This week, President-elect Donald Trump clarified his nuclear position to Mika Brzezinski saying, "Let it be an arms race. We will outmatch them at every pass and outlast them all."

Fred Kaplan, Slate's War Stories columnist, joins to discuss the history of US-Russia nuclear agreements and what the future of nuclear warfare might look like under the Trump presidency.

Bill de Blasio, Mayor of New York City, takes calls from listeners and discusses this week in NYC, including a new initiative to sign up New Yorkers for Obamacare ahead of the Trump presidency, security after the Berlin holiday market attack and responds to his first contender in the 2017 mayoral race.

Historian, author and Politico contributor Joshua Zeitz, talks about his latest article in Politico, "Let Ivanka Be First Lady,” and how the role of first lady has evolved. 

According to CNN, at least 64 law enforcement officers have been shot and killed this year, the most in five years, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. Eugene O'Donnell, professor of law and police science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, former police officer and prosecutor, talks about this uptick, and what might be behind it.

Anticipating potential new policies under President-elect Trump, Melissa Mark-Viverito, City Council Speaker, discusses her push for New York State to protect immigrants as the city does and other city news.

It's been one year since Secretary of Defense Ash Carter announced that all combat roles in the armed services would be open to women “without exception.” Ellen Haring, director of the Service Women’s Institute at the Service Women’s Action Network, Colonel Gillian Thomas, senior staff attorney for the ACLU Women’s Rights Project and Lieutenant Colonel Joe Plenzler, a retired Marine combat veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, reflect on the status of women's integration into all branches of the armed forces.             

Siri Hustvedt, lecturer in psychiatry Weill Cornell Medical College and author of A Woman Looking At Men Looking At Women  (Simon & Schuster, 2016), talks about the dialogue between the arts, sciences and the sexes.

Lauren Shapiro, director of family defense practice at Brooklyn Defender Services, pushes back against Mayor de Blasio and the Administration for Children's Services on their support for separating children from their allegedly abusive and/or neglectful parents.

Listeners share one book recommendation they have read this past year just in time for last minute gift shopping. They called in with the following list (in order):

1)    Kindred  by Octavia E. Butler

2)    Hillbilly Elegy: a Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis  by J.D. Vance 

3)    The Pilgrimage  by Paulo Coelho 

4)    MaddAddam Trilogy  by Margaret Atwood 

5)    A Little Life  by Hanya Yanagihara

6)    Mrs Queen Takes the Train  by William M. Kuhn

7)    The Tsar of Love and Techno: Stories by Anthony Marra

@BrianLehrer Your caller just mentioned one of my favorite book's, "Kindred," by Octavia E. Butler! I, too, highly recommend it.

@BrianLehrer I loved John Reed's book about learning to live with less. "Elegant Simplicity: Reflections on an Alternative Way of Being"

@BrianLehrer "Just Mercy" by Bryan Stevenson. Required reading for these times.

Undocumented immigrants call in to share their life experiences and how they are preparing for the incoming Trump presidency.