Watch the full conversation in the video above. And if you’re not already subscribed to my YouTube channel, please do — it helps us keep these conversations going.

Disney caved. That’s the plain truth of it. They pulled Jimmy Kimmel off the air after pressure from the Trump White House and the FCC — and then, under withering fire from all sides, they brought him back. In a way, you did that—all of you who stood up and spoke up for freedom of speech, from Hollywood celebrities to ordinary citizens.

It’s a great story. And Kim Masters, who is a partner at Puck News and the host of KCRW’s The Business, has got fresh info and great insight into it. Kim joined me to explain in detail what happened—and what it says about our media, our politics, and our country.

Kim knows Hollywood as well as anyone. And she didn’t sugarcoat it: Disney was “Bambi in the headlights,” she told me, panicked and paralyzed between Jimmy’s monologues, Trump’s FCC threats, and affiliate pressure from Sinclair and Nexstar. Former Disney CEO Michael Eisner once would have “brought hellfire down” on anyone threatening the network. Bob Iger? He hesitated, and got dubbed “Neville Chamberlain” for it—which must have really stung, because Iger is a Winston Churchill afficianado.

Then something genuine, and genuinely hopeful, happened. People rose up. More than 400 celebrities signed petitions. Comedians across the spectrum — even Joe Rogan, even Ted Cruz — said this was wrong. Regular viewers were outraged. And so Disney blinked.

We talked about what that moment means. Kim talked about covering the Robert Mapplethorpe trial decades ago: when prospective jurors were asked about the artist’s sexually explicit works, even people who the trial lawyers figured were conservatives said, “An adult should be able to look at whatever they want.” That, Kim said, was what happened here. People across the spectrum recognized that the First Amendment was being trampled, and they stood up.

Our conversation went deeper. Into the Ellison family and its expanding media power — Oracle money now moving to scoop up Paramount, maybe Warner Bros., even CNN. Into how corporate timidity hands power to politicians who want to muscle the press. Into the chilling possibility that journalists themselves could be targeted next.

Kim sees the danger clearly: concentrated wealth and political power are colliding with media institutions that have lost their backbones. And yet, she holds onto hope. What got Kimmel back on the air wasn’t corporate courage. It was people power. It was Americans still knowing, instinctively, when freedom of speech is at stake.

Watch the interview above. Then join the conversation in the comments. What do you think? Is Disney’s reversal a turning point? Or an aberration in the corporate submission to Trumpism?

And, please subscribe to my YouTube channel to help keep these conversations going.

Thanks for all your support and encouragement!

—Terry

P.S. If you missed my conversation with Ned Price, former deputy to the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, about Trump’s doozy of a speech at the U.N., check it out here: