Coming Up! October 1 to 5, 2012

Hello! We’ve been having so much fun at our pop-up storefront in downtown Hartford that we haven’t had much time to book up next week. No worries though, we’ll have great shows for you – check back on Monday for some updates. And we’ll see you at envisionfest this weekend.

MONDAY:  Where We Vote: Andrew Roraback
It’s the next installment of our Where We Vote series with Andrew Roraback. He’s the Republican nominee in the 5th Congressional district race that is gaining national attention, and national money. We’ll sit down to talk about the race, attack ads and the issues. You can ask questions of Andrew Roraback on the next Where We Live.

TUESDAY: Warming Ocean Waters (rebroadcast)
Ice in the Arctic Ocean is at a record-setting low this summer – covering less of the sea, and melting at a more rapid rate than ever. Although climate change skeptics rail about Al Gore’s stranded polar bears, the melting of Arctic ice is – scientifically – really real. Over 30 years, the area it covers has dropped by about half. It’s also not as thick as it used to be, which means it melts more rapidly.  Warming water is changing things not just in the Arctic, but everywhere. Research shows that the melt is affecting air circulation around the globe: because the melt is so fast, weather systems are progressing more slowly, leading to stagnant patterns, and possibly more severe storms, droughts, and coastal erosion, among other challenges.  Today, we’ll talk about what the increase in water temperature means – from altered weather patterns to sea creature migration – affecting our economy and our coastlines. What will it mean for the northeast? We’ve had lobster collapse and a lobster glut, more seals and sharks, and a nuclear reactor shutdown on Long Island Sound, to name a few things. What effect do you think warmer ocean waters will have where we live?

WEDNESDAY: Fast Growing Companies

We recently learned about the 40 “fastest-growing” tech companies in the state. The list includes bio-science, IT, manufacturing, and green technology firms. Matt Nemerson of the Connecticut Technology Council says the list is a kind of guide to a new economy for the state. Today, we look at Connecticut’s rapidly-growing businesses – to find out the keys to their success, and the role state government plays in making it happen.

 

THURSDAY: The Latino News Landscape

With the growth of the Latino population comes a new push from the media to cater to this segment of the population – and not always just in Spanish. Major news networks are creating English language programming for Latinos. And it’s happening in Connecticut too with the recent launch of CTLatinoNews.com. Coming up, we’ll talk about ways traditional media’s reaching out to the Hispanic community – and how Spanish-language news is growing at the same time.

FRIDAY:  Recapping the Crazy Week in Politics
It’s been a strange week in politics…just ask President Barack Obama, who was widely viewed as the loser of the first presidential debate. Now both the President and his Republican challenger are back on the trail, trying to spin the first debate. WNYC reporter Anna Sale was there – and she tells us what voters are really thinking. We’ll also check in with Andrea Seabrook – the former NPR congressional correspondent now has her own podcast called Decode DC and she’s been going to school on the “science” behind party politics. And the Connecticut Mirror’s Mark Pazniokas joins us to talk about a Senate campaign that’s still close – and increasingly all about the ads. The Wesleyan Media Project studies this issue and tells us that there are more ads than ever before in this election cycle.

Linda McMahon Says No to “Where We Vote”

by JD -

Well, we tried. Throughout this entire campaign season, dogged producer Tucker Ives has been trying to schedule Republican senate candidate Linda McMahon for our series on Where We Live called “Where We Vote.” We ask for one hour of the candidate’s time, in our studio, to answer questions from me and our listeners. We’d wanted to have her on during the primary against Chris Shays. Shays came on the show, she didn’t.

For weeks since then, we’ve tried again and again, and had our phone calls unreturned, and requests for dates unanswered. It’s a bit ironic, given the press release I got on September 19 with the heading “Will Murphy continue to stonewall and duck media questions for another 48 days?” 

McMahon’s rival, Democrat Chris Murphy, will join us on October 3 (originally scheduled for tomorrow), and has also already been on the program once before, during the primary season. He’ll answer some tough questions that have been dogging his campaign, but also get to talk about policy issues and give voters a reason to elect him in November.

McMahon has appeared once before on “Where We Vote” - back in March of 2010 when she was running against Rob Simmons in another senate race. During that interview, McMahon suggested that I was asking too many questions about her company WWE. Obviously, questions about WWE were on the table again this campaign year, given the wrestling empire’s ongoing effort to scrub the internet of distasteful video “highlights” of past episodes of their “scripted entertainment.”  And, for months, I’ve been wanting to ask her about the lack of access to her campaign by the press, and the feud that developed with newspaper editors over their characterization of WWE’s product.

And of course, we’d be talking about what has become the highlight issue in this campaign for Senate.  No, not jobs or the economy, but as Colin McEnroe puts it, the burning question of “who’s the bigger deadbeat?” We’d ask questions about the creditors McMahon is only now paying back from her bankruptcy in the 1970s.

We’ve said it before: If you have the money to pay for your message, I suppose you can afford to avoid interviews on “free” media like “Where We Vote.”

If Linda McMahon still wants to join us, and there’s someone from the campaign reading this, we’ve got some open dates. Get in touch with Tucker. You know where to reach him.

Bi-Weekly Apocalyptic Reminders

Our Where We Live email account receives messages every other week or so from someone named “the economy.” For several months now, the warnings that we receive have slightly evolved over time to account for presidential politics. Here’s the email:

Getting a different president, that won’t work.

Just keep sitting there saying “the economy will come back”.

You been sitting there since 2007 saying the economy will come back, the economy will come back.
The economy will not come back.

It is rapture time.

Your only escape from destruction will be the rapture.

The rapture is to be properly announced before it happens.

The way to start to properly announce the rapture is to announce that space can end (any way you go), then space can take a shape, then space can move.

Space can end.

Space can take a shape.

Space can move.

The rapture is to be properly announced before it happens.

Revelation 10;7 The mystery shall be completed.

This email has come with such regularity, that we thought we’d pass along the dire warnings.

“The rapture is to be properly announced before it happens.” What better way to properly announce a rapture than by anonymous mass email?

Coming Up! September 24 to 28, 2012

Tuesday night – don’t miss a fresh edition of *the ear cave* with special guest curator Aengus Anderson from The Conversation! So excited, hope to see you there.

Thursday and Friday – Join us for pop-up radio live from a downtown Hartford storefront! We’ll broadcast both Where We Live and the Colin McEnroe Show live from 90 State House Square, in a former bank space. Drop in and join our live audience!

MONDAY: Electric Cars
By now, you’d think everyone would be driving around in electric cars, plugging in at night and enjoying a quiet – emissions-free – ride to work. But the emergence of the electric car hasn’t been so easy. They’re still expensive, and the network to power them still hasn’t been figured out. We’ll get an update – plug in to the next where we live.

TUESDAY: What is the “Middle Class?”(rebroadcast)
This election season, we’ve heard plenty of candidates talk about how they want to help the middle class. So who are they talking about? Coming up, we’ll talk with Yale’s Jacob Hacker and sociologist Dennis Gilbert about what politicians mean when they say “middle class.” Gilbert says candidates’ use of this term is “dishonest.” A new Pew study says “the middle class has shrunk in size and fallen backward in wealth.” We’ll look at the wide, varying and sometimes manipulative definition of the middle class.

WEDNESDAY: Where We Vote: Elizabeth Esty
Elizabeth Esty won a three-way race in the Democratic primary for the 5^th Congressional District seat. Now that the embattled House Speaker Chris Donovan dropped his possible bid for the seat with the Working Families Party, she’s running one-on-one against Republican Andrew Roraback. We’re about a month-and-a-half away from the general election, the political ads are filling the airwaves and Esty is back in our studios for Where We Vote.

THURSDAY: Pop-up Radio! CT History, 19^th Century
What do you know about Connecticut history from the 1800s?How about how things looked downtown? What was the scene on Front Street, or along Main Street? Coming up, we’ll explore some of this history, and talk about a new exhibit on the Emancipation Proclamation, which is celebrating it’s 150^th anniversary year.

FRIDAY: Pop-up Radio! Envisionfest, iQuilt, Hartford’s Happenin’!
Another live show from our pop-up radio location in downtown Hartford. Today we’ll be previewing the upcoming Envisionfest, and talking about plans to make Hartford a walkable city with iQuilt.

 

Where We Vote is Back!

by JD -

It’s been awhile since I’ve used this space for regular blogging. No excuses, just lots of other things happening. But no blogging bug bites me like the election bug. And so, you’ll be seeing regular contributions from me as we head toward November.

First things first. Here’s a tentative schedule for “Where We Vote” – our series of hour-long conversations with candidates. We give listeners a chance to ask questions on air or through emails (wherewelive@wnpr.org), Tweets,  or even on this blog. The ground rules are simple: We ask candidates to come to our studios, no restrictions on questions.

Senate candidate Chris Murphy joins us on 9/25, no date set yet for Linda McMahon. Murphy has been on the series twice this season, once in a Democratic primary debate with Susan Bysiewicz, once in studio. We’re hopeful that the GOP nominee will join us, but so far she has declined our invitations.

In the 5th District, Democrat Elizabeth Esty is on 9/26, with her opponent, Republican Andrew Roraback on 10/1. During the primaries, these candidates made news on “Where We Vote” – Roraback for his changing position on the death penalty, Esty for questions about companies her husband Dan regulates at DEEP.  You can read a lot  more about this race in a page put together by the Journal Register papers.

We’re also heading to our remote home, WVOF at Fairfield University for episodes with 2nd District Congressman Jim Himes (10/16) and his Republican challenger Steve Obsinik (10/11).

I’m also blogging here as part of my “Covering the 2012 Election” class at CCSU. You’ll see contributions from me, and perhaps some of my students as we slog through the election cycle. Colin McEnroe has his own class covering the election (at Trinity) with its own blog. Oh, it’s on…

Coming Up! September 17 to 21, 2012

There is still time to sign up for our Small Business Breakfast happening tomorrow at the Norwalk Aquarium! Register here.

MONDAY: Recycling Routines: A Refresher
It wasn’t too long ago that everything you threw out went in the trash, then to a landfill. Now, due to changes in public attitude and government incentives, recycling has become a part of our daily lives. Back in 1980, for instance, only about 10 percent of trash got recycled. That number is up to 34 percent. Much better, but still “lackluster” according to proponents of “sustainable” business. So, what can we do to recycle more? What’s the incentive? Today, we look at recycling here in Connecticut. Recycling across the state has been stagnant in the last several years. Nationwide, the recycling rate has been dropping. What’s more, the amount of garbage we generate in the US has gone down along with the recession. But in mid-Connecticut, the towns served by the Connecticut Resources Recovery Authority have actually increased their recycling tonnage – in some cases, by a lot – more than 18 percent since 2006. We want to hear from you. How does it work in your town? Are you sorting out the paper from the plastic? Cans from bottles?

TUESDAY: Small Business Breakfast: Norwalk
With the elections approaching and the economy front and center in the state and national discourse, this edition of Where We Live presents a panel of small business owners offering their view of the campaigns so far, what they think of the level of debate and which issues they would like highlighted by the candidates. It’s a “real world” business view of the November 2012 election. WNPR’s Small Business Breakfast provides the opportunity for the small business community to come together and share experiences, discuss relevant issues and walk away with tools and inspiration for greater business success. WNPR’s Dankosky and business reporter Harriet Jones will be available during the breakfast to talk with guests and answer questions.

The event is free and open to all. Registration is required. To attend, visit WNPR.org, keywords: Small Biz. This WNPR Small Business Breakfast is sponsored by Founding Partner Webster Bank, with additional support from Albertus Magnus College.

WEDNESDAY: Sila Calderón
Sila Calderón was a groundbreaking politician in Puerto Rico. She was the Mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico’s Secretary of State and the first and only female governor of that Commonwealth. She’s been out of public office for seven years now and she’ll stop by our studios to talk about her career, Puerto Rican politics and business in that country.

THURSDAY: The Education Bubble
American children are taught from their earliest years that education is the path toward the prosperity and social mobility embodied in the ideals of the American Dream. To realize this goal, President Obama looks to educate more American students than any other nation by 2030, in part through low-interest federally-subsidized loans. While the loans have spurred significant increases in college enrollment, they may also be responsible, in part, for escalating college tuition, high student loan debt, and a glut of college graduates in jobs unable to pay back the value of their investment. Increasingly, economists, journalists, and policy-makers are questioning whether we have an education bubble that must inevitably burst. On Where We Live, we want to continue the conversation Are we spending more on college than it is worth– or not enough? Is the value of college less than the cost or do colleges need to become more productive places? Why is college so expensive?

FRIDAY: High School Dropout Crisis
Every year, more than a million kids drop out of school. Without a diploma, these kids will have a tough time succeeding. But the problem starts much earlier than high school. Today, we’ll preview an hour-long special airing Saturday, Left Behind, Dropping Out. We’ll look deeper into the crisis of kids dropping out of school and how we can stop it.

Coming Up! September 10 to 14, 2012

Happy Monday! JD is off to a public radio conference in Vegas this week. I can’t imagine the high jinx that will occur when public radio takes over Sin City. Well, maybe I can. In any case,  we’re expecting him to bring home the big bucks.

MONDAY: Malloy in China
Today, Governor Dannel Malloy is in China – leading a delegation trying to drum up business between our state and increasingly powerful economic force. He’ll also be making an appearance at the World Economic Forum being held there. It’s not the first trip abroad for the Governor – he went “prospecting” at the world economic forum earlier this year in Davos, Switzerland. He’s been to Afghanistan and Kuwait, visited several states and Canada, attended governor’s conferences and shows up on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” so much, he should have his own coffee mug. And, of course, last week he delivered a speech at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte.So, what’s the value in having a Governor who travels the world? Specifically, what’s the value of having a governor who wants to make connections in China?Today, we’ll talk to Governor Malloy and members of his delegation.And, we want to hear from you – do you do business with China? Do you think our state should be making this connection? What do you think of Governor Malloy’s “global ambitions?”

TUESDAY: Why is Algebra Necessary? (Rebroadcast) 
“Is algebra necessary?” It’s a question that crosses the minds of many students struggling in high school and college math classes. Professor Andrew Hacker wonders the same thing. His opinion pieceabout the math we teach to students has started a big conversation about how schools prepare people for the real world. He wonders whether this stumbling block forces kids out of school early…whether it really helps with the 21st century tools we need. His critics – and there have been several popping up in the last week – challenge many parts of his argument. And one of the more compelling questions being asked is “Why is any course necessary?” Why do we need to read Hamlet, or learn about ancient European history? What could – or should – change about the way we teach math? Only hours after the curiosity rover lands safely on Mars – is now the right time to be talking about backing off our math requirements? Can we cure our nation’s “math anxiety?” Today, we talk about the role of not just algebra, but calculus and geometry as well. We look at what can be learned about the education system as a whole.

WEDNESDAY: Questioning the Creative Class (Rebroadcast)
It’s been ten years since Richard Florida’s bestseller, “The Rise of the Creative Class.” So, has it risen yet? Florida touted the cities like San Fransisco and Austin Texas that have, for years, attracted young “creative” types with socially tolerant attitudes, plenty of outdoor activities and a confluence of art and hi-tech. But even Florida seems to be adapting his ideas – talking about everyone being a “creative” person in the new economy. Meanwhile, plenty of people WANT to believe in this idea – but are critical of Florida’s conclusions. Writer Frank Bures tried to buy in – but found life in one of the top “creative” cities to be stifiling. He says a whole generation of urban planners and Portlandia-watching hipsters got sold a bill of goods. “Florida just told us we were creative and valuable, and we wanted to believe it. He sold us to ourselves.” Today, where we live, we’ll pull apart the ideas behind the creative city – from the “class” itself to the “gay index.”

THURSDAY: Connecticut Eccentricities (Rebroadcast)
What makes your town unique or puzzling? What local history is important about where you live? What makes you proud to be in your part of Connecticut? Today we look into all the nooks and crannies that make our state eccentric. We’ll answer burning questions like: Why is Mystic half in Groton and half in Stonington? How did the Quiet Corner get its name? (Litchfield County’s pretty quiet, too.) Why is East Hampton west of Hampton? How does Lyme feel about its disease-ridden infamy? And, is Washington really the first town in the US named after our first president? Everyone has a little Connecticut history – and idiosyncrasy – to share. What are the quirky aspects of the state we call home? What makes your town unique?

FRIDAY: Magazine
We keep hearing that geography doesn’t really matter in such a globalized world. You can form partnerships from thousands of miles away over a cell phone – and multinational business has made almost every place in the world look like some version of…America. But Robert Kaplan says – not so fast. He thinks that it really is about location, location, location….his new book is The Revenge of Geography: What the Map Tells Us about Coming Conflicts and the Battle against Fate. We’ll also sit down with author and UConn professor Sam Pickering about his long career, higher education and his time in Syria. He was the inspiration behind Robin Williams’ character in Dead Poets Society, a movie that Pickering has barely seen once. Finally, we’ll talk about the lessons learned from the deadly Station nightclub fire in Rhode Island back in 2003. John Barylick represented victims in the fire and he has a new book called Killer Show.