If you're not entrenched in the world of video games, you might not realize how much real actors have to do with modern gaming. They provide everything from lines of dialogue, to portraying heroes and villains, to performing stunts all of this bringing video games characters to life. Some of the biggest game studios rely on voice and performance capture artists, and all this adds up to big bucks. The video game industry made close to $185 billion last year. But video game performers whose human ...
Aug 02, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast On Wednesday in Paris, the U.S. women's water polo team faced off against Italy and proved once again what a dominant force they are in the pool, cruising to a 10-3 win. For the team's star goalkeeper Ashleigh Johnson, these games have been something of a reunion. She has played professionally on both Greek and Italian teams. Now that she's in Paris, she's competing against some of her former teammates. She's the first Black woman to play on the U.S. women's water polo team. She made 80 saves at...
Aug 01, 2024•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast In the Middle East, two assassinations in less than 24 hours could transform the region. Israel claimed responsibility for one. It has no comment on the other. First, an Israeli attack in Lebanon killed a leader of the militant group Hezbollah. Just hours later, the political leader of Hamas was killed in Iran. The Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was attending the swearing-in for Iran's new reformist president. Hamas says Haniyeh was killed by a rocket fired into his room at an official residency. H...
Jul 31, 2024•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast In her childhood in Berkeley, Calif., you can find the seeds of the political leader that Vice President Kamala Harris grew up to become. Her childhood friend Carole Porter, who lived a few houses away, paints a picture of a working-class, multicultural neighborhood. And she pointed to two women who had a huge effect on the vice president's life. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org . Email us at considerthis@npr.org. Learn ...
Jul 30, 2024•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast For a brief moment, people in the Venezuelan diaspora felt a surge of hope as reports indicated the opposition party was polling way ahead of Nicolas Maduro's party. Then, Venezuela's electoral authority declared Maduro the winner. Members of the opposition have cried foul. And the US and other international observers have questioned the integrity of the election. So where does Sunday's election leave Venezuelans, who are living in the midst of a humanitarian emergency? And where does it leave t...
Jul 29, 2024•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Vice President Kamala Harris has a little over a week to pick a running mate to join her on the presidential ticket. The list of possibilities is long, but many have a couple of things in common the represent swing states and are white, straight men qualities that might help make a winning ticket. Who should the current Vice President pick to be her running mate, and what will make that a winning choice? For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or...
Jul 28, 2024•11 min•Transcript available on Metacast Among the many Democratic Party insiders who publicly or privately urged President Joe Biden to reconsider running for reelection, one played an outsized role: Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi is 84 years old older than Biden and no longer in House leadership. But her part in the pressure campaign that led to a change in the Democratic ticket shows: she is still very much a leader, and her political pull remains strong. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcast...
Jul 26, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast Clayton Young and Conner Mantz are longtime training partners and friends. They're also the two fastest men's marathoners representing the U.S. at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. The pair met on a run at Brigham Young University in 2017. They've been friends, training partners and competitors ever since. With years of friendship and thousands of miles binding them together, can Young and Mantz break away from the pack and take home the gold at the Olympic games? For sponsor-free episodes of C...
Jul 25, 2024•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast Vice President Kamala Harris is barreling towards the Democratic nomination for president. Her Republican opponent, Donald Trump, has a record of personally attacking women of color who stand in his way. Sexist and racist attacks on Harris have already started. How might they impact her bid for office? For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for C onsider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org . Email us at considerthis@npr.org . Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcast...
Jul 24, 2024•13 min•Transcript available on Metacast If Kamala Harris officially becomes the Democratic presidential nominee next month, she'll be the first woman of color to lead a major party's ticket. Of course, that would not be her first, first. Harris's entire career is a list of jobs that nobody who looks quite like her had held before, including California's attorney general, Senator, and Vice President of the United States. Harris often stresses that while she may be a first, others paved the way. Kamala Harris has had a career full of fi...
