History Behind News Program

Prof. Schuller explains how neoliberal policies and NGOs crippled Haiti's economy, and Haitian women shouldered the burden. Haitian migrants are at America's Southern border in unprecedented numbers. While many have fled Haiti after the recent assassination of its president, last month's earthquake and the flooding that followed, the overwhelming majority of Haitians are refugees from the aftermat...

What if Covid predominately killed young Americans? Mr. Barry explains how such a scenario would have altered our response.  John M. Barry, our guest in this episode, is the author of The Great Influenza , an award-winning book about the Spanish flu pandemic, one that famously became the impetus for President George W. Bush's pandemic preparation plan. Interestingly, President Bush has read a...

Prof. Allison, a military historian, explains America’s war strategies from Vietnam to Afghanistan.  We can't win with you... and we can't win without you. What does this statement mean? The statement comes from an American ally, which we supported militarily, and which was widely viewed as an American puppet regime. Can you guess which ally this was? Here is a hint: that regime and that coun...

Recently, the Cato Institute published a research study that showed crime rates in Texas by illegal as well as legal immigrants are lower, in fact much lower than native-born Americans. This was an astonishing report to us, not because we don't believe it, but because one hardly hears such reports in the news. The popular political narrative of some conservatives, which we often hear in the news,...

Prof. Dinka explains history of empire, independence, ethnicities & nations, civil war & more... When most of us Americans think of Ethiopia, we think of famine, of which Ethiopia is once again in imminent danger. But there is so much more about Ethiopia that distinguishes it from the rest of Africa. For example, Ethiopia was never colonized. In fact, by beating Italian invaders in the lat...

Prof. Baker takes us through the history of the movement against sexual harassment.  Governor Cuomo has resigned due, in part, to allegations of sexual harassment by him on about a dozen women. But what does the term sexual harassment mean? According to Professor Baker, its legal definition derives from the intensity and pervasiveness of the harassment. And amazingly, in the last 46 years sin...

Prof. DuVivier talks about Michael Moore's 2020 film and explains the growing pains of the carbon-neutral industry.  We hear much talk about green energy. But other terms are used as well, including renewable energy, clean energy, green energy and sustained energy. So which term is correct, and which term is more important for legislation and fundraising purposes? And how does politics fit in...

Dr. Nasr explains that contrary to popular belief, Shi'ism's dominance in Iran is relatively new.  Iran has a new president, a new government. But what does the term government mean to you? That question is not meant to be philosophical. It's rather simple in fact. To most of us Americans, our federal government is composed of the executive, the legislative and the Judiciary branches combined. Thi...

One way to understand Cuba, the way that Professor Guerra tells it, is to study it in contrast to other colonies of the Spanish Empire. And what stands out is this: slavery! It was a ruthless, barbaric form of slavery that was exercised throughout Cuba's sugar plantations. And then... fears of revolution led to mass persecutions that preceded real revolutions and incremental, slow change. Along th...

After the assassination of Pres. Jovenel Moïse, Prof. Fatton describes the world's reaction to the independence of a black nation.  Haiti continues to be on American news. The country's stability is at issue, and America has declined the request of Haiti's government to send troops. But many Haitians don't want American troops in their country, no doubt because of the long history of foreign...

Prof. Hanifi takes us through parts of Afghan history that are hardly ever covered in our news media.  As the U.S. military leaves Afghanistan, the nightmare of the Taliban regaining control of that country is more and more becoming a real possibility. And President Biden remains resolute about his decision, because, as he emphasizes, we did not go to Afghanistan to nation-build. In a recent...

Prof. Loeb informs of the scientific community's reluctance to embrace UFO research.    The U.S. government's intelligence community released its report about UFOs on June 25, 2021 (it was actually an analysis of many reports). And prior to this, our government had revived its special task force on UFOs. But what about our scientific community? According to Professor Avi Loeb, a professo...

