Midday

Midday on Medicine continues with a spotlight on a proposed new medical school at one of the nation's leading HBCU institutions.

Only about 5% of the physicians in the United States are Black, and it has been nearly 50 years since an historically Black college or university has opened a medical school.

Morgan State University is moving toward changing that, with plans for a proposed Maryland College of Osteopathic Medicine on its Baltimore campus.

Joining Tom to tell us about it are Dr. Barbara Ross Lee, the proposed college's founding president, and Dr. John Sealey, its founding dean and director.

They join us on Zoom. 

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

It’s Midday on Medicine. 

Tom's first guest today is Dr. Jeremy Greene, a physician and medical historian on the faculty of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. His new book chronicles the evolution of telemedicine. He makes the case that at various stages along the way of that evolution, telemedicine was seen as a panacea that was going to expand access and diminish disparities in the delivery of health care, but those promises remain promises largely unfulfilled. It’s called The Doctor Who Wasn’t There: Technology, History, and the Limits of Telehealth.

What’s your experience with telehealth? Have you met with a doctor over video chat or on the phone? Have you tried to have a doctor’s visit that way, and found it didn’t work?

Dr. Jeremy Greene is the William H. Welch Professor of Medicine and History of Medicine and the director of the Department of the History of Medicine at Johns Hopkins. He’s also the director of the Center for Medical Humanities and Social Medicine.

He joins Tom in Studio A.

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

Today on Midday, we're previewing the 2023 Session of the Maryland General Assembly, which gets underway on Wednesday in Annapolis.

Governor-Elect Wes Moore will be inaugurated a week from tomorrow. Comptroller Brooke Lierman will take the oath of office next Monday. Attorney General Anthony Brown was inaugurated last week.

Joining Tom live is Ovetta Wiggins, a veteran State House reporter who covers Maryland government and politics for the Washington Post. 

Ovetta Wiggins joins Tom today on Zoom from Annapolis.

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

The Maryland General Assembly begins its 2023 legislative session tomorrow in Annapolis. Thirty-eight members of the House of Delegates and eight members of the Senate are taking their seats in the chambers for the first time. A new governor, comptroller and attorney-general begin their first terms as well.

Today on Midday, a preview of the legislative agenda for the 2023 Session.

Later in this hour, Tom is joined by Ovetta Wiggins, Maryland politics reporter for the Washington Post, who offers her analysis of the legislative priorities in this year's General Assembly. (That conversation is posted separately.)

But we begin with Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson of Baltimore. A Democrat, he is in his third term in the Senate, where he represents District 46. This will be the fourth legislative Session he will preside over as Senate President.

Senate President Bill Ferguson joined Tom Monday on Zoom from the State House.

Tom's next guest is Delegate Adrienne Jones, who has represented Maryland's 10th District since 1997. She was elected Speaker of the House of Delegates in 2019.

Speaker Adrienne Jones spoke with Tom last Thursday, via Zoom, from Annapolis.

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

Today on Midday on Politics, we’ve been talking about the goings-on in the House of Representatives, and the prospects for how Republicans will govern now that they have sorted out Kevin McCarthy’s journey to the Speaker’s chair.

Tom's next guest is Russell Berman, a staff writer for The Atlantic.

Mr. Berman joins us on our digital line from Washington, DC.

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

Now, it's Midday on Politics, and we turn our gaze to Washington for a look at what transpired in the House of Representatives last week. It is not a pretty sight.\

A little after 1:00 in the morning on Saturday (January 7), the House of Representatives ended their stalemate over electing a speaker, finally giving the gavel to California Congressman Kevin McCarthy on the 15th vote.

The House will reconvene Monday evening at 5:00 to begin hammering out rules changes that Rep. McCarthy pledged to enact in exchange for the votes he needed from extremists in his party to be elected Speaker. Almost all of the 20 Republicans who withheld their votes for McCarthy until the wee hours of Saturday morning are election deniers, as is McCarthy himself. It’s anybody’s guess as to just how effective McCarthy will be, working under rules that greatly attenuate the Speaker’s power.

We get an important perspective on these developments now from Congressman Kweisi Mfume, a veteran Democratic lawmaker who represents Maryland 's 7th district (including Baltimore City) in the US House of Representatives. 

Rep. Mfume joins us by phone…

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

Today, another installment of our monthly Midday with the Mayor,  in which Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott joins Tom to take questions on key issues facing the mayor, the city and the people of Baltimore.

There were 40 fewer non-fatal shootings in our city last year than in 2021, but only four fewer homicides. More than 70 people in the Western district received help with housing, employment and other services through the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement, and that district became safer. The city plans to expand its Group Violence Reduction Strategy to the Southwestern district soon.

Late Friday afternoon, the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts issued a press release implicating the Mayor’s office in the decision to cancel the annual Martin Luther King Day parade. That was followed by a letter to the BOPA board from Mayor Brandon Scott demanding that the director of BOPA, Donna Drew Sawyer, resign. Following reports that she had resigned, the BOPA board issued a statement saying that she had not resigned. The Mayor Tweeted that the MLK Day Parade will take place at noon on January 16.

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott joins Tom on Zoom from his office in City Hall…

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

It's time again for a visit with Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins Tom each week with her reviews of the Maryland stage.

Today, she tells us about the innovative production of William Shakespeare's The Tempest, now on stage at the Round House Theatre in Bethesda, Maryland, and directed by Aaron Posner and Teller (of Penn & Teller fame),

The Tempest is a bold reimagining of Shakespeare’s popular — and enchanting — romance, featuring music from the catalog of veteran songwriter Tom Waits, modern dance moves from Pilobolus, and a bevy of astonishing feats of magic.

The Tempest is produced in collaboration with Folger Theatre. It continues at the Round House Theatre in Bethesda, Maryland until January 29.Click the Round House link for more details.

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

It's another edition of Midday at the Movies, our monthly look at films and filmmaking. Tom is joined once again by one of our favorite movie mavens — Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday. She's the author of the best-selling moviegoers' guide, Talking Pictures: How to Watch Movies.

Today, as we gear up for next Tuesday's 80th Golden Globe Awards for the year's best in film and television, Ann shares her picks for the best flicks of 2022. Paramount Pictures' Top Gun: Maverick, the military action sequel starring Tom Cruise - soars in at the top of her list.

Ann also spotlights a few new releases with strong women's themes, including director Sarah Polley's powerful Women Talking and German director Marie Kreutzer's historical drama, Corsage.

We'll also look at the financial difficulties that have forced Maryland Film Festival's venerable Parkway Theater to announce it is suspending operations. This news comes on the heels of MFF's announcement last year that it's postponing the annual Maryland Film Festival until 2024, and making changes in the interim to its business model.

Ann Hornaday joins us on our digital line.

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

Kevin McCarthy continues his quest to become Speaker of the House for a third day. After losing six votes over two days, and making yet more concessions to extremists in his party last night, he told reporters this morning he is, quote, “making progress.” The House is reconvening at this hour.

Tomorrow marks the second anniversary of the attack on the US Capitol. January 6th, like September 11th or December 7th, is a date that's emblazoned in the American psyche as a pivotal moment in our nation’s history. The attack on the Capitol — part of a conspiracy to overturn the 2020 presidential election — shook the foundations of American democracy.

A bipartisan House Select Committee that spent 18 months investigating the attack has published an extensive and damning report that lays the blame for the insurrection squarely at the feet of former US president Donald Trump. If Republicans work out their internecine fighting over the Speakership, they have promised investigations in the new Congress that will target Joe Biden and his administration.

Scholars, historians and journalists, as well as federal prosecutors, are still sorting out the actors and their motivations behind the violence on January 6th, 2021.

Today on Midday, a conversation with two scholars who study the influence of Christian nationalists on the events of that day, and how they fit into the panoply of groups that organized and executed the attack.

Dr. Matthew Taylor is the Protestant Scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian and Jewish Studies in Baltimore. He focuses on Muslim-Christian dialogue, evangelical and pentecostal movements, religious politics, and American Islam.Matthew Taylor joins Tom in Studio A.

Dr. Bradley Onishi is a religion scholar on the faculty of the University of San Francisco, and the host of a podcast called Straight White American Jesus.  His new book is called Preparing for War: The Extremist History of White Christian Nationalism–And What Comes Next. 

He’ll discuss the book tomorrow (Friday, January 6) at noon in an online forum hosted by Matthew Taylor and sponsored by the Institute for Islamic, Christian and Jewish Studies.

Drs. Onishi and Taylor are also the co-hosts of an audio documentary series that examines the role of Christian Nationalists in the Jan. 6 riot at the US Capital. It’s called Charismatic Revival Fury: The New Apostolic Reformation. You can find it on the Straight White American Jesus podcast.

Bradley Onishi joins us on Zoom, and by phone, from San Francisco…

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