8 O'Clock Buzz

Based on a national report from the Kaiser Foundation, Black and Hispanic people are nearly two and a half times more likely to die from COVID-19 than white Americans. Across the country, people of color bear a disproportionate share of the burden of the coronavirus pandemic.

Abubakarr Jalloh is an assistant professor of public health at Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia where he researches social determinants of health, health disparities, and multicultural health within the context of global health. He is a certified international civil servant by the United Nations (U.N.). He joins WORT Buzz host Brian Standing to talk about this disparity.

Feature photo courtesy: Martin Sanchez / Unsplash

Thumbnail photo courtesy: Hollins University

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Jared A. Ball, professor of communication and Africana studies at Morgan State University, author of “The Myth and Propaganda of Black Buying Power” and host of the podcast iMiXWHATiLIKE! spends a half hour talking to Jan about Martin Luther King, what the media cherry-picks to remember him by, omitting many of his more radical teachings about wealth, the military, Cuba, and more, which branded MLK as a threat to status quo in the 60’s (and now!)

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“A wealth tax of 2% on the world’s millionaires, 3% on those with wealth above $50 million and 5% on the worlds billionaires would raise $2.52 trillion dollars annually. This would be enough to lift 2.3 billion people out of poverty, make enough vaccines for the whole world, and deliver universal health care and social protection for all the citizens of low and lower middle-income countries (3.6 billion people).”

Fight Inequality Alliance, Institute for Policy Studies, Oxfam, and Patriotic Millionaires joined forced on a new report, “Taxing Extreme Wealth”, co-authored by Omar Ocampo and Chuck Collin, with their report revealing, for each the top 44 countries, the wealthiest individuals, and what such a tax could accomplish. Omar Ocampo joins Jan Miyasaki in the discussion.

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Today on the Tuesday 8:00 Buzz with Dr. Damita Brown, Rána Roman and Director Brent Hazelton join us from the Milwaukee Chamber Theatre join us to talk about their upcoming presentation of MALA by Melinda Lopez, a darkly funny tale about what it means to put our loved ones first as a daughter confronts and struggles with her mother’s aging.

Tickets and More on MALA and Milwaukee Chamber Theatre: https://www.milwaukeechambertheatre.org/mala

More on Melinda Lopez: https://www.melindalopez.com/ 

Provided Photos

Brent Hazelton (Director) Prior to joining Milwaukee Chamber Theatre as Artistic Director, Whitewater native Brent Hazelton spent 20 seasons at Milwaukee Repertory Theater, including ten as Associate Artistic Director. From 2003 to 2010, he expanded The Rep’s Artistic Internship Program into one of regional theater’s premier professional transition programs, and from 2011 to 2019 built and led the John (Jack) D. Lewis New Play Development program, including supervising the development of nearly two dozen commissioned and world premiere plays. Artistically at The Rep, Brent wrote and directed LIBERACE!, conceived the premiere and 2019 installments of REP LAB, directed SONG MAN DANCE MAN, HOW THE WORLD BEGAN, THE WHIPPING MAN, the final installment of the Hanreddy/Morgan A CHRISTMAS CAROL, MCGUIRE, OUR TOWN, and GUARDS AT THE TAJ. Three of those productions set all-time Rep sales records, and he remains one of only three directors to have staged productions in all four of The Rep’s current venues. He directed MCT’s 20/21 virtual production of UNDERNEATH THE LINTEL, is thrilled to make his in-person MCT directing debut with MALA, and will also direct INDECENT coming up in MCT’s 21/22 season. A proud co-founder of the Milwaukee Black Theater Festival, Brent serves on the MBTF Leadership Committee. As an institutional leader, he is eager to explore how a regional theater can speak directly to the experience of its community and include everyone who chooses to call it home in that conversation.

Rána Roman (MALA) is a Milwaukee native and a proud graduate of the Milwaukee H.S. of the Arts. She is honored to be back at MCT bringing this beautiful story to life. Rána’s previous collaborations with MCT include VANYA AND SONYA AND MASHA AND SPIKE (Cassandra) and LEND ME A TENOR (Maria). Most recently she was seen reprising her role as Mrs. Cratchit in A CHRISTMAS CAROL at the Milwaukee Rep. In the world that was before, Rána had the pleasure of performing in KISS ME KATE (Lily/Kate) at Skylight Music Theatre, ON THE WINGS OF A MARIPOSA (Mámi) at First Stage, and in LIFE SUCKS (Ella) at Forward Theater of Madison, where she is also a BIOGRAPHIES c o n t. 8 Milwaukee Chamber Theatre member of the Advisory Company. She is deeply grateful for all the hard work and compassion that has gone into getting our doors open again. Thank you all, for taking care of yourselves and in turn taking care of us all. Through our stories, life goes on. This performance is dedicated to my incredible mother, Sara. You made Me.

