Commonwealth Club of California Podcast

Latest Episodes:

David Rothkopf: The Untold Story of the American Resistance to Save Our Country Dec 01, 2022

Show notes

When federal employees start working for the U.S. Government, each person takes an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic.” During the Trump administration, some employees surprisingly found themselves fighting their own commander-in-chief, creating a resistance movement within the government that created tensions throughout the executive branch and various federal agencies.

Political affairs analyst David Rothkopf chronicles the unprecedented role many in the government felt they were forced to play during this tumultuous time and the consequences they faced for their actions.

Rothkopf focuses on the experiences of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and his brother Yevgeny, Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, Fiona Hill, and others who felt they needed to speak out publicly to protect our country. These once-obscure federal bureaucrats rose to national prominence by choosing to fight for what they believed, and Rothkopf believes their stories of resistance need to be told to truly understand what was really at stake for our country.

SPEAKERS

David Rothkopf

Podcast Host; Visiting Professor, Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University; Author, American Resistance: The Inside Story of How the Deep State Saved the Nation; Twitter @djrothkopf

Michael Krasny

Host, "Grey Matter with Michael Krasny"; Former Host, "KQED Forum"—Moderator

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 10th, 2022 by the Commonwealth Club of California.

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Bradley Hope: Inside the Secret Mission to Overthrow the North Korean Regime Nov 30, 2022

Show notes

How did an Ivy League activist become a global fugitive?

Journalist Bradley Hope chronicles the heart-pounding tale of Adrian Hong, a self-taught operative who tried to bring down the North Korean regime.

In addition to helping asylum-seeking North Koreans escape across the border, Hong and his secret organization Cheollima Civil Defense (later named Free Joseon), began tracking the North Korean government’s activities and its volatile third-generation ruler, Kim Jong-un.

Hear more about the high-stakes events that led Hong to become one of the world’s most unlikely fugitives.

SPEAKERS

Bradley Hope

Co-founder, Project Brazen; Author, The Rebel and the Kingdom: The True Story of the Secret Mission to Overthrow the North Korean Regime

Quentin Hardy

Head of Editorial, Google Cloud—Moderator

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 8th, 2022 by the Commonwealth Club of California.

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Cutting Edge: Treating Depression Safely and Successfully Nov 30, 2022

Show notes

We are living through a transformative time in mental health research. There is overwhelming demand for new and safe ways of addressing various states of depression. Dr. Nolan Williams and Stanford University are leaders in cutting-edge research that is generating worldwide attention.

Attend this fascinating program to learn what is currently being done in research settings as well as the breakthrough technology that is in the process of being developed so it can be in every medical setting and available to people who need treatment and support.

At Stanford, Dr. William’s Brain Stimulation Lab developed a now-FDA-cleared, personalized, accelerated neuromodulation treatment known as Stanford Accelerated Intelligent Neuromodulation Therapy (SAINT). The innovative SAINT approach is having a very positive impact on the treatment of severe depression. In a double-blind, randomized controlled trial, high doses of magnetic brain stimulation, given on an accelerated timeline and individually targeted, brought rapid remission to 79 percent of trial participants with severe depression compared to people in the sham treatment arm, where 13 percent of the people entered remission.

The SAINT approach provides a novel form of rapid-acting, non-invasive, individually targeted neuromodulation that uses electromagnetic pulses to relieve symptoms of treatment-resistant depression. For the first time, advanced tools for processing MRI-based images of the brain are used to steer a specialized, high-dose pattern of magnetic pulses to induce neurons to fire. The stimulation modifies activity in brain networks related to depression, changing the brain’s circuitry to more effectively treat major depression.

SAINT has additionally been studied in open-label studies. Overall, the therapy has been shown to be effective in the treatment of major depressive disorder, with approximately 80–90 percent of patients achieving remission of depression symptoms following the five-day treatment protocol.

Dr. Williams has been interviewed extensively by the media and has appeared on programs such as "CBS News Sunday Morning with Jane Pauley," "The Today show" on NBC, and on NPR, discussing the benefits of SAINT for relieving symptoms of treatment-resistant depression.

