KQED's Forum

Joan Didion famously chronicled California’s culture and mythology in works like “Slouching Towards Bethlehem” and “The White Album.” And it’s Didion’s relationship with Hollywood in particular that New York Times film critic Alissa Wilkinson explores in “We Tell Ourselves Stories,” her new analysis of the California writer. “The movies,” Wilkinson writes, “shaped us — shaped her — to believe life would follow a genre and an arc, with rising action, climax and resolution. It would make narrative sense. The reality is quite different.” We talk to Wilkinson about how Didion saw an American political landscape that was molding itself after the movies — and came to value story over substance. Guest: Alissa Wilkinson, movie critic, New York Times Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cooking is a basic survival skill and yet many kids reach adulthood without knowing how to prepare even a simple meal. Meanwhile, other Bay Area kids are producing professional-level dishes on shows like “Kids Baking Championship” and “Chopped Junior.” So how can children get started in the kitchen? Seasoned instructors suggest kicking off with essential skills such as chopping – and, yes kids can use knives without injuring themselves – and learning to read recipes. We’ll talk with culinary teachers, young chefs and you about the best ways to teach kids to cook. Guests: Neelam Patil, chef, educator and CEO, Bliss Belly Kitchen; science teacher at Berkeley Unified School District and founder of Green Pocket Forests founder and CEO, Culinary Artistas Aria Karayil, sixth grader at Diablo Vista Middle School and recent contestant on "Kids Baking Championship" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We take a deep look at the fallout from what national security experts are calling one of the most extraordinary intelligence lapses in U.S. history. On Monday Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg reported that he’d been mistakenly included on an unsecured group chat with senior national security officials as they disclosed plans to attack Yemen. The Atlantic published more of the exchange on Wednesday, while the Trump administration downplayed the blunder and top intelligence officials testified before the House lawmakers. We discuss the national security implications with reporters Eric Schmitt and Garrett Graff. Guests: Eric Schmitt, senior national security correspondent, New York Times Garrett Graff, journalist and historian Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In a special election on April 15, Oakland voters will choose a candidate to finish the term of recalled mayor Sheng Thao. In the first of our interviews with the two frontrunners in the race, former Oakland councilmember Loren Taylor joins us to share his vision for the city and take your questions. He says he’s the only candidate in the race with the local government expertise needed to turn the city’s economic and crime problems around. But he’s facing a tough challenger in former Congresswoman Barbara Lee. Guests: Loren Taylor, mayoral candidate, Oakland; served on Oakland City Council from 2019-2023 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How did MAGA come to control Congress? It’s the story New York Times reporters Annie Karni and Luke Broadwater chart in a new book exposing what they call the unparalleled dysfunction of the 118th congress, where Republicans ground federal legislation to a standstill and pushed moderates out, to the point that “the moments Congress worked felt like brief interruptions of a long fall down a rabbit hole.” We talk to Karni and Broadwater about how MAGA extremism became mainstream in Congress, along with the latest political news. Their book is “Mad House: How Donald Trump, MAGA Mean Girls, a Former Used Car Salesman, a Florida Nepo Baby, and a Man with Rats in His Walls Broke Congress.” Guests: Annie Karni, congressional correspondent, New York Times; co-author, "Mad House" Luke Broadwater, White House reporter, New York Times; previous congressional correspondent, The Times; co author,"Mad House" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’ve heard the Thomas Edison quote over and over: “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.” But how often does the American ideal that we can achieve anything with hard work, actually pan out? In his new book, “99% Perspiration: A New Working History of the American Way of Life” journalist Adam Chandler challenges our myths of meritocracy and self-reliance. As Americans put in grueling work and punishing hours, we’re also experiencing rising levels of income inequality and wages that don’t keep up with cost of living. Chandler joins us to talk about how the nature of work in America is deteriorating and where we can go from here. Guests: Adam Chandler, author, his books include "99% Perspiration: A New Working History of the American Way of Life" out now, and "Drive-Thru Dreams: A Journey Through the Heart of America’s Fast-Food Kingdom"; journalist; former staff writer, The Atlantic; recurring guest, The History Channel’s "The Food That Built America." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

