Season 2, Episode 8 (Show 60): Your Turn; Our Take

February 23, 2022

This week the audience takes the helm as the best of your questions, posted on the akhilamar.com website or emailed to us, are answered.  They span the gamut, from Judicial ethics to Younger abstention.  We learned a lot from you, and now we try to return the favor.

We deliver a long-promised episode, as the audience guides the discussion this week with their penetrating questions.  Was Akhil too easy on Mitch McConnell?  How about bringing on expert X or Y?  Should SB8 prompt a new exception to Younger abstention?  Oh, and by the way – what is “Younger abstention?” Can judges be ousted without impeachment?  As you see, we have a very educated audience.  Indeed, once you have completed the podcast, you will find yourselves that much more informed, as these sometimes complex concepts are explained in Akhil’s usual approachable if inimitable way.

Season 2, Episode 7 (Show 59): Now Now Now – Special Guest Jesse Wegman

February 16, 2022

Jesse Wegman returns for a lively discussion of what the ERA might mean for today’s constitutional and political order – depending on whether, and how, it is ratified.  Is ratification a “political question,” as the Court said it was in the 1930’s?  And what is the big news that is coming from Professor Amar?

We continue our discussion of the Equal Rights Amendment.  Is it the proposed ERA, the adopted ERA, or the dead ERA?  Some say we already have an ERA in the 14th and 19th Amendments; Akhil and Jesse explore what some women, such as Elizabeth Lady Stanton, had to say about the 14th Amendment and equal rights back in the day.  The SCOTUS was asked to weigh in on amendment adoption dates back in the 1930’s – they punted.  Would that happen again, should this reach them?  And – would it be better to have an ERA “Now Now Now,” as many insist, or is there a better way? Finally, Professor Amar is about to do something he hasn’t done in 22 years.  What is so important that it prompted this?

Season 2, Episode 6 (Show 58): A New ERA – Special Guest Jesse Wegman

February 9, 2022

The House says that the 28th Amendment – the Equal Rights Amendment – is on the books.  Is it?  Jesse Wegman penned a NY Times editorial on it, and now he discusses it with Akhil and Andy.

The Archivist of the United States is in the news, and if that’s happening, you know some esoteric constitutional question is up.  Fortunately, “Amarica’s Constitution,” is on the case.  We have New York Times Editorial Board member, Jesse Wegman, who wrote for the Times on this subject recently, raising all sorts of issues – which Akhil is happy to answer for Jesse and for all of us.  Meanwhile, this is all about the Equal Rights Amendment, and Amendments in general, and Article V of the Constitution, and what about ERA anyway – what would it do?  All this and more – with feeling.  There’s a lot here, so this is part one of two.

Season 2, Episode 5 (Show 57): Gary and Gorby – Special Guest Gary Hart

February 2, 2022

Part 2 of our conversation with former Senator and Presidential candidate Gary Hart takes us from Ukraine to McGovern to Justice Breyer, as this American for all seasons shares insights from a life of varied and distinguished public service.

We continue our mining of Gary Hart’s wisdom, as the former Senator, and Presidential candidate weighs in on the sort of questions a public and political intellectual confronts over a lifetime.  How can we think about Ukraine and Russia in light of our past?  Would tensions between the US and Russia today be particularly different if Gary Hart had won the presidency in 1988, given the story he tells about his prospective inauguration?  The richness of a conversation with Gary Hart is such that even a passing reference produces a new insight on how the Cold War might have taken a different path.  We hear inside references on what it’s like to run for President from a principal player in no fewer than 3 presidential races:  1974, 1984, and 1988. Inevitably, inside stories never before heard emerge, and they are here for you to savor.

Season 2, Episode 4 (Show 56): Debate Debate

January 26, 2022

The Senate spent 13 hours debating voting rights bills, and more fundamentally, debating whether the world’s greatest deliberative body would restore debate to its halls.  Listen to excerpts and our commentary as the Senate considers eliminating or modifying the filibuster.

Amidst a host of state-level voting law initiatives, the Senate considers voting rights bills.  Without 60 votes on hand, the Democrats have proposed extending the “nuclear option” to some or all legislation; this past week, they debated and voted on it.  We have digested the 13 hours of debate and play for you relevant clips, with Professor Amar weighing in on who has the history and/or the Constitution right, and who is playing with facts and founders.  A potpourri of Senators, from Leaders McConnell and Schumer, to recent Presidential candidate Klobuchar, and numerous others, weigh in and debate on whether or not the Senate shall, in fact, debate.  

Season 2, Episode 3 (Show 55): Heart To Hart: Filibuster Finis – Special Guest Gary Hart

January 19, 2022

The former US Senator, Presidential Candidate, Envoy, and long-time public intellectual joins us as we explore the possible demise of the filibuster, and what ails the U.S.’ democracy.

Exactly 10 years to the day prior to the January 6 outrages, Professor Amar and former Senator Gary Hart teamed up for a history-changing article explaining how the filibuster could become a thing of the past. In ensuing years, the “nuclear option” they outlined was invoked on presidential appointments, then Supreme Court nominations, and now it is so close to being gone for good.  But this is just one episode in an epic American life served in the public sphere, and we go afield to begin to tap the endless insights of this man who was nearly President, and wound up doing, and knowing, more than you can imagine – and he begins to share it with us.  Part one of two special episodes.