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The Brian Lehrer Show / December 13, 2005

The Brian Lehrer Show

Tuesday, December 13, 2005
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  • The Health of Healthcare

    A memo leaked from Wal-Mart last month detailed ways the company could lower spiraling healthcare costs such as hiring younger workers. The memo fanned the flames of the debate over who should foot the bill for more expensive healthcare now that the companies are resisting. Read the text of the memo for the latest Brian Lehrer Show reading project

The Raw Numbers

Scott Lipscomb, Iraq Body Count US spokesperson
and
Amir Taheri, Iranian syndicated columnist whose writing appears in the New York Post,
- on the number of Iraqi civilian casualities since 2003, and Bush's speech yesterday

» Iraq Body Count
» Amir Taheri (Benador Associates)

Calculating the Remittances Equation

Claudia Díaz, professor of Microeconomics at the Universidad Centro Americana Jose Simeon Cañas, in San Salvador, El Salvador,
and
Geri Smith, BusinessWeek's chief Latin America correspondent, based in Mexico City,
- on El Salvador and remittances

» Universidad Centro Americana Jose Simeon Cañas
» BusinessWeek

Wal-Mart and The Health of Healthcare

Cindy Watts, professor of health economics at the University of Washington
- asks who should bear the burden of increasing costs of healthcare?

» Carolyn Watts (The University of Washington)
» Read the Wal-Mart memo (a Brian Lehrer Show reading project)

A person dressed as a bear to represent a bear market performs outside the New York Stock Exchange on October 6, 200 in New York. Wall Street tumbled after the opening bell as fallout from the credit crisis triggered concerns about the economy and the Dow fell below 10,000 for the first time in four years.

Uncommon Indicators

The Brian Lehrer Show

The Brian Lehrer Show wants to hear how the economy is affecting the little things in your daily life. Share your stories and photos of the downturn.

Just Launched! The Uncommon Economic Indicators Video Contest. All the details here!

Ray Young, General Motors Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

The Rocky Road Ahead

The Brian Lehrer Show

Ray Young, the chief financial officer of General Motors, talks about GM’s bankruptcy.

Then, Damon Lester, president of the National Association of Minority Automobile Dealers, and Greg Williams, former owner of the recently closed Huntington Chevrolet in Huntington Station, NY., discusses the effect GM’s bankruptcy has had on dealerships and their employees.

paper trail small

Tweet If You Use Twitter

The Brian Lehrer Show

Farhad Manjoo, Slate's technology columnist and the author of True Enough: Learning To Live in a Post-Fact Society talks about what Twitter means and how different groups use it.

What's your take on Twitter? How do you use it? Comment below!

(<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexerde/80417539/">alexerde</a>/flickr)

Don't Say That, Literally

The Brian Lehrer Show

John Flansburgh of the band They Might Be Giants discusses the running list the band keeps of "things we can no longer say." (a few examples: "my bad" "don't go there" "one hundred and ten percent" and "voted off the island")

What would be on your list of banned words or phrases? Comment below!

happiness

From Denmark with Love

The Brian Lehrer Show

Jesper Grunwald, senior managing editor with the Danish Broadcasting Corporation, talks about the Danish economy, biking to work, and why the Danes are allegedly the happiest people in the world.

Judge Sotomayor

Squatting, Then and Now

The Brian Lehrer Show

As former squats in the East Village make the transition to coops, making homes from abandoned housing is again an issue. Andrew Reicher executive director of Urban Homesteading Assistance Board, Frank Morales an Episcopal priest involved in East Village/Lower East Side squatting and homelessness activism since the late '70s, and Rob Robinson, a leader of the Housing Campaign of Picture the Homeless, discuss the return of squatting.

Video Picks

The Brian Lehrer Show

Check out some recent video clips of interviews with guests and Brian Lehrer's weekly Web video picks.