Q&A

Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) talks about eight Black representatives from South Carolina who served in Congress during the Reconstruction Era. The eight included Joseph Rainey, the first Black politician elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, and Robert Smalls, a Civil War hero who fled the Confederacy to fight for the Union Army. Both were former slaves. Rep. Clyburn became the ninth Black congressman from South Carolina nearly a century later. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

White House Historical Association president Stewart McLaurin, author of "The People's House Miscellany," talks about the history of the White House and White House-related trivia. He also discusses the changes that presidents and first ladies have made to the White House's interior and exterior going back to President Thomas Jefferson. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Journalist Boyce Upholt talks about the history and geography of the Mississippi River and human attempts to control it going back to the Founding Era. He discusses how government-built levees, dikes, and dams have transformed the landscape and ecosystem along the 2,340-mile-long Mississippi and the impact that commerce, floods, and pollution have had on the population along its banks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In his memoir, "Who Knew," media mogul Barry Diller talks about his career in television and Hollywood, and about his personal life and longtime relationship with fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg. Mr. Diller has been an executive at ABC and head of Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox (where he created the Fox television network). While at ABC in the mid-1970s, Mr. Diller was responsible for creating the Movie of the Week and the television miniseries, including "Roots." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Former CNN Moscow Bureau Chief Jill Dougherty discusses her life-long interest in Russia, which she first visited in 1969 as an exchange student. A fluent Russian speaker, she spent 10 years covering Russia for Voice of America and CNN. Besides serving as Moscow Bureau Chief, Jill Dougherty was White House correspondent during the H.W. Bush and Clinton administrations. While in Moscow, she covered the presidencies of Mikhail Gorbachev, Boris Yeltsin, and Vladimir Putin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sir Richard J. Evans has been writing about Germany and Adolf Hitler for his entire professional life. He was knighted in Britain in 2012 for his service to scholarship. From 2003-2008, Professor Evans published a trilogy of the Third Reich with a total of over 2,500 pages. His latest book is titled "Hitler's People: The Faces of the Third Reich." In his preface, Sir Richard, a former professor at Cambridge University writes: "The individuals who stand at the center of this book range from the top to the bottom, from Hitler all the way down to the lowest of the Nazi party." There are 22 chapters. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Critic and opinion writer Christopher Scalia, son of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, recommends 13 novels with conservative themes that, he says, aren’t widely known by conservatives. In his book "13 Novels Conservatives Will Love (but Probably Haven't Read," the former English professor discusses books by Walter Scott, George Eliot, P.D. James, Zora Neale Hurston, and others. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last week, President Trump announced that a deal had been reached between the U.S. government and China regarding the control of the widely popular social media platform, TikTok. In April 2024, Congress passed, and President Biden signed, a law that required TikTok's Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell TikTok within a year or face a ban in the United States. Forbes technology reporter Emily Baker-White, author of "Every Screen on the Planet," talks about the meteoric rise of TikTok, used by an estimated 150 million Americans, and the U.S. government's concerns over its influence and ownership. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro went to prison in 2024 after being found guilty of two counts of criminal contempt of Congress for refusing to comply with a subpoena from the House January 6th Committee. In his book, "I Went to Prison So You Won’t Have To," Mr. Navarro describes the Justice Department's case against him, his arrest and trial, and what it was like for him prison. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ann Butler was a CIA spy for 25+ years. She donned disguises, used false names, and learned how to evade surveillance. She did this clandestine work while simultaneously raising five children. As she says, "No one suspected a pregnant woman was a spy." Ann Butler talks about her work with the Agency, what it took to become an overseas operative in the mid-1980s, and some of the methods she used to extract information from targets. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices