Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova of The Swell Season (theswellseason.com).

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In 2007, their movie “Once” was a huge breakout hit.

Music and love in the streets of Dublin. Raw romance. An Oscar. And the compelling twist that these musicians — Ireland’s Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova of the Czech Republic — were actually in love.

They’re not now, but they’re still making music, and with us today.

This hour, On Point: Marketa Irglova, Glen Hansard and their new album, “Strict Joy.”

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova of The Swell Season join us in our studio. Songwriter, guitarist and singer, Hansard is a founding member of the Irish rock outfit The Frames.   Irglova, a Czech-born classically trained pianist, also writes songs, plays piano and sings for The Swell Season. Together, Hansard and Irglova starred in the 2006 film “Once.” They shared an Academy Award for Best Original Song for “Falling Slowly” from the “Once” soundtrack. Their new album, “Strict Joy,” is just out.

In today’s show, we were surprised and delighted when Glen and Marketa performed a new song (so new it’s yet to be named). Here it is, from the On Point studio:

And here they talked about how their relationship has evolved…

More links:

You can hear songs from the new album at The Swell Season’s site.

Listen to The Swell Season performing at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC, at NPR.org.

Read an interview with Hansard and Irglova from Pitchfork.com.

Spc. Ryan Howard of Niles, Mich., right, and Spc. David Straub of Ardmore, Okla., wait for news of fellow soldiers while waiting at the gate of the Fort Hood, Texas, Army base on Thursday, Nov. 5, 2009. (AP)

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A shock out of Texas at the end of this week, and a day of horror.

Thirteen killed, thirty wounded at Fort Hood in a shooting rampage in the heart of an American military base. Apparently by a uniformed Army major, Nidal Malik Hasan.

It’s a tragedy and horror the country is still taking on board — overshadowing the economy, where unemployment has hit 10.2 percent. Overshadowing state elections and their fallout. An imminent health care vote. Hard news in Afghan and Palestinian politics.

This hour, On Point: The killings at Fort Hood, and the news of the week in review.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Dallas, Texas, is Bill McKenzie, editorial columnist for the Dallas Morning News.

Joining us from New York is Hendrick Hertzberg, staff writer for The New Yorker. His new book is “Obamanos!: The Birth of a New Political Era.”

And from Hanover, N.H., is Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

Detail from The Fountain of Youth, 1546, by German painter Lucas Cranach the Elder (Wikimedia Commons; click for full image).

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Everybody’s getting older. Almost nobody wants to age.

Now there’s a huge industry in “anti-aging.” Eighty billion dollars a year in this country — spent on pills and guidance, anti-aging diets and exercise, hormones and more.

“Age management,” it’s being called. And it’s booming as boomers … well, age. Testosterone sales are through the roof, with growth outstripping Viagra. For five thousand a year, we read, you can be kept tuned up like a race horse.

This hour, On Point: Age management. We’ll look at the real science and new horizons of aging.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

S. Jay Olshansky, professor at the School of Public Health at the University of Illinois – Chicago and author of “The Quest for Immortality: Science at the Frontiers of Aging.”

Luigi Fontana, associate professor of medicine at Washington University in St. Louis and director of the division of nutrition and aging at the Italian National Institute of Health.

Nir Barzilai, director of the Institute for Aging Research at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City.

More links:

“Testosterone Is Sure Looking Virile” — BusinessWeek looks at surging sales of testosterone and reports that “despite legal setbacks and FDA delays, youth-crazed boomers are making it a billion-dollar industry.”

“The Caloric Restriction Experiment” — The New York Times Magazine reports on the NIH-funded clinical trial called Calerie (Comprehensive Assessment of Long-Term Effects of Reducing Intake of Energy).

The Republican side remains empty during the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee markup on climate change legislation in Washington on Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2009. All Republicans except one boycotted the start of committee debate, protesting that the bill's economic costs have not been fully examined. (AP)

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The global climate conference next month in Copenhagen has had a long drum roll of sky-high expectations.

This is it, the world has been told as recently as last month by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. The make-or-break moment on reining in climate change.

Apparently the U.S. Senate did not get that memo. A comprehensive climate change bill has faced tough going there. Republicans boycotting the whole process. Democrats divided and afraid of economic fallout. The clock ticking.

This hour, On Point: One month before Copenhagen, where the U.S. stands.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Margaret Kriz Hobson, energy and environment correspondent for National Journal. She wrote recently about “the Senate’s climate-change dealmakers.”  She also writes a federal column for the Environmental Law Institute’s Environmental Forum magazine.

Dave Hamilton, director of the Sierra Club’s global warming and energy program.

Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat from Ohio. He wants Congress to provide free allowances under the cap and trade program to companies that need to transition to using cleaner burning fuels and manufacturing green energy products. He is also pushing Senate Democrats to require that importers pay a carbon dioxide fee for products made in countries that don’t control their greenhouse gases.

Claude Levi-Strauss in 1989.

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At the imperial dawn of the 20th century, there was the “civilized” world and the “savage” or “primitive” world, and one felt free to judge the other.

By the century’s end, the whole idea of primitive man as separate from civilized man was pretty well gone. And with it, the “savage mind.”

Much of the banishing was the work of the towering anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss. Levi-Strauss has died at 100 in his native France. We are all, he said, driven by deep myth and common structures of thinking — even to our own extinction.

This hour, On Point: The mind and work of Claude Levi-Strauss.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Nur Yalman, professor emeritus of social anthropology at Harvard University. He is also a professor of Middle Eastern Studies and has looked at issues of cultural diversity and international conflict. His 1967 book “Under the Bo Tree: Studies of Caste, Kinship, and Marriage in the Interior of Ceylon” was influenced by Levi-Strauss’s work. Most recently he’s co-author of “A Passage to Peace: Global Solutions from East and West.”

Rosemary Joyce, chair of the anthropology department at the University of California at Berkeley. She is also an archaeologist whose primary work is in Central and South America, with a focus on Honduras. Her books include “Ancient Bodies, Ancient Lives” and “Mesoamerican Archaeology: Theory and Practice.”

Conservative Party congressional candidate Doug Hoffman waits to vote at the town hall in Lake Placid, N.Y. on Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2009. (AP)

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It was a “shot across the bow” Election Day for both parties yesterday. Different versions of a wake-up call.

For Democrats, two big losses in governors’ races in Virginia and New Jersey. No Obama effect to save the day. Maybe a damper on the Obama agenda.

For the GOP, big victories in those states, but a high-profile defeat for hard-right conservatives in an upstate New York district that has gone Republican since 1872. The Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Tea Party candidate down in flames, and the GOP civil war still on.

This hour, On Point: The ‘09 elections — and the shots across the bow.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Charles Mahtesian, national politics editor at Politico.  He’s been following the 2009 races closely and reported this week on conservatives gearing up to challenge GOP candidates. He joins us from Washington.

Ross Douthat, op-ed columnist for The New York Times and co-author of “Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream.” He writes in his latest column that third-party candidates injected substance into this year’s races.  He joins us from Washington.

Thomas Edsall, political editor of The Huffington Post and a professor at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. A political reporter at The Washington Post from 1981 to 2006, he’s author of “Building Red America: The New Conservative Coalition and the Drive for Permanent Power.”  He joins us from New York.

Mickey Edwards, former Republican Congressman from Oklahoma and member of the House Republican leadership. He’s now a lecturer at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and author of “Reclaiming Conservatism: How a Great American Political Movement Got Lost–And How It Can Find Its Way Back.”  He joins us from Newark, New Jersey.

Detail from the Waldeseemuller map, 1507.

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Columbus sailed first to the New World, but Amerigo Vespucci got his name on the territory. America.

The map that first named America, in 1507, now sits in the Library of Congress. “America’s birth certificate” it’s been called.

But the Waldseemüller map – dug out of a German castle a hundred years ago – is much more than that. It’s the record of a “big bang” moment in human understanding of the shape of the world — from the explorer’s salty compass to the cosmic vision of Copernicus.

This hour, On Point: The incredible story of the map that gave America its name.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Toby Lester, contributing editor at The Atlantic and author of “The Fourth Part of the World: The Race to the Ends of the Earth, and the Epic Story of the Map That Gave America Its Name.”

