Us & Them: Recent Episodes

Trey Kay and WVPB

We tell stories from the fault lines that separate Americans. Peabody Award-winning public radio producer Trey Kay listens to people on both sides of the divide.

In the aftermath of a disaster, people search for assistance and answers. Since a rural Ohio train derailment sent toxic material into the air, soil and water earlier this year, people in East Palestine have needed help. Some look to the government for that support, while others aren’t sure who to trust. In this episode of Us & Them, host Trey Kay hears from residents who face daunting challenges. Some say government agencies are doing their best at ongoing cleanup, while others say delays and inconsistent information leave them uncertain about their safety and unclear about whether they can go home.

At least 20 states have laws banning transgender girls and women from competing on girls and womens sports teams. On the next episode of Us & Them, host Trey Kay looks at the battle over gender and sports. Kay talks with transgender athletes who say they want to be who they truly are as they compete on the playing field. We hear from a state lawmaker who says the new laws are not anti-trans, but rather designed to protect girls and women from unfair competition playing against transgender athletes. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling allows a transgender girl in West Virginia to compete on her middle school girls team for now, while a state lawsuit continues.

Travel is an activity some people use as a classroom. Leaving the familiar lets us learn about culture, history, the environment and many other topics. Us & Them host Trey Kay joined a small group to travel through America’s southern states learning about the country’s racial past and the impact of the Civil Rights movement today. This immersive journey took them across several states to places that have come to define periods in America’s racial history—from Charleston, South Carolina’s slave trade market to Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. The group visited sites that put this country’s racist history on display, and Kay was along to hear them reflect on our nation and themselves.

This episode of Us & Them was first released in December of 2022 and since then, it has received a regional Edward R. Murrow award from the Radio Television Digital News Association for best podcast. We've updated the episode and want to share it with you again now.

In West Virginia there are nearly 50 specialized court programs designed to help teens and adults kick their drug addictions. Drug courts divert people away from incarceration into a rigorous, court-monitored treatment program. They are intense experiences, some more than a year long. Participants are drug tested regularly and require monitoring devices. Graduation rates across the country show success rates from 29% to more than 60%. There are many supporters within the justice system, but critics say drug courts only work with the easiest first-time offenders and don’t take violent offenders or sex offenders. Some drug courts require a guilty plea before someone can participate, which can limit a person’s options if they don’t make it through the program. In the next Us & Them, host Trey Kay talks with people about this court-designed approach to sobriety that began nearly 50 years ago when the first drug court opened its doors.

More than 12 percent of Americans, or 42 million people, need help getting enough food to eat. In West Virginia, that number is about 18 percent. That help comes from a federal program called SNAP - the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly called food stamps. The Mountain State is one of the top recipients of SNAP benefits - nearly 45 percent are older adults or families with someone who’s disabled while nearly 60 percent are families with children. The government’s food support program actually has its roots in McDowell County, West Virginia where it began as a pilot project in the 1960s. Since then the program has reduced poverty and hunger across the nation. Today, SNAP gets caught up in political debates and election cycles. On this Us & Them episode, host Trey Kay talks with three people, a retiree, a mom and a lawmaker who all say that nutritional support has made a difference in their lives.

West VIrginia’s state prisons and jails are overcrowded and understaffed. Just over half of those who are incarcerated have not yet been found guilty of a crime, they’re in a cell because they can’t make their bail. Many of those people are poor and a disproportionate number are Black. On this episode of Us & Them, host Trey Kay takes a look at what contributes to the racial disparities in our justice system. Black people make up about 3.5% of West Virginia’s population but 12% of the state’s incarcerated population. Why are people of color overrepresented in the criminal justice system? Join Kay for a visit to arraignment court where the choices made early on play a critical role in how a case proceeds. Bail options are an important point where racial disparities can be on display and when a person’s freedom depends on their access to cash or property, some say Black West Virginians are disproportionately harmed.

