Deep Dive: FDR's Fourth Term, Buzz Aldrin's Moonwalk, and JFK's Call to Service - January 20, 2026

Welcome to Deep Dive. I am Adriana Costa. And I'm Peter Rowan. Today we are looking at January 20th, a date that has seen more than its fair share of transitions in power and milestones in human achievement. It really is a heavy day for the American story, Peter. Whether we are talking about the halls of the Capitol or the surface of the Moon, there is a lot of ground to cover. We have to start. I mean, in 1945 with Franklin D. Roosevelt, he was sworn in for an unprecedented fourth term that year. To put that in perspective, every other president had either honored the two-term precedent set by Washington or simply failed to get re-elected for a third. Yeah, it is hard to imagine a president serving that long today. And people often forget that the term limits we have now were actually a direct response to his long tenure. Exactly, Adriana. His fourth term was the catalyst for the 22nd Amendment. Congress wanted to ensure that no future executive could consolidate power for that many years. It essentially codified the two-term limit into the Constitution after Roosevelt's death. While we are on the subject of high-level politics, it is also a significant day for modern leadership. Nikki Haley is celebrating a birthday today. That's right. Haley has had a remarkable career, moving from the governorship of South Carolina to representing the United States at the UN. Regardless of political leanings, her rise as a prominent woman in the Republican Party is a major part of the contemporary political landscape. She has certainly navigated a very complex era in American governance. And transitions seem to be the theme of the day, Peter, because 1961 brought us another major inauguration that still resonates. John F. Kennedy. His inauguration in 1961 gave us one of the most famous lines in history. Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. It was an appeal to civic duty that defined an entire generation. Right, and it wasn't just the speech. The ceremony itself was a cultural touchstone. You had Marion Anderson, an icon of the civil rights movement singing the national anthem, and the poet Robert Frost reciting the gift outright. It was a moment where art and statecraft really met. It set a tone for a more youthful idealist era, though it also came during the height of Cold War tensions. Transitions are rarely simple, are they? They certainly aren't. Speaking of people who challenge the status quo, Bill Maher is also a January 20th birthday. He has spent decades using satire to critique everything from religion to mass media. Mm-hmm. Marr is an interesting figure for our discussion on politics, because he has hosted shows like Politically Incorrect and Real Time. He has made a career out of being the person who says what others might be thinking but are afraid to voice in public. He definitely pushes buttons, but moving from the studio to the stars, we have to talk about a true pioneer born on this day in 1930, Buzz Aldrin. Buzz Aldrin is a fascinating study in precision. Before he ever reached the moon, he was a fighter pilot in the Korean War, flying 66 combat missions. But what really set him apart was his intellect. He earned a doctorate from MIT in astronautics. I love that his fellow astronauts called him Dr. Rendezvous. His thesis on line-of-sight guidance for manned orbital rendezvous actually became essential for the success of the Apollo missions. And he wasn't just the second man on the moon. He was the lunar module pilot who made that landing possible alongside Neil Armstrong. He's now the last surviving member of the Apollo 11 crew. One story I find so moving is that he actually held a private religious ceremony on the moon. As a Presbyterian elder, he took communion there. It was the very first food and liquid consumed on the lunar surface. It brings such a human, spiritual element to a moment often defined by cold science. That's remarkable. It's that combination of high-level engineering and personal conviction that makes Aldrin so unique. Even after NASA, he continued to advocate for human missions to Mars, developing the Aldrin Cycler trajectory to make that travel more efficient. It's incredible to think about the span of history we've covered today, from FDR setting the rules of the presidency to Buzz Aldrin quite literally reaching for the stars. It shows how much can happen on a single calendar day when you look across the decades. Adriana, it has been a pleasure diving into these stories with you. Likewise, Peter. I am Adriana Costa. And I'm Peter Rowan. Thank you for joining us on Deep Dive. Deep Dive is AI-Assisted, Human Reviewed. Explore History Every Day on Neural Newscast.