From all of us at AirTalk, we hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday yesterday. You may have even gotten some shopping in as dozens of stores opened yesterday evening to get a head start on black Friday sales. We'd like to hear from you--has black Friday gone too far? Then, we'll talk about the proposed rule from the Obama administration to limit the financial role of non profits in political campaigns. And a new study found that older people report being less tired than younger people. We'll talk about why that may be, hear reviews on this week's movie releases and talk about the life of silver screen legend, Barbara Stanwyck. TGI-FilmWeek!
Is Black Thursday/Friday trampling over your Thanksgiving?
Wal-Mart, Macy’s, and Best Buy were just some of the retailers that decided to open their doors on Thanksgiving and deal-conscious shoppers apparently responded overwhelmingly. Wal-Mart said that its stores rang up more than 10 million transactions yesterday, and Target reported that its Thanksgiving figures were among the best single-day sales it has seen all year.
But Black Thursday hasn’t dampened consumer’s enthusiasm for Black Friday. There was the usual chaos and anticipation, and NBC reports that one fight had broken out last night in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart in San Bernardino County between irate shoppers.
How was your Thanksgiving? Did you feel like your Thanksgiving was under assault, even if you didn’t partake in Black Thursday?
Guest:
Sanden Totten, KPCC Reporter joins us from the Americana in Glendale
Obama Administration proposes new rule to rein in nonprofit political groups
The Obama administration this week unveiled a proposed rule that would limit the role tax-exempt, nonprofit groups play in politics and election campaigns. Under the proposed rule, “social welfare” groups like Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS and the pro-Obama outfit Priorities USA, which enjoy certain tax benefits under the 501(c)(4) designation but could raise millions of dollars for election campaigns, would be kept from engaging in political activities like running ads, registering voters or distributing campaign literature.
Currently, such social welfare groups are allowed to engage in some side political work. A long comment period awaits this newly proposed Treasury Department regulation and it won’t likely be finalized until after the 2014 elections.
Guests:
Jessica Levinson, Professor of Law at Loyola Law School. Her research focuses on election law and governance issues
Brad Smith, Professor of Law at the Capital University Law School in Ohio, and Chairman and Founder of the Center for Competitive Politics, a nonprofit organization dedicated solely to protecting First Amendment political rights
Study finds that tiredness decreases with age
Those who fear aging might find some inspiration from a new study out of the London School of Economics and Political Science. After analyzing data from 13,000 respondents, researchers found that Americans ages 65 and older reported being less tired than those ages 15 to 24.
The data for “More Years, Less Yawns” included study participants’ self-reported diary entries of a day’s activities along with tiredness levels for those activities. After controlling for gender, ethnicity, number of children, number of active hours, and the number of hours slept, the study’s authors still found that tiredness decreases with age. In other words, grandma’s energy can’t be explained by her sleeping more or doing less than you did.
The conclusion contradicts the popular notion that older folks are more frail and tired than their younger counterparts. Are you surprised by the study’s findings? What do you think explains the results of “More Years, Less Yawns”? Have you yourself experienced an increase in energy as you’ve moved on in your years?
Guest:
Laura Kudrna, co-author of the study and a researcher and Ph.D candidate at the London School of Economics
Filmweek: Homefront, Oldboy, Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom and more
Larry is joined by KPCC critics Henry Sheehan and Peter Rainer to discuss this week’s releases, including Homefront, Oldboy, Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom and more! TGI-FilmWeek!
Homefront
Oldboy
Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom
Guests:
Henry Sheehan, film critic for KPCC and CriticsAGoGo.com
Peter Rainer, film critic for KPCC and the Christian Science Monitor; author of “Rainer on Film: Thirty Years of Film Writing in a Turbulent and Transformative Era”
The Life of Barbara Stanwyck
She made eighty-eight movies in a career that spanned four decades and worked with some of Hollywood's most esteemed filmmakers: Cecil B. DeMille, Preston Sturges, King Vidor. Director Frank Capra called her the "greatest emotional actress the screen has yet know."
In "A Life of Barbara Stanwyck: Steel-True 1907-1940," biographer Victoria Wilson gives readers a full-scale look into the life of the screen actress starting from her formative years growing up in Brooklyn to her storybook marriage to leading man Robert Taylor, to her maturation as a silver screen legend.
Guest:
Victoria Wilson, author of “A Life of Barbara Stanwyck: Steel-True 1907-1940” (Simon & Schuster, 2013) and a vice president and senior editor at Knopf