Steve Almond: How To Take Back the White House in 2020

What can all the money in the world buy you? Thanks to the Beatles, we already know it’s not love, but could it perhaps buy you the most powerful office in the world? We may have an answer to this question as early as Super Tuesday, as one of the wealthiest humans on the planet attempts to buy the US presidency. This week on Sea Change Radio, we talk to author Steve Almond about the state of the Democratic primary. He offers his perspective on what we should be learning from Mike Bloomberg’s political ads that presently blanket our nation’s air waves, how the age of Trump changes the way that people view the field of presidential hopefuls, and what Democrats need to do if the nominee ends up being someone other than their favorite.

Community Builders: Leo Woodberry + Donnel Baird

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This week on Sea Change Radio, we continue to honor the contributions of African Americans to the environmental movement by revisiting discussions with two individuals who are making a difference in very different ways. First, we hear from the Reverend Leo Woodberry who’s building an inter-faith coalition to fight climate change. Then, we speak to Donnel Baird about his company, BlocPower, which helps green building efforts in communities of color and eases access to capital for minority-owned businesses.

Science Profile: Health Physicist Hattie Carwell

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Close your eyes and imagine a physicist. What does this person look like? Was it a white guy? Well, if it was, you might be guilty of reaffirming stereotypes, but you wouldn’t be wrong statistically speaking. According to the American Institute of Physics, less than 1% of American physicists are women of color. This week, we sit down with one such rarity: groundbreaking physicist Hattie Carwell. She helps us understand what the specialty of health physics encompasses, talks about the museum she co-founded showcasing African Americans in science, and recounts her extraordinary story of achieving renown in the scientific community in the face of racism and sexism.

Andrew Winston: Sustainability in 2020

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In optometry 2020 means normal visual acuity. But what will 2020 mean for the rest of us in the coming year? What sustainability trends might take flight as we close out the second decade of the new millennium? This week on Sea Change Radio, we take a glimpse into the future with author, speaker and corporate sustainability consultant, Andrew Winston. We discuss the need for decreased consumerism in the fashion industry, the coming boom in water technology, and how the specter of the November election looms over it all.

Steve Phillips: How Democrats Take the Senate in 2020

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This week on Sea Change Radio, we are talking with civil rights lawyer Steve Phillips, the author of Brown is the New White and the host of the Democracy In Color podcast. He lends his expertise as we discuss what it will take for Democrats to regain control of the Senate, analyze races in Texas, Georgia, Kentucky, Maine and Arizona, and tear apart the Democratic establishment’s long-held belief that in order to win, the party must focus persuasion efforts on white, moderate Democrats.

Bedazzled by Energy Efficiency

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Most environmentally minded folks agree that our shopping habits need to be significantly curbed for the good of the planet. And many often turn to the virtues of efficiency as one answer – on the surface, it certainly seems to make sense to strive for more efficient use of resources. But is the goal of efficiency the right one? On the heels of the Christmas shopping season, what better time to revisit our 2018 Sea Change Radio discussion with Kris De Decker. The founder of Low Tech Magazine, De Decker makes a compelling case for the abandonment of efficiency as the barometer for planetary stewardship. He proposes we use the simpler, but perhaps more painful objective of sufficiency and argues that pursuing greener, more efficient methods and technologies is, more often than not, a fool’s errand. De Decker maintains that the human appetite for comfort, growth, and acquisition tends to turn efficiencies into increased consumption, and that the only way to truly fight climate change is for all of us to recognize that enough is, well, enough.

As The World Burns: Talking Oil With Daniel Dicker

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On the heels of being impeached by the House of Representatives, Donald Trump unsurprisingly created a diversion, having a key Iranian General assassinated by US drones. But as tensions in the Middle East mounted, the price of oil somehow remained relatively steady. Why was this the case? This week on Sea Change Radio, we talk oil with energy expert Daniel Dicker. We discuss the current state of global oil markets, learn the important differences between sweet and sour crude, and examine Dicker’s contention that the best thing for the environment would be much higher oil prices.

Bob Berwyn: Water In The West

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As we embark upon a new decade, many of us are contemplating ongoing environmental challenges and what may be in store for the earth in the decade to come. Fortunately, there are some excellent journalists out there with their fingers on the pulse, whose mission is to uncover environmental news both alarming and inspiring. This week on Sea Change Radio we are checking in with Bob Berwyn, an Austrian-based environmental journalist who writes for Inside Climate News and is in the midst of a three-month tour of the western United States and Mexico. Berwyn discusses the fragile ecosystems west of the Rockies, tells us about permaculture in Oaxaca, and examines the ethical dilemmas that both skiers and ski resorts are facing as the planet warms and snowfall becomes less consistent.

Doris Kearns Goodwin: Leadership In Turbulent Times (re-broadcast)

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What makes a great leader? This week on Sea Change Radio, we are honored to have Pulitzer Prize-winning presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin here to give us her take on that question. Goodwin’s book, Leadership in Turbulent Times, just released in paperback, re-examines four US presidents she has studied in the past: Abe Lincoln, Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson. She discusses the contrast between these presidents’ leadership and the behavior of the current grifter-in-chief, puts today’s impeachment proceedings in historical context, and hypothesize about how past presidents might have addressed momentous issues like climate change and election tampering. Then, we dig into the Sea Change Radio archives and listen to Rebecca Vallas, a Vice President at the Center for American Progress, talk about the Trump administration’s absurd claims that poverty and hunger are now things of the past in this country.

The Ramez Naam Plan For De-Carbonization, Pt. 1 (re-broadcast)

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Whether or not we use the name Green New Deal to describe a set of aggressive long-term policies that will help humanity in the fight against climate change, most rational people agree that the status quo is completely unacceptable. The potential of a Green New Deal is that it could pave the way for some great minds to devise concrete proposals for reducing greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. This week on Sea Change Radio, we speak with one of those great minds, Ramez Naam, a futurist and technologist who’s crafted his own sort of Green New Deal. We delve into the nuts and bolts of Naam’s proposal and the problems it’s trying to solve, as he makes the case for why we may actually see bipartisan support for such a proposal.