Peter Sagal

@petersagal.bsky.social

197762 Followers 399 Following

I make Dad jokes on NPR and also write books and other things.

During the coronavirus pandemic, Mr. Neill was a soothing presence on social media, posting videos of himself playing the ukulele and relaxing on his winery, Two Paddocks. Located in South Island's Central Otago region, the estate was home to animals that Mr. Neill named after some of his friends, including Laura Dern (a cow), Jeff Goldblum (a ram) and Meryl Streep (a chicken that ended up getting killed by a ferret).
Mr. Graham was known, especially early in his Senate career, for having something of an independent streak, and he participated in some prominent efforts to find bipartisan solutions to major problems. He was a member of the so-called Gang of 14 that broke an impasse on judicial nominations during President George W. Bush's second term, and he voted to confirm two of Mr. Obama's Supreme Court nominees, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. In 2009, he joined with his Senate colleagues John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Joseph I. Lieberman, Independent Democrat of Connecticut, to try to create a framework for compromise climate change legislation.
Alzo sitting in a chair that seems to have a random human arm.
In private phone conversations with Carney’s predecessor, Justin Trudeau, Trump had threatened to scrap the 1908 agreement delineating their shared border. “I tear that up and your whole country unravels,” Trump told Trudeau in one call, according to two people familiar with the matter. Over dinner at Mar-a-Lago, Trudeau’s envoys tried to dissuade Trump from absorbing their country. When one Trump aide pointed out Canada’s 41 million people would lean Democrat, the president came up with a neat solution: just split the northern neighbor into two states, one red, the other blue.
When texting Trump, Rutte would echo the president's own syntax and hyperbole, keeping his messages congratulatory, with staccato sentences. He immersed himself in the role so thoroughly some heads of government who worked with him began describing him as an actor who never broke character. Soon, European leaders were following his lead. Finland's president and Norway's prime minister started workshopping their text messages to Trump, talking about which words they should render in capital letters. Sometimes, the Norwegian leader preferred his Finnish counterpart to send a message. Nordic officials worried that the mere mention of Norway, home of the Nobel Peace Prize, could reopen a sore wound.
Still from “Cowboys Vs Aliens” showing men on horseback fighting spaceships
It should tell the story of how the colonies inherited slavery from both global and European slaving practices, but also how the words, actions, and ideas of America's Founders helped spark a worldwide movement that ultimately ended slavery. It should tell the story of how at least eight American colonies passed or attempted to pass laws to either tax or severely limit the importation of slaves before the Revolutionary War, only to be forced by the British Crown to continue it. It should tell the story of how 750,000 Americans died in the Civil War. It should tell the story of how Americans came to reject Jim Crow and segregation, backing a colorblind standard derived from America's founding documents. In short, it should tell the story of the birth of America and how the United States, because of the principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence and upheld in the Constitution, has done more to advance and secure fundamental rights than any other nation in the world.
Still from a Monty Python sketch making fun of Belgians
Of course, the ultimate irony is that for all the talk about the detestable Dred Scott decision, the Government and the principal dissent propose a return to its core tenet. Their bottom line is that, for certain people, being born on American soil will not suffice to confer citizenship. It is that odious conclusion that the Citizenship Clause plainly rejects, as the Court explains. Ante, at 26. I add only that the Fourteenth Amendment's universalist aims should forever be the death knell for this kind of claim—one that seeks to make bloodline the marker of birthright. The America that was reborn from the rubble of the Civil War simply does not countenance that inequitable result. Thankfully, a majority of the Court remembered this today, and has dutifully preserved the most basic animating principle of our Nation's founding—that all human beings are created equal— once more.
A Thurber cartoon of a fencer cutting off another's head while saying, Touche!
"Power, not reason, is the new currency of this Court’s decision making.” Payne, 501 U. S., at 844 (Marshall, J., dissenting). Roe has stood for fifty years. Casey, a precedent about precedent specifically confirming Roe, has stood for thirty. And the doctrine of stare decisis—a critical element of the rule of law—stands foursquare behind their continued existence. The right those decisions established and preserved is embedded in our constitutional law, both originating in and leading to other rights protecting bodily integrity, personal autonomy, and family relationships. The abortion right is also embedded in the lives of women— shaping their expectations, influencing their choices about relationships and work, supporting (as all reproductive rights do) their social and economic equality. Since the right’s recognition (and affirmation), nothing has changed to support what the majority does today. Neither law nor facts nor attitudes have provided any new reasons to reach a different result than Roe and Casey did. All that has changed is this Court.
Colin Farrel as the Penguin
“The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to kill herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”
Aide Natalie Harp gazing at the President.
Here is a man who, as Haberman and Swan report, employs an aide, Natalie Harp, to immerse him in "a fresh stream of positive news stories and social media comments that she would often read aloud." Harp, the authors note, "wrote Trump adoring letters that she left in his personal spaces, including one that read, 'You are all that matters to me.?"
