Month: January 2022

In a Deadly Ruling the Supreme Court Takes the Public Out of Public Health

We begin with the devastating blow the Supreme Court dealt today to public health, essentially taking the public out of public health by denying the government’s ability via OSHA to deal with a public health crisis as the Covid pandemic rages with over 800,000 Americans dead and counting. Joining us is William Haseltine, Chair and President of ACCESS Health International, Inc., as well as Chairman of the Haseltine Foundation for Science and the Arts. With a prolific career in science, business, and philanthropy around the world, he was a professor at Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health and is well known for his pioneering work on cancer, HIV/AIDS, and genomics. He has founded more than a dozen biotechnology companies, including Human Genome Sciences, and serves on advisory boards for numerous international entities, from the Brookings Institution to the Council on Foreign Relations and is the author of a number of books, the latest of which is A Family Guide to Covid.

The Politicization of Public Health Has Led To the Defiance of Common Sense and Science

Then we look further into this counterintuitive, counterproductive defiance of common sense and science by the Supreme Court’s right wing majority and address the problem of the politicization of public health in our increasingly divided and contentious polity. Joining us is Jonathan Metzl, professor of sociology and psychiatry at Vanderbilt University and director of its Center for Medicine, Health, and Society. He is the author of several books, the latest of which is Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America’s Heartland.

Senator Sinema’s Death Blow to Biden Ensures GOP Voter Suppression Will Doom Her Party

Then finally we examine the other blow dealt to President Biden’s agenda today undermining the Democrat’s ability to govern and win future elections and that is the speech before the Senate by Democratic Senator Sinema just prior to Biden’s arrival on Capitol Hill for a lunch meeting with the Senate Democratic Caucus. Sinema effectively killed voting rights legislation by refusing to alter the filibuster rule, thus ensuring the Republican voter suppression underway will doom her party. Joining us to get a perspective from Arizona on their treacherous senator is Rodolfo Espino, a former professor of political science at Arizona State University. He is now a full time political consultant for various civil rights organizations, including the Inter-Tribal Council of Arizona and the Lawyers Committee on Civil Rights. His research and work explore voting behavior and redistricting – especially its impact on minority communities and he has served as an expert witness in cases involving voting rights and has testified before Congress regarding the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act.