TUESDAY: Tuomo Reinkinen, Pat Smith, and Phil Preis

HOUR ONE: 

Dr. Tuomo Rankinen joins the show from Pennington Biomedical Center to discuss an ongoing study on genes related to obesity.  In the 1960s, the average American male weight was 160 lbs.  Now, the average weight is nearly 200 lbs.  The average male waist size is 40 inches.  "Abdominal obesity is more dangerous to your health than fat accumulation on your hips," Rankinen says.  He asserts that in this study, more than one hundred markers have been found to be linked to obesity.  

State Representative Pat Smith says Governor Jindal should drop his salary.  She asserts that the state is in a crisis.  "I think he's just left Louisiana in the dust and is on the way to bigger and better things he thinks he'll get to," Smith says of Governor Jindal.  

"When you look at the amount of money he spends on state police that go with him everywhere he goes," Smith continues, "it's a lot of money." 

"Unless we cut TOPS or decouple it from tuition we will be a bankrupt state," Representative Smith concludes.  

HOUR TWO: 

Lawyer and two time Louisiana Gubernatorial candidate says Louisiana should dump the 250 million dollar TOPS program.  He ran for governor in 1995 and 1999.  The TOPS program costs over 250 million dollars.

"TOPS is bad government policy as it relates to LSU... it's such a politically popular program," Preis says.  "They should do away with it across the board... make need based scholarships."  

He argues that students should have a 3.8 average and a financial need to receive a scholarship from the government.  He debates with a caller, Chancellor Wharton about whether the Louisiana should keep the TOPS program and the implications of the alternative.  "To suggest people won't go there because it's not free?" Preis argues Wharton, "I just don't believe that." 

Phil Preis comments on the Common Core standard.  "Common Core is nothing more than an ACT test that is given at the end of each grade... however, it is absolutely 100% the best solution right now," he affirms strongly.