Today on AirTalk, we discuss the Supreme Court hearing on DACA and what we may expect moving forward. Also on the show, we take a look at the official launch of Disney Plus; talk with listeners about commonly misheard lyrics; and more.
What To Know Ahead Of The First Round Of Impeachment Hearings
Public hearings into President Donald Trump's actions with Ukraine promise to generate all the attention in Washington and stoke the partisan flames inside the Capitol ever hotter.
The hearings kick off tomorrow, with more scheduled for Friday. The first round of people to be questioned include career public servants who have already testified behind closed doors, according to NPR News. White House acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said Tuesday that he no longer plans to sue over the House impeachment proceedings and will instead follow Trump's directions and decline to cooperate. It's the latest reversal in position by Mulvaney, who last week asked to join the lawsuit of another Trump adviser before changing his mind Monday and saying that he intended to bring his own case. Mulvaney had been subpoenaed to appear last week for a closed-door deposition before the House impeachment panel but did not show up. Congressional Republicans continue to denounce the impeachment inquiry into Trump.
Today on AirTalk, we get the latest on impeachment from reporters who have been covering it and discuss what to expect as the impeachment inquiry moves into the public phase.
With files from the Associated Press
Guests:
Phil Ewing, NPR national security editor who’s been following the story; he tweets
Anna Edgerton, politics editor for Bloomberg; she tweets
Disney, Apple, NBC: What Does Streaming Saturation Mean For The Future Of TV?
Disney has entered the streaming arena Tuesday, as its Disney Plus service debuts with an arsenal of marquee franchises including Marvel and Star Wars, original series with a built-in fan base.
The $7-a-month commercial-free service is poised to set the standard for other services like WarnerMedia’s HBO Max and NBCUniversal’s Peacock to follow, as major media companies behind hit TV shows and movies seek to siphon the subscription revenue now going to Netflix and other streaming giants.
It’s been two weeks since Apple launched its streaming service, Apple TV Plus, which has been received with mixed reviews.
We check in on the increasingly crowded streaming landscape and what it means for the future of television.
With files from the Associated Press.
Guests:
Joan E. Solsman, senior reporter for CNET covering digital media; she tweets
senior editor and chief TV critic at Deadline Hollywood; he tweets
Crimes Involving Homeless Suspects Are Expected To Rise Again This Year
According to reports, crimes involving homeless individuals jumped by more than 50 percent in 2018 compared to the year prior. An NBC4 investigative series finds the numbers are on track to be even higher this year.
The biggest increase in crimes that involved a homeless suspect include rape, robbery and aggravated assault. The Los Angeles Police Department also shared numbers on crimes where homeless individuals were victimized, which have also increased. As part of NBC4’s investigation into the spike in crimes, investigative reporter Joel Grover talks with victims of crimes and an array of mental health and addiction experts to explore how the lack of resources and the role of the criminal justice system play into this. Grover sits down with Larry to discuss what he’s learned and Andy Bales, CEO of Downtown’s Union Rescue Mission homeless shelter joins the conversation as well.
Guests:
Joel Grover, investigative reporter working on NBC4’s Streets of Shame project; he tweets
Rev. Andy Bales, CEO of Union Rescue Mission; he tweets
Recapping The Highlights From This Morning’s Supreme Court Hearing On The Future Of DACA
The Supreme Court is taking up the Trump administration's plan to end legal protections that shield 660,000 immigrants from deportation, a case with strong political overtones amid the 2020 presidential election campaign.
The program before the court is Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama-era program that aimed to bring out of the shadows people who have been in the United States since they were children and are in the country illegally. In some cases, they have no memory of any home other than the U.S. There are two questions before the Supreme Court: whether federal judges can even review the decision to end the program and, if they can, whether the way the administration has gone about winding down DACA is legal. In that sense, the case resembles the dispute over the census citizenship question, which focused on the process the administration used in trying to add the question to the 2020 census. In the end, Roberts wrote that the reason the administration gave for wanting the question "seems to have been contrived."
The Department of Homeland Security is continuing to process two-year DACA renewals so that in June 2020, hundreds of thousands of DACA recipients will have protections stretching beyond the election and even into 2022. If the high court rules for the administration, it is unclear how quickly the program would end or Congress might act.
Guest:
Amy Howe, co-founder of SCOTUSBlog and author of the blog Howe on the Court; she tweets
Purple Project for Democracy: Debating Birthright Citizenship As Defined In The 14th Amendment
The U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment begins with what’s known as the “Citizenship Clause:” “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
It goes on to lay out protections for citizens against any law a state might make that would abridge those privileges and provides protection against deprivation of life, liberty or property without due process. But, as is often the case when it comes to matters of constitutional law, what the words of that amendment actually mean and imply can depend on who you ask.
Specifically, in the case of the 14th Amendment, legal scholars have long debated whether or not that first sentence mandates universal birthright citizenship. The debate resurfaced in the mainstream media in late 2018, when President Trump said during an interview that he was preparing an executive order to end birthright citizenship, and that it’s within the president’s power to change the 14th Amendment. The Citizenship Clause is also often referenced in the discussion about whether the children born to those who entered the U.S. illegally qualify for birthright citizenship. Landmark cases like U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark (1898) and Elk v. Wilkins (1884) have added some clarity, but legal scholars from differing ideologies still debate who is and is not protected by the Citizenship Clause, how the framers meant for us to understand it, and how it’s understood in a modern context.
Today on AirTalk, as part of our contribution to “Purple Project for Democracy,” we’ll debate the 14th Amendment with two legal scholars who have very different opinions about what the 14th Amendment says, whether it mandates universal birthright citizenship, and how this discussion fits into another controversial topic -- whether or not the children of undocumented aliens have a right to U.S. citizenship.
Guests:
Pratheepan Gulasekaram, professor of constitutional and immigration law at Santa Clara University; he tweets
Amy Swearer, senior legal policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation’s Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies; she tweets
Mondegreens Abound! The Best And Most Often Misquoted Song Lyrics
It’s happened to many of us -- that sinking feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you’ve been singing a song a certain way for years and someone informs you that you’ve been butchering the lyrics the whole time.
As it happens, there’s actually a word for this phenomenon -- it’s called a mondegreen. The term was coined in 1954 by American author Sylvia Wright in an essay for Harper’s in which she recalled a lyric from a Scottish ballad, “laid him on the green,” that she heard as “Lady Mondegreen” as a child. Today, Merriam-Webster defines it as “a word or phrase that results from a mishearing of something said or sung.”
Is there a song that you misheard or misquoted for years only to be told that you were misquoting it? What song was it, what was the lyric you thought you heard, and what was the actual lyric?