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Activists from across the country have descended upon the town of Jena, La., in what's becoming a national debate on racial justice. Reginald McKinley is a senior at Morehouse College, who has organized more than 100 students from surrounding colleges for today's rally.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: This is NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Today little Jena, Louisiana, may see more traffic than its had in a long time - traffic from Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, and more. Caravans are crossing the country to support the half-dozen young black men now known as the Jena Six. They are accused of beating a white classmate, but advocates argue the Jena Six could face prison time far out of proportion to the alleged crimes. Opposition to the way the case has been handled has grown so loud that President Bush found himself addressing the issue in a press conference this morning.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: President GEORGE W. BUSH: The events in Louisiana are - it saddened me. I understand the emotions. The Justice Department and the FBI are - they're monitoring the situation down there, and all of us in America want there to be, you know, fairness when it comes to justice.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: ColorOfChange.org, a national online advocacy group, is coordinating today's national day of action in support of the six accused teens. Morehouse student Reginald McKinley organized over a hundred students himself for Morehouse, Spelman College and Clark Atlanta University.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I spoke with him yesterday as he was beginning his journey South, and he said he first heard about the case, not in the news, but online.</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): I actually was looking through some different sites, and I read a story about the Jena Six, approximately a month ago, on Facebook.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, a lot of people think that Facebook is a place where you go scribble on people's walls and you find people to date. Were you surprised to find something this serious that you wanted to organize around?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): Facebook is a networking opportunity, depending on what avenue you want to use it for. And because I'm a part of a lot of socially conscious groups, I have tapped into that avenue. And so I believe Facebook and MySpace and other things that are actually there are what you make them.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So tell me exactly where you are right now physically, and who you're with.</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): I'm physically in Atlanta, Georgia, on the campus of Morehouse College, sitting on the steps of King Chapel. This is extremely inspirational to me because I'm sitting on the only international King Chapel that's ordained by the King's family in the world, which happened to be on the alma mater of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And we're currently looking to pursue an endeavor that he did approximately 24 years ago.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So these caravans harken back to the freedom rides during the civil rights era. What are your thoughts on that loop of history?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): Nothing that occurred in history appears out of historical vacuum because there were individuals that did it before you were here and that laid the foundation and the groundwork so that when the stage was set, that we will walk right on to it. And so this is that type of opportunity that we are going to be able to walk on a stage that has been set through the works of my mother, the individual work of my community to push for civil rights. And so that is my excitement right now.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, how old are you?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): I'm 21.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So you're only a few years older than the people who are accused of this crime. How do think you relate to them, generationally?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): Generationally speaking, that is - that was the whole basis of this movement. This is the youth of America speaking out. My collaborators have worked hand-and-hand with me with the understanding that this is the youth's voice and this is the social consciousness of us. And - I mean, we built upon that.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Morehouse is known as a place where young men flourish and have a social consciousness. There's also an idea or a stereotype that most people your age are apathetic. How do you reconcile those two views of your life specifically and also your generation?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): Though we are a generation that have felt a sense of entitlement(ph), we still have those individuals that understand that we have a civic duty. One thing that people don't often highlight is that since the civil rights movement, our parents have not instilled within us the drive to fight. And what we are currently combating is not just - not understanding the importance of civil rights, we're actually fighting generational unawareness. If the presidential debates are on and "American Idol" has to vote, you have more voters on "American Idol."</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Do you think then that the Jena Six case will advance people's social consciousness or their willingness to stand up for what they see is civil rights or human rights?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): I think it will highlight that there is something there and greater that has been going on that has been (unintelligible) in the souls of this America I know.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: On a monetary level, there probably are people who support this cause who can't go because they can't figure out the money. How much do the people who are going with you have to raise in order to get there, or how is it funded?</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): The individuals that (unintelligible) with us didn't have to pay anything. What we compiled was a sponsorship packet that we sent out to different companies and businesses to acquire all the funding and all the support that we would need to offer a free trip to the typical college students, the individuals that might not have tons of money to spend to go champion a cause that they really saw as necessary. And we didn't want moneys to be an issue in reference to your hearts desire to serve.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Reginald, thank you so much.</s>Mr. REGINALD McKINLEY (Senior Student, Morehouse University): Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Reginald McKinley is a senior, triple majoring in political science, international studies and urban studies at Morehouse College. He organized over a hundred students to rally at the National Day of Action in Jena, Louisiana.
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Seven solar companies have filed a trade complaint with the federal government, accusing China of dumping artificially cheap solar panels on the US market. But solar installers welcome the low prices. Ira Flatow and guests discuss what's best for the domestic solar industry—and US jobs—in the long run. Gordon Brinser, president, SolarWorld Industries America, Hillsboro, Ore. Dan Shugar, CEO, Solaria Corporation, Fremont, Calif.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're listening to SCIENCE FRIDAY. I am Ira Flatow. The U.S. solar industry is at war with itself because - get this - solar panels are getting too cheap. You would think that cheap solar panels would drive down the cost of solar energy and that's a good thing, but the story is not that simple.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: The cheap panels, of course, are made in China. Seven companies have filed a trade complaint with the federal government, accusing China of illegally undercutting American prices, dumping those solar panels on our market below cost, and they're asking the government to slap tariffs on those panels to keep American factories, the ones that make them here, competitive.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: One of my next guests is spearheading that effort. On the other hand, as I said, these cheap panels are driving down the cost of clean energy. Right? Helping solar to compete penny for penny with nonrenewable energy sources, like natural gas. So solar installers and lots of folks who want to see solar playing a bigger part in the energy equation - they don't mind the lower prices. They say it's good for solar in the long run, maybe at the expense of some local manufacturers, but look at the jobs, all those jobs being created installing those cheap panels and all the jobs around that.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So you can see the conflict. What is the future of the solar industry here in America? Are we going to buy all our technology from China? Does it matter? Or can we find a way to make the stuff here and save those jobs, too? Well, that's what we're going to be talking about. Our number, 1-800-989-8255. You can tweet us at SciFri at S-C-I-F-R-I.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Gordon Brinser is president of SolarWorld Industries America in Hillsboro, Oregon. SolarWorld is leading the petition against Chinese manufacturers. And he joins us by phone. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>GORDON BRINSER: Thank you, Ira, for having me on the show today.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're welcome. Dan Shugar is the CEO of Solaria Corporation. That's in Fremont, California. And he joins us by phone. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>DAN SHUGAR: Oh, thank you very much, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Gordon, let's start with you. You're concerned. Did I define that correctly, that China is dumping these solar panels at an artificially lower cost here?</s>GORDON BRINSER: Yes. SolarWorld, in conjunction with the Coalition of American Solar Manufacturing, filed the petition with the U.S. Department of Commerce and International Trade Commission to really apply the rule of law and hold the Chinese industry accountable to U.S. international trade rules.</s>GORDON BRINSER: And what we see is China is illegally dumping solar products into the U.S. marketplace, eliminating U.S. competition, jobs and really jeopardizing the U.S. energy's security long term.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: But, Dan Shugar, you make solar panels, do you not? Your company?</s>DAN SHUGAR: Yes. We're a manufacturer of solar. We have manufacturing at Solaria in Fremont, California and we also have an overseas facility.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: But you say you're not worried about this dumping?</s>DAN SHUGAR: Well, I'm not saying we're not worried, Ira. I think there are valid concerns that SolarWorld and others have put forth and there's valid concerns on both sides of this. We didn't join the petition simply because we think some of the concerns can be addressed. That would be the measure of last resort, but some of the concerns can be addressed in a less confrontational manner.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And for example?</s>DAN SHUGAR: Well, bilateral discussions about some of the nature of the allegations that are being made. It's important to recognize that the solar manufacturing is not in China or other places because the labor is really cheap. The great companies like SolarWorld and our company have achieved fairly high levels of automation, so the labor content in the panel is fairly low, on the order of 10 percent. So you wouldn't necessarily put manufacturing in China just because there's low cost labor.</s>DAN SHUGAR: I think some of the other concerns around currency valuations and other issues, there's a lot of valid concerns there. So I think it's definitely worth examining the trade practices and looking at it, but we elected not to sign on to the petition to slap tariffs on it.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Gordon Brinser, why can't you make panels as cheaply as they can in China, if what Dan is saying, that the labor cost is only, like, 10 percent of the cost?</s>GORDON BRINSER: You're correct. The labor cost is only 10 percent. That's why we clearly outline that there is no warranted cost advantage that the Chinese producers have. They basically are dumping products because of the illegal subsidies that exist in China.</s>GORDON BRINSER: China set out in their five year plan very specifically to dominate the solar industries worldwide. And they've done that through illegal subsidization of their companies and now we're seeing those companies, they've grown the capacity such that their capacity in China is somewhere between 16 and 20-some gigawatts. Their actual domestic demand is only half a gigawatt right now by most estimates. So they've targeted for the export markets of the U.S. and other markets in the world to basically destroy the manufacturing segments of those markets.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And how many employees do you think are employed in the solar industry here in this country?</s>DAN SHUGAR: We have - so the industry - let's take a step back and assess. The U.S. solar industry today has over 100,000 people employed. That's more folks than are working in coal mines and more folks than are working in steel mills.</s>DAN SHUGAR: Number two, our industry had a $6 billion sort of revenue last year and, of that, we exported $1.9 billion of products, including some raw materials to China and in other places around the world. Our industry grew at 69 percent last year. So while other industries were, you know, in retraction due to the economic situation, our industry's growing, basically adding jobs.</s>DAN SHUGAR: There's over 5,000 companies involved in solar here today, so solar jobs are real. This industry's growing and vibrant. I think the concerns, you know, that have been raised by SolarWorld and others, you know, definitely need to be studied to ensure that we have a fair and level playing field with all international manufacturers.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You...</s>DAN SHUGAR: And - go ahead.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: No. I'm just saying that, you know - but we invented the light bulb here, but we don't make light bulbs anymore. We invented the solar panel here. What's so bad about having other people make them if they create so many jobs for installers? And there's where your labor force. You're saying to me already, you know, that it doesn't take a lot of people to make solar panels. They're made by robots. But it does take people to stick them on your roof.</s>DAN SHUGAR: Well, there is - we're a U.S. manufacturer. We're actually expanding our capacity at Solaria and we do want to have U.S. manufacturing jobs in solar. Through innovation and R&D, we can keep evolving the technology, as we have now. SolarWorld, Solaria have outstanding products that we're offering customers to save money using clean, renewable energy instead of polluting resources.</s>DAN SHUGAR: The issue is - and solar panels - you don't put a solar panel on an airplane to ship it because they have glass in the front, so they're typically shipped by sea. It takes a while. So there is inherent logic in actually manufacturing the panels in the regions and markets in which they're served. So, as our market grows, more manufacturing should be here.</s>DAN SHUGAR: We just want to ensure that currency and other issues are on a level playing field, such that domestic manufacturing is not artificially disadvantaged. But we can definitely compete in the U.S. on the manufacturing side, complementing the additional jobs that are put in place with design and installation and service.</s>GORDON BRINSER: And I think, you know, we do have to point out, you know, SolarWorld has over 1,000 employees in Hillsboro, in Oregon, producing photovoltaic panels, and we've been doing it for 35 years in America, here on domestic soil. And we've been able to compete with anybody, anywhere, in any country, as long as they abide by legal and fair trade practices.</s>GORDON BRINSER: And the solar manufacturing jobs are critical because we're not talking about just the job of the factory worker on the shop floor here. Those jobs in manufacturing resonate and multiply throughout the economy, throughout these communities. We've had communities - we've had eight different manufacturing companies throughout the U.S. downsize or shut down their facilities in communities throughout the United States and those are important jobs for these communities because they basically support other jobs in the local communities; at banks, at restaurants, at - you know, malls and all throughout the community, so they are a very key, important part.</s>GORDON BRINSER: And we can have the jobs. We can manufacture here. We've shown we can compete globally, as long as there is legal practices being done. So we can have both the manufacturing jobs and the installation jobs at the same time and have a very vibrant, growing solar industry in the U.S. that is competitive.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Dan, you - Dan, has solar - have these solar panels arrived to the point where they can compete with - price-wise creating electricity as cheaply as it can, say, for natural gas and nuclear?</s>DAN SHUGAR: I'm so glad you asked that question, Ira. Yeah, that's the real story in solar, OK? People ask me when solar is going to be economical? Well, it is today, and I'll talk about that. And when solar is going to be at scale? Well, it is at - we are at a degree of scale right now. So let's talk about that for a minute. First, on the scale side, last year, our industry - so - and I'd say photovoltaic - I say solar and photovoltaic interchangeably because photovoltaic is over 95 percent of the solar installations around the world.</s>DAN SHUGAR: Last year, our industry manufactured, shipped, installed and operating 17 gigawatts of solar power. Now, for your listeners, what a gigawatt, that's equivalent of 17 - what 17 nuclear power plants put out in the middle of the day. Now, of course, because solar is generating this power in the daytime when the demand in the grid is high and power is very expensive, that power is worth a whole lot more than power that's delivered in the middle of the night. So 17 nuclear power plants in one year manufactured, shipped and installed.</s>DAN SHUGAR: This country has not installed a single nuclear power plant in over 20 years, OK? And the cost of those, especially after the Fukushima disaster, has been projected to rise through the roof. Now, in the same period of time, as solar demand has grown, solar has followed the same cost reduction curve as cell phones, computers, DVD players and so forth. For example, in the mid-'70s, solar cost about $40 a watt for a panel, OK?</s>DAN SHUGAR: Today, panels are between a dollar and a dollar fifty a watt for the panels, and systems - system prices are very - depending if it's residential or utility scale. But what - on the utility scale systems, what's amazing is solar today is less expensive than a new nuclear power plant. We're more affordable for daytime peaking power than a peaking gas plant, for example, from an aeroderivative gas turbine, those - the cost of power on utilities and all the utilities around the country is the same thing.</s>DAN SHUGAR: They're all - when do they need that power? They need it on a hot summer afternoon. And that power from the turbines cost 25 to 30 cents a kilowatt hour. Solar is half that cost. So solar is economic today for peak power in America.</s>GORDON BRINSER: And I think what we need to really understand is what Dan mentioned previously, is we've been able to reduce the cost of solar sustainably and legally over the last, you know, 20 to 30 years. And we've seen that improvement, and we've reached that point because of that sustainable cost reductions. And what we see today in the market is really a very distorted market due to really the dump prices in the market and the artificially low prices.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR. I'm Ira Flatow. But aren't you afraid that - I know that that, Dan, you agree in principle with Gordon. But you're saying don't do it in this method of retaliation against the solar power people in China. There's a different way you believe in doing it.</s>DAN SHUGAR: Well, the, you know...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Because are you going to create a trade war?</s>DAN SHUGAR: Yeah. I mean, that's basically our concern. I - it's certainly a measure of last resort. Yeah. I would just encourage the parties to, you know, sit down and see if a more - a less confrontational solution can be arrived at. I think there's, you know, a number of issues with - that are on the table that are valid. There are valid issues on both sides of this. The - but currency is also a factor. I've brought it up several times. And the solar industry is not the only industry concerned about the valuation of the yuan. And so I think we really need to look at a broad set of issues and have an informed discussion before going to the last step first.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: One of the arguments against solar power, you laid out your case very well, I thought. But people say what happens about storage, better batteries? We don't have batteries to store all that solar energy.</s>DAN SHUGAR: Well, I'm glad you asked that question, too. Thank you. As I mentioned a few moments ago, the utilities are strained in the middle of the day on the summer, so one of the myths of solar is that we need some, you know, new battery solution in order for solar to get to scale. That's actually untrue. I was formally a - I'm an electrical engineer and formally a transmission planning engineer and operations guy for a large utility, so I know how the grid works. What happens is if you look at why all these utilities around the country are overloaded in the middle of the day, and we saw that with the record heat due to the global warming that's happened in Texas and back east, it - the electric power need is actually driven by sunlight because, number one, people are up in the day in that office.</s>DAN SHUGAR: But number two, that's when the air-conditioning load kicks on, and that makes a huge strain on the grid. And the third factor is there's a lot of evaporation in agricultural conditions, so you have a lot of water pumping, and those pumps will draw a lot of power. So what happens is there's a perfect correlation between sunlight and energy demand. And so the demand almost doubles every day. In the middle of the night, it's very low, and then, it goes - it almost doubles in the day, and then same thing happens, it goes back down.</s>DAN SHUGAR: So when you put solar into the grid, solar uniquely matches load. Solar also has the nice attribute of being modular. So it can go on customer rooftops throughout the grid. You don't have these giant systems. You can have giant systems, but they're, you know, part of the solution. And then a third is rooftop and a third is small distributed systems. So it actually helps support the grid. It provides a benefit. Solar can get to, you know, 20, 30 percent of the grid without any storage.</s>DAN SHUGAR: In fact today in Germany, Germany, with half the sun of Las Vegas, is the largest solar market today. And in southern Germany, in Bavaria, there are - in the summer, there are days when 40 percent of the grid is operating on solar - 40 percent, and the same thing is true in places - areas of Spain. They have no battery storage. They're able to operate the grid. The grid is absolutely fine and able - because of this condition where - when as the demand picks up, the distributor of resources are there to support it.</s>DAN SHUGAR: It makes the grid more efficient by reducing losses, supporting voltage and extending the lives - so you don't have to build new transmission lines and substations.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right, gentlemen, we've ran out of time, but I want to thank you both for taking time to talk solar with us.</s>DAN SHUGAR: A real pleasure. Thanks, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're welcome.</s>GORDON BRINSER: Thank you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And we'll be watching to see what happens in Washington. Gordon Brinser is president of SolarWorld Industries America in Hillsboro, Oregon. Dan Shugar is CEO of Solaria. Solaria Corporation is in Fremont, California.
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Philadelphia Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson explains what led to the creation of the city's innovative patrol program, called "10,000 Men Called to Action: It's a New Day." He says traditional policing is not the solution to Philadelphia's crime problem and believes "hometown security" should be considered equally important as homeland security.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And for more, we've got Philadelphia Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson. Commissioner, welcome.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): I'm glad to be here. Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So where did this idea come from?</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): It came from the streets of Philadelphia. It came from the person by the name of Charlie Mack, David Muhammad, Bishop Robinson who had this idea of putting 10,000 men on the streets of Philadelphia to assist in the violence. They, in turn, went to Kenny Gamble. Kenny Gamble is a person the size(ph) of Philadelphia who has done a whole lot for our community and we started meeting. After meeting, we decided to make Mr. Kenny Gamble the chairman of what's going on here with the 10,000 men. And we came up with the name 10000 Men Call to Action - It's a New Day.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): Ten thousand men can be any color - Caucasians, Latinos, Afro-Americans, but the facts are that 85 percent of our homicides in the city of Philadelphia are Afro-Americans. And I think in the Afro-American community, the men have a bigger obligation because they see more crime and more murders in their community than any other person to stand up and be counted. I think we're at the point right now that people, especially in our communities, are saying enough is enough.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You, yourself, of course, are an African-American man and in this very key position in Philadelphia. Do you ever feel like you're cutting against the grain of what your colleagues in other cities would do? Would they, as police commissioners - or have you heard of anyone else - embracing this kind of approach?</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): Well, I'm not sure what they're going to do. And, I mean, we're not concerned about what they do. My concern is make sure that here in the city of Philadelphia is that we cannot arrest our way out of this problem. I said four or five years ago, traditional policing is not working. Traditional police is only locking the people up. That is not the answer. It doesn't matter what our statistics are if people can't sit on their step and kids can't come out and play.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): I will be retiring on January the 5th of next year. On January the 6th and the 7th, I'll be out there walking along with the other men because it's important to me. The only thing that will change will be my title. But my dedication and my commitment to my community will still be the same.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Describe to me what you think these men will do and what you, yourself, will do once you retired. What are we really talking about in terms of walking the streets, in terms of communicating with the police department?</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): We're not asking them to do anything that the police are not already doing. What's going to happen is that on October the 21st, there's going to be a meeting at the Liacouras Center in the city of Philadelphia. We're encouraging men to attend - all men especially Afro-American men. If Latinos want to join us, they're welcome. If Caucasians want to join us, they're welcome.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): The facts are that we would go over what the rules and regulation are, and the fact is that cannot they carry a weapon, there is no confrontations, we're not going out there to arrest anybody. And we'll talk about the things and how important it is for them to be involved.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): On the 22nd of October, the men will report to different schools throughout the city of Philadelphia. At that time, they will receive training. Training in the form of conflict resolution, training in the form of a lot other mental thing -there's no physical training involved. There would be assigned squads with squad leaders. They will go out there with a minimum of 15 to 20 guys at one time, and there's maybe three or four block area.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): When they go out there, there will be a police car assigned to that particular group - that particular squad. That police car would just be in the ear in case something happens. There will be communications there. They're just to go out there. They're called peacekeepers. They're out to solve the peace. It's hard for any criminal to do anything when there's 15, 20 - 15 men standing there right in front of them.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): So we're encouraging all police officers to be involved in this. This is bigger than policing. Police didn't solve - I mean, create this problem, the police are not going to solve this problem. We're not going to do it alone anyhow.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): You know, homeland security is very, very important. But hometown security is just as important. And a lot of our major cities are being neglected. They're being neglected because a lot of the funds that used to come to the city of Philadelphia are no longer coming here. Not just policing - for policing, for jobs, for education, for health. We have been neglected. And I say, again, traditional policing is not working. We will just never arrest our way out of this problem. It has to be holistic type of approach. We're losing people every state and overseas.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): Finally, we're saying enough, enough. We have an officer who's an army sergeant, who has been in Afghanistan, came here, maybe about four or five months ago - a little longer than that - who's mother was murdered here. And he made this statement, which just kind of, you know, hit home. Am I fighting the wrong war? Am I in the wrong place? Should I be fighting here in Philadelphia where my mother was killed instead of fighting overseas for somebody else?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What was the moment that you felt most needed as a police officer or commissioner? And what was one of the moments were you felt a sense of discouragement or despair because of the limitations on what the police force can do alone?</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): Well, I'll say it again, I've been a policeman for 43 years. I've spent seven years in homicide. I've been in every unit of base in the city. I've been in every rank in the city. So the idea is that - and I grew up in north Philadelphia. It was a big town. It was a very black neighborhood. And I see the devastations every single day.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): I see that 9-year-old boy that was shot in Philadelphia. I was at the hospital when they were trying to work on him, brain matter coming out of his ear. I see the 4-year-old girl shot. I see the things that's happening every single day right there on the frontline. So these things are very discouraging to me, so you try to do everything you can to help.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): My concern is not to go out there and make a lot of arrest. My concern is to make sure that people have a good quality of life no matter what color you are, no matter what religion you are, no matter what part of the city you live in. But, again, it has to be that holistic type approach and everyone has to get involve in this.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What's your hope for how this will affect not only crime but the other prospects, prosperity and hope of African-American men in Philadelphia?</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): Well, (unintelligible) told me we have 52 percent Afro-American men are unemployed. Anytime we have, maybe 51, 52 percent in the ninth grade did not graduate to 12th grade. What I would like to see (unintelligible), I mean, people who are working are not committing crime. People who are educated are not committing crime.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): Ninety-four percent of civilians committing crime or not committing crime were being killed not being killed are high school dropout. These things the law enforcement can't solve. You came here for law enforcement to solve our problem that we did not create. We didn't create the social ills in the city for them. We didn't create the poor education. We didn't create the lack of jobs. We didn't create poverty. We're law enforcement people. We can only do what law enforcement can do.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): So, again, when 85 percent of our community are being killed or, you know -seem like almost on a continuing basis, then we have to do something to stop. So whether there's 10,000 men or 4,000 men, or 60 men, whatever the numbers are, we will be out there.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Commissioner, thank you so much.</s>Commissioner SYLVESTER JOHNSON (Philadelphia Police Department): All right, thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Sylvester Johnson is police commissioner for the city of Philadelphia. And he spoke with us from the studios of Audio Post in Philadelphia.
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News of the torture case and the suspects involved has shocked the residents of Logan County. Reporter Gary Harki of The Charleston Gazette explains the ongoing investigation and reaction from the community.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For the latest news on the case, I'm joined by reporter Gary Harki. He's been covering the ongoing investigation for the Charleston Gazette.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Thanks for coming on.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): Hi. Thanks for having me.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So we heard from two of the officials working on this case. Can you break down the story for us? And there are mixed reports about Williams crossing paths with the suspects. What do you know about that?</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): Well, there is a charge that was filed against Bobby Brewster in July. And he was charged with domestic battery and domestic assault for allegedly hitting and verbally threatening Williams at the mobile home, where she was found - eventually found tortured.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, Megan Williams name has been released to the press. That is fairly unusual in sexual assault cases. Do you know why that was done?</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): She - her family - I contacted them on Monday and just to put in a call and say, you know, I don't know if you want to talk to us, but if you do, obviously, we like to talk to you. And they were very willing to talk basically because she - her mother, Carmen Williams, feels that this is a story that needs to be told and that needs to be out there. These are terrible things that happened to her daughter and she wants people to know what happened.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now the Charleston Daily Mail, which is not your paper, reported that Carmen Williams said her daughter Megan was mentally challenged and has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. What do you know about her mental state, whether she may have been vulnerable to dealing with people who obviously didn't have her best interest at heart?</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): I spoke to her father about that as well, Matthew Williams. And what he told me was that his daughter took some special education classes in high school. She also took some regular classes. And he did confirm that she had attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): To what extent that played in her capture or in this incident, I don't know. I talked to a girl that lives on the other side of the road from the trailer where she was eventually found who says that about a month ago, she - Megan Williams - ran down the hill from that home and wanted - needed some help to get out of there and she says she took her to the state police station. And I think - and I asked the girl there what her - what she was like, what Megan was like, and then, you know, was she fairly (unintelligible) and if it - was she sincerely intelligent. She said, yes, she seemed fine.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): So I don't really know what extent that played in this. She obviously had some sort of mental problem. But as far as that being a major factor in this, I just don't know.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: As you mentioned, Carmen Williams, her mother, is speaking and spoke to you. What is she communicating at this point both about her emotional state and about what she'd want to happen in this case?</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): The family is holding a press conference here at 2 o'clock. They're wanting to talk to the media, I guess, a little bit about this not being charged as a hate crime at this time. They have some questions about that. They feel that it should be charged as a hate crime. And as far as her emotional state, I've talk to the family everyday and they seem to be doing better than they were the first day. They say that Megan is doing better and I think as Megan goes, so goes the family.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And there'd been pictures released of Carmen and Megan in the hospital. Megan's wounds bandaged. It seems as if the family is being very proactive in speaking to the media.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): Yeah. They really want to talk to people about this. They kind of have their good days and bad days. I know yesterday, they weren't doing a whole lot of interviews or talking much, I think, just because they were exhausted from the day before. It seems as though they're speaking out a little bit more today.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, you mentioned that they're going to have a press conference about the hate crime issue. There could be state level hate crimes, federal level hate crimes. It - does the community, from what you know, seem to think that this is a race-based case, and what is the family arguing about the hate crime issue?</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): The community as a whole is extremely angry about this. I don't know if they feel that it's a race-based case or not. There is a level of anger that I have - just talking to people on the street, just people you come in contact with every day. There's a level of anger that I have seen in this that I've never seen on any story I've ever reported on before.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): As far - what was the second part of your question?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: How - the family's press conference on the hate crime issue, do you have any sense of how they feel about whether or not there should be hate crime charges?</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): They - I believe they feel there should be hate crime charges. Her mother told me today that she believes this is a hate crime. That they stabs her in the leg repeatedly and every time they did it, they called her the N-word. And that - I think that pretty much that - to the family, that means there definitely should be hate crime charges.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Where do you go from here? There was some criticism by the officials we spoke with that media attention is not helping this case.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): Well, I mean, the case is out there. And there's a lot of interests and then we're going to follow it is as we have been, and that's pretty much where in that sense.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Gary, thanks so much for talking with us.</s>Mr. GARY HARKI (Reporter, Charleston Gazette): Okay. Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Gary Harki is a reporter with The Charleston Gazette. And he spoke with us by phone from Logan, West Virginia.
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News & Notes editor Cory Turner serves up this week's staff song pick: Patsy Cline's "Leaving On Your Mind." This is Turner's last week with the show.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: It's time now for our Staff Song Pick of the Week. Today, we've got NEWS & NOTES editor Cory Turner.</s>Ms. PATSY CLINE (Singer): (Singing) If you've got leavin' on your mind.</s>CORY TURNER: Patsy Cline is her name, and the song is "Leavin' On Your Mind." It's a sad little number that capped a string of sad but popular little numbers Cline recorded before her tragic death at age 30. It's hard to believe, listening to her describe a relationship on the skids, that there aren't more years packed into that soulful, crushed velvet voice of hers.</s>Ms. PATSY CLINE (Singer): (Singing) Tell me now, get it over. Hurt me now, get it over. If there's a new love in your heart.</s>CORY TURNER: Now, I know Patsy Cline's a strange choice for a show like NEWS & NOTES. It's not exactly a new chart topper - far from it. But I guess it does speak to the African-American experience - at least in so far as it speaks to the human experience. Then again, some might say I'm a strange choice to edit the show. See, I, like Patsy Cline, am white. And to further complicate things, I'm also kind of country.</s>Mr. HANK WILLIAMS (Singer): (Singing) All I do is sit and sigh-igh, oh, lawd.</s>CORY TURNER: I really love old country. Back when folks sang about infidelity and foreclosure - not Sunday night football. Back when a Hank Williams yodel could darn near break your heart.</s>Mr. HANK WILLIAMS (Singer): (Singing) Lawd, I love to hear her when she calls me sweet dad-ad-ad.</s>CORY TURNER: But I digress.</s>Ms. PATSY CLINE (Singer): (Singing) If there's a new love in your heart.</s>CORY TURNER: I picked Patsy this week, not Hank, and for good reason. Because like her, I've got leaving on my mind. This Friday, I'll say goodbye to NEWS & NOTES. But I didn't want to go without also saying thank you to our intrepid host, Farai; to my colleagues; and to you, our listeners.</s>CORY TURNER: I'd also like to say that every now and again, we get a letter that asks why NPR produces a show focused on African-American issues. Isn't it just reverse discrimination, they ask. To which I say, I'm living proof that this show, like this song, is for anyone who cares about the human experience.</s>Ms. PATSY CLINE (Singer): (Singing) Heart.</s>CORY TURNER: Oh, and by the way, I'm not all country.</s>CORY TURNER: Unidentified Woman (Singer): (Singing) (Foreign language spoken)</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: That was NEWS & NOTES editor Cory Turner - who we will miss dearly -with his Staff Song Pick of the Week, "Leavin' On Your Mind" by Patsy Cline.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Unidentified Man (Singer): (Singing) (Foreign language spoken)</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: That's our show for today. Thank you for sharing your time with us. To listen to the show or subscribe to our podcast, visit our Web site, nprnewsandnotes.org. No spaces, just nprnewsandnotes.org. To join the conversation or sign up for our newsletter, visit our blog at nprnewsandviews.org.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: NEWS & NOTES was created by NPR News and the African-American Public Radio Consortium.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Tomorrow, we go one-on-one with Major General Walter Gaskin, the man behind President Bush's Anbar success story.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I'm Farai Chideya. This is NEWS & NOTES.
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Rapper 50 Cent said he would retire from recording if rival Kanye West outsold him. Newsweek national correspondent Allison Samuels is back to talk about 50's fate, plus a VH-1 boycott, the disappearing black fashion model, and singer Jill Scott's upcoming release.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: This NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Boycotts against VH1, "The Search for a Black Model," and preview of Jill Scott's new album - here with the freshest in entertainment, we've got Allison Samuels, a correspondent for Newsweek.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Hey, Allison.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Hey. How are you doing?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Oh, my goodness. Oh, you have so much to talk about. Well, let's talk about VH1. There's Web sites, including eurweb.com reporting a boycott because VH1 rejected a reality show with a racial spin. But it also accuses the network of deliberately stereotyping black people to its existing reality programming. So what's the show that they're taking about?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): The show they're talking about was a show about an African-American woman in this interracial love. And I think that was the name of it -"Interracial Love." And the African-American woman was going to be dating a man - a white man. And she was going to be this educated, you know, lawyer woman -something you don't see that much of. And I guess, during the meeting, when the proposal was put forth, someone - an authority at VH1, said, no, that show's not ghetto enough for us. So it's not what we want. And whoever the employee was, which is an African-American woman, leaked that out. And it's sort of gotten out over the Web sites; a lot of blogs have been talking about it. And I think it's interesting given that when you do look at the shows that they do have on, like "Flavor of Love," like "New York, New York," or even "Charm School."</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: If you don't have gold fronts, you can't be on the show.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): You can't be on there. And it's just - and it's just this sort of - I'm amazed when people watch it because I have so many friends that do watch it and enjoy it. And I watch it and I'm appalled. I'm just like, I don't really want to see this on TV for 30 minutes.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: But is there a big enough movement around this to really change the game? Because there's always people like, you know, I think of Reverend Butts of Abyssinian Baptist.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Right. Right.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: He rolled his steamroller over the rap records.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Right.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Doesn't seem to have stopped 50 or Kanye or anyone else.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Or anyone else. And BET. I mean, BET has certainly faced these things, you know, same type of objections. Although I think BET had a better situation like with the "Hot Ghetto Mess." They were able - protests did sort of go on. But that is with the black network.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): I don't know if VH1, who's, I think, bottom line is dollars and "Flavor of Love" has done so well for them. And "New York" has done so well. My thing is, though, if you're going to have those shows, at least balance them. I guess that would - that's what upset me, that you didn't see - that they didn't feel the need to say, okay, let's do this other show and show this other side of African-American women. But in their defense, that "Rock of Love" show is just as bad for white women.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): I mean, I'm amazed at what women will do to get on TV.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Yeah.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): So if - you know, I don't know. But I think, for African-American women, because our positive images are so few and far between on mainstream television, I think it sort of hurts us a lot more.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, let's move on to black women of another stripe, another model, if you want to say. Supermodel Naomi Campbell taking fashion magazines like Vogue to task, saying they're making it harder for black models to make the cover. And veteran model-turned-model agent Bethann Hardison was inspired, and she's moderating a panel discussion today in New York that's going to ask the question, what happened to the black fashion model?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You know, are black women in and out of Vogue? Are we kind of like high-heeled shoes or mini skirts or something?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Well, I think, yes. That's one answer to it. But I also think -and I've talked about this for a while. Once the fashion magazines began putting celebrities on the cover, that was the end of the black fashion morale because there are very few celebrities of African-American culture that they feel or they deem, you know, important enough to put on the cover. Unless you're Beyonce, unless you're Hale Berry, they're not going to do it. And I think that's been the downfall of supermodels in general because the term supermodel doesn't exist anymore. You may have a Gisele, you may have a Heidi Klum, but those are really the only two women that are household names that are supermodels now. And I think that's the disadvantage, you know, right now for supermodels. But…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So are you saying that this is not a black issue as mush as just a general issue? Or how does it parse out?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): I think it's a general issue but because African-Americans in everything. You now, the general issue affects us more because we are more of a disadvantage in the first place.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): There were so few supermodels that are, you know, that were African-American in the first place. Once they start sort of not only giving it to celebrities -and the part that amazes me about that is you see the same five women on these covers. If I read one more story about Ashley Simpson, who I have no idea what she does. I have never seen a movie or song or anything, but she's on Cosmo every month. And it seems to me that the editors would go, let's take a chance. Let's put some (unintelligible) on the cover. Let's put Mia Long on the cover.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): I don't understand what's so difficult. If you're not going to do the models, at least be diverse enough to get the black actresses to be on the covers. But even that is not sort of translating. So yeah, it's the African-American thing, but I do think that the overall demise of the supermodel is in general, and it's just affected us even more.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So we're on a roll - really talking about black women.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Right.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Jill Scott.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Right.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: She is a Philly soul singer, finished her third solo album. It's called "The Real Thing."</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Right.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: "Words and Sounds Volume 3." And the single is "Hate on Me."</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: (Soundbite of song, "Hate on Me"):</s>Ms. JILL SCOTT (Singer): (Singing) If I could give you the world on a silver platter, would it even matter? You'd still be mad at me. If I could find in all…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So the disc comes to stores September 25th. You got to sample it early. Couldn't wait to tell us about it. What it's like?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): It's just fabulous. I mean, she's - and Jill is fabulous. I mean, you can't even, you know, words can not even, you know, express how wonderful I think Jill is. And what I love about Jill is that - I think we've definitely been in this glam mode for a really long time. And I love Beyonce. Let's be clear. I love her. But I do think that there is a movement and a place now for someone else to come along and sort of get some of that spotlight. And Jill is so real. She's not trying to be a size two. She's not trying to be - she's not trying to be a - she's trying to be who she is, which is this great singer, this sort of real, down-to-earth African-American women. And I think African-American women really relate to that. She's going through a difficult divorce, which she talks about on her album. Just the heart breaking, you know?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And in her first album, she wrote love songs about her husband. So it's like a cycle.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): It really is. And it's sad. You know, but who doesn't go through that? I mean, that's the reality of life. You fall in love, and it doesn't work our, and you talk about it. And so I think - and I think Mary J. Blige has had sort of the - the sort of - she's done that a lot. And I - it's good to sort of hear someone else now have that story, because Mary's now -</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Pass the mic.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Yeah. Pass the mic.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): And actually - and I think Jill now has it. And her voice is just so strong and so powerful. And she's such a beautiful woman, but not in the typical way that we consider beauty. And I think that's why it was wonderful to see her on the cover of Essence. You know, in all her glory and all her beautiful - and all her beauty, and realize that that's not the typical size two, you know, cheekbones, you know, just this sort of, you know, African-American strong features that you don't necessarily see all the time, not the Caucasian features that are so strongly sort of emphasized, I think, in mainstream beauty. So I just think it's not just the album. It's just the total Jill that I'm just happy to sort of see come back.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I love that. The total Jill.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): The total Jill, yes.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, she also has been speaking out about music, saying that some of pop music is quote, "dirty, inappropriate, inadequate, unhealthy and polluted. We can demand more." However, we sisters don't always demand more. We don't always ask for more.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Right. Right.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Is her kind of stance on music lyrics, on, you know, music in general - is it going to resonate or are people just going to say stop whining?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): It's so freaky. It goes back almost to the VH1 thing. Because you would think that there would be more people who would be offended by the images that are on that. I think we've just become very complacent. I think we become - we are so used to seeing those negative images that - particularly the younger generation, I don't know if we really even understand that we can say something, that it isn't like that, that we do need to make change. I think so many of the kids, like under 25, this is what they've grown up with. And they think, well, this is the norm. Why would I complain when this is how life is?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): And so I think that Jill's message, I hope we're in the time, particularly because Alicia Keys is coming out as well. So I'm hoping with both of them coming out with albums - I have to say Alicia's new song, I'm not in love with. But, you know, I'm hoping with both of them coming out with this sort of strong, sort of we're women, respect us; we have talent, respect us; we're not handbags. Which is what Alicia Keys was saying. That, you know, now, women are accessories, and that needs to stop.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): And so I think, as long as there's two of them or even three - because I think Keyshia Cole is also a powerful sort of woman. As long as we keep seeing those women come out, I think it will at least demand people's attention for a little while.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, let's take a 60-second pop through hip-hop landia(ph). Kanye, 50 going mano-y-mano…</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Yeah.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: …on the whole album sales tip. Here's a little bit from Kanye.</s>Mr. KANYE WEST (Rapper): I really like 50. I don't want him to retire once my album sells the most. I just want to…</s>Mr. KANYE WEST (Rapper): …say to him, please, 50, do not retire once my album sells and beat your album. Please do not retire. Please.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: That's right, Curtis, also known as 50 Cent, saying that he would retire if he doesn't win on the one-on-one battle that started on September 11th when both their albums dropped. Who's winning?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Kanye is winning, which I think anybody should have realized was going to happen because Kanye has a more mainstream base. And I think that, you know, he's winning like - about 200,000, which is a pretty significant amount. But let's be clear, who's winning? Everybody is winning because hip-hop has been in a slump, and there hasn't been anything interesting going on in hip-hop for a while now.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): And these two guys come up with this sort of, you know, hype beef, this sort of semi-beef or pseudo-beef. And people were talking. And they get on the cover of the Rolling Stones, looking at each other, posturing and I'm just like, of course, there's hype. You would never have seen Biggie and Tupac get on the cover of a magazine, opposing each other and looking, you know, putting on acts. They had a real beef. This is a let's-make-money beef, let's-get-people-talking-about-us beef.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): And it's worked. I think it's an ingenious plan by those two guys because he is, well, you know, 50 has won, Kanye has won, Kenny Chesney has won. Because, I mean, he came in and said I could beat both of y'all. I don't think he is, the country music singer…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Right.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): But he is, I think, he's battling 50 Cent right now for number two.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: He's trying to get in the middle, huh?</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): He's trying to get in the middle, which I thought was cute.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: A little hip-hop sandwich.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Yeah.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): And I thought it was cute, though. But I think, overall, hip-hop has won because people are talking again the - people were really motivated to go out and buy the albums of both of them - and the last album, the last rap album that topped the charts, Common, who sold like a hundred thousand. So you know, 50's at 550 and Kanye's at 750,000. That's a huge jump.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Kaching(ph), Allison, thank you so much.</s>Mr. ALLISON SAMUELS (Reporter, Newsweek): Definitely. Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Allison Samuels is a national correspondent for Newsweek.
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Six white people in Logan County, W. Va., are in police custody for allegedly sexually assaulting, stabbing and torturing a 20-year-old black woman. Farai Chideya speaks with Logan County Sheriff W.E. Hunter for an update on the case.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: From NPR News, this is NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: There's an investigation in West Virginia that's unlike anything local officials have seen. We should mention some of the facts of the case are quite graphic and may not be suitable for young listeners.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: According to authorities, 20-year-old Megan Williams who is African-American was allegedly held captive and tortured for a week. She told investigators that she was stabbed, beaten and forced to perform sexual acts on both men and women. Police have arrested six suspects, all of them white, and Williams' race may have played a key role.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I got the latest from Logan County Sheriff W.E. Hunter.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Sheriff W.E. HUNTER (Logan County, West Virginia): We have made six arrests, including a mother and a son, a mother and a daughter, and two other individuals. And the charges range from kidnapping to sexual assault, malicious wounding, giving false information during felony investigation, and an array of charges.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: The victim's name has been released, which doesn't always happen in these kinds of cases, Megan Williams. And her mother, Carmen Williams said, I don't understand a human being doing another human being the way they did my daughter.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Have there been any cases in your region that approach the kind of depravity that this crime does?</s>Sheriff HUNTER: I've been in law enforcement for over 30 years and I have never encountered this type of crime.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Again, in addition to the victim's name's being released, the suspects' names have been released. Does that, in any way, help or hinder your investigation? How are you doing with witnesses, not necessarily to the crime itself but to their character and to their previous criminal activity?</s>Sheriff HUNTER: It's pretty common knowledge with the people that lived and know these people. They know the type of people they are. We're getting good cooperation from the community. I mean, not everybody that lives in this are where this happened are real bad people. I mean, there's some good people that live there.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Give us a little background on Logan County. But is it a place where there are African-Americans and whites in fairly large proportions as members of the community?</s>Sheriff HUNTER: Yes, ma'am. The African-Americans and the whites get along real well here together. I've lived here all my life and I've never known of any racial tension.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Is there any sense of a motive for this?</s>Sheriff HUNTER: We haven't gotten that far yet. We're still looking.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Why don't you tell us what lies ahead for you in terms of what you and the other officers need to do?</s>Sheriff HUNTER: Well, the FBI is running down a person of interest in another county in the state. We've got some more people to talk to, some more statements to take.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Sheriff Hunter, we want to thank you for speaking with us.</s>Sheriff HUNTER: Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Again, that was Logan County Sheriff W.E. Hunter.
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Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt is the director of "Lumo," a new documentary which shows how rape has traumatized women in Central Africa. The film follows Lumo, a woman who is brutally gang raped in the wake of the Rwandan genocide in 1994. But, despite many obstacles, she is determined to regain her health and her life.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, to a story of hope and healing. A new documentary shows how rape is used as a weapon of war in Central Africa.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: The film follows Lumo, a woman fighting to take back control of her body and her life after a brutal gang rape.</s>Ms. LUMO SINAI: (Foreign Language Spoken).</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Lumo bands together with other rape survivors to heal. We should mention that some of the story is quite graphic and may not be suitable for young listeners.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Filmmaker Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt directed and produced the documentary "Lumo." Welcome.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So tell me about Lumo Sinai and where she is from.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Lumo is a young woman who's 22-years-old from the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. She comes from a small village where there's very little security. She currently is living in a place that's run by militia groups who were responsible for what had happened to her.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): As a result of the rape and as a result of inadequate laws against rape in Congo, her family had kicked her out of her home. Her fiance has rejected her. And she suffered from this condition due to the rape or caused by the rape known as a fistula, which made her incontinent and unable to bear children.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, let me jump in. We have a doctor from your documentary talking about this injury.</s>Unidentified Man (Doctor): A traumatic fistula, there is nothing worse you can do to a human. You would talk about five men, about 12 men. When they tell you the details of how it happened. People haven't work(ph) to them to use material like sticks with a gun being used to really make a lady suffer is the most horrible thing.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So does this affect how her fiancee, how her family treated her?</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Yes, very much so. They both blamed her for, not only being raped, but for her condition. And they blamed her because she was out late at night and it was her fault. And many women there are blamed for other reasons like the clothes they wear or the way they look at other men. And it's a serious problem now being addressed mostly through education but also through a legislative means.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: In these cases of war, women can suffer some of the worst atrocities, but how did Lumo and others begin to heal both physically and emotionally from rape?</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Well, Lumo is very fortunate to have been found by a network of counselors who were - who's role it is to search for rape survivors and bring them to this wonderful organization called Heal Africa, which is sort of an oasis from the horrors that these women have faced. And Lumo joined about 200 other women who have had the same thing happened to them, and together they formed this vibrant community of caring women who nurtured each other, who taught each other how to sew and knit, who really cared for one another while getting great health care treatment and also this psychosocial, spiritual support from counselors of many different denominations. To Lumo, this place was a sanctuary in many ways.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Going back to the medical issues, how many surgeries did she go through to repair her injuries, and how successful were they?</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Well, most women go through one to two surgeries and there's about a 90 percent success rate. But in the case of Lumo, because it was so complicated, she had to go through five while we were at the hospital. And the last one was deemed successful, but I do have a follow-up story. We had a lot of difficulty locating Lumo after we had dropped her off in the village. And for about a year, we are trying to contact her. And so finally, last March, I was back in Congo doing some films for UNICEF, and I managed to get in touch with Lumo. And we brought her back to the hospital and sat down with her.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): After we had dropped her off, her fiancée, who had rejected her from the film, had taken her back because she looked great and she was happy and her family re-embraced her, and she live a normal, happy life for a couple of months. But then the militia that was occupying her village killed her husband, and even more tragically, her fistula reopened and she had to return to the hospital while we were there as a new patient.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): So even though she'd already been in the hospital for a year and a half going through five difficult operations, she was back to square one when we brought her into the hospital.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Fortunately, she has gotten the sixth operation by a world-renowned fistula expert and she is on her way to full recovery. And as a result of this film, someone has agreed to buy her a home in a much more secure area, close to her village, so she can still be near her family but at least will have a much greater sense of safety.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Tell me about mental health care, not just physical health.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): The idea of mental health is different in Congo because they don't have clinically trained psychologists on staff. They have a network of women who either went through a similar trauma when they're younger or just have a strong passion for helping young women.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Tell us about the Mamas.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): They're the network of counselors that I was just referring to. They're a group of women who - they work full time to help these rape survivors resume a normal life and they teach them how to read and write, and sew, and knit, and raise rabbits, and grow vegetables. And they also seek out these women, and they've created this vast network all over eastern Congo to locate women who have been raped and to bring them to the safety of this hospital where these women - if they need the operation, they can receive it.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: There's a quite a lot of singing in this film. What role does that play and what is the singing about and how does it affect the women?</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): We shot "Lumo" over a period of about five months. And in order to get comfortable with the women and for them to get comfortable with us, we spent a lot of time teaching them how to use the cameras themselves. And the nature that allowed them to see, at least on a basic level, what we were intending to do with the film and also open them up to performing, which I never thought would be an aspect of our film.</s>Unidentified Group: (Singing) (Foreign language spoken)</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): And in a lot of these cases, if you watch the movie, what they're singing about or what they're acting is - are the desires that they can't have as a result of their conditions.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): So there's two scenes in which Lumo is pretending to have a baby, which she can't have because of her condition, and then another scene in which she's getting married, which she can't have because of her situation. So in many ways, it's therapeutic for them to sing and to act and to dance.</s>Unidentified Group: (Singing) (Foreign language spoken)</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Is your intention behind the scenes to have this affect public policy either into Congo or internationally or both?</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Yeah. I would say both. I think out of privacy issues, we don't want to show it in the village that - where Lumo lives or in the hospital just because she was a patient and many people know her. But we have managed to show short versions in lobbying groups all over Congo and in congress because the founder of the hospital used to be a senator in Congo, and we believe it's had an effect. I mean, we're trying to work as close as possible with Heal Africa, which is the organization behind the hospital. To back up a little, there's a new constitution in Congo that was just ratified last year that explicitly states that sexual violence against women is a crime against humanity and has a certain punishment, which never existed before.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): But now, the next step is to get that into the judicial system so that the courts start punishing people for raping women. And we hope that our film will be used as a lobbying tool to further this and also as an educational tool for different politicians in Congo.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): And then internationally, we really hope to raise the consciousness of people outside of the Congo because 4 million people in the past 10 years have died in Congo, which is staggering and is the most amount of deaths since World War II, yet the rest of the world doesn't know about this conflict. And we hope that by showing one woman's story, it will put a personal face on this huge conflict.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Thanks for sharing with us.</s>Mr. BENT-JORGEN PERLMUTT (Director; Producer, "Lumo"): Thank you.</s>Unidentified Woman (Actress): (As character) (Singing) (Foreign language spoken)</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Filmmaker Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt directed and produced the POV documentary "Lumo." The film airs tonight on PBS and you can read more about "Lumo" at our Web site npr.newsandnotes.org.
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The town of Dix Hills, Long Island is trying to convert John Coltrane's home into a museum. The late jazz legend spent his last years at the house. Farai Chideya talks with Dix Hills resident Steve Fulgoni, who is in charge of the effort.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I'm Farai Chideya, and this is NEWS & NOTES.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: It's been a good month for John Coltrane fans. Yesterday, the Prestige record label released a new box set of Trane rarities. New York Times music critic Ben Ratliff published a new biography mapping out Coltrane's lifelong musical journey. And to top it all off, the saxophonist former home in Dix Hills, Long Island is joining both the New York State and National Register of Historic Places. As co-chair of the Friends of John Coltrane's House, Steve Fulgoni is a driving force behind that last bit of good news, and he joins us now.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Steve, congratulations.</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Hi. Thank you very much.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So you've got a 501(c)(3) non-profit, you're looking to create a museum and education center. What's that going to be like for visitors?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, we hope to create, first of all, this was the home where John and Alice Coltrane lived from 1964 until John passed away in 1967, and that Alice lived here with her children until 1972. This is where he created "A Love Supreme." This is where he created all of his later work. And miraculously in 2004, we saved the home from being demolish, and it is almost exactly the way the Coltrane family left it. So we'd like to recreate that and make it a very, very unique place for people to come and visit, see where the Coltranes lived and experience some of the music and videos that are not available anywhere else.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So give us a sense of this community. Dix Hills is suburban. Was it a place in 1964 when they moved in that there were black families there already or not so much?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, Dix Hills is a very mixed community. It's an affluent community but it really has people of every race, religion. It's a nice mixed community. In 1964, when John and Alice moved out from Queens, it was really the end of the Long Island expressway, it was far out. But they bought a beautiful home on three and a half acres of property. There are African-American people were on the block then and still are today, yeah.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So when you think about their lives together, and both of them were musicians, we should say that it's not just John but Alice who also had her own career. Take us inside what you think life might have been like inside that house.</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, first of all, the setting was very, very peaceful being a Dix Hills at that time was very rural. They had a lot of space, and they were in the process of creating a studio in the basement where, of course, Alice recorded her first five or six, I think, albums. And it was just a very, very nice warm place where they could create their music and raise their family.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now John Coltrane died in 1967. I understand he spent his last night in that house.</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Yeah, I mean, he died fairly suddenly. I don't think - there was just a one-night stay in the hospital and stomach pains and those things caused him to go to the hospital and he didn't make it. But he was there up until his last day.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now when Alice Coltrane died, it was really only a year ago, and she spent most of her later years on the West Coast. So what happened in between John Coltrane's death and this moment today?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): What happened between - I'm sorry…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Who was inhabiting the house in those years when Alice Coltrane was gone…</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Okay.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: …John had passed on?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Sure. In 1972, Alice moved to California where she lived until she passed away this year. It was owned by two separate families. And through - I consider it a series of miraculous events where the home was maybe rented and things like that, it remained entirely unchanged. There are shagged rugs in the meditation room, the recording studio in the basement. Everything was still there. And in 2002, it was scheduled - purchased by a developer who planned on tearing it down, and that's when I heard about it and started this grassroots campaign, which went all the way around the world to try and save it from being demolished.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Why did you do that, Steven(ph)? What I mean by that is that John Coltrane's music lives on. Why was it important to you to preserve where he live as oppose to other parts of his legacy?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, of course, it's about the music, and I'm a big John Coltrane fan of his music, but more so even about the man and Alice Coltrane personally. Their life, their ideals are my ideals and it - I just felt it was very important that so many people want to be able to see and touch the place where he lived and be a part of that, you know, maybe take a little part of his life with him - that experience. So I thought it was a very important part of American history and did not deserve to be torn down.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Tell us a little bit more about - you mentioned that "A Love Supreme" was created in this house. Tell us a little bit more about that story.</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, "A Love Supreme," of course, is John Coltrane's gift - musically, his gift to God where, after many years - after 1957, when he turned himself around and really started to dedicate his life to being a force for good.</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): In 1964, after a period of four or five days in seclusion, he said to Alice, finally, I have everything. It has come to me in a musical sweep. And that is "A Love Supreme," which, of course, we know today. It's his gift to God. He meditated over a period of days, and this is where it all happened.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, back to the house. Being in the National Register of Historic Places, isn't the same as being a national landmark. So what's the difference, and how did that play out?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, the Parks Department has different levels of designation. Certainly, with what we've received right now, which is a listing on the National Register of Historic Places for both national and state of New York, it is a designated that, hey, this home, is nationally significant. The highest level is landmark status, which this would have been worthy of for sure, but it's typically only one landmark is given per person. And that already exists for the Coltrane home in Philadelphia. That is a national landmark.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: When do you think you'll be able to open the exhibits?</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Well, you know, it's been a long struggle I'll be honest. We - the town of Huntington very fortunately purchased the home and property from the developer for almost a million dollars, but they deeded the home over to our non-profit organization, which is led by myself, Ravi Coltrane, and the family. But we're in the process of raising funds, so we've done a lot of work already in terms of basic - getting the house stabilized because it was vacant for a while. But we're seeking to secure funds so that we can open it to the public. And I imagine it will take a few years.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Steve, thanks so much.</s>Mr. STEVE FULGONI (Director, Friends of the Coltrane Home): Okay. Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Steve Fulgoni is co-chair of the Friends of the John Coltrane House, and he spoke with us from his office in Dix Hills.
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Barcelona is so short of water that officials are planning to import water by sea-borne tankers and to build a pipeline to bring extra water from the River Ebro. Fisherman aren't happy.
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MADELEINE BRAND, host: This is Day to Day. I'm Madeleine Brand.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: And I'm Alex Chadwick.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Coming up, political chaos and violence in Zimbabwe, and the man who discovered and first tried LSD.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Unidentified Man: He thought he was going to die or lose his mind. He had hallucinations. He had a great deal of anxiety, but he also had some of the remarkable perceptual distortions imposed by LSD.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Remembering Albert Hoffman.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: First, though, to Spain and a story about water. That country has been gripped by a drought for several years now, and the battle for water resources in different parts of the country is getting stronger. The area is so parched that Barcelona may have to use ships to bring in drinking water this summer.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: But there is another solution. A pipeline that's being built to divert water from the Ebro River but reports Jerome Socolovsky, that is angering many who live and work along the river's banks.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Ramon Carles (ph) makes his living in the brackish waters at the mouth of the Ebro River. Standing in hip waders as he cleans some clam nets just a few meters from the shore.</s>Mr. RAMON CARLES (Fisherman, Ebro River): (Spanish spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: He points to the wooden structures further out where he and his three brothers have bred oysters and muscles for more than 40 years. Every year they take out around 200 tons of shellfish. He said his catch would be worthless, though, without the fresh waters emptied by the Ebro River.</s>Mr. RAMON CARLES (Fisherman, Ebro River): (Spanish spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: They won't die, but the less water it brings, the less they will grow, he says. The problem with water in Spain is not that the rain falls mainly on the plain, it doesn't. It's that the Atlantic Coast gets most of what does fall, while the Mediterranean Seaboard is much dryer. For decades, Spain redistributed its water with some of Europe's biggest dams and reservoirs and huge water diversion projects.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Four years ago, Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero promised to establish a new water culture. Spaniards would have to adopt their lifestyles to the climate. No more English gardens and arid Murcia or lush golf courses on the Costa del Sol. But with Barcelona's drinking water reservoirs already four-fifths empty, Zapatero's government revered itself and recently approved the construction of a pipeline that would divert water from the Ebro River to the city. The decision baffles fisherman Ramon Carles.</s>Mr. RAMON CARLES (Fisherman, Ebro River): (Spanish spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: I just don't get it. These people who talk about the new water culture, they say no to water transfers and now that's exactly what they are doing, he says.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Schoolgirls in traditional white bonnets sing in a festival in the Ebro River town of L'Aldeya. Many young people leave this area when they grow up for Barcelona and other cities on the coast where tourism and industry have boomed. The people left in the delta fear they'll now loose their biggest remaining asset.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: This water, coming from the Ebro, floods the rice fields of the delta. In the distance, flamingos stand in the shallow waves.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Environmentalists say diverting the river could harm the delta's rich and varied bird life. Head up the coast and the pristine nature gives way to overdeveloped beaches in the bustling boulevards of Barcelona. At the Las Ramblas flower market Carolina Payes (ph) says she stopped spraying the plants in her stall and now hand waters them.</s>Ms. CAROLINA PAYES (Worker, Las Ramblas Flower Market): (Spanish spoken)</s>SYCLOVSKY: I can't believe the attitude of those people in the Ebro Delta. We need water in Barcelona, she says. If it were the other way around, we would show a lot more solidarity. If you need water, you should take it from wherever you can get it. This is just one example of Spain's water wars. Farmers in the dry southern provinces of Valencia and Murcia, where many of Europe's fruits and vegetables are grown, are also demanding a share of the country's scarce water resources.</s>SYCLOVSKY: The government is building a series of desalination plants, including one for Barcelona. Officials say the Ebro pipeline is only a temporary measure, but the fisherman in the river delta fear the government will simply open the tap next time the city needs water again. For NPR News, I'm Jerome Socolovsky in Barcelona.
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In Kenya, violence sparked by disputed presidential elections killed more than 1,000 people, including the young politician Melitus Mugabe Were. He had worked hard to help orphans and his death has left dozens of children devastated.
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ALEX CHADWICK, host: And north of Zimbabwe, Kenyans are dealing with the aftermath of a disputed election there around the first of the year. There have been violent and deadly ethnic battles in the country, and returning to normal life is very hard. Among the victims of the political turmoil were some orphans. Emily Meehan reports on a group of children who suffered a really terrible blow during this violence, the murder of their benefactor.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: George Etola (ph) is a 10 year old with a surprising command of his country's politics. Here he is with his friends imitating the Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki appealing to Kenyans for patience.</s>GEORGE ETOLA (10-year-old Kenyan orphan): (Speaking African dialect)</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Politics are personal for all age groups in Kenya after two months of conflict that displaced hundreds of thousands and killed more than 1,000 people, including Melitus Mugabe Were, a homebuilder, community activist and burgeoning politician. He started Villa Teag, the Nairobi orphanage that George Etola and dozens of others called home.</s>Mr. KUDAK MAGUESI (Orphan, Villa Teag): I liked him because he love children and he cared about people. I feel like, like he was my father.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Kudak Maguesi (ph), a small 11 year old, was the only child around the orphanage during the violence. Were was shot in the heart and the eye by gunmen who attacked him as he arrived at his home. The killing was killed a political assassination. Were, who won a seat in parliament in December, was a member of a tribe deemed loyal to the opposition.</s>Mr. KUDAK MAGUESI (Orphan, Villa Teag): He looked after us very well, now we don't have any hope.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Zaaria Omwaiee (ph) says the kids cried for days after Were was killed. She has worked as the housemother of Villa Teag since it first opened in 2003. The kids call her mom. On a buzzing orphanage balcony Omwaiee says teachers and staff are also devastated.</s>Ms. ZAARIA OMWAIEE (Housemother, Villa Teag): When thinking about him I just cried. Two weeks ago I was in hospital, I was admitted. Because of that I was tortured so much, and I was thinking where am I going to take these kids. He give us love so much. Now we are traumatized.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Villa Teag is in a suburb called Dandora. Mugabe Were was raised there, and just finished an apartment building on the border of Dandora's sprawling dump site. From the roof you can see scavenger birds circling above garbage. Fumes of gas. Stone-houses in rows of shacks. In the middle of Dandora is a soccer field with half finished bleachers - work in progress of the late politician. His orphanage is down a shady lane in a stone building covered with Bougainvillea.</s>Mr. EMANUELLE UMBAI: My brother started this orphanage through community consultation. Because he had been brought up by a single mother, then unfortunately our mother passed away while we were still young, he had an idea of what being an orphan is.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Were's younger brother Emanuelle Umbai (ph) has been struggling to take his place, in business, politics and as the patron of 50 orphans. He says many extended family members have lost confidence in Villa Teag now that its founder is dead. Almost 20 children have not yet returned from Christmas break.</s>Mr. EMANUELLE UMBAI: Our children also saw some of this horrific deaths, so now we are trying to give them a normal life of which they still don't believe is there for them. They believe their life is going nowhere without their patron.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Mugabe Were's family members are trying to find new sponsors. In the meantime, the mood at Villa Teag is anxious. Staff appeal to God, and the children in frayed navy blue uniforms appeal bashfully to my microphone for food, clothes and security. 10-year-old Emanuelle Ogigo (ph) finishes every sentence with a humble thank you.</s>Mr. EMANUELLE OGIGO (Orphan, Villa Teag): My name is Emanuelle Ogigo. This school is so very good to us. And will love it. I just feel very bad because I doesn't want to leave this school. Thank you.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: At the end of their lunch-break, the kids rap about life as an orphan. It's tough. They say they miss home and their parents.</s>ORPHANS: (Singing) I miss my family. I miss my school.</s>EMILY MEEHAN: Like many Kenyans, these kids didn't know how much harder life could get. For NPR News, I'm Emily Meehan in Nairobi.
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The president says Congress is blocking his proposals to deal with high gas prices. He also called on lawmakers to pass legislation to combat the housing crisis.
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ALEX CHADWICK, host: From the studios of NPR West, this is Day to Day. I'm Alex Chadwick.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: I'm Madeleine Brand. Coming up, a hard lesson for hard times, school budgets in trouble in California.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: First to the White House, where President Bush spoke with reporters this morning about the economy and other matters. We'll hear some of what he said, including a response to this - are we in a recession?</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: President GEORGE W. BUSH: You know, the average person doesn't really care what we call it. The average person wants to know whether or not we know that they're paying higher gasoline prices, and that they're worried about staying in their homes. And I do understand that. That's why we've been aggressively helping people refinance their homes. That's why I continue to call upon Congress to pass legislation that will enable people to - you know, stay in their homes. These are tough times. People - economists can argue over the terminology. And these are difficult times. And the American people know it, and they want to know whether or not Congress knows it.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: Everyone cites gas prices as a big factor for the tough times. A reporter asked what Mr. Bush thinks of calls from two presidential candidates, Senators McCain and Clinton, to suspend the federal gasoline tax through the summer driving months.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: President GEORGE W. BUSH: What I'm not going to do is jump right in the middle of a presidential campaign. We'll let the candidates argue out their ideas. I just told you I'll consider the ideas. If it's a good idea, we embrace it. If not, we're analyzing the different ideas coming forward.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: Mr. Bush said there are other options that Congress is ignoring. He said there should be more action on nuclear power and on building new refineries.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: And he returned again and again to his proposal to drill for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR. Environmentalists strongly oppose the idea.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: President GEORGE W. BUSH: People think we can't - there's not, not any more reserves to be found. Well, there are reserves to be found in ANWR. That's a given. You know, I just told you that there's about 27 million gallons of diesel and gasoline that could be - from domestically produced crude oil that's not being utilized. And not only that, we can explore in environmentally friendly ways. New technologies enables for - to be able to drill like we've never been able to do so before. Slant-hole technologies and the capacity to use a drill site, a single drill site, to be able to explore a field in a way that doesn't damage the environment. And, yet, this is a litmus-test issue for many in Congress. Somehow if you mention ANWR it means you don't care about the environment. Well, I'm hoping now people, when they say ANWR means you don't care about the gasoline prices that people are paying.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: President Bush at a White House news conference, mainly devoted to the economy. With a lot more news coming on that subject in the days ahead, the Federal Reserve meets today and tomorrow. It's expected to cut interest rates again.
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You don't want to cross celebrated playwright, screen writer, and film director David Mamet. Although he's 59, he's remarkably fit and an accomplished practitioner of jujitsu. Alex Chadwick visited with him and they talked about his new film, Redbelt.
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ALEX CHADWICK, host: Back now with Day to Day. The disgustingly accomplished film and stage writer and director, David Mamet is know for his brawny dialogue and works like the Pulitzer Prize winning play "Glengarry Glen Ross." He's brawny otherwise too though. For the last six years he's been studying jujitsu, part martial art, part fitness regimen, part spiritual quest, and now part film grist. A new martial arts movie that he wrote and directed opens Friday. The main character is a jujitsu instructor who thinks of martial arts as his religion. The film is "Redbelt."</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Unidentified Man # 1: "Whitebelt" is someone who walks in off the street. Blackbelt is someone the teacher recognizes is fit to instruct. In between we have Blue, Purple and Brown.</s>Unidentified Woman: What do you have to do to get a Redbelt?</s>Unidentified Woman: Unidentified Man # 1: There's only one.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: David Mamet is 59. We spoke at his Santa Monica office, and I wondered could he really physically go up against a man half his age, which is not me, by the way.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): A wonderful idea about jujitsu either works or it doesn't. The central motion is all about body mechanics. How to use your knowledge to counteract the other guys' strength. They used to say that jujitsu is the old man's sport because as you get better at it, what you do is you learn to use less strength.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Will people watching this film believe the reverence with which the - your lead character views the process of jujitsu.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Sure. And did you?</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Well I did because your character can carry that off. What is that that people have there, this spiritual aspect of it?</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Well, you know Bob Dylan famously said you got to serve somebody. I've listened to a lot of interesting talks on AM Radio, between atheists and religious people. And I realize I don't think there are any - there's no such thing as atheists. That the people - I think that everybody believes in a higher power, except that some people for a variety of reasons don't choose to call that power God. But they might call it a force of the universe, or they might call it fate. In fact some people who would characterize themselves as very, very anti-religious, call it my bad luck. Nonetheless, these are all expressions of the human need to understand that there's some force at work in the universe.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): One way that I think that an advance, which is to say, happier way to interact with this force, is to find that force to which one can be reverent. A lot of people give devotions to good works. A lot of people give devotion to sports. But all of us I think are looking for something unto which - something bigger than ourselves. And so, what the film is about - is about a man who is very spiritual man, whose expression of spirituality happens to be his devotion to the idea of the perfect fighter - he perfect jujitsu fighter. And as such he attracts a lot of adherence.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Unidentified Man # 2: You train people to fight?</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Unidentified Man # 1: No, I train people to prevail. Everything has a force. Embrace it or deflect it. Why oppose it?</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: But he's a fighter who doesn't want to fight.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Well, the idea is as he says, the point is not to fight, but the point is to prevail. Right? The point is - because - conflict is a fact of life. We never get away from conflict. So, that one of the philosophical ideas contained in jujitsu is why oppose force to force. What is your objective? Is your objective to bluster? Is your objective to exhaust yourself in endless fighting? Or, is your objective to prevail over those forces to which you are opposed? And there are many ways to prevail. One way is to walk away. Another one is to take the force and turn it to the side, so that you don't have two guys saying, oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah. Take the force and turn it to the side, to divert the other person's energy. And a third way is, if the other person seems intent on fighting, to let him exhaust himself until such time as you can - using as little force as possible, subdue him.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Unidentified Man # 1: That makes you mad. Control your emotions. Control your emotions. Breathe!</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: A scene from David Mamet's new film "Redbelt". Tomorrow we'll continue our conversation with David, moving from jujitsu to other forms of combat like art and politics.</s>Mr. DAVID MAMET (Director, "Redbelt"): Yeah, I wrote this piece for the Village Voice called "Political Stability," because it occurred to me half the country cannot be wrong all the time. That whether one's a Democrat or a Republican, it can't be true that the people wear a different colored lapel pin are not only wrong but savage monsters.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: More Mamet tomorrow on Day to Day.
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Reno, Nevada has been shaking a lot lately, but one resident's agent told him, "I couldn't write you a quake policy now if you were the Queen of Outer Space." The former columnist for his local paper discusses what he'll do if a big one hits.
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MADELEINE BRAND, host: This is Day to Day. I'm Madeleine Brand.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: I'm Alex Chadwick. When Corey Farley called his insurance agent the other day and asked about getting an earthquake policy for his home the agent just laughed and said I couldn't write you a quake policy now if you were the Queen of Outer Space.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: Corey lives near Reno, Nevada, and for the past two months the area and its residents have been shaken by a series - well, a swarm, really, of quakes. Now, here is what is crazy. People are worried. Instead of a bigger quake followed by smaller aftershocks, the quakes are getting stronger.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Corey Farly joins us now. He's a former long-time columnist for the Reno Gazette-Journal, and he hosts a local radio show there now. Corey, welcome to Day to Day.</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): Oh, it's a pleasure to be here, Alex.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: So, how did you sleep last night?</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): Well, between about the 10:57 to 10:58 p.m. earthquake, and the six o'clock this morning when the 60 mile per hour winds began, I got a nice nap.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: How big was the quake last night?</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): I haven't checked. It was fairly small. It shook our house, our old two-story house is a little flexible anyway, but it shook the house a little bit. And then we dozed off, and then we woke up, and the wind was shaking the house to about the same degree.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: So, there was a pretty big earthquake on Friday. Things fell off the shelves, and somewhat smaller one earlier yesterday, but two months of this is going on. How are people doing there?</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): Well, a lot of people thought they were get - we have a number of people who moved here from California in the last five or 10 years, and they thought they were getting out of the earthquake zone. And I understand real estate people are not always reliable in explaining all the hazards of when you buy a house up here, but people are starting to get worn a little thin. Normally you have one earthquake and then a series of decreasing aftershocks, and these have gotten steadily stronger from the 20th of February.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Yeah.</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): It's grinding people down.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Doesn't that kind of suggest something to everyone there?</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): We hope not. The seismologists will not commit because it's a difficult thing to predict, but they are saying that they can't rule out a larger quake.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Reno, you know, this is kind of a gambling town, isn't it?</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): It is, and it's also a very seismically active town. But we haven't - I've got a water heater strap that's been sitting in my closet for five years, and it's still sitting on the floor of my closet - haven't strapped on the water heater yet.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: You're supposed to use that to strap the thing down so it doesn't fall over!</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): I used to write stories urging people to do that!</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Corey Farley, a former newspaper columnist now the host of a program on KBZZ, 1270 AM in Reno, Nevada. Corey, may the ground under your feet be still.</s>Mr. COREY FARLEY (Radio Host, KBZZ Reno, Nevada): We all hope so, Alex. Thank you.
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President Bush is expected to announce the reduction of troops to pre-surge levels, and former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani broke with the GOP line on illegal immigration. Repbulican strategist Robert Traynham and syndicated columnist Dona Brazile talk about that and other top political stories.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: From NPR News, this is NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: President Bush will address the nation tomorrow night. At the top of his agenda: Iraq. He'll likely pick up where General David Petraeus left off in his testimony before Congress this week. The president plans to reduce the number of American troops currently serving in Iraq by as much as 30,000. General Petraeus testified that he could shrink our ground forces there to pre-surge levels by July of next year.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For more on this and the week's other political headlines, we've got Robert Traynham, a GOP strategist. He teaches at George Washington University, and runs his own political consulting firm. Also with us is Donna Brazile, a nationally syndicated columnist. She teaches at Georgetown University.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Welcome, both of you.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): Welcome. Thank you.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Hello, Farai.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So, Donna, reports from the A.P. say that the president was putting the finishing touches on his speech even while Petraeus was still testifying. How much influence do you think that Petraeus' progress report had on President Bush's decision for these reductions?</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): I don't think the president has listened to the debate that's taking place on Capitol Hill. It's clear that General Petraeus came to Washington, D.C. to report that the surge is working.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): What's not working and what's not functioning is the Iraqi government. And, unfortunately, when the president announced the surge back in January, he said essentially that this would give the Iraqi government breathing space so that they can make the political changes needed to bring about reconciliation. Ambassador Crocker, who also appeared before the joint congressional committees, didn't have much news to report, but only three benchmarks - three out of 18 benchmarks, you know, that have basically been implemented, that this country is still in the same place.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): So what General Petraeus argued for was more the same. A year from now, we will have 130,000 troops still policing and open into civil war in Iraq. And the American people have called for change.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So, Robert, what's the message here? The president says the reduction is contingent upon the progress made in Iraq. And you have these two different reports. One by the GAO that says, really, this is not working, and then one from Petraeus that's saying it's working.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Well, I would frankly agree with General Petraeus. Why? Well, because he's on the ground and he's the commander in the field - obviously that is taking appalls, if you will, not only of the troops, but also of really what's happening on the ground in Iraq - listening to the troops, listening to the people that are running the Iraqi government.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): What does this mean for the American people? Well, it means that frankly that the surge is working, as Donna mentioned. It also means that 3,500 troops per month, if everything goes well, will be coming home starting next month. It also means that the president really needs to explain to the American people, in layman's terms, what all these means to the American people tomorrow when he addresses the nation.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): This also means, from a political standpoint, that everyone that's running for president right now, particularly the frontrunners, have a little bit of breathing room right now where they can simply say, you know what, the president finally is listening to us. The American people finally have spoken, and the president has listened, and the troops are finally going to come home. Albeit not fast, it will be somewhat slow, but again, progress is being made.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Donna, I want to move on to one more thing. The Petraeus report has overshadowed basically the campaign. Well, the campaign had been making so many headlines - presidential campaign. But last week, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani appeared on CNN, and the subject of immigration came up when Glenn Beck, the host, said, is illegal immigration a crime? Giuliani said, no. And when Beck asked if it should be illegal, Giuliani again said no because the government wouldn't be able to prosecute everyone who broke the law.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Was this a surprising answer, and does it go against his, you know, myth or ethos rather, as someone who is really against terrorism and is for strong borders?</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): You know, Rudy Giuliani is running against his record as a mayor. He, as mayor, he openly supported the immigrants coming in to New York City. He established a sanctuary in New York City. He said that the federal government should not force, you know, cities to impose penalties and fines. So he's running against his previous record. I - look, I think this is going to hurt him. In the Republican primary he's already hurt, the issue of immigration has hurt John McCain. The conservatives believe that we should have close borders. Borders - fences as high as you could see. And subpoena wise, those that have been here illegal and then send them all home. So I think Rudy, right now, is in deep trouble with his conservative - with establishing his conservative credentials on immigration reform.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Robert, do you think that this is going to undermine him, especially now that Senator Fred Thompson is in the game and he has been getting a lot of traction?</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Yes. Farai, six months ago, if Fred Thompson was on the race and Mayor Giuliani would have made that statement, I would have said he's going to be fine. But now that Senator Thompson is in the race and he's running to the right, if you will, of Mayor Giuliani, this does hurt Mayor Giuliani. And, frankly, I think if he had to take that answer back, he would.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): And this is really not an issue of just what conservatives think. I disagree with Donna to a certain degree. This is what Americans think. The overall majority of Americans want our borders closed, number one. But also, number two and even more importantly, they want to make sure that every single person that comes to this country is documented. It's just as very simple as that. And so, yes, this will hurt Mayor Giuliani, particularly in New Hampshire as well as obviously in Nevada and South Carolina, some of the more conservative primaries around the country.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Would he be able to recover from this? I'm sure he will. But if I'm Senator Thompson and also Senator McCain, I would hammer him on this big-time.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What about evangelicals? Each of you - I'm going to go with you first, Robert - evangelicals have played such a big role in many previous elections, are they a bit cutout now that there is not as much of a traditional evangelical message from any of the Republican candidates or the Democrats?</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Well, that's a very interesting question because there really isn't a bona fide frontrunner right now that really speaks to evangelicals. The only one that really comes close is Governor Huckabee who is a former governor of Arkansas. Mike Huckabee is a minister. He is a social conservative. He speaks their language. The problem is that he's not really catching on as much as he would like to.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Although if you take a look at the last four or five debates, he's also done a very good job of articulating himself and also, pretty much saying, look, I am the conservative in this race. I am the evangelical-friendly person. You need to vote for me. And I think that's the main reason why that he is polling very well, particularly in Iowa and also in New Hampshire and also South Carolina.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Farai, I'm going to out on a limb here, but I would say that Governor Huckabee very well maybe a vice presidential candidate in the sweepstakes six months from now.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What do you think about that, Donna?</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): Well, he's very impressive. He's done a great job in the debates. If you like Republicans and you like them a tad bit conservative, then I'm sure he's your guy. But look, I wouldn't write off right now some of the other qualities second to your candidates in terms of the evangelical vote out there. You have Senator Sam Brownback, who's basically walked the walk and talked the talk in terms of Christian - solid Christian values. I think he will surprise people, as he did in the straw poll, when the caucus scores appear on Monday night, some cold Monday night in January.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Donna, another topic. Senator Obama is making news for an awkward coincidence. It turns out one of his campaign ads popped up on Amazon.com's Web site, but on the page for a new book that's highly critical of the Israel lobby. And Obama has been really delicate with the lobby since making a string of statements that have made him appear less sympathetic to its cause than some of the other candidates. The Obama camp withdrew the ad, even though it wasn't something that they sought, saying that its appearance was coincidental. And it's the haste with which they removed the ad that has a lot of people in Washington talking. So do you think that he overreacted to something that wasn't his decision?</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): Well, I'm sure his campaign made the decision after seeing the ad appear on a site that don't carry his views or his values. Look, Senator Obama who I still believe is in the hunt to replace Senator Clinton as the frontrunner, is a strong viable candidate that must bring together the Democratic Party in order to win the nomination.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): He's out there today in Iowa and New Hampshire. He's running very hard on his position on Iraq, but this ad may have caused his campaign a little bit of embarrassment. I think he did the right thing in moving and if it's not consistent of what he's trying to put out there.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Robert, could this backfire with some black voters? And what I mean by this is that many African-American voters, and of course, there's not a monolithic group of people, are critical of the Israel lobby. Could this backfire with some black voters who say he's bent over backwards?</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): I'm not sure. I think, you know, interesting enough, I think Senator Obama has proven himself to the black community that he is a bona fide candidate that's credible, that is seasoned on their, quote, unquote, "issues." He's also proven himself that he is also a mainstream candidate that, frankly, can transcend, if you will, race and ethnicity.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): So I don't see this going anywhere, Farai. And I think the main reason why is because, as you mentioned, his campaign moved as very quickly off the Internet. Six months ago, a year ago, Senator Obama's campaign probably didn't move that swiftly.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): But, if you take a look at his seasoned staff, if you take a look at, frankly, how much he's grown politically over the last six months, you could see that, obviously, this was a big mistake on their part and they very quickly corrected it.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): You know, I have to say as Democrats, we value the support of the Jewish community and we support strongly as well a valuable ally for America and the Middle East. So I don't want to leave the impression that, in some way, the Democratic Party is not out there supporting Israel.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): I don't understand. I didn't see the ad, so I don't know the politics behind it. But I know Obama has been accused or criticized before being somewhat anti-Israel and he's not. He supports Israel very strongly as most Democrats do.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Robert, is there a fundamental issue? Donna was saying there's a unity there, but there sometimes are a lot of frictions between different demographics in any party. What do you do about that if you're a candidate?</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Well, the only thing you can do is to try to get seasoned staff out that are credible in that community, number one, that's going to be a bridge or an ambassador, if you will, between you in that constituency. But also, too, you need to learn up on their issues and to the extent that you agree with them you need to articulate that and to the extent that you don't agree with those issues, you also need to articulate that. But you need to be very sensitive to that.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): I think that's the main reason why quite frankly that, going back to Mayor Giuliani and immigration, that's where he stumbled a little bit. I think that's where he's going to offend a lot of social conservatives, but also quite frankly a lot of immigrants as well.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): The real issue here is whether or not you really understand the constituency that you're trying to court, number one. But number two, and even more importantly, that to articulate your vision, your views to that constituency in a non-threatening way.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): You know, Iraq has been a distraction especially not just in a -on a broader war on terror, but also in the administration attempts to forge peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians. We have to get back to what Bill Clinton started and what the president and Condi Rice have talked about over and over again. We have to find lasting peace in the Middle East especially with regards to Israel and the Palestinians.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: All right. Well, guys, it's a wrap. And as usual, it's a delight. Thank you.</s>Professor DONNA BRAZILE (Government, Georgetown University; Chair, Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute): Thank you.</s>Professor ROBERT TRAYNHAM (Communication, George Washington University; GOP Strategist): Thank you, Farai.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Donna Brazile is a nationally syndicated columnist. She teaches at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. And Robert Traynham is a GOP strategist. He teaches at George Washington University and runs his own political consulting firm. Both spoke with us from NPR's D.C. headquarters.
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Analyst Juan Williams discusses how anger over the NYPD verdict relates to the presidential race. Also, will Rev. Wright's latest comments help or hurt Obama?
