News & Public Affairs
Hillsborough County Commissioner Kevin Beckner on domestic partner registries, Bass Pro Shop, the Tampa Bay Rays stadium and other issues
01/31/13 Mitch PerryLast Call Thursday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Kevin Beckner, Bass Pro, domestic partners
Hillsborough County Commissioner Kevin Beckner joined the program to talk about a variety of issues confronting the Board of County Commissioners, including his unsuccessful bid for a gun buyback program.
Beckner also discussed his disappointment with some of his colleagues for voting against a domestic partner registry, and his opposition to giving any public subsidies towards Bass Pro Shops, considering installing a store in Eastern Hillsborough.
Be the first to commentSt. Pete City Council's Wengay Newton looks for ways to keep city kids out of jail listen
01/31/13 Janelle IrwinWMNF Drive-Time News Thursday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Wengay Newton, juvenile arrests, jobs
St. Pete city council member Wengay Newton is asking members of the community to help him brainstorm ways to keep the city’s kids out of jail. Newton speaking is hosting a community meeting Thursday night addressing the city’s juvenile arrest rate. That meeting will be at 7 p.m. at the County Job Corp Center located at 500 22nd Street South.
St.Pete city council member Wengay Newton is asking members of the community to help him
Be the first to comment"Statewide Florida is arresting almost 60,000 juveniles...
Activists warn against across the board federal spending cuts listen
01/31/13 Janelle IrwinWMNF Drive-Time News Thursday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: sequestration, fiscal cliff, budget cuts, spending cuts, government spending
Looming cuts to domestic spending could impact millions of Americans if lawmakers don’t agree on a plan to avoid the so-called sequester. A group of labor activists and students who spoke in front of Senator Marco Rubio’s Tampa office Wednesday want him to look toward revenue not austerity.
As part of the deal at the end of last year to continue tax cuts for people earning less than $450,000, lawmakers postponed a series of sweeping b...
Be the first to commentPulitzer laureate, journalist Eugene Robinson, on the Obama presidency and U.S. media listen
01/31/13 Lenka Davis and Christopher DavisWMNF Drive-Time News Thursday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: media market, presidency, citizen journalism
Eugene Robinson is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and associate editor of The Washington Post. During a speech last night in St. Petersburg he addressed media coverage of the 2008 election of president Obama. He also spoke about the issues of race that accompany the first African-American presidency.
Robinson spoke last night at the annual dinner for the Suncoast Tiger Bay Club in St. Petersburg. It’s a non-partisan political club promoting dialogue about p...
Be the first to commentFormer state Rep. Rick Kriseman is "seriously considering" a bid for St. Pete mayor listen
01/31/13 Janelle IrwinWMNF Drive-Time News Thursday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Rick Kriseman, Bill Foster, Ken Welch, Kathleen Ford, St. Pete
Former state Representative Rick Kriseman’s lips have been sealed about speculation that he may run for mayor of St. Pete this year. But now Kriseman says he is "seriously considering" it.
When Kriseman, a Democrat, announced that he wouldn’t be seeking another term in the Florida House, he said it was because he was fed up with the Republican-controlled legislature. According to state campaign finance reports, Kriseman donated all of his campaign funds to var...
Be the first to commentNon-Violent Activist Talks About Palestinian Peace Movement
01/31/13 Robert LoreiRadioactivity: Live Call-In (Thursday) Listen to this entire show:
Tags: non-violence, Palestinian peace activists, Israeli occupation, U.S. made weapons, olive trees, guns
Good morning, welcome to Radioactivity. Coming up today we’ll meet a Palestinian peace activist who uses non-violence as a way to protest the Israeli occupation of territories once held by the Palestinians- before the 1967 war.
Our guest is Iyad Burnat. He lives in the farming village of Bil’in
Every Friday afternoon villagers, Israeli peace activists and members of the international community hold non-violent demonstrations against the Isareli security wall and the confiscation of vill...
Be the first to commentDiana Kasdan talks about the recent changes in the filibuster rules
01/31/13 Mary GlenneyFrom A Woman's Point of View Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Senate, women, filibuster
Diana Kasdan of the Democracy Project with the Brennan Center for Justice follows up on the attempts to change the filibuster rules for the newly inaugurated Senate. She discusses the reasons she felt were responsible for the 86-9 vote in the Senate to essentially keep most of the present.policies intact. Every Democrat in the Senate voted for the Reid-McConnell reform package which many have characterized as "watered down reform". Only Senator Bernie Sanders and 6 Republicans voted agains...
Be the first to commentHelen Benedict talks about the Pentagon lifting the ban on women serving in combat
01/31/13 Mary GlenneyFrom A Woman's Point of View Listen to this entire show:
Tags: military, women, combat, Pentagon, war
Helen Benedict is a professor of journalism at Columbia University who won the James Aronson Award for Social Justice in 2008. Professor Benedict is a novelist and journalist specializing in issues of social justice. Her most recent non-fiction book THE LONELY SOLDIER: THE PRIVATE WAR OF WOMEN SERVING IN IRAQ (2009 and 2010, Beacon Press) won the EMMA (Exceptional Merit in Media Award) from the National Women's Political Caucus and was the inspiration for the award winning and Oscar nominate...
Be the first to commentA Conversation With Author John Homans
01/30/13 Duncan StraussTalking Animals Listen to this entire show:
John Homans–the longtime executive editor of New York magazine who published his first book, “What’s A Dog For?: The Surprising History, Science, Philosophy, and Politics of Man’s Best Friend”–discusses how he decided “What’s A Dog For” would represent his first foray into writing books. He also addresses the way he approached writing the book, propelled primarily by his love for and interest in the current family dog, Stella. Homans explains a bit about how he achieved the sweeping scope and...
Be the first to commentCallers aren't sold on need for new Rays stadium; mixed opinions on gun control
01/30/13 Seán KinaneLast Call Wednesday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Rays, Tampa Bay Rays, Tampa, St. Pete, Tropicana Field, Hillsborough County Commission, Pinellas County Commission, guns, gun control, NRA
Where will Tampa Bay’s Major League Baseball team play a decade from now?
The team seems to be saying it wants out its lease of Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg but wants to stay in the region.
St. Pete Mayor Bill Foster wants the Rays to stay in his city.
This week Pinellas County officials said they are open to the team considering regional options.
The Rays spoke with Hillsborough County Commissioners last week.
We heard from listeners about their opinions.
We also con...
Be the first to commentPinellas Commissioners more receptive to a Rays move than St. Pete listen
01/30/13 Janelle IrwinWMNF Drive-Time News Wednesday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Rays, Tampa Bay Rays, baseball stadium, Pinellas County Commission, Stu Sternberg
Pinellas County Commissioners went against St. Pete Mayor Bill Foster Tuesday during a discussion with Tampa Bay Rays owners about where the team will play if they leave Tropicana Field. Most commissioners said they didn’t mind if the franchise explored locations within the region that weren’t in St. Pete. Chair Ken Welch said the city could even benefit.
Be the first to comment“There’s so many infrastructure needs that exist that could be, I think, addressed if we can all come to a holistic conclusion here t...
Should Cuban-trained doctors be banned from practicing medicine in Florida? listen
01/30/13 Janelle IrwinWMNF Drive-Time News Wednesday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Cuba, medical school, Fidel Castro, Cuban Medical School Scholarship Program, ELAM, Latin American School of Medicine, Patrick Manteiga
Two state lawmakers from South Florida want doctors who got their degrees in Cuba banned from practicing medicine in the state. But some people think they’re just catering to people who oppose Cuba’s leadership. Gail Walker is the co-executive director for an inter-religious group that helps students enroll in a medical school scholarship program.
“I would argue that the representative is trying to gain political points perhaps because he’s opposed to improved relations with Cuba.”
Th...
Be the first to commentDebating Immigration Reform
01/30/13 Robert LoreiRadioactivity: Live Call-In (Wednesday) Listen to this entire show:
Tags: immigration, illegal immigrants, amnesty, immigration reform, Senator Marco Rubio, Patrick Manteiga, la Gaceta
Good morning, welcome to Radioactivity. I’m Rob Lorei.
Coming up today we’ll hear a debate and discussion about the proposals for immigration reform. But first- two listener comments about previous programs… one about the discussion about smart meters- which came up on the last call on Monday. The other about the brief discussion yesterday about immigration reform…. Here’s what two listeners had to say.
Yesterday President Obama gave a major speech yesterday about his ideas for immig...
Be the first to commentHillsborough activists organize to advocate for mass transit listen
01/29/13 Ella WindWMNF Drive-Time News Tuesday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Transit, Hillsborough, Pinellas, Referendum
Pinellas County transit leaders recently sent a referendum for the 2014 ballot to county commissioners for a sales tax to fund light rail. Community leaders and activists from Hillsborough County met in downtown Tampa yesterday to plan a movement for mass transit in their county.
Thirty local activists and representatives from unions, environmental groups, city administration and others met to begin a plan for a political movement to demand that Hillsborough move forward with planning a...
Be the first to commentTampa looks to rezone historic Seminole Heights district listen
01/29/13 Ella WindWMNF Drive-Time News Tuesday Listen to this entire show:
Tags: Seminole Heights, Tampa, rezoning, historic district
The plans for rezoning Seminole heights began five years ago. Tim Heberlein, a local activist, attended the Vision Tampa meetings and the previous neighborhood input sessions organized by city officials for Seminole Heights residents. He is excited about the plan.
Be the first to comment“We have some great restaurants down here and to see more light commercial pop up there and different spaces where residents can walk down there, go grab a drink at Ella's and go the record stor...
