[Abridged] Presidential Histories

"This American carnage stops right here and stops right now." - Donald Trump, inauguration speech, Jan. 20, 2017. The American presidency had long fascinated Donald Trump. Ever since attending the 1988 GOP National...

Martin Van Buren is known as the "little magician." If he was a magician, he cast a powerful spell. The two party system he championed and helped establish has ruled the United States for two centuries and Democratic...

What's it like to be on the inside of a dark horse presidential campaign? Chelsea Waliser knows. Waliser was an Obama campaign regional field director during the lead up to first-in-the-nation 2008 Iowa Caucus. For...

"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek." - Barack Obama, on the campaign trail, Feb. 5, 2008 Nothing was ever...

Sahba Azami was born an Afghan refugee. Today, she's an Afghan refugee once more. But, for nearly 20 years, she was not a refugee. She was simply an Afghan. And the future was bright. Brought back to the country of her...

Donald Trump does not talk like a politician. But where some hear truth telling, and others hear something unhinged, professor Jennifer Mercieca hears a consistent rhetorical strategy designed to bind audiences to Trump...

"I can hear you! The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon." - George W Bush, World Trade Center Site, September 14, 2001 George W. Bush did not get the...

"It's the economy, stupid" - Clinton advisor James Carville, 1992. Bill Clinton left office with a 66% approval rating. This was in large part because 81% of Americans approved his handling of the economy - 71% said the...

“There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.’” — Bill Clinton's inaugural address, Jan. 20, 1993. Bill Clinton has the highest end-of-term approval rating of any president in...

For the third consecutive year, four podcasters got together to record their annual Friendsgiving History Podcast Spectacular. Tune in as I'm joined by three fellow history podcasters and friends for a roundtable...

George H.W. Bush presided over 4 of the most consequential years in world history. Before he entered office, a Cold War divided East and West: Democratic Capitalism vs Dictatorial Communism. After he left office...

“The Congress will push me to raise taxes, and I’ll say no, and they’ll push, and I’ll say no, and they’ll push again. And I’ll say to them: ‘Read my lips, no new taxes.’” — George Bush's GOP Nomination Acceptance...

Americans have long had a complicated relationship with taxes. We don't like paying them, but we love the things they pay for. In the decades after World War II, both political parties agreed - taxes are worth it. Then...

On September 8, 1974, President Gerald Ford pardoned recently-resigned president Richard Nixon of any crimes he may have committed in the presidency, and the pardon has never been the same since. Law Professor Kimberly...

Pandemics, political violence, partisans recognizable by the color of their hat - it may sound novel, but it's been with us practically since the beginning of the republic. Historian Lindsay Chervinsky , author of the...