Shows
A Public AffairDisability Activists Find Joy and Pleasure in Community
On the heels of the 35th anniversary of the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Disability Pride Month, guest host Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford hosts a roundtable on the intersection of race, gender, and disability with Nicki Vander Meulen and Dr. Sami Schalk. They talk about disability and education, evaluate how Madison is doing in terms of accessibility, and discuss how to find pleasure in life.
Last month Congress passed the budget reconciliation bill which includes dramatic cuts to Medicaid. Vander Meulen says that she’s trying to channel her energy int...
2025-08-0600 minA Public AffairHow to Inoculate Young Men Against Fascism
Fascism wouldn’t exist without young men promoting and spreading this far-right ideology. Today’s guest, Craig Johnson, tackles how to intervene before young men get swept up in the contemporary fascist movement. He joins guest host Christina Lieffring today to discuss his new book, How to Talk to Your Son about Fascism.
Though people argue about the definition of fascism all the time, Johnson says that there are two major differences between fascism and mainstream conservatism: fascists don’t play by the rules and they don’t care about law or established norms. Th...
2025-08-0551 minA Public AffairFormer police chief says we can’t have masked police
According to a new analysis from the ACLU of Wisconsin, 13 of Wisconsin’s 72 sheriff’s departments have signed cooperative agreements with federal immigration authorities. Under these agreements, they will help ICE identify and deport undocumented residents housed in local jails. Today’s guest, David Couper, predicts that up to 80% of Wisconsin sheriffs will eventually sign on. He joins host Esty Dinur to talk about ICE and democratic policing in Madison.
Couper says the city needs to continue fighting for “democratic policing,” a practice that includes being fair in the use of force, obeying the law wh...
2025-08-0153 minA Public AffairAn Imbalanced Bill
On July 4, Donald Trump signed the “One Big Beautiful Bill” into law. The 900+ page bill increases tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations while reducing healthcare and food assistance spending. Our guest today, Liz Pancotti points out a number of other, overlooked line-items in the bill, like the $325 million direct handout to Elon Musk and the elimination of a tax on firearms. She joins host Allen Ruff to talk about her recent article for Rolling Stone, “Trump’s Big Bill Will Make Americans Uninsured Again.”
What has been truly shocking to many is the fact t...
2025-07-3150 minA Public AffairThe Time For Change
In April of this year La Crosse, Wisconsin elected its first Black, gay mayor. Mayor Shaundel Washington-Spivey joins host Ali Muldrow to talk about his journey to becoming Mayor and what he hopes to achieve while in office.
Mayor Washington-Spivey got his start working in public schools and shares what it was like to work in education during COVID. His background working with youth has influenced his approach to politics, saying that he understands why young people want to see change and see it quickly. He predicts more young people running for office...
2025-07-3052 minA Public AffairThe Impact of CPB Funding on Community Radio
Last week, Trump signed a bill to cut over $1.1 billion dollars of federal funding to the Corporation of Public Broadcasting (CPB). The cuts were presented as attacks on NPR and WPR stations, but community radio stations are being painfully impacted by the cuts as well. Joining our show today is Jessie Dick, station manager for WXPR in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, Karl Halbeck, the manager of WOJB community radio on the Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe reservation, and Nathan Moore, manager of WTJU in Virginia, and a board member of the National Federation of Community Broadcasting.
...
2025-07-2800 minA Public AffairColonialism and Ecocide in Bastar and Kashmir
On today’s two-part show, we get updates on issues facing the Indigenous peoples of India and Kashmir. Host Esty Dinur is joined by advocates Lokita Singha and Apekshita Varshney to talk about the violence being done to the Adivasi people and their mineral rich lands and by anthropologist Ather Zia who discusses the state of colonialism in Kashmir.
The Adivasi people make up about two-thirds of the population of Bastar, India. They are one of the most ancient tribal populations and they follow communitarian and sustainable practices, says Singha. They live in a...
2025-07-2500 minA Public AffairJoan Walsh Discusses the Cruelty of “Alligator Auschwitz”
The new detention center in the Florida Everglades is called “Alligator Alcatraz.” Florida’s governor Ron DeSantis worked with the federal government to create the tent-based camp that can hold a projected 3,000 detained migrants at the price tag of $450 million a year. Today, host Allen Ruff is joined by journalist Joan Walsh to talk about her recent piece in The Nation, “The Abominable Sadism of Alligator Auschwitz,” in which she draws the comparison between the new camp and the Holocaust.
The goal of “Alligator Alcatraz” is not just confinement but suffering, says Walsh. This cruelty is...
2025-07-2452 minA Public AffairIs it Satire or Reality?
Today, host Ali Muldrow is joined by comedian Andrew Wegleitner to talk about how comedy is more important than ever. Wegleitner has been doing stand up for 15 years and got his start right here in Madison, WI. He’s coming back to town to record his debut comedy special on August 3 at the Bur Oak as part of Madison Comedy Week.
Wegleitner talks about how he got his start in comedy, doing stand up at The Pub and Comedy on State. He says that Madison has a very welcoming scene for new comedians. Ne...
2025-07-2352 minA Public AffairAre our voting rights being protected by the SAVE Act?
On today’s show, guest host Dana Pellebon breaks down a piece of legislation called the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act with two immigration experts, Cecilia Gillhouse and Huma Ahsan. The SAVE Act would require that voters provide proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. The purpose of this law is to prevent undocumented immigrants from voting and eliminate voter fraud.
It is already against the law for non-citizens to vote in federal and state elections and voter fraud is rare. These facts lead our guests to discuss the ideological re...
2025-07-2250 minA Public AffairGenocide is an absolute line
“No tragedy is too great to shrug away now,” amidst our “every growing tolerance for calamity and violence,” writes Omar El Akkad in his new New York Times bestseller, One Day, Everyone Will Always Have Been Against This. On today’s show, El Akkad joins host Douglas Haynes to talk about his new memoir, which weaves the personal essay with cultural critique in order to grapple with the US’s support of Israel’s slaughter and starvation of civilians in Gaza.
The purpose of literature is to bear witness, says El Akkad, especially at a time when...
2025-07-2153 minA Public AffairThe Past and Future of Madison Transportation
On today’s show, guest host Grant Foster interviews Tom Lynch, the recently retired Director of Transportation for the City of Madison. They take a deep dive into transportation policies like Vision Zero, the history of Madison’s transportation department, and what could come next for the BRT line.
Lynch served as Madison’s Director of Transportation for several decades. He describes how his job was created in the 80s, but due to some city drama, the role was empty for 30 years. Before he retired, Lynch gave a presentation to the Madison Common Council...
2025-07-1753 minA Public AffairHunger Makes Everything Harder
Recent cuts in state and federal budgets are leaving local food banks and food assistance organizations concerned about accelerating food insecurity. On today’s show, guest host Jonathan Pollack speaks with local non-profit leaders Michelle Orge of Second Harvest, Jackie Anderson of Feeding Wisconsin, and Ellen Carlson of WayForward Resources about food insecurity in Southwest Wisconsin.
The guests describe an uptick in people accessing their services. There’s been a 13% rise in people considered food insecure in Southwest Wisconsin, says Orge. She describes how Second Harvest responded during COVID, a time when they need...
2025-07-1548 minA Public AffairA Proven Model of Universal Childcare Exists
Since Governor Evers signed off on the new state budget, childcare advocates have voiced alarm at the lack of support for childcare in the budget. Though the state budget allocated over $360 million to help address the childcare crisis, the organization Wisconsin Early Childhood Action Needed (WECAN) says that “we were asking for the bare minimum, and somehow we got less.” Less than one-third of the allocated funds will go directly to keep childcare providers operating, and this funding will only last for one year.
This is a topic we’ve been following on this pr...
2025-07-1453 minA Public AffairTrading Civil Liberties for Fascism
On today’s show host Esty Dinur speaks again with Col. Lawrence Wilkerson about the decline of the American empire. Wilkerson says that on both the global and domestic fronts, the nation is doing very badly.
We’re less secure and safe than we’ve ever been in a general sense. In a national security sense, we’re doing better than ever, but there’s one major exception: nuclear weapons. The US has destroyed every nuclear treaty created during the Cold War and he worries about how the nation may deploy them again as it loses...
2025-07-1154 minA Public AffairSurprised by the Speed of Trumpism
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff speaks with longtime friend of the show Matt Rothschild who has been sounding the alarm about Trump since his first term as president. Recently he’s had speaking engagements across Dane County to talk about the dangers of MAGA and Trumpism.
Rothschild says he can smell a fascist a mile away, and he’s frustrated by the willful minimization and normalization of Trump and MAGA. When mainstream media outlets say that Trump doesn’t have a worldview, Rothschild offers a correction: Trump has a worldview, and it’s a ra...
2025-07-1051 minA Public AffairState and Federal Budget Debrief with Rep. Hong and Angela Lang
In the early morning of July 3, Governor Evers signed the two-year Wisconsin state budget after months of debate about funding for education, childcare, and more. The next day, President Trump signed into law the Big Beautiful Bill, which guts Medicaid and will result in the transfer of wealth from the poorest to the richest Americans. At the state and national levels, the quality of our healthcare, childcare, and education system is in jeopardy, and to break down how these budgets will impact folks in Wisconsin and across the country, host Ali Muldrow is joined by...
2025-07-0953 minA Public AffairBeyond Firearms: Reimagining the Defense of Marginalized Communities
In a September 2024 presidential election debate, Kamala Harris said, “Tim Walz and I are both gun owners.” Nationally, democrats are becoming gun owners at a higher rate than conservatives. To talk about spiking demand for gun ownership and gun education, especially among queer-centered self-defense organizations, guest host Matvei Mozhaev is joined by Youtuber, Tacticool Girlfriend.
They talk about what self defense and protection mean within marginalized communities in the US. Tacticool says that US gun culture is too driven by consumption, and not driven enough by safety, including environmental safety, and suicide prevention. And...
2025-07-0851 minA Public AffairYou Can’t Have Your Meat and Your Conscience Too
On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes is joined by philosopher and writer, John Sanbonmatsu to talk about his book, The Omnivore’s Deception: What We Get Wrong about Meat, Animals, and Ourselves, published last month from NYU Press. Sanbonmatsu says that there’s a better way to be on this planet than approaching animals with dominion and violence.
Sanbonmatsu felt compelled to write this book after studying the politics of the Left and reading works like Peter Singer’s Animal Liberation, in which Singer says we have to take animal suffering into account...
2025-07-0753 minA Public AffairMiddle East Expert puts US Bombing of Iran in Perspective
Norman Stockwell sits in for Allen Ruff today to debrief with Annelle Sheline of the Quincy Institute. They talk about Trump’s decision to bomb Iran and the history of the US’s intervention in the Middle East that got us here today.
Sheline says Israel and the US’s bombing of Iran caught Iran off guard because Trump seemed to be engaged in good-faith negotiations. The diplomatic process broke down even though Tulsi Gabbard testified that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon.
Iran was enriching uranium for civilian purposes, somethin...
2025-07-0354 minA Public AffairA Win for Reproductive Freedom in Wisconsin
This morning the Wisconsin Supreme Court ensured access to abortion care in the state by ruling that an 1849 law banning abortion cannot be enforced. This news comes on the heels of the three-year anniversary of the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the US Supreme and in the same week as the US Congress could vote to defund Planned Parenthood. To talk about the status of reproductive rights, host Ali Muldrow is joined by Analiese Eicher of Planned Parenthood, Wisconsin.
Eicher says that people are feeling this as a victory of reproductive freedom a...
2025-07-0253 minA Public AffairWhen progressive ideas about government became anti-American
Many people conflate the anti-communist Red Scare of post-World War II America with the Hollywood blacklists portrayed in movies and TV shows or, particularly in Wisconsin, with McCarthyism. Today, guest host Christina Lieffring speaks with Clay Risen about his new book, Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism, and the Making of Modern America, in which he shows that the movement was much bigger than one industry or one man. The Red Scare was the first time there was a large-scale conspiratorial fear of the federal government such that progressive ideas became un-American.
Risen says that...
2025-07-0152 minA Public AffairRural Communities in Alaska Face Down Climate Change
Last week huge swaths of North America experienced record high temperatures, and the Alaskan arctic is warming three times faster than the rest of the globe. To talk about the ways that climate change is affecting rural communities in Alaska, host Douglas Haynes is joined by ProPublica and KYUK journalist, Emily Schwing, about her recent article, “Newtok, Alaska, Was Supposed to Be a Model for Climate Relocation. Here’s How It Went Wrong.”
Schwing says that there are over 140 communities in Alaska like Newtok facing coastal erosion, permafrost deterioration, and the implosion of infras...
2025-06-3053 minA Public AffairAddressing Housing from the Ground Up
On today’s show, host Carlos Dávalos speaks with scholar, Danny Parker, about her on-the-ground research on unhoused folks in Madison. Often we’re presented with a very top-down picture of civic infrastructure, but Parker reports from the front lines and focuses on the lived realities of the most vulnerable in our communities.
Parker’s early ethnographic work took place in Madison. She spent years sitting on sidewalks with unhoused people, eating and going to the hospital with them, and watching how the world responded to the people she was with. Based on her...
2025-06-2752 minA Public AffairThis War is about Oil
Political geographer and activist, Zoltán Grossman joins Allen Ruff to talk about the Israel-Iran-US war. They move beyond the mainstream media narratives and sanitized versions of history used to justify the US’s military engagement in the region. Grossman reminds listeners that 1953 was the beginning of the antagonism between the US and Iran and that the oil industry has always driven the US’s involvement in the Middle East.
