Jeff Schechtman's "Talk Cocktail"

"To discover to the world something which deeply concerns it, and of which it was previously ignorant; to prove to it that it had been mistaken on some vital point of temporal or spiritual interest, is as important a service as a human being can render to his fellow creatures..." John Stuart Mill, "On Liberty"

Tuesday, January 25, 2022

A Love Letter to Spy-craft: A Conversation With Retired CIA Officer Douglas London

For as long as humans have interacted with each other, spies in one form or another, have been with us. To quote the legendary John le Carr...

Thursday, January 13, 2022

Politics Without Celebrity - Kati Marton's The Chancellor

Imagine a political leader that is not about celebrity or attention? In a time when we have elected a reality show star as President, when ...

Tuesday, January 4, 2022

January 6th Was a Rallying Point For White Hot Hate

As we witnessed on January 6th, the level of hostility and anger awash in the country today has real consequences. Demagogues and hateful rh...

Monday, December 27, 2021

How Fame, Fortune and Education Ended Objective Journalism: A conversation with Batya Ungar-Sargon

Too often when talking about the media and journalism we engage in a board discussion of ideas, policy, and how the levers of power really w...

Wednesday, December 15, 2021

The Modern Era of Television Begins with HBO: A Conversation with James Andrew Miller

The link between what we watch in movies and on television, and the business, the money and the people behind it, are inseparable. Business ...

Tuesday, December 7, 2021

The Shattering: America in the 1960's: A Conversation with Kevin Boyle

Think of all that has changed as a result of startups and creative destruction. Nothing is the same as it was because of the sometimes revol...

Wednesday, December 1, 2021

The Post-Pandemic Normal Will Never Be the Way It Was

Everyone desperately wants to know what the post-pandemic world will look like. Adam Tooze has been thinking hard about it and he thinks he...

Tuesday, November 30, 2021

Has the Death of Faith Made Us More Tribal?

I n The Universe Is on Our Side: Restoring Faith in American Public Life Bruce Ledewitz argues that there has been a breakdown in Americ...

Friday, November 19, 2021

The Rise and Fall of the NRA and What it's Cost Us: A Conversation with Tim Mak

For the past 40 years, the debate about the proliferation of guns in America has revolved around the NRA. All public policy has been shaped ...

Thursday, November 11, 2021

China: Enemy or Competitor?

Elbridge Colby, is co‑founder and principal of The Marathon Initiative. He served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and ...

Tuesday, November 2, 2021

How the Index Fund Changed Finance and Why It's Still So Powerful Today

Never have so many individuals been actively engaged in trading in the equity markets. Robin Hood, Reddit, meme stocks, crypto, blockchain ...

Thursday, October 28, 2021

Dirty, but Essential Work: A Conversation with Eyal Press

Workers left their jobs at a record pace in the past few months. They left because of health concerns, child care issues and because, post ...

Monday, October 18, 2021

Looking for America: My Conversation with Evan Osnos

Without comparing one historical era to another, suffice it to say that we live in a nation filled with anger, despair and at best anxiety. ...

Friday, October 8, 2021

What Is The Future of Transportation? Hint...It's Not A Better Car

A recent survey showed that the reason people are reluctant to go back to the office has nothing to do with COVID, but with their commute. I...

Thursday, September 30, 2021

No Cell Service, No Technology and Electrosensitives Everywhere: Stephen Kurczy Talks about "The Quiet Zone"

I suppose even the most ardent technologists have at times wanted to get off the grid...usually that urge doesn't last long. But for th...

Saturday, September 18, 2021

As You Look At The Emmys, Remember That It Is Only Streaming and Entertainment That is Bringing the World Together

It wasn’t very long ago that to see a foreign language film, you wound up in the smallest theater in the multiplex or a little art theater s...

Tuesday, September 14, 2021

The News About the News: A conversation with Martha Minow

For journalism, it may be the best of times and the worst of times. On the one hand, the national media is more vibrant than ever. The New Y...

Saturday, September 4, 2021

The Myth of "Nobody Saw it Coming"

The more we know about disasters, the more we realize that most were preordained. Covid 19 or Katrina, the current fires in California or t...

Tuesday, August 31, 2021

Democracy Dies In The Chaos of Competing Truths: A Conversation with Robert M. Smith

Survey after survey shows that trust in the news media is at an all time low. And it’s not just the left/right divide. A recent study by the...

Tuesday, August 24, 2021

America Is No Longer A Serious Nation: My conversation with Tom Nichols:

Almost everywhere in the world, liberal democracy is, if not under siege, or at least being tested. Only in rare historical times have would...

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About

Jeff Schechtman: Napa, California, United States; I grew up during the Kennedy Presidency. It was a time when the best and the brightest sat center stage in the nation's psyche. I've always remembered the story, that at an arts gala at the White House, Kennedy looked around the room and proclaimed it "the greatest gathering of talent since Thomas Jefferson dined alone." Without the benefit of such trappings, I've had the opportunity, for the past nineteen years, to have a seat at an international banquet of ideas and history. My radio program provided me a unique opportunity to "travel" around the world and speak to thousands of the most imaginative thinkers and leaders in the arenas of politics, religion, journalism, business, popular culture, academics, science, economics, history, and medicine. During these years, I have taken many people with me on this journey. It has been a momentous time. The trauma of politics, the onslaught of technology, the insights of science, and the changes in the human condition make this a period almost unequaled in history. I'm excited that technology has now made it possible for me to take more of you along with me on this journey.

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