The post-war generation reaped the benefits of peace and prosperity. Yet rather than spend that bounty, retired boomers are hoarding their riches–and upending economists’ expectations. The science of menstruation is baffling, partly because most animals don’t do it. Now clever innovations may help improve women’s health (9:13). And how old-fashioned wind-power is blowing new life into the shipping industry–and cutting its emissions (16:13).
Rolling Stone's country division recently posted an article titled The 200 Greatest Country Songs of All Time—one of their famous lists, perfect for starting arguments with your nerdiest music lover. So OF COURSE we had to talk about the list. This week we count down to the NUMBER 1 SONG!
This week includes such favorites as Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Ray Charles, and more!
Steven Pinker is a world-renowned cognitive psychologist, and is widely regarded as one of the most important public intellectuals of our time. His work delves into the complexities of cognition, language, and social behavior, and his research offers a window into the fundamental workings of the human mind.
Today, we talk to Pinker about why smart people believe stupid things, the psychology of conspiracy theories, free speech and academic freedom, why democracy and enlightenment values are contrary to human nature, the moral panic around AI, and much more.
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I was speaking with an OA listener the other day, and she mentioned a few things that made me reallllly want to interview her on this show. First off, she said she is a progressive working in a prosecutor's office in an extremely conservative area. That's already interesting enough, but then she said thing 2 which is: she voted for Trump in 2016! So, I just had to get her on to find out how she made that journey, and how she makes a difference in people's lives as a progressive prosecutor.
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Is involuntary psychiatric treatment the solution to the intertwined crises of untreated mental illness, homelessness, and addiction? In recent years, politicians and advocates have sought to expand the use of conservatorships, a legal tool used to force someone deemed “gravely disabled,” or unable to meet their needs for food, clothing, or shelter as a result of mental illness, to take medication and be placed in a locked facility. At the same time, civil liberties and disability rights groups have seized on cases like that of Britney Spears to argue that conservatorships are inherently abusive.
Conservatorship: Inside California's System of Coercion and Care for Mental Illness(Columbia UP, 2023) is an incisive and compelling portrait of the functioning—and failings—of California’s conservatorship system. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with professionals, policy makers, families, and conservatees, Alex V. Barnard takes readers to the streets where police encounter homeless people in crisis, the locked wards where people receiving treatment are confined, and the courtrooms where judges decide on conservatorship petitions. As he shows, California’s state government has abdicated authority over this system, leaving the question of who receives compassionate care and who faces coercion dependent on the financial incentives of for-profit facilities, the constraints of underresourced clinicians, and the desperate struggles of families to obtain treatment for their loved ones.
This book offers a timely warning: reforms to expand conservatorship will lead to more coercion but little transformative care until government assumes accountability for ensuring the health and dignity of its most vulnerable citizens.
Michael O. Johnston, Ph.D. is a Assistant Professor of Sociology at William Penn University. He is the author of The Social Construction of a Cultural Spectacle: Floatzilla (Lexington Books, 2023) and Community Media Representations of Place and Identity at Tug Fest: Reconstructing the Mississippi River (Lexington Books, 2022). His general area of study is in the areas of social construction of experience, identity, and place. He is currently conducting research for his next project that looks at nightlife and the emotional labor that is performed by employees of bars and nightclubs. To learn more about Michael O. Johnston you can go to his website, Google Scholar, Twitter @ProfessorJohnst, or by email at johnstonmo@wmpenn.edu.
Alexander the Great was one of the most famous people from the ancient world.
He defeated a vastly larger Persian Empire and conquered everything from Egypt to India.
Yet, what Alexander achieved wouldn’t have been possible without his father. In fact, if Alexander hadn’t accomplished what he did, his father would probably be the one given the title “great.”
Learn more about Philip II of Macedon and how he changed the world of Ancient Greece and laid the foundations for his son on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday dissolved his war cabinet that’s overseen the country’s fighting in Gaza. The move was expected, but it came after two centrist members of the cabinet resigned in frustration over Netanyahu’s handling of the war. Meanwhile, representatives from dozens of nations left a weekend conference in Switzerland aimed at ending the war in Ukraine with little to show for it. Ben Rhodes, former U.S. deputy national security advisor and co-host of ‘Pod Save The World,’ talks about what these developments mean for both wars.
And in headlines: U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy called for tobacco-like warning labels on social media platforms, President Biden is expected to issue an executive order expanding protections for undocumented immigrants married to U.S. citizens, and Maryland Democratic Gov. Wes Moore signed an executive order pardoning more than 175,000 low-level marijuana convictions.
The Biden campaign puts big money into a new ad slamming Trump as a convicted felon, fraudster, and sexual predator, and painting Biden as a fighter for working families. Trump courts the Black vote in front of a mostly white audience in Detroit, and CNN announces the final rules for next week’s debate. Plus: Jon, Lovett, and Tommy talk about who’s up and who’s down in the race to be Trump’s VP.To preorder you copy of Democracy or Else, visit http://crooked.com/booksFor tickets to upcoming live shows and book events, visit http://crooked.com/events
For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email transcripts@crooked.com and include the name of the podcast.
