Radio Times; Casey for Governor and Rebroadcast of Randy Cohen

We are stationed, serving Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. Good morning. It's 9.59 on Monday morning. I'm Brenda Jarech. Thanks for being with us for morning edition, Radio Times, and our host Marty Moscoain, keeping you up to date next. The Franklin Institute forecast a flash flood watch today with showers and thunderstorms with rain heavy at times, severe storms expected this afternoon and this evening, high to 72. It all moves out tonight with partly cloudy skies overnight, low to 54, partly sunny windy for Tuesday afternoon or evening showers possible, high to 65, 62 and overcast in center city at 10 o'clock. Next Tuesday is the Pennsylvania primary and the race to watch is the one between Ed Rendell and Robert Casey, Jr. To get the Democratic nomination for governor, it's been a test fight and an expensive one too. I'm Marty Moscoain and coming up on Radio Times today, we talk with Robert Casey, Jr. about his vision for Pennsylvania.

He's the current auditor general and the namesake of a previous Pennsylvania governor. We'll begin our conversation with John Bear, who's been covering the primary for the Philadelphia Daily News. Casey will join us at around 20 minutes after the hour. Stay with WHYY in Philadelphia and call us at 1-888-477-949-99. This news from National Public Radio. From NPR News in Washington, I'm Carol Castle. President Bush announced today that the U.S. and Russia have reached a major agreement on nuclear weapons. The United States and Russia has agreed to a treaty, which will substantially reduce our nuclear arsenals, and agreed upon a range of 1,700 to 2,200 warheads. This treaty will liquidate the legacy of the Cold War.

The President and Russian President Vladimir Putin will sign the accord at a summit next week. President Bush announced the deal is left for Chicago, where he will promote tougher welfare reform rules later today. Prior to the announcement, the President signed a $190 billion farm bill in a White House ceremony. A fire burning in the Angeles National Forest in California has grown to more than 5,000 acres. Los Angeles County Fire Captain Brian Jordan says the fire is 60 percent contained, and firefighters expect to have it fully contained by tomorrow night. The fire began on Saturday morning, and spread quickly, feeding on dry brush in the hilly terrain north of Los Angeles. No homes are threatened. There have been two injuries, both to private contractors, providing support to firefighters. Mild winds and a drop in temperature to 80 degrees yesterday afternoon help firefighters gain control of the blaze. Palestinian leader Yasa Arifat is touring the West Bank today, his first foray out of Ramallah since December.

Arifat is visiting Janine Nobles and Bethlehem, where a Palestinian gunman was shot and killed today. NPR's Peter Kenyon reports. The Israeli army said the Palestinian was shot and killed at a checkpoint outside Bethlehem after opening fire and wounding one policeman. Earlier the army reported chasing and killing a Palestinian who opened fire at an army base in the Jordan Valley in the West Bank. Arifat began his tour with the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, where he bowed before the altar. Arifat reacted angrily to last night's vote by the Central Committee of Ariel Sharon's LaCoude party to oppose a Palestinian state. Arifat called the vote the destruction of the Oslo Accords, and senior negotiator Sy Barakat called it a drastic blow that would play into the hands of extremists on both sides. Israeli foreign minister Shimon Perez called the LaCoude vote meaningless, and Sharon said he would continue with his current policies. Peter Kenyon and Pierre News Jerusalem. Strong thunderstorms have caused flooding in parts of the Midwest. Forecasters say things could get worse in Missouri, where rising rivers already have closed roads and businesses.

Heavy rain also fell in Illinois, the National Weather Service is issued a flood warning for nearly every river in the central part of the state. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial averages up 26 points to 99.65, trading his light, volume 113 million shares. And as that composite index is up 15 points to 16.15. This is NPR News. Support for NPR comes from Sadexo, providing innovative approaches to food and facilities management services throughout North America, on the web at SadexoUSA.com. Rain threatens today at 62 in center city at 10.04. Good morning. I'm Brenda Tourette, W-H-Y-Y News. For the Dow, few public school students and teachers looking for answers on how upcoming reforms will take shape or waiting longer, details promised from the school reform panel last Friday did not come, as talks continued between leaders of the school district and the city teachers union. One area the commission is tackling publicly is problem charter schools, W-H-Y-Y's Mari Saito reports.

The school reform commission is set to vote this week on whether or not to close three charters. The schools have allegedly failed to meet state requirements. One of the schools is Renaissance Advantage Charter School. State Senator Anthony Hardy-Williams is one of the school's founders. Commissioners say they have been waiting for school heads to submit necessary academic and financial documentation. The West Philadelphia School has already had problems with high teacher turnover and low test scores. Behind the scenes this week, representatives from the school reform commission and the city's public school teachers union are set to continue talks. On the table is how the district will enact reforms within the guidelines of the existing teachers contract. In head James Neville has said he wants to make better use of contract options like rewarding good teachers with improved pay and allowing principals to select their own teachers. The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers has vocally opposed any form of privatization. I'm Mari Saito, W-H-Y-Y News. As local school officials hash out education reform plans, Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Spectre focuses his sights on education issues today to public hearing in Philadelphia.

Spokesman Bill Reynolds says Spectre wants to hear from experts on effectiveness of reforms with an eye toward applying lessons learned here nationwide. So by taking a good look at it right now and then following the progress as we move along down the road, we could learn from what works, what doesn't work, and then seek to apply elsewhere. Officials from Governor Schweiger to Mayor Street to parents, students, and teachers union officials have been invited to the old-day session along with the chairman of the controversial Edison Schools Incorporated. A flood watch is up today and the Franklin Institute forecast with showers and thunderstorms some rain heavy, severe weather possible later, with a high to 72, clearing out 54 tonight then partly sunny Tuesday. 62 in Center City for the Delfia this morning at 1006, this is W-H-Y-Y. From W-H-Y-Y in Philadelphia, this is Radio Times, I'm Marty Moss, Cohen. The primary for Governor of Pennsylvania is just eight days away.

The Republican Mike Fisher is unopposed, but the two Democrats, Ed Rendell and Robert Casey Jr. are working to solidify their base and to win over the sizable number of undecided voters. A recent keystone poll put Rendell ahead by 10 points, but found that 25 percent of voters have not yet decided who to vote for. Last week we spoke with Ed Rendell and today in Radio Times, our guest is Robert Casey Jr. the current Auditor General of Pennsylvania, son of the former Governor, Robert Casey, he'll be joining us in just about 15 minutes. You can join us though right now at 1-888-477-949-9, that's 1-888-477-W-H-Y-Y. We begin our conversation with John Baer, Harrisburg reporter for the Philadelphia Daily News, he's been covering this race for the paper and John, nice to have you back with us on Radio Times. Good morning. Good morning, Marty. Nice to be back. What does an Auditor General do? Well he is, as he will often tell you, the state's fiscal watchdog. He basically has a constitutional responsibility to sort of look over how the state spends

its money and whether or not that money is being well spent. He's got the authority to go into agencies, into school districts, any place where state dollars are spent and generally audit them. Has he been considered a good auditor general? He has and the reason he has is because he is an ambitious young man and it's a great office to run for hire office from. It gives you access to all levels of state government, it gives you information about all levels of state government and it gives you a forum because people are interested in how tax dollars are spent. He's done a good job as did his father and sets the way for a higher run. Well, and speaking of his father, if someone has just moved to Pennsylvania, what does the KC name mean in the state of Pennsylvania, John? Well, it's politically fainted, Robert P. KC ran for governor three times before he became governor in 1986 in a very close contested election against the former Lieutenant Governor Bill Scranton III.

He then, during difficult times, governed in a way that Uber Humpfrey might have governed them and he really had a lot of interest in programs dedicated to providing more health insurance for children, providing more ways that government can pull people up from their bootstraps as he often said and now his son says, as Uber Humpfrey said, people in the dawn of life, people in the trial out of life, people in the shadows of life. And of course, he became a national figure for bucking his own party on the issue of abortion and he didn't support Bill Clinton in 1992, wasn't allowed to speak at the National Democratic Convention, probably didn't vote for Bill Clinton. We often asked him that and he always dodged it. And then, as you know, because of his health problems, a very rare, double organ transplant because of a disease, a genetic disease, familial amyloidosis, and you know, died too young. I mean, he was, he was 65 when he died and it will be forever regarded in the state as

a decent, honest, hardworking public servant. And does Robert Casey Jr. then share his father's politics? He absolutely does. It is, for those of us who covered the father, it is like going back a couple of generations. It's like watching the process starting all over again. He has the same mannerisms, he has the same politics, he has the same approach to governing. He is in every sense of the word his father's son and in many, many parts of the state, that is an enormous benefit to start running from. And yet he has run a very negative campaign and the criticism seems to come from many different corners, not obviously his supporters. But what explains, you think, the decision of his campaign and even he himself to be so negative? Well, I think it was a tactical decision. A sort of decision made that for the greater good, those of us who believe that he should be the governor, have to go through this in order to make him the governor. When you're running against somebody with, as profound a popularity in the Southeast

that Rendell has, with a demonstrable record of achievement and accomplishment, there really aren't a lot of ways that you can sort of get yourself above that. And as you know, we've talked on this program many times in the past. There is outside of the Southeast a very strong anti Philadelphia sentiment in Pennsylvania. And I believe that the KC campaign thought that it could cash in on that in a big way. And so dedicated themselves to this straight ahead railroad assault on Ed Rendell, his record is mayor and subliminally Philadelphia. But is it working? And I'm looking at the latest Keystone poll which does put Rendell ahead and also gives KC more unfavorable marks compared to Rendell. Is this backfiring, do you think? Well I wrote several weeks ago that the strategy is either an example of political blunder or political brilliance. At the moment it looks like a blunder. We really won't know until a week from tomorrow. Because as you said at the outset, there is a large number, a quarter of the vote is

undecided. More importantly in the western part of the state where many field election will be won and lost, there are undecided approaching 40% in critical counties like Allegheny County where Pittsburgh is located. So we're not going to know. And my sense is, my field, my intuition is that it's not working because Ed Rendell has run a near flawless campaign. He's rebutted every single charge against him. He's cast in no one. I would have been stunned six months ago if you or anyone would have told me that a week to week out, Ed Rendell would have claimed the high moral ground in a campaign. Stay wide, you know? I mean he somehow has turned this thing and convinced everybody that a negative campaign is wrong. That we should be talking about the issues and it's clearly accrued to his benefit. You say that 25% of, or actually Kirsten Paul says 25% and you said, John's in places like Allegheny County, it could be as many as 40% are undecided. Are these people not paying attention?

They can't make up their mind. They're doing something else. Why so high? I'm just wondering. Quite the contrary, Marty. I think outside of Philadelphia, the campaign has been raging for months. It's only been in recent weeks that the campaign has come to Philadelphia because of the cost of Philadelphia paid media. But in Western Pennsylvania, I was in Pittsburgh over the weekend, there is an enormous amount of interest in this race. It is, there is evidence of it everywhere. And I think part of the problem is that there is a natural tendency in the Western part of the state to be case positive because of his strong labor support, because of his strong pro-life support, his NRA support, older voters, and they tend to vote. All of those segments of the vote that I just mentioned tend to vote. And I think they are now, many of them conflicted because Rendell has been so effective in defusing all of the arguments against him and making a case for his own experience. The one, I mean, the real Trump card that Rendell has played throughout, and I think very well, is I did something in a major city that nobody had done before. I literally turned a city away from bankruptcy.

The state is looking at a huge deficit. The same kinds of problems I faced in Philadelphia. I can do the same for the state. I've proved it. You wrote that there is something like a million union workers statewide. Are they a powerful force in Pennsylvania? That's one of the questions we are going to get answered in eight days. Leadership union leadership certainly can help in phone banks and raising money and drumming up the appearance of widespread support. Union membership is a different story. Whether or not the leadership can turn out the vote of the membership is going to be critical to the numbers that we are looking at in eight days. And the amount of money that both these Democrats have raised, Rendell and Casey, what is something like $25 million at this party? 30. Yeah, it's just incredible. I mean, every year in a state like Pennsylvania, and in any large state, you said a new record, but this is a geometric jump. It's amazing the amount of money that has been raised and spent on this race. And there are no limits in Pennsylvania. There are no limits. Fortunately for those of us that cover it, it's a way it's like the Wild West. You know, it's just wide open and you can raise, you can give as much as you want, you

can collect as much as you want, you can spend as much as you want. And also you can get money from outside the state with impunity. And they both have Casey and the Casey, in the case of Casey from large national labor groups and the case of Rendell from all kinds of sources. And that's John Bear. Our guest in this first portion of radio time today, he's a Harrisburg reporter for the Philadelphia Daily News, also columnist for the paper. And he's been covering this race for governor in the state of Pennsylvania. The primary is next Tuesday, May 21st. And Robert Casey Jr. should be joining us in about five minutes or so. You can join us though at 1-888-477-94949, that's 1-888-477-W-H-Y-Y. John, I'm curious how many debates you've watched or how many forums you have attended over the last couple of months. It feels like about 86. Marty, I mean, there it was interesting. The thing early on, there were all kinds of offers for these guys to go and do places and Ed Rendell proposed a series of debates, one in each media market, over the course of

eight weeks. Casey initially was very reluctant. They were running a strategy of basically him raising money being on the phone, dialing for dollars, and them running their television. That began to be criticized in the free media, and so they sort of began to bring the event up more. But I've seen them several times, both together and individually. And their routines, I mean, now, particularly, I mean, Saturday night's debate in Pittsburgh, which the final face-to-face debate that they will have, and neither one of them was going to do anything different or make a mistake or anything like that, something like that. Those of us who have been covering it pretty much can give you all of their lines or baton by now. And is it all dependent on voter turnout? Is that going to be key to who wins this primary? It really does. We're at the state where everything has been said. I think even if there is a further big negative attack, it's going to be, it's been, it's such a wash right now, it's just going to be diffused, and it is going to come down to turnout.

Whether or not the people in South Eastern Pennsylvania, where Ed Rendell, polls tell us have supportive maybe 70 to 75% of the electorate, which is extraordinary. If they come out in numbers greater than they normally do, and the Rendell campaign argues they will, because the Southeast days never had a candidate like this, it's over, and it could be over early. On the other hand, if we have weather like today, we're going to say it's raining here in Philadelphia today. And the turnout is like, Philadelphia and the Southeast tends to vote proportionally less than other areas of the state. If history repeats itself and that holds true, then we're going to have a real dog fight. Because as I mentioned, the core support that Bob Casey has lined up during the course of this campaign, unions, NRA voters, pro-life voters, older voters, that's a vote that will turn out no matter what. Those constituencies vote and they vote heavily. And if the Southeast is not turned out, we're going to be looking at another governor, Casey.

Well, and let's say that Casey does win, how do you then anticipate a Casey Fisher race? I think that would be far more interesting than people give a credit to, you know, everyone including myself early on had said that this is the race for Pennsylvania this year that if you're not a Democrat, you should change the Democrat because, by the fall, it's not going to matter. I've actually come to believe that it's going to be closer than I initially thought. A, because my Fisher is out all this time to sort of get his act together both financially and issues wise. And B, because historically Pennsylvania, because of its ideologies, tends to be a close state. Fisher is a much better candidate now than he was even five months ago. And I think particularly if it's Casey, because they are not that different on many, many issues, we can have a real race. And if Randall wins, what happens to Casey? Well, he still has two years left as Auditor General. The options that would remain open to him would be to him. He is a lawyer. He could, as his father did, go into private practice for a while and then return.

He could run for state treasurer, which is another state-wide office that will be up when his term is up. He could run for attorney general. Those of us who think that he would be, let me, we've asked him about running for the United States Senate next time. He has said it's an office he's not interested in. Well, I thank you very much, John Bear, for getting us started today on radio times. Bob Casey is waiting in the wings to join us after this short break. Thanks a lot, John. Party always a pleasure. Always a pleasure to have you on as well. John Bear, Harrisburg reporter for the Philadelphia Daily News. Coming up after this break, we will talk with Robert Casey Jr., he's the current Auditor General of the State of Pennsylvania, and he's in a race for the Democratic primary for governor, which is May 21st. One, 888-477-9499 will be right back. The Lights of Liberty Show supports WHY-Y. Lights of Liberty dramatically tells the story of the American Revolution as it happened and where it happened, in historic Independence National Park.

Five story images are projected on some of our nation's most historic buildings, while the story unfolds through digital headsets with 3D sound that helps create a you are there experience. Now open Thursday through Saturday or Tuesday through Saturday after Memorial Day. For reservations 215 Liberty or Lights of Liberty.org, presented by Pico. From the next fresh air, a centennial tribute to composer Richard Rogers, featuring performers Rebecca Kilgore and Dave Frischberg. I'm Teree Gross-Jornis for the next fresh air. This afternoon at 3 and again tonight at 7, here on WHY-Y 91 FM. Many parents and educators feel that we have to protect our children from sex, but author Judith Levine challenges this assumption in our new book, Harmful Terminers. She argues that denying children and teen sexual expression and information ultimately causes

more problems than it prevents. I'm Dan Gottlieb and on the next voices in the family, we'll meet Levine and discuss her work. That's today at noon right here on WHY-Y 91 FM. The primary for Governor of Pennsylvania is May 21st and that's just 8 days away. This week we spoke with Ed Rendell and joining us now is Robert Casey Jr. he's the current auditor general of Pennsylvania and son of former Governor Robert Casey and he wants to win this race against Ed Rendell for the Democratic primary. And Robert Casey Jr. thanks for joining us. And to our listeners, lines open at 1-888-477-9499, that's 1-888-477-WHY. Let me begin with your ad campaign. Why have you chosen to make Ed Rendell's tenure as mayor of Philadelphia the focus of this ad campaign? Well actually the focus of our campaign, Marty, has been on healthcare and raising the minimum wage.

We put a plan on the table early to provide health insurance for unemployed workers and their families to expand prescription drug coverage to focus on public education to give children a healthy start in life. That was really the focus. One thing we did though in the early part of the campaign was to make sure that, especially people from outside of Philadelphia, knew Mr. Rendell's record on public education which I said a number of times as a failing record. And I think it's important when people go to vote that they have the whole story because he was on television saying, pretty much he did a great job, took a troubled school system and made it a lot better and that wasn't the case so we had to make sure we put that on the ear so that people know the difference between us. And also on a whole series of issues he's done the ads against my record and that's the nature of campaigns. You have to, there's a lot of back and forth and a lot of debate about issues and I think your record, both my record and his are subject to enormous scrutiny as they should be. Well I want to though if you're having second doubts because this Keystone poll that came

out in May, first of all found that Ed Rendell was ahead some ten points but also found that you're unfavorable rating went from 12% in April to 21% in May and there seemed to be some criticism of the negative tone of your campaign. I wonder if you have second thoughts about it. Well no I think there's a lot of back and forth on both sides. I think most voters in the state are beginning to get a sense of the differences between us and I think at the end of the race, they're able to short out a lot of the back and forth and the charges and counter charges and the policy papers and I think at the end of the campaign, they get back to the fundamental questions about, especially for working families fighting through a recession, who's going to be on my side and when they ask that basic question will do well and also whom can I trust. I think that's the fundamental question that people ask when they vote for governor. So you don't have any regrets, any second thoughts, any wondering whether you focus too much on Ed Randall and not enough on yourself?

No I don't because that's the nature of a campaign. You spend a good deal of time talking about your own record and your own proposals. We've had more policy papers and proposals in any candidate history, almost 15 different separate initiatives and also you have to make sure that your opponent's record is not just subject to scrutiny but if he's representing his record which I think Ed did on his education record you have to put that in front of the people and then let them decide. They can decide between the two of us, who's the person who's going to fight for public education, who's the person who's got the right ideas and creating jobs and also making sure that children have a brighter future and also that older Pennsylvanians have some peace of mind with long-term care and prescription drug care. Another poll actually done by the Pennsylvania economy league found that a lot of the voters, almost 50% of the voters didn't really know where the candidate stood and again we're just struck by the negativity of the campaign. I know you've spent a lot of money to get your message out.

Is there some reason you think the people don't know where you stand on various issues? Well I think they know some fundamental differences now they know that I'm for fighting for an increase in the state minimum wage in Pennsylvania, Ed is not. He wants to wait for the Republicans in Congress to do it. I think they know the difference in a patient's bill of rights. I'm for a very strong one, allowing people to write to sue their HMO. Ed is not a privatization. I'm against it. He's for it. Healthcare has been a major initiative for us in the campaign and I'm going to continue to fight for that and Ed has been a lack of emphasis in this campaign on healthcare. I think the beginning to understand those differences and that's part of the negative ads he did on me when he was making charges against me. That's part of what voters have to consider and I think they're able to. I think they actually know more than sometimes they're given credit for about the differences between us. What's the first thing you would do if you became governor? Well I think the first I would hope in the first hours of being in office we would first

have all introduce a healthcare plan for the uninsured using tobacco settlement dollars. The administration in Harrisburg has really been irresponsible in not putting forth the healthcare plan that they promised the people of Pennsylvania way back in June of 2001. It's been an abomination that unemployed workers in the state don't have that health insurance plan on the table. I would start with that and also apply immediately to the federal government for a Medicaid waiver to provide more prescription drug coverage. If we do that we'll have hundreds of millions of dollars for prescription drug coverage. We can also begin to put a budget together in the opening hours and days of my administration that reflects Pennsylvania's renewed commitment to public education. It hasn't been there. The state does less as a percent of the cost. The state budget spends less on education now as a percent than it did. We had this crazy voucher fight for years that no one supported across the state and we lost a lot of time and energy and focus on public education and on early learning and child

care and nutrition and other supports for young children. I want to talk about the education but I'm curious where you think the federal government will get money for Medicare waivers in that the federal government is looking at a deficit. Right actually it's Medicaid waivers and the administration in Washington has pushed this program aggressively because they want to make sure the states have the opportunity to have dollars for prescription drug coverage. This has never been available before. They apparently don't want to do a national prescription drug initiative so they're allowing states to have the opportunity to apply for a waiver which if it's granted and I think it would because Illinois just got one. Hundreds of millions of dollars that the state never had for prescription drug coverage and that's not something that we're just going to debate. We're going to do that. We're going to get it done because this state is in a crisis. You have older Pennsylvania's increasing in their numbers all the time. More and more of them don't have pace coverage. More and more of their families are facing the crisis of not having their loved ones

with prescription drug coverage. We've got to change that. In the next governor can't just talk about it. You've got to do it. You've got to do it early in the administration. And that's Robert Casey Jr., a guest today on radio times and he's running for Governor of Pennsylvania. The primary in the race against Ed Rendell is next Tuesday, May 21st and Ed Rendell was our guest last Thursday and today Robert Casey Jr. is our guest. One 888-477-9499, that's one 888-477-WHY. Another question just to follow up on what you said about education. You're asking for the state to carry more of a share or responsibility for the financial cost of education as much as 50% where are you going to get the money for that? Well, you have to do it over time and there's a fundamental difference in our approaches in the campaign. The way I would do it is to make sure, first of all, that you set the agenda in your first budget address.

