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I'm Kelly Crossley and this is the Cali Crossley Show. No no England is home to some of the best medical institutions in the world. A new report shows that health care here is falling short for those short of breath. People with asthma. It turns out the New England has the highest rate of asthma in the nation. And if that's too sweeping us to to stick consider this one person every 10 has the chronic illness asthma like so many chronic diseases should be relatively easy to take. But instead lack of medical information and economic social and environmental forces converged to make the condition unmanageable. We'll look at what lessons can be learned from this latest research. From there it's on to the media and how they fail to cover one of the most important political races in the Bay State. We top it all off with Treme. A look at post-Katrina New Orleans through the lens of HBO. Up next New England news coverage. And New Orleans. First the news. From NPR News in Washington on CORBA Coleman Democratic senators have failed a third time to

overcome a Republican filibuster of a proposed overhaul of financial regulations. Today's procedural vote was 56 to 42 It means the bill cannot be debated. Republicans want certain parts of the legislation changed before they'll agree to let it come up for a vote. Democratic leaders and President Obama say it is wrong for Republican senators to block debate on the financial overhaul matter. A major credit agency has downgraded Spain's debt Standard and Poor's lowered its rating one level S&P analysts say that's because they forecast Spain will experience much lower economic growth over the next five to six years maybe less than 1 percent a year. Just yesterday the same rating agency rocked financial markets by cutting the debt rating of the Greece to junk status the debt level of Portugal was also lowered but it's Greece that's got European and other governments worried. From Paris Eleanor Beardsley has more on world market reaction. Markets from London to New York and Tokyo all tumbled in the wake of Standard and Poor's downgrade of

Greece's debt to junk status. The downgrade which means investors don't believe Greece will be able to reimburse its debts came as Europe is preparing a 40 billion dollar bailout package but the package faces increasing opposition in Germany the biggest contributor whose parliament must approve the funds before they are released. Meanwhile the Greeks are balking at austerity measures their government has put in place in exchange for help from fellow eurozone countries dockworkers blocked Greek ports earlier this week keeping cruise ships filled with tourists from departing the Greek debt crisis is taking a toll on the euro currency which dropped to its lowest level in nearly a year. For NPR News I'm Eleanor Beardsley in Paris. The White House says it's watching the European economic situation closely. President Obama is traveling in Illinois and Missouri today talking about the U.S. economy and issues affecting rural parts of America. The town of Macon Missouri is getting ready to host him but not everyone is happy to see Mr. Obama about 11 hundred people attended a rally last night protesting some of his administration's policies. From member station KBR Sarah Whitmire reports.

President Obama will tour an ethanol plant in Macon to talk about jobs and rebuilding the nation's economy. But on the eve of his visit protesters from across the state traveled to Macon to voice their opposition to the Obama administration's economic health care and energy plans. Columbia resident Dan Fischbach says he attended the rally because he feels as if the country is quote slipping away. The Constitution is being ignored and we are totally on the right track. This has nothing to do with the bomb and this has to do with the entire government both parties the state Republican Party and a Tea Party group organized last night's rally. For NPR News I'm Sarah Whitmire in Columbia Missouri. On Wall Street the Dow Jones Industrials appear to be handling the news of Greece's debt well. The stock market is up 46 points at eleven thousand thirty eight The Nasdaq is down 3 points at twenty four sixty eight. You're listening to NPR. The Coast Guard is trying to stop an oil slick from flowing into sensitive Louisiana marshlands. Emergency response workers are trying to use a controlled burn to stop some of the oil from fouling the coast. The oil from a pipeline that was

attached to a drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico exploded and sank last week 11 workers are missing from the accident and feared dead. The slick extends some 600 miles in circumference and threatened several state line coasts. The Anglo-Dutch Shell Oil Company reports a big jump on its quarterly profits from London. Larry Miller has the story. Royal Dutch Shell learned nearly 5 billion dollars in the first quarter of this year about 50 percent more than during the same period in 2009 and substantially higher than the previous quarter. Shell credits higher energy prices the price of oil has nearly doubled in the last year and its CEO says the turnaround was driven by the company's own actions including boosting production and exploration of new oil fields. However despite increasing oil demand due to the global economic recovery he cautions the outlook for Shell this year is mixed. Tuesday BP announced first quarter profits of five point six billion dollars one hundred thirty five percent. For NPR News I'm Larry Miller in London.

The U.S. government has given the go ahead to a wind farm project off the coast of Massachusetts. The Cape Wind Project will eventually have 130 turbines project leaders say electricity can start flowing by 2012. Opponents fear the wind turbines will kill wildlife and harm the coast. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar approved the project with a condition intended to protect the environment. I'm CORBA Coleman NPR News. Support for NPR comes from NPR member stations and from the Caddo charitable foundation for environmental coverage that informs the public's choices for a sustainable future. Good afternoon I'm Cally Crossley and this is the Kelly Crossley Show. According to a new study New England has the highest rate of asthma in the nation and other words one out of 10 residents has the chronic illness. Joining us to talk about the study is Laurie Stillman who authored the report. She is the director of the Public Health Policy and Strategy Center at

the Health Resources and action incorporated. Also here is Sharon Schumann the director of education programs for the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America's New England chapter. Welcome to you both. Thank you. Laurie I have to start with you. Why do we have the highest rate of asthma in the nation. Everybody wants to know the answer to that question. And I think that if we knew exactly what caused asthma we'd have a better sense of why we have higher rates in the nation. There is some speculation that the environment has something to do with it. Both the indoor and the outdoor environment in this study one of the unique things we did was we actually controlled for a number of demographic factors you know race income education and none of those seem to be correlated with the higher reason so that leaves us with not not many factors and it probably has something to do with the environment. You know we do have in New England older housing right. It's cold here. Many people

spend much of their time indoors. A lot of people say that because of climate change for instance there's more precipitation which results in more pollen counts more mold counts. And then a lot of the air mass from the western part of the nation and the southern part of the nation where there's a lot of coal burning plants etc. seems to land up in New England and then the ocean currents seem to keep that air right above us so these are some of the things that people are talking about. What is the impact of having the nation's highest rate of asthma. Well there are so many impacts I mean there's the personal impact which many of us could talk about I have asthma my son has asthma and missing school days is the number one reason why children missed school who have chronic diseases. It's. A major reason why people miss work as well. So it's also just very

expensive because when people end up in the hospital or using the emergency room it has an enormous impact on our health care system and right now when we're so concerned with health care reform and trying to control costs this is an epidemic that is eminently controllable and there is no reason why all these people end up having to land up in urgent care. Susan the director of education programs for the Asthma and Allergy Foundation one of that now. Lori just said it's there some connection to the environment but there's also some genetic connection some people believe. And what is your organization saying in terms of its it in terms of your membership. Well. The genetic connection is that people who have parents who have allergies are more likely to be allergic and people who have allergies are more likely to develop asthma so without citing statistics that is a general fact.

But the issue is really we don't know what causes asthma. We don't know what causes a particular individual to have asthma and it probably is some combination of genetic predisposition and the important thing is what people are exposed to in terms of things that they may be allergic to or things that are irritating to their airways. People with asthma have very sensitive Airways and they tend to react to things faster than other people would. I don't have asthma or allergies so your organization seemed this increase anecdotally of course that we have a scientific evidence of it but have have you seen that the increase is happening over the years. It is clearly demonstrated that more people are having asthma and other allergies as well we do a lot of work in the field of food allergies and that for children particularly has those numbers have skyrocketed in the last decade or so.

Do you have a sense that people understand that though it's it's a chronic disease that it can be life threatening. I mean I think sometimes people think asthma Okay well you take some medication you're OK what's the big deal. Unfortunately many people do not understand the seriousness of asthma. We unfortunately receive news about people who have died sometimes people make generous donations in memory of people who have died and it's very sad to know that often it's young people. Young adults typically who you know just may not have taken it seriously enough in their lives. What we now understand better is that someone can have you know fairly mild symptoms for a long period of time and then it can become severe depending on the things that we're exposed to I know if I enter a moldy environment because of my mild allergy I will react pretty quickly and that you know depending if if I have a bad cold for example already that could really you know trigger my asthma. The same with you know people who wander

into smoking environments or places where there is that pet that they may be allergic to. Sharon has just indicated that what I believe is that a lot of people don't think that this is a a a clot a chronic condition that has a life threatening component. Do you see that as well Laurie is someone who pulled this study together. Well it certainly has a life threatening component fortunately. It's the disease is getting better managed. But I. Think that the bigger issue is the number of people whose daily life activities have been substantially impeded because of their disease. They just can't participate in the ways of people who don't have asthma can participate in society. Many people with asthma can't work. Many people who don't work have asthma that we saw that correlation. Big time as I said a lot of children missed school so that affects their education but even more than that then you've got parents who have to miss work

because they have to be home with their children so the other very important finding from the study is you know asthma is eminently controllable. If people under medications have the medications use it properly can afford the medications. And furthermore know their triggers and can control their environment most. Most of the time they should not have to have their life affected. Well that's a lot of ifs Let's start with have the medications do. Are you saying that most people can get the medications. Well here's one of the problems we saw that about 18 percent of people have said that they could not with asthma have said that they could not afford their medications and it was much as one in four people with severe asthma couldn't afford their medications. So even in a state like Massachusetts or in New England in general where a lot of people are insured the reality is that many asthma medications are not considered what's called generic brand so you can you have. You can't get the most off brand.

So as a result the co-payments the out-of-pocket costs that people have to pay for their medications even if they are insured become very high and most people aren't on just one medication they have to have their control or medications they have to have their rescue medications. Oftentimes it's a combination of them. Many people have two parents so they you want to have the medications in the two you know two parent families who don't live together so right they might need to have two different kinds of medications at work and at home. It's cool at home so it gets to be very costly so right there that's one big problem. Now I thought it was interesting one of the results of this is that consistently people who earn less have higher rates of asthma as a class issue you've just spoken to. It's difficult for people to pay for this medication that cannot be generic for the most part has to be brand name. Well lower income folks and people with lower educational status not only have higher rates of asthma. So that

has nothing to do with taking their medication or not. They develop asthma at a higher rate but then they also have more severe symptoms as well. That may be because it's not well controlled. It may be because of the stress in people's lives the physical environmental exposures that they're exposed to in their neighborhoods. There might be a number of factors but definitely we see a disproportionate number of people who are lower income lower educational level smoke. Smoking is a very big issue and one of the points in this study is children who live with smokers in the home develop asthma seem to have developed asthma at a higher rate. So smoking in the home is something we really need to pay attention to. The preventable nature of it and also the cost factor was brought home to me actually through pop culture. The movie as good as it gets. Helen Hunt son had asthma really badly and was always running to the

hospital and only because you know this is the movie it is a fairy tale. You know through the intervention of Jack Nicholson was she able to afford the treatments and afford the specialist. So this is very serious Sharon what do you tell people. How do you advise them to take care of themselves if they are trying to manage getting the medications but maybe they can't get them all the time. Well there are assistance programs that can help people to either get access you know directly from some pharmaceutical companies or get assistance paying for the medications. But it's also. Confusing sometimes for them as to which medications to take when what doses how frequently it's sometimes difficult to. It's a challenge to get the medications into the lungs where you need them and require some coordination and sometimes some extra tools to use. We really talk about the importance of having a management plan so that people

really people really need a lot of education about managing their asthma. This is not a study make people pay more attention to this do you think. Well I think anything that gets the word out there that asthma can be serious that that there's no need to wind up in the emergency room or the hospital with asthma because it can be controlled after taking your environment seriously there are many choices we make about the things that we bring into our homes. Smoking of course is important but also perfumes cleaning products the things the choice like that we that might trigger it. All right. Laurie I wonder if you could answer if Asthma is a bellwether for other illnesses that are chronic and could be perhaps preventable or can we take that away from the study. That's the perfect question to ask because I really believe that this is a lesson for health care reform not only in our state but for the nation because the reality is 70 percent of the disability and deaths in this country as well as a 75 percent of the costs of health care have to do with chronic diseases. This

is these are diseases where there needs to be an important partnership between those people who have the disease and their provider. We need to have more education built into the system and we need to reimburse providers for spending more time with high risk people in there in the office and in their homes. Well I think a study like this will bring attention to that. I'm Kelly Crossley we've been talking about the high rates of asthma in New England with my guest Lori Stillman and Sharon Schumann or Stillman is the director of the Public Health Policy and Strategy Center at the Health Resources in action incorporated. Sharon human is a director of education programs for the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America's New England chapter. Thank you so much for joining us. Up next a look at how the media missed one of the Bay State's most important political races. Stay tuned. Support for WGBH comes from you and from Eastern Mountain Sports

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Just click to donate at. This is eighty nine point seven. WGBH Boston NPR station for depth and understanding for ideas and discussion with SHARE THE WORLD AND ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. Explore new voices with us all day long here on the eighty nine point seven. The annual WGBH spring auction is underway with new items appearing in the closing every day and every bid supports the WGBH program that you depend on visit auction dot WGBH dot org. We're back I'm callin crossly when it comes to one of the most important political races in the country.

It turns out that the media never saw it coming. That's according to a new report out of the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. Joining us to talk about how the media missed this paradigm shifting political race is Mark Jurkowitz Mark is the associate director of the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. Mark welcome. Thanks Kelly good to be with you. OK so for me shocking it was polling. You say in your study not journalistic reporting that really defined this the coverage of this race and we're talking about the Scott Brown race. Well I think that certainly what we could say is that it was the it was the Rasmussen poll in early January the one that showed Scott Brown within nine points of Martha Coakley. That really was the wake up call for everybody to say holy cow this is actually a competitive race. And you know the the the project that we did we undertook this with Boston University who approached us and asked us to do this. I'll be candid with you initially this this study was supposed to only look at coverage. And

we we looked at coverage in the Boston Globe The Boston Herald The New York Times and The Associated Press was only designed to look at coverage during the primary election. You know we the assumption everybody made was this would not be a competitive general election. And once we saw what happened on December 8th they came back to us and said Can we get some of the coating of the general election campaign because suddenly this was becoming the biggest story in America. Two things I think that are worth noting one is obviously our study does suggest just how much this brown surge was a shocker to the media he got very little coverage for example during the Republican primary campaign understandably on some levels that was not a competitive race between he and Jackie Robinson and people just assumed that a Republican wouldn't be competitive. So we kind of understand that. But so there was that element of just how Brown seemed to come from nowhere the media didn't seem to be able to detect this surge until it was detectable by polls.

