2011 September | Here & Now

Why is it that when we talk about Africa, it’s often about hunger, AK-47s, safaris or tribal people? We don’t hear about the skyscrapers or the middle class. Journalist Scott Baldauf covered the continent for five years and has some thoughts on why.

We speak with 10th grader Victoria Xia, who won the “Math Prize for Girls” national contest.

Protesters have been demonstrating in San Francisco, after transit police shot and killed a transient men they said lunged at them on July 3rd with a knife in a station.

President Barack Obama is proposing a more than $3 trillion plan to shrink the nation’s debt, with roughly half of the money coming from tax increases on the wealthy and corporations.

From Talking Heads to Sigur Ros.

A new study finds that damage from non-native insects is costing local governments about $2 billion a year, but one researcher says the “war” may not be worth it.

As the government crackdown in Syria continues, the BBC’s Owen Bennett-Jones joins us from Syria’s Lebanon border where he’s been speaking with Syrian refugees fleeing the country’s violence.

Attorney Sabin Willett has represented detainees at Guantanamo Bay and says a bill making its way through Congress effectively could ensure that the prison camp will never close.

“Personal reemployment accounts” would give laid-off workers a capped benefit of $3,000 to use in their job search. But what would happen to the unemployment program as we know it?

The local food movement has helped to revive hardscrabble Hardwick, Vermont, but with success comes new worries.

From Thelonius Monk to Bonobo.

Chinese writer Liao Yiwu spent four years in prison for his writings and has been forbidden from going overseas, but this summer he made his way out.

The Government Accountability Office reports that federal agencies aren’t doing enough to keep an eye on the use of antibiotics on farms, leading to fears that factory farms are creating drug-resistant super bugs.

As British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Nicolas Sarkozy visit Tripoli, the BBC’s Peter Biles reports that water and power supplies are being restored and shops and banks are open again in the city.

The American Society of Civil Engineers says the U.S. should increase spending by $6.5 billion to fix bridges, by boosting the federal gas tax, privatizing roads and increasing fees for driving during peak traffic hours.

The closure of the Sherman Minton bridge that connects Kentucky and Indiana is creating a commuter nightmare, as the state says it could be weeks before the bridge is re-opened.

Attorneys for a man scheduled to be put to death in Texas are asking Gov. Rick Perry to halt the execution amid questions about the role race played in the sentencing.

From The Lickets to Radiohead.

It’s fall, and new TV shows are in the air. Boston Globe TV critic Matthew Gilbert says the networks are focusing on comedy, like in NBC’s “Up All Night.”

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) explains why he wants the government to invest in infrastructure and approve emergency FEMA aid without corresponding spending cuts.