Today, we talk about the efforts of House leaders to pass a bill regarding migrant children at the border before Congress leaves on vacation. Also, "Get On Up," the biopic of the "hardest working man in show business," James Brown, hit theaters today. Later on, we'll talk about the House's attempt to figure out what "driving under the influence" means when it comes to marijuana. We talk to Grover Norquist about why he's headed to Burning Man, and much more.
Congress' last-minute scramble to pass border spending bills
Congress is scrambling at the last minute to negotiate two separate border-spending bills: One in the House and one in the Senate.
Each bill would provide funds to deal with the unaccompanied minors who've been arriving at the border in recent months. Congress even delayed its August recess a day to deal with it. But there's no resolution yet ... and there may not be, at least for a while.
Southern California Public Radio's immigration reporter Leslie Berestein Rojas joins Take Two to explain where it stands and what will get Congress to act.
The immigration crisis is reviving the Minuteman Project
A Congressional lack of action on immigration, plus the increasing waves of unaccompanied children entering the country, has ramped up tensions along the border. And a name we haven't from in a while is looking for a resurgence: The Minuteman Project.
Founded in 2005, the group of vigilantes stationed volunteers along the border to stop illegal migration. Its notoriety has waned since then, but this month it and other similar groups are launching campaigns to increase their ranks and deploy members to "stop an invasion."
The Minuteman Project's founder and president Jim Gilchrist joins Take Two to talk about Operation Normandy, where he hopes to recruit 3,500 volunteers to patrol the border on May 1, 2015.
LA lawyers take on immigration cases of migrant children
We've been hearing about the recent surge in migrant children flooding into the U.S. from Central America. Right now, many of those children are getting called in to immigration court, and not all of them have legal representation.
California Attorney General Kamala Harris asked several law firms across the state to take up the cases as a pro bono services last week. One of the law firms that agreed to help is Gibson Dunn in Los Angeles. Lawyer Katie Marquart, Gibson Dunn's pro bono director, joins Take Two for more.
Friday Flashback: Border bill fail, Obama impeachment, CIA spying and more
The border bill falls into a sinkhole bigger than the one on Sunset Boulevard, impeaching the president and the love letters of...Warren G. Harding? These are just some of the topics we're tackling today in the Friday Flashback with Robin Abcarian of the Los Angeles Times and Jamelle Bouie of Slate.
The border bill is dead. What happened? What are your thoughts on the revolt of conservative Republicans? What does this tell you about the role of John Boehner? What happens next?
The GOP has a plan to court Latino voters, but it's not going so well. What are the more liberal factions of the Republican party pushing for with regard to the Latino vote?
It seems like courting Latinos has been a priority for years now. Why can't the GOP agree on a strategy?
There's currently an effort to impeach President Obama. A party using this to try to gain some political advantage, but it's not the Republicans.
Democrats are making a big deal of the impeachment efforts, using it in fund raising efforts. Is it working? Is there a chance that the Democrats might shoot themselves in the foot?
At first the CIA said they didn't spy on the Senate committee, but now they admit to it. What's going on with the CIA and the Senate? What does this mean for John Brennan, the head of the CIA?
Before Clinton and Lewinsky, there was another politician behaving badly in the White House: Warren G. Harding?
Grover Norquist on why he's going to Burning Man
Grover Norquist is going to Burning Man.
The 57-year-old anti-tax agitator and founder of Americans for Tax Reform - a conservative icon - will be attending a bacchanalian drug-fueled nudie art party in the Nevada desert. So does this mean, as Vanity Fair proclaimed, that Burning Man is dead?
"That's ridiculous," said Norquist on Take Two Show. "Burning Man has 10 principles. One of them is radical inclusion. The people who think that others shouldn't be included should move on and do something else. They seem to think this is their treehouse, and they should keep other people out, or they should tell other people how to run their lives. They shouldn't be involved in a dramatic and radical experiment whose first principal in inclusion.""
Norquist said he was turned on to Burning Man when he was invited by co-founder Larry Harvey, when the two met in Washington, D.C. He couldn't attend that year in 2012 because the Republican National Convention was held the same weekend.
Norquist tweeted at the time, "Which idiot put the GOP convention the same time as 'Burning Man' in Nevada? Is there time to change this?"
"I've always been interested in Burning Man," said Norquist. "It's a collection of people. The government doesn't organize it. People voluntarily organize it. It's exactly the type of thing that free people ought to be doing."
Norquist said his anti-tax campaign has been waged to maximize people's freedom. What they choose to do with that freedom should be up to them.
"I'm in favor of everyone having the right to be free whether they want to be Warren Buffett and go make money all day or whether they want to be Mother Theresa or something in between," he said.
And when it comes to Burning Man's notorious penchant for nakedness and drugs?
"I usually wear clothes during the day," Norquist assured. "I think many things should be legal that I don't do. I'm just going to go and be me. I'm bringing my wife along, or my wife is bringing me along. So we'll have fun, together."
