Transcripts for KSKA 91.1 FM [Public Radio for Alaska] KSKA 91.1 FM [Public Radio for Alaska] 20170415 140000

In our News in Washington d.c. This is Weekend Edition. I'm Linda Wertheimer President Trump is taking another look at proposals which seem clearer period from the campaign now in the Oval Office not so much will round up some changing views and then a look at North Korea. The Hermit Kingdom appears increasingly belligerent We'll talk to former Governor Bill Richardson who knows North Korea's leaders President Trump thought China could manage their ally but it's complicated and later a Pulitzer Prize won by a small newspaper in a state with a big problem and a commencement address by filmmaker John Waters who advises graduates make trouble 1st our newscast hits Saturday April 15th and 27 Jane. Live from n.p.r. News that Washington our jails tonight are in North Korea today. Big military parade in the capital celebrating the birthday of North Korea's late founding ruler Kim Il soon the celebration was presided over by his grandson the current leader Kim Jong Il moon the parade of military hardware including new intercontinental ballistic missiles was mounted amid worries that North Korea may be preparing for another nuclear test or a missile launch tensions have been rising in the region but the b.b.c. Steve Evans and Seoul says that's nothing new in terms of where it is now it's high but not as high as it was for example 4 years ago when Pyongyang with telling foreigners to get out of the Peninsula basically So there is clearly a dangerous situation here life goes on a little bit where in a b.b.c. Steve Evans reporting there from the South Korean capital of Seoul vice president Pence's has left Washington rather this morning for a trip to South Korea and he's due there tomorrow in a schedule to meet with South Korean leaders at the start of a 10 day tour that includes stops in Japan Indonesia and Australia a federal court in San Francisco heard arguments in a lawsuit challenging President Trump's executive order to cut off federal funds to sanctuary cities N.P.R.'s Richard Gonzales reports the city of San Francisco where the county of Santa Clara are 2 jurisdictions that limit their cooperation with federal immigration authorities their lawyers say Trump is using the threat of losing hundreds of millions of federal dollars as a weapon to coerce them into enforcing immigration laws a lawyer for the Justice Department so the president's executive order would only affect a small amount of money in law enforcement groups but lawyers for San Francisco argued that Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions have said they want to cut off all federal funds District Judge William Oric said he would issue a ruling as soon as you can Richard. Gonzales n.p.r. News San Francisco the state of Arkansas was planned to resume executions remains in limbo the state had planned to put 8 men to death over 11 days but now a federal judge has blocked Arkansas from carrying out the executions the decision this morning follows similar rulings yesterday Christians in Egypt are commiserating Easter weekend under very tight security after suicide bombings claimed by an Islamic state affiliate killed more than 45 people nearly a week ago N.P.R.'s Dina raff has more searches need tipped won't be holding traditional Easter celebrations on Sunday instead they're conducting scaled back quickly just services and prayers for the dead Egypt declared a state of emergency and tightened security at churches and government buildings across the country after the bombings moving to Turkey were voters are preparing to decide whether to hand more power to the president today the last day of campaigning ahead of tomorrow's referendum on changes to the Constitution this is n.p.r. News. The latest a movie in the blockbuster Star Wars series does not open until Christmas but N.P.R.'s Neda Ulaby reports the latest trailer is generating excitement among fans to be honest the trailer comes across at 1st a little bit like an ad for a creepy interstellar yoga retreat. But maybe that's what should I knight training is like. The movie will almost certainly continue the box office bonanza that's characterized the Star Wars franchise since it started in $197079.00 Star Wars movies have been released so far close to $10000000000.00 between them worldwide which makes the title The last at I feel just a move to some. Time. But of course there's already 2 other Star Wars movies in production and with the n.p.r. News. The latest Star Wars trailer was released as fans are in Orlando Florida for the Star Wars Celebration of bent actor Mark Hamill was among the franchise stars who appeared last night in let a tribute to the late Carrie Fisher honestly she played such a crucial role in my life both professionally and personally and both would have been. So diminished had she not been a part of my life and my career Carrie Fisher died in December her mother the actress Debbie Reynolds died a day later after suffering a stroke the movie will mark Fisher's last appearance in a Star Wars film she wrapped up filming before death I'm trial Snyder n.p.r. News support for n.p.r. Comes from n.p.r. Stations other contributors include their reader Alan foundation investing in transformative ideas to promote breakthrough solutions to significant problems learn more at read Allen dot org and the listeners who support this n.p.r. Station. Hi I'm Rosa me and I'm a fan and a proud supporter of Alaska Public Media I'm proud to be part of the anchorage community and I know you are too well today Alaska public media is giving you a chance to make a difference in our community by supporting public broadcasting you're helping to ensure independent journalism has a strong voice in Alaska we all know how important that is these days and you're helping Alaskan stay informed and connected about the issues that matter most Please choose to make a difference now by making a contribution at Alaska public dot org. This is Weekend Edition from n.p.r. News Scott Simon is off for a couple of weeks I'm Linda Wertheimer President Trump is celebrating Easter this weekend at his Mar-A Lago resort he traveled to Florida with far fewer senior aides than usual and those aides are likely scrambling to account for a number of significant policy changes the president made public this week n.p.r. Senior political correspondent Mara Liasson is keeping a tally and she joins us now good morning Mara Hi Linda we're seeing an extraordinary moment in Donald Trump's presidency already anything but ordinary he's not just adjusting positions he's out and out flipping I count at least half a dozen major reversals this week and there's a very long list NATO was obsolete now it's not obsolete China was manipulating its currency now it doesn't manipulate its currency the export import bank was crony capitalism now it's important to small businesses President Obama wasn't transparent enough now Donald Trump has reversed the Obama policy and has decided to keep the White House a visitor logs secret so the list goes on and on now all presidents change their positions when they come into office this is kind of like reality television without the television but even though Donald Trump trumpets his flexibility as an important part of his leadership style this is. Policy with Clash Oh let's let's take a look at health care Donald Trump campaigned on repealing and replacing a mama care immediately his effort to do that with the American Health Care Act crashed last month and now they're thinking about taking another run at what has changed well that's a tactical shift you know he said he was going to move on to tax reform now he's back to wanting to do health care 1st and his new negotiating stance is to threaten to stop the subsidies to insurance companies that keep the individual market going he wants to hold those subsidies hostage so that as he puts it the Democrats will come running to him begging for negotiations because he couldn't get enough Republican votes he has to turn to Democrats so far Democrats aren't biting on that and a coalition of business interests including the Chamber of Commerce has written to trump saying please don't stop those subsidies could there be real harm to Donald Trump's presidency here if he's if he's so inconsistent on everything from NATO to the Ex-Im Bank and on and on well that's a good question the question is would he lose his base that found his America 1st economic populism so appealing I think so far no as long as he stays very tough on immigration which he is he's assembling a deportation force and on social issues like his executive order making it easier to define Planned Parenthood or guns he's going to be speaking to a big n.r.a. Meeting at the end of the month I think what's potentially more harmful for him is if he can't pass anything or if he gets involved in a foreign entanglement that people don't like for the most part the slippage in the polls for him is coming from people who didn't expect the trumpet ministration to be so chaotic and ineffective and you know the new chairman of the Republican Party Rhona Romney has even warned Republicans that they could lose in 2018 if they don't start passing legislation and acting like a governing party so is there some deeper meaning in all these policy changes or is is this a new order. Donald Trump or is the real Donald Trump or what is it I think it's 2 things and there's confusion and incoherence but there is something happening if you're trying to read the tea leaves on who's getting the upper hand inside the White House in terms of defining what Trump ism is we would have to say you're seeing the globalists the New York Wall Street wing of the Trump White House ascendant you're seeing the economic populist nationalist Steve Bannan wing losing influence maybe the trumpet ministration is morphing into a Xena form but version of what Mitt Romney administration would have been like he has still has a hard line conservative stance on immigration abortion guns climate change but the economic policy is getting more globalist and less nationalist That's N.P.R.'s senior political correspondent Mara Liasson Mara thank you very much thank you now one of President Trump's newly adjusted positions concerns North Korea he used to think that China could easily solve that problem on the Korean peninsula now as he has told the Wall Street Journal he realizes it's not so easy Governor Bill Richardson knows that as well he's researched the North Korean regime and has famously negotiated with them he joins us on the line now welcome to the program thank you very much Linda our earlier this week on c.n.n. Governor Richardson you said you think president trumps foreign policy is starting to move and what you would see as the right direction you feel that way specifically about the u.s. Position towards. Well I do think that it's so far been restrained it has been basically saying that the past policy of strategic patience which was basically more sanctions shows of force needed in addition to that addition is strong pressure from China and I think that is the right way to go the right option because China contains a lot of food economic assistance energy assistance to North Korea leverage that they can use hopefully they're going to do that I think Trump has moved and push the Chinese to do that what what I'm concerned about is this talk in the trumpet ministration about preemptive strikes I think that would be a disaster we've got 28000 troops in South Korea Americans $50000.00 in Japan we've got a tender box situation the South Koreans would be probably attacked $25000000.00 in Seoul so I think we need diplomacy we need a strategy and while I think going out of strategic patience makes sense the best policy we don't have a Coke here and diplomatic strategy to deal with North Korea I think any times do you think that China would do what the president wants and put pressure on North Korea says it might abandon its nuclear weapons program. Well the signs might be that if the president did say that he would not name them as a currency manipulator that there would be some trade incentives possibly China would be in a position to exert more pressure on North Korea the big issue is why would China really want to help us they like the turbulence in the region there are rivals in the region they don't want refugees to North Korea from a regime change coming to China so China has like stability but you. When we have a missile arrangement with South Korea we're agitating militarily more in the region I think China has to think twice so I think the 1st test should be before we start launching any military is strikes is is see if some of this pressure on China is working see if they start changing their policy because for them instability in the region caused by North Korea's ballistic missile tests their nuclear test that's not good for them either. Did you did you draw any anything optimistic from the meeting with the Chinese leaders. Well I think be optimistic side was that they seemed to part and in a positive way that they've had phone calls since that meeting but they're coordinating I think the big danger is North Korea conducting some kind of a test this weekend to celebrate. Grandfather's birthday a 100 birthday and I think there will be some kind of a test some kind of a missile test and the question is how are we going to respond how will the United States and China and South Korea respond and I think it's very important that we be restrained that we perhaps increase sanctions China has that leverage to banks through energy that a show of force probably by the United States makes sense continuing to be aircraft carriers there right increasing sanctions at the United Nations but I think a military strike preemptive strike that should not be in the cards and then eventually learned I think we need to deal with North Korea Governor Richardson thank you very much thank you very much Linda. Since we've been paying a lot of attention to turnarounds by President Tran this week I'd like to propose that one of the President's Men would benefit from a revaluation of his position on at least one thing the news media the secretary of state Rex Tillerson has apparently decided he does not need to travel with an entourage of reporters as his predecessors have done one or 2 are sufficient in the news secretary's view he's also reduce the number of staff and advisers who accompany him and reduce the size of the aircraft in which he travels from the military version of 875728 smaller 737 to save money line. It's a folks might see this as a campaign promise being kept downsizing the importance of the State Department reining in the influence of the correspondents who've made a career of covering American diplomats the reporters are travel with the secretary do pay their own way and it's not cheap but the most important thing about the decision to leave the news people behind is the message that it sends when Secretary jailers in his meeting with world leaders what is said and what happens is none of the people's business the reporting on Tiller's in straggles mostly comes from his own official statements which may or may not be all we the people need to know perhaps Mr Tillerson is last job influenced what he does now corporations like his he was c.e.o. Of Exxon Mobil are not given to sharing but despite the notions that a government could or should be run like a business it is not a business it is our government emphasis on our travels with pillars and could work for the news people and the secretary getting to know one another providing an early warning that some new ideas might not be well understood or received experienced reporters might have warned that Russian leaders often refuse to see American officials although they rarely mean it but bottom line traveling with reporters is the right thing to do it's not something to be done for a gaggle of reporters who didn't get to go abroad it's something to be done for the rest of us who stay here but still need to understand what our country is doing. Listening to n.p.r. News. The anchorage concert Association invites you to experience the magic of Disney's Beauty And The Beast live on stage fall in love again with a story that proved beauty can be found within this cherished Broadway musical is coming to Anchorage April 25th through the 30th at the Atwood concert hall tickets for Disney's Beauty And The Beast are available at the center text box office in Anchorage concerts dot org this message sponsored by Anchorage concert association if you listen to f.m. 91 point one Alaska Public Media Public radio every day it's because you find something here that appeals to you it's radio that appeals to your sense of wonder your love of learning it's also radio that depends on your financial support I'm Robert Siegel host of All Things Considered go to Alaska public dot org and make your contribution that's Alaska public dot org thank you on trial Snider with these headlines by President Pence is due in Seoul tomorrow he is scheduled to meet with South Korean leaders at the start of a 10 day tour that includes stops in Japan Indonesia and Australia today North Korea rolled out a massive military parade amid speculation that leader Kim Jong un could order a new nuclear test in Turkey today is the last day of campaigning ahead of tomorrow's referendum on changes to the Turkish constitution voters who will decide whether to hand more power to the president and in Afghanistan the death toll from the u.s. Military bombing of a cave complex used by Islamic state militants is said to be climbing an Afghan official now says more than 90 ISIS militants were killed in Thursday's attack on trials later n.p.r. News from Washington. Support for n.p.r. Comes from n.p.r. Member stations and from the financial services firm of Raymond James offering personalized wealth management advice and banking and capital markets expertise along with a legacy of putting clients' financial wellbeing 1st learn more at Raymond James dot com from Carbonite for backing up and restoring office and home computers to the cloud automatically learn more at Carbonite dot com and from the John s. And James l. Knight Foundation helping n.p.r. Advance journalistic excellence in the digital age this is Weekend Edition from n.p.r. News I'm Linda Wertheimer now to a journalist in West Virginia who won a Pulitzer this week Eric Eric is a state house and investigations reporter with The Charleston Gazette mail he joins us now from West Virginia Public Broadcasting in Charleston West Virginia welcome to our program thanks so much now you won the Pulitzer for your investigation into the state's opioid crisis but you're a full time state house reporter how do you balance doing those kinds of investigative projects which take so much time and still doing all your daily work . It's very difficult we're just a 37000 circulation paper very small staff limited resources but I've been doing projects for many years so it's not an exact science and you get a lot of interruptions you get stuck on different stories but for a paper our size I think we really do a really good job with the more in-depth stories how long did it take you to save enough string to be ready to do this. But I started working on the story about 3 years ago we knew we had something really big when we got some data from the d a and from that point forward actually took about 3 weeks to complete the 2 part series but during that time period also was doing daily stories as well well know what was the big factor that you got hold of that told you Ok now we're ready. What we had was the total volume of Heider code in an Oxycontin her actually couldn't pills that were shipped to West Virginia over a 6 year period and when we totaled it up there were words of 780000000 Hider code and actually couldn't pills that's about 433 pills per person and what was even more striking was the number of pills that went to southern West Virginia just you had really small counties in southern West Virginia which is our coal region had 56 times more pills and then county that was 8 times larger in northern West Virginia. Now while you were putting all that together and getting ready to write it you still have a half to do your shift with a overnight with the cops right yeah that's that's about once a month then we actually get I actually get a break when I'm covering the legislative session which lasts 2 months I actually get a break because the younger porters they have to pull and I cut shift at least once a week so I consider myself lucky. Well you have worked there for 18 years 18 years yet I gather that you were not planning to stick around that long but then you did why basically they give you a lot of freedom they don't get in your way the editors encourage in-depth investigative work they like to hold public officials accountable they're also willing to go to bat if you need legal help if you're trying to get records or things like that so would you advise young reporters to do what you have done and stick with a local news organization for a decent amount of John Yeah I think on the least a year sometimes 2 years is a good point to kind of reconsider your options we thought that we were just going to be here for a year but this paper has a history of. Crusading investigative reporting strong local journalism early published or Ned Chilton coined this phrase called sustained outrage and that's sort of hammering away at it right an injustice until it's righted people who could manage to stay mad for a long time the one thing that we're very fortunate to have is local ownership we still are family owned if you can believe that Eric Harris is a state house an investigation supporter with the Charleston Gazette mail he won a Pulitzer this week for his investigation into West Virginia's opioid crisis he joined us from West Virginia Public Broadcasting congratulations again and thank you very much. Thanks so much in Nashua New Hampshire Michael Treadwell lives on the streets he has schizophrenia and as New Hampshire Public Radio's Emily Cohen reports when people like him don't get the help they need local taxpayers can end up with a hefty bill I find Michael Treadwell in the back of a courtroom he's wearing a windbreaker and work boots and he's leaning his elbows on his knees at 1st it looks like he's chewing gum later when we talk I discover he isn't showing he's chewing his own gums Michael Treadwell doesn't have teeth but when you live in a town like Nashua there's not a lot of lessons there and the kind I thought was a push in the spotlight especially if you think I hope I've been looking for Treadwell since I came across his criminal record doing the math I figured over the last 6 years Hillsborough County taxpayers had spent 63000 dollars keeping him in jail on charges like trespassing and disorderly conduct for years now his wife has looked like this trust pass in an apartment building spend 30 days in jail by the restaurant customers 42 days in jail Panhandle aggressively 30 days in jail at the courthouse I watch him plead guilty to public urination then we take a walk in the rain through the city people kill all of its people and then it's going out you know and it could be a very dangerous like to leave me. I don't suggest jail time. But you know it's not enough I think when you were younger did you think this is what life would be like oh no. Now. And then like this I give him points Treadwell did do time for drug charges in the early ninety's but for years his ex-wife Sherry Treadwell tells me his life was on the right track he traversed the country driving trucks a job he loved they had. 2 daughters sitting across from me at her kitchen table she remembers the guy she married he's the 1st one to give you the shirt off his back if you need any help he's right there and he has a really good sense of humor when he has teeth he has the biggest brightest smile and just covers of covers his whole face to Sherry the drinking the homelessness the stints in jail they're all symptoms of his schizophrenia she tells me it was just a year or 2 into their marriage that Michael started acting strange he would think those people listening in on our conversations he would whisper to me in the cards should the Congress bug I don't know all the cars not bugs. He wouldn't talk on the phone Sherry says Treadwell turned to alcohol to cope they divorced in 2007 people have tried to help a year after getting divorced