Commonwealth Club of California Podcast

Plastics are everywhere. And while we’ve known for a long time that plastics and our environment aren’t a good mix, it's becoming apparent that they’re massive climate polluters too. The production of plastics alone produces about 4% of global greenhouse gas emissions. After what is often a single use, the resulting waste continues releasing the greenhouse gasses ethylene and methane as it breaks apart. Yet, as petrochemical companies pay lip service ending fuel production, they are pouring resources into plastics production. How do we wrap up our reliance on plastics? Guests: Diane Wilson, Founder and Director, San Antonio Bay Waterkeeper Jane Patton, U.S. Fossil Economy Campaign Manager, Center for International Environmental Law Susannah Scott, Professor of Chemistry, University of California, Santa Barbara Alexis Jackson, Ocean Policy and Plastics Lead, California Chapter, The Nature Conservancy It's time for our annual spring appeal! At Climate One, we believe in the power of open conversations to drive positive change. Through our thought-provoking discussions and interviews, we strive not only to raise awareness of climate issues and solutions, but to also empower individuals — like each of our valued listeners — to take tangible steps toward a more sustainable future. You can show your support for Climate One by contributing to our spring fundraising campaign. For show notes and related links, visit our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As usual with Week to Week, our panelists will discuss the latest political developments in an informed, civil (and fun) manner. See other upcoming Week to Week political roundtables, as well as audio and video of past Week to Week programs. This program contains EXPLICIT content. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Philippines has traditionally been seen as a gateway to Southeast Asia and a strong ally of the United States in the Pacific. The country’s natural beauty and endowment have attracted many to its shores but have brought opportunities and challenges to the nation as well. Learn about its continued march toward economic development and as an archipelagic nation in a sea of warring interests, as we engage Philippine Consul General in San Francisco Neil Ferrer in a discussion. MLF ORGANIZER: Kalidip Choudhury An Asia-Pacific Affairs Member-led Forum program. Forums and chapters at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After more than a decade of stability or improvement, the mental health of adolescents plunged in the early 2010s. Rates of depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicide rose sharply, more than doubling on most measures. Why? In The Anxious Generation, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt lays out the facts about the epidemic of teen mental illness that hit many countries at the same time. He investigates the nature of childhood, including why children need play and independent exploration to mature into competent, thriving adults. Haidt says the “play-based childhood” began to decline in the 1980s, and it was finally wiped out by the arrival of the “phone-based childhood” in the early 2010s. He presents more than a dozen mechanisms by which this “great rewiring of childhood” has interfered with children’s social and neurological development, covering everything from sleep deprivation to attention fragmentation, addiction, loneliness, social contagion, social comparison, and perfectionism. He explains why social media damages girls more than boys and why boys have been withdrawing from the real world into the virtual world, with disastrous consequences for themselves, their families, and their societies. Most important, Haidt offers a clear call to action. Join us as he describes steps that parents, teachers, schools, tech companies, and governments can take to end the epidemic of mental illness and restore a more humane childhood. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How can young voters navigate a divided political landscape? Should we be afraid of this upcoming election cycle? Is our democracy falling apart? How can we save it? The events of January 6, 2021, epitomized the destructive effects of extreme polarization in politics. As we move into our next election cycle, where the two leading presidential candidates are once again Joe Biden and Donald Trump, many young voters are facing—and fearing—existential questions about our democracy, in what experts say is the United States’s most divided political landscape ever. “Are We Too Polarized to Govern?” presents accomplished Gen Z leaders who are working to foster bipartisan solutions to the toxic polarization that is causing so much anxiety for young people. The program will be led by UC Berkeley Political Science Professor Darren Zook and will feature Alia Braley, Cal Ph,D, candidate and author of the recent article, “Why Voters Who Support Democracy Participate in Democratic Backsliding”; Alexandra Leal Silva, associate at California Common Cause and host of the podcast “Democracy Is”; and Saanvi Arora, UC Berkeley student and director at the Youth Power Project. Panelists will discuss how and why we can exist and communicate in a diverse civil society and explore ways that young people can use their power to overcome political divides to strengthen and rebuild our democracy for the next generation. This event is part of the Creating Citizens Speaker Series at UC Berkeley, a partnership between Commonwealth Club World Affairs, the Associated Students of the University of California Vote Coalition, and the University of California National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement. The series gives UC Berkeley students and community members opportunities to listen to and ask questions of leading minds in politics, media and education as they learn how to become better, more involved citizens. We look forward to welcoming community members and students from around the Bay Area to participate in this riveting conversation and to join us for future programs in the Creating Citizens Speaker Series. This program is part of The Commonwealth Club’s civics education initiative, Creating Citizens. This program contains EXPLICIT content. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Would you even have time to duck and cover? There is only one scenario other than an asteroid strike that could end the world as we know it in a matter of hours: nuclear war. And one of the triggers for that war would be a nuclear missile inbound toward the United States. Every generation, a journalist has looked deep into the heart of the nuclear military establishment: the technologies, the safeguards, the plans, and the risks. These investigations are vital to how we understand the world we really live in—where one nuclear missile will beget one in return, and where the choreography of the world’s end requires massive decisions made on seconds’ notice with information that is only as good as the intelligence we have. In her new book Nuclear War: A Scenario, Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen explores this ticking-clock scenario, based on dozens of exclusive new interviews with military and civilian experts who have built the weapons, have been privy to the response plans, and have been responsible for those decisions should they have needed to be made. Join us as Jacobsen returns for a new Club program examining the handful of minutes after a nuclear missile launch. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Golden State has staked much of its reputation on its green credentials, with state leaders touting its role on the leading edge of global and national climate progress. But California is falling behind in meeting its ambitious emission targets, and has been criticized for over-relying on emerging clean energy technologies that may not bear out. At the same time, the state is at increasing risk from severe wildfires, epic floods and other impacts worsened by burning fossil fuels. What can the nation learn from California’s attempts to mitigate climate disruption? Guests: Scott Wiener, California State Senator Nancy Skinner, California State Senator Liane Randolph, Chair, California Air Resources Board Mari Rose Taruc, Energy Justice Director, California Environmental Justice Alliance Eleni Kounalakis, Lieutenant Governor, California Jennifer Barrera, President & CEO, California Chamber of Commerce It's time for our annual spring appeal! At Climate One, we believe in the power of open conversations to drive positive change. Through our thought-provoking discussions and interviews, we strive not only to raise awareness of climate issues and solutions, but to also empower individuals — like each of our valued listeners — to take tangible steps toward a more sustainable future. You can show your support for Climate One by contributing to our spring fundraising campaign. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How can we reimagine the justice system to support restoration instead of retribution? Our panelists believe the American criminal justice system cannot reduce its dependence on mass incarceration until we confront our impulse to punish in ways that are excessive, often wildly disproportionate to the harm caused. Instead, our panel will explore the transformative power of second chances, including those who have benefited from them—and those who advocate to ensure our system provides them. Prompting this discussion is the publication of a series of essays, Excessive Punishment: How the Justice System Creates Mass Incarceration, that trace how a maze of local, state and federal agencies have contributed to mass incarceration and deterred attempts at reform. Kevin McCracken from The Last Mile, Michael Mendoza, and Ken Oliver from the Checkr Foundation will join L.B. Eisen from the Brennan Center for Justice and retired Judge LaDoris Cordell for a thoughtful conversation on the second chances their organizations are providing and efforts to reform the existing criminal justice system. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What is a textualist, and why does that judicial philosophy dominate the current U.S. Supreme Court? Join us for a special online event as recently retired Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer gives us his provocative analysis that deconstructs the textualist philosophy of the current Supreme Court’s supermajority and makes his case for a better way to interpret the Constitution. Textualists claim that the right way to interpret the Constitution and statutes is to read the text carefully and examine the language as it was understood at the time the documents were written. This, however, is not Justice Breyer’s philosophy, nor has it been the traditional way to interpret the Constitution since the time of Chief Justice John Marshall. Justice Breyer recalls Marshall’s exhortation that the Constitution must be a workable set of principles to be interpreted by subsequent generations. Most important in interpreting law, says Breyer, is to understand the purposes of statutes as well as the consequences of deciding a case one way or another. He illustrates these principles by examining some of the most important cases in the nation’s history, among them the Dobbs and Bruen decisions from 2022 that he argues were wrongly decided and have led to harmful results for our country. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Three decades after the end of the Cold War, the United States finds itself in a volatile rivalry with the other two great nuclear powers—Xi Jinping’s China and Vladimir Putin’s Russia—in a world far more complex and dangerous than that of half a century ago. New Cold Wars—the latest from the Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and bestselling author David E. Sanger—is a fast-paced account of America’s plunge into simultaneous confrontations with two very different adversaries. For years, the United States was confident that the newly democratic Russia and increasingly wealthy China could be lured into a Western-led order that promised prosperity and relative peace—so long as they agreed to Washington’s terms. By the time America emerged from the age of terrorism, it was clear that this had been a fantasy. Sanger says now the three powers are engaged in a high stakes struggle for military, economic, political, and technological supremacy, with nations around the world pressured to take sides. Yet all three are discovering that they are maneuvering for influence in a far more turbulent world than they imagined. Based on an array of interviews with top officials from five presidential administrations, U.S. intelligence agencies, foreign governments, and tech companies, Sanger confronts the era’s critical questions: Will the mistakes Putin made in his invasion of Ukraine prove his undoing and will he reach for his nuclear arsenal—or will the West’s famously short attention span signal Kyiv’s doom? Will Xi invade Taiwan? Will both men deepen their partnership to undercut America’s dominance? And can a politically dysfunctional America still lead the world? From the battlefields of Ukraine—where trench warfare and cyberwarfare are interwoven—to the Taiwan headquarters where the world’s most advanced computer chips are produced and on to tense debates in the White House Situation Room, Sanger will explain America’s return to superpower conflict, the choices that lie ahead, and what is at stake for the United States and the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the early 1990s East Palo Alto was referred to as the “murder capital” of the United States. Thirty years later, the city has its youngest-ever mayor and has undergone a complete transformation, with zero homicides recorded in 2023. Mayor Antonio López believes that civics education and the energy of young people are keys to the continued growth of his city. Mayor López, in conversation with Commonwealth Club World Affairs’ own Issabella Romo, talks about the role of a mayor, his path into politics, and how being a poet has shaped his leadership style. Mayor López talks to students about upcoming elections, the importance of civic discussion, and why young people matter in a democracy. This program is part of the Commonwealth Club World Affairs’ civics education initiative, Creating Citizens. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Batteries are a critical part of the transition away from fossil fuels. From electric vehicles to grid scale storage for wind and solar, demand for batteries is expected to grow 500% by 2030. In order to meet that demand, we’re going to need a lot more batteries. And while companies like JB Straubel’s Redwood Materials are building capacity for recycling, for now that means a lot more mining. With the battery supply chain only growing more critical as the electric vehicle market matures, we’re revisiting this critical episode from last summer exploring how to build a battery supply chain that meets demand while reducing harm. Guests: JB Straubel, Founder and CEO, Redwood Materials Aimee Boulanger, Executive Director, Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance Support Climate One by going ad-free! By subscribing to Climate One on Patreon, you’ll receive exclusive access to all future episodes free of ads, opportunities to connect with fellow Climate One listeners, and access to the Climate One Discord. Support Climate One for just $5/month. For complete show notes, visit our website. This episode was underwritten by ClimateWorks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Scientists have known for decades that climate change is an existential crisis. For just as long, critics say there has been a complete failure of our institutions to rise to the challenge. Governments have struggled to meet even modest goals. Fossil fuel interests maintain a stranglehold on political and economic power. Even though we have seen growing concern from everyday people, civil society has succeeded only in pressuring decisionmakers to adopt watered-down policies. All the while, the climate crisis worsens. Is there any hope of achieving the necessary systemic change? Dana R. Fisher argues that there is a realistic path forward for climate action―but only through mass mobilization that responds to the growing severity and frequency of disastrous events. Spurred by the lack of progress, climate activism has become increasingly confrontational. Fisher examines the radical flank of the climate movement: its emergence and growth, its use of direct action, and how it might evolve as the climate crisis worsens. She considers when and how activism is most successful, identifying the importance of creating community, capitalizing on shocking moments, and cultivating resilience. Join us as Fisher offers timely insights on how activist social movements can take power back from deeply entrenched interests and create transformative climate action. About the Speaker Dana Fisher is director of the Center for Environment, Community, and Equity and a professor in the School of International Service at American University. Her previous books include Activism Inc.: How the Outsourcing of Grassroots Campaigns Is Strangling Progressive Politics in America and American Resistance: From the Women’s March to the Blue Wave. Her work has been profiled in the Washington Post, New York Magazine, and Wired. She has appeared on ABC Nightline, Morning Joe, PBS Newshour, CNN, and on various programs on NPR, the CBC, and the BBC. She has published works in The American Prospect, The Washington Post, TIME Magazine, The Nation, Business Insider, and at the Brookings Institution. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're honoring Southeast Asian thought leaders this year and will be having conversations with folks about their experiences and contributions as Southeast Asian artist and talent. This program includes a traditional senior blessing ceremony, performances, and a reception featuring Thai, Cambodian, Lao and Burmese food. About the Speakers Neo-soul singer Bochan (Bochan Huy) is a Cambodian American artist based in Oakland, California. Born in Cambodia, her musical stylings and influence is a culmination of her experience as both a refugee and diaspora raised in the melting pot of the Bay Area. Bochan grew up singing in her father’s Cambodian American bands. Honoring traditional style and stepping bravely away, she ushers in a new musical age. KP, also known as Khetphet Phagnasay, is a Lao-American actor, director, producer, and stuntman. He has worked on various projects, including the acclaimed Netflix series "Dahmer; Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story," where he portrayed Sounthone, the father of a 14-year-old Laotian victim. He also shared a scene opposite Michelle Yeoh in The Brothers Sun.He has also been involved in films such as "God is an Astronaut," "Demon Fighter," "Street of Hope," and "Hollywood Road Trip," among others. He grew up in Oswego, Illinois, then moved to Waianae, Hawaii, before settling in Clovis/Fresno, California. He obtained his B.A. in Theatre Arts from California State University, Fresno, and pursued further education in Asian Theatre, focusing on acting, at the University of Hawaii, Manoa. KP has also traveled to Japan, Taiwan, and mainland China as a performer. Kevin Tancharoen is a director, writer, producer, and choreographer. His feature directing credits include Glee: The 3D Concert Movie for Fox and Fame for MGM. Tancharoen has directed multiple episodes of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., HBO Max’s Warrior, The Flash, 12 Monkeys, Titans, Amazon’s Prison Break event series and Mortal Kombat: Legacy. He most recently directed on "The Mandalorian" spin-off "The Book of Boba Fett" for Lucasfilm as well as directing and executive producing Thai Cave Rescue, a limited series at Netflix from Jon M. Chu and SKG. Prior to his film and TV directing career, he directed Britney Spears' "Onyx Hotel" tour, choreographing her "Me Against the Music" video; remixed projects for Christina Aguilera, Jessica Simpson, and Tyrese; and contributed creatively to Britney Spears' "Dream Within a Dream Tour" and *NSYNC's "Pop Odyssey Tour.” Our thanks for the generous support of The Bamboo Organization for making this program possible. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Artificial intelligence can do some pretty amazing things, including for the climate. AI can help optimize the electric grid, make heating and cooling buildings more efficient, and pinpoint exactly where greenhouse gas emissions are coming from all around the world. On the other hand, the energy use of AI is massive and growing. A recent study estimates that in just a few years, the extra energy needed will equal whole countries the size of Sweden or Argentina. How do we make sure the benefits of AI outweigh its energy costs? Guests Karen Hao, Contributing Writer, The Atlantic Gavin McCormick, Cofounder and Executive Director, WattTime; Cofounder, Climate TRACE Priya Donti, Assistant Professor, MIT; Co-founder and Chair of Climate Change AI Amy McGovern, Professor of Computer Science, University of Oklahoma Support Climate One by going ad-free! By subscribing to Climate One on Patreon, you’ll receive exclusive access to all future episodes free of ads, opportunities to connect with fellow Climate One listeners, and access to the Climate One Discord. Join today for just $5/month. For show notes and related links, visit our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anyone who has fallen off the conveyer belt of mainstream health care and into the shadowy corners of illness knows what a dark place it is to land. Where is the infrastructure, the information, the guidance? What should you do next? Susannah Fox draws on 20 years of tracking the expert networks of patients, survivors, and caregivers who have come of age between the cracks of the health-care system to offer a way forward. Covering everything from diabetes to ALS to Moebius Syndrome to chronic disease management, Fox taps into the wisdom of these individuals, learns their ways, and fuels the rebel alliance that is building up our collective capacity for better health. Join us for a special online-only talk as Fox discusses the issues raised in her new book Rebel Health, an action-oriented and radically hopeful field guide to the underground, patient-led revolution for better health and health care. Fox says the next wave of health innovation will come from the front lines of this patient-led revolution. Fox identifies and describes four archetypes of this revolution: seekers, networkers, solvers and champions. She has collected tips, such as picking a proxy to help you navigate the relevant online communities or learning how to pitch new ideas to investors and partners or new treatments to the FDA. On a systemic level, this “rebel health” movement is a competitive advantage for businesses, governments and organizations to understand and leverage the power of connection among patients, survivors and caregivers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Think you know the Bay Area? Our past is so much more diverse, more heartbreaking, and more inspiring than anything we are taught in school. Join us as we explore some of these histories with Heather Bourbeau, Gary Kamiya, and Liam O’Donoghue, three locals who are deepening our understanding of and relationship to this place we call home. Heather Bourbeau is an award-winning author whose latest poetry collection, Monarch, explores overlooked histories of the U.S. West where she was raised—California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington. Gary Kamiya is an award-winning journalist of “Portals of the Past” that ran for more than 10 years in the San Francisco Chronicle and San Francisco Examiner. Liam O’Donoghue is an award-winning journalist and hosts the “East Bay Yesterday” podcast. MLF ORGANIZER George Hammond A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From massive forest fires in California to hurricanes in Louisiana, receding coastlines in Massachusetts and devastated fisheries in Alaska, the climate catastrophe is already here. Discussion of the climate crisis has always suffered from a problem of abstraction. Data points and warnings of an overheated future struggle to break through the noise of everyday life. Deniers often portray climate solutions as inconvenient, expensive and unnecessary. Many politicians, focused always on their next election, do not yet see climate as a winning issue in the short run, so they don’t take any action at all. But climate change, and its devastating consequences, has kept apace whether we want to pay attention or not. CBS News national correspondent Jonathan Vigliotti has seen that crisis unfold for himself, spending nearly two decades reporting across the United States (and the world) documenting the people, communities, landmarks, and traditions we’ve already surrendered. Vigliotti shares with urgency and personal touch the story of an America on the brink. In his new book, Before It’s Gone, Vigliotti traces his travels across the country, taking him to the frontlines of climate disaster and revealing the genuine impacts of climate change that countless Americans have already been forced to confront. This is the story of America, and Americans, on the edge, and a powerful argument that radical action on climate change with a respect for its people and traditions is not only possible, but also the only way to preserve what we love. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is the future of San Francisco on the line right now? Since COVID hit, San Francisco has repeatedly made headlines across the world for the challenges the city faces. The pandemic, remote work, downtown retail woes and the perception of rising crime have all contributed to a “doom loop” narrative. In response, city boosters have acknowledged our city’s “boom and bust” cycles and looked forward to the city rising again. Join Larry Baer, president and CEO of the San Francisco Giants, in conversation with NBC Bay Area’s Raj Mathai to explore how San Francisco’s business community is responding and how they propose to ensure the city’s best days are still ahead. As co-chair of Advance SF, Baer spearheads a group of business leaders born, raised and living in San Francisco, just like him, who are betting big on the city’s future. From his work in the 1990s to keep the Giants in San Francisco to the Giants current role investing in and building Mission Rock, a new mixed-used neighborhood next to Oracle Park, Baer has been at the nexus of sports, business and innovation in the city for decades. And, of course, he will look ahead to the 2024 MLB season as it gets underway and we ask: Should we be betting big on the Giants? A fourth-generation San Franciscan, Baer has gained a national reputation as one of professional sports visionaries leading the San Francisco Giants. Baer joined the team in 1992 as the executive vice president after he and Peter Magowan led the effort to assemble a new ownership group that kept the Giants in the city. A limited partner and board member of the ownership group, Baer was named CEO on January 1, 2012. In his first year as president and CEO, the Giants won their second World Series Championship in three years. In 2014, the Giants won their third World Series title in five years. Baer is responsible for the overall day-to-day operations of the organization and serves as a key strategist and negotiator of the club’s major transactions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What can we learn about the polarized and unstable world in which we live by exploring the revolutions―past and present―that define our age? Populist rage, ideological fracture, economic and technological shocks, war, and an international system studded with catastrophic risk―the early decades of the 21st century might be one of the most revolutionary periods in modern history. But it is not the first. Humans have lived, and thrived, through more than one great realignment. What are these revolutions, and how can they help us to understand our fraught world? CNN host and bestselling author Fareed Zakaria has investigated the eras and movements that have shaken norms while shaping the modern world. He says three such periods hold profound lessons for today. First, in the 17th-century Netherlands, a fascinating series of transformations made that tiny land the richest in the world―and created politics as we know it today. Next, the French Revolution, an explosive era that devoured its ideological children and left a bloody legacy that haunts us today. Finally, the mother of all revolutions, the Industrial Revolution, which catapulted Great Britain and the United States to global dominance and created the modern world. Zakaria, author of the new book Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present, probes four present-day revolutions: globalization, technology, identity, and geopolitics. For all their benefits, the globalization and technology revolutions have produced profound disruptions and pervasive anxiety and our identity. And increasingly, identity is the battlefield on which the 21st century’s polarized politics are fought. All this is set against a geopolitical revolution as great as the one that catapulted the United States to world power in the late nineteenth century. Now we are entering a world in which the United States is no longer the dominant power. As they find themselves at the nexus of four seismic revolutions, people can easily imagine a dark future. But Zakaria says pessimism is premature. If we act wisely, he says, the liberal international order can be revived, and populism relegated to the ash heap of history. As few public intellectuals can, Zakaria combines intellectual range, deep historical insight, and uncanny prescience to once again reframe and illuminate our turbulent present. Don’t miss his return to Commonwealth Club World Affairs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices