Mandates and COVID Politics; Assange Witness Fabrications; Remote Learning and Special Needs

Biden issues new mandates and rules in face of the Delta surge. Will these be enough to stave off the pandemic?

Dr. Gene Olinger, professor at Boston University, the principal science advisor for MRI Global Inc. and a recipient of the NIH Director Award, joins us to talk about President Biden’s national address yesterday laying out his 6-prong approach to curbing the continued COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, and whether these proposals correspond to best health practices or if they are more political in nature. We also talk about how much has our infrastructure and collective consciousness changed to adapt to living with the virus, and what lessons we have learned from the pandemic.

Kim Iversen, independent journalist and host of the Kim Iversen Show on YouTube, talks to us about the revelations related to the Julian Assange case after the audio of an interview with the main witness in the indictment against Assange, Siggi Thordarson, was released this week. We talk about the discrepancies between the statements in the interview and legal documents, how the hacking accusations could be fabricated and what this could mean for the case and press freedom.

Anna Castonguay, licensed and board certified behavior analyst and clinical director at Autism Learning Partners, joins us to talk about how changes in our education system during the pandemic have affected special needs students, whether remote learning is a suitable solution, and how services like speech therapy, physical therapy, school counseling, and others have been replicated or jettisoned under lockdown. We also talk about how these students are adapting to the return of in-person schooling and whether schools in general are providing the necessary services for them.

Dan Lazare, journalist and writer, joins us to talk about how Russia-gate is becoming China-gate on the heels of Joe Biden and Xi Jinping’s phone call this week, how US Capitol Police and Joe Biden are responding to MAGA folks returning to DC on September 18th for another rally, and The Washington Post's attacks on Politico for allegedly causing lasting damage to the profession of political journalism.

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