Episodes

  • Ep. 194 Corey Brettschneider, "The Presidents and the People"

    Ep. 194 Corey Brettschneider, "The Presidents and the People"
    Nov 26 2024
    According to professor Corey Brettschneider, author of "The Presidents and the People," the following presidents in history threatened democracy: "John Adams waged war on the national press…prosecuting as many as 126 people who dared criticize him…James Buchanan colluded with the Supreme Court to deny constitutional personhood to African Americans….Andrew Johnson urged violence against his political opponents…Woodrow Wilson nationalized Jim Crow by segregating the federal government…Richard Nixon committed criminal acts – ordering the Watergate break-in." Corey Brettschneider teaches constitutional law and politics at the Providence, Rhode Island-based Brown University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 11 mins
  • Ep. 193 Talmage Boston, "How the Best Did It"

    Ep. 193 Talmage Boston, "How the Best Did It"
    Nov 19 2024
    Talmage Boston considers himself a full-time lawyer and a full-time historian. His latest book is called "How the Best Did It: Leadership Lessons from Our Top Presidents." He chose the first 4 of 8 off the face of Mount Rushmore: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. In addition, Mr. Boston chose 24 distinct leadership traits he says were exhibited by these presidents. The other 4 presidents include FDR, Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, and Ronald Reagan. Seventy-one-year-old Talmage Boston lives in Dallas, Texas. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 14 mins
  • Ep. 192 Kyla Scanlon, "In This Economy?"

    Ep. 192 Kyla Scanlon, "In This Economy?"
    Nov 12 2024
    The title of the book is "In This Economy?" The author, Kyla Scanlon, subtitles her 277-page effort: "How Money and Markets Really Work." Ms. Scanlon is a 27-year-old graduate of Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green. The author description in the back of the book says Kyla Scanlon is a writer and a video creator focused on "human-centric economic analysis that demystifies the complex." The author background note continues: "She is the founder of the financial education company called Bread." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 5 mins
  • Ep. 191 Tess Owen, "Inside the Patriot Wing"

    Ep. 191 Tess Owen, "Inside the Patriot Wing"
    Nov 5 2024
    For the past 10 years, Tess Owen has covered extremism, disinformation, and politics for several nationally owned publications. In the October 8, 2024, issue of New York magazine, Ms. Owen wrote an article with the title "Inside the Patriot Wing." She talked with several of the over 1,400 January 6 defendants who have been spending time in the District of Columbia Jail, about 2 miles from the U.S. Capitol. This is her story of how she got to know several men who have been convicted of, in her words, "violent crimes." We asked Tess Owen how she got access to these folks behind bars and what they are saying. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 1 min
  • Ep. 190 Howard Blum, "Night of the Assassins"

    Ep. 190 Howard Blum, "Night of the Assassins"
    Oct 29 2024
    In 1943, in the middle of World War II, the Allied leaders FDR, Winston Churchill, and Josef Stalin were planning to meet secretly in Tehran. The Nazis wanted to kill them. In his book "Night of the Assassins," author Howard Blum tells the story of "Operation Long Jump," the code name for the Nazi plan to assassinate the Allied leaders. In telling this story, author Blum says: "I wanted to write a suspenseful character-driven story of men, heroes, and villains caught up in a tense, desperate time, who needed to find courage and cunning to do their duty for their countries and to fulfill their own sense of honor." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 7 mins
  • Ep. 189 Max Boot, "Reagan: His Life and Legend"

    Ep. 189 Max Boot, "Reagan: His Life and Legend"
    Oct 22 2024
    Max Boot, in his 836-page book titled "Reagan: His Life and Legend," says that his is the first definitive biography of the 40th president. Boot suggests that Edmund Morris, the president's official biographer, "appeared to be so flummoxed by the complexities of Reagan's character that he produced 'Dutch: A Memoir of Ronald Reagan,' that was widely criticized in spite of its acute insights." Max Boot also points out in his introduction: "I am fortunate that Ronald Reagan's story can now be told as never before because we possess far more archival sources and far more historical perspective." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 10 mins
  • Ep. 188 Brenda Wineapple, "Keeping the Faith"

    Ep. 188 Brenda Wineapple, "Keeping the Faith"
    Oct 15 2024
    Brenda Wineapple calls them "two gladiators." The year was 1925. She writes that "the ubiquitous politician William Jennings Bryan and the criminal lawyer Clarence Darrow, each of them national celebrities for decades, were going into battle over God and science and the classroom and, not incidentally, over what it meant to be an American." Brenda Wineapple's latest book is titled "Keeping the Faith" and is about the Scopes Trial, held in the small town of Dayton, Tennessee, which focused on the state law that prohibited the teaching of evolution in the schools. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 10 mins
  • Ep. 187 Harvey Mansfield on Presidential Immunity

    Ep. 187 Harvey Mansfield on Presidential Immunity
    Oct 8 2024
    Harvey Mansfield has been a professor of political philosophy at Harvard for over 6 decades. He retired from the classroom in 2023 at age 91. However, he's not finished thinking and writing about his favorite subject: democracy and how it works. In the Wall Street Journal of September 7, 2024, Professor Mansfield wrote an essay with this opening: "The Supreme Court case of Trump v. U.S. was about more than special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of Donald Trump, which continues under a superseding indictment handed up by a federal grand jury in Washington. The decision and the dissents contain a fundamental debate about the presidency that looks beyond the present personalities and campaign." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 15 mins