Terrence McNally podcast

While Trump is in the Middle East making family business deals, House Republicans today proposed their tax cut bill, with a price tag of nearly $5T, paid for with cuts to Medicaid, food stamps, green energy programs, and everything else DOGE took a chainsaw to. But who actually pays taxes these days? The US is now the world’s second largest tax haven, moving ahead of Switzerland, and trailing only the Cayman Islands. Here’s my 2021 conversation with CHUCK COLLINS, who directs the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at the Institute for Policy Studies and co-edits their newsletter, Inequality Weekly. We talk about his latest book, THE WEALTH HOARDERS: How Billionaires Pay Millions to Hide Trillions. You can learn more at inequality.org

I don’t say I'm concerned about “the environment.” Rather I see our goal as a healthy relationship with the rest of nature. PAUL HAWKEN’s new book CARBON: The Tree of Life takes a step back from the problem-solving approach of most of his work. He calls us to a deeper understanding of our place in the scheme of things as absolutely essential not just to deal effectively with the climate crisis, but with most of the other ways we fall short of what’s possible in our individual lives as well as the larger world. His two previous books: DRAWDOWN: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming and REGENERATION: Ending the Climate Crisis in One Generation. You can learn more at paulhawken.com

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When we the people are called to show up in the streets over and over in growing numbers till the powers that enable Trump withdraw support and authoritarian dominoes fall, here’s my 2013 conversation about Egypt’s Arab spring. The documentary THE SQUARE puts you in Tahrir Square as revolution swirls around you. The film follows a handful of activists risking their lives to build a new society. Though the Muslim Brotherhood ultimately replaces one authoritarian rule with another, the protests ended Mubarak’s 30 years of dictatorship. I speak with JEHANE NOUJAIM, Director, KARIM AMER, Producer, and KHALID ABDALLA, participant. Watch: youtube.com/watch?v=2a6SLuVtiVU

Wrapping up Earth Month, I speak with JAMES THORNTON, founder of ClientEarth, the preeminent environmental law group, with 300 lawyers holding governments and companies accountable across the globe. He steps down as the group’s president this month after 18 years. Their work training the Chinese - including their Supreme Court - in environmental law is remarkable. What I’ve learned about their successes has given me hope – something that can feel all too endangered these days. Listen in, if you could use a bit of the same. You can learn more at Clientearth.org

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Trump sows cruel, careless, criminal, incompetent chaos - even in Earth Month. Here’s my 2021 conversation with PAUL HAWKEN about his book, REGENERATION: ENDING THE CLIMATE CRISIS IN ONE GENERATION, and the organization dedicated to making that a reality. Here’s a chance to step back or sink deeper into the promise and the challenge of making a regenerative society. As an approach, regeneration expands the scope of our response to the challenge of climate change by linking and weaving it with other critical challenges we face - economic inequality, social injustice, and endangered democracy - and placing love of life at the center of all we do.

In 1987, 33-year-old JUAN WILLIAMS wrote the bestselling history Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years 1954–1965 , which accompanied the PBS series of the same name. Now 71, after 10 years at NPR and 28 at Fox News, he’s written New Prize for These Eyes: The Rise of America's Second Civil Rights Movement . He sees this movement rooted in Obama’s 2008 election and highlighted by 2020’s Black Lives Matter protests. We compare the two movements and respond to the current cruel and criminal chaos of Trump 2.0. You can find Juan’s latest commentaries at thehill.com/opinion/columnists/juan-williams/ This episode was recorded as a LiveTalksLA event March 17th, 2025 in LA.

HANDS OFF - national mobilization opposing Trump & Musk SATURDAY APRIL 5. Sponsors include Indivisible, MoveOn, Third Act, Our Revolution, Common Cause, People for American Way, Planned Parenthood, UAW, SEIU, many more. Need motivation? Here’s my 2019 conversation with ERICA CHENOWETH, Professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School and author of WHY CIVIL RESISTANCE WORKS: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict . She’s done the research and run the numbers. When nonviolent mass protests involve 3.5% of the population, regimes are nearly always overthrown.

The destructive pace and scale of Trump2.0 makes it hard to know what deserves and demands our attention. This week we step back from daily news to focus on climate with award-winning journalist ALEXANDER KAUFMAN. We look at the toll of climate related disasters and migration; the latest on the science, what have we learned over the last year or so: the actions of the Trump administration to take us backwards; and the global picture of energy and technology. What's working? What do we need more of? You can learn more and subscribe to his personal newsletter at kaufman.substack.com .

The headlines are full of the cruel, unjust, illegal, unconstitutional, and costly treatment of immigrants by the Trump administration. Here’s my 2019 conversation with SISTERS CONSTANCE TOUEY and JEANNETTE LUCEY. They met in 1984 when both were assigned to a parish K-8 school in inner city Philadelphia. Their book, DO IT BETTER: How the Kids of St. Francis de Sales Exceeded Everyone’s Expectations tells the stories of their 30+ years as principal and 8th grade teacher as they educate and transform the lives of wave after wave of poor immigrant children. I’m proud to have written the book with them.

It’s up to us. Political parties, political players, and the media promote and profit from our division. We the people have ultimate responsibility for healing our politics and our society. In her book, REMAKING THE SPACE BETWEEN US: How Citizens Can Work Together to Build a Better Future for All, DIANA McLAIN SMITH has good news. The media doesn’t report it, but hundreds of organizations and millions of people are already actively engaged in developing relationships and alliances that can work together in the service of our better angels.Learn more at remakingthespace.org

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Feeling pissed, panicked, powerless? That’s what they want. How do we turn things around? Here’s my refreshing 2021 conversation with JULIE BATTILANA, Harvard professor and founder of its Social Innovation and Change Initiative about her book POWER FOR ALL. It's a call not only to understand and assert power in our own lives, but also to collectively use this power to remake society by rebalancing existing power relationships - including racial, gender, financial and political. To learn more, go to Powerforallbook.com

When Trump sits in the White House dispensing pardons to other convicted felons - and an ambassadorship or two, when he was able to run out the clock on justice with his political donors paying most of his legal bills, when so many actions this administration has taken in the first month serve to eliminate or disable accountability or oversight… Here’s my 2009 conversation with Amy Bach about how the legal system systematically fails regular people every day. The rich walk, the poor go to prison. Her book ORDINARY INJUSTICE shows how - in the name of expedience - legal professionals collaborate rather than face off, sacrificing defendants and victims to keep the court calendar moving.

