White House Drama, Google Bias, Serena Williams

History of Politics in Supreme Court Nominations Guests: Chris Karpowitz, PhD, Professor of Political Science, Brigham Young University; Grant Madsen, PhD, Professor of History, Brigham Young University The White House and the Supreme Court are Top of Mind today. If confirmed by the Senate, Brett Kavanaugh will be the second Supreme Court justice appointed by President Trump. The resulting conservative majority on the high court will be a signature achievement in President Trump’s legacy. But rather than taking a victory lap, the White House is embroiled in drama over an anonymous op-ed published Wednesday in the New York Times by a senior administration official calling President Trump “amoral” and claiming to be part of a resistance within the White House working to protect the country from Trump’s “misguided impulses.” President Trump says the anonymous editorial is “gutless.” Are Search Engines and Social Media Free Speech? Guest: Eric Goldman, JD, Professor of Law, Co-director of the High Tech Law Institute, Santa Clara University Top social media executives testified in Congress on Wednesday about their efforts to make sure Russia doesn’t use their websites to meddle in the upcoming elections. But, after that hearing, US Attorney General Jeff Sessions had a different concern: that Twitter, Facebook and Google are keeping conservatives off their platforms. Sessions plans to meet with state attorneys general this month to discuss how social media companies may be “intentionally stifling the free exchange of ideas." In the last week, President Trump made the same claim on Twitter when he complained about Google searches for “Trump News” resulting in mostly “bad stories.” Google denies it “ranks search results to manipulate political sentiment.” Still, Trump has promised a fix. Is there anything the government could do on this, or is a Google search protected by the First Amendment? The Incredible Serena Williams Guest: Mikaela Dufur, PhD, Professor of Sociology, Brigham Young University Serena Williams’ more than two decades of tennis dominance has made her an icon. She’s redefined tennis as an athlete, a woman of color and, now, a mother. Just one year ago, she had her first child in an emergency C-section that was followed by a week-long medical crisis involving blood clots in her lungs and hemorrhaging in her abdomen. But as we speak on Thursday afternoon, Serena Williams is back on top of her game, playing in the semifinals at the U.S. Open. 3,000 Year-Old Uffington White Horse (Originally aired: 8/21/17) Guest: Andrew Foley, Ranger, National Trust in England Three thousand years ago, the image of a giant white horse was cut into the rolling hillside of Uffington, which is about 20 miles southwest of Oxford, England. It’s a sleek and minimalist stallion, as long as a football field, leaping across the landscape, bright white against the green turf. It’s made of chalk, and you have to wonder how it has survived the forces of erosion over three millennia. Holocaust Refugees on Cuba’s Shores (Originally aired: 8/22/18) Guest: Armando Lucas Correa, Author, “The German Girl”; Eva Weiner, Survivor, SS St. Louis In May 1939, an oceanliner named the SS St Louis arrived in the port of Havana. Most of the ship’s 900 passengers were Jews fleeing Hitler. They had authorized travel documents, but Cuban officials only allowed a few dozen to come ashore. The rest were sent back to Europe. The novel “The German Girl” is a fictional account of a Jewish refugee aboard the ship who is allowed to stay with her mother in Cuba as a permanent exile. Girls Will Be (Originally aired: 8/18/17) Guest: Sharon Choksi, Co-founder, Girls Will Be If you’re at an elementary school this week and come across a line of second-graders walking to lunch, you can expect to see boys dressed in loose basketball shorts or baggy cargo shorts down to their knees, t-shirts in bold colors with graphics pronouncing themselves “Hero” or “#Awesome.” The girls will have tighter fitting shorts landing well above the knee and t-shirts with ruffles and sparkles. When her daughter Maya was about this age, Sharon Choksi found that she couldn’t find any clothes Maya liked because the girls’ clothes were too tight, skimpy or frilly, and the boys’ clothes were too baggy and bulky. So the former McKinsey consultant started her own company to make the clothes her daughter wanted.