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Humor
 
 
Thursday, November 12, 2009 at 11:00 am

Before Jon Stewart there was The Onion. We’ll talk with writers for the satirical news site about their brand of fake-news humor.

Comments [60]
 
Thursday, August 6, 2009 at 11:00 am

We talk to actress and comedian Charlyne Yi about her new film, “Paper Heart,” and the quest to understand true love.

Comments [10]
 
Friday, November 28, 2008 at 11:00 am

British actor Michael Palin on how Monty Python came to be.

Comments [3]
 
Monday, May 5, 2008 at 11:00 am

Sunshine State humorist and novelist Carl Hiaasen knows a lot about Florida and human nature. What he didn’t know was just how ugly his own nature could get when he put it back on the golf course.
Decades after Hiaasen laid down his golf clubs as a young father, he picked them up again at fifty-something. [...]

 
Friday, April 11, 2008 at 11:00 am

Man walks into a restaurant and asks: “How do you prepare your chickens?” And the cook responds: “Nothing special really. We just tell them they’re gonna die.” Bada boom. The human condition in a two-line joke about chickens.
Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein see philosophy today all over the world of humor. A world where Woody [...]

 
Monday, January 7, 2008 at 10:00 am

Only four days after the first votes, in Iowa, of Election ‘08, and one day before the New Hampshire primaries, Americans are in the thick of one of the most amazing political seasons in years.
But one thing’s been missing: the late-night laughs. Leno and Letterman sneaked back on last week. Tonight, Jon Stewart and Stephen [...]

 
Tuesday, January 1, 2008 at 10:00 am

Southern-raised humorist Roy Blount Jr. took the midnight train out of Georgia a long time ago, to make a life well north of the Mason-Dixon line.
But you cannot take the South out of the Southern boy, and definitely not out of Blount’s lifetime of humorous essays and exasperation over America’s North-South incomprehension.
In a new collection, [...]

 
Tuesday, December 25, 2007 at 10:00 am

In the long-ago fall of 1969, something completely different in television began happening in the UK. It was called Monty Python’s Flying Circus — a free-form, satirical, anarchic circus of humor that had Britons staring dumbfounded, then laughing ’til they cried.
Monty Python made the leap to America, and then onto the big screen, with “Monty [...]

 
On Point Today
Jazz Great Sonny Rollins
Wednesday, March 17, 2010 (photo: sonnyrollins.com)

We’ll talk with tenor saxophone great Sonny Rollins about his six decades at the pinnacle of jazz.

Comments [20]
 
Ireland’s Epic Boom and Bust
Wednesday, March 17, 2010

For more than a decade Ireland boomed. It was Europe’s Celtic Tiger. Then it came crashing down. We’ll look at Ireland’s wild rise, and what went wrong.

Comments [22]

Recent Shows
Ben Zimmer on Language
Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Blogger and lexicographer Ben Zimmer takes over William Safire’s language column. We’ll catch the new wave of American language.

Comments [168]
 
Will the Dodd Bill Do the Job?
Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Senator Chris Dodd finally unveils his bill to rewrite the nation’s Wall Street regulation. Is it tough enough to do the job?

Comments [31]
On Point Blog
IED’s in Afghanistan: Hard Numbers

The Department of Defense provided On Point with some statistics about IED attacks in Afghanistan, where there has been an increase in the use of such weapons over the past 14 months. It’s striking to see the spike in numbers — from 2,677 IED incidents in 2007 to 8,159 last year.

More » | Comments [2]
 
Christopher Hill: U.S. Troop Withdrawal ‘On Schedule’

U.S. Ambassaor to Iraq Christopher Hill spoke with On Point live from Baghdad today as early voting gets underway, part of the run-up to Sunday’s elections. “So far so good,” Hill said, despite scattered violence. Hill said that the plan to withdraw U.S. combat troops by Sept. 1, and to leave only a residual advisory force of 50,000 or fewer, remains “very much on schedule.” Observers worry that a spike in violence could derail that timeline.

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The Supreme Court’s Radio Silence

For radio listeners, a key element of our conversation about the Supreme Court gun-rights case was conspicuously absent: the audio recording of the oral arguments. Here’s why.

More » | Comments [5]