All this presents a profound challenge to journalism. The profession is shaped by an assumption that has been around at least since the Greek tragedians: Revelation is followed by reversal. When Oedipus' (or Richard Nixon's) crimes are exposed, he must fall from power. But not so Trump. With a few notable exceptions, he relies on a collective shrug of indifference from those in his support system, and defies exposure. What can journalists do in a world where there is no shame and, apparently, no consequence?
Title art for "The Starlost"
Poster art for the 1977 TV SF satire, "Quark."
These natural, and apparently adequate means all failing, what will convince them? This, and this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right. And this must be done thoroughly - done in acts as well as in words. Silence will not be tolerated - we must place ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Douglas' new sedition law must be enacted and enforced, suppressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, whether made in politics, in presses, in pulpits, or in private. We must arrest and return their fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. We must pull down our Free State constitutions. The whole atmosphere must be disinfected from all taint of opposition to slavery, before they will cease to believe that all their troubles proceed from us. I am quite aware they do not state their case precisely in this way. Most of them would probably say to us, "Let us alone, do nothing to us, and say what you please about slavery." But we do let them alone - have never disturbed them - so that, after all, it is what we say, which dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse us of doing, until we cease saying.
"The Benihana Christmas episode where Michael and Andy (Ed Helms) draw with a Sharpie on one of the Asian women that they've brought back to the Christmas party is jaw-droppingly, kind of horrific," he told shared. "It's a tricky conversation. It's like they're clueless, and in their cluelessness, they're racist and insensitive, and they're always saying the wrong thing... so it's a show based around clueless, insensitive, racist, sexist people that kind of mirrors the United States in a lot of ways."
"You've got to remember that the stakes of this thing by now were so high that the president of the United States and his spokespeople almost every day were attacking The Washington Post for using innuendo and hearsay information," Bernstein says. "We had been assiduous and careful, and people were starting to really believe the stories we had written. And, boom, came this, and it looked like it could all be over."
Encyclopedia Briwn Solves Them All
Encyclopedia Briwn Solves Them All
Roupp then was asked how he'd respond if someone from LGBTQ+ community took exception to his inscription of the Bible verse on Pride Night. "First of all, as a believer, I would push them to read the Bible," Roupp stated. "I think God has blessed me in so many ways, and I don't think I would be here right now if it wasn't for him. So, like I said, there's no hate in it at all, you know, like I said, we live in a country where you're welcome to believe what you want. There's a freedom of speech and stuff like that, so that's really all I have to ay about that. I'm just thankful that God has put me in this situation and that I can go out and share his kingdom." Roupp was charged with four earned runs in 4 2/3 innings and took the loss in the Giants' 5-1 defeat to the Cubs.
Mr. Rubio, in a brief interview during his visit to New Delhi last month, endorsed the decision to cancel the embassy construction project because "we're not going to be in the business of pissing away money." He spoke as he headed for Mr. Gor's lavish "Freedom 250" party that featured the disco group Village People and mockups of the Oval Office and the White House briefing room where guests could take pictures.
In December 2025, the Center's Board voted overwhelmingly to add President Trump's name to the Center in recognition of his personal commitment to rebuild and revitalize the Center-which had fallen into a sad state of dangerous disrepair-so it can once again serve as a world-class performing arts center. In this action, however, one of the Board's ex officio trustees, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH, a troublemaking appointment, from the beginning of her tenure!), sued her fellow trustees of the Board alleging, among other things, that this resolution and its implementation constituted a breach of fiduciary duty under the Center's organic legislation. In actuality, it represented a saving of The Kennedy Center which, if this doesn't happen, would go into financial and structural collapse, something the Board recognized in approving the name change. Despite all of this, the district court, however, ruled against the Board, and granted a permanent injunction, requiring the Center to revert to its prior name-and make all necessary adjustments to its physical signage, website, and more-by today, June 12, 2026. Again, millions of dollars is necessary to be raised, and this movement would come to a halt.
Authors' note This article is adapted from reporting for our book "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump." The bulk of the reporting took place from the spring of 2023 to the spring of 2026. During that time, we conducted more than 1,000 interviews with a wide range of people close to President Trump, including campaign officials, White House staff members, officials serving in government departments and agencies, former aides, donors, lawmakers, friends and business associates. Many of our interviews were conducted on the journalistic ground rule of "deep background," agreed to in advance, which meant we could use the information but not identify who gave it to us. Throughout the reporting process, we made extensive efforts to contact the individuals named and give them ample opportunity to offer their perspective. When we use direct quotes, those quotes came either from the person speaking, from someone who heard that person directly or from contemporaneous notes, recordings or transcripts. When we paraphrase, it's because witnesses or participants in the dialogue could not recall the precise wording but were confident about the thrust of the message expressed. Where there were discrepancies between the accounts of participants in meetings, we generally erred on the side of removing the disagreed-upon material; in some instances, we relied on our own judgment of various sources' reliability, based on our long histories of covering Trump and his inner circle. Over the course of these past three years, during our daily reporting for The New York Times, each of us has spoken to Donald Trump multiple times, and the president sat for an hourlong interview with us on March 16, 2026.
