Ever since President Bush stood on the deck of an aircraft carrier and declared his mission accomplished in Iraq, Americans have been wondering when the troops might come home. But nearly six months later, security and stability in post-Saddam Iraq remain elusive. Attacks on coalition forces continue. The number of U.S. casualties is climbing, and public support for a continued U.S. presence on the ground in Iraq appears to be faltering.

Last week, after days of contentious debate, Congress approved the Administration’s request for $87 billion dollars. But even as Washington prepares to send more bucks to Baghdad, there seems to be no clear measure of what success there will look like, and no exit strategy in sight.

Guests:

Senator Joseph Biden, Democrat from Delaware

Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican from Nebraska.

The unconventional choreographer Rennie Harris says his new dance called “Facing Mekka” has been in the works for nearly three years. It’s now on a U.S. tour, and it continues to evolve. It is one more step for Rennie Harris in taking his own roots in hip-hop dance into new associations with world music, and with traditional African dance, and further along on what he sees as his own spiritual journey.

See Rennie Harris’ “Facing Mekka” tonight Friday 10/17 at 7 PM, Saturday 10/18 at 8 PM, and Sunday 10/19 at 2PM. The performance is at the Cutler Majestic Theatre, Emerson College, 219 Tremont St. , Boston MA.
(Call 617 876 4275 for more information).

Guests:

Rennie Harris, dancer, choreographer, artistic director, Rennie Harris Puremovement

Philip Hamilton, vocals;
Lenny Seidman, tabla

When the President of the United States is able to win congratulatory applause with his disdain for fancy talk, it is as if he is adding punctuation to the latest book by the linguist John McWhorter. The book’s called “Doing Our Own Thing: The Degradation of Language and Music and Why We Should, Like, Care.” McWhorter says the degradation of language began in the mid 60’s. He says the public slide away from reverence for the spoken word continues to this day, and its hurting more than American politics. He says it threatens America’s cultural health.

Guests:

John McWhorter, author of “Doing our own thing: The Degradation of Language and Music and Why We Should, Like, Care”

By the time Saul Bellow won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1976, he had already populated American letters with a menagerie of characters you couldn’t help but root for.

Fifty years ago, he gave us Augie March, a well-meaning, wandering “Columbus” who goes nowhere and everywhere in the course of six hundred bursting pages. There is Moses Herzog, embattled, embittered and twice-divorced, but hopeful, always hopeful. Even Bellow’s supporting cast leaves an impression. A would-be prize fighter has “an immense face like raked garden soil in need of water.” An institutionalized brother’s look reveals “wisdom kept prisoner by incapacity.” There are those who call Bellow “the greatest living American author.” Two of them, Martin Amis and James Wood, explain why.

Thursday, October 16th, at 6:00 pm at the Boston Public Library, join Martin Amis, James Wood, Stanley Crouch and Jonathan Wilson in a celebration of the 50th Anniversary of The Adventures of Augie March. The reception is open to the public.

Guests:

Martin Amis, author, most recently, of “Yellow Dog”

James Wood, editor, The Library of America Collection, “Saul Bellow, Novels: 1944-1953″ and literary critic, The New Republic.

For some Americans, the attack on a convoy in Gaza which killed three U.S. citizens, brought the Israeli-Palestinian conflict a little bit closer to home. But for many people in the region, it was just one more bomb, one more attack, in the relentless, bloody and interminable conflict lives.

In the next weeks we’ll bring you the voices of Israelis and Palestinians, ordinary people whose stories and perspectives don’t often make the headlines. Today, we’ll speak with Jewish settlers who are living in the West Bank.

Attacked by Palestinians and denounced by Israelis as obstacles to peace, settlers are devoted to a biblical vision of a greater Israel. And they practice what they preach, by living in mobile homes on remote hilltops and raising large families there.

