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December 5, 2012 Television has made enormous strides toward respectability and seriousness in the last 15 years or so, but it's gotten addicted to bloody violence.

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December 5, 2012 The new album It's Okay To Do Stuff pays tribute — sort of — to the 40-year-old Free To Be ... You And Me.

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December 5, 2012 Jimmy Fallon, The Roots, and Mariah Carey perform a stripped-down holiday standard.

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December 4, 2012 It's holiday box-set season, and Fresh Air critic David Bianculli shares some favorites for the TV-lover on your list. "Giving someone a gift of a TV show," he says, "is somehow very personal. You're giving something that you love, and that, in many cases, will occupy many hours ... of their time."

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On Fresh Air from WHYYPlaylist

December 4, 2012 PBS remixes another of its iconic shows, and this time, it's all about books.

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On Morning EditionPlaylist

December 3, 2012 For this week's Sandwich Monday, we try McDonald's new CBO sandwich. CBO stands for "Cheddar, Bacon, Onion," but they have to put an asterisk after "Cheddar," because it's not really cheese. We don't know why they don't have to put an asterisk after "food."

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December 2, 2012 A discussion of highbrow holiday movies collides with admissions of gorging on cornball Christmas fare where Santa brings people love and magic happens.

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On Weekend Edition SundayPlaylist

November 30, 2012 NPR's Neda Ulaby investigates the etymology of random, a word comedian Spencer Thompson calls "the most misused ... of our generation." It turns out that Thompson's frustration is a bit misplaced — random has been around since the 14th century, and its usage shows how life, like language, evolves.

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On All Things ConsideredPlaylist

November 30, 2012 On this week's show, we use a certain Lindsay Lohan vehicle as a jumping-off point to talk about how you make a good biopic. Then, we'll let you know how we're doing on our fall television pool, and we'll close with what's making us happy this week.

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ListenPlaylist

November 29, 2012 Never give a box full of dog — that's our advice. Well, that and a few more things that aren't consistent with how they give gifts on TV.

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November 28, 2012 It's time for the press screenings of Les Miserables. They're embargoed after they happen, but we can share what we won't be doing.

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November 28, 2012 Our complicated relationship with milk may make images of this week's EU dairy farmers' protest more powerful than, say, if they sprayed police with water. For much of human history, says historian Deborah Valenze, we've wavered between reverence and revulsion for the stuff.

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