Oscars and Ultra Violence with Author Walter Kirn

In this wide-reaching conversation, the brilliant Walter Kirn talks about all things American, from Hollywood and the recent Oscars, to the election and gun violence.
As usual, Kirn provides a wry perspective that is hard to anticipate, and logic that is difficult to argue with.

Guest Bio

A 1983 graduate of Princeton University, he has published a collection of short stories and several novels, including Thumbsucker, which was made into a 2005 film featuring Keanu Reeves and Vince Vaughn; Up in the Air, a feature film directed by Jason Reitman; and Mission to America. In 2005, he took over weblogger Andrew Sullivan’s publication for a few weeks while Sullivan was on vacation. He has also written The Unbinding, an Internet-only novel that was published in Slate magazine.
He has also reviewed books for New York Magazine and has written for The New York Times Book Review and New York Times Sunday Magazine, and is a contributing editor of Time, where he has received popularity for his entertaining and sometimes humorous first-person essays among other articles of interest. He also served as an American cultural correspondent for the BBC.
In addition to teaching nonfiction writing at the University of Montana, Kirn was the 2008-09 Vare Nonfiction Writer in Residence at the University of Chicago. He received his A.B. in English at Princeton University in 1983, and obtained a second undergraduate degree in English Literature at Oxford University.

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Episode Breakdown

00:01 Coming up on Media Mayhem.
00:58 Welcoming Walter Kirn.
02:00 Romney, a human in name only.
07:05 Latinos and Republicans.
10:37 The Oscar race, campaign, and show.
17:43 “The Oscars this year looked like the Tonys.”
19:42 Michelle and Barack Obama and Hollywood.
24:09 Assessing ARGO and the ceremony.
34:33 “Bathed in Ultra-Violence”-the Aurora and Newtown shootings.
42:20 The psychology of gun ownership.
47:10 The 2nd amendment and the rights of gun owners.