Larry Bellorín began making his living as a singer, multi-instrumental musician and music teacher when he was a teenager in Venezuela. His career was interrupted abruptly in 2013 when Venezuela’s state-run economy crashed and socialist President Nicholas Maduro cracked down on opponents and folks like Larry, who refused to choose sides. He and his family fled to Raleigh, North Carolina and have added their names to a huge backlog of asylum applicants. Larry worked construction and thought his musical career was behind him until he met Joe Troop, a GRAMMY-nominated musician and North Carolina native who introduced him to the folk music and traditions of Appalachia, which Larry found eerily similar to the joropo he played in Venezuela. Their duo, Larry & Joe, is the realization of a dream for both musicians. It’s also a reminder for Larry of what - and who - he had to leave behind. Us & Them host Trey Kay tells the story of Bellorín’s musical beginnings, his “magical” kinship and duo with Troop and the song he can’t yet bring himself to sing.

Imagining the future is at the core of this episode of Us & Them. Earlier this fall, we held a day-long workshop to hear ideas and talk about what can make the future a reality. The Civic Imagination Project based at the University of Southern California works with cities across the country to get residents thinking about new directions and possibilities for their communities. We invited people from the Upper Kanawha Valley with a range of backgrounds and experiences to discuss their hard-hit economy and consider fresh approaches and alternatives. Considering the future can offer people some control about what’s ahead and as the conversation develops, there can be inspiration for more citizens to get involved. In this episode, we learn that many things are possible if we can just imagine them.

There’s a lot of energy and movement on abortion policy and law this fall. Some states have defined their position with five states offering ballot measures to protect or further restrict access to abortion. Since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, plenty of people feel like one side has won...and the other has lost. But how is this power shift playing out for people on the front line of the issue? How are individuals and groups facing what comes next in this post-Roe world? In this episode of Us & Them, two West Virginia women, an abortion rights advocate and an abortion-rights opponent, outline their perspectives on where we are in this moment and what’s ahead.

It’s time for our Us & Them dinner party crew to share a meal in person! This remarkable group of people has been meeting for two years, virtually, to talk across their social and political divides. There’s a lot they disagree on and there are moments of awkward concern at the table as they navigate that space. In this new episode, we’re together to talk and listen and try to understand a little more about each other. Our guests agree that sharing food and views enhances a sense of comradery and helps us really see each other. This Us & Them dinner party episode offers respectful talk across the table.

U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin may be redefining the nation’s political landscape by reconfiguring the middle. While some say he’s tough to predict, others insist Sen. Manchin’s consistency has come to serve as an important political reference point. As the spotlight shines on the toxic battle between left and right, a man with decades in public office recently helped deliver a rare compromise bill through Congress. For the past two years, Joe Manchin has seemed to be at the center of the political debate between us and them. This episode offers perspective and analysis on Manchin’s political legacy and the future as we weigh consequences of the midterm elections and how they may play out on Manchin’s next campaign.

West Virginia’s U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin is the man in the middle. For years, Manchin has used his deciding vote in the Senate to stand up to Pres. Joe Biden’s legislative agenda, but recently a surprise agreement changed everything. In this episode of Us & Them, we look at the outcome of that legislation called the Inflation Reduction Act. Many are asking, “Who is Joe Manchin?” The important compromise on climate legislation in the bill is producing a transformation to Manchin’s political image and according to some analysts, opening opportunities for the future. Joe Manchin is not up for reelection to his Senate seat until 2024, but the outcome of the midterm elections could have a significant impact on him. If the Democrats lose their majority in the Senate, Manchin will no longer be the all-powerful deciding vote. However, if the party holds control of the Senate but loses the House, it’s unlikely Democratic legislation will even make it to the president's desk. Despite the frustrations many in his own party have with Joe Manchin, there’s an important fact to — Manchin represents one of the most elusive and powerful factions in American politics - the middle. How far can that take him?

Whatever you call what happened at the Capitol on January 6th, 2021, a rally - a protest - a riot - or an insurrection, the congressional investigation and hearings are forging new territory. On this episode of Us & Them, we look at who’s watching the hearings, who’s not and why. What some call a clarifying moment in our nation’s experiment in democracy is surprisingly forgettable to others. Host Trey Kay listens to a range of opinions about what that day meant and finds a new layer of uncomfortable truths behind how people feel. Kay uses the Us & Them approach to listen to others and finds to his surprise, the outcome is far from what he imagined.

More than a hundred years ago West Virginia was home to our nation’s most violent labor uprising. For some, the Battle of Blair Mountain was a watershed moment when coal workers decided their rights were worth fighting and even dying for. The armed insurrection pitted 10,000 coal miners against 3,000 heavily armed coal industry guards and state troopers. The conflict came to a head because of the social and economic forces that hit West Virginia’s coal country after World War I.

It was the largest labor uprising in American history and the largest armed conflict since the Civil War. And yet, the Battle of Blair Mountain is largely unknown to most Americans, including West Virginians. To learn more, we follow the path of the miners on their march to Mingo, and learn what precipitated the battle.

The episode was honored with an award from The Virginias Associated Press Broadcasters.

Many West Virginians have trouble with their teeth. In fact, there’s a big gap between folks who can reliably access an affordable dentist and those who can’t. That’s no surprise when half the state’s counties have fewer than six dentists. A recent national ranking shows West Virginia is second to last in overall oral health care. A state report shows that by third grade, 56 percent of children show signs of tooth decay, and 12 percent of adults have had all their teeth extracted.

People who don’t have good oral health habits and access to regular and quality dental care elevate their risk of other critical health care issues such as heart disease, cancer and diabetes. About more than aesthetics or any toothless hillbilly stereotype, access to dental care is a dangerous culture divide that might look like a class gap but is deeper and far more serious.

This episode was recently honored with a regional award from the Associated Press of the Virginias. The first place honor was for best documentary.

More than a dozen states have new laws banning transgender girls and women from competing on girls and womens sports teams. Recently, three states have limited medical care or treatment that supports gender affirming therapy. On this episode of Us & Them, the battle over gender and sports. We’ll hear from transgender athletes who say they want to be who they truly are as they compete on the playing field. We’ll hear a lawmaker who says the new laws are not anti-trans, but rather designed to protect girls and women from unfair competition playing against transgender athletes. A federal judge has temporarily blocked West Virginia’s transgender sports ban but at least one national organization says it wants to extend the ban to any team that receives federal funding.

2020 presented new levels of outrage over police killings of Black and Brown people in this nation. Police killed George Floyd and Breonna Taylor which prompted protests, marches and rallies to denounce racially motivated police brutality. A Black Lives Matter march in Kingwood, West Virginia set up a flash point for that tiny town. Black protestors and their allies faced off with white people who say Kingwood has no race problem. The angry white crowd outnumbered BLM marchers and showed the raw seam of rage that has come to define racism in this country. In this Us & Them episode, host Trey Kay speaks with West Virginia Delegate Danielle Walker, a woman pushing back at the fear and outrage of racial hatred in America.

This episode, which was originally posted in January 2021, has been honored with a 2022 Regional Edward R. Murrow Award for excellence in Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.

Charges of vaccine hoarding and global protectionism are coloring the debate over our response to new strains of COVID with vaccinations. The World Health Organization reports so far, only 16% of people in low-income countries have gotten a single vaccine dose. That compares with 80% in some high-income countries. The role vaccinations can play in shortening or ending the pandemic is still critical although COVID fatigue may prevent people from getting their first dose or continuing on to complete the regimen. ‘America first’ has been central to the Biden administration’s vaccination campaign. Now that focus has shifted and there’s more U.S. effort going into producing vaccines for the world. As international organizations work to get shots in arms, the effort continues to face challenges that may well affect our political and medical realities for years to come.

Healthcare workers are the glue in our public health system. They’ve seen firsthand the impacts of messaging around COVID-19 — the good, the bad, and the downright dangerous — especially on social media. That firehose of information shaped our experience of the pandemic. The internet has also catapulted dangerous misinformation about the virus and treatment into mainstream public opinion. It’s a crisis some healthcare workers are taking to task themselves. In a new Us & Them episode, host Trey Kay talks with some of the Internet’s favorite doctors and nurses about what that movement should look like.

America has roughly 400 million guns in circulation. Our divisions - social, political and racial - and our fear of those differences fuel even more gun purchases. 2020 showed a historic rise in gun violence. Guns killed a record 45,000 people, the majority of them by suicide. In this episode of Us & Them we explore the foundations of the Second Amendment and the cultural and historical beliefs and myths that contribute to our very American divide over guns. Gun ownership is at record levels across the country with 40 percent of adults saying they have at least one firearm in their home. But what rights does the Second Amendment give us? And what happens if our collective arsenal intersects with our widespread distrust of our institutions, our government, and each other?

The weedkiller dicamba has created a divide between people who work the land in Arkansas. In a new episode from the award-winning program Us & Them (from PRX & West Virginia Public Broadcasting), their team follows up on a story that’s gotten ugly over the past few years. A newer version of the herbicide is designed to give soybean farmers a way to combat pigweed, a tenacious plant that can take over soybean fields. However, there's evidence that the chemical can evaporate from where it was sprayed and move to harm other plants. It’s become so controversial that some farmers and backyard gardeners are afraid to complain about crop or plant damage. On the other side of the debate, farmers who want to use the herbicide have gone to court and challenged who gets to make the rules about pesticide use in the state. Rural farm communities are typically tight-knit and if one farmer has a problem with another, they meet at what is called the “turn row'' to talk things out. But that’s not what's happening in Arkansas. The atmosphere has gotten just plain un-neighborly.

Our trust can be tested by many things, both personal and professional. Political fractures make us question those we disagree with. The shifting science of a pandemic presents challenging scenarios for healthcare leaders. As COVID cases continue to rise and fall, Us & Them wanted to hear from people who’ve landed at different points along this trust continuum. Some don’t trust information or data about the coronavirus or the vaccines; from science, from healthcare, from government. Others say healthcare and government officials are doing their best handling a shifting reality with a virus that continues to mutate and infect. Where are you on the trust continuum? How willing are you to listen to someone who disagrees? That’s the challenge in our newest episode of Us & Them. Listen to a range of ideas and opinions. Some may challenge your thinking, others could upset you. But if the exchanges get us all listening and thinking, that can be a good outcome.

America’s public schools are once again in the crosshairs of our nation’s culture wars. Some parents want more say in what and how their kids are taught — especially topics like racial history and gender studies. These parents say schools are pushing a social agenda they don’t agree with. The call for more parental involvement includes increased challenges to the books used in classrooms. Last year, those cases quadrupled with challenges against nearly 1600 individual titles. Educators worry that the pushback against classroom materials can also achieve a broader goal — to challenge teachers with policies and laws that restrict what and how they can teach.

Americans are looking back to reassess their history and origins. George Floyd’s murder launched a global movement to assert the critical role that race plays in American law and society; however, even before Black Lives Matter protests swept the nation and the world, there were efforts to redefine America’s origin story. Now, there are fresh fracture points in how we see ourselves and how we teach our history. A focus of this debate is on a little-known academic and legal concept called Critical Race Theory that says that racism is inherent in our laws and institutions. The theory is not part of standard public school curriculum; however, it has become a catch-all term for efforts to include race as an element in how we teach America’s history. Some parents are against any approach that makes their children pawns in a racial legacy they say focuses too much on oppression and victimization. Once again, one of our nation’s most sensitive cultural flashpoints is evident in debates over laws and school curriculum, and who decides what students will learn about our past.

Born from an era of segregated educational opportunities when Black students were not welcome at predominantly white schools, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have been focused on surrounding students with Black excellence. Today, HBCUs are no longer exclusive. In fact, some schools — like Morgan State University in Baltimore, MD — are actively recruiting a more diverse population to provide a more global experience to prepare graduates for the future. In West Virginia, white students make up a significant majority of the enrollment at the state's two HBCUs. Us & Them host Trey Kay looks at this era of intense competition for students and how some of the nation’s 100-plus HBCUs are adapting for the future.

The public health campaign to sell people on COVID-19 vaccinations is more than a year old, but its success is limited. The latest strain of the virus shows that unvaccinated people are significantly more likely to contract the omicron variant, resulting in higher rates of hospitalization and death. This reality raises a question - why are people refusing the shots? What’s gone wrong with the public health message? Early on the focus was on mass vaccinations, which convinced many millions of people. When the numbers stalled, it was time for incentives; get a shot, win a gift card or a car. In West Virginia, the campaign became, “Do it for Baby Dog,” using the governor’s English Bulldog as a mascot. But few of these efforts are swaying vaccine-resistant people. So, what will work? On the next Us & Them, we’ll hear why vaccination campaigns were successful in the past, and the approach many experts say we need to start trying.

We can document almost everything around us with devices of all kinds. But in 1970, there were few cameras around when police opened fire on crowds in Augusta, Georgia. A protest-turned-riot over the brutal murder of a Black teenager left six Black men dead from police bullets. But there was never justice for any of the deaths, including 16-year-old Charles Oatman in the Richmond County Jail. The story of that riot remains relatively unknown among Augusta residents both Black and white. Us & Them host Trey Kay talks with podcast producer Sea Stachura about her award-winning work, “Shots in the Back: Exhuming the 1970 Augusta Riot.” Historians call it one of the largest uprisings of the Civil Rights Era in the Deep South.

A social movement has been gaining steam in the past decade as we’ve learned more about the way trauma can affect our physical and psychological health. A study more than twenty years ago, first came up with a way to assess the impact of childhood neglect, abuse and family dysfunction. Now, advocates are getting traction with “trauma-aware” campaigns and coalitions. School districts, communities, states and even countries are investing in trauma awareness, training and screening. Nearly half the kids under 18 in the U.S. have had an adverse experience or serious trauma. The original study concluded that the more traumas early in life… lead to poor health outcomes later on. That research got almost no attention when it was published in 1998 however today, its findings are considered ground-breaking. But some say using such a rubric to assess a person’s experience won’t work for everyone and may simply label and limit their future potential.

The coronavirus pandemic continues to prove just how interconnected the world is. Now, a new COVID strain called “omicron,” shows the potential downside of our global vaccination approach. As people in the U.S and Europe line up for booster shots, low vaccination rates in some countries allow the virus to mutate into new strains. ‘America first’ has been a consistent focus for the Biden administration’s vaccination campaign. Early in 2021, high income countries controlled nearly 60 percent of global vaccine doses, despite having just 16 percent of the world’s population. Millions of people around the world continue to wait for their first vaccination dose. COVID may prove the only way to defeat a virus is to provide equitable treatment around the world.

Masks and vaccines continue to trigger Us & Them divides across the nation. As statewide public health mandates have dwindled, public health choices increasingly fall to local government officials - city, county and school board leaders. Many say the mask and vaccination requirements they’ve imposed in the interests of public health, have put a target on their back. More than 80% report they’ve been harassed, threatened or experienced violence. Some are afraid to do their job and they say the aggressive resistance has a budgetary impact on cities required to enhance safety measures. Us & Them host Trey Kay travels to several southern states to hear from people about their decisions and the consequences.

Travel is an activity some people use as a classroom. Leaving the familiar lets us learn about culture, history, the environment and many other topics. Recently, a small group spent six days traveling America’s southern states to learn about the country’s racial past and the impact of the Civil Rights movement today. This immersive tour took them across several states to places that have come to define periods in America’s racial history—from Charleston, South Carolina’s slave trade market to Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. The group visited sites that put this country’s racist history on display, and Us & Them host Trey Kay was along to hear them reflect on our nation and themselves.