Treadwell walked into a church looking for a bus money and met Jouret a Copeland 9 years later Copeland knows him better than anyone including how bad he can get when he drinks he gets to get them to scream and holler and he's talking and he's cutting people out swearing and carrying on and so forth and what not it is people because they don't know what its intentions are it was Copeland who got Treadwell diagnosed with schizophrenia over and over she's trying to get him into New Hampshire state mental hospital and failed even a judge's order couldn't get him from jail to the hospital instead Treadwell continues to cycle from the streets to court to jail and back again his story is not uncommon half of jail inmates nationwide have a combination of mental health and substance abuse problems that's according to the Department of Justice Sherry Treadwell's ex-wife says the system isn't just failing people like Michael it's failing their families her daughters don't have a dad around she works 2 jobs and is rarely home and they miss him his liver. Is gone now because of the alcoholism and so we know he's not going to be around for too much longer and this hurts this hurts the girls and I and it hurts me more because I know the system could have done something last time I talked to tried well he told me he wanted to go down to South Carolina where he grew up to get his trucking license back in order he did make it to South Carolina he ended up in a jail there for n.p.r. News I'm Emily Corwin in New Hampshire at midnight tonight many Christian congregations around the country will hold an Easter Vigil to commemorate the resurrection of Christ this as Jewish congregations celebrate Passover an 8 day commemoration of the Jewish people's liberation from slavery in Egypt. I'm joined now by Andrew my gallon is Dean and president of Berkeley divinity school at Yale thank you for being here thank you and so tell me is it is it something special when these holidays overlap they are generally close but not like this year where they're just one is right on top of the other one that's why they don't always overlap for reasons that have to do with oddities in astronomical calculations than anything else because they actually share a common history and I think that it is special when they overlap because Christians are certainly I would think more readily the roots of their Easter celebrations are intimately connected with the celebration of Passover and perhaps Jews also see the sense of affinity that they have with the Christian neighbors and perhaps find other ways in which their own televisions are eliminated you know one of the things that said every year at the Seder that I go to is that the Last Supper was a Seder That's absolutely right we can't be sure that it was a Seder quite like those that are more familiar from recent times because in fact as strange as it may seem the stories of the Last Supper are among the oldest evidence we have for anybody celebrating a seder and yet they don't include some of those lovely details that are familiar to so many the series of cups of wine or all the special foods or the questions that are asked it's absolutely true that. The bulk of the earliest Christian material identifies the Last Supper as a meal celebrated at Passover by Jesus with his disciples even though they are a bit short on the ritual detail I there are echoes in the 2 faiths now in the way the 2 holidays are celebrated I think so there are some similarities still and there are some ironic differences I mean there are many parts of the world where Christians will traditionally eat lamb for instance at Easter and they might think about is something to do with Jesus as the Lamb of God but of course that also an acoa. Passover in particular even though ironically lamb is not likely to feature it at a stated table because of the fact that the sacrifice of the Passover lambs ended when the Jewish temple was destroyed in the 1st century so the symbolism of lamb however is still common in both holidays and there is a real genuine connection Jewish friends want to come to me it was ironic that as their household to getting rid of the leaven of it in the form of your various flowers and so forth that Christians are baking up a storm. Cross Buns every Easter for instance and that pretty good you know living. Absolutely but still. Big to still point to the affinity between wanting to bake and the significance of bread and grain and it's it's a given to something that supports life as a kind of basic food and of course Christians use unleavened bread some Christians at least in the Western Christian tradition tend to use unleavened bread for every Eucharistic celebration and that in itself it's understood to be an echo of that last supper so Christians are sort of using a form of Mark so throughout the year and celebrating a little Passover every Sunday in one sense what about the The Journey From Slavery to Freedom which is part of the Passover celebration the way that Christians celebrate their journey from death to life which is part of the resurrection of Christ and you know those are parallels that we should pay attention to well the Easter Vigil itself is really a kind of mini Passover of Christians I think and much of its symbolism is specifically about mapping Jesus' narrative the story of Jesus connection and his movement from death life as a kind of image that parallels that of the Exodus experience so that Jesus becomes Israel itself and his passage from death to life is like the passage through the Red Sea and so quick. Themselves especially in the 1st 1000 he's a Christian history saw the whole of the Jesus experience very much as a new kind of pasta a new kind of deliverance from slavery to freedom and the creation of a people who had a special relationship with God but of course they allegorize to the Exodus story invited out of their own story and the Easter Vigil still retains that basic language and symbolism of a Journey From Slavery to Freedom journey from oppression to liberation that's Andrew McCallum his dean of Yale's Berkeley Divinity School thank you very much for talking