^ I was using cutenews 1.3.0 - the highest version that shows up with cssu-devel and extras-devel enabled - I did not know there was a newer one.
I am now trying your 1.3.1 and will report back.

FWIW, one of the podcasts currently not updating at all is
https://www.drabblecast.org/feed/podcast-m4a/