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ALEX CHADWICK, host: The Bell verdict and race again in the national dialogue. We're joined by NPR news analyst, Juan Williams, a regular Friday guest on Day to Day. Juan, welcome back.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: Good to be with you, Alex.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: So how is this going to play in the national story about Senator Obama's campaign and the issue of race in that a front page story on New York Times yesterday.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: It's very interesting since I think it's ghost of racial tension's past. I am in New York today, and the way that the Bell verdict is being played here is one of anxiety over the possibility of civil unrest riots or people acting out, anger in the part of the black community. It takes you again back to something more like the '60s and that kind of anxiety and anger on the street, the potential for it at least. And in the case of Barack Obama, the way that it relates as I think it points out, differences in black, white perceptions, if you think about, for example, this week Reverend Wright, Jeremiah Wright, coming front and center in terms of Barack Obama's campaign. He speaks with a lot of anger and he says he's speaking to people who are really feeling hurt, and his opinions are being distorted and played for advantage by a white media. All of this I think plays to what some people had seen as past racial issues in America and that Barack Obama was America's future, and he was transcending race, and somehow, Alex, on this day, we're very much back in the middle of it.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: You mentioned Reverend Jeremiah Wright. I saw him last night. The lead on ABC News, a clip from these interviews that are playing tonight, Bill Moyers on PBS has a lengthy interview with him. I actually thought this might help Senator Obama because when you see Reverend Wright talking about the clips that have been played and when you see him, he seems like a much more reasonable person.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: His demeanor is just low key. He seems as if he's a thoughtful person and he claims that his words were taken out of context, and again, he appeals to the idea that there was media distortion. The problem here is two for one. The very fact of the interview and the fact that he is going to have a speech in Detroit at an NAACP meeting and then go on to Washington to the National Press Club on Monday makes him now the focus of attention, and it's a focus of very negative attention because you can imagine this is an opportunity for any of the networks to play more of the incendiary clips about, you know, KKK USA or the "God blank America" comment.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: Those are powerful things and I think they have not helped Barack Obama especially with white working class voters, the very voters that he has been unable to get ahold of in his effort to what we in the political circle have said in cliche terms as close the deal, finally defeat Hillary Clinton. When you look back at the results from Pennsylvania this week, what you see is his failure with that constituency was central to his defeat.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Well, what does Senator Obama do now, Juan? Does he just wait for this to go away or does he have to get out in the next few days, make another speech or take some kind of stance?</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: This is the hard part. Exactly, how do you deal with Reverend Wright being all over the airwaves in advance then of the May 6th primaries in North Carolina and Indiana? Indiana is just so critical. If Barack Obama is able to win there, he's likely to win in North Carolina. The betting is, he wins the North Carolina. But if he is able to hold off Hillary Clinton in Indiana, then it would be seen that he really has thing in hand. But, here comes more of these issues just to drag him down. So, if he speaks to it, he adds fuel to the fire. If he doesn't speak to it, he allows the dynamic to stay in place. He's just caught and I think that's the frustration they're feeling inside the campaign.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Remind me never to run for president. Analysis from NPR is Juan Williams, a regular guest on Fridays here on Day to Day. Juan, thank you again.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: You're welcome, Alex.
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Tough words about Iran have been on the tongues of a number of Bush Administration officials in recent weeks. Diplomatic correspondent Mike Shuster discusses the latest developments.
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ALEX CHADWICK, host: From NPR West, this is Day to Day, I'm Alex Chadwick.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: I'm Madeleine Brand. Remember those hanging chads from the 2000 election? Well, coming up, new voting controversies in Florida.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: First, we're going to welcome back NPR diplomatic correspondent Mike Shuster, who covers Iran, a country that is again the subject of militant talk from Washington. Mike, greetings to you.</s>MIKE SHUSTER: Hi, Alex.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: So the people who have had tough remarks about Iran in the last week, ten days, include Defense Secretary Robert Gates, General David Petraeus, who's running the war in Iraq, and Mike Mullen, who is the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Just review what they say.</s>MIKE SHUSTER: And President Bush, as well. When you put all these statements together, essentially it feels, again, like the level of belligerency towards Iran, but specifically towards Iran and its activities in Iraq, is on the rise. Basically, what they're all saying is that they believe there has been an increased pace of Iranian funding, training, and arming of what they call special groups, which are the more militant militias that have been active in Iraq, particularity in Basra, during the fight a few weeks ago in Basra and in Sadr City in east Baghdad. Now, these special groups are generally believed, although not by everybody, to be connected to the Mahdi army of Muqtada al-Sadr. And so, essentially, the allegation is that the Iranians are increasing the pace of arming and infiltrating fighters of these groups, and that they are sowing the mayhem in Iraq, and they are also killing American troops.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: The comments that I was struck by particularly came Friday from Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, because he said then, make no mistake, we could get into another conflict in this region. We have the resources to do that, even though the Secretary of Defense, Mr. Gates, had said a few days earlier, another war in this region would be disastrous for us. But the nation's chief military officer seemed to say, we need to go into Iran? No problem.</s>MIKE SHUSTER: Well, yeah, he said that there were operational plans. The United States, in this respect, seems to be trying to use belligerent talk to affect the behavior of the Iranians in Iraq. It seems unlikely that the United States is preparing to engage in military activity against Iran, although it's threatening to. And it seems this belligerent talk is just meant to affect the behavior of the Iranians. It is not clear that it will.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: In the, sort of, the deck of cards in that region, the Syria card showed up this last week. Also, more information about this building that was bombed by the Israelis back in September. U.S. intelligence now says it believes that was a nuclear reactor under construction. Do the Syrians have anything going on here?</s>MIKE SHUSTER: The Syrians deny that it was a nuclear reactor. There are pictures of this facility. Skeptical experts now seem to think that it may have been a reactor of some kind. The question is whether it was ready for operation, which the United States intelligence community claimed that it was, and there are a lot of questions being raised about whether it truly was ready for operation and therefore needed to be bombed by the Israelis. There are a lot of questions being raised, as well, about whether this could have been taken care of through the International Atomic Energy Agency and diplomatic pressure on Syria.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: Is it a coincidence that the Syria question and issue comes out in the same week when there is this pretty tough talk about Iran?</s>MIKE SHUSTER: Probably not. One of the issues involved with the Syria- North Korea connection and the bombing that the Israelis carried out was whether it was a message ultimately to Iran. And maybe these two sets of facts that we are talking about are related in trying to send a message to Iran that the United States is going to be tough in Iraq and on the nuclear issue, even though action, precise action, military or otherwise to affect Iranian behavior is not so clear.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: I asked you a couple of weeks ago, when we last talked about this, if there is a war gage, where has that needle been pointing. You said you didn't think it had moved much in the month before then. What do you think in the last two weeks?</s>MIKE SHUSTER: I still don't think it has moved much. I think this is a lot of talk and pressure, but I don't think that the U.S. military in Iraq is ready to hit Iran in any sense.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: NPR diplomatic correspondent Mike Shuster with us again. Mike, thank you.</s>MIKE SHUSTER: You're welcome, Alex.</s>ALEX CHADWICK, host: We've got Marketplace in just a moment on Day to Day.
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To combat the skyrocketing price of flour, several Massachusetts bakeries have taken on a project that's part Little Red Hen, part World War II Victory Garden. The bakeries are recruiting their customers to till up their lawns and gardens and plant wheat.
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ALEX CHADWICK, host: Back now with Day to Day. In this time of record high wheat prices, some bakers are taking the do-it-yourself philosophy to new heights. From member station WFCR in Amherst, Massachusetts, Tina Antolini reports.</s>TINA ANTOLINI: On a muddy April afternoon, 40 people are weathering a chilly spring breeze in front of a popular bakery in Northampton, Massachusetts. They're here to learn how to dig up lawns and replace them with wheat. Local farmer Lesley Cox (ph) is providing the crowd with a tutorial.</s>Mr. LESLEY COX (Massachusetts Farmer): Wheat likes hot weather. The center of origin for wheat is what? Israel, you know, the Middle East, fertile crescent.</s>TINA ANTOLINI: Northampton is no fertile crescent, but the pioneer valley does have some of the richest soils in the country, yet no one has grown wheat here on a large scale since World War Two. That frustrated Jonathan Stevens and Cheryl Maffei, the pair of bakers that own the site of this unlikely gardening workshop. As the sort of community-minded bakers who hand out poems with their loaves and leftovers to their friends, Stevens and Maffei wanted to get their flour from closer to home.</s>Mr. JONATHAN STEVENS (Owner, Hungry Ghost Bread): We should be thinking ahead, and as we are, about where the food's going to come from, and do we want commodity traders in Chicago deciding how much our wheat is going to be.</s>TINA ANTOLINI: But bringing local reproduction back was no easy task. Most of the farmers Stevens and Maffei approached said they just couldn't afford to take a risk on relearning how to grow the grain, what with New England's notoriously unpredictable weather. That, Maffei says, is when they struck on the idea that's part wartime Victory Garden, part Little Red Hen.</s>Ms. CHERYL MAFFEI (Owner, Hungry Ghost Bread): What if we have our customers grow the wheat. It's a good way to find out what will grow here.</s>TINA ANTOLINI: Nearly 50 people have signed up to carve a ten by ten plot out of their own lawn or garden to test several varieties of wheat. One of those customers is Scott Fulford (ph). On a recent Saturday morning, he set out to perform surgery on his front yard.</s>Mr. SCOTT FULFORD (Resident, Massachusetts): Goodbye, lawn.</s>TINA ANTOLINI: As his three-year-old son, Max, runs around, Fulford digs up hunks of sod. In this shady suburban neighborhood full of well-manicured lawns, his brand-new wheat patch may stick out a little. But he says losing this grass is no sacrifice.</s>Mr. SCOTT FULFORD (Resident, Massachusetts): This is an improvement and enhancement. Less grass means less lawn mower.</s>TINA ANTOLINI: And less yard maintenance, as the wheat shouldn't require any watering. Maffei and Stevens say it could take a couple of years before they have enough hard data to entice a bunch of local farmers to take the wheat growing plunge, but, in the meantime, they're already envisioning this summer's harvest. They're planning a bicycle brigade of volunteers, going from plot to plot, all wielding scythes. It's like a cheerier version of the Grim Reaper, bringing the pioneer valley's wheat production back from the dead. For NPR News, I'm Tina Antolini in Amherst, Massachusetts.
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It turns out, 2018 was the most volatile year ever for the U.S. stock market. But while the market's ups and downs may be nerve-wracking, there might be less cause for alarm than one would think.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: The end of 2018 was a time for anxiety if you own stocks. The market plunged only to soar days later and then slip again. But there might be less cause for concern than it seems. Here's Stacey Vanek Smith and Paddy Hirsch from NPR's Planet Money Indicator podcast.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: Market volatility is measured with something called the Chicago Board of Options Exchange Volatility Index, or the VIX.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: The VIX - also known as the fear index.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: It's a much better name but a little terrifying.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: And the reason it's called the fear index is because when investors are afraid, they can tend to start acting erratically, like buy, sell - wait. No. Buy. And volatility like we've been seeing recently can be really stressful unless you're Georgetown economist Jim Angel.</s>JAMES ANGEL: I kind of enjoy the volatility.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: Really?</s>JAMES ANGEL: Yeah. I mean, because this is the stuff I study, right? I'm a nerd.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: Now, Jim says this volatility is happening because there's just a lot of uncertainty right now. Like, there's a lot of big, important stuff - feels like it's up in the air, both politically and economically.</s>JAMES ANGEL: What's going to happen with the government shutdown? What's going to happen with trade wars and tariffs? And many people think that a recession is coming. We just don't know how, when or how deep.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: So, says Jim, there are reasons to be super worried. But one of the things that he told me is that volatility is actually normal and healthy in the stock market.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: Jim says the extra volatility that we're seeing right now worries him a lot less than what happened to the fear index in 2017. 2017 was actually one of the least volatile years for the stock market ever. Stocks just did this slow, steady march up and up and up and up.</s>JAMES ANGEL: When the markets are too complacent and everything looks really good, that's when you should be worried.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: So, Paddy, to sum up the first reason to be optimistic according to Jim Angel in spite of all this volatility is that a certain amount of volatility is healthy.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: The second reason to be optimistic, according to Jim, is that when people are scared and stock prices fall, those stocks get cheaper.</s>JAMES ANGEL: It means I'm going to get better prices when I buy stocks at the end of the month as part of my normal retirement plan.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: So if you are saving money for retirement through work in a 401(k) plan or a 403(b), Jim says a volatile market can be good news depending on who you are.</s>JAMES ANGEL: A fall in the stock market is great news for young people. The fact that stock prices have come down means that when they take this month's paycheck and buy some stocks with it, I get more shares than I got last month.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: But this brings us to the bad news. If you're close to retirement, a falling stock market or a really volatile stock market is really hard to deal with because you don't know if you should pull your money out or keep it in or move it into safer territory.</s>JAMES ANGEL: We call that period when people are in their 50s and 60s the retirement red zone.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: The red zone.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: Yes. And Jim says, you know, if you're in the red zone, what you have to try to figure out right now when the markets are really volatile is if this is a temporary blip or if this is signaling, you know, a coming drop in the stock market. Of course, knowing that is not possible, so you just have to guess.</s>JAMES ANGEL: I'm not a very good soothsayer or astrologer, so I would say consult the people who slaughter the pigeons and look at the entrails for a better forecast.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: And don't buy stocks during Mercury retrograde.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: And that is the point, right? When people don't know, they get scared and then the stock market kind of wigs out and jumps around just like it's doing right now.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: This could be a long year.</s>STACEY VANEK SMITH, BYLINE: Stacey Vanek Smith.</s>PADDY HIRSCH, BYLINE: Paddy Hirsch, NPR News.
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There's a new art installation in the Namibian desert, according to CNN. It's six speakers, playing "Africa" — in Africa. The speakers are powered by the sun — so the song is on an endless loop.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: Good morning. I'm David Greene with news you're going to hate me for because - welcome to the rest of your day.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I know we report on this Toto song a lot. But come on. It's worth it. According to CNN, there's a new art installation out in the Namibian desert. It is six speakers playing "Africa" in Africa. They're powered by the sun, so the song is on an endless loop - just like in your head.</s>TOTO: (Singing) I hear the drums echoing...
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David Greene talks to commentator and columnist Cokie Roberts, who answers listener questions about the relationship between presidents and their attorneys general.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: President Trump's nominee for attorney general, William Barr, faced some sharp questioning this week from senators who wanted to know just how independent of President Trump he would be. The relationship between the chief executive and the nation's most influential lawyer is sometimes cozy - although also sometimes tense, as was the case between President Lyndon Johnson and his attorney general, Robert Kennedy. Nicholas Katzenbach succeeded Kennedy as attorney general, and here is how he viewed the relationship between President Johnson and Robert Kennedy.</s>NICHOLAS KATZENBACH: They didn't like each other. They had to work together politically, and they did. But it was not easy for either of them.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: We want to bring in commentator Cokie Roberts for our Ask Cokie segment, where she takes your questions about how politics and the government work. And go figure; many of you had questions about this relationship. And we'll get right to them.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Hi there, Cokie.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: Hi, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. So actually, one of the questions we got gets right at that Kennedy-Johnson relationship. It's a question from California.</s>LEA WILLIAMS: This is Lea Williams (ph) in Santa Barbara. Cokie, wasn't there a megamess between Bobby Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson? How did it get resolved?</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: A megamess - was there a megamess?</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: (Laughter). It was a mega mess. It got resolved by Kennedy resigning in September of 1964 to run for the Senate. And he was elected in November. But the two men really did dislike each other, and they distrusted each other. Johnson was always sure Kennedy was out to get him and keeping the flame of his brother Jack alive to overshadow the new president.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: You listen to the Johnson tapes, David, and the conversations between the two are just painful to listen to. But their problems were personal, not on policy matters, until Kennedy became an opponent of the war in Vietnam.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, several listeners actually pointed out that Kennedy's appointment as AG was controversial in part because of nepotism. Right? I mean, he was John F. Kennedy's brother.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: Right - and campaign manager. And that appointment was highly controversial at the time. And when Eisenhower appointed his campaign operative and former Republican National Committee Chairman Herbert Brownell to the job, there were outcries. But Brownell turned out to be a very tough attorney general - supporting civil rights, recommending progressive Southern judges and then Chief Justice Earl Warren.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: But it goes back to the beginning, David. George Washington appointed his Revolutionary War aide-de-camp Edmund Randolph as the very first attorney general. But Randolph also, I must say, had a distinguished career in government after the war.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, here's a question that came to us about the relationship between the president and AG, not on a personal level but in terms of what the law says. It comes from Ruth Compton (ph). And she wrote - doesn't the AG take an oath to defend the Constitution? She went on to say that maybe conflict exists because the president isn't always protecting and defending the Constitution. She wrote, I don't see this. I must have misunderstood the Constitution piece.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: Well, obviously, the most famous case of an attorney general defending the Constitution over the president's wishes was the so-called "Saturday Night Massacre," when Nixon ordered his attorney general, Elliot Richardson, to fire the special counsel investigating Watergate. Richardson refused and resigned. The deputy attorney general refused and was fired. But more recently, there's the case of John Ashcroft refusing to certify the legality of George W. Bush's domestic surveillance program. And that's a dramatic story featuring names that are in today's headlines.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: The president's lawyer and chief of staff went to the hospital where Ashcroft was in the ICU to get his signature. Mrs. Ashcroft alerted the Justice Department, and the acting attorney general, James Comey, got to the hospital first with FBI chief Robert Mueller telling agents not to evict him. Ashcroft refused to sign, and Bush changed the program.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, that's right, one of the most dramatic moments at least in my memory involving an attorney general.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: Right.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: That was incredible. Thanks, Cokie.</s>COKIE ROBERTS, BYLINE: Good to talk to you, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Always great to talk to commentator Cokie Roberts. And you can ask Cokie your questions about how politics and government work. Just tweet us using the hashtag #AskCokie.
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Gillette has become the latest brand to face backlash for taking a stand on a heated social issue with a new ad spotlighting the #MeToo movement and calling out toxic masculinity.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Gillette, the maker of razors, seems to have cut itself shaving. To be more precise, it ran into trouble when it did not stick to shaving. The company paid for a digital ad that spotlights the #MeToo movement and calls out male bullying and sexism. Now Gillette, which is one of NPR's financial underwriters, faces criticism for its gender politics. NPR's Alina Selyukh reports.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: Over the past three decades, Gillette built a manly image to sell its razors - clean-shaven men, strong jaw lines, working out, winning at work, attracting women.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST: (Singing) Gillette, the best a man can get.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: But in Gillette's latest ad, men are pensive. And the famous tagline becomes a question.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Bullying.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: The #MeToo movement against sexual harassment.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Toxic masculinity.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: Is this the best a man can get?</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: The ad shows zero razors. Instead, it's scenes of boys bullying and fighting, a sitcom joking about grabbing a woman's behind, a male executive cutting off a woman in a meeting.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #5: Boys will be boys.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #6: Boys will be boys.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: The ad is called "We Believe" because its actual message comes halfway through.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #7: We believe in the best in men.</s>TERRY CREWS: Men need to hold other men accountable.</s>TERRY CREWS: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #8: Smile, sweetie.</s>TERRY CREWS: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #9: C'mon.</s>TERRY CREWS: UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #7: To say the right thing. To act the right way.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: The ad went viral, got lots of love on TV and social media. But on YouTube, for every person who liked the video, two gave it a thumbs-down. Angry Twitter users began a hashtag, #boycottGillette, saying they would abandon the razors they grew up using.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: A lot of the criticism is political, accusing Gillette of leftist propaganda and using radical feminism to snuff out masculinity. The ad is also accused of painting men with one oversimplified, negative brush.</s>SUSAN CANTOR: They spent an awful lot of time in the ad exposing male stereotypes and cliches.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: Susan Cantor is the CEO of Red Peak Branding. She says the ad's positive message and Gillette's big financial commitment to support it got lost in the negativity. It left some men feeling lectured rather than inspired. Gillette is far from alone in the Twitter boycott club. Starbucks faced one over its pledge to hire refugees, Target for gender-neutral toys, Nike for choosing Colin Kaepernick as its spokesperson.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: Gillette's parent, Procter & Gamble, is also no stranger to socially aware ads. It got an Emmy for an ad featuring black parents talking to their children about racism in society. Companies are making a bet that having a stance will resonate with core customers. Cantor cited a survey by her firm.</s>SUSAN CANTOR: Consumers really do want companies to take a position and to take a stand.</s>ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: In Gillette's case, that might be exactly the calculation. Startups like Harry's and Dollar Shave Club have eroded its market share with cheaper razors. In a statement, a Gillette spokesman said the company knew its latest ad might be polarizing. And he says the campaign will be a success if people pause and ponder their actions and what it means for men to be the best they can get. Alina Selyukh, NPR News.
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David Greene talks to Suzanne DiMaggio of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace about reports that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will meet his North Korean counterpart Friday in Washington.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: For months, negotiations between the U.S. and North Korea on how to end North Korea's nuclear program have been stalled - well, until now.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: A North Korean delegation has arrived in Washington, and they're meeting Secretary of State Mike Pompeo today.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I want to turn to Suzanne DiMaggio. She's senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. And she helped arrange some of the Trump administration's earlier informal talks with North Korea. Welcome back to the program.</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: Good morning. It's great to be with you.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, we appreciate your time. What are you expecting from these talks in Washington?</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: I think it's looking like Kim Yong Chol is coming to Washington to firm up the details for a second summit unless...</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And he's the top negotiator from North Korea, right?</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: Absolutely. He is Secretary Pompeo's counterpart in the negotiations. He reportedly is going to deliver a letter to President Trump from Kim. And I expect that they'll announce a summit soon.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Any idea of when, where that summit might take place, if there's going to be another presidential summit?</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: Yes. Their earlier report said it likely will take place in Vietnam, either Hanoi or Da Nang, probably in March.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: So pretty soon - what is laying the foundation for the two countries to want to hold another summit? I mean, since Kim Jong Un and President Trump met in June, I mean, has either side actually gotten anything?</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: Well, since Singapore, which is now over seven months ago, there really has been very little concrete progress. It's more or less been a photo op on the world stage. So I think the second summit is an opportunity for the U.S. to come to the table and try to formulate a policy going forward that will actually end up with results.</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: I think the U.S. failed to do the diplomatic work prior to and following the Singapore summit to capitalize on this breakthrough. And we shouldn't repeat that same mistake in the lead-up to a second summit. There's still time to do that.</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: So talking about repeating mistakes. I mean, if the Trump administration does not do the important diplomatic work that you're talking about and if this is seen as another, quote, unquote, "photo op," does it start to get dangerous? Like, you're giving Kim kind of, you know, these photo opportunities on the world stage and seeming like he's important and, you know, in talks with the United States but not having to actually do anything to denuclearize.</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: Well, after this meeting in Washington, the U.S. special rep for North Korea, Steve Biegun, reportedly will fly to Stockholm, where he'll meet his counterpart. And these two people will be responsible for negotiating the details of anything that comes out of the summit. So that's a good and positive development. And that should be a series of very intense meetings over time up until the summit. We'll see if that happens.</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: I mean, on the upside, we've seen a sharp reduction in tension, no talk of fire and fury. But without progress soon, we can see easily slipping toward a ratcheting tension quickly. And that's one thing that worries me. What do we do then when it seems like diplomacy has been exhausted?</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Suzanne DiMaggio is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Thanks a lot.</s>SUZANNE DIMAGGIO: My pleasure. Thank you.
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The BBC reports that Maria Parry searched for her cat for three days before finding it. She climbed up the tree to comfort the cat and realized she was too terrified to climb down.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep. It must be embarrassing to call the fire department for a cat stuck up a tree. But in southern England, it was necessary because a person was also stuck. The BBC reports Maria Parry searched for her cat for three days and found it stuck up a tree. She climbed up the tree to comfort it and realized she was too terrified to climb down. Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service brought a ladder to save the woman and also the cat, named Harry, who's fine.
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Two years ago, Donald Trump promised voters a long list of things he would do as president. As he completes his second year in office, we check the president's progress.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Sunday marks the second anniversary of President Trump's inauguration. And it's no surprise he has an expansive view of his accomplishments.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I have actually done more than I promised. We've done a lot.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Working with Congress, the president did increase the military budget as promised. Other promises haven't come through. A promised trillion-dollar infrastructure program has not materialized. A promised ban on Muslims entering the country had to be drastically narrowed to survive court challenges. A review by NPR's Scott Horsley finds many other promises somewhere between mission accomplished and mission forgotten.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: No promise from the Trump campaign stands higher than his border wall - a gleaming, new barrier along the U.S. border with Mexico.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We're going to have a wall. We're going to have a barrier. We're going to have something that's going to be very strong.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Two years in, President Trump has not built a wall. And Mexico certainly hasn't paid for one. But the president is willing to shut down a quarter of the government to show he's trying. And Andrew Selee of the Migration Policy Institute says the president has pursued other get-tough measures on both legal and illegal immigration.</s>ANDREW SELEE: We've never had a president who's focused so much attention on immigration policy and so uniformly in the direction of trying to reduce the number of people coming here and remove those who are here illegally.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Trump has slashed the number of refugees entering the country, tried to revoke temporary status for the DREAMers and, after a few rewrites, he ultimately won approval for his travel ban. On trade, the president has renegotiated NAFTA as he promised, pulled out of a big Asia-Pacific trade deal and he's trying to drive a hard bargain with China.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We're doing trade deals that'll get - going to get you so much business, you're not even going to believe it.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Congress still has to ratify the new NAFTA deal, though. And an agreement with China remains far from certain. Trump also delivered on his promised tax cut, which has contributed to faster economic growth. Analysts disagree about whether that growth is sustainable or merely a temporary sugar high.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: But there's no question the cut has reduced government revenue. Marc Goldwein of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget says that's one factor in the ballooning deficit - expected to hit a trillion dollars this year.</s>MARC GOLDWEIN: You know, we heard some people claim these tax cuts are going to pay for themselves. Certainly, they haven't to date, and there's no evidence they will in the future.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: As promised, Trump has promoted fossil fuels. And last year, the U.S. became the world's largest oil producer. Coal consumption, however, continues to shrink. And while the president keeps chipping away at the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare, Drew Altman of the Kaiser Family Foundation says Trump has yet to deliver on his promise to repeal and replace.</s>DREW ALTMAN: The core of the ACA is still standing. It's still there. And politically, the law's more popular than it has been.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Trump is also pushing ahead with his promise to roll back regulations, though some of those moves are likely to be tied up in court. And speaking of court, Trump continues to put his stamp on the federal bench, having seated not only two Supreme Court justices but 30 judges on the Court of Appeals - more than any other president at this point in his term.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Russell Wheeler, who monitors judicial appointments at the Brookings Institution, says most of the appellate seats Trump is filling were already occupied by Republican appointees. So the president's not so much building a new conservative court as locking one in for years to come.</s>RUSSELL WHEELER: Now obviously, you know, if you replace a 70-year-old sort of slightly-to-the-right appellate judge with a 45-year-old firebrand conservative, then you're not trading apples for apples.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Wheeler says Trump is not likely to have so many appeals court vacancies to fill in the second half of his term. But the appointments he's already made will be delivering on the president's promises long after Trump leaves office. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.
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Poll shows cracks in key parts of Trump's base. A judge in Chicago will decide whether 3 police officers covered for a colleague in the shooting death of a black teenager. Syria bombing raises alarm.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: President Trump famously said he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and not lose any voters.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, now a survey shows a portion of his base support is a bit less solid. This is from the latest NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll. To be clear, this is one survey. We don't know if this is temporary. But this slip comes during a government shutdown and also after the resignation of key officials.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: NPR lead political editor Domenico Montanaro is here.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Domenico, good morning.</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: Hey there, Steve.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Hey. What are the numbers?</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: Well, the president's approval rating is back down to 39 percent - down from 42 percent last month. And it is the result, underneath that, of some slippage with some key parts of his base. For example, in December, suburban men and white women without a college degree had approved of the job the president was doing. Now they don't. And he's also down with white evangelicals and slightly even with Republicans overall. You know, as we noted, it might be temporary. But the poll does show that the president is not faring well during this shutdown.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Well, the president has seemed to assume that funding a wall, which is his demand for reopening the government, is the most important issue for his base supporters. Could he be wrong?</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: Well, I think one of the potential problems with that is that they also want to see the government function. And Trump's base mostly blames Democrats for the shutdown. But 61 percent of people overall say that during this shutdown, they have a more negative opinion of President Trump. That includes almost a quarter of Republicans, 40 percent of white evangelical Christians and 55 percent of whites without a college degree. Overall, the president is shouldering most of the blame for the shutdown. I mean, that's up from when the shutdown first started. And 70 percent of people - 70 percent - think that shutting down the government to reach a policy solution is just bad strategy.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Wow, 70 percent. So let me ask about this, Domenico. If you follow the president's approval rating over the past couple of years, his approval goes up a little; it goes down a little. Sometimes it's in the high 30s. Sometimes it gets up to the low 40s. It's stayed right in that range. You're telling us it's gotten back down into the high 30s again, which is the lower end of that range. But is there any sign he could be headed out of that range as the 2020 presidential campaign begins?</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: So we started to ask a couple 2020 questions just to sort of get a feeling, a thermometer, a little bit of a temperature reading of what might be happening in next year's elections. And what really jumped out here is that just 30 percent said that they would definitely vote for President Trump for re-election. But the percentage of people saying that they definitely would not vote for him was 57 percent. You know, a president up for re-election normally wants to be close to 40 when it comes to definitely vote for and definitely under 50 (laughter)...</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Yeah.</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: ...For those who say...</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Fifty-seven percent say, no way will I vote for this man for president in 2020.</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: Right. And sometimes these numbers definitely close. President Obama was in a range that was not great for him. Forty-eight percent in 2010-2011 said that they would not vote for him. But that's about the percentage that wound up not voting for him. About 47 percent didn't vote for him in 2012, not 57 percent.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: OK. So that does not look good - at least at this moment, at least in this one survey for the president. Of course, he's not the only person up for re-election in 2020.</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: No, he's not. You know, Republicans in the Senate are the ones who are, you know, taking a lot of the pressure here during the shutdown. There have been a few cracks among Republicans who have come out and said that they want the shutdown to end. But you know, Mitch McConnell - also up for re-election - he's somebody who has really been careful not to weigh in too much. But we're going to see if that's going to continue because a lot of people see him as one way out.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: OK. Domenico, thanks so much.</s>DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: You're welcome.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's NPR political editor Domenico Montanaro.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: All right. Two police officers and a detective are accused of a cover-up in Chicago.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, this involves the 2014 fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald. McDonald was 17 years old when he was shot and killed by Police Officer Jason Van Dyke.</s>UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: (Chanting) Sixteen shots and a cover-up, 16 shots and a cover-up.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Protests swept Chicago after that shooting. Protesters chanted, as we hear, 16 shots and a cover-up - after police released dashcam footage of the teenager walking away from the police when the first bullet struck. Activists say the trial of the shooter's colleagues are spotlighting a code of silence in the Chicago Police Department. And a judge is set to announce a verdict today.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: NPR's Cheryl Corley is covering this case.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Good morning, Cheryl.</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: Good morning.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: How did the officers allegedly cover up?</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: Well, the prosecutors say that all three of these people falsified police reports and they did so to protect Jason Van Dyke. They said in those reports, specifically, that Laquan McDonald threatened police officers with a knife before he was shot. Video from a police dashcam video contradicted that - actually showed McDonald walking away from police. So these officers are accused of three things - obstruction of justice, official misconduct and conspiracy.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: And I suppose part of the evidence here is that Jason Van Dyke - the officer you mentioned, the man who pulled the trigger - has already been convicted. There's no question about that part of the case, that there was a crime. And you're saying that it was allegedly not in the police reports that they filed.</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: Absolutely. And he gets sentenced tomorrow for that, but absolutely. He was convicted. People saw that video. And that video was also a big part of this case, as well.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Now, how - if at all - does this reflect the broader police culture in Chicago or elsewhere?</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: Well, I would say first, Steve, I want to talk about Officer Dora Fontaine. She was a key witness in this case who says she found out that her statement about the case included false comments that weren't made by her. And she says she's had to pay a price for coming forward - that she was taken off the streets, that she was assigned to desk duty. And on the witness stand, she explained why.</s>DORA FONTAINE: Other officers were calling me a rat, a snitch, a traitor. If I was at a call and I needed assistance, some officers felt strong enough to say that I didn't deserve to be helped.</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: So if you talk about the so-called code of silence by police, that's been a real big concern for years in Chicago. The U.S. Justice Department investigated the city, spurred by the Van Dyke shooting. And they issued this really scathing report a couple of years ago, said there's been a pervasive code of silence affecting police misconduct cases here. And...</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: And what we're hearing from that witness is effectively that claim. She's saying that other officers pressured me if I tried to say anything.</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: Yeah, absolutely what she's saying. You know, it's not just Chicago, though. It's a problem for other police departments, too. But this conspiracy trial and the Van Dyke trial have just really put a spotlight on what's been happening here. And there's been really some sustained public outrage about what happens to folks who do come forward.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Cheryl, thanks.</s>CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: You're welcome.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's NPR's Cheryl Corley.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: All right. We now know that four Americans are dead in Syria, including two service members, after an attack that was claimed by ISIS.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, two service members as well as an interpreter and a civilian Pentagon employee among those killed. This is just days after the U.S. said it was beginning the troop withdrawal that President Trump ordered from Syria last month. At the time, he said ISIS was defeated. Well, ISIS says this attack in the city of Manbij was carried out by one of the group's suicide bombers.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: NPR's Jane Arraf joins us now from neighboring Iraq, where remnants of ISIS also pose a threat.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Jane, what are people saying about this attack?</s>JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: Well, they're essentially saying that this really complicates President Trump's decision to pull those U.S. troops out of Syria because, we'll recall, that decision was based on the assumption that ISIS was defeated. And if this was ISIS, the attack, this is probably not what defeated looks like because it isn't really just about the soldiers and civilians killed. It's about the instability. So at one point, ISIS controlled about a third of Iraq. And with U.S. help, they still have thousands of troops fighting remnants of them. So one government spokesman here says this emphasizes it's still a threat.</s>JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: And then we have to mention Turkey, which also gets a vote in this. The Turkish government issued a statement after the attack, saying that they wanted to press ahead with an agreement with the U.S. for military action in Manbij, that agreement from last year. The Turks, though, are in a campaign against a Syrian-Turkish group that they consider terrorists. So they're actually seen as potentially part of the problem rather than the solution here.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Let me just ask; the reason that we think that ISIS is responsible for this attack is only because ISIS said so. Is it clear that ISIS did commit this attack that it claims?</s>JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: It's not clear, no. But we have to point out, too, this is a hallmark - a particularly effective one - of ISIS, the suicide vest. You know, at one point in Iraq, forces here - security forces were facing dozens of suicide bombings with suicide vests every day. So I spoke to a senior U.S. military official who doesn't want to speak publicly who says it's too early to say because they're still investigating but also because there are claims of responsibility emerging from other groups. And there, that's particularly tricky because there are all those other theories floating around not based on evidence.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Now, we have to mention that on...</s>JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: And there's no word yet on what the White House thinks.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Well, now we have to mention that at about the same time or on the same day as we learned of this attack, we heard from Vice President Mike Pence, who gave the standard administration statement about this. Let's listen to a bit of that.</s>VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE: The caliphate has crumbled, and ISIS has been defeated.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: OK. Obviously not defeated or not fully defeated - but ISIS has been substantially reduced. Is it fair to say that much, Jane?</s>JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: So absolutely fair to say it's been substantially reduced. Now, Pence went on in a tweet later to say they've crushed the ISIS caliphate and devastated its capabilities. So yes, they have crushed the physical caliphate. But the point is - and that's the point shared by his own military people - they haven't eliminated ISIS as a threat. And that's really what we're talking about here, the potential to regenerate and launch attacks like this, which are incredibly destabilizing and feed on the tension between various groups in a very complicated region.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's NPR's Jane Arraf.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Jane, thanks so much.</s>JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: Thank you.
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For a new podcast, member station WNYC has been asking: What scares you? Samin Nosrat, the Iranian-American food writer behind the cookbook, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, talks about some of her fears.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Having courage doesn't mean that you're fearless. It means that you overcome your fears. Our member station WNYC has been asking people to name their fears, and we're sharing some. Today we hear from Samin Nosrat. She's the Iranian-American food writer behind the influential book, "Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat." And here are some of her fears.</s>SAMIN NOSRAT: That the color of my skin will bring harm upon me. I've always been aware of being different, but I wasn't really aware of any sort of threat to my physical person because of the way I look until September 2001. At that time, I used to wear this agate necklace, and it had the Arabic names of, like, the five main prophets of Islam on there. And so I remember I got a flat tire a few days later, and the guy who was changing my tire was black. And he was like, oh, what's on your necklace? And I told him. And he was like, you've got to put that away. It's not safe to look like you look anymore.</s>SAMIN NOSRAT: That no one will ever love me just as I am. There are a lot of etiquettes built into the way that Iranians relate to other people and other Iranians, and one of them is called taarof. So to taarof can mean something as simple as, if somebody offers you a cup of tea and you want it, you must first say no. And you might actually want the tea, but you just have to appear to not want the tea. Like, I had to actually have my therapist go watch videos of it so he could understand me and my culture. But, like, there's videos on YouTube of, like, Iranian parents training their kids. Like, here's a cookie. Do you want it? And the kid will be like, yes. And then the parent's like, no, no - you have to say no. (Laughter). And so it's this really complicated, like, brainwashing that I'm trying to unravel, but it is still something that controls me and probably will control me, you know, until I die.</s>SAMIN NOSRAT: That I will get cancer. I had a sister born with a kind of a brain tumor that children can't survive. So she passed away when she was 3, and I was a baby. And in a lot of ways, that loss has affected my family life. And I think my mom always was guided by, like, things that she heard or thought could cause cancer and kept those things away from us. So, like, we never had a microwave. So I think that that's always been a little bit there in the back of my mind.</s>SAMIN NOSRAT: I'll never find love. I - yeah, I don't have a long - let's put it this way. (Laughter). My professional resume is much longer and more filled out than my personal one.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Food writer Samin Nosrat. And you can hear the rest of her fears and other episodes whenever you listen to podcasts, wherever you listen to podcasts. Ten Things That Scare Me comes from WNYC Studios.
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During the Great Recession, the state sold its capitol and other buildings in a sale-lease-back deal to raise money. Nearly a decade later, the state has a plan to reclaim the buildings.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep with congratulations to Arizona, which is buying back its own state capitol building. During the Great Recession, the state sold the capitol and other buildings to raise money. Think of the math. The state raised $700 million in the short term, then it leased the buildings back, promising rent payments projected to total far more than the sale price - free enterprise. A decade later, the state is borrowing money to buy the capitol back.
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Steve King is stripped of House committee assignments. Confirmation hearings begin Tuesday for Attorney General nominee Barr. And, the big Brexit vote takes place in Britain's Parliament Tuesday.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Punishment in Congress has been a long time coming for Republican Steve King.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah. Long before his latest troubles, the Iowa congressman had a history of remarks about immigrants and about people of color. He referred to people from Mexico as, quote, "dirt." He endorsed a political candidate linked with neo-Nazis, saying she supports, quote, "Western civilization" and, quote, "our values." He narrowly won re-election last fall amid questions about his views of Jews and others.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Now House Republicans have stripped him of his committee assignments after he questioned why white supremacy is offensive. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy announced this move following a meeting of the Republican Steering Committee.</s>KEVIN MCCARTHY: It was a unanimous decision from steering in light of the comments.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Iowa Public Radio's Clay Masters has followed King's career for years and is on the line.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Hi there, Clay.</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: Good morning, Steve.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: I got a question here of fact. Critics of this move have essentially said - OK, so Republicans are acting, but why would they even bother because they have looked the other way to so many remarks in the past? If you follow Steve King for years as you have - his career for years, is it true that he talks this way all the time?</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: He does. Covering Congressman King over the years, he has a history of saying offensive things. I mean, I have a running list of them. We could go over them. It'd take up quite a bit of time. But top Republicans in the state, time after time again - from the governor to the party chair and the U.S. Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst - then regularly call out these remarks and say it does not represent their values. But that's kind of where it stopped. And now it's a new Congress. And it's getting much more mainstream attention, I think largely because these comments were published in The New York Times. New Utah Republican Senator Mitt Romney, the onetime Republican presidential candidate, even called on King to step down.</s>MITT ROMNEY: He ought to resign and move on and let someone else, who represents American values, take his seat.</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: And a big one - Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post saying silence on this kind of rhetoric damages the party. And Scott's seen as a rising star in the GOP by many.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: And we should just mention Tim Scott is African-American - one of relatively few top officials on the Republican side who are African-American - so his words carry a bit of extra weight in a situation like this. Now, we mentioned that King is being stripped of his committee assignments. What does that mean exactly?</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: Well, Congressman King was on the agriculture committee and the judiciary committee - I'm sure you're aware agriculture is a big industry in Iowa and especially in the district he represents - the judiciary committee, which has jurisdiction over immigration, voting rights, impeachment, these kinds of things, and the small business committee. And then again, you know, this was a unanimous decision from the steering committee, as you mentioned.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Didn't Steve King take to the floor of the House the other day and say, wait a minute, my remarks - he didn't say he was misquoted quite precisely, but he suggested there was something wrong about - he made the mistake of talking to the media and that he was misunderstood in some fashion.</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: Yeah. He says the quote was mischaracterized in The New York Times. And reports have shown him walking out of the meeting with Representative McCarthy in silence. I'm in Des Moines, not in D.C., so I saw it on Twitter and not in person. But he walked to the elevator while news media followed him asking questions, and he really didn't say a word. Again, he says the quote was mischaracterized. And he also says, in the statement that he released yesterday, he will continue to point out the truth and work with all the vigor that he has to represent the district for at least the next two years.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Although when we say point out the truth, we should underline - remark after remark after remark over years from Steve King suggests his basic beliefs are that Western civilization is threatened by immigration, that it has something to do with birthrates, that people from different countries can't uphold it. These are things he's said again and again and again, right?</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: That's right.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Clay, thanks so much. Really appreciate it.</s>CLAY MASTERS, BYLINE: All right. Thank you, Steve.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's Clay Masters of Iowa Public Radio.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: William Barr faces questions before the Senate today. His hearing for the post of attorney general underlines the complexities of the job he is seeking because, in effect, he would have multiple masters.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah. That's a good way to put it because under the Constitution, he is appointed by the president. But he has to be confirmed by the Senate. He's answerable to Congress. And above all, he is supposed to enforce the law in this job. Now, senators want to know how Barr will handle these conflicting forces. If he's confirmed, he would oversee the special counsel's investigation of Russian involvement in U.S. politics, an investigation that is increasingly involving his boss. Now, we should say, Barr was attorney general once before, but that was a much less troubled time.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas is covering his effort to become attorney general once again. He's in our studios.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Ryan, good morning.</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Good morning.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: What do we need to know about the background of William Barr?</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Well, he is very much an establishment Republican lawyer. As you said, he served as attorney general once before. That was from 1991 to 1993. So he would bring experience to the job. He also held other senior positions at the Justice Department, including the head of the Office of Legal Counsel as well as deputy attorney general. So he knows the institution. And people who worked there with him say that he does care deeply about the Justice Department. He would be taking over from acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker who stepped in on a temporary basis after then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions stepped down under a lot of pressure from the White House.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That resume would make him sound like a noncontroversial choice at a controversial moment - except for some remarks that he has made about the special counsel's investigation. What has he said?</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Well, this is really going to be the focus of these confirmation hearings for Democrats in their questions for Barr. And what he said that has really grabbed Democrats' attention is there's an unsolicited memo that Barr wrote, basically, last year to the Justice Department. And in that memo, he essentially says that Mueller would be wrong to pursue an obstruction of justice case against Trump tied to Trump's firing of then-FBI Director James Comey.</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Now, we learned last night from a letter that Barr sent to the committee chairman that Barr shared that memo or discussed it with several people, including many of President Trump's lawyers as well as the man who is now the White House counsel. Now, Barr was a private citizen at the time that he wrote the memo. He says the memo was based solely on information that was in the media, that he wrote it on his own. Still, for many Democrats, some have said that they want Barr to recuse himself from overseeing the Mueller investigation. They've called, at a minimum, for him to commit to allow it to proceed unimpeded. And they want him to promise to release to Congress and the American public the final report that Mueller's expected to...</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: OK. That's a list - recuse yourself, stay out of the investigation and release this public report or make sure the report becomes public. Is he likely to do those things?</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Some of them perhaps - but he's very unlikely to recuse himself. That's something that Sessions came under a lot of pressure from the president for doing. In a copy of Barr's written testimony that was released yesterday, Barr stops well short of recusing himself. He does say, though, that it's vitally important that Mueller be allowed to finish this investigation. He says the country needs answers. He vowed to be independent, not to interfere in Mueller's probe. And he said the public and Congress need to be informed of Mueller's results. He said his goal was to be as transparent as he can consistent with the law. And that, of course, fell far short of what Democrats wanted to hear.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Can Democrats stop him if they choose to?</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: The math is very much on the side of the GOP. They do have the numbers to get get him confirmed. And GOP support at this point has been quite solid.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: NPR's Ryan Lucas, we'll be listening for your reporting as the confirmation hearings go forward. Thanks.</s>RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Thank you.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: OK. The big vote on Brexit is supposed to take place, finally, in Parliament today.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah. And it is not looking good at all for Prime Minister Theresa May. The unpopular deal on the table is expected to fail in a Parliament vote. In a last push to sell her plan, May warned of dire consequences if this doesn't pass.</s>PRIME MINISTER THERESA MAY: Fail and we face the risk of leaving without a deal or the even bigger risk of not leaving at all.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: NPR's Frank Langfitt is covering this drama from London. Hi there, Frank.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Hi, Steve.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: OK. When last you discussed this vote with us some weeks ago, it was put off because losing would be such a total disaster for Theresa May. Did she make any progress in the last hours toward avoiding defeat this time?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: I don't think people think so. You know, Parliament's had a long time to think this through. And it looks like there's a lot of opposition. We just don't know exactly how much. The vote's going to be at 7 p.m. London time, 2 p.m. Washington time. And the question really is how much she does lose by and then what the implications of that. If it's 20-30, which an MP estimated to me on Friday - although that seems generous - she could try to go back to the EU and get more concessions. But that doesn't seem very likely since Brussels been saying for weeks, no more negotiations.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: If it's a larger number, you know, Brexit process could go in any number of directions. The U.K. could try to delay it. They could walk away from the EU, which she was just talking about there, and pay the economic price. Or the big thing would be - you know, do you take Brexit back to the people for a second referendum?</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: And just say - oh, gosh - nevermind. Let's...</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Not even nevermind, Steve, but more like - hey, you want to think this one through again?</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: (Laughter) Is that really possible?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: It is possible. If you asked me six weeks ago, I would've probably said, nah, it's not going to happen. But this has been such a mess. And I think, also, it's gone so badly in terms of the political process that more and more members of Parliament - who, remember, were always kind of for remaining in the EU to begin with - are talking about this. But tonight, depending on what happens, I mean, the country could head in any number of directions.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Now, that is an interesting point, Frank Langfitt. We have a bunch of lawmakers who are going to vote down a Brexit deal - at least according to the prognosticators. And a lot of them, you're pointing out, if you ask them privately...</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Oh, yeah.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: ...They don't favor Brexit at all.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: No, they didn't. You had a split in the country in 2016. It was 52-48 in the populace, the people who voted, to leave. But it was very well known that members of Parliament did not want to leave the European Union. And the reason for that is there have been a lot of economic benefits, of course, and also, it would take this island nation out of a gigantic trading bloc, which is an enormous economy that gives them a lot of leverage economically in terms of cutting trade deals.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Has the polling support for Brexit been sustained even amid all of this revelation of how difficult it is? Is there still about half the country, give or take, that's for this?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: You know, that's a great question, Steve. But I think people would say there's been a split now that it's gone 52 to remain, 48 to leave. But people are so concerned about another vote and that it would be antidemocratic that even Remainers might vote to leave because they would agree with the Prime Minister that it's just not fair. You don't redo - you don't get do-overs in democracy.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Wow.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Frank, thanks for the update. Really appreciate it.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Happy to do it.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's NPR's Frank Langfitt.
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The British parliament votes Tuesday on the deal. Theresa May warns rejecting her plan opens up the possibility of Brexit being stopped, or that Britain leaves the EU without a deal.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit plan is facing a huge vote today, and it is not looking good for her. In a last push to sell her plan, the prime minister warned of dire consequences if this does not pass.</s>PRIME MINISTER THERESA MAY: Fail, and we risk - face the risk of leaving without a deal or the even bigger risk of not leaving at all.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Let's bring in NPR's Frank Langfitt from London. Hi there, Frank.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Hey, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: OK. So in the long journey that is Brexit, tell us what exactly is happening today.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah, sure. Parliament is expected to vote down vote the deal, as you mentioned. And the question is going to be, what's the margin of defeat? If it's 20 or 30 - and I was talking to one MP who estimated this to me on Friday; frankly, I think that's a bit generous - the prime minister could try to go back and get more concessions out of the European Union and bring this back for a second vote. But Brussels has been very clear; it's done with negotiations. It's kind of tired of this whole process.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: If it's a larger margin, I think you could see the Brexit process go in any number of directions. The U.K. could try to delay. The United Kingdom could walk away from the EU without any deal at all. Of course, that would mean paying, in the short term, a pretty steep economic price or - and the most striking thing would be taking Brexit back to the people for a second referendum.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Which would be extraordinary. I mean, a lot of these different...</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: It would be completely extraordinary, David. It would basically be saying - I mean, the politicians, who would never put it this way, would be basically saying, we can't sort this out; we know you voted for it; let's see what you think again.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Or try again (laughter).</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah, try again.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Maybe we can work it out next time.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: No, and, I mean, you know, that is an extraordinary thing for a democracy to do.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: There's a lot at stake here then. I mean, this is - the prime minister's not really exaggerating.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah, there's a ton at stake. And I think that - I think, particularly for listeners in the United States, what we're talking about here is the future of the United Kingdom. This is the biggest political decision in decades. The U.K. is going to try to unwind more than 40 years of economic integration with the EU. The EU, of course, is 20 nation - 28 nations that trade as one, an enormous economy, second only to the U.S. And then what the U.K. wants to do, ideally, is go off on its own so it can control immigration - immigration, like in the States, was a big issue in this vote - control who comes here and then build what Brexiteers claim is going to be a much more prosperous future making trade deals - the U.K. - all by itself.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Frank - and I'm sure you hear this, too. I mean, some of our listeners will ask why we cover Brexit so extensively.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I mean, what do you tell listeners who wonder what it means to people in the United States?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah. There are a number of answers to that one. One is, this is America's closest ally. We're democracies. We share a common language and of course fought in wars together. And the political chaos that's resulted from the original Brexit vote here has diminished the U.K.'s status in the world. That's certainly not good for the U.S. interests. The Brexit vote was also - kind of on a bigger picture, it was a rejection of this pillar of the post-World War II global order that the U.K. and the U.S. helped build. Now, this is the same world - post-war order that Donald Trump has attacked in the past when he calls the E.U. a foe or that NATO members are deadbeats. So what's happening here is part of a much bigger challenge to the global system that many in America would still argue the U.S. benefits from.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: So we're sort of learning something about our politics as we watch this play out.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Oh, I think we are. Yeah. No, I think we are very much. And one - a common element of this is the rise of populism, identity politics and of course economic discontent. You know, the Trump mantra was Make America Great Again. The leave campaign was take back control. And there's been kind of a desire to go back to a more nostalgic time in this country, where people felt that their communities were wealthier and also that it wasn't so diverse from their perspective. They liked it when it was more people like themselves - people who were white Britons.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right, covering a big moment in the journey that is Brexit. That is NPR's Frank Langfitt talking to us this morning from London. Frank, thanks so much.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Happy to do it, David.
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David Greene talks to marine biologist James McClintock about how warming temperatures are impacting glaciers around the Antarctic Peninsula, and consequences of a global rise in sea level.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: Each year, we catch up with James McClintock. He's a marine biologist with the University of Alabama, Birmingham who does research on climate change. And he makes an annual visit to Antarctica. We reached him by phone, as we have the last two years, at Palmer Station, a U.S. research facility on the Antarctic Peninsula. James McClintock, you there?</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: Hey, David. Yes, I'm here.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I feel like I ask you this each time we speak, but I love starting with the question, how's the weather there?</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: Well, it's a lovely day. It's probably in the high 30s maybe the low 40s, a little bit of cloud cover. They've had a record snowfall. But right now it's lovely, and the snow is not falling. So that's how it's going.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And I feel like I have taken a personal interest in the Adelie penguin population, who you talk about whenever we speak - I mean those little creatures who look like Charlie Chaplin in their little tuxedos. Are they of interest to you on this trip, and what do we know about them?</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: The news is a little sad. The population of 15,000 breeding pairs of Adelie penguins has reached a new low. It's down to 1,100 this year. So over 90 percent of them are disappearing. What's happening mainly that's causing the big problem is that they come in at a very predetermined time of year to lay their eggs. And then along comes these unseasonably late snowstorms because it's getting warmer and more humid. Ironically, it's snowing later. And then the snow melts, and the eggs drown. So the Adelie's having a really tough time right now.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: You arrive here, you know, each year. As you arrive this time and you look out at the landscape, does anything strike you as starkly different from the last time you were there?</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: If you look behind the station, Lamar Glacier (ph) is just retreating very, very quickly. In fact, I was talking to a couple of Palmer Station staff this morning that went on a little camping trip the other day and spent the night sleeping on the rim next to the glacier. And they said they couldn't sleep. The glacier cracked, and pieces fell into the water all through the night. Like, every 20 minutes to half an hour. They'd be woken or be jarred by a crack of ice. This is indicative of 87 percent of the glaciers along the Western Antarctic Peninsula that are now in rapid retreat. This is just sort of the canary in the coal mine here.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: We're now two years into a presidency in the United States with a president who really has cast a lot of doubt about climate change, also pulled out of the big Paris climate accord. Is that affecting your work at all or affecting the work of other researchers like you?</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: Not so much here in the National Science Foundation program. But colleagues that are working in the Environmental Protection Agency, et cetera, are definitely experiencing some impacts on their climate-related research.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Are you worried at all about the future if, you know - as priorities shift based on a philosophy and a vision set by this president?</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: Yeah. I think scientists in general are concerned because we see this as a very important time for this research. And we're looking for continued and perhaps even greater support to provide the kinds of information that'll be critical for policy decisions as we move into a future of climate change that is already upon us, quite frankly.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: James McClintock, it is always great to catch up with you. Have a great trip, and best of luck in your research.</s>JAMES MCCLINTOCK: Thank you, David.
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President Trump tried to bypass House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and on Tuesday invited rank-and-file House Democrats to a shutdown meeting at the White House. They declined to attend.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: The partial government shutdown is now into its 26th day. And this is largely a story of what has not been happening. Museums have not been opening their doors. Hundreds of thousands of federal employees and contractors are not getting paid, and many of them are not getting to go to work. As for negotiations between President Trump and Democrats, well, even those don't seem to be happening. Joining us is NPR White House correspondent Scott Horsley.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Hi there, Scott.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Good morning, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. So President Trump invited lawmakers to the White House yesterday. It sounds like Democrats were just not interested in coming.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Well, that's right, David. The Democrats who were invited were not leaders like Nancy Pelosi or Steny Hoyer but rather rank-and-file lawmakers from around the country. The president was looking to drive a wedge within the party and maybe expose some cracks in what has so far been a pretty united front. It didn't work. Not a single Democrat showed up for what the White House called a working lunch - and not because they were afraid they might get served fast food leftovers. This is New York...</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: (Laughter) Which the president served this week to some athletes - but yeah.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: (Laughter) That's right. This is New York Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, who is the Democratic caucus chairman.</s>HAKEEM JEFFRIES: The question that I think everyone can reasonably ask is, is he inviting people to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to really try to resolve this problem or to create a photo op so he can project a false sense of bipartisanship?</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: So hold the Democrats. Hold the photo op. The president's special order did not come through. President Trump wound up dining with a bunch of House Republicans. And David, probably few parties will have less to say about ending the shutdown than House Republicans.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, I mean, the president seems pretty dug in here. The Democrats sound dug in. I mean, listening to the voice there, I mean, questioning the president's motives. But you have Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer floating the name of one person who he said could actually help break this gridlock. It's Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, which makes me wonder - where is McConnell in all this?</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Where is Mitch McConnell?</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: He's been largely invisible, but he is playing a critical behind-the-scenes role in extending this shutdown. He has refused to allow a vote on any spending bill that is not pre-approved by the president. You know, the Democratic-controlled House has been passing spending bills that would reopen the parts of the government that are closed but without wall funding, bills similar to those that already cleared the Senate late last year. But McConnell has said he won't bring them to the floor even though there are a handful of Republican senators who say they'd be OK with reopening the government under those conditions. So McConnell is, in effect, running interference for the White House here.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, speaking of the impact of all this - I mean, this is Day 26, as we said - tax season is coming. The president knows how unpopular it would probably be for Americans to not get their tax returns because of this shutdown, so the administration's bringing back tens of thousands of employees at the IRS. But are they going to get paid for coming back to work?</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: No, they're not. Forty-six-thousand IRS employees are going back to work today, more than half of the agency's workforce. They are not being paid. And as you say, their assignment is to process tax refunds so those are not delayed by the shutdown. That's a departure from the way earlier administrations have handled this, when they've concluded you can't pay refunds while the Treasury Department is closed. And on the one hand, it's good for taxpayers, who will not have to wait indefinitely for their refund checks. On the other hand, it's one more way to extend the shutdown on the backs of unpaid federal workers.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: This reminds me, David, a little bit of an old "Star Trek" episode where the...</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Oh.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: ...The crew of the Enterprise shows up at this planet where the inhabitants have been at war for a really long time. And they have sanitized the war so there's no real incentive for them to end it. The administration has tried to sanitize this shutdown so there's less pressure on lawmakers, less pressure on the president. But of course, it's those unpaid federal workers who are shouldering a lot of the load.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, it really sounds that way. All right. NPR's Scott Horsley updating us on the shutdown that goes on with no end in sight.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Scott, thanks.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Good to be with you, David.
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Reuters reports you can pay $23 to enter a room and release your pent-up feelings by smashing things: TVs, computers, old radios, furniture, etc. One customer brought wedding photos to destroy.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: Good morning. I'm David Greene with a way to vent your anger. There's a company called Smash in Beijing. Reuters reports you can pay 23 bucks to enter a room and release your pent-up anger by smashing things - TVs, computers, old radios, furniture. One customer brought her wedding photos to destroy. Staff will blare whatever music you like. I think I'd go with Def Leppard. The only rule at Smash seems to be that you can't smash other people, which is a really good rule. It's MORNING EDITION.
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Britain's Parliament rejects Brexit deal. Federal workers affected by the shutdown look for ways to pay the bills. At least 14 people were killed when extremists stormed an upscale hotel in Nairobi.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: It is very rare in Britain for the ruling party to lose a vote in Parliament. It is unprecedented for a government to lose the way Prime Minister Theresa May did yesterday.</s>JOHN BERCOW: The ayes to the right - 202.</s>JOHN BERCOW: The noes to the left - 432.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's right. Theresa May's Brexit plan lost by 230 votes. That's - I don't know, David - like your Pittsburgh Steelers lost the Super Bowl by 10 touchdowns or something.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Wow. Thanks, Steve.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Britain now has no deal with the European Union as a deadline nears to leave. Opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn is challenging Theresa May's rule today.</s>JEREMY CORBYN: This House can give its verdict on the sheer incompetence of this government and pass that motion of no confidence in the government.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. Let's bring in Robert Shrimsley of the Financial Times, who has been covering all of this in London. A bit of news there in your country, Robert.</s>ROBERT SHRIMSLEY: Yeah. Morning, David. It was quite remarkable last night. I was actually sitting in the press gallery of the House of Commons when the vote came in. And we all thought she was going to lose, and we all thought she was going to lose fairly badly. But the scale of it was just breathtaking. And you heard the gasps all the way across the chamber. Nobody thought it was going to be quite as bad as that.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: So what do those gasps mean? I mean, there's always a lot of energy and noises coming from British Parliament. But, I mean, it sounds like what? I mean, do those gasps mean it's sort of like what - where does the country go from here after this?</s>ROBERT SHRIMSLEY: I think the gasps are a direct reflection of the scale of the unhappiness with Theresa May's plan. But it is also crikey what happens now. It is - I mean, as you said, there's going to be a confidence vote tabled by the opposition today. But the remarkable thing is she's probably going to win this by a relatively small majority. So we will have - and you may remember there was a leadership contest to try and topple her by her own party at the end of December. So the overwhelming likelihood is that by the end of the day we will have a prime minister who cannot get through the most important single piece of legislation she has to manage, cannot be removed by her own party till December and cannot now be removed by Parliament either. It's a very, very happy place to be.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: But in a way, I mean, the fact that she can survive this, what does that tell us about Theresa May and this moment and her leadership?</s>ROBERT SHRIMSLEY: Well, I mean, as you say, in ordinary circumstances, a defeat like that would be the end. She would have resigned already. Historically, in British politics, if the prime minister cannot get her legislation through on anything important, she goes. So it's remarkable that she's going to hang on. I think what it tells us is that nobody has any better plans. The Conservative Party, the government, is terrified of calling an election, which what would - be happen if she falls probably because they think they will lose. There is no unity within the Conservative Party as to who an alternative replacement might be because the Conservative Party is split over the best way forward on Brexit. And that choice would see one side or another losing. Therefore, it suits everybody within the Conservative Party to leave her in place for a bit longer.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, you say no one has a real plan. The European Council president, Donald Tusk, offered a plan in a tweet after this vote. I don't know how serious he was because he was basically saying like, look; British Parliament, if you can't figure this Brexit thing out, why don't you just stay in the EU with us? I mean, is that even possible after all this?</s>ROBERT SHRIMSLEY: Everything's possible. I mean, it's not true that nobody has a plan. The problem is that everybody has a plan and they're all (unintelligible).</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: (Laughter) None of them just seem workable.</s>ROBERT SHRIMSLEY: The fundamental options that lie ahead for Britain are as follows. They can - they can revive Theresa May's plan or it can find a softer form of Brexit or it can hold a referendum and try to call it off. All these things are possible. No one would bet a large amount of money on any of them at the moment.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. Robert Shrimsley is editorial director and political commentator at the Financial Times covering this extraordinary moment in Britain. A few seem to know exactly where it goes from here. Thanks so much. We appreciate it.</s>ROBERT SHRIMSLEY: Cheers, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. It has been nearly a month now since hundreds of thousands of federal workers have gotten paid here in this country.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: President Trump invited congressional leaders back to the White House on Tuesday afternoon to discuss an end to the partial government shutdown. House Democrats did not come. The many workers on hold include Frank Ruopoli, who's on furlough from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.</s>FRANK RUOPOLI: I feel a little betrayed by our politicians. You know, I got into this many years ago, and I chose to, in a way, serve my country, and I expect the same out of my politicians.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: So how are workers getting by?</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, NPR's Jeff Brady has been trying to answer that question. He's been speaking to a lot of them. Hi there, Jeff.</s>JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: Hey, good morning.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Just listening to that voice there, I mean, someone who chose to, as he put it, serve his country going through this right now, I mean, how many workers are we talking about who've been impacted by the shutdown, and where do they work?</s>JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: Well, we started with about 800,000 workers affected, and they're all across the government. None of them have received a paycheck since they started - since the shutdown started on December 22. Half of those 800,000 - about 400,000 - they were furloughed initially, so they haven't worked since then. The other half are still working and not receiving a paycheck. The numbers are changing a bit now because some employees are being called back. The IRS is bringing back tens of thousands of workers for the tax filing season. At the Food and Drug Administration, thousands of employees are resuming their work performing food inspections. And the Federal Aviation Administration has recalled several thousand engineers and inspectors. But, remember; these employees, they're just being recalled to work. They still aren't receiving a paycheck.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Which is amazing, and we've heard different voices on our air. I mean, one that stays by me is someone who is, you know, dipping into college savings for their kids to try and get by. But you've really been hearing a lot of stories talking to people. So how are federal workers getting by as you've been hearing?</s>JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: Yeah, it's really tough because a surprising number of federal employees don't earn a lot to start with. About 1 in 8 workers earn less than $40,000 a year. Some people are taking temporary jobs to bring in money. I talked with a Forest Service employee who lives near Lake Tahoe on the California-Nevada border, and he was picking up odd jobs, you know, fixing a dishwasher or a toilet for somebody - very different from his regular job, fighting wildfires. Frank Ruopoli, who you just heard from a little bit there, is a graphic designer at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He made a plan after the 2013 partial government shutdown. That one lasted 16 days.</s>FRANK RUOPOLI: The shutdown a couple years ago, you know, brought a lot of anxiety on me and my family and, you know, trying to make ends meet. So what I decided to do is go and get my EMT certificate.</s>JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: So he studied to be an emergency medical technician. And with that, he was able to go out and find a part-time job right away with a company that needs EMTs to fill some shifts. Some federal workers are applying for unemployment benefits. A few of them told me that was a new experience. Another said it was just really tough to find anything knowing that you might have to go back to work at any time.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And on the political front, any movement? I mean, any light at the end of the tunnel for these employees?</s>JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: Well, Congress passed some legislation that will give workers back pay, so they know in the end they'll get paid, but that doesn't pay the bills now. And there are many contract workers who are just out of luck but not a lot of movement right now.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Robert Costa, excellent reporter for The Washington Post, well-connected, is reporting that a lot of Republicans he's hearing from, and possibly some Democrats, too, I suppose, are at the point where they're expecting some outside force, some outside disaster to be needed to get this shutdown to move in any direction at all.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: We'll see if that happens. NPR's Jeff Brady. Thanks, Jeff.</s>JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: Thank you.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right, so at least 14 people are dead after gunmen attacked an upscale hotel complex in Kenya's capital, Nairobi.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: One question is whether an American is among the dead. We're checking on that. The Somalia-based militant group al-Shabab has claimed responsibility. Bursts of gunfire and explosions could be heard around the hotel complex more than 16 hours after the attack began. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta has since announced the siege is over and that all attackers are, quote, "eliminated."</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. NPR's Eyder Peralta has been on the scene and joins us now. And, Eyder, have things finally calmed down? Are people feeling a sense of safety? You know, I mean, there was shooting going on hours after this took place.</s>EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Yeah. There was shooting going on this morning. But right now, there are no more gunfire or explosions. But there's still a big security presence, and there's still a lot of unanswered questions. What's the total number of people dead - how the terrorists managed to get into a secure hotel? That hotel had two checkpoints. It had lots of security. It had metal detectors. So there's a lot of questions left unanswered.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Oh, so this is a hotel that was sort of braced for something like this and yet this group was able to carry this out, which has to be making a lot of people question security structures in the country after seeing this.</s>EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Yeah. I think that's the big question. I think, you know, this is a city that always has braced for these kinds of attacks. That kind of security is not uncommon here in Nairobi, so it leaves people fearing.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And al-Shabab, I mean, has struck high-traffic civilian areas in Kenya many times in the past. So, I mean, what are people saying and telling you about the way forward here if if this group is still able to carry stuff like this out?</s>EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: I think there's a sense of disbelief here. I'm actually at the morgue right now, and it's just a lot of families looking for answers. They're sitting around. They're looking inconsolable. You know, I saw one lady faint. She was overcome by grief. I also spoke to Jasin Jama (ph) who's an older man (ph) who lost two family members in the attack. He's Somali and a Muslim - communities that always come under suspicion during these times. And what he was saying is that terrorism doesn't make sense. But every time this happens, Kenya has to come to terms with its vast diversity.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And is the government able to deal with al-Shabab at all? I mean, does anyone feel like the government's going to be able to take care of this militant group?</s>EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Kenya is in a tough neighborhood. Al-Shabab obviously controls huge parts of Somalia, and they will always be a threat or they're always a threat to Kenya. But the president says that, you know, Kenya embraces peaceful coexistence, but they will never forget those who hurt their children.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. NPR's Eyder Peralta on the scene of a terrorist attack in Kenya's capital, Nairobi. Eyder, thank you so much.</s>EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Thank you, David.
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More than 30,000 LA public school teachers on Monday are expected to strike. David Greene talks to Joseph Zeccola, 2018 Los Angeles County Teacher of the Year, about the factors leading to the strike.
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UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: (Chanting) UTLA, UTLA.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And that is the sound there of thousands of public school teachers in Los Angeles protesting last month. They were calling for smaller class sizes, additional school funding to hire more nurses and counselors, a cap on charter schools and also a 6.5 percent pay raise. Well, those demands have not yet been met. After months of negotiations between the teachers union and the school district, a breakthrough never came. And this morning, a strike has begun, with thousands expected to skip work today.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Joseph Zeccola is among them. In 2018, he was named as one of the school district's teachers of the year. And he told me that one thing that has led him to the picket line is his past experience teaching in South Los Angeles. I asked him to take me into the life of a student there.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: What you're dealing with are average kids in the United States except, you know, a gigantic percentage of them are dealing with some type of trauma in their lives. In the average classroom, half of the kids know someone who's been shot. You know, half of the kids have one level of someone connected to their family who is either in jail or has had a very difficult confrontation with a police officer, often for things that are nonsense-based.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: So what you have are kids who are in a lot more need of attention and support. And they don't get it. So what happens is you've got kids in the classroom. And all of a sudden, you can't figure out why this - these kids are breaking down crying. This kid is completely silent and frozen. So you're trying to, while teaching a class, assess what's going on with that kid and figure out where to put that kid. Can you get that kid in touch with a therapist?</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: So, for example, I had a couple kids who were failing really miserably who didn't before. When I pulled them aside, these are two girls who were related. I had them in different classes. It turned out that one was a cousin of the other. They were living together. The mother and the father were on the outs. Father got arrested. They lost their home. They're living with the relatives. The relatives hate them. They always want them out. And I've got two girls crying at my desk, saying, I just want to go home, and I don't have a home to go to.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: We don't have the psychiatric social working support for - when a school committee of 2,000 kids has hundreds who are like this, we don't have the support. And what we did at the school I was at is we fought tooth and nail to get an extra psychiatric social worker. It took us three years of pushing for it to get it. And again, when you're doing that that means, what are you not spending money on to get that? But we got it. And the minute we got it, you saw two psychiatric social workers who are trained professionals in social work with a team of interns whose schedules were 100 percent booked, which tells you they probably need three or four. And, again, this is every day you see this.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: As difficult a challenge as the one you're describing, is this not the kind of thing that public school districts and school systems around the country deal with every day? Are you making a reasonable demand that the school district could actually respond to?</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: Oh, absolutely. I think - I'm really glad you asked me that question. So I think you're right that what we deal with is very standard for urban school districts across the country. Where we're different is the Los Angeles Unified School District, while being part of the richest state in the union and the fifth-largest economy in the world is ranked 43rd in per-pupil funding. So you have a situation where we could do so much better. So the picketing is around trying to get our school board to make the right decisions.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: We looked up some numbers from the California Department of Education. I mean, the LA school district graduation rates have actually really been soaring over the last decade or so - I mean, from 62 percent in 2009, 2010 to 80 percent in 2016, 2017. You know, you've made the argument that this is not about teachers, per se. It's not about just getting you more money. It's about students. But do numbers like that make you vulnerable in terms of someone saying, look - the schools are actually doing well by its students - this strike may be just about getting more money for teachers?</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: It's a silly way to look at it because I have 38 students in an 11th grade English class. There is no way I can give them the time they deserve. And I'm one of these teachers who - I spend my vacation time meeting with students to give them writers' conferences. So what you're talking about is all of us have traditionally - and teachers across the country will tell you this - we do more with less. When they make cuts, we adjust because you don't get into this profession to get rich. You get into it because you care desperately about the kids that you're in the room with.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: So we keep adjusting when those situations happen. And we have risen the graduation rate. I'm very proud of that. But the idea that their conditions are close to optimal, again, I would say is preposterous. The class size - if I have a class of 36 - just to give you an idea, David - and I want to read my students' papers - and I want to read all of them, and you can't - class size of 36 - to give every student a 15-minute read, that's nine hours, not counting going to the bathroom. And that's outside of school. And that's one class, one set of papers. And as an English teacher, I want my kids to write constantly.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: So it's just - it's not sustainable under the current levels when you have class size like that. And just as a as a way to look at the difference, you know, the most prestigious private school in our city, Harvard-Westlake, has class sizes of 15. What does that tell you? I mean, there's a reason those class sizes are there. So, no, we're not going to get rich. Do we deserve a raise? Sure we do. But I'm one of the teachers - and there are countless like us who would give up the raise for the class size in a heartbeat. You know, we'd like both, but the class size is a thing that we'd fight to the death over.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Let me just give you a chance to speak directly to parents of students in this district who, you know, could obviously be worried about what this all means for their students - and they're going to be seeing a lot of disruption - to tell them why it's worth it.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: It's worth it because if you look nationwide, you see a trend of public education being defunded, being devalued. Last year, you saw some teacher strikes in some of the worst-funded states. What we're trying to do for every kid in this country but most specifically for every kid in Los Angeles is push that ball back in the other direction and to say that public education is a vital necessity. Our kids deserve the best we can give them. We want them to have the skills to negotiate the best possible lives for themselves. And the way to do that is to give them the resources and to create a teaching profession that attracts the best and brightest to come into it - not to get rich but to know that it won't be such a burden, they'll quit.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, thanks so much for talking to us. And congrats on the teaching award. That's great stuff.</s>JOSEPH ZECCOLA: Thank you very much, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Joseph Zeccola was named one of the Los Angeles Unified School District's teachers of the year in 2018.
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The third annual women's march is this Saturday. The first march was a moment of unity for many women disillusioned with the 2016 election results, but now there are questions about that united front.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Women opposed to President Trump and his policies face a challenge. Two years ago, they organized one of the largest protest days in American history. The first Women's March came the day after the presidential inauguration. Now organizers are struggling to stay unified, so the third annual march this Saturday is seen as a test, just as the presidential campaign begins. NPR's Asma Halid reports.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Angie Beem was a woman who didn't pay attention to politics much. Sure, she voted, but that's about it. During the 2016 campaign, though, she started noticing troubling Facebook posts.</s>ANGIE BEEM: My family were starting to be racist and saying horrible things, and I didn't recognize them.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: She felt like Donald Trump was empowering people to be mean. And so when he won, she decided she had to do something. She became the president of the Washington State chapter of the Women's March. But at the end of this month, that group is dissolving. Beem says it's because of the national leadership.</s>ANGIE BEEM: They're anti-Semitic. I mean, they claim they aren't, but they are. They're being racist.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: The accusations are a long and complicated story. In a nutshell, one of the founders of the national march attended an event last year with Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam. He's known to spout anti-Semitic slurs, but his defenders say he and his group have done a lot of positive things for people of color in poor communities.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Another founder, Linda Sarsour, has been an outspoken critic of the United States' relationship with Israel, and Beem found her opinions troubling, too. Sarsour denies any allegations of anti-Semitism. She says the women's movement, let alone the Democratic Party, has never been a united front.</s>LINDA SARSOUR: I think the Women's March is actually reflective of this idea that you can create a big tent. But that doesn't mean that the people inside of the tent are always going to agree on everything. And in fact, they might have very public fights about the things that they don't agree with.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Sarsour says the idea of creating a multiracial women's movement is new. And so the fact that people are trying it, even if it is messy, is progress. She says it's what the Democratic Party needs to focus on in 2020. And Aimee Allison, a progressive activist from the Bay Area, agrees.</s>AIMEE ALLISON: If you look at women of color's participation in this last election, women of color and black women in particular delivered wins for Democrats.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Both Allison and Sarsour say the party needs to put issues like racial justice and immigration at the center of the debate. But Lanae Erickson has some alternative advice. She's with the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way.</s>LANAE ERICKSON: I think the biggest lesson is that beating Trump can concentrate the mind.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: A lot of Democratic activists say you keep the big tent united by focusing on a common foe. Erickson says Democrats inherently have a harder job keeping everyone satisfied because the party is just more ideologically and demographically diverse than the GOP. She says the strength of that first march back in 2017 was that women were protesting for all kinds of different things under one umbrella.</s>LANAE ERICKSON: I think the Women's March was one of those things that was kind of like Barack Obama. It could mean to you whatever you wanted it to mean.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: That's a lesson Erickson hopes the Democratic Party heeds as it heads into 2020. Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg says all this talk about a schism in the Women's March is elitist and kind of irrelevant to most women who are just frustrated by the president.</s>ANNA GREENBERG: I'm not dismissing or diminishing some of those divisions, and it may lead to less enthusiasm among some people. But it's a whole other swath of less engaged people who just want to come out and march.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Sherri Masson is one of those women. She leads a local indivisible group in a conservative Detroit suburb.</s>SHERRI MASSON: We decided that the Women's March was larger, was bigger than a small group of people that were organizing it.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: And so she's still planning to go. Masson says the march encouraged people who had never volunteered for an election before to make calls and knock on doors during the midterms.</s>SHERRI MASSON: It answered that question that people had the morning after the election - what can I do? Oh, my gosh. We have to do something. And I think it sort of gave us that something.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: And, she says, even in her little group of women, there are disagreements. But what keeps them together is an urgency to defeat Donald Trump.</s>ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Asma Khalid, NPR News.
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Reports say the FBI was concerned about Trump's ties to Russia as early as 2016. Britain's prime minister speaks about Brexit. Public school teachers in Los Angeles are expected to strike Monday.
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: So there is new reporting suggesting that the FBI was concerned about President Trump's possible ties to Russia going back to early 2016.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: This latest revelation was first reported by The New York Times, and it showed that the FBI was on alert well before the Russian probe that began in 2017. In response to this reporting, Fox News host Jeanine Pirro asked the president over the weekend whether he has ever worked for Russia.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think it's the most insulting thing I've ever been asked. I think it's the most insulting article I've ever had written.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: OK. Let's sort through all this with NPR White House reporter Ayesha Rascoe, who joins us this morning. Hi, Ayesha.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: Good morning.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: OK. So we're talking about two pretty major stories here on the FBI's inquiries into President Trump. Walk us through exactly what they're saying.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: The New York Times revealed that the FBI's investigations had two parts. So one part, we knew about, and that was the criminal investigation into whether Trump was obstructing justice when he fired former FBI director James Comey. The other part, which hadn't been reported before, was the counterintelligence probe into whether Trump was acting on behalf of Russia after firing Comey, making it a national security issue. Then you have The Washington Post. Their story basically said that President Trump had actively worked to conceal details about his meetings with Russian president, with Putin. And so that idea - or Russian President Vladimir Putin.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Right.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: And that there were no in-depth records of any of Trump's in-person meetings with Putin, not even classified records. And Trump and the White House have pushed back against these stories, but not really with detailed specific denials. And Trump told Fox News in an interview that he wasn't keeping anything under wraps.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I mean, this is all extraordinary. I mean, we should say, as you said, the White House is pushing back and President Trump has called all of this a hoax. But just the suggestion that the intelligence agencies are worried that the president of the United States is working with or for another government and hiding what happens in meetings with another foreign leader, this has to be bringing significant reaction.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: It is. And you have Democrats who control the House are saying they are going to investigate. The House Foreign Affairs Committee is saying they're going to look into Trump's interactions with Putin. And Adam Schiff, the Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, he tweeted that Democrats had tried to subpoena the interpreter who was at one of the meetings with Trump and Putin during the last Congress but Republicans blocked that. Now, that may be on the table again, and there'll be some disputes over that. But either way, these types of questions, these types of articles being written and reported about Trump and Russia are going to spur more probes by the House.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: You bring up that interpreter. I mean, that interpreter might be the only person, besides Putin and Trump, who might know exactly what happened in those meetings.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: Yes. Exactly. And so that's why there's an interest there.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: OK. So this is all happening as we mark this Monday as the partial government shutdown entering its fourth workweek now. Any end in sight?</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: Not really. There wasn't any movement over the weekend. You do have some lawmakers who seem to be getting a bit antsy about getting the government back open. Here's South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham on Fox News Sunday.</s>LINDSEY GRAHAM: Before he pulls the plug on the legislative option - and I think we're almost there - I would urge him to open up the government for a short period of time, like, three weeks, before he pulls the plug. See if we can get a deal.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: And so there, Graham is talking about after three weeks if they can't get a deal doing national - declaring a national emergency so Trump could build the wall without congress's approval. And then you have some Democrats who are saying that centrist Republicans in the Senate should put pressure on McConnell and put pressure on the president to go ahead and open up the government again and that, kind of, it's up to them to kind of force this issue. But none of these options so far are really gaining any traction or look close to becoming reality. Right now things just seem really stuck.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. Still stuck entering that fourth workweek of the partial government shutdown. NPR's Ayesha Rascoe. Thanks.</s>AYESHA RASCOE, BYLINE: Thank you.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. So British Prime Minister Theresa May is making one last push for her Brexit plan.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Right. So she is expected to deliver a speech to sell her plan today. And I know what you're thinking - haven't I heard this, like, a million times before?</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: That's what I'm thinking.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Maybe not a million. But for sure, Theresa May has made speeches to try to sell the British Parliament on her Brexit plan. What is different now is that she is warning that if Parliament rejects her deal, Brexit might not happen at all. So the Parliament is going to vote tomorrow. This is being hailed as one of the biggest votes in decades.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And NPR's Frank Langfitt is in London. Frank, is this just a broken record, or is this moment really different somehow?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Well, this is actually pretty interesting. What she's going to do is, prime minister's going to go to speak to factory workers in a place, an English city called Stoke-On-Trent, which voted heavily to leave the EU in 2016. And what she's basically going to say is, if Parliament doesn't back her deal, which sets out the terms for how the U.K. would leave the EU at the end of March, that members of Parliament are likely to torpedo the whole Brexit process. And she's going to, say, really defy the democratic decision of the British people back in 2016. Also expected to say the trust in politics will suffer, quote, "catastrophic harm" if the referendum result is foiled.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: So after all this - all the machinations, all the political debate, all the concerns - I mean, she is about to say that Brexit might not happen at all?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah. She is going to say that because I think that her concern is that if - she's very concerned about losing control of this process if her bill goes down, her withdrawal agreement goes down to a big defeat tomorrow night, and members of Parliament may push for a second referendum. And that's something that even six weeks ago didn't seem realistic, but now it's a genuine possibility.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: So as we talk about her raising the stakes, what is the prime minister trying to do here? What strategy is at play, do you think?</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Well, I think what you're seeing is, she is very concerned of losing this and not having it be able to go anywhere. And what she's basically going to do is say, you know, the future of democracy is at stake, and so if you don't go with this, you know, this is going to really fall apart. And really basically what she's going to say to her Brexiteer colleagues in the Conservative Party is, if you don't back me, you're going to lose what you care about most. And one of the reasons she's doing this is she's really struggled through this whole process, as we've been talking about now for many, many months. And I think this is a sign that she doesn't have many cards left to play, and this is the one that she's decided to play this morning.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And what happens in her strategy going forward? I mean, it sounds like these could be some dramatic days.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Yeah. I think what's going to - we'll have to see tomorrow night how big the vote is, how much of a loss she faces. Most people think she's going to face a loss. And then she's going to be given three days to come up with a plan B. Now, keep in mind, they've been doing these negotiations for over 1 1/2 years. So it's just three days to do that. She's expected to probably go back to Brussels, try to get some concessions on this very unpopular withdrawal agreement that most members of Parliament seem to be very much against. The opposition Labour Party, they smell blood. They say they will call for a vote of no confidence in the prime minister's government, but they haven't said exactly when. Their strategy is to try to basically win a no confidence vote, trigger a general election and try to topple the prime minister and her conservative party.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Parliament, as I mentioned earlier, David, could move to take control of this process which, up until now, the government's been driving. And that could mean trying to come up with a new deal with the EU, which, there doesn't seem to be at all the time for that. There's a possibility of trying to delay Brexit. And then there's the big possibility, as May's talking about now, the possibility of a second referendum with an option to stay inside the EU.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Which would be extraordinary. All right. NPR's Frank Langfitt in London. Thanks a lot, Frank.</s>FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE: Happy to do it, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. Public schoolteachers in Los Angeles are expected to go on strike beginning this morning.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: This is going to impact nearly half-a-million public school students. This is the country's second-largest school district. So a lot of kids will be affected. Los Angeles teachers have been working without a contract for more than a year. They've been grappling with the school district over salaries and classroom conditions.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And one person covering this is Kyle Stokes from member station KPCC in Los Angeles. He joins us now from our studios at NPR West. Good morning, Kyle.</s>KYLE STOKES, BYLINE: Morning, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: All right. So negotiations - we're talking about talks that go back to early 2017. Just remind us, what are teachers demanding, and why has there been no breakthrough at all?</s>KYLE STOKES, BYLINE: Well, there's not been a lot of a breakthrough because there's a really fundamental issue at stake here, and that's how much money the LA Unified School District even has to spend on the demands its teachers are making. The two sides can't even agree on that. So right now, the school district has nearly $2 billion in the bank. And the president of the teachers union, United Teachers Los Angeles - his name is Alex Caputo-Pearl - says it's time to start spending that money.</s>ALEX CAPUTO-PEARL: To be hoarding $2 billion in a school district that is more low-income and more of color than just about any in the nation is a practice that must be challenged based on racial justice grounds.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I mean, Kyle, that's an extraordinary accusation, to say that the school district is hoarding money and not spending that money to help students. What is the administration's reaction to that?</s>KYLE STOKES, BYLINE: Well, the school superintendent Austin Beutner, who leads the school district, does plan to spend some of that reserve on things like teacher raises and other demands. But he also says the district just cannot afford to spend much more.</s>AUSTIN BEUTNER: The notion that we are hoarding reserves, the notion that more money exists somewhere else with which to do more, is not accurate. We're spending all we have in service of our students.</s>KYLE STOKES, BYLINE: Now, the teachers union just does not buy this. The district has been making dire projections about its finances for years, all while building up this nearly $2 billion reserve. And, you know, between things like declining enrollment and things like rising pension costs, the district is still spending more money than it is taking in, and that has regulators concerned about the district's long-term solvency. So - long way of saying - that is the root cause of this dispute. If you can't decide how much money there is to spend, it's really hard to figure out what kinds of demands are reasonable.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: I mean, one question that always comes up in a teachers' strike is how much of this is about, you know, teachers wanting more money to help students, and is some of it about getting more money for teachers' higher salaries?</s>KYLE STOKES, BYLINE: Well, actually, the biggest sticking point here has actually been a plan to reduce class sizes. Now, that's a financial issue because having fewer students in classes means the need to pay more teachers. In negotiations, the district has pledged to spend about $130 million to reduce class sizes by a handful of students in certain grades. But that's not the only thing the union is asking for. For years, raising class sizes in LA has been used as an escape valve the district has used to solve its budget problems. There's language in the contract that lets the district do this. The union wants these that escape valve closed off for good. That's been a fundamental sticking point.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: KPCC's Kyle Stokes. Thanks, Kyle.</s>KYLE STOKES, BYLINE: You're welcome.
