White House threatens to veto farm bill over food stamp cuts; Rep. Matsui reflects on her food stamp challenge; Are people still excited about Google Glass?; What's the difference between a geek and a nerd?; OC arts high school connects students to Hollywood; Sports Roundup: NBA Finals, Lebron James, Yasiel Puig and more, plus much more.
White House threatens to veto farm bill over food stamp cuts
The five-year, half-trillion dollar farm bill is currently in the House.
Last week, the Senate passed its version of the bill, meanwhile, the White House is threatening to veto the farm bill if cuts to the food stamp program run too deep.
For more on this, we're joined now by Michael Doyle of the McClatchy newspapers.
Rep. Matsui reflects on her food stamp challenge
One of the big sticking points in the farm bill debate is the food stamp program, which currently provides a government stipend to the poor to help them make ends meet.
That amounts to $4.50 a day, or $1.50 per meal.
On that kind of money, your breakfast is might be as simple as one boiled egg and a slice of dry toast. No butter. That's what was on the menu for California Congresswoman Doris Matsui from Sacramento.
She spent several days last week trying to understand what it was like to eat on food stamps, and what cuts to the program would mean.
Congresswoman Matsui joins the show to tell us about her experience.
Are people still excited about Google Glass?
Google Glass could be called: a wearable computer, the next wave of always-on engagement online, or to haters, ugly and invasive. At $1,500, however, it's not typically a toddler's play thing. But as some developers and tech writers try it out, they're giving their kids a go.
The result? Blurry pics of dad's face, walk-n-talk video, and a kind of native ease with a sometimes awkward product.
While it's pretty darn cute, it got us wondering if the mystique of Glass had worn off. Mat Honan is a senior writer at Wired and a father who dressed his toddler up in the new tech.
What's the difference between a geek and a nerd?
Do you know the difference between a geek and a nerd? Believe it or not, there has been plenty of discourse on this subject. Finally, science may be helping to shed some light on the debate.
Burr Settles, a specialist in machine learning systems, has analyzed Twitter feeds, looking for combinations of words that help define the difference between geeks and nerds.
For one, Settles defines them as such:
- Geek - An enthusiast of a particular topic or field. Geeks are “collection” oriented, gathering facts and mementos related to their subject of interest. They are obsessed with the newest, coolest, trendiest things that their subject has to offer.
- Nerd - A studious intellectual, although again of a particular topic or field. Nerds are “achievement” oriented, and focus their efforts on acquiring knowledge and skill over trivia and memorabilia.
Below is a graphic depicting the data he collected on nerds vs. geeks:
Interview Highlights:
On why he decided to take on this study:
"I remember having a lot of conversations in graduate school because a lot of us were both geeks and nerds on whether there was actually a difference and what that difference was. In those conversations, we kind of thought, that geeks were more enthusiasts who tended to collect things, like trivia or memorabilia about the particular subject that they're interested in. Whereas nerds were more intellectual students of that particular field or topic."
On how he conducted the experiment:
"It was based on actually a quote by John Rupert Firth, who is a linguist, who said 'you shall note a word by the company it keeps.' And so the idea is to be more empirical about words and see how they actually are used. Because the data is available from Twitter through a service that they provide, I downloaded a month's worth of tweets and looked for the one that had the word geek/nerd in it and computed a correlation score for all the other words, to see what kind of company the two words keep."
On what he found:
"The interesting thing was, rather than pitting the words geek and nerd against each other, I figured there were some words that were geeky and not nerdy, but some were both, some were neither. So I computed these scores for geek and nerd independently and created a Scattergraph where you can see words that were geeky but not nerdy, such as culture, or shiny or trendy. And words that were more nerdy or not geeky or things like biochemistry and neuroscience, Harvard and Oxford."
On what he's learned from doing this study:
"One thing is, they are not mutually exclusive. You can be both a geek and nerd and again, I think the data reinforces the conversations I had with my grad school friends. Words like collect and collection and collectible and original, those were all associated with geek. Terms like math, history, calculus. If you're an enthusiast about a topic, if you're kind of a collector, or aficionado that's more geeky. But if you're a practitioner or an expert on the theory, than that's more nerdy."
On how the terms have evolved over the years:
"I'm not a historical linguist - and it's a shame that we don't have Twitter going back three centuries to verify how these words have evolved over time. So really now, it's a snapshot of the here and now and how they use it. Both geek and nerd were insults in the middle part of the twentieth century and they've come into their own in positive terms now. Geek has gone from being a circus performer to being kind of a social outcast and now being something hip and trendy."
Fake border crossing as an amusement park attraction
An unusual amusement park attraction in the central Mexican state of Hidalgo offers visitors the thrills and chills of an illegal border crossing. The attraction takes visitors through a fake United States-Mexico border, complete with fake smugglers and fake threatening border patrol agents.
The aim is to dissuade would be migrants from making the trip. From the Fronteras Desk, Irina Zhorov reports.
The coyote, or smuggler, leading this simulated illegal border crossing used the name Simon and wore a face mask. Before setting off, he addressed his charges that evening, about 40 students from a private school in Mexico City.
"Tonight we’re going to talk about migration," Simon said in Spanish. "But for us it isn’t just something rhetorical, but rather the opposite. Because we have endured, we have suffered, of hunger, thirst, injustice, heat, cold, we have suffered from everything."
Then, under the cover of night, Simon herded them into the woods, toward the fake frontera.
The actual U.S.-Mexico border is nearly 800 miles away from the Parque EcoAlberto. EcoAlberto is where the indigenousHñaHñu community lives and where it runs a recreational park with attractions like hot springs, rappelling and, more recently, this fake border crossing for tourists.
For three hours or so this night, the tourist group endured sirens, dogs, chases, and the fake border patrol yelling threats.
Maribel Garcia works as an administrator for the Parque. She says the purpose of the Night Walk is simple.
"Our objective is to stop the immigration that exists amongst our citizens, principally from the state of Mexico to the U.S.," Garcia said in Spanish.
Garcia says traditionally this region subsisted on agriculture, but that wasn’t bringing the community what it needed.
"Because we didn’t have sewer systems, light, telephone, roads," she said.
So people went north. The HñaHñu community has lost, Garcia estimates, about 80 percent of its population to the U.S., mainly Arizona and Nevada. Garcia says it was the HñaHñu youth returning home after crossing the real border who thought up this tourist attraction as a way to create income for the community and encourage others to stay in Mexico.
Titi, who also works as a coyote on the Night Walks, was emphatic that it was not training for future generations.
"We try to help people so that they won’t leave," Titi said in Spanish. "It’s time to create some employment, to work with our own and regenerate everything, or at least what we can, even though it might be slow going."
The HñaHñu’s efforts are well timed. According to one estimate, for first time since the 1960s there is net-zero migration from Mexico to the U.S. Increased border patrol, stricter laws in the U.S., rising smuggling fees, violence in the desert, and the struggling U.S. economy are keeping more Mexicans at home, and even have some people returning to Mexico from the U.S.
Garcia, the administrator, is hoping the Night Walks convince youth in particular to put their energies into their home communities.
"The youth that already have something figured out, that already have something visualized for the future, they’re the youth that in that moment think, 'How difficult,'" she said.
The tours cost the equivalent of about $20. So the visitors are typically middle-class Mexicans or, like tonight, students from private schools — in other words, not the most likely group to attempt an illegal crossing into the U.S.
Still, there were some who had been thinking about it. Over tea and sweet breads at the end of the walk, Jazmin Arely Moreno Alcazar said she got the message.
"No, it’s not worth risking it because if we can’t stand a few hours, we won’t be able to stand days. Because it’s very ugly," Alcazar said in Spanish.
Alcazar and a friend said no longer was crossing illegally a consideration.
Garcia said it’s difficult to quantify how effective the tours are for other visitors. But as the Parque’s tourist offerings expand and the number of visitors grow, she said there is a new hope that enough money will come in to encourage more community members to stay put.
Sports Roundup: NBA Finals, Lebron James, Yasiel Puig and more
Time for our weekly romp through sports with Andy and Brian Kamenetzky, brothers who have covered sports for the L.A. Times and ESPN.
The NBA Finals game 6 was in Miami last night. The Spurs had a 10-point lead to start the fourth and final quarter. Lebron James and the Heat have their legacy on the line.
The Heat went on to win in overtime and force a winner take all game 7 tomorrow.
Three years ago when Lebron infamously made his nationally broadcast decision to as he said, take his talents to South Beach, the Heat threw a huge party complete with pyrotechnics a hydraulic stage.
Lebron James is one of the greatest players of all time. But if tomorrow the Spurs wind up champions, what will most of America be saying about Lebron?
The Clippers, who for decades have been the running joke of the sports world are now stepping up their relevancy.
The Major League Baseball All Star Game is in New York is a little less than a month from now. The Dodgers Cuban sensation Yasiel Puig has played a grand total of 13 games but he's hitting .479 with four home runs. Is this enough to make worthy of being an All-Star or should people just calm down a bit?
All-star Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw is upset over something that would make most people overjoyed.
American Olympian hurdler, now bobsledder, Lolo Jones is also upset over her check.
The Oakland A's have an awful ballpark from the inside out. They want to move, another California city wants them but why can't they leave?
Serena Williams is catching some heat over some comments attributed to her in Rolling Stone.
OC Register ad deal with local universities raises eyebrows
The Orange County Register has been praised for being one of the few newspapers in the country that's expanding in an industry that's contracting. But the reaction to one of the Register's latest additions has been met with some controversy.