I’m honored to talk with JAMES STEELE, of the investigative reporting team, Barlett & Steele. He and DON BARLETT worked together for over 50 years, won journalism’s highest awards, wrote nine books. Don Barlett died this past fall. Their 1991 Philadelphia Inquirer series America: What Went Wrong? showed how Wall Street and Washington were squeezing the middle class and fueling income inequality and led to a best-selling book. That was 1991 B.C. Before Clinton. They have been on that beat ever since. We did an episode in 2012 on their Betrayal of the American Dream . Jim and I talk about their partnership, about how we got here, and what it feels like to have your warnings ignored. Learn more: barlettandsteele.com

Ever the real estate guy, Trump unleashes a demo crew on the government, says US should develop Gaza’s beachfront. Elon Musk invades federal agencies, accesses all our data, brags about throwing our global humanitarian aid in a wood chipper. Criminal, cruel, and unconstitutional. Here’s my 2020 conversation with JEAN GUERRERO, about her book, HATEMONGER: Stephen Miller, Donald Trump, and the White Nationalist Agenda . Chief architect of Trump's Muslim travel ban and his family separation policy, Miller has even more power this time around as White House Deputy Chief of Staff. Learn more at jeanguerrero.com

A week into Trump 2.0, the cruelty and overreach are on full display, and the media and the Democrats are not up to the challenge. I turn to longtime Republican strategist, STEVE SCHMIDT, who abandoned the GOP in 2018 and co-founded the Lincoln Project. He’s now perhaps the most articulate, full-throated and damning critic of his former party and the inadequate opposition. You can learn more at steveschmidt.substack.com or The Warning with Steve Schmidt on YouTube.

TERRENCE McNALLY is my guest this week. In February 2014, I took a hiatus from this show after 17 years. I thought it might be the end of the line, and before signing off, turned to journalist and best-selling author, SARA DAVIDSON, to interview me. I returned to these conversations In 2017 after Trump’s election. So here we are - 11 years after that hiatus and this conversation, 8 years after my return, and a few days after Trump’s second inauguration. How did things look to me then as I reflected both backward and forward?

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STEVE WASSERMAN has spent half a century in the world of books, newspapers, and ideas, as an opinion editor at the LA Times, editor of the LA Times Book Review; and as an editor at several major publishers. We’ll talk about that lifetime of work, how publishing and the press have changed, and about his first book, a memoir, TELL ME SOMETHING. TELL ME ANYTHING. EVEN IF IT’S A LIE - with cameos from Susan Sontag, Orson Welles, Jackie Kennedy, Robert Scheer, Gore Vidal. He’s now the publisher at Heyday Books, a fifty-year old independent publisher in Berkeley. Learn more at heydaybooks.com

With Trump acting as if he were already president - and madly so - a number of the wealthy and powerful are stepping over each other to obey in advance. A clear step on the path toward authoritarianism cited by both Tim Snyder in On Tyranny and Daniel Ziblatt & Stephen Levitsky in How Democracies Die - here’s my conversation with Naomi Klein, recorded in July 2017, 6 months into Trump’s first term, about her book, NO IS NOT ENOUGH: Resisting Trump's Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need. What were we thinking? How would we respond? How does our response look 8 years later?

Happy New Year! Let’s work together locally & personally in 2025 as citizens and neighbors to overcome the political and media failures that brought us to this place. Here’s my conversation with SAM DALEY-HARRIS, founder of the anti-poverty lobby Results, about RECLAIMING OUR DEMOCRACY: Every Citizen’s Guide to Transformational Advocacy (2024 edition), out in paperback mid-January. Learn more at reclaimingourdemocracy.com . I recommend pairing this with my recent episode with MARSHALL GANZ on his book, PEOPLE, POWER, CHANGE.

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What was it like for a girl to grow up in Virginia in the days of legal segregation and civil rights battles? What was it like to go to college in the days of the women’s and anti-war movements? The first female president of Harvard (2007-18), DREW GILPIN FAUST, and I are contemporaries, and we look back together at our young years in the South and our paths through the Sixties and beyond, as we talk about her memoir, NECESSARY TROUBLE: Growing Up at Midcentury . You can learn more at drewfaust.com

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I was saddened to learn of the recent passing of Donald Barlett. Here's my 2012 conversation with him & Jim Steele, about their book, Betrayal of the American Dream - one of my favorites. Had the Democratic party heeded their warnings about rising inequality & the destruction of the Middle Class, Trump would never have been President. To say nothing of the positive impact on the lives of the millions whose feelings of being left behind fueled the rise of MAGA and the Right. Even more prescient - Betrayal was an update of 1992’s #1 best-seller, America: What Went Wrong.

MARSHALL GANZ worked on organizing campaigns with Mississippi Freedom Summer in 1964 and Cesar Chavez and UFW for 16 years, helped devise the grass-roots organizing model for Obama’s 2008 campaign, and teaches organizing and public narrative at Harvard. We talk about his life’s work and his new book PEOPLE, POWER, CHANGE:Organizing for Democratic Renewal . You can learn more at marshallganz.com , hks.harvard.edu , or leadingchangenetwork.org

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I talk with PAULA DANIELS, Co-Founder, Chair of the Board of the Center for Good Food Purchasing, and recently announced initial director of the Los Angeles County Office of Food Equity, which aims to address the root causes of food-system problems in the region. We talk about what it takes to pull together elements of business, entrepreneurism, politics, government, science, and more to move the needle on a huge and complex system. The Center uses the power of procurement to create a food system that prioritizes the health and well-being of people, animals, and the environment. As its goals and standards are adopted by a growing national network of major food purchasers such as school districts, the program exerts growing leverage on the larger food system in America. You can learn more at GoodFoodPurchasing.org

In 2024, Republicans won the popular vote for only the second time since 1980. After the worst four years of his life, Trump, running against the best administration for labor in years, won bigger numbers than 2020 among working class voters - including Blacks & Latinos. Hartmann’s new book, THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN DREAM: The Demise of the Middle Class – and How to Rescue Our Future, supplies the backstory to that damaging development. Biden finally dumped neo-liberalsim but voters didn't know.

As we have for the last few elections, ROB JOHNSON - Executive Director of the Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET) and host of podcast ECONOMICS & BEYOND - and I offer our post-mortems. Biden’s late withdrawal meant the Dems skipped primaries, debates, and a convention that would have tested candidates and messages. 2024 was another “change” election and they didn’t get the memo. Bad time to be an incumbent. Trump’s message: If you’re angry, vote for me. Turns out a lot of voters were angry.

LAUREN WINDSOR calls herself an “advocacy journalist”. Her biggest scoops usually come when she goes undercover among right-wing pols and donors to secretly record things they don’t want us to hear. Her accidental truth-tellers include Sam Alito, Rudy Giuliani, Roger Stone, John Eastman, and Ted Cruz. Executive producer of The Undercurrent and executive director of American Family Voices, we talk about her new documentary, GONZO FOR DEMOCRACY. You can learn more at laurenwindsor.com

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STEPHEN UJLAKI’s documentary BAD FAITH opens with the following text: “Christian Nationalism is a political movement that believes America was founded as a Christian nation privileging Christianity over all other faiths. Masquerading as religion, this ideology exploits scripture and sacred symbols to achieve extremist objectives.” The film lays out the timeline, connects the dots, and makes clear that 1) Christian Nationalism is a political movement first, not a religious one. 2) Since the 1970s, it has been relentless, well funded, absolutely cynical, and frighteningly successful. 3) Christian Nationalists have achieved much of what they set out to do, and, if Trump wins again, have dark plans for more.

I’ve been talking about voter suppression with GREG PALAST since 2002. Known for his investigative reports for BBC, The Guardian , and Rolling Stone , his new documentary, VIGILANTES INC: America’s New Vote Suppression Hitmen , narrated by Rosario Dawson and produced by Martin Sheen, reveals that in 43 states individual citizens are able to challenge and remove fellow citizens from voter rolls. You can donate to watch it at gregpalast.com where you can also find Greg’s other documentaries, and his articles and books, including The Best Democracy Money Can Buy - or stream it for free at saveyourvote.org .

I get the dirt from WENDELL POTTER about our broken healthcare system, especially the role of insurance companies, who consistently put profit above the health and lives of patients. Potter walked away from his job at one of the country's largest health insurers to emerge as a critic of the industry and an advocate of reform. He’s a best-selling author (DEADLY SPIN and NATION ON THE TAKE), leads the Center for Health and Democracyand publishes HealthCareUncovered on Substack. You can learn more at wendellpotter.com

Here’s my 2022 conversation with National Book Award winner, KEVIN BOYLE, about his book, THE SHATTERING: AMERICA IN THE 1960s. He reminds us that, after the Depression and two World Wars, the Silent Majority craved security not change. I suspect this history lesson offers us a window into the minds and the worldviews of many of the crucial undecided MidWest and Sunbelt voters upon whom this election and our future depends. You can learn more at kevinboylehistory.com

ARLIE HOCHSCHILD is the author of best-seller, STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND: Anger & Mourning on the American Right. Five years talking with folks in Southern Louisiana revealed a “deep story” that holds their political contradictions together - they’re waiting in line for the American Dream and Democrats help others - Blacks, Latinos, LGBTQ - cut in front of them. In her new book, STOLEN PRIDE: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right , she takes readers to Pike County, Kentucky. In the nation's whitest and second poorest congressional district , she looks again at the intersection of jobs, culture, emotion, and politics.

The Democrats have for too long ceded rural voters to the GOP. When the solution to minority rule is voting, connecting with and winning over rural voters is essential. Here’s my 2022 conversation with Maine state senator CHLOE MAXMIN and CANYON WOODWARD about the the book they’ve co-authored, DIRT ROAD REVIVAL. It tells the story of their winning elections in rural Maine with CHLOE as candidate and CANYON as campaign manager and offers lessons they've learned to guide other rural progressives. You can learn more at dirtroadrevival.com

Blind spots. In his book, EXCLUDED: How Snob Zoning, NIMBYism, and Class Bias Build the Walls We Don't See , RICHARD KAHLENBERG points out not only how restrictive zoning laws negatively influence all sorts of things in this country, but also that such laws are more likely or more restrictive in communities that are otherwise more liberal and progressive. KAHLENBERG also testified on the side of doing away with race-based affirmative action in higher education. It’s a provocative conversation. You can learn more at richardkahlenberg.org

This episode, archived conversations with two wise elders recently in the news. First, my 2007 conversation with PHIL DONAHUE who died August 18th at the age of 88. Donahue always seemed to be as focused on the common good as he was on ratings - while delivering well on both. We talked about his decades of work as well as Body of War , the documentary he co-directed about Tomas Young, a severely disabled Iraq War veteran. Second, my 2008 conversation with Nobel Peace Prize-winner Muhammad Yunus, pioneer of micro-credit, about his work and his book, CREATING A WORLD WITHOUT POVERTY. Since August 8th, Yunus has been serving as Chief Adviser of the interim government of Bangladesh following the resignation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Learn more at grameenfoundation.org and muhammadyunus.org

RANDY OLSON earned a Harvard Ph.D. in Biology and was a tenured professor when he quit and moved to LA to attend USC film school. His goal: help scientists learn to communicate better. We receive so much input that we can no longer deal with separate bits of information, so we look for narratives. He’s the author of DON’T BE SUCH A SCIENTIST and HOUSTON, WE HAVE A NARRATIVE. and he’s developed tools. His Narrative Index predicted Trump’s 2016 victory and his ABT framework - and, but, therefore - helps folks create compelling stories. Learn more at abtframework.com

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80-some days till the polls close. The Harris-Walz campaign is riding a wave of momentum in the country to move past Trump that feels sustainable to me. I assume Trump/the Right/the GOP will get very dirty. That’s a reality, but so is my 2019 conversation with JOSHUA DOUGLAS, about his book - VOTE FOR US: How to Take Back Our Elections and Change the Future of Voting: Americans working to take back their democracy, one community at a time - expanding voter eligibility, easing voter registration rules, making voting more convenient, giving redistricting back to the voters, improving civics education. You can learn more at joshuaadouglas.com

BILLY WIMSATT is founder and executive director of Movement Voter Project and Movement Voter PAC. MVP helps progressive donors invest in the election efforts of local community-based organizations in battleground states. In that role, during the Biden-Harris-Walz relaunch, Wimsatt and MVP listened to and at times spoke for both grassroots organizers and donors. Billy shares what he calls a “roller coaster” of events, in which he and MVP stuck their necks out and made three big bets that paid off. He also fleshes out MVP’s model and let's you know how you can get involved.

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Given Biden’s exit from the race, I thought it might be interesting to replay the first episode I recorded following his election. Here is my November 5th, 2020 conversation with Rob Johnson, Executive Director of the Institute for New Economic Thinking. Rob and I have made a point to talk after the last several elections. This episode is very much a conversation rather than an interview, as the two of us give you our take on where the country stood at that moment, how we’d gotten there, and our hopes for a Biden administration. Joe Biden’s age was the one issue where voters agree with the Republicans for which there was no defense.

I’ve talked with journalist and best-selling author, GEORGE PACKER, about 2013’s National Book Award-winning The UNWINDING and 2021’s LAST BEST HOPE, in which he offers four narratives of America that motivate and divide us. Today our jumping off point will be his current cover story in The Atlantic on Phoenix, Arizona, WHAT WILL BECOME OF AMERICAN CIVILIZATION? Conspiracism and Hyper-partisanship in the Nation’s Fastest-growing City . More tour guide than pundit, George chooses the characters and makes the introductions, but the voices in this piece are those of the people of Phoenix.

