Old Mole Variety Hour for April 14, 2025

Hosted by:

Frann Michel

Produced by:

KBOO

Program::

Old Mole Variety Hour

Air date:

Mon, 04/14/2025 - 9:00am to 10:00am

KBOO Community Radio Portland Oregon Old Mole Variety Hour

Health, care for all or for some? Views, Reviews, and Interviews from a Socialist-Feminist, Anti-racist, Anti-colonial and LGBTQ-positive Perspective

Health, care for all or for some? Hosted by Frann Michel, this episode of the Old Mole includes these segments:

Healthcare for ALL Oregon: Oregon is poised to become the first state in the union to enact a single payer health care plan. In June of this year, the Universal Health Plan Governance Board for the State of Oregon will present for public input the first draft of its comprehensive plan. The finalized plan is due to the legislature in September of 2026. It is likely that the plan will be referred for a statewide vote in 2027. Patricia Kullberg speaks with two organizers with Health Care for All Oregon about the essentials of the plan and the political obstacles it faces. Rebecca Shoon is a professor of public health and board member of Health Care for All Oregon. She has studied comparative health systems and ways to engage the public in health policymaking. Collin Stackhouse is a long time advocate for universal health care in Oregon and also serves on the Community Engagement and Communications Committee of the Governance Board. More information can be found at the HCAO website, including opportunities for the public to provide input into the features of the plan.

Rise for Climate Justice: This Saturday afternoon, April 19th, a climate justice rally will be held from 3-5 pm at the Elizabeth Caruthers Park in Portland. The theme of the rally is local and global: From the US to the Philippines: Defend Lands and Land Defenders. Jan Haaken talks with two organizers--Juliette Nolan and Diana Meisenhelter--about the rally and the march to the local Tesla dealer that follows. Juliette Nolan organizes with Kalikasan Solidarity Organization (KSO), a Portland-based grassroots environmental justice organization that builds solidarity support for land defenders in the Philippines fighting for their lands and livelihoods. Diana Meisenhelter is a long time environmental and social justice activist and labor organizer and active with Extinction Rebellion, a global climate justice movement, at the local, national and international levels. You can find a fuller version of this conversation on the segment page here.

Eugenics Logic: The current federal government has slashed resources for public health and for people with disabilities and in doing so has suggested that vulnerable people are social burdens, "waste" to be cut. In her article "The Eugenics Logic Behind Running a Government Like a Startup Under the Trump Administration" on the Disability Visibility Project, anthropologist Valerie Black argues that techbro oligarchs have brought a "survival of the fittest" logic into para-governance. Black holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and is currently a postdoctoral scholar at UC San Francisco's Decision Lab. Frann Michel here talks with Black about ableism, capitalist fetishization of productivity, and the history, paradoxes, and continuation of eugenics in the USA. You can find a fuller version of this conversation on the segment page here.

*Special thanks to Denise Morris and Jon Nelson for editing*

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