YouTube is the site for step-by-step how-to guides, unboxing and reaction videos, and children’s songs that get stuck in your head. It has also fundamentally changed how we produce and consume online content. As YouTube marks its 20th anniversary, we look at the cultural impact of the platform and how it evolved from a simple video-sharing site to the most visited website after Google’s own homepage. How do you use YouTube? Guests: Victor Xie, video creator, his YouTube channel is "Did You Eat Yet?" Mark Bergen, reporter, Bloomberg News; author of "Like, Comment, Subscribe: Inside YouTube's Chaotic Rise to World Domination" Johnny Cole Dickson, video creator and host, his YouTube channel is "No Lab Coat Required" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In her new book, “The Instability of Truth: Brainwashing, Mind Control, and Hyperpersuasion,” Harvard historian of science Rebecca Lemov examines the many ways our minds can be controlled against our wills. Lemov chronicles the use of brainwashing techniques on a range of people from U.S. soldiers who were imprisoned in Korea in the 1950s – some of whom refused to come home after the conflict ended – to members of back-to-land cults that proliferated in the Bay Area in the 1960s. She joins us to talk about how brainwashing is used, the troubling implications, and how anyone can fall victim to mind control, even you. Guests: Rebecca Lemov, professor of the history of science, Harvard University Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

President Trump’s unprovoked tariffs on Canadian goods, his threats to make the sovereign nation a 51st state, his belittling of Canada’s leaders: it’s all making Canadians just a bit miffed. Or as Vox’s Canada-based correspondent Zack Beauchamp puts it, “out-of-this-world angry about what the United States is doing to them.” We’ll talk about the unraveling of relations with our once closest ally, and how everyday Canadians and their government are responding. Guests: Zack Beauchamp, senior correspondent, Vox; author, "The Reactionary Spirit" Vjosa Isai, reporter based in Toronto, New York Times Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

During the pandemic, former Atlantic writer Ed Yong became a trusted source for news about COVID and its impact. In 2021 he won a Pulitzer Prize for that work, which often was about “the massive gulf between what you want the world to be and what you see happening around you.” As part of our series looking at the legacy of the pandemic five years on, we talk to Yong about how COVID changed our relationship with health news, reporting and research. Guests: Ed Yong, science journalist and author, "An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us." Yong won the 2021 Pulitzer prize for his writing in the Atlantic about the Covid-19 pandemic. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sequoia trees. Ojai tangerines. Jasmine. Ocean spray. Weed. “Our sense of smell is often overlooked, but it’s the one thing that can bring back memories of a place faster than anything else,” writes Los Angeles Times assistant editor and olfactory artist Maxwell Williams. LA Times readers shared with Williams their most memorable L.A. smells, including the La Brea tar pits, In-N-Out fries and —of course— the beach. And we want to hear from you, wherever you are in the state: What smell reminds you of California? We’ll talk about the unique scents that surround us in the Golden State. Guests: Maxwell Williams, assistant editor of West Coast Experiences, Los Angeles Times Aashish Manglik, associate professor of pharmaceutical chemistry, UCSF Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As the Library of Congress’s new National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, Bay Area children’s author Mac Barnett wants to reframe how we think about picture books. With his platform, “Behold the Picture Book,” he’s championing the vital role picture books play in engaging readers of all ages and why we love them. What’s the picture book you love reading over and over and over? Guests: Mac Barnett, author of the children's books "Circle," "Square" and "Triangle" which have been made into a new animated series "Shape Island" on AppleTV+. Barnett is also the author of the "Mac B. Kid Spy" and the "Jack" series. His books have won Caldecott honors and E.B. White Read Aloud Awards. Aida Salazar, children's book author. Her picture books include "Jovita Wore Pants" and "In the Spirit of a Dream." Laura G. Lee, children's book author and illustrator. Her picture books are "Soy Sauce!" and "Cat Eyes." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Edward Fishman, a former top sanctions official in the U.S. Department of State, says that “the world economy has become a battlefield,” with sanctions, tariffs, and embargoes as the U.S.’s primary tools for engagement. But after years of U.S. sanctions against Russia and a Ukraine truce still out of reach, are they effective? In his new book “Chokepoints,” Fishman examines the history of economic warfare and when it has helped the U.S. achieve its strategic goals and when it has fallen short. He joins us. Guests: Edward Fishman, senior research scholar, the Center on Global Energy Policy; adjunct professor of international and public affairs, Columbia University Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How should we raise children in a world that is burning? This is the question that Berkeley poet Rachel Richardson contemplates in her new collection, “Smother.” As wildfires beset California, Richardson worried about the impact it would have on the land, communities and her own family. “The smoke is not cruel, only truthful,” she writes. And throughout the collection, fire, smoke and air flecked with ash become metaphors and characters as Richardson searches for resilience, defiance, and ultimately, hope. Guests: Rachel Richardson, poet, "Copperhead, Hundred-Year Wave," and, most recently, "Smother"; co-founder, Left Margin LIT in Berkeley; recipient of the Stegner and NEA Fellowships. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Who is the Government? Dave Eggers and Sarah Vowell attempt to answer that question in essays about the scientists who discover new planets at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California and the archivists who safeguard the nation’s historical record. They’re both featured in the new anthology, “Who is Government: The Untold Story of Public Service.” We talk to Vowell and Eggers about the civil servants who make up what their editor Michael Lewis calls “the vast, complex system Americans pay for, rebel against, rely upon, dismiss and celebrate.” And we’ll get an update on the legal challenges to the Trump administration’s efforts to slash the federal workforce. What public servant in your life would you like to celebrate? Guests: Dave Eggers, founder, McSweeney's; co-founder, 826 Valencia; author, many books including “The Eyes and the Impossible” and “The Circle” Sarah Vowell, author, seven nonfiction books including “Lafayette in the Somewhat United States”, “Unfamiliar Fishes" and “Assassination Vacation" Stephen Fowler, political reporter covering the restructuring of the federal government, NPR Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

