Seeking Asylum at the US Border Is Getting More Difficult By the Day

Guest: Kari Hong, PhD, Associate Professor, Boston College Law School

As of Wednesday, the Trump Administration has agreements with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala aimed at making it harder for migrants to request asylum at the southern US border. These agreements require migrants who pass through another country on their way to the US to first apply for asylum in that other country. People traveling on foot from Central America will be most affected by these policies.

 

First It Burned Them, Then It Froze them. How an Asteroid Killed the Dinosaurs.

Guest: Sean Gulick, Research Professor at the University of Texas at Austin

You’ve heard that a massive asteroid caused the dinosaurs to go extinct. But how exactly? I’ve never understood why a giant rock crashing to Earth would kill all the dinosaurs. One asteroid couldn’t smash them all. What about the dinos on the other side of the planet –how does an asteroid kill them?

 

Mystery of “Skeleton Lake” in the Himalayas Deepens After DNA Analysis

Guest: Éadaoin Harney, PhD candidate in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University

There is a mysteriously creepy lake high in the Himalayas of India that has long puzzled archaeologists. The lake and its shore are frozen and snow-covered most of the time, but when they thaw, hundreds of bones surface. Hence the nickname “Skeleton Lake.” Who are these people? Is this a burial ground? Or was there some horrible massacre at the lake? New DNA analysis has offered some clues –but also deepened the mystery.

 

Breathing and Shaking Toward Recovery from Trauma

Guest: James S. Gordon, MD, professor of psychiatry and family medicine, Georgetown Medical School, author of “The Transformation: Discovering Wholeness and Healing after Trauma”

Overcoming the effects of a serious trauma might include medication and therapy. If you’re being treated by psychiatrist James Gordon, it will include deep breathing and frenzied full-body shaking. Dr. Gordon’s techniques sound strange, but they’ve worked for teachers and students affected by the Parkland shooting and for people in Puerto Rico, Houston, Haiti and New Orleans devastated by natural disasters. The techniques have also helped Syrian refugees in Jordan, Palestinian children in Gaza and a range of veterans and victims of war suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

 

Jackie Robinson’s Daughter on Her Civil Rights Awakening in 1963

Guest: Sharon Robinson, Author “Child of the Dream: A Memoir of 1963”

1963 was a pivotal year for the Civil Rights movement in America. The historic March on Washington happened that summer. In the months before that march, the nation watched in horror as TV news cameras showed Alabama police using firehoses and dogs on African American youth marching in what’s known as the Birmingham Children’s Crusade. And in September of 1963, four African American girls were murdered in the bombing of Birmingham’s 16thStreet Baptist Church. 1963 was also a pivotal year in the life of Sharon Robinson, the middle child and only daughter of baseball legend Jackie Robinson.