You're putting together the first budget which commits more of the state's resources to public education. Secondly, you have to use revenue growth. We have growth every year in the budget and you have to use a portion of that. Even if next year it's minimal, you have to use a portion of that for public education. And also thirdly, reprioritizing how we spend money the last couple of years, the governor's office increases or expenditures by 238% and you had agency after agency expending triple figure percentage increases in their budgets. At the same time, the decay through 12 public education was only increasing 14%. So if you're a governor who's really committed to public education, as I will be, you can find a lot more dollars in the state budget and with revenue growth for public education. I think the state can get to the 50% level. It's now in the mid 30s. I think we can get to the 50% level over an eight-year period and I think that's achievable. So you're talking about kind of an incremental approach then? Yes. Yes. I don't think, no, my opponent has talked about a $1.5 billion initiative to get there. Only problem is I think is if he analyzes plan, I think he's about $1 billion short unless

he increases state income tax. Now he can get to the $1.5 billion with a massive state income tax increase. I think that's the only way he can get there short of having a magic one. You've talked about childcare and early education. I think if earmarked something like $10 million for that? Yes. What we did in our start smarter plan was to add $10 million of new state dollars. But on top of that, $55 million of existing dollars in the state budget. For example, we have an initiative in Pennsylvania, which this administration put forth, which was to have $10 million spent on cyber. They call it cyber start to have computers and technology in childcare centers. And that's a wonderful idea if the children are learning and if the facility is of a high quality. But I think the first thing we've got to do is guarantee that a child in Pennsylvania who goes into a childcare center is in a place that the parents can afford. It's in a place that has a high quality of learning opportunities, preschool and early

learning opportunities. And that the care is nurturing and that the care givers are not just prepared to educate their child long before they even get to kindergarten, but that they're providing the quality of care that parents should have the right to expect. Do you want all they kindergarten for public schools? Well, I'd love to have it. I think across the state, the only problem is right now the state, I don't think, can afford a statewide initiative. But what our plan does is the $65 million that's in our start smarter plan would allow such as school districts, but local communities to apply for grants from the state to do whatever they would want to do at a local level. For some, that might be all they can to grant for others. It might be another early learning initiative for others. It might be an expansion of the children's health initiative. I think local communities, after they've gone through an analysis of what they need and they've done a risk assessment of the challenges facing children every day in their communities, should have the opportunity to apply for federal and for state dollars to do that.

And they can make their own mind up about whether it should be all they can to grant. But I think what you would have is more and more districts in the state applying for and implementing all they can to grant across the state. Now, if times get better and the budget begins to increase, I think we can expand our program substantially above the $65 million we're talking about spending. Let me get Nina to join as she's calling us from Upper Bucks County. Go ahead, Nina. You're on radio times. Yes. Mr. Casey, I was curious if you have an agenda for dealing with the malpractice crisis. And the issues that physicians are facing and then what's going to it's going to trickle down to patients having to go to another state to have any kind of surgery that might generate any kind of a difficulty with maybe the higher risk specialties. And Nina, you're talking about the fact that a lot of these insurance premiums have

just gone through the roof. Absolutely. And the companies wouldn't be leading the state and refusing to ensure physicians if they know there's a problem with frivolous lawsuits in the state of Pennsylvania. But there's no limit on the torts. Thank you, Nina. Okay. Robert Casey, do you need to go ahead? Yeah. I'm guessing from the content of your question that we probably disagree on the strategy of how to get there. I don't think limiting the damage award that injured workers and others recover as a result of a lawsuit is going to have much of an impact on medical malpractice rights. I do think though that across the state there is a consensus that there's a significant problem, the general assembly began to deal with that a couple of weeks ago with the legislation that was passed to begin to address the question of medical errors, which is one of the more urgent problems in that whole system where a very small number of physicians in Pennsylvania are causing a lot of the problems in the system, and I think we have to make

sure that medical errors are not just reported, but that the patients and families can have access to that information. The other thing we have to do, I think, is recognize that in this fight that took place in Harrisburg, he had doctors and lawyers going at each other, but the insurance companies in the state were really left off the hook and rendered virtually blameless in the process. And what we're going to need, I think, in the future is not just addressing some of these issues directly, but also having an insurance commissioner who's very aggressive about the oversight of insurance carriers, especially medical malpractice carriers, in terms of how they do their, how they make investments and how they comply with state law. And at the same time, making sure, as we do in our patient protection plan, that the state of Pennsylvania has a healthcare consumer advocate who goes before the insurance commissioner when the insurance companies are coming in for significant rate increases, and make sure that the point of view of people in the state consumers is brought to bear on that process

to make sure that the insurance companies' rates are justified, and the only way you can justify them is through an adversary process where you have an advocate who's arguing on behalf of consumers. Unless we get insurance companies under control and begin to do the aggressive oversight of insurance companies, these rates are going to continue to spiral out of control, even if doctors and lawyers reach a consensus on what the solution should be. But many would say that the crisis is right now as that there are surgeons, obstetricians who are leaving their practice, leaving the state of Pennsylvania giving up their practice because they literally cannot afford to pay the malpractice insurance. Well, that's true. And I think that the general assembly began to address that, but I don't think the solution is what sometimes the medical community has framed it as, that if you reduce damage awards, take other measures to change our system, the justice system that somehow that's going to lead to much lower premiums, I just don't think that the evidence bears that

out. Let me get Kevin to join us. He's calling us from Center City, Philadelphia. Go ahead, Kevin, you're in radio times. Yes, I wanted to ask Mr. Casey, one of the things is I'm a state worker, and I'm between you and Attorney General Fisher, I wanted to know what the mechanism is. It allows you gentlemen to go all around the state campaigning for a different office. Then the one that you were elected to do, in other words, how do you get time off or things like that? Ed Rendell is doing it by taking leave of absence from his office, but I thought the hijacked might be somewhat clear in saying that you couldn't politicize the office within the workplace. So I'm just curious when something like Governor Ridge left us, and now we have you as Editor-General, and you're using that as a springboard to run for something else. I'm wondering when does it end? All right, Kevin. Thanks for calling, and go ahead, Robert Casey, Jr. Yeah, Kevin. It's a good question. I think we've been very open about that. When we campaign for Governor, I remain the auditor general, and that's something that I think taxpayers are fully aware of when I ran for re-election in the year 2000.

I made it very clear in television appearances and coverage through the Associated Press and other media that there was a significant chance, a highly likely chance that I would run for Governor Pennsylvania in 2002, and voters re-elected us overwhelmingly by a landslide. So who's doing your job? I'm sorry. Who's doing your job? Well, we continue to do that. I think the most important thing that the measuring stick for an auditor general is, is the work getting done, are the audits being completed, and we're actually, because of the efficiencies that we've created in that office over five years, we're actually producing more audits year after year than we were in previous years, because of the work that we've done and because of the team that we have around us. So that work continues just last week, we've produced an audit on the Children's Health Insurance Program today, and Philadelphia, we're going to be releasing a result of a task for a study on minority and women businesses that was worked that we did as auditor general.

So our work continues, but at the same time, I think the people of the state are fully aware that we're running for Governor and that does take time away, but the work continues and we're blessed with a team of people that have been able to help us with that. That's Robert Casey Jr., I guess today on Radio Times, we're going to take another short break and then talk more and take more of your phone calls here on Radio Times. Our phone number is 1-888-477-9499, we just have one open line at 1-888-477-WHY-Y. Robert Casey Jr. is the current auditor general of Pennsylvania, and he's running against Ed Rendell for the Democratic Primary, which is just eight days away. Give us a call and stay with us, we'll be right back. The mainline health heart-setter hospitals, Lankana, Brinmore, and Peioli are proud sponsors of WHY-Y.

The heart-setter physicians and professional staff have been dedicated to providing advances in cardiac care for decades. Brinmore Hospital is currently conducting clinical research and improved treatments for heart attack and coronary disease. For a mainline health heart-setter doctor, the number is 1-866-CALL-MLH. Next time on The Tavis Smiley Show, what does it take to keep historically black colleges in the black? We'll talk about the challenges HBCUs face, securing endowments, and donations from alumni, plus we'll kick off our celebration of hip-hop appreciation week with a conversation with McCarrick and Oneham, author of The Hip-Hop Generation. That's next time on The Tavis Smiley Show from NPR. Coming of age in the shadow of your father may not be everyone's battle, but it was for Marlo Thomas, as she struggled to come into her own dad gave her words of encouragement

that motivated her to explore acting, activism, and writing. Now she's compiled a collection of words that inspired others, heroes, role models, cultural icons, Marlo Thomas on The Next Tavis Smiley Show. This afternoon is one on WHYY. We're back here on radio times with Robert Casey Jr. And before we take some more phone calls here, I'd like to put just a couple of questions, more questions to you. Both the governors of Maryland and Illinois have called for a moratorium on death penalties in their states and have called for groups of people to take a look and make sure that the death penalty is fairly applied. Would you ever want to do that in Pennsylvania? Well, I think Marty, it's something that we should study if there's a consensus to do that. I think there might be. I don't think there should be a moratorium at the same time. I think that people in the state support, and I support the death penalty, I think it's

an appropriate punishment. And I think it's also a deterrent to further crime. I do think that at the same time we're supportive of the death penalty that if a defendant has, if there's DNA evidence available to a defendant, that should be made available. And also, the representation that's provided, especially in a capital case, that we have skilled advocates that can argue those cases, I think the state should help with that. And of course, when you're the governor of Pennsylvania, probably the most serious and grave decision you have to make is the decision to sign a death warning that has to be done, I think, with a great deal of deliberation and time so you can review the warrant thoroughly and also review the record. What's your position on gun control? Well, I don't think we need further restrictions on gun ownership. I think that with this state, as you know, really led the country when we eliminated the

gun show loophole, we've had laws in the books for years, the intent of which, if they're enforced, keep guns out of the hands of children. We should make sure that we vigorously enforce those laws, but I don't think new gun control laws are going to have any impact, I think it would have an adverse impact on the right to bear arms, across Pennsylvania. And you oppose abortion? Yes. In any and all circumstances? Well, I've always been, my position has always been a pro-life position, and I think that a lot of people in the state, even in the Democratic primary, have the same position. Would that apply to rape, incest, life of the mother, health of the mother? My position has always been the favoring the one exception for the life of the mother. I do think that if the United States Supreme Court were to overturn Roe v. Wade and return that decision to the state legislatures, and if the General Assembly of Pennsylvania were to pass an abortion bill, it would contain exception for rape and for incest, and for the

life of the mother, and I would sign that legislation, it would have the effect of reducing the number of abortions in the state. Let me get Cindy to join us. She's calling us from Palmerton. Go ahead, Cindy, you're a radio time. Hi, good morning. Good morning. I've heard a lot of different things on different issues, but I haven't heard anything on your environmental policies. A couple of rich had started a very strong education and recycling policies that are going to be expiring in 2003, you know, the growing greener, trying to reduce the landfills and so on. Are any of these going to continue? Well, what we've outlined, these are other plans you can get on, Casey for governor.com. What we proposed in the campaign, Cindy, was an environmental and restoration initiative, which did a number of things. First of all, the effect of it would be to replace growing greener, which, as you said, is we'll be running out of time and it's actually running out of money now because that budget is being cut by the administration to balance the budget.

