Trump's Immigration Plan, Starving Polar Bears, Cryonic Body Preservation

Guest: Charles Kuck, JD, Atlanta-based Immigration Attorney, Former President of the National American Immigration Lawyers Association President Trump’s plan for immigration reform was the centerpiece of his State of the Union Address this week. The plan has vocal critics in all corners of Congress, which seems like a sign that it’s a real compromise. Congress faces some urgency to come up with a plan in the next week – when another budget vote must happen. Democrats have vowed to block that and force another government shutdown if an immigration compromise isn’t in the works. So let’s look at the President’s proposal.

Guest: Denise Pope, PhD, Senior Lecturer at the Stanford University Graduate School of Education, Co-Founder of Challenge Success Teenagers in America today are getting less sleep than they were 20 years ago: Most of them report getting less than 7 hours when doctors say the teenaged body and brain need 9 hours a night to thrive. But how can they get that and still manage dance practice, swim team, honors classes, music lessons and time with friends? What’s the parents’ role in all of this and should a parent at some point step in to scale back or restore balance in a teen’s busy life?

Guest: Blaine Griffen, Associate Professor of Life Sciences, BYU A few months ago a National Geographic video of a starving polar bear went viral and sparked a debate about the effects of climate change and melting Arctic ice. If you’ve seen that video, you remember it: that poor emaciated polar bear dragging a leg, rummaging through an empty trash can before collapsing on the ground. Before that video went viral, BYU biologist Blaine Griffen had a study already in the works on the challenge polar bears face getting enough food when seasonal ice melts faster than it used to.

Guest: Dick Lehr, Professor of Journalism, Boston University, Author of “Trell” The murder of 12-year-old Tiffany Moore on a Boston street in 1988 was a turning point in the city’s fight against drugs and gang violence. Police believed the African American girl had been an innocent victim of gang gunfire. The pressure was on to solve the case and send a strong message about law and justice. A few weeks later, they arrested a man who would ultimately get a life sentence for the killing. But they got the wrong guy. Fifteen years later an investigative reporter at the Boston Globe dug into the case and uncovered a host of police and prosecutorial wrongdoing.

Guest: Jeremy Straub, PhD, Professor of Computer Science, North Dakota State University In the last 18 months, terrorists pledging allegiance to ISIS have made trucks their preferred weapons. More than 100 people around the world have been killed in nearly a dozen such attacks, including eight fatalities in New York City last Halloween. When someone uses a gun to kill lots of people, we immediately start debating gun control. Debating “vehicle control” after a terror attack seems preposterous, but what if the focus weren’t on controlling who can drive one? What if we focus on technology that would let the vehicle take control away from the driver who tries to steer the truck into a crowd of people?

Guest: Max More, PhD, President and CEO of Alcor Life Extension Foundation The latest Legend of Zelda game, Breath of the Wild, has been wildly successful among gamers and begins with Link waking up from a 100 year sleep. Other fictional characters who’ve been placed into suspended-animation and then brought back to life include Captain America, Han Solo, the astronauts in the movies “Interstellar” and “Passengers.” But there are actually about 300 people currently in a state of cryonic preservation and some 2,000 others who’ve signed up to be frozen as soon as they die. Find out more about cryonics at Alcor