As fires rage in California, so does a debate about how to best tackle them.

Democracy Now! 2018-11-21 Wednesday

• Headlines for November 21, 2018
• Trump Chooses "Relationship with Saudi Arabia" over Accountability for Jamal Khashoggi's Murder
• Did Israel Kill Yasser Arafat? Stunning Investigation Exposes Israel's Secretive Assassination Program
• Costs of War: 17 Years After 9/11, Nearly Half a Million People Have Died in Global "War on Terror"

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Despite the additional hurdles involved, daters in prison fall into the same categories as daters on the outside: romantics, hopefuls and players.

Thanks to Charlie Srey, Sincere Carter, Kevin Turner, Mo, Allyson West and Jessie Ayers for talking to us for this story.

Ear Hustle is produced by Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods with help from outside producer Pat Mesiti-Miller, who also comes in to lead the sound design team. This episode was scored with music by David Jassy, Antwan Williams, E. Phil Phillips, Eric “Maserati E” Abercrombie and Lee Jaspar (aka Matthew Lee Jasper). Eternal thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Davis for their support of the show.

Thanks to Nectar and Bombas for supporting this episode. Find out more about the show at earhustlesq.com, where you can also buy an Ear Hustle mug to go with your T-shirt! Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX.

''One of America's foremost practitioners of narrative nonfiction'' (The Wall Street Journal), Nathaniel Philbrick is the author of the National Book Award-winning In The Heart of the Sea, an account of the nearly mythic 19th-century maritime disaster that inspired Herman Melville's Moby-Dick. His many other books include Mayflower, a Pulitzer Prize finalist; The Last Stand, a chronicle of the clash at Little Bighorn; Bunker Hill, a fresh take on the first major battle of the Revolutionary War; and Valiant Ambition, an account of the tragic relationship between George Washington and Benedict Arnold. In his latest book, Philbrick narrates the epic year leading to Washington's decisive land and naval victory over Lord Cornwallis's forces in Yorktown. Watch the video here. Ellis Wachs Endowed Lecture (recorded 10/25/2018)

In his book Colonial Buganda and the End of Empire: Political Thought and Historical Imagination in Africa (Cambridge University Press, 2017), Dr. Jonathon Earle illustrates the rich and diverse intellectual history of Buganda, an East African kingdom that came to be incorporated into the modern state of Uganda.  Earle constructs the intellectual...

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Bernard Mandeville (1670-1733) and his critique of the economy as he found it in London, where private vices were condemned without acknowledging their public benefit. In his poem The Grumbling Hive (1705), he presented an allegory in which the economy collapsed once knavish bees turned honest. When republished with a commentary, The Fable of the Bees was seen as a scandalous attack on Christian values and Mandeville was recommended for prosecution for his tendency to corrupt all morals. He kept writing, and his ideas went on to influence David Hume and Adam Smith, as well as Keynes and Hayek. With David Wootton Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York Helen Paul Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton And John Callanan Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at King’s College London Producer: Simon Tillotson

From the Winnipeg Comedy Festival this past spring - we feature Howie Miller and Leonard Chan. Between them they poke fun at their family, their backgrounds and their social status. Hey guys! Save something for the hecklers!

Frances Arnold, George Smith and Gregory Winter shared the 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for using evolutionary principles to create highly efficient enzymes and antibodies, with numerous practical applications.

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Democracy Now! 2018-11-14 Wednesday

• Headlines for November 14, 2018
• NY Politician: We Need to Block $3 Billion Handout for Amazon & Use Money to Forgive Student Debt
• As Jeff Bezos Earns $191K Per Minute, Why Are NY & VA Giving Amazon $3 Billion in Corporate Welfare?
• Advocates: Trump Creating Border Crisis by Pitting Troops Against Women & Children Fleeing Violence

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This week we are joined by Caitlin Smith-Oyekole, a Ph.D. candidate in American literature at the University of Notre Dame, where she focuses on doubt in American literature from the Great Awakening to the Civil War. Previous projects have focused on print culture and musical practice in colonial New England, the incipient crisis of authority in 16th -century radical Protestant rhetoric, and more. She is here today to talk to us about the history of the superhero narrative, from Golden Age Superheroes to the Marvel Cinematic Universe!

 

Discussion thread here. 

© 2019 Brian M. Watson

Bill Bruford’s instantly identifiable sound and brilliant sense of composition made him the defining drummer of the progressive rock movement; but at age 60, after four decades in the music business, Bill unceremoniously walked away.

Bill tells Joe about: being a young jazz elitist; "leveraging himself sideways" from an upper-middle class family to the seedy life of a musician; doing a lot with “a modest amount of talent”; the creative dynamics of Yes and King Crimson; how he achieved his signature snare sound; retirement; and earning a doctorate from The University of Surrey. During the course of the conversation, Joe and Bill also christen a new band, Wongford. This is a can’t-miss episode with one of the all-time greats.

Henry VIII's henchman. Protestant reformer. Master politician. According to Wolf Hall author Hillary Mantel, 'This is the biography we have been awaiting for 400 years'.

A History of Power and Knowledge The Israeli historian Ilan Pappe spoke on September 14, 2018, at the City Club of Cleveland. Attempts were made to prevent Prof. Pappe from speaking, however the President of the Board of Directors of the City Club explained why they did not retract the invitation. She said that a forum devoted to freedom of speech will use this as an opportunity to reflect on the role the City Club plays in the community. We believe, she said, that our work requires us to listen and learn. As the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians continues, many question the very representation of the Zionist state. Ilan Pappe, Ph.D., Professor of History and Director of the European Centre for Palestine [ . . . ]

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Democracy Now! 2018-11-12 Monday

• Headlines for November 12, 2018
• A Century After End of WWI, Trump Snubs Peace Summit While Macron Warns of Growing Nationalism
• Emma Goldman, Eugene Debs, Jane Addams: Honoring Antiwar Resisters on the 100th Anniv. of WWI's End
• A Century After WWI's End, Adam Hochschild Cautions: "Think Long and Hard Before Starting a New War"
• On Veterans Day, Advocates Warn Against Pence & Trump-Led Attacks on VA Healthcare
• After Former Marine Kills 12 in Thousand Oaks, CA, a Discussion on Mental Health for Veterans

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Russian Science Fiction Literature and Cinema: A Critical Reader (Academic Studies Press, 2018) offers a compelling investigation of the genre whose development was significantly reshaped in the second half of the 20th century. In her introduction to this volume, Anindita Banerjee outlines the specificity of Russian science fiction literature and cinema and...

The antebellum South was on the road to agricultural ruin, and the Civil War put a brick on the gas pedal. In Unredeemed Land: An Environmental History of Civil War and Emancipation in the Cotton South (Oxford University Press, 2018), a sweeping reassessment of some of the oldest questions in...

Author Andrew Delbanco says the 1850 law paved the way for the Civil War by endangering the lives of both escaped slaves and free black men and women in the North. His book is 'The War Before The War.'

Also, film critic Justin Chang reviews the psychological thriller 'Burning.'

Terry Gross spoke with Queen lead guitarist Brian May in 2010 about recording the many vocals in 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' writing the anthem 'We Will Rock You' and getting a PhD in astrophysics. The new biopic 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' about Freddie Mercury and the meteoric rise of Queen, is now in theaters.

Also, film critic Justin Chang reviews the Coen Brothers' new film, 'The Ballad of Buster Scruggs,' coming to Netflix Nov. 16.

This post was originally published on my Patreon page.

Several people on my Twitter feed touted the drop in the stock market last month as evidence of the failure of Donald Trump’s economic policy. I responded by pointing out that he was reducing wealth inequality. I was being only half facetious.

I have always been less concerned about wealth than income both because I think wealth is less well-defined and because income is the more important determinant of living standards. In the case of the stock market plunge, the vast majority of the losses go to the richest 10 percent of the population and close to half go to the richest 1 percent, for the simple reason that this is the distribution of stock ownership.

When people decry the rise in inequality in wealth over the last decade, they are basically complaining about the run-up in the stock market. The real value of the stock market has roughly tripled from its recession lows. With the richest one percent holding close to 40 percent of stock wealth and the richest 10 percent holding more than 80 percent, a tripling in the value of the stock market pretty much guarantees a big increase in wealth inequality. If we think this increase is bad, then why would we not think a drop in the stock market is good?

There is a correlation between the stock market and economic growth. The market generally rises when the economy is strong and falls in recessions, but this link is weak. Remember the recession of 1988?

I hope not, because the economy continued to grow at a healthy pace until the summer of 1990. This is in spite of the stock market’s largest one-day drop ever in October of 1987. (It did recovery half of its value by the end of the year.)

In short, the recent plunge in the market tells us little about the future direction of the economy. If we are troubled by wealth inequality then we should be happy, rich people now have substantially less wealth.

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When former Michigan Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer faced a populist, progressive rival in the state’s Democratic gubernatorial primary earlier this year, she had a little help from her health insurance industry friends.

Whitmer was hosted at a fundraiser thrown by lobbyists for Blue Cross Blue Shield. She netted $144,000 during a single day at the event.

The company’s interest in the race came as no surprise, as Whitmer’s chief rival, former Detroit public health chief Abdul El-Sayed, was campaigning on establishing a statewide single-payer health care system. Essentially, he was running to put the company out of business.

