BPR Full Show 2/18/19 : Political Roundtable, All Revved Up, Village Voice

Charlie Chieppo, principal of Chieppo Strategies and senior fellow at both the Governing and Pioneer Institutes, and Shannon O’Brien, former state treasurer and Democratic nominee for governor, joined us to discuss the latest political headlines.

TV guru Bob Thompson told us what to check out in the world of television. Thompson is the founding director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture and a trustee professor of television and popular culture at the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse.

Darla Shine, the wife of President Trump’s deputy chief of staff for communications, took to Twitter last week to promote anti-vaxxer dogma in response to a recent measles outbreak in Washington state. She suggested that diseases such as measles “keep you healthy and fight cancer.” Medical ethicist Art Caplan joined us to explore this and more. Caplan is the Drs. William F and Virginia Connolly Mitty chair and director of the division of medical ethics at the NYU Langone Medical Center. He’s also the co-host of the Everyday Ethics podcast.

It’s official: Boston has the worst traffic congestion in the U.S. We opened up the lines to ask if you’d be willing to carpool, if it would reduce congestion and get more cars off the street.

After decades of sexual assault accusations, Theodore McCarrick has been defrocked for sexual misconduct. Is this a first step in accountability, or is the Catholic church still sidestepping a systemic problem? Reverends Emmett G. Price III and Irene Monroe joined us for this and more. Monroe is a syndicated religion columnist, the Boston voice for Detour’s African American Heritage Trail, a visiting researcher in the religion and conflict transformation program at Boston University School of Theology. Price is a professor and founding executive director of the Institute for the Study of the Black Christian Experience at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

Steven Maler, the founding artistic director of Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, joins us to discuss the latest upcoming production, "Birdy," and how he’s given Shakespeare’s "Hamlet" a high-tech upgrade.

Poet Richard Blanco joins us for a special birthday edition of "Village Voice." Blanco is the fifth presidential inaugural poet in U.S. history, His new book, "How to Love a Country," deals with various socio-political issues that shadow America. It will be released in March.