Grossman also describes the development of anti-Muslim sentiment in the US, especially after 1979 and how this ideology has been used to sell the publi...
2025-06-2653 minA Public AffairLessons from Youth Poets
Young people are too often victims of our broken criminal justice system. 1 in 14 US children either has or has had a parent behind bars. And too often their teachers, administrators, guidance counselors, and even their own friends routinely overlook or stigmatize these young people as troubled, or trouble.
To talk about the experiences of youth impacted by the justice system, host Ali Muldrow welcomes back to the show Victor Trillo Jr. and Amy Friedman, to talk about the collection, Home and Away.
They talk about the profound hopefulness of youth artists i...
2025-06-2553 minA Public AffairThe Ongoing Violence of US Empire
On today’s show, host Sara Gabler speaks with Stephen Zunes and Negin Owliaei about the rapidly developing situation in Iran. On June 13 Israel launched an unprovoked attack on Tehran and only days ago President Trump ordered the bombing of three locations in Iran. Even if (as of this morning) the nations have reached a possible ceasefire, Israel and the US’s escalation of force will have long consequences for Iranian civilians and so much more.
Zunes describes the situation and how decades of US meddling in Iran got us here. He’s confide...
2025-06-2452 minA Public AffairState Budget Roundtable with Jessie Opoien and JR Ross
Every two years, Wisconsin goes through a grueling budget setting process. Last week, the GOP-led Joint Finance Committee cancelled their meeting despite the looming June 30 deadline for the next state budget. To make sense of the situation, host Douglas Haynes is joined by two veteran journalists, Jessie Opoien and JR Ross.
Issues like childcare and education are front and center for state lawmakers and for Wisconsin residents. Opoein says that spending for the UW System is a sticking point on both sides of the aisle. The proposed $87 million cut isn’t enough for some...
2025-06-2353 minA Public AffairHow Banality Enables Evil
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur speaks with two guests about Israel’s actions against Palestinians and now Iran. First, we’re joined by scholar Elizabeth Minnich who explains her philosophical study of banality and her new book, The Evil of Banality: On the Life and Death Importance of Thinking.
Studying under Hannah Arendt, Minnich watched the public’s confused reception of Arendt’s concept of the “banality of evil.” It was hard for people to accept that mundane actions could be monstrous. So Minnich strove to expand the definition of banality.
Now, Min...
2025-06-2053 minA Public AffairAnalyzing the LA protests with Truthout reporter Schuyler Mitchell
Today’s show breaks down the recent events in LA, from the growing impunity of ICE and the National Guard to the increasing authoritarianism of the Trump administration. Host Allen Ruff is joined by Schuyler Mitchell to talk about her recent piece in Truthout.
Mitchell describes witnessing 2020 Black Lives Matter protests in LA following the murder of George Floyd. At the time, the Governor and Mayor authorized the deployment of National Guard troops, and these troops, along with local law enforcement, responded to peaceful protesters with force. Since then, the city has paid out...
2025-06-1952 minA Public AffairAdding Tears to the Sparkle of Pride
On today’s show, host Ali Muldrow celebrates Pride month with two guests in the studio: Alder Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford and Alder Sean O’Brian, who both serve Madison’s east side. They highlight the important work of LGBTQ+ leaders at a time when attacks on queer and trans folks are being promoted by the Trump administration.
Muldrow opens the show by talking about how in this political climate, Pride feels full of conflicting emotions. It calls for people’s most exuberant selves, but there’s no crying in glitter. Martinez-Rutherford says there’s a lot of cr...
2025-06-1852 minA Public AffairYouth-Centered Spaces Are Missing in Madison
On today’s show, guest host Sabrina Madison speaks with two local leaders, Justice Castañeda and Rosa Thompson, about an issue that many folks overlook: the lack of teen-centered spaces in Dane County, especially for Black youth. They talk about what would be possible if youth were centered in the design and programming of public spaces. Because we close schools during the summer and community centers don’t stay open late, youth don’t have many places to go. What they need are spaces where they feel safe, that have robust programming, mentorship, and care fo...
2025-06-1752 minA Public AffairFostering Food Justice and Outdoor Education
The Annual Nourishing Minds, Sustaining Futures Summit will take place this Wednesday, June 18. Now, in its third year, the program aims to foster food justice and food education in schools and is open to the public. Host Douglas Haynes speaks with three of the organizers–Allison Pfaff Harris, Sonya Sankaran, and Kathy Oker–about the event’s speakers, workshops, and the importance of environmental education.
There’s a lack of equity in outdoor education and within outdoor spaces more generally, says Oker. She wants to help all people repair their relationship with the natural w...
2025-06-1652 minA Public AffairLA Stands Up for Immigrants’ Rights
Today’s guests give an on-the-ground perspective on the ongoing ICE raids in Los Angeles. Bill Gallegos and Aquilina Soriano Versoza highlight the work of immigrant rights activists and protesters who have taken to the streets to oppose Trump’s sending of 200 National Guard soldiers and 700 Marines to LA.
Soriano Versoza describes how the raids are being executed without warrants and how ICE is showing up in places where they know immigrants live and work and making arrests without probable cause. As of Wednesday, there were over 300 confirmed disappearances, and legal advocates are being...
2025-06-1353 minA Public AffairHow Aid is Being Weaponized in Gaza
On today’s program, Allen Ruff speaks with friend of the show, Mouin Rabbani, about Yasser Abu Shabab, the continuing genocide in Gaza, the chaos created by US-backed aid organizations, and Israel’s military and political interventions in surrounding states like Syria, Yemen, and Iran.
Rabbani describes how the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a joint US-Israel project, is weaponizing aid in order to gain control over the distribution of supplies. The GHF’s former leader, Jake Wood, was an exorbitantly paid US mercenary and well known Christian Zionist, resigned last month saying the organization couldn...
2025-06-1200 minA Public AffairA Safe, Decent, Affordable Home for Everyone
On today’s show, host Matvei Mozhaev speaks with Maria Foscarinis, a principal architect of the 1987 McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, the first major piece of federal legislation to address homelessness. They discuss her recent book, And Housing for All: The Fight to End Homelessness in America, which details the impact of homelessness on people’s lives and argues that ending homelessness in the US requires the recognition of housing as a basic human right.
Foscarinis discusses the last four decades of the homeless crisis in the US. She started her career when Regan came...
2025-06-1151 minA Public AffairWhat’s in Madison’s Water?
On today’s show, host Greg Michaud interviews Joe Grande, the Water Resources Manager at Madison Water Utility. They discuss what’s in Madison’s drinking water, how consumers can have confidence in their tap water and stop buying bottled water, and what Madison Water Utility does to determine if water is meeting standards, as is disclosed in the recent Annual Drinking Water Quality Report.
Grande describes how Madisonians get their tap water, which typically is sourced from 1-3 of Madison’s 20 wells. To produce their annual report, the Utility samples roughly 27,000 times over the...