But it appears that Blue Cross Blue Shield gained more than just the defeat of single payer. This week, Whitmer won the governor’s mansion, putting the state back in the Democratic column. She quickly announced the composition of her transition team.

One of the “honorary co-chairs” is Daniel Loepp, the president and CEO of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan.

In a 2015 interview, Whitmer credited Loepp with being the first person to suggest that she enter politics, back when he worked in the state legislature.

During the campaign, Gretchen Whitmer — whose father is Richard Whitmer, formerly the head of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan — was defensive against criticisms that she was too close to the health insurance giant. “It’s extremely sexist to say that a woman is beholden to her father’s former employer,” she told CNN.

The governor-elect’s team did not respond to a request for comment. Though Whitmer ran to the right of El-Sayed, her platform was still broadly progressive and pro-labor.

Whitmer’s transition team isn’t the only one bringing corporate interests onboard post-election. In Georgia, Republican Brian Kemp has declared victory, despite an ongoing legal effort by his Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams to chase down enough provisional and absentee ballots to take the race to a run-off.

Kemp announced Thursday that his transition team would be led by David Dove, Kemp’s former legal counsel and chief of staff. More recently, Dove was added to the new lobbying arm of the litigation and regulatory law firm Robbins Ross Alloy Belinfante Littlefield LLC.

The newly minted Robbins Government Relations Group opened October 2, just over a month before the election. In an interview with a legal publication, partner Josh Belinfante explained why the firm decided to open a lobbying arm. He emphasized the potential to influence regulations.

“A lot of our clients’ problems can be resolved through the legislative branch more easily and effectively than through the judicial branch,” Belinfante said. “Or our clients may have a win in the judicial branch that may need to be protected in the legislature — particularly clients who are highly regulated, and particularly when legislation or regulations pass that govern what they do.”

According to disclosures, Dove is not currently registered to lobby. But presumably, the firm’s clients now have a chain of communication to the man responsible for staffing the next governor’s mansion. The Intercept reached out to the firm and to Dove to ask if he would be taking a leave of absence while serving on the transition team, but they have not yet responded.

The post Michigan’s Democratic Governor-Elect Puts Blue Cross Blue Shield Executive on Transition Team — After the Company Funded Her Campaign appeared first on The Intercept.

As we approach the centenary of the Armistice, Gary Sheffield explores the final moments of the conflict that devastated the world for four and a half years

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Despite enduring for nearly five centuries, the Roman Republic ended in a series of crises and wars that discredited the idea of republics in the West for centuries. In Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny (Basic Books, 2018), Edward J. Watts examines why Romans traded the liberty of political...

A wave of populist revolts has led many to lose faith in the wisdom of people power. But such eruptions are essential to the vitality of modern politics • Read the text version here

Andy Zaltzman and Anuvab Pal trace the rise and fall of the British Empire by looking at what's been left behind, in a combination of location recording and stand-up comedy. In this first episode, Andy and Anuvab wander around London, from the docks the trading ships originally departed from in the east of London, to the final resting place of Empire in the west, via the central strongholds of power in Westminster and the City. What and who have we chosen to remember, and what have we decided to forget? With supporting evidence from the India papers in the British library - seven miles of documents - Andy and Anuvab offer up contrasting perspectives on the shared history between Britain and India. Andy Zaltzman is a comedian best-known for The Bugle, his weekly satirical podcast. He is a regular performer on Radio 4 both as a guest on programmes like The Now Show or as presenter of his own shows such as My Life As A... . Anuvab Pal is a comedian who first appeared on Radio 4 on an episode of Just A Minute recorded in Mumbai. In 2018 he made his debut at the Edinburgh Fringe, and appeared on Radio 4's Fresh from The Fringe and BBC Two's Big Asian Stand-Up. He is Andy's regular co-presenter on The Bugle podcast. Written and performed by Andy Zaltzman and Anuvab Pal. Produced by Ed Morrish A Somethin' Else production for BBC Radio 4.

How was Jewish life affected by the First World War? How did Jews around the world understand, engage with, and influence the Great War and surrounding events? And why has the impact of World War I so often overlooked Jewish historical narratives? In this fascinating and important new edited volume, World...

Democracy Now! 2018-10-29 Monday

• Headlines for October 29, 2018
• Uncle of Stephen Miller: Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting Is What Happens When Hate Is Legitimized
• Rabbi: Trump & GOP Have Blood on Their Hands for Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting & Hateful Violence
• Glenn Greenwald on Bolsonaro: Brazil Has Elected "Most Extremist Leader in the Democratic World"
• Glenn Greenwald: Violence Like Pittsburgh Shooting Is "Inevitable Outcome" of Racist Scapegoating

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