Category: 3-SometimeCommentary

In Los Angeles, the fires rage on, with damage estimates so high they almost defy belief. But perhaps the L.A. fires truly will cause as much destruction as nearly every major disaster worldwide last year. We’ll explore which aspects of the damage can be attributed to climate change and which cannot. Plus, we’re joined by John Kay, Oxford professor, Financial Times columnist, and author of The Corporation in the Twenty-First Century: Why (Almost) Everything We Are Told About Business Is Wrong. We discuss the assassination of a healthcare executive and reflect on a time when the pharmaceutical industry was one of the most respected sectors in the world.

 

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You've probably heard President-elect Donald Trump say he plans to close the Department of Education.

It's the smallest of the cabinet-level federal agencies, with just over 4,000 employees. Its 2024 budget was $275 billion. That's 4 percent of all federal funding.

Trump's plans to completely shutter the department are unlikely to happen. He may, however, make big changes to it, shifting many of its responsibility to other agencies.

But what are those responsibilities exactly? And who carries them out? As part of our series on federal workers, dot Gov, we're diving into the Department of Education today to talk about its functions and what the future president's plans for it mean for the American people.

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In the first programme of the New Year Adam Rutherford follows two possible guides to a more fulfilled life – Socrates and optimism – but asks whether either has any answers to dealing with racism.

The philosopher Agnes Callard proposes the questioning Socratic method in Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life. She shows that this ancient method offers a new ethics to live by, from answering questions about identity and inequality, to helping us love and die well. But to truly flourish we also need a huge dose of optimism, according to the science writer Sumit Paul-Choudhury. In The Bright Side he argues that being optimistic is not only central to the human psyche, but plays a crucial role in overcoming the challenges of the twenty-first century.

The social psychologist Keon West is more sceptical. In his new book The Science of Racism, he challenges those – a reputed half of the population – who think that racism doesn’t exist. He goes back to the data and research to reveal the extent and prevalence of racist behaviour, and the repeated inadequacy of attempts to address it.

Producer: Katy Hickman

Each weekend on Best of The Gist, we revisit an archival segment from the past and replay something from the current week. This weekend, we listen back to a 2019 Gist intro about Trump’s then-infatuation with Greenland. Then, we hear Mike’s 2025 Spiel on the same topic. At least he’s consistent. 

 

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The Gist is produced by Joel Patterson and Corey Wara 

 

Email us at thegist@mikepesca.com 

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Follow Mike’s Substack > Pesca Profundities 

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Joshua Oppenheimer, the director of the recent apocalypse musical The End, starring Tilda Swinton and Michael Shannon, joins us to discuss musicals and his past work crafting brilliant documentaries. Plus, we’ll hear a direct dispatch from our friend Meghan Daum, whose house was destroyed in the Southern California fires. And I think we can safely say that Donald Trump won’t be waging war on Greenland, even if he won’t say it clearly.

Listen to Meghan's full story from The Unspeakable Podcast at her substack, and consider becoming a paid subscriber. She's a friend of The Gist, a fantastic writer, and a person who could use your support.

Voices and Votes: The State of Free Speech After the Election

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