Throughline
The past is never past. Every headline has a history. Join us every week as we go back in time to understand the present. These are stories you can feel and sounds you can see from the moments that shaped our world.
We the People: Succession of Power
The 25th amendment. A few years before JFK was shot, an idealistic young lawyer set out on a mission...
EscucharWe the People: Cruel and Unusual Punishment
The Eighth Amendment. What is cruel and unusual punishment? Who gets to define and decide its boundaries?...
EscucharWe the People: The Right to Remain Silent
The Fifth Amendment. You have the right to remain silent when you're being questioned in police custody,...
EscucharEmbedded: The Network
In the mid-1980s, an OBGYN in Brazil noticed that far fewer pregnant women at his hospital were dying...
EscucharWe The People: Canary in the Coal Mine
The Third Amendment.Maybe you've heard it as part of a punchline. It's the one about quartering troops...
EscucharCongress has voted to eliminate government funding for public media
Act now to ensure public media remains free and accessible to all. Your donation will help this essential...
EscucharEdward Said and the Question of Palestine
Edward Said brought the question of Palestine into the American mainstream. He taught at Columbia University...
EscucharWhat Makes Us Free?
What's the role of government in society? What do we mean when we talk about individual responsibility?...
EscucharDoes America Need a Hero?
Captain America: an all-American superhero. Clad in red, white, and blue, he carries only a shield....
EscucharIran and the U.S., Part Three: Soleimani's Iran
The Iran-Iraq war, 9/11, and the story of Iranian Revolutionary Guard general Qassem Soleimani, from...
EscucharIran and the U.S., Part Two: Rules of Engagement
Military confrontations, early-morning attacks, and digital warfare: the story of Iran and the U.S....
EscucharWhat the Supreme Court Does in the Shadows
The Supreme Court is issuing its final decisions of the term this month. But it's been extraordinarily...
EscucharIran and the U.S., Part One
The U.S. and Iran have had a tense relationship for decades — but when did that begin? This week,...
EscucharAbortion Before Roe
Abortion wasn't always controversial. In fact, in colonial America it would have been considered a fairly...
EscucharThe First Department of Education
Whose job is it to educate Americans? Congress created the first Department of Education just after...
EscucharThe Woman Behind The New Deal
From Social Security and the minimum wage to exit signs and fire escapes, Frances Perkins transformed...
EscucharWe the People: Search and Seizure
The Fourth Amendment is the part of the Bill of Rights that prohibits "unreasonable searches and seizures."...
EscucharWar Crimes
On today's episode, we travel from the battlefields of the U.S. Civil War, through the rubble of two...
EscucharThe Tax Collector
Gangsters, banksters, and politicians. Today on the show, how the hunt for Al Capone helped turn the...
EscucharCalifornia's 'Bum Blockade'
The story of the Los Angeles police chief who, faced with one of the largest internal migrations in...
EscucharMotherhood
Baby bonuses, childless cat ladies: the rhetoric around motherhood is politically charged right now....
EscucharThe Deadly Story of the U.S. Civil Service
When James Garfield won the Presidency in 1880, Charles Guiteau got ready to accept his new government...
EscucharThe Alien Enemies Act
In March 2025, President Trump issued an executive order invoking a centuries-old law: the Alien Enemies...
EscucharWhen Things Fall Apart
Climate disaster, political unrest, random violence: Western society can often feel like what the filmmaker...
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