Leid Stories

Leid Stories - Descending The Cliff - 12/18/12

President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner are close to hashing out a budget before the hammer falls at the end of the year. But what will the final product look like? Rebecca Theiss, a budget policy analyst with the Economic Policy Institute, explains. Plus, surprise! Hillary Clinton won't be able to testify Dec. 20 before a congressional committee looking into the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. She's home "under doctor's orders," convalescing after allegedly fainting and hitting her head.

Leid Stories - The Deaths of Innocents - 12/17/12

In the aftermath of the Dec. 14 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., the nation finds itself once again dealing with questions that are hard to answer (Why did it happen? Could it have been prevented?) and harder still to ignore (How many more mass killings will it take before something is done to de-escalate America's homegrown arms race?) Official messages of mourning and half-masted flags won't stop the carnage. Decisive action at all levels of government is long overdue.

Leid Stories - Hillary's Take-Out: Fried Rice - 12/14/12

Hillary Clinton, the feminist, winds up her brand-enhancing tenure as secretary of state with a death blow to the ascendancy of Susan Rice. There'll be no climbing on her shoulders. By deftly playing her cards, Clinton landed a choice slot in the Obama administration and now leaves on a high note, nicely poised for a slew of lucrative options, including a 2016 presidential run. Rice, on the other hand, is left to pick up the pieces of a career shattered by being the face of Clinton's failure in Benghazi. This, plus "Cliff Notes" (a different take on the so-called fiscal cliff) and listeners' views on what mattered most this week.

Leid Stories - The School-to-Prison Pipeline - 12/13/12

The longstanding claims of parents, educators and activists that schoolchildren in poor communities across the United States not only receive substandard education but also are cultivated as prime fodder for the nation's prisons is finally getting federal attention -- and long-overdue intervention.  A U.S. Senate hearing Dec. 12 and an Oct. 24 Justice Department lawsuit against the State of Mississippi and several of its agencies are the latest chapters in the shameful story of the "school-to-prison pipeline."

Leid Stories - Anti-Union Union? - 12/12/12

That Michigan became the 24th state to part ways with its die-hard union past and join the right-to-work club is significant. That the legislative "battle" was tidied up in just one day is even more so. Leid Stories discusses Republican Gov. Rick Snyder's big win, how organized labor dropped the ball, and what it means to the Union, now truly divided into "red" and "blue" states. Listeners offer their opinions and ideas on the subject and related issues.

Leid Stories - Right to Work / Rogue Banks - 12/11/12

With Gov. Rick Snyder's signature, Michigan today becomes the second state in the Rust Belt, and the 24th state in the country, to adopt right-to-work statutes. Union opposition was intense, and there was even pressure from the White House and other workers' rights groups. But is there is deeper meaning to this fight? Plus, HSBC's record $1.9 billion settlement with the Justice Department over money-laundering charges points up, once again, the pattern of too-big-to-fail banks going rogue but still being allowed to stay in business.

Leid Stories - It's What You're Not That Matters - 12/10/12

America's obsession about race has a fairly simple premise: Who and what you think you are aren't nearly as important as understanding who and what you are not.  Not white.  While there is intense interest in whether and to what degree the "Nots" have internalized this premise, scant attention is paid to the fact that whites are having an identity crisis all their own. Leid Stories starts that conversation.

Leid Stories - Cliff Notes - 12/07/12

Leid Stories unmasks the missing factor in congressional debates on the so-called "fiscal cliff" -- the Federal Reserve. Plus, it's Free Forum Friday! Listeners take center stage with their analyses of contemporary news issues and events.

Leid Stories - Alton Maddox, Attorney at War (Part 2) - 12/06/12

"The People's Attorney," Alton H. Maddox Jr., for decades a legal strategist and litigator of precedent-setting criminal and civil-rights cases in New York City and in the South, discusses the landmark victories won in some of his cases, the crisis in black leadership, and why political setbacks should not discourage movement forward.

Leid Stories - Alton Maddox, Attorney at War - 12/05/12

"The People's Attorney," Alton H. Maddox Jr., for decades a legal strategist and litigator of precedent-setting criminal and civil-rights cases in New York City and in the South, discusses a range of issues with Utrice Leid in the first of a series of wide-ranging interviews.