Discussing tomorrow’s primary results, which will likely dictate the tone each of the campaigns take into the party conventions this summer; looking at a new project, Vote Allies, which aims to use vote-sharing to help the disenfranchised be heard and weighing the effects of changing rules in sports.
AirTalk election 2016: Analyzing the major storylines on the eve of the CA primary
California’s primary elections are upon us after months of speculation and waiting.
While there’s not too much speculating left to be done about the outcome of tomorrow’s primaries, the results will likely dictate the tone each of the campaigns take into the party conventions this summer, as California and the other states voting on Tuesday are the last major contests before the candidates set their sights on Cleveland and Philadelphia, respectively.
On the Democratic side, polls show Hillary Clinton with a slight edge over Bernie Sanders, who campaigned in Los Angeles over the weekend. Sanders has shown no signs that he’s winding his campaign down, despite being mathematically out of the race. Hillary Clinton ended last week on a high note as she got kudos for her pointed foreign policy speech in which she repeatedly questioned Donald Trump’s temperament and qualifications for the presidency.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump found his way into the headlines for another set of bombastic comments, this time regarding the Mexican-American judge presiding over the lawsuit against his now-defunct real estate school, Trump University. Trump drew sharp criticism from the GOP establishment after he questioned whether Judge Gonzalo Curiel could be impartial in ruling on the case due to past comments Trump has made about plans to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico.
Do you have questions about voting? Visit KPCC's Human Voter Guide here.
Guests:
Ange-Marie Hancock, associate professor of political science and gender studies at the University of Southern California
Zach Courser, Research Director of the Dreier Roundtable and visiting Assistant Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College; he tweets
Frank Stoltze, KPCC correspondent
Abby Sewell, reporter for the Los Angeles Times covering the LA County supervisor races
A new program seeks to increase the sense of democratic inclusion via vote-sharing
The right to vote is reserved for adults who are U.S. citizens or meet their state’s residency requirements, but even still, only seven out of 10 eligible voters are registered to vote.
A new Los Angeles-based project, Vote Allies, is working to increasing voter participation by motivating eligible voters who typically wouldn’t cast a vote to “share” their vote with someone who is not eligible. By symbolically sharing a vote with a partner, Brett Shears, founder of Vote Allies, wants all members of society to feel like their voice matters. The program currently has 60 registered participants, 14 of whom include ex-felons and undocumented people.
Others, like Ira Mehlman, media director at The Federation for American Immigration Reform, are skeptical that the program will make much of a difference in the way voters will cast their votes, “People sharing their votes probably would have voted that way anyway.”
What do you think? Would you be willing to share your vote with someone who is eager, but ineligible? How might this program influence current and future elections?
Read more about the project on KPCC here.
Guests:
Brett Shears, founder, Vote Allies and Independent Election Administrator for the Neighborhood Councils, Region 6, which includes Downtown Los Angeles, Pico Union, Olympic Park, MacArthur Park, Wilshire Center-Koretown, Historic Culture and Westlake North and South
Lonella “Joy” Enix, Chair of the Southwest Los Angeles Neighborhood Development Council and an eligible voter participating in Vote Allies
Ira Mehlman, Media director, The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)
KPCC listeners remember The Greatest: Muhammad Ali
He was a massive fighter, a massive force, so days after his death at age 74, fascinating stories about Muhammad Ali abound.
He was a massive fighter, a massive force, so days after his death at age 74, fascinating stories about Muhammad Ali abound. As Stephen Battaglio commemorates in the LA Times, a hugely significant relationship in Ali's life was with sportscaster Howard Cosell.
The rapport between the charismatic, unconventional boxer and the measured broadcaster was captivating for viewers.
For AirTalk listeners, whether it was Ali's impact on his sport or his impact on society, share your thoughts on his incredible life.
Guest:
Stephen Battaglio, Staff writer for The Los Angeles Times covering TV and media biz out of New York; LA Times: Muhammad Ali and Howard Cosell were must-see sports TV
New pedestrian crosswalk makes an infamously dangerous intersection safer
The intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue is not only one of the most famous intersections in Los Angeles, it’s also one of the most dangerous when it comes to pedestrian injuries.
But this reputation may soon be out of date since the Los Angeles Department of Transportation installed a scramble crosswalk last November. Scramble crosswalks also known as the Barnes Dance-- named after Henry Barnes, a legendary American traffic engineer and commissioner who was a strong advocate of the scramble intersection-- are diagonal crosswalks in which all vehicular traffic is completely stopped so that pedestrians can cross an intersection from every direction simultaneously.
According to an analysis of LADOT data by tech blog Gizmodo, there were 19 crashes, which caused 13 injuries at Hollywood and Highland in the first eleven months of 2015. Five and a half months after the scramble was installed, only one non-injury car vs. car collision occurred.
Both Pasadena and Beverly Hills have declared the success over the few scramble sidewalks in their neighborhoods.
Does this mean that scramble sidewalks should be the norm at every intersection? What impact does the Barnes Dance have on traffic? And what would it take for the city to install more scramble sidewalks where pedestrians are most vulnerable?
Guest:
James Moore, Director of USC’s Transportation Engineering Program
Requiem for the three-pointer: Is there ever a good time to change rules in pro-sports?
Steph Curry and Klay Thompson, and by extension the Golden State Warriors, are the kings of the three-point shot.
That's led them to a lot of success and a shot at back-to-back championships. But now people say they might be too good at the three and that it's time to move the line further back.
Unprecedented? Not quite. When the Chicago Bulls won their second three-peat ('94-'97), the line was shortened to 22 feet from 25 feet.
Rule changes are a constant in sports, including the recent "Utley Rule" in baseball, moving the post-touchdown extra point kick back further in football, and so on.
Do you think the three-pointer line should be moved? When is it right to institute a rule change in sports? Is this just part of the efforts to give every pro team as even a chance at success as possible? Or is it just punishing successful teams to do this sort of thing?
Guests:
Patrick Hruby, contributing editor at Vice Sports
Nick Dimengo, associate editor for BroBible, a sports humor and entertainment site, and a feature writer for Bleacher Report.