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Two conversations about the big picture. First, 20 years ago USPS released a stamp honoring inventor and multi-hyphenate visionary Bucky Fuller. Here’s my 2004 conversation about the man and his work with his daughter, ALLEGRA FULLER SNYDER. Buckminster Fuller Institute: bfi.org . Second, one of my favorites, my 2008 conversation with MacArthur-winning evolutionary biologist STUART KAUFFMAN about his book, REINVENTING THE SACRED: A NEW VIEW OF SCIENCE, REASON, AND RELIGION. Is the universe’s ceaseless creativity the best way for us to think about God? Learn more: stuartkauffman.com

This week, we step aside from today’s news to dig into a story millions of years in the making, as I speak with ZOE SCHLANGER about her best-selling THE LIGHT EATERS: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth . What are we to make of a vine that grows leaves to blend into the shrub on which it climbs, a flower that shapes its bloom to fit exactly the beak of its pollinator, a pea seedling that can hear water flowing and make its way toward it? Schlanger‘s research over the last several years reveals a reality that challenges our understanding of consciousness, intelligence, and life itself. You can learn more at zoeschlanger.com

As Congress negotiates a new “Farm Bill” – they do so every 5 years – will health, nutrition, poverty, and nature/climate get seats at the table or will Big Ag and Big Food dominate and dictate as usual? Speaking of food, here’s my 2021 conversation with MARK BITTMAN, longtime fixture at the New York Times , author of 30 books, about one of his latest – ANIMAL, VEGETABLE, JUNK: A History of Food from Sustainable to Suicidal . How did things get so bad and how can we turn things around before it’s too late? Learn more at markbittman.com

The US holds one national popular vote and the Republican party has won that vote once since 1988, that’s 36 years. Yet they’ve held the presidency nearly 12 of those years. Since Nixon, they’ve appointed 15 Supreme Court justices, to the Democrats 4. I speak with ARI BERMAN about his new book, MINORITY RULE: The Right-Wing Attack on the Will of the People—and the Fight to Resist It . I learned a lot about the pulling back from direct democracy by the framers between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. The GOP exploits the resulting Constitutional weaknesses. This may be the most critical domestic challenge we face today. Learn more at aribermanauthor.com

In May, FATHER GREGORY BOYLE, founder of HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES in Los Angeles — the largest gang intervention and re-entry program in the world — was honored by President Biden with the Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor. Homeboy said that Boyle “…exemplifies the transformative power of compassion, forgiveness, and second chances. For nearly forty years, Father Greg has empowered hundreds of thousands of individuals to break free from the cycles of poverty, violence, and incarceration.” Here’s our 2010 conversation where we talk about his work and his first book, TATTOOS ON THE HEART. We were joined by Luis Perez, one of the senior staff at Homeboy. Learn more: homeboyindustries.org

With an eye on the election, I speak with RICHARD CIZIK, founder of Evangelicals for Democracy, which aims to build a community of evangelicals across the political spectrum who champion democracy as an act of Christian faith. Earlier he spent nearly three decades deep inside the Religious Right. In 2008, after 28 years at the National Association of Evangelicals, Rev. Cizik was forced to resign as VP for Governmental Affairs, for publicly supporting civil unions and for advocacy on climate change. Learn more: EvangelicalsforDemocracy.org

In response to the wonderful positive reaction to last week’s episode with DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN on her new best-seller An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s, here’s our 2013 conversation re her book, THE BULLY PULPIT: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism , a history of the first decade of the Progressive era when courageous journalists and an ambitious president took on the Robber Barons - the 1% of their day – and won. You can learn more at doriskearnsgoodwin.com

In this recording of a recent LiveTalksLA event, I speak with historian and best-selling author, DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN, about her latest book, AN UNFINISHED LOVE STORY: A Personal History of the 1960s , which combines personal memoir with presidential history. Her late husband of 42 years, Dick Goodwin, worked closely with JFK and LBJ in the White House, and with Eugene McCarthy and Bobby Kennedy on their presidential campaigns. She and Goodwin went through hundreds of boxes of letters, diaries, and documents he'd saved for over 50 years, a record of politics and power in the 1960s. Doris hopes her book reminds us of the enormous progress achieved in those years as well as opportunities lost, and sheds light on our own challenging time offering lessons we might carry forward. Learn more at doriskearnsgoodwin.com

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As perhaps too much public attention is focused these days on the Manhattan trial of one Donald J. Trump, here’s my 2021 conversation with Federal Judge JED RAKOFF of the Southern District of NY. In his book, WHY THE INNOCENT PLEAD GUILTY AND THE GUILTY GO FREE, RAKOFF makes clear that the US justice system bears little relationship to what the founding fathers contemplated, what the media portrays, or what the average American believes. The US accounts for about 5% of the world’s population yet houses nearly 25% of its prisoners, with one in nine serving a life sentence, and half a million incarcerated for lack of bail. 40% are Black males and another 20% Hispanic males.

I don’t know if my big question is “Why don’t the rich/super-rich and their corporations get the value of a society that works?” Or is it - “Why don’t they care?” Despite the knowledge that it might be impossible, moving society in that direction calls for getting ideas and models out into the world that show it’s actually possible to reduce inequality. CHUCK COLLINS has been doing that for years in his work and writing. He runs the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at the Institute for Policy Studies and co-edits Inequality.org and its (highly recommended) weekly newsletter.

Earlier this year my dear friend, meditation teacher, TRUDY GOODMAN, experienced a medical emergency that almost killed her. Another reminder of the preciousness and fragility of life and friendship. Here’s my 2015 conversation with TRUDY and JACK KORNFIELD on the occasion of an event at Insight LA, the mindfulness mediation center founded by Trudy. The event featured virtual dialogues with Jon Kabat-Zinn (Wherever You Go, There You Are), Ram Dass (Be Here Now), Tara Brach (Radical Acceptance), Joseph Goldstein (Insight Meditation), and then-Congressman Tim Ryan (A Mindful Nation). We talk about Trudy and Jack’s personal paths, what each of their guests means to them, and tell the story of mindfulness in America over the last 45 years.

In 2020, I talked about democracy with filmmaker/writer/organizer/activist, ASTRA TAYLOR. Four years later, following a pandemic, waves of protests, an insurrection, and a couple of ongoing wars, we revisit our fragile and threatened way of political life. She’s been busy - working with the Debt Collective, a union of debtors she co-founded, and writing two new books, THE AGE OF INSECURITY and SOLIDARITY: The Past, Present, and Future of a World-Changing Idea.

Earth Day 2024 is April 22nd. Here’s my 2011 conversation with JANINE BENYUS, who coined a term and invented a field called Biomimicry. After 3.8 billion years of R&D on this planet, failures are fossils. What surrounds us in the natural world has succeeded and survived. So why not learn as much as we can from what works? Nature has already solved many of the problems we grapple with. Animals, plants, and microbes are the consummate engineers. They have found what works, what is appropriate, and most important, what lasts here on Earth.

Why does our society produce more poverty than other wealthy countries? Why don’t we or why can’t we change our incentives? I speak with MARK RANK, about his books, THE POVERTY PARADOX and POORLY UNDERSTOOD: What America Gets Wrong About Poverty , and his latest, THE RANDOM FACTOR: How Chance & Luck Profoundly Shape Our Lives & the World Around Us. Learn more at bit.ly/3JdYuWZ

I describe the goal of my engagement with what we call the environment as “a healthy relationship with the rest of nature.” In this 2019 conversation, CHARLES EISENSTEIN asks: Have we become too focused on climate change? and reminds us that holding rivers, forests, and creatures as sacred and valuable in their own right, not simply as carbon credits, can engage emotional and psychological connections deeper than any policy prescription. I say we need both. We’re engaged in an existential improv and the first rule of improv is “Yes, and-“

With social media and AI, bad actors weaponize information, stressing democracy. We have two options: stop the lies or stop people from believing them. The former is near impossible in a free society, but there’s solid evidence the latter is achievable. I talk with two founders of the Mental Immunity Project, ANDY NORMAN, author of MENTAL IMMUNITY, and MELANIE TRECEK-KING, creator of THINKING IS POWER, an online resource that teaches critical thinking to the general public.

As we fasten our seatbelts and plunge into the 2024 campaign, here are two conversations worth a re-listen. From 2007, I talk with DREW WESTEN about the ideas and advice in his influential book, THE POLITICAL BRAIN: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation. Westen: Democrats almost always present the best arguments but lose elections to Republicans who have mastered the art of emotion and story-telling. In the second half, my 2009 conversation with BERNIE HORN of the Leadership Training Institute about FRAMING THE FUTURE: How Progressive Values Can Win Elections and Influence People. Horn: Persuadable voters make choices depending on how political issues and questions are framed. Emotion, framing, narratives. Trump traffics in all three.

ROB JOHNSON is a plain-speaking and passionate critic of an economic, financial, and political system that leaves too many behind. He and I do post-election shows - and we’ll do another this November, but this week we talk about the State of the Union as well as the state of the union. We talk about Biden’s speech and about how the two of us see things - the economy, the election, the two parties, the nation’s mood, how we got here, and how we might move forward. Rob is President of the Institute for New Economic Thinking and host of the podcast Economics and Beyond. Y ou can learn more about him and his work at ineteconomics.org

We know Republicans exercise minority rule in the states, the House, and the Supreme Court. Now Biden is arming Israel without meaningful or effective demands for humanitarian treatment of innocent civilians. Is it time for civil disobedience? Here’s my 2013 conversation with Tim DeChristopher. In a disputed auction of oil leases on pubic lands, Tim bid and won the rights to 22K acres, which he had no plan to pay for or exploit. He was tried on federal felony charges and served 21 months in prison. I offer this example to remind us of the personal courage it may take to offer real resistance to policies and actions being done in our names.

ANGUS DEATON won the Nobel prize in Economics for work accomplished before he and his wife, economist Ann Case, wrote DEATHS OF DESPAIR and the Future of Capitalism. Pre pandemic, life expectancy in the US was no longer rising, and already falling among adults without 4 years of college, due in large part to alcoholism, drug overdoses, and suicides. In his newest book, ECONOMICS IN AMERICA: An Immigrant Economist Explores the Land of Inequality , Deaton reflects on 25 years of his writings from the perspective of 2023. He’s takes a hard look at the field of economics, and its role in a society and an economy that leaves out so many. His last words in this conversation: “I made a lot of mistakes in my life, and it's good to be able to live long enough to be able to acknowledge them.” You can learn more at deaton.scholar.princeton.edu

This week the media offers Academy Award buzz as well as the horrors of Israel’s response to the horrors of October’s attack by Hamas. Here’s my 2013 conversation with Palestinian EMAD BURNAT and Israeli GUY DAVIDI, co-directors of the Oscar-nominated documentary, 5 BROKEN CAMERAS. The film tells the story of Burnat, a Palestinian West Bank farmer, his wife, and four small children. As we track the destruction of each of his cameras, we witness his village’s ancient olive trees bulldozed, protests intensify, and a son grow from a newborn to a young boy.

We all know the newspaper business is in trouble. A weekday edition of the LA Times - once a “national” newspaper, along with the NYTimes, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal - now might be 32 pages and another 100 were recently laid off in the newsroom. The culprit is assumed to be the internet, stealing both stories and ads. Not so fast. I talk with MARGOT SUSCA, a former reporter, now a professor of Journalism, about her first book, HEDGED: How Private Investment Funds Helped Destroy American Newspapers and Undermine Democracy . Her assessment: “What we have is not a crisis of profit. What we have is a crisis of greed and growing inequality.”

The last time a Democratic presidential candidate won a majority of White voters was in 1964. ROBERT P JONES, President and Founder of the Public Religion Research Insitute (PRRI) and author of THE HIDDEN ROOTS OF WHITE SUPREMACY and the Path to a Shared American Future , writes that “White Christian nationalism has become central to the…Republican Party, two thirds of whom identify as white and Christian.” To find the origins of white supremacy, he says we need to look beyond 1619 to 1493, when the Pope issued the Doctrine of Discovery - that all territory not already inhabited or controlled by Christians shall be claimed by Christians as their new promised land. Learn more at www.whitetoolong.net

In todays fractionalized & polarized world, facts and reality are too often less important than which narrative you embrace or which stories you believe. Here’s my 2012 conversation with JONAH SACHS, Co-Founder of Free Range Studios - the folks behindthe classic Story of Stuff - and author of WINNING THE STORY WARS. Learn how and why narrative works so well and how to use it to your advantage.

The market – using money in politics to write its own rules - cannot respond effectively to critical challenges we face . JOAN WALSH, formerly at Salon, CNN, and MSNBC and now national affairs correspondent for The Nation , authored CORPORATE BULLSH*T with Nick Hanauer (Pitchfork Economics; Civic Action) & Donald Cohen (The Public Interest). Digging into myths and strategies of the Right, they focus on six big lies used over and over again to hold onto power and hold back progress. To learn more, go to thenation.com - search for Joan Walsh.

American democracy is under attack in 2024. Last week I talked with SAM DALEY-HARRIS about the life-tested lessons in his book RECLAIMING OUR DEMOCRACY: Every Citizen’s Guide to Transformational Advocacy . I recommend the book and the episode. I follow this week with my 2017 conversation with FRANCES MOORE LAPPE and ADAM EICHEN. LAPPE, who published Diet For A Small Planet over 50 years ago and whose work since has consistently updated the best the 60’s had to offer, and EICHEN, who graduated from college in 2015, met on a pro-democracy march. They co-authored DARING DEMOCRACY: Igniting Power, Meaning, and Connection for the America We Want - their report on pro-democracy movements near the end of Trump’s first year in office.

We must up our game in 2024. We sign petitions and make donations, but how many meet with a Congressperson or write a letter to the editor? SAM DALEY-HARRIS, founder of anti-poverty lobby RESULTS and Civic Courage, has a new 2024 edition of RECLAIMING OUR DEMOCRACY: Every Citizen’s Guide to Transformational Advocacy. His message: Find and get involved this year with a group that offers a rich structure of support - that coaches you, empowers you, emboldens you, and educates you. To learn more go to civiccourage.org or reclaimingourdemocracy.com

Despite the conflicts and injustices in the news, during this season we’re reminded to love and care for our families and neighbors, as well as those we don’t even know. I wish health, happiness, and peace to you and your loved ones. Here’s my 2011 conversation with John Prendergast and Michael Mattocks. As an emotionally wounded 21-year-old, John formed a “Big Brother/Little Brother” relationship with 7-year-old Michael. We talk about the book they wrote together, UNLIKELY BROTHERS: Our Story of Adventure, Loss, and Redemption, in which they share their experiences over 25 years as their lives intertwine.

