the terrible presentation, it could still be informative to the true political junkie. That was before ... when they actually had a weekly podcast. At some point in early 2015, that just evaporated without any explanation. Now this feed has (apparently) become a sporadic dumping ground for miscellaneous 1-on-1 interviews that run the gamut from "pointless and stultifying" to "merely boring." At this point, I'm expecting, very soon, to get a live three-hour Q&A session from the DC school-board meeting as recorded on somebody's smartphone. What I'd really like to know is why the weekly discussion ended, and whether that's temporary or permanent. I cannot find any discussion about this anywhere online. So what the heck is going on with this podcast???

Insider content, of course, it's politico, but the audio quality is abysmal. Buy some decent microphones already.

I listened to at least 20 episodes of this. Some of the folks have some worthwhile insights, although the Hilary watch exemplifies to me the pitfalls of this beltway navel-gazing.But the real reason I can't bear to listen any more is because of the truly lousy (nonexistent?) sound engineering. The WORST I have ever encountered on a podcast. Seriously, if someone is getting paid to engineer this podcast, it's way past time for them to seek a new career. Getting matching levels for all the speakers is not that difficult.

This podcast could be really good but please stop being so cynical that you insult your audience. What does the Politico team think of House of Cards? Oh, turns out you guys hated it because you were too cool for it? Well guess what, the kind of people who would listen to your show watch House of Cards and we like it. And what about Meet the Press? Oh you guys are such "insiders" that you are bored by Meet the Press? Well the kind of people that you want to listen to your podcast watch the Sunday shows, and I can tell you that it is far more boring to listen to you talk about how boring they are for you. Stop being too cool for your audience.

They don't have an ounce of wit or creativity. Which wouldn't be too bad if they didn't try so hard to be witty. Being in Washington must really be soul sucking and isolating. Even the intro tune is uncreative, it's the jingle from the iPhoto slide show. Really? I miss It's All Politics from NPR...

Poor imitation of Slate's gabfest. Can't get behind these folks. Not a shred of charm or insight.

This is more interesting. I'm a longtime fan of Dan, John and Emily (see, we are on a first name basis), but I'm also in need of some new perspectives. Why the Scrum? Alexander, Reid, Josh and David posses great chemistry as they breakdown the headlines. An early highlight for me is when they discuss what is missing from the headlines/news cycle as well as what is being over-covered. If you are a Playbook subscriber, this is a no brainer.

Smart, often funny podcast on politics. Everything you love about Politico. I listen on my Friday commute to work. Great way to start the weekend.