Midday

And now, the problem with plastics.

Most of the plastics we encounter in our consuming lives cannot be recycled, and the pollution from plastics is causing great environmental harm, from the petrochemicals it takes to make it, to toxic exposure while using it, and the waste it creates when it is dumped in underdeveloped countries.

We speak with two environmental activists who are working to confront the growing ecological and public health dangers posed by the worldwide proliferation of plastic.

Tom's first guest is Lisa Ramsden. She's a Senior Oceans and Plastics Campaigner at Greenpeace USA. Lisa Ramsden joins us on Zoom from Durham, NC...

Then, Tom talks with Jennifer Congdon, the deputy director of an environmental justice organization called Beyond Plastics.

Jennifer Congdon joins us on Zoom from Bennington, VT. 

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

The murder of Tyre Nichols at the hands of five Memphis policemen is yet another example of violence against Black citizens that can traumatize Black communities throughout the country.

We begin today with Dr. Donell Barnett, the president of the Association of Black Psychologists. He is the Deputy Director for Mental Health Clinical Operations at the Illinois Department of Human Services.

Donell Barnett joins us on Zoom from Chicago…

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Tom's guest today is Pico Iyer, who for more than 50 years has been acclaimed as a compelling, insightful and thoughtful writer. He has published widely as a journalist, and he’s written novels, but he is perhaps best known as a travel writer. He has journeyed to the far corners of the globe, and written with a deep sense of wonder, compassion, sensitivity and radiant kindness.

Since 1992, Iyer has divided his time between western Japan and a Benedictine hermitage in California.

Born in Oxford, England in 1957, Iyer was raised in England, India and the United States. He’s taught writing, literature and journalism at Harvard and Princeton. He’s been a columnist for Time Magazine. He’s published 15 books that have been translated into 23 languages. He’s given numerous TED Talks, which have been viewed more than 10 million times. In 2008, he published his biography of His Holiness the Dali Lama, with whom he has been close since he was a teenager.

Pico Iyer's latest book examines how different cultures conceive of, understand and pursue spiritual fulfillment, and the connection of different places to the quest for inner and outer peace.

It’s called The Half Known Life: In Search of Paradise.

It's a poignant, persuasive and important book.

Pico Iyer joins us on Zoom from Santa Barbara, California.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

It's time for another visit with Midday's theater critic, J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins us each week with her reviews of Maryland's regional stage.

Today, she tells us about the new Spotlighters Theater production of [title of show].

The small-scale musical about two guys writing a musical was written, in fact, by those two guys: Jeff Bowen (music and lyrics) and Hunter Bell (book). Their self-referential play, which explores the creative and artistically transformative journey required to mount a stage musical, is directed by Stephen Foreman, with musical direction by Mandee Ferrier Roberts, and a four-member cast that includes Alex Gubler as Hunter, Nick Cherone as Jeff, Neva Sullivan as Heidi, and Natalie Stolurow as Susan.

There have been some late changes to the play's production schedule.

Spotlighters Theatre has announced that due to a number of positive COVID-19 tests among the cast & crew, its performances of [title of show] for Thur, Jan 26 through Sun, Jan 29 are CANCELED.

Patrons with tickets for Sat, Jan 21, and for Jan 26, 27, 28 and 29, should check their email for a message from [email protected], with instructions for how to reschedule their tickets for a future performance of [title of show], or to convert their ticket purchase into a donation, a ticket credit, or to request a refund.

[title of show] will be performed at Spotlighters Theatre from February 2-5. For more information, follow the theater link.

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Judy and Tom also discuss the announcements that two esteemed local theaters will be closing.

Single Carrot Theatre, which has been an innovative force in Baltimore for the past 15 years, is canceling the one show left in its final season, but will continue its educational programs through the end of the academic year.

Rep Stage, the professional theater-in-residence at Howard County Community College in Columbia, will be closing permanently after completing the two productions remaining in the current season.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

The Baltimore County Public School System has had four different superintendents in the last ten years. And sometime later this year, they’ll have another one.

Dr. Darryl Williams, who's been on the job since May, 2019, and who has been facing increasing pressures from the County Council and several community groups, announced Monday that he will not pursue a renewal of his contract. He will leave the system at the end of June.

WYPR News reporter John Lee, who covers Baltimore County, provides analysis of the Williams departure and what's next for BCPS.

John Lee joins Tom in Studio A…

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Today, a conversation about classified documents and how they keep turning up in places they don’t belong — such as the Mar-a-Lago, Florida, estate of former President Donald Trump.

The latest revelation in this regard came on Tuesday (January 24), when it was revealed that lawyers for Mike Pence discovered what they described as “a small number” of documents in Pence’s Indiana home.Last Friday, the FBI conducted a 13-hour search of President Joe Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware, and found an unknown quantity of documents. These are in addition to the material discovered earlier in his garage and in a room adjacent to the garage at the home, and at an office he used in Washington after his tenue as Vice President.

Beyond the initial questions of how these classified documents were removed from their original, secure filing locations — and for what purpose — there are the larger questions of who’s keeping track of these documents? And is our national security at risk?

On Midday today, Tom speaks speak with two individuals with unique perspectives on those questions.

Tom's first guest is Tyler Pager, a White House correspondent with The Washington Post since 2021. He previously covered the White House for Politico, and reported on the 2020 presidential campaign for Bloomberg News. Tyler Pager joins us on our digital line from the Post newsroom in Washington, D.C.

Then, Tom speaks with Matthew Connelly, a professor of International and Global History at Columbia University and an expert on the US government's system of document classification. The author of several books on political history and international affairs, his latest — due to be published next month — is called The Declassification Engine: What History Reveals about America’s Top Secrets,

Professor Matthew Connelly joins us on Zoom from New York.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Today, we’re going to talk about transgender rights.

We are having this conversation in the context of dozens of states passing laws that not only limit or prohibit trans women from competing in women’s sports, but also impose legal limits in areas like health care, school policy, and public accommodations. The ACLU is currently tracking 185 anti-LGBTQ bills that are under consideration in state legislatures across the country.We will examine those efforts and those bills in other shows.

Today, we will focus on youth and professional sports, and efforts to prohibit trans women from competing against cisgender women. We speak with two top-flight athletic competitors who hold fundamentally different views on the issue.

Tom's first guest is a 12-time All American swimmer who competed for the University of Kentucky. Riley Gaines is a spokesperson for the Independent Women’s Forum, an organization formed in the 1990s to support Justice Clarence Thomas’ nomination to the Supreme Court. The IWF opposes allowing trans women to compete against cisgender women, and supports a number of other conservative causes.

Riley Gaines joins Tom on Zoom from Nashville, Tennessee.

For another perspective on inclusiveness and equality in women’s sports, Tom speaks next with Dr. Veronica Ivy. She is a queer trans woman, a two-time Masters track-cycling world champion and a previous Masters world-record holder, the first known trans woman ever to win a track-cycling world championship. She is an advocate and activist for trans and intersex rights.

Veronica Ivy joins us on Zoom from Victoria, in British Columbia, Canada.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Now, a look at the first few days of the Moore-Miller administration in Annapolis.

Governor Wes Moore wasted no time after his historic inauguration last Wednesday, issuing executive orders, assembling his cabinet for a pep-talk and releasing his first budget.

Joining Tom to talk about what’s been a busy few days in the state’s capital — and to help us unpack the numbers in Gov. Moore's budget proposal — is WYPR news director Matt Bush.

Matt Bush is with us in Studio A.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

It’s déjà vu all over again. There’s a showdown in Congress about raising the debt ceiling. Republicans in the House want to use the debt ceiling as leverage to pass cuts in search of a balanced budget. Some Republicans have suggested abolishing the IRS and no longer collecting taxes. Instead, they propose funding the government with a national sales tax of up to 30%. And, will they actually say out loud that they support reductions to cherished social programs like Social Security and Medicare? We have about five months to find out.

That political fight is on-going. Last Thursday, the Treasury began taking what it calls “extraordinary measures” to avoid defaulting on US debt. Those measures will run out in June.

In 2011, the mere fact that Congress bickered about it for several weeks was enough for the stock market to shudder. And, the US credit rating was downgraded for the first time.

The Biden administration has said that raising the debt ceiling is a non-negotiable, basic duty of Congress. Permission to bring the country to the brink of default, or perhaps into actual default, was one of the conditions Speaker Kevin McCarthy had to agree to in order to be elected Speaker.

Tom's first guest today is Kathleen Day, an author, journalist and full-time lecturer at the Johns Hopkins Carey School of Business.

She joins us on Zoom to explain just what's at stake in the debt limit debate.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Joining Tom now are three excellent reporters who have collaborated on a documentary that explores the consequences of tax breaks that the city of Baltimore offers to developers. The intention of these tax breaks is to spur economic growth, but as the film points out, assessing the impact of these muti-million dollar financial incentives is often difficult to do.

Stephen Janis and Taya Graham are reporters at the Real News Network.  Jayne Miller is an award-winning former investigative reporter with WBAL Television. Their documentary, based on their RNN investigative series and podcast, is called Tax Broke: The inside story of how Baltimore's inclusionary housing bill got hollowed out, and how activists hope to fix it.

They join Tom here in Studio A…

The three reporters will host a free screening of their film at the Charles Theater next Thursday night at 7:00. To sign up for the event, click here.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.