What we do is we increase tipping fees, landfills, by $3 in the first two years and then $5 in each of the next eight years, and dedicate that $950 million to an environmental initiative, which is a 10-year number. So we have $950 million just from that over 10 years. In addition to that, we have a bond issue on top of that of $250 million for a total of 1.2 billion over a 10-year period, which can be used for a number of initiatives depending upon what individuals and communities at the local level would want. It can be for preserving open space, it can be for preserving farm land, for preserving conservation lands and forest lands, and also for treatment of acid-mine drainage, which is a terrible problem across the state as a result of our coal mining industry and for other reasons.

So there's a whole series of things that the local decision-makers could implement with those state dollars. And on top of that, we have a separate initiative, which is a five-year initiative to borrow $175 million to supplement the Penn Vest Clean Water Program, which provides loans and grants for clean water and sewer projects all across the state, which is really the best in the country. And we have to make sure that the dollars are there for that. So we want to make sure that we implement our initiative, which would provide not just a replacement for growing greener, but would also actually be a significant improvement in an expansion of growing greener, and would commit more dollars. And the important thing here is the dollars, unlike growing greener, would not come from the general fund. It would come from borrowing, and mostly from the landfill tipping fees. Another part of the landfill tipping fees on top of the $3 or $5 increase would be increases above that, which we're dedicating for real property tax relief across the state.

Thanks, Cindy. Thanks for coming. And speaking of tipping fees, do you think Pennsylvania should continue to be a landfill importer? Well, the problem, Marty, as you know, is that we've under this administration in Harrisburg, the administration that I have to fight against every day as auditor general, I don't have a lot of company because I'm the only Democrat. What they've done is double the landfill capacity of the state between 1995 and 2000, and they were much too liberal about providing our allowing permits in that permitting process to take place. So this state, which had a real problem in mid to late 1990s, is that the problem of out-of-state trash has actually got worse, because we've allowed the permitting process to have many more landfills in Pennsylvania. What we should do is provide a moratorium, make sure that we're aggressively pursuing a federal remedy, which is, you know, because of the interstate commerce cost has to be

a federal remedy to limit the importation of out-of-state trash. And also to have an aggressive and consistent and continual effort at the state borders when trucks are coming across the New York, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Pennsylvania line, to insist that those trucks are fully compliant with all the environmental and motor vehicle laws, so that even as the race is coming into the state that we're not having further problems because of the violation of the environmental or motor vehicle laws. Let me get Alicia to join us calling us from Kutztown University. Hi, Alicia, go ahead, you're on radio times. Hi, good morning. Good morning. I'm concerned about the status of our state system universities. I perceive what seems to be a consistent dismantling of our state system where our students are middle class students and lower socioeconomic students are having to take on a greater burden of the cost and having less access. This year alone, our university has faced a $3.5 million cut back.

Can Mr. Casey respond to that? Thanks, Alicia. Alicia, very good question. I think what's happening in the state system, which is really a jewel of this state, it's not something, frankly, that governors or legislators or even educated brag about enough. It's just a phenomenal system that we have that we should brag about more than we do. But what's happening here is it's a failure on the part of the Rich Wiker administration to be fully committed to public and I am an underlying public education and that's led to a lack of investment in public education at the elementary and secondary level, but also at the higher education level, while spending for public education has actually gone down as a percent of the budget, spending on corrections and economic development programs and other initiatives have gone up and we're never going to create jobs in Pennsylvania unless we make a full commitment to public education.

So what I would do as governor is work very hard in the first budget to do everything possible even when we have a budget shortfall to commit more dollars to public education from pre-kindergarten all the way up through higher education. But there's been a real almost adversarial relationship between this administration and public education. The House Democratic Caucus for years have been urging the administration to change its attitude and to reprioritize its funding to meet those needs which is you set filter down to students having to struggle just to make ends meet to go to those public institutions. Thanks a lot, Alicia for calling in. Pennsylvania is really near the bottom now for job growth compared to other states. We have lost population or actually not grown as fast as the other states which meant which has meant that we've lost representation in Congress. It looks as if the state is really losing its status nationally.

How are you going to make Pennsylvania an exciting and magnetic place for people to move to for businesses to come to? Well, the party part of it obviously is job growth and creating the jobs of the future. The only way this state will fully transition into a new economy and to really a new age of growth is if we completely focus and focus like never before on those high-paying high technology jobs in the future. I think this state is well positioned right now to be not just a national leader but a world leader in biotechnology and nanotechnology all of the life sciences other than biotechnology. We have the research capacity, we have the universities, we have with rare exception, very good school systems, but what we don't have is a governor in an administration that's fully committed to developing a workforce that has a high skill level. Not just any skills, not just any job training, but the high skill levels that we're going to need to create those jobs in the future.

That's why employers will not just expand but locate in Pennsylvania because of our workers in the skill level and that requires over time a workforce development system which we have the outlines of now but we don't have the full commitment to creating those jobs in the future. And also making sure that in the short run we're not waiting for the recession to be over that we use the resources that state government has, the capital dollars, we have the capacity to spend hundreds of millions of dollars right now with the capital redevelopment assistance program and other initiatives, economic development programs, to get construction projects moving, to allow communities to grow, to bring new life to downtown areas of our urban centers and in smaller towns all across the state by using the leverage and the resources of state government and also making sure that the small employers, small businesses have access to tax credits and other initiatives that can allow them to grow to invest in technology and the training of their workers and technology and also to make sure that we have one thing

that they can do right now is to create, as our program talks about, create sites for future development places like the state of North Carolina have had an explosion over the last 10 or 15 years in bio technology because they not only train their workforce in those high skill areas but also they created sites that were ready. Massive sites that had all the environmental work done ahead of time shovel ready sites that had all the infrastructure in place so that when an employer came into North Carolina as they should come into Pennsylvania and when they asked those two basic questions do you have high skill workers if the answer to that question is yes Pennsylvania will be ready and do you have the site and if Pennsylvania can answer that question yes we'll have tremendous growth we'll keep our young people here and most of the young people will leave Pennsylvania leave because of one word wages and if the high wage high technology jobs are not here and if we don't create the amenities in our communities where these new technology workers want to locate then we want to track them so I think we have great potential

but we need to see we need strong leadership from the governor of Pennsylvania to get that done. Let me get Michael from Winwood to join us this morning already at times go ahead Michael. Yes good morning. I have a question for Bob Casey. I read a little bit about your biography and I'm aware that after you got out of school you taught I guess what the judge would volunteer for at a school in North Philadelphia which I find very commendable. What I wanted to know from Mr. Casey was did that give you any kind of a like a firsthand particular insight into what really are specific needs of these poor urban and also poor rural school districts throughout Pennsylvania. Oh really didn't I'm glad you asked because it gave me an insight into the challenges and struggles that children in North Philadelphia faced every day and when I taught there was in the the 80-83 school year in the middle of a terrible recession when a lot of neighborhoods in North Philadelphia probably had unemployment rates above 25 percent and these kids were from those neighborhoods they had to struggle every day and it gave me an insight into the difficult lives those children

faced lives that I didn't face as a child and I was just startled every day by their ability not just to get to school and to do their homework and to achieve but also to do it in a way where they they were hopeful and positive about the future so it gave me a tremendous insight into those those children and also gave me an insight into teaching and I did it in a one year program so it was just it was a one year initiative but in a one year commitment of my time but it gave me an insight into what it's like to teach in a classroom full of children when the numbers get to 35 or above 30 and how different when I talk about class size I have an insight into it because I throughout throughout that year I was teaching classes of about 35 children and the other part of it which gave me an insight into was the just the what urban centers are facing every day the transportation system I used to ride the the the broad street line from one one neighborhood North Philadelphia to the other I lived a 23rd in Taiyoga and took 33 bus from 23rd in Taiyoga down

to to 18th and 17th in Gerard so it gave me an insight into neighborhoods and communities but also it gave me an insight in particular into what families are facing especially in a in a recession as we're living through an 82 and 83 and we have just about less than a minute actually your approach is an incremental one to the to the problems that face a state of Pennsylvania is that going to be dramatic enough to deal with the problems that the state faces well I think it's realistic and I wish that I could I could make a wild promises about all this new revenue that's out there but I just don't think it's it's credible to say that and I also don't think that the trying to solve one problem which is an education funding problem and for many communities a property tax problem which is a really urgent crisis in many people's lives I don't think by trying to solve that problem we should create another problem which would be a massive income tax increase but I do think that if you take the approach I'm taking it's not only

realistic but it is it would be a significant change from where we are in Pennsylvania today where we can really commit ourselves to public education and the way you do that is by making a full commitment every year in the budget using revenue growth you're making sure the priorities that are there in terms of how you allocate that spending well we got to stop you there because we are out of time and I thank you Robert Casey Jr. for joining us today on radio times Marty thank you you're very welcome and thanks of course to all our callers I'm Marty Moscow and you're listening to WHYY FM Philadelphia your member supported NPR station serving Pennsylvania New Jersey and Delaware and actually looking ahead on Wednesday we'll be talking with Mike Fisher he's the Republican candidate for governor he's unopposed but we thought it would be important to hear his perspective we're shifting hours so second hour radio time today we're actually on tape a conversation with Randy Cohen he writes the Ephesus column that's in the New York Times magazine and his book is called

the good the bad and the difference the Franklin Institute forecast for today looks like a lot of weather we've got a flood wash hours and thunderstorms some rain will be heavy at times a few thunderstorms may be severe later this afternoon and into this evening high of 72 degrees tonight showers and thunderstorms this evening then becoming partly cloudy overnight low of 54 degrees Tuesday partly sunny windy in afternoon or evening showers possible on Tuesday high 65 Wednesday mostly sunny windy high near 70 degrees supporting WHYY hilltop preparatory school in Rosemont PA serving students with learning disabilities in grade 6 through 12 and those who need a transitional year before college since 1971 hilltop offers a unique combination of college preparatory curriculum small classes and clinical support for self-esteem self-advocacy and social skills open house may 15th from 932-1130