Jul 23, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast In just a matter of hours, a Kamala Harris for President campaign has gone from a far-flung possibility, to all but certain likelihood. It puts the Vice President in a tricky spot. She's got to run on President Biden's achievements, while avoiding the more challenging aspects of his record. Biden entrusted Harris with some of the most challenging parts of his portfolio, including voting rights, the rollback of reproductive rights and immigration. Harris has struggled to find her footing on immig...
Jul 22, 2024•7 min•Transcript available on Metacast President Biden has made a historic decision to endorse his vice president, Kamala Harris, to take his spot at the top of the Democratic ticket. The move comes after weeks of calls for Biden to step aside after concerns about his fitness for the job. NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with Senior White House Correspondent Tamara Keith and National Political Correspondent Mara Liasson about what this means for the Democratic Party in the months ahead to the election. For sponsor-free episodes of Cons...
Jul 21, 2024•11 min•Transcript available on Metacast A plucky meteorology heroine; a male rival with no shortage of hubris; and some very, very big storms: that's the basic formula behind the new disaster action movie Twisters , which follows storm chasers around Oklahoma amid a tornado outbreak. It's a standalone sequel to the 1996 film Twister , a box-office hit in its day which also spurred a lot of real-life research into severe storms. We've since learned a lot about how tornadoes behave, and the technology of storm chasing has improved drama...
Jul 21, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast In 2017, the Larry Nassar scandal rocked the Olympic community. Hundreds of allegations of sexual abuse against the former USA Gymnastics doctor underscored how vulnerable athletes are particularly when they're minors. That year, Congress and the U.S. Olympic Committee had a solution. The U.S. Center for SafeSport was founded to investigate and respond to allegations of sexual abuse and misconduct. The goal was for predators like Larry Nassar to never harm young athletes again. Now, seven years ...
Jul 19, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast A warming planet is making storms and wildfires more intense, and more destructive. That's making homeowners insurance more expensive and harder to find. Insurance companies are raising their rates because, they say, they need to cover increasing losses from extreme-weather-related property damage. This week the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is holding a summit to address this spike in premiums. HUD Acting Secretary Adrianne Todman explains what the federal government is looki...
Jul 18, 2024•8 min•Transcript available on Metacast Donald Trump's message for America has long been one of grievance and retribution. What will he say at the Republican National Convention this week, after an attempt on his life? For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for C onsider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org . Email us at considerthis@npr.org . Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Jul 17, 2024•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast When President Biden heard that Donald Trump had picked J.D. Vance to be his running mate, he called the Ohio senator "a clone" of Trump. But when Vance first gained national attention, he was one of Trump's loudest critics. Vance first drew the national spotlight in 2016 with the publication of his memoir "Hillbilly Elegy." The book served as a biography of his upbringing in America's Rust Belt and social commentary on the white working class at a time when many were trying to understand those ...
Jul 16, 2024•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast In the days after the assassination attempt, Donald Trump secured the Republican presidential nomination, announced his VP pick and had a legal case dismissed. Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, dismissed the entire federal case against the former president involving his handling of classified documents. Consider This host Ailsa Chang spoke with NPR Justice Correspondent Carrie Johnson about the legal issues in the ruling and its implications. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sig...
Jul 15, 2024•7 min•Transcript available on Metacast Shortly after 6pm on Saturday, a would-be assassin took aim at former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Trump and two others were injured and one person was killed before the Secret Service shot and killed the alleged gunman, identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks. Crooks was a registered Republican but gave $15 to a progressive Political Action Committee in 2021. Law enforcement has yet to identify a motive or an ideology. For the first time in decades...
Jul 15, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast In the weeks since Biden's disastrous performance in the presidential debate, a steady drip of high-profile supporters everyone from members of Congress, to big donors like George Clooney has urged him to step aside. They're worried he's too old for a second term, and too vulnerable to losing to Trump. President Biden rejects those calls. He believes he can withstand a bruising campaign, win re-election, and lead the country for four more years. Last fall, Consider This host Scott Detrow travele...
