Wednesday: Swoosie Kurtz, "The Mercy in the Sky", Recent La. Poll Numbers, and LT. General Russel L. Honoré, US Army (Ret)

Producer: Frank Barnett

Hour One

Actress & Author, Swoosie Kurtz

Swoosie Kurtz discusses her new book "Part Swan, Part Goose: An Uncommon Memoir Of Womanhood, Work, And Family" at the Roundabout Theatre Company on April 28, 2014. Image Credit: http://www.zimbio.com/pictures/yysMamKFLab/Swoosie+Kurtz+Reads+New+Book+Part+Swan+Part/LHTQfF4Aaw9

Emmy Award-winner and two time Tony Award-winning actress Swoosie Kurtz joins Jim on the show today to promote her new book Part Swan, Part Goose: An Uncommon Memoir of Womanhood, Work, and Family. The book celebrates Swoosie's life and career, and candidly reflects on the choices that empowered her, the wrong choices that enlightened her, and the intimate journey of caring for an aging parent.

Yahoo News National Correspondent, Holly Bailey

Yahoo News National Correspondent and Author, Holly Bailey. Image Credit: https://twitter.com/hollybdc

Yahoo News National Correspondent and Oklahoma native, Holly Bailey joins us today to discuss and promote her new book The Mercy of the Sky. When Moore was hit by a tornado in 2013, Bailey went back to her home state as both a journalist and former resident. In The Mercy of the Sky Bailey does for the Oklahoma flatlands what Sebastian Junger did for Gloucester, Massachusetts, in The Perfect Storm - telling a dramatic, page-turning story about a town that must survive the element or die.

Pollster, Bernie Pinsonat

Pollster Bernie Pinsonat and Jim Engster.

Bernie Pinsonat, Founder of Southern Media & Opinion Research, joins Jim in studio to discuss the results of a statewide poll his company conducted. The poll asked Louisiana residents about their opinions on Common Core, the Religious Freedom Bill, the 2015 Louisiana Governor's Race, and much, much more.

 

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Hour Two

LT. General Russel L. Honoré, US Army (Ret)

U.S. Army Lieutenant General Russel Honore in Cameron Prairie, Louisiana on September 25, 2005. Image Credit: http://www.newsweek.com/former-army-general-lambasts-oil-industry-hijacking-democracy-269086

Native of Lakeland, Louisiana and retired Lieutenant General, Russel L. Honoré joins Jim in studio today as the lone guest for Hour Two to discuss his latest environmental efforts at the Capitol, and his "seriously considered" bid for Governor of Louisiana. Honoré served as the 33rd commanding general of the U.S. First Army at Fort Gillem, Georgia, and as the 2nd Infantry Division's commander while stationed in South Korea. He is best known for serving as commander of Joint Task Force Katrina, responsible for coordinating military relief efforts across the Gulf Coast following Hurricane Katrina. He served until his retirement from the Army on January 11, 2008. He's currently active in environmentalism, and heads up the GreenARMY: an alliance of civic, community, and environmental groups and concerned citizens from around the state ready to effect meaningful social, political, and environmental change in Louisiana. For more information on the GreenARMY, visit gogreenarmy.com.

Tuesday: An MLB take on Tom Brady, Jazz Listening Room Series, TOPS, and the Louisiana Legislative Session

Hour One

Former MLB Detroit Tigers Pitcher, Denny McLain

Former Detroit Tigers Pitcher Denny McLain graces the cover of Sports Illustrated in 1968, the year he won 30 games. Image Credit: 2guystalkingmetsbaseball.com

Former Detroit Tigers Pitcher, and the last man to win 30 games in a season, Denny McLain starts the show today with Jim to talk about something different: Football. With the recent four-game suspension handed down to Tom Brady and the $1 million fine given to the New England Patriots for deflating footballs during last years AFC Championship game,  Denny shares his opinion on the severity of the punishment, and even draws a few comparisons between "Deflate-gate" and MLB's "spitball".

Jazz Musician & Saxophonist Brad Walker

Jazz Musician and Saxophonist Brad Walker will perform with his Quintet Thursday May 14th at the Shaw Center for the Arts as part of the Jazz Listening Room Series. Image Credit: schedule.sxsw.com

Jazz Musician/Saxophonist Brad Walker joins Jim as the second guest today to promote his upcoming performance in the Jazz Listening Room Series on Thursday May 14th, 2015 at 7:30pm.  Presented by The Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge, Brad and his Quintet will play in the Hartley/Vey Theatre of the Manship Theatre at the Shaw Center for the Arts in downtown Baton Rouge. Tickets are $10 each, and for more information or to buy tickets visit www.manshiptheatre.org/events.asp or www.bradwalker.me. The concert will also feature special guest vocalists Quiana Lynell and Peter Simon (of Minos the Saint), as well as internationally renowned trumpeter Brian Shaw (LSU). Originally from North Carolina, Brad came to study music at LSU where he earned a Bachelors Degree in Saxophone Performance and a Masters Degree in Jazz Studies. After school Brad moved to New York City and spent three years honing his craft until ultimately deciding to move back to Louisiana to the Big Easy where he now resides. In New Orleans Brad enlisted some of Jazz's heaviest players (Simon Lott, Brian Seeger, James Singleton, and pianists Oscar Rossignoli and Doc Sharp), and together they created, and still create, what the Arts Council calls "a distinct sound that stands out in today’s vibrant New Orleans music scene" by seamlessly blending "the language of modern jazz with electric flavors of rock, funk, and soul." 

LSU Chancellor Emeritus James H. Wharton

Chancellor James Wharton speaks to students regarding a tuition hike of $48 per semester in 1989. Image Credit: http://www.lsu.edu/departments/gold/2011/07/alley.shtml#!prettyPhoto

LSU Chancellor Emeritus James H. Wharton talks with Jim about the TOPS program, and addresses his concerns for the future of TOPS amid possible, massive cuts to higher education. Wharton was named chancellor of LSU in 1981, and as Chancellor he established high admission standards for LSU that enhanced the national image of the University, and he was instrumental in restructuring the Alumni Federation to form the LSU Alumni Association. He led the LSU Foundation to be more dynamic in its fundraising efforts, and in 1987 the Carnegie Foundation designated LSU as a "Research University I” the highest advanced-research ranking given by the foundation. The designation put LSU in the top two percent of the nation's 3,300 universities; a group of 45 public and 25 private national institutions. Today he serves as a Member of the Board of Trustees for the Patrick F. Taylor Foundation and remains a highly regarded education expert.

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Hour Two

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalist, Tyler Bridges

Author and Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Tyler Bridges joins us over the phone from the halls of the Louisiana State Capitol as the lone guest for Hour Two of today's show. He and Jim discuss the possible outcomes in the upcoming 2015 Louisiana Governor Election; the latest news concerning the Legislative Session from the Capitol; and much, much more.

Author and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Tyler Bridges. Image Credit: www.tylerbridges.com

A graduate of Stanford University, Tyler's career as a journalist spans over 30 years. He's reported for The Daily Journal in Caracas, Venezuela, The Times-Picayune, The Lens, and The Miami Herald where he was a member of two Pulitzer Prize-winning teams. His career includes freelancing stints with such publications as The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal.  He is the author of The Rise of David Duke (University Press of Mississippi, 1994) and Bad Bet on the Bayou: The Rise of Gambling in Louisiana and the Fall of Governor Edwin Edwards (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2001). In 2011-2012 he spent a year at Harvard University on a Nieman Fellowship studying the coverage of politics and government in digital media. Currently, Tyler is covering the 2015  Louisiana Legislative Session for The Advocate.

MONDAY: Tobacco Tax, Author Steve Fiffer, and the Public Affairs Research Council

HOUR ONE: 

State Government Relations Director at the American Heart Association Stasha Rhodes join the show to discuss the tobacco tax.  "I think that if we're going to increase our tobacco tax we need to make sure it has a public health impact for the positive."  Louisiana has had the third lowest cigarette tax since 2002.  3 out of 10 people in Louisiana smokes.  Rhodes cites the website as the authority on how much money raising the tobacco tax would bring to the state in terms of raising revenue and lowering healthcare costs.  

223 million would be made in the first year if the tobacco tax was raised back to the $1.18 tax.  

30 states have the tobacco tax at a dollar or higher. 

15 states have the tobacco tax at two dollars or higher. 

When a tobacco tax is increased a dollar, 43,000 smokers in Louisiana would quit.  

Author Steve Fiffer shares his book.  He shares the experiences that lead to the violence of Bloody Sunday and racial tensions in the 1960s during the fight for racial equality.  Fiffer also asserts that these marches pushed for the voting rights legislation to be passed.  

The Patriots have been fined 1 million dollars and a first round pick.  Tom Brady will be suspended for the first four games.  

HOUR TWO: 

President of the Public Affairs Research Council Robert Travis Scott comments on Tom Brady and the New England Patriots punishments for deflategate as well as state legislative issues.  

They discuss why the tobacco tax did not go higher.  "I think part of what they want to do is stay on level with neighboring states." 

Scott comments on Governor Jindal's new book coming out in October.  

Assistant News Director at Louisiana Radio Network Michelle Southern discuss the punishment for Quarterback Tom Brady and the New England Patriots.  

"I do think it's a sad day because Tom Brady is one of the most likable players in the NFL." 

"He ALLEGEDLY cheated," Michelle says, "I think four games is just way overboard." 

Southern thinks that Brady will appeal his suspension.  "I think they're just picking on him." 

"You don't boo your team," Southern says, "You never ever ever boo." 

FRIDAY: Visit Baton Rouge, The Tom Brady Deflated Football Scandal, NAACP, and Crowd Management at Jazz Fest

HOUR ONE: 

Paul Arrigo, President and CEO of Visit Baton Rouge, joins the show today to discuss the Miss USA pageant and Bayou Country Superfest.  He has been in Baton Rouge for 18 years.  He was a native to New Orleans.  

The telecast for Miss USA reaches 70 countries.  It will be held at the River Center July 12th.  

"New Orleans has a love affair with itself... it's a world class city..."

"Baton Rouge has great pride in itself," he says.  

They also comment on the Louisiana International Film Festival.  

"In 2014, we had about 4 million visitors to Baton Rouge."

"Travel is ____ Tweet for Tourism" to win Taylor Swift tickets to one of her concerts on her 1989 World Tour.  

  "This state has become Hollywood South as a result of the film credits.  You would have to assume that if that goes away, so would the business." 

Former LSU quarterback Alan Risher comments on Tom Brady and the New England Patriots deflated football scandal.  

"He's probably mentally in a tough spot... worried about his reputation for sure." 

"I'm sure he'll get a 2-4 game suspension at the start of this season." 

"Maybe I should have deflated a few balls back in my day," Risher says.  

"For the most part Americans are forgiving people if you come out with the truth." 

He also comments on La'el Collins.  

HOUR TWO: 

Musheer Robinson from the NAACP joins the show to discuss the riots in Baltimore.  Robinson is a graduate of Brown University and a Rhodes Scholar.    

He also comments on Ferguson and South Carolina.  He suggests that now racial upset it coming into mind for everyone.  "How are we going to reevaluate our relations to make that convivial society?" 

"The economic division is absolutely gigantic," he says of race relations in Louisiana.  

Robinson laments that Governor Jindal had not done more for racial relations with his heritage.  

"We need elected officials to start thinking strategically about how to build communities... and create opportunities for everybody." 

"There's a vibrancy in the culture and the music," Robinson says, "but in human actualization, there's so much segregation." 

"He has had more threats on his life than all of the other presidents in the past century combined," Robinson says of President Obama.   

Security Expert Paul Wertheimer, founder of Crowd Management Strategies in Los Angeles comments on Jazz Fest 2015.  

This year's Jazz Fest held the largest amount of people ever at 460,000 people.  

He has spent a large part of his life studying disasters.  "Communities don't recover from it.  Families don't recover." 

"It <Jazz Fest> should make as much money as it can without compromising public safety." 

Wertheimer says that those in charge of Jazz Fest are "taking a gamble with people's lives." 

THURSDAY: Author Sarah Bird, Obama Mama and the Louisiana International Film Festival, House Bill 701, Governor's Race, and the Tom Brady Scandal

HOUR ONE: 

Author Sarah Bird shares her novel Above the East China Sea.  She describes the challenge and fascination she felt in her research for Okinawa.  "They're very welcoming people... very very open."

"I wanted to tell the story of a contemporary military kid... It's hard growing up that way... moving constantly."  She talks about the difficulty in military families now because moms are not necessarily staying at home and the growing number of single parents.  

She lived in Okinawa  as a child for three years while her family was stationed there.  "I learned to scuba dive there.  At the time it was one of the great barrier reefs of the world." 

Filmmaker Vivian Norris joins us today to promote her film, Obama Mama, which will play this weekend at the Louisiana International Film Festival.  The film depicts the life of President Obama's mother, Stanley Ann Dunham.  

Norris calls her a "pioneer in micro-finance for women." 

She managed to get a PhD as a single mother.  "The fact that she died fighting with insurance companies to pay bills... That's something that stuck with the president." 

They also comment on Ted Cruz and the debate surrounding the acceptable birthplaces of presidents.  

Part of the National Asian American Pacific Forum, Lawyer Shivana Jorawar comments on House Bill 701 which was passed on Wednesday.  Jorawar is a Queer Indo-Caribbean lawyer and policy advocate with a focus in gender equity, immigrant rights and racial justice.  House Bill 701 bans sex elected abortions in Louisiana.  

"It's a strategic ruse that is meant to confuse people into passing something that is negative for women." 

"The strategy is here is to open the door for more and more abortion bans to question a woman's motives." 

Jorawar says HB 701 is founded on "myths to propagate dangerous abortion restrictions." 

HOUR TWO: 

C. B. Forgotston comments on the governor's race and the louisiana legislative session.  Today, the House passed 11 bills which raise $670 million in revenue.  

Forgotston is not impressed.  "That was blowhard and rhetoric.  There's not one solution in it."  He continues, "Most of the taxes end in 18 months."  

"There's still going to be cuts to higher ed.  They admitted they didn't pass enough."  

Tax measures require 2/3 approval in the house and the senate.  

"Jay Dardenne has no path to make the runoff besides trying to run down Senator Vitter." 

Sports Writer Mark Kram Jr. gives his opinion on the New England Patriot's deflated football scandal and how this affects the team and Tom Brady.  

Kram calls the language in the report very circumstantial.  "It's called cheating.  It's not something that's unusual."

"I do think Brady is disingenuous when he says he had no knowledge of it.  He's the quarterback..."

Governor of New Jersey Chris Christie comes to the defense of Tom Brady.  Christies says, "I think it's way way overblown." 

WEDNESDAY: Astronaut Mark Kelly, Actress Sally Kirkland, Caddo Parish New DA Dale Cox, and the Pelican Institute of Public Policy

HOUR ONE: 

Astronaut Mark Kelly joins the show to discuss his new book Astrotwins.  He wants to ignite interest in math and science in young people outside of the classroom.  Both he and his twin brother, Scott Kelly, followed similar career paths and were both selected to be shuttle pilots by NASA in 1996.  "I was the better student," Mark says of he and his twin brother, "Even identical twins are not created exactly the same."

"It is the greatest thing ever. I cannot think of anything to compare it to... it's hard to do well," he says of his experience in space.  

In 2015, his brother was selected to be the Commander of the International Space Station.  

He also comments on his wife, Gabby Giffords, and her recovery from her shooting.  He shares his views on gun control and gun rights.  He expresses his support of the second amendment while stating the ways gun control can be improved.  

Jim comments on the NFL investigation released Wednesday which concluded that the New England Patriots employees and quarterback Tom Brady were "at least generally aware" of the violation in deflated footballs. 

Actress Sally Kirkland shares her experiences throughout her year.  Her first studio film was in 1954 in front of Andy Warhol's cameras.  "He set up a stationary camera and said don't move." 

She has made 150 films.  She will be at Perkins Rowe on Sunday at 12:30 for the Louisiana International Film Festival.  

Kirkland was in several films with Robert Redford.  She discusses those experiences.  Kirkland worked in Days of Our Lives and General Hospital.  

HOUR TWO: 

Newly appointed District Attorney of Caddo Parish Dale Cox joins the show.  He was recently appointed after the passing of former Caddo Parish District Attorney Charles Scott.  

He discusses the death penalty.  "The number of homicides and the savagery of homicides have grown exponentially from when I first started as a prosecutor." 

"I think we need it <death penalty> more than ever now."

"It is not uncommon for their to be 5, 10, 15, 25 years between the death sentence and actual death penalty," he says, "I think it's lost its effect." 

"I would not be in favor of any tax.  I'm a fiscal conservative." 

Dale Cox has been a prosecutor for 40 years and has had 4 death penalty convictions.  

"You should use it in those cases that are so horrendous they're really hard to describe they're so bad." 

President of the Pelican Institute of Public Policy Kevin Kane comments on the amount of people in jail.  Louisiana has the highest rate of incarceration in the country.  

Louisiana has about 400,000 inmates.  Kane offers his opinion of the challenges this poses to the state.  

"All this does is create a task force... that we recognize this is a problem that merits some study," he says, emphasizing the lack of controversy surrounding this proposition.  

They comment on the retributions against simple marijuana possession which can be life in prison.  

Our imprisonment rate increased since 2013, whereas the nation's rate decreased.