to thank you Linda RINGBACK 'd 'd. I'm Lakshmi saying I'm frequently in on the collaborative spirit that I've come to identify with n.p.r. For those people on whom I depend editors producers associate producers collaboration is at the heart of the way we cover the news with one goal in mind serving the listener and doing so with integrity Thanks for listening to this n.p.r. Station. The phaser between fearless girl and charging bull has grown more tense if you recall fearless girl is a sculpture that a Wall Street investment firm commissioned for International Women's Day this past March she was installed directly opposite wall street's famous charging bull sculpture the artist who made charging bull wants that girl gone he says she diminishes his piece we're joined now by our friend from New York magazine art critic Jerry Saltz for some perspective on the sculptural kerfuffle thanks for coming back to our show Thanks for having me Linda So what do you think of Arturo demoted his view that he's a sculptor that made the charging boat can he dictate what other art to be nearby doesn't seem to work for artists in museums and galleries Well that's a mouthful and 1st of all you said the sculptor are turbo demoted I would not even call him an artist frankly I think of him more as at best a skilled craftsman with a totally clichéd idea of what's called Sure is and he plopped this thing down paid for with his own money God love him and the thing has been horrible ever since. So I think if you don't like it I think it's kind of a joke I think it has nothing to do with Wall Street oh bullish bullish markets that sort of thing yeah I actually think that that's the opposite that the market there are not big strong bulls I think the best down a move would have been maybe a sheep because the market does what other people in the market already have done it follows itself in fact the fearless girl sculpture which is probably just as bad. At least points out something about the fake masculinity of a bull market which is that it can be scared to death by anything maybe the animal signifying Wall Street should have been I don't know a juror ball. Oh so you're not fond of each of these in separately and or together I'll tell you why because neither has an ounce of originality neither has a new way of dealing with material form subject matter surface collar or public art I'm getting and I'm getting I'm sorry. Yeah so what to do Ok there are a couple of solutions I would 1st offer the Solomonic solution take them both out or perhaps you would want to put the girl in back of the bowl or standing alongside the bull in fact Herman Melville's Moby Dick begins in the 1st paragraph with Ishmael wandering down right on this corner having his nose lead into water I'd rather have the sculpture of Melville there I think the point is that most public sculpture is bad because there are too many people involved with making the decision it's too democratized because of necessarily where it goes. To senior art critic for New York magazine thank you very much thank you Linda. This is n.p.r. News. Behind every story the mission of n.p.r. Should have n.p.r. Mission of n.p.r. 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News I'm Linda Wertheimer Olivia Surjit as a young British writer presumably also a brilliant one judging from the prizes she's won she identifies herself on her Instagram account as a baby novelist her 1st novel just published here it's called sympathy maybe what it's about is falling in love in the digital age possibly it's about identity and obsessive really tracking that identity through the endless possibilities of the Web or not. Mr Richards joins us from London where she lives to talk about her book Welcome to our program thanks for having me now there are a handful of things we know about the narrator of your book Alice hare she's a philosophy graduate she's adopted she has complicated relationships with her adoptive and her birth relations and she is obsessed with a slightly older woman a Japanese writer called musical The Mara So could you sort of pick it up from there I think you're totally right in saying that she is completely obsessed with this older woman and I think part of the reason why that happens is because her own story is very dim and in place of any sort of certainty about who she is or where she comes from or what her own origin story might be she starts to fixate on this woman who for her is this mixture of some parallels that she perceives between them but equally quite a lot I think of wishful thinking and this sort of imaginary bond she she seems them to share now Alice's relationship to music go in real life is a creation right I mean she's done all the research she's googled all of that was in the end you sense that she doesn't really get to know the real person but it's still what happened right it's still real life or is it I mean I still am not 100 percent definite even with myself as a writer about exactly what doesn't doesn't happen in this story at all narrated by Alice who is as you will discover a very unreliable narrator in various ways and who whilst writing it is still trying to imitate her heroine's confessional style and the thing I think about what you just said in terms of Googling all over the pace is that I. I saw in lots of ways Alice and relationship as a kind of metaphor in a way for our own individual relations with fear Internet itself so the way that the Internet both tracks us and the way that we use it to search for other things so this is sort of a new path or a new direction for literature in fiction. Creating narratives on social media and. As we perhaps used to do in novels and stories I guess I wanted to sort of explore a form of storytelling that could compete or co-exist with this supposed that you know death of publishing death of the novel which is obviously always being you know there's so much doom and gloom about that and I think that your one point. As a writer and says Oh there's no point anymore and being a writer and writing novels because you know the Internet kills every plot you can just find out exactly what you want to