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Government meteorologists who work on hurricane modeling and forecast improvements have been furloughed as part of the shutdown. Also endangered: FEMA hurricane training exercises.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: In this country, it's never too early to prepare for hurricane season - unless the partial government shutdown gets in the way of those preparations. NPR's Greg Allen reports from Miami.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: Hurricane season in the Atlantic doesn't begin until June. But it's now, during the quiet off-season, that researchers say typically, a lot of work gets done to improve hurricane forecasting.</s>ERIC BLAKE: I can guarantee you we're not making progress right now with the government shut down.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: Eric Blake is a hurricane specialist and union steward at the National Hurricane Center in Miami. At the National Hurricane Center, meteorologists - working without pay - are staffing only day-to-day operations, not research and development. Most of their partners at the Hurricane Research Center in Miami and the Environmental Modeling Center in Maryland are furloughed. Blake described some of the work they should be doing.</s>ERIC BLAKE: We're trying to get better ways to, say, incorporate reconnaissance data - airplane data or the dropsonde data.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: Dropsondes are weather sensors, each with a small parachute, dropped by hurricane hunter aircraft into storms, gathering information on wind speed and air pressure. Blake says that information helps forecasters understand how a hurricane is forming and what it's likely to do.</s>ERIC BLAKE: There's also new satellite technologies, new data sources that we have to integrate into the model to continue to improve it.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: The shutdown has put on hold a big project that's upgrading NOAA's computerized weather prediction model. The GFS, as it's called - the Global Forecast System - is one of the models used by the National Hurricane Center to forecast the intensity and tracks of developing storms. James Franklin, a hurricane researcher who worked at NOAA for 35 years, says the improved GFS was supposed to be ready in time for this year's hurricane season. Depending on how long the shutdown continues, that may not be possible.</s>JAMES FRANKLIN: We don't have people at the hurricane center right now who are evaluating this proposed upgrade. And we don't know how much of a delay there will be in getting this upgrade into operations.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: In recent years, while the upgrade has been in the works, meteorologists say other global weather models have done better than the GFS in hurricane forecasts. With the shutdown, that gap may widen. The government shutdown has also had a major impact on FEMA, which works with the National Hurricane Center to train local emergency managers. The first training sessions, set for this week, have been canceled. Former FEMA administrator Craig Fugate says this has a direct impact on hurricane preparedness.</s>CRAIG FUGATE: All these classes that have been canceled, we're not going to be able to make them up this year. And that means those people are not getting the training they were trying to get to get better at what they're doing.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: Last year demonstrated the challenges hurricanes pose for meteorologists and emergency managers. Hurricane Florence's storm surge and rainfall forced local governments to order the evacuation of more than a million people in the Carolinas and Virginia. Franklin says storms like that show why training courses are so important.</s>JAMES FRANKLIN: A emergency manager comes out of that course really understanding what the hurricane center can provide and what they can't provide. And it really helps them to make better decisions about who has to evacuate, who does not.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: As they try to prepare for the upcoming hurricane season, government forecasters and emergency managers have another concern - filling vacant positions. Fugate says FEMA is chronically understaffed.</s>CRAIG FUGATE: Now people are starting to think about - how long can I go without a paycheck before I need to start thinking about doing something else?</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: The shutdown hasn't just frozen hiring. Fugate says it's hurting FEMA's ability to retain staff that the nation will turn to when there's another disaster.</s>GREG ALLEN, BYLINE: Greg Allen, NPR News, Miami.
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Apple's stock nose dived after the company told analysts that it would be lowering revenue expectations this quarter. It cited problems in China as the reason.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: It was just last year that Apple became the first American public company to be valued at $1 trillion. The new year has not started quite so well. The company's value plunged 10 percent in a single day. The catalyst was a letter from Apple CEO Tim Cook lowering earnings expectations for the company. NPR's Laura Sydell looks at what this means for Apple's future.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: Think of a Hollywood blockbuster, say, "Mission Impossible." It's been super popular, so the studio releases several successful sequels. But one year, it releases a sequel, and it's a yawn. The iPhone is a bit like a movie franchise. After years of blockbuster sales, the most recent release has been kind of a so-what. As I recently discovered, some customers just weren't excited by it.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: I'm standing in Union Square in San Francisco. The Apple Store is right across the way, and I'm going to ask some people here, if they still have old phones, why they're not walking in and upgrading.</s>MACHIK BUTORAC: The current ones do the job for me - I mean, for what I use. You know, I don't take much photos with the iPhone. I just use it for business.</s>ANNE MARIE BINGO: I think the only thing that would make me buy the new one is the camera because I have friends who have it, and it has taken really nice pictures. But that's not enough to make me get rid of this one that's still working fine and upgrade to the new one.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: Many analysts say Machik Butorac (ph) and Anne Marie Bingo (ph) are typical of a lot of Apple customers right now.</s>JAMES MCQUIVEY: Apple's biggest problem is that it's a company that has built a sort of mystique around itself by, every two, three years, releasing a product that just boggles everyone's mind.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: James McQuivey is an analyst with the research firm Forrester.</s>JAMES MCQUIVEY: It has been a number of years since Apple has really dazzled anyone with the hardware.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: In his letter to investors, Apple CEO Tim Cook said that part of the reason he was lowering expectations was that there were fewer iPhone upgrades than expected. But his biggest problem is China. McQuivey says Chinese companies like Huawei are making products that have a lot of the same features as the iPhone.</s>JAMES MCQUIVEY: But this is a market that is very, very comfortable with knockoffs and very, very comfortable with substitutes because they're cheaper and they're more easily available.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: That's a problem because it's not just about knockoffs. The Chinese customer has been one of Apple's biggest growth engines, says Loup Ventures analyst Gene Munster.</s>GENE MUNSTER: Two-thirds of the problem is China, and the economy there has had an acute negative impact on Apple.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: Munster says China and Taiwan account for close to 20 percent of Apple's business. After growing four quarters in a row, Munster estimates that Apple will report that its revenue fell 36 percent in the last three months of 2018.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: Apple CEO Cook believes trade tensions with the Trump administration are taking a toll on the Chinese economy. A lot of Chinese may still prefer the iPhone; they just don't have the money to buy it. At a moment when a lot of analysts are souring on Apple, Munster remains optimistic. While most of Apple's profits still come from the iPhone...</s>GENE MUNSTER: The Mac, the iPod, AirPods, Apple Watch, services - all those are doing really well, better than what we'd expected.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: According to Munster, year-over-year revenue for these products and services will be up close to 20 percent. Munster also believes, as carriers upgrade to 5G network speeds in late 2020, it will entice people to upgrade their phones.</s>GENE MUNSTER: On average, 10 times faster - so downloading your movie 10 times faster or refreshing that webpage at those speed improvements - this is the difference between dial-up and broadband.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: Meanwhile, the company isn't giving up on the franchise. Munster says he expects Apple to release new phones this year with better screens and better cameras.</s>LAURA SYDELL, BYLINE: Laura Sydell, NPR News, San Francisco.
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The world's biggest gathering of human beings, Kumbh Mela, starts Tuesday in India. Pilgrims dip in sacred waters at the confluence of 3 rivers. Up to 120 million people are expected through March.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: The biggest gathering of human beings on earth begins today in India.</s>UNIDENTIFIED HINDU MONKS: (Chanting in Sanskrit).</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Those are some of the human beings, Hindu monks, chanting mantras on their way to bathe in the Ganges River. Over the next seven weeks, up to 120 million people are expected to do the same. It is called the Kumbh Mela pilgrimage. It's the equivalent of taking the entire populations of California, Texas, Florida and New York and sending them all swimming in the same spot. NPR's Lauren Frayer is there in India.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Hi there, Lauren.</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: Hi, Steve.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: What is the purpose of this gathering?</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: This is a religious fair that happens at the confluence of three rivers, the Ganges, the Yamuna - those are two of the biggest rivers in India - and a third, the Sarasvati. And that's a mythical river. Hindus believe it's here but that it's invisible. And every 12 years, people come bathe in the confluence of these rivers. And this year is actually called a half Kumbh because it's only six years since the last one. But there's nothing half about this. This is still expected to be the biggest gathering so far - as you mentioned, 120 million pilgrims expected by the time the pilgrimage is over in early March. And these dates are determined by the alignment of the stars and the planets by astrologers.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: So what's it like to be in that crowd?</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: You know, it sounds cliche. This is India, but this is the most colorful creche of humanity that I've ever seen and that I could ever imagine. I mean, barefoot, bearded monks; naked people; whole families carrying their suitcases on their heads, camping along the way - they sleep in these vast tent cities - rich and poor, ascetic monks and tourists side by side. I've just ducked into a little Hindu temple on the banks of the Yamuna River - you know, stepping out of the melee to talk to you. But this morning at dawn, I met Gitanjali Verma (ph). She was on her way back from the banks of the Ganges. She's a local but making this pilgrimage for the first time.</s>GITANJALI VERMA: It was like - in another kind of world, you are. It was incredible.</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: You're quite emotional, I can tell.</s>GITANJALI VERMA: Yes, yes.</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: Yeah.</s>GITANJALI VERMA: I think it's just the faith. And it's the total purity of the heart and the mind.</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: They bring people here. And they all plunge into the rivers, which is actually pretty chilly this time of year. People had blue lips and were shaking as they plunged into the waters at dawn this morning. This is a ritual that's supposed to wash away your sins and break you out of the cycle of death and rebirth.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Well, that sounds quite spiritual. But I have a question about practicalities, Lauren. How do they ensure safety and order for 120 million people in the same place?</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: So here are a couple stats I can give you that the organizers have given me - 122,000 toilets have been built here; 20,000 trash cans; 30,000 police and security forces. They have built 200 miles of new roads for this pilgrimage. This is my first time here. But pilgrims who have done it before tell me it's much better organized this year. And that could be because an election is coming. There are posters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi along the paths down to the river banks. These pilgrims are exactly his Hindu nationalist voter base.</s>STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: That's NPR's Lauren Frayer. Thanks so much.</s>LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: You're welcome, Steve.
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Trump considers bypassing Congress to get border wall funding. In Cairo speech, Secretary of State Pompeo slams Obama Mideast policies. Trial of drug lord "El Chapo" picks up steam in federal court.
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RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: It's supposed to be payday for some 800,000 federal workers. But the partial government shutdown means that is not going to happen today.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, Lisa Honan is one of those federal workers, and that missing paycheck for her means that she has to find other ways to pay her bills.</s>LISA HONAN: We're going to probably withdraw on our 5-29 account for - I hate to say it. It's our - the, you know, funds for college that you put away for your kids.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Could be a lot of tough choices for federal workers like that. It has now been 21 days since the shutdown began, which means it's tied for the longest shutdown in history. And with budget negotiations stalled on funding a border wall, President Trump looks like he may be getting closer to declaring a national emergency to pay for the wall.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: That means he could sidestep Congress, and they could pass a budget without funding the wall. So what is next if the president goes ahead and does that?</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: NPR's congressional correspondent Susan Davis is in the studio this morning. Good morning, Sue.</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: Good morning, Rachel.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Where are we at right now?</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: The stalemate continues. There has been no progress. They are no closer to a deal. And some lawmakers that have been trying to get a deal, people like Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, have essentially said he does not see a pathway for a deal and that the only way out is for President Trump to use presidential emergency powers, declare a state of emergency on the border and redirect funds on his own to build the wall.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Can he legally do that? I mean, is that within the president's authorities to do?</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: It's unclear. It is - what is clear is that Democrats in Congress would likely challenge him in the courts and question the constitutionality of that. These emergency powers certainly give the president very broad leeway to make decisions. Although, I believe that Democrats would argue these powers were intended for things like after 9/11 or after Hurricane Katrina, states of emergency in which there is no doubt and no dispute of what the emergency is.</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: There's obviously a big dispute on what the emergency is. However, if he were to do that, it could also give a pathway to reopen the government.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: I mean, what does it say about where we're at as a country when the only way to get out of a government shutdown is to declare a national state of emergency?</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: You know, the congressional budget process has been broken for some time. I think we've seen fits and starts of these shutdowns. But it's a snowballing of effect of a government that's just simply not working very well.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Even if this happens, if the president does choose to use this card, the - declaring a national emergency, when would it actually go into place? Do we know about timeline?</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: It's unclear. But one thing that is important to remember when we talk about the wall, too, and this $5.7 billion, even if the president gets the money or directs it to the wall, it doesn't happen very fast. The money that was sent to DHS last year for last year's spending bills is still going out the door to fund border walls - border wall and structures along the barrier - along the border.</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: So this new influx of cash doesn't happen fast. And it doesn't happen quick. Contracts still have to go out. It takes a very long time to get these structures. So it could still be a very long process.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Before we let you go, I want to shift gears to some other congressional news. Michael Cohen, President Trump's former lawyer, who has pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations and other federal crimes - Cohen announced yesterday that he's going to go to Capitol Hill and testify before Congress. Who made this request?</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: The House Oversight Committee is led by Elijah Cummings. He's a Democrat from Maryland. They announced yesterday he would testify on February 7. Cohen is expected to be the first of what could be many high-profile hearings on Capitol Hill this year, as House Democrats and their new majority intend to have fairly aggressive oversight and investigations into questions of how this administration has conducted itself.</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: And it is important to note that Cohen is coming up voluntarily but that also Democrats have said they are willing to use their subpoena power to force as many people as possible to have pretty high-profile hearings that will be televised.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: So even though Cohen has given extensive interviews to Robert Mueller and his team, Congress - Elijah Cummings - just want him on the record in a public venue.</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: Exactly.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: NPR's Susan Davis for us this morning. Thanks, Sue. We appreciate it.</s>SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: You're welcome.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is headed to the Gulf as he continues his grand Middle East tour.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, this comes after he stopped in Cairo yesterday. And that's where he outlined the Trump administration's vision for America's role in the Middle East. And in giving that speech, he took some direct hits at President Obama and his overtures to the Muslim world in his own speech that also took place in Cairo a decade ago.</s>MIKE POMPEO: The results of these misjudgments have been dire.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Here to tell us more about the impact of Pompeo's speech is NPR's Jackie Northam. Good morning, Jackie.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Good morning, Rachel.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: What's the fallout been from this speech by Secretary of State Pompeo?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Well, you know, a number of Obama supporters came out and said that essentially it was just distasteful and that it was wrong to be criticizing a former president while on a high-profile trip like this. One of - a former official within the Obama administration said he felt that Pompeo was living in a parallel world. You know, it was an attack, really, on the - on the Obama administration. Pompeo doesn't actually ever say his name.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Right.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: But there was no question he was talking about President Obama. And he criticized Obama for the nuclear deal with Iran and accused him of blaming the U.S. for the problems of the Middle East right now when instead, he should have been providing strong American leadership.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: And Pompeo said - and I'm quoting here - "the U.S. is a force for good in the Middle East." But, you know, Rachel, one of the main reasons for this trip is to clear up confusion caused by conflicting statements within the Trump administration about the U.S. withdrawing troops from Syria.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Right. But Pompeo also said in that same speech, when the U.S. - and I'm paraphrasing here. When the U.S. withdraws from the world, chaos ensues. So it's hard to make sense of that with - with the confusion over the Syria troop withdraw.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Sure, and that's - you know, that's harsh rhetoric, you know, coming from a secretary of state about a former president's administration.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: So now Secretary Pompeo, I understand he's already arrived in Bahrain. And then he's going to Saudi Arabia this weekend, right?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: He is, indeed. And he's expected to meet with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, just one of the many meetings he's got.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: And of course, we know that name because he's been implicated by U.S. intelligence agencies in the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. Any idea as to whether or not Mike Pompeo, Secretary Pompeo, is going to bring that up?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Yeah, no, that's - that's definitely one of the things. I mean, this issue is not going away, the whole killing of Jamal Khashoggi. Now, this is the second time he's meeting with the crown prince. The first time he went a couple weeks after the killing of Khashoggi.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: And there was pictures of the two men shaking hands and smiling broadly in that. And Pompeo said the crown prince categorically denied any involvement in Khashoggi's death. But since then, Rachel, the U.S. intelligence has assessed that the crown prince was involved.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: So the Trump administration continues to take the crown prince's word over the word of its own intelligence agencies?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Right. President Trump says the crown prince denies involvement and that the U.S. has strong ties, particularly financial ties, to the kingdom. So, you know, there's doubts that Pompeo will push the crown prince hard for any answers.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: NPR's Jackie Northam for us this morning. Jackie, thanks. We appreciate it.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Yeah, thanks very much, Rachel.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: It has been a week of dramatic testimony in the trial of the notorious drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Yeah, Guzman's already convicted of trafficking crimes in Mexico. His current trial, taking place in a Brooklyn federal court, centers on a 17-count indictment. The charges span decades. They include accusations of money laundering, also shipping tons of cocaine and other drugs into the U.S., also ordering hundreds of murders, kidnappings and other acts of violence. And this week, really interesting stuff, we've gotten more insight into how the FBI ended up tracking his movements in real time.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Keegan Hamilton has been tracking all this. He is U.S. editor for Vice News and the host of a podcast called Chapo: Kingpin On Trial. He joins us now. Hey, Keegan, thanks for being here.</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: Good morning. Thanks for having me.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Let's talk about what you saw unfold in the courtroom this week and, in particular, this key witness who worked for El Chapo. What can you tell us about him?</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: The star witness this week was named Christian Rodriguez. He is a Colombian systems engineer who was hired by the cartel to devise a secure communications system, which was sort of encrypted phone calls that he set up for the cartel in the mountains of Sinaloa, where Chapo was hiding out.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: What did he say?</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: He said that he was approached by the FBI and recruited to become sort of an undercover informant who was giving them access to the cartel's communications in real time. That gave U.S. authorities sort of a live window into how Chapo was running his organization.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: I mean, in our newsroom, we've just been kind of speculating about how dangerous it must be for people like him to come forward.</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: That was pretty incredible. And some of the testimony this week highlighted, you know, how keenly aware he was of that. He had not one but two nervous breakdowns during his time working as an informant, had to seek mental health treatment for that. And the defense used that - tried to use that against him, saying that some of the treatments he used affected his memory and recollection of the events.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: So El Chapo has pleaded not guilty. How's he been reacting to all this testimony in court?</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: You know, normally he's actually kind of cheerful in the courtroom, looking over at his wife, who's in the audience. In this case, the gravity of the testimony - it was very clear that this was another nail in his coffin, perhaps the most - the final nail in his coffin. And he just sort of sat there looking stoically, almost grimacing, saying, like, oh, this is it. This is - I don't know if I can come back from this.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: I mean, so obviously, El Chapo's responsible for a lot of the drug trade here in the U.S. Is this trial teaching us anything about how the U.S. government deals with the quote, unquote, "war on drugs?"</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: I think if anything, it's showing us the futility of the war on drugs. I mean, we've heard over and over again that Chapo is the one supplying these drugs. But while he's being - while he's doing this, they're arresting his operatives, seizing tons of drugs. It's made no dent. He's been gone. Drugs are still available in the United States.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Where does the trial go now? I mean, how long is this expected to last?</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: We're hoping that this could wrap up potentially as soon as the end of this month, likely in early February.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: All right, Keegan Hamilton of Vice. He's also the host of the podcast Chapo: Kingpin On Trial. We appreciate you sharing your insights into this trial. We appreciate it. Thanks, Keegan.</s>KEEGAN HAMILTON: My pleasure.
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In the wake of high-profile child sex abuse scandals, the public often focuses on the accused. Victims and their needs often draw far less attention. Experts who work with young victims explain how children respond to abuse, and what treatment options can help them cope with the aftermath. Mitru Ciarlante, Youth Initiative director, National Center for Victims of Crime Teresa Huizar, executive director, National Children's Alliance
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BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Brian Naylor in Washington. Neal Conan is away. The investigations into allegations of sexual abuse at Penn State continue. Jerry Sandusky, the former defensive coordinator, faces 40 counts of abusing young boys. Nearly 10 additional suspected victims have reportedly come forward since his arrest.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Last night on NBC's "Rock Center," Sandusky declared he is innocent. He said that he did shower with several boys and take part in what he called horseplay, but he insists he is not a pedophile. A jury will ultimately decide the facts of this case, but the latest allegations focus attention on the many victims of childhood sexual abuse - how they respond, and the treatment options available to them. And we should note that this segment may include graphic language and descriptions.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: If you've been a victim of childhood sexual abuse, what helped you overcome the incidence? Our number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected], and you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org, and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Later in the program, Matt Continetti of The Weekly Standard joins us, to argue that it's important for Republicans to reclaim the high ground on income inequality.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: But first, Mitru Ciarlante joins us from the studios of Oregon Public Broadcasting in Portland. She's director of the Youth Initiative at the National Center for Victims of Crime. Welcome to the program.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Thank you.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And did I get your last name pretty close? Ciarlante?</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Excellent. Good job.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thanks. Mitru, let me ask first. How do children tend to respond to abuse?</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Well, the way children respond to sexual abuse depends greatly on their life situation at the time the abuse occurs; the relationship to the offender. And probably one of the biggest factors is their age and developmental stage at the time of abuse. But, you know, I can tell you some general things about how children respond.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Please. How does it vary in terms of age?</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Well, a child's understanding of what is happening to them will vary depending on their age. For some young children, you know, they may not identify what's happening. They may not have the vocabulary to identify it as something actually sexual. It may or may not feel physically bad, depending on how it's perpetrated. And just their understanding of the whole thing varies, depending on, you know, where they're at in their developmental process cognitively, emotionally.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: But I think what it does for all children who are abused sexually, it's a great betrayal of the trust that they had. Most of the time, the abuser is someone known and trusted by the child and the family. So one effect that sexual abuse has on children is to betray that trust that they had, that adults are here to take care of children and look out for children and help keep them safe.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And the symptoms - I guess there are physical ones as well as emotional symptoms.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Sure. Younger children may develop a generalized anxiety or fear that, you know, gets externalized to many parts of their environment. In victims of all ages, it's not uncommon to see depression, eating problems. Younger children might complain of tummy aches as their anxiety comes out that way. And sleeping problems are also common.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: With the older youths, sometimes it's harder for adults to have that compassion and identify what's happening with teens as a potential problem that needs intervention because with adolescents, we may see more acting out, behavior that gets labeled defiance, as some of their emotional reactions come out as anger.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Hard to tell, sometimes, the difference between what might be considered the normal actions of a teenager.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: That's so true. And it's really hard to tell, when we see changes in children, how much of that are changes that are just because of development or changing grades, changing schools. So what we would really encourage parents and other adults to understand is that when we're seeing any of these changes in children and teens, it may not be sexual abuse or victimization. But it's certainly a time to get closer to that child, inquire more in a non-pressuring way, to try to be that trusted adult that's available so that the process of disclosure could begin.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Now for, you know, I guess you might say the grooming process, how a predator develops his prey, it usually is - it's over a period of time, right? It's not right away. They try to work on gaining the trust of children that they want to prey on?</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Yes. Child sexual abuse is often a process of that abuser carefully gaining and then abusing the trust of the child and their parents, or the other adult caregivers in their world. So, you know, the relationship may be developed gradually in a very non-threatening way. And that's important if a predator's going to be successful. They need to not exhibit any red-flag behavior or, you know, boundary violations that might warn the parents.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Usually, you know, those behaviors that we would consider inappropriate and intrusive will be introduced more slowly and gradually, not to alarm the child. At the same time, there's an emotional conditioning that's happening, whether it's making promises to the child or giving their family benefits that the child, you know, realizes that this person helps our family. Mommy and Daddy like and trust this person. You know, it's a complex process.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Do – does abuse - is sexual abuse always physical?</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: I'm glad you brought that up because children and teens experience a wide range of sexually abusive behaviors, and not all of them involve touching. And today, you know - well, exposure to pornography is age-old, but we also have the electronic exposure to inappropriate material, or what's called sexting; or adults exposing themselves to the children. So there is a range of behavior that may not get to the point of touching, but it still has, you know, a psychological effect on the child.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And do children - I think sometimes they feel like they have done something that has brought the abuse on, that they've kind of invited the abuse. And how is that - make it - I guess that makes it more difficult for children to tell an adult that something's happened.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Yes, Neal. That is part of the difficulty for children in disclosing, as well as one of the hurdles survivors have to overcome. The self-blame, blame, the feeling that victims were somehow complicit with the abuse. And for the rest of us, you know, looking at these situations, it's helpful for us to understand how powerful the conditioning is that the abuser uses. It may be spoken. It may be very overt - as in, you know, telling a child, you make me do these things. I know you want this. Or even telling a child there's something about them that makes an abuser touch them in these ways.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: But even if it's not said out loud, the victims often internalize that - you know, we look around the world and say, why me? Why is it happening to me? I must be bad, or there's something wrong with me. I think that's one of the really heartbreaking things to hear in counseling adult and child survivors of victimization, that self-blame and feeling that all along, they were dirty or bad in some way, and that's why this happened.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: We're speaking with Mitru Ciarlante. She is the director of the Youth Initiative at the National Center for Victims of Crime. And we'd also like to hear from you via emails, or you can give us a call at 800-989-8255.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take a call now from Laura(ph). Laura, you're on the line from Worcester, Massachusetts. Welcome to TALK OF THE NATION.</s>LAURA: Hi.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Hi.</s>LAURA: I guess I was asked if I'd tell a little bit more. I'm middle-aged now, and it's been a whole lifetime of recovering. I was abused by family members as well as several other boys, when I was a child. It went on for years. I was told later, when I saw a psychiatrist, that - I actually developed psychotic symptoms - and he said, you know, it's no wonder because you don't really know what's real. And I didn't.</s>LAURA: I had no support, and I have endured a lifetime of shame and family still hiding or not talking about it or, in a sense, elevating the person - one of the persons who did it, because he died. And I've had so many treatments now. And one of the things I've done is just admit to myself what is real. You know, I've been really honest with people with whom I can be honest. As I said, it's been a lifetime. I feel really weird saying it, but a lifetime. And I've had treatments as different as Suboxone, which is taken as an opioid. I have had - I think it's called electrical magnetic stimulation of the brain.</s>LAURA: And I've been told that things are forever changed, that your amygdale is, and your hippocampus is - and the whole axis - I think it's called HPA axis. And I've met some survivors, and they've experienced the same things and yet, you know, when you compare yourself to other people, you have to be wary that they are in recovery far enough so that you don't become a victim of the retelling, which can really be problematic if you want to move on with your life.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Well, thank you. Thank you, Laura, for sharing that with us. Mitru, I'm just wondering if that is something that you hear often - that it's just completely life- altering.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Absolutely. I mean, physically, the alterations in the brain that Laura referred to, that's accurate. And I do want to also thank Laura for telling her story and helping to break the stigma because that's part of what keeps child sexual abuse flourishing. And it's helpful for survivors to know that you're not alone because the surviving - some people don't say they're survivors; they say they're surviving child sexual abuse because it can be a lifelong process.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: When children and adolescents are developing, the actual physical structures in their brain are developing much like a house - the wiring, the plumbing, the foundations - and when trauma happens during those crucial developmental times, it's like a wrecking ball. It knocks out those structures and, you know, this is all part of the healing process that Laura was helping to describe.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: What's amazing is that our minds do some pretty amazing things to help us cope and survive.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: We're talking about victims of childhood sexual abuse, the lasting effects and the treatment options available to help. If you've been a victim of childhood sexual abuse, what helped you overcome the incident - 800-989-8255 or by email, the address is [email protected].</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I'm Brian Naylor. This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Brian Naylor. Some 80,000 children report cases of sexual abuse every year. That's not counting the children who never report what happened to them.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: We're talking today about what happens to victims after they're abused - the effects that linger for a lifetime, and the treatment options that are available to help them understand what happened.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: If you've been a victim of childhood sexual abuse, what helped you overcome the incident? Our number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected], and you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org, and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Our guest is Mitru Ciarlante. She's director of the Youth Initiative at the National Center for Victims of Crime, and she joins us from Oregon Public Broadcasting. And here in Studio 3A is Teresa Huizar. She's the executive director of the National Children's Alliance. Thanks very much for coming in today.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Thank you for having me.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Teresa, let me ask. To begin with, how do you help a victim understand what happened to them?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, I think, obviously, that's going to vary some by age, but part of it is having the child's disclosure in and of itself. You know, hearing that, a part of evidence-supported mental health treatment includes having kids tell their story. We call that a trauma narrative. And one of the reasons we have them do that is so that we can try to correct the sort of cognitive distortions your prior caller was talking about - the sense that it's their fault, the sense that they've done something wrong.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: And so having them talk about it in that way provides an opportunity to have them re-evaluate and think about - is that really possible that it's their fault? Is that really true? And it's an opportunity for the professional to correct those myths.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So that's a treatment that works. Do we know what treatments don't work or things that have been tried over the years?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: I am really glad you asked that because I have a feeling that many of the callers today will be adults who, at the time of their victimization, unfortunately did not have evidence-supported mental health treatments available to them.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: The research around what actually works in this field is quite recent and, more or less, over the last 15 years, we've learned a tremendous amount about the types of treatments that work, and a whole list of treatments that don't work.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: I think, if callers are interested in learning about treatments that work with kids, the National Child Traumatic Stress Network at NCTSN.org has an entire list of evidence-supported mental health treatments where research says these treatments work for kids.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I want to read a couple of emails that we've received. Francis(ph) from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, writes: I was a teenager when I was abused by a man who is a serial sexual predator. What helped me heal was a healthy and loving sexual relationship with my next girlfriend, my first true love. To know that I could give myself physically to someone who truly loved me, and who was not manipulating me and taking advantage of me for his own selfish purposes, was very affirming.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: How does abuse of a child affect one's later love life?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, I think you raise a really important point, and that is that when somebody has been sexually abused, aside from simply losing the ability to trust - which is an enormous part of that, and all effective treatment tries to deal with that issue. The other thing is that there are trauma triggers, things that remind us about the trauma that we've had or in which we may re-experience that trauma. And you can imagine that physical intimacy is one of those things that may very well prompt a flashback sort of experience, where you can have this experience of feeling the sensations again - all over again - of having been sexually abused, even though right in the moment, you're with somebody that you trust and you have a loving relationship with.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: And I think that having an opportunity to talk about one's sexual abuse history, and to talk about those reactions in the moment and how to cope with those, is a really important thing to help victims throughout their life develop healthy relationships and loving relationships.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Another email, from Michelle(ph) in Fort Thomas, Kentucky. She writes: I have a very close family member who was abused for about a year by someone when she was about 7. She didn't tell anyone until she was 17 and, after repressing it for that long, it took a huge toll on her psychologically. She ended up being admitted nine times into different hospitals because of the psychological damage.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: What happens when abuse is not reported for a long time?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, the effects, as you can hear there, are very often compounded because the good news about effective mental health treatment is that if children disclose and people believe their disclosure and intervene and get them help, they really can have hope and healing. And that's the great news.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: And the sad news is that for kids who may not feel that there's a safe person to disclose to or often the person that they disclose to, at first, doesn't believe them, in the intervening time before they finally get treatment, there's a lot of opportunity for risk-taking behavior, for self-harm, cutting themselves, suicidal thoughts, depression, anxiety. When all of those things go untreated, you can imagine the kind of long-term mental health effects of that.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take a call now. Mike, you're on the line with us from Madison, Wisconsin. Thanks for calling TALK OF THE NATION.</s>MIKE: Yes, good afternoon. Excellent topic, and I appreciate the work that your guests are doing with this because there isn't enough that can be done for children that are victims of abuse. Having been a victim of abuse myself as a pre-teenager, we were very - my family was very involved religiously - in the church. The minister of that church had his own camp during the summertime that he encouraged boys to participate in and, of course, my family and my mother and father believing that - and him being a very strong person in the community, a very upstanding person in the community, I attended this camp and it wasn't after - until a couple of years into this camp that the sexual abuse started taking place.</s>MIKE: And when I disclosed this to my parents, one of the hardest hurdles, initially, was the fact that my parents didn't believe me, either. And my mother did. My mother was supportive. My dad was, you know, you realize what you're going to do to this family? You know, why would you do this? Why are you making this stuff up?</s>MIKE: And, finally, when we did go to the police department, that was the attitude that was - and, of course, this was quite a while ago - but that was the attitude that was solidified by members of the police department as well; that this is a very reputable man in the community. It was a smaller community. He said, you know what? Your family's not going to want this kind of press. Nobody's going to believe this child, you know.</s>MIKE: And we started to pursue it until that same idea was – again, was reinforced by not only the officers, by the investigators,by social workers at the time, but by the courts as well; that this can't possibly be the person that would do this. And it was becoming so devastating to our family. And I remember the arguments late at night between my mother and father, and the tear that it was causing, and my father leaving for a short period of time and...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Did you - I mean, so eventually, though, you prevailed? You continued to press this?</s>MIKE: Well, what caused that is what was touched on slightly - is the fact that we withdrew our complaint against him, and it wasn't until several years later, when several other victims came forward, and we had the support of those other families and those other victims so that people started believing that this person actually did this. And we were all there to support each other.</s>MIKE: And the system changed. The people started realizing that this was going on. And then we were not looked at as the terrible person who tried to ruin this man's life but as another victim - and were treated that way.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thanks, Mike.</s>MIKE: And that was tremendous.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thank you very much. And that raises a question I wanted to ask, and let me bring Mitru back into the conversation. Are communities - are police departments better equipped to deal with these charges now, with these cases of abuse?</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Better than in the past, certainly, and you know, there are many of us - including the Children's Alliance and the National Center for Victims of Crime - a lot of our work is about equipping those police departments and local child protective services workers to be better prepared for helping children in cases like this. But I want to help people understand that when a child is sexually abused, it is a violation for their parents as well. It's a betrayal experienced by the whole, entire community when it's someone who was trusted by that community and children were put in their care.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: And it's not uncommon for the family and the community to go through their own process of grief and anger and also, unfortunately for the children, denial in the beginning. And that's also why we keep talking about disclosure of sexual abuse as a process.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Many adults or children whom people think did not tell for several years actually had many incidents of trying to let someone - let an adult know what was happening to them. So we really need public awareness like this so that we can all remove some of those filters that keep us from seeing something that's so abhorrent, it's really hard to accept about our own community members and family members.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Another email, from Kate(ph) in Manchester, New Hampshire: I'm a victim of childhood abuse and am aware of my coping mechanism, and have sought therapy to deal with these issues. My boyfriend is also a victim, and he refuses to seek a therapist based on bad experiences with them.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And she asks, are there signs that men tend to exhibit that are different from - men? And this is a good question. I mean, do men and women respond to - react to abuse - or boys and girls react to abuse differently?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, one of the things that I would say about that is, the way that depression acts out in men can be somewhat different than with women. You may see more anger as a part of that than you typically may see with women. Having said that, every individual reacts somewhat differently. But when it comes to children, basic responses to child traumatic stress tend to be fairly consistent.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: That is, it's not at all uncommon to have a response of hyperarousal; that is - sort of a hypervigilance, an anxiety, an increase in your startle response, to have this re-experiencing piece of it where your sleep may be disturbed, or whether you have traumatic memories intruding on your thought during the day or flashbacks to that. And then I would say the other piece of that is avoidance - that because we want to try to move away from those trauma triggers and trauma reminders, you have victims of abuse who may isolate themselves very significantly because of that.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: And all of those reactions are very amenable to treatment. And so, you know, I would encourage this boyfriend to get into treatment because there certainly are some effective treatments that are available.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And I want to ask, if it's a boy, a young man that's been abused, is it more difficult for him to deal with if it's another male or if it's a female? Does that, you know, change - does it make harder if he's a...</s>TERESA HUIZAR: I think what it may do, for some boys especially, is that they begin to question their own sexuality. I mean, if you think about it developmentally at the time that they're sexually abused, their own sexually may be formative. And so there is, I think, some additional questioning that goes along with that when it's a same-gender offense versus a cross-gender. Having said that, all sexual abuse is traumatic in nature, and all of it has significant impact on the victims that are involved.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let me ask - let's go to a call. Fred, you're on the line, joining us now from Margaret, New York. Is that right?</s>FRED: Margaretville, New York. Yes.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Margaretville, New York. Thanks for calling us.</s>FRED: This is a great topic, and I wish it had been more in the public mind years ago. I'm 68, but this took place when I was 11 and 12 in summer camp. And the issue of sexual identity was what profoundly affected me. It was the most popular counselor in camp, so I felt blessed that he had chosen me. And that's what messed my mind up for many years. It wasn't until I realized that it wasn't so much a sexual thing - because the guy was not gay, and neither am I - it was a power struggle.</s>FRED: It was him exhibiting dominion over selected kids. And when I realized that, it freed me. And I also realized that homosexuality is not a choice. You either are or are not and - but it was difficult for me to understand that as an 11-, 12-, 13-year-old. It wasn't until I was in my late 20s that I began to really understand this.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Well, thank you very much, Fred...</s>FRED: The point is that it's power sometimes, not so much the sexual aspect.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thanks, Fred, for calling. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. And let me just ask you to - if you might for a moment - to respond to what Fred said. Is it often a power issue, or it seems that way to a child?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, I think that certainly people abuse children for a variety of reasons. And while professionals have tried to create different typologies for sexual-abuse offenders, the truth is there are many motivations, and those vary. And in this case, it may have been power, and in others it may be sexual, and in others it may be something else. I think the important message is whatever the reason behind it, it's certainly not the victim's fault and clearly, the entire responsibility of the offender.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: But certainly, the messages that are given by the offender to the child create myths in their head. I mean, what your caller just described is basically, spending a lifetime dispelling the myths in his head about why he was selected. And those cognitive distortions are precisely what high-quality mental health care can directly address.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I want to read from another email, from Kate. I was a victim of abuse from the age of 9 to 15 by an older stepbrother who did not live in the house. I never revealed what happened. The recent events in the news have made me realize I need to make public what happened, and to confront this individual. So Kate is now revealing this, I guess, because of the news. How bad - or is it bad, worse when it's a brother, a stepbrother?</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, certainly it's an increased betrayal of trust. And the other complicator here is that over the course of her lifetime, this individual is going to run into that family member over and over and over again. So you can imagine how stressful this is. We have the holidays coming up. Well, imagine you're going to be thrown in at the Thanksgiving table and at family reunions, and at every wedding and other family event. And so having some coping mechanisms, and some ability to deal with the sensations of anxiety that come up when you're repeatedly exposed to someone who's harmed you in that way, I think, is critically important.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Is it a coping mechanism kind of thing? Or do you need to move beyond coping with it; you need to report it.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Well, certainly, I think it's important to report abuse, all abuse. That should go, you know, in my opinion, without saying; that individuals, if they have been abused, should report it. And you know, states vary in terms of the statutes of limitations, in terms of what can be criminally pursued about that. But I think there's value to reporting that, in case that individual has harmed others, and to prevent future harm of others as a part of that. I think to the extent that you can have the support of your family in directly addressing that and not sweeping it under the rug, that's also important.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: But these things should be done hand and hand with a professional. I do have some concern about a caller that may say, well, I'm going to go and confront that individual. I mean, let's make sure that the caller is also safe in the doing so, and is prepared emotionally to handle what that confrontation might look like. And so I would just encourage her to reach out to a mental health professional as she plans on what her contact will be.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: We have received over 100 calls and emails, and we haven't been able to get to them all throughout this segment. But thanks very much for everyone, for listening and for responding. Teresa Huizar - I'm sorry - is executive director of the National Children's Alliance. She joined us here in Studio 3A. Thank you, Teresa.</s>TERESA HUIZAR: Thank you.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And Mitru Ciarlante is director of the Youth Initiative at the National Center for Victims of Crime. She joined us from the studios of Oregon Public Broadcasting in Portland. Thank you, Mitru.</s>MITRU CIARLANTE: Thank you very much.
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News & Notes closes its month-long series on the black literary imagination with a special snapshot. We asked several of our guests to share some of their favorite books and childhood reading memories.
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TONY COX, host: As we do every Friday, we end the show with a personal story. But instead of one of our usual voices, we've got a special look back at our series on The Black Literary Imagination. We asked several of our guests after their interviews to share with us some of their favorite books and childhood reading memories. We then cut those together with a few series highlights and the result is this week's Snapshot.</s>Mr. BYRON PITTS (Reporter, CBS): Oh, well. You said Walter Mosley. I love Walter Mosley's work.</s>Ms. JOYCE CAROL THOMAS: My name is Joyce Carol Thomas. My favorite book is "Their Eyes Were Watching God" by Zora Neale Hurston.</s>Ms. JOYCE CAROL THOMAS: Prof. JAMES ALAN McPHERSON (Author, "Elbow Room"; Professor, University of Iowa's Writers' Workshop): I love Neville. I love Twain. I love Ellison.</s>Ms. JOYCE CAROL THOMAS: Ms. SHEREE R. THOMAS (Editor, "Dark Matter"): Oh, I'm going to go out on a limb. I'm going to say…</s>Mr. ISHMAEL REED (Professor Emeritus, UC Berkeley; Author): You know, the first book that really turned me on was "Collected Works of Nathaniel West."</s>Ms. TANANARIVE DUE (Author, "My Soul to Keep"): "The Mummy," "Dracula," that kind of thing. I don't think I ever imagined myself as a horror writer or a speculative fiction writer at that time. But I was definitely drawn to that type of writing from a very young age.</s>Ms. NAKEA MURRAY (Founder, As The Page Turns): Two books stick out in my mind. The first one would have to be "Child of God" by Lilota Files, as well as "Harlem Girl Lost" by author Treasure E. Blue.</s>Mr. ERIC JEROME DICKEY (Novelist, "Waking With Enemies"): For me, I mean, early on, "Devil In a Blue Dress." I can't tell you the number of times that I read that and just - how everything is a character, you know? Every location is a character. Being specific. Every character has his or her own personality.</s>Ms. JOYCE CAROL THOMAS: Her characters who are ghosts become real people for me. And so she was in touch with a dimension that most people are not in touched with. And so it's always exciting to see that.</s>Mr. BYRON PITTS (Reporter, CBS): I've only seen my mother cry twice in my life. The first time, when it came on the radio that Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated. And the second time was when the therapist told my mother - I've never forgotten his words: I'm sorry, Mrs. Pitts, your son is functionally illiterate.</s>Mr. BYRON PITTS (Reporter, CBS): Prof. McPHERSON: This is going to sound silly but I used to play hooky from school and go to Carnegie Public Library across the street from my house and read all day. And I used to love to discover new books.</s>Ms. TANANARIVE DUE (Author, "My Soul to Keep"): That was such a hard question. I'm so torn.</s>Ms. BETTY BAYE (Columnist, Courier-Journal; Founder, The Zoras): Sister Souljah's book "The Coldest Winter Ever." That was so instructive.</s>Mr. BYRON PITTS (Reporter, CBS): Walter Mosley, Ed McBain. Right now, I'm reading Anais Nin.</s>Ms. BETTY BAYE (Columnist, Courier-Journal; Founder, The Zoras): From Baldwin and Hurston to - we've done DuBois, we've done Poitier's memoir. We've done Miles Davis.</s>Ms. TANANARIVE DUE (Author, "My Soul to Keep"): I'm going to go ahead because I'm feeling sentimental, especially listening to Octavia's voice and say "Parable of the Sower," which - there are so many other books, but that book is such a journey that it actually makes you stronger as the reader as you go on.</s>Ms. TANANARIVE DUE (Author, "My Soul to Keep"): Prof. McPHERSON: And (unintelligible) simply go on "The Egyptian" about ancient Egypt through the time of turmoil. I love that book.</s>Mr. ERIC JEROME DICKEY (Novelist, "Waking With Enemies"): You know, there are no boring subjects, just boring writers.</s>Ms. JOYCE CAROL THOMAS: You want to read work that reflects yourself, not necessarily, literally yourself but your perspective, your point of view and the community around you. And if you don't see it in the work in front of you, as a writer, you're challenged to write it yourself.</s>Ms. BETTY BAYE (Columnist, Courier-Journal; Founder, The Zoras): A book club gives you a way to be sort of an unofficial cultural anthropologist in that you tap into other people's lives.</s>Mr. BYRON PITTS (Reporter, CBS): I got this great line in the book where he says, in talking about the beginning of slavery, he tells a small story of the first ship and the so and so, dropped anchor into the muddy waters of history. I thought, wow, yeah. Exactly. That's it.</s>TONY COX, host: That was Byron Pitts, Eric Jerome Dickey, Betty Baye, Joyce Carol Thomas, Nakea Murray, Ishmael Reed, James Alan McPherson, Tananarive Due and Sheree R. Thomas with this week's Snapshot.</s>TONY COX, host: In case you missed a conversation on our series on The Black Literary Imagination, or you just want to listen again, go to our Web site, nprnewsandnotes.org.
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Occupy Wall Street and reports on the nation's growing income gap have helped rally the political left, argues Matthew Continetti of The Weekly Standard. It is not the government's responsibility to redress wealth disparities, he says, and the GOP must do a better job of communicating that message. Read Matthew Continetti's Weekly Standard op-ed, "About Inequality."
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BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: After being forced to evacuate Zuccotti Park early this morning, Occupy Wall Street protesters promised to continue a movement that has spread nationally, in some cases globally. The movement created a focal point for fears about the country's growing income gap. And President Obama and other politicians have picked up on the theme in recent weeks, as many in the middle class continue to face long-term unemployment and stagnant incomes. In a recent op-ed in The Weekly Standard, Matt Continetti argues that the issue of inequality has shifted the political ground to the left.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Republicans, he says, were largely caught off guard by the populist surge and have been too quick to dismiss the left's arguments about income inequality. And we would like to hear some - from some Republicans. What would your – or should your party do on the income of - on the issue, that is, of income inequality? 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected], and you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Matt Continetti is the opinion editor for The Weekly Standard. His op-ed "About Inequality" was published in this week's issue, and he joins us here in Studio 3A. Welcome back to the show.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Thanks for having me.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Matt, you argue that the right has not responded coherently to the arguments on inequality. What's at stake here? Is this issue going to hurt Republicans going into the 2012 elections?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Well, according to the polls, it has every possibility to hurt the Republicans. When you ask about the fate of the Bush tax rates, say, the public is behind efforts to repeal them, and they side with President Obama on that. So it's certainly an issue that galvanizes media opinion, and I think as a function of that could galvanize public opinion as well.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: A recent poll by The Wall Street Journal found three quarters of Americans agree with an argument that the power of banks and large corporations should be reduced. Is this a view that tends to benefit the left?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Right. Well, I think I would distinguish between the findings in that poll and then the overall debate about income inequality, because I think inequality that the people are worried about in that poll is political inequality, the inequality of the banks to shape public policy, for example. And there, I think, there is some room for everyone on whatever side of the spectrum to agree about restraining the political equality, or rather enforcing political equality among the various interests.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: That's sort of what the Occupy Wall Street movement seems to be about...</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Well, there's many - there's a variety of things the Occupy Wall Street movement seems to be about. And I'm been following it pretty intensely. There are things that the liberals want the Occupy Wall Street movement to be about, and that is primarily the issue of income inequality. But I think if you talk to the occupiers and if you read their theorists, the people that write the books that inspire the people to occupy Wall Street or McPherson Square here in Washington, D.C., they have other concerns.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: And they're much more against everything - against the structure of government in this country, against globalization, against war. It's not just the issue of income inequality for them.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: But on the issue of income inequality, how do you think that conservatives should recapture this argument?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Sure. Well, my problem with a lot of the conservative response so far at these debates is that on the one hand there are those who deny the fact of income inequality by citing social science research. But to deny the fact of it is not to deny that it's a problem. It's just to dispute whether the problem exists. And then on the other hand, you have some conservatives who want to kind of outdo the left or say, well, you're right, income inequality is a problem, but here are the response is that we should have as conservatives.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: But, of course, if those responses don't work, then you open a space for the left to do their responses. And so in my piece that you cited, I argue that maybe conservatives should return to an earlier understanding of what equality was, and that was the understanding of the founders. There's been a lot of interest in the Founding Fathers over the last few years that we see in the Tea Party movement, for example. And the founders never thought about equality of income as the concern of government. They thought the concern of government ought to be the equal protection of rights, including those rights that lead to inequality of income - the right of property, for example. And I think that's a much firmer ground for the right to make a stand on and to say - what the right is supporting is a vision of government that the founders supported in the Declaration, in the Constitution, but that so few people - on both left and right, actually - pay any attention to.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Is there - so in inequality of property, you mean not just real property, but material property?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Right. For the - right. The phrase from Locke that Jefferson appropriated for the Declaration was life, liberty and property. He changed that to happiness. But that meant that, you know, we have certain rights, and the exercise of those rights in our differing abilities is going to lead to different accumulations of property. And so they wanted to protect the rights, not equalize the property.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take a call. You can join in the conversation and give us a call here at TALK OF THE NATION. And Ed is on the line with us now from Denver. Ed, welcome to the program.</s>ED: Thank you.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: What can we do for you today? What are your thoughts about income inequality?</s>ED: Well, I basically kind of parallel with what was just said. I think the role of government is less to make the accumulation of property equal, and more to make the accumulation, the opportunity equal. And what I've seen happen in my lifetime is that the access to quality, primary education and higher education has become more and more difficult for anybody that's not in the upper-class. And I think that's what should be focused on, is making sure the opportunity is equal from birth.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And do you think that your party - the Republican Party - needs to do something about this? Or what should they do?</s>ED: Well, I think they need to admit that it's a problem. I think that's the biggest thing. If they - if we really believe in what we say, that you pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, if you really believe in that, then that means that there shouldn't be a big difference in opportunity between a rich son and a poor son.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Ed, thanks very much. Matt, do you agree with that? Does the Republican Party - does the government not do enough to encourage education equality?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Right. Well, I would agree that there are problems with our education system, and certainly the Founders, especially Jefferson, believed that education was going to be crucial to the fate of the democratic republic that they were creating. And we see today that there are plenty of problems with our educational system. Both left and right agree. But then it gets into this case of, well, what are the problems, and what are the solutions? That's a conversation that I think the Founding Fathers would want to have, and it's a conversation to be conducted on the level of reason and, you know, what are the appropriate powers of government, and such. So I agree with the caller. I think he makes some interesting points.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: The Republicans who have been campaigning for president have talked a lot about the economy, a lot about the jobless rate, but not so much about the issue of income inequality. Should they be?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Well, I think so, because I think once you grasp equality from the point of view that I'm talking about right now and that I've - and that I'm writing about in the Weekly Standard, it becomes, actually, a pretty powerful issue for conservatives, or for whoever wants to get it, because, obviously, the Founders of this country were very intelligent men and farseeing. And they had a vision of equal rights of all, and that the role of government was to protect the equal rights of all, and specifically those rights that we have as - by nature of being human, such as the right to life and the right to conscience and stuff and such, the things we read about in the Bill of Rights. This is the template, I think, for an agenda that actually could sway a lot of people in the middle.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Frank joins us on the line from Hollywood, Florida. Frank, your thoughts about income inequality and the conservative movement.</s>FRANK: First of all, an excellent topic. I appreciate it. I am a fiscal conservative. I've been one since 1986, the first time I ever voted. And then I'd like to mention that the inequality - the discussion's all great, but for instance, I'm unemployed right now. I've just retired from the military, and I'm looking for a job, and it's very difficult. We can have all these conversations about how the liberals think and how the conservatives think. But at the end of the day, if I don't have a job, I don't really care what these two - the two parties think. I really don't care how they're campaigning. They've - they don't provide the means for myself and others - because a lot of us out there, both conservative and liberal - who simply do not have employment.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thanks very much, Frank. And, Matt, that's an interesting point. I mean, if you don't have a job, I guess, a lot of this discussion about income inequality is sort of irrelevant, at best.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Yeah. I think that's right. And I think that's one reason why the Occupiers, for example, do - have had traction, is that we do live in a time of high unemployment. And then the discussion becomes, well, I think, two-fold. One is: Is it the government's role to provide jobs to the public? And two, what type of climate should the government foster for industry and for entrepreneurship, for example? Those - I mean, those are questions that aren't easily resolved. And I personally don't believe that it's the government's role to provide jobs for everybody. I do believe, on the other hand, that there are certain policies that we have had enacted, especially in the last few years, that have made it harder for people to find work. And so there's an example, if we can go through the different policies.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Well, right. And then the one thing that you do hear from the Republican candidates is the need to get read some of those, quote, unquote, "job-killing regulations..."</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Right.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: ...that have kept people from hiring. I don't know if that's - the book is still open as to whether or not that's actually occurring. But clearly, you can - the argument is made that the government has gotten too big and interfering with the private sector.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: That's right. Or certainly - I mean, I guess, the strongest case on that would be that what the government has done in the last few years just hasn't worked, I mean, that we've spent 800 billion in stimulus money. We've had record deficits of more than a trillion-and-a-half dollars over the last several years. And by every expectation of our economists - in the White House, especially - you would think that we would be producing jobs. But we haven't. So then perhaps it's time to seek other alternatives and maybe rethink our assumptions.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: You're to TALK OF THE NATION, from NPR News. So, Matt, is this largely, do you think, a - would you say that this is - this whole discussion is kind of a trope of the left about income equality, or is it something that your side needs to seriously engage in?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Right. Well, it's certainly a trope of the left, right? I mean, because banner of the French Revolution was liberty, fraternity and equality. And ever since the Revolution, when we - our categories of political thought came into being, left and right, equality has been the great quest of the left, and that they view that equality - not only in the equality of rights like I mentioned, but also the equality of things, the equality of goods. And so this is definitely the left's ground.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: What I'm saying is that the conservatives have an opportunity to try to take us back to the grounds that existed before the earthquake of the French Revolution, and in a way that the Founders of this country discussed equality, which is very different from the way that we discuss it today.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Quick email from Steven in San Rafael, California: I believe people who have no problem with meritocracy or those who work smarter and/or harder are more amply rewarded. Witness the popularity of someone like Steve Jobs. The problem arises when some are able to amass great fortunes, not through merit, but through corruption and the influence of money in the system. What about that, corruption, influence of money in politics?</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Right. Well, I don't think anybody would be for corruption. You don't have the corruption caucus in Congress, even though some of them have issues with it. No, no one's corruption. And I think the emailer raises a good point, which an earlier caller did, too: What about these - wealth that is not justly acquired? And there, I think, the Founders would have a problem with that sort of wealth. But that just takes us to the question of: What is justly acquired? And that's a conversation we ought to have.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Matt Continetti is the opinion editor for The Weekly Standard. He joined us here in Studio 3A. A link to his piece about inequality can be found at our website: npr.org. Matt, thanks for coming in today.</s>MATT CONTINETTI: Thanks for having me.
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Emily Rapp and her husband eagerly anticipated their baby's birth. But when their son Ronan was nine-months-old, he was diagnosed with a terminal disease. All of their plans suddenly felt inconsequential and they refocused their lives on being fierce, loyal and loving "dragon parents." Emily Rapp, mother of 19-month-old Ronan and author of Poster Child Jan Wyss, registered nurse and manager, Partners for Children Program, San Diego Hospice
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BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Brian Naylor in Washington. Neal Conan is away. Like most prospective parents, Emily Rapp and her husband spent much of her pregnancy poring over parenting guides and planning for their child's future.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: But by the time Ronan was nine months old, it was clear that something was wrong. Ronan wasn't developing as expected and a trip to the eye doctor eventually led to a diagnosis of an incurable genetic disease. Most children with that disease, Tay-Sachs, won't live beyond their fourth birthday.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Being a parent of a terminally ill child, Rapp wrote recently in the New York Times, means parenting without a net and without a future. She joins us in a moment.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: If this is your story, tell us what helped you. Our number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected] and you can join the conversation at our website. Go to NPR.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Later in the program, a former DJ on the future of rock music on the radio.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: But first, we start with Emily Rapp. She is a writer and professor of creative writing at Santa Fe University of Art and Design in New Mexico. She joins us now from a studio in Santa Fe.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Emily, thanks for sharing your story with us today.</s>EMILY RAPP: Thank you for having me.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Tell us, what did you first do when you first learned of Ronan's diagnosis?</s>EMILY RAPP: It was interesting because, obviously, when I got the news, I was devastated, clearly, and I often tell people that it was almost as if he died that day, in some ways, because we were robbed of a future with him. And then several things happened. I felt a great overwhelming need to reach out to other people who had a similar experience just because it's such an isolating feeling, this kind of grief.</s>EMILY RAPP: And so I did that and I got in touch with National Tay-Sachs and Allied Diseases Organization and they put me in touch with mothers who started calling me, just calling my number and offering to talk. So my first response was to reach out to other people and see what they had done to survive this experience.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And, as we heard, you did all of the sort of planning that typical young parents tend to do up until his...</s>EMILY RAPP: Yes.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: ...diagnosis.</s>EMILY RAPP: Yes.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And, you know, how did the news, you know, transform the way you approached parenting when you found out?</s>EMILY RAPP: It's been a slow kind of evolution over the last nine months since his diagnosis and I feel like it's been a hugely transformative period in my life, maybe the most terrible and beautiful nine months of my whole life because so much of parenting is obviously a future-directed enterprise. And what I started to learn from Ronan was, not only is he sort of free of those expectations, but he encouraged me to sort of love him in the moment, which is actually kind of difficult to do if you follow those sort of traditional or, at least American, parenting advice.</s>EMILY RAPP: We seem to have found ourselves in a parenting Olympics where parents sort of live through their children. So it was a huge sea change in my perspective and I'm actually very grateful for my son for teaching me that important lesson.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Just tell us a little bit about Tay-Sachs. How has it affected Ronan?</s>EMILY RAPP: Tay-Sachs is a rare, progressive neurological disease. It's caused by a missing enzyme and it's sort of - it's been commonly associated with the Jewish community, although that's not true anymore. It is not a Jewish disease.</s>EMILY RAPP: And what ends up happening with children who have Tay-Sachs is that they gradually lose their faculties and their functions and so the first step in terms of prolonging life would be a feeding tube or other interventions.</s>EMILY RAPP: I also want to say that it's really important for people to know that Tay-Sachs can happen to anybody. It is not a Jewish disease and the NTSAD, the organization I mentioned earlier, has done a great deal of advocacy in this area in terms of carrier screening. And that's something I'm very passionate about because I actually did have the test for Tay-Sachs, but the...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And they were negative?</s>EMILY RAPP: ..standard - it was negative. The standard prenatal test does not detect all of the mutations.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So did you feel at all, you know - I don't know. Did you feel betrayed when you found out or felt maybe that the medical community had let you down or that you were the victim of a horrible, horrible joke?</s>EMILY RAPP: I suppose. Yeah. I mean, and I think that anyone who gets a terminal diagnosis for their child feels that often, that sort of, why me, feeling and you feel like a victim. But there's nothing we can do for him. And, in that sense, it's been an experience that's sort of - it's transformed me in the sense that it's made me much more fearless in life. And so I don't feel like a victim of the medical community. I mean, I wish that I had known this information before I had the test, but I certainly don't think I've been wronged in any significant way.</s>EMILY RAPP: Of course, I wish it hadn't happened, but it has and I understood from the beginning that the only way to survive it was to really just go right into it, accept it and write about it and tell his story. Those are my coping mechanisms and were from the very beginning.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah. Is it difficult to interact with parents of healthy children? Do you feel at all isolated because of Ronan and Ronan's illness?</s>EMILY RAPP: I don't - sometimes it is, although, you know, I have this amazing parenting group through the Tay-Sachs Foundation and, interestingly, it's probably the only parenting group I've ever felt comfortable in if only because they're not concerned with sort of the banal issues. They know the truth about life. They're in this. You know, their task is loving their child and that's what we talk about.</s>EMILY RAPP: So I actually don't feel isolated because I've been very connected with parents who - not only do their children have Tay-Sachs, but other fatal diseases, as well. So I have that network of parents.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And do you find it difficult to talk with other parents, though? I mean, they're talking about their kids doing things that - I don't know - that they would take for granted and that you know that Ronan may never be able to experience? Does it feel alienating, sometimes, or...</s>EMILY RAPP: Sometimes. Although, you know, probably those parents are pretty careful not to have those conversations around me - is what I would say. You know, Ronan is who he is and he's great company. He's a great kid. You know, I can only speak out of my experience, so I suppose there's a little bit of that. It depends on the day.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah, yeah. What kinds of decisions have you had to make about his care to this point?</s>EMILY RAPP: Nothing at this point, but we have decided to do the nonintervention route because we feel that it would prolong suffering versus giving him a high quality of life. So our goals are centered around making him happy, which is very easy to do, trying to make him feel safe and comfortable and just - you know, we do a lot of sort of sitting with him in our laps and being with him. It's basically just sort of a very peaceful coexistence.</s>EMILY RAPP: And so far, we haven't had to make those decisions that we will do in the future.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And you say nonintervention. That means no feeding tubes.</s>EMILY RAPP: That's right.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And are there other things that you've decided that you're not going to deal with?</s>EMILY RAPP: That's really the first step for most parents and, you know, one thing I will say about the National Tay-Sachs and Allied Diseases Organization is that parents make a whole range of decisions about care for their child and there's no judgment about that within the group. You know, you can only do what you would do for yourself. It's an impossible choice and I really appreciate that about the community that I'm involved with, is that your choice is respected and you're expected to respect the choices of others.</s>EMILY RAPP: And I can only speak, you know, for my own son, but don't have any judgment about other people's decisions.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And have people - tell you - how do people respond, you know, when they find out about Ronan? Do they say they, you know, they couldn't imagine facing such a thing or...</s>EMILY RAPP: Yeah. That's the common response. I mean, what I think is interesting about that, when people say I can't imagine, is that the reason that it's so horrific is that they actually can imagine. You know, I have a lot of friends who are parents and they just - you know, a lot of the parenting is about terror of this very thing happening.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah.</s>EMILY RAPP: So I think people actually can imagine, but they maybe don't want to. And I think it's important - I mean, I've - from the very beginning - have been very frank about it and I think that sort of helps people be at ease, but yeah. It's hard to know what to say. I mean, I guess the only thing to - the wrong thing to say would be nothing at all, which, you know, people have different reactions when they hear this news, but, you know...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And are you and your husband a team on this? You're on the same page? Have you...</s>EMILY RAPP: We are, in terms of care decisions. Absolutely. I mean, we - thankfully, we are and I think we are very united in our care of him and we take good care of him and we enjoy him. We try to understand that, because our moments are limited, we really have to stay aware of what's happening and that can be really sort of exhausting and it can also be incredibly exhilarating. It's kind of a mix.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And how do you - you mentioned holding Ronan, spend a lot of time with him, I guess, on your lap and close to you. Do you get out much? Do you...</s>EMILY RAPP: Oh, yeah. We take him out. We hike with him. We take him in his stroller. We live in Santa Fe, which is a beautiful place to walk and bike and run and we take him on road trips and take him out to eat. I mean, we take out a lot of places and he's very well known in this town and we have a lot of people who come to visit. We've had people visiting for the last nine months just to meet him and hold him.</s>EMILY RAPP: And, you know, I just want him to be surrounded by love for his whole life and he might be unique in the sense that he will only have ever experienced unconditional love his entire - for the whole span of his life. So I often think about that when the days are hard.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah. And this is a difficult question, but you know, how do you think about the future? Have you begun to prepare yourselves for a life without Ronan?</s>EMILY RAPP: We have. I mean, it's really hard, obviously, to do when he's sitting right there and, you know, one of the things that I've tried so hard to do, which is very much against my nature, is to not sort of project into the future, but to really just sit with him and be like, this experience is terrible, but it's also very true. I mean, it's an opportunity to learn something about being a human being, as well as a parent, as well as a partner.</s>EMILY RAPP: And they maybe aren't opportunities I would choose, but here they are. So we kind of take it day by day because we don't know. We don't know how long he has left, so we try not to project too much into what comes next.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And you're a writer. Does that help you, in a way, deal with this?</s>EMILY RAPP: It's saved me, I have to say. I started a blog about Ronan three days after he was diagnosed and, believe me, as a writer, it was the last thing I thought would be my coping mechanism, but it has saved me. It's very important. It's one of the hooks into the world that's gotten me through this experience.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: We're talking about the challenges of raising a child with a terminal illness. If this is your story, tell us what helped you. Our number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected]. I'm Brian Naylor. This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Brian Naylor. We're talking with parents about raising terminally ill children. It can be an isolating experience filled with difficult decisions and challenges, but as our guest, Emily Rapp, wrote in the New York Times, there are also rewards. Our experiences have taught us how to parent for the here and now, for the sake of parenting, for the humanity implicit in the act itself. Parenting, I've come to understand, is about loving my child today, now. In fact, for any parent anywhere, that's all there is.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: You can find a link to her piece at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION. If this is your story, tell us what helped you. Our number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected].</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And let's take a call now from Kaylee(ph), I think in Kansas City. Thanks for joining us.</s>CALE: I'm sorry, it's Cale(ph).</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I apologize, Cale.</s>CALE: That's fine. Yeah. My story is a little bit different, but I mean there's difference and similarities. My wife and I lost identical twin daughters. They were born prematurely at 24 weeks and had kind of a compilation of issues, schizencephaly, hydrocephalus and they were monoamniotic, meaning they were in the same amniotic sac and umbilical chords were tangled and things like that.</s>CALE: But, you know, we basically had to decide the same, you know, as your guest did. Do we intervene or not...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah.</s>CALE: ...when they were born? You know, the surgeries had very little probability of increasing any kind of quality of life or extending life, just - so we chose to let them pass.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Mm-hmm. So without any intervention.</s>CALE: Correct.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah. Well, thank you, Cale. Thanks for sharing that with us. I'd like to bring into the conversation now Jan Wyss. She's a registered nurse who works with parents of terminally and chronically ill children and their families. She manages the Partners for Children Program at San Diego Hospice and joins us from member station KPBS in San Diego.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Welcome to TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JAN WYSS: Thank you.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I understand families that connect with your program sometime after their child has received a terminal diagnosis, they've often already had the opportunity to absorb the news, but when parents do first come to you, what's the first thing you tell them?</s>JAN WYSS: We actually ask a lot of questions. We find out where they're at, where they're at in life, what goals of care they've set for their child, what they're going to need support-wise, advocacy-wise, what it will take to live as normal a life as they can and the most comfortable life they can with that child.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Emily mentioned the isolation parents like her can feel. Do you see that in your work?</s>JAN WYSS: I see it on a daily basis and I mentioned to a friend just yesterday that I had a call over the weekend and it was from a mom and that's exactly the reason she called was the isolation. It's hard to tell your family about what's going on. They don't really understand. Your friends don't want to hear you complain all the time. You don't really have time to foster those friendships. It's hard to get away when you're doing 24/7 care with your child. And not knowing how much time you have, you want to make the most quality of that time and not sort of be out and about with friends instead of at home.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah. And I just want to ask you, Emily, is that - do you feel like your time is really, really valuable now and, you know, you want to spend it as creatively as - doing your job and also, you know, being a mother as much as you can be?</s>EMILY RAPP: I do. I also feel, too, that one of the things that I was sort of committed to at the beginning of this process was to try to live as normal a life as possible and I feel really grateful that I have sort of a planet of friends who have sort of - they call me every day, they send me emails. So I don't actually feel that I'm losing my life as much as I think some people might feel.</s>EMILY RAPP: So, certainly, I think the time with him is very concentrated and is very intense, but at least in Ronan's case, we're not really doing 24/7 care at this point. But I do - you know, everyone's situation is different.</s>EMILY RAPP: But I also, you know, knew that, if I was going to be able to survive Ronan's death, I would need to make sure that there was something for me after he died. So I'm very conscious of trying to keep those sort of pillars in my life of work and friendship and relationships and family.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Jan, as a health care professional navigating the health care system, it must be - it's incredibly difficult in the best of times. A parent with a terminally ill child is not going through the best of times. Do you find yourself having to sort of - do you help parents navigate the forms and all of the other things that need to be - the testing and things that need to be done?</s>JAN WYSS: We do. That's probably what our expertise is at San Diego Hospice is we know what community services are available. We meet parents at appointments, support them, advocate for them and their child, help them understand when they leave the appointment what was discussed, make sure they understand what was - the medical jargon can get so confusing and I think, when you've got an emotional reaction to what the doctor has said, it shuts down your ability to process that. So we're able to help them when they leave that appointment, too, and talk about what happened there. Where do they want to go from here, and support them in the decisions they've made.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take a call now. Mary, you're on TALK OF THE NATION from San Leandro, California. Thanks for calling.</s>MARY: Yes. This is Mary.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Hi.</s>MARY: Hi. Yeah. I kind of want - listening to Jan speak and the isolation part of the process of having a terminally ill child is one of the frustrating parts, and also trying to decide if your child is going to need a trach and if that's the best option for them.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And have you found yourself - you know, have you been able to get advice from medical professionals or family members?</s>MARY: When he was first diagnosed, there wasn't really any support for us. There wasn't any organization that kind of took us and explained everything to us, the process of his illness. I had a son named Brandon(ph) who was diagnosed with Duchenne's muscular dystrophy, which is a life-limited, terminal illness.</s>MARY: And, when we found out, we didn't really have any support and then, once things started changing for him, we were able to get some support through the Muscular Dystrophy Association and through George Mark Children's House in San Leandro, which helped guide us.</s>MARY: And one of the hard parts about having a terminally ill child is you kind of lose your role as the mom and you become a caregiver and you become the doctor. You become his psychologist. You become everything else but the parent to that child because you are so busy taking care of all the medical needs that you don't have time just to sit and hold his hand and cuddle him and just be there for him.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Mary, I want to ask you one question. Your son was diagnosed at five, as I understand it, and he lived until he was 19.</s>MARY: Correct.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: You know, that's a 14 year continuum. How did you deal with him growing older and through, I guess, different levels of understanding about what he was facing? Was that difficult?</s>MARY: I actually have a great husband. Brandon had a great dad. And we just talked about everything and what we really focused on with him getting older - and changing is the quality of life for him. And he loved life so much that, when we were told that he was going to need a trach and be on a ventilator, my husband and I kind of had to sit back and think about that because it was the quality of life. And we knew before that we would not do a trach for him...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Okay.</s>MARY: ...because at that point, then his quality of life is going to be limited. But, as he got a little bit older and showed us how much he loved life and how life meant to him and he still - just because he had a trach didn't mean he wasn't going to have any quality of life. But when that moment came, the decision to do it or not do it was hard for us. But, as we discussed it, we decided the best thing for him was to have a trach for him...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right.</s>MARY: ...and being on a ventilator because his quality of life was still good.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Well, Mary, thanks very much for sharing this with us. I'd like to ask you, Jan, about parents who - everybody has a different story, but children of different ages - do you counsel them how to speak to their children, whether it's age five or age 10 or age 15? There are different levels of understanding, obviously, as children age.</s>JAN WYSS: That's true. We do. You know, children understand way more than we give them credit for. And sometimes, as parents, we think we're able to hide things or not tell them, but they have it figured out long before we do. So that's probably the first piece. It's just being open and honest with the kids and being there to support them. You know, working with San Diego Hospice, I have a lot of support behind me in helping to find those pieces, and we have counselors that help the kids on our program. But just, you know, those kids are - they know more about their situation and their condition than most kids about anything.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah.</s>JAN WYSS: So they seem to grow up way too fast.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: What about siblings? How do you help families deal, you know, who have - whose brother may be, you know, facing a terminal illness? What do you tell someone?</s>JAN WYSS: For siblings we do a lot – a lot of listening, really. We have to be open to where they're at. And sometimes you don't understand whether they're worried about their sibling who's dying and what's going to happen to the sibling, or are they worried that the attention is all going to the sibling and not to them? And so identifying - and both issues are real and appropriate for whatever age they are, but then dealing with what the situation is. Maybe they need parent time away from that sibling, or maybe they need to be included in the activities and the care of the sibling.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's turn to Jim on the line with us from Louisville. Jim, thanks for calling TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JIM: It's my pleasure. Thank you for the program. And it's Louisville in Colorado.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: There we go.</s>JIM: I had to learn that when we moved here.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: You have a child terminally ill?</s>JIM: Well, we lost our son in '94. He was four years and nine months old at the time, and he was diagnosed at three months with tyrosinemia, which is a metabolic liver disorder. And the only treatment available really at that time was transplant - liver transplant. And we lost him in the process of a liver transplant. And I'd just like to say that - that certainly my heart goes out to all the other parents who've lost children or who face that prospect. But the whole experience for us also taught us the importance of family, community, faith, and sort of the frailty of knowledge.</s>JIM: And I was screened for thalassemia, which is related to Tay-Sachs, and - because I carry the trait - and we found that my wife did not carry that. And going through the experience with Michael with a very different disorder led us to wonder, you know, what would we do if we knew all the possibilities; how would we choose, and we might not have had Michael, who truly was a positive force in our lives and other people's lives.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Jim, let me just stop to say here for a moment that you're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. And Jim, you've had two children since your son's death?</s>JIM: Yes, we have.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And was that a difficult decision, or I mean how does that - how does losing a child factor into a decision to have more children?</s>JIM: That's a great question. And it was - we knew through our time with Michael that we loved being his parents, and it was a terrible decision to know that there was a one-in-four chance that any subsequent pregnancy might result in the same condition for our child. And so we went into it with, you know, great trepidation. Let me just say that friends counseled us along the way that there are many ways to be a parent. And we've been fortunate that our now 16-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter do not have - they didn't have the disease, they don't have the disease, and that one of them, our son, is a carrier of the gene.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Well, Jim, thanks very much for calling in and best of luck to you.</s>JIM: Well, thank you.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Emily Rapp, I want to ask you a very, you know, personal question. But have you...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: ...thought about - since that's what we're dealing with in this hour, have you thought - after Ronan, have you thought at all about more children?</s>EMILY RAPP: Of course, yeah. I mean, that's something that I very much want. It's much - as the caller stated, it's much more complicated. There are ways to do that in the medical community, to test for Tay-Sachs in utero, et cetera. So those are discussions that haven't been sort of resolved at this stage. But certainly it's something that I think about a great deal, and I love being Ronan's mom. And I like parenting. It's been, you know, this isn't exactly the experience that I expected, but it's definitely one that I value and cherish very much. So, you know, obviously parenting a healthy child would be much different, but I do want that.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Jan Wyss, I just want to close with you. Families in this situation must begin to make, you know, decisions about end-of-life care, things that, you know, seems so out of step with how we think about being parents. How do you help parents navigate those decisions?</s>JAN WYSS: Those are really hard decisions, and we start very, very slowly. We give parents a lot of time. You know, unless you've got good rapport built with someone, it's really hard to have those discussions. Those discussions shouldn't happen in emergency rooms. Obviously they have to sometimes. But if parents have thought about things ahead, and so often they have, and then can share their thoughts, they're not always ready to make all of those decisions today, but we'll leave it open.</s>JAN WYSS: We talk about the decisions, the consequences, and everyone's talked a lot about quality of life, and that's really where the focus is, is what we'll give them the most comfort, the most palliation of their symptoms and can they live - what's more important, and most of the time it's to live a quality of life. At San Diego Hospice, we value the palliative care and the quality-of-life focus. So you know, those parents feel well supported and able to make decisions. Sometimes they only do make the decision like the one mom said that they knew that they just didn't want to do the feeding tube.</s>JAN WYSS: (Unintelligible) Emily said that, that she just doesn't want to do the feeding tube. She hasn't made any decisions beyond that right now. Taking one step at a time as they walk through the diagnosis and the process is all that parents can do.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I think that's a good point to leave it at. Jan Wyss is a registered nurse and manager of the Partners for Children program at San Diego Hospice. She joined us from member station KPBS in San Diego. Thanks very much.</s>JAN WYSS: Thank you.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Emily Rapp is a writer and professor of creative writing at the Sante Fe University of Art and Design. She joined us today from a studio in Santa Fe. Emily, thanks very much for being on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>EMILY RAPP: Thank you.
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With the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade less than a week away, it's crunch time for the balloon technicians. Science Friday goes behind the scenes at Macy's design studio to find out about the final preparations for the parade.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: Joining me now is our multimedia editor, Flora Lichtman, with our Video Pick of the Week. And it's very seasonal, is it not?</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. It's time to lighten up as usual with pick of the week. But this time, even more than usual. We are headed to the Macy's design studio to get a look at those balloons that they use in the parade every year.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: How they design them.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: How they design them. And actually, right now, it's crunch time for the balloonatics there. And it's - I didn't even come up - I wish I came up with that word.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: It's a great word, great word.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: They called themselves that.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Balloonatics.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. I love it. And so they're doing sort of the final checkup on all these balloons before they go out for their big day. So we saw puff the - one of the new balloons, Julius, which is a monkey, blown up in the studio. It's really, you know, this is something that I remember watching a parade on TV, as a kid, every Thanksgiving. And so to see them now up close, they're really tremendously large.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And I saw - while watching the Video Pick of the Week - it's up there - watching them how they blow this up and how they've test them, it's how talkative these guys are, right? The...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: The balloonatics...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah, the...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: ...not the balloons? Yeah.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. I know. It was a really fun visit. So they - well, they told us a few things. They shared some secrets about how they make the balloons. So the balloons are actually divided into different compartments. And one of the advantages there is that if you, you know, nick it, oops...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Oops.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: ...the whole thing doesn't come down. You just deflate like a hand or an arm.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Good thing.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: So that's a good idea. And then, the other thing is that the major thing for the people working on inflation is getting the skin to the right amount of smoothness - called skin stress.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Good. Of course.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: And so there's a very technical test for that. You thump on the balloon and it makes this sort of like boing blimp sounds.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Like thumping a watermelon.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. Exactly. Same idea.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Same idea.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: So all the inflation people are trained to listen for that ring. So it was sort of a neat thing. But one of my favorite parts about this was talking about what it's like on the day of the parade. And just to give you a sense of what it's like, Jim Artle had this to say.</s>JIM ARTLE: When the sun starts coming up and you can see the floats in all their glory and they sparkle and balloons majestically sitting under their nets. When I start to launch the balloons in the morning, I take off at a dead run with this huge grin on my face. And I don't stop until I'm all the way back down to the end of the parade landing the balloons and putting them all the way. Everyone of us is like that.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Jim Artle has been there for 31 years.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Wow. He's seen a lot of hot - a lot of helium.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: A lot of helium. And actually, he has a very special trick that I'm going to look for when I watch the parade this year, which is that, as we know, Charles' law says that when you heat up a gas, it expands...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: ...right? So as these balloons are going down the path, they're losing a little bit of helium little by little by little. So they get - by the end, there's a little bit sag here, it sounds like. So right before their glamour shot in front of the national cameras, Artle will park the balloon in between an across street. So the sun is shining down on it, which will puff it up so that it looks bright and fresh for the cameras.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Ready for its close up...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Exactly.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: ...as they say. And it's our Video Pick of the Week. It's - see the balloonatics up there on our website, @sciencefriday.com. It's a beautiful piece, beautifully done by Flora, went out there and watch...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: And Christopher Intagliata too.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Christopher was out there. And go to our website, @sciencefriday.com and see that video pick. That's something new to watch for on the parade.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Absolutely.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Thank you, Flora.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Thanks, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: That's about all the time we have for today.
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There's nearly a year to go till the 2012 Presidential election and already the Republican field has faced off for at least ten debates since May. That intense schedule has helped boost the campaigns of more polished candidates, while sinking the public perception of those who stumble. Ken Rudin, Political Junkie columnist, NPR John Harwood, CNBC chief Washington correspondent Alan Schroeder, author, Presidential Debates
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NEAL CONAN, HOST: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in New York. The Supreme Court puts health care on the docket for the presidential campaign. The supercommittee can't move off the dime, while Cain and Perry suffer forgettable moments.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: It's Wednesday and time for a...</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: I stepped in it.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: ...edition of the Political Junkie.</s>PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN: There you go again.</s>VICE PRESIDENT WALTER MONDALE: When I hear your new ideas, I'm reminded of that ad, where's the beef?</s>SENATOR BARRY GOLDWATER: Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.</s>SENATOR LLOYD BENTSEN: Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy.</s>PRESIDENT RICHARD NIXON: You don't have Nixon to kick around anymore.</s>SARAH PALIN: Lipstick.</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: Oops.</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: But I'm the decider.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Every Wednesday, Political Junkie Ken Rudin joins us to recap the week in politics. We don't often change the montage, but, oops, became an instant campaign classic. Herman Cain stumbled over Libya. Newt Gingrich introduced his new running mate, Freddie Mac. They joined Mitt Romney and Ron Paul in what amounts to a four-way dead heat in Iowa just seven weeks away. In a few minutes, we'll focus on the effect of all these televised debates, depending on how you count, as many as a dozen thus far and many more to come.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Later in the program, Jaimy Gordon on the year since she won the National Book Award for "Lord of Misrule."</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: But first, Political Junkie Ken Rudin joins us. I'm in New York City today. He's in Studio 3A, but we still begin with a trivia question. Hey, Ken.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Hi, Neal. And, by the way, they would not let me fit in your seat to do this show.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And a good thing, too.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: There's police blotter all over, keeping me away from there. By the way, one thing about the Junkie montage, our producer, Sarah Handel, said that now we have four Democrats and five Republicans in the montage, but the Democrats still get 14 seconds of air time and the Republicans get six. So just to let you know that we're on top of this thing.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: And also, I had a little contest on Facebook for people to guess the new addition to the montage. Andy Hall of Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin was the first person to predict, oops, as the answer.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Oops. OK.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: OK. So the trivia question is, obviously the whole story - it seems to be the whole story - in the Republican battle is debates and it's a debate question. Who was the first female panelist for a presidential candidate debate?</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: If you think you know the answer to this week's trivia question and, again, the first female panelist on a presidential candidate debate, give us a call. 800-989-8255. Email is [email protected]. You can also join the conversation on our website. Go to NPR.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And we mentioned, oops, but it wasn't just Rick Perry who had a difficult moment this week.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: That's true. But you know something? Oops was only a week ago. It was the night of our last program. Obviously, they couldn't do it before we went on the air last week, but that was only a week ago and it just seems remarkable how that gap has really changed everybody's perception about the race, although Rick Perry was kind of in a downward slide for the longest time, anyway, with previous debate flubs.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: But then we had this event. Herman Cain was sitting for an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. This is a video of a video interview and, of course, it's gone viral on the internet, as it usually does. But he was asked, basically, a seemingly innocuous question about he differs or, you know, what's his take on President Obama's handling of the situation in Libya and...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And, Ken, this is truly a painful moment. We're just going to play a short - actually, we played a little bit in the billboard, but here's a short excerpt of what Herman Cain told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:</s>HERMAN CAIN: I do not agree with the way he handled it for the following reason - no, that's a different one.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And you could have played that any number of ways with an embarrassing long 10 second silences before he stammered and got the answer wrong.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: The problem with this whole thing is that everybody's talking about the excitement of somebody new and somebody, you know, unscripted and unprogrammed, but he also seems unprepared. And for all of the criticisms about Herman Cain the last couple of weeks, the number of women who have discussed about sexual harassment charges, or these accusations against him and his complete unfamiliarity and we kind of saw this in Saturday night's debate, the foreign policy debate on foreign policy issues.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Herman Cain's numbers have declined. Now, his unfavorables are up, but he's still among the leaders, believe it or not, with 48 days to go before Iowa.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And that is an interesting poll. Now, there are four candidates within spitting distance of one another and they may get to that in the next debate. And that is - we mentioned Herman Cain. It is Mitt Romney, who's been at or near the top all the way. Ron Paul is in these top group of four, and Newt Gingrich.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Well, you know something? I mean, you know, here's the problem about having such a long pre-presidential campaign season and that is before the voters even get a chance to do it, but we smarty-pants analysts all wrote off Newt Gingrich early in the year when, basically, his entire staff quit en mass. His fundraising numbers were really, really down. He was basically an asterisk in the poll and, actually, a similar thing happened to John McCain in 2007 when his staff quit and we said he was finished, too. And, of course, that showed how much we knew.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: But the thing about Newt Gingrich is that he was always the smartest guy in the class. Just ask him. He'll tell you he is the smartest guy in the class, but he does have a very good debating style. Now, some people think it's a little condescending. Some people think it's a little mean the way he'll attack the moderators like, what a stupid you asked, or he'll roll his eyes at the absurdity. How dare you ask me such a question like that? But for the most part, his answers have been solid. They're not critical of his opponents. He's more critical of President Obama and the media, than he is on the fellow Republicans.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: And it seems to be a winning thing. And so he doesn't have the money, he doesn't have the campaign staff, but again, since we've had 9,463 debates this year and he usually does very well in them.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And now, he's going to find himself, though, suddenly on the defensive after it's come out that he's been on the payroll of Freddie Mac. Not just on the payroll, but for well over a million dollars over the past 10 years.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Right. That's a report from Bloomberg News that came out that between $1.6 million and $1.8 million he's taken from Freddie Mac since he left the speakership after the 1998 disastrous - even though the Republicans kept control of the House, but it was a disaster for the Republicans and Newt Gingrich.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: So he took a $1.5 million from Freddie Mac and, again, this is somebody who hates the ways of Washington and hates the lobbyists of Washington. Of course, he says he wasn't a lobbyist. He was a consultant.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: An historian, he likes to call it.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: An historian. Well, you know - yeah. Well, I think we have to revise some of that history a little bit when we're talking about Newt Gingrich. And you knew this was going to happen. The reason nobody was talking about all these things about Newt Gingrich; his marriages, his flip-flops on Libya. For example, he was for the no-fly zone and then he was against the no-fly zone when Obama did it. But we didn't talk about it because he was inconsequential.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: And now that the anybody-but-Mitt-Romney crowd has now focused on Newt Gingrich now that Herman Cain may be down and Rick Perry certainly is down, there will be, obviously, more stuff about Newt Gingrich coming up.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: We have some people on the line who think they know the answer to this week's trivia question. And that is the first female panelist to ask questions at a presidential candidates' debate. Give us a call. 800-989-8255. Email us, [email protected].</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And we'll begin with Pete. And Pete's with us from Inverness in Florida.</s>PETE: I would like to guess Cokie Roberts.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Cokie Roberts of ABC and National Public Radio.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Well, Cokie Roberts was not one of those. Matter of fact, I don't believe Cokie was ever on a debate panel herself, but Cokie Roberts is not the right answer.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Thanks very...</s>PETE: Thanks. Love the show.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Thanks very much, Pete. Let's see if we can go next to - this is Alex. Alex with us from Oklahoma.</s>ALEX: My guess is the money honey, Maria Bartiromo.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Just made her recent debut as a panelist on the...</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Right, right. She was part of the CNBC debate last Wednesday in Michigan, but that was the first time she was ever on a debate panel, so it would not be Maria Bartiromo by the Ramones.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And by the way, we're going to have her partner on, John Harwood, a little bit later in the broadcast to talk about debates, but Alex, thanks very much for the call.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's go next to - this is Debra. Debra with us from Chanhassen in Minnesota.</s>DEBRA: Hi, guys. My guess, Nancy Dickerson.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Nancy Dickerson. Oh, boy, that goes back.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Well, Nancy Dickerson is a great guess and, actually, if I didn't know the answer, that would have been my guess, too. But as it turns out, Nancy Dickerson also never appeared on a presidential debate. I think most of her reporting was mostly in the Kennedy-Johnson years and, of course, after the 1960 debates, there weren't debates during those years. But not Nancy Dickerson. Good guess, though.</s>DEBRA: Oops.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Thanks very much, Debra.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Did I hear an, oops, there?</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: She did give us an oops. Let's go next to - this is Jonathan. And Jonathan is with us from Stillwater in Minnesota.</s>JONATHAN: Yeah, I am. But I went to the same junior high school as Ken, McCombs Junior High School.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Oh, my God, that was in the 1980s. Don't say the year.</s>JONATHAN: Well, no, no. I'm older than you.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: OK. Whew.</s>JONATHAN: So you're OK. Elizabeth Drew. It was in New York.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Wow.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: I think that's the correct answer. McCombs Junior High School is the correct answer.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And it's a great damn park, but anyway, moving right along.</s>JONATHAN: Elizabeth Drew.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Elizabeth Drew is the correct answer. Ding, ding, ding. I've heard a lot of other answers. Questions that there was Carol Simpson, there was - I'm trying to think other women - Ann Compton. But, anyway, Elizabeth Drew was one of the debate panelists in 1976, Carter versus Ford. We also have an email from Carrie Dupler(ph) of Santa Rosa, California, also named Elizabeth Drew.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: So two Political Junkie No Prize t-shirts this week. We're going to put you on hold, Jonathan, and collect your particulars and we'll send you one of those fabulous t-shirts in exchange for your promise of a digital picture of yourself wearing it to be...</s>JONATHAN: I will, but I don't have a McCombs Junior High School t-shirt.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Wow.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Well, thanks very much and congratulations, Jonathan.</s>JONATHAN: Thank you.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: All right. We managed to find the right button even here in the New York bureau. In the meantime, there is some other news.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: The Supreme Court this week put health care squarely on the agenda for the presidential campaign. They're going to be debating President Obama's signature legislative accomplishment and there's going to be a decision on this come June.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: That's exactly right. The middle of the presidential campaign and both sides, both the side that feels that the Obamacare or whatever you want to call the health care bill, a program that President Obama and the Congress passed, even the side that thinks it's unconstitutional and the Obama side that thinks it's absolutely constitutional - both sides think they're going to be right, but again, this will come in the middle of the campaign. The arguments will start in March. A decision will come in June and it's anybody's guess what they'll decide, but it certainly will shake up the campaign.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And we should note something we've talked about before. The recall in Wisconsin underway. Governor Scott Walker now has served long enough to be eligible to be recalled. So are some other Republican state senators, so there's going to be a campaign to collect signatures that has just gotten underway.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: But in Arizona - well, it's great to hear. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, shot almost a year ago, has finally been talking with the media, gave an interview and had a message for her constituents.</s>REPRESENTATIVE GABRIELLE GIFFORDS: I want to go back to work. Representing Arizona is my honor.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And, Ken, it's great to hear Gabby Giffords talking again.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: You know, in such a horrific story, as she was shot on January 8th, it pierced the left side of her brain, shot in the head. It was just an awful, awful time. Six other people were killed. Thirteen people were badly hurt. She has still not come back to Washington to vote. There's still no discussion about whether she's running for reelection again in 2012. That is not clear, but the fact that she's still able to talk to us is a great achievement.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: If she's going to run, she does not have to file her paperwork, I don't believe, until May.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Anyway, it's Political Junkie Day. Ken Rudin here with us, as always. Up next, the politics of debates. John Harwood, who moderated the GOP debate a week ago will join us. It's the TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Neal Conan, this week in New York City. Ken Rudin, our Political Junkie, is back in Studio 3A in Washington. Neither of us, of course, has ever flubbed a line or put our foot in our mouth in a live national broadcast. Well, maybe Ken did, but never on a Wednesday.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: In a moment, we'll talk about the flurry of GOP debates in recent months; the good exchanges, the bad, and how they've changed the campaign for president.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: But, Ken, a ScuttleButton puzzle posted today.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: That's true, but we have a winner from last week's. There was a Skip Bafalis, former congressman from Florida button. There was also a Matty Alou baseball card that...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: The late Matty Alou.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: That's right. He just died last week. Anyway, when you add the Skip Bafalis, you have Matty Alou in between. There was another button. You have a Skip to My Lou puzzle and Ann Brekke of Chicago was the big winner.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Well, you can find the ScuttleButton and Ken's latest Political Junkie column at NPR.org/junkie. So far, there's been a Twitter debate, a Tea Party debate, a debate on the economy, a foreign policy debate. I think there was a commander in chief debate, in fact, and maybe eight others, depending on how you count.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Just under a year from the 2012 presidential election, they're just getting warmed up. How have all these debates affected the campaign? Give us a call. 800-989-8255. Email us, [email protected]. You can also join the conversation at our website. Go to NPR.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: It was Rick Perry who stole the show at the CNBC debate a week ago with this exchange.</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: It's three agencies of government when I get there that are gone: Commerce, Education and the - what's the third one there? Let's see.</s>MARIA BARTIROMO: Give me five.</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: Oh, five? Okay. So Commerce, Education and the...</s>MITT ROMNEY: EPA?</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: EPA. There you go.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Seriously? Is EPA one you were talking about or...</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: No, sir. No, sir. We were talking about the agencies of government. The EPA needs to be rebuilt. There's no doubt about that.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: But you can't name the third one?</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: The third agency of government I would do away with. The Education, the Commerce and - let's see.</s>MITT ROMNEY: Oh, my.</s>GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: I can't. The third one. I can't. Sorry. Oops.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Rick Perry responding to CNBC's John Harwood, who moderated that debate. John Harwood is CNBC's chief Washington correspondent. He's covered presidential campaigns for decades and joins us now by phone from New Orleans. Nice to have you with us today.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Hi, Neal.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And I wanted to ask you, were you, as he stumbled around there, tempted to say, well, let's go to another question?</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Well, we almost did. You know, it's one of those things. When you have a lot of candidates on the stage and multiple people from our end at CNBC poised to ask questions, the management of the microphone is kind of difficult and when the moment, as you could hear in that clip, sort of drifted into humor and there was laughter and Perry was smiling and Mitt Romney said, EPA, and it was unclear at that moment whether, in fact, that was the agency.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: And Maria Bartiromo, my colleague, was about to go to another question and then a producer in our production truck - you know, these people never get seen by the public, but they play a huge role in having a successful production - yelled in my ear, don't stop, because he was aware that Perry had not answered the question. And so that's when I said, seriously? Is the EPA the one? And when he acknowledged, no, the natural follow-up was, OK. What is it? Can you remember it? And he couldn't. Then it, you know, produced that remarkable moment.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And, for good or ill, his campaign was in trouble before that, but that moment may be remembered as the death of the 2012 Perry campaign.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Yeah. I don't know if it's the death or, you know, one more blow to a campaign that was struggling, but the relevant point, though, Neal, is that one of the reasons his campaign was struggling was because of prior debate performances.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: So it is, without a doubt, correct that the debate season this fall has shaped the campaign in a way that exceeds any campaign in my memory and I think that's partly because many of the Republicans running are running kind of one-man-band campaigns. They don't have big organizations, so they're not contesting on the ground in Iowa and New Hampshire the way past traditional kind of leading candidates have done. These are people whose campaigns have largely existed on the debates and that's where they rise or fall.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And debates - another way to think of them is free air time.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Absolutely, free air time. If you don't have money for television commercials, what better way to communicate with your audience, especially the most politically interested and active people in your party, than on a televised debate? That's who the viewers are.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: And that's how Herman Cain has made such a positive impression on so many people. It's why Newt Gingrich, who has gained altitude in recent days, skirmishing with moderators and sort of displaying the experience that he's had as a leading figure in American politics, although we had a moment in the last debate that is now reflecting the phenomenon we're talking about, coming back to bite him. Because I asked him about the $300,000 he got from Freddie Mac as a consultant. And now it's come out today that he, in fact, got a lot more than $300,000. And so, in yet another way, that debate is having a life beyond the two hours last Wednesday night.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Ken?</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: John, you know, it's not that you asked a gotcha question. I mean, Hal Bruno, my former boss at ABC who just passed away last week - and he's the one who asked, you know, Admiral Stockdale, your opening statement, sir? And he said, who am I and why am I here? And that, you know, caused another kerfuffle back in 1992.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: I remember it well.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: But we talk about all the candidates preparing for debates and it seems like the debates have taken over this entire campaign, but obviously, you, the moderators, the panelists - they prepare, too. And there's always questions about bias and the right question and which candidate to address it to.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: How much preparation do you have to go through in preparation for this debate?</s>JOHN HARWOOD: We did a lot of homework. We had a lot of conference calls and meetings. At CNBC, because we have a heavy focus on business and financial markets, our headquarters is in greater New York. You know, we had different perspectives from different people participating in the debate, a lot of debate over what's an appropriate question to ask and who to ask it to. And also how much time to spend on the people who appear to be most likely to win the nomination, as compared to those who are benefiting from the free air time, but don't really have much of a chance.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: You promise fairness to the candidates, but not equal time, and so we had to figure out, how much is it about Romney? How much is it about Romney and Perry? How much it's about Cain, since he's been rising in the polls and dogged by a controversy, the sexual harassment issue that had nothing to do with the subject of our debate. So we had to figure out how to manage that, as well.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And got some boos when your partner asked about it.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: We were not surprised by that. Maria and I had addressed a breakfast of Michigan Republicans that morning and were asked whether or not we were going to raise that issue and we didn't say for sure one way or the other, but we said, you can't really avoid something that's been so much in the news. We got booed at that point. So, you know, you're not going to please everybody.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: And, of course, when you do a primary debate, your audience in the hall is going to be partisans of the Democrats or Republicans, as the case may be, whoever's debating. And you know that, if you ask something that's unfriendly to a popular figure, that there's the potential for that negative reaction. We've seen audience reactions at earlier debates on issues like the death penalty and gay rights make themselves part of the story, too.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: John Harwood is with us, CNBC's chief Washington correspondent, and among those who moderated a presidential debate this year. Of course, it seems like everybody has. There's been a lot of debates.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Right. Good company.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Alan Schroeder joins us now. He wrote the book, "Presidential Debates: 50 Years of High-Risk TV," and joins us from Northeastern University in Boston, where he's a professor of journalism. He also deserves a medal of sorts for, I think, having watched every single one of the debates this year.</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: Absolutely, absolutely. Wouldn't miss them.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Thanks very much for joining us. There are moments we all remember, but there is more debates than ever. What is the cumulative effect, do you think?</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: Well, I think the cumulative effect, as John just mentioned, is that it really has kind of jump-started this campaign a little bit early. It's also created space for people who are nontraditional politicians to become part of the process.</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: But I do want to take issue with one thing you just said - is the number of debates is excessive? I went back and looked at the roster for 2004...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: I didn't say excessive. I just said a lot of them.</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: A lot of them, but no more than in the past. In 2004 and 2008, we were at exactly the same point at the end of November in terms of the total number of debates as we are right now. It just seems like a lot.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Well, can I just jump in for one thing? Alan, while I'm thinking about that, in 2008, there were 19 Republican debates. There have been 11 so far this year and there are 14 more scheduled, so that's like 25, 26 debates, so all told, 2012 will break all the records.</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: Yeah. It will if they all go through. Of course, that's the other thing. A lot of times, debates get scheduled and planned and then don't actually come to fruition.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And as we've seen the moment, the campaign seems to - as John mentioned earlier, is being defined by these debates.</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: Well, absolutely. And I think that's not such a bad thing. I mean, I would argue that these debates are doing what debates are supposed to do, which is give us a glimpse into both the personalities and the positions of the candidates and in a way that allows for kind of an extensive consideration because it's happening over a long period of time, and it's involving a lot of people. So it's a winnowing process. It hasn't winnowed much yet, but it will soon. And I think the debates have been extremely valuable in that regard.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Ask Tim Pawlenty. But Ken, one of the things, the constant criticisms of American campaigns, especially for higher office, is that you can't do it unless you've got a lot of money and an established organization. That seems to be turning on its head.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: That's exactly right. I mean, in the old - I was just saying the same thing, in the old days, if you have the boots on the ground, the organization in states like Iowa, New Hampshire, that was the key. But if you're a great debater, if you're a Newt Gingrich, as I said, the smartest guy in the room, you could just stand up there and just, you know, woo the audiences. And there's something very interesting, Alan, about this particularly - particular cycle, and that it seems like a soap opera, like, remember, friends, last week we heard Herman say this, and Rick Perry said this. What will he do this week? Like, we're glued to it. It's always like you can't miss it because you're afraid you'll miss something exciting.</s>ALAN SCHROEDER: Yeah. Absolutely. I think that's exactly right. It is the miniseries effect, and it is the reality television effect, and it gets very addictive. And I think these audiences of four, five million people doesn't seem like a lot, but for a cable news timeslot, that's a huge audience. And I think the reason is that people are getting sort of suckered into the - not suckered into, sucked into the whole thing as, you know, just a cumulative effect of a lot of debates.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's get a caller in on the conversation. John's on with us from Charlottesville in Virginia.</s>JOHN: Actually, you guys just took - stole my thunder. That's how I feel. The debates have kind of taken on a reality TV show feel to them. I feel like people are talking more about soundbites and gaffes than the actual issues. And I almost feel like I'm going to be prompted to text who I wanted to vote off at the end of these debates. It's amazing.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: You can only vote Tim Pawlenty once.</s>JOHN: Yeah, right. I feel like it's taken a completely different turn this time around, and I'm not sure I'm a fan of it.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: All right. Well, thanks very much for the call, John. Let's see if we go next to - this is Caleb. Caleb with us from Jamaica Plain in Massachusetts.</s>CALEB: Yes. Hi. Two quick comments. One, I actually have a very - I'm from a liberal left progressive perspective, I have a very positive impression of the structure of the Republican primary debates because I think that there's a significant democratization effect of precisely those types of candidates that wouldn't be covered by the, you know, corporate interests behind the major media outlets and also who don't have the same level - equal level of funding. So I think that's important.</s>CALEB: I think the number actually gives them, the public, ample time to look at these ways that each candidate is responding to the issues in text format after the debates, so the kind of archived effect presents a lot more raw material for analysis than a very limited controlled process. And the second comment I want to make is that I don't know who your masters at the Brookings Institute are, whoever is putting this gag order, but I think the lack of coverage of Ron Paul's candidacy, who I differ from in many, many respects...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And did you hear him on Political Junkie about a month ago?</s>CALEB: ...you need to address the Ron Paul show in the polls. His winning a number of these primary things. I don't support him for many reasons, but I do support some of his perspective. And it's just a - it's an obvious bias, some kind of gag order maybe originates - I don't know the politics of it, but maybe you could expound on the obscene lack of coverage of his presence and performance in the polls...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Caleb, again, I will just refer you to the broadcast interview with Ron Paul that we had on this program – what, about five, six weeks ago, within the last month and a half, in any case. But thanks very much for the comment. You're listening to Political Junkie on TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. Ken, I'm sorry.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Neal, I'm sorry. When we're sitting not across from each other, it's difficult. Can I just address the first two callers because there's something that they have in common. The first guy said that we focus too much on gaffes and not about substance, and the second guy talks about, you know, the Brookings Institute, our masters, keep us from talking about Ron Paul. And then I have this question for John Harwood. John, on - there was another debate on Saturday night that not many people watched because it was Saturday night.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: But it was pretty instructive to me, interesting to me that it was about foreign policy, and basically they're talking about - the candidates were talking about, well, you know, let's wipe out Iran, let's attack Iran if they build a nuclear weapon or let's, you know, let's approve waterboarding. And that was pretty instructive. And I think that didn't get much attention.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: That's true. And Ron Paul got very little airtime in that debate and was complaining about it afterwards.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: On both – on both the military attack and on waterboarding.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Yes.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And took different positions on both.</s>KEN RUDIN, BYLINE: Yeah.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Exactly. And I think one of the reasons for that is I'm imagining from the perspective of my colleagues at CBS and National Journal, is that Ron Paul, for all intents and purposes, is not a Republican, especially on those issues, and for that reason I think people accurately see him - this is one way of being responsive to the caller's question, why doesn't Ron Paul get covered more, is because in the estimation of most people who follow this process, his chances of winning the Republican nomination are essentially nil.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: And if that's the case, then you've got to wonder, like, is your debate most usefully spent by voters on candidates with a greater chance to win. We have - during our debate, we had people, a team of people in our production truck tracking the amount of airtime that each candidate got and using that to guide us to make sure that we didn't leave anybody too short. Rick Santorum got the least at five and a half minutes. Mitt Romney got almost 10 minutes. And that to some degree reflects their prospects in the race. You focus on the people with a greater chance.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Ron Paul has run as a libertarian for president. He has said he might not support the Republican nominee. Yes, he has a respectable chunk in the polls, but I think his chances of building on that are quite small and that influences how reporters view him.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: One other question about debate preparation - we have seen in other debates, including this year and in other years, of course, some questions that are really fluff. It's the equivalent of the boxers-or-briefs question. Do those come up in your production meeting, and did you think about that at all?</s>JOHN HARWOOD: Yes. We had a - depending on how the time worked out for the earlier questions, we had a round of short-answer questions designed to be different. One of the reasons people do those is A) to be honest, some of the political stuff that you and me and Ken spend our days talking about are boring to many average viewers, and so we're trying to find something relatable; B) we're trying to get something that they might not have scripted, so that we see how they react in the moment, even if something is not a serious public policy issue.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: But in fact, in our debate we had so much conversation that seemed to go to the core of the economic issue that we were exploring that we ended up consuming the time without going to those fluffier questions.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: John Harwood, thanks very much and congratulations.</s>JOHN HARWOOD: My pleasure. Thanks so much.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: John Harwood, CNBC's chief Washington correspondent, he joined us on the phone from New Orleans. Our thanks as well to Alan Schroeder, who joined us from Northeastern University. Ken's back next Wednesday. It's the TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.
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Tuesday, Occupy Wall Street protesters were evicted from Zuccotti Park in Manhattan. Similar evacuations were carried out in cities across the country, including Portland and Oakland. Many analysts argue this could be a turning point for the movement.
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NEAL CONAN, HOST: Yesterday, New York City Police evicted hundreds of Occupy Wall Street protesters from privately owned Zuccotti Park in New York, on the orders of Mayor Michael Bloomberg. A judge in New York ruled that the removal was legal and protesters could use the park, but their free speech rights did not extend to putting up tents or staying overnight. Similar evictions in other cities have raised serious questions about the future of the Occupy movement.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: So what has Occupy changed? Where do you think it should go from here? 800-989-8255. Email: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org, click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And we have an email that's already arrived. This is from Lorna in Palisade, Colorado: I didn't get the object of sitting in parks to protest Wall Street. It seems to me a more proactive approach would be productive. For example, systematically pick offensive companies and initiate nationwide boycotts of their product or services. I'm thinking more of the middle class would get behind this. Hit Wall Street in its pocket book, she says.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And let's see. We go to a phone call, and this is Jake, and Jake is with us from San Francisco.</s>JAKE: Hi. I'd just like to thank you for allowing me to speak on air.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Sure. Go ahead.</s>JAKE: Yeah. So I think the way that Occupy Wall Street can go from here is actually speaking through voting. And the way the Tea Partiers got all their people into government was by voting them in. So I think in order to actually change the government, the Occupy Wall Street people need to vote in people or force Congress enact bills that will actually do something.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Well, the way - just to follow up, Jake, the way the Tea Party did that, at least to a considerable degree, was to run more conservative candidates against Republicans they did not think conservative enough. Should Occupy Wall Street do the same in the Democratic Party?</s>JAKE: I don't think - not necessarily Democratic, but maybe more independent because I think both Democratic and Republican are corrupt. So if we actually talk about creating a new third party or changing up a two-party system that is our government, then maybe that's something that Occupy Wall Street could talk about.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: All right. Thanks for the call, Jake. We're also going to read excerpts from several editorials and articles that have appeared in the past couple of days. This is from "After Zuccotti, What Now From Occupy Wall Street?" by John Cassidy in The New Yorker.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Given the internal fissures that were developing, it could conceivably turn out that Bloomberg has done OWS a favor. In some ways, the movement has already outgrown Zuccotti Park. It has now more than 80 working groups looking at everything from community banking to town planning. It has significant media support. It has ties to trade unions, environmental activists and the backing of celebrities and public intellectuals such as Jeffrey Sachs and his colleague Joseph Stiglitz.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: What is needed is some way to build upon those successes while maintaining the energy and enthusiasm that OWS unleashed. The recent history of the indignants in Spain shows that a heterogeneous protest movement can survive the loss of its focal point. In June, after repeated clashes with the police, the Spanish protesters decided to leave their encampment. In Madrid's Puerta del Sol, the movement lives on. Last month, hundreds of thousands of people marched, in its support, through Madrid, Barcelona and other cities.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's see. We go next to - this is Patrick, Patrick with us from Buffalo.</s>PATRICK: Hi, Neal. Thanks for taking my call.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Sure.</s>PATRICK: In my opinion - first of all, I have the utmost respect for the Occupy Wall Street individuals who have been there day in and day out, encamped. However, I see this as a real opportunity for the movement, in that in my opinion, the movement needs to grow in number significantly and it needs to become much more heterogeneous. And, in my opinion, the way to do that is to have successive Saturday or, you know, maybe week - weekend protests where the call is sent out to people from all walks of life, you know, middle class, you know, teachers and firemen and everybody. I think that there was probably a mood among, you know, regular everyday middle class citizens that this was an occupation. And if they weren't going to stay in the tents, then maybe they shouldn't show up. And I think that was, you know, something that we could possibly correct.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: All right. Thanks very much for the call, Patrick.</s>PATRICK: Sure.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: This is "Occupy vs. the LAPD" by Jack Dunphy and PJ Media. Now that these Occupy Wall Street people have been at their occupation for however long it's been, what next? No one seems to know. But whatever the denouement that awaits in the final act of this drama, it will be police officers who will be asked to bring the curtain and the tents. For people trying to live and work around the encampments, that day can't come soon enough.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Being down for the cause is all well and good, but when the paying customers avoid your shop or your restaurant out of fear of sharing space with the hygienically challenged cast of characters headquarters at Zuccotti Park, well even the most socially conscious have to pay heed to the bottom line. Let's see if we could go next to - this is Ryan. And Ryan's on the line with us from Tulsa.</s>RYAN: Hi, Neal. A little bit less logistical, versus that last caller, and a little more philosophical. On the question where occupiers go from here, I would put myself more in a Tea Party camp than I would in an Occupier camp, very conservative fiscally. But I think that there is some common ground. And there's a nerve that strikes, at least me, that's common with some of the Occupy movement. And that is that wealth has been consolidated and is being protected. And it's being the losses, as we've heard of – the refrain that the losses have been socialized, but the profits has been privatized.</s>RYAN: And I'm a real estate investor/syndicator, commercial real estate in Tulsa. And so I go out and I find real estate deals, and I put together pools of investors to essentially buy commercial property. And as the markets were set to correct, I kind of started licking my chops and began to realize that, because of policies that were put in place through D.C., that institutionals -banks, (unintelligible) et cetera were protecting our interest.</s>RYAN: And the resetting of bases, financial bases, that should have occurred in commercial real estate, didn't. And maybe there's a couple of points that you could talk about here, some observations of mine. Because that resetting is not happening, because it's being propped up...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: What you're essentially saying, it's still very difficult to borrow money.</s>RYAN: Well, it's - I'm actually talking less about borrowing money. I'm talking more about lowering bases. And so what I mean by that is the next generation - I'm 34. These younger folks, they're waiting for an opportunity to get into the game, into the economy. And because across the spectrum, from real estate to other industries, you see this very high barriers to entry where only the larger players can play and they protect the walls. They build the walls. When there's an event, like we had in '08, where things should have reset, and instead, props were brought in and (unintelligible)...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: So those companies should all have been allowed to fail in '08, including the car companies.</s>RYAN: And here's the discussion. This is where the next generation, my generation and below, has to, I think, come face to face with this reality. If we want that resetting to happen, there's going to be carnage, and it's going to be difficult. But in my mind, history shows that that's where the opportunities come from. And an earlier conversation on Diane Rehm - there's a great comment from a panelist saying that the older generation protects their wealth. The younger generation has a harder and harder time to break in.</s>RYAN: I think it has to reset. In my opinion, it will be hard, but that's what we're made of. And I think that the - to get our trajectory back in the direction it needs to go, don't erode capitalism. Let it work in a true, free sense.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: All right, Ryan. Thanks for...</s>RYAN: (Unintelligible) the bases reset.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's give somebody else a chance, but thank you very much for the call. This is from The Washington Post, Jennifer Rubin, who writes: OWS should not be rehabilitated. I wonder if the protesters' unbridled contempt for public order and wealth creation is really a desirable model for the left's discourse on income inequality.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Frankly, if the left wants to appeal to middle-class Americans, it would be wise to repudiate a grab bag of sleazy characters who are disrupting the lives of working people and adding to the financial burden of cash-strapped cities. Now is no time to celebrate their "contribution," quote, unquote, to American political dialogue. Let's go next to - this is Cory, Cory with us from Berkeley.</s>CORY: Hi there. That's an interesting to follow up on. Living in Berkeley, I have been to some of the demonstrations, and one of the things that I'm quite aware of is how much the movement has occupied the media dialogue and very quickly and very effectively. I feel like one of the things I've observed is that the very process of this organization is an important product. That it's based on small, decentralized groups working together that refuse to be categorized specifically. The fact that we are coming together to talk about topics that need to change, an inequity that needs to be settled. And that it's amorphous I feel like is a healthy thing, that these are not clearly delineated subject to say here's the problem, here's the solution. We're not there. Things are quite complex.</s>CORY: And it's appealing to me that a decentralized process is stepping up to say we need to reclaim democracy itself. We need to reclaim that process. We need to take care of people. We need to speak for people who are hurting. The other piece of it that I've observed is that the homeless people I see are suffering even more than the homeless people I was seeing on the streets 10 years ago, five years ago. I just feel like the people who are hurt the worst are in even worse shape, and that the safety net has fallen apart to the degree that it's OK to say something has to be done. I don't know exactly what, but to bring that up and say this needs to be what we demand that our government discusses. So I'm appreciating that aspect.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: No, I understand that, Cory, and I think, particularly at the beginning when that message resonated, I think, the movement was far more effective in communicating a message. The last few weeks, the message seems to have been complicated by numbers of incidents of violence and gassings and friction with the police, indeed, a couple of unfortunate deaths and violence within the communities.</s>CORY: Right. And there's important connections to bring up there. I think it really raises questions about the police role. Who are they protecting and serving? Why aren't they more integrated in with the demonstrations? Like, you know, San Francisco has had a very calm approach and has been very integrated with the protesters, in a way, to make it more effective for the whole city.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And then you had situations like Oakland where the police - long history of friction there, and I understand that.</s>CORY: Exactly. And then in Berkeley, there was a man who just died. And I'm appreciating, at this moment, that that doesn't have to become something that's directly connected to the Occupy movement because it's not necessary. It may not have had anything to do with the protesters. It remains to be seen, and I appreciate that we're not jumping to conclusions here.</s>CORY: In Oakland, it's very entrenched and, you know, the mayor may lose her job over it. There's a lot of civic issues about how do we occupy space and who is considered the general public and who is not. And I feel like that's very much part of the debate here.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Cory, thanks very much for the call.</s>CORY: Thank you.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: We're talking about the Occupy movement and where it goes from here. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. And here's an email from William in Grand Rapids. Maybe we should take a lesson from the Arab Spring protest by gathering and marching every Sunday afternoon after normal Christian worship hours when more people are not working or going to school for support of Occupy Wall Street issues. This would allow our broader representation of the American public, allow the protesters – the protest to continue until some progress is made. Each week, there could be a different speaker at a central gathering place.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: This is from Rachel in Detroit. Occupy Wall Street just seems like a really loud, vague question, pointing out issues many of us know. But until someone either decides to offer a response, solution or even excuse, it just doesn't feel like any dialogue has opened up. And let's go next to Paige, and Paige with us from Collegeville in Tennessee.</s>PAIGE: Hi. It's actually Clarksville.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Oh, I'm sorry.</s>PAIGE: I participated in Occupy Nashville. I don't sleep there. I work two jobs. I have kids. But every free second, me and my children are both out there. And when they evicted everybody out of Richmond, I think that the resonating issue or the resonating picture that should be kept when they evict us is that there was - right after they had bulldozed everybody's camps, they'd bulldozed everything with tents with people in them. There was one lone protester holding an Occupy sign, standing in front of the police vehicle. And you can't let not having a tent somewhere in a park bend a movement that has been so resonating for my generation, for my children, for my parents.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Paige, thank you very much for the call.</s>PAIGE: You're welcome.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Here's an editorial from Leo Kapakos, a New York Political Buzz examiner. You can't evict the Occupy Wall Street revolution. As for the tarps and tents, the city can tear them down and take them away but that won't slow down this movement. The 99 percenters will not be deterred and are not going anywhere. Neither are any of the other 99 percenters all over the country. Occupy Boston was kicked out. They are back. Occupy Cal at UC Berkeley was kicked out. They are back. There have been police raids on Occupy Wall Street in Portland, Denver, Albany, New York, Burlington, Vermont, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina. They are all back.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's see if we can go next to Spencer. Spencer with us from Salt Lake City.</s>SPENCER: Hi. Thank you for taking my call. I actually am really excited about the momentum of the movement. But I would see it being really tragic if they didn't actually at least use a part of their - the publicity and their energy and drive the momentum to get valid initiatives on to change laws because I think there's probably a fine line between activism and camping. And a lot of people would probably be interested in changing lives if that movement puts a - 10 things they wanted to legislate in order to change policy and put them up on a website, let people read them and then let start getting signatures. Because ultimately, they will probably have to bypass legislators unless we can get people to put bills forward in order to change policy, because that's really where a lot of the change has the potential to happen.</s>SPENCER: I mean, I think I don't really feel one way or another about Proposition 8, but - in California. But, you know, this was a grassroots, however you want to think about it, signatures got that on the ballot, and then the people voted. And I would think it would just be very tragic to not use some of this energy, at least from the Occupy movement, to say we want to change these laws. We want to, you know, whatever it is. Your campaign finance reform, I think, personally, is probably at the root of most problems (unintelligible)</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Spencer, I'm afraid we're going to have to leave it there because we're out of time, but thank you. Spencer, I apologize, but thanks to you and thanks to everybody who called and emailed. We're sorry we didn't have a chance to get to all of your calls. Brian Naylor is here tomorrow. See you Monday. TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.
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Reporting in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers write that complete strangers are capable of spotting individuals with a genetic predisposition to empathy and sociable behavior. Author Sarina Saturn discusses the study, and how sociability has evolved across cultures.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. Think of a time a close friend shared some bad news with you - maybe the death of a parent or a friend. How did you respond? A hug, lots of eye contact. Where did that empathy come from? When we share emotions with others, recognizing a friend's sadness, for example, how much of that behavior is dictated by our genes, and how much do we learn from our culture, from those around us, from being exposed to us our whole lives? Could some cultures even be biologically wired to show less empathy than others?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Those are the sorts of questions my next guest is trying to answer, and her latest study suggests genes do play an important role. Observers in her study were able to tell what a stranger's genetic disposition for empathy was just by watching a few seconds of a silent video clip of them. Joining me now to talk more about it is Sarina Rodrigues-Saturn, assistant professor in the department of psychology at Oregon State University in Corvallis. She's one of the authors of that study appearing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: DR. SARINA RODRIGUES-SATURN, OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY: Thank you so much. A pleasure to be here.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Thank you for joining us. Tell us exactly what the people were looking at in that study.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: DR. SARINA RODRIGUES-SATURN, OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY: All right. So basically, we had a study of couples, romantic couples discussing a time of suffering in their lives, and we showed our participants silent video clips of the listener how they are behaving when they are hearing their partner talk about these things. And we had our participants rate how prosocial, how much they seemed to care and their various gestures to relay their caring and sympathy.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And then, how did you follow up to find out about whether this was hardwired into them or something to be learned?</s>UNIVERSITY: That's an excellent question because I would never say that we have an empathy gene or a caring gene, but we're very much a product of our genetic variations that color our personality and our various emotional states and traits. So here, we were just kind of following up a study that we've done before and many others showing that. This particular genetic variation of the oxytocin receptor relates to prosocial behaviors here in a romantic setting but also the ability to read other people's emotions, stress reactivity, neural activity, parental sensitivity. So the field is really exploding to show these relationships.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So your study showed that if you had one kind of gene, then you were better at reading the empathy - you're more empathetic than people who had a different kind of gene?</s>UNIVERSITY: Right, precisely. So the oxytocin receptor is really key, so oxytocin is a social lubricant that is so important for pair bond formation, love for your fellow human being, devotion, trust. And it only has one receptor, unlike a lot of other neurotransmitters that have many to play out its role. Oxytocin just has one. So it makes sense that genetic variation in the gene that codes for the receptor to carry out oxytocin signaling would cause all these differences in social behaviors.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: How do we know that it wasn't learned along the way? I mean, critics would say, you know, you only had 23 people in your study. You need a bigger study and - to come up with a conclusion that you did.</s>UNIVERSITY: Oh, absolutely. Those criticisms are very fair. We basically had a nested design in the study, and thereby, we actually had thousands of data points that we had by our over 100 observers collecting this data as well. Along those same lines, there's been over a dozen of other studies with this particular genetic variation showing how it moves all of this social behaviors on how well we can understand people in a noisy environment, our optimism, our self-esteem, our parenting behaviors. So it really follows a line really nicely with some of the previous research that's been done in the field.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Now, you were talking about these various genes and how they might affect your empathy. How could - or how various - I should say, how various is the gene? How many different flavors of it do you have, and how many different kinds of empathy might you have?</s>UNIVERSITY: Yeah. That's an excellent question. So we really just have one gene that codes for the oxytocin receptor, but we have these things called polymorphisms, which is just a term for many forms, that produce two or more different flavors in the same population. So the oxytocin receptor has various polymorphisms, and we just focus on one that has been plied to maybe be a role in transcription and signaling of this particular hormone. And now, we're not a product of our genes.</s>UNIVERSITY: There's no such thing as a gay gene or a divorce gene or a depression gene. I was quite a skeptic coming into this field. But we know that we are a product of many, many genes that influence our behaviors but also our life experiences, our environment, our upbringing and our culture. So we're finding this relationship, but we're not claiming that this gene is responsible for everything.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Could - does the gene work the same way in all the cultures that you studied, or could it work backwards in some cultures?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: DR. SARINA RODRIGUES-SATURN: That's an excellent question. So other researches in the field, like Young Jun Kim(ph), Shelley Taylor, Joni Sasaki, have really been studying these genetic variations in different cultures. And it's not black and white. It's a very nuanced and complicated story. For example, if you compare Americans and Koreans, the genome type that has been associated with more empathy, more pro-socio behaviors, less stress reactivity. In America, GDs are more likely to seek emotional support when they're really stressed out, but Koreans, not so much. And so that very much falls in lines with the cultural norms regarding emotional support.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And so, how do you explain that difference?</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Well, that's a good question. So we basically have different societies, not – one's not better than other. Here in America, we have an individualistic society where everyone is expected to look after himself or herself and their immediate loved ones. In collectivist societies, there's a greater emphasis on the group, and this group thing, and this large mentality of harmony and loyalty within an entire society. And so it might seemed that we have different cultural rules depending on where we live and our ethnicity background and the genes that our ethnic background give us, based on whether it makes more sense to seek emotional support or regulate one emotions or just put one's heart on one's sleeve. It really depends on the context, and it really depends on your culture.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Let's go to the phone. 1-800-989-8255 is our number. First stop, St. Louis. Hi. Welcome to - Nick, welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>NICK: Hello, sir.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Hi there.</s>NICK: How are you all doing? My question - I guess, you just started to touch on it. So all genes are not necessarily expressed and whether or not they go through some post-translational modification. So are you suggesting that, whether or not it's expressed, there is a - you can actually measure cultural differences, saying - versus a high matriarchal, paternalistic culture versus a, clearly autonomous cultures? And there are measurable differences between, say, these genes that are expressed in an Eastern culture versus the Western culture? Can you talk about that, please?</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Yeah. That's an excellent question. So we have these things called alleles, which is basically just showing that we have alternative forms of a gene. So they come in different flavors.</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: So for this particular genetic variation, obviously, we get a pair version from each of our parents, and we can fall into a category of having two copies of the A allele, one copy of the A allele and one copy of the G allele, or two copies of the G allele. And for various evolutionary drives that we're not really quite certain what happened exactly, but some cultures do have more of A allele and some cultures more of the G allele. Now, the G allele is what we call an ancestral allele, and that it really evolved first. And the A allele came later in our evolutionary history, whether it was a disposition to be less sociable and less empathetic in certain societies. And again, this not better or worse. It's just an adapted mechanism to basically respond to one's culture and society.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Well, then, if we take that - if we follow that pathway of the evolution of the alleles, that would say that we're becoming less empathetic.</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Yeah. You could take it that way. I would just - I guess, it's just not so cut and dry. So for example, this G allele - in European-Americans, the G allele, there's lower psychological well-being if you're religious. But if you're from an Asian culture, there is more well-being. So it's very, very complicated based on the social hierarchy. And it's possible that not reading everyone's emotions when you're - it might be century overloaded, some cultures, or it might detract from this mentality to go along with the group and think of things in terms of we instead of me.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: By the way, your study was a very interesting from the point of view - and your methodology - is that people could tell, looking at other people, in just a few seconds, whether they had that gene or they didn't have that gene just by the way they were acting. And, in fact, the negative part was even stronger than the positive part.</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Right. Precisely. And my hat goes off to the first author, Alex Kogan, who had this brilliant idea to look at these romantic couples, especially when they're talking about a time of suffering in their life. And so I think we're really good at picking up on first impressions. I know myself, I - when I need help from, let's say, a bank teller or an in shop, I look to see who seems the most approachable and the most friendly. And so we're really good at picking up on that. And it would make sense that a genetic variation that would influence our social processing would be expressed outwardly in behaviors that strangers can pick up.</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: And so, yes, it was a beautiful design that Alex put together with 20-second, just silent videotape, just looking at how much this person was nodding, making eye contact, using kind of an open stance to show that I'm here for you. I really care about you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Let's go to Leslie in California. Hi. Welcome, Leslie.</s>LESLIE: Hi. Thanks for taking my call. I'm a registered nurse, so I have some empathy, I hope.</s>LESLIE: But I'm calling because, you know, in a lot of the cases like the violence that happens in random situations, that person seems to have lost the capacity for empathy at all. And I'm wondering if there's any application in the mental health field for, you know, this discovery because it would really markedly change, you know, the way we treat people with mental illness who display antisocial behaviors.</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Right, precisely. And I think this would just let us get some knowledge about how important oxytocin is for being this social glue that keeps us together, to feel attached, to really care what someone else is feeling and to also understand that some of us do have genetically influenced traits that make it a little harder to make eye contact, a little harder to be sociable and to understand where they're coming from and come up with ways to really coach people out of their shells and to help them really understand what other people are feeling.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Leslie, were you talking more of a gene profile then, finding out people's genetic profiles to see if they might be more...</s>LESLIE: I don't think that would be far from, you know, reality in the future. I think it's very important because - I mean, look at what happened with the Virginia Military Institute. And people noticed that there were patterns in this people that were - they were asking for help and no one was responding to them.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Mm-hmm. All right.</s>LESLIE: And it's, you know, I just wonder, you know, if you could do a genetic test for where someone is with their oxytocin - much as you would do for serotonin or for dopamine, you know, there are medications that address those particular neurotransmitters. I mean, I don't know why you couldn't do it for oxytocin? In the end - I mean, I think, heck, you know, if I was feeling bad and I have to take a pill to feel better about my human beings, I would do it in a heartbeat...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: There you go.</s>LESLIE: ...you know?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Well, thank you, Leslie.</s>LESLIE: OK. Thank you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I guess that does open a whole world for medication, does it not, Sarina?</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: It definitely does. Yeah. And it definitely could bring some more targets for therapeutic mechanisms. But I'm a big proponent of natural inductions of oxytocin via massage, cuddling, social contact, because we can get it very naturally in an endogenous setting before we turn to pharmaceutical.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Everybody turn to one another and give a big hug this afternoon, especially for...</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Precisely.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: ...especially for Thanksgiving. We all need a hug around that time, that holiday, don't we?</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: We sure do. We all do, no matter who you are or where you come from.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Thank you very much for taking time to be with us today.</s>RODRIGUES-SATURN: Thank you for having me.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Sarina Rodrigues-Saturn, assistant professor in the department of psychology at Oregon State University in Corvallis. I'm Ira Flatow. This SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR.
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The Pentagon announced last week that the process of the U.S.'s deliberate withdraw from Syria has begun. Rachel Martin talks to Robert Ford, a former U.S. Ambassador to Syria, about the withdraw.
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RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: President Trump has a warning for Turkey. He said on Twitter that if Turkey attacks U.S.-backed Kurdish forces in Syria, the U.S. will, quote, "devastate Turkey economically." Last month, the president announced that the U.S. is pulling all its troops out of Syria, and defense officials confirm that process is now underway. But the U.S. exit will leave Kurdish fighters vulnerable to an attack by Turkey. U.S. forces fought alongside Kurdish forces in the battle against ISIS. Now I am joined by Robert Ford, U.S. ambassador to Syria from 2011 to 2014. Ambassador, thanks for being here.</s>ROBERT FORD: Good morning. How are you?</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: I am well. You support President Trump's decision to pull troops from Syria. Can you just briefly remind us why you think that's the best course of action?</s>ROBERT FORD: The reason I think it's the best course of action is that the American soldiers there have done about as much as they can in terms of reducing ISIS's capacity to threaten the United States. To totally eradicate ISIS, that's really a job that only Syrians, not American soldiers, can do.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: So what do you make of the president's tweet warning Turkey not to attack the Kurds? Do you think that will be enough to deter an action like that?</s>ROBERT FORD: Well, that's going to be hard. The animosity between the Syrian Kurdish fighters, this particular group in Syria and Turkey, goes back decades. And it's going to take very agile American diplomacy to keep the two sides from starting to fight again.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: What about this mention - the president, in that same tweet, just said the words create 20-mile safe zone. What does that mean? Can you provide - understanding you're not in the president's head, but can you give any more context to what that would look like on the ground?</s>ROBERT FORD: The tweet raises a lot of questions. The Americans and Turkey and this Syrian Kurdish fighting group have been discussing some kind of a border zone. That's been going on for weeks. But exactly how that would be done, what it would include - would it include Syrian Kurdish towns, for example? That's less clear.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: What does it mean when the president says he'll devastate Turkey economically? I mean, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was asked by reporters today traveling with him in the region. He said it wasn't really clear on what it did mean. Is it sanctions? What would it look like?</s>ROBERT FORD: Well, for example, the Trump administration applied punitive sanctions against Turkish exports to the United States because of the case of the American pastor Andrew Brunson, who had been held by the Turks for years. Would those sanctions be reimposed again? It's not clear. Again, you know, diplomacy by tweet can raise as many questions as it answers.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Before I let you go, I want to get your reaction to a story that broke in The Washington Post over the weekend. It reveals that President Trump went to great lengths to conceal details of conversations he had with Vladimir Putin. That reportedly includes at least once taking the notes from his own interpreter and instructing that interpreter not to discuss what had transpired with other administration officials. As someone with a long history in the State Department, a veteran diplomat, would that be an unusual move?</s>ROBERT FORD: Well, I was around summits involving George Herbert Walker Bush and Barack Obama and others, and I've never heard of a president taking translator's notes like that. You know, a president's desire for keeping conversations private is certainly understandable, but usually the top aides are included in understanding what was discussed, even if they weren't in the meeting. And the Trump administration seems to be going way beyond that in terms of trying to keep information limited. And it's not helpful in teams, diplomatic teams, being able to do the follow-up.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Do you see this as a dangerous precedent?</s>ROBERT FORD: No. I don't think it's a dangerous precedent because every American president can set his or her own style. Richard Nixon's antics didn't create a precedent during the 1970s, for example. And he was a guy who loved privacy, too. But what I do think is, today, it's making the task of the State Department, it's making the task of the Defense Department, it's making the task of the National Security Council more difficult.</s>RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: Ambassador Robert Ford, now a senior fellow at both the Middle East Institute and Yale University. Thanks so much.</s>ROBERT FORD: My pleasure. Thank you.
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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is in Saudi Arabia — the latest stop in his swing through the Middle East. While there, he met with Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman. What did they talk about?
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DAVID GREENE, HOST: So did the death of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi change the U.S.-Saudi relationship? The Trump administration has been under pressure to hold the Saudi government accountable. And this morning, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Saudi Arabia's crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman This comes as Pompeo continues a weeklong swing through the Middle East, and NPR's Jackie Northam is here to catch us up. Hi, Jackie.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Morning, David.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: So what was this meeting like?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Well, it lasted about 45 minutes, and there were several issues that came up. The two men talked about conflicts in Syria and Yemen and the need to find a way to end the war there. Iran also came up. Saudi Arabia and the U.S. are on the same page about trying to contain Iran. But yes, they also talked about the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. He was killed at the Saudi Embassy in Istanbul last October. And Pompeo spoke to reporters afterwards about their talk, and this is what he had to say.</s>MIKE POMPEO: The Saudis are friends. And when friends have conversations, you tell them what your expectations are. And I think the Trump administration has made clear our expectation that all of those involved in the murder of Khashoggi will be held accountable.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Well, a lot to unpack there - I mean, saying that accountability is important but also stressing the friendship between the two countries.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Right.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And this is not the first time Pompeo has had a meeting with the crown prince since this journalist's death, right?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: No, that's right. Pompeo met with the crown prince about two weeks after Khashoggi was killed. And, you know, David, his death just caused outrage across the world. And there were demands from all corners for accountability. Pompeo was dispatched at that time to Riyadh to hear what the crown prince had to say about it because the finger of responsibility was pointing towards the crown prince. There was pictures of the two men smiling and shaking hands. And at the time, Pompeo said the crown prince categorically denied any involvement in Khashoggi's death. But here is Pompeo back in Riyadh asking for more details.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: You say the finger of responsibility. I mean, one (laughter) - one place pointing that finger is U.S. intelligence, right? I mean, they've basically concluded that the crown prince was somehow involved in this death. So the issue is not going away at all.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Right.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: And doesn't that put more pressure on Pompeo to be tougher with Saudi Arabia?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Well, yes. Indeed. And in fact, before he left, State Department officials had a backgrounder for reporters. And they were saying that, you know, the Saudis have to come up with what they call a credible narrative. They have to be shown to be more proactive in trying to, you know, decide who has done this, who caused Khashoggi's killing. So Pompeo probably did speak much more harshly than he did the first time around. But we don't - we're not privy to these conversations. The two men spoke by themselves for a little while. So we'll have to see. You know, there are 11 suspects on trial in Saudi Arabia for Khashoggi's death. And five of those face the death penalty, but there's a lot of anger. There's a lot of concern, you know, that people aren't being held accountable, meaning the crown prince himself. And so, you know, the U.S. has said, look it, even if they're having those legal processes under way now and these 11 are being tried, it doesn't really hit the threshold of credibility.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: We should say this meeting in Saudi Arabia - I mean, part of a much bigger trip that Secretary of State Pompeo is making, but he's cutting it a little short. Is that right? What's happening?</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Yeah, that's right. He was supposed to be going to Kuwait. It was supposed to be sort of the last leg of this weeklong swing through the Middle East, but they're heading back. He's heading back to the U.S. for a family funeral. That's why he's returning early.</s>DAVID GREENE, HOST: Oh, I see. OK. NPR's Jackie Northam, thanks so much.</s>JACKIE NORTHAM, BYLINE: Thank you.
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NPR's Brian Naylor reads from listener comments on previous show topics, including a recommendations for places to find personal and artistic renewal, and the reasons some people do — or do not — report sexual abuse.
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BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: It's Tuesday, and time to read from your comments. When we talked to author P.J. O'Rourke about his new book "Holidays in Heck," many of you offered suggestions of where P.J. should go next. Wu Nyen Proul(ph) in Franklin, Kentucky, wrote: Visit Easter Island. It's such a humbling experience to stand before the Moai; sleep to the sound of waves; pure, unpolluted air; and great fish. Even a 4G iPhone can't get a connection. You and your family will enjoy what it's like to live without the Worldwide Web - these days, something one can only imagine.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Photographer Annie Leibovitz joined us to discuss her new book of photographs, "Pilgrimage," and her journey around the world to take photos of the places and things that brought a sense of personal and artistic renewal. We asked you to share your places of renewal, and Glenna Auxier from Gainesville, Florida, wrote: The mountains of North Carolina - Asheville and Boone - are like magic to me. I breathe better, sleep better, and I just feel a satisfaction that's not the same in the flatland. In Florida, I live on the Earth. In North Carolina, I feel I am in the earth. It's both physical and spiritual. I can't really explain it, but it's very true.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Following the allegations of sexual abuse at Penn State, we discussed why people are often afraid to come forward when they suspect abuse is occurring. Holly Mullen from Salt Lake City, Utah, sent this email: I just started a new job as director of a nonprofit rape recovery center. I do not have a lot of social work experience, but I know this: I wish every person who ever hesitated, or might hesitate, to report child sexual abuse could spend a few hours in our waiting area. We serve male and female victims of sexual assault over the age of 13. Many of them visit us years, even decades after being abused and not believed, often when they were young children. The repercussions and ripple effect in society of not reporting are huge, and painful. Please report.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: If you have a correction, comments or questions for us, the best way to reach us is by email. Our address is [email protected]. Please let us know where you're writing from, and give us some help on how to pronounce your name. And if you're on Twitter, you can follow us there @totn.
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Boarding a flight with kids can be a nightmare for everyone. And as airlines cut back on amenities and pack cabins, flying as a family has grown more and more difficult. Michelle Higgins, the New York Times' Practical Traveler, compiled a list of family-friendly airlines and flying tips. Read Michelle Higgins' Piece, "Are We There Yet? When Families Fly"
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BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: No milk, no coloring books, no pre-flight tours of the cockpit and certainly no sympathy for most airline passengers traveling with children. Flying can be a hassle for just about everyone, but families may endure some of the worst shocks, especially over the busy holidays.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: If you've traveled recently with children by plane, what advice do you have? Call us at 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected]. And you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Michelle Higgins, the Practical Traveler for The New York Times, joins us from WNYC, our member station in New York. Earlier this month, she wrote a column entitled "Are We There Yet? When Families Fly." Michelle, thanks for joining us.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Glad to be here.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So how tough is it out there for families on planes these days?</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Well, even as recently as a few years ago, you know, families could count on a handful of common courtesies like boarding before other passengers, landing a roomier seat in the first row of coach, bringing certain strollers on board and being able to get a cup of milk on board, for instance. But these services and courtesies are fading fast as airlines try to maximize capacity and slash services for all passengers on board.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So what are some of the challenges that travelers with - families with children are experiencing now that they didn't just a few years ago? Lack of milk on some flights, I guess, number one.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Right. As - and as recently as four years ago, some airlines were still routinely calling families to board first. The idea was that getting the kids on early was not just a courtesy for families, but it kind of - it benefitted everyone on board by getting them out of the way. But that's not the case anymore because more and more airlines are charging for early boarding. So the only way to really guarantee that you're going to - your family is going to get on board early is to pay for it. So you should check with your airline to see what they offer. American and United both allow passengers traveling in coach to pay extra to board first.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Such a treat. I did notice the other day. I was flying on Southwest, and there were some families who could board first, and then there are others who were allowed to board after the first, sort of the A row of - the A grouping of passengers. I guess each airline has a different policy, and some are probably better than others.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: That's right. While each airline says that it allows families to board towards the front of coach, generally they have different policies. So American, for instance, doesn't call boarding for families regularly anymore. Now, passengers who want to board first have to ask the gate agent or pay $10 a person to guarantee a spot in the first boarding group in coach.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Southwest, which you mentioned, also allows passengers to pay to get in that group A boarding. That is the, you know, the first ones to get a seat on that - those planes. And otherwise, they do allow families to come after the A boarding and before the rest of coach.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Mm-hmm. And the advantage, I mean, for travelers is just - it's a courtesy, but, you know, families are traveling with strollers and car seats and everything else. It kind of - it makes sense to give them some time to stow all that stuff.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Well, especially now that the overhead bins are so crowded because the airlines are charging for checked bags. So getting on board first isn't just about getting settled in the seats and getting the kids settled. It's also about getting all of the gear that families inevitably need on board, you know, with them so that they have - they're - they have it accessible if the kids need a snack or, you know, some entertainment on board as well.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take a call now. Charice(ph) joins us from Binghamton, New York. Thanks for calling TALK OF THE NATION.</s>CHARICE: Hi. How are you?</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Good. What's your experience been traveling with children or flying with children?</s>CHARICE: We found that with little children, if you can bring the car seat into the plane and set it up for the kid - the child to sit in the car seat, it really calm the child down. They knew what to do. They knew that they were sitting for a long time. And it made – they were more comfortable, and we were more comfortable. So that was a really useful tip that somebody gave to me.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Now that's, of course - you bought that seat.</s>CHARICE: Yeah. We bought the seat and, you know, for an 18-month or - when our son traveled. And he was calm. He slept, you know. Otherwise, you - another time when we flew, he was running around and he didn't - he wasn't comfortable sitting on the chair. So, yeah. Yeah, you do have to buy the seat unless you know that the plane is not going to be...</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thank you, Charice. And, Michelle, you've written, also, airlines are not always seating families together in the first place.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: That's certainly one of the biggest sticking point for families because they really need to be sitting next to the kids. And sometimes they'll board the plane and find out their seats have been separated. Or because flights are filling up so fast now and you can choose your seat online in advance, if you book kind of later in the game, there may only be middle seats in separate rows. So, it's very challenging for families because once onboard, they're often left to themselves to sort out and swap with passengers who are willing to give up a seat. And that's increasingly challenging as flights are packed to the brim.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So there may not be a seat or maybe it's only a middle seat or something, and you're hesitant to give, you know, take a middle seat and give up your aisle or whatever.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Right. And flight attendants I spoke to say that it used to be easier to move passengers around, to accommodate families when they were separated for whatever reason because, you know, the planes were empty or there was more wiggle room. But now with a middle seat, you know, if you are trying to swap with someone for a middle seat and you need to sit next to your child, it's very difficult to get someone from the aisle or the window, for instance, to, you know, give up that choice seat and be stuck in the middle.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Obviously, passengers who have not been parents themselves, I think, probably. Let's take a call from Miranda(ph) in Berkeley, California. Miranda, thanks for joining us.</s>MIRANDA: Hi. I was just going to say I've flown six times cross-country with my daughter in the last year. She's one now. She was 3 months old when we started flying. And we've only had wonderful experiences. I've never gotten a seat for her. And the flight attendant and the people at the front desk, before a fight takes off, have always found us an extra seat.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Wow.</s>MIRANDA: A lot of times, we even have the entire back row to ourselves. And I think - I've flown only on Virgin America. I'm not sure if they have a particular policy about it, but we've had just a wonderful experience.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Well, a good endorsement for Virgin. Thanks very much, Miranda. Do you find that the policies vary, Michelle, quite a lot from airline to airline?</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Well, in terms of policies, they're generally the same. But in some cases, like Virgin America, for instance, they have - families do tend to prefer them over some other carriers because each seat has a TV in front of it. So depending on the age of your child, that can be very valuable on a long flight and can make the flying much more pleasant. They also do offer, you know, you have to pay for it, but they do offer kid-friendly, you know, entertainment on board as well as meals. So they have kid-friendly movies you can pay for as well as some TV that is free and kid-friendly meals. And that's not the case with all of the airlines.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: In fact, you wrote that in at least one case, the flight attendant didn't have - wouldn't give milk to a mom with a child, saying that it was - well, you tell the story. I mean, it's just amazing.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Right. Well, the family was flying a long flight. They were flying from Newark to Hawaii with a stopover in Los Angeles. And, you know, they brought milk on board for the kids, who I think at the time were about 18 months old. And, you know, it just didn't last the entire flight, whether the kids drank it all or if it spoiled right towards the end. And so they asked, could I have a cup of milk? And the answer was, well, the milk is for passengers for their coffee.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: And so, you know, she ended up giving the child some water and, you know, went through it. But it's - it reinforces the message to families that if you don't have it, don't expect the airlines to provide it. You really need to bring all of the supplies on board these days.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. That's a good tip. Let's take a call from Chris in Prescott, Arizona. Chris, what's your experience been flying with children?</s>CHRIS: Hello. I recently traveled to South Africa with my wife and two small children, 6 and age 3. And we flew down with Delta Airlines. And on the way down, the children were not allowed to sit in our laps. And on the way home, we flew with South Africa airlines - much more accommodating. They let the children sit in out laps so that we could comfort them. I, you know, and it wasn't during the taxiing and takeoff. It was - when we reached cruising altitude, the stewardess walked by several times to remind me that my son wasn't allowed to sit in my lap.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Wow. Did you have a seat for him?</s>CHRIS: (Unintelligible) said, well, if we had a problem he needs to be in his own seat, to which I replied, well there's all sorts of people milling about in the cabin, and they'll need to be in their seats as well. And she just couldn't adequately explain it to me. And I'm wondering if, with the South African airlines, do they operate under a different set of rules or how is it that works?</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Chris, thanks very much. Michelle, do foreign carriers have different standards than American ones do?</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Well, foreign carriers generally seem to be more family friendly, from what I've found. They offer more, you know, perks for families, bassinets onboard, particularly because sometimes the flights are longer when you're flying from the U.S. to a foreign destination, but also because, you know, they're competing on different routes that cater more to families. So I think I wasn't clear on whether it was the South African airways that was asking him to have the child in the seat or if it was the domestic carrier.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I think it was - I think he said it was Delta.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: It was Delta. Yeah. And that's interesting. I haven't heard that before. But it kind of goes to - it speaks to how parents are often given mixed messages. You know, they take the airline one time and they're told one thing about keeping the child in the seat. And on another, they might now have that rule imposed. So, oftentimes, it's up to, you know, what kind of flight attendant, what flight attendant you get on your trip and what, you know, what they expect out of passengers.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Michelle Higgins is the Practical Traveler columnist at The New York Times. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I want to read an email here from Jay(ph) in Oregon, writes, I have two kids, ages 3 and 5, and I think boarding early is crazy. The last thing I want to do when flying is to spend extra time sitting trapped on a plane. And I guess that's one point of view also. It's tough to keep the sometimes antsy kids happy on board and getting there early makes it that much tougher.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: What I'm wondering, Michelle, do you think that airlines are, in fact, trying to discourage families from traveling? It's maybe less lucrative or more hassles than it's worth?</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Well, I think it really comes down to a matter of resources. American carriers have lost about 55 billion over the course of the past decade according to the Air Transport Association. You know, as operational costs like fuel and employee benefits have, you know, outpaced revenues. And so they've done everything they can to, you know, make up for those losses by cutting service and adding fees. And for families, that just makes things more complicated and compounds the cost.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: If you talk about baggage fees, you've got to start multiplying in terms of families. Early boarding, you're probably not going to get it. You know, hoping to sit together, you can't count on it anymore unless you paid extra. You know, 'cause the few empty seats, you know, aren't really there anymore.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Lauren(ph) from San Marcel(ph), California. What's your experience been flying with children?</s>LAUREN: Hello.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Hi. Yeah.</s>LAUREN: Hi. Hi. Yeah. I recently flew with our three kids, from California to Hawaii. We have a 5-year-old, a 3-year-old and a 6-month-old. And one of the tricks I like to do is when, at the end of the flight, especially if you're landing sometime in the evening, the attendants always tell you that you have to turn off your electronic devices, and that's really hard because if the kids are watching DVDs on the DVD player, you have to turn it off. And you usually have about 30 or 40 minutes still to go that you have to entertain them. So I always stop at the dollar store, pick up a couple packs of glow sticks.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: And at that point, when we're in our descent, I break them all open, and the kids entertain themselves with that. And on that last flight, we starting passing the glow sticks back through the cabin, and by the end of - by the time we landed, all the little children on the plane had their glow sticks, and the parents were happy and all the passengers were happy.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Well, that sounds like fun. It must have been a fun flight.</s>LAUREN: It was. It was. It kept them busy. I do it every time now.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Well, thanks for that tip.</s>LAUREN: All right. Thanks.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Michelle, it's always good to be prepared, I guess, to bring toys and other things to keep your kids amused.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: That's a really good point. You know, bring as much on to entertain them as possible. You know, in terms of younger kids, you know, the real challenge is that age between, you know, the toddlers, the age between when they have the attention span long enough to, you know, watch TV or play with a, you know, tech, you know, an iPod or something like that onboard versus the little kids that can just sleep on the flight. So there's that tricky age in between that's especially - that you especially need, you know, a bag full of surprises, essentially.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: You know, one thing that I found is ice can actually be a big saver onboard because flight attendants often have ice and little plastic cups and little straws, and that can be a big entertainment for toddlers.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And, you know, we talked about flight attendants not, you know, saying milk was for their first-class passengers. I mean, they're certainly a harried bunch these days with a lot of responsibilities, and some of them probably are not having good days or a good flight. So what's your advice for dealing with flight attendants who may not be the most cooperative or friendly?</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Right. Well, just remember that it's really not that they are holding back on passengers. Many times, it's simply that the airline hasn't offered them the tools to, you know, provide passengers what they're asking for. The flight attendant I spoke with who flies on American says she used to have five to six cartons of milk on each flight for coach, but that was five or so years ago. Now, on her flight, they don't serve milk after 9 a.m.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Michelle Higgins is the Practical Traveler columnist at The New York Times. We posted a link to her article at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION. She joined us from our New York bureau. Michelle, thanks very much.</s>MICHELLE HIGGINS: Thank you.
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Citing "capital scarcity" the Geron Corporation said it will abandon its research into using human embryonic stem cells to treat spinal cord injuries. Stem cell expert Leonard Zon discusses the announcement and what it means for the future of embryonic stem cell research.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: For the rest of the hour, we'll look at the state of embryonic stem cell research. Earlier this week, the Geron Corporation announced it was abandoning its research into using embryonic stem cells to treat spinal cord injury. Geron was the first company to get the green light from the FDA to conduct clinical trials using embryonic stem cells. That was way back in 2009. And now, citing, quote, "capital scarcity and uncertain economic conditions," the company is looking to sell off that part of its business and focus on other work.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Joining me now to talk about the announcement, what it means for other research using embryonic stem cells is Leonard Zon. He is an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and also director of the stem cell program at Children's Hospital Boston and professor of pediatrics at Harvard Med School. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY. Welcome back.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: DR. LEONARD ZON: Oh, thank you, Ira. It's a pleasure to be here.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is this a real blow to stem cell, the embryonic stem cell research?</s>ZON: Well, we're certainly saddened by the decision to stop the trial in its midst, and it is, you know, upsetting that something would get this far along and have an issue. I think there's a lot going on in the field, and we still are very excited about the promise of stem cell research. But I think, as this illustrates, funding that research and looking for the ultimate therapies is going to take some time.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: It's sort of a purely business decision then?</s>ZON: From my understanding, that's what happened here. So the company Geron had two paths: one was an oncology drug that seemed rather promising, was in phase two trial, and the other was to continue its stem cell research. It was clear that they had put a lot of money into stem cell research, and so they thought that would be a good path. But having to choose one or the other, they then chose the oncology drug path.</s>ZON: Now, we don't know everything about those decisions, and obviously there were some patients who were treated. So we don't know if all the decision was made as a business decision. But that's what I've been told informally.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So as you say, there were four patients who were under treatment, and they had hoped to treat 10 patients?</s>ZON: That's right. That's right. This is a very interesting trial. The idea was that there are embryonic stem cells which can make all the cells of your body, and these cells could be turned into supportive cells for neurons, for the brain cells and also for the spinal cord cells. And so the idea was once these cells were made, these supportive cells, they could be introduced into a patient who had a spinal cord injury, and they would start supporting the cells, and the repair of the neurons would be better if they were treated with the cell product. So, you know, we have four patients who are treated, and I guess they wanted to treat 10, and we'll have to follow those patients and see how they do.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: 1-800-989-8255 is our number if you'd like to talk about this. You can also tweet us at scifri. These were early stage trial, right, just phase one?</s>ZON: That's right. So the idea was, really, a safety trial. If you were to take patients who are obviously devastated from having a spinal cord injury and then put in these supportive cells, we would want to make sure that they wouldn't cause any damage. And at least from the, you know, texts that we've had and other messages, it seems that there wasn't any major problem in terms of safety with the four patients who were treated.</s>ZON: A safety trial is only done for safety purposes. It's not to necessarily evaluate efficacy, how well it works. So I think we need to still see how the patients do, but again, it was to find out is the drug or these cells safe if you put them into a patient who's had a spinal cord injury.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: By this company pulling out of actual testing of embryonic stem cell treatments, doesn't that cut drastically the number of companies left who are actually making those tests?</s>ZON: Yes, it's a very small list of companies. So actually, there's only one other company that's doing embryonic stem cell research, and that's a company called ACT. And they're trying to turn these embryonic stem cells into a cell that's in the eye. It's called a retinal pigment epithelial cell. But there are patients who have a genetic disease where those cells are defective, and they end up becoming blind. And the also more common disease, macular degeneration, also affects that cell population.</s>ZON: So that company hopes to use the embryonic stem cells to inject them into the eye and try to rescue the blindness or prevent the blindness that occurs in this particular genetic disease called Stargardt's disease. So short of that, there aren't other companies who are using embryonic stem cells, but there's a growing number of companies that are switching and trying to use reprogrammed skin cells.</s>ZON: When we talked last time a few years ago, we discussed how this new technology could take a skin cell and reprogram it to think it's an embryonic stem cell. And these cells, in many ways, have great abilities to be matched for the patient, let's say for their immune system. So there's a number of companies now who are trying to make those cells functional, and then trying to use them to do transplantation to fix a disease.</s>ZON: Those cells also end up being very interesting because you can make disease-specific cells. So you can take a disease and actually study it in a dish, a disease in a dish, and then try to find drugs that would be used to treat those diseases. And this is something that we're even seeing pharmaceutical companies get involved in, using stem cell technology.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: What about the shortage now? As Geron backs out, don't they have a whole population of cells to use, and what's going to happen to that cell line or those cell lines that they have?</s>ZON: Absolutely. It's a very interesting discussion. We have to know that Geron has the largest number of cell lines that we know of for embryonic stem cells, and we would like to know what's going to happen to those stem cell lines. Obviously it's a business, and they probably will want, in their partnering opportunities, to sell it to another business. But it does create an issue for the stem cell field what will happen to those lines and how the - how will they be used in the future.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And would somebody take over continuing those lines, or do they just throw them out?</s>ZON: Well, that would be a very significant shame. I think that, you know, those lines are incredibly valuable, and we'd like to see them used for both biology as well as for medicine. And so, hopefully, they'll be placed in the care of a good company and they'll use them.</s>ZON: And, you know, I think what's interesting now when we look at this clinical trial is how it will - the results of the clinical trial actually get reported. You have four patients treated, and, you know, will they be followed? Will they be reported in the scientific literature? Those are also important things for the company to decide.</s>ZON: And if they're trying to partner that opportunity, how will their new partner or new - or when they sell the business, how will that company actually deal with that information? So both the lines as well as the dealing with the clinical trial that obviously these patients are already transplanted and will be followed, that's going to require some insight from the new company.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And if I recall, it was a huge regulatory hurdle for the company to overcome, all kinds of paperwork and documentation and expenses that way?</s>ZON: That's right. It's a - yeah. Absolutely. There was an amazing amount of paperwork that went into this. As you might expect when a totally new therapy comes about, the FDA is going to be involved in a very responsible way, ask for a number of experiments to be done, pre-clinical experiments that would allow them to ultimately do the trial. This took many, many years and many millions of dollars.</s>ZON: So, in a significant way, Geron has played an important role by forging this pathway of regulatory hurdles. So I think for future companies that come in, the FDA will know how to deal with this, to some degree, and I think that new therapies won't have to do as much work as has been done for Geron.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Let's go to the phones, 1-800-989-8255. Let's go to Jerry(ph) in Cookeville, New Jersey. Hi, Jerry.</s>JERRY: Oh, that's Cookeville, Tennessee.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I'm sorry. Cookeville...</s>JERRY: That's OK.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: That's close by, right?</s>JERRY: Yeah, but very interesting conversation with the - what the gentleman was just talking about with the human stem cells and all the promise that that's really showing. And as far as embryonic stem cells go, I really don't think that it's really done a whole lot, you know, considering all the different treatments. They use human stem cells. I mean, before long that will be like wanting to keep building wagons when the car is the wave of the future.</s>ZON: Well, I think it's interesting that the embryonic stem cell field really started in 1998 when the first human embryonic stem cells were derived. And you have a need to study those cells for many years before they can become interesting for biology, but also interesting as new therapies.</s>ZON: I often discuss - if you look at the history of organ transplant, for instance, bone marrow transplantation, a procedure that's done every day - even here at Children's Hospital we do hundreds every year - what happens is is that, in 1961, there was the discovery of the stem cell, and it didn't become a standard of therapy until about the late 1970s. So there's a large gap between the initial discoveries and then ultimately being successful.</s>ZON: And I do think that what this illustrates from Geron is it took a long time for the company to actually get this therapy into a patient, and that was very costly to deal with all the regulatory hurdles. And so that timeline is just not appetizing for venture capital companies as well as for large pharma. And so the timeline is long, and I think that makes people think, as the caller just said, that it's taking a long time before embryonic stem cells could be therapeutically useful.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Isn't that the weakness of the system, of allowing pharma to do this kind of research instead of having it, let's say, federally funded at NIH or someplace to develop this therapy? Because if they don't do it, if they drop it, it's not going to be developed.</s>ZON: Well, as you know, the entire field of organ transplantation was done completely academically initially. And then once it was clear that it was successful - and I would argue as soon as there's a success for embryonic stem cells or these new reprogrammed skin stem cells - then there will be an entire industry around being able to make it better.</s>ZON: I do think we were held up tremendously by NIH funding, which was not available in the 1990s through a presidential policy. But then, over time, that's been loosened up, and there is more money for embryonic stem cell research, and also for these skin reprogrammed cells that the NIH is investing in that particular area. So hopefully this will continue and that we'll see, over time, and, you know, over coming years, that this will be interesting therapeutically.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Mm-hmm. And where do we - let's talk about these stem cells, not the embryonic ones, but the other kinds that people can actually use their own cells and reprogram them. Is there any one disease to you, looking, surveying the field, that seems most promising at this point?</s>ZON: Well, I mean, at Children's Hospital, we're trying to use these to turn those cells into blood stem cells and being able to use those for patients who don't have a donor for marrow transplantation. I think that there's a lot of research going on in these skin cells - they're called iPS cells - and these skin cells, again, could be made from patients who have a particular disease. So we are making hundreds of lines of different genetic diseases.</s>ZON: We just made lines from a very rare blood disease - there's only 100 patients in the world who have that particular disease - so that we can study it and understand it. We make it from very common diseases, diabetes and Parkinson's disease also. So pretty much stem cell research could help the many diseases, but they're going to require significant investigation to study each of those diseases and their organs that are affected.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR. Talking with Leonard Zon, investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Our number: 1-800-989-8255. Let's go to Richard in Penngrove, California. Hi.</s>RICHARD: Hi, Ira. Just love the show. And, Dr. Zon, I wondered if you were aware - I'm sure you are - of the story, which I only heard about on NPR in the last couple of days. And you'll forgive me. I've forgotten - I don't even think it was in the United States, and probably not because of the unfortunate backward policies that have caused some delay in our research. But the young - the very young, actually, baby - I guess it was in the first five days - was born and - either obtained or born with a virus which destroyed its - the young person's liver.</s>RICHARD: They were - they had done some clearance work before in research, before and had approval to go ahead, and this was the first case, apparently, that it was appropriate, injecting a liver stem cell into the young person - injecting or placing, I don't know how it was - with a coating from an algae, which allowed the membrane of the algae to provide a protective coating against the virus but permeable still so that it could actually take over and support liver functions until the young person's liver is healthy enough to restore him to normal health. And I believe he's several months old. Are you aware of this, sir?</s>ZON: Well, I'm, you know, I don't know that particular case. I heard a little bit about it, but not that much about it. It does illustrate how you can use a variety of cells and do transplantation and really affect things, affect organ function. And so we're just at the beginning of seeing how cell therapy can actually work, and so we see a number of studies to try to fix different heart disease and also, as you're illustrating, liver disease. I think that it's important that the people who are listening realize that some of these therapies are rational and have a scientific basis and should be done, and I believe what you're talking about was done in the correct - in a reputable institution.</s>ZON: I also just want to say that we are very concerned about stem cell tourism, so you do need to worry about some company, let's say, that is telling you they'll fix any type of disease through a particular cell population. And very frequently, we find that that group of companies is trying to make money rather than actually trying to help people. Having said that, I don't know this particular instance, so it sounds very fascinating.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: But what you're saying is that as soon as someone, some company has a breakthrough in this and creates a real product, everybody else will want to join in on the bandwagon and starts investing more money and research in it.</s>ZON: I think that's true. I mean, we go back to - if you think about IVF, and at a certain point in time, there was a large debate about whether this was ethical as well as whether it should be done at all. And then as soon as there was a baby, I think that entire debate went away. I think if you look at organ transplants in the early - in the '60s and '70s, there were a number of patients who did extremely poorly from organ transplants and a number of the doctors were heavily criticized by trying to do these types of procedures as, you know, it would never work. But then as soon as there was a success, the entire field became much more invigorated, and we were able to see how it could become an industry as well as it could become a standard of therapy.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Dr. Zon, thank you for taking time to be with us today.</s>ZON: Well, thank you, Ira. It's a pleasure.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Happy holidays to you. Leonard Zon is a professor of pediatrics at Harvard Med School and also director of the Stem Cell Program at Children's Hospital in Boston.
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A literary agent once told Jaimy Gordon she was a "small-press" author at heart. But in 2010, she won the National Book Award for fiction for her book, 'Lord Of Misrule.' Gordon talks about what the award has meant for her career.
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NEAL CONAN, HOST: Tonight, the American literary establishment gathers here in New York for the National Book Awards. It's not quite the Oscars, but the honor can change the career of a novelist, historian or poet and vault a book to the top of the best-seller lists. Last year, the fiction award went to a little known author for her novel "Lord of Misrule," which had an initial press run of 2,000 copies. They've had to reprint. Jaimy Gordon joins us in just a moment. We'd like to hear from you too.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Writer, artists, athletes, musicians, if you've received sudden recognition, how did it change your work and your life? Give us a call, 800-989-8255. Email us, [email protected]. You can also join the conversation at our website. That's at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION. Author Jaimy Gordon joins us now from member station WMUK in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where she's also a professor of English at Western Michigan University. Nice to have you on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JAIMY GORDON: Hi, Neal.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And you're about to pass the baton to a new winner this evening. I suspect that's a little bittersweet.</s>JAIMY GORDON: It's about time, I think, for me to stop traveling in connection with having won the National Book Award. So even though it's been wonderful and I got to talk about "Lord of Misrule" a lot of places - Portland, Denver, Nashville, even Moorhead, Minnesota, Neal...</s>JAIMY GORDON: ...where you had me read all the most naughty parts of the book to an auditorium full of Prairie Lutherans. Do you remember that?</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: I do.</s>JAIMY GORDON: That was fun.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And I do remember there were naughtier bits I didn't have you read but...</s>JAIMY GORDON: I can hardly believe it, but still, it was fun. All that's been great, but, as I always confess, I'm distractible. I'm notorious for not being very prolific, which is one reason that I was such an obscure author at the age of over 60. Let's just leave it at that. So I have to point out not that I would complain, because I had can't complain tattooed on the inside of my eyelids when I won the National Book Award. And I almost made it through the whole year without complaining.</s>JAIMY GORDON: But I'm not getting as much work done as I should, and I have a book contract to fulfill. I really want to do that. And I'm getting a little panicky. So that's as close as I'm going to come to complaining but...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: It's hard to imagine a writer with a book contract who's - contract who's not panicky. But in any case, one of the nice things, I suspect, about winning the National Book Award is that you - the benefits extend to those with whom you are associated, in this case your publisher, who's been very loyal to you.</s>JAIMY GORDON: My publisher is one of my oldest friends. I wish it on everybody that they should have a tremendous stroke of luck just when they're about ready to give up on their career, and they should have it with one of their very best friends from the beginning. It's been a lot of fun, not that we have occasionally had a tiff over this or that, but it's - between us, it's really like family. So that's Bruce McPherson of McPherson and Company in Kingston, New York.</s>JAIMY GORDON: The funny thing that happened with Bruce was that when I heard that he didn't want to go up to even 8,000 copies – eventually it sold 45,000 copies, but he was reluctant to go to 8,000, I called him and said what's going on? Why don't you just ask the printer to do 6,000 more? He said but, you know, I like pretty books, and I don't want to sacrifice my embossed endpapers.</s>JAIMY GORDON: So I actually hung up the phone before I exploded about that, but then - but he changed his mind quickly.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: There is that first run, and that will become publishing legend. Then there are all the hardback copies, but there is a realm of paperback immortality and there's now a chance for that as well.</s>JAIMY GORDON: I think that Random House published enough of the paperback so that it will be a kind of immortality. I hope not an unpleasant kind of immortality for them. I actually love that paperback. I love the sepia photograph on the cover. And if nothing else happens, then I'll buy all the ones that are left in paper (unintelligible) with them because I just love the way that book looks so much.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: We want to hear from others who have had unexpected and sudden recognition in whatever field. Give us a call, 800-989-8255. Email us: [email protected]. But, Jaimy Gordon, I - when we were there in Moorhead, Minnesota, one of the things you told me was that this was, in some ways - in a lot of ways - a story you had lived and a story you had been writing one way or another for many, many years. It must be both astonishing and a little disconcerting to share that story, not with a couple of thousand readers, but with tens of thousands of readers, maybe hundreds of thousands of readers.</s>JAIMY GORDON: You know, winning the National Book Award was very good. I - that made me very happy. But the high point of the year might have been winning this award, called the Dr. Tony Ryan Award for the year's best book about horse racing, because there was such a exquisite irony about receiving this beautiful Irish crystal trophy at Castleton Lyons Farm outside Lexington, near where the Kentucky Derby is run - at least the poshest place you can imagine where the studs stand for $25,000 a pop - for a book about Indian Mound Downs, the most rundown half-mile race track in West Virginia where most of the race horses could be bought for 1,500 bucks. It just - it was wonderful. And I didn't really expect that crowd to like my book, but they did. God bless them, especially if they were both horse people and readers. So I really lucked out there.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: The - we should point out that the "Lord of Misrule," the horse that plays such a psychic role and in the end, a physical role in the novel, I don't think would ever a whiff of Churchill Downs, though a mighty competitor at Indian Mound Downs.</s>JAIMY GORDON: I was trying to suggest about "Lord of Misrule" that actually he might have been a stakes horse at one point. He was preserved in phenylbutazone by then, but he'd been a great horse in his day.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: In his day?</s>JAIMY GORDON: That sometimes happens.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: That's - not at that stage of his career. Not at that stage of his career and not when, as you entered him in a race that is rich with metaphor against top competitors who are - all represent various qualities.</s>JAIMY GORDON: I just want to mention another writer who has kind of a magical animal in her book. Next week, I'm going to be reading at the Miami Book Fair with Tea Obreht who's a finalist for the National Book Award tonight. We'll know tonight whether "The Tiger's Wife" won. It's just a gorgeous book that has a wonderful, magical animal in it. In that sense, it's kind of in the same family with "Lord of Misrule." And we're kind of excited about that. I like that book and I haven't met her before.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: You will still be going to book festivals for quite some time, and your next book is due when?</s>JAIMY GORDON: Oh, please, don't ask me that.</s>JAIMY GORDON: You know, I've actually repressed the date. I think it's at the end of 2012, but I'm hoping that there's a little bit of rubber, a little bit of elasticity in the date.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: It must have been interesting to negotiate that new contract.</s>JAIMY GORDON: It was wonderful. And, you know, the whole thing happened before I even the National Book Award. Thanks to my agent, Bill Clegg. He had the whole thing taken care of. And I was one of the few people at that banquet who was having any fun. I was even eating the chicken and - because I was so sure that I was not even in the consideration. I mean, I felt that the judges, may they be blessed, had already done enough for me, just to make a finalist. And there was no reason for them to go any further out on that limb since the book hadn't even really been officially published yet. Its pub date was the same date as the National Book Award. So there hadn't been any reviews. And in that sense, they were definitely taking a chance on me. But as I say, I wasn't the least bit worried about it. I was having fun. My sisters were there. And I was hardly even - well, I was listening. I was listening, but not as much as people who might be expecting to win.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's see if we get some listeners in on the conversation. 800-989-8255. Email us: [email protected]. Our guest is Jaimy Gordon - until later this evening, the current winner of the National Book Award for Fiction. "Lord of Misrule" is the name of her book. Let's start with Susan. Susan with us from Watertown in Massachusetts.</s>SUSAN: Hi, Neal. thanks for taking my call.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Sure.</s>SUSAN: I - it's funny that you all are talking about this because my husband is a musician and, oh, just yesterday, he received a very gracious and nice Facebook posting from Nick Hornby who is an author, that he really admires - and he was saying how much he admires my husband's music and how he puts some - his music on all of these, you know, playlist that he gives to his friends, and he's a big fan, and he hopes he keeps up the good work. And my husband was just blown away now. This happens just yesterday, so nothing has really happened yet. But I can tell you my husband was like on cloud nine, you know, talking to his friends and the family. So it was just such a neat thing for, you know, an accomplished author like him to sort of help out the little guy.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: And Nick Hornby's, if you haven't heard, "High Fidelity" among many others.</s>SUSAN: Right, which is a book based on musicians, and so, you know, my husband is such a huge fan.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Well, Susan, and how old is your husband, if I might ask?</s>SUSAN: He's 42 so, you know, he's, you know, your guest was mentioning, you know, with this sort of happening later in her life. And my husband is still plugging away at it and, you know, hoping that it will happen. So it was really, really nice of Mr. Hornby to contact my husband.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Jaimy Gordon, you must have met a million other writers who say, you know, you won for me too.</s>JAIMY GORDON: That's right. And who say, well, you give us hope. You know, I feel as though, in this literary world of the moment, we probably need a slightly changed model for fame, more to go around but less of it for each person. Because I - we live in a world of writing programs now. There are 300 university writing programs. And there are probably more truly interesting writers out there producing a lot of interesting new books and fighting for attention.</s>JAIMY GORDON: It doesn't - and there has been quite a bit of talk about, not only my case, but suddenly, there seemed to be small-press authors or not such well-known authors making it into the top awards for a number of awards, not only just in the U.S. And I think that might have to do with a changed demographic of a kind, for writing, so...</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Susan...</s>JAIMY GORDON: ...a shallower sea of fame with hundreds of writers splashing around in it.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Maybe just 10 minutes of fame for everybody.</s>JAIMY GORDON: That's right.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Susan, thanks very much for the phone call.</s>SUSAN: Thank you.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. And our guest, again, is Jaimy Gordon. "Lord of Misrule" won the National Book Award for Fiction a year ago. Another prize will be handed out - well, several more prizes, here in New York City tonight. I'll see if we can get another caller on the line. And this is Douglas, Douglas with us from Fairhope in Alaska?</s>DOUGLAS CAZORT: Alabama.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Alabama, AL. I apologize.</s>DOUGLAS CAZORT: That's OK. I enjoy your show every afternoon.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Thank you.</s>DOUGLAS CAZORT: And I have my 15th seconds of fame on NPR. Linda Wertheimer interviewed me on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED for a book that I wrote called "Under the Grammar Hammer: The 25 Most Important Grammar Mistakes and how to Avoid Them." The real interesting thing about that is that was 19 years ago this month, and the book is still in print.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: You're kidding.</s>DOUGLAS CAZORT: On the following year, I came out with "Chairman Cazort's Little Red Book of Writing," and it was not on NPR. And it went out of print in one year. So thanks to Linda Wertheimer, thanks NPR.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: We will extend your gratitude. Thanks very much for the phone call, Douglas.</s>DOUGLAS CAZORT: Thanks a lot. Bye-bye.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Let's see if we can go next to - this is Craig, and Craig is on the line from Boise.</s>CRAIG: Hi, Neal. How are you doing?</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Good. Thanks.</s>CRAIG: Yeah. I got into writing from another writer that encouraged me. Back in 1995, I published a book. It's an outdoor book. It's very small demographic, but it opened the doors, with the success of that book, to several magazine articles. And currently, I'm working on three other books just because it just excited me. And the encouragement that I've got from everyone that's read the book, it's changed my life a little bit.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: In what way?</s>CRAIG: I'm constantly writing things down. I keep journals on a daily basis. I'm always jotting ideas down. Currently, I'm working on a fiction book, and it just opened a different door. I'm a consultant on a technical side, project management in renewable energy, so it's totally outside of what my realm of professionalism is. And it's opened another door, I think that - eventually, my goal is to continue doing this and use this as part of my retirement.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Well, Craig, good luck. Keep writing.</s>CRAIG: Thank you.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Jaimy Gordon, we just have a few seconds left with you. But if you could tell us in what way do you think this changed your life.</s>JAIMY GORDON: It changes in every way. I think that for an older writer and probably even among the writers who identified with my success because they are hoping so much to move out of obscurity themselves, only the older ones could have begun to worry, what's going to happen to my papers? What's going to happen to my letters? Will anybody be reading my books, will they'll totally disappear? I feel as though, at least that question is answered because I'll always be on that list for having won the National Book Award, and it's a very good list.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Mm-hmm.</s>JAIMY GORDON: It has a lot of books that I love on it, like Robert Stone's "Dog Soldiers." I mean, it's a great thing to be next to writers of that stature, and I'll always be there. So someone will - even if I don't become more prolific than I've been to date, someone will be looking at that book, "Lord of Misrule..."</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Well...</s>JAIMY GORDON: ...and checking it out.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: ...belated congratulations. And we'll be thinking of you tonight.</s>JAIMY GORDON: Thank you so much, Neal.</s>NEAL CONAN, HOST: Jaimy Gordon, author of "Lord of Misrule," winner of the 2010 National Book Award for Fiction, also a professor of English in Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo. She joined us from there, our member station WMUK.
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Trump administration officials are sounding positive that the political crisis in Venezuela will end with democracy. But analysts warn that this political standoff could get much more violent.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Trump administration officials are sounding confident that the political crisis in Venezuela will end with a democracy. And, though Washington remains hopeful that the embattled President Nicolas Maduro will leave the scene, peacefully, President Trump has repeatedly said that all options are on the table. NPR's Michele Kelemen reports on the risks of the U.S. approach.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: The Trump administration has gone all in to support National Assembly President Juan Guaido's attempts to get Maduro out of the way and hold new elections. Vice President Pence went to Miami Friday to meet Venezuelan exiles.</s>VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE: Nicolas Maduro is a dictator with no legitimate claim to power, and Nicolas Maduro must go.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: How to get there is the topic of many meetings in Washington. The U.S. point person on Venezuela, Elliott Abrams, has been spending a lot of time with Guaido's representatives here.</s>ELLIOTT ABRAMS: You know, we're all on what we call Team Venezuela, which is an effort to help the Venezuelans liberate their country from this regime.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: He's warning Venezuelan security forces it would be - in his words - extremely foolish to move against Guaido or U.S. diplomats. The U.S. is encouraging Venezuelan security forces to switch sides, though, David Smilde of the Washington Office on Latin America says the U.S. is underestimating Maduro's grip on power.</s>DAVID SMILDE: You know, this is a government that controls not only the institutions but, also, all of the guns and as well as the state oil company. And so it has sort of a full house of power, and it's not easy to dislodge. They're not going to just give up because they have U.S. against them. No. In fact, that fits very nicely into their ideology.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: Maduro and his supporters have talked for years about how the U.S. is trying to overthrow them. And current U.S. policy is reinforcing that narrative, says Smilde, who teaches at Tulane University. He also worries that the U.S. isn't looking closely enough at the other risks, including smaller armed groups.</s>DAVID SMILDE: They're leftist in orientation. They're anti-imperialist, and they undoubtedly would fight on behalf of the government. I don't think that they're any match for any kind of organized forces. But, as we see in Iraq, sometimes, it's the sort of disorganized small-scale resistance that can be the most damaging in the long run.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: Smilde isn't predicting an all-out civil war. The most likely scenario, he says, is a lengthy stalemate with Russia and China coming to Maduro's rescue. That worries Cynthia Arnson, too. She runs the Latin America Program at the Wilson Center for Scholars.</s>CYNTHIA ARNSON: Russia and China have very different attitudes towards Venezuela. But they have a similar position against intervention, in quotation marks, "against what the United States is doing." And U.S. policy I think is helping to drive them together closer and closer in opposition to what the United States and other democratic countries in the region want to do.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: So far, she says, the Trump administration has pulled out all the stops for National Assembly President Guaido, including blocking the accounts of Venezuela's state-owned oil company. But Arnson says the U.S. has played its hand for now.</s>CYNTHIA ARNSON: So this has been a process of squeezing and squeezing and squeezing. And now the sense is this is the moment to go all out and topple the regime. If that doesn't happen, I'm not sure that the United States has too many other cards up its sleeve other than trying to get Latin American countries and European allies to mount a serious negotiation that is aimed at a transition.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: Vice President Pence, though, is holding a tough line.</s>VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE: This is no time for dialogue. This is time for action.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: And he's warning Maduro not to test President Trump's resolve.</s>MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: Michele Kelemen, NPR News, Washington.
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After a week of record-cold temperatures, NPR's Michel Martin speaks with climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe about how climate change is leading to more weather extremes.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Let's talk about the insane weather this week that left much of the Midwest frozen. The polar vortex is finally moving on. But, before it did, temperatures fell 30 degrees below zero in some places, and hundreds of temperature records were broken. And, once again, President Trump used the extreme temperatures to question the reality of climate change, tweeting, quote, "what the hell is going on with global warming? Please come back fast. We need you," unquote. OK. So let's answer that question.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Why, if the climate is changing and the Earth's atmosphere is warming, does it still get so cold? To help us understand what's been going on this week, we've called Katharine Hayhoe once again. She is a climate scientist and the director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University. Professor Hayhoe, thank you so much for joining us once again.</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: Thank you for having me.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: First, I think it would be helpful if you could explain the difference between climate and temperature. For example, this week, Australia was experiencing record heat, and even Alaska was unusually warm. So what is the difference between climate and temperature?</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: Well, weather is what we experience from day to day, and that is what sticks in our mind. We all remember the crazy heat wave or the ice storm or the blizzard. But climate is the long-term average of weather over at least 20 to 30 years.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, tweeted this week, quote, "winter storms don't prove that global warming isn't happening," unquote. So how is it possible for warmer temperatures to yield yet more snow or these just huge amounts of snow?</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: Well, so, first of all, people say - why is it so cold out? And the first answer to that question is it's winter. And then the second answer to that is it's weather because, you know, we get hot and cold and wet and dry. That's weather. But the third answer is, actually, the really interesting one to us, scientists. And it's the fact that as the planet gets warmer, our air can hold more water vapor.</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: And so when a storm comes along now as opposed to 50 or a hundred years ago, there's more water vapor in the atmosphere for the storm to sweep up and dump on us. Now, if it's above freezing, that precipitation falls as rain. But if it's below freezing, it can even fall as snow. And our winters - make no mistake - are warming. In fact, winters are warming faster than any other season. But it still gets below freezing, so we still have snow. But we can see more of it when it's warmer.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Could all of this mean more rainy days or potential hurricanes? You talked about that more vapor in the atmosphere, overall. Does this mean we could have more rainy days and more potential hurricanes, even fiercer hurricanes?</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: We are not seeing a change in the number of hurricanes because hurricane formation depends on a lot of different factors, some of which are kind of canceling each other out when it comes to a changing climate. But what we are seeing is that hurricanes and typhoons and cyclones, as they're called in other parts of the world - they are very unique storms that get their energy from warm ocean water. And over 90 percent of the extra heat that is being trapped inside the Earth's climate system from burning coal and gas and oil - over 90 percent of that heat is going into the ocean, where it is fueling stronger storms. And, as you just alluded to, they have a lot more rainfall associated with them today than they would have 50 or a hundred years ago.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And is it accurate that - I mean, anecdotally, it seems that we're seeing fewer cold snaps, but they're more extreme. Is that true?</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: We are seeing fewer cold spells, and that is what the data shows. But part of this is actually psychological because winter is warming. And so we have gotten used to what would have been considered remarkably mild winters 30 or 50 years ago. So now, when we have a cold outbreak, we're like, oh, my goodness. This is unbelievable. Where did this come from? And the reality is a lot of our cold weather is we're just not used to anymore.</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: And then, of course, we still do break cold temperature records. In fact, in 2017 - across the United States, over 10,000 cold temperature records were broken in 2017 alone. But, the same year, over 30,000 hot temperature records were broken. So it's that ratio that's showing us that, yes, we can feel break cold and hot temperature records. That's just weather. But long-term, decade by decade, we're breaking many more high-temperature records because the planet is warming.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That was Katharine Hayhoe, director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University speaking to us from her home in Lubbock, Texas. Professor Hayhoe, thanks so much for talking to us.</s>KATHARINE HAYHOE: Thank you.
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NPR's Michel Martin speaks with Patrick Howley, editor in chief of the website Big League Politics, about why it published a picture from Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam's yearbook page.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We're going to go back now to Virginia Governor Ralph Northam's yearbook photo that features a man in blackface next to someone dressed as a Klansman. The image was first posted Friday by the website Big League Politics, which is described by the fact-checking site Media Bias/Fact Check as, quote, "strongly right-biased." Joining us now is the founder and editor-in-chief of Big League Politics, Patrick Howley. He's also a former writer for Breitbart and Daily Caller, which are also conservative websites. Patrick Howley, thanks so much for talking to us.</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: Michel, thank you for your time.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: What led you to this photo? And why publish it now?</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: Well, I work with whistleblowers all around the country. And this was a citizen whistleblower who is concerned that Ralph - that he's a racist. And you know what? He is a racist. And I think we've shown the world that he is a racist because he was clearly one of the two people in that photo. Either he was in the Klan robe, or he was in blackface and...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Well, he says he wasn't, so I don't know that - how clear it is. But, anyway, to that point, though, Fox News contributor Dan Bongino tweeted that the photo had actually been kicking around in conservative circles for months before it was posted on Friday. And he says that he'd been sent a copy of the photo in October of 2018, but he couldn't independently verify that Northam was one of the men in the photo. Can you?</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: Michel, I don't know anything about that. But I know that I wrote this story the day that I learned about it because I was so moved by this person's story. And if you look at what this story is accomplishing with progressives and conservatives and libertarians and people all over the country who are affected by this and who are working together - and I think that's very important. I think the mainstream news narrative needs to get out of the 2D narrative.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: The website - the - your website says you don't consider yourself or you don't consider the site liberal or conservative. How do you describe the mission of your website?</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: It's just to provide an independent service for investigative citizen journalism all over the country. I don't believe that journalists should be sanctioned or licensed. I think that citizens with cellphone cameras can be journalists all over the country. And I try to provide a network for that, and I do a very good job of checking the authenticity and the facts of everything that we publish. So I knew - you know, I got this photo in. I checked it out. I - and it was a bombshell. And Ralph has to answer to this.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Is it true that your site is now owned by a political consultant who worked for the failed Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore and the unsuccessful Virginia Senate candidate Corey Stewart whose campaign was based on his support for the Confederate monuments? And isn't it true that your site has also written favorably about white nationalists, such as the candidate Paul Nehlen, who ran against Paul Ryan.</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: I have never written anything favorable about white nationalists. And, Michel, if - you know, I'm an independent person. And my contribution this week is I have helped get the word out about Ralph Northam, who is, obviously, a white supremacist...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: But I don't see the same level of outrage about Congressman Steve King's comments about white nationalism. For example, on your site, the headlines about Steve King include Representative Steve King Gets Last Laugh, Wins Re-Election In Iowa Despite Haters And Losers and Watch Steve King Slams New York Times On House Floor Over Racism Story. So would it not be unreasonable for someone to argue that it isn't really the racism that troubles you, it's liberals, it's Democrats, it's people you consider insufficiently conservative?</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: No because knowing Iowa very well, I know Steve King, and I know that he's not a racist. So I take it on a case-by-case basis.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: I see. OK. Well, that was - where do you think the story goes next, Mr. Howley, very quickly if you can?</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: Well, you know, Ralph is going to have to answer to this. And I believe that he should resign.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's Patrick Howley. He's the founder and editor-in-chief of Big League Politics. Mr. Howley, thanks for joining us.</s>PATRICK HOWLEY: Thank you, Michel.
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With jury deliberations about to begin in the trial of drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, New York Times reporter Alan Feuer tells NPR's Michel Martin about shocking new allegations unsealed Friday.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We're going back now to the trial in New York of Joaquin El Chapo Guzman, who's accused of operating one of the world's most violent and far-reaching illegal drug trafficking operations. The jury begins deliberating tomorrow. There are 17 counts against Guzman, including money laundering, conspiracy to murder rivals and firearms violations. And on Friday night, days after the closing arguments, prosecutors unsealed secret documents, alleging even more shocking behavior by Guzman. I asked reporter Alan Feuer, who is covering El Chapo's trial for The New York Times, what was in them. And please be advised that it is disturbing.</s>ALAN FEUER: Well, to be blunt, the paper's quoting - a very close associate of Chapo said that Chapo drugged and raped a series of young girls. When he was living in the mountains, hiding from the authorities, there was some sort of madam, a procuress, who would send Chapo photographs of girls as young as 13. They would then, for the price of $5,000, be brought into the mountains so that Chapo and his associates could rape them.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: What was the prosecutor's argument about how this evidence fits into the case?</s>ALAN FEUER: There's not a whole lot on why the jury never heard about this, but I think that one way we can conceive of it is that the charges that Chapo is facing in the indictment - they are mostly drug and murder charges. There are no sexual assault charges. And so, in the most clinical legal way, this evidence did not fit the four corners of the indictment.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So these documents with this very disturbing information was unsealed at the eleventh hour. OK. But are the jurors going to take that into consideration or are they instructed not to?</s>ALAN FEUER: They - I mean, listen. If they follow the judge's instructions not to read anything about the case and to pay attention only to what's introduced in court, they should never hear about this.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So, you know, throughout this trial, you've been reporting on just this just incredibly graphic testimony by these really kind of over-the-top, you know, larger-than-life figures. Prosecutors brought on something 50 witnesses. And then you said that Guzman's defense lasted only 30 minutes, and they called only one witness. So what is the defense's case?</s>ALAN FEUER: There is no defense, affirmatively speaking, in this trial. And, by that, I simply mean they're not alleging mistaken identity. They're not alleging actual innocence. The defense largely relied upon a very strong cross-examination of the cooperating witnesses, the Shakespearean cast of characters that you were mentioning because, by-and-large, these people were as violent and horrific as he, himself. In their closing arguments, they reprised a kind of conspiracy theory, you've got to call it, that Chapo was not actually the leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel but that the real mastermind behind the cartel was his close partner Mayo Zambada and that Mayo, working in league with a corrupt Mexican government, had essentially spent 45 to 50 years practicing his trade as a drug trafficker free and unmolested, while Chapo was, as they called him, the rabbit who was hunted down, thus letting Mayo run free.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So, finally, are any steps being taken to protect the jurors?</s>ALAN FEUER: So the jurors from the very beginning of this trial have been anonymous. Nobody, including the judge, knows their real names. They are picked up every morning by federal marshals and driven to the courthouse. They are then escorted home by federal marshals after the end of every trial day. Going forward, there's been no public discussion about whether they will continue to receive any kind of protection. But, you know, one assumes that their anonymity will shield them, ultimately, going forward.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's Alan Feuer, court and criminal justice reporter for The New York Times. Alan, thanks so much for talking with us.</s>ALAN FEUER: My pleasure.
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Republicans and Democrats alike are focused on one major issue: jobs. But inventor and entrepreneur Dean Kamen argues they're missing the bigger picture. To bolster the economy, he says, requires passion, innovation and risk.
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JOHN DONVAN, host: And now the Opinion Page. The Obama administration is expected to spend up to $1 billion to fund training and job placement for health care workers, a decision under the White House's We Can't Wait agenda. With unemployment at 9 percent, government officials have a single focus, and that is to create jobs. But inventor and entrepreneur Dean Kamen argues that the talk of job creation is actually setting a low standard. He says: We need more people who are passionate about finding new solutions and new industries.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Do you agree with Kamen? Tell us what you think. Our name is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected]. And you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Dean Kamen, you've undoubtedly seen some or all of his gadgets out there in the world. He invented the first wearable infusion pump, the iBOT wheelchair, and more recently, the Segway Human Transporter. He is an entrepreneur. He's an inventor. He's an advocate for science and technology. And he joins us from a studio in Manchester, New Hampshire. It's good to have you on the show, Dean.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Always good to be here.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So you are arguing that the government's current focus on creating jobs - which essentially is to create a system of getting wages to people now, salaries to people now - is too narrow. So what should the government's focus be?</s>DEAN KAMEN: Well, I'm certainly, obviously, like everybody else, concerned that people have jobs and can feed their families. But I think the dialogue has lowered the bar. You know, in the '80s, early '90s, the National Academies published a report that - at least to the people that read it - was pretty chilling, called "A Nation at Risk," which described the fact that this country is losing its technical edge. They looked around the rest of the world that was just gearing up to be able to produce high-performance, high-quality, high-tech products of every kind, and this country had sort of gotten stuck, and that it was going to come back and bite us. And they talked throughout this report about what we had to do to keep our leadership.</s>DEAN KAMEN: A few years ago, the same National Academies wrote a new report, not "A Nation at Risk," but a new one called "Rising above the Gathering Storm." And if you put the two next to each other, they're chillingly the same, except for one thing: the tense. In the new one, they talk about what America has to do to catch up, to regain, to get back. And I think the fact that Americans are now willing to accept that somehow we've lost it and are now are saying: We need jobs, we need jobs. This country used to outsource jobs. In every generation, we created something new.</s>DEAN KAMEN: A hundred years ago, it might have been cars. Then we outsourced cars when that became something that people thought a lot of the manufacturing was heavy and dirty and low-margin. And then we invented electronics. And then we invented computers. And then we invented biotech. And it seemed to me that the ecosystem of the world used to be pretty good. The inventions happened here, where people were highly motivated, very innovative, very well-educated. They created whole new industries that had high margin that solved real problems worldwide, whether it was health care or the environment or energy. And then 20 years later, patents expire. Twenty years later, people learned how to do all this stuff.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Well...</s>DEAN KAMEN: Twenty years later, it gets outsourced to the rest of the world...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: These are the...</s>DEAN KAMEN: ...and gives them jobs, and we go on to the next big thing.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: The big question in all of this: If you're correct and we let this happen, why would we let this happen?</s>DEAN KAMEN: I don't think it was intentional. I think, you know, a rich environment leaves you - you know, people get a little lazy. When you're a rich country - I think we've enjoyed, you know, generation after generation, always doing a little better than their parents. And I think people started to think it's simply our birthright to have high quality health care and high quality education and...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So - but what did we stop doing? What did - and I'm not sure which we I'm asking about, but let me put it this way: What did we - we just did a show with people about losing work and they want to work. What did we, the workforce, do wrong to contribute to this?</s>DEAN KAMEN: I'm not sure it's the workforce. I think we as a culture, we as a country lost our edge. We stopped investing in all the leading-edge stuff. The work ethic of your great grandparents and your grandparents - as I said, when you become a culture that seems to be born and you know the water is drinkable and the - you flip the switch and the lights go on and life is good and you have security, maybe you don't work as hard as they work around the world to pick themselves up out of poverty. But we pick the worst possible time, the worst possible generation to sit back on our laurels because the rest of the world has figured out that the model that worked so well for a few hundred years in the United States, namely highly motivated, highly educated, incentivized innovation - let the government do everything it can to create an atmosphere where entrepreneurs and innovators will risk their life and their resources and their money to create great, new things.</s>DEAN KAMEN: Well, the rest of the world is doing that now on steroids, and America, you know, frankly, a lot of what you even hear from these politicians, which I think was the original comment, saying we need jobs, we need jobs, we need jobs, I think that sets the bar too low. You know, kids don't need jobs. They need to be inspired to create whole new industries, to create great careers for themselves. I don't think, going back to Eli Whitney or Alexander Bell - I don't think the Wright brothers were out to create jobs in aviation. I don't think Edison was out to create jobs. And in our modern times, I don't think Larry Page and Sergey Brin started Google to create jobs. And I think the government of the United States shouldn't set as its threshold to success that we found a way to give people jobs. You know, kids get jobs working at a fast food place, on their way to building careers that will allow them to go and grow and allow our whole country to do better than it did in the past, to take on the great global problems that we all have.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. But Dean, where is the spark got to go now? You know, if anything we - again, we were just listening to a rash of people who are unemployed and want to work. They didn't sound lazy or unmotivated to me in any way. And you're saying that somebody kind of needs to move, to make a move. But where does that move need to come from? Does It come from the government? Does it come from the bottom up? Does it come from a teacher to his student in a moment of inspiration? And I assume we've had teachers inspiring students, and that that has never stopped. So I'm looking for, in a way - and I'm not sure - you're saying you have it, the cure right now.</s>DEAN KAMEN: Well, I think it's a little of everything you said. But as it relates to government, I don't think government ever did or ever will create jobs. I think what government can do is create an atmosphere in which entrepreneurs and innovators will create solutions to problems which in themselves will create the industries that create all the jobs. What government can do can create a world-class educational system that gives kids the tools to fill those jobs by making the next generation of exciting careers. I think government is sort of like the referee. They are the ones that help make the game fair. They can do a lot of things, but they're not in the ring. They're not playing any game. They never have...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: No. But they're also - at the game, they're sort of - they're the hot dog salesman as well, in a way, in keeping the fans fed. And you're talking about - I think you're talking quite clearly about improved education. And my question is does government funding come in there?</s>DEAN KAMEN: Well, I think this confused...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And those will be jobs for teachers.</s>DEAN KAMEN: Well, this - I think our country always had great public education. It used to be one of the few places in the world where you could get a great public education, and I think that's in large part why we were so successful in outpacing the rest of the world. Now, as I said, a lot of the rest of the world has figured out that their kids are going to be world class in math and science education. And in this country, we're not keeping up with that kind of support, particularly for science and technology education.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And some of those kids are coming here to study. Our guest is Dean Kamen. He's an entrepreneur and inventor, classic innovator, definitely fits the description, arguing that we need spirit of innovation more than we need the creation of jobs by government at the moment. Do you agree or disagree with Dean Kamen? Tell us what you think at 800-989-8255. I'd like to bring Mark(ph) into the conversation. Mark, you're in Detroit. Is that correct?</s>MARK: Yeah.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Yeah. Share your view with us.</s>MARK: Well, you know, I think the innovation is here. I'm a middle school teacher and, you know, not everybody is going to be an innovator. And - but I think where we have the problem is - in the States is somehow being able to keep it here. I mean, look at the fiasco with the whole solar panel deal, you know? China was able to undercut us. And, you know, the bottom line is a big issue. But also, you know, people having to, you know, young people are great at innovating. But the people that are going to help implement that whole program, you know, are the older people. They have to be willing to have some foresight. I mean, the guy that revolutionized the Japanese auto industry was an American. And the, you know, the American car companies didn't want anything to do for him. I forget his name.</s>DEAN KAMEN: Deming.</s>MARK: But, you know, the Japanese say, well, come over here and talk to us, and now look at them, you know?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: That's a great example and I think goes was exactly to what Dean's talking about. And I don't want to ask you though. Is that what you're talking about, Dean? Why did that guy ended up working for us.</s>DEAN KAMEN: I think he's got of exactly right, and I agree he's got it exactly right that kids are all born innovators. They're all born excited about learning new things. And what our government has to do is support our teachers and support the teachers giving kids the tools to do that innovation. And I'm happy to point out - I love the fact that they picked somebody in Michigan because that has - that state has the highest concentration of support for our FIRST program. It's got more schools involved in science and technology, innovation through our FIRST program than any state in the country.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Dean - I'm sorry, Mark, I meant to say, in everything that Dean's talking about, in terms of creating jobs, the government essentially filling payrolls. Do you agree with him that that's not appropriate action? And the trick to the question is, what if those payrolls are teacher's payrolls, since you're a teacher?</s>MARK: Ah-ha. Well, the teacher's payroll could always be improved, I'll tell you that. But, you know, I think that, you know, there's never one magic bullet. I mean, innovation is great, but implementation takes time. It's kind of like the old, you know, drilling for oil. You know, because they drill, drill, drill, drill. Well, you know, you can start drilling now, but it's going to be, you know, quite a number of years before those wells produce. So in the meantime, you know, we need jobs to get us there, you know?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right.</s>MARK: And besides, and besides, funding innovators is a great thing, but I think our country is going the wrong way in terms of expecting everybody to be college educated, innovative, you know, people. We got plenty of people that need just regular manufacturing jobs and so forth...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. Dean, thank you. Thank you very much for your call. We're talking with Dean Kamen, inventor and entrepreneur, about his view that all of this talk about we need to create jobs now is missing the point and setting the bar too low. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Dean, the title of the legislation that the government is talking about right now, the Obama administration, is We Can't Wait. And there is a sense to the situation we're in that there's a house on fire right now, and that creating jobs, creating these payroll situations for individuals across the nation, is something that we need to do now regardless of whether there's a need for innovation or not. What about that?</s>DEAN KAMEN: Well, again, I'm certainly not in favor of everybody that wants to work - having a job to create an ability to feed their families. All I'm suggesting is that in the long term, unless those jobs are actually creating real wealth and competing in realistic way against people that are more than capable of doing the same thing somewhere else in a much lower cost, you're just fooling yourselves. You're just kicking a can down the road. I think what the government ought to be focusing on doing is making sure that everybody out there is capable to filling a job, which is a high-added value, sustainable way to create real wealth for themselves and for the country. And one way that the need to look at this is the fact that the rest of the world is creating an ever-more competitive, more capable workforce that are playing with newer and better technologies at the manufacturing level and at the product level.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: We have an email I wanted to get to from a John Pushtay(ph) in Cleveland, who writes this: We cannot become a country solely of inventors and entrepreneurs. We need a balance of manufacturing, retail, technology, inventors and entrepreneurs. As far as manufacturing goes, we used to have something called on-the-job training. Manufacturers simply cannot plump down a plant and expect instant workforce. No company should expect that. I'm interested in his first line, that we cannot become a country solely of inventors and entrepreneurs because I'm not sure that that's what you're arguing. But I want you to clarify.</s>DEAN KAMEN: I'm not arguing that at all. Henry Ford created jobs for hundreds of thousands, and if you include the steel industry and the glass industry and the rubber industry, millions of job. There are always industries as, you know - Google has created tens of thousands of jobs. I'm not suggesting that everybody needs to be an entrepreneur or an innovator. What I am saying is that unless this country creates a workforce that is capable of the, quote, "jobs" in those new, exciting, high-margin, high-added value industries, the jobs we create will either be so low paying we will have become the country to which, you know, the low-paying jobs get outsourced, something that this country was used to doing for a hundred years. And we won't like it, and it won't support our standard of living.</s>DEAN KAMEN: But you can't just wish that problem away. You have to have people properly trained and properly motivated to take on the next generation's new and exciting jobs, which are the high-value added, wealth-creating jobs. And we need to focus on doing that. And if there's any place that government ought to put its resources, it is to create the infrastructure and resources and educational system that allows the average kid in the current generation growing up, looking towards a career to have the skill sets to compete for the exciting, high-margin, high-value careers of the future, when our kids are competing with 6 billion people around the world that are getting really, really top-notch education and are focused.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: We have an email from David Logan in Port Charlotte, Florida, who asks about the demonization of corporations in the current debate with the Occupy movement, et cetera. And he's asking this: Do corporations help to drive innovation or are they hoarding all of the resources?</s>DEAN KAMEN: Ha. I suppose there's probably a good example of any extreme. I think in general, history has shown us that competition and capitalism work. And I would say that it's from companies, typically, I'd like to think small startup companies that great innovation emerges. Some of it grows them into giant companies. Others, it gets sold into large companies that can then leverage it to the major global solutions to problems. But, you know, you can always find bad examples of everything. I think we need to focus in this country once again on creating an atmosphere that inspires kids to be innovators.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: You hear that music? That's the music that tells us that that flourish was fantastic ending. Thanks very much for joining us, Dean Kamen, who also founded FIRST, a robotics competition that helps encourage students to move in to careers in science and technology. Tomorrow, after the allegations of sexual abuse at Penn State, we'll talk about what help is available for victims. This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm John Donvan in Washington.
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After weeks of game postponements, the NBA league made a final offer to players — and the players rejected it. Canceling games affects players and fans, but it can also be devastating for the many businesses that revolve around the industry. Pablo Torre, reporter, Sports Illustrated
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BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: The NBA season may be over without a single tip-off. After several rounds of postponing games for weeks at a time, the league made what it called a final offer to players who, yesterday, rejected it. The players' union announced plans to disband the union and file an antitrust lawsuit against team owners. The season was scheduled to open November 1.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Now, after two years of negotiations and 137 days under a lockout, the schedule for the season is completely blank. Canceling games affects the players and the fans, of course, but a ripple effect extends to the many businesses that revolve around the industry, from the bars and restaurants that host sporting events to the shops that sell NBA gear.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: How is the lockout affecting you? 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected]. And you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Joining us now from our bureau in New York is Pablo Torre. He's a reporter with Sports Illustrated. Pablo, welcome to the program.</s>PABLO TORRE: Thanks for having me, Brian.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So what are the chances that we're going to see any NBA action this season?</s>PABLO TORRE: Well, you know, you can't say for sure at this point, but it's certainly not looking good. I mean, this is the bleakest it's been since the - you know, since this two-year saga began in - when David Stern is using language like nuclear winter of the NBA. That's certainly not encouraging.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Yeah.</s>PABLO TORRE: And certainly the shift from, you know, the negotiations over hotel boardrooms to inside of the judicial system and the courtroom is not encouraging either.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And I don't want - this is a really complex back-and-forth kind of thing, but why did the players turn down this most recent offer that the NBA says was its final offer?</s>PABLO TORRE: Well, let's deal with it on two levels. The first level, I guess, in terms of the tenor of the negotiations, which is a big aspect, is that the players really felt sort of disrespected. I mean, their egos were severely insulted by the NBA. The mere act of offering an ultimatum, you know, we heard veiled allusions to the plantation owner mentality here, and a lot of the players took that to heart, in all honesty. They want to be treated as equals, but they had, in their mind, their intelligence and their intellectual abilities to sort through a complex economic problem insulted.</s>PABLO TORRE: Now, the second level, which is the actual sort of the brass tacks of it, is - well, there's two buckets in that too. It's very complicated, as you said. Well, one is the basketball-related income, which is - which was in favor of the players, 57 percent to 43 percent. That's the bulk of the NBA's revenue.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And this is - when you say basketball-related income, what does that mean?</s>PABLO TORRE: Yes. That means, basically, in layman's terms, the vast majority of income from basketball-related activities, ticket sales and so forth and so on. That's sort of the big bucket of money coming into the NBA. And then you had the owners basically saying, you know, we want 50-50 on that. And the players, ultimately, it was reported, began to drift towards the 50-50 split very, very reluctantly.</s>PABLO TORRE: But it turned out that the second bucket of these brass tacks issues, that being the system issues in terms of how can contracts be negotiated, what are the restrictions on teams in terms of signing certain players, the size and length of contracts, those rules ended up being, it seems, an insurmountable hurdle for the players, and that ended up being the last straw, as it were, in the negotiations.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: So what's the point - they said that they're going to disband their own union. What's the point of that?</s>PABLO TORRE: Yeah. So they're taking a cue from the NFL players' union, in a sense. They saw that, you know, when you have a - you know, the players' union, you can disband and sue the league on antitrust grounds because they are, in fact, running a de facto monopoly, a fact circumvented by the fact that they can collectively bargain with a union.</s>PABLO TORRE: Now, it's different in this case because the NFL players decertified, and the NBA players here, in this sense, would seek to disclaim. Now, that's legal jargon, but the basic line of thought is a disclaimer on the union basically saying they do not represent us can move this issue more quickly through the federal court system. Basically, in effect, they can hope to get a shortened timeline. And in fact, in an attempt to save the season, some of the NFL players were subject to - in a more protracted timeline there even though that they were able to actually have the NFL season in time.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: We're asking our listeners to join us in the conversation. Call us at 800-989-8255, or email us at [email protected], where we received an email from Jessica, who says that the NBA lockout has affected me financially. I work for Target Center box office, and basketball season is usually a steady source of income. This year, instead of working one or two games a week, I'm only working one event per month. Thank goodness for day jobs. Target Center, I guess, is in Minneapolis. This is, you know, we see this dispute between some basketball players who are making millions of dollars and owners who are making, you know...</s>PABLO TORRE: Billions.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Billions. Tens of millions, whatever. But there's a lot of folks who were - at a much lower level who are really feeling the impact of this.</s>PABLO TORRE: Yeah. You know, there's a sense of, you know, a sports team is in a sense of public trust, and that's an emotional way. But we also forget that these are huge, huge multimillion dollar enterprises where you employ everybody, from the towel boy working in the locker room to the concessions people to the folks hired to clean up after the aisles, and all of those jobs certainly evaporate, if not are just put on hold, for as long as the lockout goes on.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And so we're talking about the labor issues and the union is disbanding, something the NFL Players Association did earlier this year. I guess before that was all resolved, the NFL players and owners were able to reach an agreement without too much being missed except for the preseason. It seems to be a little bit more intractable.</s>PABLO TORRE: Yeah. You know, one of the big fundamental things to understand about the differences between these two lockouts is that the NFL owners are in such a better place financially. Now, we can quibble with exactly how many owners are in trouble in the NBA. The NBA and David Stern would have you believe that 22 of 30 teams are losing money, which is a staggering number when you think about it. In the NFL, everybody pretty much is doing well. It's a profit machine over there. And so in terms of how bad the economics of the current league are, the NBA certainly has a significant edge there in terms of how dysfunctional everything is.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take a call now. Reed is on the line with us from Memphis, Tennessee. Thanks for calling TALK OF THE NATION.</s>REED: How's it going y'all?</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. So how's the strike affecting you? No Grizzlies, right?</s>REED: Yeah. Let me know the Grizzlies. During the season, it's a pretty good joint out here. I mean, people love, you know, they love their sports teams. And quite honestly, I think it's going to make the neighborhood a little bit safer, I would hope because, you know, a lot of times you open your window at night and you got people standing in the street, you know, they're talking about the game that just happened. They're, you know, acting a fool. So I don't know, man.</s>REED: I don't know what all the people, the Grizzlies fans are going to do now that, you know, we're not - probably not going to get the season. But I hope everybody's going to be safe, you know, watch some football or watch the (unintelligible) or something.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Thank you, Reed. Aside from the rowdiness around some of the arenas, there are a lot of bars and restaurants, souvenir stores that are - hotels doing a lot less business this year. What are your, you know, it's - I guess it's hard to understand that - we were talking before about the millionaires versus the billionaires. I mean, LeBron James is getting, what? Sixteen million a year or something. With endorsements, I think, for a lot of people, it's hard to understand why this or how this is a labor issue. What...</s>PABLO TORRE: Right. Right, and I think that's certainly an understandable concern. And, you know, that's one of the things that the players and the owners, I think, when they look back on this, will come to understand is that it's - I think sports fans' interest is only so inelastic, you know? It's in such a time — in such a unique time right now that it's crazy. It's really crazy to think that they could throw away four billion dollars in revenue because they couldn't agree on a couple of, quote, unquote, "system issues," or just how to divide that pot especially, you know, in an economic climate, which is so, so devastating to so many.</s>PABLO TORRE: It's not a good time to be quibbling over the millions and millions of dollars when people can't really even begin to wrap their minds around what it might be like to be in any of their shoes.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Brandon(ph) is on the line with us now from Minneapolis. Brandon, you've already bought your season tickets.</s>BRENDAN: Yeah. I already got the season tickets. Me and my wife have been - we've been watching the Timberwolves for about probably a year or two. And, like, to know that there's no season is - it kind of kills you because that's like, you know, our other thing that we do. We either, you know, watchin' Vikings' games or we're going actually going down to the Target Center and enjoy the atmosphere, even though the team doesn't win very much anymore.</s>BRENDAN: But it's always fun to kind of get away and be able to, you know, see a game. And it's just - it's kind of discouraging. I really hope it doesn't end up like hockey did that one year when so many people just lost interest.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: And they were out for the entire year, right, the NHL?</s>BRENDAN: Right. They were gone the whole year. And, like, the sad thing about it, I was a sports intern. I was covering hockey when I was living in St. Louis. And I was really starting to enjoy it. And then that following year, they're gone. I'm like, well I'm not going to worry about watching hockey next year. I don't know any of the players anymore. Some people leave. Some people go, you know, this case with the pros; I don't know a lot of people looking to go to Europe, maybe just, you know, not do anything for the whole year. And now I'm working at this park for the park board, you know, like where kids normally sign up for to play basketball at this particular period of time. There is like maybe two or three sign-ups for kids. And I think, normally, they would be 10, 12 or it'd be full by now because nobody's seeing them on TV.</s>PABLO TORRE: All right. Yeah.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Thanks, Brandon. Pablo, I'm wondering this is something that - it's got to worry the players and the league that should there be a long lockout or the season is lost, are they going to be able to get those fans back?</s>PABLO TORRE: Yeah, yeah. I don't know what the magnitude of the disgust, as it were, is going to be. That'll all become clearer once the messaging from both sides begins. I will say that the league and the union, especially, really, in terms of the union, they've done a pretty bad job in terms of articulating what exactly they're fighting for; what's their, sort of, animating spirit in terms of why they're rebelling here. And that's something I think that going to have to - will have to be clarified and really made in - I mean, one of the things that's been ignored is really just the fans, you know?</s>PABLO TORRE: We haven't the league and the unions really, you know, really speak to the fans in a heartfelt, genuine, substantive way. In a lot of ways, they have been so trapped in their, sort of, turmoil there in these boardrooms that they've lost sight of the fact that they have this public trust issue that can erode over time as we saw with hockey.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. We have an email here from Jessica in Connecticut who writes that - I'm sorry. Utah. I'm so happy for the lockout. Not being a sports fan, it's nice to spend so much more time in the evening with my husband without him being distracted by the basketball game on TV.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: I'm wondering what are the players doing with themselves while they're not playing basketball or at least not playing in the U.S.? Did this - there was some talk of players joining European leagues. Has that, in fact, happened?</s>PABLO TORRE: Yeah. We've had a couple of players already over there. Deron Williams, the point guard, an All-Star for the Utah Jazz is overseas. Ty Lawson, another point guard, is over there. But one of the problems with the timing here, is that a lot of these overseas teams have full rosters already. It's going to be very interesting in terms of what kind of jobs are available for players. I do not think that you're going to have a lot of players just automatically sliding into an overseas uniform. There's going to be a bit of messiness there in terms of getting roster spots.</s>PABLO TORRE: And then in terms of the non-basketball stuff, we've actually, you know, one of the other products here that may go up in interest is college basketball. And so you've seen, well, on that level, you've seen some players actually going back to, first, get their degrees, which is a great thing. Rajon Rondo and Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving, to name a couple of All-Star caliber players, are all getting their degrees, going back to classes. You have some players becoming assistant coaches. University of Texas has a couple of ex-players, Tristan Thompson and Royal Ivey, over there serving on their coaching staff.</s>PABLO TORRE: And then you just have players who will be engaging in their other business interests. Now one of the things to remember about that though is that without this NBA income - I had one NBA money manager predict to me that by not having a season, over 70 percent of NBA players may well be committing financial suicide. So many of these guys live week to week, paycheck to paycheck, and to not have that income is going to be a dramatic change. So you wonder what kind of activities and enterprises they'll have to resort to when you don't have the big money flowing in that they were so used to.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Let's take one more quick call here from Kelly in River Falls, Wisconsin. How are you dealing with no NBA season?</s>KELLY: Well, I'd like to see them play, but I'm with the players. I go to see the players, not to go to see David Stern. And I just say that, you know, that I think he needs to go. Mark Cuban wants to speak to this issue, but he puts a gag order on him, so I think this - David Stern has gotten a little power nuts and all with success, and I'm backing the players 100 percent.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: All right. Thanks, Kelly. Pablo Torre, is there any sense that David Stern, the NBA commissioner, is going to be out of a job anytime soon? Or are the owners pretty happy with the tack that he's been taking?</s>PABLO TORRE: Yeah, that's a billion dollar question. This is certainly the lowest point in his tenure. He had been overseeing one of the greatest growth periods in professional sports. And now he's really dealing with a divided ownership between the big market teams and the small market teams. And certainly, the players are none too happy with him, too. So if there is a time for an exit for David Stern, this lockout would be the thing that heralds it.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: But - so are there - is there a faction of owners, Mark Cuban was mentioned as one that have big issues with the way Stern is conducting things?</s>PABLO TORRE: Yes. Yeah. In terms of which, you know, which owners are you paying attention to, really, there's a very vocal faction of smaller market teams reportedly, where these are the guys who are really suffering economically. Some of the owners like Mark Cuban, Miami Heat's owner Micky Arison is another billionaire who's doing fine for himself and seems to be on that side of wanting to speak out. Those guys are doing OK. But it's the smaller market teams that are really suffering that are pushing for the harshness that we've seen from David Stern.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Pablo Torre is a reporter with Sports Illustrated. He joined us from our New York bureau. Thanks very much for your time.</s>PABLO TORRE: Thank you, Brian.</s>BRIAN NAYLOR, HOST: Tomorrow, Robert Frank tells us why the super rich have become the most unstable force in the U.S. economy. Join us for that conversation. This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Brian Naylor in Washington.
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Or The Beach — Seasonal depression, or seasonal affective disorder, affects some five percent of Americans in the winter as daily sunlight hours dwindle. Psychiatrist Richard A. Friedman discusses the evolutionary origins of the winter blues, and treatments ranging from light therapy to a trip to the beach.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. Have you noticed how short the days are getting? Is it having an effect on you? Maybe you have a little trouble rolling out of bed each morning or you're feeling a little bit sluggish, a little depressed even.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Well, the good news is it's a normal reaction to less daily sunlight, but why do you get the winter blues? And is there some evolutionary advantage to all of this?</s>In some people the depression can be more acute: Seasonal Affective Disorder, SAD. What can they do about it? That's what we'll be talking about. Our number is 1-800-989-8255, 1-800-989-TALK. Dr. Richard A. Friedman is a professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College here in New York. He is here in our New York studios.</s>In some people the depression can be more acute: Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY, Dr. Friedman.</s>In some people the depression can be more acute: DR. RICHARD FRIEDMAN: Thank you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: What exactly is going on that causes this seasonal depression?</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, what we think is going on is that people are essentially beginning to respond to the fact that the days are getting shorter, and so daylight gets shorter during the winter. And there are a group of people that respond by feeling lethargic and tired and sad and they want to sleep more and eat more and have less sex.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: How do you know if you're one of the people who has this full-blown Seasonal Affective Disorder?</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, because you have a repeated pattern of depression the same time every year. That is, when the photoperiod starts to get short and the winter is coming on, and then when the winter lets up and spring comes, you start to feel good again.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Do we actually know what's going on in your brain when this happens?</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, we know what's going on in other animals who've displayed behavior that's somewhat like humans; that is, a kind of hibernating behavior, so we think it's linked to the hormone melatonin, which basically is the signal that tells your brain that it's nighttime.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So could you just take melatonin pills and solve it that way?</s>FRIEDMAN: You can manipulate melatonin, but it's not as effective as light, so far.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So you want to get more light, artificially, if you have to, right?</s>FRIEDMAN: Right. You want to basically fool the brain into thinking winter's not here and that, you know, the days are actually not getting shorter.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And how do you do that?</s>FRIEDMAN: You administer light in the morning and you essentially tell the brain, hey, it's time to wake up. It's actually daylight.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah?</s>FRIEDMAN: So, basically, what you want to do is override the signal from the season that is telling you the days are shorter, the photoperiod's getting smaller, and you can override it with light.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Now, do you need to get a prescription for a light box or can you go out and buy one yourself? Or can you self-diagnose this or is it better to - maybe you could try it and see if it works.</s>FRIEDMAN: Yes. You know, light is highly effective, very safe, very few side effects. Most people who have seasonal depression are aware of the pattern. You don't need a prescription to get a light box and you can buy one yourself on multiple websites.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: 1-800-989-8255. Someone is tweeting us, saying what about a tanning bed. People get into tanning beds. Is that the same thing or will that help? But you're going to get brown at the same time.</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, that's a bit dangerous because the exposure to UV light is carcinogenic and it's harmful. And basically, you want visible light spectrum and you're getting - you don't want to be exposed to UV light.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And for how many hours a day?</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, actually, you don't need much exposure. You know, basically 20 to 30 minutes in the morning, when the brain is the most sensitive to light, does the trick.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And if it's working, you'll know it immediately?</s>FRIEDMAN: It's very fast. The treatment has an onset of action that's much faster than antidepressants.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And much cheaper. (Laughing)</s>FRIEDMAN: Much cheaper and less side effects.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And a lot less side effects. Why - is there some evolutionary advantage to this? Why would people have this happening?</s>FRIEDMAN: It's a fascinating question. Well, it seems like there might be. In the sense that, you know, people who have seasonal depression look like they're going through some sort of energy conservation strategy. They're eating less, they're conserving energy, they're more tired, they want to be a couch potato. They consume a lot of calories. They look like, in a sense, they're hibernating. Not hibernating in the way that bears hibernate, where their body temperature goes down.</s>FRIEDMAN: And, in fact, there are very interesting scientific experiments that have been done looking at people who have seasonal depression and looking at the difference in their melatonin secretion during the winter compared to people that don't. And they behave like hibernating animals, because what happens is that as the daylight gets shorter, their nighttime get longer and their melatonin secretion gets longer in the winter. It's like hibernating animals.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Well, how do we know that we're not the abnormal people and they're the normal people?</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, in a sense, we might be the abnormal people in the sense that, you know, people that don't have seasonal depression have a constant melatonin secretion all year long, even though daylight is getting shorter, and probably because we're sensitive to artificial light. So with artificial light we've extended the day.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Are there people who actually go the opposite direction?</s>FRIEDMAN: You mean people who are depressed in the summer?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah.</s>FRIEDMAN: Yes. They're a smaller group of people and, mostly, you find those people in the South and, for some reason in Asian countries. So there's a smaller - much smaller percent of seasonal depressives have summer, you know, depressions.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And now, I've heard of therapies that involve going to the beach instead. Why would going to the beach work?</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, for two reasons. One, it's very sunny.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah.</s>FRIEDMAN: Two, it's very beautiful. And three, it's filled with negative ions.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: The beach is?</s>FRIEDMAN: The beach is. Yes. Wet, damp places have an excess of negative charge and although it sounds like snake oil, actually there's good empirical evidence that negative ion generators can actually improve seasonal depression, just like phototherapy.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So you could get a negative ion generator?</s>FRIEDMAN: You could get a high-flow negative ion generator. Yeah.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I've heard about positive, negative ions for years, I've heard about...</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, you know, the folklore about these hot, dry winds that drive people mad?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Uh-huh.</s>FRIEDMAN: Well, there's actually some scientific basis behind it because these hot, dry winds like the Santa Ana and the Foehn and the Mistral are full of positive ions and they do drive people...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Because I've also heard that the way animals know that the weather is going to change or people - they start sniffing the air, that they're detecting, possibly, the ion change that's coming.</s>FRIEDMAN: Yeah, possibly.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Also. Is it easier to get the light box or the negative ion generator? Which is it...</s>FRIEDMAN: Probably easier at this point to get the light box, and maybe cheaper.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is it? Yeah.</s>FRIEDMAN: I think so.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And you can build your own if you want.</s>FRIEDMAN: You could, although the issue is, you want to really be sure that you've got a filter that will take away as much UV light as possible because you don't want to harm your eyes.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right. You know, people will say to you, why don't you just get out of bed and go jog someplace? You'll feel a lot better.</s>FRIEDMAN: Yes. Well, people who don't experience depression always say things like that. You pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. It's very hard.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah. If you could get out of bed, you wouldn't be depressed.</s>FRIEDMAN: By definition.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: By definition. Thank you very much for joining us today.</s>FRIEDMAN: My pleasure.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: We're talking to Richard Friedman, professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College here in New York.
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NPR's Michel Martin asks Jon Wolfsthal, former director for non-proliferation at the National Security Council, if the U.S. withdrawal from a nuclear arms treaty spells a new arms race with Russia.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We're going to stay on the subject of international affairs, but we're going to take a step back in time to 1987. That's the year that saw a milestone on the road to ending the Cold War. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev came together at the White House to sign the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces, or INF Treaty. The agreement banned an entire class of nuclear weapons. And, within a few years, the U.S. and the USSR eliminated thousands of missiles and warheads. At the signing ceremony, Reagan got to the heart of what would make the treaty work.</s>RONALD REAGAN: We have listened to the wisdom of an old Russian maxim, and I'm sure you're familiar with it. Mr. General Secretary, though my pronunciation may give you difficulty, the maxim is doveryai no proveryai. Trust but verify.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: More than three decades later, the trust apparently is gone.</s>MIKE POMPEO: Russia has jeopardized the United States' security interests, and we can no longer be restricted by the treaty while Russia shamelessly violates it.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That was U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, yesterday, announcing that the U.S. will withdraw from the INF Treaty within six months unless Russia returns to compliance. Russia replied by saying that it, too, is withdrawing from the treaty. So that would seem to invite the question - is this the start of a new arms race? We called arms control expert Jon Wolfsthal to talk about this. He served as senior director for nonproliferation and arms control in President Obama's National Security Council. He was kind enough to join us in our studios in Washington, D.C. Thank you so much for coming in.</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: Thanks for having me.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Well, first, the Trump administration says Russia has violated the INF Treaty. Is this true? And if so, how has Russia done so?</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: Unfortunately, it is true. It's not just the Trump administration that says Russia has cheated on this agreement. The Obama administration, publicly, in 2013, came out with that same information. Under the treaty, neither side can test or possess missiles launched from the ground that can go between 500 and 5,500 kilometers. Russia has tested such weapons and now has about a hundred of those missiles deployed in the field, something that is absolute violation of the treaty that's been called out by the United States.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So where does this go next? I mean, the White House said it will, quote, "suspend its obligations under the treaty and will move forward to develop new military options." Those were their words. Does this mean the administration wants to be able to deploy new kinds of weapons? I mean, is this - are we back to the Cold War?</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: Well, I don't think we're back to the Cold War, but we're clearly in a very dangerous action-reaction cycle with Russia and, increasingly, with China. What's really frustrating for people that supported arms control and wanted to see the U.S. save this treaty is we don't have a military requirement for these missiles. Russia is building them because they don't have weapons of this grade, and they are at a conventional inferiority to the United States.</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: But even the Joint Chiefs of Staff has said we don't need missiles to counter Russia's deployment. What we are seeing is this mindset that - well, the Russians have it, so we have to have them, too. And that's what fueled the Cold War. That's what led us to have 35,000 nuclear weapons each and live in a very, very dangerous world that looks, increasingly, like the world of tomorrow.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: What would be the alternatives to this if you think this was not necessary from a standpoint of U.S. defense strategy? As briefly and as simply as you can, could you just give us a sense of what are some of the U.S. alternatives that are not being explored here?</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: So I actually give high marks to the Trump administration. They got the NATO allies to support the idea that Russia was violating this treaty - something the Obama administration was unable to do - and got alliance unity in confronting Russia. Over the last three months, we've seen a series of Russian proposals to display the violating missile, to have joint transparency so that they could reassure us these missiles weren't in violation.</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: And the U.S., instead of pursuing them, said nope, doesn't matter. We're out of the treaty because you're cheaters unless they're all destroyed immediately. And so we're going to squander that unity. And what Russia really wants more than a military capability is a divided NATO. They want to see the United States separated from our European allies.</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: And, with our withdrawal, there are a lot of Europeans saying, well, wait a second. We backed you in the hopes that you could save this agreement, but you don't really seem to be trying to save it. And we're going to see these fractures in Europe come back.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And that would seem in alignment with other U.S. moves to sow division, both, domestically, within the United States through their now well-known operations and also dividing the U.S. from NATO. I mean, this is in alignment with a lot of the things that Russia has been doing, both sort of overtly and kind of covertly.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: I think the other thing that's confusing, though, I think for many Americans is that President Trump seems to continue to have an affinity for President Putin. I mean, yesterday, the - President Trump said he hopes to get - I'm quoting here again - "get everyone in a big beautiful room and do a new treaty that would be much better." How do you understand that?</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: It is confusing. It's unsettling to have an American president that likes autocrats and strongmen and dictators. President Trump is going to play this as if he's being tough on Russia. They cheated. And so we're going to get out of this agreement. We're going to show them when, in fact, what we've done is let Russia off the hook.</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: If we stayed in this agreement, if we used it to try to sanction them or get our allies to support us in getting tough on Russia, then I think we could say we were actually imposing a price on Moscow for their cheating. What we're seeing now is basically a get-out-of-jail-free card. Russia already has these missiles. They're going to build more. They have a hot production line. And because the U.S. doesn't really need these - because our European allies don't want to have them on their territory, we're going to end up in a worse position.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's Jon Wolfsthal. He was a special assistant to President Obama. He's now a senior adviser at Global Zero. That's a nonpartisan group that's dedicated to the elimination of nuclear weapons. He was kind enough to join us here in Washington, D.C. Thank you so much for joining us.</s>JON WOLFSTHAL: Thanks for having me.
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In 1956, dentist and amateur ornithologist William Rhein captured the rare Imperial woodpecker on 16 mm color film. Although this 85 second clip is the only known photographic record of the bird, Rhein kept the film to himself until after he died. Writer and bird fanatic Tim Gallagher tells the story of Rhein's expedition to look for the bird, and his own trip to the same mountains over 50 years later.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: With us now is Flora Lichtman. Hi, Flora.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Hi, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Our Video Pick of the Week. And, of course, it's going to be something special.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: This is a special one. We go back in time for this one. This story - let me set the scene for you. The story starts in the '50s with a dentist, William Rhein, who is also basically a bird fanatic - in fact, to the point that he makes these self-funded expeditions all over the world, including to Mexico several times, to look for one rare, giant woodpecker, the Imperial woodpecker. It's two feet tall.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Just like the one they've been searching for...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: It is a very close relative to the one they've been searching for here in this country.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah. Right.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: The ivory-billed woodpecker is its sort of closest relation. So he - on one of these trips, he manages to get this bird on film, and no one has captured this, to anyone's knowledge, on - in a photo or on film. But he wasn't happy with the footage, it sounds like, so he kept it under wraps. So for the longest time, the bird - the ornithology community thought there was no footage. Eventually, a very persistent ornithologist at Cornell tracks down a mention of the film and goes and drives to Rhein's house - you know, this is 40 or 50 years after this expedition - gets him to pop on the projector and gets this footage. He brings it back to Cornell and shows it to Tim Gallagher, who's sort of the star of our story in this video. And Tim Gallagher, when he sees this footage, this is how he describes it.</s>TIM GALLAGHER: I mean, it was incredible. I mean, this bird's hitching up the tree and chipping off chunks of bark. It even takes off and flies three different times. It was just like seeing a ghost.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Wow. And you have the video, that - footage of that video up on our Video Pick of the Week.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: You can see it for yourself.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And it is this incredible woodpecker that just - do we know? Is it vanished? Is it extinct? Is it - where is it?</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: It's heavily endangered, if not extinct. So this video, actually, prompted Gallagher to go back to this very spot where Rhein camped and see if he could see - find this woodpecker, and in that journey had a lot of sort of scary adventures. It's become drug-growing country.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: It's in Mexico. Yeah.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: It's in the mountains of Mexico. And so he had quite an adventure looking, and he didn't find one. And he actually said that he was glad he didn't see one, because it would just be too sad, because there's almost no way you could protect a bird in that country.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right. And that would be impossible, right, because of the violence that's going on there. You have the drugs - yeah.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: It's so lawless. I mean, the people can't even be protected, let alone birds.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Wow. And so he - you have him on the Video Pick of the Week up there...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: We have the...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: ...the video - the bird's in a tree, moving up and down, flying out of the tree.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Chipping bark, you should go - definitely go see it.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: But there's one other thing we want to do today. So we had - if you may remember, a few weeks ago, we did this contest with Astronaut Don Pettit...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: ...about the egg in space. Why does the watery egg wobble in space? And we have a winner.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: We have a winner.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: We have a winner. Frank...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Where's my bell?</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. Frank Tartaglia from Belleville, New Jersey said - he was one of our winning answers. He was picked randomly, and he won a SCIFRI pocket protector for his winning answer. And I just want to have him - I just want to play his answer for you.</s>FRANK TARTAGLIA: My answer was that the moment of inertia was moving in the water-filled egg. And as Astronaut Pettit pointed out in the podcast, when he was spinning the book, the moment of inertia was moving when he spun it that certain way. And I said, wow, that's the answer. That's why it's wobbling, because the book was wobbling.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Are you a scientist?</s>FRANK TARTAGLIA: No, no, no. I'm a computer programmer.</s>FRANK TARTAGLIA: So that pocket protector goes right along with my nerd image. In fact, it's been, you know, it's been many years since I've had one because they're not easy to find. But I will wear mine proudly.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Very heartwarming.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. I'm wearing mine proudly right now, too.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes, we all are. And, you know, we sold out of them. Let's - we're going to make a whole bunch of them - batch of them for...</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Yeah. And we'll have more contests.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: More contests.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: So there should - there will be other opportunities.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes, absolutely. Thank you, Flora.</s>FLORA LICHTMAN, BYLINE: Thanks, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Our Video Pick of the Week at - you can see this rare woodpecker up there in our website from old footage taken over 50 years ago of the woodpecker. That's about all the time we have for today.
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Huntsville, Alabama is known to many as "Rocket City." Nearly half of the city's jobs are connected to space and defense funding. Now, with NASA and the Pentagon facing significant cuts, Huntsville faces an uncertain future. Newton, Iowa, went through similar straits when Maytag left town in 2007. Mayor Chaz Allen, Newton, Iowa Mayor Tommy Battle, Huntsville, Ala. Richard Longworth, senior fellow, Chicago Council on Global Affairs and author, Caught in the Middle
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JOHN DONVAN, host: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm John Donvan in Washington. Neal Conan is away. Huntsville, Alabama, to some, is better known as Rocket City, where NASA engineers build rockets and kids come every year for space camp. With nearly half of the city's jobs linked to space and defense spending, the city is deeply connected to the nation's space exploration programs.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But the residents of Huntsville may soon need to start exploring new careers, with budget cuts looming at NASA. And it's not just Huntsville. In 2007, Newton, Iowa faced its own struggle to reshape itself when its major employer for more than a century, Maytag, left town. The city lost a total of 4,000 jobs, which is 20 percent of its overall population.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: This is a familiar story in cities across the country, like Muncie, Indiana, Flint, Michigan, Youngstown, Ohio, entire towns reeling when a manufacturing plant shuts down or a major industry moves overseas.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: What happens when a city's major employer just disappears? Does town ever bounce back? We're going to speak to the mayors of Huntsville and Newton in a few minutes, but first, if this is the story of your city, we want to hear from you. When a major employer left your town, tell us what happened to you. What did you do?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Our phone number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected] and you can join the conversation at our website. Go to NPR.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So joining us now from Newton, Iowa by phone, is Mayor Chaz Allen; and from Huntsville, Alabama, Mayor Tommy Battle. So Mayor Allen in Newton, we want to start with you. You had Maytag there for a century. People's grandparents, maybe great grandparents, were working for the company. And then they were gone. So what happened when they finally shut down?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: Well, when they finally shut down, we had a choice to make. We had tried to retain Maytag or Whirlpool at the time, to keep the jobs here. And, obviously, that fell apart and we ended up taking what we called a retention council and making it a transformation council. Because we knew, going forward, we had to transform ourselves into what would be a new economy for Newton without the stable manufacturing of Maytag.</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: It was a shock at first, but I think we've done a lot to recover. It was a lot easier in 2007 as we were the focus of a lot in the nation, just because we were the first ones it had happened to. Not the first, but the focal point was Maytag.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: You you had people who3 were interested in maybe coming in and helping in some fashion or other?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: Oh, you bet. You bet.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: A couple of things. Did Maytag give you warning that this was coming?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: Not really Maytag, but when they were sold to Whirlpool, we were really pressing to try to get Whirlpool to keep the jobs here. And then I believe it was in May of 2006 - or maybe it was June - that's when we got the call that they would shut the whole thing down and move it to Ohio and Mexico.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So some of it went overseas, then?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: You bet.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: What about, though - I'm wondering if there was a sense of betrayal, given that there was this 100 year, plus, history and I'm assuming that people have photos of Maytag appliances in the background and themselves on the line in their photo albums and it goes way back. And there was, perhaps, a sense of family. Am I exaggerating that or...</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: No. I think a lot of people - it was. I mean, they'd spent their - people graduated from high school and wanted to go work at Maytag, work there 30 retires, retire and then move onto something else because of the benefits and the wages they had. It was a good living.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And on an individual basis - I understand you were saying that the town, to some degree, was trying to plan for this, but on an individual basis, how many people were just left out in the cold in terms of being ready for a world without Maytag?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: Well, it's one of those things where it's a double-edged sword. Not having Maytag, all of a sudden, our unemployment went up and we have empty buildings. Well, to attract new businesses, you need a higher unemployment and spaces for them to move to. But with Maytag and the community, we didn't have those opportunities back then because you had to compete against Maytag for the employees and the wages.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: I want to bring in Tommy Battle. You're the mayor of Huntsville, Alabama and, as we said at the beginning of the program, a city famous for helping to put us into space. You were manufacturing the Saturn rocket there. You have not only a base, Mayor Battle, of industrial line workers. You also have a large community of scientists and engineers, highly educated people, who are facing, if NASA continues scaling back, the same sort of struggles. So do you have a plan?</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: Well, we were very fortunate. We started back in 2005 period, where we were working on the BRAC Movement, which was the Base Realignment and Closure Movement where the Department of Defense was consolidating some bases. And we had about a 10,000 job gain out of that, so any losses that we had with NASA, we were able to offset with gains that we had and still come out with positive growth out of our area.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So you're saying it's no problem?</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: You know, you hate to lose anything and, you know, especially when it's somebody's job. Anybody's job is an important job, but the community has been able to weather this as we've gone through these, you know, economic times. We've still got a base of probably 4,500 to 5,000 NASA workers still here who will be working on the FLS, which is the heavy lift rocket engine to take us back into deep space.</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: So we've still got a good future in front of us with NASA.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Do you see yourself still as Rocket City?</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: We are Rocket City, Missile City, Army Aviation City, you know, Material Command, Biotech. We've diversified our whole economic base to such a degree that it really makes your whole community grow in different facets and different areas.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Again, Mayor Chaz Allen in Newton, Iowa, when Maytag left under the auspices that Whirlpool had taken it over, how did the town change in the immediate aftermath? Did people stay?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: Yeah. It's ironic. Our census came out this year and our census in 2000 was about 15,800 people. We prepared for the worst and, actually, we only lost 400 people in our community after losing 4,000 jobs. People in Newton commute to different places now. There's a lot more people commuting to Des Moines and Pella and Knoxville and Marshalltown and Ankeny, to work at the places like Vermeer, Pella Windows, 3M, John Deere. So we're kind of right in the center of a manufacturing hub, so the people were able to stay in Newton, but commute to work.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But are you in a hub of other one company towns? In other words, are you vulnerable to five or six companies deciding that it's time to shut down and go somewhere else?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: I think we're always vulnerable to that. I think that's something that, as the economy starts to pick up, we'll be less vulnerable. But right now, I think everybody's got a weakness in the fact that the economy is slower right now and we're all subject to that.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Mayor Allen, you mentioned that, when this began to happen to you around 2007, you got a lot of attention because you were, in a sense, leading this unfortunate curve. And so you had the government's attention and you had companies possibly talking to you. But you also had a pretty good economy at the time in 2007.</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: Exactly.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So what happened in 2008, 2009?</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: In 2007 and 2008, we were able to attract TPI Composites, which makes the wind blades for wind turbines. We were able to attract Trinity Structural Towers, who makes the actual tower for the wind turbines. And one of the things that we were very successful with was we took some of the Maytag engineers that are the core of Maytag and they created their own company and stayed in town and did engineering for more than just white goods. They started doing engineering for a lot of different things.</s>MAYOR CHAZ ALLEN: And we did see a change in 2008, I believe, about August of 2008, as Bear Stearns and all of that started going. Money started drying up for these ventures that we were so lucky to get in 2007.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. We're talking about what happens when a company leaves a one company town, when a major employer goes, and we're asking you to tell us your experiences. What did you do? How did you handle it?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Our number is 800-989-8255 and we want to bring in Dawn from Dutchess, New York to join us in the conversation. Dawn.</s>DAWN: (Unintelligible) but in the mid - but I grew up in Dutchess County, which is the home of IBM. And in the mid-'90s when IBM, you know, had an enormous downsize, I mean, the effect on every aspect of life in Dutchess County was altered. Our real estate market changed. People had to up and leave their homes and go to different markets, you know, and my own family, my aunt and uncle had to move. They, you know, were fortunate enough to move to Vermont, where they could stay with IBM, but that wasn't the case for a lot of people.</s>DAWN: And it was devastating because Dutchess County, you know, has been the home of IBM for decades.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And would you say that the community unraveled? I mean, I'm meaning that literally when you say that people moved away.</s>DAWN: Enormously. People were moving away. People were walking - we had our own microcosm in Dutchess County of what is happening across the nation and, really, across the world right now. I mean, you know, the real estate market shrank incredibly. People were under water in their homes. They were walking away from their homes. They were, you know, short selling if they could, declaring bankruptcy.</s>DAWN: I mean, and you know, fortunately, IBM didn't just dry up and go away. They really had to take an enormous step back and look at their own corporation and how they were going to continue to do business and do it better.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Well, Dawn, what did you do?</s>DAWN: Well, I went away to school and, you know, I really considered what it was that I was going to do with my future and how I was going to proceed from there. You know, was I going to enter that sort of industry or enter an industry that, you know, had more potential and more growth?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But you stayed in Dutchess County?</s>DAWN: I did until 2000 and then I left and I moved across the country.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Thanks very much for your call, Dawn. I want to ask Mayor Tommy Battle in Huntsville - you know, we didn't talk about the tax base. These companies contribute enormously to any town's tax base. They let you run your fire and police department and build your roads and keep your schools going.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: In Huntsville, NASA's cutback has affected you how in that way?</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: You know, the offset of the jobs has helped us. You know, 1,500 jobs. You know, you can really count on that to be - oh, about $12 million a year as an economic impact on your area, so you know, you had a negative $12 million, but then, with the, you know, 10,000 jobs that we got from the BRAC Movement, that comes out to about an $800 million, you know, positive impact.</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: So you swing both ways. We had the same situation in the '70s when the Saturn program ended and IBM, who was heavy in this area, moved. And, you know, we had some of the same situations that Dawn was talking about where houses were for sale. There was high unemployment.</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: But one of the golden linings out of all that was that four engineers - you leave an engineer alone too long, they're going to start a company. They started Fortune 500 companies here.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Wow.</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: And grown from...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So getting laid off was the best thing that happened to these guys?</s>MAYOR TOMMY BATTLE: Well, they grew from their basement to Research Park to a Fortune 500 company and provided a good, stable economy for us.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Well, Tommy Battle, I want to thank you for joining us. You're the mayor of Huntsville, Alabama. And Chaz Allen, the mayor of Newton, Iowa. Two towns trying to figure it out and making progess.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm John Donvan. We're talking about cities and towns where one company provides the jobs or most of them and much of the revenue. And then, for whatever reason, the company gets up and leaves town or just cuts back significantly.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: If this is the story of your city or town, we want to hear from you. When a major employer left your town, tell us what happened to you. Our phone number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected] and you can join the conversation at our website. Go to NPR.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So we've asked you to tell us your stories and we want to continue with that. And we're going to talk with Alex in Dayton, Ohio. And, Alex, I understand that your family actually has put Dayton behind them. Is that right?</s>ALEX: Actually, it's not Dayton. It's Wilmington, Ohio. Over in Wilmington, almost half the city was employed by DHL or it used to be Airborne and ended up switching to DHL. I'm not sure because I was young back then. It was quite a few years ago. My family actually ended up having to move to Tampa, Florida because my dad's dad, my grandpa, had a position opening in a business over here.</s>ALEX: But the rest of my family is still living in Wilmington and, not only did I have to move with my family because, I mean, my dad worked there. My grandpa worked there on my mom's side. Most of my family worked there. They all ended up unemployed and my aunt is the only one that's really kind of staying afloat over there now. The whole town...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So, Alex, I mean, is it still a sense of a community or does it just feel like a life raft?</s>ALEX: What was that?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Does it still feel like a real community or does it just feel as though it's something that's hanging on by its fingernails?</s>ALEX: Yeah. I go there all the time for holidays and it just doesn't have the life it had when I was younger. It just looks like a ghost town most of the time because the small businesses are all failing over there.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But it's ghost town with people in it and those people are your people. Why do you think that they stay?</s>ALEX: Well, I mean, for the same reasons most people want to stay at the place they live in because it's like home to them, but I mean, there's not a lot of choice. Apparently, I didn't have much of a choice. My family didn't.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Right. But are they staying because they think it's going to turn around or more - they just don't feel...</s>ALEX: Well, there has been a few little glimmers of, like, hope here and there, like they were talking about building a casino inside the old airport or the hub or whatever it was.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Yeah. The casino option. It's always out there.</s>ALEX: Yeah. Eventually, that was shot down, but there's been quite a few little plans they had, but it never - none of them ever actually pushed through and I guess a lot of people are staying there just to - you know, just in hope that something will come up, something will fix it.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. Alex, I want to thank you for your story. Thanks for sharing that. I want now to bring in Richard Longworth. Richard Longworth is the author of a book on this subject. It's called "Caught in the Middle: American's Heartland in the Age of Globalism." And he's joining us from member station WBEZ in Chicago.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Richard, thanks very much for joining us.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: John, it's my pleasure.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So are we talking about a very widespread pattern here?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: We're talking about a general pattern, certainly, across the Midwest and in other areas, some down south, but the Midwest was the old industrial heartland of the United States. We kind of invented industry in much of the economy, here, on the basis of a lot of good ideas 100 years ago.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: Big corporations, heavy industry, most of them. A lot of them auto-connected, heavy machinery, farm machinery, and we've lived on that for the past 100 years. A lot of, also, consumer goods like Maytag refrigerators. And those are the jobs that are going away now. This isn't something that started with the recession, as Chaz Allen pointed out. Maytag left in 2007, before the recession began. It's been going on for some 20 or 30 years.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: The recession has focused a lot of minds here on, what are you going to do about it? I think there's a realization that the good old days aren't going to come back to towns that relied on one industry or one factory.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Was it an insane idea in the first place to rest on the assumption that there would always be this one employer in town or was there a time when it made perfect sense?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: Well, at one time, it made perfect sense. You had this broad sort of working class-middle class. People here who hadn't graduated from high school, carried their lunch in a lunch bucket, but still owned their own homes, owned a car, had a cottage by the lake, took vacations, lived kind of a middle class way of life.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: And for several generations, this held true and people just assumed that your grandpa worked in the factory, your daddy worked in the factory, you'd work in the factory, your kids would go into the factory. This was something that was never going to end and then it ended.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Well, let me put that question in a different way, Richard. Going forward, would it be ill-advised for any town to have a relationship with an employer in town where that employer is the only one? Or should all the towns out there be trying to figure out ways to immediately diversify their base?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: Well, I think diversification is certainly the way to go. As Mayor Allen of Newtown pointed out, they've got a couple of wind turbine companies in there. They have an IT company in there. They've got some engineering companies coming in. Their point is that, rather than have one company employing 4,000 people, they'd rather have 40 companies and each employing 100 people. And that certainly makes a lot more sense because there's more resiliency.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: How easy is that to achieve?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: It's hard work.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Yeah.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: We built this industrial economy. It took a certain shape based on these big corporations, served us well for 100 years and now it's gone and now we've got to do it all over again. It's going to take a long time, but a lot of smart people are thinking about this.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So it's essentially the issue of manufacturing. If manufacturing were still an American byproduct, this might not be happening?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: No. There is life in manufacturing. I think we have to remember, there's not as many jobs in manufacturing. Gary, Indiana is kind of the headquarters of the nation's steel industry now. They turn out as much steel there as they ever did. There's terrific productivity, but they do with about one-tenth as many workers.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: But there are good manufacturing jobs, like these wind turbine jobs that Mayor Allen was talking about, but they're going to be a different kind of manufacturing jobs, not the old assembly line jobs, not the routine consumption type jobs, but much more high tech, taking higher skills. High school dropouts don't cut it anymore. Kids have to have at least a couple years of community college to work and, hopefully, more beyond that.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: The center of this phenomenon appears to be in the Midwest and I want to go now to the Midwest to Barry. You're in Flint, Michigan. And Barry, you worked for Buick. Is that correct?</s>BARRY: Right. I worked for Buick for almost - retirement, (unintelligible) go to retirement.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And so what happened? Did you lose your job? Was it a downsizing or is the plant gone?</s>BARRY: It's like when they was bombing Afghanistan, it looked like they practiced on plants first. They took out everything. I mean, my daughter, she moved to Jersey because she could see the writing on the wall. And when she came back to visit, she couldn't believe those factories were torn down. It's just all gone. It's just like one big floor plan. That's all you see. One big floor plan of Chevrolet, AC, Buick, on and on and on.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Well, I've been to Flint, and what also is empty are a lot of the houses. I've literally seen bulldozers go in on an afternoon and knock down five or six houses because the theory is that we've got to shrink the town because it's just not what it used to be. And I left there...</s>BARRY: Well, that, too.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Go ahead.</s>BARRY: That, too, and you've got these punks going around setting fire to these houses. So you've got one house on fire and two houses on either side getting scorched because somebody's burning these houses up.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Yeah. Barry, thank you for your call. I want to turn again to Richard Longworth about that. You know, we've been talking about the job, you know, from the point of view, I guess, of the psychology of the individual who loses it. That's tough, it's difficult, it's embarrassing, humiliating and demeaning. But what happens to the fabric of communities where these jobs go and bouncing off what Barry just told us about Flint and the buildings burning?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: John, you know, it's hard to say, but some of these old towns might not have a future. It's not that the earth is going to open up and swallow them, but they continue to shrink. You know, workers who lived in these towns like Barry in Flint will stay there, but smart kids, like Barry's daughter will pick up and move away. We're losing a lot of our smartest kids. We're losing a lot people.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: Towns are shrinking. One of the things that people are talking about out here is something called the Shrinking City Concept. That is, you've got a town that maybe was 200,000 people. Now, it's about 70,000 or 75,000. It's never going to be as big as it used to be, so how do you make a decent place to live for a smaller town?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: This is a lot trickier in the south. It's not just a matter of knocking down some old houses, but places like Cleveland and Detroit are signing onto the Shrinking City Concept, too.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Can I say, also, that shrinking a city so reverses the psychology of this country over 200 years where we grew and we spread and we traveled and we pushed the frontier back and now to have the frontiers - to be sucking them back in somehow doesn't sit right.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: It doesn't sit right at all, but Youngstown, Ohio's a good example. That was a steel city. About 30 years ago, all the steel mills collapsed. There was a great sense of denial in Youngstown. People thought, yes, the steel mills will come back sooner or later. Youngstown now has a new, young mayor, too young to remember the old steel mills, not hung up on this denial, who is trying to build a smaller, but decent town there, working with local businesses, working with Youngstown State University. It's a community effort, as these rebuilding efforts has to be, not just companies, but everybody in town, all the stakeholders involved. They've got a couple of new IT companies in there. They've got an incubator. They're trying to fix up their downtown. They are long ways away from making it what they want it to be, but this is the plan now.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: This may be the wave of the future for these towns. Or conversely, it may mean just throwing in the towel.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: That they're done. Michelle in Port - you're in Port Charlotte, Florida, and joining us in the conversation. And I'm guessing your story does not begin in Florida.</s>MICHELLE: Not really.</s>MICHELLE: The towns where I grew up, it was more like a twin town. So it was Molt and Kalispell(ph). There were three industries altogether. And between the '80s and the early 2000s, they had all gone. And so you'd expect you'd be growing up and joining one of these factories, and there was absolutely nothing for you anymore.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So is that why you're gone?</s>MICHELLE: You know, most of the kids, they either went off to college. Or if they couldn't get a scholarship, they just joined the military like me.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So do you have any ties with the old town, in any way?</s>MICHELLE: Well, my family - everybody's still there.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Yeah.</s>MICHELLE: The - a few of the industries - Molt Windows went - was bought by China. And then, I guess, they moved back in the early 2000s, but all the people that had previously worked there, they had gone on and done other things, because in the 10 years between the plant closing and reopening, they had to have done something.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right, Michelle. Thanks very much for sharing your story with us. We're also getting your emails. And Tyler Vier(ph) - I believe I'm pronouncing that correctly, Vier - says he was in Greenville, Michigan when Maytag shut down 3,000 jobs. A new company then came in and opened a solar panel factory, Richard. And then he says, unfortunately, they've just now laid off half of their workers, and they have had extreme difficulty there finding qualified workers. And Tyler is communicating with us from Grand Rapids at the moment. But that's an interesting - is - towns talk about wanting to do a reinvention, and yet maybe they don't have the tools. What about that?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: This was - actually, it was an Electrolux plant. It had been there forever. It was key to the town. When it closed, it looked like they were going to turn out the lights. And then this solar panel company came in, promising something like 1,200 jobs - not enough to replace the 3,000, but, you know, gave Greenville a shot at a future. As you said, these jobs - some of these jobs have materialized. Two of these plants are up and running. They had hoped that about half of the old Electrolux workers would get jobs there. As it turned out, less than 10 percent did. A lot of this is probably because you can't take somebody, a high school dropout who has been on an assembly line all life and turn him into a high-tech worker.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: You have here what we saw - certainly in the collapse of the steel industry 20 years ago in Chicago - sort of a lost generation of older workers. And by older workers, I mean people 35 or 40 who may not really have much of an economic future. So the question is: What can we do for their kids? What can we do for our younger generation?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. We're talking about what happens in one-company towns when the one company pulls the rug out. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION, from NPR News.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Richard, I was looking at an article in the Economist, which tells us, interestingly enough, that one-company towns are now becoming the pattern in China. Is that telling us about the transition of manufacturing jobs, or is it simply telling us something about the way China is organized?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: I think probably more of the latter. The - you know, it's a different system. It is an authoritarian society. They can direct funding and investment where they want. They are getting these big companies and placing them there. But the one-company towns here are probably a thing of the past. What some people are talking about...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And let me stop you. And is that just as well, because of the vulnerability that we now know has been established for these communities?</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: I don't know what the future of China is going to be. You have to remember that these companies, this process did work for us for a century. It underlay a very substantial civilization. And we didn't modernize. We didn't innovate. We didn't look ahead. I think it is this failure to keep up with the times, not to realize that the times were changing that probably has as much to do with this as the fact that there's one-company towns. Now that these companies have collapsed, we're trying to diversify.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: Some towns, Warsaw, Indiana, which is the - sort of the national headquarters of the orthopedic industry, has a number: three of the four biggest orthopedic companies in the United States. If you ever get a false hip, a fake hip, it's probably been made in Warsaw.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Let me...</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: So they're based on several companies, but one industry.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Let me bring in Grover from Kansas City. Grover, you're on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>GROVER: Well, I'm just kind of frustrated. We're talking manufacturing, and my wife is losing her job. She's in the IT industry, and there's a company here in town that processes mutual fund transactions. And they're shipping all those jobs to China here at the first of the year. And she loses her job next week. So I don't think IT's...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: I know it's very fresh for you, then. What plan do you have?</s>GROVER: I don't know, because, you know, the - she's been in that job and moved up to the, you know, jobs in the company for the last 20 years. And, you know, it's - there's not a whole lot to rely on in this market anymore.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Did you - Grover, did you see it coming?</s>GROVER: I didn't. She may have, but I didn't, you know. I don't know whether she can go back to school and, you know, find something else to do. But, you know, it just kind of, you know, she's done continuing education through her career. You know, she's gotten to a point where, you know, you feel some form of security, and then all of sudden it is gone.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Well, Grover, we wish you the best, and we wish your wife the best, as well. And thanks very much for sharing your story with us. I also want to thank Richard Longworth for joining us. He's a senior fellow at the Chicago Council of Global Affairs and author of "Caught in the Middle," which certainly describes the phenomena we're talking about. He joined us from member station WBEZ in Chicago. Thanks very much, Richard.</s>RICHARD LONGWORTH: Thank you, John.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Coming up on the Opinion Page, inventor Dean Kamen says politicians have it all wrong with their focus on creating jobs. Stay with us. I'm John Donvan. This is TALK OF THE NATION, from NPR News.
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For years, Steve Jobs courted biographer Walter Isaacson to write the definitive story of his life. When Isaacson learned how sick Jobs really was, he accepted. Here he discusses profiling the tech visionary, a task that often involved reconciling Jobs' recollections with those of his friends, family and colleagues.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: When Steve Jobs first began his battle with cancer, he called up my next guest, the biographer Walter Isaacson, and asked him if he might consider writing the definitive story of his life. Isaacson had written the biographies of Einstein, Ben Franklin, Kissinger. You know, you've read all those books.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And Jobs told him, quote, "I think you're good at getting people to talk." Isaacson turned Jobs down a number of times, but finally accepted when he found out Jobs might not have long to live.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: The finished book, entitled simply "Steve Jobs," is the fruit of more than 40 meetings between the two and over 100 interviews with Jobs' family, colleagues, friends and enemies. For the rest of the hour, we're going to talk about some of the challenges of writing that book, such as weaving together Jobs' version of events in his life with those of the people around him. Sometimes those stories didn't actually quite match up.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And we're going to look at Jobs' legacy on our personal gadgets and how he became such a wizard at marrying great art and design with great - or maybe I should say insanely great - technology.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Walter Isaacson is the author of the new book "Steve Jobs," and he's CEO of the Aspen Institute and he joins us here in New York. Welcome back to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Good to be back, Ira. Nice to see you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is there any question somebody has not asked you yet?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Oh, no. I don't want to leave the impression that I turned down Steve many, many, many times. I kept...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Tell us the story.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Well, I just kept saying, you know, hey, you're young. You're in the middle of a career. Let's do this 20 or 30 years from now. And I didn't quite realize how sick he was, but once I realized that, you know, he was battling cancer and, you know, he had now transformed the telephone and iPad industry, I was pretty eager to do the book.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Uh-huh. It reminded some of the people we talked to about being the chosen biographer of royalty when they want to have the best portraits painted of them. Did you think of that at all?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Well, the odd thing was he's very much of a controlling guy. He loves to control everything from end to end, which is why you can't open up your iPhone and why, you know, the Mac software and the Mac hardware are tightly integrated. But he kept saying, I don't want to have any control of this book. This will be yours. And be independent. Be honest. Interview other people. I'm choosing you because you can get other people to talk.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And for a while I was wary, but he opened up, never asked to see anything and, you know, he also had a style that was honest. He was sometimes brutally honest and he kept saying I should try to be honest in the book.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Except he wanted the cover for himself.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Oh, he hated - when he saw the cover that we put in the catalog, he just hated it. And you know what? He was right. It was one of those gimmicky kind of - it had him and an apple or something and it was in one of those catalogs about eight, nine months ago. And he called me up. I hadn't really felt the brunt of his fury, but I remember landing at San Francisco because I was going to go see him and he told me to just turn around, that the cover was so ugly. He used words other than ugly, but they had the same number of letters, that, you know, it showed that we had no taste, so after hearing him rant for maybe 10 minutes or so, he said the only way I'll cooperate is if you let me have some input into the cover.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: So I paused and I thought for maybe one, one and a half seconds and said, you know, this is the best designer of products in our time. I said...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And he knew...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: ...yeah, I'd love that.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And he knew it's all about the cover, didn't he?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And, you know, he really - he said nobody's going to read the book anyway, so you might as well just have a good cover.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And because the covers of all the objects he was involved, the Mac and the iPad, the iPhone, those were the important - part of the design was important to him.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I must admit, I was stunned by the depth of his obsession with design the more I heard about it. Even in the late 1970s, when he's going to Sony to finger all the brochures and then starts hating the heavy industrial design of Sony, goes to the Aspen Design Conference and gets hooked on the Bauhaus, the simplicity of the Bauhaus movement.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And I think it was, you know, his dad. When he was like six years old, they were making a fence around the backyard of the house and his father said, we have to make the back of the fence as pretty as the front. And Steve said, why? Nobody will ever know. And his father said, you'll know.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You'll know. You'll know.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And that's why in the Macintosh, which you couldn't open up, he made the first Mac, or for that matter the current Mac, with the screws that you can't actually open.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And he said, we've got to make the inside as beautiful as the outside. We'll know.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. We will know. We'll talk more with Walter Isaacson, author of the new book "Steve Jobs." Our number, 1-800-989-8255. You can tweet us at SciFri at S-C-I-F-R-I and go to our website at ScienceFriday.com and our Facebook page, SciFri. So stay with us. We'll be right back after this break.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're listening to SCIENCE FRIDAY. I am Ira Flatow talking with Walter Isaacson, author of the new book "Steve Jobs," and he's also the CEO of the Aspen Institute. Our number, 1-800-989-8255.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Walter, you have written about the biggest names in science and technology, Einstein, Ben Franklin. We'll throw Kissinger in there with it.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Political science.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Political science. And you must have thought about the comparisons between Steve and these other people.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Well, you know, I like writing about the life of the mind. I don't know. I think I was on your show once and I was talking about maybe writing about Louis Armstrong.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And I could never get my head into, you know, Louis Armstrong's head. I know everything about him except for whether he was happy. You know, major things, like how he thought. So I love interesting minds and, since you're the host of this show, you've probably met more smart people than anybody I know and you probably learned that smart people don't often amount to much. You know, it's really the creative people, the people who have an imaginative leap, an intuitive leap, who think different, as Steve said in the ads for the Apple computers.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: That's what I found in Einstein in particular. As you know, he wasn't the best physicist in 1905.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He couldn't even get a job at a university. He was working at a patent office. But he kind of thought differently. He said, well, how do we know time is absolute? Likewise, Steve was not the best engineer in Silicon Valley by a long shot, not nearly as good as his friend Steve Wozniak.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: But he was able to think different and imagine the future and, to me, we talk about the - I mean, the reason I write about scientists is I'm not a scientist, but I like combining science and the humanities. Sometimes we divide people, the people who are the science geeks and the people who are the humanities geeks. In some ways it's the combination of the humanities and the science that leads to great creativity. You see that in Ben Franklin, you see it in Albert Einstein, and you see it, of course, in Steve Jobs.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Where did he get his passion for arts and design that he put in? I remember from the early days of the Mac, and one thing that set the early Mac apart is it had all the calligraphy in it. He used to...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He drops out of - yeah.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You know, he had all these fonts you never heard of and he kept putting them in there himself.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I know. He kept designing the fonts. He drops out of Reed College, but the one thing he does is he just hangs around, stays on campus and takes a calligraphy course. He loves the beautiful lettering of fonts. And so when he develops the Macintosh, it has a bitmap screen, which means instead of just characters, you can actually take each pixel and each pixel is connected, is mapped to a part of the microprocessor. So you can make a sans-serif font or a script or whatever you want.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: So he gets Susan Kare, this wonderful young designer, and Andy Hertzfeld, and they're designing fonts so that the type on your screen doesn't look like that horrible ASCII text you and I are old enough to remember on computers in the old days.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And he would spend the nights looking at the fonts, and the people on the board and the top management of Apple were like, fonts? Why are we dealing with this? And at one point Susan Kare, who designed some of the fonts, named them after her hometown of Philadelphia, the stops on the mainline train, like Rosemont.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And he said, these are first-class fonts. We have to name them after first-class cities. And that's why the fonts you see now are named New York, Geneva.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Oh.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: You know, all the names of great cities.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And he was obsessed with the tiniest details of his products, almost to the point of distraction. You talk about, in the book, just choosing the right shade of beige for the computer case.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Yeah.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: The perfect...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Pantone is one of these color companies that has probably thousands of shades of beige. None suited him. This drove the other people at Apple nuts. I mean, we're talking about, you know, the late 1970s, before they were a big old company.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Likewise, it continues throughout his career. There's a wonderful scene, when they come out with the iMac, that sort of translucent, Bondi blue, I think it's '98, 1999, and there he is yelling at poor Lee Clow that the pictures of it - it's not f-ing blue enough.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And just, even when they do the original Mac, Bill Atkinson makes perfect squares that they can render instantly. He also makes perfect circles they can render instantly. Steve says, but we need rounded rectangles. And Atkinson says, no, that's almost impossible to do. He said, no. And he makes him go on a walk and look at the windows and look at the no parking signs and look at mirrors, look at the screens of a computer and say, everything is a rectangle with rounded corners.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And Bill Atkinson has to figure out a sequence of numbers, you know, so he can produce square roots, which the microchip they had - microprocessor they had couldn't do so that he could produce rounded recs, which is why, when you're looking at that computer screen, the wonderful little folders and icons, all of which have rounded corners on their rectangles.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: 1-800-989-8255. Let's see if we can get a call or two in here. Let's go to Jenna in St. Mary's, Kansas. Hi, Jenna. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>JENNA: Hi. Thanks. I'm glad you took my call.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Go ahead.</s>JENNA: I was wondering, after all those interviews with him, I mean, you point out his eye for detail and his drive for perfection. Do you think that's what made him successful?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I think the ability to connect artistry to science is what made him successful. He was somebody who felt a deep emotional attachment to beauty. He'd sometimes cry when he talked about a beautiful object or when he talked about a letter he was going to write his wife on his anniversary or when he would, you know, talk about an advertising copy for the Think Different ads. He felt poetic beauty was something that made you cry and he drove engineers to be able to do it. To me, that's the real source of his genius.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Thank you, Jenna.</s>JENNA: Thank you, thank you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're welcome.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Thanks, Jen.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You know, it reminds me of a Richard Feynman statement about looking at a flower.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Yeah.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And he says, you know, as an artist looks at a flower, you see the colors and, you know, the shape, but I know what's working inside the flower and I see more beauty than you do because I know the details.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: One day, when they have flat screens and they're trying to make the new iMac using a flat screen, Jony Ive, the world's greatest industrial designer, is working with Steve at Apple and he comes up with something in which there's the computer attached to the back of the flat screen. And Steve says he hates it, probably in the same words he used to tell me he hated the original cover of the book. And he says it doesn't have integrity. It's not true to the flat screen nature, which is supposed to float and feel free.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: So he just goes home - Jobs does - and sits in his backyard and then Jony comes over to see him and there's a profusion of sunflowers in the backyard and as they look at the sunflower, they figure out - oh, that's what computers will look like. They'll have that wonderful curved neck and that will be something that will hold the screen so it floats and feels as if it were at your disposal.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And the curved neck of that new iMac, which you've seen, the Sunflower iMac...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: ...Steve Jobs has a patent, a design patent on it, in his own name from sitting in the backyard thinking that up.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is that the domed one with the white dome on the bottom and...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Yeah. The one - yeah.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I have that in my office.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Oh, you're dating yourself, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I go further back than that. 1-800-989-8255. One of the things I've wondered about, and I've heard him quoted as saying this - why are his products made overseas? I would think that the only legacy - the only way he could have had a legacy better than the icon that he is now is to have created all these jobs for his products, jobs in this country. He used to talk about - I can't get a factory built here. It takes 40,000 steps to get a factory built here. I can do it all overseas.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Did he ever talk about any of that?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And it's true. Totally. He talked about it all the time, and he talked about it to President Obama. He had a couple of meetings with Obama, a dinner with Obama. Obama came to the Westin Hotel in San Francisco to see him, and that's what Steve talked about, which is two things. If you want to build a factory in China, you can do it in six months and in the first three months you can start moving people in as the, you know, the top floors are being built.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Now, that's probably not the way we want to do it in the United States. On the other hand, you go to the other extreme. You want to build a factory in California, you know, you have six months just filling out the forms for the regulations and the environmental reviews or whatever it may be. I believe in all of those things, but I believe there's some happy medium so you can build a factory.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Secondly, he said our country does not turn out enough trained engineers anymore to support factory workers. There are about 700,000 factory workers at Foxconn, which is the Chinese companies and Taiwanese-owned companies that build a lot of Apple products. To support 700,000 engineers, 700,000 factory workers, you need about 30,000 engineers. That's the ratio.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: We're not talking about engineers, you know, who went to Cal Tech, MIT or Harvard necessarily. We're talking about people like my dad, who went to LSU or Tulane or a community college and got great industrial engineering degrees and could help work and build things in this country.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: We no longer create the number of engineers, and if we train an engineer from another country, as soon as they get their engineering degree, instead of stapling a green card to their visa, we kick them out of the country. And he said, I'm not going to be able to build factories unless there are enough engineers and our school systems stink. He actually used a stronger word, but - yeah.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So he was aware that that was a shortcoming and that's something we should be working on and speaking to the president about it.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Oh, yeah. He was very aware, very worried about the state of education in America. I think he would have been - look, when he built the original Mac, he built a beautiful state-of-the-art factory in Fremont, California. He made the walls totally painted white. He wanted it to be a showcase. Same thing happens when he does NeXT Computer. But nowadays, he says it's hard to build a factory, and it's hard to get the engineers to staff a factory. I'm sure there are people who can do it, but it would be nice if we had a country that made this easier.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Manufacturing is very important to this country. You're not going to have great industrial design, great engineers or great, you know, product people once you allow all the manufacturing to go overseas.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So it was not just a question of profit margin, making it cheaper.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I don't think Steve was ever driven by pure profits. He was driven by making insanely great products, and those aren't the same thing. Everything you do, he says, if your goal is to make a great product, is different than if your goal is to make a profit - the people you promote, the people you hire, the way you do things, the way you build the inside of the machine. I think that, obviously, with any company, they'd be insane not to try to figure out how to make a profit. On the other hand, I think he would have been happy to have factories in the United States if you could build great products.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Talking with Walter Isaacson, author of "Steve Jobs," by Walter Isaacson, a terrific book and very easy to read. And as a geek myself, I was struck by the back cover, which a lot of people don't look at a lot, and it has the young Steve Jobs with the original iMac in it.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And you notice how he's sitting, the lotus position.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes. The...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He had just finished his Buddhist training.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And, you know, the geek in me is saying: Look, there's a floppy disc in the machine.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And it looks like a human face with a smile, which is the way he wanted it designed.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is that right?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He said I want it friendly, and you see that strip on the top...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: ...of the original Mac?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He kept saying make it narrower. It looks like a Neanderthal. I want it to like a friendly person. I want it to look like a smile.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And when it booted up, if I remember, it had that smiling face.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: It said hello with a smiling face.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And that was it. The designers of the original Mac kept saying: We did not know what it meant when he kept saying make it friendlier. But even when you get to the current desktop computers of Apple, the iMacs and stuff, for a while, he put a recessed handle in it - not because you're going to carry your desktop around, but he said the handle made it clear that the computer defers to you, and you can touch it, and made it friendly.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah. I remember that. They came in colors and...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: You know, the fact that he's sitting in the lotus position amused me, too, because one of his strengths, too, was combining that counterculture of the late '60s and early '70s, that quest for enlightenment with the scientific Silicon Valley culture. You found that in California then, people who went off to India to seek spiritual enlightenment, but who were also president of the electronics club. And Steve is the embodiment of that Whole Earth Catalog, tools for living that took computers which used to be sort of tools of the power structure and unfriendly, and said, no. They empower you. They're your friend. They're personal.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Talking with Walter Isaacson on SCIENCE FRIDAY, from NPR. I'm Ira Flatow, talking about his new book, "Steve Jobs." That's all that had to be said in the title, didn't it? "Steve Jobs."</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I know. The original title, we thought it was iSteve.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: iSteve.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: My daughter, you know, she's at college. She said that was the stupidest, geekiest thing. My wife hated it, and Steve hated it. And I said wait a minute. What would Steve Jobs do? You know? A simple title.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is it enough for us to just say Steve, and everybody knows who we're talking about?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I don't - I guess so. I'm not sure, you know, a generation from now. But Steve Jobs, it's like Apple Computer. It's a simple, direct name.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Did he ever think about - and I have thought about this over the years, if we wanted to retool - you talk about his business acumen, and that was one of his strengths. We wanted to retool manufacturing, especially the car industry, the year they almost went bankrupt, why couldn't Steve been assigned to build to build an iCar, and come up with an idea like that?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: You know, he talked to me about that. He said, you know, if I really had another career and another life, I'd love to build a car. And you know why? His father was an auto mechanic, the guy who adopted him, Paul Jobs. He repossessed cars from people who couldn't pay their loan - I mean, for the finance company, but then he fixed them up and sold them back. And what Steve learned from watching his father is how a car company integrates everything. You don't have to go buy the software somewhere and the engine somewhere and the headlights somewhere and the chassis somewhere.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: It's all built together in an integrated fashion, and that's what Steve Jobs liked to do with his computers, unlike, say, Dell or Microsoft, where somebody makes the hardware, somebody makes the software. And at the end, I asked him: This end-to-end integration of product, who else does it well? I mean, who - I was seeing if there's any other technology company. He said no technology companies. The companies that do it well are the car companies. And then, he paused, and he said: Or, at least they used to.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: So he always told me if he had had another career, he would have loved to build the greatest car. I think this is true of television, as well. I mean, you talk about brain-dead products.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Right.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: The fact that your VCR has a remote control that is totally complicated and unconnected to the remote control with your TV that's hooked up to a cable box, all totally - you should be able to do what you do with your iPad: pull it out of a box, you know, boot it up, and it'll do what you want.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Did he figure that out before (unintelligible)?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He said he cracked it. He said he cracked the interface, how to make it simple. And I also think it was part of the philosophy of iCloud, that every device you have - your iPod, your iPhone - it should have synchronized automatically your pictures, your music, your video, the things you want to watch. Life should be simple. And it was Michelangelo who said it: Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. And that became Steve's mantra.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And there was another - I can't remember, the technologist is either or the author is either Isaac Asimov or one of the other people who said that the best technology, not only is it magical, but you don't have to know that it's there when it's working.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: That's the iPad. Everything he did had a certain magical quality. You're right.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Mm-hmm. 1-800-989-8255 is our number. I only have about a minute to the break, and Walter will be staying with us. Did he know - can he look at something and say, you know, this is something you'll want to have, even before I make it, you know, but you're going to want it now?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: You know, at the first retreat that the Macintosh team takes in the early 1980s, somebody says, we ought to have some focus groups to see what people want. And Steve says: How do people know what they want until we've shown them? And he quoted Henry Ford, saying: "If I had done focus groups, people would have told me they wanted a faster horse." So he said - at the end of the book, I just have him talking about his legacy, he says: It's our job to read what's on the page before other people see it written on the page. And I think he had that emotional connection that allowed him to do that.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: 1-800-989-8255. Talking with Walter Isaacson. The book is "Steve Jobs." You can tweet us @scifri, and as I said, the number again: 1-800-989-8255. Stay with us. We'll be right back after this break.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY, from NPR.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're listening to SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow, talking with Walter Isaacson, author of the new book, "Steve Jobs." He's also the CEO of the Aspen Institute. Our number: 1-800-989-8255. Walter, you write in the book that you sometimes heard many different versions of how a particular meeting or relationship played out. You had one from Steve. You had four from others. How did you reconcile those different things?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Well, I think that's what journalists or writers try to do, is gather information, say: Here in my gut is what I think is true. And I don't think it's because people were misleading. It's just that he had a very strong personality and force field around him. So the day he resigned in August is, you know, a month or two ago, as CEO of Apple, I talked to him right after the resignation. He told me the whole story of what he said and what he did. And then, within a day, I talked to three people on the board, and they told me the whole story.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And there were, you know, some different versions of it. I think that a journalist can usually try to get at the truth, but you make mistakes. And then later on, you'll write and correct them. Also, you sometimes err on the side of kindness, because you could always take the most sensational story, the I-told-Steve-and-then-he-bit-my-head-off story. But you actually want to put it into a context of, oh, and then, we actually got the job done and Steve was right, and he made us do amazing things. So you try to put it in the context of here's the best explanation that helps you appreciate the guy.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Your book isn't very flattering in how it portrays Steve's relationship with other people sometimes.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Especially in the beginning.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yes.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He was a tough customer, very demanding. There's a passion for perfection, and he divides everybody into heroes and dunces. I mean, you know, either you're the best-ever artist, or you totally stink at what you do. And so he could be brutal. But as I said just a moment ago, I try to put it in the context of when he gets the team right, he's able to tell them you can shave 10 seconds off the boot-up time of the Mac. And they say no, that's impossible.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And he convinces them you can do it, and in the end, they shave 28 seconds off of it. So he's able to convince them they can do the impossible, sometimes by being very brusque and rude. He says, look. Brutal honesty is the price of admission for being in the room with me. I can tell you you're full of it. You can tell me I'm full of it. But in the end, they used to give an award at the old Macintosh team of the person who stood up to Steve the best during the year. It was usually won by a woman, you know, Joanna Hofmann, Debbie Coleman. They got promoted. They stuck with Steve.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: By the end, he's got - I mean, people would not have stayed with him if he were a true jerk. By the end of his career, both at Apple, everywhere else, he's got a very loyal set of topnotch players who actually are more faithful and loyal and inspired by him than in any other company has.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And in one of those instances you talk about in the book, occasionally, he appreciates it when sometimes being proven wrong, and I'm going to talk about the disc drive for the Macintosh.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Oh, that's where he finally talked to people around him: Sometimes you have to just defy me. For a while, they're doing the Mac, you know, the new - the original Macintosh. You're right, the first Macintosh. And he wants some disc drive that some company he thinks is better to make it. They know - the engineers - that that company is going to screw it up. So they secretly get Sony - a guy from Sony to help develop the disc drive. And whenever Steve comes around, they have to hide him.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And at one point, Steve came unexpectedly onto the engineering floor, and they pushed the poor Sony engineer into a closet. And he finally says I do not mind, but your American business habits are very strange. Steve, when he found out that they had done that - and frankly, it saved his bacon, because they did need the new drive - he just smiled and said I guess I taught you guys right.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: 1-800-989-8255. Let's see if we can get a phone call or two in here. Let's go to Bob in Plymouth, Michigan. Hi, Bob.</s>BOB: Oh, hi. Yeah. I wanted to ask Mr. Isaacson about the meeting between Steve Jobs and Ken Olsen from Digital Equipment. I don't know if that ever happened, but the rumor was around Digital in Maynard for a long time that that Steve wanted to talk to Ken about possibly, you know, working together. Ken, of course, didn't like PCs, but Digital was pretty good with networks. And I guess it's a little scary to think what Jobs and Ken together might have come up with regarding networking and Internets and so forth. Did he ever - does Mr. Isaacson know whether that actually happened or...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: No, I don't know much about that meeting. Steve met, of course, with all sorts of business leaders, and he said - in praising Bill Gates once, he said: We like to have end-to-end control at Apple, of the hardware, the software, the content and everything else. Because Microsoft will license out and work with others, they have embedded in their genetic code the ability to collaborate with other companies. And it's not one of the strengths of Apple, and it's not one of my strengths. And that's a nice way of saying that Steve often clashed with partners, rivals, whatever.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: He had a very good relationship with Intel, because they made the chips. But even then, with the great Paul Otellini running Intel, you know, there are times when they can't agree on making the right chip for the product that Apple wants. So Steve was not at his best when it came to making business alliances.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And his final relationship with Bill Gates, how did that wind up?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Absolutely astonishing. I mean, if you want a history of the digital age, you need to look at these two people. I call it a binary star system, which your listeners would appreciate, because it's, you know, two stars whose gravitational pull on each other causes their orbits to be linked.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Starting in the late '70s, Bill Gates, with a fledgling company called Microsoft, is writing Word programs and that, you know, spreadsheet programs for the Apple II and the original Mac. And...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: People forget that, that Bill Gates supplied the original...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: But that - oh they used to -</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: I remember that, you know.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Bill Gates told me - he said, I used to go to every one of those Hawaii marketing meetings for Apple and be there on, you know, fake game shows and dating games that we did together, and there for all the dances.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: They were very close. There was a rivalry and a respect, a friendship and a competition. And, of course, it got really bad when Bill Gates creates Windows, which Steve felt was a ripping off of the look and feel of the Macintosh operating system. You know, Bill Gates said, well, you know, we both ripped it off from Xerox, but, oh. I mean, it was - actually, I can understand why Steve was mad, because they had done great improvement.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And - but by the very end, this - you know, a few months ago, Bill comes by to visit and, you know, spends three hours talking with - at Steve's home in Palo Alto about the 30-some years they had spent together. And he even makes the admission that Steve - to Steve: Your way of integrating end-to-end products, that actually makes for beautiful products. And afterwards, Bill said, I said that to him, but I think only Steve Jobs could have done it. You had to have been an artist with a passion for detail and perfection to do that integration.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: When I told Steve that, he said, oh, no. That's bull. If Bill had wanted to, he could do it. But I said, well, who else did it? And that the conversation we had about car companies were the only ones he thought of who did end-to-end integration.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Was Steve angry about his impending death?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: No. I think, in fact, he kept believing he was going to outrun the cancer. He had his DNA sequenced. In fact, it was a whole genetic sequencing. And he was able to get molecular targeted therapy. You know, I talked at one point in the book about how he was trying to treat it with diets, but you have to realize he was also getting the most advanced scientific treatment that kept him alive for seven years. And even in my last meeting with him, just, you know, a month or two before he died, he was saying, oh, I'm going to go on this new drug regimen. I think it's going to carry me through for another year. I think I'm going to outrun it. He used to call it the lily pad. He thinks I'll get - he said, I think I'll get to the next lily pad.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: 1-800-989-8255. I'm talking with Walter Isaacson, author of the new book on Steve Jobs. Let's see if we can get a call or two here - in here. Alfredo in Cleveland. Hi.</s>ALFREDO: Hello, Ira. Hello, Walter.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Hello, sir.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Alfredo.</s>ALFREDO: I just want to hit three quick points. A friend's son just recently left Apple. As he described it - now, this is a PhD in engineering, from San Francisco over to China on a regular basis. And he left for what he described as a hostile work environment, which he felt was coming from the top-down. And all the descriptions of all the kindness and elevating Mr. Jobs to virtual sainthood is kind of looking at one side, and I think, Walter, you mentioned, erring on the side of kindness. I thought a journalist or author is supposed to err on the side of facts.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Well, you know, when you get six or seven versions of a story, you always try to say exactly what was the truth, and I always aimed for the honesty. I think if you look at the book, he would feel, you would feel that I tried to be very honest, including about the fact that he was not the most nurturing, sweetest of all bosses. And I hear where you're coming from. I do think there are lots of tales in the book in which I try to be very honest, but I do try to show that he does, by doing it, inspire most people - obviously, not everybody - but most people into being part of a loyal team that tends not to leave him.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And as far as workers in China being mistreated or that kind of criticism that was leveled against his company?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Yeah. You know, I can't sort of elevate him to sainthood there. He did not sit there as much and worry about the outsourcing to Foxconn, but they did. Apple, as a company, spent a lot of time trying to make sure conditions at Foxconn and in China were improved. And I think Steve spent a lot of time thinking about: How could we get more jobs back to America?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And so you think his legacy is intact?</s>WALTER ISAACSON: I think his legacy will always be a mixed one of somebody who had a very artistic temperament - which could make him difficult to deal with - but as a result created awesomely, insanely, great, beautiful, emotionally connective products. But even more importantly, I think his legacy will be the creation of Apple. When I asked him: What's your best creation? I thought he'd say the iPad. He said Apple Computer, because it is a place - which we don't realize, you can't just do startups and products. You have to leave a place that nurtures the idea that imagination should be connected to technology. And there are not as many places in this country as there should be that nurture that. People say: I want to do a startup. I want to sell it. Google does it well. Apple does it well. And I think imagination, creativity and technology should be welded. That will be his legacy.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: But it took a vision of - his vision to be able to hold it all together, that a piecemealing...</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Right. And the question is: Will Tim Cook and Jony Ive and the four or five other top players in Apple be able to have a collaborative joint vision that holds it together? Jony Ive is the best industrial designer of our era. Tim Cook is one of the best - probably the best manager, corporate manager of our era. I think those people can hold it together. Five or 10 years from now, we'll see.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right, Walter. Thank you very much for taking time to be with us.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: Ira, it's always a pleasure to be with you.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Walter Isaacson, author of the new book "Steve Jobs." It's a great read. It's a giant book, but it goes really, very, very fast right through it. And it's always a pleasure to have you. Thanks for coming.</s>WALTER ISAACSON: And I'll be back. I hope.
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To prevent harassment on TV and film sets, production houses are hiring so-called intimacy coordinators to oversee sex scenes. NPR's Michel Martin speaks with Ita O'Brien, who serves that role on Netflix's Sex Education.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: It's award season for the movie and television industries, which are still, as other workplaces are, grappling with the fallout from the #MeToo movement. But unlike other industries, entertainers are often called upon to have intimate contact with each other in ways that would be totally uncalled for in other workplaces.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So how to prevent abuse and harassment on set? To that end, some production houses are now hiring so-called intimacy coordinators to oversee sex scenes. HBO announced this fall that they would staff every one of its television shows and films that have intimate scenes with an intimacy coordinator. We wanted to understand more about what this work entails, so we've called Ita O'Brien. She is the intimacy coordinator for the new Netflix show "Sex Education." She's with us now from London.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Ms. O'Brien, thanks so much for talking to us.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ITA O'BRIEN: Thank you very much for inviting me.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So, first, what's the job description? What does an intimacy coordinator do for a production?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: O'BRIEN: The intimacy coordinator is someone who is practiced in putting in place a clear structure and a process to go through when choreographing a sex scene. So it allows for - to serve the director's vision, make sure the writing's served, and then putting a clear structure in place so that then the actor can choreograph the sex scenes safely. And then it means when they come to then actually acting it and filming it that everybody knows exactly what's happening, and then they can actually create and act the sex scene in a way better way than has been done before.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: If you weren't there, who would be doing that? The director?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: O'BRIEN: Yes. Yes, absolutely. And, of course, what's happened in the past, a lot of bad practice hasn't been because anybody's been sort of harassing or abusing but just because there hasn't been a clear structure put in place, and some very big different scenarios would happen - like, the director might talk about the scene very clearly about what they want but then just not know that the next stage is actually not just leave it to chance but then to create the structure and sculpt the sex scene so that everybody knows exactly what's happening. So in the past, they would've spoken about it, and then go, right. Just go for it. And then you get a situation where the actors are just improvising as best they can what's asked of them.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Another scenario that's happened is that, again, the director will talk about it really clearly. You know, the director isn't someone who's practiced in helping to choreograph physical bodies and physical bodies moving. So then they'll say, OK. You two go and work it out for yourselves. So then you're into a situation where actors are left in - rather than still being in a professional situation, they're suddenly thrown into a private situation and might go to their trailer, or they might, you know, go to a rehearsal room, but they're left to their own devices. And so then he's, like, oh, right. OK. You know, what are you happy with?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And you get situations where perhaps an actor with more experience - they might then take the lead. And, you know, it's basically a no-brainer. You know, when I bring this work in, everybody goes, oh, my goodness. This is just so obvious. And why hasn't it happened before now?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Well, that was what I was thinking - in the sense that fight coordinators have existed for years in Hollywood, that they choreograph fight scenes. It's interesting, though, that this work has only recently become part of the experience. But I think people are familiar with the abusive situations.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: I think the one that comes to mind for a lot of people is "Last Tango In Paris," where Maria Schneider says - for those who are familiar with the film - but it was in 1972, was a huge, you know, moment in film history - but a scene of violence between Maria Schneider and Marlon Brando. And Maria Schneider says that the director, who was a man - Bernardo Bertolucci - and Marlon Brando knew what was going to happen, but she didn't. And the director says that he wanted her to react - you know, he wanted her to really feel the humiliation of this scene.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Well, there's been a huge outcry about this subsequently. Many people - industry have talked about how just really wrong that is. But that happened in 1972. And yet, your work has only just - when has your role really become institutionalized?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: O'BRIEN: OK. So my understanding of it is, unfortunately, money speaks. And the thing is that a production is going to take care when they've deemed there to be a risk. There was a time - I think it was about 30 years ago - when people would do stunts, and there wasn't a stunt coordinator there. They'd just go ahead and do them. And, of course, people were injured.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So for years, as you said, "Last Tango In Paris" in the '70s - that we've known that doing an intimate scene while you're intimate and private personal body's being violated results in injury. But that injury is emotional and psychological. And my sense is that that hasn't been taken into account. It hasn't been deemed something that is - that they need to take care, and that someone might be able to call or address - you know, call out a miss, a wrongdoing, and therefore take action and be able to sue.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: For me, the shift has been post-Weinstein. So post-Weinstein, the time's up - the fact that, you know, you are being listened to and heard. And that's the difference - the understanding that the injury - it can be physical, but it's emotional and psychological is now being given credence. And codes of conduct is about what we don't want. We don't want abuse. We don't want harassment. But the intimacy guidelines, the intimacy on set guidelines gives a clear process that allows for transparency and for agreement and consent so that then everybody is on the same page. And then you can get a fabulous sex scene. You can get a fabulous moment of passion.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: But, you know, the show that you worked on, "Sex Education," centers on sexual situations. I mean, it's about a high school student who's the son of a sex therapist who gives sex advice to his peers. Well, the reason I'm curious about this is that in part because of the whole question of consent is very, very important when it comes to people who are underage. But the also - other question I have is, these are people who one assumes are still pretty new at this game, right? And are they really going to say no if they're uncomfortable with something?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: O'BRIEN: So, first of all, obviously, none of the actors who were cast in the roles that had their sex scenes were under 18. Everybody was sort of - absolutely over 18, you know, mostly into their 20s, early 20s. But you're absolutely right. There were - a lot of the actors were very new out of drama school and, you know, very often hadn't done - hadn't been asked to do a sex scene on set before. So that's where the production knew that they needed to take care of the actors and help support the actors in how to do the sex scenes and how to do them safely, which is where they contacted me and brought me in on the production.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: How did you come to this work?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: O'BRIEN: So I came to this work through my work as a movement director and when I was creating work around abuse, looking at the dynamic of abuse in our society. This - that was in 2014. And when I started looking at how at bringing actors together, inviting them to do the research and in order to explore the abuser and the perpetrator, I was looking at, how do I keep my actors safe? What practices and processes should I put in place in order to create a safe rehearsal room?</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And so, in a way, for me, that was the beginning of it. I started looking at structures and processes that kept the actors safe so they could create the intimate work, create these - you know, explore the relationship to those dynamic, but do it in a safe way.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's Ita O'Brien. She is the intimacy coordinator for the Netflix show "Sex Education."</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Ita O'Brien, thanks so much for talking to us.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: O'BRIEN: Thank you very much for inviting me.
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In Venezuela, opposition leader Juan Guaido has called for nationwide protests aimed at ousting President Nicolas Maduro. Maduro is asking his supporters to come out in counterprotest.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Now to Venezuela, where the struggle for power spilled into the streets of its capital, Caracas, today. In one part of town, there was this.</s>UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: (Cheering).</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: They're cheering on opposition leader Juan Guaido, the 35-year-old politician spearheading the U.S.-backed campaign to oust President Nicolas Maduro. And in another part of town...</s>PRESIDENT NICOLAS MADURO: (Singing in Spanish).</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: A defiant Maduro broke into song in front of a big crowd of his own. We're joined now from Caracas by NPR's Philip Reeves.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Philip, thanks so much for talking to us.</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: You're welcome.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Maduro sounds positively cheerful. Is that real? How is that possible given the situation he's in?</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: It is remarkable considering the amount of pressure that he's under - pressure at home by the emergence of this new, young and, until recently, little-known opposition politician, pressure because the U.S. and much of the Western Hemisphere recognizes Guaido and not Maduro as head of state and pressure because the U.S. has cut off Maduro's government from a large and crucial chunk of its oil income. Yet, there he is - there Maduro is in front of a crowd of loyalists, cadres in red hats and shirts, the uniform of the ruling Socialist Party. There is dancing and saying he won't surrender and lambasting Trump, Bolton and Pompeo and the U.S. government in general as authors of an attempted coup against him.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: What about Guaido? Can you tell us about the demonstration in support of him? What was that like? Was it big? And does it make a difference?</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: Yes, I was there. It was very large - not, perhaps, as large as the crowd that turned out to see Guaido take an oath of office 10 days ago declaring himself to be the legitimate interim president, but tens of thousands of people all the same. Guaido does have to keep the momentum going if he is to oust Maduro. And, you know, I asked people about that, whether they were going to carry on or whether they felt they could carry on. And the answer I got generally was that yes, they would keep going. This is Luis (ph), an engineer who wouldn't give his full name for fear of reprisals.</s>LUIS: What is there to lose? If you don't have anything to eat, you don't have anything to look forward to. It comes a moment where you say, well, what the hell?</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: So when Guaido got on the stage, he stood at a podium decorated with the presidential seal. I think he's looking - he's getting more presidential, and personally, I think it bears some similarity to the style and speech of President Obama. And one key thing that came out of his speech - he says he's going to try to move humanitarian aid into Venezuela to help the widespread poverty that's been caused by chronic shortages and hyperinflation and so on.</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: And that means he's opening up an important new frontier in the challenge to Maduro. It's testing the Maduro government's military. Will they allow this aid in? A lot of people really need it. Or will they follow Maduro's orders? And, you know, when you've got an army in which soldiers lower down the ranks are themselves hungry and poor, that is going to be a very considerable test of their loyalty.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And there was news today that an Air Force general has broken from the government and has recognized Guaido as president. Is that significant?</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: Well, Guaido has - you know, for the last 10 days, he's been saying consistently that he wants the armed forces to come to his side. And he's been offering an amnesty, knowing that if they do that, then Maduro would certainly fall. This guy is an Air Force general at divisional level, which means he's two tiers down from the absolutely highest command. And he posted a video online recognizing Guaido as the legitimate head of state calling Maduro a dictator.</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: He says that 90 percent of the armed forces are against Maduro, and he encouraged others in the armed forces to follow his example. He is one of hundreds of generals, but nonetheless, this is a victory for Guaido. You know, he has been offering this amnesty. And, you know, he'll be hoping that this will be the start of a domino effect and that Maduro's military power base will evaporate eventually.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's NPR's Philip Reeves reporting from Caracas, the capital of Venezuela.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Philip, thank you.</s>PHILIP REEVES, BYLINE: You're welcome.
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Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam insists that he is not in a racist photo in his yearbook and says he will not resign.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We're going to start the program today in Virginia, where Governor Ralph Northam says he will not step down over a racist photo on his yearbook page, despite calls from both national and state Democrats for him to do so. The photo in question shows a person in blackface standing next to another in a Ku Klux Klan robe. Yesterday, Northam said that he was in that photo, and he apologized for it. Today, in a reversal, he had this to say.</s>RALPH NORTHAM: When I was confronted with the images yesterday, I was appalled that they appeared on my page. But I believed then and now that I am not either of the people in that photo.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Northam said that he is sorry for the pain caused by the photo, but he wants time to earn the forgiveness and trust of the Virginians - Virginian voters and look further into the origin of the picture. NPR's Sarah McCammon was at that remarkable press conference in Richmond, and she is with us now.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Sarah, thanks so much for joining us.</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Hi, Michel.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So Governor Northam said first he was not in the photo, said he was in the photo, then he says he was not in the photo.</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Right.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: How is he explaining what happened?</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: So yeah. That photo surfaced yesterday on a conservative-leaning website, and it was quickly confirmed by multiple media outlets, including NPR. And Northam's response was to release two statements, one a video statement, last night acknowledging he was in it, apologizing for it. Now Governor Northam says he's spent the past 12 hours or so talking to lots of people, including some of his med school classmates, and he says it's not him, and that he does not believe he should heed the calls to step down.</s>RALPH NORTHAM: I could spare myself from the difficult path that lies ahead. I could avoid an honest conversation about harmful actions from my past. I cannot in good conscience choose the path that would be easier for me in an effort to duck my responsibility to reconcile.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Now, Sarah, the governor acknowledged that a lot of people are going to have a hard time believing him, particularly after he first said that he was in the photo and apologized for it. So how did he explain all that?</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Well, he says things happened really quickly yesterday, and there was a lot of hurt, and he felt he had to respond. He says he's had some time since then to look at the picture more closely and think about this, and he's sure it's not him. And, Michel, one of the reasons he says he knows this wasn't him is because he remembers another incident around the same time that he remembers with regret. He says he did darken his face - and this was in the mid-'80s at a costume party where he dressed as Michael Jackson</s>RALPH NORTHAM: And I used just a little bit of shoe polish to put under my - or on my cheeks. And the reason I used a very little bit is because I don't know if anybody's ever tried that, but you cannot get shoe polish off.</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: And he says after that, he had a conversation with a friend who helped explain how offensive that is, and he regrets doing it.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Well, even before he acknowledged that there was an incident involving blackface, politicians, groups across the country on both sides of the aisle, but particularly, it has to be said, Democrats have been calling on Northam to resign. Does his press Congress's latest statement appear to have changed anybody's mind?</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Not really. I mean, calls were coming in, I should say, even right up before, moments before that press conference. The Democratic Governors Association, the Virginia ACLU, which are usually allies to Governor Northam, called for him to resign just before he took the podium. And in the aftermath, a lot of others have doubled down on their calls for resignation, including the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus, House and Senate Democrats and others. So this does not appear to be stemming the tide of calls for his resignation, Michel - at least, not in the short term.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So what happens now? The governor said that he's staying in office, but he's clearly facing a lot of opposition. How does he plan to address all this in the days ahead?</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: He says he wants to keep looking into the photo, how it got into his yearbook. He says there may have been some kind of a mix-up. And he said he didn't even buy that yearbook, so he doesn't know how that photo got there, didn't know it was there until recently. He said maybe even using some facial recognition technology could help. He's also asked Virginians for time to earn their forgiveness, and he says he wants to have more open conversations about race.</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: But there is growing concern here, Michel, among Democrats both about the message this sends and also what kind of a leader Ralph Northam can be in Virginia. He's got another three years left in his term as governor, and I've heard a lot of concern here just about how he can lead. I also asked him during that press conference if, after these conversations continue, there are still calls from groups like the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus for him to resign, would he heed those calls? He said he would consider it, but he didn't make a firm commitment.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's NPR's Sarah McCammon.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Sarah, thank you so much.</s>SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Thank you.
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The new CBS crime drama Person of Interest tells the story of two men who help stop crimes before they happen. It's been praised for raising questions about the role of surveillance in society. Jonathan Nolan created the show, and J.J. Abrams, the man behind Lost, is executive producer.
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JOHN DONVAN, host: The new CBS crime drama "Person of Interest" tells the story of two men who prevent crimes before they can be committed. Excuse me. They find out about the crimes by looking at data gathered by intelligence surveillance designed to catch terrorists. The series was picked up by CBS after the network says it tested better than any other series in recent memory.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: The show's producer is J.J. Abrams, creator of the hit show "Lost," and Jonathan Nolan, who co-wrote "The Dark Knight." He created that series and also produces it. Both men have brought their knowledge of suspense and crime to the meaty subject of privacy and surveillance. But in a time of rapid advancement of technology and heightened terrorist suspicion, it's unclear to some where the line of fiction ends and where reality begins.</s>So if you have seen the show, we want to know: Is it about you? Do you feel like you're being watched, and do you care? Or is this clearly fiction? Our number is 800-989-8255. Our email address is [email protected]. And you can join the conversation at our website. Go to npr.org and click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>So if you have seen the show, we want to know: Joining me now to talk about the series are the executive producers Jonathan Nolan and J.J. Abrams. Welcome to both of you.</s>So if you have seen the show, we want to know: J.J. ABRAMS: Hi.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Thank you so much.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So CBS is saying that this show has tested better than any other show in recent memory. What do you think happened here? Why does this resonate with viewers?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: I think it feels like there's sort of an undercurrent here that we've tapped into. We like to say - I mean, there's a heightened aspect to this show. We like to say that reality is one firmware upgrade away from the show. That's the difference.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And am I speaking with Jonathan or J.J.?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: This is Jonathan.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: OK, Jonathan. Thank you. I needed to clarify that. J.J., hello to you, as well.</s>ABRAMS: Hello.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. I just wanted to establish the different tones in your voices. So the two main characters use this database that - they call it the machine, and it collects information from everywhere - phone calls, credit card records, Internet searches - and works on the notion that you can find patterns in these things using algorithms, and, in theory, find out what people are doing.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So Michael Emerson, who played the fantastic character of Benjamin Linus in "Lost," is now Finch in this program. He plays the billionaire who invented this system and is now putting it to something of a private use. Let's listen to him as he describes it to somebody in the program.</s>MICHAEL EMERSON: (as Finch) This thing looks for plotters, for schemers. It looks for malicious intent. We built it to stop terrorists before they could act. But a machine doesn't understand the difference between those crimes that are relevant to national security and the ones that are irrelevant.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So what happens in the program is he and a colleague, whom he hires, go out to solve the crimes that are considered irrelevant, or to at least to approach, look up - look at and investigate the acts of violence that are irrelevant. And those can be mafia hits and lovers' quarrels, all sorts of things like that. And what's really interesting - and you alluded to this a little bit, Jonathan - is the plausibility of this. Is this something that could be for real soon, now?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Well, the government's been actively trying to build something exactly like this for at least 15 years. So the science fiction sort of question of the show is simply whether or not, you know, the government's competent enough to have achieved it. That's really the only question you have to ask yourself.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: John Poindexter - famously of the Iran-Contra affair back in the day - was heading DARPA in 2003 and 2004 and tried to build something called the Total Information Awareness program, which was basically exactly what we sort of postulate in the show...</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But Congress did - Congress found out and shut them down, we think.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: What happened kind of hilariously is that Congress found out and shut down the program in DARPA, and what happened was Poindexter moved it into the NSA. So it went from being in the public eye to being top secret. So we really have no idea what happened to that program.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: J.J., the part of this that I think also connects with every viewer who's a citizen of this country and a member of the culture, we all leave bread crumbs behind us every day. We leave markers to where we've been and maybe somebody could figure out where we're going, but we go through toll booths and past cameras and we swipe credit cards and we go online and do searches. And I kind of want to get a sense of whether that's what you're tapping into, is the notion that it's not just some bad guy who's being watched and is out there, but it's kind of all of us.</s>ABRAMS: I think that when you look around, when you become aware - or in Jonathan's case - hyperaware of the cameras that are watching all of us, you realize that over the course of any hour and any day, you're being observed almost constantly. And when you watch any documentary or reality show, you see how people become so accustomed to cameras on them, that the cameras go away. They become invisible, and the people just behave. And that's kind of what we've all been conditioned to do. We're all in a reality program.</s>ABRAMS: And if you just realize how many cameras are actually on you, and you think for a second, oh, there's someone behind those cameras, they're just not, you know, cameras. They're cameras that are wired and tapped into networks that are observed. I mean, people are observing these things. And that was really, for me, the most provocative aspect of this pitch that Jonah had, which was: Who's watching? And what would happen if someone was watching and was able to predict crime?</s>ABRAMS: And we've all seen crime shows. But crime shows are usually a reaction to a crime that's preexisted, that happens, you know, just when the show begins. And this show posits: What would happen if we could prevent a crime? And you don't know if the person of interest every week is going to be a victim or a perpetrator.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Right. You don't know who your bad guy is. We're asking our listeners who are your viewers, fans of the show, to tell us whether they connect with it on that basis. And so we want to go now to Justin in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Justin, you're on TALK OF THE NATION. Welcome.</s>JUSTIN: Hello. Thank you for taking my call.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: So, you're...</s>JUSTIN: I think the show is great. I really enjoy it. I find that it's very realistic. It's like we are being watched all the time. Like I said, I'm 21. I'm a student at Western. And it's like any time you go into the store or go into the university, you're being watched. I don't - I couldn't say I really care much, because I feel like it's going to happen, anyway, yet it does make you think, like, who's actually watching the cameras.</s>ABRAMS: It's funny, the day that we went to CBS to talk about how they were going to present the show and how it was going to be, you know, premiered and everything, as a joke, they showed a little video at the beginning of the meeting that was of Jonathan pulling into the lot, going to his parking space, parking, getting out, walking, getting into the building, into the elevator, going the stair - and it was - I think there were, like, a dozen cameras, and none of them are placed there. They were all just the actual cameras they have.</s>ABRAMS: But the fact that they were able to cut that together in, you know, the 20 minutes before the meeting began was crazy. And it was a joke, but it wasn't. It was a real reminder that this was all real. This is all out there. So I think that that sense of being watched is not an illusion.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And it's not just watching. Finch makes the point that it's all kinds of data, and this - it reminds me of, you know, when you get the phone call from your credit card company that says we want to make sure that you've made these last three charges because they look suspicious to us, tells you, number one, they're watching and, number two, that they have ways of translating the data, figuring out a pattern or profile that either is you or isn't you. And you addressed that, as well, that it's not just about cameras. Although visually it works terrifically, it's more than just cameras, isn't it?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Cameras, in many ways, are the least sophisticated part of what we're doing, but certainly the most visually exciting. So we use a lot of them in the show. But I think the credit card example is a fantastic example. I mean, the credit card companies, for years, have been working on algorithms that essentially predict what you would do. And then when something falls outside of your - what they consider your normal behavior - an impulse purchase, a splurge, something like that - you get a phone call. It's sort of exactly the same technology.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But we think we want that one. I think we think we want that one. I think...</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Well, that's the thing. It's, like, where do you draw that line?</s>ABRAMS: And it's not just what you do but where you are. I mean, it's - it really is incredible how this is about tracking you. But the show "Person of Interest" is really much more about these two heroes. I mean, they're unlikely in the techniques they're using are technologically, you know, titillating and interesting. But the action of the show is essentially - and I love this when Jonathan pitched the idea. It felt like a superhero show without capes, without costumes.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Finally got rid of the cape.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Paul is in Orange Park, Florida. Paul, you're on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>PAUL: Yes. Sixty-one years old and would not want to go to the extreme of saying I'm paranoid, but I feel as though the government, at all levels, is aware of what I do and where I go and how I manage my money.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Yeah, you're paranoid. Just kidding. Just joking.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: He is just joking. But Jonathan, I want to take - I mean, you've obviously given a great deal of thought to this and wanted plausibility. In your heart of hearts, to what degree do you think the government actually is collecting all of this stuff on us?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: In my heart of hearts, I think, having lived in D.C. for five years, sadly, I think the answer is probably that the thing protecting us most is a level of technical sophistication, that it's difficult to build this sort of thing that we present in the show. And so if you consider how buggy half the software you use in your life is, then hopefully that's protecting us.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Paul, do you change the way you live your life because of this sense that they're out there watching you, that you could be seen?</s>PAUL: I'm disconnecting, you know, taking more of my financial transactions offline as, you know, you might say. I avoid public places and - not that I'm doing anything wrong. I'm not. I'm a law-abiding citizen, but you saw the latest news about the GPS trackers that law enforcement felt no compulsion to have a court order to put on people.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right, Paul. Thanks very much for your call. Thanks for joining us. I'd like to go to Amy in San Francisco.</s>AMY: Hi. I actually have a complete opposite view. I feel like we're in a limbo land, maybe, where a while ago, when there was just a few cameras, it felt like there was a lot of focus going on. But now, as we have more cameras, there are so many people and so much information out there, that we feel a certain anonymity. And it might be that, eventually, we got more technology to be able to track everybody.</s>AMY: But there's no way that the government knows what I have bought, et cetera, or at least enough to keep track of. Sure, if I become a person of interest in a real sense, from, I mean, in an investigation, maybe that would happen. But I know from my investigations of things that I do for work, there's no way I could keep track of that many things at that many times.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: All right. Thanks, Amy, for your comment. And we've heard from Rita by email, who says, for me, it is all about the two stars of the show: one a nerdy, physically compromised brainiac - that would be Finch, played by Michael Emerson - and one drop-dead gorgeous, highly confident partner who work together for the good of all - that would be Reese, played by Jim Caviezel. In the back of my mind, she says, it's the unlikelihood that our government could do anything that well - which is your point, Jonathan. Your hope - you're betting on incompetence. I love the show. I live in the boondocks to know why I live there. Thanks for the program.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: But speaking of what can be done and some of the gee-whiz, there's a scene in which Reese early on - actually, in the first episode - and he said - that happens a few times. He kind of hijacks another person's cell phone. He can hear everything that's on the phone, and he can hear everything that happens in the room where the phone might be resting at any particular moment. And he basically has control over it. So is that make believe, or is that doable now?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Well, that's - if your phone - if you look at your phone and it's newer than six or seven years old, if it was made since 2005, the government compelled the manufacturers and the carriers to set aside enough bandwidth and the capability to turn on that microphone. So if your phone is new and - you know, it was built in the last couple of years, and it's got power and it's within range of a cell tower, the government could be listening to you.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: In terms of what they do with - in the show, it's called bluejacking. And if you've kept your phone up to date, it's harder to do it these days. But it's certainly not impossible. And if you look at a couple of cases over the last couple of years with laptops and with cell phones, one with laptops where there was a school - I believe in Midwest, I think in Ohio - where they'd given the kids laptops, and surreptitiously started turning on the cameras in the laptops and watching people, watching students at home. It's a massive class action lawsuit now.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: I think the idea that we're really drawn to here is that a lot of these devices that we take with us, whether it's a laptop or a cell phone, are sort of functioning as - sort of a like a Trojan horse, you know. And this is why we're sort of seeing a firmware upgrade aspect of it, because we've all got the hardware. We carry it with us everywhere.</s>ABRAMS: For the true conspiracy theorists, I think the irony is that we're actually all paying to be monitored, you know, or to have the ability to be monitored. It's really kind of amazing.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Julie in St. Louis, you're on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>JULIE: Hi. This is Julie. I wanted to comment on the use of the technology as a deterrent in crime in the show, and if it exists currently. These surveillances are secretive, and people don't know about them. But if they were more public, do you think that would defer people from committing crimes in the first place by raising the cost of the crime?</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: J.J., you want to take that?</s>ABRAMS: Well, it's an interesting question. I mean, I don't know, you know, how much you want to make people aware of, you know, how much the government will want to make people aware of what they're actually doing. And my guess is that - and funding is certainly a part of it. But I think one of the reasons that DARPA went NSA is that it was, you know, it became sort of, essentially, a black ops. And I think there's a kind of - I'm sure there's a strategy involved in that regard.</s>ABRAMS: And as someone who, like, I'm sure most every listener feels like they have nothing to hide, and therefore they go about their business. There is something sort of fundamentally unnerving about the notion, as public as they may make it, that we are being watched. But, of course, anything that would help prevent any kind of a serious crime is only a good thing.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Are your two heroes also violating everybody else's privacy by reading this material off of the machine?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Yup. Yup.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: Is that a problem?</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: I think it's one of the paradoxes we sort of play with in the show and one of the questions that Finch asks himself. I think it's really important - you know, I mean, I don't - I think, although it's apparent, I don't have - I'm pretty torn myself about the idea of surveillance in this way. You know, I grew up in England, where the Panopticon and the idea of a total surveillance state was a given. And they actually put the cameras up in a very - very prominent locations. So it was a deterrent, as the last caller was sort of asking about.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: I think, you know, for our characters, the idea is they're sort of taking the surveillance state - and much as the show is about the idea of the surveillance state and asking that question, it's also assuming the surveillance state. It's here. We're sort of stuck with it.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: I took note of Finch saying at one point the best place to hide is in plain sight. But I think the message that your show also tells us that now everywhere is in plain sight, and that maybe there's nowhere left to hide. All right, guys, I want to thank you. Jonathan Nolan is creator and executive producer of the new CBS drama "Person of Interest," which airs on Thursdays. He joined us from our New York bureau. J.J. Abrams is the executive producer, and he joined us from NPR West. Thanks, both, for joining us.</s>JONATHAN NOLAN: Thank you.</s>ABRAMS: Thank you.</s>JOHN DONVAN, host: And tomorrow, a new book focuses attention on the Trail of Tears. This is the TALK OF THE NATION, from NPR News. I'm John Donvan, in Washington.
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NPR's Michel Martin discusses how politics have seeped into this year's Super Bowl with Mark Leibovich of The New York Times, Megan McArdle of The Washington Postand Rodney Carmichael of NPR Music.
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MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And finally today, we're going to head into the Barbershop. That's where we invite interesting people to talk about what's in the news and what's on their minds. And, yes, there's an awful lot going on in the news today. But we decided to talk about Super Bowl LIII, which is tomorrow in Atlanta.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We decided to focus on that because the Super Bowl is usually the most-watched or one of the most-watched television programs of the year. Usually, more than 100,000,000 watch it along with the halftime show and the commercials. And there have been controversies before about the game or the show, but this year, it seems as though the controversy or controversies are the story, from the officiating in the playoffs to the number of artists who apparently declined to perform during a halftime show in support of former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who hasn't played in two seasons after setting off a wave of activism and condemnation for kneeling during the national anthem.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We wanted to talk about all of that, so we've called three people who've thought about the issues that we're talking about here. And joining us now is Mark Leibovich. He's the chief national correspondent for The New York Times Magazine. He's also the author of "Big Game: The NFL In Dangerous Times."</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Welcome.</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Good to be here.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: We're also joined by Rodney Carmichael, who reports on hip-hop for NPR and NPR Music.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Glad to have you back, Rodney.</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Hey, Michel. Thanks.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And Megan McArdle is with us. She's opinion columnist at The Washington Post.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Welcome back to you as well.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: Thanks for having me.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And Mark, I'm going to start with you because you're a political reporter first, but you took some time off to report and write a book that looks at the inner workings of the NFL. And guess what? You're still covering politics.</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: (Laughter).</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So is the Super Bowl more fraught this year than it's been before? If that's true, why is that? And is that OK?</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Absolutely it is more fraught, just like everything is more politicized. And you're right. I mean, I decided to take a break from politics to jump into the National Football League for a couple of years, and, like, there is no break whatsoever. Since Donald Trump came upon the scene, everything has been more divided, including the Super Bowl.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And, Megan, you've written kind of - I don't know, despairingly - do you think that's a fair word...</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: (Laughter) Yes.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...About that very issue. I mean, you've said that there don't seem to be any places, safe spaces that don't have politics attached to them, be it the NFL or the Oscars or any public awards show.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: Yeah.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Is that really a bad thing?</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: I think it's getting more and more like that. I think my favorite episode of this was that after the election, Penzeys Spices, where I buy a lot of spaces - the owner is very anti-Trump, and it turns out that there's another spice company owned by his brother and sister-in-law, and they came out and said, well, we love everyone. And so now there is a Republican and a Democratic place to buy your bulk cinnamon. And I think that that's really - it sort of sums up where America is today.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So tell us about the NFL, though. I mean, do you - you know, obviously people have very different feelings about the whole kneeling controversy and what that means and the fact that two years later, it's still having an effect - the fact that, you know, artists - Rodney's going to talk more about that - are saying in support of Kaepernick and in support of the idea that he has a right to protest that they decided not to participate in something that would normally be a plum opportunity for them.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: Right.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Is that...</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: I mean, look, I think...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...Wrong?</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: ...That this is incredibly divisive, and people are taking stands on something they feel very strongly about. And I think one of the things that I have observed about all of this is the complete inability of either side of that debate - you know, I see both sides of that to some extent. I think Kaepernick certainly has a right to protest and that the artists certainly have a right to say no. Like, stand up - I admire people who stand up for what they believe in, even at personal cost.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: But just the inability to kind of even frame the debate in a way that you can have a discussion about it because people cannot see beyond, I am outraged because he won't stand for the national anthem. I am outraged because he is being punished for not standing for the national anthem. And there's just - there's sort of no in between anymore, and it's really a sad place that America's come to.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Rodney, how do you see all this?</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: I mean, I think the thing we have to remember is, you know, there's really no form of racial justice protest that America has ever been supportive of. You know, in civil rights era, they fought back with dogs and water hoses. In Black Lives Matter, it was rubber bullets. You know, you've come to Atlanta with the Super Bowl. It is the black mecca. It's the home of civil rights. It's the home of hip-hop. There's no way that, you know, the NFL isn't going to be confronted in terms of their stance on racial politics.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And what is your thought about the fact that there could be or should be some place that is devoid of politics - that people could kind of just agree to take off - well, in hockey, take off your gloves has a different meaning...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So we'll...</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Right.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...Use the other meaning of take off your gloves - just kind of chill.</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Yeah. I mean, the thing is, you have to remember, like, there's a reason for protest in this country, and it's because black people, marginalized people don't have any other means of access in terms of historically being able to get their voice heard in systems of power. So protesting and, you know, at times like this where it seems like it's comfortable for everybody else - it's not comfortable for everybody else and for black folks at these other times, so that's why we're having protests at times like this.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So, Mark, talk a little bit more about where that that whole thing is. It's not like the main feature of your book about the NFL, but it's certainly...</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: It intervened.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...Bubbling under the...</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Oh, there's no question.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: It's infused...</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Well...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Right?</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Like, the reason I wanted to write about the National Football League is it has become the - just the great spectacle of American life. I mean, something like 48 of the top 50 top-watch shows in America every year are football games. Donald Trump became the other great spectacle of American life, the other great reality show. He's wanted to end the National Football League for years, and he just sort of belly-flopped right into the middle of this pool. And this becomes a proxy fight for whether you support Donald Trump or not.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: And is this still, do you think - you know, it's interesting because at one point, hundreds of NFL players were kneeling, and then it became very fraught and complicated. Even some of the owners - one owner, let's say...</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Right.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: One owner at one point knelt with his team.</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Right - for one week.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: But has it - has that - is this - is that controversy - so we're going to talk about the entertainers in a minute.</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Yeah.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: But is it still something that is very present for the league?</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: It's present in that Colin Kaepernick does not have a job, and people are acutely aware of that. But no, protest has not been a big story this year. Donald Trump has essentially laid off, and he was occupied on the midterms and the shutdown and so forth. So - but it's very much beneath the surface. And, again, the Colin Kaepernick situation is something that a lot of people who are outside the league are very quick to weigh in on, musical acts being a great example here.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Megan, can I just ask you briefly about this? But not to belabor the point, but could you just address Rodney's point for a minute? I mean, Rodney's point is that, you know, the idea that some people get to have a safe place where they cannot think about the broader issues in their lives is something that some people never had. I mean, they're going back to - you know, how many - it was a great writer who said, you know, what is the fourth of July to the Negro? And did you see my point? So...</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: Absolutely. No, look, I think that's an absolutely valid point. And I think there's kind of two questions you have to separate in that. And one is, does the country need places where it can come together on a non-political footing? And I would say it does. I'm not going to tell a player protesting police brutality no, right? I'm not going to say that. I'm just saying, like, it is sad to watch all of those spaces collapsing at once, and it is sad that the NFL is one of them. I'm not saying that, you know, I therefore think Colin Kaepernick did something wrong or that the players did something wrong.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: I think the second question, which is a different question, is, tactically, does this advance your cause? And I'm more skeptical on that front. I'm skeptical that the particular form of protest chosen - it gets a lot of attention. But there's often in protesting - and I, you know, I did a lot of protesting in college, and I've looked at a lot of the social science literature on this - and it turns out that there's often a direct tradeoff in protesting between how much attention you get and how much good you're actually doing. The more attention you're getting, often, that attention is negative.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: You have turned off - it's like closing down highways as a form of protest. Yes, you have attracted a lot of attention, but all of the people whose attention you have attracted hate you, so that, you know, you do have to think about. And I'm not sure that this has actually been a tactically effective protest, which is completely separate from the moral legitimacy of doing it.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So, Rodney, talk a little bit more about Atlanta, if you would...</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Right.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...And the significance of this event to Atlanta. And then talk a little bit, if you would, about the calculation, or the - calculation, is that right? - the debate that a number of artists have had about whether or not to participate.</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Yeah. Well, I mean, it's definitely an interesting time to converge upon Atlanta. You know, like I said, it's the black mecca in a lot of ways, especially in pop culture. You've got, you know, hip-hop capital, you've got the legacy of civil rights, the home of Dr. King. And so, you know, I think coming to Atlanta made the Kaepernick thing and the NFL that much more impossible for the NFL to escape, you know? And it's a confrontation in a lot of ways. But I think, for a lot of entertainers, it's been one of those things where your decision is your politics, and, you know, your politics affect your pocket. And so all of that is in play.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: So what about Big Boi, Travis Scott, Maroon 5...</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Yeah.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...Gladys Knight, who...</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Yeah.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...Are participating. What is it for them? I know that's a lot of people to talk about. But maybe...</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Well...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: ...Talk about Travis Scott and Big Boi.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Yeah. I mean, Big Boi, he's, you know, home of outcasts, home of Atlanta. He's done a lot for the city. I think one of the really interesting things about all of the people that are performing that you name - they all have ties to the same manager, Irving Azoff, whose management company has - you know, he's been a really power player in the music industry for a long time. So, you know, you have this situation where a lot of performers are performing on a stage at a time when a lot of people don't want them to. And I think you have to kind of look at the machinations of the music industry and how that plays...</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Briefly, is it a plus or a minus for these artists? Will it be at the end of this?</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: It's a little more nuanced than that, you know? I think - you know, there's still a lot of black fans of the NFL. A lot of black fans are going to be watching the Super Bowl. I think that you've got to be able to use your mike to say something in this country, and, you know, hip-hop has that tradition. So for Big Boi and Travis Scott, I think they're going to be between a rock and a hard place if they don't figure that out.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Mark, very briefly?</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: Well, I would say yes. I mean, I think the racial politics of this are also inescapable. I mean, the Atlanta Falcons have a actually 40 percent black season ticket base, which is just unprecedented in the league. And Maroon 5 made some news this week by refusing to hold a press conference. So there's speculation they might have a surprise in store. This is very much in keeping with the reality show.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Very briefly - such a cliche - Rams or Patriots? I'm sorry. I have to do it.</s>MARK LEIBOVICH: You know, I grew up in New England, so I, as a birthright, root for the Patriots. And I know everyone else is rooting against them.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: That's true. Rodney?</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: (Laughter) I'm going to pick Atlanta. I'm rooting for Atlanta.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: OK. Megan?</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: I come out - I'm descended from Boston people, so I have to also go with the Patriots, or they will kill me.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: OK (laughter). That's Megan McArdle of The Washington Post, Mark Leibovich, New York Times chief national correspondent, and NPR Music hip-hop writer Rodney Carmichael.</s>MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: Thank you all so much for joining us.</s>RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Thanks so much.</s>MEGAN MCARDLE: Thanks for having me.
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Sportswriter Ray Ratto believes you're hating the New England Patriots for all the wrong reasons. NPR's Ari Shapiro chats with Ratto ahead of Sunday's Super Bowl.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Technically, this Sunday is Super Bowl Sunday. Unofficially, for everyone outside of New England, it's Patriots-hating day. The past 18 years, you could safely bet on two things in the NFL - the Patriots winning and other teams' fans tearing their hair out after each victory. Sure, success breeds contempt, and it hasn't helped that the Patriots were involved in some scandals. But sports columnist Ray Ratto writes in Deadspin that the hate is getting a little ridiculous. Ray, welcome to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.</s>RAY RATTO: Hello. How are you?</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: I'm fine, thanks. All right. Aside from the fact that the Patriots always win, what are some of the reasons that haters give for their passion?</s>RAY RATTO: Well, it probably started with the tuck rule, when they beat the Raiders with the benefit of a obscure rule that actually existed in the NFL but, to anybody's knowledge, had never been applied. From there, you got to Spygate, where the Patriots were accused of spying on the other team. Then you got to Deflategate, where Tom Brady was accused of having footballs deflated during their win over the Indianapolis Colts, which is a violation of NFL rules. Then you had, basically, Bill Belichick and Tom Brady being associated with Donald Trump, which is its own set of red flags.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: That is a long and varied list. Do you think those fans have a point?</s>RAY RATTO: Fans don't have to have a point.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter). That's the nature of fandom.</s>RAY RATTO: They've never been bothered by having a point before. It's 18 years. It's some things that they got caught at that other teams have probably tried in the past. And I think, in general, it's the idea that sort of the Patriots are above it all that frustrates everybody else. I mean, even last year, when they lost to the Eagles in the Super Bowl, everybody was excited about the Eagles winning for the first time ever. But eventually, that all sort of churned back into, OK, what's the AFC going to do about New England this year? Because the dynasty must die. And the Patriots went out and said, no, the dynasty must not die. So I think that's where we're at now.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: OK. Well, you have been dispassionately, objectively describing the view of these fans. Where do you come down on this?</s>RAY RATTO: I actually don't care.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter).</s>RAY RATTO: Because there's a part of me that says, you know what? If somebody's good enough to beat them, they will. You know, they've been beaten enough times. It's just that over 18 years - and this, I think, is partially the media at work. In a 24/7, 365 media world, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting somebody talking about Tom Brady. So I think there's just this sense of institutional weariness that adds to everything else.</s>RAY RATTO: You already didn't like the Patriots. Now you're going to just keep telling me about them. When do you stop? When do I have to stop listening to it? When, you know, you have control over your remote. Change the channel. Mute. There's lots of things you can do to escape it.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: All right. Someday, the Patriots' dynasty will end. Tom Brady will someday retire. Who will fans get to hate then?</s>RAY RATTO: I think the Dallas Cowboys are always available for that.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter).</s>RAY RATTO: But other than that, you know, without the Patriots, I think there'll be a few years where the NFL will be more egalitarian hate-wise that you can pick out, you know, teams you want to hate based on your own impulses.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: A day of freedom and celebration and widespread hatred, (laughter), among the people and the teams, spread around the nation.</s>RAY RATTO: Exactly. Hatred will be distributed more equally.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Sports columnist Ray Ratto of Deadspin. Thanks a lot.</s>RAY RATTO: All right. Thank you, Ari.
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NPR's Audie Cornish talks with former China trade negotiator Amy Celico about who has the upper hand in the current round of trade talks, China or the U.S.
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AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Next we're going to hear from someone who's negotiated on trade policy with China. Amy Celico worked on China trade policy under President George W. Bush. She now advises U.S. companies who are doing business in China. Thank you for coming into the studio.</s>AMY CELICO: Great to be with you.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: From the point of view of you and your clients, these tariffs - have they kind of hurt China and been a win for the U.S., put us in a better position for these trade talks?</s>AMY CELICO: Well, I certainly agree with President Trump that that does give the U.S. side leverage. The Chinese certainly don't want these tariffs to continue as they're looking at their own economy softening. And the tariffs will continue to hurt and hurt in a much more significant way if the tariff rate goes up on March 1. And so there is an incentive for the Chinese to want to make a deal. However, I think in the U.S., President Trump and the administration also face pressures to find a way forward rather than simply walking away from a deal and increasing the tariffs because that would hurt our economy, too.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: What are some of those pressures?</s>AMY CELICO: Some of those pressures of course are the fact that American businesses want to be in China. They want to be - American farmers, American companies want to be trading with China. And without having what will become this year the largest consumer market in the world - China - as a market for our goods and services, our companies will face pressure. And the stock market will dip. And as we have seen over the past few months, the administration is sensitive to those fluctuations in the markets.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: What can you tell us about China to help us understand what it means to sit down and negotiate, especially when you're talking about issues that are bigger than, say, as Scott reported, a soybean order - right? - trying to get at longtime structural grievances that the U.S. has had, whether it's market access or intellectual property theft?</s>AMY CELICO: Like you said, Audie, these are longtime concerns that the U.S. government has had with China. And so I have a lot of sympathy for the negotiators on the U.S. side right now trying to make progress where progress hasn't been achieved in the past. The Chinese government is looking in a more long-term way at these issues about what it is willing to give. The impact on the domestic economy...</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Is that different from, say, the George W. Bush years that - where you were there?</s>AMY CELICO: Well, I will say I think that there is a coming realization within China that foreign investors need to be in the market for China to meet its own economic development goals. And I think when we're talking about the George W. Bush administration years where China of course was doing very well, growing at record rates, they were starting to talk about indigenous innovation and starting to say, maybe we don't need foreign investment as much; we feel very strong now. Today, this year, this month, President Xi talked about the risks to the country. And in his speech earlier this month, he talked about the softening economy as a real risk.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: What leverage do you think the Chinese have over the U.S.?</s>AMY CELICO: I think the Chinese, like I said, can look at this in a more long-term way. And I think they recognize that the Trump administration wants and, in some ways, needs a win on trade. I don't think anyone expects that some kind of trade truce or de-escalation of trade tensions is going to eliminate the many, many growing tensions in the bilateral relationship.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: But I ask because you heard the president say earlier that, this may come down to a conversation between me and President Xi. You know the players involved. What does that mean - is - given this president's temperament and approach when it comes to trade?</s>AMY CELICO: I think the Chinese probably are hoping that if it is left to President Trump to negotiate a deal with President Xi, that he may accept some superficial gains that maybe his own administration and experts on trade policy would have said aren't enough to call it a victory. And so the Chinese recognize that, I think very much welcome a high-level meeting even in order to postpone the end of the talks. President Xi and President Trump together declared this was going to be a 90-day process. But even in December, President Trump hinted that if it needed more time, he would give more time. And so those tariff rates may not be going up on March 2 anyway.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Where do you see points of compromise?</s>AMY CELICO: Again, I think that the Chinese government is starting to recognize that with its slowing economy, foreign investors in the market actually will help the economy meet some of its consumption-led growth goals. And so levelling the playing field for foreign players is something that is also in China's interest - the same things we've been asking for for more than a decade. And so there is an area of compromise - of course, also purchases. The U.S. government has said that they do want to see the trade imbalance righted in some ways. And so while we're not talking about eliminating a massive trade deficit, we are talking about that being an area where both sides win.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Amy Celico leads the China practice at the Albright Stonebridge Group. Thank you so much.</s>AMY CELICO: Thank you.
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NPR's Ari Shapiro speaks with BBC Kabul Bureau Chief Shoaib Sharifi about the reaction in Afghanistan to negotiations between the U.S., the Taliban and the Afghan government.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The U.S. is trying to negotiate a peace deal between the Taliban and the government of Afghanistan. They hope that an agreement between these two groups could open the door for American forces to leave the country after 17 years of war. Many Afghans have strong feelings about this. Shoaib Sharifi has been getting reaction from people around the country. He's the BBC's Kabul bureau chief. Welcome to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: Thank you, Ari.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: A deal between the Taliban and the Afghan government is still a long ways off, but do most people that you've talked with view this possibility with more excitement or fear?</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: There are mixed feelings particularly in the cities, but in rural areas - because in the last 17 years, a lot of people in rural areas have had to deal with literally nonstop conflict, there is a hope, not a mixed feeling. There's a hope that come - no matter what happens, a return - if the return of the Taliban means an end to current conflict, it's a big achievement for those people on the ground level.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: And then compare that with the attitudes in cities like the capital, Kabul, where you live. What is the attitude there towards the possibility of a peace deal between the government and the Taliban?</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: In the northern city of Mazar, I talked to a female painter who has a shop in the city. And she's worried that under the Taliban regime, women were not allowed to go out of their homes without being accompanied by a male. And even painting was forbidden under the Taliban. So for her, a return of the Taliban with the same strategies and approach they had 20 years back would mean immediate loss of her profession and, as she put it, imprisoned in the - in their homes.</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: So overall there is a feeling people are trying to digest that maybe the Taliban has also transformed in the last 18 years, and people hope the Taliban understand that there have been a lot of progress in terms of education and human rights overall. So it's hope that it's a new Taliban with a new approach, with an understanding of new realities in Afghanistan.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: You know, people who were born after the U.S. invasion are almost adults at this point. And so there are people who don't remember life under the Taliban. How realistic is it that a power sharing agreement that included the Taliban today would be more accommodating to minority and women's rights than Taliban rule was 20 years ago?</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: The Taliban - a lot of manpower, the fighting forces on the ground are not the Taliban who were fighting 20 years ago. They're also the new generation. We found that they were more keen on taking selfies and filming people with mobile phones. In fact, a female colleague of mine and I talked to this Taliban, and he didn't seem to mind and talk to her. So somehow...</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Her face was not covered. Her hair was not covered.</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: Her face was not covered. She even had makeup. And this is the first time after 18 years people saw the Taliban on the streets of Kabul. So somehow this new generation of Taliban - they have also been affected - technological progress as well as overall progress in Afghanistan in the past 18 years.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: As you know, there have been talks before, and they've never led to an agreement. Do people in Afghanistan think this time might be different?</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: Well, yes, and this is not because the Taliban are serious. It's more because this time, the American side of the table is more serious to take the talks to a more practical results. And all of that is sort of overshadowed by that mixed feelings of what kind of a deal, what sort of a deal the two sides would agree on. And what would it mean for conflict as well as for what this country has achieved in the last 18 years?</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Shoaib Sharifi of the BBC speaking with us on Skype from Kabul, thank you very much.</s>SHOAIB SHARIFI: Thank you, Ari.
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Closing arguments were heard Thursday in the trial of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán, accused of being one of the world's premier drug traffickers. The case now goes to the jury.
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AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: There were closing arguments in the trial of Joaquin El Chapo Guzman today. He's accused of being one of the most notorious drug traffickers and leader of the Mexican Sinaloa Cartel. The case now goes to the jury. If convicted, Guzman could spend the rest of his life in an American prison. NPR's Quil Lawrence was at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, N.Y., and joins us now.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: And Quil, this is after three months of proceedings. How did the prosecution sum up its case?</s>QUIL LAWRENCE, BYLINE: Well, that took all day yesterday, over six hours. And the prosecutor described a multibillion-dollar, multinational enterprise - an entrepreneur exporting drugs to the U.S. using at first a tunnel under the Arizona border; later using train cars filled with cooking oil that had false bottoms; building a canning factory so he could seal kilos of cocaine into La Comadre brand jalapeno chili cans, filling those with cocaine and shipping them to the United States; planes, fishing boats, submarines full of cocaine and cash - and point by point, connecting what cooperating witnesses had - and we'll talk about those in a second - what they had said with wiretaps, that Guzman allegedly set up his own secure communication system and taped and monitored everything sort of Richard Nixon-like. We can listen to a little clip of it.</s>JOAQUIN GUZMAN LOERA: (Speaking Spanish).</s>PEDRO FLORES: (Speaking Spanish).</s>GUZMAN: (Speaking Spanish).</s>PEDRO FLORES: (Speaking Spanish).</s>QUIL LAWRENCE, BYLINE: Here he's just haggling over the price of heroin with a drug dealer in Chicago. But this allowed the prosecutor to say with each of these witnesses' testimony - well, how do we know that's true? Well, you heard it from his own mouth, meaning the defendant's own mouth, she was saying.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: In the face of all this, the defense calls one witness, and that lasts 30 minutes. Can you talk more about what their closing arguments were, what their answers were to the charges?</s>QUIL LAWRENCE, BYLINE: I mean, the closing arguments were a lot longer, basically all day today. And the defense was a lot less technical than the prosecution and much more animated, discrediting these cooperating witnesses, which isn't hard because most of them are convicted drug dealers and multi-murderers. One's a notorious Colombian drug lord blamed for over a hundred murders, known as La Chupeta.</s>QUIL LAWRENCE, BYLINE: The defense attorney - he was crude at times. He was warned by the judge not to claim that the government is in some sort of a plot with these ulterior motives against El Chapo. And he kept on appealing to the jury just not to trust the government blindly. He said at some point, this isn't about justice; it's just about getting El Chapo. He said that these cooperating witnesses were going to go free in the United States in exchange for testimony. He said to the jury - they'll be free among you, so be careful. He even went a bit anti-immigrant, saying, we only bring in the best, talking about these cooperating witnesses. And he was claiming that Chapo Guzman was not the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, but it was really his partner Mayo Zambada who was the real drug kingpin.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: What happens now?</s>QUIL LAWRENCE, BYLINE: Well, jury deliberations will start next week. They could take a while. I mean, there's so much - three months' worth of evidence. There were boxes and boxes of evidence in the court, including AK-47s and cans of the aforementioned chilis that used to smuggle cocaine. So they might have a lot to work through. But at the same time, it seems kind of lopsided, so much prosecution evidence and so little defense. And Guzman has escaped two Mexican prisons, but they say what he fears so much is being here in the United States where it's much harder to escape from prison. So that's why he feared extradition so much.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: That's NPR's Quil Lawrence. Quil, thanks for your reporting.</s>QUIL LAWRENCE, BYLINE: Thank you.
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President Trump meets this afternoon with the vice premier of China, about a trade agreement. But Trump says a final deal will probably have to wait until he meets with President Xi.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The Trump administration says it made substantial progress this week in trade talks with China. Those talks culminated this afternoon in an Oval Office meeting between President Trump and China's vice premier. China announced a major new purchase of U.S. soybeans, but there was no such breakthrough on the administration's major structural complaints. More talks are expected in the coming weeks, and NPR's Scott Horsley joins us now from the White House. Hi, Scott.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Hi, Ari.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Explain what the president is trying to achieve through these talks.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: President Trump says he's trying to broker a comprehensive deal to end the trade war between the U.S. and China. Of course, it was Trump himself who escalated that war last year when he imposed stiff tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars in Chinese imports over what the administration says are unfair trading practices by China. In particular, the U.S. wants more access to Chinese markets and also an end to practices like intellectual property theft and the forced transfer of American technology. One question going into these talks was whether Trump would hold the line on those structural demands or if he would simply settle for, like, a big purchase order from China on soybeans. Trump told reporters he wants all of the above.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: This is a serious deal that we're doing. This could be done very quickly very easily, but it wouldn't be comprehensive. It would be small.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: In speaking with reporters after the talks, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer was pretty guarded about the prospects for actually making a comprehensive deal. He said there's still a lot of work to be done. But he did suggest it's a good sign that these talks didn't go off the rails during the last couple of days of very intense, very detailed negotiations. He likened it to a golf match where you can't win in the middle rounds, but you can lose. (Laughter) So the U.S. and China didn't lose in this middle round, but he said there's still a lot of putting left to come.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter) OK, so still a lot of work left to be done, putting left to come, whatever analogy you want to use. What does that entail?</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Trade Representative Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin are expected to travel to China sometime in the middle of February for follow-up talks. That might have happened sooner, but we're just a few days away from the start of the Chinese New Year. So there is going to be a brief pause here in negotiations. If those talks go well, President Trump suggested it might set the table for an even higher level of negotiations.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think that, probably, the final deal will be made - if it's made - will be made between myself and President Xi.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: President Trump was already planning another round of nuclear talks next month with North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un. That might happen in Asia. So if he's in the neighborhood, Trump might use that as an opportunity for another round of trade talks with Chinese President Kim - Xi Jinping.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: And there's a tight deadline here - this March 1 limit. What - it's coming right up.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: That's right. Come March 1, the U.S. tariffs on some $200 billion in Chinese imports are expected to more than double if there is no agreement. So that clock is ticking, and there could be a - you know, that could be a powerful motivator for both sides to make a deal.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Finally, what about this soybean purchase that the Chinese announced?</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Well, remember, China had been a huge market for American soybeans. And they all but stopped buying last year in retaliation for Trump's tariffs. They did start up buying soybeans again on a small scale last month during this sort of truce in the trade negotiations. And in the Oval Office today, China's vice premier announced plans to really ramp up those soybean purchases. Trump called that a welcome development.</s>PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It's a sign of good faith for China to buy that much of our soybeans and other product that they've just committed to us prior to the signing of the deal - is something that makes us very proud to be dealing with them.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Again, that doesn't deal with the more difficult issues of intellectual property protection and technology transfer. But it's certainly welcome news for a lot of Midwestern farmers who have been some of the big casualties caught in the crossfire of this trade war so far.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: That's NPR's Scott Horsley speaking with us from the White House. Thank you, Scott.</s>SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: You're welcome.
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NPR's Audie Cornish speaks with Ben Sinclair and Katja Blichfeld, the co-creators of the TV series High Maintenance. The show is now in its third season on HBO.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The show "High Maintenance" is now in its third season on HBO. One of the creators Ben Sinclair stars as a Brooklyn weed dealer. The show is not about weed though. The dealer, known only as The Guy, is a storytelling device. He lets us inside people's homes, allowing us to see their most intimate moments, as my co-host Audie Cornish explains.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Each episode means new clients with new stories.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character) Hey.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: A depressed comic, a feminist meetup...</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character) He just has, like, a really intense male look.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: ...A group of swinging professionals.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character) I think that's a belly dancer.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: ...An agoraphobe.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #4: (As character) What? You're going out?</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: ...To name a few. Ben Sinclair and Katja Blichfeld created "High Maintenance" as a low-budget web series when they were a married couple. They've since separated but remain creative partners. And they say the initial constraints of budget and actors' limited availability helped define the show's structure.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Because in the beginning, we weren't paying anybody to participate in the production of this.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: So no one would stick around for more than an episode.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Yeah, you got it. So we thought it just felt better to ask people for one-day commitments. And in doing so, we also realized we were setting ourselves up for just having a lot more freedom narratively.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Right, because every time The Guy opens the door, you're just, like, in a completely different world, which, you know, in New York, I feel like makes so much sense. I mean, did you know there were communities that you're like, I'd really like to write about X; I'd really like to write about Y?</s>BEN SINCLAIR: Definitely. I had the pleasure of being a flower delivery person while we were making the first episodes of the show. And one of my favorite parts of that job was just that I got to go into people's homes to, you know, deliver something. And it was just - there was so much character information just on the walls of their apartments. And we would just kind of brainstorm from there.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: I find it interesting that you have this experience delivering flowers, but that's not what the show is about.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: Yes, it is.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Fair, fair. But you go with the weed model. And can you talk about why?</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: I mean, I remember when Ben was doing these deliveries and the way that people behaved while he was there I think was very telling - like, oh, interesting, people can really let their guard down.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Yeah, but this is different cause people think they're kind of buddies with their weed guy.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Well, that's the fun part about it.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Right. You don't think you're buddies with the florist.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: It's true. But I feel like we recognize that the weed delivery, played by me, could be an avenue for people to get very vulnerable in this complicit situation of, like, I need weed. It's illegal. You're here. It's illegal.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: We're in this together.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: We're in this together, exactly.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Right. I think if I've ever heard a criticism of the show, there is this idea you have - in a way, you're just seeing kind of privilege at work. Like, no one's worried about the police coming. Nobody's worried about getting in trouble - right? - even the dealer himself.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: Yes.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Well, that's less now though, I think, and that is something we were happy about - that the tide is turning at least in New York. It's not quite the same environment that it was when we started.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: And I - we do take that criticism with more than a grain of salt. But - wait. Is that the right way to say it? No, we take that criticism very seriously.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Yeah, more than a grain - the whole shaker.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: Taking it with a grain of salt would mean, like, don't fully listen to it. We actually do pay attention to that criticism. But we don't want this to be a show about weed. And once you start talking about the illegality of it...</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: The business of it.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: ...The business of it, it starts to be a show about weed. And we're more interested in it being a show about something that might prompt a person to smoke weed - an anxiety, a neurosis, a loneliness.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Right. And I think if anything, the legalization that's been happening and the breaking down of the stigmas around it, I think, has been helpful to us expanding our viewership because I think a lot of people might have been more turned off a few years back at our premise. And now it's like, oh, I'm curious.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: People are still turned off by our premise.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: For sure.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: The thing I see online most about our show is, oh, I wasn't going to watch this because I thought it was just about weed. But I'm watching it, and it actually is very good.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: (Laughter) Well, I guess there's a little bit of - there's a stigma, so to speak, of, like, weed culture and humor in pop culture - right? - in movies and things like that - kind of going back to the "Cheech And Chong," which I know is very beloved. But, yeah, I think there's a segment of the population that's like, eh, not for me.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Not for us - like, we haven't watched those films. It's kind of - I mean, that's just true. I have never seen a "Cheech And Chong" film. And maybe I've seen, like, "Pineapple Express." I feel like that's the most stoner thing I've ever watched.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Ben Sinclair, I want to go back to a point you made about what the show is really about because I'm often struck by how many people in an episode do exhibit anxiety or loneliness specifically - including The Guy, which is the character that you play. And I want to talk about the season three premiere, where there's a funeral scene for an older hippie named Berg. He lives upstate.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #5: (As character) He never judged me for anything.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: And the guy is so moved to speak. He opens his mouth and tries to, and, like, he gets cut off. And everyone starts singing.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTORS: (As characters, singing) Now, I don't hard know her.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: I felt like my heart just, like, fell on my chest. It was like, he wants to talk. He wants you to feel how much of this is about loneliness? He's a guy surrounded by people.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: Well, I mean, New York is very encapsulating of that feeling of being alone but being surrounded by people. I think that because of technology and how capitalism has really caught on in the world, I think we're all just thinking that we are an island, and I think human beings are meant to be together.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Where does The Guy go from here? I mean, you've taken him out of New York. You've told us a little bit about him, which in the early parts of the series - right? - he was an enigma. So how are you thinking about going forward?</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: I think this season, you'll see - if you keep watching, that we are sort of setting up a shift for him of some kind. What that will be remains to be seen.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: I think because in the past years that Katja and I have had so many huge life changes - like, I do feel - and I hope I'm not speaking out of school - that while we were married, we had all of these wonderful things coming to us, but I think we both felt alone somehow. We both felt, you know, that feeling as you're getting older, and, like, you've arrived at a certain point that you always have been trying to accomplish. And you still feel not full.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: And I feel like The Guy is trying to - in the words of one of the eulogizers at Berg's funeral - have a very full cup. And there's more to life than making money, which is what this show about as a weed dealer. It's not about dealing weed. It's about having a human experience. And with this tide of legalization coming to New York that seems very strong, it seems like we have two parallel lines of the popular opinion of weed - and The Guy is kind of searching - that are really converging into an interesting point of view.</s>AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: Ben Sinclair and Katja Blichfeld, they're the creators of the HBO series "High Maintenance." It's now in its third season. Thank you to you both.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: Thanks, Audie.</s>KATJA BLICHFELD: Thank you.</s>BEN SINCLAIR: And thank you, Ari.</s>JOAN JETT AND THE BLACKHEARTS: (Singing) Crimson and clover, over and over.
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The U.S. special representative for North Korea says Kim Jong Un and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo agreed in October that North Korea will dismantle its facilities that make fuel for nuclear weapons.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: President Trump also said today that he will announce next week exactly where and when he'll meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for a second time in late February. Meanwhile, Trump's envoy for North Korea declared in prepared remarks today that Pyongyang has promised to destroy all of its plutonium and uranium enrichment facilities. Here's NPR's David Welna.</s>DAVID WELNA, BYLINE: A copy of special representative for North Korea Stephen Biegun's speech to a gathering of North Korea experts at Stanford University was released beforehand by the State Department. In it, Biegun says the U.S. seemingly is, quote, "farther away than ever before," unquote, from the goal of what he calls the final fully verified denuclearization of North Korea. And yet Biegun also says Kim Jong Un made a previously undisclosed promise to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in October. Kim said North Korea would, if the U.S. took unspecified, quote, "corresponding measures," dismantle and destroy all of its plutonium and uranium enrichment facilities where the fuel for nuclear weapons is made.</s>MICHAEL GREEN: It is more specificity than Donald Trump got in June, but verification, a declaration - what about the weapons? There are huge questions that it leaves on the table.</s>DAVID WELNA, BYLINE: That's Georgetown University North Korea expert Michael Green. He says those questions include...</s>MICHAEL GREEN: How would it be verified? Would the North Koreans provide a credible declaration of those facilities and allow inspections to make sure the international community got all of them? That's a big question. The second big question is, what about the plutonium and uranium they have already harvested and weaponized? They may have as many as dozens of nuclear weapons from what they've already done. Is that included? Apparently not, so it would leave the North with a considerable and dangerous arsenal.</s>DAVID WELNA, BYLINE: And that arsenal, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told Congress yesterday, is not likely to be dismantled.</s>DAN COATS: We currently assess that North Korea will seek to retain its WMD capabilities and is unlikely to completely give up its nuclear weapons and production capabilities.</s>DAVID WELNA, BYLINE: In today's speech, Special Envoy Biegun warns that the U.S. has what he calls contingencies should the diplomatic process with North Korea fail. David Welna, NPR News, Washington.
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NPR's Ari Shapiro speaks with political commentators E.J. Dionne of The Washington Post and Brookings Institution and David Brooks of The New York Times about the week in political news.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: All right, as Scott just described, Cory Booker is entering a field of Democratic presidential hopefuls that is already crowded. In fact, Booker is not even the only senator in the race.</s>KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND: I'm filing an exploratory committee...</s>ELIZABETH WARREN: Committee for president.</s>TULSI GABBARD: I have decided to run.</s>PETE BUTTIGIEG: To serve the American people.</s>JOHN DELANEY: It can't just be about how bad he is.</s>KAMALA HARRIS: I stand before you today.</s>JULIAN CASTRO: (Speaking Spanish).</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: That was Julian Castro, Kamala Harris, John Delaney, Pete Buttigieg, Tulsi Gabbard, Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand, all of whom intend to run for the Democratic nomination for president. We're going to talk more about the race to enter this race with our week in politics regulars, E.J. Dionne of The Washington Post and the Brookings Institution and David Brooks of The New York Times. Good to have you both here in the studio.</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: Great to be here.</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Good to see you, Ari.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: This is a big field, and there has never been one so diverse. David, what stands out to you about the Democratic field at this point?</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: I, too, am running. I call on all Americans to run.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter) At least somebody is announcing this on NPR.</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: You know...</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Which party, David?</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: My imaginary single party.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: We're going to get to the independent race in a moment. But the Democrats...</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: You know, of the Democrats - first of all, the thing that strikes me both about the Booker announcement and the Kamala Harris announcement is how upfront they were about being African-American. And that may seem banal. It's kind of obvious. But my memory is that Barack Obama was not that way.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Trying to downplay race.</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: He sort of downplayed race. And they're saying, no, this is who I am, and they're owning it. So I take that as a sign of progress. I do think, as we just heard, this temperamental difference is the key difference, not an ideological difference. I hope that Cory Booker's right, that comradeship can defeat polarization and hatred. I don't think there's that much evidence for it. I think Kamala Harris is a very strong candidate because she is a prosecutor and can be a very polarizing presence.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: E.J., big picture - when you look at this crowded and quickly growing field, what do you see?</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: I'm still pondering somebody running for president on the slogan love ain't easy. That that would get a lot of support. I want to just underscore something Scott and you, Ari, said. This is an amazingly diverse field. When you think about just how much has changed since Barack Obama ran against Hillary Clinton, so far, three of the major candidates are women, and more may come. Two of the major candidates are African-American. One is a married, gay military vet. Another is a Latino former cabinet secretary. And we got more coming. And I apologize to anybody I left out, such as, say, millionaires.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter).</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: I mean, this is an amazing thing that's happening in the country, and we - before we get into all of the division we're going to face, I think that's worth celebrating. I broadly agree with David that Kamala Harris is a very strong candidate and had a very good start out of the box, something Donald Trump himself actually said in an interview. That may be the worst thing that ever happened to her in the Democratic primary. I think that Elizabeth Warren had a good start in Iowa, and Trump is targeting her. That will probably help her along the way.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Well, we could spend a long time going through the entire list of 10...</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Yes, I know.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Democratic names...</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Right, exactly. I just want to - one candidate I do want to mention who's not on the list today is Sherrod Brown because I think his tour in Iowa - and I guess he's taking it to New Hampshire - the Dignity of Work tour - whether he runs or not, I think that theme is going to take off because with all this talk of unification, that's a theme that could actually pull this party and the country together.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Let's talk about a different potential candidate who got the lion's share of attention this week, Howard Schultz, the former Starbucks CEO. A lot of that attention was negative. He's thinking about running as an independent, seems to be getting trashed for it. David, what - as somebody who's often dissatisfied with the candidates of the two major parties, would you like to see a credible third-party candidate, and do you think Schultz is that person?</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: I'd like to see one with a stronger message than he has. He has - his message is one of fiscal conservatism and civility, which is fine as far as it goes, but it doesn't really respond to the needs of the moment. On the other hand, if the choice is between Bernie Sanders, who wants to eliminate all private health insurance, and Donald Trump, Schultz is the sort of empty vessel where a lot of people will go. So I don't think it's completely ridiculous to think that he could have a serious campaign depending on how effectively the Democrats repel anti-Trumpers who are not liberal.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: A serious campaign to win or a serious campaign as a spoiler, E.J.?</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Well, I think David may have said the essential phrase - empty vessel - because that's kind of what he looks like at the end of this. I agree with you. The question that - it's impossible to see how he can win. The smallest group in the electorate actually if you look ideologically are economic conservatives and social liberals. And for somebody who says he's doing it to defeat Trump, he, as a matter of strategy, directed all his - practically all his fire at Democratic candidates.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: At Democrats, yeah.</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: And so I think it's the worst - one of the worst rollouts I've ever seen unless he was trying to sell books, where he did get more...</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: He does have a new book.</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: ...Attention than most book writers get.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Staying with the theme of elections, Congress considered a bill this week that would have made Election Day a national holiday, making it easier for people to vote. And Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he was strongly opposed to it. This is part of what he said.</s>MITCH MCCONNELL: Just what America needs - another paid holiday and a bunch of government workers being paid to go out and work, I assume, our folks on - our colleagues on the other side - on their campaigns.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: McConnell also described this holiday and the bill in which it would be contained as a power grab. David, do you think it's a power grab?</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: I don't think opposing paid holidays is a good political move for anybody.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter).</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: I will say I think I broadly support it. I think both parties should be in favor of as many people voting as can. It should be said that people do study this and have studied it for decades. The idea that there's some hidden well of voters - of progressive voters or conservative voters who would swing the election one way or the another if we had higher turnouts is not true. Our elections basically reflect what would happen if everybody turned it down.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Just briefly, E.J., what do you think?</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: If that were true, I don't think Mitch McConnell would be opposing this bill so much. If it's a power grab, it's a power grab by the electorate. And what he is clearly saying is that Republicans fear that if you do make Election Day a holiday, people, particularly working people who don't control their schedules, will have a greater opportunity to vote. And so he's saying, I really want a smaller turnout. That's even a worse message, I think, for a politician than opposing a holiday.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: All right, we've only got a minute left, and I want to give each of you 30 seconds to look ahead to next week's State of the Union and the Democratic response from Stacey Abrams, who ran for governor in Georgia and was defeated. E.J., what are you looking for?</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Donald Trump - presidents are supposed to inspire optimism and hope, but Donald Trump depends on our being petrified. So I think that that dynamic between the two is tough for him. Stacey Abrams was a great choice not only because she represents a big chunk of the Democratic Party but because she's an optimist, and she combines pragmatism and progressivism.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: And David?</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: Yeah, well, if Cory Booker - if acumen sells, then Cory Booker is going to get the nomination. I don't think it does. I'm actually looking forward to this just to see first what Trump says. It's not as if he has a gigantic agenda to rollout. He's just got his wall. But second, it - you could in theory have a really philosophical difference between two versions of American cohesion, one which is the Trumpian version which is more ethnically monocultural and one that is different. And that's sort of the big debate of the moment.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: David Brooks and E.J. Dionne, have a great weekend. Thanks so much.</s>E J DIONNE, BYLINE: Good to be with you.</s>DAVID BROOKS, BYLINE: Thank you.
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NPR's Ari Shapiro checks in with Carlos, the Venezuelan protester we first met in June 2017. Even though he insisted he did not want to leave his country, in October, he fled to Belgium.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Venezuela is in political upheaval. The authoritarian President Nicolas Maduro is holding onto power while politicians inside his country backed by the United States tried to force him out.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: It has taken years to get to this moment. And through that time, we've been checking in with a man named Carlos. We've only used his first name out of concern for his safety. The first time we talked with him was in June of 2017.</s>CARLOS: The food situation is pretty extreme. I cannot find basic food. I mean, no rice, no chicken. Fruits are very expensive. So what has really shocked me is that this past year, you can see in every street of the city, there is somebody in the garbage looking for food. And it's not a homeless person. It's a regular guy, dressed up normally with a backpack or with a working suitcase, looking for food in the garbage.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Carlos used to be a tour guide. As tourism in the country dried up, he started marching in the streets every day with thousands of other Venezuelans.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: By the time we talked with him six months later, in December of 2017, the protests against Maduro had stopped. Carlos told my co-host Robert Siegel it was just too dangerous.</s>CARLOS: The violence by the government increased so much. The police would come and fire to the protesters, either rubber bullets or real bullets.</s>ROBERT SIEGEL, BYLINE: Live rounds.</s>CARLOS: Yeah. It got pretty, pretty violent, so people got pretty scared.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: And Carlos told us then that his hopes for the future of his country had faded.</s>CARLOS: We believed before that we were able to make a change. Now I don't feel I can make a change, and neither do the people in the streets feel they can make a change. Once we get a job outside Venezuela, we're going to leave. I mean, it's like just - the last one can turn the light off.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: That was just over a year ago.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Now, the opposition to President Maduro has the best chance it's ever had to unseat him. Opposition leader Juan Guaido has powerful allies, including the United States and the European Union. And so we have reached out to Carlos once more. Welcome back to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.</s>CARLOS: Thank you very much.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: You are no longer in Venezuela. Where are you living right now?</s>CARLOS: Well, actually, I've been living in Belgium for three months. I had the very good luck to have very good friends in Europe who have been looking after me all this time. And they made me an offer that I couldn't reject to come to live with them, and they would pay, also, for my plane ticket. Very, very generous, loving friends of mine. I couldn't say no.</s>CARLOS: And with a lot of pain, I had to leave my country, leave my family. Only my parents are there. My two sisters already left. I felt that ship was sinking, and my sisters and me, we were like, leave the country first so we can help my parents maybe leave, or I might go back if things change, but I don't know. It's a lot of uncertainties (ph) for the time.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Tell me about that decision to leave Venezuela after all of this time, having lived there your entire life. You're now in your late 30s. You say the offer to move to Belgium was one you couldn't refuse, but it was also a difficult decision.</s>CARLOS: No, of course. I didn't want to leave. I work in tourism in Venezuela. And also, I'm an actor and architect. But the TV stations closed up, so there was no more work for an actor. My tourism company would depend always on how the streets were. And if their protests exploded like it does now, we were out of a job from one day to another.</s>CARLOS: So these great, great, loving friends of mine - they told me to come to Belgium as a tourist, of course, for the beginning. And now, we're asking for a student permit so I can stay as a student. And therefore, I can work as a student for a part-time job.</s>CARLOS: So it's like figuring out, but it's very, very hard and painful for me, for my late 30s, to begin from zero in another country. And it's, like, frustrating.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: What is daily life like for your parents? They're getting older, and it seems like the situation in Venezuela is getting progressively more difficult.</s>CARLOS: Yeah. Actually, my mother - she's 60, and she tells me every day that she doesn't see a future there anymore. But my father - he has a little - hopes more down. I think he's depressed as well because he feels like, at 59, he's not able to start from zero. And my sisters and I would tell him every day that, yes, he can start from zero, that he must find the strength to leave the country. But they don't want to.</s>CARLOS: Every day for them, it's like wait in lines to buy food, or manage to change some dollars that we send them to bolivars to buy food in the black markets, buy medicine at a black market because you don't find anything in the supermarket. My father started planting at home vegetables so it wouldn't be so hard to go to the supermarket to find them. And, well, now, they're protesting every morning.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Which is why we're not using your last name, out of concern for their safety.</s>CARLOS: Thank you. Thank you, because, yes. So every day, I write with them to check if they were back OK at home after the protest because you never know what's going to happen.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: I'd like to get your perspective on the political developments of the last month. Right now, Juan Guaido, the opposition leader, is recognized by the U.S., Europe, many other countries as Venezuela's interim president. They've declared Maduro an illegitimate leader. How do you view all of this?</s>CARLOS: Well, for us, it's great. Guaido is our hero right now. He's very clean, very honest. He went to school with a friend of mine, so we think he's a fresh start for us as interim president. And we're very, very happy. And we're, as well, shocked with all the support of international countries.</s>CARLOS: Not all Europe is supportive. For example, Italy does not support us - Guaido. There is a lot of things going on. There's a lot of diplomacy. There's a lot of negotiation. Of course, I'm not current of all of it.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Juan Guaido has called for massive protests in Venezuela tomorrow. Is it hard for you not to be there?</s>CARLOS: Yes. My parents are going, so I've been checking up with them today. But we hope this protest is - seal part of the pressure. We need the military to buck up on us because currently, the military are with Maduro, and they are the tipping point to change everything.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: I'd like to play a clip from the last time we spoke to you in December of 2017, when you said your hope for the country had faded but was not entirely gone. This is what you said.</s>CARLOS: This little hope that I have - this little spark of hope is, every time, getting smaller and smaller and smaller. It hasn't gone all out yet, so I'm counting on that.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: How's that little spark doing today?</s>CARLOS: Well, that little spark - I think it turned up again this month. It's very funny that now, with all my friends - most of them, they lived abroad for the same situation. And now we're joking like, OK, who's going back first? So there's, like, this crazy energy going on with all Venezuelans abroad. I saw the video of a Venezuelan shoveling snow, singing that he was going back to Venezuela, back to the sun once things change.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: That's an incredible level of optimism.</s>CARLOS: Yes. It changed from the most pessimist from months ago to now very optimistic. But we are very - well, I'm scared all this optimism - to fade away. We hope not because I think Guaido's plans, if it doesn't work out, I really don't know what to think. I haven't even thought about it.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Thank you again for taking the time to talk with us. We really appreciate it.</s>CARLOS: Thank you.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Carlos is a Venezuelan who we've been checking in with several times over the last 18 months. Now living in Belgium, he's one of about 3 million Venezuelans who have fled that country since 2015.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: And tomorrow on Weekend Edition, some of the security forces that back President Nicolas Maduro are wavering. We hear from a Venezuelan police officer considering whether to switch sides and join the opposition. You can ask your smart speaker to play NPR or your station by name.
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New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker joined the growing Democratic presidential field for 2020 on Friday. He's pushing a message of unity as many candidates have taken a confrontational approach.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Another day, and another Democrat announces his intention to run for president. Today, it's New Jersey Senator Cory Booker. Many political observers have expected him to take this step for years. As NPR's Scott Detrow reports, Booker's entry into the race kicks the field of declared Democratic candidates into the double digits.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: About 15 minutes after he announced his campaign in an online video, Cory Booker called into Tom Joyner's morning radio show.</s>CORY BOOKER: Well, I literally just pushed send on my tweet and Instagram accounts, but this is my first time saying it publicly. I wanted to come on this show, Tom, because of what you mean to so many people in this country.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: By calling in to the influential African-American radio program, followed immediately by a Spanish-language interview on Univision, Booker made it clear that in a crowded and diverse Democratic field, he'll be working hard to win the support of black and Latino voters.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: For the first time in political history, two of the top-tier candidates in the race are black. But Booker is making it clear he'll be running a very different campaign than California Senator Kamala Harris.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: Harris, like other Democratic candidates, is focusing on taking the fight to Trump. Booker isn't campaigning on confrontation. Instead, he's framing his campaign around big, soft focus themes, like common purpose and love.</s>CORY BOOKER: You can't drive out darkness with darkness. You've got to bring the light. You can't drive out hate with hate. You've got to bring the love. And I just think it's time for a more radical empathy for each other in this country.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: It's not that Booker has never gone after political opponents. He made headlines last year lambasting Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen in a hearing following the Oval Office meeting where President Trump used a derogatory term to describe several majority-black countries.</s>CORY BOOKER: Your silence and your amnesia is complicity. I hurt. When Dick Durbin called me, I had tears of rage when I heard about his experience in that meeting. And for you not to feel that hurt and that pain.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: From his time as Newark mayor to his five years in the U.S. Senate, Booker has built his career on big, buzzy moments, often using social media to create them. In 2017, he livestreamed an hours-long sit-in in front of the Senate to protest the Republican push to repeal the Affordable Care Act.</s>CORY BOOKER: And we're just going to sit down. And we're going to sit there for - I don't know how long, but we're going to sit there.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: It started with just Booker and Congressman John Lewis, recruited dozens of senators and even more supporters.</s>CORY BOOKER: I'm really psyched to see so many young people here. Where are you from?</s>UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: The Chicagoland area.</s>CORY BOOKER: You're from the Chicagoland area.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: Sometimes the moments have backfired, like when Booker made what looked like a bold gesture during Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation hearing, threatening to release confidential documents.</s>CORY BOOKER: And I understand that the penalty comes with potential ousting from the Senate.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: It later became clear the documents had already been approved for release. Meghan McCain referenced that scene during an interview on ABC's "The View" today.</s>MEGHAN MCCAIN: How do you convince people, especially on the left, that you're authentic and that you're not a phony, especially during this time, and this isn't just, you know, sort of a political stunt, if you will?</s>CORY BOOKER: Well, you can't speak to authenticity. No, you've just got to be who you are. And there are going to be critics all the time</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: In the early hours of his presidential campaign, Booker has made it clear he won't change his approach. Asked whether his message of compassion and love will hold up to Trump's brutal Twitter attacks, Booker said...</s>CORY BOOKER: You know, love ain't easy.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: And he interrupted the press conference outside his Newark home to greet a neighbor in Spanish, emphasizing his ties to the city where he launched his political career.</s>CORY BOOKER: What is one of the greatest professions in our country, which is public school teachers. (Speaking Spanish). I'm sorry about that.</s>SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: Scott Detrow, NPR News, Washington.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks with former White House Counterterrorism Chief Richard Clarke about the disparity between the president's rhetoric about global threats and that of top intelligence officials.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: President Trump took aim again today at one of his favorite targets - his own intelligence team. Quote, "the intelligence people seem to be extremely passive and naive," he tweeted. In a follow-up moments later, "perhaps intelligence should go back to school." The president was talking about Iran and what dangers that country may pose. And what provoked him was this - testimony yesterday before the Senate Intelligence Committee from the leaders of the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency and this man.</s>DAN COATS: I'm here today with these exceptional people who I had the privilege to work with in making sure that we can do everything we possibly can to bring the intelligence necessary to our policymakers, to this committee and others.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: That would be Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats. And despite his very pleasant-sounding tone there on subject after subject, from Iran to North Korea to ISIS, testimony from Coats and other U.S. intelligence leaders contradicted the president's stated views and policy. Let's bring into the conversation someone who has spent a lot of time navigating between presidents and the spy agencies that serve them, former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke. Hey there.</s>RICHARD CLARKE: It's good to be with you.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Good to have you with us. Now, we should acknowledge that remarkably, this is not new for President Trump to publicly insult his own intelligence chiefs. But what did you make of this back-and-forth yesterday and then again today?</s>RICHARD CLARKE: Well, part of it, I thought was quite good. We have the director of national intelligence, who is a former Republican senator and who doesn't have a lot of background in intelligence. Some of us were concerned he wouldn't do a good job and he might politicize intelligence. In fact, he's done the exact opposite. He's protected the professional intelligence analytical community and given them the cover to stand up and do their job independent of policymakers and to write a good report, which they publicly released yesterday. So that's to the plus. To the negative is, of course, the president attacking his intelligence community publicly. Look. I've been on both sides of this. I've been an intelligence analyst, and I've been a policymaker.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Yeah.</s>RICHARD CLARKE: And there's a natural give and take between the two. And if the system works, one usually upsets the other. But to do it publicly just undercuts the entire intelligence community - the morale, their standing. There's no value to having a public feud.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Of the numerous disconnects on Iran, on North Korea, on ISIS, was there one that leapt out at you?</s>RICHARD CLARKE: Yeah. I would add the Russian election interference to that list - so Russian election interference, Iran, North Korea, ISIS. There's language in the report that obviously the administration wouldn't like. But on all of those issues except for North Korea, they're factual statements. They're not value judgments. Iran is in compliance with a nuclear agreement. Russia did interfere in the 2016 election. ISIS does still, quote, "command thousands of fighters and maintain over a dozen networks."</s>RICHARD CLARKE: The only value judgment is when they say North Korea is unlikely, in the intelligence community's judgment, to give up the WMD. That's their judgment based on a lot of expertise and presumably intelligence. If the president disagrees with that, fine. But why do we have to have him do that publicly? I doubt he's actually read this report, by the way.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: One disconnect that struck me watching - unless I missed it, neither Coats nor anybody else up there testifying pointed to the situation on the U.S.-Mexico border as a...</s>RICHARD CLARKE: It's not in the report.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: ...National security threat.</s>RICHARD CLARKE: No. The Mexican...</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: How do we square that?</s>RICHARD CLARKE: Well, because it's not a national security threat, and it's not a crisis. It's the dog that didn't bark here. It's not in the report because it's really not a crisis.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Very quickly - you have direct experience of working for a president who chose a path of action at odds with what the intelligence might suggest. You were in the White House in the run-up to 9/11. Did you see parallels?</s>RICHARD CLARKE: No, not really. What's disturbing here is there's attack across the board on the intelligence community, and he's really not using intelligence to shape policy.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke, we will leave it there. Thanks so much for taking the time.</s>RICHARD CLARKE: Thank you.
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NPR's Ari Shapiro talks with Ryan Crocker, former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, about why Crocker thinks the American plan to withdraw from Afghanistan is surrender.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The U.S. is trying to negotiate a peace deal to leave Afghanistan. And some Americans who know the country best say the deal on the table now is effectively a surrender. That's what Ryan Crocker argues in The Washington Post this week. He was U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan and has spent decades as a diplomat in the Middle East and Asia. Welcome.</s>RYAN CROCKER: Thanks for having me, Ari.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Do you think it's a mistake for the U.S. to negotiate with the Taliban at all, or do you just think this particular negotiation is misguided?</s>RYAN CROCKER: So here's the thing. The Taliban for years has laid out its position that they are ready to talk to us anytime. They will not talk with the government of Afghanistan because they consider it illegitimate. We caved on that. We are now talking directly to the Taliban. The Afghan government is not in the room. If that's the course we continue on, it will totally delegitimize the Afghan government. And I think there is no outcome I could see from doing that that wouldn't effectively be a surrender, and we're just negotiating the terms.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: One of the arguments you make is that the U.S. won't be able to enforce any peace deal once American troops pull out. By that measure, would the U.S. have to stay in Afghanistan forever?</s>RYAN CROCKER: It's important to look at this in perspective. When I was out there - 2011, 2012, - we had well over 100,000 troopers. We're down now to a little over 14,000. The cost is much less. There still is a cost, but I think it is something we very much can bear. So it's a question of, are we going to see this through, both for our own national security - because Afghanistan, let's not forget, it's where 9/11 came from. Are we going to stand by our values? Because we've put a huge effort into the future of Afghan women and girls making - letting them take their place in society again. Well, that's not part of the Taliban agenda to say the very least.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: In your description, I'm not hearing anything that sounds like, well, once this condition is met or once this box is checked, then it will be safe and prudent for the U.S. to remove its troops. It sounds like you're saying as long as there's a need, American forces should stay there.</s>RYAN CROCKER: That is exactly what I'm trying to say, Ari - that if there is a need, we need to be there. President Trump said this himself the summer of '17. It's not about calendars. It's about conditions. If that means a presence that may rise or fall in terms of troops on the ground, it is a price, I think, we can pay.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: In your Washington Post piece, you say these negotiations bear an unfortunate resemblance to the Paris peace talks during the Vietnam War. And you write then, as now, it was clear that by going to the table, we were surrendering; we were just negotiating the terms of our surrender. And I think that some Americans would draw another parallel with Vietnam, which is this war has cost America too many lives and too much money. And those people would argue that it's time for the war to end whether or not the U.S. declares victory. How do you respond to that argument?</s>RYAN CROCKER: Well, here's a hard truth. You don't end a war by pulling your troops off the battlefield. The Obama administration tried that in Iraq, and the war grinds on to the benefit of Iran. Iran is - has done very nicely out of that. Look at Afghanistan. We will simply be handing over to a force that has more patience than we do, and that would be the Taliban. And we've seen that movie before.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: You've talked about the consequences of leaving Iraq too early, leaving Vietnam too early, leaving Afghanistan too early. Some people will hear this as an argument for endless war.</s>RYAN CROCKER: So here's the thing I've observed over many, many years in the Middle East. We as Americans lack patience. We want to get 'er done. That's how we built our own great country. The rest of the world works on a different clock. What our adversaries have seen over time is that, boy, if you create problems, eventually the Americans will leave; they'll get tired of it; they'll want to move on to something else. So that's what our adversaries count on. That's what our allies fear. We need to be sending the signal right now that we will be where we need to be to protect our interests, to protect our values for as long as it takes.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Ambassador Crocker, thanks for speaking with us today.</s>RYAN CROCKER: Thanks very much for having me.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Ryan Crocker. He's now a diplomat-in-residence at Princeton.
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NPR's Ari Shapiro talks with author and historian Peter Stark about his second-person narrative "Frozen Alive" in Outside Magazine which deals explicitly with hypothermia's physiological effects.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The cold snap in the Midwest is shattering records. In some cities, school is canceled, mail delivery suspended. At least eight people have died from the cold. While you are hopefully huddled someplace warm, we're going to talk now with the man behind one of the most famous pieces ever written about extreme cold. OK, that's a subjective statement, but here is something we can say definitively. Peter Stark wrote the piece "Frozen Alive" more than 20 years ago, and today it is still one of the most popular stories on the website for Outside Magazine. Peter Stark, welcome.</s>PETER STARK: Thank you. It's great to be here, Ari.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Will you just start by reading the first paragraph of this story?</s>PETER STARK: Sure. (Reading) When your Jeep spins lazily off the mountain road and slams backward into a snowbank, you don't worry immediately about the cold. Your first thought is that you've just dented your bumper. Your second is that you failed to bring a shovel. Your third is that you'll be late for dinner. Friends are expecting you at their cabin around 8 for a moonlight ski, a late dinner, a sauna. Nothing can keep you from that.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The story goes on to describe a near-death experience as the man tries to ski to his friend's house and ends up falling in the snow. Of all the things you've written in your career - and you have written a lot - why do you think this story keeps resonating after 20 years?</s>PETER STARK: In my mind, it's the zombie story, the story that's about being dead or near dead, and it comes back to life every winter when it gets really cold.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter).</s>PETER STARK: And I think one reason is that we're all humans. We all have a body. We all have the same physiology. And every one of us has been cold in some way or another at one point or another. And this is what happens when your body is taken to an extreme in that cold situation.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Tell us about the inspiration for this piece. I understand it was not your original idea to write it this way.</s>PETER STARK: No. I was really interested in the physiology of cold, and so I came up with this idea of camping out on the coldest spot in the United States in the lower 48 states, Rogers Pass, Mont., on the coldest night of the winter and then writing about that experience and weaving in again the physiology of cold.</s>PETER STARK: Well, when that coldest night of the year rolled around, it was going to be 50 below zero with a 50-mile-an-hour wind, and I decided this might be a really bad idea. So I stayed home, and I called my editor and said, you know, how about if I just camp in the backyard?</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: (Laughter).</s>PETER STARK: And he said, no, no, no, (laughter) we don't want you to camp in the backyard. Why don't you invent a guy who goes out in cold like this and he gets in trouble and then use his experiences to tell the physiology of the human body responding to cold?</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Did you do a lot of research with doctors and outdoors experts and actually dig into the science behind this?</s>PETER STARK: Yes, I did. I did a tremendous amount of research into the physiology of cold. I interviewed actually an old acquaintance from Wisconsin who nearly died of hypothermia by skiing off the wrong side of a mountain in Montana on a 20-degree-below-zero day and getting caught in the woods to really get his sense of what went through his mind in those situations. And I interviewed emergency room doctors who had warmed up hypothermia victims and got a sense of what they were like when they came in.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The story concludes on a poetic and sobering note. Will you read this paragraph that's close to the end?</s>PETER STARK: So this is at the - near the end when the victim who's had a near-death experience in the cold - but he's been rescued and brought to an emergency room, and so he slowly starts to come to consciousness. (Reading) You've traveled to a place where there is no sun. You've seen that in the infinite reaches of the universe, heat is as glorious and ephemeral as the light of the stars. Heat exists only where matter exists, where particles can vibrate and jump. In the infinite winter of space, heat is tiny. It is the cold that is huge.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Writer and journalist Peter Stark, thank you so much.</s>PETER STARK: Thank you, Ari.
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The U.S. government and Venezuela's self-proclaimed interim president are calling on the military to withdraw support for Maduro's government. But fomenting a coup could bring unexpected consequences.
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AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Now to the power struggle in Venezuela where opposition leader Juan Guaido claims to be the country's legitimate president, and President Nicolas Maduro is holding onto power with the support of the armed forces. Now Guaido and his U.S. backers have embarked on a risky strategy to promote a military uprising. Reporter John Otis has more.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: Nicolas Maduro, who has led Venezuela's socialist revolution for the past six years, is deeply unpopular. He's overseen food shortages, hyperinflation and a crackdown on dissent. But he's kept the military on his side. Analysts say he provides top-ranking officers with fat paychecks and control over lucrative assets, including the state oil company.</s>PRESIDENT NICOLAS MADURO: (Speaking Spanish).</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: In a recent speech, Maduro praised the armed forces as always loyal and never traitorous. But Juan Guaido, the self-proclaimed interim president, is trying to break that support through videotaped messages to the armed forces like this one.</s>JUAN GUAIDO: (Speaking Spanish).</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: Rather than a traditional coup, Guaido calls on officers to turn their backs on Maduro, keep their guns silent and allow his transitional government to take power. This week, U.S. national security adviser John Bolton issued a similar statement.</s>JOHN BOLTON: We also today call on the Venezuelan military and security forces to accept the peaceful, democratic and constitutional transfer of power.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: According to John Polga, a Latin America specialist at the U.S. Naval Academy, it may be just a matter of time before Maduro's support starts to crack.</s>JOHN POLGA: I think the first general that defects from that coalition is going to be the first in a long line of dominoes to fall.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: Still, a military coup could quickly spiral out of control. David Smilde, a sociology professor at Tulane University and an expert on Venezuela, says a coup could lead to a military government even more radical than Maduro's.</s>DAVID SMILDE: One of the most likely coups would be from somebody that thinks Maduro is driving the revolution off the cliff and wants to save the revolution.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: Another possibility is a split within the armed forces leading to shootouts between factions loyal to Maduro and those backing Guaido. Then there is the presence in Venezuela of Colombian guerrillas, armed mafias and drug trafficking gangs, says Amy Myers Jaffe of the Council on Foreign Relations.</s>AMY MYERS JAFFE: Maduro could step down. He could go to some neutral country that will take him. But it doesn't mean that all the militarized factions in the country will lay down their guns and report to the new government.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: Evan Ellis, a research professor at the U.S. Army War College, agrees.</s>EVAN ELLIS: I think it would very quickly become a violent criminal mess. It would become a - basically a free-for-all.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: The military's top brass has so far remained loyal to Maduro. Gaudio has offered amnesty to those who switch sides. But many officers may still fear prosecution for corruption, human rights abuses and other crimes should the opposition take power. In addition, Smilde says, many remain committed socialists and resent the calls for a coup, especially those coming out of Washington.</s>DAVID SMILDE: You know, one of the things that keeps the military together is ideology, the anti-imperialists revolution that they're defending. And so I think the United States pressuring in that direction is probably not the most productive.</s>JOHN OTIS, BYLINE: Venezuela's Defense Ministry did not reply to requests for comment. For NPR News, I'm John Otis.
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Alex Perry, Time magazine's Africa Bureau Chief, explains why the Horn of Africa is arousing strategic interest among world powers. He recently wrote an article on terrorism in East Africa and talks about the political problems Ethiopia poses.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For more on East Africa's relationship with the U.S. six years after 9/11, Alex Perry. He's Time magazine's Africa Bureau Chief. And he recently wrote a piece about the rise of extremism in East Africa called "Ethiopia: Horn of Dilemma."</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Alex joins us now from Cape Town, South Africa. Welcome.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Hi.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So today is the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, and most of our national focus has been on terrorists from Afghanistan and Arab nations. So what does East Africa have to do with terrorism?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Well, it's primarily about geography. East Africa is basically just south of the Middle East. And there's a potential overspill of the turmoil in the Middle East. Influences have always traveled that way. Christianity basically found its legs in the Ethiopia. Islam also did, when the Islamists were thrown out of Saudi Arabia or when they were thrown out of Mecca. They found refuge in Ethiopia. And now, the fear is that this sort of turmoil that you see to the north will also come south and to some extent, that's already come true. Somalia is home to the oldest and best-established jihadi camps in Africa.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Al-Qaida has a presence there. You know, lot of the Islamism is homegrown and locally focused. But there are - both al-Qaida and U.S. military, regards Somalia essentially as the third front on the war on terror.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Is there any evidence that East Africans actually have been involved in international attacks?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Oh, yes. Plenty. I mean, there's the - in 1988, that we tend to think of September 11th is the start date for the war on terror. But 1988, essentially, where when the first shots were fired when two American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were blown up with simultaneous car bombs and attacks had killed, I think, 224 people. That was carried out by a group of people who subsequently and probably, previously, had found refuge in the camps in Somalia.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now you recently reported from Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. And in your article, you called it, quote, "a town of spooks." What did you mean by that?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): You just can't avoid bumping into suspicious people with lots of information. It is. I mean, Ethiopia is the second largest country in Africa. And in some ways, it's a spiritual spencer(ph). It's the only country in Africa that was never colonized. It's also where, you know, early man was first born for the 5.8 million years ago.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): So it has this sense of being a heartland, and as one diplomat puts, it's the center of gravity for the region, perhaps not all of Africa but certainly for East Africa. And to that extent, it attracts the spooks because when everybody is looking at the Horn as a potential risk area, something that could blow up, everybody has their spies on the ground in Ethiopia. It is slightly unnerving, you know. Addis Ababa is a town of cafes. Ethiopia produces great coffee. And in cafe culture, it's very much part of the culture. But just sitting in a cafe, you hear - you overhear the most amazing conversations going on on next-door tables.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So when you're talking about these spooks or spies and operatives, you really are talking about many different nations. How many different nations do you think have an active role or an active stake in Ethiopia's future?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Oh, you name it. I mean, the U.S. considers the Ethiopia its number one African partner. The Chinese are in there. Mossad, the Israelis are fairly active. The Brits are active. The North Koreans have recently supplied Ethiopia with arms shipments. You know, everybody's there.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): It's slightly strange in some ways because you wonder what the end game is, what are they all competing for. There's no great pot of gold at the end of this rainbow.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Somalia has been at civil war since 1991 and Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries on earth. But it's more than out of fear of what might happen, what could blow up and also it's simple competition, if everybody else is there, you kind of got to be there too.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: When you talk about Somalia and the Islamic Courts Movement, there is a perception that the U.S. urged Ethiopia to invade Somalia but the U.S. assistant secretary of state says it was quite the opposite. Now, the U.S. actually did back that invasion with material support, so how much does Washington have influence in the Ethiopian government's decisions?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Look, I mean, this - I know that perception is there. That in some ways this was, you know, an American proxy war. That Ethiopia is a puppet or a poodle for America. I have to say that's, you know, while that perception is widely shared, it's entirely mistaken.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Ethiopia is virulently independent, which, again, goes back to the whole idea that it was never colonized and, you know, it had a very proud heritage. It's the last great living African civilization. So the idea that Ethiopia is anybody's poodle, I think, is out of whack and put about by people who don't really know Ethiopia.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): The stories that we heard, and we have people who are very close to the talks at senior levels between the U.S. and Ethiopian government, was America tried very hard to stop Ethiopia invading Somalia. General John Abizaid actually flew to Addis Ababa and essentially tried to forbid the Ethiopian prime minister, Meles Zenawi, from going in. Well, that sort of language doesn't go down very well in Ethiopia. Meles is quite his own man and replied that he would go in.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): At which point then America changed its stance and lent small contingent of support. There were special forces units traveling with the Ethiopian command, providing the kind of satellite tracking and intelligence in targeting information that the Ethiopians simply don't have the capability for. And I think there was also a certain amount of logistical support.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You've also talked to the Ethiopian president. And what kind of sense do you get of his estimation of extremism inside his own country?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Inside his own country, he's getting increasingly worried. One of the spillovers from Somalia is into the Ogaden region of Ethiopia, which is ethnic Somali. And what the Ethiopians are now facing in Somalia, which is a nationalist insurgency backed by Eritrea, according to a U.N. report that came out in July, it is now facing back at home in terms of an insurgency by two groups. The former, the Ogaden National Liberation Front is the much more important and significant, that is also, sets(ph) Ethiopia, being backed back by Eritrea.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You mention Eritrea. It is neighboring Ethiopia. There've been long-running conflicts between these countries and…</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Yeah.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: …Eritrea might have provided the Somali insurgency with weapons. So do you believe that Eritrea still supports Islamic radicals in Somalia?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): The U.N. report is absolutely categorical that it's supplying them with weapons - and sophisticated weapons. We're talking sort of, you know, surface-to-air missiles and that sort of things, suicide vests. Somalia hadn't seen suicide attacks until the last year. Now they're happening. There seems to be no doubt.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): And, in fact, I must say when I was in Mogadishu a few months back on matter(ph) sort of midlevel insurgent commander, you know, an Islamist, he admitted absolutely openly that the Eritreans were flooding that rebellion with support, with weapons, with cash, with whatever they needed.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And Eritrea has been prickly, to say the least, with the U.S. Is there room to renegotiate that relationship?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): I hope so. It's a very difficult one. At the moment, I would say there probably is room to renegotiate but nobody is minded to. The U.S. is taking an extremely hard line with Eritrea, closed its consulate in Oakland and is broadcasting widely that it's thinking of adding Eritrea to the - to its list of state sponsors of terrorism, which is very heavy-handed for, you know, a little country like Eritrea.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): I mean, this is a tiny, tiny place. The big fear is, basically, puts us one step further towards the scenario in the Horn of Africa that everybody has been afraid of for all these years, which is a regional war.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Because, if Eritreans are backed into a corner and has nobody to negotiate with - from what I understand, the U.S. simply refuses to let it start even talk to Eritreans at this stage, then it, you know, if there's no talks, then it has to fight.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): And it will fight by backing the Somalis in Somalia, by backing the (unintelligible) inside Ethiopia, possibly by facing another war with Ethiopia across that common border.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): And you have this three-front war, which consumes three countries, and the Horn of Africa goes up in flames.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, finally, how big of a priority is this region for America given that the military is really stretched thin in Iraq and Afghanistan at this point?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): As we've said before, it is the third front in the war on terror. It is a much more minor undertaking than either Afghanistan or Iraq, but it is significant. There is a - since 2002, the U.S. has had eighteen hundred troops stationed in Djibouti and a series of sort of forward bases around the region which, you know, when they're empty, can simply be a shed in the runway but can take up to sort of three or 400 people. And it has the capability to move large amounts of troops offshore, which it did recently, on warships.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): During the Ethiopian invasion, the USS Eisenhower's offshore and that takes 72 planes and three-and-a-half thousand men. So there is - there's an increasing focus on Africa as a place which has a lot of unstable states and, you know, potentially, therefore, offers safe haven for terrorists and so on. And a lot of that attention, specifically, focused on the Horn of Africa.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Alex, thank you so much.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Alex Perry is Time magazine's Africa bureau chief. He spoke with us in Cape Town, South Africa, and you can read his article "Ethiopia: Horn of Dilemma" at our Web site nprnewsandnotes.org.
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The Georgia voter photo ID requirement had its fair share of detractors. For more on where the law's opponents stand, Al Williams — a Georgia state representative and chairman of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus –- explains why he and his organization opposed the bill.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For more on where the law's opponents stand, we have Al Williams, a Georgia state representative and chairman of the Legislative Black Caucus. Thanks for coming on.</s>State Representative AL WILLIAMS (Democrat, Georgia; Chairman, Legislative Black Caucus): Hello, and thank you for having me.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So why is your organization against the law?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: Well, primarily, the law was not needed. We went from one of the better states exercising voter rights to one of the most restrictive. We have not one instance in 12 years - and that was a study done by the previous Secretary of State Cathy Cox - not one instance of voter fraud at the polls. And the proponents of this bill - you can't have it both ways. You scream on one hand about not wanting government intrusion and then on the other hand, you step in and put a very restrictive law on the books.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So, though, you say there has been no voter fraud at the same time, is there really any evidence that this law could be restrictive or are you just going on faith?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: No. There's definite evidence. I don't know where some of the other facts are found, but I know that 36 percent of senior citizens over 75 years old don't have driver's license and many forms of this identification the secretary of state talks about.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Most of the fraud that occurs with voting is with absentee ballots, where only a signature is required. But none of these provisions will even addressed in Senate Bill 84. This is why many feel limiting voter fraud and securing our elections is not the motive with this SB 84 but instead who votes.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: This is not a popularity contest. This is being decided in the courts. Nonetheless, what is the sense that you get from constituents in your state?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: A lot of disappointment, and, you know, we live in a state where when you have 40 percent voter turnout, everybody is cheering about the huge turnout. So we make it more restrictive. And it directly affects black people and older folk who traditionally vote Democrat. This was a Republican game to lower the turnout - case closed. And as far as the court's ruling, we've been ruled against before but we will not give up the fight.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Are you afraid that this will affect the local elections later this month?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: Have no doubt that it'll have some effect. We would have never opposed in the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus if we did not feel like it would directly affect every election. We should be working on improving voter turnout. Of course, the average report - there are a lot of Republican absentee voters. That's why it was never addressed.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, let me just ask you. How many African-Americans, or what percentage are there, in your caucus?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: We have 52 African-Americans in our caucus, and we are the largest legislative black caucus in America.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And do you think that you can really make a difference at this stage when this has already gone on to appeals?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: I think we can. We represent up to 2.5 million African-Americans plus poor and disenfranchised people throughout the state. We have to make a difference. There was a time when none of us served in legislature, and we had to fight. When one or two of us win the legislature, you find numbers mean nothing. Commitment means everything.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Do you want to continue to fight this in the courts? What is your plan from this point forward?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: I think that we will have to stay in the courts. We have to oppose it. When Plessy versus Ferguson passed was ruled to law, if we had given up the fight then, we'd still be snucking at the backdoor.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Final question. There is certainly a lot of talk about the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department. Whether or not it has lived up to its promise in recent years, do you think that there's an atmosphere where, at the federal level, there is some effort to really deal with cases like this?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: The Civil Rights Division - the Justice Department, is not nearly as effective as it originally some years ago was, and that started under President Ronald Reagan. Civil Rights Division is, in a lot of instances, window dressing with no real commitment for the civil rights of those that they are supposed to be advocating for.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Representative Williams, thank you so much for speaking with us.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: State Rep. WILLIAMS: Thank you. Thank you very kindly.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: We have been talking about the Georgia Voter ID Law and a new set of court decisions on that. Al Williams is a Georgia State representative and chairman of its Legislative Black Caucus. And he spoke with us from Cumulus Studios in Savannah.
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There's cold and then, there's -60 wind chills coming from a brutal storm front creating havoc in much of the Midwest. Yes, it's winter, but this is upwards of 40 degrees colder than normal.
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MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Negative 23, negative 29, negative 31 - somewhat unbelievably, those are the temperature readings today in parts of the Upper Midwest. Dangerous, bone-chilling, record-setting cold has closed schools and businesses, canceled thousands of flights, even suspended mail delivery in some states. From Chicago, NPR's David Schaper reports.</s>DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: It is ridiculously cold in Chicago today, and the wind is biting. It is bright and sunny, but that big, bright yellow and orange ball in the sky is doing nothing to warm the air. Forecasters summed it up well when they said the sunshine today would be, quote, "ineffectual."</s>JON DAVIS: We got down this morning at O'Hare to minus 23. That is the coldest reading in Chicago since January of 1985.</s>DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: Jon Davis is chief meteorologist of the risk management firm Riskpulse. He says about a month ago, there was a rare warming of the stratosphere disrupting the polar vortex which usually sits over the arctic.</s>JON DAVIS: The polar vortex split, and then many areas of the hemisphere got cold. First it was Europe, then it was China, then the third part of it is then over us right now and is the reason for the cold.</s>DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: As a result, 200 million people of the continental U.S. are experiencing freezing temperatures. That's 70 percent of the country, with 70 million people suffering in subzero conditions that will last at least through Thursday and some facing life-threatening windchills of up to 65 degrees below zero.</s>DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: Social service, city and state agencies across the Midwest are reaching out to the homeless and other vulnerable residents to bring them into warming centers. Because of a significant strain on the natural gas system, Xcel Energy in Minnesota is urging residents to turn down their thermostats to a chilly 60 degrees. Good luck with that. And the dangerous cold is affecting shipping companies, too.</s>CHARLES MILLER: There's not many trucks out on the road today.</s>DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: Charles Miller is with the logistics company Evans Transportation Services outside of Milwaukee.</s>CHARLES MILLER: Diesel has a gel point essentially where the wax in the diesel itself will start to congeal.</s>DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: That means eagerly anticipated shipments of Super Bowl party staples like beer and avocados for guacamole are delayed. But by game time, temperatures here are expected to soar, rising as much as 60 degrees over today's 20-below readings. David Schaper, NPR News Chicago.
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For the latest news from the continent, Farai Chideya speaks with NPR East Africa correspondent Gwen Thompkins. They discuss Ethiopia's millennium celebrations and that nation's struggle with poverty and reports of rebellions and repression.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For more on East Africa's relationship with the U.S. six years after 9/11, Alex Perry. He's Time magazine's Africa Bureau Chief. And he recently wrote a piece about the rise of extremism in East Africa called "Ethiopia: Horn of Dilemma."</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Alex joins us now from Cape Town, South Africa. Welcome.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Hi.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So today is the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, and most of our national focus has been on terrorists from Afghanistan and Arab nations. So what does East Africa have to do with terrorism?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Well, it's primarily about geography. East Africa is basically just south of the Middle East. And there's a potential overspill of the turmoil in the Middle East. Influences have always traveled that way. Christianity basically found its legs in the Ethiopia. Islam also did, when the Islamists were thrown out of Saudi Arabia or when they were thrown out of Mecca. They found refuge in Ethiopia. And now, the fear is that this sort of turmoil that you see to the north will also come south and to some extent, that's already come true. Somalia is home to the oldest and best-established jihadi camps in Africa.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Al-Qaida has a presence there. You know, lot of the Islamism is homegrown and locally focused. But there are - both al-Qaida and U.S. military, regards Somalia essentially as the third front on the war on terror.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Is there any evidence that East Africans actually have been involved in international attacks?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Oh, yes. Plenty. I mean, there's the - in 1988, that we tend to think of September 11th is the start date for the war on terror. But 1988, essentially, where when the first shots were fired when two American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were blown up with simultaneous car bombs and attacks had killed, I think, 224 people. That was carried out by a group of people who subsequently and probably, previously, had found refuge in the camps in Somalia.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now you recently reported from Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. And in your article, you called it, quote, "a town of spooks." What did you mean by that?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): You just can't avoid bumping into suspicious people with lots of information. It is. I mean, Ethiopia is the second largest country in Africa. And in some ways, it's a spiritual spencer(ph). It's the only country in Africa that was never colonized. It's also where, you know, early man was first born for the 5.8 million years ago.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): So it has this sense of being a heartland, and as one diplomat puts, it's the center of gravity for the region, perhaps not all of Africa but certainly for East Africa. And to that extent, it attracts the spooks because when everybody is looking at the Horn as a potential risk area, something that could blow up, everybody has their spies on the ground in Ethiopia. It is slightly unnerving, you know. Addis Ababa is a town of cafes. Ethiopia produces great coffee. And in cafe culture, it's very much part of the culture. But just sitting in a cafe, you hear - you overhear the most amazing conversations going on on next-door tables.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So when you're talking about these spooks or spies and operatives, you really are talking about many different nations. How many different nations do you think have an active role or an active stake in Ethiopia's future?</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): Oh, you name it. I mean, the U.S. considers the Ethiopia its number one African partner. The Chinese are in there. Mossad, the Israelis are fairly active. The Brits are active. The North Koreans have recently supplied Ethiopia with arms shipments. You know, everybody's there.</s>Mr. ALEX PERRY (Africa Bureau Chief, Time Magazine): It's slightly strange in some ways because you wonder what the end game is. What
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NPR's Ari Shapiro talks with Mark Cohen, senior fellow with the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology, about what the Huawei indictment says about China's technology theft.
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ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: This week gives us one vivid illustration of how complicated the U.S.-China relationship can be. Tomorrow negotiators from the two countries meet for another round of trade talks. And just yesterday American prosecutors unsealed two sweeping indictments against China's giant telecommunications firm Huawei. One of those indictments alleges that the company and its CFO violated U.S. sanctions on Iran. The other charges the company with stealing trade secrets from T-Mobile.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: And we're going to explore that now with Mark Cohen. He led the China team at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office until last year. Before that, he dealt with intellectual property issues at the U.S. embassy in Beijing. Welcome.</s>MARK COHEN: Thank you, Ari.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: This indictment reads like a screenplay. It describes in detail how Huawei tried to steal the technology powering a T-Mobile robot named Tappy so that it could build its own robot in China. The part I want to zero in on is this allegation that while this was all taking place, Huawei launched a formal program to reward employees who stole confidential information from competitors. How big a deal is this?</s>MARK COHEN: Well, it's a pretty big deal. I think it supports the narrative coming from the Trump administration and elsewhere that China has embarked on a very holistic campaign to acquire U.S. technology, often illegally. And here you have a bonus program that's intended to incent employees to go ahead and steal proprietary information, which actually Huawei's own local management in the U.S. said its employees should not adhere to because they have to abide by U.S. law.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Do you think these indictments signal a change in the U.S. approach to this problem?</s>MARK COHEN: They signal an escalation in an approach. The Department of Justice, the FBI announced a special effort last November to deal with economic espionage from China. I think China is viewed as a greater competitive threat. And we've seen some major cases with major losses to U.S. industry.</s>MARK COHEN: We always knew that there were state policies to encourage China to domestically innovate, whatever that means. And we always saw these incentives to lure back employees, Chinese Ph.D.s from the U.S. or elsewhere to work on important projects. In the Huawei indictment, we now have an indication of a corporate incentive from a major Chinese company basically to steal, which further underscores the threat that is posed by this type of activity.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: So let's talk about the trade negotiations that resume tomorrow. How does this major public accusation of criminal behavior against one of China's biggest companies affect the conversations happening between the U.S. and China about trade?</s>MARK COHEN: Well, the trade issues are huge. We're talking about half a trillion dollars or so in bilateral trade, $250 billion with potential 25 percent tariffs. By comparison this is relatively small, this isolated matter. But I believe it is very supportive of the U.S. narrative about the need for systemic changes in China regarding intellectual property protection and particularly trade secret protection.</s>MARK COHEN: But in addition to that - and I think this is more fundamental to what the administration is saying - China has created a system that abuses global IP norms, that tolerates immoral activity when it serves the national technological interests. And this case, to a degree, is a pretty convincing instance of where that toleration has led to conspiracy to steal from a company based in the U.S. and to acquire technology illegally.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: The behavior described in this indictment seems so, for lack of a better word, shameless and persistent and widespread. It's hard to imagine that a public indictment like this is going to make much of a difference in what China decides to do going forward.</s>MARK COHEN: You know, pursuing individuals or pursuing companies, you know, is one way to make the case. Hopefully it creates some deterrence. I think this case, to a very large extent, is at least about deterrence as it is about anything else that this kind of behavior, this kind of encouragement of theft of trade secrets will not be tolerated by the U.S. And not only that, it will be disclosed to the world, severely contradicting Huawei's statements that they don't tolerate this type of behavior.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Mark Cohen, thanks so much for joining us.</s>MARK COHEN: My pleasure.</s>ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: He's senior fellow at the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology.
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Mohammed Naseehu Ali used to boast about his name that made him something of a superstar in America. But he says since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, his Islamic name has brought him a lot of trouble.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I'm Farai Chideya, and this is NEWS & NOTES.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What's in a name? Well, if you're a Muslim living in the United States today, your name might evoke ideas about you that your parents never intended. When Mohammed Naseehu Ali first came to the U.S., he liked his name. For one, it made people think of the former heavyweight champ, one of the world's most beloved American citizens. But after 9/11 everything changed.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Mohammed Naseehu Ali, welcome.</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): Thank you.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So you came to the States in 1988. Did you think your name was an advantage?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): Oh, definitely. Actually, my name the way you pronounce it fully is Mohammed Naseehu Abubakar Ali. It's a whole name. And - but when I got here, of course, you know, knowing full well how popular Muhammad Ali's name was, I, you know, conveniently just deleted the two names in between and just call myself Mohammed Ali.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And you are Ghanaian by birth.</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): Yes, I'm from Ghana. Yes.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So did you think about going with your middle name? I understand that would be the common thing to do in Ghana because Mohammed is a first name given to many people and…</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): Everyone is named Mohammed in my family.</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): It is the middle name, you know, that's pretty much the adjective that describes the quality of Mohammed. So typically, at home they would call me Naseehu to differentiate from all the other Mohammeds. But here, you know, I think, generally, Americans like to use the first and the last name. And who would say no to a name like Mohammed Ali? So I just took on Mohammed Ali.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: How did people react to your name before the attacks on the World Trade Center?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): Let me tell you, Farai, I used to get very cool reactions, you know? Some funny ones, some even - are foul but, you know, in the kind of funny way, you know? Sometimes when people hear my name, when I tell them my name is Mohammed Ali, they will just look at me and go, please, tell us your real name. What is your real name? But my name is Mohammed Ali, you know?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): And, you know, it's runs a gamut, you know? I get some people who just, as soon as they hear the name, they will just look at me from top to down. And I'm smallish, you know, I'm not a big guy at all. So you know, they give me this little, you know, what are you doing having a name Mohammed Ali?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): So it used to be, you know, really great, you know, wherever you go. You know, wherever I went, you know, the name just involves this, you know, respect from the original Muhammad Ali, and then they look at me this funny guy having the name. But then, of course, with September 11, everything changed.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You were actually in New York on 9/11. Tell me what happened?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): No, I was at the site. I was in the World Trade Center. Right after the first plane had hit, and they were trying to get us out of the building. So I came out of the building, you know, to make a long story short. I called my wife at home. At that time, we had a 6-year-old - fifth-month-old, and I was telling her, listen, I don't know what's going on here but something really crazy, something terrible is going on around here so I'm just going to leave. As I was on the phone with her, the second plane hit so the line went dead. For the next six hours, my wife and my family thought I was dead because I was right, right at the site, you know, when that happened. It was horrible.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: When you heard that these terrorist attacks were led by Muslims, did you think that it might have an impact on you directly?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): I thought so. Let me tell you, even until today, anytime I watch the news, and there are news of terrorist, you know, plots or attempts, of course, most of them have the name Mohammed. And honestly, my biggest fear right now is for them to name someone from West Africa, you know? I still, you know, used to get it because largely it's Muslims who were doing it. And largely, even though mostly, it's people from the Middle East. But lately people from North Africa have been, you know, they've been involved in that. So I knew it's going to come to that. I knew that. I've always have that fear.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You mentioned that you had a six-month-old at the time of the 9/11 attacks.</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): Attacks. Mm-hmm.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now your child is old enough to understand some things about the world. Do you talk to your child about Muslim - anti-Muslim prejudice and about the events of 9/11, anything like that?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): I do talk to her a lot about it. I do talk to her a lot about it. Even though, you know, I'm a Muslim, I grew up a Muslim, I still do practice, you know, but I'm not, you know, I'm not a fundamentalist by any means, you know? And I'm very, very, very moderate even way to the left side, you know? So I do talk to her. You know, the point is for me not to raise her - I want to raise her as a citizen of the world, to be honest with you. It may sound, you know, like a cliche, but that's how I want to raise her because, as an artist, that's how I live my life. I want to raise her as a very proud black person first and foremost, and the (unintelligible) comes, you know, later.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Finally, do you think things have changed for better or worse in those intervening years after the wounds of 9/11 were so fresh?</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): I am not sure if things have changed, to be honest with you. I mean, sometimes I go in between being very angry about what happened to me sometimes when I do travel. But then, at the same time, you know, you understand that is human nature. We tend to get panicky and, you know, whenever there's any religious ethnic, you know, on national attention so I do understand it, you know, that, you know, when it comes to that.</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): But things really - I don't think things have changed that much because I still do get into trouble sometimes when I travel. You know, they will keep me, you know, for a very long time doing some research somewhere and the fact that they have not been able to figure out that Mohammed Ali, who lives in Brooklyn at my address, is not a terrorist, I think we have a very long way to go.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Mohammed, thank you so much.</s>Mr. MOHAMMED NASEEHU ALI (Writer, "The Prophet of Zongo Street"): It's my pleasure.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Mohammed Naseehu Ali is a writer living in Brooklyn, and his latest novel is "The Prophet of Zongo Street."
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Gen. David Petraeus testified before Congress on Monday, delivering perhaps the most anticipated wartime assessment in a generation. Farai Chideya talks with Juan Williams about Petraeus' report on the war in Iraq, and the prescriptions he has for the country.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: From NPR News, this is NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Today, General David Petraeus testifies before Congress, delivering perhaps the most anticipated wartime assessment in a generation. Petraeus' report is likely to echo President Bush's Labor Day speech that sectarian violence is down and the troop surge needs more time. But questions remain about the advocacy of Iraq's central government and the effect a longer surge could have on army and Marine forces that are already stretched thin.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For more, we've got NPR's Juan Williams.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Hi, Juan.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: How are you, Farai?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, this is tricky. At the time of our broadcast, General Petraeus is just getting ready to address Congress. Still, you have a good idea what his overall game plan is. Let's start with the toughest question: Is the troop surge working?</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: And his answer will be yes, that, in fact, you see a decrease in sectarian violence in Iraq, specifically in Baghdad, the capital. And at the effort to even construct the walls has helped to tamp down on some of the fighting and, certainly, decreased the number of deaths. Now, that's going to be what he says and is part of a plea for the Congress to give him more time to accomplish even more of a stabilization of Iraq.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: I might add here that there are separate numbers that come from the general -the GAO, the General Accounting Office, and even another report by a General Jones last week that suggested that the army and the military had not been able to come up to speed as quickly as Americans might have hoped. But General Petraeus will take a much more forward-looking optimistic point of view.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So is this GAO report going to undermine Petraeus' testimony and credibility?</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: Well, there's conflicting data. And it can't undermine him because the data's not public, Farai. So there's been pleas from the Democrats to make it public and to make the data that General Petraeus is relying on public as well. The White House, so far, has turned down those requests and said that it's a matter of military secrecy. But the general impression is that General Petraeus is someone who is going to tell the truth. And his numbers may be a little different, but overall, that his report will be supported by what congressional delegations have seen over the last month, that there appears to be less on the street violence in Baghdad and in some of the distant provinces, such as even Anwar province, the one that President Bush visited recently.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, the question here: How long can the U.S. troops sustain the surge? And, Juan, are you hearing anything about whether or not, once again, the military is considering extending the troops' tours of duty to continue the surge?</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: Well, this is an argument that's taking place inside the Pentagon. And Defense Secretary Robert Gates and some of the heads of the various branches of the Armed Forces and the joint chiefs of staff have suggested that that, in fact, by next spring, the military will be stretched and - to the point of breaking and that they cannot extend beyond that point.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: And I might add that that also fits the political timetable, Farai, that six months before the '08 elections, the Republicans want at least to start to see a few brigades coming home. And so that would mean, you know, five to 10,000. Right now, we're at 170,000 in all. We're at the, really, the most Americans in Iraq at - of any time. And the idea is that Senator Warner of Virginia has asked that some begin coming home by Christmas.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: And President Bush, who's going to speak later this week, to talk around Washington is he's going to say that you're going to start to see some reductions by springtime. And as I said, I don't think there's much of a choice there because the military is at the breaking point.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: There's so many moving pieces here. You have al-Qaida in Iraq, some victories there in al-Anbar province. But some of these reports have leveled harsh criticism at the Iraqi government for being unable to make good on the benchmarks that it set for itself. Are the general's hands tied as long as he's saddled with a stalemate in the Iraqi government?</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: They are. And, you know, last week he sent a letter out to the troops in Iraq saying that, you know, progress hasn't come as quickly on the political front as he had hoped. That you have achieved some tactical improvements. But in terms of the reason for these tactical improvements, which was to allow the Iraqi government to take shape, to allow the Iraqi army and police to get up to speed, to allow the Iraqi people to find a way top economically sustain themselves by dividing up the revenue from oil and other economic enterprises, that that just hasn't come about.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: So he expressed frustration with the political developments in Iraq as well as with the political insistency and some might argue, impatience here at home, to - for getting the job done. So his job, as he's testifying today - by the way, this is only the first day of testimony. He's going to have two other sessions before the Congress, Farai. His job, in a sense, is to say that on the military front, he sees progress. But to acknowledge that in terms of the political timetable, the benchmarks that you mention, the Iraqi government, Prime Minister al-Maliki's - they've fallen behind.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You mentioned some impatience with potential timetables. Again, the Republicans, some of them starting to break away from the president's position. Do you think this is going to continue? Are there any hints that there will be more breakaway Republican voices?</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: This is a very tricky political calculus to be played here. In some ways, what you're hearing, what I'm hearing from White House people is they don't mind if a few Republicans break away, especially Republicans who are politically vulnerable. Here, we're talking about people like Norm Coleman, the senator from Minnesota, Olympia Snowe in Maine. They're talking about people who they want to retain in the Congress, make sure that they are able to win the election.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: But the White House doesn't see that there's anywhere near the dozen Republican votes in the Senate that would be necessary to create a veto-proof majority that would vote to either set a deadline or the pull funding at this moment in order to end the war. So they don't mind if there are few breakaways. And so far, there really haven't been very many breakaways. So far, they've been able to hold the line. And it's a big surprise that the Democrats who thought that with the August recess, as members of Congress, Republicans went home, they would get so much criticism because, as you know, the poll numbers suggest most Americans want the war over. But that didn't play out and the Republicans instead have focused on the tactical improvements that have come with the success - the limited success, but success related to having more Americans on the ground and tamping down the violence.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Juan, thanks so much for the update.</s>JUAN WILLIAMS: You're welcome, Farai.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: NPR's senior correspondent Juan Williams.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, one of the 17 lawmakers beginning negotiations on border security, hoping to find a compromise to avert another government shutdown.
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MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: All right, let's dig in on these border negotiations with Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar of Texas. His district sits on the U.S.-Mexico border, and he sits on this conference committee that's trying to find a compromise. We have caught him just off Statuary Hall in the Capitol. Congressman, good to speak with you.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: It's a pleasure. Thank you so much.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: I want to start with how you are feeling about prospects for a deal. I noted President Trump saying he's doubtful a deal will be reached. He said he thinks the chances are somewhere below 50-50. Where do you put them?</s>HENRY CUELLAR: You know, I work with our colleagues. We're appropriators. And, of course, we work with our Senate appropriators - Democrats and Republicans. I think appropriators, by nature, are deal-makers. We sit down, and we work things out. So I feel that if there's no outside influence - you know, we're talking about the president - if they just let us do our work, I feel very confident that we can work something out.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Nobody wants to see a shutdown. As you know, our position was very simple - keep the government open, pay the employees and negotiate. And that's where we are. We ended up, after a 35-day disaster, back in square one. So we want to negotiate now.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Well, I mean, you just put your finger on the challenge, which is, it seems, looking at this from the outside, that the biggest issue isn't whether you in Congress can come up with a solution. You did it before with Senator Mitch McConnell's plan. The challenge is coming up with something that the president will sign. Are you any clearer on that today - on what he would accept?</s>HENRY CUELLAR: We have no idea. With all due respect to the president, he does change his mind. As you know, originally, back in December, we thought we had a deal. And the Senate had a deal, and we were ready to go with that deal. But then it changed. And all the sudden, he said, no, I want $5.7 billion, and I'm not going to change my mind. And it's still on that.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: But originally, we, you know, we thought we had a deal. So that's why I feel confident that we can sit down and actually negotiate.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: To drill down on this, are there specific items you want to see on the table in these talks?</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Well, listen; if you want to stop drugs, where do most drugs come? According to DEA, or according to CBP, ports of entry. So we need to modernize...</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Legal ports of entry, you're saying.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Yeah. Legal ports of entry.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Official crossings.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Official crossings. So we put technology - the modern X-ray machines. You look at K-9s. You look at personnel - men and women in blue. And you secure those ports of entry. If you look at the latest drug case in New York, what do they say? Most drugs will come through ports of entry or through fast boats or submarines. So Coast Guard needs to have their equipment, also, to stop those folks on that.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: I guess what I'm driving at is, can you give us any more insight into what exactly the sticking point is at this moment in negotiations?</s>HENRY CUELLAR: What the sticking point, I think, at the end is going to be - my opinion - is the president wants a show and tell, which is this, quote, "wall" - fence. That's what he wants. He wants to fulfill a campaign promise. He thinks this 14th-century solution is the best way to secure the border.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Last thing to ask you, which is this - to what degree hanging over these talks is that the president might decide to bypass you all - to bypass Congress if Congress doesn't give him what he wants - declare a national emergency or just send more military to build a wall?</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Well, you know, keep in mind, can he declare? He can. Can he win? Probably not. I mean, there'll be lawsuits everywhere. I mean, notice how he's handled this emergency. If there was an emergency, what do you do? You declare it on the moment. You don't say, let me look at this; let me think about it; oh, I'm going to do this.</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: You're saying it's telling that he's threatened to declare an emergency but, so far, has not.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Yeah. I mean, if it's an emergency, he would've declared it already. And by the way, listen; the border crime rate - murder, rapes, assault - is lower than the national crime rate. In fact, my hometown of Laredo is about three, four times safer for 100,000 individuals than Washington. The most dangerous thing I do on the border is when I leave the border, come to Washington, D.C., because it's so dangerous here. And again, I'm not talking about the politics. I'm talking about FBI stats. So I mean, you know, when they talk about the crisis, what crisis are you really talking about?</s>MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: Henry Cuellar - he is a Democratic congressman from Texas. Thank you so much, Congressman, for taking the time.</s>HENRY CUELLAR: Thank you.
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Our panel of reporters debates the stories making news this week. In the mix Friday: the Clinton campaign's finances; the political and personal drama of Sen. Larry Craig; and comedian Eddie Griffin getting the boot at a Black Enterprise event. Joining Farai Chideya are Ron Claiborne of ABC News' Good Morning America Weekend, Laura Washington of the Chicago Sun-Times and John Yearwood, world editor for The Miami Herald.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: From NPR News, this is NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: The presidential campaign of Senator Hillary Clinton has been getting some unwanted press. One of her donors, Norman Hsu was arrested by the FBI yesterday after failing to show up in court in relation to a 15-year-old felony conviction.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So why is this coming up now? For the second time, Hsu has skipped bail on a financial paper trail indicates that he may have flouted campaign finance laws. Senator Clinton and others who have received donations from Hsu have plans to donate the money to charity.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: For more on this and other stories, we've got ABC correspondent Ron Claiborne, Chicago Sun-Times' columnist Laura Washington, and world editor for the Miami Herald, John Yearwood.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Welcome folks.</s>Mr. JOHN YEARWOOD (World Editor, Miami Herald): Hi.</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): How's your (unintelligible), Farai.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So Ron, let me start with you.</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): Okay.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: This is a multiply layered story. It's kind of like a big old birthday cake where you've got this guy, Norman Hsu, who has made his money, arguably making sort of knockoff clothes for, you know, discounts designer knockoff. And he may - allegedly - have been funneling money to other people to get around campaign finance laws.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Does this hurt Senator Hillary Clinton that this keeps coming up in the news?</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): In the long - look, the election, if she's the nominee, is 14 months away. I think voters will not know or remember who Hsu is by then. But it doesn't look good right now when you have a guy who, with allegedly, this kind of a skullduggerist background, if I can make up a word, as a chief fundraiser for her. It just doesn't look good.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And, you know, Laura, when we think about campaign finance laws, a lot of times, there's this look at, you know, how much are big corporations influencing American politics. The question that I have among many is what does he get out of this? Do we have any idea what he would get out of being a campaign finance bundler, if in fact, that's what he is?</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): Well, it's obvious that people give money to candidates in expectations of many things - favors, attention, clout. In Hsu's case, it seems that he was trying to create a perception that he had clout and he had connections because it helped his business. There's been reports about the number of times he bulldozed his way into events to take photographs with candidates.</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): This is probably the expectation that many of these folks have. It's not necessarily a direct favor, but it's all about influence peddling. And the answer to your earlier question about, you know, in the long term, will it hurt Hillary Clinton. I think in the long term, it might hurt many of these candidates. Remember, Hillary was not the only person to accept money from Hsu, many people did. And whether or not it's going to have any impact, I guess, to pardon the pun, it depends on how many other shoes you're going to drop along the way.</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): There's a hundred - hundreds of thousands that people are giving to these presidential campaigns and there's got to be some dirty laundry in a lot of those contributions.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: John, is this a situation where it's just going to be really, really rough for almost any candidate to completely vet all the people who were giving them money?</s>Mr. JOHN YEARWOOD (World Editor, Miami Herald): Yes, Farai. Indeed, you will expect that there's someone in the base of her campaign headquarters vetting all these names. But given the number of donors we've been seeing, the tens and hundreds of thousands, I can understand why it's very, very difficult.</s>Mr. JOHN YEARWOOD (World Editor, Miami Herald): Also, I just want to take a little issue with a comment that it might not hurt Hillary. There's been a great deal of conversation in the campaign, as you know, about the corrupting influence of money. And what I expect if you bundle this with other stories about lobbyists, it could hurt Hillary at some point because she's been the one with the big bull's eye about taking money from taking lobbyists and now we're talking about taking money from people like Hsu.</s>Mr. JOHN YEARWOOD (World Editor, Miami Herald): I understand certainly that others are involved. But I think it's something that the campaign certainly has to be very wary about.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: All right.</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): Well, look at Barack - but look at Barack Obama, though. He has made an issue and implied that Hillary is, you know, sort of captive to the lobbyists and he's not taking a lobbyist's money. But there's been a lot of report in Chicago about a gentleman by the name of Tony Rescoe(ph) who is currently under indictment, who got a lot of support Barack Obama throughout his career. And Barack Obama had to return some campaign funds to him. And look at that, no one's talking about that. So Barack Obama, who set himself up as a paradigm of virtue when it comes to campaign finance reform, is not getting her by this. Hillary Clinton I think will probably slide to it, at least, even in the time being.</s>Mr. CLAIRBORNE: You know, the reality is that these candidates - this race is going to be incredibly expensive by the time it's all over. And first and foremost, they want money. I think they're not thinking about initially, or maybe subsequently they will, the background of Hsu. He was well-known for the last several years as a big-time fundraiser for Democrats. So imagine Hillary Clinton's campaign was saying, we'll happily take any money that he can help us raise.</s>Mr. CLAIRBORNE: And I would draw a distinction between lobbyists. It - there is a pretty ugly perception by many people that if you're taking money from lobbyists, that just doesn't look good. That does not look good. And Hillary Clinton has not yet renounced this source of income. Hsu was a fundraiser ostensibly, and these candidates, all of them are happy to have people like Hsu in so far as he was able to bring in lots of money, and they love money.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, I want to move on to another politician. This is something where, you know, I have to say, it's probably a TGIF moment for Senator Larry Craig because he's had a rough week.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So this is a Republican senator from Idaho. He says he plans to stay in office if he can get his original guilty plea dismissed and these plans for staying in office were revealed on Wednesday when he left a message for his lawyer, Billy Martin, on the wrong voicemail. I'm sorry, I shouldn't be laughing.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: The owner of the voicemail box leaked it to the press. Here it is.</s>Senator LARRY CRAIG (Republican, Idaho): Billy, this is Larry Craig calling. You can reach me on my cell. Arlen Specter is now willing to come out in my defense, arguing that it appears by all that he knows I've been railroaded and all of that. Having all of that, we've reshaped my statement a little bit to say it is my intent to resign on September 30. I think it is very important for you to make as bold a statement as you are comfortable with this afternoon. And I would hope you could make it in front of the cameras. I think it would help drive the story that I'm willing to fight, that I've got quality people out there fighting in my defense. And that this thing could take a new turn or a new shape, has that potential.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You know, all of us have those moments where it's like, uh-oh, wait, I'm wearing the right shoe on the left foot. And I don't know, Laura, does this show a certain degree of ineptitude more than malfeasance?</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): You're right. You're right to laugh, Farai. This guy just doesn't get it. You know, he talks about Billy Martin making a bold statement on his behalf. I wish he could make a bold statement about anything. He - mistake after mistake after mistake, he made a mistake going into that bathroom. Whatever happened in there, we won't know for sure. But that was a mistake. He made a mistake pleading guilty to a crime that he claims that he didn't commit under a lot of pressure. He made a mistake resigning and apparently he thought so after the fact because as we know he's starting to back up and imply that he might recant his resignation.</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): You know, he hasn't made any smart moves all the way down the line. So it's his fault. I mean, he has only himself to blame.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Ron, Craig sent this voicemail on Saturday afternoon, on the way to the press conference where he would announce his intent to resign. So can you kind of clear up exactly what he seemed to be doing chronologically?</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): Well, the bathroom - the restroom episode in Minneapolis airport was back in June and he subsequently, a couple of months later, he says, without the advice of counsel, which probably the case, pleaded guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct, not the original lewd behavior charge. I guess he was thinking that this thing would be kept quiet. That's mighty naive of him.</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): And, of course, it did get out, the allegations against him, in very graphic detail, and then his fortunes just went rapidly downhill from there where the Republicans in the Senate deserted him almost to the man and woman, except for the - his fellow senator from Idaho. They wanted him - our understanding was they wanted him to be out of office before Congress returned from the August recess.</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): He did, instead, made that statement about his intent to resign, clearly leaving himself what he thought was an escape hatch. And earlier this week, it looked like he was trying to exploit that. He's been trying to clear his name using Arlen Specter's comments as his support. Last I hear is now he says if he cannot get this conviction overturned, he will leave office. And I'm not sure how he could get that overturned, but, you know, the legal system works in strange ways.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, John, this is a case where you have some very clear ethical implications but it's also become, in some ways, kind of a man-bites-dog story where there's just so many different crazy things that have happened. Is that -at a time when we're leading up to the report on Iraq by General Petraeus, is this the kind of thing that maybe we shouldn't be spending as much time on, and I say that fully acknowledging that I'm asking you to comment on it?</s>Mr. JOHN YEARWOOD (World Editor, Miami Herald): I'm not quite sure how much I would (unintelligible) on it, Farai, but certainly it is a big story. It is an - clearly interesting, and some may say, titillating story. But I think, though, but I'm not quite sure if your show is heard in Idaho, but the people, I think, that I - they really feel for him more than anyone are the people of Idaho who probably want this national nightmare, some may call embarrassment, to go away. And the longer their senator decides to stay and fight, the more embarrassed that they'll feel about this whole episode.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, we only have a couple of seconds and I'm going to give them to you, Laura. There's one more topic. Eddie Griffin, comedian, doing stand-up performance at a Black Enterprise event, he was using the N-word, he was yanked. Was that a good decision by the organizers? What do you think?</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): Well, the organizers were, of course, the Black Enterprise and in particular, Earl Graves, the major domo(ph) of Black Enterprise, and it was Earl Graves' show. He was offended by it. He hired the guy to begin with. He has the right to pull it. He is - when he made the announcement that he was pulling the comedian, he said he would pay him. In his view, he was using the offensive terminology, although we know that that kind of terminology is commonly used among comedians.</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): But I think it's part of this continuing movement in this continuing and growing dissent coming from within the African-American community feel most recently by the Don Imus situation about offensive terminology and its impact on the black psyche. And so yes, Earl Graves had the right to do it, he did it, and he got a lot of attention for it.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: All right, guys, that's a wrap. Thanks so much.</s>Mr. RON CLAIBORNE (Correspondent, ABC News): Okay, Farai. Thanks.</s>Ms. LAURA WASHINGTON (Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times): Thank you.</s>Mr. JOHN YEARWOOD (World Editor, Miami Herald): Thank you, Farai.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Laura Washington is a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, and she joined us from member station WBEZ in Chicago. We also had Ron Claiborne, a correspondent for ABC News. He joined us from ABC Radio in New York City. And John Yearwood, world editor for the Miami Herald, and he joined us from member station WLRN in Miami, Florida.
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The U.N. says more than 3,500 people have died in Syria's eight-month cycle of protests and government crackdowns. Residents of Homs, the third largest city in the country, report fierce fighting as government forces try to regain control of the city. Kelly McEvers, foreign correspondent, NPR Ramita Navai, reporter, Frontline's "Syria Undercover" Rami Khouri, director, Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy at the American University in Beirut
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NEAL CONAN, host: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington. After eight months, the anti-government uprising in Syria may be reaching a watershed. Syrian security forces are reported to be engaged in a long and bloody effort to regain control of the city of Homs, one of the centers of protest.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: More and more attacks are reported on government troops there and elsewhere, and as the United Nations reports that the death toll has now passed 3,500, the Arab League and Turkey face the prospect that yet another promise to end the crackdown will prove empty.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: In a few minutes, we'll talk with "Frontline" reporter Ramita Navai, who spent time undercover in Syria to document the evolution of the anti-government movement, and get the latest on what we know about the battle in Homs.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: How does this end? Give us a call, 800-989-8255. Email [email protected]. You can also join the conversation on our website. That's at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION. Later in the program, Bert Sugar on the life and famous fights of Joe Frazier. But first, NPR foreign correspondent Kelly McEvers joins us by phone from Beirut, and nice to have you with us today.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Hi.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And what's the latest news coming out of Homs?</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Well, what we know is that government troops are basically going door-to-door in Homs. It's the sixth day of a siege there. They're searching out protesters and army defectors who claim to be protecting the protesters. It's a bloody offensive. They're using tanks, shelling residential homes. Women and children have died. In the six days, we know at least more than 100 people have died.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And what do we know of what kind of resistance they're meeting?</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Well, I mean, Homs is the place where the protest movement has turned into something else. You have people in the army who have refused to shoot on their own and who have defected, as they call it, to the protesters' side. They have taken up arms.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: A video emerged a couple of days ago of a group calling themselves the Farouk Brigade. It looked like, you know, rebels in Benghazi, Libya. It was the first time you'd seen anything like this in Syria, holding guns, saying that they're going to defend the protesters but also holding olive branches and promising that if the government stops its offensive on civilians that they would put down their arms.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And this after the government promised to withdraw forces from the cities, this a promise to the Arab League.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Right, this was a promise they made to the Arab League and made sort of a big production about announcing in the past week, saying - last week, saying that they would, yes, pull tanks and armored vehicles out of the cities, that they would release political prisoners and that they would allow monitors and journalists into the country and after that that they would begin a dialogue with the opposition.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: It's clear now to everyone involved that they have completely reneged on this promise.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Though they did say 500 prisoners were released.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: They did do that on the occasion of Eid-al-Adha, the Muslim feast. That's a small fraction of the tens of thousands who activists and human rights groups say have been detained since the uprising began.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And as this continues, we see reports not just from Homs but from elsewhere in the country as well, that there is a small but steady level of attacks on Syrian government forces, ambushes of the style you might see in Afghanistan or Iraq.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: You are seeing that, there's no question. There's a group again forming that's calling itself the Syrian Free Army. Its leader is reportedly in Turkey, you know, crossed over into the refugee camps there earlier in the conflict. They are - you know, they are armed, and they do claim that they're just defending the protesters.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: But as this conflict drags on, it's starting to look a little bit more like a war and less like a peaceful movement.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: There is also some developments on Syria's border. There have been reports that several opposition figures from Syria were arrested by Syrian agents in Lebanon and spirited back across the border.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Yeah, I mean, arrested is little bit more an official term than you might want to use. I mean, some people are just frankly disappearing. Here in Lebanon where I am right now, you had an 89-year-old man who was once the vice president of Syria back in the '60s, who broke with the regime of Hafez al-Assad, who's the father of the current president. And, you know, for - was a figure in the opposition, the Syrian opposition, but hasn't really been politically active for years.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: A few months back, he was walking outside of his daughter's house and was just snatched and taken, and now they believe he is being held in a Syrian prison.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And we see reports that Syrian forces are laying landmines along the Lebanese border, their side of the Lebanese border, to cut down on the number of those military defectors and others crossing the border.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Yeah, you do see, we have seen reports of that that have been confirmed here in Lebanon. The issue with Lebanon, I mean, it's probably the weakest state that borders Syria. Syria, for 15 years, Syrian forces occupied this country after the end of the Lebanese civil war and only pulled out of here in 2005. So there are a lot of ties between the security forces of the two countries, between different political factions here in Lebanon and in Syrian.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: You know, Hezbollah, which has become a major political player, you know, once a militant organization, now a political player in Lebanon obviously has strong ties to the Syrian regime. So there's a sense that as much as Syria's trying to sort of play dirty, in several countries, that it can really get away with it most here in Lebanon.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: It's interesting you describe Lebanon as the weakest country on Syria's frontier when another of its neighbors is Iraq. But there is a strong neighbor to the north, and that is Turkey, up until a few months ago an important Syrian ally and now looking more and more like somebody - a state that is aligning itself in opposition to Bashar al-Assad.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Right, you know, the prime minister, Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan, you know, was thought to be really close to Assad at one point. I mean, the two were said to have vacationed together. I think it was the real hope of Turkey's allies, particularly the U.S., that he would have some sway with Assad earlier in this uprising, that he could sit down and talk to him, talk about, you know, how to sort of reasonably end this conflict.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: And at one point in the summer, you know, Assad made some assurances: Yes, we'll stop the violence. We'll start a dialogue with the opposition. And yet again, and it was right around the time of Ramadan, you know, the previous Muslim holiday, went into another city that has known protests and crushed it with tanks and guns, just as it's doing now.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: So, I mean, we're seeing a pattern here of sort of promise an international partner that, you know, they're willing to reform, but yet, you know, days afterward continue to brutally repress civilians.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: There has been the formation of the Syrian National Council, a sort of umbrella organization for opposition groups. That has found a home in Turkey. You mentioned the Syrian Free Army. That has also found a home inside Turkey.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Right, you know, Istanbul has hosted many conferences for the Syrian National Congress. The Syrian opposition has had a lot of problems uniting itself, getting its act together, basically figuring out who it is, who's its leader, who should be part of the group. And I think Turkey's tried to help that, I think, sending a message to Assad that, you know, we are your strong neighbor to the north, and we can help groups that oppose you in certain ways.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: The problem with the opposition is that, you know, the questions still remain who exactly is the Syrian opposition. I think nowadays if you were to come forward and say that you're in the Syrian opposition, there's still a really strong chance that back in Syria that troops could storm into your house and arrest your mother and your sons.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: So there's still quite a bit of fear for - on the part of many Syrians in the opposition to even come forward. And then yet with the outsiders, the sort of Syrians in exile in places like Paris and London and even the U.S. that they take over, then you've got the protest movement inside Syria saying wait, they're not really the real opposition. So it's a really difficult time for the opposition in Syria.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: But should we take pause when the Syrian free army is reportedly based in a refugee camp on the Turkish side of the frontier? Turkey, of course, is a NATO ally. If - is that force being used to launch cross-border attacks?</s>KELLY MCEVERS: You know, I'm not sure that we've seen a whole lot of reports of cross-border attacks. I think what's happening in the camps there, from the reports that I've seen, is that you have sort of organizing, and there's, you know, quite a bit of media appearances, but the attacks that are happening are attacks in places like Homs, inside places like Idlib, which is near Homs, not far from the Turkish border. But they're internal attacks, generally, again aimed at government forces that are coming to attack protesters.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: So any idea when the situation in Homs will resolve one way or another?</s>KELLY MCEVERS: It's really hard to say at this point. I mean, Syrian state media, you know, if you were to watch only Syrian state media today, you would see that the government troops have been victorious and that, you know, the conflict is over and that they have retaken the sort of, you know, the rebel city of Homs.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Talking to residents and activists, we hear a different story. People are still heading out in different neighborhoods, trying to launch protests, and defectors, they say, are still, you know, defending the people.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Kelly McEvers, thanks very much for your time, we appreciate it.</s>KELLY MCEVERS: Yeah, you're welcome.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: NPR foreign correspondent Kelly McEvers, with us on the line from Beirut. Here in Studio 3A is Ramita Navai, a reporter for "Frontline," also a reporter for Britain's Channel 4, their foreign affairs series "Under-reported World." A piece she did called "Syria Undercover," is broadcast starting tonight on PBS on the "Frontline" series, and it's good of you to be with us today.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Thank you.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And you were in Syria undercover, starting in September, and saw some of these changes as the protest movement began to evolve.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Yes, the protest movement was actually very much in place when I was there. I got back about five weeks ago. Nearly every point that your correspondent just covered for us I witnessed, apart from the shelling.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: The shelling from tanks and the attacks...</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Yeah, I didn't go to Homs, but I left Damascus. So I went to a town northwest of Damascus called Madaya, and in that town, there were violent house-to-house raids and searches, just as your correspondent described. And we went to towns north of Damascus, in Rif Dimashq.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: In that town you were just mentioning, you were in one of those houses as the house next door was broken into, and the people were rousted out.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Yeah, so what happened is shortly after we arrived in this town, lookouts told the activists we were with that the military was entering the town, which means that there were going to be raids. The activists just fled. We were at a meeting with about 15 of them. They fled, dragged us with them, ran into a safe house, and we were essentially trapped there for three days.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: For three days they wouldn't talk above a whisper. And news was coming in of raids in the neighborhood. They were getting closer and closer. Finally on the third day, the news that we were all dreading, that militia men were going to be raiding our street.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: We're talking about the cycle of protest and violent crackdown in Syria and the evolution of the protest movement there. More with Ramita Navai about her "Frontline" report when we come back. We'll also talk with Rami Khouri of Beirut's Daily Star about the broader situation with Syria. Stay with us. I'm Neal Conan. It's the TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Neal Conan. Despite an agreement brokered by the Arab League and growing international pressure, the violence in Syria continues to grow. Thousands of anti-government activists are dead. The government militias are now engaged in an assault on the key city of Homs, the third largest in the country.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Western reporters are not allowed in to document the fighting. Ramita Navai is here with us in Studio 3A. She went in for a report that you'll see tonight on PBS' "Frontline" program "Undercover." We want to hear from you, as well. How does this end? 800-989-8255. Email us, [email protected]. You can also join the conversation on our website. That's at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And Ramita Navai, we'll get to calls in just a moment, but you went in on a tourist visa, could not disclose that you were a reporter?</s>RAMITA NAVAI: No, so most independent foreign media was banned when we went in there. We were really lucky to get 15-day tourist visas, and we had to operate below the radar, always making sure that we weren't being followed and monitored.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And it sounds like obviously you made contacts with some of the organizers. We talk of the protest movement, and you met with some of the organizers. How organized are they? Are they interconnected? Do they talk with each other? Are there means of communication?</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Well, there are many different opposition groups, but once you're on the ground, what's remarkable is that they're all quite unified in helping each other on the ground. So there's this network of protestors and opposition activists that spreads the whole country. And they're always sharing information with each other about the movements of the security forces, the latest information on how to keep safe.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And this information flows back and forth. You also visited underground hospitals. It's become dangerous for those injured, and there are of course thousands of those, dangerous for them injured in protest to be treated in regular hospitals. Doctors go to these secret hospitals, facilities, to treat people there and say that all kinds of medical equipment is being brought in across the borders from, primarily you said, Jordan and Lebanon.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Yeah, this is one of the most depressing parts of covering this story, actually, that nobody is safe, not even in hospitals. You're not safe anywhere. And so a doctor that we spoke to said he say with his own eyes dozens of injured protestors dragged out of their hospital beds, and he said that some of them had superficial injuries, and it would be a familiar pattern. They'd be arrested, dragged away. A few weeks later, their dead bodies would be delivered to their families.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: So yeah, people are too scared to take injured to hospitals, and they're all being treated in people's back rooms and safe houses.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Let's get some callers in on the conversation, 800-989-8255. We'll start with James(ph), James with us from Boston.</s>JAMES: Yes, hi. Thank you so much for covering this. It's a story that's under-reported. I'm actually a journalist covering this story for a website call EA Worldview. And, you know, some of the things we've noticed is that this is not a sustainable campaign that Assad is waging. And, you know, what we haven't seen yet is we haven't seen large-scale political defection.</s>JAMES: But those who have defected have talked about the fact that there are many others who are willing to defect who are beginning to question whether or not Assad can survive this. And, you know, the economic impact is just incredible on the country. And it's really only a matter of time before the defectors or before more leaders decide to jump ship on Assad.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Would you agree, Ramita Navai?</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Let's hope so. I would like to agree. I think it's really hard to figure out what's going to happen next. I think if you look at Saddam, he lived in isolation for, God, 10 years. He endured sanctions. I think that, at the moment, Assad believes that he can do the same. I think he's buying time with the Arab League, he's trying to ride this one out.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: I think there - just as exactly as the caller is saying, there haven't been enough important defections, military and political. So that really might be the tipping point. Whether that will happen, we don't know. Especially with military defections, what's important is arms, like Libya, for there to be a rebel group. And as the caller says, the economy is all but at a stand-still. So arms are really expensive.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: It's hard to get arms, and I think they're the questions that we'll have to see what plays out to be answered first.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: James, thanks very much for the call. Let's go next to - this is Omar(ph), and Omar is with us from Columbus.</s>OMAR: Yes, I think what we need to do in Syria is the same as what we did in Libya. We need a military intervention, and that's the only way we can solve the problem there because there's no way we can solve it politically, you know, that political agreement or any kind of peace agreement.</s>OMAR: The regime in Syria is one of the most brutal regimes in the world. It's actually worse than the Libyan - the previous Libyan regime.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Well, you could get into a long conversation about who was worse to whom. But in any case, three-and-a-half thousand people dead by U.N. standards, more than had been killed in Libya before intervention there. But the political circumstances and the strategic circumstances of Syria, Ramita Navai, very different?</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Absolutely, and interestingly, most of the activists that we spoke to on the ground don't want military intervention. They're scared of military intervention, and as you say, politically very different. So Assad can cause all sorts of trouble in Iraq. Of course one of the closest allies is Iran, and he really has got a lot of influence with Hezbollah, along with Iran, naturally, and with Shiite groups all over the Middle East.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: He himself threatened this can be many, many Afghanistans, you know, if you meddle with our affairs. I think what needs to be done is that Western countries can put pressure on the Arab League because the Arab League wants to sort this out itself. It wants to keep it within the Arab nations, but it's totally ineffective.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Joining us now by Skype from Beirut, is Rami Khouri, director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy at the American University in Beirut, also a syndicated columnist at Lebanon's Daily Star. And nice to have you back on TALK OF THE NATION.</s>RAMI KHOURI: Thank you, glad to be with you.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And let's begin right there with the Arab League. If, as we now expect, the Syrian promises to the Arab League turn out to be empty, what's the reaction likely to be?</s>RAMI KHOURI: Well, the Arab League has had a very spotty and mixed record of effectively intervening in any kind of conflict in the Arab world to resolve it. And I think we'll probably see the same here. The fact that they took the initiative is surprising, and it may be the early birth pangs of a new Arab League. We may not have a new Arab world totally, but we may have a new Arab League that is acting more decisively to at least try to play a mediating role in conflicts that are within individual countries or between Arab countries.</s>RAMI KHOURI: But the likelihood is that the Arab League won't get very far because it does, in fact, represent the Arab governments, and the Arab governments are not all of the same mind. But the trend is increasing in terms of putting more pressure on the Syrians as increasing frustration and anger with what's going on in Syria around the Arab world.</s>RAMI KHOURI: And as you get more Arab governments that are more democratic and more responsive to their people's wishes, you will start to see Arab governments take positions that actually reflect public opinion, and public opinion in the Arab world is moving quite critically against the Syrian situation. So I think this is a trend that will probably continue, and the Arab League will play a minor role in the end, but it could play a catalytic role, which is start a diplomatic process, as is happening now, perhaps.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And the other key neighbor of Syria is Turkey, which as we said earlier is becoming, well, more and more involved with the opposition.</s>RAMI KHOURI: Well, Turkey is in a complicated position because it has, first of all, much more respect and clout around the region because of its recent policies in the last, say, five, seven years. It has a lot more impact. People take it more seriously. It has tried to develop good relations with everybody in the region and to a large extent has done that.</s>RAMI KHOURI: But when it comes to Syria, the problem is there is you get two countervailing pressures. The Turks don't want to get too heavily involved in Syria because if they do appear to the Syrians to be ganging up on Syria, then the Syrians always have the card to play which is the Kurds, and the Kurdish situation in Turkey is delicate and keeps flaring up.</s>RAMI KHOURI: There's recently been a bout of fighting with major Turkish military operations in Turkey and partly in Northern Iraq in some cases, and the Syrians could get involved with that, too. So there's a very delicate relationship there. I don't think the Turks are going to overtly sponsor military action against Syria, but I think what they're doing is making clear that they can play a bigger role if they want.</s>RAMI KHOURI: And that role can be positive or negative. They can apply pressure, or they can produce diplomatic breakthroughs, possibly. They tried that with Iran, with the Brazilians. The Turks and the Brazilians took a major initiative with Iran. So the Turks have a special credibility in the region that they could also possibly bring to bear.</s>RAMI KHOURI: But they tried and failed. So this is a dilemma that everybody's facing, that every time that somebody gets a promise from the Syrian government, that promise doesn't seem to get fulfilled. So people are slightly bewildered about to do next.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Let's see if we can get another caller in on the conversation. Raymond's(ph) on the line with us from Miami Beach.</s>RAYMOND: Hi, thank you for taking my call.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Sure.</s>RAYMOND: I think you laid out the question to your guests that what is the way out for this Syrian problem. And I think that probably a choking of the regime through the sanctions and other means by the West, and maybe also by the Arab League, and also maybe provide a way out for them because otherwise they'll become suicidal, and they just killing everybody if they know...</s>NEAL CONAN, host: A way out that does not involve the International Court in The Hague, is what you're suggesting.</s>RAYMOND: Well, yeah, which is hardly likely but at least, you know, try that because the other option, which would be a military intervention, has been jeopardized by the Russians and the Chinese intervention on behalf of the Syrians. And therefore if you're going to go by sea, for instance, and do something like that and the Russians might supply the Syrians with arms, and then, it will become another mess over there. That's my comment.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Already a mess but thank you very much, Raymond. How - Ramita Navai, from your experience, how deeply are the sanctions biting?</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Well, from my experience, sanctions aren't always very effective. Iran coped very well with sanctions. Saddam coped very well for years with sanctions. So sanctions alone won't do it, but it will be a mixture of diplomatic pressure. It will also really heavily depend on, as we saw in Libya, armed groups, a rebel army arming themselves. And also if a rebel army can form, then the West may decide to back them. But at the moment, it's too dispersed. There's isn't a main group of people that the West can say, right, we're going to arm you.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: There's no place a rebel army holds no piece of land where they can organize, train and say this is the nascent part of a new Syria, of a free Syria.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Absolutely. That's a really important point. There's no Benghazi. There is no place at the moment - there's no place that's safe for activists. And this is something that your correspondent brought up as well, that in Syria you cannot say I'm an activist. There's no way you can hide.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Ramita Navai, a Frontline reporter, also a reporter for Channel 4 in Britain. Her piece the "Syria Undercover" airs tonight on Frontline, on many PBS stations. Also with us is Rami Khouri of the Daily Star in Beirut and the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy at the American University in Beirut. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And Rami Khouri, the other development that we've been talking about is the evolution of the protest movement from protest to resistance as more weapons become involved, as that Free Syrian Army formed by defectors begins to form. How does that change the equation?</s>RAMI KHOURI AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN BEIRUT: Well, it could, and this revolution has been going on for about four, five months, and it will continue to. There are several different groups in Syria that could possibly be using arms. One, is the defecting military, which is - these are small numbers, but they're enough apparently to use their arms on someplace. You could have some of the defectors, the civilian demonstrators who've just been enraged by the death of members of their families, and the tanks attacking their city centers and may have taken up arms in small numbers.</s>RAMI KHOURI AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN BEIRUT: And you have a third group, which is foreign Salafi, you know, militant Islamist fighters who are out to get the Syrian regime because the Syrian regime hit them hard in Hama 25 years or 30 years ago, whenever it was in the 1980s. And the - so there's different groups that could possibly be using arms, not just one group. But the overwhelming majority of the demonstrators keep saying that they're peaceful and they want change. But the fascinating development, I think, is we've seen that the - at the beginning of this process in March, when I was in Syria in April, they - the demonstrators were calling for (foreign language spoken), which means reform of the regime.</s>RAMI KHOURI AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN BEIRUT: They wanted political reform. They weren't asking the president or the regime to step down. Then four, five months later, they started calling for the - they wanted the regime to go. Then, they started calling for the - putting the president on trial. And the latest demand just in the last few days within Hama and Homs with the accelerated government crackdowns that the protesters are asking for protection. They're saying we want international protection, which might be a step towards a different kind of international involvement.</s>RAMI KHOURI AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN BEIRUT: How that protection might come, we don't know. But the demonstrators are calling for it, or some of them are. And this could provide a new direction in which this movement would go. It's a big dilemma for the international community, of people who want to pressure Syria and stop this fighting and get a reform process moving. It's a big dilemma for them to figure out what they actually do. The sanctions by themselves will continue to the will of the foundation of the regime economically, but that will take another four, five months to really show up in a big way.</s>RAMI KHOURI AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN BEIRUT: But we know that there's massive economic stress in the country from business people and others who come and go. So there is a vulnerability there. And it's possible that economic pressure after three, four months will cause some of the pillars of the regime to actually finally break away and give up. That may be business people, maybe some of the minorities, some of the Alawites, some of the security people. It's hard to tell.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Ramita Navai, we'll give you the last word.</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Yeah. Absolutely, this was a peaceful uprising. I never saw an armed protester, and I saw thousands on the streets protesting. But it's definitely changing. I spoke to activists yesterday. I'm still in touch with them all. And they're arming themselves. They really are. They're trying to get weapons, but, of course, weapons are expensive. But they say this is the only way that they can survive, the only way they can defend themselves.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And that appeal that Rami Khouri was just talking about for intervention is that something that's coming up?</s>RAMITA NAVAI: Absolutely. They've been saying this for a while now. They hold up banners saying international protection when you're there. So there's growing support for a no-fly zone, for example. They're still very scared of military intervention. So at the moment, it's soft intervention that they're looking for.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Soft intervention of the sort that, well, in only six months or so ended the regime of Colonel Gadhafi in Libya, or it helped with the - obviously, the Libyan rebels. Ramita Navai, thank you very much for your time today. We appreciate it. Her piece "Syria Undercover" premieres tonight on many PBS stations as part of the Frontline series. Rami Khouri, as always, good to talk to you.</s>RAMI KHOURI AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN BEIRUT: Thank you. Glad to be with you.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Rami Khouri, director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy at the American University in Beirut and an editor at large at Beirut's Daily Star.
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News & Notes tech contributor Mario Armstrong talks with Farai Chideya about technology that tracks gunshots in crime-heavy neighborhoods, how to get the most out of GPS and how early and how often to expose kids to computers.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: This is NEWS & NOTES. I'm Farai Chideya.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You don't have to be techie to have your life affected by the latest gadgets. Well, what about crime? Tracking neighborhood gunfire may no longer be a shot in the dark. And if you're trying to get from A to B quickly, does using GPS make more sense than using a good old-fashioned map? Finally, how much computer time is too much for school children?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: The man with the plan is our own tech expert Mario Armstrong.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Hey, Mario.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Hey, Farai. How are you?</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So - I'm great. What about ShotSpotter? It's this new technology for tracking crime. What exactly is it?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Yes. So there are a couple of companies that are out there. ShotSpotter seems to be one of those that's getting a little bit more of attention, and that maybe because they've been doing it probably the longest and have the largest footprint of example customers that big(ph) cities that are actually utilizing it.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: But what it is essentially, in layman's terms, it's a gunshot detection hardware and software system. And what that means is if someone pulls a trigger in an open area where this technology has been deployed, this technology, which is made up of cue-stick mikes that are placed in strategic locations throughout a city, could actually pinpoint the location of that gunshot and actually even give a little bit more detail than that. It can actually give whether or not the gunshot was - taken while in movement, which direction the gunshot actually came from, and the speed of travel. So they could actually tell if someone was physically standing and shooting, or even if someone was doing a drive-by shooting.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, you know, Newark, New Jersey, has installed a similar system called Community Eye. And one thing that comes to mind is this whole stop-snitching movement. And will this technology give police a way to track crime even if people don't want to testify? Or is it going to just take the burden off of people who should be stepping up to the plate? What do you think about that?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: That's a great question. I mean, we are living in a time when - you brought up stop snitching, famous for starting in Baltimore, a DVD was created about it, and it's actually being studied in universities across the country. And essentially, what it is, is witness intimidation. It's like, hey, don't talk about what's going on in your neighborhood, or don't snitch on things that are happening in your neighborhood or else.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: So maybe this type of technology doesn't even involve a concerned citizen because, like I mentioned, it can triangulate the sound of that type of activity. And in some cases, Farai, it's starting to show that it may even be better than the human ear. In other words, if a concerned citizen hears a gunshot in their neighborhood and they make a phone call, how well can they really say where that gunshot came from? And so you just don't - or how many shots actually took place. Did you hear an echo or what - was it two shots or really was it five shots?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: So this technology has proven to be, at least, very - it's much smarter than the average citizen could ever be because it can really pinpoint whether or not there's echoes, whether or not just false alarms. And maybe remove this whole idea of having to - I hope it doesn't remove the idea of calling the police in the first place. I don't think that's what this technology should do or can do. But I think it can certainly aid those that are scared to call or are feeling intimidated to call the police. Here's another tool that could help you solve crimes in your neighborhood without you being put on the hook.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Let's talk about transportation technology. Some New York City taxi drivers are on strike this week and one of their beefs is that the city wants them to install Global Positioning Systems, or GPS, for passengers. Now, a lot of new cars have these, you know, pre-installed GPS. You can buy them to slot on in your car for anywhere from 300 to $10,000.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: And the whole idea is that if you get in a cab with GPS and somebody says, do you want to take the Triborough Bridge? You can like punch up a few things and say, well, actually the Triborough is bracked(ph) up so let's take such and so and so. But I don't know if that's going to work. And how well are these GPS systems working in general for people?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Okay. So in general, for the average everyday consumer, GPS really works very well. The technology has really matured. And, as you mentioned, you're starting to see it pre-installed in cars. You're also starting to see more handheld portable devices that are coming under the $300-price tag, which is making it much more accessible and affordable to people. And you're starting to see people really benefit from the use of GPS, which in its basic terms is an ability to look at a screen that gives you a map or a satellite view, if you wish, of where you currently are and where you intend to go. You could have multiple destinations or reroute you around traffic.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: The other thing that really is popular about GPS is what's called point of interest. And these are things that maybe of interest to you along a path, maybe ATM machines or hospitals or parks or universities or restaurants. So they've become more than just get me to point A, to point B, something I can already do with maybe MapQuest or Google Maps, but it actually allows me as I'm driving or as I'm moving to change and alter my schedule and tell me how that may affect my arrival times and destinations.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Now, does it account - do most of these devices account for weather conditions, traffic conditions, all these other things that actually really make how fast you get to some place really critical?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Yeah. And I think that's part of why the New York City cab drivers, the association out there, has decided to do this two-day strike because, I think, part of them feels like, hey, wait a minute, this is just too much scrutiny on us.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: I mean, GPS - is it really that valuable to the consumer in this car? And, you know, I think they may feel like there's a little bit - just too much scrutiny going on with having GPS, but maybe some of the rouge drivers that are in - that have happened. I mean, I don't know about you, Farai, but I'm sure there's been some times when I've been in a cab where they've taken the long route…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Oh, yeah.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: …to get me to my destination. And so I don't know if I'm directly answering your question, but as it relates to GPS in this fleet of vehicles, I think the consumers want it because they want to be able to have alternatives. But answering your specific question, they have become smarter in terms of real-time traffic issues. So if there's an accident, if there's a toll road, if there's a bridge problem, if there's bad weather, some systems - not all - mostly on your higher-end…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: The expensive ones.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: …costs. The expensive ones can accommodate for real-time traffic conditions.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: I get into a good-old-taxi fight at least once a year, but I rarely win.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Well, just imagine.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Don't go head to head with the cab driver. They're always, like, well, do you want me to let you out on this corner? So…</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Right.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Right. True, true. But if you're armed in the backseat with a GPS device telling you, well, look right here, you know. I don't know what you're seeing, but this is what I'm seeing. You might have a more, you know, a strong - much stronger argument that might tick them off even more.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: It depends if you're in the middle of the highway.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: But finally, let's get to our education-related content. We are doing an education series. And there's all these computer-like gadgets out there for kids, you know, in the 3- to 6-year-old range today. Things like Leapfrog, they resemble PCs. They're not quite PCs. Is it really important to get kids familiar with working on computers or computer-like devices, or is this something that they'll catch up to later just fine?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Yeah. You know, this is an age-old question. I continue to receive e-mail and questions about this. And, by and large, you know, kids learn -I'm convinced, anyway - kids learn in spurts. Now, I feel that kids need to be introduced to the basics of technology. It's not going away. It's here to stay. And we want our kids to be able to perform just like any other kid and we want them to be as competitive as their peers.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: So do you need to have them in front of a computer each and every day? Absolutely not. You need to have everything in balance. But certainly, if your kid isn't using the computer, they may be at a little bit of a - behind the gun a little bit, if you will. Get them using basics, Farai. Just using the mouse. Let them play with some of their favorite cartoon Web sites, things that are safe for them to visit online, just to get used to in a, you know, comfortable with the keyboard and a mouse, and what a right click and a left click means, and what does this thing do.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Yeah. But you know what, when that stuff in the sippy cup spills into the mouse, the mouse is dead.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So how do you actually want them on your computer?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: That's why you want to buy spill proof. What we bought our 4-year-old is spill-proof sippy cups, although they're not always 100 percent. But, you know, I have a young kid, he's 4 years old, just turned 5, and believe it or not, as much technology that we have in the house…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Happy belated birthday.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: …I'm sure he'll appreciate that - we don't push it on him, though. He - we let him gravitate to it. We make things relevant that he enjoys and use that as a way of connecting him. We don't want it to be something that he can't still interface with other kids, that he can't still communicate, but he clearly needs to know that this vehicle and this tool is here, and he's not, you know, it's not so foreign to him when he sees it in a classroom. We are seeing more and more of these devices show up in our classrooms a lot sooner. Kids these days are now being asked to deliver PowerPoint presentations, which many people in the office environment still struggle to do.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: So this is happening, and it's something that we do need to pay attention to. And you just need to know the maturity level of your kid and what they can and can't handle. But clearly expose them, folks. Please expose them to technology.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Just a quick pop. What's your son's favorite thing to do?</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: His favorite thing to do is probably just to go - he loves his iPod. He's figured out how to work my iPhone, which is good. I just let him play with technology, whether it's right or wrong. But the most fun that he gets is probably going online to - well, he's graduated from "Sesame Street." They used to be his favorite place. Now he's on to "Star Wars." And so he goes to starwars.com and…</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Smart man.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: …there's a lot of educational things whether it relates to science and space.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: All right. Well, Mario, thanks for the tips.</s>MARIO ARMSTRONG: Not a problem.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Mario Armstrong is NEWS & NOTES tech contributor. He also covers technology for member stations WYPR and WEAA in Baltimore. And he spoke with us from the Baltimore Sun studios.
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While DVD sales plummet in the U.S. and book publishers fear for their futures, pre-orders for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 totaled some nine million copies. Jamin Warrren of Kill Screen Magazine talks about how Modern Warfare 3 is extending an invitation to non-gamers to belly up to the console.
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NEAL CONAN, host: As DVD sales fall and book publishers fear for their futures, the videogame industry thrives. Pre-orders for "Modern Warfare 3," the latest installment in the "Call of Duty" franchise, totaled about nine million copies. That's three times more than its main competitor, another first-person shooter called "Battlefield 3," also released this week. In a moment, whether this latest iteration lives up to the "Call of Duty" standard. If you're a fan of the series, what have you come to expect? 800-989-8255. Email us: [email protected]. Joining us now from our bureau in New York is Jamin Warren, founder of Kill Screen magazine. It's nice to have you with us today.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Hello.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And some reviewers say, great franchise. This one, not so different from "Modern Warfare 2."</s>JAMIN WARREN: Well, that certainly depends on who you ask. One of the most significant approaches for this game is a big shift, I think, in the way that Activision is thinking about their audience. "Call of Duty" as a franchise is one that's really thrived on its multiplayer environments and situations where large groups of people play against each other, kind of capture the flag-like environments.</s>JAMIN WARREN: One of the things that happened with those particular games is that they've really favored a particular type of gameplay style, most notably, the type of gameplay that teenagers and college students like to play - which is it thrives on precision and shooting people, frankly, in the head. And one of the things that Activision did was try to find ways to include a much, much wider audience of people who would be interested in the "Call of Duty" franchise, recognizing that those hardcore gamers who love that series since its inception, will always be there, but that there's this larger game market out there that's actually interested in the franchise as well.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And that involves incorporating a bit more of a narrative and a few more options other than kill shots as the way you rack up points.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Yes. So on the campaign side, the game's separated into two different types of game play. One is a single-player campaign, which is a continuation of "Modern Warfare 2" which - in which the Russians have kind of invaded the United States in a "Red Dawn"-esque scenario. Really, in the multiplayer environment, what's changed is, in the past, the type of game play - the points were calculated by something called a kill streak, which is just a number of people that you shot in play. And they blew it to something called the point streak, which really favors team-based play.</s>JAMIN WARREN: So for someone like me who maybe isn't the most precise shot, I can accumulate points for my team, based on diffusing a bomb or protecting my flag or other sorts of things that don't necessarily thrive on minutia or, you know, single shot kind of game play.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Or the reaction to time of a flea.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Exactly. Exactly. You know, I think what's interesting here is that this is emblematic of a larger industry shift, which is noticing that these excessive games like "Farmville" or "Angry Birds" on iOS devices, there's this larger movement towards understanding that. It's not just kids and college students who play video games, but it's everyone else as well. There was a report that was done by Deloitte that said that the fastest growing demographic of people who play games are those in their 30s and 40s. In part, these are people who've grown up on video games that are interested in adding consoles to their everyday regimen.</s>JAMIN WARREN: And you really see this in Activision's marketing campaign. They have been pushing this tag line, we are all soldiers. And their latest thought featured Jonah Hill and Sam Worthington - Jonah Hill playing a newb, sort of a new character in the environment, and Sam Worthington playing a vet. So again, you know, in gamer culture, being a new player to an environment is not something you'd be proud of, but Activision is attempting to reposition this property and say, hey, look, we welcome new players as well. We're not just, you know, kids in the basement with all the lights off, kind of shooting each other in darkness, that there are parents, there are uncles, and everyone should be a part of this game-playing environment, not just teens.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: We're talking with Jamin Warren, founder of Kill Screen Magazine, about "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3." You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. And let's get Steve on the line. Steve's with us from St. Louis.</s>STEVE: Hi. I'm a bit older. I'm calling in regards to my kids' responses. They tell me that Activision is - limited some features within the game, from the previous company that released "Modern Warfare 2." Also, I had a curious response when I preordered the game. I was told that the sooner we preorder the game, "Modern Warfare 3" that is, the more free downloadable content we would receive. That is to say that those who waited until the date of release would not receive this downloadable information, this downloadable content.</s>STEVE: When I picked up the game, I expected to see a special code number that we would input, via our live connection, and I didn't receive that. I asked the sales associate why we didn't, and they told us that, in fact, there was no free downloadable game.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: You got scammed, in other words.</s>STEVE: Well, that's the word - actually, the exact word that they used. They said, you know, Activision has scammed everybody.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Jamin Warren, got a response for that.</s>STEVE: Just a comment. I was a little bit disappointed in that.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Sure. Well, I'll take the first one first. You know, again, it's a matter of perspective. One of the things that's hard about long-running franchises, it's a bit like "Star Trek" or "Star Wars," is that people who have been accustomed to a particular play style, they like keeping things exactly the same. You find this a lot with Electronic Arts' popular "Madden" franchise. They need to find a way to make the game fresh, year over year, so they'll make minor tweaks. And there's always a mixed result from hardcore players who say, oh, I want things to go back the way they were before. But there's obviously pressure on Electronic Arts, in this case, to introduce new players to a system.</s>JAMIN WARREN: The same is true for Activision. They're always going to be making changes, particularly in the multiplayer side, to try to track new audiences. But that often comes with a cost, in that some of the folks who've been playing the game for years and years and years often complain. As far as the downloadable content situation, you know, I guess that would be something to take up with the retailer. I guess we need more details.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Or maybe the attorney general.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Or the - perhaps yes. I think a letter writing campaign might be appropriate as well. But I think that does point to something very interesting, which has happened elsewhere in the video game industry, is that they're experimenting with different ways to get video game purchasers to be there on day one and purchase from retail as opposed to used games - from a used games or gray market or borrowing from their friends. And so - go ahead.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Oh, I was just going to say we just have a minute left. But I wanted to say, you know, they - all those units that were pre-sold under whatever basis, this is a game expected to make over $1 billion. Its predecessor made over $1 billion. There's been one movie in history that even approached that number.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Absolutely. And, you know, frankly, as someone who writes about the industry, it's amazing that more people aren't talking about that this is a front-page business story, not just a video game story or entertainment story. You would be hard pressed to find any other entertainment property that generates as much revenue as something like "Call of Duty" does. It really speaks to the ubiquity of video games and what a commercial and cultural force they've become in our everyday lives.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Jamin Warren, thanks very much for your time today. Appreciate it.</s>JAMIN WARREN: Thank you so much for having me.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Jamin Warren, founder of Kill Screen Magazine. He joined us from our bureau in New York. Tomorrow, the growing problem of homeless veterans. This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Neal Conan in Washington.
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Many who live in Jena, La., worry the media attention about racial tension is giving the town a bad name. Billy Wayne Fowler, a member of the La Salle Parish school board, says some of the coverage has been unfair.
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FARAI CHIDEYA, host: As Jordan said many locals worry their hometown is getting a bad rep nationally. Locals like Billy Wayne Fowler, a member of the LaSalle Parish School Board.</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): I've lived here all my life. And our town is a small town consists of hardworking, law-abiding, Christian people.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What has happened to this town as the rest of the country takes a look at it during this controversy?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): What's happened to our town is a lot of inaccurate reporting. If people could read that FBI report, they'll have a different outlook on what happened here.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: What specifically makes you think that?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Well, basically, when the FBI gave their report to the U.S. attorney, Donald Washington, he gave the report and he clearly says that nobody here in Jena, by (unintelligible) law, except given the fullest extent of the law handed down charges against these guys. But he says they were then the letter of the law will do that. And why he did that I don't know. Both whites and blacks here thought they were way too strict. And as we've found out yesterday, they've been reduced and I have an idea they're probably going to be reduced even further.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: So you think that the charges not only have been lowered but that the town approves of this, black and white?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Yes, ma'am, most definitely.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: When the black students protested after the nooses were found hanging from a tree, I understand that the District Attorney Reed Walters held in assembly at the school. He had some tough words for the students. Do you know what he said? And do you think he was singling out the black students?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Yes, I know what he said, and, no, I do not think he was singling them out. What he was doing, there was a lot of tension about that time. And I think he was sending the message to everyone just cut out to foolishness. It's time to quit playing around and just take care of our business.</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Now let me tell you about the nooses. The FBI report could not charge the white kids for hanging the nooses. And you know why? What he found out - he said that he found out it was a joking manner, and it was. Can you believe that whites and blacks stuck their heads through those nooses, poking fun at one another that day? Now that was not known at that time.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Someone burned Jena High last year. Do you know who's responsible?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): I wish I did. No. That's been kept a really a tight secret. If they know anything, they're not saying anything and anybody's guess would be as good as mine.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: With the magnitude of the fire, the kids had to be moved. Where are they going to school right now?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Well, fortunately, our campus is spread out, and we have enough space that we are making do with what we got still on the same campus. And it's - we've got kids in classes with no air conditioning, and it's primitive conditions that we're having the school under, and it's going to remain that way until we get an academic building rebuilt.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: When you think about Jena High and the classes that have graduated over the past couple dozen years, has there been a better set of race relations, you think, between students over time? Has it stayed the same? How would you characterize - where's your - where's Jena going in terms of how people have been getting along over the past couple of decades?</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Let me put it to you this way. I've been raised here all my life. If I could take you back here in Jena 50 to 60 years ago and let you see the conditions that were here then compared to now, you would have to agree we have come a long way to be a Deep South small town.</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): What I've observed here and the FBI report, Mr. Washington, who's a black attorney, come in here and he tried to find evidence of racism. He says this is not an issue on racism. That it's strictly a legal matter. And his report says that.</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): So as far as racism here, we're no different from any other town. There's not a single thing that a white person can do in Jena, Louisiana that a black person can't do. We get along. Only a small group of people on both sides - if there's trouble, that's usually coming from one of those two groups.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: Well, Mr. Fowler, thank you so much.</s>Mr. BILLY WAYNE FOWLER (Member, Ward 5, LaSalle Parish School Board, Louisiana): Well, I appreciate you having me. And you have a good day.</s>FARAI CHIDEYA, host: You, too. Billy Wayne Fowler is a member of the LaSalle Parish School Board. And we also reached out to district attorney Reed Walters, but he did not return our call.
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Former heavyweight champion Joe Frazier died Monday night at the age of 67, just a month after being diagnosed with liver cancer. "Smokin' Joe," as he was called, was known for his powerful left hook that knocked down Muhammad Ali in 1971 at Madison Square Garden. Bert Sugar, boxing analyst and historian Larry Merchant, ringside announcer, HBO boxing
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NEAL CONAN, host: Last night, the world lost a champion, Olympic gold medalist and later world heavyweight champ, Joe Frazier. Smokin' Joe won that title in the shadow of Muhammad Ali, who've been suspended after he refused to report for military service. But Frazier proved himself every bit a champion in three epic fights with his great rival. Joe Frazier died last night, just weeks after being diagnosed with liver cancer. He was 67 years old. What's your memory of Joe Frazier?</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Call us, 800-989-8255. Email us, [email protected]. You can also join the conversation on our website. That's at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION. Boxing historian Bert Sugar joins us now from his home in Chappaqua, New York. Nice to have you with us today.</s>BERT SUGAR: It's nice to be here. At my age, it's nice to be anywhere, Neal.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Well, it's a sad occasion. Is it fair that we remember Joe Frazier as the standard by which we measure Muhammad Ali?</s>BERT SUGAR: I don't think he's measured as the standard, but I do think it's unfair that he's basically interlinked so closely with Muhammad Ali. We never refer to their first fight, won by Joe Frazier, as Frazier-Ali. It's Ali-Frazier. We never refer to their three fights, and that was a heck of a - I guess, I can say heck of a. It was a heck of a trilogy, coming down the line, ending in the one in the Philippines, and it's still called Ali-Frazier. Frazier has always been the second banana.</s>BERT SUGAR: And for today, today alone, he stands on his own. He doesn't have to share a shadow with Muhammad Ali. He is one of the 10 greatest heavyweight champions of all time and should be remembered alone, not as part of any Ali-Frazier twosome.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Anybody who saw him fight will never forget that relentless style. He was always advancing, moving toward his opponent relentlessly.</s>BERT SUGAR: Well, he had one gear - forward, left hook, forward, left hook, forward, left hook, forward, left hook. You got that? Next step - forward, left hook, forward, left hook, forward, left hook. That left hook could take apart barns, buildings brick by brick, and that's what he survived on, and that's what he made his name on. And it was a left hook that was basically learned in the cornfields of South Carolina, where his dad, who had lost his arm in an accident, auto accident, had his young son, Joseph, hold saws, planks, what have you while he - with his left hand, while he did the work, whether it was nailing the nail or doing something. Out of that came Joe Frazier's left hook from it.</s>BERT SUGAR: I'm sorry. Left hook from hell because that's what it was. And it decimated. There's still I'm sure former opponents walking around the streets looking for boxing's home for the woefully beaten just because they fought Joe Frazier with one of the greatest left hooks in history. People will remember the 15th round against - by Frazier against Ali. What they don't remember is that he shook Ali up in the 11th. He hurt him in the fourth. Joe Frazier was one of the greats.</s>BERT SUGAR: And what has always bothered me, Neal, about Frazier is that he's always been part of Ali-Frazier. They say it that quickly. He's gone, Ali-Frazier. And to that end, we've lessened him. We've marginalized him because he stands on his own, especially today, as one of the 10 greatest heavyweight champions.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Let's get a caller in involved in the conversation. We want to hear your memories of Joe Frazier. 800-989-8255. Email: [email protected]. Reese(ph) is on the line, calling us from Laramie, Wyoming.</s>REESE: Thanks for having me on, Neal and Bert. It's a pleasure to talk to someone of your caliber. I wanted to say that my memory - I'm too young to even have experienced any of Joe Louis - excuse me - Joe Frazier's fights. But I remember watching about (technical difficulty) I think it was their first one. And when Joe Louis knocked down Muhammad Ali for the first time. You could see...</s>BERT SUGAR: Wait a minute. Time out. Go backwards.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Joe Frazier, you meant to say.</s>REESE: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm sorry. Oh, gosh. I keep doing that. I'm sorry. I'm nervous. But he knocked him down for the first time. And you could see somebody had taken a picture almost at the point of impact, and it looked like it left a mark on the camera. And it was like a super nova went off, like a thunderclap because I was just - I was blown away. It was just this earth-shuttering event to see Muhammad Ali just dropped, and it was stunning. It was beautiful. It was amazing.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: The person...</s>BERT SUGAR: It was Neil Leifer's great picture, and Neil was there almost as a freelancer. The assignment for Sports Illustrated had gone to Herbie Cohen. And if you look closely, he's across the ring with his mouth open and his camera pressed against his chest.</s>REESE: Oh, man.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: That's a great picture. Reese, thanks very much for the call.</s>REESE: Thank you, sir.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Let's see if we can go next to - this is Tyson. Tyson with us from Winston-Salem.</s>TYSON: Yeah. Hi.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Go ahead. You're on the air.</s>TYSON: Yeah, when I was - I just wanted to share a story about meeting Joe Frazier. I was a 12-year-old kid and a friend of a friend knew Joe Frazier. They owned a restaurant. And in the parking lot behind the restaurant, Joe Frazier shadowboxed with me, and I was - I can remember being just absolutely scared to death that one of his punches would land.</s>TYSON: And, you know, it was just absolutely remarkable. Here he is and he was amicable. And it was just one of those stories that I tell all the time. I shadowboxed with Joe Frazier.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: I can understand why you would say it. And, Bert Sugar, Joe Frazier also remembered as a gentleman outside the ring.</s>BERT SUGAR: He was such a nice person. He was the lunch-pail-type of boxer. He just came, did his job, and went on being a nice person. Joe Frazier sometimes didn't understand what was happening to him, as witnessed by all the hubbub before the first Ali-Frazier fight, when Ali called him a gorilla and other shameful, shameful slurs and, unfortunately he carried that hurt all the way to two days ago. He never let it go.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Long-time HBO sports commentator Larry Merchant covered the Fight of the Century for The New York Post back in 1971. The next morning, The Post ran this lead: Muhammad Ali fought a truth machine last night, and the truth that emerged was painfully clear. The arrogance and hubris that made Ali a great champion made him a former champion. You can't con Joe Frazier for 15 rounds. Joe Frazier comes at you too honestly, too openly. And Larry Merchant...</s>BERT SUGAR: He does.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Larry Merchant joins us now from his home in Los Angeles. Nice to have you with us.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: Thank you.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And that line, you can't con Joe Frazier, what did you mean by that?</s>LARRY MERCHANT: Well, Joe fought in a way that is rare in boxing, particularly for heavyweights, in that he would never stop coming at you. And that – what that meant inside the ring was that fighters who could fight in their own style and pace and do what they want to do suddenly find their instinct for survival kicking in, self-preservation. And so, for the few years, that type of fighter can be on top because of the training it takes to fight that way, because of the punishment they take. They can be extraordinarily popular as witnessed the two previous heavyweight champions who fought in that style, Jack Dempsey and Rocky Marciano - short but brilliant, fiery careers.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: And so he was a handful for anybody, and I think that that first fight with Ali was the apex of his career. He puts such an effort into that fight and took so much punishment that he wound up in a hospital for nine days recovering from the effort, from the depletion of his body. And I would maintain he was never at that level again. And his next greatest fight, which arguably is the best heavyweight fight ever, was the third fight between them, when they were both older and a little slower, and it was just a test of will.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And Joe Frazier's will did not flag. He was determined to come out for that last round. He was prevented from doing so.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: Well, I think that Eddie Futch, his trainer, knew the end was there. He was trying to save his life not to fight. And nobody ever questioned that he didn't do the right thing.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: We're talking with two men who've seen a lot of Joe Frazier's fights and seen a lot of Joe Frazier. They are Bert Sugar, and also with us is Larry Merchant. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Let's go next to Robert. Robert is with us on the line from Chicago.</s>ROBERT: Hi. I got a question for Larry. I remember, as an older teenager, when Joe was going through the fights with some heavyweight (unintelligible), I remember seeing a picture in some magazine where he was doing squats with, like, a 1-year-old calf on his shoulders. Do you remember that picture?</s>LARRY MERCHANT: I'm sorry. I didn't quite hear you. What was on his shoulders?</s>NEAL CONAN, host: A 1-year-old calf.</s>ROBERT: Yeah, a cow, a calf. It wasn't a full-grown, but it was a 1-year-old.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: I have a vague recollection, but not a very clear one...</s>LARRY MERCHANT: ...of something like that.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Boxing champions used to take all kinds of pictures like that, so did Babe Ruth and a lot of baseball players too. Robert, thanks very much...</s>LARRY MERCHANT: Yeah. You know, that was some PR guy's idea of how to get a picture in the paper, presumably, where Ali was just this beautiful, natural showman who used ridicule as a way of to create a narrative for the fight that was upcoming. And sometimes it crossed over into cruelty which humor can do when it's aimed at you, and it was aimed Frazier and Liston and many others. But as Bert Sugar pointed out, Joe carried it with him throughout his life.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: The bitterness, was there nothing that - we kept hearing that there had been reconciliations at various points. I guess, that never did really happen.</s>BERT SUGAR: No.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: No. I think they meant it. Joe meant it at the time. But deep down, there was a hurt. And it wasn't just from the ridicule, in my opinion. It was that he knew he was - or felt he was every bit as a good as Muhammad Ali. But it was a situation not so dissimilar from Marvin Hagler and Sugar Ray Leonard, that Ali was an extraordinary man and Joe was an ordinary man, that Ali stopped traffic wherever he went. He was provocative. He was a pied piper. Everything that Joe did or virtually everything was in terms of Ali. When is Ali coming back to fight him? And would they fight and so on. And so, this was something that was very deep inside Joe. And in a way, you have to respect it. That was how he felt, and he was willing to show us.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Bert Sugar, you said no, he never did reconcile.</s>BERT SUGAR: No. There were attempts made and you get all this little, you know, foo-fooing(ph) and it's going to happen, and it never did. And I think, in their perversity, they were very comfortable with just carrying this hate, particularly Joe Frazier. Ali didn't care. Ali just threw out slings and arrows, calling George Foreman a mummy, and Ernie Shavers an acorn. And he would just throw these out. Some people...</s>LARRY MERCHANT: Called Liston a big bear.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Liston, The Big Bear, yes.</s>BERT SUGAR: But Joe, it hurt. The gorilla in Manila.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: And particularly because Joe Frazier - in those times, with all of the social turmoil and the political turmoil that was associated with it, Joe was supported by the anti-Clay or anti-Ali people, anti-him for changing...</s>BERT SUGAR: Anti-war.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: And they were anti-him because of his anti-war status. They were anti-him because he was part of the black movement of the '60s. So - and Joe just represented, you know, what I would call a red state mentality, a go-to-work mentality. And you didn't hear - he communicated through how he fought, not through his thoughts on the world scene. So there was a natural divide there, and that's where Ali, once again, crossed the line when he called him an Uncle Tom.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Well...</s>LARRY MERCHANT: Ali...</s>BERT SUGAR: I never got the belief that Joe understood what the hell was happening.</s>LARRY MERCHANT: I agree, and I'm not sure that Ali was fully aware of all of the implications of everything he did. But he was just this force of nature from the time he was a kid and, you know, going to the Olympics. I mean, thousands of athletes at the Olympics, and who stood out? An American light heavyweight.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: Gentlemen, it's a sad occasion but good to speak with you both, Bert Sugar, and also, of course with us Larry Merchant.</s>BERT SUGAR: And nice to remember Joe Frazier.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: And nice to remember Joe Frazier. Thank you, gentlemen, both, for your time. Larry Merchant, ringside announcer for HBO, and he joined us today from Los Angeles, Bert Sugar from his home in Chappaqua in New York.</s>NEAL CONAN, host: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Neal Conan in Washington.
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How important are museums, TV shows and after school clubs to teaching kids science? Ira Flatow and guests look at "informal science education" and what researchers are learning about learning science. Plus, what's the best way to keep undergraduate science majors in science? Lynn D. Dierking, interim associate dean for research, College of Education, Sea Grant professor in free-choice learning, science & mathematics education, College of Science, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Ore. Linda Kekelis, executive director, Techbridge, Oakland, Calif. Susan Singer, Laurence McKinley Gould professor of the natural sciences, department of biology, Carleton College, Northfield, Minn.
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IRA FLATOW, HOST: This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. We're going to be hearing President Obama talking about the need to help kids learn science in places other than the classroom.</s>PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I want us all to think about new and creative ways to engage young people in science and engineering, whether it's science festivals, robotic competitions, fairs that encourage young people to create and build and invent, to be makers of things, not just consumers of things.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And we keep hearing about how American students are falling behind the rest of the world when it comes to math and science, but new studies are showing that the places to teach science, places where kids will soak up science, are not in the classrooms, but museum trips, TV shows, afterschool clubs, even radio shows about science. Has that been your experience, too? What do you think? How much of what you know about science comes from your experience outside of a classroom?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Our number is 1-800-989-8255, 1-800-989-TALK. You can always go to our website at sciencefriday.com and also on our Facebook page and you can tweet us @scifri, @S-C-I-F-R-I. Let me introduce my guests. Lynn Dierking is the Sea Grant professor in free-choice learning in the College of Science at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon. She's also the interim associate dean for research at the College of Education at Oregon State University and she's also an advisor to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And I want to thank her for being with us here today. Hi, Lynn.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Hi there, Ira. Great to be here.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Nice to have you. Susan Singer is a professor of natural sciences at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. She joins us from Minnesota Public Radio in St. Paul. Thanks for being with us today.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Thanks, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And Linda Kekelis is executive director of Techbridge. That's in Oakland, California. Thank you, Linda, for being with us today.</s>LINDA KEKELIS: Hi, Ira. I'm looking forward to our discussion today.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Me, too. And let me kick it off - well, let me ask Lynn Dierking. You study informal science education. Tell us what that informal part means.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Well, it's about all the kinds of ways that we learn. And I would say, we've been talking - I know in the information you've provided, talked a lot about children. But it's the way that our society supports people of all ages and walks of life in exploring and learning about science and technology and engineering and mathematics. So you mentioned many of the places, museums, science centers, you know, radio programs, television.</s>LYNN DIERKING: I was fascinated, I - Flora's piece is one of my favorite SCIENCE FRIDAY pieces and I was fascinated to hear about the search for the imperial woodpecker. We've got a couple of free-choice science learners on our hands who are able to pursue their interests and hobbies around STEM.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Are you learning? Do your studies show that more people are learning science outside of the classroom in these informal places?</s>LYNN DIERKING: I wouldn't say more people, but I do think - and I wouldn't necessarily say that these are better places. But I think that what these opportunities do for children and adults is they help them understand at a deeper level some of the things that they have learned in school or they may get them excited about something that then they want to pursue in more depth in school. But there's definitely evidence in my work and the work of other people doing research on this area that these experiences can be exceedingly powerful.</s>LYNN DIERKING: They're very memorable, and actually they connect often to other experiences that children and adults have in their lives, both in school and out of school.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Linda Kekelis, you are director of a program called Techbridge. Tell us about that, please.</s>LINDA KEKELIS: Techbridge is a nonprofit that's based here in Oakland, California, and we turn girls on to science and engineering through enrichment programs outside of schools. The heart of Techbridge are our afterschool and summer programs where we have a chance to give girls time to tinker and build things and take things apart and discover their inner engineer or computer programmer.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: We don't always think of girls as doing that.</s>LINDA KEKELIS: That's right. And the girls don't either until they have a chance to be in Techbridge and by being in the company of girls, they discover that they really do love science and technology when they get to work on projects that appeal to their interests.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And we actually have one of the students online. Nori Dubon is a 10th grader in Oakland Unity High School. And she's with us. Hi, there. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.</s>NORI DUBON: Hi.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Hi. Are you eager to go to these after-school projects?</s>NORI DUBON: Huh? I'm sorry. Can you repeat that?</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Do you like the - do you like working on these projects, taking things apart and learning how they work?</s>NORI DUBON: Yes. I love it. I love getting my hands, like, in there and just, like, doing something from scratch. And if I mess up, like, trying to figure out what I did wrong and just - I love Techbridge.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah, and what got you interested in it? Did you always have that interest or did it have to bring someone like your teacher, like Linda, have to bring it out of you?</s>NORI DUBON: Well, I have always been interested in science and, like, learning about how stuff works and why it works like that and just a theory. But I - my teacher actually came and talked because I didn't know what Techbridge was really about until my biology teacher came and talked to us. And he was talking about this program that was really a hands-on program where girls got to build stuff and just get out there into the world of engineering and just, like, do what they have to do and learn about science, which you don't get to see a lot of girls engineering.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: No, you don't. Do you find that Techbridge helps you in your schoolwork at all?</s>NORI DUBON: Yes. I can really relate to what I'm learning in Techbridge to other stuff that I'm learning in my school. Like, last year, I used to be in Biology class and I remember that a biology major came in and she was talking to us about science, biology and microscopes. And I could follow along with her because I was just learning about that in my biology class. And then, she taught us how to do a microscope out of, like, materials that were very tiny and then so that was really cool.</s>NORI DUBON: I was really excited to learn how to do something that was also related to my schoolwork.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And are you going to follow up and major in science in college, you think?</s>NORI DUBON: I am definitely going to major in science once I go to college. I love science. I think it's a great - it's just a concept where you can learn how to do something yourself and get to answer questions that you have and get to know why that happened. And I just love science.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Well, good luck to you, Nori, and thank you for taking time to be with us on the show.</s>NORI DUBON: Thank you so much.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're welcome. Nori Dubon is a 10th grader at the Oakland Unity High School in California. Our number, 1-800-989-8255. We're talking about informal science education and how to get it and where it's happening.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Let me ask Susan Singer. Tell us what's happening once kids get to college. Now, she's going to start out, Nori, as a science major. What's going to happen to her? Is she going to drop out if she's like everybody else?</s>SUSAN SINGER: Oh, I hope not, but I don't have all cheery news today, Ira. Actually, I coach a science Olympiad High School in Minnesota and I want all of my students, just like Norea, that are excited about science to go on and have a terrific experience. It turns out that nationally, the United States actually ranks 27th in the world in terms of the proportion of our college students that graduate with degrees in science and engineering and math. And it's not just because we don't have enough students coming to college excited about science.</s>SUSAN SINGER: We're losing - in fact, nationally about 40 percent of all students who come excited and say they're going to be science or engineering or math majors graduate within five years. The rest don't. And if we break it down demographically, it's a little more discouraging. Students from underrepresented groups graduate with one of those degrees in five years at a rate of about 20 percent, so we're losing folks. And we don't want anyone to have a bad experience, and beyond that I think we really have to think about what the national implications are. Right now, in terms of the U.S. population, about 28 percent of the U.S. population are members of underrepresented groups.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Yet in the workforce, only about nine percent of the science and engineering workforce are members of underrepresented groups.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: What is an underrepresented group?</s>SUSAN SINGER: In the statistics I've been giving you, they've been broken down in terms of blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans and also Asians, although Asian students tend to do better than white students overall in terms of retention.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Is there some way how we teach engineering and other topics? I remember when I was in engineering school, it was almost like they were trying to weed us out, you know?</s>SUSAN SINGER: Yes.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Instead of encouraging us to become engineers. Like, okay, we're going to get the people who don't belong here out of here.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Whether that's the intent or not, that seems to be what's happening. And Ira, I would confess to being one of those engineering dropouts. I got hooked on genetics. I'm a biologist, but perhaps my experience wasn't unlike what you saw. We know so much about how to teach effectively and engage students. But for a whole plethora of reasons, that seems to not be happening right now in undergraduate education. And one of the most common reasons students report leaving science as a major is the type of teaching they experienced.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Mm-hmm. 1-800-989-8255 is our number. We're talking with Lynn Dierking. She's Sea Grant professor in free-choice learning at the College of Science at Oregon State University in Corvallis. Susan Singer is professor of natural sciences at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. And Linda Kekelis is the executive director of Techbridge in Oakland, California. Before we go to the break, Linda, Lynn, have you heard anything here that you can respond to, give us any ideas of how to teach these kids better?</s>LYNN DIERKING: Yeah, I think something that is really interesting in what Sarah was sharing is that some of the work that I'm doing - in fact, I know Linda because we've been tracking some of the young women who participated in Techbridge, you know, as many years ago as 10, 15 years. One of the things we're finding out is that the experiences that are provided in out-of-school settings can be extremely powerful and impactful for children and youth who are from underrepresented groups.</s>LYNN DIERKING: And it's not clear exactly why that might be the case. Clearly, part of it is an opportunity to become very engaged and have the hands-on experience. I think Nori spoke to that very, very well. But there's also this sense of other people like me who are interested and in the case of women specifically...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Okay, Lynn, hang on. We'll get to that point after the break so - I don't want to cut you off. We'll give you a full chance to answer that. Stay with us, we'll be right back after this break. I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're listening to SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. We're talking about informal science education and its relationship to formal classroom learning with my guests Lynn Dierking. She's at Oregon State University. Susan Singer at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, and Linda Kekelis, she's at Techbridge in Oakland, California. Our number, 1-800-989-8255. And when I rudely interrupted Lynn Dierking, she was telling us about her own experience.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Yeah, actually, I apologize. Actually, I realize I called Susan Sarah. I'm sorry, Susan.</s>SUSAN SINGER: No worries.</s>LYNN DIERKING: I just wanted...</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: You're just like me. Just joining the spirit of me getting names wrong so you fit right in.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Yeah, I just wanted to add that this community piece seems to be really important among young women, a place where they feel safe being smart and being able to do things that are not maybe typically the things that girls, particularly in their community, might engage in. And I think that that's a really important piece of this and the research supports that that seems to emerge. Also, knowing a scientist and knowing people that can give you advice, many of the young women in the study that I've been involved in with my colleague Dale Macready(ph) at the Franklin Institute, those young women are the first people in their families to go to college.</s>LYNN DIERKING: And so they don't have the background and history of knowing, you know, how do you apply for college and what's important? How do you visit a college and make a decision? So it really supports what Susan was saying about the importance of getting children and youth into college and then helping to support them while they're in college.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Linda Kekelis, we keep hearing from experts like those on this panel today that it's important to have a mentor for kids. Is that what Techbridge does, gives you, as Lynn Dierking was saying, a role model - and as Susan has been saying, a role model and a bridge to get you interested in college and to stay in college?</s>LINDA KEKELIS: We find role models are really important. We do lots of fun hands-on activities and the girls tell us that, you know, they really enjoy the experience. It's very different from the school day, but they see those sorts of projects as hobbies, but not as career interests, so it really takes a role model who can help dispel the stereotypes that kids might have about who does science or engineering and also help share their passion for what they do and show girls that science and engineering can help make the world a better place, which is a very great interest to the girls that we work with.</s>LINDA KEKELIS: And what we've also discovered is that a lot of people want to support kids and be role models, but may not have the experience or the know-how for how to relate to kids or how to share their career, so it's really important that role models get support and training in advance. You know, we help them prepare for any classroom visit or field trip that they do with our girls and come up and share a personal story and help the girls relate to them, show that, you know, life is not all work, but they also have got, you know, hobbies and interests outside of work and family life that's important for kids to hear about.</s>LINDA KEKELIS: And I think especially for the girls that we work with who are from under-resourced communities, you know, being able to see the wide range of careers that are available in science and engineering are so important for helping the girls to see new possibilities and what they can do.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Susan Singer, if you had to put your finger on one of the main reasons that college kids drop out of science and engineering majors, as majors, what would you say?</s>SUSAN SINGER: Well, I think what happens is they're not feeling successful and they feel like they're working very, very hard and beating their heads against a wall and not making progress. And I think what we can collectively do in a way is like the mentoring piece, if we have better professional development for the people that are teaching them, to help structure their learning in a way that they make progress and feel good about what they're learning.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So we need to teach teachers to be better teachers is what you're saying.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Absolutely. Right. We've learned that in K-12 and we're really starting to understand that in higher ed, where typically someone gets a PhD and knows a lot about the research field, but they don't know about how people learn or what kind of instructional strategies are successful. And as a new faculty member, you're just tossed out there and people want to do their best and they're trying very hard, but they don't necessarily have the resources. And there are a lot of programs that are starting to emerge, both during the graduate school experience and after that that are helping.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: And of course you may not see yourself as a teacher once you get in there. You're a scientist and a PhD.</s>SUSAN SINGER: That's traditionally how we've prepared people. Exactly.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Yeah. And you don't have the training to do that. So that's like your secondary job, you view yourself as, not as your primary job of what you need to do is to teach these students.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Right. And most young faculty would like to keep their jobs and obtain tenure. And in many, many institutions, research productivity's the currency of the realm.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Let's go to Laura in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Hi, Laura. Welcome to Science Friday.</s>LAURA: Hi.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Hi there.</s>LAURA: Hey. Well, I just wanted to say that I really think you have to have both programs going on. In my experience as a student, I liked science. I had good science teachers, but I also had the opportunity for a lot of experiences in museum programs and science camps and you would just going into museums that are some of the things that really stick with me. And I've also worked in both environmental education and then I taught high school for seven years.</s>LAURA: And it's a lot harder in the classroom environment to make it interesting and exciting, especially with situations like, you know, crowded classrooms, lack of supplies. And I think a lot of kids just never find out the interesting things about science if they don't get a chance for those hands-on programs and, like, experiences that really engage them personally and make them feel like they're discovering something. So I think you're definitely on the right track with this.</s>LAURA: The kids have got to have the opportunity for both. And I'm just starting a biology PhD program, but one of my long term goals is to really help support those programs that get kids involved in the interesting, like the exciting parts of science so they see what's going on with it.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Lynn Dierking, any reaction?</s>LYNN DIERKING: Yeah. I would absolutely say that I think something that we're beginning to understand and is starting to be a part of the conversation is how do we build bridges between what kids are doing in school with their out-of-school experiences and then how do we build bridges within the educational system. Building on what Susan said a few minutes ago, I was just at a meeting in D.C., actually yesterday and the day before, talking about how we need to better understand how children and youth move through both their in-school time and their out-of-school time and how they connect that to further education, further hobbies and pursuits.</s>LYNN DIERKING: And so this is a conversation that's happening at the national level, talking about the fact that we can't just focus in on improving classroom teachers' abilities. We need to think about the whole ecosystem of education and really support undergraduate, graduate education, technical education. Something that came up at this meeting were the number of youths that are dropping out, and to the point where in some communities that are not even talking about K12 anymore, they're talking about K-8.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Well, how do we reach children and youth who are disengaged and not even in the school system? So I think these notions of how we can connect and talk to one another in these different educational settings is really important.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. That's depressing to hear, K-8 versus K-12.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Indeed it is.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Wow. So people aren't even getting a high school education - many more people are not getting a high school education. They're trying to reach them before they get to the 8th grade.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Yup, yup. And once again, that relates to these statistics that Susan was sharing. I mean, 50 percent of the children in school don't move on. They may get a high school diploma, but they don't move on into the system. And then, of course, the ones that do get there, the sobering statistic Susan was sharing about how many of them don't complete their degrees, is very, you know, very sobering.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: So Susan, last comment. It doesn't sound - it sounds like things are getting worse instead of getting better.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Well, I think the situation is serious, but I tend to be more optimistic than that. I think there is a growing awareness of this and I think there's a collective will at all levels of education and an evidence base that's out there about what we can do. And I think we're collectively going to find a way to do this.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Mm-hmm. With the resources we have?</s>SUSAN SINGER: Well, that's the sticking point, Ira.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: Ah, the details, details.</s>SUSAN SINGER: We certainly have to rethink some things.</s>IRA FLATOW, HOST: All right. Well, we'll save that for another time because that's a whole 'nother discussion. Thank you for being with us today. Susan Singer, professor of natural sciences at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. Lynn Dierking, she's a Sea Grant professor in free-choice learning in the College of Science at Oregon State University in Corvallis. And Linda Kekelis is executive director of Techbridge in Oakland, Calif. Thank you for being with us today.</s>SUSAN SINGER: Thank you.</s>LYNN DIERKING: Thanks so much.
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