This week, South Carolina’s senate debates whether the Confederate flag should be removed from public view at the state capitol. We're looking at the film that helped resuscitate the confederacy after the Civil War – D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation. Then, when NBC canceled Hannibal earlier this summer, fans hardly had time to complain before rumors began to circulate about the show being picked up by one of the online streaming services now keeping shows alive long after networks give up on them. Finally, a Supreme Court case that was overshadowed by an historic slate of decisions. A California farm challenged a Depression-era law that allows the government to forcibly appropriate food crops to control prices.
Listen to the full show.
"Birth of a Nation" in Today's America
Josh Zeitz wrote the article “How an Infamous Movie Revived the Confederacy” for Politico. He spoke with us about the influence The Birth of a Nation has had in America.
Take Me to Your Leader
Back when the summer blockbuster Cowboys and Aliens first came out, producer Eric Molinsky looked at the alien invasion narrative from a Native American perspective.
Listen to this story again at PRX.org.
Cancelling Cancelations
Phillip Maciak writes the “Dear Television” column for the Los Angeles Review of Books. He joined us to explain a new phenomenon in the fluid new landscape of on-demand television where network loyalty is scarce, and cancelation no longer means the end of a show.
SCOTUS Rules on Raisin Cartels
Ilya Somin is a professor at the George Mason University School of Law and a contributor to the Wshington Post’s blog: The Volokh Conspiracy, where we found his recent post “Property Owners Prevail in Raisin Takings Case.”
Justice on Horseback
Because recording devices are prohibited inside the Supreme Court, when it handed down its landmark decision on same sex marriage, interns, armed with sensible running shoes,raced each other in an attempt to deliver the news first. But in the early days of our nation’s history, verdicts were delivered in a much different way. Catherine Moore from the podcast “Backstory with the American History Guys” brings us the story.
Listen to this story again at PRX.org.
Sidenote: The winner of this year's Running of the Interns was Lauren Langille, who you can see in the final leg below.
