The Syracuse Police Department has had tensions with the city’s Citizen Review Board, as well as ongoing conflicts with the county district attorney’s office. This week on the Campbell Conversations host Grant Reeher talks with Syracuse Police Chief Frank Fowler about those issues, as well as the national problem of police shootings of unarmed citizens and other police abuse—and the effect they have on police-community relations. They also discuss the facts and the myths about crime in Syracuse.

Often overlooked in considerations of the anti-nuclear movement are the distinctive contributions of activists of color. In this week’s edition of the Campbell Conversations, host Grant Reeher talks with Montgomery College professor Vincent Intondi, the author of the book "African Americans Against the Bomb: Nuclear Weapons, Colonialism, and the Black Freedom Movement". They discuss the ways that Black anti-nuclear activism intersected with other important strains of Black activism and Black

Is democracy a sham, a pipe dream that keeps disappointing us? If so, then perhaps the problem is the way we think about democracy in the first place. This week on the Campbell Conversations, host Grant Reeher talks with two highly respected political scientists who have recently co-authored a very provocative book on American democracy, titled "Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government". Vanderbilt professor Larry Bartels and Princeton professor Christopher

On the eve of the New York presidential primary, Campbell Conversations host Grant Reeher talks with two area party chairs. Janet Burman, who heads up the Syracuse City Republican Committee, and Mark English, chair of the Onondaga County Democratic Committee. They discuss the controversies and turmoils in the nominating process, the restrictive voting rules in New York State, and aspects of the candidates’ campaigns and positions.

In 2013 Campbell Conversations host Grant Reeher interviewed economist and author Richard Wolff. Wolff predicted a political movement that looks very much like what the Bernie Sanders campaign has become. In this new interview, Reeher brings Wolff back as a soothsayer, to comment on the Sanders campaign, its significance for American politics, both now and in the future, and class-based politics more generally.

In an interview that continues topics raised last week with Sarah Chayes, this week on the Campbell Conversations host Grant Reeher talks with Robert Grenier. Grenier was CIA Station Chief for Pakistan and Afghanistan during 9-11, then served in Washington as CIA Iraq Mission Manager, and finished his CIA career as Director of CIA's CounterTerrorism Center.

What can the political dynamics leading to extremism in the Middle East reveal about the political situation in the U.S.? This week on the Campbell Conversations, host Grant Reeher talks with Sarah Chayes of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the author of Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security. They discuss the common threads that run between the American founding, present-day radicalism in the world, and our own current political dissatisfaction.