That was a key element the other was the real ebb and flow of coverage here in the very beginning in September when this race began to define itself there was a lot of interest both locally and nationally because there was a lot of speculation that this was going to be a high profile you know sort of star studded race that might include for example Joseph Kennedy the former congressman from and that's right and then after he dropped out. Right. Never got in. Yeah right. Yeah and what we found is he got almost as much coverage in the primary period as Scott Brown did even though it was never a candidate because they miss Kennedy that's why it was your candidate. But there was also that the you know the dalliance with Curt Schilling on the Republican side the famous Red Sox bloody sock hero. Or maybe even Andy Card. So the media initially was very interested in this race. They set it up as wow this could be a great exciting race when the field cleared and it was obvious that you know there weren't any huge gigantic names in the race

media interest particularly on the national level. But to some extent a local level subsided and didn't really rev up till the last month before the primary campaign. It then subsided again and then the last two weeks of the general election campaign when the Scott Brown race became the most important political story in America then suddenly there was a frantic game of catch up here. It's really interesting to me as one who just listens to all kinds of media. I first became aware of Scott Brown through talk radio. I'm going to ask you if you could see some of that coverage in what you did here because there was one station here in town. OK. And people were talking to him I fact I first heard about him on our show there. They were everybody wasn't talking about him on the on that station at the time but. But you know a couple people that said oh who's that guy. And then he was interviewed right after Kennedy's death. Senator Ted Kennedy's death and was being pressured to ask answer the question would he run. And he very firmly said I will not answer this question

right after the man has died. That's not how I was raised. And at that point I became very interested in him saying. That's interesting. Who is this guy. But I don't guess everybody is listening and nobody else knew him. What's happening. Well I guess I'm one of the things that and we did not include talk radio in the study for a number of reasons some of them were just simply logistical which is you know for us to evaluate this kind of coverage and the tone of coverage the candidates get. You've really literally got to be able to listen to and hear or read every word of the news report or whatever it might be and it's very difficult to do that with talk radio. But clearly from people I know in Boston they suggest that the talk radio played a a fairly strong role in you know ideological talk radio in sort of lifting the Brown candidacy now that may or may not be true one thing we know about sort of ideological talk radio is they tend to preach to the converted. Well that's true. So then then the rest of us are just flipping.

You know you know and Brown Well you know he is an office holder in Massachusetts he was in a complete unknown by any stretch of the imagination. And you know again frankly you know all the attention the primary campaign was on this Democratic race that included you know Michael Capuano for significant names was a pretty competitive race even though it was very stagnant never really shifted from day one. And again you know Brown in some ways had the misfortune of running against somebody who was such a you know a perennial candidate in a non-factor in the race that he didn't get any of this sort of attention during the primary campaign. Well I have two questions for you first. Let me just say back to the whole question of ideological radio because in many circles the Rasmussen report really leans right. And so when that report came out when that poll came out there had been other polls and it showed the gap some people dismissed that you know quote unquote traditional media people because they said well it's a biased poll. Yeah you know I'm not a pollster although there are people who work at the Pew Research Center who are.

And you know there have been critic criticisms of the Rasmussen polls in the past on sort of methodological grounds. On the other hand there are significant pollsters and on this one they were clearly on to something right exactly. And you know the other I mean I can remember from my vantage point here which is not paying day to day attention but certainly knowing enough about messages politics from having been in Boston for 30 years you know I wasn't really paying attention until I saw that poll. And I said Oh my goodness a single digit race my first thought was that's probably not true and if you remember the globe then came out with their own poll shortly thereafter that showed Coakley up by 15. Exactly I think a lot of people then said Well you know I want to run that is my sense. Right. Rest well they I think a lot of people to the rest of the post probably wrong right over samples Republicans or whatever the case might be. And yeah this sounds more like it. And it really you know and then suddenly you started to see what happened and frankly a lot of the media narrative in the last couple weeks of the general election.

And this is another interesting factor we code for something called tone which means how are the candidates treating the story negatively positively or neutral during the primary campaign. You know Martha Coakley is positive story positive coverage far out seeded or exceeded her negative coverage in the last two weeks of the general campaign which we looked at her negative coverage considerably exceeded her positive coverage and it was mostly a horse race and you know she made a lot of unforced errors. Right. That were that became you know picked up in the media everything from thinking that Curt Schilling was a Yankee fan and to pooh poohing the idea of you know shaking hands at Fenway Park misspelling Massachusetts in an ad so a lot of that late narrative that worked toward Brown's favor frankly were the result of some unforced errors by the Coakley campaign. Well here's the other thing. One of the study demonstrated that the papers the major papers rarely ventured outside of the city of Boston. I just wrote Wow. I mean is that because of resources limited resources.

You got to pay attention to the right if this is a state what. By that you know. Well this is one of the things that we find interesting in our coding we do something called Dateline which obviously tries to get the cross the idea of where our you know news organizations sending their reporters. And what we found in the primary election campaign only two percent of the stories we looked at for a Dateline from the Massachusetts location other than Boston in the general election that number was a little bigger it was 6 percent but what that suggests and you know there may be stories that people you know wrote and reported from somewhere they came back so I you know I'm not saying it's an exact count but what that suggests is that there wasn't a lot of going on the road with the candidates report with the candidates. You know sort of let's face it I've covered political campaigns you probably have to get Kelly you to sense the kind of momentum shift that is happening with a guy like brown. You need to sort of feel it out there you need to see it hear it and feel I covered the 1980. Barney Frank Margaret Hechler campaign when every thought heckler would win. And by just simply being out there day in day

out even before it showed up in the polls you could feel the momentum moving to Frank. I think there are two things here and we don't you know yell at the media ends and we finger wag but clearly they miss or under play the amount of resentment there was towards the Democratic political establishment. An unpopular governor a former speaker of the house in legal trouble. There was that that could have discerned the other thing is if you go out there with a candidate and you see what's happening with the crowds and the level of enthusiasm you do get a sense of whose message may be resonating at after the fact there was a lot of coverage of things like Well Brown was a three times as many public events that Coakley was that could have been an ongoing story that may have been a tip off earlier that something big was happening here. I tell you what the people in the street said and I said if people had gone out with the candidates particularly Brown they could have done the count. The signs in the yard poll and that would have told them a lot of stuff but they didn't do that well they didn't know it until Lent you know yard signs are one

indicator that can just mean hey my friend in my late yard and I'm not complaining about it but but often you know really ad events. Would you listen the candidates rhetoric you see the level of enthusiasm the size of the crowds that sort of thing. It sounds that often the candidate feels whether it it's not definitive but it does it did it does give you a hint that you know maybe we shouldn't be waiting around for the next poll to see what the shape of the race is like. Well this was work that needed to be done that had to be done because it's going to be referred to a lot. And I have a feeling even maybe in our upcoming gubernatorial gubernatorial gubernatorial campaign I can say it. So I am really appreciative of the work that you guys do down there. We've been talking about the media with my guest Mark jerko is the associate director of the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. Mark thank you for joining us. My pleasure Kelli thanks. Coming up it's a look at post-Katrina New Orleans through the lens of the new HBO series Treme. We'll be back after this break stay with us.

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Visit WGBH. This is eighty nine point seven dollars each. Boston's NPR station for ideas and discussion with the takeaway and the world. The new eighty nine point seven. That sounds. Good to me and again my baby. Claims that that was a theme song for a trim a HBO special series and that music was composed by Jon buthe a real life New Orleans musician. I'm Kelly Crossley and this is the Kelly Crossley Show we're talking about the new HBO HBO series Treme which was just renewed for another season Treme which is a neighborhood in New Orleans takes place three months after Hurricane Katrina. Having only broadcast a

handful of episodes the series has already generated tons of buzz. So joining us to talk about what truce this fictitious rendering of post-Katrina New Orleans offers are Lois Eric Ely Rachel Ruben and Amelle Thomas. Lois Eric Ely is a New Orleans based writer and filmmaker. He recently joined the HBO series Treme as a writer our contributor Rachel Reuben is chair of the department of American studies at UMass Boston and Linell Thomas is a professor of American studies at UMass Boston and she's also a native of New Orleans. Welcome to you all. Hello Calli. Hello. I have to start with our contributor Rachel Ruben in so many ways. What happened with Katrina and all of its aftermath really spoke to our national consciousness and I wonder what you think that this series how this series is really speaking to that to our national consciousness. Well it's yes it's very interesting you know and I can only imagine how how wonderful it is for four people from New Orleans to see

