Connect the Dots

Of the many issues that divide Americans today, few have inflamed passions more than abortion.

This week, Supreme Court justices heard arguments regarding the 15-week abortion ban in Mississippi that could weaken or strike down Roe vs. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that gave Americans the right to the procedure. A decision in the case—Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health—is expected next year. 

And the stakes are high.

On this week’s episode of Connect the Dots, host Lynda Lopez explores what the US might look like if Roe vs. Wade is overturned in discussion with Laurie Bertram Roberts (exec. Director, Mississippi Freedom Fund), Heidi Seick (chief empowerment officer and co-founder of Vote Pro-Choice) and Amy Gehrke (exec. director of Illinois Right to Life).

Every election day, American voters are tasked with picking a side and tasked with identifying which candidate’s values and ideas most closely align with their own. Almost always, it goes to a Democrat or Republican.

But what does identifying with a party really mean in a country where 40% of us identify as independent and where recent events have forced many Americans to rethink, and perhaps pivot, our personal and political identities?

On this week’s episode of Connect the Dots, host Lynda Lopez asks “Are political labels tearing the country apart?"

In any other year, November 7th would just be another autumn day. In 2020, however, it was a day that no American would ever forget, as former Vice President Joe Biden was finally projected to win the 2020 Presidential election.

Fast forward a year later and the approval rating of President Biden and his administration is nowhere near as high as the public had hoped.

On this week’s episode of Connect the Dots, host Lynda Lopez asks “When did Americans start to doubt the Commander in Chief?”

Read the article here: https://www.audacy.com/kcbsradio/news/politics/when-did-americans-start-to-doubt-biden-as-president

Strikes have been erupting across the United States, from the Kaiser health worker demonstrations in California to the Kellog’s factory strikes in Michigan, laborers are asking to be repaid for the struggles they endured while working through the pandemic. 

In this week's episode of "Connect the Dots," we'll go to the picket line in Battle Creek, Michigan, where Kellogg's employees say it's been a long time coming for fairer pay and better hours.  

We'll also hear from a labor expert who sees a seismic shift across the country.

And we'll travel to New York City, where Yellow cab drivers have just ended a hunger strike against the city, which they say has left them in a desperate situation.

Read the article here: https://www.audacy.com/kcbsradio/news/national/american-workers-strike-back

While Hurricane Ida has slowly faded from public attention two months later, its impact is still a devastating reality for many low-income residents, who tend to live in flood-prone areas. With climate change threatening to make these natural disasters even worse, the likelihood of surviving these horrific events comes down to where you can afford to live.

This week on “Connect the Dots,” we heard from two Audacy producers: a Bronx native who lost everything during Ida, as well as a Louisiana local who’s lived through his fair share of hurricanes, including Katrina.

We also spoke with insurance and housing experts in the non-profit sector who can shed light on what the road to recovery from these storms should look like. 

The daily lives of street vendors, their passion for feeding customers, and the adversity they face in their unrelenting fight for belonging offer a unique window into the present-day immigrant experience in the U.S.

In this week's episode of "Connect the Dots," we’ll close out Hispanic Heritage Month as we hear from Fazila Bhimji, senior lecturer at University of Central Lanashire and longtime researcher on immigrants from Latin America; Carina Kaufman-Gutierrez, the director of New York City’s Street Vendor Project; and Maggie Morales, owner of locally-loved food truck Mike's Coffee Express in Queens, who says she’s still waiting for a vending permit after applying seven years ago.

Read the article here: https://www.audacy.com/kcbsradio/news/national/how-street-vending-in-us-is-radical-act-for-immigrants

This week on Audacy's weekly news podcast "Connect the Dots"--hosted Lynda Lopez--we’ll hear from policy analyst Harris Mojadedi and Hayward mayor pro tempore Aisha Wahab, both members of the Afghan Coalition of the Bay Area and children of refugees, about how the Afghan community has been able to maintain its culture in the region following a long trek and decades of war at home, and about the barriers facing Afghan immigrants, especially women, to this day.

This week on Audacy's weekly news podcast Connect the Dots--hosted by Lynda Lopez--attorney and enrolled member of the Pawnee Nation, Brett Chapman, explained how coverage of Native Americans in traditional media could have an impact on finding missing Indigenous people across the country. Nicole Wagon, Northern Arapaho Indigenous persons advocate in Riverton, Wyoming and the mother of two girls who were found murdered in Wyoming, also shared the work she's doing with her community to solve the problem, with her thoughts on what law enforcement should do to make the future safer for Indigenous people.

This week on Audacy's weekly news podcast "Connect the Dots"--hosted Lynda Lopez--we’ll hear from Dr. P.S. Sriraj, director of the Urban Transportation Center in the College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs at University of Illinois Chicago and director of the Metropolitan Transportation Support Initiative, as well as Juan Matute, the Deputy Director of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies, about the state of mass transit in America pre, mid and post-pandemic, how commuters have been impacted in the past year, and how we can address transit funding in the future. We’ll also hear about how different cities are transforming their transportation systems for the better. 

This is “Connect the Dots” from Audacy, a weekly news podcast that dives into one of the biggest topics of the week with host Lynda Lopez from WCBS News Radio 880.

This week, we take a look at the billionaire space race, what's changed in space exploration since our venture to the moon in 1969 and the many concerns facing the future of space tourism.