What would happen if the US government were to default?; Biggest roadblocks to Asian mental health may come from within; The Band's Robbie Robertson on the music that changed the world; Study shows anti-gay sentiment is underestimated; The struggle over Bitcoin's future; Sports Roundup: Dodgers must win, Puig under fire; App Chat: Guilt-free entertainment for your kids, plus much more.
What would happen if the US government were to default?
The U.S. government is still shut down, and the country may be at the brink of financial default.
The Treasury department says come Friday, it will not have enough cash on hand to pay the nation's bills. Everything from defense contract payments to veterans benefits and social security checks.
Joining us to break down what all this might actually mean is David Gura, Washington-based reporter for Marketplace.
Although a congressional deal to avoid default is in the offing, the fact that we are cutting it so close is leaving investors — and us, too, really — feeling a little sick.
Delia Fernandez, a certified financial planner and president of Fernandez Financial Advisory from Los Alamitos, joins the show with more.
Biggest roadblocks to Asian mental health may come from within
Asian Americans tend to seek mental health care less often than other groups, but that doesn't mean they're not suffering from mental illnesses.
In fact, many studies show that some parts of the Asian American population have the highest suicide rates in the country. KPCC's Jed Kim reports on some of the challenges in reaching them.
The Band's Robbie Robertson on the music that changed the world
The 1960s were arguably some of the most influential years for American folk rock. One of the most well-known acts from that time was The Band.
They've come out with a new box set of previously unreleased songs recorded live at The Academy of Music in New York in 1971. It includes arrangements by Allen Toussaint and a guest performance from Bob Dylan.
Included are songs like "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down."
But before they were The Band, they played for Bob Dylan as the Hawks. Dylan heard about the little-known folk Americana band through the grape vine. He liked their sound and he asked them to accompany him on a world tour in 1965.
Robbie Robertson, one of the founding members of The Band, joined Take Two recently to talk about what it was like to tour with Dylan.
"We played around the world and it was something that we didn't see coming," said Robertson. "But this was about to become a musical revolution and we got booed everywhere we played around the world."
Robbie also has a book that came out last week called "Legends, Icons and Rebels: Music That Changed The World." It's all about rock and roll from the '60s and '70s that has shaped what we listen to today.
Catch him signing copies of his book at the Barnes and Noble at The Grove.
Study shows anti-gay sentiment is underestimated
And now to a study... About studies.
You hear about opinion surveys all the time. Things like, "this percentage of Americans thinks same sex marriage should be legal," or "tThis percentage thinks one's sexuality is a choice, not something your born with."
But just how accurate are such surveys?
That's something Ohio State University economist Katie Coffman has been looking into and some of her results are rather surprising. Coffman and her colleagues ran an experiment to change how these sensitive questions were asked to get a more accurate result.
Their results show that people are more likely to say they're supportive of gay rights when they're asked directly - even if they might secretly feel otherwise. Their research tests what's known as the "social desirability bias", or telling people what we think they want to hear.
They gave respondents two different surveys like the ones listed below. One survey asked people to answer direct questions anonymously about their own sexuality and their attitudes towards homosexuality.
Another group of people were given the same questions, but in the form of statements. They were then asked to give the total number of answers that were true for them.
Questionnaire for Gay Sentiment Study
The results were surprising and economist Katie Coffman joins us to talk about it.
Former San Diego Mayor Bob Filner pleads guilty to felony false imprisonment
Former San Diego Mayor Bob Filner has been charged with one felony count of false imprisonment and two misdemeanor charges of battery. Host Alex Cohen checks in with KPBS reporter Mark Sauer.
Sports Roundup: Dodgers must win, Puig under fire and more
The Dodgers have been pushed to the edge, it's Hollywood vs. Midwest values and is the game of baseball facing a critical crossroads? This means it's time for sports with Andy and Brian Kamemetsky, who have covered sports for the ESPN and the L.A. Times.
The Dodgers must win today to stay alive in their series with the Cardinals. First pitch is this afternoon at 1 p.m. Is the warm California sun setting on the Dodgers season or is everyone heading back to the Gateway Arch home of toasted ravioli and gooey butter cake for a Game 6 on Friday?
Regardless of what happens today, this series has brought up some interesting cultural debates. Before the series began, legendary Washington Post columnist Thomas Boswell wrote:
"When the Dodgers meet the Cardinals on Friday with the Gateway Arch framed in center field to start the National League Championship Series, we'll see a clash of baseball worldviews and a collision of regional cultures, too. The Cards have always hugged Midwest virtues while the Dodgers loved movie stars in the box seats and star power on the field, but this year both teams are such extreme versions of their traditional selves it's just delicious.