The vice president said he thought the president would be OK with releasing the nipple-related documents, arguing that Trump had been accused of worse. "I think we should put it out," he said. "It would cause people to say we're going further than we need to." Wiles quickly responded that the president would not, in fact, be OK with it. It was a point no one wanted to continue debating.
The Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response, responsible for pandemic preparedness and for standing up field hospitals and quarantine facilities in Kenya, is currently run on an acting basis by John Knox, a former Los Angeles firefighter who founded the group Firefighters4Freedom during the pandemic to fight vaccine mandates.
I didn't speak to Shari Redstone about the sale. I felt the sale was very necessary. The company was in financial trouble. It wasn't clear what our path forward was going to be. Mr. Ellison came in with a lot of money, a young man of vision, and I thought this was going to be very good for all of us.
By the frame of the Government under which we live this same people have wisely given their public servants but little power for mischief, and have with equal wisdom provided for the return of that little to their own hands at very short intervals. While the people retain their virtue and vigilance no Administration by any extreme of wickedness or folly can very seriously injure the Government in the short space of four years.
A bald, aging runner stops his watch as he crosses a finish line.
"Some in our party are still strong enough and have enough guts," Mr. Lutin said, "to stand up for reality and stand up against bologna."
Mr. Frank met Mr. Ready, a carpenter and welder in Ogunquit who was 30 years his junior, at a gay political fund-raiser in 2005. Mr. Ready had been taken to the fund-raiser by his partner at the time, Robert Palmer, who was dying and who wanted to find someone who might care for Mr. Ready when he was gone. When they met Mr. Frank, they decided he was the one. For his part, Mr. Frank was impressed by Mr. Palmer and Mr. Ready's relationship. "I had never really seen that up close between two guys before," he told The Times. "I was envious in some ways of what Bob and he had."
Menu from “The Angry Elephant”
At a recent campaign event in San Antonio at the Angry Elephant, a politics-themed restaurant, Lauren Boebert, the Colorado congresswoman who has had her own run-ins with the president, introduced Mr. Roy as a fighter and a mentor.
Anough they are both deeply read In history they are not historians, and although they both work for prestigious publications they are not strictly journalists, or at least they don't adhere to the journalistic rituals of objectivity. They are not talking heads or pundits, either. I can only tell you what they are in relation to me: they are my teachers, and I am looking forward to learning more from them today. ADAM SERWER is a staff writer for the Atlantic, and the author of New York Times Bestseller, The Cruelty Is the Point. He's also written for The American Prospect, Buzzteed News, and Mother Jones, and is the recipient of a number of awards, including from the National Assocation of Black Journalists and the Sidney Hillman Foundation. JAMELLE BOUIE is a columnist for the New York Times, and has written for the American Prospect, and Slate, where he was chief political correspondent In addition to politics and history, he also writes and speaks about action movies, photography, men's fashion and cooking, which we can get to if we run out of other things to talk about.
At the fiftieth anniversary of the march on Selma, President Obama gave what | thought was the best speech of his career... he apparently agrees, because he decided to write part of it in big letters on his new Presidential Center down near Chicago's second best University. In that speech, he described the history of America as one of various groups, initially not included in the definition of "We", fighting and sacrificing to become part of it. And it's a great story, and a true one. But it's also a history written by the victors.... or so it seemed in 2015. He did not speak of the people who fought that inclusion, and who demanded that sacrifice, often in human lives. He did not speak of their victories, and their aspirations, who they were and why they fought. And of course, he took it as a given that they had lost. That part of our history is not often taught, perhaps out of shame. And if we had been taught about those forces, perhaps we would not have been so surprised, in recent years, by their resilience. Much of what | now know about that aspect of our past | learned from our two guests today.
Good afternoon! My name is Peter Sagal, you may know me from my day job telling Dad jokes on NPR. In 2012, I was invited to host a new four part series for PBS, eventually titled Constitution USA with Peter Sagal. In making that documentary, I became both deeply interested in Constitutional law, and an unabashed fan of the Constitution and American democracy, for all the flaws in both. Last year, I approached the CHF and proposed, in this moment of extraordinary change and challenge in our democracy, a series on our Constitution, to figure out how our founding document led us here, and how it may be used to find our way forward. Today is our third and final event in our spring session... we'll be reconvening in the fall. The title for our session today, Who is the We In We The People? Is also a good way of summarizing our current national debate, to use a polite word for it. Who has privilege, who has power, who has rights, who even has citizenship under our Constitution.
A little cottage in Maine with a garden
A New York Times Wirecutter post about underwear, with the illustration blocked by Bluesky as "adult content"
After it became public on the afternoon of January 6 that the Vice President would not fraudulently alter the election results, a large and angry crowd— including many individuals whom the Defendant had deceived into believing the Vice President could and might change the election results— violently attacked the Capitol and halted the proceeding. As violence ensued, the Defendant and co-conspirators exploited the disruption by redoubling efforts to levy false claims of election fraud and convince Members of Congress to further delay the certification based on those claims.
On stage in San Diego with Bill Kurtis and Ron Burgundy. (Really)