A look at the history of socialism in the US, how late night appearances can help presidential candidates, Disney's 'Fantasia' turns 75.
Should socialism be a dirty word in America?
Socialism means many different things to many different people, and it means a lot to Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.
Friday morning, the senator from Vermont appeared on NPR's Morning Edition, where he defined socialism as an effort to create a society where all people can live with dignity.
Is socialism that simple, and why are so many Americans turned off by that term?
, a professor of politics and public policy at Occidental College, joins the show to explain more.
The road to the White House may be paved with laughter
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump will host NBC's "Saturday Night Live" this weekend.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehIiDTDzENY
His appearance is not without controversy. Several Latino groups have asked "SNL" to cancel his appearance, with some calling his campaign racist.
Meanwhile, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton showed up on Jimmy Kimmel Thursday night, talking about life with her husband Bill if she won.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OLchWH8jjI
Why do serious political candidates keep showing up on late-night TV? Because those appearances can help turn the tide of a White House bid, at least according to Matthew Baum.
Baum is the Marvin Kalb Professor of Global Communications at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government and has written extensively on the subject. He and Take Two's A. Martinez looked back on some of the most memorable late night appearances by presidential candidates.
"Sock it to me?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qRZvlZZ0DY
Four words have rarely had such a marked impact on the trajectory of a White House run, says Matthew Baum.
"His advisors believed that this was an opportunity to make him appear more likeable, just a regular guy," Baum said. "Nixon was a policy wonk, he was never particularly comfortable talking about his personal life, and so this was all about just making him seem like a regular, likeable guy."
Clinton/Sax '92
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LhgGs4TrYA
A young Bill Clinton made a splash with audiences when he appeared on the on the Arsenio Hall show during the 1992 presidential election. Baum says it was a bold move.
"This was something that was perceived as, sort of, new and different and really out there," Baum said. "It was very controversial at the time. The Pundit class was sure this was going to sink Bill Clinton ... yet it obviously worked quite differently. It was very effective for Clinton in firing up younger voters and minority voters, who were the predominant audience for the Arsenio show," he said.
Sen. McCain and the wrath of Letterman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR5FGkpfsbM
During his 2008 White House bid, Senator John McCain, appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman. McCain had broken a previously scheduled interview with Letterman to do an interview with CBS News. Baum says, McCain quickly learned that Letterman can hold a grudge.
"McCain was pretty goodhearted about the whole thing," Baum said. "But, more importantly, by 2008 this was necessary. You had to mend fences with Letterman because late night TV is now perceived as an important venue for getting to the White House. The last thing he could afford is having one of the most influential late night hosts repeatedly and aggressively going off on him ..."
Press the play button above to hear more.
SoCal artist 'Shag' on his new store opening in LA
California has served as an inspiration to all sorts of visual artists for many, many years.
Ansel Adams took beautiful photos of Yosemite; David Hockney painted swimming pools; Robert Williams depicted the seedy side of Hollywood.
And then, there's Josh Agle, better known as "Shag."
For years, Shag has created vividly colored artwork featuring classic Southern California landmarks: Disneyland, Palm Springs, Hollywood's Cinerama Dome.
Some of it appears on massive prints, but you can also find his imagery on things like cocktail glasses, coasters and throw pillows. Starting this weekend, they'll all be on display — and for sale — in a new Shag Store in West Hollywood.
Ahead of the store opening, Shag sat down with Take Two's Alex Cohen to talk about how California and consumerism inspire his work.
To hear the full interview, click the blue player above.
Celebrating 75 years of magic with Disney's 'Fantasia'
Seventy five years ago this month, Walt Disney Productions released a film called Fantasia.
The movie is not your typical Disney flick. You won't see any princesses here. Instead, what you see is a collection of eight animated segments set to pieces of classical music. The movie was originally intended to be a short, but it grew.
"It grew, like an acorn grows into a mighty oak," says John Canemaker, Oscar-winning animation director and author of "The Lost Notebook: Herman Schultheis and the secrets of Walt Disney's Movie Magic."
"Because Disney was such an imaginative and expansionist type of entrepreneur, it just grew into an idea to do an entire feature of short classical pieces using classical music."
Today, Fantasia continues to be recognized for its cinematic and sound innovation. It was the first commercial film to be released in stereo.
"[Fantasia was] a singular effort to move beyond conventional narratives and to explore alternative story-telling possibilities in color and graphics," says Canemaker.
To celebrate its big anniversary, there will be screenings held throughout the country. You can find a theater near you here.
The implications of Mexico's latest ruling on marijuana
Mexico's Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that it is legal to produce and consume marijuana for personal use. In what lawyers call a narrow ruling, the decision only applies to the four members of an advocacy group who brought the case forward. But there are signs that it could lead to an over all decriminalization of weed in the country.
This could have huge implications for Mexico, which has frequently faced marijuana-related issues, including incarcerations and drug cartel violence.
Brad Rowe, a policy analyst who studies and writes about drugs and violence in Mexico, joined the show to explain more.
To listen to the full interview, click on the blue audio player above.
A covert mouthpiece for China, based in West Covina?
There may be a covert network of radio stations that is the mouthpiece for the Chinese government, with the broadcasts coming from the Southern California city of West Covina.
An investigation by Reuters reveals that G&E Studio is majority-owned by a subsidiary of the Chinese state-run China Radio International.