Some say it's a smart way to bring in some much needed revenue, while others call it a serious breach of journalism ethics. KPCC's Ben Bergman explains.
LAUSD awards Apple $30 million contract to supply iPads in classrooms
If you have a child in LAUSD, you might soon find them coming home with an iPad. Yesterday, the school district awarded Apple with a $30 million contract; enough to provide each student with an iPad.
Sure iPads are cool, but how effective are they when it comes to teaching students?
OC arts high school connects students to Hollywood
Ever since 1910 when movie stars first began being identified by name, young hopefuls have dreamt of fame on the silver screen. More than 100 years later, the path to stardom has become more and more complex. KPCC reporter Mary Plummer reports on one group of aspiring young actors who have a leg up.
'Midnight in Mexico' details journalist's experience covering the drug war
Mexico's drug war has resulted in the death of more than 80,000 people in the last six years. It's a story that has proven dangerous to report , as journalist Alfredo Corchado learned.
Corchado joins the show to talk about his new book, "Midnight in Mexico: A Reporter's Journey through a Country's Descent into Darkness."
Activists worry that tighter border security will lead to more migrant deaths
Debate continues in the Senate over immigration reform, and hearings have begun across the Capitol in the House. Supporters of a comprehensive reform bill got a boost yesterday from the Congressional Budget Office.
It released a study showing the Senate immigration plan could shave almost a trillion dollars from the nation's deficit over the next two decades. That didn't seem to soften opposition, especially in the House.
Yesterday, House Speaker John Boehner said he wouldn't schedule a vote unless he had a majority of Republicans willing to support a plan. He talked about what has become a major sticking point in the debate.
Republicans want to tie any path to citizenship to an increase in security along the U.S.-Mexico border. Supporters of the Senate version of the bill, including Republican Marco Rubio, argue the plan already includes the toughest border security measures in U.S. history.
That's worrisome to some human rights activists who argue an already alarming number of deaths by migrants along the border will only increase with added security measures.
Kate Morgan-Olsen, a volunteer with the Tucson-based group, No More Deaths/No Mas Muertes, joins the show with more.
Developer, Council agree to shorter Hollywood Millennium towers
This week real estate developers made an unusual concession. Millennium Partners, creators of the controversial skyscraper project Hollywood Towers backed down to public pressure and agreed to reduce the height of two residential towers by 25 percent.
The revision will crop the east tower from 55 stories to 39 and the west tower will be cut from 45 to 35.
We find out why residents objected to the project and what it means for the new structure.
Chipotle begins labeling genetically modified menu ingredients
The Mexican-themed fast food chain Chipotle's has cooked up something new. No, not another burrito bowl, it's a new way of labeling its food products.
On its website, Chipotle has begun to mark which ingredients contain genetically-modified organisms, or GMOs. Other food chains have also made changes to their menu boards, including Starbucks , which is adding calorie information for its items nationwide.
Pat Crawford, director of the Dr. Robert C. And Veronica Atkins Center for Weight and Health at the University of California, Berkeley, joins the show with more.
Food companies focus on giving products a more natural look
Listing calorie counts and ingredients is parts of a larger move to help Americans become more conscious about what they're eating, but major food companies are trying to capitalize on another food trend: The homemade look.
McDonald's is jumping into the game with their new Egg White Delight McMuffin, which boasts an egg cooked right on a grill. Unlike their yolkier, perfectly round brethren in the original McMuffin, these lower-calorie versions have a looser shape, designed to make the breakfast treat look less processed.
Candice Choi of the Associated Press says the food industry's push to make products appear premium or natural is spurred by the current trend toward healthier eating among Americans. However, since the FDA doesn't have clear guidelines as to what constitutes "natural" people often don't know how to differentiate between something natural and something disguised as such.
"I think people don't really know what a natural food is, especially when you're walking around in a supermarket and everything's packaged….A lot of people just go a lot on sight," said Choi. "Companies understand that, so they're giving those visual cues saying this is a natural product."
Another example of this trend is that Domino's Pizza workers are instructed not to worry about making their new "Artisan Pizzas" perfect for a more rustic look. Kraft Foods took more than two years to develop its Carving Board lunch meat line look like leftovers from a homemade meal. The company developed a slicer that produces uneven, thicker pieces of turkey for the illusion that the meat was hand carved.
"Most people equate lunchmeat with a perfectly round cookie cutter slices, but Kraft's Carving Board turkey comes in these thick slabs and they're all different," said Choi. "There's no uniform shape, the edges are ragged and it really does look like something that somebody carved."
Does this focus on the physical appearance of food really entice consumers to buy? Choi says yes.
"I cover the industry and when I go to the supermarket I definitely go by those cues," said Choi. "I think it is more natural to reach for something that appears more wholesome."