2025-06-1100 minA Public AffairAI Data Centers are Coming to Wisconsin
On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes unpacks the future of AI in the state of Wisconsin. He’s in conversation with Brett Korte who describes why big tech companies are looking to Wisconsin as the future home of their data centers. Wisconsin happens to be water rich, and these data centers require water. But Korte says that Great Lakes water is governed by compacts with lots of stakeholders, making water harder to access. Korte adds that data centers require rezoning, so there’s room for community action. Nevertheless, there’s been widespread support for these ce...
2025-06-1052 minA Public AffairMedia in the time of the American Empire’s Decline
On today’s show, economist Richard D. Wolff joins host Esty Dinur to talk about the state of the American empire and the state of independent media. We’re also joined in the studio by Norman Stockwell who reiterates that funding independent media is as important as ever in light of potential cuts to the Corporation of Public Broadcasting. Wolff says that we’re living through the decline of the American Empire and that decline is gathering speed. He says that we can’t accept that what has happened to every other empire won’t happen her...
2025-06-0653 minA Public AffairTrue Community is a Subversive Thing
Today we turn the tables; Allen Ruff sits in the guest seat to talk about his life and times. Ruff has been hosting the show for over 20 years and logged over 1000 hours of tape over that time, many of which you can find on the WORT website. Guest host, Bert Zipperer, interviews Ruff about what brought him to Madison, how he developed his subversive analysis, and the early days of WORT.
In this rare interview, Ruff opens up about how his youth amidst working class radicals in New Haven and later education at A...
2025-06-0553 minA Public AffairLife Lived on the Edge of Freedom
On today’s show, guest host Yuri Rashkin is joined by independent journalist, Jonathan Fink. These two popular YouTubers of the Rashkin Report and the Silicon Curtain (respectively) break down the recent development in the war in Ukraine and champion the work of independent media on the increasingly politicized topic of Ukraine.
They discuss Ukraine’s recent drone strike on Russian aircraft and how the world is starting to see that Ukraine has more cards in its hands. Fink calls this an “inflection” moment because Ukraine is acting from a position of strength and inno...
2025-06-0452 minA Public AffairOn the Morality of Taxpaying
On today’s show, host Sara Gabler speaks with sociologist Dr. Ruth Braunstein about money and morality. They discuss her new book, My Tax Dollars: The Morality of Taxpaying in America, which was published on April 15, or Tax Day–an auspicious day that Braunstein calls an American “ritual.”
Braunstein says that tax paying is the most significant way that everyday people interact with the federal government. And people invest a lot of symbolic value (in addition to material value) in the act of tax paying. Groups like war tax resisters and anti-abortion activists resist pa...
2025-06-0352 minA Public AffairBuilding Symbiotic Relationships with Beavers
In Wisconsin we don’t have a shortage of beavers, despite over hunting and over trapping in the nineteenth century. But their resurgence isn’t without friction, especially as development encroaches on their environments. On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes is joined by journalist Bennet Goldstein whose recent reporting covers the ways that people are living with beavers and learning how to mitigate floods and drought from them.
Goldstein describes how human-built dams were constructed around Wisconsin in the early twentieth century to mitigate floods in the very hilly Driftless region. An increa...
2025-06-0253 minA Public AffairResisting Nuclear Energy in Wisconsin
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur is joined by two representatives from Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) to talk about the Point Beach Nuclear Reactor in Two Rivers, Wisconsin on Lake Michigan. Amy Schulz and Alfred Meyer discuss the potential relicensing of this power plant despite the reactor being past its lifespan and how to oppose this relicensing.
Meyer is concerned that the regulatory studies done on nuclear plants don’t account for the effects of climate change on these reactors. Meanwhile the Trump administration last week issued four executive orders that would...
2025-05-3053 minA Public AffairAn Update from Cuba
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff speaks with three solidarity activists who recently returned from Cuba as part of a delegation to Santiago de Cuba called Levantate por Cuba. For decades, Cuba has been the target of a vindictive blockade, used as a punishment of the island’s people because they dared seize their own history and break free of neocolonialism from Washington DC and across the hemisphere.
Jordan Muhammad is a recent graduate, activist, organizer, and substitute teacher based in Chicago. On the solidarity trip Muhammad spoke with many people...
2025-05-2900 minA Public AffairFocus on Housing with Briarpatch Youth Services and Porchlight
A few weeks ago, host Ali Muldrow spoke with State Senator Kelda Roys about the housing crisis in Madison and Dane County. As the average price of a home has soared to nearly half a million dollars, the number of kids experiencing homelessness in the city is also growing. Today we’re picking up that theme with two guests from local homeless services agencies: Karla Thennes of Porchlight and Jen Ripp of Briarpatch Youth Services.
From her over thirty years at Porchlight, Thennes describes how accessible housing has decreased over the years and th...
2025-05-2853 minA Public AffairHow Health Became a Luxury Product
In 2023, wellness was a $6.3 trillion dollar industry, it’s also notoriously riddled with grifts and scams. As online wellness influencers drive the anti vax movement, white Christian nationalists and the Make America Healthy Again movement are transforming body purity into body fascism. On today’s show, host Richelle Wilson is joined by journalist Amy Larocca to talk about the world of wellness and her new book, How to Be Well: Navigating Our Self-Care Epidemic, One Dubious Cure at a Time.
Larocca started tracing the emergence of our current wellness movement when she noticed the ma...
2025-05-2752 minA Public AffairThe Crises of Regional Colleges and Universities
On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes is joined by journalist Molly Parker to talk about the erosion of educational access in rural areas, the value of regional universities, and Parker’s recent article for ProPublica, “A University, a Rural Town and Their Fight to Survive Trump’s War on Higher Education.”
Parker describes her experience of going to college at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale and how this was an adventure for her as a young person from a rural environment. Schools like SIU are affordable and allow students to be closer to family. Th...
2025-05-2652 minA Public Affair“You can’t put the oil back in the pipeline”
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur is joined by two legal experts from Earthjustice–Andre Segura and Stefanie Tsosie–to talk about the Trump administration’s attacks on the environment.
They discuss the reconciliation bill that was passed yesterday and what this billionaire’s bill will mean for the environment. Segura says that this bill is a huge giveaway to the oil and gas industry and will make it easier to drill and transport oil and gas, impacting ecosystems the world over. Increased drilling in the Alaskan Arctic, Gulf of Mexico, and beyond will...
2025-05-2352 minA Public AffairHow to Build Civic Courage with Henry Giroux
On today’s show, social critic Henry Giroux discusses what he calls the “politics of cleansing,” the multi-pronged offensive currently being waged against civil liberties, dissent, and ultimately democracy by “American-style fascism.” He says that cleansing means to purify in the service of domination. And in his recent article in CounterPunch he seeks a language that is comprehensive enough to describe Trump’s assault on democracy.
From religious fundamentalism, to educational repression, the imposition of ideological conformity, and attacks on DEI, we’re watching racial cleansing unfold. That’s coupled with the hollowing out of government...
2025-05-2252 minA Public AffairThe role of the artist is to sing
Continuing our focus on the arts as an antidote in times of political turmoil, today we’re joined by local poet Nate Marshall to talk about his most recent collection, Finna. His poems consider the brevity and disposability of Black lives, question how gendered language is related to violence, and explore the vastness of Black vernacular.
Marshall and Muldrow discuss the weight of writing about challenging moments in history. He says he remains curious about power, language, and masculinity. But too often readers have been primed to expect racialized suffering in Black American li...
2025-05-2253 minA Public AffairRebroadcast of a Conversation with Ada Deer
On today’s show we’re rebroadcasting an interview from 2019 in which outgoing News Director Chali Pittman interviewed Ada Deer, the late Native American social worker, activist, professor, lobbyist, and author. They talk about Deer’s life, work, and American Indian history.
Deer grew up on the Menominee Reservation and graduated from UW–Madison with a degree in social work. She later taught courses that fused Indian history and social work. She also served as Assistant Secretary of the US Department of the Interior as the head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and was t...
2025-05-2053 minA Public AffairGuaranteed Income Helps People Put One Foot Forward
On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes speaks with Dr. Michelle Robinson about the Madison Forward Fund 2.0, which was recently unveiled by the Foundation for Black Women’s Wellness. The guaranteed income program will focus on maternal-child health and support 42 families, each getting $500 a month for 12 months. This program builds off of the Madison Forward Fund that ran from 2022 to 2023.
Robinson provides insightful context on the history of income inequality, the interacting realities of racial and gender-based inequity, and the fact that there is precedent for these kinds of programs in our existing publi...
2025-05-1953 minA Public AffairA Conversation on Seeds, Stories, and Solidarity
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur speaks with three panelists taking part in a program next week to celebrate World Day for Cultural Diversity. Dr. Claudia Calderón, Avexnim Cojti, and Cherie Thunder are part of a panel called Let’s Get Growing: Seeds, Stories & Solidarity happening on May 21 from 5-7pm at Aubergine on Willy Street.
As part of today’s roundtable, they talk about seed sovereignty, which is the right of people to use and exchange their own seeds in order to maintain the foodways and autonomy. This movement counters the bill...
2025-05-1654 minA Public AffairSocial Security Is Affordable and Popular
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff speaks with Nancy J. Altman about the status of Social Security under the Trump administration. As the program enters its 90th year, Altman reflects on how it was created during the Great Depression but was meant to provide basic economic security (not dependent on wages) even in times of prosperity. Now, the program serves over 70 million people.
Altman has written about how Elon Musk and DOGE are trying to undermine the program by appealing to an old playbook of lies and misinformation. Contrary to false claims that...
2025-05-1552 minA Public AffairWe’ve Got To Live Together
Good luck trying to find an affordable apartment or buy a home in Madison these days. As the city keeps growing, so does the cost of housing. To talk about the situation we’re in and what local and state governments can do about it, host Ali Muldrow is joined by Senator Kelda Roys.
They discuss the Ella Apartments and programs like the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority (WHEDA), zoning and accessory dwelling units, the very narrow pathways to home ownership, how hard it is for people to downsize and stay in the...
2025-05-1453 minA Public AffairRoundtable on Black Leadership in Madison
On today’s show, Alder Isadore Knox Jr. hosts a roundtable discussion on Black political leadership in Madison. He says that this is a unique time for this conversation given the reduction of Black elected officials on the Madison City Council, from 9 alders to 5 in the current term. He’s joined by Richard V. Brown Sr., Sheri Carter, and Amani Latimer Burris. They talk about their reasons for running for political office as well as their civic accomplishments.
Latimer Burris says that she’s proud of asking tough questions at Council meetings and she’s...
2025-05-1353 minA Public AffairRebroadcast: Status of Childcare in Wisconsin
Today’s show is rebroadcast of a show from April 28.
On April 17, a record breaking number of child care advocates marched on the Wisconsin state capital and sent a message to legislators that the state needs to invest $480 million in childcare. According to the Institute for Research on Poverty, without this investment, 1 in 4 childcare providers in the state could shut down.
To shed light on these changes, host Douglas Haynes is joined by Corrine Hendrickson and Ruth Schmidt, two child care professionals and advocates. Schmidt says that Wisconsin is one of six...
2025-05-1254 minA Public AffairWhy Is Trump Still So Interested in Greenland?
“We need Greenland for national security and even international security,” President Trump said during his first State of the Union of his second term. “One way or the other, we’re going to get it.”
That bold claim set off a new wave of awkward diplomacy, including surprise visits from Donald Trump Jr., and Vice President JD Vance and his wife, Usha.
Acquiring Greenland is not a new obsession. Trump floated the idea in his first term. Numerous presidential administrations have floated the idea, at least privately. Even Truman made a secret offer...
2025-05-0953 minA Public AffairNeoliberalism on Steroids
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff is joined by David McNally to reflect on Donald Trump’s first 100-ish days in office. They try to make sense of Trumpists’ multi-pronged offensive on immigrants, trade, DEI, and so much more. McNally says that Trump relies on shock, awe, and fear, but even within this climate, there are cracks that can be exploited.
While some are claiming that neoliberalism is over, McNally says that Trumpism is a natural outgrowth of neoliberalism that includes a weakening of organized labor and social movements and a celebration of big...
2025-05-0851 minA Public AffairWhat are schools for? A Conversation with Eve L. Ewing
It’s a common refrain to hear that getting an education opens doors, even in a community like Madison with its huge achievement gap. But today on the show, host Ali Muldrow speaks with Dr. Eve L. Ewing, who argues that instead of creating equal opportunities, the American education system perpetuates inequality. Ewing is the author of Original Sins: The (Mis)education of Black and Native Children, in which she demonstrates how schools were designed to propagate the idea of white intellectual superiority.
Ewing asks a deceptively simple question, what are schools for? Th...
2025-05-0752 minA Public AffairHow to put data over dogma
On today’s show, host Sara Gabler speaks with author, scholar, and prominent TikToker Dan McClellan about his new book, The Bible Says So: What We Get Right (and Wrong) about Scripture’s Most Controversial Issues. They discuss how Christians derive their notions of sexuality, gender, and authority by going straight to the source, the Bible itself.
McClellan uses an approach that he calls “data over dogma” in which he strives to put aside any of his own beliefs and assumptions in order to assess what the historical record and the texts themselves say. Inst...
2025-05-0654 minA Public AffairThe Miraculous and Disastrous with Author Tamara Dean
The Kickapoo River Valley is one of Wisconsin’s most beloved landscapes. On today’s show, host Douglas Haynes speaks with author Tamara Dean about this magical region and the miraculous, disastrous, and difficult changes she observed while living on the land. Her new book, Shelter and Storm: At Home in the Driftless, is a collection of essays about what she learned from moving to this area in the early 2000s.
When she and her partner purchased a farm in the Driftless, she had many goals: of becoming an organic farmer, creating a poll...
2025-05-0552 minA Public AffairPeace activists are shut out from getting aid into Gaza
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur speaks with a peace activist and a scholar about the humanitarian situation in Gaza. It has been two months since Israel began a full blockade of all aid to Gaza. In response, the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, made up of volunteers from over 21 countries, attempted to open a sea-based relief route. Last night, their vessel was attacked by drones, and the vessel was substantially damaged. Cassandra Dixon joined us today from Malta to describe the attack.
We’re also joined by Jennifer Loewenstein who discusses the healthcare situ...
2025-05-0253 minA Public AffairMay Day with Armando Ibarra
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff is joined in the studio by Armando Ibarra to celebrate International Workers Day or May Day, a day that has long been one of working class mobilization. Initiated in Chicago in 1886, May Day commemorates organized workers’ strength against oligarchs of the past and present.
While workers’ movements have made great gains since that first May Day, today’s plutocrats haven’t ceased in their efforts to take away workers’ gains. Across the country today, people are taking to the streets again, demanding dignity and fair treatment. Many events a...
2025-05-0152 minA Public AffairA Roundtable of Black Women Leaders in Madison
On today’s show, host Ali Muldrow is joined by four accomplished Black women who are or have been in public office and who serve in organizations at the executive level. Brandi Grayson, April Kigeya, Sabrina Madison, and Dana Pellebon are local leaders who bring years of expertise and care to their work. However, they face an inordinate amount of scrutiny in their professional and personal lives.
Muldrow starts the show by reminding listeners of the words of Ida B. Wells, the investigative journalist and a founder of the NAACP, who said that the...
2025-04-3000 minA Public AffairBonnie Raitt Day
Fifty years ago today, on April 29, 1975, Bonnie Raitt gave a benefit concert with Mose Allison for WORT at the Capitol City Theatre in downtown Madison. This was a major event in the history of our station. On today’s very special edition of A Public Affair, WORT’s Production Coordinator Aaron Scholz is behind the mic to explain why. In addition to a special message from Bonnie Raitt, we hear four interviews with folks who helped coordinate the benefit show, were at the show, or were involved with WORT before we went on the air over...
2025-04-2953 minA Public AffairAn update on lawsuits brought against Standing Rock protesters
In late March, the climate advocacy group Greenpeace was ordered to pay $660 million in damages to Energy Transfer, the oil company behind the Dakota Access Pipeline. The grassroots protests against DAPL in 2016 and 2017 were organized by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and Indigenous water protectors. Greenpeace peacefully supported the protests but was charged with defamation by Energy Transfer.
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur is joined by Cody Hall who reminds listeners of what happened at the Standing Rock protests and No DAPL movement against the incursion of the Energy Transfer oil pip...
2025-04-2553 minA Public AffairA Robert McChesney Retrospective
On today’s A Public Affair we’re honoring the life and legacy of Robert McChesney who passed away on March 25. In addition to being a renowned academic and activist who fiercely advocated for independent media, McChesney was also a host on this show. In this episode from 1997, he interviews Allen Ruff about his first book, “We Called Each Other Comrade”: Charles H. Kerr & Company, Radical Publishers.
Featured image: photo of Bob McChesney.
Did you enjoy this story? Your funding makes great, local journalism like this possible. Donate hereThe post A...
2025-04-2450 minA Public AffairLocal Poets Roundtable
Continuing our April theme of talking with poets and artists about the role of art in times of political turmoil, today host Ali Muldrow is joined by three local poets in the studio to talk about their craft and their work in the community.
juj e lepe, Jonny Teklit, and Andrew Chi Keong Yim talk about the competitiveness and performance of slam poetry, how art takes on a greater meaning in moments of social and political upheaval, how to address both human rights violations and joy within their craft, and the storytelling of...
2025-04-2354 minA Public AffairThe Freedom of Biking with Artist Julia Bourdet
On today’s Earth Day edition of A Public Affair, host Patty Peltekos speaks with artist and writer, Julia Bourdet, about her decarbonized journey across the US. With a sketchbook in hand, Bourdet spent seven months traveling by boat, train, and bike from Europe and across the continental US. Along the way she met with environmental activists and Americans of all walks of life during the presidential election cycle of last Fall.
Bourdet says that traveling is an experience of self-discovery and that bicycling, in particular, is a form of freedom for her. She...
2025-04-2253 minA Public AffairClimate Art with TetraPAKMAN
In the spirit of Earth Day, today’s show features an artistic wake-up call about the climate emergency. Host Douglas Haynes is joined by Madison artist, TetraPAKMAN, to talk about his role as artist in residence at the Madison Public Library. His current installation “Wake Up!” and exhibit “Doing Something” are on display at the Central Library through this week.
They talk about the meaning of “hacking,” the role of humor in communicating difficult subject matter, the recyclability of tetra pak material, and how people are manipulated by corporations and the media about what’s actually...
2025-04-2152 minA Public AffairSkunk Hill Spring Gathering
This Spring, Fred and Germaine Pidgeon have reason to celebrate. On May 3, the Friends of Powers Bluff are hosting a Spring Gathering and Homecoming at present day Powers Bluff County Park in Arpin, Wisconsin, also known as Skunk Hill or Tah-qua-kik. This area was originally home to the Potawatomi, Ho Chunk, Ojibwe, and Menominee People. After years of work by the Pidgeons, the land is being preserved, and this will be celebrated with presentations, walks, crafts, and giveaways.
Host Esty Dinur outside the WORT station with Fred and Germaine Pidgeon.
The Pidgeons tell h...
2025-04-1800 minA Public AffairVan Jackson on Zombie Economic Nationalism
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff is joined by Van Jackson to talk about Trump’s tariffs and their impact both on global trade and domestic labor. Aimed at China, these tariffs are part of a larger strategic project that many worry could lead to an economic downturn worldwide. They talk about how tariffs will hurt the working class, the rise of crony capitalism, the increasingly flagrant spoils system, and Arundhati Roy’s vision of civil disobedience.
Jackson puts Trump’s tariff regime in the context of international politics. He says we’re past th...
2025-04-1753 minA Public AffairState of the Arts: Wisconsin Humanities Loses Funding
On today’s show, we’re continuing our April theme of highlighting the role of the arts in times of political turmoil. As federal cuts to arts and culture programs are hitting local organizations hard, host Ali Muldrow speaks with Jessica Becker and Jen Rubin of Wisconsin Humanities. Last week the organization was notified from the National Endowment for the Humanities that all of their grant funding had been canceled.
Becker says that their funding comes from a 53-year-old grant program that ended overnight when the Executive Director of Wisconsin Humanities received an unide...
2025-04-1654 minA Public AffairMariel Barnes explains the “manosphere”
On today’s show, host Christina Lieffring speaks with scholar Mariel Barnes about misogyny online and in public life. They discuss the rise of what Barnes calls the “manosphere,” its rising influence on US politics, and how it leads to doxxing and violence.
