Today, Explained

It was a week of whiplash in the national fight over gun control. First, major retailers like Dick’s and Walmart raised the gun-buying age from 18 to 21, and companies like Delta dropped their NRA discounts. But then pro-gun rights legislatures pushed back. Vox’s German Lopez walks Sean Rameswaram through the many debates. He says the reason the country is stalled is because we haven’t begun to have the right conversation about guns. Sean and Vox’s Dylan Matthews talk about the elephant in the room.

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There’s a new kind of algorithm that allows you to take a video of one person and map the face of another person onto his or her body. Not surprisingly, it’s being used to map celebrities’ faces onto the bodies of porn stars having sex. Vox’s Aja Romano tells Sean Rameswaram how “deepfakes” are spreading across the internet. Plus computer scientist Peter Eckersley explores how the same technology could tear our society apart in bigger ways.

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A coalition of 20 states filed a lawsuit claiming Obamacare is unconstitutional yesterday. Vox’s Sarah Kliff says that’s just the latest pushback on the Affordable Care Act. Idaho has been quietly allowing insurance plans that don’t comply with Obamacare’s rules, and the Trump administration hasn’t been doing anything to stop it. Experts say if the federal government doesn’t intervene, other red states will likely follow in Idaho’s footsteps.

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Today, special counsel Robert Mueller dropped over 20 criminal counts against former Trump campaign official Rick Gates, just days after Gates agreed to a plea deal. Mueller's Russia probe has a lot of people and moving parts, so how do we keep them all straight? Vox’s Zack Beauchamp tells Sean Rameswaram not to focus on all the names and places or it might start to sound like “We Didn’t Start the Fire.” We update the Billy Joel song to explain Mueller’s investigation. 

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Today, the United States Supreme Court denied a request from the Trump administration to expedite a decision on DACA. This keeps the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program on life support for a few more months, but also keeps its 690,000 recipients in limbo: Do they stay or do they go? Congress still hasn’t been able to pass a vote on DACA. Vox’s Dara Lind and Matthew Yglesias say that’s because Trump has moved the conversation into unfamiliar territory: from illegal immigration to legal immigration. 

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Something changed this week. Teenagers managed to break the deadlock over gun control. Marches, walkouts, and serious policy debates are on the way. To understand what's different about the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Sean Rameswaram speaks with Vox reporter German Lopez, Georgetown psychiatry professor Liza Gold, and Elizabeth Love, a Utah teenager who's a bit of a badass.

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Cape Town is just a few months away from being the first major city to shut off its taps in the history of the modern world. Day Zero - the day Capetonians in South Africa will need to line up at water distribution points for daily water rations - is currently scheduled for July 9th. Reporter Kristen van Schie tells Sean Rameswaram how the three-year drought is drastically changing life for millions of Capetonians. Plus three tips to ward off a water crisis in your own city from hydrologist Peter Gleick.

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North and South Korea are on opposite sides of a demilitarized zone, separated by barbed wire, tank traps, and guard towers. But in the 2018 Winter Olympics, they came together on the rink. Is hockey the key to peace with North Korea?

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"Black Panther" is the biggest movie in the world, but what makes this comic book adaptation more important than the nearly 20 Marvel movies that came before it? Sean Rameswaram attends a "Black Panther"-themed engagement party and speaks to Evan Narcisse, writer of the "Rise of the Black Panther" comic books, to find out. (No spoilers!) (Transcript here.)

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Today we launch our show, but it turns out it's a lot easier to launch a nuclear weapon. Vox's Alex Ward walks us through the six easy steps and tells Sean Rameswaram about the time we accidentally dropped a nuke on North Carolina. Twice.

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