610-527-332-30 Randy Cohen writes one of the most popular columns for the New York Times the Ephesus runs weekly in the Times magazine and Cohen offers advice and his musings on a range of moral issues sent in by readers it's funnier than dear Abby more playful than Miss Manners friendlier than Dr. Laura more hip than Martha Stewart I'm Marty Moscow in and today in radio times we rereadcast our interview with Randy Cohen he's collected some of his columns in the new book the good the bad and the difference he's also supplemented the book with his second thoughts his explanations reactions from readers contributions from other people including his mother even pop quizzes so stay with WHYY in Philadelphia but when you hear that phone number don't call in first news from NASA above the radio from NPR News in Washington I'm Carl castle president Bush announced today that the US and Russia

have reached agreement on a nuclear arms treaty the two countries will reduce their nuclear arsenals to his few as 1700 warheads from the 6000 now allowed speaking to reporters the president said he will sign the agreement when he visits Moscow later this month I look forward to going to Moscow to sign this treaty it is be the culmination of a lot of months of hard work and a relationship built on mutual trust that I established with President Putin in Slovenia this is good news for the American people today it'll make the world more peaceful and put behind us to call war once and for all last year the two leaders had agreed in principle to the plan but their representatives had trouble agreeing on how to carry it out the treaty must be approved by the Senate president Bush signed into law this morning a new 10 year 190 billion dollar farm bill the president said that farmers and ranchers need help as he acknowledged that the new law is generous but not

perfect at the signing ceremony the president said the measure will break the habit of passing yearly emergency spending bills to bail out farmers the new bill increases overall farm spending by 77 percent and restores price supports that were scrapped by the 1996 Freedom to Farm Act critics of the measure call it a budget buster French president Jacques Chirac told victims families that the terrorists who killed French engineers in Pakistan would be punished Chirac attended a ceremony for the victims in the northern port town of Sherborg in PR's next spicer reports the stores were closed in shalebu as thousands gathered to pay their respects to the 11 French victims of a suicide bomber eight of them were employees at the local navy dockyard and had flown to Pakistan to help its navy build a submarine last week a suicide bomber drove a car into their bus killing 14 people president Jacques Chirac addressed the crowd in the port city he said the crime was monstrous and Chirac's war the terrorists would find no sanctuary promising

to never give in to threats of blackmail or to give up frantic part in the fight against terrorism Chirac posthumously awarded the naval engineer the legion of honor frantic's highest distinction French investigators are working with Pakistani police to find out who was behind the attack next bison NPR use Paris former president Jimmy Carter has gone to Cuba where he has met with Cuban president Fidel Castro Carter says he and his wife Rosalind traveled to Cuba as friends of the Cuban people the emphasizes that it is a private visit and he will not be negotiating with the government on Wall Street the Dow Jones industrial averages up 112 points to 10,051 trading as moderate volume 295 million shares the Nasdaq composite index is up 31 points to 1632 this is NPR news support for NPR comes from the James Irvine foundation supporting NPR's West Coast expansion www.urvine.org partners in building a better California cloudy skies 62 and center city at 11.04 good morning i'm branded Chirac's why wine news storms that

race through the Delaware Valley last night could be a hint of things to come later today meteorologist Jim Porrier says an 85 mile an hour wind gust recorded a dover air force base in Delaware last night and a 61 mile an hour gust at the villas in Cape May County, New Jersey could be repeated with moderate risk of severe weather later to day and tonight in Barrington County and Barrington Camden County official say damage caused by storms last night was not a tornado but from straight line winds across the region high winds toppled trees toward down power lines and caused building damage in places including West Vincent Township and Spring City and Chester County officials have been investigating those reports of damage New Jersey state troopers are heading to two of the garden state cities but for very different reasons W.H.Y.Y. Eugene Saun reports 100 state troopers both in uniform and plain clothes begin patrolling in Camden this week to help the nation's porous city battle drugs in general crime governor McGregor is not said how long they will be helping Camden police but the head of the state police has estimated that the effort would cost $600,000

for the first year extra troopers will be in Newark this week to help police keep order during a very hotly contested mayoral election a state police spokesman would confirm troopers are helping out on election day but would not say how many the spokesman also claims that this is not unusual saying troopers are always sent in to help on any voting day but the city of Trenton is also holding a mayoral election Tuesday and Trenton police director James Golden says no troopers are scheduled to help patrol in the capital city that day in Trenton I'm Eugene Saun W.H.Y.Y.N. For men charged in the infamous drug house massacre that made national headlines for Philadelphia 18 months ago are scheduled to go on trial today jury selection is beginning in the case against force suspect charged with bursting into the Lex Street House in West Philadelphia and murdering seven people the prosecution believes the defendants carried out the killings in a price war among rival drug dealers jury selection could last two weeks with testimony expected to go on

through July this summer it's 62 degrees overcast in center city with rain on the way it's 1106 from W.H.Y.Y.N. Philadelphia this is radio times I'm Marty Moss Cohen writing for David Letterman and Rosie O'Donnell hardly seems like the appropriate job training for an advice columnist especially ones that won the deals with ethical matters but that's the route that Randy Cohen took before being hired by the New York Times magazine to write the ethicist column the columnist turned out to be wildly popular and it's syndicated in some newspapers across the country readers write to Cohen about the moral dilemmas of everyday life like is it okay to sneak food into a movie theater is it wrong to work for a church and not believe in God should I intervene if I see a parent hit their child Cohen's columns are a mix of advice ethical musings and humor Randy Cohen has chosen the best of some of these columns organized them by subject matter

added in arguing with the ethicist ethicist section given guest ethicist a chance to weigh in included a second thoughts chapter where he takes back even reverses himself on some of his earlier columns and added a series of pop quizzes and he's put them all together in a new book it's called The Good the Bad and the Difference had a tell right from wrong in everyday situations and he joins us this morning on radio times nice to have you here in the flesh thanks for having me an ethicist is a hard thing to say on the radio you know might be easier to write than say it's very cruel and you know when I was first offered the job I was under the impression that it was to write a column called the anesthetist and I thought well I can I can law the reader into a sort of stupor just like that certain other New York Times column that's we could name I'm up to that and let me give out the phone number here because every time we have Randy Cohen on the show the lines do light up and it's one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine that's one eight eight eight four seven seven w h y y so do any of your friends call you the ethicist behind your back well not with quite the note of contempt you bring to it but with a certain

sense of irony yes it's true that people who wouldn't have paid two cents from my advice a few years ago now ask me things with a certain deference which just testifies to the awesome power of the New York Times and not to any insights of mine well and I wonder too when when you go to things like cocktail parties I don't know whether people go to cocktail parties anymore I'm available are you I am whether you like lawyers and and doctors people ask you for I mean seriously ask you for some ethical advice yeah it's it's a it's a kind of two-part problem as soon as I walk in the door I feel that whatever wicked fun had been going on has now stopped that I've become a kind of official wet blanket we better not do that bad thing that ethical guy is here and believe me I'm off duty much of the time and when people ask what I do for a living they they then present me with their ethical conundrums and and I say to them what my doctor says to me in that situation which is well take off your clothes and hop up on the table and we'll try to sort you out but you ever use that title with your daughter to say look you know I write the ethicist column in

the New York Times you better you know go to bed she's 14 I guess you can't it doesn't work anymore it doesn't matter what what titles you offer her and she will ignore you well tell us a story of getting this job the idea for the column originated in house at the magazine they introduced several new features and they asked a few people four or five people to audition for the job they gave us each the same three questions to which we had to provide responses they're very discrete you know I really wanted to know who the other people were but but they wouldn't say to their credit they didn't want to embarrass anyone I get the impression the other people were genuinely trained professionals you know serious sophisticated philosophers university types I believe how they chose after that I don't know you'd have to ask the New York Times I'm guessing some kind of clerical error well there this is one of the questions though I believe because I think you include this as I was dropping a memo on a colleague's desk I glanced inadvertently I promise at her computer screen and saw my name she'd written an email to our boss definitely attributing the failure of a recent project to me that was a rash overstatement but how can I

defend myself without acknowledging my inadvertent email read that was one of the questions cunning I think really cunning because it balances your own wrongdoing you're no longer pure with a genuine interest in not taking the blame for something for which you should not be blamed you know you shouldn't read other people's computer screens but if you saw your name on the screen and didn't continue to read I would take your pulse because how could you not I mean you have to allow humans to behave like human beings I suggested that this person write a memo to the boss herself a kind of preemptive strike laying out and explain it saying that project that didn't work out so here's here's why I think it failed here's what I think we should do but don't blame anyone shoulder what if there's any blame shoulder it yourself think about ways we could do better in the future and never admit the terrible thing you go to the grave with that one you also write in this book about how how writing for David Letterman which you did kind of was a training ground even a proving ground for this particular column and I was surprised to read that well of course

you know it's entirely in my interest to persuade everyone that this was good training but I would put it to you that it was yes that that the Letterman show was a kind of profoundly moral enterprise that had a central thesis that was coherent which was as follows I thought that our childhoods had been bought and sold to produce ridiculous pop culture crap for profit Dave's job and the job the show was to offer a critique of that especially junk culture that manifests itself as crappy television shows he gave us kind of implicit guidelines as writers you know because all comedy attack well most comedy attacks and the interesting ethical comedy especially don't you think yes but the question is well whom and why and I felt it was that our task on the show to assail the wicked and the powerful not to bully their victims to only blame people for things which they chose to do not not for things over which they had no control so you could mock someone for being a dreadful actor but not for having a dreadful nose you know that ethics involves volition those guidelines would work out pretty well in many of the questions I get

to the column now so have you had to kind of refine deep in your and this is a kind of a serious question you're understanding of what it means to be an ethical person oh yeah sure to behave ethically sure if a chimpanzee had my job the chimpanzee would know more about ethics three years later yes one of the ways in which my thinking about it's changed the most is just deciding the range of ethical behavior by which I mean say a homeless person asks you for money you must make a decision right at that moment how you respond and before that would have been the extent of what I regarded as the ethical question what you do right then I've come to see it a little differently that the ethics entails civic responsibilities and as important as what you do right then is what you do when you get home which is you you have to think about ways so that there aren't so many homeless people how can you change the conditions that made this sad state possible civic obligations this is a serious question but having sort of thought a lot about some of these ethical issues

and refine the definition for yourself and of course dealt with so many letters that you've gotten do you think you're a better person because of it oh no you've lead a more ethical oh no I just a more conflicted life a more self-conscious life that by thinking about these questions as part of my workday I'm incredibly aware of the times I fall short I'm not sure if it's improved my actual behavior but it's up the embarrassment threshold of a lot but shame and embarrassment is one way to get people to behave isn't isn't that part of what William Bennett is talking about well or a part of what Switzerland is talking their streets are very clean I do want to read actually because this book does include some pop quiz questions and you've had it have included your email and these pop quiz questions actually might make it or I guess answers might make it into the next book is that correct the one of the drawbacks of the column is I can only respond to a question someone sends me and there are many interesting issues about which no one has inquired so I've included in the book ethics pop quizzes where I ask the questions these are questions I wish I'd received and yes I'm planning to put the most interesting answers

into the paperback well here here's one and and I will give out the email addresses the ethicist one word the ethicist at randomhouse.com and the the pop quiz question goes like this I'm the leader of a large western nation you'd recognize the name the trumpets its devotion to democracy in the election that brought me to power I received far fewer votes than my opponent but our peculiar rules made me the victor it's a wild story for me to continue in office is legal but is it ethical you're a troublemaker I'm hoping for that question you know I check my mail for anything with a white house return address and I live in hope that one day it will come and that's Randy Cohen our guest today on radio times he writes the ethicist column he doesn't claim to be the ethicist but writes the ethicist column in the New York Times a Sunday magazine it's a very popular column and full of both interesting questions and very interesting responses one 888-477-949-9 that's one 888-477-WHY why in my billboard to the show I described you as funnier than dear Abby more playful

than this manners friendlier than Dr. Laura more hip than Martha Stewart which got me thinking that mostly men give advice about cars or stocks you're really kind of making forays into what's a more female territory well we're above such gender distinctions at the New York Times and I own not on radio time I use only public transportation and if you'd like investment advice you can you can see where I've put my savings and do quite the opposite I watch my the savings of a lifetime dwindle every day but are you saying that that what you're more highly evolved and clicking clack or or just that they're both national figures I don't need them as my enemies or their legions of admiring listeners I certainly am not and and you you've managed to alienate I certainly some of the leading advice columnists in the country I'm taller than dear Abby I think that was all we said right but but you think in any way that that advice is a sort of especially sort of more personal ethical moral I mean Dr. Laura says she gives moral advice these days but

but that that's a kind of province of of women or has been well it's certainly true in magazines that women are more inclined to seek advice and to discuss what to me are the most interesting issues of our day among one another than our man at least judging by our magazines I'll tell you another difference between me and the four people you mentioned dear Abby it's a kind of moral paragon to her readers that all they really want to know is well what would Abby do I have no moral stature with my readers I have no no no grandstanding or no grandstanding the way she does so that I must construct an argument it's not enough for me to say don't kick the dog I have to lay out a series of reasons as to why you should not kick the dog all Abby has to say is don't kick the dog and you do include both in this book and I think in one of the the columns recently where where people disagree with you and argue with you and and we don't hear a lot of that I guess in in other columns or certainly in Dr. Laura it's a great part of the job that five minutes after

the column comes out I get email from readers pointing out just how wrong I got it often very interesting email that that these are questions about which honorable people can differ they're complicated questions I only have a little bit of space and the readers often point out another aspect of the problem or and I hate to say it something I might have missed or applauded my reasoning and and it's it's wonderful to read that mail I feel that we're all engaged in this kind of ongoing discussion that we're in it together it's it's less fun to read the mail when it starts out you know dear sir I am a Paul people say awful awful things in email and it hurts my feelings that even even a total stranger calling you a jerk is surprisingly painful I've had to toughen up well you you get a couple hundred I guess letters slash emails a week how do you how do you pick the one or two you're going to use I try of course to pick the ones that will be of most interest to the readers there's there's some repetition now I've been doing the column for about three years I try to pick the ones for which I have some semblance of an answer that if the question catches

my attention and and I think I might have a at least a slightly fresh way to see the question I'm inclined to take that one but it's it's to serve the readers interest really and and a part of it is also your chance to sort of interview the so-called experts or experts in in fields of transportation or psychology or something to find out what what other people think it's these are certainly questions that many very smart people have thought about for a long time and I be foolish not to call them up on the phone that for instance for reasons obscure to me and maybe it has to do with the character of those who practice these fields but I received nearly no questions from lawyers but many from doctors so I talked a lot of medical ethicists and that's Randy Cohen our guest today on radio times he writes the ethicists column in the New York Times magazine and he has a new book out it's called the good the bad and the difference how to tell right from wrong in everyday situations one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine stay with us we'll be right back the central library of Philadelphia proudly supports W H Y Y and presents the free library free party celebrating 75 years on the Benjamin Franklin

Parkway June 2nd from 2 to 5 p.m. featuring exhibits and tours highlighting the history of the library book binding and paper preservation demonstrations vintage cars and children's entertainment all open to the public central library located at 1901 Vine Street 215 686 53 22 for details presented by Verizon Foundation existing laws hold out the promise that child support will be vigorously enforced child custody disputes fair divorce settlements equitable protection from abuse orders just and children protected family courts are the forms in which these major life alternate decisions affecting families are made learn more about the complexities and challenges facing family courts on continuing changes in the pursuit of justice for women tonight at nine on W H Y Y one advantage of a free market economy defenders of globalization claim that if we drop all barriers to international trade the average American family would gain about $2,500 a year

but then there's the catch i'm david broncachi of that story plus the latest business news coming up on marketplace from pr i back with Randy Cohen our guest today on radio times he writes the weekly column the ethicist ethicist in the new york times magazine he's also written a couple of other books actually he's got a new book i should say it's called the good the bad and the difference which is a compilation of some of these columns with some thoughts from other ethicists or so-called ethicists is getting worse if the hour goes on so cruel it is very cruel i apologize deeply to the entire radio community i should also say that he won four Emmy awards three is a writer for late night with david letterman and he was the original head writer on the rosy adult show and joins us this morning on radio times you can join us as well give us a call at one eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine that's one eight eight eight four seven seven

w h y y and again i'm told it's a wildly popular column with the readers of the new york times yes wild i can say that let me just actually have you and i read a little section from the book and this is from a section called arguing with the ethicist this is from k r new york city on a recent airline flight i had ease my seat down with the hulking guy behind me shouted hey it's tight back here and ordered me to return to upright when i wouldn't he actually kicked my seat back in place worse when i called the flight attendant all she did was her romp miss i do think you should put your seat up the guy in front of me had a seat back so i would have been forced into a cramp little rhomboid had i complied what should i do you should have held your tiny ground when you buy an airline ticket you purchase more than a chance to recreate the confinement of a galley slave on a greek tri-reme at the battle of salamis you rent a slender swath of space both vertical and incline those few almost imperceptible degrees of course if you can accommodate the passenger behind

you that's a courteous thing to do but it's not an obligation and it is certainly not a courtesy he may demand pedally next time it happens ask the flight attendant if she can move you to another seat or the obnoxious guy behind you to cargo and this is a david ohen's who begs to differ as a six foot five inch frequent traveler of over 20 years i beg to differ know where my ticket as it ever said the passenger in front of me can put his her seat back thereby removing 10% or so of my space when i squeeze into a typical coach seat my knees literally jammed into the seat in front of me and then he goes on to say reclining of one seat requires the concurrence of the person behind you is it your space kr doesn't think so i sympathize with your suffering but the party who inflicted it on you is the airline and it is to them you should complain rather than attempt to gain more space at the expense of the passenger in front of you then Richard merson demurs the consensus among travelers that they're reclining a seat is rude and that's in capital letters

with the exception of early morning or late night flights when the seat is reclined to enable the passenger to rest more comfortably curious about your assertion that yours is the consensus view it's obviously not the view of kr is there someplace i might read the study that backs this up then as warner proposes a technical solution the suggestion has been made which is a long way from gathering steam that airline seats be modified or come equipped with an enabling button on the back that can be used by the passenger sitting behind to limit the reclining travel of the forward seat when both are occupied an interesting idea but how about the suggestion that the airlines might actually provide a humane amount of room why should passengers be so docile in their dealings with the real source of their misery and so fierce in battling one another and this i think is a little example of how passionately people feel about some thing that's been done to them yes it's not that the the large grand questions that i get the most response which not questions about

cloning or bioethics it's of the experiences of ordinary life which often i think can see a larger interesting questions about the right of property about what obligations you have to your neighbors they seem like small questions but they're they're they're rich with possibilities well and i also think that one of the things that we as a culture and i don't think it's just true for america's trying to figure out not just about property but privacy i think we all our notions of privacy are kind of turned upside down now with cell phones and and all the sort of public uh things or have private things we can now do in public and i don't think people have figured out how to navigate all this you roll your eyes well yeah because i came to fill it out here on the amtrak and was surrounded by people who started talking on their cell phones and their loud cell phone voices the moment the train moved and we're uh and continue to talk till we pulled into the 30th street station with no sense of wrongdoing it's a it's a i think it's the wrongdoing it in my view yes that that um you're in this is public life now you you have to have some civic sense you have to think about the effects of your actions on others um we are not in

your silly advertising office we're in public and you must moderate your behavior and modulate your tone yes i i think it's the triumph of privatization that that sense of entitlement um there's not a sense of we're in a kind of uh how you behave in in a say a city park how you behave in any kind of public space where you consider others and that's uh randy koan our guest today on radio times we're gonna start taking some phone calls here one or two open lines at one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine that's one eight eight eight four seven seven wh y y he writes the ethosist column in the New York Times magazine it's uh syndicated and uh it's also the basis of his new book called the good the bad and the difference how to tell right from wrong in everyday situations a book he dedicated to his mom one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine give us call here we have ed and ed joins us from new town go ahead ed hi i i have just a general question i was wondering if i could list the response from you on uh ethics to me has always been presented uh

throughout the media as a be all endos the as the end result of of of of effort by a person um but i don't think it is the end i think that the ethics is the root of most controversy and most conflict and i i i looked at your example of of of handing a quarter to a homeless person or not handing a quarter to a homeless person i sometimes do i sometimes don't but i think that uh whether a person does or doesn't they could be ethical either way um but but do you think everything ed is is ethical either way i i think most things are i don't think everything is i i as it stands his other examples of for example example cell phone use i agree with um i i don't know what the cell phone user would say uh but i i think that when you look at an issue uh and and you get both side you see that both people are coming from an ethical position i don't think ethical is a is an absolute um and i've had a problem with that my most the most of my life and i've always

examined things uh in in that light and i was wondering what his perspective on that was the example of this the the airline seat is a perfect example you know people feel differently about it i'm i'm i'm i'm always the absolute always escapes me though okay hold on a good go ahead ramp my job in the column is is to both to suggest what i believe is the proper behavior but that's usually the first line the remainder of my space is devoted to making uh an utterly persuasive and charming and rational case that that is the right behavior and if i do it with sufficient eloquence and uh both of expression and of reason i should persuade everyone in the airline from the humvellist coach passenger to the um most arrogant first class passenger that that that that uh my approach to the situation is the correct one that's my job um that's what i strive to do so you're saying there they're even when it comes to airline seats and and and tilting them back there is a kind of absolute rightness um yeah and that's my job that these are of course questions honorable people will differ over as we see and all right what we did in our

