Tag Archives: Civil Liberties

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle-Free-Speech-in-USA-/-Influencers-of-American-Congress-Dec. 7th, 2014

First, after years of allowing censorship and criminal prosecution of dissent, what caused the radical turnaround by the Supreme Court to then support free speech and dissent? Part one of a two part discussion with Thomas Healy.

  • Thomas Healy is Professor of Law at Seton Hall Law School. Author of The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind–and Changed the History of Free Speech in America

Then, we know that the wealthy have more influence than other americans, but just how unrepresentative is the American Congress and the state legislatures?

  • Thomas Hayes, is Professor of Political Science at University of Connecticut.
  • Martin Gilens, is Professor of Politics, Princeton University. Author of  Affluence and Influence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America
  • Patrick Flavin, is Professor of Political Science at Baylor University.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle -American Dream and Reality -/- Reaction-to-Terrorist Threat-/-Fundamentalism -Oct. 12th, 2014

First, we look at the gap between the American Dream and reality, with Miles Corak, professor of economics with the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. [ dur: 13mins. ]

  • Miles Corak is professor of economics with the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottowa. He is the author of, Generational Income Mobility in North America and Europe

Then, are the high alerts, embassy closures, and the national surveillance state reasonable reactions to the threat of terrorist acts? Our next guests suggest that the government may be overreacting. We are joined by John Mueller and Mark G. Stewart, authors of, “Terror, Security, and Money: Balancing the Risks, Benefits, and Costs of Homeland Security.” [ dur: 17mins. ]

  • John Mueller is a research scientist and professor of political science at Ohio State University and author of Retreat from Doomsday and War, Presidents and Public Opinion.
  • Mark Stewart is a professor of civil engineering and director of the Center for Infrastructure , Performance and Reliability at the University of Newcastle in Australia.

Finally, on the Scholars’ Circle panel, in many parts of the world fundamentalism is on the rise oppressing human rights, sometimes using bodily harm and even death. Simultaneously, the international community has been ineffective in helping the scholars, journalists, human rights advocates and artists who are struggling against the oppression. How bad is the situation and what can be done? [ dur: 28mins. ]

  • Karima Benoune, Professor of Law  at UC Davis, School of Law; Author of  Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here: Untold Stories from the Fight Against Muslim Fundamentalism
  • Ousseina Alidou, Professor at Center African Studies, Rutgers University; Author of Engaging Modernity: Muslim Women and the Politics of Agency in Post-colonial Niger (Women in Africa and the Diaspora) and Muslim Women in Postcolonial Kenya: Leadership, Representation, and Social Change
  • Sadia Abbas; Professor of English at Rutgers University; At Freedom’s Limit: Islam and the Postcolonial Predicament

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Indonesia Election / Ferguson Missouri – Aug. 24th, 2014

First, Indonesia’s new political era–What the Court’s decision for Wiwodo really means. [ dur: 20 mins. ]

  • Dr. Chris Wilson, Lecturer at University of Auckland, New Zealand. Author of Ethno-Religious Violence in Indonesia: From Soil to God

Then, we look at the hidden structural problems that led to the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.  [ dur: 20 mins. ]

  • Clarissa Rile Hayward, is Professor of Political Science, Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Author of How Americans Make Race: Stories, Institutions, Spaces.
  • Delores Jones-Brown, is Professor of Law, Police Science,Criminal Justice, City University of New York . Author of  Race, Crime and Punishment

Finally, how can education prevent another Ferguson? [ dur: 18 mins. ]

  • Garrett Albert Duncan is Associate Professor of Education in Arts & Sciences. He also teaches African&African American Studies at Washington University in St. Louis. His publications listed here.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle Radio- June 1st, 2014

First, sanitation and antibiotics have saved the lives of many, but are they also the culprits behind some of our modern diseases? We might have gone overboard in killing our microbes. And that may be causing some of today’s epidemics. With Martin  Blaser.[ dur: 22 mins. ]

  • Martin J. Blaser is Professor of Translational Medicine and Director of Human Microbiome Program at New York University. He is the author of Missing Microbes : How the Overuse of Antibiotics Is Fueling Our Modern Plagues.

