We analyze the economic costs of the U.S. Visa Waiver Program overhaul; when should gun owning parents be prosecuted if their kids accidentally shoot and kill? New research finds no differences between male and female brains and middle and high schools are encouraging more expressive writing with a ban on "boring words."
Analyzing economic costs of overhauling US visa waiver program
Congress may move quickly to overhaul a program that allows travel from 38 countries to the U.S. with no visa, something that has come under criticism following the Paris terror attacks.
House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy told reporters Monday that he was looking at action before the end of the year. Without legislation "I think the country will be less safe," the California Republican said. At the same time, the White House announced a series of changes aimed at improving the program, including more terrorism information sharing with other countries.
The so-called visa waiver program lets people from 38 countries visit the U.S. for 90-day stays without obtaining a visa. It has come under scrutiny following the Paris terror attacks since several of the suspected perpetrators were from Belgium and France, which are countries on the list.
McCarthy outlined five changes House Republicans would like to see to the program. They include requiring all countries to issue electronic passports; ensuring that all passengers are screened against a database of lost and stolen passports; and kicking countries out of the visa waiver program if they aren't abiding by requirements.
Changing the visa waiver program appears to have bipartisan support in the House and the Senate and general agreement from the White House. Many lawmakers note that the large scope of the program - it admits some 20 million visitors to the U.S. each year - makes it a potential security concern.
How much time and money would it take to implement these changes? What would be the economic costs of limiting travellers from Germany, Japan, South Korea, and the other U.S. ally countries currently eligible?
With files from the Associated Press.
Guests:
Alex Wayne, White House Editor, Bloomberg News
Daniel Costa, director of immigration law and policy research, Economic Policy Institute - a nonpartisan think tank created in 1986 to include the needs of low- and middle-income workers in economic policy discussions
On prosecuting gun-owning parents when children accidentally shoot and kill
In Arkansas this November, within about a week of each other, two unintentional self-inflicted firearm deaths occurred at the hands of a two and six year old.
Six-year-old Eron Burks found a loaded gun on the floor of the car his aunt was driving and shot himself in the face. His aunt has been charged with manslaughter.
A 2-year-old got his hands on a gun in his uncle’s home and shot himself in the head. His parents have been charged with manslaughter.
However, in South Carolina, a 24 year-old great aunt was charged with unlawfully carrying a pistol when her nephew shot his grandmother, not fatally, in the back after finding a gun in the pocket of the passenger seat in the car they were all driving in.
Guests:
Michael Gmoser, the prosecutor for Butler County, Ohio
Adam Winkler, Professor of Law at UCLA. He tweets at
Dahlia Lithwick, Senior Legal Editor for Slate
Could teaching religion in public schools be the pathway to religious tolerance?
While public school teachers are prohibited from preaching, holding courses in world religion may give students the insight to discourage incidents of religious discrimination or hate crimes.
In one case that resulted from a dispute about teaching intolerance and gay rights, California’s Modesto City School District found success teaching its curriculum on world religions. The required course has been touted as a national model to promote respect for religious diversity.
Linda K. Wertheimer’s book, “Faith Ed: Teaching about Religion in an Age of Tolerance,” raises questions about the impact of religious education in public schools and what our system should consider when introducing programs that teach religious diversity.
Today, Wertheimer, a veteran education journalist, discusses her book with Patt Morrison and weighs in on how schools can approach the issue of religious intolerance with education.
Guest:
Linda K. Wertheimer, veteran education journalist and author of “Faith Ed: Teaching About Religion in an Age of Intolerance” (Beacon Press, 2015)
Study author, brain expert explain implications of new research finding no differences between male and female brains
The research team led by the University of Tel Aviv’s Daphna Joel has found male and female brains do not translate into differences in cognitive abilities.
Joel and her team poured over the brain scans of more than 1,400 men and women to reach the conclusion.
“Although there are sex/gender differences in brain structure, brains do not fall into two classes, one typical of males and the other typical of females,” the paper published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reads. “Each brain is a unique mosaic of features, some of which may be more common in females compared with males, others may be more common in males compared with females, and still others may be common in both females and males.”
What are the implications of the study?
Guests:
Daphna Joel, lead author of the new study, “Sex beyond the genitalia: The human brain mosaic,” published in yesterday’s the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. She is a professor of psychological sciences at the University of Tel Aviv in Israel
Arthur P. Arnold, PhD, Director of the Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology of the Brain Research Institute at UCLA, and a renowned expert on brain research. He is also the editor in chief of the journal, Biology of Sex Differences.
Does banning ‘boring’ words from classrooms encourage creativity or create confusion?
In the world of broadcast journalism, we’re taught to be as clear and concise as possible when we write copy for air.
“Write conversationally, like you’d speak” is a phrase often uttered by journalism professors who want needless words removed from news copy, because every second counts. But in other classrooms across the U.S., teachers are telling their kids the exact opposite.
In an effort to encourage livelier, more expressive writing, teachers from elementary to high school are urging students to use a broader, more eclectic range of words in their writing. Staples like ‘good,’ ‘bad,’ and ‘said’ are being banned from classrooms in lieu of other words like ‘phenomenal,’ ‘atrocious’ and ‘exclaimed.’
How much does it actually help? Some teachers suggest that once students begin to use the alternate words, they’re astonished at how fast their vocabulary expands. But others have expressed concerns that banning words could lead to confusion, or that students will just pick a word that looks cool without really knowing whether it’s an adequate synonym for the word they want to replace.
Do you think students should be encouraged to ditch certain frequently used words in lieu of more creative ones? What are the potential advantages and disadvantages to teaching this kind of writing? Do you think it will help or hurt students more in the long run?
Guest
Leilen Shelton, middle school teacher at Mariner’s Christian School in Costa Mesa and author of “Banish Boring Words” (Scholastic, 2009)
Impact of Fox nixing overnight ratings on how we see TV viewing numbers
When Fox airs the first episode of its ‘X-Files’ reboot after the NFC Championship Game on January 24, we won’t see how well it did the next morning.
Fox announced it will no longer be gathering ‘overnight’ ratings, as it has done in the past. The numbers are generated by Nielsen and give an insight into how many households tuned into or watched on-demand a previous night’s primetime show.
The move is an effort, Fox says, to “change the conversation” about television watching. More and more viewers are tuning in to primetime shows via DVR, video-on-demand, or on streaming platforms.
Fox will become the first major network to nix the overnight ratings, but its competitors suggest that it wouldn’t be getting rid of the ratings if they had better overnight numbers to show.
So far, no other networks have said they might follow suit, although there have been executives who suggest that the conversation is a good one to start. TV journalists and publications that report the overnight numbers say they’ll continue to report Fox’s ratings.
Guest:
Stephen Battaglio, Staff writer for The Los Angeles Times covering TV and media biz out of New York; LA Times: “Fox tries to break the overnight ratings habit as TV viewing changes.” He tweets at @SteveBattaglio