Chatter

Lawfare
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Chatter Podcast

Weekly long-form conversations with fascinating people at the creative edges of national security. Unscripted. Informal. Always fresh. Chatter guests roll with the punches to describe artistic endeavors related to national security and jump into cutting-edge thinking at the frontiers where defense and foreign policy overlap with technology, intelligence, climate change, history, sports, culture, and beyond. Each week, listeners get a no-holds-barred dialogue at an intersection between Lawfare's core issue areas and something from Hollywood to history, science to spy fiction. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  1. 4 HR AGO

    The Inside Story of the Challenger Disaster with Adam Higginbotham

    The explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger in January 1986 riveted millions of Americans, who watched the horrific event live on television. What they didn’t know then was that the tragedy was largely preventable, a disastrous result of hubris and “magical thinking” as much as flawed engineering.  Journalist Adam Higginbotham’s new book, “Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space,” is a definitive account of what went wrong, and how NASA failed to learn from its own mistakes. Higginbotham’s story begins with an earlier fatal accident, a fire in the capsule of the Apollo 1 mission, which presaged Challenger’s fate. He then recounts the early days of the space shuttle program. Astonishingly, the very mechanical flaws that led to Challenger’s destruction were known, but the warnings of a few engineers were ignored by more senior officials, who by the time Challenger was set to launch the first teacher into space faced tremendous political and public pressure to make the mission happen, despite obvious risks.  Higginbotham spoke with Shane Harris about his book, why he wanted to tell the Challenger story, and the future of human spaceflight.  Books, events, and people discussed on this episode include:  “Challenger”: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Challenger/Adam-Higginbotham/9781982176617  “Midnight in Chernobyl”:  https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Midnight-in-Chernobyl/Adam-Higginbotham/9781508278511  The Apollo 1 fire:  https://www.nasa.gov/mission/apollo-1/  Roger Boisjoly, rocket engineer:  https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/02/06/146490064/remembering-roger-boisjoly-he-tried-to-stop-shuttle-challenger-launch  The crew of Challenger STS-51L:  https://www.nasa.gov/challenger-sts-51l-accident/  The Columbia disaster:  https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2003/04/09/denial-of-shuttle-image-requests-questioned/80957e7c-92f1-48ae-8272-0dcfbcb57b9d/  Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Jay Venables of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 23m

  2. 17 SEPT

    UFO Culture, with Sarah Scoles

    Science journalist Sarah Scoles has written extensively about astronomy and the UFO community, including in her 2021 book They Are Already Here. She joined David Priess to discuss how scientists look at ETs, pop cultural takes on first contact with extraterrestrials, the incredible influence of Carl Sagan's Contact, the Allan Hills meteorite, the evolution over time of beliefs about aliens contacting humans, how the Roswell myth emerged, the International UFO Congress, the Mutual UFO Network, UFO investigators, seeing lights around Area 51, SETI salvationalism, extraterrestrial-visitation belief as a religious movement, and more. Works mentioned in this episode: The book Contact by Carl Sagan The movie Contact The book Making Contact by Sarah Scoles The book They Are Already Here by Sarah Scoles The book Countdown by Sarah Scoles The event "UAP: The Search for Clarity," at the Michael V. Hayden Center for Intelligence, Policy, and International Security, November 15, 2023 Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Jay Venables of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 11m

  3. 10 SEPT

    Ronald Reagan Reassessed, with Max Boot

    Council on Foreign Relations fellow, Washington Post columnist, and author of military history books Max Boot has just completed a definitive biography of Ronald Reagan, eleven years after starting his research and writing for it. He joined David Priess to talk all about Reagan, including his appeal as a biography subject, his World War II experience, his speech preparation, his turn from New Deal Democrat to right-wing Republican, his path to electoral politics, his management style, his optimism, his pragmatism, his influence on pop culture in the 1980s, his role in ending the Cold War peacefully, his movies, and more. Works mentioned in this episode: The book Reagan: His Life and Legend by Max Boot The movie Kings Row The movie Bedtime for Bonzo The movie Knute Rockne All American The book The Unwinding by George Packer The book Desert Star by Michael Connelly Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Jay Venables and Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 25m

  4. 3 SEPT

    How Movies and TV Affect Everything, with Walt Hickey

    Walt Hickey is the Deputy Editor for Data and Analysis at Insider News, and the author of You Are What You Watch: How Movies and TV Affect Everything. His book explores the power of entertainment to change our beliefs, how we see ourselves, and how nations gain power.He joined Eugenia Lostri, Lawfare's Fellow in Technology Policy and Law, to talk about how we use media to express our societal apprehensions, the ways in which the military, NASA and the CIA collaborate with Hollywood, and the soft power of media productions. Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Isabelle Kerby-McGowan and Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 31m