ZEV YAROSLAVSKY, who served on the Los Angeles City Council and LACounty’s Board of Supervisors for a total of 40 years, has written a political memoir, ZEV’S LOS ANGELES: From Boyle Heights to the Halls of Power. Our conversation deals more with the memoir than the politics. We talk about Zev’s early years, his family and heritage, his college activism advocating for Russian Jews, and his surprise election to the City Council at the age of 26. Please note, this conversation was recorded before the October 7th attack on Israel by Hamas and the Israeli military response. To learn more about Zev, go to luskin.ucla.edu

Whether trying to influence involvement in foreign wars, fight for social justice, or win an election, effective organizing is crucial. Here’s my 2012 conversation with MARSHALL GANZ, who dropped out of Harvard in 1964 to participate in Freedom Summer, worked for years as one of the lead organizers for United Farm Workers, and helped devise the grass-roots model for Obama’s 2008 campaign. Now a lecturer in public policy at Harvard, I can say without reservation, we need to learn from him. You can find more at marshallganz.com

I talk with NELSON LICHTENSTEIN, History professor at UC Santa Barbara, and the author of several books on labor in America including State of the Union: A Century of American Labor . First, about the resurgence of unions in America - highlighted by good new contracts at UPS, Kaiser Permanence, and Big Three automakers, as well as successful organizing at newer huge employers like Amazon, Starbucks, and Trader Joes; and second, about his latest book, co-authored with Judith Stein, A FABULOUS FAILURE: The Clinton Presidency and the Transformation of American Capitalism.

I speak with theoretical physicist, futurist, and best-selling author, MICHIO KAKU, about his latest book, QUANTUM SUPREMACY: How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything,

eventually illuminating the deepest mysteries of science and solving some of our biggest problems, including global warming, world hunger, and incurable disease. What is quantum computing? Where do we stand? What are the obstacles? What is the promise? What are the warnings? Learn more at mkaku.org . This episode was recorded as a LiveTalksLA event May 5th, 2023 in Santa Monica.

In the five years since I recorded this conversation with NANCY MAC LEAN about her book, DEMOCRACY IN CHAINS: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America, events have confirmed her analysis and her warnings. We now have minority rule, led by Mitch McConnell, Mike Johnson, Donald Trump, and the radical 6-3 Supreme Court. She has been passionately attacked on the Right, and passionately celebrated by those who care about democracy

You can learn more her at scholars.duke.edu - search for Nancy MacLean.

Responding to the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and too many others, millions marched in 2020 to protest police brutality. Though Floyd’s killers faced charges and were found guilty, we learned that it remains extremely difficult to hold police accountable. Decisions of the Supreme Court, state and local governments, and policy makers have made them all but untouchable. In SHIELDED, UCLA law professor JOANNA SCHWARTZ shares the stories of victims, exposes the ways in which our legal system protects police, reveals the weakness of their justifications, and calls for sustained citizen engagement to make change.

Two conversations with warnings of the ’08 crash to come. KEVIN PHILLIPS is best known for his 1969 book The Emerging Republican Majority articulating Nixon’s Southern Strategy which nearly 50 years later delivered us Trump. Phillips in time grew disillusioned with the GOP, and wrote books like The Politics of Rich and Poor; Wealth and Democracy; American Theocracy. In April 2008 we talk about Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism. Phillips died October 9th at 82. S econd half, you’ll hear my 2007 conversation with economist Robert Frank on two of his books. The Economic Naturalist: in Search of Explanations for Everyday Enigmas and Falling Behind: How Rising Inequality Harms the Middle Class,

STEVEN GREENHOUSE covered labor at the New York Times for 19 years. When we last spoke in the early days of the Biden administration, workers’ share of income had slid to its lowest level since the 1940s and the percentage of workers in unions was the lowest in over a century. But unions are winning these days – winning contracts, winning strikes when necessary, and perhaps most critically in the big picture - winning popular support, especially among young people. He’s author of Beaten Down Worked Up: The Past Present and Future of American Labor.

MICHAEL LEWIS’s new book, GOING INFINITE, the story of Sam Bankman-Fried and the rise and fall of crypto exchange FTX, is the #1 Selling book on Amazon. Here’s my 2010 conversation with Lewis about another #1 best-seller, THE BIG SHORT. In telling the story behind the Oscar nominated film, one of the great “explainers” defines a lot of terms - securitization, derivatives, credit default swaps - you remember. I think it's one of my favorite episodes.

I believe minority rule to be one of the most dangerous challenges facing American society with enormous impact for the fate of the world. I’m excited to engage with Daniel Ziblatt, about his latest book, TYRANNY OF THE MINORITY:Why American Democracy Reached the Breaking Point , co-authored with Stephen Levitsky. Their previous book, How Democracies Die , was described by The Economist magazine as "the most important book of the Trump era." You can learn more at scholar.harvard.edu/dziblatt . This episode was recorded as a LiveTalksLA event September 21, 2023 - link to video .

JONATHAN TAPLIN’s new book THE END OF REALITY picks up where MOVE FAST & BREAK THINGS left off. It documents how - rather than confront and solve the critical challenges we face - some of our wealthiest and most powerful men are plotting their escape - from transparency and regulation with crypto, from real life with the metaverse, from planet earth with colonies on Mars, and from death itself with transhumanism and cyborgs. This fantasy/nightmare is being sold by four billionaires - Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Marc Andreeson, and Peter Thiel.

JONATHAN TAPLIN is former tour manager for Bob Dylan and The Band, producer of two Martin Scorsese films, MEAN STREETS and THE LAST WALTZ, and Director Emeritus of the USC Annenberg Innovation Lab. Next week I’ll talk with him about his new book, THE END OF REALITY: How Four Billionaires Are Selling a Fantasy Future of the Metaverse, Mars, And Crypto . How better to warm up for that than by replaying our 2018 conversation about his earlier book MOVE FAST AND BREAK THINGS: How Facebook, Google and Amazon Cornered Culture and Undermined Democracy. You can learn more at jontaplin.com

July 2023 was the hottest month in recorded history, June ranks #2. All time high temperatures hit the US, Europe, and China. Phoenix recorded at least 110F for 20 days in a row. I speak with JEFF GOODELL about THE HEAT WILL KILL YOU FIRST: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet . Biggest takeaway: “The assumption that we will do what we need to do in time and things will go back to normal is a profound misunderstanding of this moment.” CO2 is not like smog. Recent extremes and disasters are here to stay. Learn more at jeffgoodellwriter.com

There’s little doubt we face critical challenges and serious doubt about whether we have the vision, the culture, the systems, or the will to successfully deal with them. I’ve been asking lately, “How did we get here?" and focusing a lot on the generations, in particular the Boomers and the 1960’s. I’m excited to speak with PHILIP BUMP, a national columnist for The Washington Post , about his first book, THE AFTERMATH: The Last Days of the Baby Boom and the Future of Power in America , an assessment of how the baby boom created modern America, and where power, wealth, and politics will shift as the boom ends. You can learn more at pbump.com .

In her new book THE FIGHT TO SAVE THE TOWN: Reimagining Discarded America, MICHELLE WILDE ANDERSON, Professor at Stanford Law School and Stanford School of Sustainability, explores vicious cycles in Stockton CA, Lawrence MA, Detroit MI, and Josephine County OR - four communities left behind by the modern economy. As local economies shrink, government is underfunded. As government delivers less to citizens, they lose faith in government and in each other. Coming back gets harder and harder, but it is not impossible. She tells the tough and inspirational stories of “People who” - in her words - “are working their asses off on some of the most important issues in the country.”

