Month: May 2023

It’s been five years since the U.S. pulled out of the nuclear deal. What followed: the U-S re-imposed crushing sanctions, over time, Iran stopped adhering to the limits the deal had set and day-by-day its nuclear program crept forward.

So how close is Iran to a bomb? What can the U.S. do to stop Iran, if it chooses to pursue one? And how are regional and global shifts changing the equation?

NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly puts these questions to the U.S. special envoy for Iran, Rob Malley, and to Vali Nasr with the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.

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Back in March, roughly 80 people in Hong Kong marched in opposition to a land reclamation project that protesters say would increase pollution. Police were watching closely. Demonstrators had to wear numbered badges around their necks as they walked in the rain.

It was a different image from the hundreds who protested in 2019. Back then, the people of Hong Kong showed up in unprecedented numbers. They were opposing what they saw as mainland China’s latest efforts to impose authoritarian restrictions to chip away at Hong Kong autonomy.

NPR’s Ailsa Chang speaks with Louisa Lim, author of Indelible City: Dispossession And Defiance In Hong Kong. They discuss the long history of friction between Hong Kong and China, and the state of freedom of expression in Hong Kong today.

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Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign announcement on Twitter did not go as planned. A series of awkward technical glitches delayed the event for about 20 minutes.

Nevertheless, it was still a big moment, not just for DeSantis, but for Twitter, too.

In fact, Desantis’ announcement is just one example of how the social media platform has changed since Elon Musk took over the company.

NPR’s Eric Deggans talks with writer Charlie Warzel, who has covered the platform for 15 years, about his latest piece in The Atlantic, “Twitter is a Far Right Social Network.”

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Tina Turner, one of Rock and Roll’s greatest stars, died this week in her home in Switzerland at the age of 83, after a long period of illness.

In a career that spanned six decades, Turner left behind an indelible legacy in music, on the stage and on screen. Host Eric Deggans looks back on her tumultuous, and triumphant, life. Also we answer whether the “Queen of Rock and Roll” was somehow still underappreciated.

Since its relaunch in the 1980s, Jeopardy! has had thousands of contestants. For some of the its most memorable champions, the gameshow has been a launchpad for wider success.
However, the disappearance of one of the earliest champions from the show left fans mystified for decades.
NPR’s Sacha Pfeiffer talks with Claire McNear, a staff writer with The Ringer, about the 40-year-long mystery behind one of Jeopardy’s most enigmatic champions.
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It’s been one year since an 18-year-old gunman killed 19 students and 2 teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. The tragedy reignited debates around gun safety in America and has haunted a community still seeking to fully understand how law enforcement was so slow to take down the shooter.

About a month after the shooting, Congress passed the most significant gun legislation since the Federal Assault Weapons ban of 1994, but many Republican led-states, including Texas, have resisted gun safety legislation, even loosening gun restrictions.

Uvalde, too, is divided — between those who want stricter gun laws and those who oppose them, between those who want to mark a year since the massacre, and those who want to move on. And for the families who lost loved ones, they’re still searching for justice, accountability, and healing. NPR’s Adrian Florido reports from Uvalde. And we hear from Texas Tribune reporter Zach Despart about the police response to the shooting.

The United States has 27 years to reach its net-zero emissions goal. And among other initiatives to move towards that goal, the Biden administration is offering incentives for carbon capture and storage.

Carbon capture is a way to suck up carbon dioxide pollution from ethanol plants, power plants and steel factories, and store it deep underground.

While the companies that build the pipelines say the technology will help the U.S. meet its greenhouse gas emissions goals, they have also run into problems.

In Iowa, farmers are pushing back against the pipelines crossing their land. And for a town in Mississippi, a CO2 pipeline endangered lives.

NPR’s Julia Simon reports from Satartia, Mississippi on the aftermath of a pipeline rupture. The Climate Investigations Center obtained recordings of the 911 calls from Satartia and shared them with NPR.

Harvest Public Media’s Katie Peikes also provided reporting in this episode.

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The Hollywood writers’ strike has meant three weeks of late-night comedy and soap opera reruns for television fans. And for some fans, it might feel familiar. 15 years ago a Writers Guild strike lasted 100 days. And the effect of that strike was felt on shows from Saturday Night Live to Friday Night Lights.

NPR’s Ari Shapiro talks with veteran TV writer David Simon about the strike and the changing business practices in the entertainment industry.

And writer and cultural critic Emily St. James explains how the 2007 WGA strike may have saved the life of an iconic character in Breaking Bad.

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A Food and Drug Administration advisory panel recently recommended allowing birth control pills to be sold without a prescription.

While more than 100 countries currently allow access to birth control pills over the counter, the U.S. is not one of them.

Washington Senator Patty Murray says it’s important that the pill is easily available – but also affordable.

When – and if – that day comes and the pill is available over the counter, Murray wants to require insurance companies to cover the cost, free of charge.

NPR’s Sarah McCammon speaks with Senator Murray on the proposed legislation.

And we hear the latest on the legal challenge to the abortion medication mifepristone, as attorneys gather in New Orleans at the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to argue whether it should be removed from the market.

NPR’s Becky Sullivan and Selena Simmons-Duffin contributed reporting on the real-life experiences of individuals taking mifepristone.

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Across the country, members of the class of COVID are graduating: students who started high school before the pandemic, then spent the end of their freshman year and subsequent years navigating a new reality.

And it was a very difficult path.

According to many studies there has been considerable learning loss for K-12 students throughout the pandemic. And a recent study from researchers at Harvard and Stanford shows that the pandemic exacerbated existing inequalities.

NPR’s Sarah McCammon talks with three graduating high school seniors about how they made it through remote learning and coped with social isolation, and what they learned about themselves.

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