In his forthcoming book, Seek Higher Ground: The Natural Solution to Our Urgent Flooding Crisis, Tim Palmer lays out the history and legacy in the US and explores the reality of worsening flood risks and impacts in light of the climate crisis. Host Sara Gabler welcomes Tim on this flooding episode of A Public Affair. Sara and Tim are also joined by  two representatives of the Coon Creek Community Watershed Council, a conservation non-profit based in Coon Valley, Wisconsin. 

Together they offer both a nation-wide and Southern Wisconsin specific perspective on the impact of flooding, the importance of understanding your flood risk, and the value of community efforts toward flood mitigation.

Tim Palmer is photographer, writer, and former land-use planner. He is the author of more than thirty books, and we’ll be discussing his last book, published this month by the University of California Press, called Seek Higher Ground: The Natural Solution to Our Urgent Flooding Crisis. Among many honors for his work and his books, he has received a Conservation Achievement Award from the National Wildlife Federation, the Ansel Adams Award for Photography from the Sierra Club, the Lifetime Achievement Award from American Rivers, and the National Outdoor Book Award.

The Coon Creek Community Watershed Council is a non-profit based in southern Wisconsin. Its mission is to continue the historic legacy of conservation leadership in the Coon Creek Watershed as stewards of the land, water, and air.

Nancy Wedwick is an educator, lawyer, organizer, grandparent, fifth generation Coon Valley resident, and president of the Coon Creek Community Watershed Council, a nonprofit she and her neighbors formed in response to increasingly severe flooding in their region. While generating flood resilience may be one of the Council’s immediate goals, Nancy ultimately sees her work as part of a movement to build collaborations within and across watersheds, and to imagine a safer and more sustainable future for her community. She is passionate about enhancing watershed literacy by nurturing the relationships linking people to each other and to the lands and waters they share.

Sydney Widell is the council’s Watershed Coordinator. She began collaborating with the council as a masters student at UW-Madison.

 

Photo by jim gade on Unsplash of Odana road in Madison in August 2018

 

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On today’s special A Public Affair we talk about three films coming to the Wisconsin Film Festival

We kick off the show with a conversation about Goodbye Julia with actress Siran Riak who plays the title character. Goodbye Julia is the debut film by Sudanese filmmaker Mohamed Kordofani, and tells the story of an unlikely friendship between a North Sudanese housewife and a South Sudanese maid. The film will have 2 showings at the Wisconsin Film Festival: Saturday, Apr 6th, 11:00 AM at Chazen Museum of Art and Monday, Apr 8th, 11:30 AM at Flix Brewhouse.

Then, we talk with Angels of Dirt creator and director Wendy Schneider. The movie charts the life and career of Flat Track racer Charlotte Kainz, who tragically died at the age of 20. Angels of Dirt is having it’s Wisconsin premiere on Sunday, April 7th at  7:00 PM at the Barrymore Theatre.

We finish our Film Fest preview with One With the Whale co-director Peter Chelkowski. One With the Whale follows one  Alaskan family’s struggle to find a way to live with Ancient Indigenous values, feed themselves despite the global climate crisis, and grapple with the cruel reality of social media. The film is showing in Madison on Friday, April 5th at 6:00 PM at Music Hall.

In the final 10 minutes, Esty Dinur talks with Halah Ahmad about the Uninstructed Campaign and the Listen to Wisconsin effort. Listen to Wisconsin is a grassroots effort to represent Wisconsin voters’ demands for a ceasefire and serious efforts towards peace in Gaza by voting in the Democratic Presidential Primary for an “Uninstructed Delegation” on Tuesday, April 2nd.

 

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How do we understand the contemporary global role of the US, the once reigning imperial superpower? Where might things be headed? These are the questions host Allen Ruff asks global historian Alfred McCoy on today’s A Public Affair. They talk in part about a recent McCoy wrote for Tom Dispatch “The American Empire in (Ultimate?) Crisis.”

Profressor McCoy will be moderating a panel discussion titled “Soldiers in Revolt” on Tuesday, April 2nd at the Wisconsin Historical Society Auditorium from 5pm to 7pm.

 

Alfred W. McCoy is the Harrington professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the author of In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of US Global Power. His newest book is To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change (Dispatch Books).

Photo by Stéphan Valentin on Unsplash

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There are two referendums relating to the election process on the April 2nd ballot. If they are passed by voters, they would immediately amend the Wisconsin Constitution. Voters will see more referendums in August and November. They are part of an increasing reliance of ballot referendums by state Republicans to make constitutional changes and propel a conservative agenda. 

Today’s guest, journalist Jack Kelly tells host Jessa Nicholson Goetz that historically referendums were either government functions or very classically Wisconsin things. “Some of the previous amendments that we’ve seen were changing things about the way that fees were collected, or codifying the right to hunt and fish.” He goes on to say, “the amendments that we see now are rooted in policy arguments and policy disputes between the Republican controlled legislature and Governor Evers.”

Jack Kelly is the statehouse reporter at Wisconsin Watch. He previously was a Wisconsin Watch contributing reporter on judicial and environmental issues and covered the statehouse for the Capital Times. He has a bachelor’s degree from UW-Madison and a master’s degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.

Photo by Chali Pittman for WORT News

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In his just released book Barons: Money, Power, and the Corruption of America’s Food Industry, author Austin Frerick tells the story of the corporate titans who own most of our food and how that impacts the rest of us. On his publication day, Frerick joins host Bert Zipperer to talk about the companies, people, and policies behind the food industry. We also hear from a number of listeners with questions about the rapid changes in the food market.