know straight away Alice responds that actually maybe it's more like a game of chess where you know everything or you can know everything but the trouble is knowing what your opponent plans to do next so it's sort of about how we can know everything but we still have to choose and we still have to try and predict what those moves might be amongst you know the possibilities I would be interested in how you think this affects plot. Your own plot since whereas him walking around New York City going out to Roosevelt Island and so on and then and then you're talking about the Higgs Bozon and discarded supercollider in Texas yeah it's hard to follow I think that as much as I'm sure part of it was because this is my 1st novel and I know that everyone sort of tries to write every book with their 1st novel it wasn't entirely accidental I promise. I think what I was trying to do or I know what I thought was trying to do was to mimic the way that we get led astray by the Internet and how for example was you can be reading a very serious story on the news about Syria so 1st that you looked at a year ago but didn't buy will pop up and the way that these algorithms not just a way maybe from where we wanted to get to when we 1st opened our. Clicked on to a website that kind of looping for path was obviously I took a gamble that people would want to follow me on it now you you said that your narrator is an unreliable narrator who obviously leads us down some kind of rabbit hole Alice here but at the end is it the reader who is unreliable. So the thing about the way that she's writing this is she's writing into the void and so she addresses herself to a huge range of people who might be listening who might be on the other end and I do think that in the end it means that a reader might come away from this feeling sort of perhaps resentful or cheated some Howard of a kind of nice new ending I sort of hope every time I go back over that and that and think she faked this at one point or so maybe does she do that again cetera I wanted to the reader to feel like they have to kind of rake over certain parts I thought maybe I'm asking quite a lot from someone who just wants to go on holiday the book is called sympathy Olivia Surjit thank you thank you. Music has been an important part of Lizzie knows a lot for a long time growing up she's saying in the church choir and she played concert harp then she discovered Bob Dylan and started teaching herself his songs on the harp but she didn't really grow up with much folk music there is a long tradition of black people playing folk music but I wasn't really aware of it and it's not all that visible in popular culture so it took me a while to kind of find my way and see where I fit in. But I'm still kind of getting used to the idea that somebody like me could find a home in this genre. And I to. The album that I just put out is called hard one and the idea for that phrase hard one really stuck with me because even in those words it contains this feeling that I often have that joy and sorrow or struggle and triumph kind of live in the same house and the title track I wrote. It opens with my feet under cold water whenever I come home and that's something that you have to do in New York when you come in after a hot day and it kind of represented for me and washing away a lot of struggles that I'd been through. I have been up and down with depression for about half my life a lot of women especially women of color are handed this idea that we have to be really strong for everybody and that our anger and our sadness and our confusion is dangerous and and that's something that I've internalized a lot throughout the course of My Lai. So the title track hard won it really is a victory a personal victory for myself because I had to get used to the idea that it was Ok to get mad and actually have anger be a tool for healing rather than something that's scary. So last summer I felt like every week I was hearing a new story of a person of color doing all the right things but just being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time and being killed by police and I know that this is something that has happened in our in our country for a long time but it just felt so poignant hearing it on the news all the time. The Killing Season came out of that grief and that fear that I was processing. There is no telling. When. The worst thing that can happen to a person is to not be allowed to be seen as fully human in the complex ways that we all are so I felt this need to start to describe my world view and what I was experiencing and I think I'm going to keep doing it. That was Lizzie know her 1st album is called Hard one. I should say right off that I am really qualified to be your commencement speaker I was suspended from high school and kicked out of college in the 1st marijuana scandal ever on a university campus I've been arrested several times I've been known to dress in ludicrous fashions I've also built a career out of negative reviews and I've been recently called The Prince of Peace by the press and another title I'm really proud of the people's pervert. With those words filmmaker John Waters began his commencement address to the class of 2015 at Rizzi the Rhode Island School of Design John Waters has always been a trouble maker from his outrageous early movies Mondo trash show multiple maniacs and pink flamingos through his more acceptable work like a crybaby in Hairspray the filmmaker author and actor has proudly worn those monikers you just heard Prince of Pew the people's pervert his sage advice to risky students has now been published with some great graphics in the new book make trouble John Waters joins us now from our studios in New York welcome to our program thank you very much I guess if a school is going to invite John Waters to give its commencement address it would be a place full of artists like Rizvi did you seek anyone's advice on what to tell these kids or did you just tell them what you wish someone had told you well I think I didn't ask a lot of people's advice I want to know how long it should be because I've never graduated from anywhere I got kicked out of practically every school ever went through so I didn't know what they were I'd never heard a graduation speech so I found out how long it should be and I did read it to a friend he said Harlow you merit check Robert somebody else but that usually goes with anything I write it can go either way you could hate it or like this is the end of your juvenile delinquency you say in this talk and the beginning of your adult disobedience and later on you say contemporary arts job is to wreck what came before certainly is yeah I mean think of it I mean didn't pop art and abstract expressionism overnight didn't the Beatles and Motown overnight so you encourage these fine young people to come up with something that can Harf I mean they can astonish me now it's a high bar No don't try to get on your parish. Parents nerves you get on the coolest people in your school that are one year ahead of us nerves that's the way you make a mark. Well now and as you must know many people in America agree with you they voted for the president who is a card carrying disruptor and that's what they like about him yes and what I also say in the book is that it time to stop wanting to be an outsider no matter who you are for I believe that both Obama and Trump would describe themselves as outsiders and so when I was young outsider was a word that nobody wanted to be now everybody wants to be an outsider so it's time to be an insider it's time to sneak in and change things from the inside and before I wrote this book Trump was not elected so I think in a weird way it became even more of an act of this book because I do believe we should make trouble one woman's March is not enough that we should be out there every day I go to college is a lot and speak at a time stop studying. This is that don't you know it's your time to go out there and cause some trouble do you think that these kids I mean when you were looking out and they were they were sitting in front of you in their robes where they paying attention you think Oh they definitely were yes and the parents like me too because I address them a lot of times the parents aren't addressed I said Liza entitled brats to they think you're made of money and you can order your kids up so if your kid comes home from school when they have their whole face tattooed Well maybe encourage them to open a really fancy tattoo parlor in Paris you got to work with what you got you said that your parents actually made you feel safe and they did that's the hardest thing and you can be a serial killer and be a good parent if you make your own children feel safe I'm not saying My life wasn't my parents everything that I made these movies that were horrified by nobody said they were good in the beginning they their friends would say in the mean reviews anonymously and in the mail I don't know what kind of friend would do that but my mother told me that way later. When all bear kids started getting in trouble they would call her for advice I like the part where you say that you should go out into the world and design clothes so hideously they can't be worn ironically Well that's true I mean that's a new way to astonish people being shocking anymore like Hollywood makes $100000000.00 gross out movies that aren't funny but have to think of a new way to make something new and the biggest sin you can never try to argue can never look like you're just trying to shock people can start simple but making people laugh is the hard part and if you want to change anybody's mind I'm an opposite of a separate our star don't believe that we should never not talk to people we don't agree with politically if you can make that person laugh it's the 1st step to getting them to listen to change their mind John Waters filmmaker writer artist and Commencement Speaker thank you very much thank you Are you in demand now as a commits to speak you know that's funny I never got one on or off after this one I thought I would cash you know I was going to try to get into this racket. It was. This is Weekend Edition from n.p.r. News Scott Simon will be back in jail week so I'm Linda Wertheimer. Support for n.p.r. Comes from n.p.r. Member stations and from an ata creators of the Japanese made Dreamwave massage chair with Shell 2 point detection and 16 programmed massages including morning and night time sessions retail dealers nationwide Moret Dreamwave chair dot com from c 3 io t. Bringing cloud computing artificial intelligence machine learning and Io t. Big data solutions to commercial industrial and government business processes learn more at c 3 I o t dot com and from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. We all need to take stock of what we're doing online and making sure our activities are getting results learn how to refocus your approach on your messaging to make stronger more meaningful connections online building a smarter online presence presented by you a Center for Corporate and professional development is on Thursday April 20th from 9 to 1230 states sharp enroll at u.e.a. Data Alaska dot edu slash c c p d this message sponsored by USA. The legislature is likely to go past the 90 day mark as they try to find a solution to the state's fiscal crisis lawmakers from both chambers seem to agree on using permanent fund earnings but they're having a harder time finding common ground on budget cuts and new taxes will discuss the plans and the divisions on the next talk of Alaska Tuesday at 10 am on the recorded rebroadcast can be heard at 8 pm on f.m. 91 point one Hi this is Jason De Rose I'm N.P.R.'s Western bureau chief a big part of my job is working with local member station reporters like Alaska public media when they want to do a story for a national audience if a reporter thinks that their story might be of interest to a national audience it's my job to work with that reporter to help them tell it for this news who live every place except Alaska so if somebody pitches me a story about health care here I might say to that reporter what why would I be interested in that if I lived in Seattle or Chicago or Birmingham Ala.

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