Fight Trump with Science. Fight Trump with Data. Fight Trump with Facts.
The Mother Jones Podcast
Mother Jones
4.5 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 6 May 2020
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
From flattening the curve to pharmaceutical trials, the story of the coronavirus pandemic is a story told using science and statistics. Every day brings a torrent new information about the number of deaths, the number of hospital beds, the number of unemployed workers, or the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine or ibuprofen. But as President Trump tries to spin the numbers in his favor, using whatever spin and disinformation he can, sorting through the garbage science takes knowledge and fortitude—and a few handy journalistic tools everyone can use. On today’s episode of the podcast, you'll hear from two Mother Jones journalists who can help. Sinduja Rangarajan and Jackie Flynn Mogensen have been sifting through scientific studies and data sets since the start of the pandemic. They’re sharing tips and tricks for separating the useful information from the disinformation. With a global pandemic at stake, getting accurate information has never been more important.
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| 0:00.0 | Sunduja, what are we listening to? |
| 0:05.0 | We're listening to the sound I created using actual data of cases and COVID debts. |
| 0:22.0 | Initially it's just feb and Jan and March and you just see the ding ding ding |
| 0:26.3 | and what's happening is the piano is talking about the number of cases over time and |
| 0:32.0 | the bass is talking about the number of deaths over time. |
| 0:36.0 | And then as you progress it increases in pitch and intensity and that's because |
| 0:49.0 | you're hearing how the COVID cases have increased. |
| 0:53.2 | This is the Mother Jones podcast. |
| 0:59.2 | I'm Jamila King in Brooklyn. On today's show, uh-oh, the president is spouting torrents of spin and stupidity again. |
| 1:19.0 | Everywhere, numbers are inflated, deflated, squeezed, and punctured to suit him. |
| 1:25.8 | Just this weekend, he upwardly revised the death count he expects because the self-described |
| 1:30.9 | boardtime president is trying to make it look like he's winning. |
| 1:34.1 | And now I'm saying 80 or 90 and it goes up and it goes up rapidly. |
| 1:38.0 | That's after his son-in-law called this whole thing a great success. |
| 1:41.6 | This is a great success story. How do you cut through the crap? How do you get your hands |
| 1:46.2 | on the right numbers, the right science? One tip, listen to this podcast. Today, where to find the numbers and the science you and your family can use? |
| 1:57.0 | Stick around. Today two Mother Jones journalists experts at doing just this. They're medical science and data |
| 2:16.0 | fact finders and they're here to share their tips, tricks, and stories they've |
| 2:21.0 | discovered from their explorations |
| 2:23.4 | into knowing what we know, and leaving the bad info behind. |
| 2:27.6 | Sindhuja Rangarajan is a senior data journalist at Mother Jones. |
| 2:34.3 | She's an Excel wizard and one of the big parts of her job is evaluating data sets |
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