'Get On Up': James Brown biopic honors the man and his music
James Brown has been called a lot of things: a social activist, soul brother #1, musical innovator, and Godfather of Soul. Now he's the subject of a biopic that opens in theaters today.
Eight years after his death, he still remains larger than life:
We look back at his life and career with music and culture expert, Erik Wright, an adjunct professor at Valencia College.
The rise of Fullerton's Burger Records
To find one of the most influential indie record labels in California, you have to head to a mini-mall in Fullerton, just south of Los Angeles.
There, you'll find a place called Burger Records. Inside you'll find the record label's owners living on the property, no shower or kitchen. Despite that, last year they released more than 300 albums.
Host A Martinez speaks with Lee Rickard and Sean Bohrman, longtime friends and owners of Burger Records.
Between Two Buns: The Burger Records Story from Jack Sample on Vimeo.
Covered California rates to rise by 4.2 percent in 2015
California consumers of individual and family health insurance policies are likely to see only modest price increases next year, which marks a departure from the trend of double-digit premium increases that were happening before passage of the federal health law.
Officials with the state-run insurance marketplace, Covered California, put the average statewide premium increase for these plans at 4.2 percent, but the actual price any one person will pay for their policy will vary.
Southern California Public Radio Health Care Correspondent Stephanie O'Neill explains what consumers of these policies can expect in 2015:
Who is most affected by this news and who isn't?
These rates apply only to those people who buy individual and family insurance policies on their own. So these are the folks who don't have employer-based insurance, Medicare or Medi-Cal. And we know statewide there are 1.2 million Californians who this year signed up for these these policies through the state-run insurance marketplace called, "Covered California." We also know that most of them are getting subsidies to offset the cost of their monthly premiums. But then there are others who didn't buy through the marketplace because they earn too much to get subsidies, and they pay full retail for their premiums. So news of only modest increases in next year's premiums is going to be most welcomed by them.
And the news this week is notable because it's reversed a trend of often huge premium price hikes in this market, right?
Right. Before passage of the Affordable Care Act, rates in the individual market were extremely volatile. It wasn't uncommon for companies to raise rates by 30 percent from one year to the next. In fact, Anthem Blue Cross had announced a 39 percent rate hike just as Congress was debating the federal health bill, and many health policy experts believe that played a key role in Congress voting to pass the Affordable Care Act.
So statewide, Californians can expect to see an average increase of 4.2 percent, but what does that mean for any particular person?
Not a whole lot. Essentially, if you buy one of these policies, the premium you'll pay will vary based on number of factors. They include your age, which one of the state's 19 pricing regions you live in, the amount and type of coverage you buy, and which insurance company you buy it from. So, for instance, in parts of L.A. County that show an overall 4.3 percent increase in plans, you'll see Anthem Blue Cross charging as much 16 percent more for one of its plans, while in that same region, Kaiser will charging 14 percent less for one of its plans.
But the great news, even if you're in a plan that will have a big hike in monthly premiums, is that you now have time to shop, compare and switch out of the plan or change insurance companies when the next open enrollment period rolls around.
And when is open enrollment?
It starts on November 15th of this year and ends next February 15th.
Navajo leaders divided on Grand Canyon development plan
Developers are negotiating with the Navajo Nation to build a $150 million tourist destination on the eastern edge of the Grand Canyon. But Navajo leaders are divided over whether to allow desperately needed economic development on a place many believe to be sacred.
Reporter Laurel Morales has the second in her series.
How dangerous is driving under the influence of marijuana?
The question of driving stoned was taken up by a committee in the House of Representatives this week, a response to the changing landscape in marijuana law across the country.
More than 20 states have legalized the drug in some form and last weekend the New York Times editorial board endorsed an end to pot prohibition. So how will all this affect the safety of the road?
Dr. Marilyn Huestis, a senior investigator at the National Institute on Drug Abuse said current research shows drivers using cannabis are at twice the risk of getting into an accident or a fatal accident.
That's less than for alcohol, which gives an individual an eight or nine times greater risk, but it is a strong correlation.
"The higher the concentration of THC, the primary psychoactive compound in cannabis, just like the higher the amount of ethanol you have for an alcohol test, the greater the odds," said Huestis.
Depending on the frequency with which the user takes cannabis, the effects can be milder or more pronounced, according to Huestis. Habitual users of marijuana will become more tolerant and less affected than others who use the drug infrequently. But it will still affect things like decision-making and peripheral vision.
'Alive Inside' doc shows how music can combat Alzheimers and dementia
It's rare that within the opening minutes of a documentary you can make an audience gasp, laugh and cry. But that's exactly what might happen if you go see "Alive Inside," a new film that won the audience award at Sundance and had its audience riveted.
The documentary, filmed over a series of years, follows a social worker on his quest to give life and humanity back to nation's elders who are living out their days in sterile, institutional nursing homes.
