Hasan Jeffries, associate professor of history at The Ohio State University, talks about hip-hop’s birth in the Bronx and its dual identities of both protest music and party music.
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What really happened to the Branch Davidians
Author Jeff Guinn joins guest host John McCaa to discuss the failed 1993 ATF siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.
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The U.S. wasn’t founded on free markets
Harvard professor and author Naomi Oreskes joins us to talk about the public relations campaigns designed to crush regulations and unions.
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How should we memorialize those who were enslaved?
Clint Smith, a staff writer at The Atlantic, discusses the shortcomings of America’s reckoning with its treatment of indigenous populations and enslaved peoples, and what should be done to address deeper questions of public memory.
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The true history of lie detector tests
Writer and director Rob Rapley joins us to discuss the invention of what is known as the lie detector test, its uses and abuses, and how it’s used today.
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History is defined by what happens after a great invention
Derek Thompson, a staff writer at The Atlantic, joins us to discuss why, when the U.S. is a world leader in Nobel Prizes in science and technology, we still lag behind in the implementation of innovation.
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Parasites could unlock evolutionary history
Scott L. Gardner, professor of biological sciences, joins us to discuss parasitology around the world and how these tiny creatures offer insight to the evolutionary history of regions.
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How Daniel Webster united the states
Professor Joel Richard Paul joins guest host John McCaa to discuss orator, lawyer and politician Daniel Webster, who argued that binding the states together was the only way to end slavery.
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In Mexico, some enslaved people found freedom
Alice L. Baumgartner joins guest host John McCaa to discuss the Civil War and how thousands of enslaved people found freedom in Mexico.
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The legendary hypocrisy of Thomas Jefferson
Prof. Thomas S. Kidd joins guest host John McCaa to discuss the ways Thomas Jefferson diverged from his own moral compass and the complicated portrait of the man we know from history books.
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The forgotten story of how Lincoln tried to bring together a divided nation
Political analyst John Avlon discusses Lincoln as a peacemaker, his approach of reason over brute strength, and how that was derailed after his assassination.
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The FBI was never the same after WWII
Author Beverly Gage discusses why worries about homegrown conspiracies led to erosions in civil liberties and set up Hoover to gain significant power.
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