Access Utah

Today on the program we hear from former state archeologists Kevin Jones about his new book "The Shrinking Jungle." In his book, he takes us on a journey with the Ache of Paraguay, one of the last hunter-gatherer groups to come into contact with the western world. His story is a fictional tale based on experience with the Ache' and their efforts to save the gradually diminishing rainforest.

Many of us believe in sustainability. But do we walk the talk? We’ll ask you what you’re doing in your daily life to promote sustainability, to personally be part of a green solution to our environmental problems. What changes have you made? What solutions have you found that you‘d like to share with us?

According to NPR, the Defense Department estimates there are about 19,000 sexual assaults in the military per year, but according to Pentagon statistics, only a small fraction of these cases go to court-martial. Last fall, nineteen current and former members of the U. S. military filed a lawsuit alleging that they were sexually assaulted while serving. They claim that even though reform has been promised for years, the military doesn’t seriously investigate or punish sexual predators.

Poet, playwright and Logan native May Swenson would have been 100 this year and USU scholars have organized a centennial celebration, including readings by A Prairie Home Companion host Garrison Keillor and former Utah Poet Laureate, and current University of Utah English Professor, Katherine Coles, on April 25 at 7:00 p.m. in the Morgan Theater of the USU Chase Fine Arts Center. (The reading is free but seating vouchers are required and are available through the USU Caine College of the Arts Box Office in the Chase Fine Arts Center, room 139-B.)

Today on the program Sheri Quinn talks to author David Gessner about his latest article "How Vernal Utah Grew to Love Big Oil" in the March 2013 issue of One Earth magazine.

Eva Kor is a Holocaust survivor and victim of Dr. Josef Mengele’s medical experiments on twins at Auschwitz. Mengele was given the name “Angel of Death,” because of his position as a SS physician in charge of selecting which new prisoners of the camp would be killed or selected for forced labor. Kor and her sister launched a search for other twins who survived Mengele’s experiments and located 122 individual survivors. She founded C.A.N.D.L.E.S. Holocaust museum in Indiana.

Moab resident Steph Davis is a superstar in the climbing community. But when her husband made a controversial climb of Delicate Arch, the media fallout and the toll on her marriage left her without a partner or an income. Accompanied by her beloved dog, Fletch, she set off in search of a new identity and discovered sky diving. Though falling out of an airplane is antithetical to a climber’s control, she discovered new hope and joy in letting go.

When nine Vietnamese women arrived at Virginia Sudbury’s law office in Pago Pago, American Samoa she wasn’t sure she would take the case. She ended up as lead plaintiff attorney in precedent-setting case which drew international attention to issues of involuntary servitude and human trafficking in far-flung U. S. territories. Virginia Sudbury now lives in Utah, and is author of a new book: “Sweatshops in Paradise—A True Story of Slavery in Modern America.”

We’ll address issues in Higher Education on Tuesday’s Access Utah. How did Utah’s colleges and universities fare at the Utah legislature? How best to plan for the change in age requirements for LDS missionaries? What does the future of higher education look like? Will we see more online classes, video conferencing and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs?) Will these new methods of teaching and learning displace traditional face-to-face classrooms? Should they?

Jack Schmidt, professor in Utah State University's department of watershed sciences and head of the US Geological Survey's Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center, has long studied the Colorado River. He's among the team of scientists that designed a series of controlled releases of water from Glen Canyon Dam in an effort to restore habitats altered by the use of dams.

Mark Lynas, author of “The God Species: Saving the Planet in the Age of Humans” joined us for the hour on Wednesday. He says we need to embrace Nuclear Power and Genetically Modified Organisms as parts of any successful portfolio of solutions to Climate Change. Many fellow environmentalists disagree.

Mark Lynas is the author of a number of books, including The God Species, and is Tom Williams guest for the hour. We discuss Lynas' idea that we must master human technology, like nuclear power, to save the world from ourselves.

When USA Today invited their readers to send in questions about fracking for Duke University professor Robert Jackson, readers responded with such questions as: “What happens to the chemicals that are left behind after the fracking process? What is the risk to well water? It’s my understanding that fracking uses massive amounts of water? Does fracking cause earthquakes?”

According to www.domesticviolencestatistics.org every 9 seconds in the U. S. a woman is assaulted or beaten; domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women—more than car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined; and nearly 1 in 5 teenage girls who have been in a relationship said a boyfriend threatened violence or self-harm if presented with a breakup.

What should government’s role be in promoting our health? New York City’s mandated downsizing of sodas was recently blocked by judge. In Utah, HCR2, which urges the state to address obesity, overwhelmingly passed the 2013 legislature. Some governments are adding fatty foods and violent video games to the traditional list of goods, like tobacco and alcohol, subject to “sin taxes.”

Governor Gary Herbert will join us on Thursday’s Access Utah. We’ll ask him about Medicaid expansion, guns, the possible prison move, air quality, the economy, and anything else you’d like us to talk about. We’ll also ask the governor if there are any bills he may veto. Later in the program Sen. Todd Weiler R-Woods Cross joins us to talk about his proposal that we look at changing Attorney General from an elected to an appointed office. Finally, we’ll get a Democratic reaction to the recently-concluded legislative session from Rep. Rebecca Chavez-Houck D-Salt Lake City.

The book by Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein: “It’s Even Worse than It Looks--How the American Constitutional System Collided with the New Politics of Extremism” caused quite a stir when it was published last year. Mann and Ornstein said that the dysfunction in our government is the result of a mismatch between increasingly parliamentary-style parties and our constitutional separation of powers. They pinned more of the blame for increasing polarization on Republicans. Their proposed solutions were provocative as well, including mandatory attendance at the polls, changing the political culture through restoring public shame, and restoration of full disclosure to campaign financing.

Our guest for the hour today is Emil Kerenji, an applied research scholar at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the U. S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

We’ve recently experienced a zombie renaissance and Southern Utah University Assistant Professor Kyle Bishop has a book out called: “American Zombie Gothic: The Rise and Fall (and Rise) of the Walking Dead in Popular Culture.” He says that zombie movies reflect our cultural anxieties. Indeed, such movies have addressed the violence of the Vietnam War, fears of mass annihilation during the Cold War, and anxieties related to 9/11.

On the next-to-last day of the 2013 Utah Legislature, we’ll ask you which issues you’re focused on: Liquor Laws? Guns? Medicaid Expansion? The Budget? Social Services? State’s Rights? Education? Is there a bill you hope passes? Maybe there’s a bill you hope dies in the home stretch?