dialogue were um suggestions sent in by other people to the column but what what i'm meant to do in the column is is to persuade you that my view is the superior view yes that's not an easy job no it is ed what are your thoughts well i i appreciate his job but uh i'm there's i'm trying to expand the conversation beyond that you know i'm i watch crossfire at the time and i see two people coming from completely two backgrounds arguing though yes on the right and even further from the right i remember the crossfire slug yeah and uh you know both of them are are stand on their ethical ground but there's tremendous conflict there well i you one could argue whether it's an ethical ground or whether it's it's another kind of ground and well there's other grounds i appreciate that i understand there could be other grounds but i think that you know when when you take away those other grounds and people are only standing on their ethical ground there will still be tremendous conflict um playtoward back add up on this that he thought that no one will willfully acts badly that everyone does that which they believe to be good um i hate to go

at rounds with playtow because history is on his side but judging by my male people do wicked things things that they themselves believe to be wicked all the time uh that's something that has to be wrestled with too thank you Ed thank you yeah now thanks for calling in and again you can call as well as we uh continue our current conversation with Randy Cohen and we're talking about uh his column it's called the ethicist and it's uh in the New York Times magazine every Sunday one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine that's one eight eight four seven seven w h y y and listening to ed and and you've included in this book the fact that not everyone takes your advice or agrees with your advice or or or runs with what you've suggested yeah one of the things i got to do in the book is to go back and check in with the people i corresponded with in the very first year of the column to see if what i did was of any use to them at all that um people who glibly offer advice the way i do very seldom stick around to see if the advice is taken you know we don't we don't sit around and count count the bodies by the side of

the road and it was a bit humbling to find out several years later what did you find some people thought the advice was utterly fatuous and immediately disregarded it and everything's worked out great that but i i i comfort myself that i provided some use to them by clarifying things by clarifying the question some people quite gratifyingly found the advice genuinely helpful and others were in the middle it was kind of all over the place well there's a a a follow-up that you got from one of your readers like many who submit questions to the ethicist or at least as i imagine them i submitted this question in the hopes of being granted ethical wiggle room from a higher authority and that raises the question about why someone would go to you randy Cohen for some kind of ethical advice um yeah it's i i think often what they're going to is the new york time the awesome power of the new york times that i'm i'm granted a kind of institutional authority because of that association but it's it's a legitimate question i think for people to ask about my credentials that are to ask about my background and and i get that in two forms too that some people go

the implicit tone is oh well what an interesting column how did you come to write it what you charming fell out and and the other version of and i should say more frequent version of it is who do you think you are where do you get off um the times has a policy of not running any id lines at the bottom of their columnist explaining their background although we've often discussed this at the column and they were a little about me when i started um credentials are an interesting thing i certainly wish i had a phd in philosophy i i wish i knew more i wish i had a sports car i wish i had a bigger apartment all these things would help me do my job better but credentials i think are a good guy to someone who you're considering hiring the same way SATs are a guy to who you want to admit to your school they're meant to help you predict how well a student will do in his or her first year of school credentials are meant to help you decide how well someone will do a particular job i've been doing the column for three years now and i believe the readers have a pretty good sense of how well or how poorly i do it and they can decide from that well someone typed it actually called in couldn't stand the lines and

the questions you being how could you ethically call yourself the ethicist's name of the column i wish it were called you know randy land or you know welcome to randy land right um uh but yes i certainly dispense ethical advice and i try to construct a rational ethical argument about why you should take that advice but i do not have a phd in philosophy that's quite true on the other hand ethics isn't physics um there's no license to be an ethicist well i guess there's no license to be a physicist but all physicists have to have certain things in common they all practice the scientific method they all they all have have studied mathematics and they know the history of their own field there's a series of things you can assume that every physicist has done i'm not so sure that's true in the work i do let me get nail or kneel to join us calling from his cell phone hi kneel go ahead hi you're made at times i just like to say listen i read the column every week and enjoy it uh we have i've been having a debate with friends about an ethical decision and i think it's a fine line between a good deed and honest to go deep we were three

hour away at a restaurant in a mall near near philadelphia we put our name in one to eat at another restaurant two hours later went back in line at the mall and got and we told we had 15 minutes to wait and we took the beeper and we and we handed it to another person who was waiting in the three hour line and we debated if that was a good deed or was that an unfair deed and why was there three hour wait is this a really popular restaurant yeah yeah yeah it's a really popular restaurant at the king approach or mall and it's just open and it doesn't take reservations no no reservation okay Randy i've got to go with unfair here reluctantly it's it's a high-tech version of the cutting in line question and if you yourself want to sacrifice for someone that's fine but aren't you cheating those in line behind you unless you can get the consensus of every single person in line behind you that it's okay with them you really ought not do it and if you choose to step out of the line you should just tell the restaurant what do you think Neil well we again that was our debate we felt like people in mind were never gonna it was never gonna get into the restaurant and

we did have the debate on was it unfair or not and which side were you which side were you on well we thought we did a good deed for a woman who said oh this was my favorite restaurant and thank you thank you thank you and she was eight months pregnant oh well that that is that complicate things Randy oh yeah she's eight months pregnant very beautiful very wealthy you know that's a fatal disease you know that what the more these mitigating factors get piled on the more you should be suspicious of your own behavior okay Neil thanks for calling in let me get Bill to join us Bill's calling us for new town hi Bill hi how are you I'm fine if it's not too much of a knock for more on I'm a lawyer the teacher's ethics oh my goodness my head is hurting wait I'm confused I'm frightened right well the I'm so far enjoyed your conversation very much and I think you've touched on a whole bunch of stuff I wanted to ask you about the question I had for you have have you developed any kind of personal platform for your ethical decisions not the name drops but you told Terry and his and say verses can't or something like that you've played or something

like that from what from what I'm hearing you are even though you don't have your PhD you're certainly reading enough of these you know classical ethicists to to be familiar with their writings and I've wondered if any one of them made any impact on you personally and the other question I have is it's it's pretty easy to figure out what's wrong it's how do you get people to see that they have an ethical obligation to do what's right what are you talking about the environment or what you're talking about you know helping a neighbor who's not quite your brother that kind of thing and I was just kind of would like to know a little bit more of your foundation and how do you see the positive stuff go thanks thanks Bill for calling in go ahead to answer the first question yes I've taken various remedial classes you know I've I've tried certainly done a lot more reading about ethics since I've had the job then before I had the job and among the the various philosophers who I've read many offer splendidly useful ethical tools

I'm Kant comes to mind you know the categorical imperative actors if everyone would act as you did is it tremendously useful but not universally applicable ethical tool but you would be foolish not not to consider the the writing of such incredibly brilliant man the person who's met the most to me is someone who operates less from a coherent system I'm referring to Samuel Johnson the great 18th century moralist and I think what I admire about him so much is that he manages to combine a very bleak view of the human condition you know life is everywhere in a state in which much is to be endured and little to be enjoyed with an incredible sociability a genuine affection for humanity and he seems to see so deeply into the human heart and I often find myself referring to his writings and do you agree with with our caller with bill that that it's easier to fear what's wrong it's harder to sort of fear what to do and it's been quite fascinating to see how this is reflected in nearly everybody every body of ethical thought that consider the 10 commandments

they're almost all thou shalt not it's very very easy to proscribe to tell people what they ought not to and that's generally quite specific thou shalt not cover by neighbors ox you know they get quite down to it but it was wife but anyway ox or ass wife too there's a whole list of what you might not you're not permitted to cover it if you've been doing some illicit cover coveting but but the prescriptions are often quite general do unto others as you would have them do unto you boy easy to say sure but a little vague a little vague a little hard to do sometimes and that's Randy Cohen our guest today on radio times we'll talk more after this short break take more of your phone calls here on radio times at one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine that's one eight eight eight four seven seven w h y y and he's put together some of his columns from the ethosist in a new book called the good the bad and the difference we'll be right back support for w h y y comes from outie outie assured pre-owned cars covered by a limited warranty

are available at your local philadelphia area outie dealers coming of age in the shadow of your father may not be everyone's battle but it was for Marlott Thomas as she struggled to come into her own dad gave her words of encouragement that motivated her to explore acting activism and writing now she's compiled a collection of words that inspired others heroes role models cultural icons Marlott Thomas on the next todmund show this afternoon at one on w h y y many parents and educators feel that we have to protect our children from sex but author Judith Levine challenges this assumption in our new book harmful to minors she argues that denying children and teen sexual expression and information ultimately causes more problems than it prevents i'm Dan Gottlieb and on the next voices in the family we'll meet Levine and discuss her work that's today at noon right here on w h y y 91 f m support for w h y y comes from

stonyfield farm organic and all natural yogurt committed to healthy food healthy people and a healthy planet more information available at stonyfield dot com stonyfield farm yogurt on a mission back with randy koan our guest today on radio times we're talking about ethics it's something that he writes about for the new york times magazine and it's got a new book out called the good the bad and the difference how to tell right from wrong in everyday situations one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine he had an article recently about some of the questions that he has never been asked but wish he had been i'll just read one for you here i read an ethics column for a prominent national magazine you'd recognize the name i specifically instructed by my editors to confine myself to ethics and not to take on politics the paper employs many fine writers to cover that subject but would it be so wrong to sneak in a few policy questions under

the guise of ethics questions what if a portion of the proceeds went to a charity rc new york city yes yes i know i'm not meant to do it but the distinction is less clear than you might think for instance often the only way you can achieve your individual ethical goal is by working with other people by collective action or what we call politics for instance you know if your next door neighbor opens up a big lead smelting plant in her backyard you can argue all you want but you're unlikely to get rid of it you might see yourself as having an ethical obligation to provide clean air for your kids and and clean water for the kids down the block and without political action how are you to deal with your individual ethical goals let me get to betty to join us betty's calling us from del ran hi betty you're ready at times good morning good morning i'm going to go from the sublime to the trivial thank i'm so glad you call thanks for saving the show betty uh... i i wrote to randy comb and by the way i i really love your column thank you almost always agree with it i worry about you don't but when you said that you can't take the shampoos and so

combed from the hotels for which you've been paying an absolute fortune and maybe haven't washed your hair it's often as you should i not only disagreed with you but i sent you a wonderful little essay that my twelve-year-old grandson broke telling how how it enhances his life to take shampoo the comb and then remember all his vacations when he uses it and i never got a reply from you well i'm sorry you have you read it you have a read it no i never actually got it i didn't get but and i do try to respond to all i wrote that i didn't email well betty hold on one second because uh... there's a whole the motel soap question is in this book and perhaps randy would like to share something with the audience well uh... on rare occasions i feel i've gotten a question totally wrong and and i am able to recant in print and this is one i think you are right your twelve year-old nephew is right and i was just wrong um... the question was slightly more complicated it was

a woman was taking many many motel soaps in order to give them to charity and i had originally written that if she wants to give to charity that's a fine thing but she should give her own stuff not someone else's um... but i think i got it wrong and i went back and called several motel chains and asked you know in the end it's their soap and what's their policy and how do they feel about it and it was fine with them and if it's fine with them and fine with the customer i was wrong to suggest it was anything but fine but don't take the towels right i mean you sort of draw the line soap is fine shampoo it's an interesting moral distinction i have to go back to that plate i'll see if plate i would have taken the towels or a manual come see what he has to say thanks betty we've got tom tom's joining us from his car phone hi tom hi thanks for taking the call you welcome two questions for you one is since i don't read the times um... what is our way to uh... access your column on the internet um yes uh... nytimes.com you can read the column of course you know if only we're available in convenient book it's a crazy dream

but but but hold on it but that is that is tom though cheating the new york times i don't know i don't know not at all okay the new york times voluntarily puts up it's website and and encourages people to go there and read it well i appreciate that information i i'm uh... a snobby philadelphia and new york is just a large city to the north i apologize on behalf of all of us and the column is syndicated around the country and if you can encourage a philadelphia paper to take it on i'd be delighted i'm from the area and wish i were here i'll tell you what that's one of the things i will do is write the inky and and hope they will take the column on uh... my my question is to do with uh... uh... some of the earlier uh... things that you brought up uh... it seems like some of the things have to do more with courtesy rather than ethics views you discerned the difference in their between the two and also what is your feeling on what is referred to uh... as situational ethics big big question thank you tom uh... you can see a kind of continuum between etiquette at one and an ethics in the middle and

politics at the other end and in some ways it's a matter of scale if uh... the tiniest interactions of life we we call etiquette and and the ones involving the most people and and the and the greatest consequences we call politics with with ethics somewhere in the middle it's there's there's even a little more to it than that that much that we regard as etiquette has a real moral foundation like do you offer your seat to someone on the bus um... who who is frail or needs a seat that's not simply a sort of hollow courtesy that's a genuine act of compassion to another person and and as such ethical other things like well when can i wear you know a white's living suit um... that no longer seems to me to have an ethical component and is and a simply etiquette thanks a lot tom for calling in you can call as well just one open line here at one eight eight eight four seven seven nine four nine nine that's one eight eight eight four seven seven w eight why why i wonder even post-enron whether you've gotten questions about the ethics of of paying taxes cheating on taxes uh... with all the sort of public disclosures about how enron was was using the

system to its own benefit with uh... with the sort of uh... stamp of approval from congress whether people feel a kind of sense of entitlement to cheat on their taxes because they see the system is inherently unfair to them uh... it's certainly true that the more there is a general perception uh... that the system is unfair the more likely people are to behave unfairly which is another way that ethics and politics become indistinguishable if people live in a just society the more act apt to behave well if they live in an unjust society the more apt to behave badly there's a kind of step there's a study of uh... uh... rookie cops if you put a rookie cop in a corrupt station house the odds are very great here she will become corrupt if you put the same person in a clean station house they'll become clean which brings us back to civic obligations that you can't if you look only at individual ethical behavior i don't think you get very far you really have to consider the society within which that behavior is practiced and you have civic obligations to help build adjust society we're even quote uh... the author of fast food nation in this who who looked at

how people treated in fast food restaurants effective so much turnover as a kind of ethical issue about the treatment of of people that the essentially getting paid the minimum wage yeah it turned out that a very high percentage of the robberies at fast food joints were by people are employees uh... and the the tendency seemed to be from people who study these things that the more unfairly an employee perceives himself as being treated the lower the wages the less chance of employment the worse the working conditions the likelier that employee is to then go and commit those kind of crimes that if you treat people with decency and fairness they're apt to behave better do one to one yeah in in the broadest most society a little sense yes let me get Andrea to join us she's calling us from wilmington Delaware go ahead Andrea hi good morning i'm a frequent listener of uh... radio times i'm on my cell phone i hope you can hear me yes you're doing great i am uh... my position is disciplinary council with the Delaware supreme court and i just felt i had to comment on mr. Cohen's comment that he hears frequently from doctors but not very frequently from attorneys i would suggest that that is because attorneys are governed by

a code of conduct uh... which mr. Cohen is not uh... capable really of commenting on because he's not trained as a lawyer he's not trained in legal ethics specifically and we do have us for example in Delaware places where attorneys can go with ethical questions and that's why you would not hear really from and a Delaware lawyer at the out the fifth i can't speak for other states but as a general rule i would not expect an attorney to uh... ask a column that about legal ethics oh go ahead ranny well two things one is i should say that there are there is a uh... a legal ethicist in new york state who does similar work to what i think you've described to whom i refer all the time and i couldn't function without her she's extremely smart about these kind of questions um... and varied that that the law itself represents not just the the application of power but it also was a kind of body of moral thought and in the course of doing the column many an ethical question first touches on what's legal and and so i have occasion to

consult with a variety of lawyers um... to help me think through these questions before i begin i didn't really want to denigrate lawyers and i understand that they might refer a question to a fellow professional but then we're stuck with the question of well why are doctors writing in? well and doctors have codes of ethics sure most of the professions have some kind of code of ethics yes yes they do so why doctors and not lawyers i think it's more ambiguous than that it's more elusive than that i don't know well and and are thanks for calling in and and uh... i assume she thought you were kind of insulting lawyers but uh... oh it's a chill joke and i'm here no well barely you insulted doctors recently i'm just quoting from uh... surely not um... uh... i was uh... this was a question i recently earned a master's of science and traditional oriental medicine became a license acupuncturist because i diagnosed in treat disease may i refer to myself as doctor Bartlett even though i've not earned a doctorate and uh... uh... apparently there was a great brew ha ha because you said here in america we reserve the title for md's the occasional academic with a phd and puffed up social climbers well that's largely true except for the great ask foolishness of

my confining the title to md's that um... ignorance pure ignorance pure carelessness that uh... we we common it is common practice in our country to offer that title to veterinarians to dentists to osteopaths to uh... a whole series of uh... physicians and medical practitioners all who have doctorate degrees i was simply wrong and corrected it in print there you go let me get uh... where are we angela to join the she's calling us from pensawken hi angela good morning uh... before i get my question i actually wanted to make one comment about the hotel stuff because i travel a lot for my job and i do take them but the reason that i take them is that when i get a box full i actually donate them to like Ronald McDonald's house or a homeless shelter something because they're always asking for them so it's a little bit of a robin hood thing and not necessarily my own stash because i hate this little bottle you can never get the soap all the way out let's you turn them upside down for a week and it drips out absolutely but things like the Ronald McDonald's house i actually got the idea because on like the sunday morning community

servicing that they always do on uh... the other radio stations where they're required to do an hour community service at like four o'clock in the morning yeah once years ago i heard something and uh... they were saying you know the little hotel so if you can donate them you know we always need those so that's what i started doing and uh... and they desperately need them so that's why i for anybody else who travels who wants to uh... go against what you said or now i've encountered i mean that was the original matter someone who was doing what you were doing and giving them the charity and i originally said give your own stuff to charity not someone else but uh... well i deserve to be teased because i got it wrong and i checked with and self-flagulating your no no i was wrong she's right i was wrong go ahead angel and actually i've been listening to my that i'm not gonna ask a question i'm gonna ask i'd like to ask a different question that's always scary angel about go ahead yeah um how often do your friends uh... tease you because i imagine that when you're out with friends you really do apply the kinds of things that but you know being the ethicist you know you kind of have to live your life by

this code as well and i imagine that's a little bit different than how it used to be before you got this job i'm not applying yeah i'm not applying that you weren't an ethical guy before but i imagine that before taking this job you never thought as deeply you know reading all the uh... different philosophers that you read and having to think so deeply about these things all the time i imagine that that really you know pervade your thought all the time now and i imagine that your friends must be like okay so what's the answer to this one or rolling their eyes uh... hold on you must kind of get teased sometimes yes you're teasing them they're constant um and and what can i say i um it's a job where you should be teased um i i don't claim to be more virtuous than anyone else and i'm not sure that having this job has has made me a more virtuous person but certainly a more self-conscious person well you have included you have several um guest ethicists in this book including your mom yes uh... who who gives i think very practical advice as she always has since i was a little shabber yeah that that it seemed to me that again there are

there are many different ways to approach each of these questions and one of the things i hope to do with the guest ethicist was to demonstrate that right that honorable people might come at these from very different perspectives and it also seemed to me that that the way people shape their values is i i felt through three things primarily whatever religious training they had uh... the values at the particular time and place where they live you know i'm an american of you know two thousand two but and most important of the three uh... their family and so my mother was there to articulate that and did wonderfully as she always did uh... yeah was it was very straight ahead and and and very not only ethical but i think very practical i thought that the admirable difference between my mother and myself that that i think we both you i can hear the echoes of her values in me but she went so much further than i did and showed so much generosity in suggesting actual practical steps yes she was better than i was well i guess i should should read what what uh... the question was and you can summarize very quickly what what she said um and and this was the question to the guest ethicist who happened to be uh... ranny coen's mom my mom a recent widow

in her mid seventies wants to start driving again she hasn't driven in years had many accidents when she did his heart of hearing and arthritic and has had and has a history of alcoholism while we her children object her therapist is told her that she should make her own decision as an encourage us to simply be supportive what is the right thing to do wow very i'm said um both my mother and i suggested that if if you're your mom is it is uh... presents a real risk to other people you have to discourage her driving you you can't allow her to do that i didn't go much further than that my mother god bless her when went on to list a whole series of practical steps you could take um what sort of alternative transportation was available to senior citizens what phone number you would call to get it up she she did much more background work than i did and gave the person many more concrete steps they could take well i'm thinking of uh... david letterman who you wrote for it and his mom i mean there's something about moms that uh... they grown up men sure sure as as the embodiment of of all those family values that that we were taught um and

that we try to embody and and i see it in myself and and i i felt i saw it in david uh who's my boss not my pal but that he didn't wish to do anything that would embarrass his mother and i'm aware that my my mom and i don't see eye to eye on everything but when i'm writing a column and i know she'll disagree with it it makes me very uneasy well i just want to read a once again the pop quiz question that we had it at the top of the show and uh... this is uh... uh... i am the leader of a large western nation you'd read you'd recognize the name that trumpets its devotion to to democracy in the election that brought me to power i receive far fewer votes than my opponent but our peculiar rules made me the victor it's a wild story for me to continue in offices legal but is it ethical and that's one of the questions in randy coen's new book and he's interested in your response and you can email them to the ethicist one word at random house dot com and randy coen has been a pleasure to have you with us again in the flesh on radio times thanks a lot thanks so much for having me on you're welcome and his book is called the good the bad and the

difference how to tell right from wrong in everyday situations and as always on radio times are thanks to all our collars Alex coen is our interns gadi williams and uh... ought to be anthem the engineers this week to vorelistic the associate producer susan rebom alan to the senior producers of radio times i'm already must go and have a terrific weekend everybody you're listening to w-h-y-y-f-m philadelphia your member supported n-p-r station serving pennsylvania new jersey and delaware the art and theater company is currently presenting the philadelphia premier of james joys is the dead

james joys is the dead joins friends and relatives who gather at an annual you'll tide party with melodies and songs inspired by the folk music of irland this is a glimpse into the