Tina Tchen, CEO and President of TIME'S UP, didn't set out to become a champion for women's rights. But in 1978 she fell into a job in Springfield, Illinois, which happened to be at the center of the fight for the Equal Rights Amendment. Her involvement in the movement helped set the foundation for a long career in law and public service. Tchen joined David to talk about progressive politics, her time as chief of staff to First Lady Michelle Obama, how the Covid-19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted women, and how to make the most of this pivotal moment as the country faces a reckoning on race, sexism and treatment of essential workers. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Just months after graduating from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a degree in engineering, California Senator Alex Padilla was drawn to politics, outraged by a state ballot initiative regarding undocumented immigrants. He soon became the youngest Los Angeles City Council president and is now the first Latino senator from California. Sen. Padilla joined David to talk about the 2022 midterms, election deniers and voter suppression, policing and public safety, his relationship with California Governor Gavin Newsom, the diversity of the Latino community, and his dedication to immigration reform. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Rep. Adam Kinzinger was one of just 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump following the January 6 insurrection. After deciding to not seek reelection in 2022, Rep. Kinzinger has spent his last months in office as a member of the January 6 Committee, investigating the events of that day. He joined David to talk about his work on the Committee, tribalism in politics and its negative effect on leaders, why he thinks the Mar-a-Lago search could spell trouble for Trump, and his predictions for the midterms. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
We revisit our April 2019 conversation with Bryan Cranston, actor, producer, director, and screenwriter. He joins David to talk about finding truth in acting, challenges posed by inhabiting larger-than-life figures, the parallels between acting and politics, and more. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
In this Essay I would like to share some reflections on the politics of same-sex marriage politics. In a very short period of time, this issue has moved to the center of the gay and lesbian rights movement as well as larger mainstream political and legal debates. Some have even argued that this issue affected, if not determined, the outcome of the 2004 presidential election. This, I believe, is rather an overstatement, but I must concede that the issue has gained traction in ways that most of us would not have predicted five years ago. The states of Vermont and Connecticut have enacted Civil Union laws for same-sex couples, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts now allows both same and different sex couples to marry, and, in the last year, trial courts have found unconstitutional the exclusion of same-sex couples from the institution of marriage in New York and California. Spain has now joined some of its fellow EU members in the Rhine Delta by allowing same-sex couples to marry, and the Constitutional Court of South Africa found that the South African Constitution requires that same-sex couples be permitted to marry on terms equal to those made available to different sex couples. At the same time, Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed the same-sex marriage law in California, courts in Arizona and Indiana rejected constitutional challenges to their marriage laws, an intermediate appellate court in New York reversed a trial court finding that same-sex couples should be permitted to marry, and referenda barring same-sex marriage swept the country in 2004 and 2005 and will, no doubt, continue to do so in 2006. Forty-two states have enacted "little DOMAs," limiting the institution of marriage to one man and one woman. This issue, like so many others in American politics at the present moment, is highly polarized – rarely garnering moderate positions. I would like to reflect on this dynamic political, moral, and legal moment – which, I fear, may have shifted again by the time you finish reading this Essay – by offering some thoughts about how and why this particular issue has emerged as the highest of priorities in the gay community, and what might be the costs of such a strategic choice. Just two years ago, in sweeping language, the U.S. Supreme Court found laws that criminalized same-sex sex unconstitutional in Lawrence v. Texas. This decision has been widely referred to in the lesbian and gay legal community as "our Brown," referring to the landmark 1954 desegregation decision Brown v. Board of Education. By this, of course, it is meant that Lawrence would usher in a civil rights revolution for gay men and lesbians in a fashion equivalent to the civil rights movement inaugurated by Brown.
After graduating from college, Andrew Young had a moment of extreme clarity while standing at the top of a mountain. He suddenly realized that "everything has a purpose," and he proceeded to channel that purpose in his work as a civil rights leader and confidant to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., as a politician, and while representing the United States on the world stage as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. He joined David to reflect on his life and career, the legacy of Dr. King, the current debate over voting rights, and the state of politics in America. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Rep. Ayanna Pressley got her start in progressive politics at a young age, watching as her mother fought for tenants' rights as an organizer in Chicago. When Rep. Pressley left college to care for her ailing mother, it didn't stop her political trajectory. After serving as the first woman of color on the Boston City Council, she beat out a long-time incumbent in 2018 for a seat in US House of Representatives. Rep. Pressley joined David to talk about the destruction caused by Covid-19, prioritizing marginalized groups in legislation, criminal justice reform, and the implications of the Georgia Senate runoffs. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Jonathan Karl was a young reporter for the New York Post when he first interviewed Donald Trump in 1994, following a tip that the newly married Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley were staying at Trump Tower. Trump gave Jonathan a tour of the tower and answered his questions, insisting Jonathan identify him only as "a source in the Trump Organization." As the current Chief White House Correspondent for ABC News, Jonathan says his relationship with Trump has changed, but Trump's penchant for press coverage has not. Jonathan joined David to talk about his decades covering politics, how his childhood years in South Dakota got him interested in journalism and the danger of Trump's willingness to undermine the media. Jonathan's new book, Front Row at the Trump Show, chronicles his experiences covering the Trump White House. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
For the 400th episode of The Axe Files, David is joined by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi has never been a stranger to politics—her father served in Congress and later became the mayor of Baltimore, a position her brother also held—and she has weathered countless political storms since being elected to Congress in 1987. Her most recent battle is perhaps the most unexpected: securing funding for the US Postal Service. Pelosi also spoke with David about her expectations for Democratic gains in the House this fall, her questions regarding President Trump's relationship with Vladimir Putin and her concerns for an imperiled Republican Party. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Rep. Karen Bass is a fifth-term Democratic Congresswoman from California and the Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus. Watching the Civil Rights movement as a child first sparked Rep. Bass' interest in politics. She got her start as an organizer and activist, eventually leaving her job as a physician assistant to start her own nonprofit addressing the HIV/AIDS and crack cocaine epidemics ravaging her community. Rep. Bass joined David to talk about what she views as racist tactics used by the Trump campaign, regretful comments she's made in her past, the "surreal" process of being vetted for vice president, and why her parents would be terrified. To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
This article serves as an introduction to the special section on Sensorial Politics, which includes articles by Nicholas Caverly, Elsa Davidson, Susan Falls and Ali Kenner. The introduction outlines the arguments of the articles before proceeding to a discussion of the common themes they illuminate as a whole. In particular, they address four key issues: the relationship between the sensorial and the political; the role of sensorial disruption and its political effects; the issue of labor; and the issue of knowledge. We conclude that while these pieces advance our understanding of the relationships between the sensorium and politics, they also open up avenues for ongoing research and theorization, particularly in our contemporary situation, in which the Covid-19 pandemic has recast sensorial politics in new ways.
This week, we're revisiting a 2015 interview with Rep. Nancy Pelosi. Then serving as House Democratic Leader, Nancy Pelosi spoke with David about her childhood in Baltimore, her tenure as Speaker of the House and all of its challenges, the key to building consensus, and politics and power.To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy
This edited volume explores the discursive, performative and mediated dimensions of contemporary political discourse. The strengths of the volume are manifold: it contains cutting edge interdisciplinary research on political discourses by international authors (UK, USA, Italy, Germany, Austria, Denmark) in political science, discourse linguistic and social interaction research. The contributions represent a wide range of methodological approaches to political discourse, analyzing a broad variety of genres, some of which have been less analyzed to-date, for example Wikipedia articles in combination with their discussion pages or the interaction between politicians and voters in the constituency office of a British Member of Parliament. The contributions also focus on political discourses of high and relevant topicality, such as EU membership of Britain, populism, migration and xenophobia, terrorism and narratives in international relations.
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