The Cosmic Curator 8/20/22: What’s the most important part of your life!?

This is your Cosmic Curator, Tom Yaroschuk, with a look at the stars for today Saturday August 20th through the lens of Vedic astrology, that’s the astrology of India.

Here’s a little Vedic astrology 101. According to that school of thought, a birth chart maps out the destiny one may encounter on the way to achieving freedom and happiness.

Furthermore, to that end, a birth chart has four key objectives in life.

They are Dharma, Arta, Kama, and Moksha…

About the Host:
Tom Yaroschuk is a Vedic Astrologer. His intention is to help people understand their karma and the issues they may confront to cultivate more fulfilling lives. Tom is writing a memoir of the spiritual lessons derived from his work in a Homeless Day Center in between a career as an award winning television and documentary producer.

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Democracy Forum 8/19/22: Libraries: Defenders of Democracy (Originally aired April 15 2022)

Host: Ann Luther, League of Women Voters of Maine
The mostly volunteer team at the League of Women Voters – Downeast who plan and coordinate this series includes: Martha Dickinson, Starr Gilmartin, Maggie Harling, Ann Luther, Judith Lyles, Wendilee O’Brien, Maryann Ogonowski, Pam Person, Lane Sturtevant, Leah Taylor, Linda Washburn

Democracy Forum: Participatory Democracy, encouraging citizens to take an active role in government and politics

Description, guests and links FMI can be found here

About the host:
Ann currently serves as Treasurer of the League of Women Voters of Maine and leads the LWVME Advocacy Team. She served as President of LWVME from 2003 to 2007 and as co-president from 2007-2009. In her work for the League, Ann has worked for greater public understanding of public policy issues and for the League’s priority issues in Clean Elections & Campaign Finance Reform, Voting Rights, Ethics in Government, Ranked Choice Voting, and Repeal of Term Limits. Representing LWVME at Maine Citizens for Clean Elections, she served that coalition as co-president from 2006 to 2011. She remains on the board of MCCE and serves as Treasurer. She is active in the LWV-Downeast and hosts their monthly radio show, The Democracy Forum, on WERU FM Community Radio -which started out in 2004 as an recurring special, and became a regular monthly program in 2012. She was the 2013 recipient of the Baldwin Award from the ACLU of Maine for her work on voting rights and elections. She joined the League in 1998 when she retired as Senior Vice President at SEI Investments. Ann was a founder of the MDI Restorative Justice Program, 1999 – 2000, and served on its Executive Board.

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Awanadjo Almanack 8/19/22: “Timely and Timeless”

Producer/Host: Rob McCall
Production Assistance: Rebecca McCall

About the host:

Rob McCall: Born in the Black Hills of South Dakota, grew up in Oregon and Illinois. Father was a Scots-Irish preacher, mother a Yankee Congregationalist tracing her ancestry back to the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Father taught him about Scripture, mother taught him about Nature.

Bachelor of arts in philosophy, bachelor of divinity in American religious history, graduate studies in education, doctor of ministry in congregational studies, certified in elementary education, tree fruits and entomology.

Worked as an elementary school teacher, tree and landscape contractor, church sexton, orchard manager, chimney sweep, ambulance driver, musician. Began second career as a preacher at age 40. Served as minister of the First Congregational Church of Blue Hill, Maine 1986 – 2014. He is currently chaplain of the Brooklin Fire Department.

Since 1992 has published the weekly Awanadjo Almanack which is broadcast to midcoast Maine and on the web at WERU-FM and appears in a number of publications. His writing has also appeared in Yankee, Down East, Maine Boats, Homes & Harbors, Island Journal and elsewhere.

His first book, Small Misty Mountain, was published in 2006 by Pushcart Press and distributed by W.W. Norton. Publisher’s Weekly called it “by turns inspiring and infuriating.” His second book, Great Speckled Bird, followed in 2012. His third book, Some Glad Morning, was released in October 2020.

