AirTalk debates the pros and cons of lowering the score needed to pass the California bar now that the decision is in the hands of the state Supreme Court. We also delve into the procedure behind the Senate's health care vote today; could gene therapy be the newest cancer treatment?; and more.
Confused about the Senate health care vote today? Here’s the AirTalk explainer
A procedural health care vote is set for Tuesday in the Senate.
And if successful, the vote could lead to the start of a repeal and replacement of the Affordable Care Act. As reported by the New York Times, GOP leaders can only afford to lose two Republican votes, one of which is already a “no” from Senator Susan Collins of Maine. Senator John McCain of Arizona, who was diagnosed last week with brain cancer, returns for the vote today. He is expected to be in favor of an ACA repeal. But the path to a repeal won’t be straightforward. A Senate debate will first have to happen. That means the question of repeal without replacement will be on the table, which is unlikely to happen. A vote on a repeal and replacement will then move forward, leading to a myriad of options.
So what can the public expect out of the Senate health care vote today? Libby Denkmann talks to guests to take a deep dive into the future of the ACA.
Guests:
Adriel Bettelheim, health care editor at POLITICO; he tweets
Kevin Whitelaw, Congress editor at Bloomberg; he tweets
Nathan W. Monroe, associate professor of political science at UC Merced; his focus includes Senate history
Should the names of sheriff’s deputies who’ve committed misconduct be public?
On Monday, LA-based advocacy group Dignity and Power Now launched a website with data on 22 deputies that have been cited in public reports of misconduct, such as officer-involved shootings.
Dignity and Power now is one of the groups that’s advocating that a confidential list of nearly 300 Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies who’ve committed misconduct be made public.
This against the backdrop of Sheriff Jim McDonnell attempting to send prosecutors names of the deputies whose misconduct could undermine their perspectives as witnesses. The State Supreme Court barred Sheriff McDonnell from doing so after the deputies’ union sued. Dignity and Power Now is one of the organizations urging McDonnell to appeal the decision, though whether he will do so remains unclear.
Should the names of “problematic” deputies be public information or is it a privacy violation? In addition or alternately, should those names be provided to prosecutors?
Guests:
Mark-Anthony Johnson, director of health and wellness at Dignity and Power Now, grassroots civil rights organization that aims to advocate on behalf of incarcerated people and their communities
Randy Sutton, retired police lieutenant with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and author of multiple books on policing, including “A Cop’s Life” (St Martin’s Press, 2006); the national spokesman for Blue Lives Matter
Discussing impact on law students, legal profession if CA Supreme Court lowers state bar ‘cut score’
The state bar exam for California has long been known in legal circles to be one of the toughest in the country to pass.
California’s ‘cut score,’ the grade required to pass the exam, is higher than all other states except one: Delaware. But a debate has been raging in legal circles across the Golden State about whether California’s cut score for the bar was realistic. Now, the state’s high court is taking action.
The California Supreme Court has amended the state's ‘Rules of Court’ to say that the supreme court, not a State Bar of California board, will be the body to decide what a passing score is. This follows a 2016 that saw just 62 percent of test-takers from American Bar Association accredited schools pass the test. Under New York State’s cut score, 87 percent would have passed.
The discrepancy has alarmed some in the legal profession. In February, deans from 20 ABA-accredited schools wrote the Supreme Court of California and requested that it lower the cut score. They argue that the pass-fail rate is a result of the cut score being arbitrarily high, not a sign that the people taking the test aren’t qualified to be lawyers. Others disagree, saying that the Supreme Court is rushing to change the score without looking at all the evidence, and point to law schools lowering admission standards to keep tuition dollars flowing.
Should California lower the cut score of its bar exam? How would this impact the legal profession?
Guest:
David Faigman, Chancellor and Dean of the UC Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco
Robert Anderson, associate professor of law at Pepperdine University School of Law in Malibu
Trump steps up criticism of Sessions, and the latest on Russia investigation
President Trump went on Twitter and continued his attacks on Attorney General Jeff Sessions, criticizing the Department of Justice for not doing more to investigate alleged “Hillary Clinton crimes” and leakers of sensitive US intelligence.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken a VERY weak position on Hillary Clinton crimes (where are E-mails & DNC server) & Intel leakers!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken a VERY weak position on Hillary Clinton crimes (where are E-mails & DNC server) & Intel leakers!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 25, 2017
It’s the latest in a series of tweets the President had sent out in the last week or so. His displeasure with the Attorney General first surfaced in an interview he did with the New York Times earlier this month. In the interview, Trump criticized Sessions for recusing himself from the Russia probe.
The sustained attack has many wondering whether Sessions’ days as attorney general may be numbered.
What, if anything, would happen to the Russia investigation if Sessions was to vacate or be removed from his post?
Guests:
Larry Liebert, a national security editor at Bloomberg
Andy Wright, associate professor at Savannah Law School in Georgia; he is a former Associate Counsel to the President in the White House Counsel’s Office under President Barack Obama (2011-12)
Could gene therapy be the newest cancer treatment?
A new gene therapy could be approved for certain leukemia patients. And that may open doors for a new swath of cancer treatments using the same science.
As reported by the New York Times, the approval would likely spark new ways to use the technology for breast, prostate, ovary, lung and pancreatic cancers. It is also being studied for glioblastoma, the brain tumor John McCain was recently diagnosed with.
A new method uses immune cells extracted from donated samples of umbilical-cord blood, and are combined with other types of cell therapy. Researchers are also trying to administer these treatments in the early stages of leukemia. Another approach uses cells from components of the immune system known as killer cells which fight foreign threats in the body.
So what are the risks involved in these new therapies? How would they potentially increase the survival rate? When can we expect them to go into effect?
Libby Denkmann speaks to a developer of one of these new therapies to find out more.
Guests:
Stephen Forman, M.D., lead researcher at City of Hope’s T-Cell immunotherapy research laboratory; his focus includes immunotherapy cancer treatment, and stem cell transplantation research
Katy Rezvani, M.D., Ph.D., professor and researcher of stem cell transplantation and cellular therapy at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
As predictive algorithms become widespread, how do we approach machine bias?
Ideally, predictive algorithms are stone-cold, rational, big data-crunching tools that can assist humans in their flawed decision-making process, but the caveat is that they can often reflect the biases of their creators.
According to Laura Hudson in her FiveThirtyEight piece “Technology Is Biased Too. How Do We Fix it?” algorithmic bias is a growing problem, as organizations increasingly use algorithms as a factor in deciding whether to give someone a loan, offer someone a job or even whether to convict a defendant or grant them parole.
But fixing these algorithms presents a philosophical quandary: how to define fairness? And if biases are impossible to avoid, then which ones are less harmful than others?
So how are problematic algorithms already being used today? How, if at all, can they be made “fair?” And in what way can we use algorithms responsibly?
Guest:
Suresh Venkatasubramanian, professor of computing at the University of Utah and a member of the board of directors for the ACLU Utah; he studies algorithmic fairness
That time when your friends step up during a health crisis
Amy Silverstein got her first heart transplant when she was twenty-four years old. That heart lasted almost twice as long as doctors anticipated, but by the time she was fifty it had begun to fail.
She debated whether a second transplant, and all that it required, was worthwhile. She had already beaten the odds once and, during that time, attended law school, married her husband, and raised her son. And the most likely option for a successful second transplant involved leaving New York and moving to Los Angeles.
As Silverstein debated whether or not to wait for a new match, her friends refused to take no for an answer. They drew up spreadsheets, collected decorations, and organized their schedules so that they could effectively move with Silverstein to Los Angeles while she needed to be there. Her new book,“My Glory Was I Had Such Friends: A Memoir,” tells the story of how these friendships saved her life as she waited for (and finally got) a match.
AirTalk sits down with Silverstein to discuss her experiences as a patient and the influences of her friends along the way.
Guest:
Amy Silverstein, author of the new book, “My Glory Was I Had Such Friends” (HarperCollins, 2017)