details of their lives sort of lovingly rendered not on the news especially you know set after Katrina but I speak for I speak for the majority of Treme viewers who are not native natives of New Orleans. And so you know it makes me wonder what where how the show really does need to be situated in the national consciousness to the third episode ends with. With a sort of upsetting scene in which a funeral a Mardi Gras Indian funeral a memorial service is interrupted by a tour bus that pulls up with the sign on it says Katrina tours and and the mourners sort of in no uncertain terms tell the bus driver just to keep on moving. And I'm sitting there watching and thinking are the television viewers of the show on the bus. Are we on the bus or do we somehow get symbolically permission to be among the mourners telling you know that the tacky tourists to keep on moving. It's sort

of an uncomfortable moment to think about you know whether this is some kind of television tourism. You know despite perhaps better intentions on the part of the producers of the show. So you know maybe it's even worse than the current train a tour bus because we're not putting money into the New Orleans economy. We just get to watch the show. And so when you know when the character says you know just keep on driving on out of here. I'm thinking should I be hearing but Tune in next week you know Torme is that tourism is so complicated and you know here I would really like to see hear from my colleague Lyndal Thomas because she she does absolutely fascinating work on the meaning of tourism in New Orleans in terms of its its cultural economy and of course its financial economy. Well there you go Lynn I'll jump right in and then well allow us to tell us what did you mean by writing this one. OK. I also was thinking about the show as the tourist experience perhaps the quintessential tour because the series does allow

viewers to go outside the purview of Bourbon Street and to see the real expressive culture as it takes place in these neighborhoods of the Treme in Gentilly and the show has this way of doing both at every turn. Making fun of tourists as crass and insensitive the Wisconsin folks not knowing what the real story is. But then as being a commercial really for the authentic New Orleans that in some ways is inviting people to come in to see the real story and it's interesting even in that scene where the tour guide is banished from that memorial. The tour guide apologizes and says Oh of course you're right so in the end it's not so much that tourism is the problem. The guy gets it and the two of us can maybe find a way to circle around the neighborhood with some of the tours actually do in the post-Katrina tours.

Now what I take away is a very strong you know this is an opportunity as you've spoken to a little bit about the rest of us out here to understand that culture that kept getting getting spoken about in in the months and weeks after Katrina like what was being lost there was more than buildings more than you know it was all this culture that was so special. I want to give our listeners a chance to hear a little bit of a clip from one of the episodes and this one actor Clark Peters plays Albert Lambro chief of the Indian tribe Guardians of the flame. He's returned to find his home destroyed by flooding and he set up shop in a local bar and here he's asking a member of another tribe to help him with repairs. Not so many back over here one floor with most of these people waiting on insurance those a guy. Drew a square where they get money $200 every truckload I clear off them New Orleans East trees that's gone. That theme is good for most but if you get all in business is good enough.

Speaking of which I got a ton of money hauled out of the bar and need to be dumped. I'm asking as a chief. Bad. It's all a mistake. In a mansion. Like T-Mobile drove a lovely golden eagle all my life and you know it. Made ballroom for practice. Lois Lois tell us what you're trying to achieve this is. This sounds very authentic I have to say so and you're there to make sure that that happens. So are we giving the rest of America a taste of what culture really means in New Orleans. Well I got a start at a different point because when Eric overmind David Simon decided to do a show about New Orleans really because they love normal music you know we're trying to figure out a way to build a show around that. And then Hurricane Katrina came and it became an opportunity to look at the city in a different way. But my point was that it is not the issue that is has its genesis directly or primarily in the storm but really what we're trying to do is show the lives of

these people with whom has been this one cataclysmic event the failure of the federal levee but who also have the same aim to family problems by Nektar problems relationship problems that other human beings have so it's an opportunity to show that the people of New Orleans are not merely the crowd that you see. At the Superdome during the storm and for the economic issue too there's a whole lot of people getting work from the show in New Orleans I don't think that that is a problem and there isn't as Ruben said it's always complicated we talk about exposing a culture to a wider audience out of context. When you talk about putting coaches in museums or sending tourists but the other thing is that in the absence of that in our contemporary culture it can often be difficult to get the widest tided to place any value on it. I think one of the great tragedies in the war than post-Katrina was that the things that we bring to this nation are mostly cultural and we're in a country that seems to care about us only because we produce oil and secondarily

because he's produced the food. The music the dance all of those sorts of things the architecture seem not to be sufficient to the country to do right. Well our listeners should know that you did a documentary which of course is a truth telling piece of work and now this is fictitious and you've been employed to work to try to create let us into this this this area of New Orleans is so special. Well so how do you think you are doing in terms of trying to balance all that we're discussing here. Well I tell you when Dawn logs came to me about doing this documentary she said we really need to focus it on culture and that is what the show does. But when I look at what happens walking down the street I look at what happens when I feel like we have created jest this last week in a panel discussion Northern Union I think sort of two things. Thank you for getting this and that the other thing right and then critical but hyper critical in a way that you only be critical of somebody's got big things right.