Guests:

David Israel-Halevy, a settler who lives in Mevo’ot Yericho in the West Bank

Rachel Avital, a settler who lives in Ofrah, in the West Bank

Barbara Plett, BBC correspondent.

The World Health Organization estimates that two million girls a year are circumcised, their genitalia cut in a traditional rite of passage that is so ancient, no one really knows when it began.

Female circumcision is meant to usher a girl into womanhood, preserve her virginity, and ready her for marriage. But the time-honored practice is also dangerous. Girls can bleed to death, contract HIV/Aids, or later on suffer during menstruation and intercourse. International calls to ban the practice have failed, no match for the pull of tradition.

Obstetrician and gynecologist Dr. Nawal Nour works at the crossroads of culture and medicine, treating and educating circumcised women, but withholding judgment about the beliefs and the history that keeps this practice alive.

Guests:

Dr. Nawal Nour, MacArthur Fellow.

Since it was composed by a Baptist minister a century ago, the Pledge of Allegiance has been a morning ritual for millions of American school children. In the 50’s, Congress added “under God” as a public vaccination against the real, and perceived, threat of Communism. Since then, the Pledge, and its reference to God, have engendered special ire from those worried about the line between church and state.

Now the Supreme Court has taken up this matter. The question before the court is whether the phrase “under God” is an endorsement of state-sponsored religion, a true first amendment breach, or whether it is just a bit of ceremony and a harmless nod to America’s religious roots.

Guests:

Dr. Charles Haynes, senior scholar with the Freedom Forum’s First Amendment Center

Dave Gordon, superintendent of the Elk Grove Unified School District

Jim Henderson, senior counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice.

Here’s a provocative question for you: when it comes to power, do American women really want it? To answer the question, Fortune magazine polled the country’s 50 most successful women in business and found their answer to be a resounding no.

Many said they long for the day when half of the nation’s senators or CEOs of Fortune 500 companies are women, but if you ask them if they want these jobs they say no thanks. They would rather have a life, either with family and children, or with plenty of time for themselves, than go for the brass ring.

And there is the dilemma, if the most powerful women in America don’t want to go for the big jobs, how are women ever going to get equal space at the top?

Guests:

Pattie Sellers, Editor at Large, Fortune Magazine

Myrtle Potter, COO, Genentech

Susan Desmond-Hellmann, Chief Medical Officer, Genentech

Many of us remember what it was like for women in the sixties and the seventies. The Mini skirt was in fashion, sisterhood was the watchword, higher education and equal pay were all the rave. Yep, those were the days in Baghdad.

In the years before Saddam Hussein took his nation into war, women held powerful government positions, and wielded real political leverage. Today, women have slipped far into the background, most spending time sequestered in their homes, rather than participating in the rebuilding of their country. It’s reasonable to imagine that the women who ran Iraq in the 1970’s would play a key role in getting the nation back on its feet, and getting themselves back into decision making positions. It hasn’t happened yet.

Guests:

Sidney Kwiram, project coordinator for the Carr Foundation

Lauren Sandler, New York City based journalist, both Lauren and Sidney recently returned from a research project on women and culture in Iraq

Rend Rehim Francke, executive director of the Iraq Foundation

Yanar Mohammed, director of Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq

When Ashley MacIsaac first appeared he was a teenage prodigy with a scary haircut, nothing under his kilt and a frightening virtuosity with the fiddle. The musical elite embraced his talent. Young punk rockers thrilled to his onstage energy and antics. And enough fans bought his record, “Hi, How Are You Today?” to make it a multi-platinum hit. He had, as they say in marketing circles, “cross over appeal.”

He also had a crack problem. So when Ashley MacIsaac took a very public dive from propriety, fame turned to infamy, harmony to discord. But he’s back, this time with a self-titled CD that blends traditional Cape Breton fiddling with his own bluesy vocals. Ashley MacIsaac: ready for his comeback, and my guest.

Guests:

Ashley MacIsaac, Cape Breton fiddler