Passions include wild plants and animals, and traditional fiddle tunes. Married for 53 years to Rebecca Haley, artist and singer. Father of two, grandfather of two.

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Around Town 8/18/22: Local Land Trusts Preserve Wallamatogus Mountain

Producer/Host: Amy Browne

This week: We’re headed to Penobscot, where Chrissy Allen, Development Director of the Blue Hill Heritage Trust has some good news to share

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices, Maine Currents and Maine: The Way Life Could Be, Amy also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and Maine Association of Broadcasters awards for her work in 2017 and 2021.

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Notes from the Electronic Cottage 8/18/22: Online Privacy After Roe v Wade Overturn

Producer/Host: Jim Campbell

We are starting to see the effects of our digital world on individual women now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v Wade. Here are links to further investigate the issues mentioned in today’s program:

These Companies Know When You’re Pregnant—And They’re Not Keeping It Secret, Gizmodo “Gizmodo identified 32 brokers selling data on 2.9 billion profiles of U.S. residents pegged as ‘actively pregnant’ or ‘shopping for maternity products.'”

Google Maps Regularly Misleads People Searching for Abortion Clinics, Davey Alba and Jack Gillum, August 15, 2022, Bloomberg

EXPLAINER: Online privacy in a post-Roe world, The Associated Press, August 10, 2022

In a Post-Roe World, the Future of Digital Privacy Looks Even Grimmer, Natasha Singer and Brian X. Chen, New York Times, Published July 13, 2022; Updated July 20, 2022

About the host:
Jim Campbell has a longstanding interest in the intersection of digital technology, law, and public policy and how they affect our daily lives in our increasingly digital world. He has banged around non-commercial radio for decades and, in the little known facts department (that should probably stay that way), he was one of the readers voicing Richard Nixon’s words when NPR broadcast the entire transcript of the Watergate tapes. Like several other current WERU volunteers, he was at the station’s sign-on party on May 1, 1988 and has been a volunteer ever since doing an early stint as a Morning Maine host, and later producing WERU program series including Northern Lights, Conversations on Science and Society, Sound Portrait of the Artist, Selections from the Camden Conference, others that will probably come to him after this is is posted, and, of course, Notes from the Electronic Cottage.

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Relationship Rewind 8/16/22: 500 Days of Summer

Host: Alli Williamson, Youth Educator and Advocate at NextStep Domestic Violence Project
Helpline: 1(800) 315-5579
Music credit: Brandon Nelson, local musician donated theme music for the show.

Relationship Rewind: Rewinding relationships in popular media and breaking down behaviors based in power, control, and abuse.

This episode: We’re discussing the 2009 movie 500 Days of Summer
-Unhealthy behaviors in relationships
-How media normalizes these behaviors
-The impacts of these messages about relationships on young people

Guest/s: Celia, Local College Student

About the host:

Alli Williamson is the youth educator and advocate for NextStep Domestic Violence Project based in Hancock and Washington County, ME. She teaches young people from Kindergarten to College about what power and control looks like in friendships and relationships, what resources are available to support those experiencing this, and how we can work to make our schools and communities safer and more equal spaces where abuse may be less likely to happen.

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Outside the Box 8/16/22: “Another Kind of Outrageous”

Producer/Host: Larry Dansinger

About the host:
Larry Dansinger (no pronouns) of Bangor came to Maine in 1974 and has been here ever since. Some of Larry’s activities since then: Done community organizing on numerous issues through INVERT and then Resources for Organizing and Social Change (ROSC), committed civil disobedience several times, grown a garden yearly since 1977, joined various food cooperatives and two men’s groups, refused to pay federal income taxes for war, lived on a community land trust for 23 years, and met a wonderful partner whom Larry has loved for over 40 years. Larry has produced Outside the Box features on WERU since 2007 and continues to look for unique ways of seeing almost any problem or situation.

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