DSR's Words Matter

Battle for the Marble Palace – Abe Fortas, Earl Warren, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon and the Forging of the Modern Supreme CourtAuthor Michael Bobelian is a contributor to Forbes where he writes on the Supreme Court, white collar crime and politics.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our guest this week is a celebrated historian and the award-winning author, co-author or editor of more than 30 books. Most of these works are focused on American presidents or people we know because of presidents.Douglas Brinkley is the Katherine Tsanoff Brown Chair in Humanities and Professor of History at Rice University, a CNN Presidential Historian, and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair.  Katie and Joe talk to Professor Brinkley about the power and consequences of a president's words.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last week we lost one of the most influential and celebrated novelists in American literary history Toni Morrison. A novelist, essayist and Princeton Professor, Morrison wrote nine major novels -- all of which earned extensive critical acclaim. Among dozens of other awards and achievements, she won both a Pulitzer Prize and American Book Award in 1988 for her novel Beloved. And in 1993, Toni Morrison became the first black woman of any nationality to win a Nobel Prize.The citation for her award in literature declared Morrison to be an author “who in novels characterized by visionary force and poetic import, gives life to an essential aspect of American reality.” In 2012, Toni Morrison was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama.In commencement address at Rutgers University in 2011, Toni Morrison encouraged graduates to seek a meaningful life -- something she herself had certainly achieved. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is the federal government doing enough to fight domestic terrorism? This week we talk to one former senior law enforcement official who says no. For nearly two decades, Daryl Johnson was senior domestic terrorism analyst at the Department of Homeland Security and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Back in 2009 he wrote a DHS Report on “Rightwing Extremism” that was widely circulated in the law enforcement community and was leaked to the press.Instead of taking action, Republicans on Capitol Hill attacked his findings.Johnson explains how and why Donald Trump's election changed the pattern of extreme white nationalists and what can be done about it.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Shannon Watts is the author of Fight like a Mother – How a Grassroots Movement took on the Gun Lobby and Why Women will Change the World.Until December of 2012 Shannon Watts was a stay-at-home mother of five and former communications executive.The day after the Sandy Hook tragedy, Shannon Watts started a Facebook group with the message that all Americans can and should do more to reduce gun violence.That online conversation turned into a grassroots movement -- Moms Demand Action which now has a chapter in every state and is part of Everytown for Gun Safety, the largest gun violence prevention organization in the country with nearly 6 million members.She is also an active board member of Emerge America, one of the leading organizations for recruiting and training women to run for office.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Over the last few weeks, Donald Trump has left no doubt that he is a racist. He has also made it clear -- race will be perhaps THE biggest issue in 2020. The question is: Can racism win?This week Katie and Joe talk to Keith Boykin. Keith is a CNN political commentator, New York Times best-selling author, and a former White House aide to President Bill Clinton. Keith teaches at the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University in New York and previously taught at American University in Washington, D.C. He is a co-founder and first board president of the National Black Justice Coalition.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we sit down with Lauren Moxley, the host of The Ginsburg Tapes Podcast -- which chronicles Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s oral arguments before the then all-male United States Supreme Court from 1972 to 1978 —before she became #Notorious RBG.The Ginsburg Tapes allows the listener to be a fly on the wall for some of the most important cases in American jurisprudence as future Justice Ginsburg challenged laws treating men and women differently. In between the actually Supreme Court recordings, Lauren puts the cases, the law and even the Justices themselves in historical context and explains how as a lawyer, RBG really did change the World.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Few know more about the origins of the FBI's Russia investigation than our guest this week, former Justice Department and FBI senior official James A. Baker. From 2014 to 2017 Mr. Baker was general counsel of the FBI and was involved in the initial and some of the most important aspects of the investigation into Russia's attack on the 2016 presidential election. We talk to Jim Baker about that, Robert Mueller's testimony and if our government is doing enough to ensure that the 2020 election is free from foreign influence.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As Special Counsel Robert Mueller prepares to testify in front of Congress the week, Katie and Joe previewed his testimony with National Security expert Jeremy Bash in last week's episode.Some things are worth repeating. So in case you missed this important preview, here it is again.From 2009 to 2011, Jeremy served as Chief of Staff at the CIA under Director Leon Panetta and from 2011-2013 as Chief of Staff at the Department of Defense under then Secretary Panetta.A graduate of Georgetown and Harvard Law School Jeremy was the policy director for national security issues 2000 Gore-Lieberman Campaign and also served as the Chief Minority Counsel for the House Intelligence Committee under Ranking Member Congresswoman Jane Harman.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Katie and Joe talk to two journalists to go beyond the tweets and find out what's really going on race and immigration in Donald Trump's America.Eugene Scott covers identity politics for the Washington Post. He joined the Post from CNN Politics, where he covered the 2016 presidential election and was the senior reporter on the website’s breaking news team. He’s a regular on-air contributor, providing analysis on MSNBC, CNN, CBS and NPR. Eugene is a graduate of the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.Molly O’Toole is an immigration reporter for the Los Angeles Times based here in Washington. Previously, she was a senior reporter at Foreign Policy covering the 2016 election and Trump administration. Molly has covered immigration and security from Mexico, Central America, West Africa, the Middle East, the Gulf, and South Asia.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices