A roundtable of political junkies look at the top stories in national politics, the monk's calligraphy that inspired apple fonts, websites vs. ad blockers.
Politics and comedy: The week’s top political headlines, served with a side of humor
Another week brings yet another round of political fodder.
As the race for the White House heats up, so too has the rhetoric around remaining candidates. Here’s what Take Two explores today:
Naughty words on the campaign trail
Senator Lindsay Graham doesn’t like the direction of the presidential election. No, not one bit. When speaking about the state of the Republican party late February, the former presidential candidate didn’t mince words.
Not long before this uncommon utterance, Republican frontrunner Donald Trump may or may not have used a sexual slang at a rally. Okay, he did.
These two moments of raw candor led the Associated Press to issue a statement explaining why they chose not to edit the vulgarity.
Understanding the Trump supporter
Few can deny that Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump has struck a chord with American voters. Trump has garnered ardent supporters from several groups. So why are so many so quick to write them off as racists?
Another round of primaries
Mississippi, Michigan, Idaho and Hawaii head to the polls today, but it won’t be a make-or-break day for candidates. A deeper look at what's at stake.
Guests:
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Jenny Yang, comedian
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Lou Perez, comedian and writer for the “We Are the Internet TV” channel on YouTube
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Jim Newell, reporter for Slate
Listen to the roundtable live this morning at 9:15.
A podcast will be available after 10:00.
Newly naturalized Mexicans could spell trouble for the future GOP nominee
The contest for the White House has set in motion a different kind of race — a race to get naturalized before November.
About 8.8 million residents of this country are eligible to become naturalized citizens. About 2.7 million of them are Mexican.
Mexicans could have some significant pull in American politics were it not for one thing: only about 36 percent of those eligible to become citizens have applied — Compare that to 68 percent for other groups. But that could be changing.
Several policies on the table could affect Mexican families directly. And that has energized many Mexicans to get involved.
Take Two talked about it with Louis DeSipio, professor of political science and Latino studies at UC Irvine.
Press the blue play button above to hear the interview.
Documentary highlights pressures boys face to 'be a man'
"Be a man."
Three small words with huge implications.
The documentary "The Mask You Live In," from the non-profit organization The Representation Project, examines our modern idea of masculinity and the impact that concept has on boys and young men.
Two experts featured in the film joined Take Two to discuss:
- Judy Y. Chu, an Affiliated Faculty member of the Program in Human Biology at Stanford University and author of "When Boys Become Boys"
- Ashanti Branch, Founder and Executive Director of The Ever Forward Club
"The Mask You Live In" is now available on DVD and streaming.
How do much do men care about their body image?
OK guys...admit it.
You care about how you look.
It's cool, no judgements. But WHY do you care and what bugs you the most about HOW you look?
A Chapman University psychologist has just published a study examining how men feel about their bodies and their attractiveness.
The survey reported that between 20 and 40 percent of men surveyed expressed dissatisfaction with their bodies.
That raises some interesting questions; and the discrepancy between gay men and straight men's body image raises even more.
Take Two's A Martinez spoke to Dr. David Frederick, a leader in the study at Chapman University to find out what these numbers mean.
On why there are so few studies on men's body image compared to women
I think for a long time we've known that women are dissatisfied with their bodies... Some of the dissatisfactionon for men can be a little more hidden. You'll see it more in men will obsessively work out, they'll obsessively exercise, or they won't express their dissatisfaction because it's not considered as masculine to admit you have that concern.
On how body satisfaction differentiated between hetero and homosexual men
Over all, the gay men were only a little more likely to be dissatisfied with their bodies. Where the gay men and heterosexual men differed were in all of the other things we measured. We asked about how much they try to modify their body, how much social pressure they feel about their appearance and we asked how feelings of their body affected their sex life. That's where the [differences were].
On what he and his team hoped people took away from his study
Even though men on average are less satisfied than women, there is a huge group of men who are dissatisfied with their bodies who are feeling pressure from the media to have a very toned body. Which can in some ways be a very positive thing to aspire to, but in other ways can lead to very harmful practices such as abuse of supplements and abuse of steroids among other things... One thing we really want to bring attention to is just how many men are feeling dissatisfaction because that's a very overlooked problem.
To hear the full conversation, click the blue play button above
Inside Tim Cook, the man behind Apple's fight against the FBI
The Justice Department asked a Brooklyn federal court yesterday to reverse its decision, stating that Apple isn't required to help the FBI with the encrypted iPhone of the San Bernardino shooters.
Many have called it a battle between the need for security and the need for privacy.
But to really understand the case, you may just need to travel to Robertsdale, Alabama.
That's just what Washington Post reporter Todd Frankel did to look at the roots of current Apple CEO Tim Cook.
Meet the Trappist monk who inspired Apple's iconic design
Chances are that if you've opened a Mac computer or typed a few lines on a keyboard, you've probably used a font inspired by a former Trappist monk named Father Robert Palladino.
Palladino was a master of calligraphy, a long-time teacher at Reed College in Oregon and a mentor to many – including a young drop-out many years ago named Steve Jobs.
Jobs was a student at Reed in the early 1970s. He dropped out of school after six months, but continued to take courses, including a calligraphy class taught by Palladino.
"To an open mind like Steve Jobs, inspiration comes from unexpected places," said Gregory MacNaughton, Education Outreach and Calligraphy Initiative Coordinator at Reed College's Douglas Cooley Memorial Art Gallery. "Handwriting and calligraphy had a huge impact on the designs of Steve Jobs."
In recent years, MacNaughton worked closely with Palladino to revive calligraphy at Reed. He said Palladino was teaching up until January this year. He died last month and will be honored at a funeral mass in Portland Friday.
Reed's calligraphy program formerly ended in 1984, but at one point was considered the most well-known in the nation. Former notable students include the beat poets Gary Snyder and Philip Whalen and Adobe designer, Sumner Stone.
Steve Jobs himself credited his time studying calligraphy with shaping his design aesthetics in a 2005 commencement speech at Stanford:
"Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and sans serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But 10 years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backward 10 years later."
The war brewing against web advertisement blockers
Pop-up advertisements, videos that play automatically, ads that seem to follow you on the web page...let's be honest: online ads can be REALLY annoying.
Ad blockers have become a popular way to get around them, but of course, ads are how many websites make money.
So, now there's a war between the people that are using ad blockers and the sites that are losing money.
Kate Murphy wrote about this topic for the New York Times. She joined the show to discuss.
New music from Lukas Nelson, Wynton Marsalis and La Yegros
If you love new music, but you don't have the time to keep up with what's hip and new, we've got the perfect segment for you: Tuesday Reviewsday. Every week our music experts bring in their top picks, which we promise, will keep you and your musical tastes relevant. This week music journalist Steve Hochman joins host A Martinez in the studio to talk about his selections.
Artist: Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real
Album: "Something Real"
Songs: "Surprise," "Something Real"
While his dad was readying his new album of Gershwin songs, Lukas Nelson and his band were out on the road with another American musical titan — and Willie’s FarmAid co-founder — Neil Young. As you’d think, while the elder Nelson’s legacy is present (Lukas’ voice carries some of the same earthy/ethereal blend), the music here runs much closer to that of the Canadian rocker.
But younger Nelson and crew (which includes his brother Michael) bring in their own influences and perspectives for what in places is almost Southern prog-grunge — opening song "Surprise" is kind of a combo plate of Lynyrd Skynyrd, Pearl Jam and Rush. That’s more of a compliment than you might think. In other places there are touches of Jimi Hendrix in stinging guitar lines, and perhaps some Black Sabbath and Cream in the charging riffs.
The title song takes more of a classic Texas boogie-rock, a little ZZ Top chug. But with third song "Set Me Down On a Cloud" there’s a country ballad root — you could easily hear it in the voice of either Willie or Neil. But in the voice of Lukas, the ache of such lines as "Set me down on a cloud with my soul turned inside out" is plenty, uh, real.
Young does, in fact, guest on one song, the closing "San Francisco" — yes, the 1967 Scott McKenzie "be sure to wear some flowers in your hair" hippie ode, here given rocked-up treatment. While that might seem incongruous, the album was recorded in San Francisco, in the William Westerfield Mansion, once home to Janis Joplin, not to mention some exiled Russian royalists in an earlier generation. Music royalty, Russian royalty, perfect for an album that rocks, uh, royally.
Artist: La Yegros
Album: "Magnetismo"
Songs: "Magnetismo," "Chicha Roja"
Mariana Yegros takes her title as "The Queen of Nu Cumbia" seriously, and really ups the ante with the combination of pulsing electric beats and Argentine folk roots on her second album, "Magnetismo." As the title implies, this is a powerful attraction of seeming opposites, brought together in a tight bond. Also an exciting one, accordion lines bounding along studily insistent bass.
Yegros lives in both Paris and Buenos Aires, with family origins in the rain forests of northeast Argentina. All of that comes into play, wound together by producer Gaby Kerpel (aka Argentine innovator King Coya). The balance always seems perfect, whether leaning more to the Euro-clubby side (the thumping title song) or to the folky side (the burbly "Chicha Roja"), never gimmicky or cheesy.
Guest spots from Argentine titan Gustavo Santaolalla (best known, perhaps, as composer of the "Brokeback Mountain" score and, recently, the "Jane the Virgin" theme music), Brazilian Girls’ Sabina Sciubba and the African band Lindingo enhance the lively sounds. All in all it’s a compelling — and fun — invitation to the thriving electo-cumbia scene, from an artist putting her own stamp on it while transcending any scene or genre. Regal.
Artist: Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis
Album: "The Abyssinian Mass"
Songs: "Processional: We Are On Our Way," "Recessional: The Glory Train"
Never mind what it says on the calendar, or the name of this reviews segment. Today is Sunday. And we’re going to church. Well, via Lincoln Center, home of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, directed by Wynton Marsalis. In 2008, Marsalis was commissioned to write a jazz service celebrating the bicentennial of Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church. Marsalis is nothing if not ambitious, and the result was a full two-hour program involving a big band, 70-member choir, guest vocal soloist Damien Sneed and a sermonizing preacher, all presenting gospel optimism, scripture (both Old and New Testaments represented), social commentary and historical/cultural sweep. Oh, and it swings.
Well, it had better. If anything could get the sometimes-stiff Marsalis to loosen up, it would be Baptist gospel. To be fair, Marsalis has long ago shed much of the formality that shackled some of his early works, without losing his respect for history and scholarly acumen for the forms. And in the course of this massive… mass, he brings in generations of lively jazz, blues and various church styles, all crafted to give the musicians and singers a platform from which to launch into bursts of unbridled spirit.
Meanwhile, the spiritual matters endemic to the work is spiked with contemporary concerns, pleas not just to look toward heaven but to move into the world with love, understanding and a will to work for change, to make heaven on Earth, if you will. A sermon by the Reverend Dr.Calvin O. Butts III , in three parts interwoven with joyous musical interludes and punctuations, is an inspiring highlight, and perhaps an antidote to the vitriol running through so much of our political discourse this election year.
As such, Marsalis’ mass slots well alongside such modern works as Leonard Bernstein’s rock-jazz-classical "Mass," Mary Lou Williams’ jazz mass and the Sophocles re-setting "The Gospel at Colonus" (which featured the Blind Boys of Alabama, not to mention the Abyssinian Baptist Church’s choir, in its original 1980s staging) for innovative and powerful renewals of the form. This 2-CD audio plus DVD documentary captures the fervor and fire of the monumental 2013 tour of the work, the bristling energy evident in every note — as roof-raising at home as it must have been in the church.