You know I'm saying it's kind of like if somebody told me wrong going to even bother bother engaging in the discussion and I think everybody in New Orleans is watching this show and everybody's excited because that's what was like when I walked back to my house. That's what it was like when that roof we didn't come back to fix my roof after I paid those kinds of things the real for us. And you were in the raid that John Goodman expresses in the first episode is the raid that we all wish we could have expressed to a broader audience. OK let me let our listeners hear the rage that John Goodman is is expressing. He's one of the main characters enter a man a college professor named Crighton Burnett played by John Goodman and in his first episode he and a visiting British TV journalist do an interview at one of the busted levees. He was saying this was a natural disaster pure and simple a natural disaster a hurricane is what hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast was a natural disaster Hurricane pure and simple. The flooding of New Orleans. Was a man made catastrophe a federal. Up up topic. It's a

decades in the making tatty we can add is that I have no worries. Now Lois I want to give Lenell a chance. Professor Owen L2 to respond to one thing you said. You know people are critical because you're getting most of the big things right and so they're picky about the small things. But Leno has an issue about the way race relations are portrayed or not betrayed in the series go ahead and explain what you mean. Well right now I do want to acknowledge that I think the series does memorialize the experiences in the lives that were lost and pays tribute to the resilience of the people of New Orleans as well. I think Albert Lambro character has this wonderful line where he says well I don't know how. And he also has another great line about you know people are interested in New Orleans music New Orleans people perhaps not so much. But I do think that. There might be several

reasons but we just listen to the Goodmans characters rant. And there's some way in which the white character seems to be exceptionally heroic. They get to take on the power brokers whether it's the Army Corps of Engineers or Burnett's wife in the character who can take on the judicial system or Davis the character who can bring up racial profiling and take on tourists or the musician in the French Quarter who recounts the stories of rescuing people that it doesn't seem that the African-American characters are positioned to do. I mean it's been three episodes so far but so far in the series. And I wonder as well if at this particular moment nearly five years after Katrina in a city that is really protective of one another who feel in a lot of ways that we've been ignored and this experience is that next

recognize. And who are in the series as well as in our own lives. Also demanding not just a tribute but recognition continue for more federal support. So I wonder if people feel resistant to talking about a history of racial conflict or ongoing racial tensions that I haven't seen manifested in the series so far. I'm going to let Lois respond but first I want to get Rachel in on this. This is after all intertainment now to HBO credit they did do the big nonfiction series with Spike Lee called When The Levees Broke. You know no getting around that right after Katrina. So this is a fictitious rendition of all that is New Orleans post-Katrina. Right absolutely. But you know I I think that entertainment is incredibly important and for me I'm I'm slightly less interested in whether something is fictitious than how it's fictitious. You know so the question is What story does get told

not that you know about that there's a story told because of course it's a you know it's a narrative and we need to get interested in the characters and I would just sort of like to add a little bit to what Lynn L. said not just that the white characters have sort of power in insult incite. Excuse me but that they do seem to have more latitude to be angry. And this really sort of makes me wonder why why certain characters seem more appropriate for the series or for television perhaps in an angry state. And I particularly am thinking about thinking also generationally. Why. Because you know one thing I really would like to talk to to talk about is that the kinds of music that are focused on you know new or LOT of music in the series a lot of music in a series that focuses on music in New Orleans is an incredibly important. A producer for example of hip hop music and a subcategory of New Orleans bounce which you know is is sort of

speaks to a whole generation nationally Little Wayne is huge. But why why not. You know why for instance you can't can we imagine and and maybe all of them lobbying the writer here but can we imagine you know a hip hop oriented young African-American man or woman in the show who's also really insightful and really angry and expressive of it. Ok Lois I'm going to let you answer but let me tell our listeners that we're talking about the HBO series Treme and we're talking with Rachel Ruben our cultural contributor here at the Kelley Crossley Show Mel Thomas who's at UMass Boston. And now Lois Eric who is a writer on the series and a native New Orleans. You want to respond. Yeah. What I would say. Terms of black characters expressing rage to take control of their own protest urge you to keep your eye on Big Chief Lambro who will take up an important issue in this in this series.

OK thanks for that. In terms of the music there really well actually no. If you look think about the first episode Davis Mechelle there you know it's all mystical he puts on mystical. He does put on mystical briefly but it's you know it's the compass is on second line jazz that we might wreck you know I was like yeah maybe I'm the performer and the music is sort of used as punishing I did get a chuckle out of using club music to scare off the gay couple. But but it's it's not the sort of the same like loving attention to performance. Well let me suggest this also imagine what is going through your mind in putting this together you have the sort of 10 major events that might have happened in a particular year. Plus the characters you've chosen the possibility of adding other characters. Plus the primary responsibility which is to provide quality entertainment. Often it is difficult to do all those things and at the end of the day I've covered all the bases. People are constantly saying you know you go to do this issue or that issue.

None of what you said are things that I think we are attempting to avoid. But by the same. So when the question is is there room and 10 episodes to introduce another character doing hip hop. And I would say that unless you're in the writers room listening to all the good ideas that don't get into the show for various reasons have to have a certain kind of sympathy for effort. Lois I'm interested in the kind of response you're getting from people you're generating a lot of buzz. But can people be drawn to it or are they just they hear Katrina and they go oh I can't I know you want to look at a fictional story about it. I think in that regard I timing has been perfect. Good friend of mine Jed Harald a wonderful book called Between things that I was not able to be able to share because it was I don't want to go to that place. So soon afterward at this point now I think people are able to deal with it another kind of way and see it out having the same kind of emotional reaction that most have to have right

after the flood. Well I do have to say that I love the inclusion of the musicians that I didn't know about any generation I mean I just this John boo Tay and Kermit and some of the other people I did know Dr. John but you know I just didn't know all of that and that's that's been very good and I love the theme song so that's helpful. So maybe some other things going to happen. What are you hearing in terms of response because you are native New Orleans and New Orleanian as well. I think that people are really excited to see themselves finally recognized and recognizable. And by Hollywood or in this public forum you know that it does like I mentioned before move beyond Bourbon Street and literally you can sometimes see folks you really do know not just oh you behave like folks that you know or talk like folks that you know my husband's got sun for instance is in the series but there are a lot of local actors like Lola's talked about the people

that are employed in people that you may have run across. So I think you know are such a momma's house. Some other situation that is a small New Orleans. So Rachel as a person who's not a New Orleans how are you received do you think other people are going to respond to it. I can say that I have relatives in the wheezy Ana Benton Rouge mostly a little few in New Orleans who had to leave after Katrina. So I'm familiar with the gumbo and music gumbo particularly. But I'm I'm curious if this would be attractive to people who just come to it fresh. No connection I think. I think it has absolutely has a huge potential to be attracted tract of to people who come to it fresh. I do think that you know I do. Well you what you asked about reception and I I have also I've heard as I said speaking for the majority of viewers who are not from New Orleans I've I've heard a huge amount of enthusiasm and you know Joy that the show is renewed so

quickly and people are I think very interested in it and I think that they are very receptive to the kinds of details that that construct the building blocks of the of the truth of the narrative imagist also because for New Orleans I don't think this can be. I underestimated the fact that the Saints won the Super Bowl this year that there has been a change in leadership a changing mayor a new mayor that people you know the final roll home checks are finally being cut that people now I think it's correct or finally ready maybe for the first time since the storm able to reflect on that time period and to begin to move forward. I have to say Lois that I appreciated that the first episode when the character said oh my god it's the first second line since the storm. You could sort of as a viewer really get caught up in that enthusiasm and that will to combat.

Well I tell you when I did the documentary A lot of what we were trying to do was remind people what it felt like to be in the city and to show that footage even though you may not know that music well may not know that dance. You get a sense of being there and understand why this place is so fascinating. I think what other shows it's all about oil and swimming. But you have to exaggerate the exoticism. The truth is that reality is exact enough if you think the enthusiasm is reflective of the fact that we have been paying attention post-Katrina or that we haven't. I'm not certain either. Mind you David Simon came off the wire with a whole that of folks I wish I'd discovered it to know such a great show. He didn't come down here so you get the combination of his reputation the same plans who will obviously all of those things but the fundamental thing that people have still missed is that the lesson of Katrina is not about the power of storms or about the power of the federal government being late in reacting. The problem is the Army Corps of Engineers has built faulty projects

all over the country and that's an issue that no one wants to deal with. We want to talk about New Orleans is a basket case. We don't want to talk about flooding in Sacramento California as example we don't talk about the Everglades. Other places the Amoco then you need to do a project that endangered all American. Well I have to say that that's a theme that's being articulated pretty well in this in this series even I got it. And the first couple episodes so you did your job well. We have been talking about with my guest Lois Eric a New Orleans based writer and filmmaker. He recently joined the series as a writer and Rachel Ruben chair of the department of American studies at UMass Boston. And let Mel Thomas who is also a professor of American studies at UMass Boston and a native New Orleanian and the series heiress what day the first time what day it airs on Sunday Sunday 9:00 PM door. OK and then of course it's repeated many other times during the week so I encourage everybody to check it out because it really

is pretty interesting. I love that theme. All right. OK. Thank you all for joining us. This is the Calla Crossley Show. Today's program was engineered by Jane pick and produced by Chelsea murders. Our production assistant is Anna white knuckle be we our production of WGBH radio Boston NPR station for news and culture.