How COVID-19 is Affecting Immigration Detainees (0:30)

Guest:  Patrick Michels, Immigration Investigative Reporter, Reveal - From the Center for Investigative Reporting

Across the country, more than 37,000 immigrants are being detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement in conditions that are sometimes crowded and prime for the spread of disease. On Tuesday, ICE announced the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in a detainee. Immigrant rights advocates are filing a flurry of lawsuits demanding that migrants be released on humanitarian grounds.

 

Good Neighboring in the Time of COVID-19 (20:41)

Guest: Rodney Smith Jr., Founder of Raising Men Lawn Care Service

Even in the middle of a global pandemic, Rodney Smith, Jr. is on a crusade to do good. He’s been at it for four years, actually, traveling the country mowing lawns – for free – for veterans, single mothers, people with disabilities, the elderly or sick. With the quarantines, Smith is sticking to mowing lawns in Huntsville, Alabama where he lives, rather than traveling to other states. But through his nonprofit called “Raising Men Lawn Care Service” he’s got an army of kids doing the same for people all over the world.

 

Why Are So Many White, Uneducated Americans Dying Deaths of Despair? (32:36)

Guest:  Anne Case, PhD, Professor of Economics, Princeton University; Angus Deaton, PhD, Nobel Prize Winning Professor of Economics, Princeton University, Co-Authors of “Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism”

Life expectancy is falling in America. That’s not supposed to happen in a developed country like ours – and it wasn’t happening until about twenty years ago. But not all Americans are dying younger. Mainly it’s middle-aged white people dying of what Princeton economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton have dubbed “deaths of despair.”

 

2,995 Days of Disneyland (50:24)

Guest: Jeff Reitz, Instagram: @disney366_

The coronavirus pandemic shutdown Disneyland and with it pretty remarkable run for Jeff Reitz. He’d been to Disneyland every single day for eight years. The night the park closed, a week and a half ago, was Reitz’s 2,995th consecutive day at Disneyland. Can you even imagine?

 

Shaking Earthquake Science (1:09:41)

Guest: Victor Tsai, Associate Professor of Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences, Brown University

There was a 5.7 magnitude earthquake in Utah last week – the strongest we’ve head in decades so it caused quite a bit of anxiety, though not much damage. An earthquake of similar magnitude struck the capital of Croatia on Sunday and caused, significant damage. But in California, there was a 5.3 earthquake near Eureka last week that barely made the news, since quakes of that size happen dozens of times a year in the state.  Why are some earthquakes of the same magnitudes more destructive than others?

 

Earth’s Car-Sized Second Moon Was Only Visiting (1:24:51)

Guest: Bill Gray, Creator of Guide Astrometry Software

Earth just lost a moon. Not the moon - a second, much smaller one, about the size of a Toyota Prius. Astronomers only discovered it orbiting our planet a month ago. Now it’s gone. Where did it go? Where did it come from? And could we get another moon someday?