Underpinning: The Moth Radio Hour

The Moth

Arts, Performing Arts

4.6 • 25.6K Ratings

🗓️ 16 December 2025

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This episode originally aired on December 28, 2021. If you've been moved by a story this year, text 'GIVE25' to 78679 to make a donation to The Moth today. In this hour, stories of tradition, codes, regulations — and breaking them wide open. A foul-mouthed boater, a long-forgotten toy car, and a foray to Florida. This episode is hosted by Moth Senior Director Meg Bowles. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by The Moth and Jay Allison of Atlantic Public Media. Storytellers: Michael Steinberg gets an unexpected case in his new role as the director of the Michigan ACLU. Samuel James looks at an artifact from his past with new eyes. Frimet Goldberger ventures into the unexplored world of a Florida water park. Podcast # 745 To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Think about cheese.
0:02.0	Make your thoughts cheesier.
0:04.2	Now add 100% chicken breast fillet,
0:06.3	Chipotle sauce and Amadea cheese melt.
0:08.3	And it's giving the new cheesy chicken stack at McDonald's.
0:12.0	Did we mention it's cheesy?
0:13.9	Cheese.
0:15.8	Availments at the 4th of Jan, 2026 from 11am.
0:18.1	Plus and participation may vary.
0:19.2	Subjects availability.
0:33.6	Music of Jan 2026 from 11 a.m. Plus, and participation may vary. Subject's availability. This is the Moth Radio Hour.
0:35.6	I'm Meg Bowles, and in this hour, we bring you three stories of history and tradition, or more specifically the ways people are often restricted by these legacies, especially when they're dictated by law.
0:49.6	Attorney Michael Steinberg told this first story at an evening we produced at St. Anne's and the Holy Trinity Church in Brooklyn, New York.
0:57.8	Here's Michael Steinberg, live at the month.
1:02.5	In 1997, I was appointed legal director of the ACLU of Michigan.
1:18.6	It was the honor of my life, but I had considerable anxiety about whether I was up to the task. You see, I viewed the ACLU as being the organization responsible for keeping our country true to its stated values of freedom and equality and democracy.
1:31.4	And it was a tall order, and there's a lot of pressure.
1:35.7	Plus, it seemed like the ACLU legal directors of other state affiliates were all graduates of Harvard or Yale Law School, and many had already
1:46.6	argued cases in the U.S. Supreme Court.
1:50.0	Me, I had been a high school teacher and a soccer and basketball coach, and I did a little
1:56.2	political organizing before I went to a state law school and started a very small private practice.
2:03.1	And I had no idea how it ever matched the accomplishments of my colleagues.
	...

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