SPEAKERS

Dr. Nolan Williams

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences; Director of the Stanford Brain Stimulation Lab, Stanford University

Adrea Brier

CNHP, CLC, Integrative Cancer Consultant and Advocate—Moderator

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Muppets in Moscow Nov 30, 2022

Show notes

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, against a backdrop of massive cultural shifts, violence and political upheaval, Natasha Lance Rogoff took on the challenge of creating a program that had never existed before, Ulitsa Sezam, a Russian version of Sesame Street. This new children’s television program, produced by a Russian-American team, was designed to introduce children into the world of learning in a very joyful way.

What started as an attempt to entertain and educate millions of children across the former U.S.S.R., encouraging tolerance and inclusion, spiraled into the astonishing true story of culture clashes shaping all aspects of production. On the set, the production team navigated conflicts about topics like diversity, class, and even the notion of encouraging children’s optimism about the future. Meanwhile, off the set, there were car bombings, assassinations of the show’s top broadcast partners, and hostile takeovers of the production studios.

Muppets in Moscow is as much about the work that went into the show and how rewarding it was to bring such a popular American program to the former U.S.S.R., as it is about navigating the Russian television landscape in the 1990s and stretching the limits of freedom of expression in a society unaccustomed to such freedoms.

While Ulitsa Sezam ended in 2007 along with many other independently produced programs shut down by Putin’s government, a generation of Russian children grew up watching it. The show’s history offers a valuable perspective of Russia and its people that remains relevant today. Join us as Natasha Lance Rogoff sheds light on the core values and beliefs that shaped Russia during this tumultuous period and the clashes that continue to play out today between Putin’s Russia and the West.

SPEAKERS

Natasha Lance Rogoff

Journalist; Television Producer; Filmmaker; Author, Muppets in Moscow

Leslie Dixon

Screenwriter; Film Producer—Moderator

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 17th, 2022 by the Commonwealth Club of California.

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CLIMATE ONE: Yvon Chouinard: Giving It All Away Nov 25, 2022

Show notes

Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard made headlines recently when he announced that he and his family had transferred their $3 billion stake in the storied outdoor gear company to a special purpose trust and nonprofit that would give away $100 million a year, specifically to environmental causes. Patagonia has a long history of donating at least one percent of its profits – and 100% of profits made on Black Friday – to grassroots environmental non-profits. Yet even with this massive gift, and Laurene Powell Jobs’ own recent $3.5 billion pledge, climate philanthropy still only accounts for a small fraction of all charitable giving. This Thanksgiving weekend, we look back to our 2016 interview with Yvon Chouinard and bring the story up to date with Inside Philanthropy’s Michael Kavate.

Guests:

Yvon Chouinard, Founder, Patagonia

Michael Kavate, Staff Writer, Inside Philanthropy

For show notes and related links, visit https://www.climateone.org/watch-and-listen/podcasts

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Aric Prather: How to Get a Good Night's Sleep Nov 21, 2022

Show notes

We all need sleep to survive. It is essential to our physical and mental wellbeing and just as important as food, water and oxygen. So why do so many of us struggle to get a good night’s rest?

Dr. Aric Prather runs one of the world’s most successful sleep clinics and shares effective techniques that he uses to help his own patients achieve healing and restorative sleep.

Hear more about this powerful plan to improve your quality of sleep in just seven days.

NOTES

The Commonwealth Club is a nonprofit public forum; we welcome donations made during registration to support the production of our online programming.

SPEAKERS

Aric A. Prather

Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of California, San Francisco; Author, The Sleep Prescription: Seven Days to Unlocking Your Best Rest

Mark Zitter

Founder, Zetema Project; Member, Commonwealth Club of California Board of Governors—Moderator

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 7th, 2022 by the Commonwealth Club of California.

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Humanities West Presents Ramses the Great Nov 20, 2022

Show notes

Ramses the Great ruled Egypt more than 3,200 years ago, but he made sure we would still be talking about him today. He ruled for 67 years, probably starting on May 31st (III Season of the Harvest, day 27 to ancient Egyptians) in 1279 BC. He soon set about creating a new capital city in the Nile delta, where he had chariot, weapon and shield factories built. Not long thereafter he defeated the Sherden pirates who were seriously harassing sea traders in the Mediterranean, and “won” the Battle of Kadesh against the Hittites in the largest chariot battle ever fought. He also had enormous temples, obelisks and statues erected all over the New Kingdom, and ordered lots of gold objects.

