Transcripts For KQED PBS 20240703 : vimarsana.com

KQED PBS July 3, 2024

And we believed that that meant it was rich in carbon, which is the essential element for all life on earth and key to our origins investigation. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. And friends of the newshour, including leonard and norma glorifying and clue and patricia you vent. For more than 50 years, advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better world, at hewlett. Org. And with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Amna welcome to the newshour. Major Hollywood Studios have reached a tentative deal with writers after nearly five months of striking. Geoff in coming days, members of the Writers Guild of america will vote to approve the new contract, which includes pay increases to keep up with streaming and protections around the use of artificial intelligence. But when production on shows restarts is an open question since actors remain on strike. Janice min is editorinchief of the ankler, a Digital Media company that covers the industry. Thanks for being with us. Janice thanks for having me. Geoff we should say neither the Writers Guild nor the studio have released the detailed terms of this contract. On the face, it appears the writers have won some concessions. What are they, based on your reporting . Janice one of the big ones was about minimum staffing in rooms. One of the things writers were trying to get the studios to agree on was a certain number of people that could be in a room so you could not have situations where soul show runners were being asked to create and write shows. They wanted to guarantee work for people in the union. Another concession seems to be in artificial intelligence. Anyone who has been paying attention probably has heard ai thrown around. Writers consider this a big threat and actors still out on strike probably consider it a larger threat because their likenesses can be replicated and used. And pay increases. Seems like they want a pretty big pay increase in terms of streaming residuals in terms of pay in the room. I think one of the positive signs for the Writers Guild members is their language in the press release or the email sent to members yesterday was incredibly triumphant. In 2008 when they last had a strike and settled with the studios, they were much more sober about it, saying we put in the fight, we got what we could. Yesterday felt more like a victory lap. Geoff lets talk more about the residuals. Writers say the streaming revenue model has broken residuals, as writers and actors are typically paid a flat fee regardless of how well their show does on streaming platforms. We spoke with a writer named charles dewey, a staff writer for criminal minds, who identified that as his top concern. Than the legacy studios and its going to be allyoucaneat. What i think none of the writers and actors were planning on or were expecting was how big streaming would become in this industry, how many millions of people would be watching their shows, and how Little Information they would have about that to give them any leverage in knowing if they were being paid enough, not enough, too much. That is where this gray area formed, which is the basis of so much being negotiated. Geoff our team also spoke with a writer named jorge reyes, who writes for shows on streaming platforms. He expressed some concern about the impact of artificial intelligence. Theyd just hire us to tweak things and that would reduce us to a gig economy. It would reduce what a writer earns, it would reduce our pension, it would reduce our health care. So it would decimate us and in a way that we werent willing to accept. Geoff you can understand the ways in which the studios would want to expand into the realm of ai. What might a compromise look like on this issue . Janice it sounds like there are specific guidelines around credits and the usage of ai to originate ideas. Its also in the way actors are looking to protect their likeness. Ai feeds off original existing i material. Im going to have to guess there are provisions around using existing writers material to generate future material. If you were a writer on the office for eight years, that your voice cannot be used to create the new Office Spinoff thats coming out, that will come out 10 years from now. Its about protecting your original voice and not being replaced in the writers room. I think anyone that has played around with chatgpt knows you can plug in, can you write me some aaron sorkin dialogue about trumps potential second term in office . It spits it out and is fairly convincing. Thats probably one of the most terrifying things for writers today. Geoff in less than two minutes, what might an agreement for the writers mean for the separate actors strike . The two sides have not spoken in more than two months, and so far as i know no talks are scheduled. Janice there are no talks scheduled. One thing we should look out for is the Screen Actors Guild leadership has been much more strident and are asking for different things. Fran drescher, the president of sag, formerly the star of the nanny, has come out with, even in these heated time, especially loaded language against the studios, calling them land barons. Particularly insulting personally to robert iger, ceo of disney. She has definitely made it much more i would say a class war in hollywood, taking it far beyond even some of the rhetoric of the writers. Getting these two to the table what we hear is the ceos are fairly stunned by the words coming out of sag. I think its going to both of them will have to cool down a little to make that happen. But sag is asking for something