Midday

It’s Midday on Ethics. Today, a conversation about vaccine mandates. Tom's guest is Dr. Jeffrey Kahn, the director of The Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics.

To entice those who are reluctant to become inoculated, the private and public sector have tried education, trusted influencers and a range of incentives, from money to doughnuts to tickets to beer. But patience is wearing thin with those who are still, despite wide availability and solid evidence of efficacy and safety, refusing to act in a way that will help stop transmission of this deadly disease.

There is some early evidence that mandates are effective. The New York Times reported last week that in New York, where a mandate for health workers is in effect, roughly 92% of workers in hospitals and nursing homes have now been vaccinated. Other Health systems in California and Texas report that the wave of resignations predicted when mandates were announced have not materialized. Private companies report equally high levels of vaccinations after they instituted mandates.In California, not only teachers and staff at public schools will be required to be inoculated. Soon, all students age 12 and up will have to get vaccinated in order to attend classes.

Mandates are the subject of several lawsuits, but so far, the courts have held that the state or private employers do have the right to require vaccination against certain diseases in the interest of public health. On Friday, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor denied a request from some New York City teachers to block the city’s vaccine mandate.Many who choose not to be vaccinated frame the issue as one of personal liberty rather than public health. What do the rest of us owe them?

Dr. Jeffrey Kahn joins us on our digital line from his office in Baltimore.

We welcome listener comments and questions.

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

Today on Midday, it's Midday at the Movies, our monthly look at films, filmmaking and the movie industry. Tom guests are our movie-maven regulars, Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday and Maryland Film Festival founder and former director Jed Dietz.

We'll discuss the question of whether pandemic-weary filmgoers feel it's safe to return to movie theaters. And we get Ann and Jed's takes on some of the current cinema, including the re-release of Sankofa, Ethiopia-American filmmaker Haile Gerima's 1993 masterpiece about slavery, now on Netflix; Nuclear Family, independent director Ry Russo-Young's new autobiographical documentary series on HBO Max about her same-sex parents and the unexpected complications they faced in raising their family; The Eyes of Tammy Faye, director Michael Showalter's dramatic adaptation of the documentary about the disgraced televangelist, played by Jessica Chastain; and The Card Counter, writer-director Paul Schrader's latest portrait of alienation and redemption starring Oscar Isaac, and now showing at the Charles and area theaters.

Ann Hornaday joins us on our digital line; Jed Dietz is on Zoom.

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

Today on Midday, it’s Midday on Politics, with a focus on local government. Tom's guests today are three members of the Baltimore City Council: Phylicia Porter lives in Pigtown and represents the 10th district. Odette Ramos lives in Charles Village and represents the 14th District. Mark Conway lives in North Guilford and represents the 4th District.

They were all elected in 2020. They are part of a group of five freshman lawmakers who have been in office about 10 months. In 2016, the Council had eight new members. Two of them, Shannon Sneed and Leon Pinkett, chose not to run for re-election to their council seats, choosing instead to run in the primary for City Council President. Nick Mosby won that election. He is serving in that position for the first time. Comptroller Bill Henry and Mayor Brandon Scott were also elected to their offices for the first time.

All of which is to say that of the 17 public officials elected to run City Hall, only two, Council Vice President Sharon Green Middleton and 11th district Councilman Eric Costello have served more than one term. Some would say that this infusion of new people brings fresh perspectives and new ideas to city government. Others worry that lack of experience in elective office might impede efforts to govern effectively.

We welcome listener comments and questions for our three Council members.

Councilman Conway joins us on our digital line. Councilwomen Ramos and Porter join us on Zoom.

In her response to a question about help for renters struggling to pay their energy, water and rent bills during these difficult times, Councilwoman Ramos gave the phone number to reach the Baltimore City Community Action Partnership, a service of the City's Office of Children and Family Success. That number is 410-396-5555. Here is the link: https://www.bmorechildren.com/residents

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

The Supreme Court will begin its new term on Monday, October 4th. For the first time since the COVID crisis began, the Court will hear oral arguments in person - though the Supreme Court building remains closed to the general public.

It will hear those arguments in several cases that are reflective of some of America’s deepest cultural and political divides, including cases that concern reproductive rights, gun regulation and religious freedom.

And it will convene as public opinion of the Court has plummeted, with polls showing a lack of confidence and the perception that the justices are political partisans. In just the past few weeks, Justices Clarence Thomas, Stephen Breyer and Amy Coney Barrett have made public remarks aimed at convincing people that they are not politically motivated, a recognition, at the very least, that the Court is acutely aware of the possibility that their credibility has been undermined.

Today on Midday on the Law, we take a look at some of the hot-button issues the Court will consider during the new session, with legal scholar Kim Wehle, a law professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law, a former Assistant US Attorney, and the author of two excellent books, How to Read the Constitution-And Why, and What You Need to Know About Voting-And Why. Kim is also the host of an Instagram show called #Simple Politics.

Kim Wehle join us on our digital line from Chevy Chase, Maryland.

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

Today is National Voter Registration Day. The record voter turnout in the 2020 Presidential election gave way to re-doubled efforts on the part of Republican state legislators across the country to make voting regulations more restrictive and to make voting more difficult. Most of the laws that have been enacted or proposed will affect, in particular, voters of color.

Tom's first guest today is Andrea Hailey. The veteran organizer and founder of the Civic Engagement Fund is the first African American woman to be the CEO of Vote.org, the non-partisan, on-line voter registration organization.

She joins us on Zoom.

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

Now, a conversation about the importance of global vaccine equity, the role that the United States is playing, and what else it could be doing.

Last Wednesday, the White House convened a Global COVID 19 Summit with more than 100 leaders from governments and international organizations. President Joe Biden announced that the US would purchase 500 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine for underdeveloped countries, and he committed nearly $800 million dollars to help distribute the vaccines in nine countries across three continents. Other countries also announced their intentions to donate vaccines and money as well.

Joining Tom on Zoom from Baltimore is Bill O’Keefe, the Executive Vice President for Mission and Mobilization at Catholic Relief Services, a private relief and development agency that has been deeply involved in helping poor countries around the world cope with the COVID pandemic. Mr. O'Keefe advocates for U.S. policies that promotes justice and reduces poverty internationally.

And from Monrovia, Liberia, in West Africa, Abena Amedormey joins us on Zoom, as well. She’s the Country Manager for Catholic Relief Services in Liberia, one of many African nations where fewer than 4% of the population has received a COVID vaccination.

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

Today on Midday, it’s the Midday Healthwatch with Dr. Leana Wen, an emergency physician and former Baltimore City Health Commissioner who joins us each month to talk about public health issues, and who has been providing us with timely updates on the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trends in the pandemic are headed in a relatively positive direction. Nationally, cases are down about 20% in the last couple of weeks, but that still amounts to about 114,000 new cases every day. With 45% of the country still unvaccinated against the coronavirus, many people who received the Pfizer vaccine six months or more ago, are now cleared to get a third dose.

There was some confusion last week when an advisory panel of the CDC made a recommendation as to who should qualify for a booster shot. CDC Director Rochelle Walensky broadened the group that her advisors had identified. The people who are now eligible include people who are immunocompromised, at least 65 years old, or who work in front line jobs like medical personnel and teachers. That group is likely to expand to include people who received the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, but the FDA and CDC have not yet approved boosters of those vaccines.

Today on the Midday Healthwatch, Dr. Leana Wen will help us sort out these developments. Dr. Wen teaches at the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health. She’s also a columnist for the Washington Post, a medical analyst for CNN, a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author of Lifelines: A Doctor's Journey in the Fight for Public Health. Dr. Wen lives with her husband and their toddler and baby in Baltimore.

Dr. Leana Wen joins us today on Skype…and as always, we welcome your questions and comments…

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

It’s the Midday Newswrap. Today, we’re going to focus on local stories with three members of WYPR’s award-winning news team.

John Lee covers Baltimore County for WYPR, and won a 2020 Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association Award for his series of reports on COVID-19's impact on the Baltimore County Schools. He joins Tom today on our digital line to discuss the story he broke last week about a devastating auditor's report on the Baltimore County School system that described the school board as dysfunctional, the central office as bloated, and found systemic problems of low morale and poor communications.

Rachel Baye, WYPR'S Statehouse and Maryland politics correspondent, whose reporting on kids in the Maryland foster care system won her a prestigious 2021 National Edward R. Murrow award, joins Tom on our digital line to discuss her recent coverage of the Columbia hotel that laid off its employees last year because of the pandemic and took $2.5 million in federal PPP loans this year, but has so far failed to rehire or compensate its laid-off workers. Rachel also describes the ongoing battles over mask mandates in the state's public schools, and the latest legislative efforts to legalize recreational marijuana in Maryland.

Joel McCord has been WYPR's News Director since 2012, and also covers the Chesapeake Bay region and various counties throughout the state. In 2019, Joel won a Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association Award for his moving commentary on the mass shooting that killed five staffers at the Capital Gazette newspaper, in his home town of Annapolis. Today he joins Tom on Zoom to discuss his recent reporting of improved prospects for a proposed Chesapeake Bay Bridge replacement, following signs of a compromise from a long-time critic of the plan, Anne Arundel County Supervisor Steuart Pittman. And Joel recaps his coverage of the Talbot County Council's vote on September 16 to remove the Talbot Boys Confederate monument from the courthouse lawn in Easton.

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

It's time again for Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins Tom today with her review of Rapid Lemon Productions' Rachel, a seminal, century-old play about racism that's been newly adapted for the stage by Baltimore playwright Aladrian C. Wetzel.

Rachel was written in 1916 by Angelina Weld Grimké, one of the luminaries of the so-called Harlem Renaissance. She penned it as an artistic retort to the 1915 release of director D.W. Griffith’s racist film, “Birth of a Nation”.

Originally titled “Blessed are the Barren”, the play tells the story of a Black woman who rejects marriage and motherhood after discovering a horrifying family secret. It was first produced in Washington, DC, by the NAACP, and published in 1920.

Ms. Wetzel's new adaptation is her second commissioned play for Rapid Lemon Productions, after 2019’s acclaimed Thank You, Dad.

Rapid Lemon's production of Rachel is being performed live on stage, and also live-streamed, through September 26th at Baltimore's Motor House, located at 120 W North Ave, Baltimore, MD 21201. For ticketing information, click here.

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

The Southern Poverty Law Center estimates that there are about 2,000 Confederate Monuments in the United States. Baltimore took down four of its confederate monuments in 2017. In writer Clint Smith’s hometown of New Orleans, the city has also removed four monuments. But as he reports in his recent book, at least 100 statues, parks, and streets in the Big Easy are still named after Confederate figures.

The book is called How the Word is Passed: A Reckoning With the History of Slavery Across America. In this compelling, insightful and probing work, Dr. Smith takes us on a tour of sites that are important, in different ways, to understanding how America is confronting the legacy of slavery.

It’s a diary of visits to 8 sites in the US and one in Senegal, Africa, and Smith’s reflections on how the history of each place is told, the decisions about what to include, what to ignore, and what is fabricated to create a particular, false narrative.

Clint Smith holds a PhD in Education from Harvard. He’s an award-winning poet, and a staff writer at The Atlantic. In the context of the uproar over Critical Race Theory and attempts to outright ban teaching about slavery and the history of race in America, Dr. Smith has produced a timely, beautifully written, and deeply personal account of how we reckon with America’s original sin.

Clint Smith joins us on Zoom from Silver Spring, Maryland.

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