BPR Full Show 08/15/2019: Tax Holiday? Give Me A Break.

Today on Boston Public Radio:

• Chuck Todd discussed the latest political headlines. Todd is moderator of Meet the Press and political director for NBC News.

• We opened the lines to hear from listeners about whether they think there is a disconnect between the way government operates and the will of the people.

• Former Suffolk County sheriff and former public safety secretary Andrea Cabral discussed how Jeffrey Epstein's apparent suicide is casting a spotlight on how federal prisons are rife with violence, sexual harassment, and chronic under-staffing. Cabral is now CEO of Ascend.

• Boston Globe business columnist Shirley Leung discussed new MBTA cars on the orange line and the planned merger between Harvard Pilgrim and Tufts Health Plan.

• Paul Reville discussed the tuition hike at UMass and other education headlines. Reville is former secretary of education and a professor at Harvard University's Graduate School of Education, where he runs the Education Redesign Lab.

• Corby Kummer discussed a potential meat tax in Germany as the country reckons with the industry's environmental harm. Kummer is executive director of the Food and Society policy program at the Aspen Institute, a senior editor at The Atlantic, and a senior lecturer at the Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy.

• We opened the lines to discuss the sales tax holiday in Massachusetts.