I speak with ERWIN CHEMERINSKY, Dean of Berkeley Law School, about the Supreme Court’s recent term. I see ethical challenges and radical rulings - the law of the land interpreted through their religious and moral lenses, overturning legislation and precedent - hardly conservative behavior, stretching and distorting the law in their decision defending arguments, imposing their agenda on the nation with little regard for real world consequences, the common good, or the future. We’ll also talk about his latest book, WORSE THAN NOTHING: The Dangerous Fallacy of Originalism. Learn more at law.berkeley.edu – search for Chemerinsky.

I speak with talk show host, THOM HARTMANN, about the newest book in his “hidden history” series. THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICAN DEMOCRACY. I’d heard the Founders drew inspiration from political systems of Native Americans, to which Hartmann adds, so did Europe’s Enlightenment thinkers. He quotes Thomas Paine: “To understand what the state of society ought to be, it is necessary to have some idea of the natural and primitive state of man; such as it is at this day among the Indians of North America. There is not any of those spectacles of human misery which poverty and want present to our eyes in all the towns and streets in Europe.” In addition to these revelations, Hartmann clarifies myths of the Constitution and offers a 21-point agenda to restore US democracy. Learn more at thomhartmann.com

I’ve long believed that to confront challenges like climate change, we need to move public opinion to the point where a majority favor policies that respond effectively and fairly. I’m afraid that’s no longer true. I read with alarm STAN COX’s article MAGA Legislators Increasingly Force Taxpayers to Support Fossil Fuel Industry by, among other things, outlawing ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) investing. Here’s my conversation with STAN COX of the Land Institute and JOHN FEFFER of the Institute for Policy Studies, about this anti-democratic and destructive strategy and other aspects of the politics of climate. You can learn more at landinstitute.org and johnfeffer.com

Recent Supreme Court rulings doing away with affirmative action and student loan forgiveness while allowing religious bigotry, reinforce the harsh reality of minority rule in today’s United States. While it challenges and handicaps the effectiveness of mass movements for progressive change, it also makes them even more critical. Here’s my 2018 conversation with LESLIE CRUTCHFIELD, Executive Director of Business for Impact at Georgetown University and former managing director at Ashoka, the global venture fund for social entrepreneurs, about her book, How Change Happens: Why Some Movements Succeed While Others Don’t

With this episode, I’m reminded of when I did my first show on the sub-prime crisis. In PLUNDER, BRENDAN BALLOU, a federal prosecutor, explains how private equity has reshaped American business - from nursing homes to prisons, emergency rooms to apartment buildings - by raising prices, reducing quality, cutting jobs, and shifting resources from productive to unproductive parts of the economy. What’s worse, as of now PEs are legally shielded from liability for the consequences of their actions. You can learn more at plunderthebook.com .

We lost an American hero last week with the death of DANIEL ELLSBERG, whose release of the Pentagon Papers in 1971 revealed the cynical realities of the Vietnam War. A president was ignoring the will of the people, Congress, and the courts, promising peace while planning war without end. Ellsberg, a military analyst at the Rand Corporation, risked life in prison to end a war he helped plan, for which Henry Kissinger called him, "the most dangerous man in America." His actions did not end the war – at least not as quickly as he had hoped – but they did change history. Here is our conversation recorded in 2009.

HECTOR TOBAR was born in Los Angeles, shortly after his parents arrived from Guatemala. He’s a Professor of English and Chicano/Latino Studies at the University of California, Irvine, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, and the author of six books, including DEEP DOWN DARK: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine and The Miracle That Set Them Free , adapted into the film, The 33 starring Antonio Banderas. We talk about his newest, OUR MIGRANT SOULS: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of Latino. You can learn more at hectortobar.com .

Surgeon General: “There are ample indicators that social media can have a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents.” June’s here. How about a weekly “vacation” from screens? In this 2019 conversation about her book, 24/6, TIFFANY SHLAIN, filmmaker and Internet pioneer - she founded the Webbies (digital Oscars) - offers a strategy her family has employed for a decade - turning off all screens for 24 hours one day a week. She says this practice has completely changed their lives, giving them more time, productivity, connection, and presence. What could it do for you?

Here’s my conversation with MICKEY HUFF & NOLAN HIGDON. Huff is Director of PROJECT CENSORED. Since 1976, its annual book reports the year’s top-25 news stories ignored, misrepresented, or censored by mainstream media. Huff & Higdon co-authored LET’S AGREE TO DISAGREE. Its first lines: In an age defined by divisive discourse and disinformation, democracy hangs in the balance. {This book] seeks to foster constructive dialogue through critical thinking and media literacy. L earn more at ProjectCensored.org

When I talk about the relentless push of Big Business, the Right, and the GOP toward our current crisis of inequality, injustice, minority rule, and an inability to solve problems, I usually start around 1970. Today’s guests go back to the early 20th century. I talk with NAOMI ORESKES and ERIK CONWAY, authors together of the best-selling and Important MERCHANTS OF DOUBT: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming , about their new book, THE BIG MYTH: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market . Learn more at thebigmythbook.com

I believe human beings want more than anything to feel seen and heard. Last week the US Surgeon General declared loneliness a public health epidemic, as deadly as smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day, raising the risk of premature death by 30%, with higher rates of heart disease, stroke, anxiety, depression, dementia, and suicide. Here’s my 2021 conversation with NOREENA HERTZ about her book, THE LONELY CENTURY: How to Restore Human Connection in a World That’s Pulling Apart. You can learn more at noreena.com

I talk with three-time Pulitzer Prize winning NY Times investigative reporter WALT BOGDANICH about his book, WHEN McKINSEY COMES TO TOWN. The company brands itself one of the good guys, but Bogdanich and co-author MIchael Forsythe point out that, shielded by NDAs, McKinsey has so far escaped scrutiny for advising tobacco companies, opioid manufacturers including Purdue, oil companies, and repressive governments. We pull back the curtain on its role in pursuit of the bottom line above all that has made this country less equal, less just, less healthy, less safe, and less democratic.

SHEILA KUEHL has long been one of my favorite elected officials. A true public servant, she served 8 years in CA’s State Senate, 6 in the State Assembly, and 8 more on LA County’s Board of Supervisors. Kuehl was the first openly gay or lesbian person elected to the Legislature, first woman named Speaker pro Tem of the Assembly, and authored 171 bills signed into law. One of my go-to sages re state and local politics, now retired, we look back together at how she was so successful - not just at overcoming prejudice but also at achieving real world results. Is it possible to still succeed in today’s political climate?

April is Earth Month. My environmental goals: a healthy relationship with the rest of nature and an effective reckoning with climate change. Here’s my 2020 conversation with SAM MYERS, Harvard research scientist, Founding Director of the Planetary Health Alliance, and one of the editors of PLANETARY HEALTH: Protecting Nature to Protect Ourselves. The book offers solutions to the challenging impacts of environmental change on human health by reimagining cities, food, energy systems, economics, and ethics. Learn more at planetaryhealthalliance.org .