Is he right? Are both teams extreme versions of their traditional selves and what does that mean?
I remember this same kind of argument when the Lakers and Boston Celtics play in the NBA Finals. In the sports reporting business, we look for juicy storylines but is city comparison and contrast always the flimsiest one?
Now to the touchier side of the debate because the Dodgers Yasiel Puig has ticked off members of the Cardinals with his...demonstrative style. Puig is emotional and does not hold back.
In game 3 he hit a ball to right field that he thought was a homerun, he raised his arms, styled a bit then started sprinting when he realized it was staying in the park. He wound up celebrating at 3rd base with a triple. Some Cardinals players complained that Puig doesn't know how to act on the field.
All season long, Puig has been at the center of a lot of anger thrown his way for the way he plays. Where do you think this anger comes from?
Singer Mark Anthony, born in NY East Harlem, was ripped for singing God Bless American during the MLB All Star Game. Some of the comments ranged from "Shouldn't an American be singing God Bless America?" OR "Why is a Mexican singing, doesn't he know this is America's song?" Earlier this year we spoke to ESPN reporter Pedro Gomez who got heat for interviewing Latin ballplayers in Spanish on the English broadcast. How much of all this do you think this has to do with race?
Brian you've been in plenty of locker rooms with Latin ball players, in your experience how trusting are these guys at being themselves around white America?
How much of this can be attributed to the unwritten rules of baseball?
Major League Baseball has been lagging way behind the NFL and NBA in terms of coolness with young sports fans and young people in general. Isn't this the kind of stuff that will keep it firmly behind the other two leagues in the hipness rankings?
MLB commissioner Bud Selig has said he will step down after next season. It feels like baseball is at a huge crossroads in how the sports will define itself going forward. Will it stay the same? Radically re-invent itself? It feels like there's a lot at stake doesn't it?
Even those outside the US are worried about the government shutdown
At this moment, lawmakers in Washington are reportedly close to making a deal to end the government shutdown.
At issue for the congressional Republicans at the center of this battle, is their determination to de-fund the Affordable Care Act. If no agreement is reached, the country will tomorrow default on $11 billion in debt, possibly sending the country and the world into economic chaos.
In today's New York Times, reporter Damien Cave took a global view on the crisis. He joins the show from Mexico City with more.
Using the shutdown as a teachable moment
There are very few silver linings to what's been going on in DC of late, except perhaps if you are a teacher.
The past few weeks has been filled with teachable moments for professors of political science and economics across the country. Dr. Raphael Bostic is a professor at the Price School of Public Policy at USC. He joins the show to talk about how he's teaching the shutdown.
App Chat: Guilt-free entertainment for your kids
This week on App Chat we profile apps that are good for the younger generation. Ciaran Blumenfeld, who writes for the site Momfluential, joins host Alex Cohen to share some her favorite apps for kids.
Recommended Apps:
Paper 53
Drawing app lets you create your own book anytime anywhere - can be printed too.
My Play Home
Virtual dollhouse
Minecraft Pocket Edition
A "lite version" of the game that is fun distraction.
Esme in Paris
Paper doll app that teaches (a smattering) of french vocabulary words as you play.
Moshi Monsters: Buster's Lost Moshling's
A hide and seek game with super cute characters.
The struggle over Bitcoin's future
There is a civil war going on inside the world of the Internet currency Bitcoin.
Its backers are fighting over the future of the online cash after one of its biggest shopping sites was busted this month for selling illegal drugs and other goods. For The California Report, Aarti Shahani reports.
Food, farms and delta water
This is part III in a 5-part piece series by Amy Quinton at Capital Public Radio. Read/hear part I and part II of the series here.
California's farms and ranches generated nearly $45 billion in revenue last year. Without water exported from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to arid Central Valley land, much of the produce we get in restaurants and grocery stores wouldn't come from California.
At Magpie Cafe in Sacramento, co-owner and Chef Ed Roehr sits down just as the lunch crowd is thinning. "Much of the food that we use probably comes from California," he says. "Stone fruit of varying kinds, earlier we had cherries, but now we're using black figs," says Roehr as he looks over the menu. "Some days 80 percent of our produce comes from California."
Joe Del Bosque knows the canals and pipelines that send the water south well. In Los Banos on the western side of the Central Valley, we hop on a packing truck as workers pick cantaloupes from his 120 acre field.
