The Ohio state legislature, in a vaguely-worded bill, is proposing funding nuclear “reactor farms” using experimental technology capable of producing prodigious amounts of radioactive waste… according to Terry Lodge, attorney for the Toledo Coalition for Safe Energy. That group, along with a consortium of 56 safe energy organizations (including Beyond Nuclear in Wisconsin), are working to halt this project.

Today on the Tuesday 8:00 Buzz with guest host Stan Woodard (in exile)…

Prison reform activist Isabelle Martinez joins to talk about the prison industrial complex, and University of Wisconsin’s relationship with Badger State Industries and the prison labor used to build its furniture. Sign the petition to divest UW from prison labor at BSI.

Community Power Building Director Mankher Dahnweih, and Community Power Building Lead Jewel Adams from Freedom, Inc talking about working in the Dane County Jail, coaching people after domestic violence and drug addiction helping people recover. Volunteer to help Freedom, Inc support people in recovery.

Photo by Ken Fager on Twitter

With live performances and gatherings too risky, many arts organizations have had to make artistic lemonade out of pandemic lemons.  Normally, around this time, the Madison Ballet would be gearing up for one of their most popular annual events, the Ballet’s seasonal production of Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet, the Nutcracker Suite.  With a full production impossible, the Ballet company got creative and is offering a series of virtual Nutcracker Master Classes through Sunday December 20th.  Madison Ballet School Director Rachelle Fochs, will teach a December 13th class on the Snowflake dance.  Madison native and professional dancer and choreographer Zachary Guthier will conduct a master class on the Waltz of the Flowers on December 20th.  Rachelle and Zachary joined Monday Buzz host Brian Standing on December 7, 2020.

Pandemic or no, the Madison / Dane County real estate market is hot.  According to recent real estate sales, the median home price rose to $311,000 in November of 2020.  Meanwhile rents have skyrocketed by 23% over the last five years, well more than the pace of inflation. There are more buyers than sellers in Dane County, and that’s pushing buyers into neighborhoods like Madison’s North Side that have traditionally been bastions of affordable housing.  On Wednesday, December 9th the North Side Planning Council sponsors a virtual talk by Olivia Williams, the new executive director of the Madison Area Community Land Trust and member of the Dane County Affordable Housing Action Alliance.  Williams will discuss how land trusts and other tools can help resist gentrification.

Even as the nation saw an unprecedented drop in driving at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Wisconsin recorded a significant increase in fatal car crashes and crash fatalities during the initial months of the crisis. Here to talk about a recent research report from the Wisconsin Policy Forum entitled “Alcohol, Speeding Deaths Fuel Increase in Crash Fatalities,” is the organization’s communications director and policy researcher Mark Sommerhauser.

Photo by Gabriel Meinert on Unsplash

647 individuals in the U.S. have amassed almost a trillion dollars during the pandemic, at the same time as millions of Americans have struggled to make ends meet. Researcher for the Program on Inequality and the Common Good, Omar Ocampo, recently authored an article “Billionaire Wealth vs. Community Health” where he discusses Trump’s bailout dollars being distributed to private equity groups, and how the needs of the pandemic have created new billionaires this year.

Despite promises to “drain the swamp”, the Trump administration has appointed lobbyists, private executives, and many with corporate interests. Max Moran and the Revolving Door Project investigate Executive Branch appointees and candidates to try to determine their personal interests and look to those who actually want to serve the public good. Today he talks with Jan Miyasaki about his recent article “Biden’s cabinet could do a lot – if he resists the urge to fill it with ‘consensus’ picks“, Biden-announced appointees, and suggests qualifications for those who may best serve as IRS executives, anti-trust leaders, and other positions of importance in the new Executive Branch.

“Justice is not in the courtroom, but in the ways in which we acknowledge the legacies of the violated”. Laura Levitt, Professor of Religion, Jewish Studies, and Gender at Temple University has written on Holocaust victims’ issues, and in her latest book “The Objects that Remain”, writes about the recovery process of those who have been involved in individual attacks of violence of a more personal nature.

Today on the Tuesday 8:00 Buzz with Damita Brown (in exile)…

Allison Bell Bern from Allies for Black Lives joins to talk about what it means to be an ally and what we can do right here in Madison to support anti-racist efforts and the Movement for Black Lives.

In the second half, Adam W McKinney from DNAWORKS joins to talk about their current exhibition, “Fort Worth Lynching Tour: Honoring the Memory of Mr Fred Rouse,” social justice activism and community building using dance and current tour working to support healing our community.

Photo by Ken Fager on Flickr

Despite the sitting President’s desperate and unfounded denials of the election results, presumptive President-elect Joe Biden has started assembling his transition team and has begun the process of laying out an agenda for his first term.  Among his first announcements, Biden has tabbed former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry as his Special International Envoy on Climate Change.  The very fact that Biden plans on re-establishing the position of climate envoy seems to indicate, as Biden promised during the campaign, that climate change will re-emerge as a focal issue for the new Administration.  On the other hand, Biden’s campaign promises in support of fracking, and his longstanding corporate ties have many environmentalists nervous.  University of Washington geoscientist and environmental author Scott L. Montgomery joined Monday Buzz host Brian Standing on November 30, 2020.

(Photo of Joe Biden by Gage Skidmore)