The Exchange

It was a nail-biter at last night's Iowa Caucuses. After a year of campaigning, debating, promises and political ads, voting began for the twenty twelve Republican presidential candidate.  A too close to call race went well into this morning with Mitt Romney squeaking out an 8 vote victory from Rick Santorum.  Ron Paul came in a healthy third and Newt Gingrich a disappointing fourth. Rick Perry and Michelle Bachmann will both re-evaluate their campaigns.  We’ll look at the results and how they may affect the discussion in New Hampshire’s primary and other contests down the road.  

Our issue Tuesday series continues with the Republican Presidential Candidates and their fiscal policies.  The soaring national debt has been a rallying cry among republicans, who see it as a top economic threat.  We’ll examine what the candidates are saying about government spending, debt and deficits…as well as entitlement reform, programs like Social security and Medicare.

Guests

In a new book, author Charles Mann explores what happened in the years after Columbus’s famed voyage to the Americas.  He says it altered everything:  sparking a new era of globalization and not just in commerce:  but radical changes in crops, cultures, and politics.  We’ll talk with Mann about this expansive look at this new era and how the world changed after Columbus.  

Guests

• Charles C. Mann - Author of 1493:Uncovering the New World Columbus Created

Today it's our New Hampshire Newsmakers of the Year show, the 2011 edition. From the economy to the primary, from battles over the budget to extreme weather, we'll look at some of the top stories of the year, see what's happened to those stories since the headlines have died and see how they may play out in the coming year.

Topics and Guests

When immigrants and refugees come to a new country like America, they are often cut off from their homeland, their loved ones and their culture. Often they are required, even at very young ages, to navigate a tangled web of bureaucracies and to adapt rapidly to new settings. Many newcomers find resources that help them make the transition to their new lives in New Hampshire yet others may find those resources lacking. We listen to firsthand accounts of the struggles involved in coming to the Granite State.

Guests:

In recent years, children are arriving from new countries, bringing diversity but also new challenges.  Many don’t speak English and some aren’t literate in their own language.  We talk with people in the education system and folks dealing with foreign born newcomers on a daily basis and ask how they are working to overcome these issues.

Guests:

June Tumlin: Department Head of the English Learner program at Manchester Central High School

Thomas Sica: Principal of Rundlett Middle School in Concord

Healthcare delivery is complicated enough without language barriers, financial difficulties and cultural misunderstandings. Being a newcomer in a strange country presents many new challenges but healthcare is one of the most difficult to overcome. We take a look at the myriad obstacles the foreign born population face, and what some local healthcare providers are doing to help overcome them.

Guests:

We’re looking at the history of immigration as a part of NHPR’s year long series on New Hampshire’s Immigration Story. In the early days it was French Canadians and Irish who arrived, at the turn of the last century Greeks and Eastern Europeans and today, new arrivals from Brazil, to Burundi to Bhutan. We’re looking at who came, why they came and the little known stories around our immigration history.

Guests:

David Watters: Professor of English at UNH, where he is the director of the center for New England culture.

The London Sunday Telegraph once proclaimed Charles Dickens as "The Man who Invented Christmas" and his timeless story "A Christmas Carol", the main reason why. Written in London in 1843, at a time of expanding urbanization and industrialization, and a declining interest in old customs and ceremonies, "A Christmas Carol" with Scrooge, Cratchit, Tiny Tim and a host of ominous ghosts, helped its readers find the true spirit of Christmas and look back nostalgically at the old time Christmas traditions of friends, family, fun and frivolity.

We sit down with NHPR President Betsy Gardella!  She’s steered our ship for the past six years, and she also sits on the Board of Directors at National Public Radio.  We’re taking a look at some of the changes at both institutions over the past year, from programming changes to technology to new transmitters reaching new listeners in the North Country.   

Every ten years, with new census data, states need to re-draw their political lines and it’s never pretty.  This year is no exception, with competing partisan maps and legislative approval on a final plan due in January.  We’ll see where the new lines may land and how that could affect New Hampshire voters this fall. 

Guests

Our issue Tuesday series continues with a look at where the Republican Presidential Candidates stand on the environment.  It’s a low priority for most G. O. P. voters this year, but the candidates do have their positions from energy policy to the impact of regulation on business to the elimination of  the E. P. A.  We’ll find out what they’re saying and how that’s playing in the Republican primary. 

Guests

New numbers show the Granite State is near the top when it comes to abusing painkillers. Also, New Hampshire is  one of only two states that does not monitor the purchases of these medications.  We’ll explore that latest on this issue, and what some are in New Hampshire are doing to reverse these sobering numbers.

Guests 

The first-in-the-nation caucus state has been overflowing with Republican Presidential candidates, all hoping to be the number one choice of caucus-goers in early January.  We’ll find out what they’re saying and how they’re playing in the Hawkeye State and how that compares to the campaign this year in New Hampshire. 

Guests 

At first, many New Englanders seemed on board with this alternative energy source, but now some these projects are encountering stiff breezes.  We’ll find out how Wind Power is playing at the local level in the Granite State and how recent debates have become more nuanced and less black-and-white than in the past.

Guests

Writers Russell Banks, Ann Patchett and Jeffrey Eugenides all have new novels out.  Horror writer Stephen King has a new thriller based on the Kennedy assassination, while notables Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly and Chris Matthews tell the true story of Presidents Washington, Lincoln and Kennedy. We’ll look at the books that may be under your Christmas tree this holiday season.

Guests

Our Issue Tuesday Series continues with a look at where the Republican Presidential candidates stand on health care.  All of them firmly oppose President Obama’s new health care law, saying they’d repeal it.  They favor a more market-based approach, with ideas ranging from  tort reform to tax credits to technology. But there are a lot of areas in which they differ as well.  We’ll explore their positions on everything to prescriptions plans to entitlement programs to their overall philosophies on who should get care and how much they should pay.

Guests 

We sit down with UNH President Mark Huddleston.  He’s spent months responding to an unprecedented state budget cut, announcing layoffs and reductions, but also new ways to bring in revenue.  We’ll find out more, and ask Huddleston about continuing pressure to lower college costs…especially since New Hampshire students now have the nation’s highest level of student debt.

Guest

Mark Huddleston - President of the University of New Hampshire  

New Hampshire has always had an independent streak which continues down to its most local way of governing.

This year’s Republican Presidential candidates have been clear about where they stand on many issues, but when it comes to immigration, its a little more murky.  Several candidates are trying to “thread the needle” on this one: sounding tough, to please the base, but not so tough, that they “turn off” voters in the general election, especially Latino voters.  Today on we bring you a special Thursday version of our Issue Tuesdays series as we look at the Republican Presidential candidates and compare their platforms on the immigration. 

Guests

"By 2008, the United States had become the biggest international borrower in world history, with two-thirds of its $6 trillion federal debt in foreign hands" points out Jeffry Frieden, co-author of a new book called Lost Decades: The Making of America's Debt Crisis. International borrowing has been a long-standing economic tradition -- we even funded the American Revolution this way. But, Frieden points out, more recent borrowing is massive compared to the past and encouraged debt-fueled consumption rather than sound investments.

Although not as much as a hot button issue as last election, many voters still want to know the candidates’ views on the war in Afghanistan, on China, the Middle East and on fighting terrorism at home and oversees. Today our Issue Tuesday's series continues with a look at the Republican Presidential candidates and  what they are saying on matters of foreign policy. 

Guests

It’s one of our nation’s most divisive issues. Anew book called “Gunfight” looks at both the history of debates over gun laws and  how it shapes our current dynamic, describing pro-gun groups bristling at any hint of regulation and gun control advocates seeking sometimes ineffectual laws.  We’ll look at America’s long debate over the second Amendment.

Guest

A new film looks at the Free State Project from the perspective of several activists. The Free State Project chose New Hampshire as its destination about ten years ago.  The goal was to convince twenty thousand people, seeking limited government and greater personal freedom, to move here. We’ll look at the movie and at this movement and find out how it’s evolved and affected the Granite State.  

Christina Heller - Independent filmmaker who directed the movie "Libertopia".

Since the state received eleven and a half million dollars in federal money for charter schools last year, there has been a flurry of activity, including in Nashua where two charter schools are in the works. Meanwhile, though many former foes now support charter schools, questions remain on such issues as admission policies, accountability, and how teacher unions fit in.  Today we'll look at how charter schools are doing and where they're heading. 

Guests

What began a half century ago as an organization for insurance purposes has grown into much more.  The AARP has become an influential lobbying group with forty million members.   We’ll talk with the author of a new book which examines this and the AARP’s role in current debates over Medicare and Social Security.  

• Frederick Lynch - An Associate Professor of  Government at Claremont McKenna College, and author of Invisible Victims and the Diversity Machine

We begin a six part series called Issue Tuesdays, where we compare the Republican Primary candidates on some of the biggest topics facing this election. Today we begin with what may be the biggest for many... jobs. We’ll look at the candidate’s plans and how they propose they can get Americans back to work.  

Guests