Chris Aldrich | Chris Aldrich

🎧 Strong Verbs, Short Sentences, Season 3 Episode 9 | Revisionist History

Listened Strong Verbs, Short Sentences, Season 3 Episode 9 by Malcolm Gladwell from Revisionist History

"She was Joan of Arc, Madame Curie, and Florence Nightingale--all wrapped up in one."

One long, hot afternoon on Capitol Hill, in the summer of 1991, the most powerful man in Congress took on the most powerful person in American science. Science won. What does it take to end a reign of terror? The science fraud panic of the 1990s, part two of two.

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🎧 The Imaginary Crimes of Margit Hamosh, Season 3 Episode 8 | Revisionist History

Listened The Imaginary Crimes of Margit Hamosh, Season 3 Episode 8 by Malcolm Gladwell from Revisionist History

"Epidemics of fear repeat themselves. The first time as tragedy. The second time as farce. Margit Hamosh? Definitely farce."

What was it that Margit Hamosh did? What was her alleged fraud? I have been going on and on about this case for a good 20 minutes now, and I haven’t told you. Do you know why? Because we didn’t know.

It pains me to think of all these wasted hours over minutiae.

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🎧 CNN's Lanny Davis Problem | On the Media

Listened CNN's Lanny Davis Problem from On The Media | WNYC Studios

Did they err? Or did they lie?

Six weeks ago, CNN broke a blockbuster story: According to several anonymous sources, President Trump had advance knowledge of the infamous Trump Tower meeting. It was a potential smoking gun, until one of those sources — Lanny Davis, attorney for Michael Cohen — recanted.

Beyond that headache for CNN, there was another. The original article had claimed, "Contacted by CNN, one of Cohen's attorneys, Lanny Davis, declined to comment." Depending on how you understand the word "comment," and depending your general disposition, that claim could be technically true or woefully, mendaciously disingenuous. Bob spoke with Washington Post media reporter Paul Farhi about the implications — and dangers — of this latest media mishap.

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🎧 Fallout: Apocalypse now, then, and later | On the Media

Listened Fallout: Apocalypse now, then, and later from On The Media | WNYC Studios

End-of-times narratives themselves are nothing new; only the means have changed. While once a few horsemen and a river of blood were enough to signal the dusk of man, apocalypse now requires the imaginations of entire atomic laboratories — or roving squads of special effects crews. This week we look through a few recent highlights from the genre: from a 1980's made-for-TV spectacle, to a new piece of speculative fiction documenting a hypothetical nuclear conflict with North Korea.

1. Jeffrey Lewis [@ArmsControlWonk], author of "The 2020 Commission Report," on what we might say to ourselves after a devastating war with North Korea. Listen.

2. Marsha Gordon [@MarshaGGordon], film studies professor at North Carolina State University, on the 1983 film "The Day After," which imagines a massive nuclear strike in the Midwestern U.S. Listen.

3. Anne Washburn, playwright, on "Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play," in which she imagines American cultural life after a devastating nuclear event. Listen.

4. Andrew Fitzgerald [@magicandrew], chief digital content officer at Hearst TV, on what journalists, seven years ago, thought about the prospect of covering the end of the world. Listen.

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