  5. 27 AUG

    What Putin Wants, with Peter Clement

    For more than 40 years, Peter Clement has studied Russian political culture and leaders--serving for most of that time as an analyst, manager, and executive at the CIA before his retirement in 2018. He has PhD in Russian history, teaches at Columbia University, and has thought long and hard about what makes Vladimir Putin tick. He joined David Priess to discuss his road to studying Russia as a career, the art of Kremlinology, Putin's rise, Putin's feelings about Ukraine across the decades, the images of himself Putin projects to the West and within Russia, why FDR would be great to have around right now, and more. Works mentioned in this episode: The book First Person by Vladimir Putin The essay "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians" by Vladimir Putin  The article "Putin's Risk Spiral," Foreign Affairs (October 26, 2022), by Peter Clement The book Present at the Creation by Dean Acheson Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 26m

  6. 20 AUG

    Gaming Out an Insurrection with Jesse Moss

    It’s January 6, 2025. Congress has convened to certify electoral votes in the presidential election. But members of the U.S. military are in revolt, throwing their support behind the losing candidate. The legitimate president huddles in the Situation Room with his top advisers and Cabinet. They have six hours to prevent violent protests from exploding into civil war.  That’s the dire scenario imagined in the new documentary “War Game.” Real-world experts--including former elected officials and retired military officers--play the roles of government decision-makers. Over the course of the game, they are surprised with new and increasingly perilous complications, from the spread of online propaganda to a renegade general who exhorts military service members to take up arms against their commander-in-chief. All the while, they grapple with whether the president should invoke the Insurrection Act, a fateful decision that risks undermining the government’s legitimacy at the very moment the president is trying to preserve it.  Shane Harris spoke with the film’s producer and co-director, Jesse Moss, about what inspired him to make this real-life thriller and what it tells us about the state of the union as we head into the home stretch of an election.  Articles, organizations, and television shows discussed in this episode include:  The Washington Post op-ed that inspired the war game: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/12/17/eaton-taguba-anderson-generals-military/  Vet Voice Foundation: https://vvfnd.org/campaigns/war-game-film/  Trailer for the film: https://wargamefilm.com/    “The Bureau”: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4063800/  More about Moss and his work: https://www.jessemoss.com/Jesse-Moss-1  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 4m

  7. 13 AUG

    Reconceptualizing National Security with Gina Bennett

    Gina Bennett had a remarkable intelligence career of more than three decades, focusing on counterterrorism even before the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 and continuing to apply that expertise long after 9/11. She has written a book about how national security and parenting lessons reinforce each other, taught students at Georgetown University, and mentored women entering national security careers. She joined David Priess to talk about her path into and through the intelligence community, the evolution of counterterrorism analysis since the late 1980s, motherhood and work pressures, the value of teaching, how security studies ignores lessons from more than 99 percent of human history, why a hunter-gatherer perspective illuminates security challenges better than traditional views, the limits of bumper sticker takeaways from 9/11 like "failure of imagination" and "didn't connect the dots," and more. Works mentioned in this episode: The book National Security Mom by Gina Bennett The TV miniseries Catch me a Killer  The article "Of Lice and Men: America Needs to Rethink Its National Security Paradigm," Georgetown Security Studies Review (February 2024), by Gina Bennett Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 34m

  8. 6 AUG

    The Art of Political Lawyering with Bob Bauer

    On this week’s show, Lawfare’s Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sits down with longtime Democratic lawyer Bob Bauer to discuss his mémoire of political lawyering, “The Unraveling Reflections on Politics Without Ethics and Democracy in Crisis.” Bauer, a longtime Lawfare contributing editor, discusses his career as a litigating street fighter on behalf of Democratic Party causes and some of the regrets he has about party lawyering in an era of rising polarization. Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 18m
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About

Weekly long-form conversations with fascinating people at the creative edges of national security. Unscripted. Informal. Always fresh. Chatter guests roll with the punches to describe artistic endeavors related to national security and jump into cutting-edge thinking at the frontiers where defense and foreign policy overlap with technology, intelligence, climate change, history, sports, culture, and beyond. Each week, listeners get a no-holds-barred dialogue at an intersection between Lawfare's core issue areas and something from Hollywood to history, science to spy fiction. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Information

  • Creator
    Lawfare
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2024
  • Episodes
    155
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Lawfare
  • Show Website
    Chatter

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