the wga is not, which is revenuesharing. They are asking for 2 of i revenue generated by the shows where there actors star. There with these big data companies, apple, amazon, netflix, they dont share data. That makes it almost impossible to figure out how they could come to some sort of conclusion. Geoff a real pleasure to speak with you. Thanks for your insights. In the days other headlines, ukraine says it killed the commander of russias black sea fleet, in one of kyivs boldest attacks yet on the occupied peninsula of crimea. But kyiv did not provide any evidence to support its claim. Thats as russian drones and missiles pounded a string of cities across ukraine. Some of the worst violence was in and around odesa, where port infrastructure, a grain silo, and an abandoned hotel were destroyed. Thousands of Ethnic Armenians are fleeg the nagornokarabakh region to safety in armenia. The territory was controlled by separatists for three decades until azerbaijan recaptured it last week. Residents packed their belongings and headed for the border. Azerbaijan said it would protect any armenians who stay, but those leaving say its no longer safe. [translated] we dont know what will happen to us next. We dont know whats in store for us, but theres no chance we can go back. If we could, we wouldnt have left in the first place. It is very dangerous there. Geoff hours later, an explosion at a gas Storage Depot in nagornokarabakh injured more than 200 people. There was no immediate word what caused the blast. In hawaii, residents began returning to whats left of their lahaina properties today, after wildfires destroyed the Historic Town earlier this summer. Authorities cleared the first zone for reentry in the northern part of lahaina. Officials supervised the temporary visits and warned that the ash might still contain toxic chemicals. It was the first of 17 zones in the area to reopen. The Biden Administration announced today its investing 1. 4 billion into improving the nations aging railway system. It will fund 70 projects in 35 states and washington, d. C. , and aims to increase capacity and improve safety. Railway safety has been a major concern since a train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in east palestine, ohio last february. Free, athome covid19 tests by mail are back, as a wave of new infections continues to sweep the nation. Starting today, the u. S. Government will send up to four rapid tests per household to anyone who requests them on the website covidtests. Gov. The program has been on hiatus since june. And stocks closed higher on wall street today. The Dow Jones Industrial average gained 43 points to close at 34,700. The nasdaq rose 59 points. The s p 500 added 17. Still to come, President Biden meets with Pacific Island leaders to strengthen relations and counter chinas influence. The family of a black texas teen sues, saying his School District discriminated against his hairstyle. And the cofounder of bet reflects on her groundbreaking career in a new memoir. This is the pbs newshour from weta studios in washington and in the west from the Walter Cronkite school of journalism at Arizona State university. Amna as the clock ticks down to a Government Shutdown and Union Workers continue their strike against car manufacturers, there could be major implications for the u. S. Economy and the political landscape. Here to break down the stakes, amy walter of the Cook Political Report with amy walter. And tamara keith of npr. Thanks for being here. Five days left until the deadline to fund the government or there is a shutdown. Speaker mccarthy said he is a believer they can get a stopgap funding bill done, but the hold up is it is republicans inability to reach consensus. If there is a shutdown, is not clear to the American Public, that this is a potential republican shutdown . I dont know if they are paying as close attention, there is a lot of other news. The reality is we are spending a lot of time talking about one person, Kevin Mccarthy, and the number of republicans in the house saying we are ok with a shutdown because we didnt get what we wanted. I think the fact the focus will be on him will make that somewhat clear. The real question is what the implications are in the months and weeks to come. Does this last for a significant amount of time . So significant it has a real impact on real peoples lives and the economy and how people see the republican party, who is trying to run in 2024 on making us stewards of the economy because democrats have not done a good job making inflation low. If the conversation in the next few weeks is actually, this is the republicans creating unnecessary damage to the economy, that muddies the waters to their argument. Amna what about the democrats role in averting a shutdown . We saw a number of them from the administration, from Congress Asked about it this weekend. Is anyone saying we should play a role in averting a shutdown . Tamara they feel as though they can play a role eventually, but first republicans have to figure it out. I talked to congressman colin alred over the weekend and others are out there. The basic message is republicans cant pass anything now on their own. Democrats are not willing to bail them out by passing a partisan measure. On the a bipartisan measure that can make it t of the senate is something democrats in the house would be willing to support. In the end, whenever the shutdown ends, and we dont know when that will be, a large number of democrats are going to end up voting for it. Its possible more democrats will vote for it than republicans, because thats the way it always is with every government funding bill. There