Background Briefing: January 4, 2026
Trump's Monroe Doctrine: Threaten Greenland, Canada, Mexico, Colombia and Brazil But Support Argentina, Chile, El Salvador, Honduras and Ecuador Whose Authoritarian Leaders Like Him and Keep on Maduro's VP While Spurning the Nobel Prize-Winning Leader of Venezuela's...
Background Briefing: January 1, 2026
A Hopeful Welcome to 2026 On this first day of the new year 2026 we speak with Richard Parker, who teaches economics and public policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and is a Senior Fellow at the Shorenstein Center. He is a former managing editor of...
Background Briefing: December 31, 2025
An Interview on the Increasing Power of the Unrepresentative Supreme Court Today on this New Years Eve we are looking back at 2025 with guests we were in touch with over the year as major stories evolved chief among them the increasing power of the Supreme Court....
Background Briefing: December 28, 2025
An Interview From July on How We Are Already in a Constitutional Crisis Today we are continuing our retrospective of the major news stories of 2025 from the Background Briefing archives and go to an interview on July 20, 2025 when many were fretting over...
Background Briefing: December 25, 2025
A Former Catholic Priest on the Meaning of Christmas On this Christmas Day we speak with James Carroll, the author of many books about religion, politics, and history. His memoir of the Vietnam War, An American Requiem, won the National Book Award. His history...
Background Briefing: December 24, 2025
Celebrating a Homeless Couple Giving Birth in a Stable Under a Cruel and Hostile Government On this Christmas Eve we speak with the Reverend Dr. Liz Theoharis, Co-Chair with Reverend William Barber of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral...
Background Briefing: December 22, 2025
The Relationship Between Antisemitism and Criticism of Israel We begin with charges of antisemitism leveled by Israel's PM Netanyahu against Australia's PM who was booed at a memorial service yesterday, blaming him for the Bondi Beach massacre because Australia...
Background Briefing: December 21, 2025
Trump's Deteriorating Mental and Physical Health We begin with the dam breaking in response to Trump's disgusting remarks following the murder of Rob Reiner and his wife as tolerance for this sick, stupid, cruel and vulgar man's behavior even upset some in MAGA world...
Background Briefing: December 18, 2025
Trump's Mad, Fact-Free Diatribe to the Nation Telling Us How Bad Biden Was and How Great He Is We begin with the jailbreak in the House where four Republicans broke ranks to join with the Democrats in a discharge petition to save the Affordable Care Act going around...
Background Briefing: December 17, 2025
A Profile of the Dark Force Behind the Indiscriminate Roundup of Immigrants and the Revival of the Political Paranoia of the "Red Scare" We begin with the possibility that the White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles might be sidelined after her embarrassing...