Then, on the Scholars’ Circle panel, in light of the shootings in Santa Barbara, we look at how the meaning of the second amendment has changed since its introduction and what it may mean for today’s debate about gun laws. Our guests have traced the historical meaning of the second amendment from the very first days when it was drafted and proposed. [ dur: 36 mins. ]

  • Michael Waldman is President of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law. His is the author of POTUS Speaks: Finding the Words That Defined the Clinton Presidency, A Return to Common Sense: Seven Bold Ways to Revitalize Democracy, and his latest, The Second Amendment: A Biography.
  • Adam Winkler is Professor of Law at UCLA School of Law. He is the author of Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America and the co-editor of Encyclopedia of the American Constitution.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- Feb. 16th, 2014

First, we’ll revisit the 1926 founding of Black History Month. [ dur: 15 mins. ]

  • VP Franklin, Distinguished Prof. History at UC Riverside; Author of Living Our Stories, Telling Our Truths: Autobiography and the Making of the African-American Intellectual Tradition editor of Journal of African American History.

Then, they may have been some of the world’s greatest thinkers but they were also great failures at love. [ dur: 15 mins. ]

  • Andrew Shaffer is the author of, Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love, and Literary Rogues: A Scandalous History of Wayward Authors.

Finally, on the Scholars’ Circle panel, what is love? Is it emotional? Biological? Can it be summarized by rational decision? How does it play out in society? [ dur: 28 mins. ]

  • Simon May is a Visiting Professor of Philosophy at Kings College, London. His books include, Love: A History and Nietzsche’s Ethics and his War on “Morality”
  • Bennett W. Helm is a Professor of Philosophy at Franklin & Marshall College. His books include, Love, Friendship, and the Self: Intimacy, Identification, and the Social Nature of Persons and Emotional Reason: Deliberation, Motivation, and the Nature of Value.
  • Dr. Robert Epstein is Senior Research Psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology. He is currently working on a book called Making Love: How People Learn To Love, and How You Can Too, which is based on his research on how love emerges over time in arranged marriages. He is also the author of, Cognition, Creativity, and Behavior: Selected Essays.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- Nov. 24th, 2013

First, we continue to trace the birth of free speech in the US, a country that for decades prosecuted dissenters. What caused the radical turn around by the Supreme Court to support free speech?  With Thomas Healy.  [ dur: 29 mins. ]

  • Thomas Healy is professor of law at Seton Hall Law School. He is the author of, The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind — and Changed the History of Free Speech in America. And the law review publications, Brandenburg in a Time of Terror, and The Rise of Unnecessary Constitutional Rulings.

Then, in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s assassination, we revisit a discussion with Kennedy’s special counsel, closest adviser and speech writer. President Kennedy referred to him as his intellectual blood bank. We spoke with Sorensen in 2008. He passed away in 2010. [ dur: 29 mins. ]

  • Ted Sorensen has authored nine books including, Counselor: Life at the Edge of History. He co-authored Kennedy’s Pulizer Prize winning book, Profiles in Courage.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- Nov. 17th, 2013

First, after years of allowing censorship and criminal prosecution of dissent, what caused the radical turnaround by the Supreme Court to then support free speech and dissent? Part one of a two part discussion with Thomas Healy author of, The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind ” and Changed the History. [ dur:  27 mins. ]

  • Thomas Healy is professor of law at Seton Hall Law School. He is the author of, The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind — and Changed the History of Free Speech in America. And the law review publications, Brandenburg in a Time of Terror, and The Rise of Unnecessary Constitutional Rulings

Then, we know that the wealthy have more influence than other americans, but just how unrepresentative is the American Congress and the state legislatures? [ dur: 31 mins. ]

  • Thomas Hayes is Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Connecticut. His publications include, Responsiveness in an Era of Inequality: The Case of the U.S. Senate, and Do Citizens Link Attitudes with Preferences? Economic Inequality and Government Spending in the New Gilded Age
  • Martin Gilens is Professor of Politics at Princeton University. He is the author of Affluence & Influence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America, and Why Americans Hate Welfare: Race, Media and the Politics of Antipoverty Policy.
  • Patrick Flavin is professor of political science at Baylor University. His publications include, Income Inequality and Policy Representation in the American States, Does Higher Voter Turnout Among the Poor Lead to More Equal Policy Representation? and How Citizens and Legislators Prioritize Spheres of Representation.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- July 14th, 2013

First, how much does biology effect the propensity for violence? We are joined by Adrian Raine, author of, Anatomy of Violence: The Biological Roots of Crime. [ dur: 28 mins. ] [ dur: 28 mins. ]

  • Adrian Raine is Professor of Criminology and Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of, Anatomy of Violence: The Biological Roots of Crime;

Then, as the California prisoners are on hunger strike, we explore the effects of solitary confinement and the impact of harsh prison conditions on guards and prisoners. [ dur: 28 mins. ]

  • Hope Metcalf is Associate Research Scholar in Law, and Director of the Arthur Liman Public Interest Program. She teaches a clinic on prisoners’ rights in the United States. She is the co-author of Administrative Segregation, Degrees of Isolation, and Incarceration: A National Overview of State and Federal Correctional Policie, and Gideon at Guantanamo: Democratic and Despotic Detention
  • Philip Zimbardo is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Stanford University and current *core faculty at Palo Alto University. He is the creator of the The Stanford Prison Experiment. He is the author of numerous publications including The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil, Psychology and Life, and The Psychology of Attitude Change and Social Influence.
  • Dr. Stuart Glassian is a psychiatrist who has formerly taught at Harvard Medical School. His is the author of, Psychiatric Effects of Solitary Confinement, and Effects of Sensory Deprivation in Psychiatric Seclusion and Solitary Confinement.
    He has served as an expert on class-actions lawsuits regrading solitary confinement.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- June 30th, 2013

What are the collective impacts of the last Supreme Court term on our lives and our rights? [ dur: 18mins ]

  • Erwin Chemerinsky is the founding Dean and Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of California, Irvine School of Law. He is the author of books, including, Constitutional Law, and The Conservative Assault on the Constitution.

Then, the life, legacy and leadership of Nelson Mandela in the words of one of his closest colleagues. [ dur: 10 mins ]

  • Albie Sachs, former South African Constitutional Court judge; Author of many books, including The Soft Vengeance of a Freedom Fighter and The Strange Alchemy of Life and Law

Finally, in the wake of President Obama’s new climate plan, three of the world’s top scientists assess how to heal this planet. [ dur: 28 mins. ]

  • Mark Z. Jacobson is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director of Atmosphere/Energy Program at Stanford. He is the author of Air Pollution and Global Warming: History, Science, and Solutions and  Atmospheric Pollution: History, Science, and Regulation
  • Michael E. Mann is a Professor of Meteorology at Penn State University, and the director of the Penn State Earth System Science Center. Dr. Mann is author of more than 150 peer-reviewed and edited publications, and two books including, Dire Predictions: Understanding Global Warming, and The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines. He is also a lead author for the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on climate change for which he, his coauthors, and VP Al Gore won the Nobel prize.
  • Peter Ward is Professor of Biology at the University of Washington. He is the author of Our Flooded Earth, Under a Green Sky: global warming, the mass extinctions of the past and what they can tell us about our future mass extinctions, and, Out of Thin Air: Dinosaurs, Birds, and Earth’s Ancient Atmosphere.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- May 5th, 2013

First, power is shifting and changing hands more rapidly than ever. What does it mean for global politics, religion, and economies? [ dur. 24 mins. ]

  • Moises Naim, Carnegie Endowment for Int’l Peace, author of “End of Power from Board Rooms to Battlefields and Churches to States, Why Being in Charge Isn’t what it Used to Be”;

Then, on the Scholars’ Circle, what are the politics that are preventing the closure of Guantanamo Bay? What are the legal and diplomatic ramifications? [ dur. 30 mins. ]

  • David Glazier, Prof. of Law, Loyola Law School. Author of “Playing by the rules: combating al Qaeda within the law of war.: An Article from: William and Mary Law Review”;
  • Jonathan Hafetz, Prof. of Law, Seton Law. Author of “Habeas Corpus after 9/11: Confronting America’s New Global Detention System”;
  • Peter Jan Honigsberg, Prof. of Law, Univ. of SF School of Law, Witness to Guantanamo . Author of “Our  Nation Unhinged: The Human Consequences of the War on Terror”;

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