Dozens of those objects are on display until February 12 at the de Young Museum in a state-of-the-art exhibit featuring the greatest collection of Ramses objects and Egyptian jewelry ever to travel to the United States. Along with colossal royal sculpture, the exhibit highlights recently discovered animal mummies and treasures from the royal tombs of Dahshur and Tanis. Visitors can also immerse themselves in multimedia productions that re-create moments from Ramses’s life or take a virtual tour of Abu Simbel and Nefertari’s tomb. The de Young’s ancient art curator, Renée Dreyfus, will share with us the stories of some of these art objects and how the de Young organized this outstanding and rare exhibit.

Egyptologist Rita Lucarelli will explain the evolution of the funerary beliefs of ancient Egyptian society from their origins in prehistory to the time of Ramses. She will draw on her scholarly work on the Book of the Dead to discuss the magical texts found in royal and elite tombs and how they compare to the "personal piety" or "popular religion" of the Ramesside period, about which there are many sources to draw upon from that well-documented society.

Among those documents is the earliest known peace treaty in world history—between Ramses II and Hattušili III, the Hittite king. It was recorded in two versions―one in Egyptian hieroglyphs and the other in Hittite using a cuneiform script. The two versions are nearly identical, but in the Hittite version the Egyptians are the ones who sue for peace, while in the Egyptian version the Hittites are the ones who sue for peace. Some things never change.

SPEAKERS

Renée Dreyfus

George and Judy Marcus Distinguished Curator, Curator in Charge, Ancient Art, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, de Young / Legion of Honor

Rita Lucarelli

Associate Professor of Egyptology, Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures, University of California, Berkeley; Faculty Curator of Egyptology, Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley; Fellow, Digital Humanities in Berkeley

George Hammond

Author, Conversations With Socrates—Moderator

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 4th, 2022 by the Commonwealth Club of California.

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Susan L. Shirk: Uncovering China's Past, Present and Future Nov 19, 2022

Show notes

For decades, China’s ascension to power was promised to be peaceful, with the nation’s leaders adopting a restrained approach to foreign policy and reassuring the outside world of their non-combative intentions. What changed?

Susan L. Shirk provides a sobering, behind-the-scenes account of China’s transformation from fragile superpower to global heavyweight—threatening Taiwan, tightening its grip on Hong Kong, and openly challenging the United States for economic and military dominance.

Hear more about China’s future and what that could mean for the United States and the rest of the world.

SPEAKERS

Susan L. Shirk

Research Professor and Chair of the 21st Century China Center, The School of Global Policy and Strategy, University of California, San Diego; Author, Overreach: How China Derailed Its Peaceful Rise

Jane Perlez

Foreign Correspondent and Former Beijing Bureau Chief, The New York Times—Moderator

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 3rd, 2022 by the Commonwealth Club of California.

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Senator Sheldon Whitehouse: Dark Money, The Supreme Court, and What Comes Next Nov 19, 2022

Show notes

As a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse reveals how special interest groups are using “dark money” to influence and control our courts.

In 2020, Sen. Whitehouse raised these alarming concerns during the Amy Coney Barrett hearing. He asserts that a group consisting of billionaires and corporations are using their wealth and power to back appointees and nominees that will advance a right-wing agenda and policies.

Hear more about these growing implications and what this ultimately means for the future of our country.

SPEAKERS

Sheldon Whitehouse

U.S. Senator (D-RI); Author, The Scheme: How the Right Wing Used Dark Money to Capture the Supreme Court; Twitter @SenWhitehouse

In Conversation with Melissa Caen

Political Analyst; Attorney

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CLIMATE ONE: In Person at COP27: Funding the Global Energy Transition Nov 18, 2022

Show notes

Climate One has been at this year's UN climate summit, COP27, where one of the issues at the forefront of the conversation has been “loss and damage” – the idea that rich countries who have historically emitted the vast majority of climate-disrupting pollution should have to pay for the resulting suffering borne by those least responsible for the problem. At the same time, the whole world needs to drastically reduce its emissions and transition to clean energy – and that costs money, too.

When even wealthy countries struggle to meet self imposed goals to cut down on carbon pollution, how can developing countries, who are already suffering the effects of the climate crisis, fund their own moves to clean energy?

Guests:

Bogolo Joy Kenewendo, UN Climate Change High-Level Champions’ Special Advisor, Africa Director

Arunabha Ghosh, CEO, Council on Energy, Environment and Water

Alastair Marsh, Reporter, Bloomberg

Johnson Cerda, DGM Global

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