Underreported from WNYC's The Leonard Lopate Show

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Underreported: The Power of Hippo Sweat Jan 17, 2008

Show notes

Find out what humans can learn from studying hippo sweat, which may have powerful antibiotic and sunblock properties. Herpetologist Dr. Brady Barr explains more about the promises of hippo sweat, and why he has to don a 200-pound hippo decoy suit in order to collect samples of hippo sweat to be tested. Dr. Barr stars in the National Geographic Channel's "Dangerous Encounters with Brady Barr: Undercover Hippo," which airs on Sunday, January 20, at 9:00 PM ET/PT.

Underreported: FEC Shutdown and What it Means for the Elections Jan 10, 2008

Show notes

The Federal Election Commission (FEC), the agency that administers and enforces campaign finance laws, has essentially shut down due to a shortage of commissioners. We’ll look into the reasons behind the shortage, why the Senate has been in a stalemate over commissioner nominees, and what it could mean for the presidential campaigns if the FEC impasse isn’t resolved soon.
Paul S. Ryan is FEC Program Director of the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization which works in the areas of campaign finance and elections, political communication and government ethics. J. Gerald Hebert is Executive Director of the CLC and law professor at Georgetown.

Underreported: Mexico’s Murdered Grupero Singers Jan 10, 2008

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In Mexico, grupero musicians are being killed at an alarming rate – 13 in the past year and a half. Last month, singer Zayda Pena was shot to death in a hospital emergency room; Sergio Gomez of K-Paz de la Sierra beaten, tortured, and strangled. Maureen Meyer of the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) explains what these murders have to do with Mexico’s brutal drug wars.

Underreported: The 10 Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2007 Jan 03, 2008

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People struggling to survive violence, forced displacement, and disease in Somalia, Sri Lanka, and elsewhere went underreported in the news this year. Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières has released its 10th annual “Top Ten” Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2007. Executive Director of MSF-USA Nicolas de Torrenté discusses the list.

Underreported: Cyberwars Dec 27, 2007

Show notes

Cyberwars may be the wars of the future. In April 2007, cyberattacks from Russia crippled the banking, police, and government offices of Estonia; in June, the US accused the Chinese military of hacking into a network used by Defense Secretary Gates. Leonard talks to Andrew Macpherson of Justiceworks at the University of New Hampshire.

Foreign Policy magazine featured cyberwars in their article "The Top Ten Stories You Missed in 2007."

Underreported: Cellphones in the Global Economy Dec 27, 2007

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Cellphones are helping to connect the world’s poor to the global economy. Nicholas P. Sullivan is author of You Can Hear Me Now.

Underreported: Are Sex Offender Laws Working? Dec 20, 2007

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US sex offender laws may do harm than good, according to a recent report from Human Rights Watch. Strict notification laws and residency requirements don’t reflect the reality of the risks children face, may not protect victims, and violate the basic human rights of former offenders.

Sarah Tofte is a researcher at Human Rights Watch; Linda runs a support group for families of registered sex offenders. Elizabeth J. Letourneau, Ph.D. works with juvenile sex offenders. She's Associate Professor at the Family Services Research Center of the Medical University of South Carolina.

Weigh in: What do you think about current sex offender laws? Are they working? We’d like to hear from people associated with both victims and offenders.

Underreported: What Life is Like for US Soldiers in Afghanistan Dec 13, 2007

Show notes

The war in Iraq gets more headlines, but US soldiers in Afghanistan are still battling it out with the Taliban and Al Qaeda the old-fashioned way – traveling on foot, building crude bunkers, and advancing slowly. Sebastian Junger and photographer Tim Hetherington joined an American platoon in the Korengal Valley, one of the most desperately fought-over pieces of terrain in the world.

Underreported: Afghan Public Opinion Poll Dec 13, 2007

Show notes

Most of the news from Afghanistan focuses on the Taliban, or US and NATO troops, or the opium poppy crop. We hear very little about what the people Afghanistan think about what’s happening to their country. Pollster and political scientist Craig Charney of Charney Research recently conducted a poll of Afghan public opinion.

Underreported: Sarah Chayes with an Update on Afghanistan Dec 06, 2007

Show notes

Former NPR correspondent Sarah Chayes lives and works in Kandahar, Afghanistan, where she’s founded a soapmaking company, Arghand, to help rebuild the war-torn country. She tells us the latest on the resurgence of the Taliban there.

Sarah Chayes' article in the Dec. 2007 issue of the Atlantic Monthly magazine is "Scents and Sensibility."

Sarah Chayes's recent book, The Punishment of Virtue: Inside Afghanistan After the Taliban, is available for purchase at amazon.com