Prof. Balcerski shares the surprisingly circuitous history of America's celebration of the 4th of July.  America's Independence Day has been on the news. One reason is that President Biden set a goal for at least 70% of Americans to get one Covid vaccine shot, which he did not achieve. Another reason, a more complicated one, is that some have brought focus to the importance and meaning of the...

Prof. Wasserstrom connects history of Opium Wars to China's repossession of Hong Kong & its emotional patriotic education.  Hong Kong never really left the news after its massive demonstrations in 2019 and early 2020. But this month, June 2021, America's news coverage of Hong Kong spiked. Here are some highlights. According to the Wall Street Journal, out of apprehension for Hong Kong's future...

The consumer price index rose to 5% in May, a level it had not reached since August 2008, when it was at 5.4%. Economists and the business community are now wondering when the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates to combat and control inflation. Changing interest rates may affect the stock market, our economy, and our lives - the lives of ordinary Americans, which means that the Federal Reser...

Join two patent experts (one is a historian) for a fun debate about the ethics and economic impact of America's patent system.   Last month, President Biden's Administration made the extraordinary decision to support the suspension of Covid vaccine patent rights.  While pundits weigh our moral obligation to help other countries against the gravity of patent rights for America's businesse...

Prof. Pytlik tells the long history of coexistence between Muslims & Jews, which defies America's understanding of this region.  Last month, in May 2021, for almost two weeks Israel and Hamas exchanged missiles and rockets. At the same time, Israeli Arabs attacked Jews, and Israeli Jews attacked Arabs... all in the streets, neighborhoods and restaurants of Israel. This was the people of I...

Prof. Demmer: 130,000 Vietnamese evacuated in 1975 along with the US military. Over time, one million Vietnamese refugees settled in the U.S.   When is the right time to leave Afghanistan? And when was the right time to leave Vietnam? Are we leaving our allies in Afghanistan, defenseless before the onslaught of the Taliban? Just as we left our allies at the mercy of the North Vietnamese? What...

The success of President Biden's climate summit hinges on the unprecedented cooperation of the international community. But as Professor David Takacs explains the history of America's climate change commitments in this episode, the U.S. doesn't come out quite the exemplary leader to spearhead this enormous effort. Ask yourself this: how did the U.S. handle the Kyoto Protocol? Or the Paris Agreemen...

We are having a bit of fun with the title of this podcast because it poses a trick question? You see... if Mr. Biden was president in 1821... aside from the fact that there was no "Democratic" political party then, he would have another issue on his hand: there were no corporate or income taxes back then either.  And no! As much as our current political skirmishes suggest, it wasn't a Democratic U...

China's highly anticipated and much-delayed census finally arrived. And it is making China's officials nervous because it shows a definite downward trend for its population growth. In fact, China's recently announced that families can have three kids, which is a step up from two kids, which was a step up from only one child, which was China's policy from about 1979 to 2015.  China's populatio...

Click https://thepeel.news/register/subscribe-support/ to support our podcast for the price of a cup of coffee. The knee of a police officer placed on the neck of an African American man for longer than 8 minutes - in broad daylight, brazenly in full view of a cell phone camera. How did we get here? How have previous U.S. Presidents handled violence against African Americans? How have they reacted...

Republicans argue that President Biden's infrastructure plan includes items irrelevant to infrastructure. It will be a big political fight. But passing big infrastructure legislation has always been difficult - legally and politically.  In this podcast, we briefly review the history of America's infrastructure - from Washington's dream of a water canal to America's constitution, and then to presid...

America has experienced three mass shootings in three weeks. But have there really been... three mass shootings in the three weeks! We are not trying to be cute here. Of course, there were three mass shootings in the last three weeks. We merely pose this question to highlight the frustrating fact that there is no consensus on the exact definition of a mass shooting. There is actually disagreement....

Since last week, Democratic Party's push to end the Senate's filibuster has picked up momentum. Republicans are against it and so are some Democrats... including a very important - the President of the United States.  In this podcast, we analyze the history of the filibuster. How did it get started? How do Senators end a filibuster? Why has it morphed from a rare parliamentary procedure of the pas...