Austin Frerick will be at Leopold’s (1301 Regent St, Madison) on Tuesday, April 2nd at 6pm for a book talk and signing in collaboration with the Wisconsin Farmer Union.

Austin Frerick is an expert on agricultural and antitrust policy. He is a Fellow of the Thurman Arnold Project at Yale University. He also serves on the Board of Directors for Common Good Iowa and the Socially Responsible Agriculture Project. In 2022, The Advocate named him a “Champion of Pride.” He has advised presidential candidates Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, and Pete Buttigieg on agricultural policy, and served as Co-Chair of the Biden campaign’s Agriculture Antitrust Policy Committee in 2020.

His writing has featured in Vox, The American Conservative, Buzzfeed News, Fast Company, and Forbes, among many other publications.

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Throw this archived show on your speakers or in the car with your kids or grandkids while they are home this spring break!

On this A Public Affair: Spring Break episode, Douglas Haynes is joined by two very special cohosts–his daughters! The show kicks off a handful songs from the King of Kids Music David Landau. You can check out David’s new and improved YouTube channel here.

Then, we hear about what is happening at the Madison Children’s Museum with Kia Karlen and Brenda Baker. They are open everyday this week and have free admission on Thursday evening. They also tell us about their upcoming programing that offers age appropriate activities around climate change.

Wrapping up the show, we talk with Tammy Ocampo from the Madison Public Library about the We Read Spring Break programing and the We Read Youth Voices Writing Contest.

Bye-Bye Sweetie-Pie by David Landau plays us out.

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This week, the US drafted a new UN security council resolution calling for an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza tied to the release of hostages. That’s as a UN panel of experts is warning that a catastrophic famine there is imminent – and that up to half a million Palestinians will perish from war and famine if the conflict continues unabated.

Activist and author Ralph Nader argues that already, there are likely many more Palestinians killed in the conflict that mass media or governments have let on. In a recent post on his website, Nader argues that based on on-the-ground-accounts and photo and video documentation, a more likely appraisal of Palestinians killed so far is more likely to number in the hundreds of thousands.  He joins host Esty Dinur to talk why he thinks deaths in Gaza are being drastically underreported.

Read Ralph Nader’s webpost, “Stop the Worsening UNDERCOUNT of Palestinian Casualties in Gaza,” here.

About the guest: 

Ralph Nader is an author, attorney, consumer advocate and corporate critic. His 1965 book Unsafe at Any Speed propelled the passage of the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act, which enacted safety standards for automobiles. He has run for president four times.

Photo courtesy @mjb on Flickr. 

 

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Our guest today argues that we’re all operating under the biased rules of capitalism – so much that we might forget to step back and take stock of the situation.

Marjorie Kelly is the author of Wealth Supremacy: How the Extractive Economy and the Biased Rules of Capitalism Drive Today’s Crises (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, September 2023). The manifesto seeks to debunk myths and norms implicit in our capitalist way of life – among them, the myths that that there’s no end to wealth, that expanding capital is the most important goal, and that material gain comes at all other social or environmental expense.

Marjorie Kelly joins host Esty Dinur to talk about the dangers of an extractive economy, and how it is at the root of everything from the climate crisis to the corruption of democracy. Together, Kelly and Dinur envision what a non-extractive economic structure might look like.

About the guest: 

Marjorie Kelly is Distinguished Senior Fellow at The Democracy Collaborative, a national research and development lab for a democratic economy. Her previous books include The Making of a Democratic Economy (co-authored with Ted Howard), Owning Our Future: The Emerging Ownership Revolution, and The Divine Right of Capital. 

Kelly was previously a Fellow at the Tellus Institute, a nonprofit that researches environmental and social issues, where she cofounded an initiative to envision and advocate enterprise and financial designs that integrate social, environmental, and financial aims.

She was cofounder and for 20 years president of Business Ethics magazine. You can find more about her at her website, marjoriekelly.org, and follow her on Twitter at @marjorie_kelly.

Image courtesy Berrett-Koehler Publisher

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In her latest book, Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia author Kate Manne uses intimate stories and sharp analysis to explain why anti-fatness has become a vital social justice issue. She joins host Richelle Wilson on today’s A Public Affair to discuss the harms caused by both blatant and subtle fatphobia.

“Between two thirds and three quarters of us by some measures are fat; and yet, we often regard ourselves as really a thin person waiting to emerge victorious after the next diet or exercise program,” Manne tells us. The feminist moral philosopher goes on to say that because of this perception, we don’t stand together in solidarity, instead  “we try to change ourselves rather than work on changing the systemic oppression that I argue is really what’s plaguing us.”

Kate Manne is an associate professor of philosophy at Cornell University, where she’s been teaching since 2013. Before that, she was a junior fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows. Manne did her graduate work in philosophy at MIT. Her previous books are Down Girl and Entitled.

Photo by Diana Polekhina on Unsplash

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On today’s two-part show, host Jade Iseri-Ramos chats with Sarah Quinn, Academic and Career Planning Coordinator at West High School, about a pilot program happening on April 4th. The first annual Equity Symposium will bring 50 presenters into the school to discuss a wide-range of equity topics. Sarah explains the behind the scenes work behind the event and what she hopes students will get out of it.

Then, Sue Jennik, Program Director of the Dane County League of Women Voters and chair of the Wisconsin League of Women Voters Legislative Committee, comes down to the station to talk about two proposed constitutional amendments on the April ballot. Sue explains why the League is advocating for a no vote.

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

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