Del Bosque remembers what this area looked like before the federal Central Valley Project brought water to the valley.
“Just grazing land, that’s all it was, that would turn green for a few months in the spring and then dry the rest of the year," says Del Bosque, pointing to the dry golden foothills in the distance. "That’s what this was, without water that’s what this would look like just bare ground of short dry grass.”
Now, Del Bosque has 2,200 acres of farmland that he says is some of the most fertile you can find.
“I’m blessed to have so many options," says Del Bosque. "If I don’t want to grow cantaloupes, I can grow tomatoes, or I can grow asparagus, or almonds or peppers.”
This year though, he had to leave 300 acres fallow. The Central Valley Project cut water deliveries to 20 percent. He says he and other farmers thought they were headed into a great year because of an early wet winter.
“We weren’t able to take advantage of those high flows in the Sacramento River because there happen to be some smelt that were caught in the pumps," he says. "And it wasn’t just a shutdown of a day or two, it was 60 days.”
Farmers have had to adjust over the years, as the Endangered Species Act protected the Delta smelt and other threatened fish. The Westlands Water District estimated that 800,000 acre-feet of water was lost when pumping stopped. The dry months that followed made the situation worse.
“We’re trying to maintain the water that will sustain us, we’re not trying to take more," says Del Bosque. "But we’ve been cut back from 100 percent, to 20 percent, or 10 percent in 2009. We can’t be sustained by that.”
150 miles to the south, Rod Stiefvater walks through drip-irrigated pistachio orchards just outside of Bakersfield. He farms 8,000 acres, mostly in Kern County.
Kern County is the largest agricultural water user of the State Water Project. Agriculture accounts for a third of the county’s economy.
“Particularly in Kern County we are kind of ground zero where loss of water will affect our economy, our quality of life,” says Jim Beck, Kern County Water Agency General Manager. He says the criticism that “big ag” is taking Delta water is unfair.
“I spend a lot of time in Stockton and Sacramento explaining that I’m not out to take your water," says Beck. "We’re not trying to benefit our area to the detriment of another area, we’re trying to receive the benefits that we believe can be acquired without damaging other areas.”
He hopes the BDCP is the solution. He says on average Kern County receives about 60 percent of its contracted water. He doubts the BDCP will restore it all, but hopes it will make a difference and it should be important to the whole state.
"Kern County and the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley are among the most productive agricultural areas in the world, not just California or the United States, we’re talking about the world,” says Beck.
Farmers believe that could be at risk without an adequate water supply from the Delta.
He says the economics of water in California means fewer farmers plant lower-valued row crops such as cotton. Steifvater says without the Bay Delta Conservation Plan and its proposed tunnels, some crops will go.
“More than likely our allocations will continue to fall. And that will mean more and more drought years for us in terms of having adequate supply of water and it probably means the lower value crops that are grown here will disappear,” says Stiefvater.
Why some states decided to pay to keep National Parks open
Although the Senate's got a deal in place, the government is still shut down. It's not yet clear when things will be back in working order.
Three weeks in many federal services and agencies remain closed, but there are a few that have reopened. The federal government has said states who are willing to foot the bill can open up their National Parks.
Some states have jumped at the opportunity: New York has opened up the Statue of Liberty and Arizona is allowing visitors into the Grand Canyon.
But you might still want to hold off on taking that trip to Yosemite, as California said no to reopening its parks. To find out why some states are willing to pay, we're joined by Marina Koren, a staff correspondent at National Journal and wrote about this issue for The Atlantic.
Does Mexico's soccer team have a chance at the World Cup?
Last night Mexican soccer fans celebrated the victory of their rival U.S. team over Panama. That newfound enthusiasm for the U.S. team is not really a change of heart.
The win last night cleared the way for Mexico to move forward in their dreams of qualifying the World Cup. It's been a tough season for the Mexican team, known as El Tri.
The string of losses that have put World Cup dreams in doubt have been a major blow for a country where futbol is practically a national religion. Here to tell us more about what's ahead for soccer fans is Dave Denholm, who covers soccer for Fox Sports.
Jaime Jarrín: The voice of the Dodgers en español
Jaime Jarrín is the Spanish voice of the Dodgers, and like his colleague, Vin Scully, he's a Hall of Fame broadcaster who's been at it for a long time. Jarrín has been calling Dodger games on the radio for 55 years.
KPCC's Leslie Berestein Rojas spoke with the legendary broadcaster and discovered a few things fans may not know about him.