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Today on the Tuesday 8:00 Buzz with Dr. Damita Brown, Randy Coloni from Save the Farm joins us to talk about their efforts to preserve the Voit Farm on Milwaukee Street as a community asset, preserve Starkweather Creek, and guard it from gentrification and rampant commercial development, in the face of it’s pending sale.

More on Save the Farm: https://www.savethefarm.net/

Listen in Madison at 89.9FM or online anywhere at wortfm.org.  Support your community radio with a donation online at wortfm.org!

Provided Photo

Randy Coloni is joyfully retired after many years working in the State Medicaid program, then as Director of research grants related to healthcare for indigent and high risk populations in Ucare HMO, and in a grand finale, as a helpful hardware person at a local hardware store! A longtime eastsider, he now actively volunteers, delivering food to families in need through Thea’s Table, participating in the time banking and mutual aid networks in Madison, and through the SavetheFarm group, advocating to see the 64 acre Voit Farm property become a model diverse, sustainable, affordable neighborhood, designed with meaningful input from the local community.

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In the late 1980’s Houston’s hip-hop scene went national when the Geto Boys began blasting their intense tracks. The success brought attention to the band’s work but it also cast a spotlight on one of the member’s disability. Bushwick Bill was born with dwarfism and is one of the few visibly disabled musicians to become famous and to address disability in his work. In fact, he put it right in the foreground.

That’s the subject of Charles Hughes‘ recent book, Why Bushwick Bill Matters (2021, University of Texas Press). Eight O’Clock Buzz sub host Andy Moore is in conversation with Hughes about the complicated symbolism of Bushwick Bill.

Hughes is Director of the Lynne and Henry Turley Memphis Center at Rhodes College and author of several works, including Country Soul: Making Music and Making Race in the American South (2015). He received his PhD in US History from UW-Madison in 2012, and is currently at work about the history of African-Americans in professional wrestling.

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While headlines are starting to include words like “peak” when it comes to the Omicron variant, well, that’s not happening in Dane County. Here in Madison your chances of testing COVID positive remain about 1-in-4. The virus has once again shown who’s in control over what we do…if we want to do it safely.

In the local music community live shows have been canceled and / or rescheduled this month. Many shows are staying on the books, too, but protocols at clubs are changing, tightening, and venue owners hope for the best and adjust, often reducing total crowd capacity…just like in the bad old days.

Earlier this week, Andy Moore did some reporting for arts and culture outlet Tone Madison on how small venues are coping with the latest crunch of COVID-19. This morning on the Buzz, he’s in conversation with two people who were kind enough to participate in that story and for whom these stakes are very high: Brennan Nardi, owner of Madison’s Harmony Bar, and Toffer Christensen, promoter and booker for the Bur Oak.

Photo courtesy Andy Moore/Tone Madison

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Right when we needed a little shot in the arm of something good, mother nature delivered. Did you see Lake Monona the first half of this week? Better yet, did you skate on Lake Monona? It was five miles of glass. It wasn’t the earliest freeze on record but it was the most beautiful. Or was it? What, scientifically speaking, needs to happen for ice this perfect? Or is this once in a lifetime?

Well for more, guest host Andy Moore spoke with the definitely-real and not-at-all made up “Dr. Frank Peppin” from the “Beloit Oceanographic Institute.”

Photo courtesy katie wheeler on flickr, licensed under a Creative Commons noncommercial license.

The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this production are fictitious. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased) or institutes (located in Beloit or elsewhere) are intended or should be inferred. No Culvers were eaten in the making of this segment.

After several attempts to flee Afghanistan after the U. S. pulled out of that country, Basir Bita and his family finally managed to flee to Pakistan and then to Canada. Bita was a civil society activist and leader of the Afghanistan Youth Peace Volunteers, and speaks about the current political and living conditions in Afghanistan, where human trafficking, food insecurity, lack of sanitary conditions, wholesale lack of medicine and healthcare have become a way of life since the U. S. left the country in August.

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Born out of a penny donation fund to pay the bail of Vietnam war protestors in 1971 and deciding what to do with the leftover $300 at the end of the year, the Community Shares of Wisconsin (CSW) this year marks its 50th anniversary — now supporting social causes of over 70 community action organizations. This week, Jan invites three of the former and current leaders in CSW to talk about the history and current activities of the group in their silver anniversary year.

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