Read the first chapter of “The Fourth Part of the World.”

View an interactive version of the 1507 Waldseemüller map.

Michael Dine, professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He’s author of “Supersymmetry and String Theory, Beyond the Standard Model.”

(Photo: Flickr/Archie McPhee Seattle)

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Love and marriage. Divorce and alimony. For decades they all went together.

Now, on alimony, some aren’t so sure. It’s not Ma and Pa Cleaver splitting up anymore.

Women make up half the work force. Men are being laid off in greater numbers. The whole world of family and marriage has been widely re-engineered.

So who should pay whom — and for how long — when a marriage breaks up? States are rewriting laws. Passions are high. Second wives and distant spouses are weighing in. And the recession has cranked up the pressure all around.

This hour, On Point: Updating alimony.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guest:

Jennifer Levitz, staff writer for The Wall Street Journal. Her recent article “The New Art of Alimony” looked at how “divorce settlements are facing strict new limits as some ex-spouses—primarily men—protest the endless support of a former partner.”

Danaya Wright, professor at the University of Floirda Levin School of Law, where she teaches a course in the history of family law.

Douglas Dougherty, practices family law at Dougherty, Hanneman & Snedaker, LCC in Columbus, Ohio.

Maya Lin, "What Is Missing?" Listening Cone, 2009, installed at the California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco. (Photo: Bruce Damonte Photography, Inc. © Maya Lin Studio, Inc., courtesy PaceWildenstein, New York.)

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Architect, designer, and environmental artist Maya Lin carved a permanent, powerful place in the American heart with her Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington DC.

She was 21 when she drew that black granite line in history, and she went on to a wide-ranging life in design.

Ten years ago, Maya Lin announced she was out of the memorial business entirely. But now, she’s done one more: to all the species vanished or vanishing from the Earth. A king-sized listening cone, filled with the sounds of birds and frogs and primates slipping away.

This hour, On Point: Maya Lin and “What Is Missing?”

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guest:

Maya Lin joins us from New York. An award-winning architect, designer and environmental artist, she’s best known for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC.  Her  latest work, which she calls her final memorial, is “What Is Missing?” It focuses on extinct and vanishing species, and incorporates sculpture, video, sound, hand-held electronics, printed material and an interactive website.

More links:

Maya Lin’s official website offers a rich visual experience. Covering the full scope of her work, it includes a wealth of beautiful images and provides detailed background information on the art and the artist.

“The Missing Piece” — Susan Morgan reported on Maya Lin’s “What Is Missing?” in a multimedia feature for The New York Times Style Magazine that includes a photo gallery.

You can also browse a slideshow of her work below, or view the slideshow at full size. Click on the images to view descriptions.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner (left) gets ready to testify before the House Financial Services Committee in Washington on Thursday, Oct. 29, 2009, as the Committee's Chairman, Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) presided. (AP)

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One year ago, the U.S. government and all of us were over a big, ugly barrel. Bail out the mega banks, or they would crash and take the whole economy down with them. “Too big to fail.”

And so we bailed and bailed and bailed. Billions and billions in taxpayers’ dollars to save the banks that had driven the crisis. And the cry went up: “Never again.”

Well, now the tools for “never again” are on the table, and there’s a huge debate over whether they will work, or bring Wall Street running back for more.

This hour, On Point: How to fix “too big to fail” on Wall Street.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us in our studio is Kenneth Rogoff, professor of economics and public policy at Harvard University. His new book is “This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly.”

Joining us from Washington is Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.  He’s spearheading the Financial Stability Improvement Act of 2009.

Also from Washington we’re joined by Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA), member of the House Financial Services Committee. He calls the Financial Stability Improvement Act of 2009 “TARP on steroids.”

 

Actor Boris Karloff in the role of the Frankenstein monster, 1931.

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Human beings, it seems, can’t get enough of monsters.

From ancient times to the latest slasher flick to “Where the Wild Things Are,” we fear and revel in the hair-raising horror of the great beast, the unspeakable boogeyman, the terrifying other.