Barnes studies how this form of online misogyny took off around 2008 with the emergence of Web 2.0. She says that the manosphere is made up of “a group of loosely connected websites, blogs, and forums that share the belief that men are oppressed in modern day society because of women, feminism, and gende...
2025-04-1553 minA Public AffairUSDA Ends Farm to School Programs
Last month the USDA eliminated two programs that help schools, child care centers, and food banks buy food from local farms. This cut erased more than $1 billion in support, and a USDA spokesperson said these programs “no longer effectuates the goals of the agency.” Now, school districts and local organizations are scrambling to save these programs.
To talk about school nutrition and farm to school programs, host Douglas Haynes is joined by Erica Krug, the Farm to School Director at Rooted, Kaitlin Tauriainen, the President of the School Nutrition Association of Wisconsin, and Jenni...
2025-04-1454 minA Public AffairThe Uhuru 3 Legal Victory
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur is joined by Chairman Omali Yesitela, the leader of the African People’s Socialist Party and the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, and Penny Hess, the Chairwoman of the African People’s Solidarity Committee. Uhuru means “freedom” in Swahili and is used as a greeting and a demand because of its historical significance in the struggle against colonialism.
In 2022, Chairman Omali and Hess, along with Jesse Nevel, were targeted by the FBI. Their homes were occupied, equipment confiscated, and financial records taken with military force. They were later charged, wi...
2025-04-1153 minA Public AffairRachel Ida Buff on Birthright Citizenship and Due Process
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff is joined by scholar and activist Rachel Ida Buff to talk about the right to due process through the 14th Amendment and the Trump Administration’s goal to end birthright citizenship. She’s written a recent article on this topic for The Progressive, “As Trump Sets His Sights on Birthright Citizenship, Deported Mothers Fight for Their Children’s Rights.”
During the first Trump presidency, the idea of removing birthright citizenship was just a “twinkle in the administration’s eye,” says Buff. But now immigrant mothers, particularly women who give birt...
2025-04-1052 minA Public AffairState of the Arts: Round 1
On this show we regularly talk with poets and artists about their work. And today host Ali Muldrow is joined by three professionals who work behind the scenes to make local arts programming happen. And they happen to be artists themselves.
At a time when arts funding is being slashed left and right, we wanted to make the time to highlight some important arts programming happening in our community. Karin Wolf is the Arts and Culture Administrator at the Madison Arts Commission. She says that the city’s youth poet laureate application will ope...
2025-04-0952 minA Public AffairRobert McChesney Retrospective
On today’s A Public Affair we’re honoring the life and legacy of Bob McChesney who passed away on March 25. In addition to being a renowned academic and activist who fiercely advocated for independent media, McChesney was also a host on this show.
In an obituary written for the Nation, John Nichols says that McChesney “inspired generations of people to challenge corporate power and support a media reform movement that lives on.”
To pay tribute to McChesney and his legacy, today we’re re-airing an episode of A Public Affair from Decem...
2025-04-0853 minA Public AffairWhat we lose when schools close their doors
In June the UW–Oshkosh, Fox City Campus will close for good. It will join 5 other associate-degree granting UW campuses that have closed since 2023. These closures are mandated by Universities of Wisconsin President, Jay Rothman. And these closures have locked out non-traditional students from higher education and the cost of this will stretch across generations.
To talk about the impact of these closures, host Douglas Haynes is joined by Ken Brosky, who directed the documentary, Closure: The Dismantling of Wisconsin’s Colleges. They talk about the mission of the University of Wisconsin colleges inclu...
2025-04-0753 minA Public AffairWisconsin Film Fest Preview Extravaganza
On today’s show, host Esty Dinur previews the Wisconsin Film Festival with four directors and the Festival’s senior programmer Mike King.
She speaks with filmmaker Tim Hunter, an American television and film director. His 1986 film River’s Edge won that year’s award for Best Picture at the Independent Spirit Awards. His film, Tex will air at the Wisconsin Film Festival on Saturday at 4pm at the UW Cinematheque. His narrative film, Returning to Earth will also play at that time, and his documentary, By Kevin Thomas will play on Sunda...
2025-04-0456 minA Public AffairPoet Martín Espada Reads from Jailbreak of Sparrows
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff is joined by Martín Espada who has just published a new volume of poetry, Jailbreak of Sparrows. Espada is a longtime friend of WORT and former Madisonian. He reads from his collection on the air and discusses the supple power of language.
Ruff asks Espada about the importance of his father, Frank Espada, who was a civil rights activist, documentary photographer, and a leader in the Puerto Rican community in New York City in the 60s and 70s. Espada’s father plays an important role in his...
2025-04-0353 minA Public AffairMoney Doesn’t Vote, People Do
Wisconsin’s Spring Election results are in, and host Ali Muldrow breaks down the results with Nick Ramos and Iuscely Flores. They talk about the role of big money in the Supreme Court election, the rise of constitutional amendments, and how fair maps are changing the terrain of Wisconsin’s electoral system.
Ramos and Flores reiterate the need to keep fighting for our democracy. As Ramos says, the beat goes on. This means listening to your neighbors. Flores says the work of organizing is the work of talking to each other. She adds that...
2025-04-0253 minA Public AffairNews Roundup Call-In Show
On today’s show we take our cue from you, our listeners. Host Esty Dinur opens the phone lines to discuss current issues in national and state politics with callers. They cover the abduction of pro-Palestinian activists, Kristi Noem’s photoshoot in El Salvador, the importance of independent media, and more.
Wisconsin is under the microscope because of our state Supreme Court election next week. Billionaire Elon Musk promised voters money in exchange for their votes, but deleted a social media post saying he would “personally hand over” $2 million hours after he posted it. ...
2025-03-2853 minA Public AffairDavid McNally Unpacks Two Months of the Trump Presidency
On today’s show, Allen Ruff speaks with David McNally about the first few months of the Trump Presidency. They talk about Trump’s real estate plans for Gaza, the attacks on universities, Tesla Takedown, and the model organizing of Ella Baker.
McNally has written about the “grifter capitalist,” a new iteration of the classic American figure of the con man. Grifter capitalists like Donald Trump tend to be connected with real estate and finance; they’re wheelers and dealers, self-promoters, and they don’t actually understand the modern global economy, says McNally.
For ins...
2025-03-2753 minA Public AffairRace and Reproductive Politics with Annie Menzel
Continuing with host Ali Muldrow’s feminist book club series, on today’s show, Muldrow speaks with Annie Menzel, author of Fatal Denial: Racism and The Political Life of Black Infant Mortality. They discuss white racial innocence, the birth justice movement, and the history of obstetrics. Menzel diagnoses how white expertise and authority shape the world of reproductive health for mothers and birthing people.
Fatal Denial reframes the conversation about Black maternal health away from viewing Black parents as problems. Instead, as Muldrow asserts, the book makes clear that the conditions of Black Ameri...
2025-03-2652 minA Public AffairRebroadcast: L’Eau Est La Vie Camp And Standing Rock
This week the climate advocacy group Greenpeace was ordered to pay $660 million in damages to Energy Transfer, the oil company behind the Dakota Access Pipeline. The protests against DAPL in 2016 and 2017 were organized by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and Indigenous water protectors. Greenpeace peacefully supported the protests but was charged with defamation by Energy Transfer.
Now, a North Dakota ruling in favor of Energy Transfer could have far reaching effects on first-amendment rights and is an alarming instance of a corporation using a lawsuit to intimidate activists. Greenpeace is appealing the verdict. ...
2025-03-2551 minA Public AffairEngaging Youth in the Legislative Process
In a time when public trust in government is near historic lows, today’s show highlights regional efforts to revamp civics education. Host Douglas Haynes is joined by Kate Ullman and Adah Lambeck to talk about two initiatives to educate and engage young people in the political process. Ullman and Lambeck discuss how focusing on policies not “politics” is the key to engaging young folks. Lambeck says that young people are motivated by local issues that impact them, like gun violence.
The Legislative Semester is a nonpartisan civics and government curriculum that engages student...
2025-03-2454 minA Public AffairColonialism and the Weather
On today’s show, Carlos Dávalos is joined by two atmospheric scientists, Mayra Oyola-Merced and Ángel Adames Corraliza from the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. They discuss how weather systems differ across tropical and mid-latitude regions, how meteorological data is in question under the Trump presidency, and the politicization of weather agencies. And they advise people to pay attention to weather issues from around the world like the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC), the potential collapse of the rainforest, and the increasing number of aerosols in the atmosphere from...
2025-03-2153 minA Public AffairThe Warfare State with Norman Solomon
On today’s show, host Allen Ruff speaks with journalist, media critic, author, and activist Norman Solomon about his article, “How the Warfare State Paved the Way for a Trumpist Autocracy.” Solomon says that so many military projects are being undertaken under the name of “defense,” but this is a smokescreen for vast amounts of spending that support the “warfare state.” He writes that “militarism has been integral to the rise of the billionaire tech barons who are now teaming up with an increasingly fascistic Donald Trump.”
When Trump first ran for president in 2015, he unders...
2025-03-2052 minA Public AffairIs It Love or Unpaid Labor?
On today’s show, host Ali Muldrow speaks with Emily Callaci, author of Wages for Housework: The Feminist Fight Against Unpaid Labor. In it, Callaci writes about the second-wave feminist movement, Wages for Housework, and the important questions about unpaid labor, gender, economy, and social reproduction that it raised. Muldrow calls the book “immensely relevant for this moment.”
Callaci describes the 1970s as a time when social movements were focused on expanding people’s rights. But the Wages for Housework movement tried to address what they thought was a fundamental source of inequality: the econo...
2025-03-1952 minA Public AffairWhite Supremacy in Law Enforcement
On today’s show, host Christina Lieffring, news and politics editor at Tone Madison, speaks with Mike German about his new book, Policing White Supremacy. German is a former FBI agent who worked undercover in white supremacist and militia groups, and his book documents the threat that violent far-right groups pose to the public and how the FBI ignores that threat.
White supremacy and white supremacist violence are foundational in the US, German says. Law enforcement agencies are more likely to focus on leftist social movements than white supremacists groups even though white supr...
2025-03-1849 minA Public AffairWorking Shoulder-to-Shoulder with Immigrants
On today’s multi-lingual show, host Douglas Haynes checks in with two representatives from Voces de la Frontera and Voces de la Frontera Action, Wisconsin’s leading immigrants rights organization. Luis Velasquez and Nindik Figueredo discuss the daily realities of immigrants and migrants in Wisconsin. They share their stories of joining Voces and talk about the status of DACA and Assembly Bill 24 which, if passed, would force county sheriffs to work with ICE.
Figueredo says she has been busy with community education projects because it’s more important than ever to inform and organi...
2025-03-1754 minA Public AffairA Crisis of Conspirituality
From the high costs of insurance and issues of quality of care, the US’s healthcare system leaves a lot to be desired. Here in Wisconsin, the maternal mortality rate is higher for Black women than white women. And about one third of hospitals in the state are run by Catholic groups who can select which reproductive procedures they’ll provide based on the Catholic Church’s directives.
But instead of coming to the conclusion that we need more and better healthcare, too many folks seem to be eagerly abandoning evidence-based medicine for the lav...
2025-03-1453 minA Public AffairUnderstanding the City of Madison’s Referendum and Proposed Budg...
Early in-person voting begins today in Wisconsin, and we are just two week away from election day. Voters across the region will decided on state-wide referendums, and weigh in on school district and municipal levy increases.
On the ballot for Madison voters, is the question:
Under state law, the increase in the levy of the City of Madison for the tax to be imposed for the next fiscal year, 2025, is limited to 2.97%, which results in a levy of $296,149,162. Shall the City of Madison be allowed to exceed this limit and increase...
2024-10-2252 minA Public AffairUnderstanding the MMSD Referendum Questions
Madison voters will encounter two referendum questions, one for facilities and one for operations, on the November 5th ballot. If passed, they would incrementally increase property tax over the next 4 years. By 2028, the average Madison property tax will be raised by more than $1,300. (That’s based on the average Madison home valued at $457,300.) The operations increase will be used in part to recruit and retain educators, invest in 4k programs, and support multilingual education. The increase for facilities will address the repair and remodel needs for aging school buildings and update technology in elementary and mi...
2024-10-0852 minA Public AffairElection Coverage with Assembly District 47 Candidate Joe Maldonado
Assembly District 47 covers Fitchburg and parts of Southeastern Dane County, from Stoughton, McFarland, the towns of Rutland, Dunn, Dunkirk, Albion, and Pleasant Springs. It’s both urban and rural, with sprawling suburban subdivisions and dense apartment complexes.
Joe Maldonado is a candidate running to represent this area in the Wisconsin legislature. On today’s show, he speaks with host Carousel Bayrd about his priorities for the district. Maldonado currently serves on the Fitchburg City Council and has a background in youth development. He says he wants to be a voice for historically underrepresented and...
2024-08-0652 minA Public AffairWisconsin Senate District 16 Candidates
On today’s show, longtime host Carousel Bayrd comes out of retirement to interview the three candidates for Wisconsin Senate District 16. The seat is currently held by Melissa Agard who is running for Dane County Executive.
Because of Wisconsin’s new legislative maps, District 16 now looks a little different and represents a diverse group of rural and urban communities. It includes Sun Prairie, Cottage Grove, parts of North Madison, Fitchburg, Cambridge, Fort Atkinson, Stoughton, and even parts of Dodge and Jefferson Counties.
Representative Melissa Ratcliff says that protecting abortion access is her to...
2024-07-3052 min