From Boomers to Millennials: A Modern US History Podcast

By the time he attended New Jersey's Rutgers University, it was clear that Paul Robeson was an academic, athletic, and artistic prodigy. He also had the misfortune of having been born of African ancestry in the USA during 1898, at the low point of American race relations. After his aspiring legal career was scuttled by racism, Robeson participated in the Harlem Renaissance of Black culture, and he went into show business. He made his fame singing "Old Man River" in the musical "Show Boat," and went on to become a star of stage and screen. He also became a left-wing political activist, promoting labor militancy and wealth redistribution in pursuit of global human equality. This got him into trouble by the time of the Red Scare. Although he was not a card-carrying Communist, unlike many other leftists of the era, Paul Robeson never stopped defending the Soviet Union. He did not accept reports that the USSR had fallen far short of its stated egalitarian ideals and had engaged in bloody repression of political dissidents. His views on this topic were criticized by both liberals and conservatives, and his once-thriving career suffered greatly as a result. By the end of a life spent dealing with both racial and political persecution, Robeson suffered poor mental & physical health, but his iconic acting and singing performances have left an indelible mark on American culture.
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The fifth episode in our series on the rise of the Kennedy family as a political dynasty begins by contrasting the anti-expert populist image of current HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. with the ethos of the mid-20th Century Kennedys, who were striving to be accepted by the Establishment. We then do a deep dive into the presidency of John F. Kennedy, discussing behind-the-scenes dramas, including: the president's marginalization of VP Lyndon B. Johnson; his attempts to manipulate and pressure the news media; his efforts to present an image of tough-minded pragmatism rather than sentimental idealism; his management of his hidden health problems; his reckless womanizing, including a likely affair with troubled actress Marilyn Monroe; and his schemes to ensure his brother Ted was elected to the US Senate during 1962. We conclude with a discussion of the fact that, although JFK & his administration had many positive accomplishments & legacies, the idealized "Camelot" image that some Baby Boomers maintain about his presidency is unrealistic, as Pres. Kennedy shared many of the flaws & hypocrisies common to other prominent politicians of this era.
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This end-of-year episode examines key US news events from the year 2025 and tries to put them into historical context. Issues discussed include: tariffs & their economic impact, mass deportations by ICE, the DOGE budget cuts, the "MAHA" movement, the Trump Administration's foreign policy, the aggressive use of executive power (including the pardoning of the J6ers), the Fall 2025 government shutdown, political violence (including the killing of Charlie Kirk), the partisan gerrymandering wars, and the Epstein files. We conclude by noting that the year 2025 has been largely a negative one for American society, but there are still a few reasons to keep hope alive.
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Michael Harrington was a writer and scholar primarily concerned with the problem of poverty within the otherwise affluent postwar 20th Century USA. He grew up in a Midwestern Irish-American family, and he attended parochial schools, where he excelled academically. Harrington moved to New York & became involved in the Catholic Worker movement, before he lost his faith and turned to more secular political organizations. He considered himself a socialist, but he downplayed those beliefs when he wrote a bestselling book aimed at liberal reformers entitled "The Other America: Poverty in the United States." That 1962 work became a bestseller that helped to inspire Pres. Lyndon Johnson's Great Society programs. Harrington continued to speak out against economic inequality throughout his life. He founded Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) during the 1980s and remained its leader until his 1989 death from esophageal cancer at age 61. During the 21st Century, DSA experienced a boom in membership, but it also began taking controversial positions that some original members questioned. We conclude the episode by noting that Harrington's work exposing the neglected issue of American poverty remains relevant today, as the USA's unusual gap between relatively high average incomes & relatively low life expectancy continues to grow.
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This brief biography looks at the life of marine biologist and author Rachel Carson, who wrote the book "Silent Spring," widely credited with launching the modern environmental movement. After earning a graduate degree in zoology from Johns Hopkins University, Carson struggled to find employment as an independent woman during the Great Depression of the 1930s, but she eventually secured a role working as a scientist for a federal agency. In 1951, she was able to leave that job upon publication of her first bestseller, "The Sea Around Us." Her follow-up to that book would be even more successful, but also would be more politically divisive. Released to widespread acclaim in 1962, "Silent Spring" exposed the negative ecological toll of pesticides upon animals other than insects, including birds, fish, and humans. Chemical industry groups tried to label Carson as a "hysterical woman" out to damage the American system of "free enterprise" capitalism, but many scientists & politicians were persuaded by her arguments. Although Carson died of cancer in 1964 and therefore did not live to see the full flowering of the environmental movement during the Sixties and Seventies, her concerns about maintaining clean air & water helped bring forth numerous nonprofit organizations & regulatory agencies designed to address such problems. In recent years attempts to move the USA toward green energy have received setbacks, but a new generation of activists continues to be inspired by Carson's legacy to push for a move sustainable world.
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