Even when the beast is us.

From the Minotaur to Frankenstein to Freddy Krueger, monsters rock and woo us. Tomorrow on Halloween, there will be plenty of little monster critters out with bags of candy. Today, we look at why.

This hour, On Point: A new history of monsters.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guest:

Stephen Asma joins us from Chicago. He is a professor of philosophy at Columbia College in Chicago. His new book is “On Monsters: An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears.”

President Barack Obama salutes as the remains of Army Sgt. Dale R. Griffin of Terre Haute, Ind., are carried from a plane at Dover Air Force Base on Thursday morning, Oct. 29, 2009. According to the Department of Defense, Sgt. Griffin died in Afghanistan. (AP)

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Recession? What recession? We’ve got 3.5 percent growth in the third quarter, the Commerce Department said this week — so maybe that’s over. Or maybe not.

In Pakistan, Hillary Clinton took jabs — until she hit back. Pakistan must know where Al Qaeda is, she said, and could get them if they wanted to.

We’ve got a health plan from the House this week, an all-night vigil by the president at Dover Air Base, no decision yet on troops and Afghanistan, and no flu vaccine for lots of people in line. A skinny rocket goes up. Michael Jackson’s back.

This hour, On Point: Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Anne Kornblut, White House correspondent for The Washington Post. Her forthcoming book is “Notes from the Cracked Ceiling: Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, and What It Will Take for a Woman to Win.”

Also from Washington we’re joined by Howard Fineman, senior Washington correspondent and columnist at Newsweek. His latest  book, now out in paperback, is “The Thirteen Arguments.”

And from Hanover, N.H., we’re joined by Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

More links:

In today’s roundtable we talked about Matthew Hoh, a former Marine captain who became the first foreign service official serving in Afghanistan to publicly resign in protest over the war. The Washington Post reported on the story and posted Hoh’s resignation letter.

Photo: john-irving.com

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Novelist John Irving was listening to an old Bob Dylan song when a few lines grabbed him:

I had a job in the great north woods
Working as a cook for a spell
But I never did like it all that much
And one day the ax just fell.

And John Irving was off, on his latest novel. “Last Night in Twisted River.”

Loggers. Big woods. Bears. Blood. Sex. Naked sky diver. Death by skillet. It’s the kind of wild tale he’s been telling ever since “The World According to Garp.” This time with the love of fathers and sons.

This hour, On Point: Novelist John Irving and “Last Night in Twisted River.”

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guest:

John Irving joins us from New York.  The best-selling author of “The World According to Garp,” “A Prayer for Owen Meany,” “Until I Find You,” and many more, he won the National Book Award, an O. Henry Award, and an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for “The Cider House Rules.” In 1992 he was inducted into the national Wrestling Hall of Fame in Stillwater, Oklahoma. His most recent novel is “Last Night in Twisted River.”

Read an excerpt from “Last Night in Twisted River.”

Top: University Cultural Centre, National University of Singapore (Wikimedia Commons/User: Sengkang). Bottom: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass. (Flickr/erinc salor)

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For many decades, through economic ups and downs, the United States has had one big consolation and wellspring of faith in the future: the second-to-none American system of higher education, with universities dominating the world in new research and new horizons.

American higher ed is still second to none. But it’s stalled out in recession and cutbacks. And Asian higher education is storming to the fore. Billions and billions are being poured into universities in China and beyond. Giant ambitions. Giant resources.

This hour, On Point: Rising Asia challenges the American university.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Jeff Selingo, editor of the Chronicle of Higher Education, which recently published a special report on higher education in the U.S and in Asia.

Also from Washington we’re joined by Charles Vest, former president of MIT and president of the National Academy of Engineering. He served on the National Academies panel which produced the 2006 report “Rising Above The Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future.”  It warned that the U.S. was in danger of falling behind in science and technology.

And from Toronto we’re joined by Qiang Zha, assistant professor of education at York University in Toronto, and an expert on Chinese higher education. He is a researcher for the “China’s Move to Mass Higher Education” project, an in-depth three-year study of Chinese universities and the public policy behind them.