G&E produces content that is heard on at least 15 radio stations around the U.S. including Los Angeles, Washington DC, Las Vegas and more.
It is illegal for a foreign government to own more than a 20 percent stake in a single radio station. However, the FCC is investigating whether G&E skirted that law because it does not own the stations it broadcasts content on; it only leases airtime.
G&E is also under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department because a foreign government seeking to influence public or political opinion must register and disclose its ties. G&E Studio has not.
Reuters reporter Koh Gui Qing joins Take Two with more of her story to explain what she's uncovered.
'CodeGirl' tracks teen girls in worldwide tech competition
The mobile app market is estimated to be valued at $77 billion by the year 2017. But most of that money will likely go to men. As of now, 80 percent of app developers are male.
Some leaders in the tech field are trying to change that with events like the annual competition called Technovation. Each year, high school girls from around the world develop apps aimed at solving a problem in their community. Finalists are selected to pitch their ideas in front of a team of expert judges.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRb5iel-3Ck
Director
followed a number of teams as they made their way through the 2015 competition for a new documentary called "CodeGirl." Chilcott joined host Alex Cohen to tell more.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
How Chilcott first found out about the Technovation competition:
"Back in 2013, I was making a very short documentary for a new non-profit called Code.org that was about to launch, and I had the privilege of interviewing some of the top figures in tech all over the U.S. And I noticed that I was having to go out of my way to find prominent women in tech — they exist, but it was just a little bit harder to track them down. While I was doing a lot of research, I stumbled upon this contest, Technovation, and, you know, it's one thing to say to high school girls, 'You're really smart, you're creative, statistically you're just as good as the boys — if not better — in math and science and engineering, so therefore you should change careers and study it [tech]. It's another to say, 'Hey, look around you. Even though you're only 14 years old, what problem do you see, and how would you solve it?' And it was a real practical application, and the more I learned about it and the more I watched the pitch videos from previous years, it's like I could see these lightbulb moments where these girls were like, 'Wow, I see that problem and I might be able to address it, do something about it.' And I knew then, I was like, 'I have to make a film about this.'"
How she decided which teams to follow in the film:
"For that reason, it was the most challenging documentary that I have ever made, because initially, we got the statistics in from Technovation, and over 5,000 girls had signed up in 60 countries. And we thought, even if we had a large budget, which we didn't have, there still would be no way to guess the winning team. So, I made the decision that we would go to Moldova, the team that won last year in 2014 was from Moldova, and I said I'm going to start with them, because there are more teams from Moldova because they've been inspired by these girls and they've heard about the contest. So we went to five cities in Moldova and filmed with girls there, knowing, statistically speaking, it was extremely unlikely that one of those girls would advance, you know, and that's exactly what happened. So, we had regional ambassadors from Technovation, and mentors and coaches all looking out for us, but even so I knew, I said, how am I going to structure this film? Because it's going to be like 'Game of Thrones' — you meet characters, and then they're gone, and then you meet other characters, and then they're gone. And that's what we went with in the end, because there was literally no way for me to follow a team from the beginning and the end. So we followed the arch of the contest, we just changed teams as we went. And in the end I think it works because you see the similarities with girls all over the world, and you also see their differences."
On how the judges made their decisions when considering the diverse backgrounds of the contestants:
"We actually reviewed the judging rubric so that we ourselves would understand that they were judged on their pitch that they make at world pitch night, and when they go to San Francisco, they're judged on their business plan, they're judged on their code, and they're also judged on, does their app solve a pressing problem? So, if it's an amazing idea for an app but maybe it doesn't show high profitability, they could still score highly by the way that they're judged. And we were there when the judges were going around at the app expo and asking them questions, and they definitely looked at the apps from all sides, and in order for these teams to even get to finals, they had to be reviewed by other judges along the way. But even so I'll tell you, some of the best ideas didn't make it, and it kind of mirrors real life. I mean, maybe there was a flaw with their code that I didn't have access to, or maybe, for example, there were a number of volunteer apps. It's really interesting, all over the world, girls kept bringing up the same thing. One: potholes. There were apps to find and report potholes. I mean there were so many apps that's like, 'If you see a pothole, take a picture and report it,' and it was a really great idea. And then there were volunteer apps, partly because a lot of girls in the U.S. and other countries are required to do a certain number of volunteer hours before they graduate, and others because there are so many people who want to volunteer but they don't know where to go, and then so many places that need volunteers. And I think the judges see those apps every year, and maybe those aren't as interesting, and yet there isn't an app like that on the market. One of the teams in the film, Benefaction from Anaheim, they didn't even advance to semi-finals, and they have a funder now, and they're working to put that app out. So, for a lot of the girls, of course they want to win and do well, but it's really about just entering and figuring out what they can do, and a huge percentage of them keep working on their app log after the competition. And to me — these are over-scheduled high school girls who are doing sporting events and all these different things, and yet they're making time for this contest."
To listen to the full interview, click on the blue audio player above.
The man behind the Batmobile - George Barris
George Barris, the great king of custom cars, has died. Barris was 89 years old.
Yesterday, Barris' son Brett posted on Facebook "Sorry to have to post that my father has moved to the bigger garage in the sky."
Barris is mostly known for the amazing 60's creation - the Batmobile.
But did you know he also designed the car from the Munsters?
Knight Rider
And the truck from the Beverly Hillbillies
We take a look back on his life and work is LA Magazine editor Chris Nichols.