June, 2007

I am just going to go ahead and admit that I am afraid of science.  I am also afraid of math.  Just the idea of trying to understand mathmatical or scientific concepts makes my brain shut down.  There were many unpleasant moments in high school because of this mental block.*

But so now that I am a bit older and a bit more patient, and more interested in the world around me, I find myself actually wanting or needing science sometimes in order to be able to understand concepts or ideas that are important to our world.  Like, climate change, or bird flu, or stem cells.  But where to go to get that kind of information?  Who is going to teach science to adults?

Natalie Angier is!  Her new book has been called a "guide for the scientifically perplexed adult who wants to understand what those guys in lab coats on the news are babbling about."  That would be me.  Is it you, too?  Join us today and find out.

 -Jessica

*College was quite a different story where thanks to distribution requirements that were kind to non-scientific minds, I was only made to take two science classes.  Most people took psychology, but I took a course called Ethonobotany and a course called The Biology of Science Fiction.  This was hands down the best science course I have ever taken.  In fact it was one of the best classes I took in college.  Every meager things I know about science I learned in this class from science fiction writer and professor Joan Slonczewski.  If you like science fiction, check out her stuff.  Thanks for helping me not be totally terrified of science, Professor S.

I'm hanging this picture above my desk.

Whether you love Dick Cheney or hate him, you gotta admit...he's got to be pretty clever to have made the vice presidency so powerful.

Marc shared a colorful quote during his introduction to today's show.  John Nance Garner said the vice-presidency is "not worth a pitcher of warm piss."  Lovely image, and perhaps not true anymore-or at least, not true for Dick Cheney, who has exercised considerable influence from that position.

We'll be discussing this at noon today.  What do you think?

-Jessica

How do you feel about the fact that tens of thousands of people are coming to our state because of Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC)?

 Are you a real estate agent who is looking forward to the business?

...or a parent who is worried about more kids in an already overcrowded school?

Are you a highway construction worker looking forward to benefit from the money for new transportation projects?

...or a frustrated commuter dreading even more clogged roadways?

Are you a homeowner hoping to benefit from a rise in property values that may result from a rise in demand?

...or someone one or two years away from being a first time home-buyer dreading the effect these well-payed military types will have on local home prices (that would be me!)?

There are just so many ways to feel about BRAC!

Today at noon we are joined by Lt. Governor Anthony Brown.  He is the chair of the BRAC subcommittee.  He is going to tell us what he has been doing to make sure we are ready for all these people.

-Jessica

Whatever you think of her politics, you have to respect the passion and commitment that Maria Allwine shows to the causes that are dear to her.

Her newest incarnation is as the Green Party candidate for President of the City Council of Baltimore City.  She'll be joining us today to discuss her agenda for that office.  What would she do if elected?  She's run for office before, but never served.  Would her history of political activism translate into effective political leadership?  What would it mean for Baltimore to have someone like Maria Allwine at the helm of our city council?

Join us with your thoughts and questions.

-Jessica

First off, a geography test.  Can you find the Eastern Shore on this map?

While much of The Eastern Shore is still full of small towns and farms, places like Kent County and Worcester County have seen large population growth and increasingly widespread development.  This hour we'll be looking at some of the concerns accompanying current development projects around the region.

As Jessica is from Ocean City, perhaps she has more to add here.

 -Justin

How much time do you spend getting to and from work every day?  What else would you like to be doing with that time, however much it may be?

Our show this hour will be focused on commuting, so if you need to vent, now's your chance.  Seems like commuting is something about which just about everyone has something to say, whether it be bragging about only having to walk two blocks to work or bragging about suffering through a two hour drive on congested highways.  We hope you'll share your stories with us, both here and on the air.

A lot has been written about commuting.  Here's a great article from The New Yorker a few issues back, There and Back Again: The Soul of the Commuter, by Nick Paumgarten.  It uses commuting as a medium for looking at some fundamental questions about our ability as humans to decide what is best for ourselves and what we do with our time.

-Justin

These pictures will make sense if you listen to the show on Monday, I promise.

This hour we'll have interviews with the authors of some pieces that caught our attention in the papers lately, or in one case, online.  If you want to do some homework over the weekend, here's a link to each one:

What Ted Stevens, Bolivian cocaine and Halliburton have in common by Michael Scherer on Salon.com

Parents' paranoia takes toll on kids' health, happiness by L.J. Williamson in The Baltimore Sun

New Lyrics for Israel by Adam Lebor in The New York Times

-Justin

Finished reading the articles for noon and looking for something else to read over the weekend?  Read the book that we'll be discussing in the second hour on Monday with author Camelia Entekhabifard.  It's called Camelia: Save Yourself By Telling the Truth, A Memoir of Iran. 

Camelia was born and raised in Tehran.  She has a pretty incredible story about being imprisoned there for her work as a journalist, and charming her way into an opportunity to flee the country after some horrible months in solitary confinement.

Now she lives in New York City and continues her work as a journalist around the world.  Just not in Iran.

-Justin

One city had more homicides per capita than Baltimore last year, Detroit.  Newark wasn't far behind, barely beaten out for third by New Orleans.  This hour we talk with journalists from Detroit, Newark, and here in B-more who have been covering crime in their towns.

Violence is nothing new in any of these places.  How did it become such an entrenched part of their cultures?  How is each place dealing with the problem?  What can we learn from each other?

-Justin

Thanks to the City Paper for this artful shot of our current City Council President, taken back when she was City Council VP.  The article that it came from has this nice quote, as well: “I’m a workhorse, not a show horse.”

That said, the City Council President will be here today to discuss her bid to maintain her presidency in this fall's election.  Tune in at 1pm.

-Justin

I took this picture looking east from the top of Federal Hill recently.  Lots of cranes around the harbor, lots of development going on.

The plan for this hour is to talk about development around the city and state, along with other state political issues, with a focus on Maryland's budget.

We have a group of journalists joining us for the discussion: Charles Robinson, statehouse reporter for MPT’s State Circle, Joanna Sullivan, editor of the Baltimore Business Journal and Blair Lee IV, columnist for The Gazette.

-Justin

 A little bit of radio lingo for you: perf-chat.  That's when a musician comes into the studio and performs AND chats with the host.  That is what we are going to do on Wednesday with two members of the Cowboy Junkies. 

The Cowboy Junkies made their mark in 1988 with The Trinity Session, which was recorded live in a single day in a church in Toronto.  Now they are out with their 11th studio album, called At the End of Paths Taken.  It's a rumination on family, on standing in between growing children and aging parents, on marriage, birth, and death.

They'll be playing at Ramshead Live!on Wednesday night, but you can join us Wednesday at 1 o'clock for a performance and to hear Marc talks with Margot and Michael Timmins of the Cowboy Junkies.

-Jessica

We just wrapped up our hour with David Frum, conservative political commentator, author, and former speechwriter for our current president.  I was taking the calls and emails, and I have to say, we had some irate listeners.  If you heard Jerry from Pikesville's call, you know what I'm talking about.

Along with some emotions, some interesting ideas came through.  Are we wrapped up in a liberal/conservative political divide to the detriment of our political discourse?  Are both sides doing anything more than boring each other to tears by repeating the same arguments/defenses over and over?  Is there any meaningful dialogue between the two sides amidst all the rhetoric?  How did we get to the point of viewing our political options as "two opposing sides?"

www.davidfrum.com is full of David's writing, so you can take a look at his ideas and judge them for yourself.

-Justin

The rate that selective reduction happens?  It is going up as more and more women use Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART).  Many of the fertility treatments used today result in a woman carrying multiple fetuses. But while she may conceive that many, the womb remains, as author and journalist Liza Mundy says, " ideally, a single-occupancy vehicle."  And so in order to save one or two fetuses, others must be reduced.

 According to Liza Mundy, 1 in 7 American couples struggle with fertility problems.  And in our "want it, get it" culture, those struggling with fertility problems aren't going to just accept the hand nature has dealt them.  They're going to invest in what is now a multi-billion dollar industry and in many cases, sacrfice financial stability and their health in order to achieve pregnancy.  And it's hard to not support what these couples are doing-the pain of being unable to conceive or carry a child to term is unthinkable.

Liza Mundy's new book is Everything Conceivable: How Assisted Reproduction is Changing Men, Women, and the World."  In this book she takes a comphrensive look at the growth of the ART industry and beyond.  She tackles the philosophical and ethical questions that this new technology is creating and the vast consequences it has for human destiny.

I hope you will join us for this fantastic show and call or write in with your own experiences with Assisted Reproductive Technology or your thoughts on the ethics of it all.  Or post in the blog for other's to read your thoughts.

-Jessica

"A view of the "Sun" Building at Baltimore and Charles Streets. It was built after the 1904 fire. The "Sun" moved in the 1950s to Calvert Street. The Baltimore and Charles Street building was demolished before 1962 for the Charles Center development project."

Thanks to the Baltimore County Legacy Web for the picture and text above.

This hour some former Sun reporters, all of whom recently took a buyout, join us to talk about the Sun's shrinking newsroom.  It's nothing like the good-old-days on Charles Street, I'm sure.

-Justin

Golf, anyone?

-Justin

I made a post below asking our female audience to submit their financial questions for Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar, authors of the book On My Own Two Feet: A Modern Girls Guide to Personal Finance.  We are doing a pre-recorded interview with them this afternoon, and I am happy to say that lots of you submitted questions. 

You have a great opportunity to go meet one of the authors, Sharon Kedar, MBA, CFA tonight at the Light Street Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library at 6:30.  She will be speaking and copies of the book are available for purchase and signing.  Call 410.396.1096 for more information.

-Jessica

Tomorrow, get ready for an hour talking about planning for the influx of people coming into Maryland because of Base Realingment and Closure with Lietenaunt Governor Anthony Brown.

Scratch that. Elected officials are busy, and when your boss is the Governor and asks you to clear your schedule to come to a meeting, you listen! No harm, no foul. We're working to schedule another date soon. Good thing we had a special super secret show in the works!!

WatchingAmerica.com is a website I try and check on a daily basis. It's a place where you can read articles from the foreign press about America. The people who run the website have dozens of articles translated each day from the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Russia, China, and more. In conversations with the founder of the website, William Kern, we thought that Watching America could translate into a radio special, too. So tomorrow we are putting some hurt on the phone bill at WYPR (which reminds me...are you a member yet?) and talking to foreign journalists around the world.

We'll talk to:

• Ahmad Khalidi, a co-editor of Mideast Mirror, a London-based daily, as well as the Editor-in-Chief of the quarterly Journal of Palestine Studies.
• William Waack, a newscaster for O Globo, Brazil. He's spent multiple decades as a reporter, editor, and international correspondent for the Brazillian Press.
• Andrei Sitov, the Washington Bureau Chied for the Itar-Tass news agency of Russia.
• and Hugh Williamson, the Berlin correspondent for the Financial Times since 2001.

We'll be talking with them about how America is viewed by their audience and in their countries. What does the world think of our domestic debates over immigration? What does the world think of our scandals (federal prosecutor firings, Plamegate, etc.) Watchingamerica.com shows the foreign press writing about topics such as tensions between Iran and the U.S. (understandable; has consequences for the entire world) and Paris Hilton's trip to, and from, and back to jail (less understandable; of course I care, and desperately, but why do they?)

Enjoy the show. It will be the first of many such programs on Watching America.

-Jessica

 I'm going to jump in here with a few quick words about this hour's show.  I just came out of the studio, where we recorded the interview that will be played at 1pm.  The conversation never came around to Paris Hilton or any of the recent political scandals, but it did cover a lot of very interesting ground.  To find out the details, you'll have to listen.  If you don't catch it at 1pm, just go to http://www.wypr.org/M_Steiner.html.  We'll have the audio up there as soon as possible.

We taped the show in advance in case we had any trouble with all of the international phone connections, and to better coordinate with schedules in so many time zones.  Since we won't be taking calls as it airs, we're really looking forward to some feedback right here!

-Justin

Who the heck is Andres Alonso?

Well, starting July 1st, the new CEO of Baltimore City Public Schools.

He's also a Cuban immigrant, a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School.  He's been a teacher and was most currently the Number 2 official in the New York City Public School System.

He's also our guest tomorrow at Noon.

Now, I know you all are passionate about our schools and how they need to be reformed.  I hope to see lots and lots of comments and ideas in this blog.  Anything posted before the show will be given to Marc so he can consider to read or ask during the program.

-Jessica

update:  Don't miss our two hour special with Dr. Andres Alonso that will air from 7-9 pm on August 22nd on WYPR!

This afternoon we welcome Stanford University professor Seth Lerer.

He is the author of Inventing English: A Portable History of the Language.

 If you are a fan of William Satfire and love to learn the etymology of words, this show is for you.  My boyfriend is a big fan of words and wordplay.  I had to beg him last night to cease anagramming words outloud-it's driving me crazy.  He's the kind of word nut that will excitedly tell anyone who will listen how awful and awesome once meant the same thing, and will get very heated when discussing how he believes people misuse the word myriad.

 If you have the same tendancies (or if you are just driven mad by people who do), join us today.  We'll be talking about how the English language has developed, and some of the people who had the biggest influence, like William Shakespeare.  Did you have any idea how many words he invented?  Apparently, I have him to thank for my name.

-Jessica