A few of the 18,000 young people, mainly college students, who gathered in Nashville, Tenn., for the four-day Passion '06 conference in January 2006. (AP)

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If you’re twenty-something, you know it. If you’re not, think about it: It takes some courage to be stepping into the world right now. Scarce jobs. School loans. War and terror and the climate itself in trouble.

What’s the rock, the hope, the inspiration you cling to? For some it’s God. For some it’s not.

Today’s twenty-something Americans grew up in a time of religious fundamentalist ascendancy and atheist pushback, evangelical power politics and the anti-religion rebukes of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens.

Now they’re making their own decisions, their own way, on the moral life, the spiritual life.

Two guests today. One, from Notre Dame, has polled thousands of young Americans on their spiritual and religious lives now. One, from Harvard, says humanism is the way — be “good without God.”

This hour, On Point: Looking for goodness, for grounding, for God. We’re looking at young America’s search for meaning.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from South Bend, Indiana, is Christian Smith, professor of sociology and director of the Center for the Study of Religion and Society at the University of Notre Dame. He’s co-principal investigator in the National Study of Youth and Religion, a longitudinal study started in 2001. His previous findings were published in “Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers.” His new book is “Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults.”

Read an excerpt from “Souls in Transition.”

With us from New York is Greg Epstein, Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University. His new book is “Good Without God: What a Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe.”

Read an excerpt from “Good Without God.”

Apple's iPhone (as shown at apple.com) has plenty of new competition.

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Cell phones blanket the world. Billions of them. But the next phone in your hand — if it’s not there already, on the road, on the move — really isn’t a phone. It’s a computer.

Mobile computing — with powerful smart phones like the iPhone or the new Droid — is exploding in popularity. Big sales. Zillions of “apps.” Lots of power in your pocket.

New users call it a revelation. Industry watchers have long predicted a revolution. Is it here? Is it on?

This hour, On Point: What does it mean for our lives, work and economy when mobile computing goes to critical mass?

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Austin, Texas, is Omar Gallaga. He writes on technology culture for the Austin American-Statesman and is regular contributor to NPR’s All Tech Considered.

From New York we’re joined by John Abell, New York bureau chief for Wired.com. He directs coverage of business and disruptive media and writes for Wired.com’s Epicenter blog.

And from Los Angeles we’re joined by Jason Calacanis. He’s an Internet entrepreneur who has founded many companies, including Silicon Alley Reporter and Weblogs, Inc. He’s founder and CEO of Mahalo.com, a “human-powered” search engine.

Thelonious Monk performs at the Newport Jazz Festival in Newport, R.I., on July 5, 1963. (AP Photo)

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Jazz great Thelonious Monk had a genius for unusual and daring composition, for confounding and delighting the world. He did things with rhythm, melody and chords that had never quite been heard before.

Hip America swooned for his music and for his myth: the mystical, elusive “George Washington of bebop.” From the 1940s to the 1970s and beyond, the myth of Monk nearly overshadowed the man. But his music rolls on.

A new biography from Robin Kelley tells the story of the music and the man — of Coltrane and Chopin and genius and Monk.

This hour, On Point: a deep new look at the great jazzman Thelonious Monk.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Robin Kelley joins us from Los Angeles. Professor of history and American Studies at the University of Southern California, he’s the author of the new biography “Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original.” You can read an excerpt here.

And from New York we’re joined by Matthew Shipp, jazz pianist, composer, and bandleader. His previous albums include “One,” “Harmony and Abyss,” and “Equilibrium.” His forthcoming album, available this January, is “4d.” You can hear him playing and talking about piano jazz at NPR.org.

Here’s a list of the Monk songs featured during the hour:

“Blue Sphere”
“Introspection”
“‘Round Midnight”
“Evidence”
“Trinkle, Tinkle”
“Brilliant Corners”
“In Walked Bud”
“This is My Story, This is My Song”
“Jackie-Ing”
“Well, You Needn’t”

More links:

In this clip from the documentary “Straight No Chaser,” you can see Monk’s famous “dance” during a performance:

And here’s Monk playing his renowned composition “‘Round Midnight” in Norway in 1966:

The entrance to the San Francisco Medical Cannabis Clinic in San Francisco, Monday, Oct. 19, 2009. Pot-smoking patients or their sanctioned suppliers should not be targeted for federal prosecution in states that allow medical marijuana, prosecutors were told in a new policy memo issued by the Justice Department. (AP)

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Before 1914, drug use was no crime in America — and millions of Americans were addicted to tonics peddled off the back of wagons and laced with opium or coca. Then came the big crackdown.

Now, “medical marijuana” is on the move. Fourteen states permit its use. And pretty broad use. LA has a thousand medical marijuana shops. In Colorado, thousands of young men have suddenly complained of chronic pain and signed up.

Last week, the U.S. Department of Justice officially said it will not prosecute what the states accept. Is defacto decriminalization on the way?

This hour, On Point: Marijuana, medical marijuana, and the law.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Josh Meyer, reporter for the Los Angeles Times. He reported on the Justice Department’s new policy on medical marijuana, announced last week. LATimes.com offers an interactive map of medical marijuana dispensaries in LA, and a map showing the states that have legalized medical marijuana.

Also from Washington we’re joined by Peter Cohen, adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University and the chair of the Physicians Health Program of the District of Columbia Medical Society.

And from Los Angeles we’re joined by Mark Kleiman, professor of policy studies and director of the Drug Policy Analysis Center at UCLA. His most recent book is “When Brute Force Fails: How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment.”

The "This Old House" Newton Centre Project 2009, in Newton, Mass., as shown on the Old House My House blog (click the image above).

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Americans love homes and fixing them up. In 1979, there was a lone public television show devoted to the task, the art. “This Old House” set out to make the magic of renovation and repair accessible — and became a huge national hit.

This year, “This Old House” turns thirty. The landscape outside has changed. An epic housing bust. A raft of commercial shows from “Extreme Makeover” to “Flipping Out” grabbing at the tool belt.

This hour, On Point: Norm Abram, Kevin O’Connor, and more, on “This Old House” at thirty.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Kevin O’Connor is now in his sixth season as host of “This Old House” and “Ask This Old House.”  He is also on the editorial board of This Old House magazine.

Norm Abram, master carpenter of “This Old House” since the show’s premiere in 1979. He was also host of “The Yankee Workshop,” which ran for 21 seasons. He serves on the editorial board of This Old House magazine and has his own column, Norm’s Notebook.

Deborah Hood, senior series producer at “This Old House,” where she started in 2002 as an associate producer.

More links:

On Point got a tour of the current project site in Newton, Mass. In this video Tom Ashbrook talks with Tom Silva, general contractor for “This Old House”:

In this photo taken Sunday, Oct. 4, 2009, new Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, left, sits with his comrade Waliur Rehman during a meeting with media in Sararogha in the Pakistani tribal area of South Waziristan along the Afghanistan border. (AP)

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Full boil in Afghanistan today. Helicopters down. Fourteen Americans dead. Anti-American protest in the streets of Kabul.

The Taliban crowing. But what is the Taliban? Is it a patched-together crew of outback opportunists that might be bought off, brought in, worked with to defuse Afghanistan and let the U.S. and NATO ramp down?

Is it a stone-cold ally of Al Qaeda committed to global war with the United States that must defeated?

Is it something else? The answer is central to America’s decision on troop levels for Afghanistan.

This hour, On Point: We’re looking again at the Taliban.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Peter Bergen, longtime journalist and senior fellow at the New America Foundation, where he co-directs the Counterterrorism Strategy Initiative. He’s author of “The Osama Bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda’s Leader,” and editor of the Af-Pak Channel, at ForeignPolicy.com.  Read Peter’s piece on the Taliban-al-Qaeda merger in The New Republic.

Michael Semple, regional specialist on Afghanistan and Pakistan, and currently a fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard. He’s worked in the Af-Pak region for more than 20 years, most recently as the deputy head of the EU Mission to Afghanistan.  His new book is “Reconciliation in Afghanistan.”  Read Michael’s piece on “Flipping the Taliban” in Foreign Affairs.

Read journalist David Rohde’s account of being held hostage by the Taliban for 7 months,  in the New York Times.