Many have dementia or Alzheimers, most are forgotten and rarely get a visitor. Filmmaker Michael Rossato-Bennett lets his images do the most powerful talking as viewers see elder after elder spark awake when a pair of headphones with their favorite old-time songs are placed over their ears.
We talked to Rossato-Bennett and Cohen more about the film, and what they hope will come out of it.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS:
Rossato-Bennett on how the inspiration for the film began:
"I never intended to make this film. There was a foundation, the Shelly and Donald Rubin Foundation, and they had just given Dan a grant. One of their employees asked me to do a website, and Dan apparently wanted video in the website. So, it was just a job. I was so moved by what I experienced that it took hold of me. When I saw what happened, when Dan and his people gave music, specifically to Henry, a 94-year-old man who was completely checked out, it just stunned me in a physical way."
It's kind of like a discovery, that music "wakes people up." Can you talk about that, Michael?
"Music therapists have known for 50 years that music is incredibly powerful, and it can reach people with dementia. What Dan was doing was novel, was absolutely personalizing it, like seeking the music that was the most important to these people when they were really young."
It looked like you were giving them a shot of a recreational drug, and they were awake. How did you come to this? Did you just one day put some headphones on someone in a nursing home and see them wake up?
Dan Cohen: "I'm a social worker, but I spent most of my life in technology companies, and in 2006, on the radio I heard a journalist talking about how iPods were ubiquitous, they're everywhere, and I thought, well, all the teenagers have them and a lot of us adults, but nursing homes? And if I'm ever in a nursing home, am I going to have access to my favorite '60s music? So I Googled 'iPods and nursing homes,' and even though there are 16,000 nursing homes in the U.S. alone, I couldn't find one that was using iPods for their residents. I live in Long Island, I called up my local public facility nursing home, and I said 'I know music's already your number one recreational activity. You have live music, you have a lot of group music, but can we see if there's any added value if we were to totally personalize the music?' So they said, 'Sure' and I came in with my laptop and some iPods and it was just an instant hit."
It's an unusual strategy because Michael, as you show in the film, most often people in nursing homes are just medicated.
"Oh my god, yeah. It's an institutional setting, so if somebody kind of isn't happy and is unable to communicate, they really have very few options, and maybe they start screaming or maybe they start thrashing around. So what does the staff do? They're understaffed, they don't have time, they just write on the chart, 'This person needs something to calm them down.' Right now, 20 percent of people in nursing homes in America are on one form of antipsychotic or another. The problem is, first of all, these drugs are incredibly powerful and yet they're massively overprescribed. The U.S. government right now is even trying to reduce the use in nursing homes. Coler Goldwater is a large nursing home in New York City, did a study over three years where they gave personalized music to their residents, and they were able to reduce the use of antipsychotics in their facility from 38 percent to 13 percent."
Have you been able to, since the film came out, been able to get more support for getting this personal music system?
DC: "Absolutely, as families and nursing home administrators and government officials see the film, they want to apply it. They are open to this, and it's happening. In the state of Wisconsin, they just announced they were going to increase the number from 100 to 250 nursing homes. They're going to put it in all the nursing homes, and all the assisted living facilities in the state. Utah is replicating that, and Missouri and Alabama and Ohio are all queued up to do this. The Henry clip certainly was a pivotal moment in that sort of inflection.
New app shows STD test results to possible partners
In the world of romance, online dating services have given way to apps that you use on your smartphone. They've made it even easier to connect with potential partners. And, that has increased the risk of getting a sexually transmitted disease.
KPCC's Rebecca Plevin reports on new technologies designed to keep those romantic encounters safe.
Kodak negotiating deal with studios to bring movie film back
The production of traditional movie film has decreased tremendously for Kodak since the rise of digital technology. As more and more studios shifted to digital video, the company's sales plummeted in the last seven years.
But now a number of major directors, including Quentin Tarantino and J.J. Abrams and Christopher Nolan, have come together to help bring movie film back.
Wall Street Journal reporter Ben Fritz has been writing about this and he joins Take Two to talk more about the plan.
Writer/director James Gunn on Marvel's 'Guardians of the Galaxy'
Marvel's latest offering, "Guardians of the Galaxy" is arguable the biggest action movie of the summer. It grossed $11 million dollars on opening night, and it's expected to hit $100 million by the end of the weekend.
It follows a group of protagonists, including Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper), as they are being chased after stealing a planet destroying orb.
"Guardians of the Galaxy" trailer
The film's one of Marvel's lesser known franchises, so writer/director James Gunn had to flex his creative muscle to make it appealing to summer movie going audiences.
"I don't wanna work hard to make anybody like any character. I think the only way that you can make someone like a character is to make that character as real as possible and as truly complex as possible," James Gunn told A Martinez in a recent interview at his house in Los Angeles.
In the interview, Gunn also talks to Martinez about how obsessive Vin Diesel was about his lines, how he settled on Chris Pratt after refusing to work with him for the longest time and what it's like having to wait all weekend to find out how his movie does.