Debt ceiling roulette continues in Washington. Nation-backed hackers, cyber espionage and the new cyber arms race – click and load. ABC News withdraws from checkbook journalism. Did Parton punt her performance at the Hollywood Bowl? Are you one of those “creative types?"
Debt ceiling roulette continues in Washington
We have six days until the drop-dead date for raising the nation's debt ceiling. There have been budget plans aplenty jockeying for support in recent weeks. There was the Gang of Six plan, the Harry Reid plan, the Mitch McConnell plan, the John Boehner plan part one, ad today Washington waits for Boehner, the sequel. During President Barack Obama's national address on Monday evening, he asked Americans to make their voices heard on the stalemate debate. Moments later, congressional websites were jammed. A memo from the Capitol call center said telephone circuits at Congress were "near capacity" due to the high volume of incoming calls. At the peak, House offices received a combined 40,000 calls in an hour - twice the typical number. We want to take your calls on this, too. Have you contacted your representatives in Washington yet? Would you urge them to compromise or hold their position? How passionate are you about the issue?
Guest:
Jeanne Cummings, Deputy Government Team Editor for Bloomberg News
Nation-backed hackers, cyber espionage and the new cyber arms race – click and load
When we think of hacking, most of us probably worry about someone shady accessing our personal email accounts or cell phones. But these are mere paper cuts compared to the large-scale, international cyber attacks that are rapidly gaining in frequency and severity. As technology becomes more entwined with every aspect of life, so too does the risk of brazen invasions, whether you’re a lone individual, huge corporation or governmental entity. It’s full-on war out there and a cyber weapons industry is exploding to arm the fighters. The most famous example of this new breed of weapon is Stuxnet, a computer worm that destroyed something physical – the centrifuges at a nuclear facility in Iran. Now, we have weapons that can carry out an assassination by shutting off a hospital’s computer-controlled intravenous drip or hack into a car’s computer system to crash it at will. Google, the IMF and even our national symbol of defense, the Pentagon, have all been hacked. It’s a Code War era complete with international ties and political motives. But unlike the Cold War, during which mutual assured destruction kept the superpowers from pressing the red button, this crisis has no clear failsafe. How do we fight a war in which traditional military strategy does not apply? What are countries and corporations doing to fend off such attacks? Has the U.S. been involved with any hacks aimed at its enemies?
Guests:
Michael Riley is a Washington reporter for Bloomberg Businessweek
Ashlee Vance is a technology writer for Bloomberg Businessweek
ABC News withdraws from checkbook journalism
Generally, it’s thought a respected news organization would never deign to pay sources for an exclusive story. Aren’t murky ethics left to tabloids and reality TV? Not so. In a competitive media environment, even the big networks have lured "big gets" with a check. It is often in the guise of licensing photos or videos belonging to an interview subject, but implicit in those negotiations is the exclusivity: no other media outlet will get the interview. The most recent example was ABC News paying Meagan Broussard -- one of the women who was sent lewd photos by then Congressman Anthony Weiner. Among the most controversial examples was ABC's $200,000 payment to Casey Anthony, shortly before she was charged in the killing of her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee (that deal became public during the murder trial, which recently acquitted Anthony). Now, in a quiet volte-face, it's reported that ABC has banned the practice. What about NBC and CBS – when has money changed hands? Why the change at ABC? What are some problematic examples of this in newspapers and magazines? How does checkbook journalism change the story? Is it too late to put the genie back in the bottle?
Guest:
Judy Muller, Associate Professor, The Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism, University of Southern California, host of Town Hall Journal which airs on KPCC, Sundays at 9:00 pm; NPR commentator and Former ABC News Correspondent; Author of Now This: Radio, Television, and the Real World
Did Parton punt her performance?
The great Dolly Parton performed for the first time ever at the Hollywood Bowl last weekend in front of sold-out crowds…but did she sell out her fans? A reviewer from the Los Angeles Times is suggesting that Dolly may not have sung her songs live and at one point pulled out and blew into a saxophone, but didn’t truly play a note. The Hollywood Bowl is a venerable performance venue that’s paid for by us—the tax payers. Do they have a policy regarding lip-syncing? If they allow lip-syncing do they owe it to the public, who are paying almost $200 dollars a ticket in some cases, to tell us when we won’t be seeing real singing? Or has Dolly been entertaining the masses for long enough that she’s more of an institution and less of a singer? Do the Bowl and Parton owe us live music? And if you went to the concert this weekend, does it ruin the experience to know that the music you heard may not have been coming from the tiny, sparkly dot you watched on the stage?
Guest:
George Stroumboulopoulos, award-winning music journalist; long-time radio DJ; Host, George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight on CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation)
Are you one of those “creative types?”
No matter what the medium, artists of all kinds rely on their innate creativity to produce their content and set themselves apart from the pack. But even the most tenured professionals have moments in which they are unable to successfully draw from their personal creative wells. Whether it’s a musician who can’t find the right series of notes or a novelist who is struggling with writer’s block, sometimes it’s impossible to make one’s imagination a reality. Don Hahn, a producer on Disney movies such as The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, found this problem so pressing that he took it head on in his new book, Brain Storm: Unleashing Your Creative Self. What advice does Hahn have from his own career for the aspiring “creative types”? What emotions and thought processes hinder or encourage creativity? How do you construct an environment conducive to creativity?
Guest:
Don Hahn, author of Brain Storm: Unleashing Your Creative Self and Producer of The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast