Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the massive forest fires in Alberta that have become the costliest natural disaster in Canada’s history and speak with Dr. Mike Flannigan, a Professor with the Department of Renewable Resources and the Director of the Western Partnership for Wildland Fire Science at the University of Alberta. He joins us to discuss the forest fire that began on May first as a part of the cycle of nature and that only when man-made structures a placed in the forests do you end up with the kind of damage in Fort McMurray where 88,000 people were evacuated and one fifth of the homes were destroyed at an estimated loss of $7 billion.

Part 2

Then we look into the escalating legal battle between the governor of North Carolina and the U.S. Attorney General who today accused the state of North Carolina of “state-sponsored discrimination against transgender individuals”. Dr. Charles van der Horst, emeritus professor of Medicine at the University of North Carolina’s Center for Infectious Diseases joins us to discuss the cynical nature of the “bathroom” law being used by Republican lawmakers to rile up their religious right base for the upcoming elections and that little attention has been paid the rest of the laws that were slipped through in a special session such as banning any raise in the minimum wage.

Part 3

Then finally we speak with Richard Winger, Publisher and Editor of Ballot Access News, about the efforts underway by dissident factions in the Republican establishment who are frantically searching for a candidate to run as a conservative alternative to Donald Trump, now the party’s presumptive standard-bearer. We will discuss the various ballot deadlines for Independent candidates entering the presidential race, most of which indicate that there is still time to get an Independent third party alternative to Trump on the ballot and that already the Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson is getting much more attention than usual due to Trump.

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the sacking of Turkey’s Prime Minister by the country’s power-hungry President Erdogan who is moving to strip immunity for members of parliament under a new anti-terrorism law that appears to be primarily aimed at stifling internal opposition. An expert on Turkey’s domestic and foreign policy, Asli Bali, a professor at the UCLA School of Law who teaches courses on Public International Law, International Human Rights and the Laws of War, joins us. We discuss the recent brawl in the parliament between members of Erdogan’s AKP Party and opposition MP’s and the bombing of Syrian refugees in a camp near the Turkish border which exposes Erdogan’s failed Syria policy while he reignites a civil war with the Kurds.

Part 2

Then we look into how, while Republican politicians and pundits are falling into line behind Donald Trump, some of the big donors have closed their checkbooks as the former presidents Bush 41 and 43 and the last Republican presidential standards bearer Mitt Romney are making it clear they will not support Trump. Libby Watson, a staff writer at the Sunlight Foundation which advocates for open government, joins us to discuss that while the Koch brother are diverting of their funds to State and Congressional races, most of the big donors will eventually come around to support Trump in the general election in this record-breaking $5 billion election season.

Part 3

Then finally on the Mexican national holiday of “Cinco de Mayo” we speak with Ryan Devereaux who covers national security for The Intercept about the incident that has roiled Mexico for the last year which he describes in his latest article at The Intercept “Independent Investigator Leave Mexico Without Solving the Case of the 43 Disappeared Students” as “the drop that spilled the glass”. We discuss Mexico’s broken justice system and assess why the government has covered up the disappearance of the students.