President Donald Trump has called for the impeachment of the federal judge who ordered a halt on the administration’s deportation of hundreds of alleged Venezuelan gang members under a rarely used 18th-century wartime law. The administration went ahead with the deportations over the weekend despite the judge’s order. The clash comes a few weeks after the controversial arrest of Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil, a green card holder who is facing possible deportation for his role in Gaza protests. We’ll get the latest on Trump’s recent immigration actions and the legal battles surrounding them. Guests: Ted Hasson, immigration reporter, Reuters Deep Gulasekaram, professor of law and director of Byron White Center for the Study of Constitutional Law, University of Colorado Boulder Law School; co author, the leading immigration law textbook used in U.S. law schools Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

California in 2023 experienced a net loss of nearly 270,000 residents. The main reason given by those surveyed? The state’s cost of living is too high for working families. According to journalists Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, much of the blame for that lies with Democrats, who they say have “failed at the work of governing” by pushing policies that make it too hard to build homes, mass transit and clean energy infrastructure. We talk to Klein and Thompson about how they think the left can govern better and smarter. Their new book is “Abundance.” Guests: Ezra Klein, columnist, The New York Times; co-author of "Abundance" and "Why We're Polarized;" his podcast is "The Ezra Klein Show" Derek Thompson, staff writer and author of the Work in Progress newsletter; The Atlantic; co-author of "Abundance" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In his new book “Carbon: The Book of Life,” Paul Hawken guides readers through the integral role of carbon in our world and daily lives. Carbon is a miracle element that is the basis of life on earth, and yet, it has become maligned as the culprit of our climate change crisis. Hawken, a Bay Area native and longtime environmentalist and entrepreneur, offers a hopeful re-consideration of carbon, as a way to embrace our connection to the planet and guide us to climate solutions. We talk to Hawken about his new book, his work on environmental sustainability and how to reimagine our complex relationship with carbon and the planet as a whole. Guests: Paul Hawken, environmentalist, entrepreneur and author; his latest book is "Carbon: The Book of Life." His other books include "Regeneration," "Drawdown," "Blessed Unrest" and "The Ecology of Commerce." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emmy award winning Comedian Carol Leifer has sat through countless bad speeches. Fed up, she set out to create the ultimate guide to speech writing with co-author Rick Mitchell. It’s called “How to Write a Funny Speech for a Wedding, Bar Mitzvah, Graduation, and Every Other Event You Didn’t Want to Go to in the First Place.” Leifer offers thoughtful writing tips honed during her time working on television shows like “Seinfeld,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” and “Hacks.” She joins us. Guests: Carol Leifer, comedian

The Pacific Circuit comprises the vast system of trade routes, cargo ships and relationships connecting Asian manufacturing and American consumers. And it all starts at the Port of Oakland. In his new book “The Pacific Circuit: A Globalized Account of the Battle for the Soul of an American City,” Forum co-host Alexis Madrigal charts how the port shaped Oakland’s history and how, in turn, the global commerce it enabled helped create the problems plaguing Oakland and every other U.S. city today. As he writes, “Oakland has a way of concentrating the power and problems of our country.” In this special hour of Forum, co-host Mina Kim talks to Alexis Madrigal about how the port and global trade have affected the city and its longtime residents. Guests: Alexis Madrigal, co-host of Forum, KQED; author, “The Pacific Circuit: A Globalized Account of the Battle for the Soul of an American City” ; Also a contributing writer at The Atlantic, where he co-founded the COVID Tracking Project