GOP Spending Bill, Psychology of Winning, Facebook Privacy

Guest: James Curry, PhD, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Utah, and Co-Director of the Utah Chapter of the Scholars Strategy Network President Trump is out with a proposed budget that acknowledges he will not eliminate the federal budget deficit in eight years, as he promised. Rather, the tax cuts and large spending increases Republicans have approved in recent weeks will grow the federal debt by at least $7 trillion dollars over the next decade. So the question is why did Republicans in Congress do it? Why approve a 2-year spending bill that boosts funding $300 billion above the limits they’d enacted in 2011 to rein in government spending?

Guest: Dhruv Khullar, MD, MPP, Physician, New York-Presbyterian Hospital When your doctor tells you to lose 15 pounds or recommends a medication for a health condition you’re experiencing, do you obey? How much do you trust your doctor’s expertise? How much do you trust the healthcare system more broadly – the hospitals, clinics, insurance companies and pharmacies? Physician and public health researcher Dhruv Khullar is concerned about declining levels of trust between Americans and the medical community.

Guest: Sheldon Krimsky, PhD, Lenore Stern Professor in the Humanities and Social Sciences, Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning, Tufts University and Adjunct Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, Tufts University School of Medicine, and 35-year member of Council for Responsible Genetics

Guest: David Matsumoto, PhD, Psychologist, San Francisco State University and former Olympic Judo Coach One of the best things about watching the Olympics is when the cameras catch that amazing moment when an athlete realizes they’ve won a gold medal. Incredibly, researchers have found that split-second moment of victory looks the same on Olympic athlete’s faces, no matter what country they come from.

Guest: Erik Carter, PhD, Professor of Special Education, Vanderbilt University Nearly one in five Americans has some type of disability, according to Erik Carter, a professor of Special Education at Vanderbilt University. That number might seem high if we don’t usually interact with - if we’re not friends with - people with disabilities. It’s one thing for governments to legislate that buildings must be accessible to all, but who can legislate what happens in our hearts? Professor Carter wants to see not just better access to facilities for people with disabilities, but more a more welcoming attitude toward them when they show up at neighborhood, community and church events.

(Originally aired: May 25, 2017) Guest: Alessandro Vespignani, Sternberg Family Distinguished University Professor of Physics, Professor of Computer Science and Health Sciences, Northeastern University Northeastern University computer science professor Alessandro Vespignani uses all the complaining people do on Twitter about feeling crummy and fluish to predict the scale of the coming flu season.

Guest: Erin Egan, Chief Privacy Officer, Facebook A series of court rulings against Facebook in Europe and some strict new privacy laws set to take effect across the EU in the coming months have prompted the social media company to overhaul its privacy settings. The idea is to “put the core privacy settings for Facebook in one place and make it much easier for people to manage their data,” said Facebook CEO Sheryl Sandberg at an event in Brussels a few weeks ago. Here's a quick tutorial from Facebook on how to protect your personal information.