Q&A: Dana Bash, "The Elections That Changed the World"

This week's program is an encore presentation featuring a C-SPAN interview with Eric Sevareid that was recorded in his Georgetown home 37 years ago in 1989. Sevareid was a war correspondent with CBS Radio starting in 1939. He spent a total of 38 years with the network. When CBS News with Walter Cronkite went to 30 minutes in 1963, Eric Sevaride would end each newscast with a two-minute analysis and commentary. Some refer to him as "The Grey Eminence." The Cronkite evening news audience in those days was close to 30 million viewers a night. Today the program is watched by around 4 million people. The American population has increased by 100 million people since 1989. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Over his six-decade career, Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer David Hume Kennerly has covered U.S. presidents and first ladies, world leaders, the Vietnam War, the 1971 Frazier-Ali fight, and much more. He joins us to discuss his work and his new book, "In the Room: Sixty Years on the Front Lines of History." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pulitzer Prize-winning and bestselling author Jared Diamond joins David M. Rubenstein for a fascinating conversation about the origins of life on Earth, the science of the animal kingdom, and the evolution of human behavior. Diamond also discusses his book, Why Is Sex Fun?, exploring the surprising science behind human sexuality and what sets us apart from other species. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever wonder why things cost what they do? Economic expert and author Lindsay Owens argued that technology is used against consumers to determine pricing on everything from rainy Uber rides to concert tickets. She was interviewed by Journalist Jamie McGee at the 2026 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Walter Stahr has written books on John Jay, William Henry Seward, Edwin Stanton, and Salmon Chase. Now comes his biography of America's 27th president, William Howard Taft, who subsequently also served as the 10th Chief Justice of the United States. Walter Stahr writes at the beginning of his book: "Taft was a modest conservative president, one who avoided foreign wars, worked closely with our allies, lowered tariff rates, and reduced the federal deficit." Stahr also writes that "Taft didn't agree with his predecessor, Theodore Roosevelt, that the president had some vague power to pursue the public good." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The actor Jimmy Stewart left great success in Hollywood in 1941 to become an officer in the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II. A licensed pilot, he flew B-24 bomber missions over Germany, retiring as a Brigadier General in the Air Force reserves in 1968. Executive producer Kelly Stewart-Harcourt, daughter of Jimmy Stewart, and director Aaron Burns discuss their new movie "Jimmy," a biopic of Stewart's World War II service, his difficult yet triumphal return to Hollywood, and the making of the 1946 Christmas classic "It's a Wonderful Life." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Who are the most influential figures in American history, and which events have shaped the nation we know today? Award-winning, bestselling historians Annette Gordon-Reed and Douglas Brinkley join host David M. Rubenstein at the National Book Festival for a wide-ranging conversation about the people, defining moments, and turning points in U.S. history. Together, they explore America's past and the lasting impact of the individuals and events that helped shape the country. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"Can we say, 'In a crocodile accident?'" This and many other stories documenting not just how people died, but how they lived - in a book from New York Times obit writer Sam Roberts. He was interviewed by Director of the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute Harold Holzer.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eugene V. Debs ran for President of the United States as a socialist five times. The first in 1900, the last in 1920, when he received close to a million votes. Shawn Gude, a native of Iowa, a former editor of Jacobin, and a current resident of New York City, is the author of a Debs biography titled "American Socialist." In his introduction, Gude writes: "The story of Eugene V. Debs' life is the story of one man's radicalization, and of the country he helped radicalize in turn." Debs dropped out of school at age 14. His base of operations and his hometown was Terre Haute, Indiana. Shawn Gude tells about his union activities, his presidential campaigns, and why he was sent to prison twice, once for six months and the second time for over two years, before his sentence was commuted by President Harding in the early 1920s.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

CNN Chief Political Correspondent Dana Bash, co-author of "The Elections That Changed the World," looks at elections going back to ancient Rome that have had an outsized impact on humanity. She discusses the elections of Lincoln, Hitler, Churchill, Nelson Mandela, and others. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices