Month: February 2024

Despite a last minute agreement to push a deadline for a shutdown, Congress and the White House have to agree on how to fund the government. So far, all they’ve been able to do is kick the can down the road.

And conditions for making a political deal are only getting worse. Republicans can only lose two votes. And there’s skepticism all around.

Finding a way out largely depends on Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, Republican of Louisiana. But Johnson has a fractious caucus, is relatively inexperienced, and shutdowns have become the political weapon of choice.

If the House leader can’t find a path to a deal, the entire country could pay the price.

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The backlash to the Alabama Supreme Court ruling designating frozen embryos has been intense. Republicans at the state and national level have openly disagreed with the decision. And Democrats have used the ruling to hammer Republicans over reproductive rights.

Last month, Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth introduced a bill to protect IVF. It hasn’t gotten a lot of attention – until now.

Duckworth used IVF to build her own family, and has been warning since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade that the decision could lead to reproductive rights being challenged.

Duckworth discusses her legislation and whether she thinks republicans will support it.

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Popular culture is filled with stories of the underground railroad – the legendary secret network that helped enslaved people escape from southern slave states to free states in the north.

Harriet Tubman is the underground railroad’s best known conductor. Tubman, who was a Union spy during the Civil War, escaped slavery in Maryland, but returned again and again, risking her own freedom to help free others, including members of her family.

Inevitably there’s much we don’t know …including how the term, the Underground Railroad, came to be.

Journalist Scott Shane, stumbled on the answer while he was writing his book “Flee North: A Forgotten Hero and the Fight for Freedom in Slavery’s Borderland.”

His book tells the story of Thomas Smallwood, an activist and writer who’s story and the key role he played in the abolition movement has mostly been lost to history.

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In the last few years, a new trend has emerged on social media: De-influencers.

Instead of selling, de-influencers encourage their followers to stop buying things they don’t actually need. De-influencers are also using this trend as an opportunity to raise awareness about the negative impact of overconsumption on the environment.

From plastic packaging to useless gadgets that end up in landfills, over-consumption doesn’t just have a negative effect on our wallets – but also on our planet and climate change.

We look at what role can de-influencers play in helping address climate change and spreading the message of sustainable living.

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In Kansas City neighborhood organizations do the work of violence prevention one block, and one person at at time.

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Quote – “The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride.” That statement, from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to the U-S Embassy, came two days after Russian missiles began raining down on his country two years ago.

After weeks of speculation and warnings Russian President Vladimir Putin had declared war.

Fueled by grit, patriotism and billions of dollars from the US, Ukraine has waged a fight no one expected they could. But nearly two years in that could be changing.

US aid is stuck in Congress. This week, Russian forces captured their first city in 9 months. And that plea Zelensky made for ammunition in February 2022 – he’s still making it.

Ukraine has waged a war against Russia that has exceeded expectations. Can it continue to stand up to Russia if western aid doesn’t come through?

We get the view from the battlefield from a Ukrainian writer turned soldier.

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Keyser, West Virginia, was once known for coal. But the jobs have been disappearing. First because of automation, then cheap natural gas. And now, the urgency to address climate change is one more pressure on this energy source that contributes to global warming.

Now the town, like so much of the country is attempting to transition to renewable energy. The country’s first major climate policy, known as the Inflation Reduction Act, gave that transition a boost. It passed with the key vote of West Virginia’s own Senator Democrat Joe Manchin.

Keyser represents a national shift in American energy production. And in a town that was defined by coal for generations, change can be difficult.

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Brian Mann covers the U-S opioid and fentanyl crisis for NPR. That means he talks to a lot of people struggling with addiction. Again and again, he’s heard stories of people who have succumbed to their addiction — last year 112, 000 — more than ever in history.

But when Mann traveled to Portugal to report on that country’s model for dealing with the opioid crisis, he heard a very different story. Overdose deaths in Portugal are extremely rare.

The country has taken a radically different approach to drugs – decriminalizing small amounts and publicly funding addiction services – including sites where people can use drugs like crack and heroin.

Portugal treats addiction as an illness rather than a crime. No one has to pay for addiction care, and no one scrambles to navigate a poorly regulated recovery system. Could Portugal’s approach help the U-S fight its opioid epidemic?

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Much of the world has spent the weekend mourning Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. And asking why he chose to return to Russia, after he’d been poisoned, and when it was clear he was in danger.

Filmmaker Daniel Roher, who interviewed Navalny for the Oscar-winning documentary “Navalny,” says the Russian opposition leader was an incredibly optimistic and certain about himself and his mission. And that Navalny believed he could usher in a brighter future for Russia.

So what happens to that future now? Aleksei Miniailo an opposition activist and researcher in Moscow weighs in on how the Russian opposition sustains its movement after the death of its most prominent figure.

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About two years ago, New Jersey’s Democratic Governor Phil Murphy said that the state would be partnering with the Danish company Orsted, the largest developer of offshore wind projects in the world.

The company had agreed to build Ocean Wind 1, the state’s first offshore wind farm, powering half a million homes and creating thousands of jobs in the process.

The following year, Orsted inked another deal with the state for Ocean Wind 2, a second offshore wind farm with similar capacity. After years of review, the projects were approved in summer 2023. Construction of the first turbines was slated to begin in the fall.

And then Orsted backed out, cancelling the contracts full stop.

Despite the setbacks, Murphy is still all-in on wind. A month after Orsted dropped out, Murphy directed the state’s Board of Public Utilities to seek new bids from offshore wind developers. And the state just approved two new offshore wind contracts.

After several setbacks, could this mean a second wind for offshore wind?

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