are Something Like a dozen House Republicans right now who have never once voted for funding the government. The challenge for Kevin Mccarthy is the majority is so narrow that some people who have never voted fun the government before would have to do it for them to pass a partisan bill, which would get sent to the senate where the senate is not going to support it and you would be back at square one. Thats why a lot of House Republicans, and they dont seem upset about it, are protecting the government is going to shut down this weekend. Amna the strike by United Auto Workers has widened. They say there is progress in the ford talks. President biden is going to join them on the picket lines in detroit tomorrow. Former President Trump on wednesday will address auto workers. Lets look at how Union Households have viewed the parties in the past. In 2020, Union Households made up 20 of voters and broke decisively for mr. Biden. We know unions make up a strong part of the constituencies in a number of key swing states, michigan among them. How are they viewing this and is there room for them to break one way or another amy michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania, very important states. The white house is looking at polling that says Union Members and unions have never been more popular with the American Public than they are now. They feel that the president being on the side of workers is better for the president than being on the side of business. Going to the picket lines is a big way of showing that. I interviewed congresswoman debbie think all recently of michigan. She said in 2015 and 2016 she was shouting from the rooftops that donald trump was talking about trade and showing people in the Union Movement that he cared deeply about them. Did he follow through on all the things he said he was going to do with trade . No, but she said there was a risk to democrats if they dont show support for Union Workers. Amna the big picture is there is a Government Shutdown looming, autoworkers strike, and messages being sent to unions about how this is unfolding. Inflation has been coming down, unemployment is at historic close, but what does this mean for democrats, for President Biden if the economy doesnt continue to improve . Amy i want to make clear the difference between what the challenges are for uaw unions and the realities of electric vehicles and what that means for specific Union Workers. The Building Trades are very happy with President Biden because they have so much work thanks to the infrastructure bill. Each state is going to have different constituencies that are unionized so when we see a big number like labor households, there are different workers and trades involved. Tamara not all unions are the same. Amna almost all members of the aflcio endorsed resident biden earlier than ever. Uaw held back, though they have made clear they have no intention of endorsing donald trump. Amna no endorsement yet though. The Bigger Picture is for a president looking at a pessimistic public, anything that makes them feel as though there are headwinds driving down the economy besides the cost of things is not going to be particularly helpful. Amna in the two minutes left, just days after the doj indicted him on corruption and bribery, new jersey senator bob menendez said he will not resign. He said he will be exonerated. We have seen a number of new jersey democrats call for him to resign. There have been some who are silent, for instance fellow senator cory booker. What does the silence say . Amy its fascinating. Only two Democratic Senators have called for his resignation. I think there is a reticence among Many Democrats after what happened a few years back with senator al franken at the height of the me too movement. There were accusations he had sexually harassed someone he worked with, there were photos. Almost immediately many of his colleagues called on him to resign. Many of those people looking back say, maybe we jumped too soon. We should have allowed this process to play out. This is challenging for democrats. This is 2023, we have democrats running on a message in phonied 24 on dont elect donald trump because of the corruption. Do not come out when we say corruption, we mean everybody, no matter who you are. I am very curious to see, now that we have seen two senators stepped out, if we wont see more. He also has a challenge from a fellow congressperson in new jersey. Tamara this is not his first rodeo. This is not the first time he has been indicted on federal charges. He went to trial last time and the jury was deadlocked and there was a hung jury. He didnt resign then either. That might be some of the history. We are in a time in politics where shame and people calling on you to resign is not enough to make people resign. Look at george santos, also indicted and everyone on earth has called on him to resign from congress for his many lies, and he is staying put for now. There is this thing in the Justice System where you are presumed innocent until proven guilty. You might lose your committees but you can stick around. Amna we will watch as it plays out. Always good to see you both. Thank you. Geoff in washington today, President Biden hosted a gathering of Pacific Island leaders that was equal parts about the u. S. Growing its relationships and working to counter chinas power in the region. Lisa desjardins looks at the tensions across the pacific rim. Lisa we are talking about some of the most remote and most beautiful places in the world. These 18 Pacific Island countries cover an area as vast as the entire continental Unit

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