Jul 12, 2024•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Palmer Luckey launched his first tech company as a teenager. That was Oculus, the virtual reality headset for gaming. Soon after, he sold it to Facebook for $2 billion. Now 31, Luckey has a new company called Anduril that's making Artificial Intelligence weapons. The Pentagon is buying them keeping some for itself and sending others to Ukraine. The weapons could be instrumental in helping Ukraine stand up to Russia. Ukraine needs more weapons and better weapons to fight against Russia. Could AI ...
Jul 11, 2024•11 min•Transcript available on Metacast Four years after World War II, leaders from Europe and North America formed an alliance largely aimed at deterring Soviet expansion the North Atlantic Treaty Organization NATO. Seventy-five years later the member states of that organization have come together in Washington to celebrate NATO and plan for its future. As they did in 1949, the NATO allies believe Russia presents the largest security threat to their world order. The immediate threat is Russia's war with Ukraine, but the allies also w...
Jul 10, 2024•11 min•Transcript available on Metacast Former President Trump derided Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer as "the woman in Michigan," when the two publicly clashed in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic. A Detroit rapper once put out a song about her called "Big Gretch" praising her handling of the pandemic. Whitmer's star soared during the pandemic with people being attracted to her human, pragmatic style. These days she's a national co-chair of the Biden-Harris campaign while simultaneously being touted a possible replacement for B...
Jul 09, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast On June 27th, long-simmering concerns about President Biden's age and whether he's fit to serve a second term exploded after a disastrous debate performance. Biden has been trying to clean up the mess ever since. First at a fiery rally in North Carolina. And some ten days after the debate in a one-on-one interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos. Neither event accomplished the goal of shoring up support for Biden, and now members of Congress are questioning whether the 46th President should rem...
Jul 08, 2024•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast California recently allocated $12 million for reparations for the state's Black residents as a way to compensate them for the harm caused by the legacy of slavery and current discrimination. Although it's not clear what the money will be spent on, it is clear it won't be directed toward cash payments at the moment, which many in the reparations movement say is the best way to atone for the legacy and harm of slavery. NPR's Adrian Florido speaks with NPR race and identity correspondent Sandhya Di...
Jul 07, 2024•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast Students with disabilities often face a tough time getting the services they need at school. When they can't get them, many families seek help from the federal government. And, right now, the Department of Education is swamped with a record number of discrimination complaints. The backlog is leaving families across the country waiting months, even years, for help. NPR's Jonaki Mehta visited one such family, in central Georgia For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This , sign up for Consider This...
Jul 05, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast Extreme wildfires doubled worldwide over the last two decades, according to a new study of NASA satellite data. You'd think, if the wildfire crisis is getting worse, there'd be more and more firefighters in place to meet that demand. But at agencies like the U.S. Forest Service, adequate staffing has been a huge challenge. But as organizations like the Forest Service raise alarm about firefighter shortages, there's also a whole group of people who are trained to fight fires and are struggling to...
Jul 04, 2024•15 min•Transcript available on Metacast This year, more than half the world's population lives in countries that are choosing leaders. And those choices will tell us a lot about the state of democracy around the world. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy
Jul 03, 2024•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Civil Rights Act was signed into law on July 2, 1964. President Lyndon B. Johnson called it a way for America to honor its promise of liberty. But 60 years on, how well has it lived up to that promise? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy
Jul 02, 2024•11 min•Transcript available on Metacast On Monday the Supreme Court issued its most anticipated decision of the term expanding the power of the presidency, and calling into question whether former President Trump will ever face a trial in federal court for allegedly attempting to overturn the 2020 election. In a 6-to-3 decision, along ideological lines, the Court ruled that presidents have absolute immunity for their core constitutional powers, and are entitled to a presumption of immunity for other official acts. But the Court ruled ...
Jul 01, 2024•15 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