While we live in the most age-diverse society in human history, with almost equal numbers of people of every age, the US has become an age-segregated nation, with few opportunities for generations to connect. Here’s my conversation with EUNICE NICHOLS, Co-CEO of CoGenerate - the recently chosen new name for what had been called Encore.org . The organization’s focus evolved from seniors’ purposeful second and third acts to cogeneration - bringing older and younger people together to solve problems and bridge divides. In the words of Encore founder and Eunice’s co-CEO, Marc Freedman: “in our new chapter – in Encore’s encore – we are not just asking what older people can do for the next generation, but what older people can do with the next generation.” You can learn more at cogenerate.org .

I was a virtual attendee last week at an inspiring and humbling memorial for the late EDGAR CAHN, on what would have been his 88th birthday. Cahn, an unsung hero of 20th century America, authored articles and books that intentionally led to national policy, including The War on Poverty (1964) which led to the establishment of Legal Aid, Hunger, U.S.A (1968), Our Brother's Keeper: The Indian in White America (1969), and Time Dollars (1992). He and his late wife, Jean Camper, co-founded Antioch School of Law, now the District of Columbia Law School. Here’s my 2012 conversation with Edgar and THOMAS FRANK, influential social critic and author of What's the Matter with Kansas? and One Market Under God.

Though most people now accept that genes influence our height, weight, heart health, etc., many get nervous when we apply that same perspective to things like our mental health, intelligence, or educational attainment. Here’s my conversation with KATHRYN PAIGE HARDEN, Professor of Psychology at the University of Texas, about the ideas in her first book, THE GENETIC LOTTERY: Why DNA Matters for Social Equality, which attempts to reconcile the findings of behavior genetics with her commitment to social justice. You can learn more at kpharden.com .

Recently China led negotiations to end longstanding hostilities between Iran and Saudi Arabia. In the US, we’ve seen how even one person willing to oppose the popular consensus can dictate our nation’s response to climate change. Here’s my 2019 conversation with BARBARA FINAMORE about her provocative book, Will China Save the Planet ?, which explores China’s big picture, long-term strategy to reap the technological, economic, and political benefits of seizing leadership of the global response to climate.

10K people a day pass the 60-year mark. There’s no way to make the changes needed to protect our planet and society unless we bring our power into play. Here’s my conversation with BOB FULKERSON, Lead National Organizer for THIRD ACT, the year-old organization founded by BILL McKIBBEN to mobilize Boomers and older to defend democracy and confront the Climate Crisis. Learn more at thirdact.org and join a National Day of Action 3/21/23. Deliver a message to big banks who fund fossil fuels & climate destruction.

The world is a crazy place and the battle for our attention has never been more fierce. (1) In 2009’s RAPT: Attention and the Focused Life , WINIFRED GALLAGHER argues that the quality of your life largely depends on what you choose to pay attention to and how you choose to do it. Worth paying attention to. (2) Former Ohio Congressman TIM RYAN - lost 2022 Senate race to Hillbilly Elegy author, election denier J.D.Vance - urges the practice of meditation in A MINDFUL NATION: How a Simple Practice Can Help Us Reduce Stress, Improve Performance, and Recapture the American Spirit .

The countries, conflicts, and causes change, but has military action and defense spending become the one huge thing that unites both political tribes and parties? So that when one challenges leaders to be more more respectful of other ways of dealing with conflict and more realistic about our goals and how to achieve them - decision-makers and the media assign such common sense thinking to the fringe. We talk today with ANDREW BACEVICH, co-founder of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, about Ukraine, defense spending, and the ideas in his newest book, ON SHEDDING AN OBSOLETE PAST: Bidding Farewell to the American Century.

I’m calling this conversation with economist ROBERT POLLIN, INFLATION 101. What’s really going on? The current bout of inflation is global, not domestic. It’s higher in other economies than in the US. It’s primarily due to the global pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. And it may already be over. Yet the Fed seems intent on risking recession to fight it with tools that ignore its real causes.

In his new book, THE FIFTIES: An Underground History, JAMES GAINES asks: Who laid the groundwork for the ’60s - and then celebrates a few solitary, brave, stubborn individuals who pioneered the radical gay rights, feminist, civil rights, and environmental movements. Their courage and genius changed what it was possible to imagine. As early as the mid-1940s, Harry Hay said “Gay is good.” Pauli Murray laid legal paths for Thurgood Marshall and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Black vets of WWII and Korea said enough is enough. Silent Spring ’s Rachel Carson and MIT’s Norbert Wiener warned of potential manmade environmental destruction. You’ll be inspired and you’ll learn a lot. I did.

In the first two years of the pandemic, globally the top 1% captured nearly double the amount of new wealth as the other 99%. In Capitalism, Alone: The Future of the System That Rules the World , BRANKO MILANOVIC says we’re all capitalists now. Liberal capitalism delivers rampant inequality and excess as it fights for hearts and minds with political capitalism, as practiced by China. What are the prospects for a fairer world now that capitalism is the only game in town?

Since 1988, the GOP has won only one national popular vote but has named 11 of 15 Supreme Court justices. The current 6-3 court is a uniquely powerful tool of Minority rule. Their radical decisions last summer went against the majority of Americans on church and state, guns, environmental protection, the climate crisis, and women’s rights. I talk with DAHLIA LITHWICK - senior legal correspondent at Slate and host of Slate’s Amicus podcast - about that eventful term and some of the big cases of the current term. We examine how this court operates in order to achieve their extreme agenda. And we talk about her new book, LADY JUSTICE - stories of courageous and principled women lawyers who worked to hold the line against the Trump administration.

As we reach the end of one year and the beginning of another, many of us take stock of how we live and what we value. Here’s my conversation with LYNNE TWIST about her new book, LIVING A COMMITTED LIFE: Finding Freedom and Fulfillment in a Purpose Larger Than Yourself . She asks us to consider “a commitment to the common good: to something that takes you out of yourself and into the realm of service.” I think the challenge and opportunity Lynne offers in her work and in her new book is timely and worthy of our attention. You can learn more at Lynne’s site, soulofmoney.org .

I wish you, your loved ones, and those without loved ones at this time, health, safety, peace, and joy. At this time of reflection, here’s my 2014 conversation with SARA DAVIDSON about her book, THE DECEMBER PROJECT. Sara met every Friday for the last year of his life with 89-year-old Rabbi Zalman Shachter-Shalomi, founder of the Jewish Renewal movement. What did they talk about? In his words, "When you can feel in your cells that you're coming to the end of your tour of duty, what is the spiritual work of this time, and how do we prepare for the mystery?"

Why are medications essential to survival so outrageously expensive? Why are vaccines for a global pandemic a source of huge profits and limited availability? Why does the government allow private companies to patent and monopolize drugs resulting from tax funded research? Here’s my conversation with ALEXANDER ZAITCHIK about the revelations in his book, OWNING THE SUN:A People's History of Monopoly Medicine from Aspirin to COVID-19 Vaccines . You can learn more at zaitchik.com