Start Making Sense

On this week's episode of the Edge of Sports podcast, we talk to Prof. Louis Moore, author of "We Will Win The Day," about Lamar Jackson's new contract, the NFL Draft, and what both say about the state of the Black Q.B. in the NFL.I have some Choice Words about France on the precipice of both the Olympics and social chaos. We've got a Just Stand Up award for Miami Heat legend, Dwyane Wade, for his courage in the face of the anti-trans bigotry his family has been facing, which caused them to leave the state of Florida. We also have and Just Sit Down awards for the cowardly silence from some of the biggest stars in the Florida sports community.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

The American judicial system is facing a far reaching legitimacy crisis, with the Republican ominated judges continuing to push an extremist ideological vision and Supreme Court justices Clarence Thomas and Neal Gorsuch standing accused of serious conflict of interest violations.Moira Donegan, who wrote on the issue in her column for The Guardian, joins the podcast to discuss how the courts are leading the country into a constitutional crisis. We also take up the failure of Democrats to use what power they have in the Senate to check right-wing judicial extremism and possible corruption.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Anatol Lieven is back after three weeks in Ukraine, where he found soldiers determined to win, and Russian bombardment doing surprisingly little damage.Also on this episode of Start Making Sense: A neighborhood in Port-au-Prince fights back against the gangs. Amy Wilentz comments on the news from Haiti.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This has been an eventful week in both the news media and social media. Tucker Carlson was apparently fired from Fox News. Meanwhile, Twitter under the aegis of Elon Musk continues to be in turmoil as it changes verification policies, to the irritation of longtime users. To make sense of it all, I talked to Ryan Cooper, managing editor of The American Prospect. Ryan has produced a fascinating Youtube video about the journalist Matt Taibbi, a one-time muckraking radical who in recent years has increasingly aligned himself with the reactionary agenda of Carlson and Musk. As it turns out, Taibbi’s trajectory provides a perfect storyline for tracing recent changes in the media and also the disturbing tendency of some former leftists to shift right under the impetus of the culture wars.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week, we speak to Washington media legend David Aldridge about the forthcoming sale of the Washington football team by its much-loathed owner Dan Snyder.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It’s getting late to take action about the climate emergency, but it’s not too late: that’s what Rebecca Solnit and Thelma Young Lutunatabua say in their new book, “Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility.”Also: abortion rights will be a key issue for Democrats in the 2024 election, especially after Republican judges have tried to ban medication abortions. John Nichols comments.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

The victories of Brandon Johnson in Chicago and Janet Protasiewicz in Wisconsin are the latest signs that the upper Midwest, after a long period of trending right, is now the home of a liberal and left resurgence. Chris Lehmann, who surveyed the region in a recent column for the Nation, joins the podcast to talk about this development. We look at the history of how the “Blue Firewall” that helped Obama win in 2012 became a cornerstone of Trump’s victory in 2016, the disastrous impact of the 2010 midterms, the GOP campaign (aided by Koch-family money) to create permanent Republican power in the region using gerrymandering, and the counterattack led by grass-roots activism and union organizing. In discussing the recent liberal resurgence, we examine the impact of social issues (notably abortion and trans rights) and economic issues (notably workers’ rights and trade). We also contrast the politics of Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan (where the Democrats are finding their footing) with Iowa (where the right con

Donald Trump and his 34 felonies: can he really be brought to justice for paying off Stormy Daniels? We feature highlights of The Nation’s roundtable discussion among Elie Mystal, Justice Correspondent, Joan Walsh, National Affairs Correspondent, and Chris Lehmann, D.C. Editor.Also: Afghan girls who escaped from the Taliban. The story of a boarding school that evacuated its students from Kabul during the chaotic withdrawal of the Americans, and moved -- to Kigali, Rwanda. SOLA, the School of Leadership Afghanistan is the place where Afghan girls study to become members of the generation that will one day lead a peaceful and united Afghanistan. The founder, Shabana Basij-Rasikh, explains.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In an earlier podcast, Moira Donegan, frequent Time of Monsters guest and columnist for the Guardian, predicted that Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk would strike down FDA approval of mifepristone, the medication used in most abortions in the United States. Donegan’s prediction came true on Friday.Moira returns to the podcast this week to discuss the impact of this decision. We talk about how outrageous Kacsmaryk’s ruling was on both legal and factual grounds as well as the way the decision will likely end up being reviewed by the Supreme Court. We also talk about the political divides over how to deal with abortion inside both the Democratic and Republican Party as the Dobbs effect reshapes politics.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week we speak to Theresa Runstedler, author of the book Black Ball: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Spencer Haywood, and the Generation that Saved the Soul of the NBA.We'll have Choice Words about what Caitlin Clark has taught us throughout the fallout after the NCAA women’s championship game. We also have Jake’s Takes on the NBA finals and more. Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

The landslide victory of the progressive candidate in Wisconsin’s Supreme Court race, Janet Protasiewicz, ten times bigger than Biden's, shows how abortion wins elections. And in Chicago, progressive candidate Brandon Johnson won the race for mayor. John Nichols joins the show to discuss these victories.Also on this episode: Will Trump's indictment on 34 felonies change anything in the 2024 election? Or had everybody already decided what they think about Donald Trump? The Nation's DC Bureau Chief, Chris Lehmann reports.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

While the arrest of former president Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business record can be welcomed as a rare example of accountability for the elite Americans, the actual case will have to be tested in court. My colleague Elie Mystal has written an important column cautioning against having high expectations. The fact is the case brought by Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg is for one of Trump’s lesser offenses (compared to ongoing investigations over obstruction of justice, over attempted influencing of election officials, over incitement of the January 6 attempted coup, and over handling of classified documents, among other matters).Further, this particular case against Trump has to clear some high legal hurdles. On this episode of The Time of Monsters, I talked to Elie about Trump’s legal status, why we should welcome the former president’s arrest, why we should be clear-eyed about how far the court case can go, and how MAGA Republicans are using this case to foment racism.Subscribe to The Nation to sup

On this episode of Edge of Sports, we speak to Michael Lee of the Washington Post about why this has been the most dispiriting NBA season in recent history. We don’t just catalog the moments, though. We also try to understand the underlying issues.We have Choice Words about the late Willis Reed, and what his life meant for the New York Knicks as well as the city. We have a Just Stand Up awards for the Maryland Terrapins lady women’s team that went on a great tourney run. We also have a Just Sit Down award for Silver who has not done a great job of handling the flame ups that have occurred during the NBA season. All that and more on this episode of the Edge of Sports podcast! Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In Los Angeles last week, a three-day strike by 30,000 public school custodians, food service workers, bus drivers and teacher's aides ended with a 30% pay increase. Harold Meyerson, the editor-at-large of The American Prospect, joins the podcast to discuss.Also: For a century, thousands of young baseball players have lived with low wages, overcrowded housing, and all-night rides in uncomfortable buses in order to play in baseball’s minor leagues, hoping to eventually make it to the majors. Now, their lives are changing because they organized a union. Kelly Candaele and Peter Dreier have more on that story.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

On this episode of The Time of Monsters, Alex Shephard discusses why Ron DeSantis and other rivals are faltering.Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is the preferred Trump foe of the Republican establishment. Both the donor class and media outlets (notably those owned by Rupert Murdoch) have rallied around DeSantis as a figure who can unite the party by adopting the policies of Donald Trump but without Trump’s embarrassing personal flaws. But their theory of Ron Santis isn’t working out: he’s faltering in the polls and some of his major supporters are starting to waver. Other Trump rivals, like former vice president Mike Pence, are also having trouble gaining traction.Writing in The New Republic, Alex Shepard cogently noted that De Santis and other would-be Republican presidential nominees face the same difficulty as candidates like Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz did in 2016: they're afraid to alienate Trump’s passionate base of support, so they can’t fully challenge him. This makes them look weak when Trump attacks

American women in 2023: the news is bad, but it’s not all bad. Katha Pollitt is on the Start Making Sense podcast to explain.Also: the largest anti-war demonstrations in American history were the protests in the fall of 1969--with more than two million people in the streets demanding “End the War in Vietnam.” But did those demonstrations help end the war? Historian Chris Appy comments on the new documentary, “The Movement and the ‘Madman,’” out on PBS American Experience March 28.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Last year, the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision. This has only emboldened the anti-choice movement. Those who hoped that abortion would at least be safe in blue states and kept available in red states via mifepristone are waking up to a world where the anti-choice movement is using legal warfare to move towards its goal of a nation-wide abortion ban. As Moira Donegan notes in a recent column in The Guardian, a right-wing Trump-appointed federal judge in Texas is hearing arguments for rolling back FDA approval of mifepristone. Elsewhere, pharmacists and doctors are being intimidated by legal threats so that even legal abortion services are getting harder to come by. A novel legal argument is being used to raise the possibility that anti-abortion laws can be applied retroactively, again creating a chilling effect.I talked with Moira about these and other trends. As she notes, they raise a fundamental question about not just reproductiv

On this episode of the Edge of Sports podcast, we speak to Daily Memphian columnist Chris Herrington about the personal troubles of Memphis Grizzlies point guard and budding icon Ja Morant. We talk about the Grizzlies, the city of Memphis, and what’s next for the superstar point guard.We have Choice Words about the MVP debate going on between Embiid, Jokic, and Giannis. We also have a Just Stand Up award to Lamar Jackson for standing on his principle, and a Just Sit Down award for the NFL owners that are seemingly colluding against Lamar. All that and more on this episode of the Edge of Sports podcast!Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Since the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank last week, we need to understand how and why medium-sized banks have been allowed to avoid strict supervision from federal banking authorities and avoid safety requirements. John Nichols comments.Also: Do masks work to help stop the spread of COVID-19? A New York Times columnist recently said that they don’t, and cited an authoritative review of research as his source. But it turns he was wrong about that study. Gregg Gonsalves is on the show to explain.Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

The good news is we have one less thing to worry about: so-called Havana Syndrome turns out not to be caused by a mysterious super-weapon to harm American diplomats and military personnel, despite numerous press reports warning of a hypothetical ray gun created by a foreign foe (Cuba? Russia? China?). Instead, an assessment by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) concluded that the symptoms of Havana Syndrome, reported by hundreds of government officials working all over the world) likely had “medical, environmental, and social factors that plausibly can explain.” In less polite terms, this was an example of a mass psychogenic illness, a product of hysteria and over-active imaginations. Writing in Jacobin, Branko Marcetic links the Havana Syndrome frenzy to other examples of national security paranoia such as the false reports of Russians paying for Taliban bounty hunters and the recent meltdown over Chinese surveillance balloons. I talked with Branko about both the Havana Syndrome, and the reasons – p