It’s another Thanksgiving with COVID-19, but this time, vaccinations allow many Americans to gather together and share a hug and a meal. Us & Them host Trey Kay invites his ‘virtual dinner party’ guests back for an anniversary. It’s a tradition we began last year - bringing together a wide ranging group to talk occasionally about the hot topics of the day. We talk politics and the 2020 election as well as the issues of election reform that continue to reverberate. COVID vaccinations and masks present some honest conversation. This year we’ll see what kind of common ground there is at the table. It seems the more the dinner party guests talk with each other, the more they learn something that can help them see things more clearly and connect on different levels.

Us & Them host Trey Kay honors Veterans Day with a remarkable conversation with the last surviving World War ll U.S. Marine recipient of the Medal of Honor. Hershel Woodrow “Woody” Williams grew up as a farm kid in the Mountain State and enlisted in the Marine Corps just after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. He served in the Pacific campaign and fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima. Williams received the Medal of Honor for fighting against enemy positions to open a lane for infantry soldiers. For four hours under heavy fire, he used a flamethrower against reinforced concrete pillbox defenses. After leaving active service, Williams created a foundation to honor the families of service people lost in battle and offer scholarships to the children of fallen soldiers. Williams, who is 98, says his goal is to ride a horse on his 100th birthday.

West Virginia is now the 42nd state to introduce public charter schools as an education choice for parents and students. A new state law allows the creation of ten charter schools over the next three years. That can include two virtual charter schools. A state authorizing board is reviewing seven applications that are required to follow the same rules and regulations that public schools do. But charters can offer more flexibility to adapt and adjust learning approaches. In some states like Colorado, Michigan, North Carolina and California more than 10 percent of students now attend charter schools. The educational reform movement got its start 30 years ago in Minnesota and in the past three decades, charters have created an us and them divide. Despite their popularity and expansion, some people oppose charter schools. They say charters drain students and resources from traditional public schools. When students attend a charter program, state funding moves with them. We’ll hear from students, parents, teachers and leaders about West Virginia’s decision to bring in charters - and a lawsuit that claims the plan is unconstitutional.

America is seen as a land of opportunities and education for all. But a group of young refugees in Pennsylvania had to challenge the local school district to access their schooling. Lancaster school officials first said the six refugees aged 17 to 21 were too old for public school programs. Only after a lawsuit and protracted negotiations, were the students placed in classes for English language learners. We track the story talking with Jo Napolitano the author of a new book, “The School I Deserve,” that follows the case; and a conversation with Khadidja Issa, one of the refugees who was willing to fight for her education.

Every year, West Virginia children are taken into state custody. Sometimes, a case involves parental neglect or drug abuse. Other times, kids commit crimes and are placed in juvenile residential facilities. The juvenile justice programs and agencies have been under a spotlight over the past decade - partly because West Virginia has had one of the highest rates of juvenile incarceration in the country. Lawmakers have passed bills to reform the system but the outcome is mixed. Meanwhile, juvenile incarceration means the system makes decisions for kids - and those changes can last a lifetime.

One hundred years ago West Virginia was home to our nation’s most violent labor uprising. For some, the Battle of Blair Mountain was a watershed moment when coal workers decided their rights were worth fighting and even dying for. The armed insurrection pitted 10,000 coal miners against 3,000 heavily armed coal industry guards and state troopers. The conflict came to a head because of the social and economic forces that hit West Virginia’s coal country after World War I. It was the largest labor uprising in American history and the largest armed conflict since the Civil War. And yet, the Battle of Blair Mountain is largely unknown to most Americans, including West Virginians. To learn more, we follow the path of the miners on their march to Mingo, and learn what precipitated the battle.

WVPB’s Us & Them introduces us to an unusual cultural divide, one that exists within families. It’s a generation split that comes when chemical addiction prevents parents from raising their children. Millions of U.S. households have become “grandfamilies,” a new kind of family structure. This generational Us & Them divide, puts pressure on aging adults and spotlights underlying financial issues that cause a strain between parents and their adult children. West Virginia and other Appalachian states are at the epicenter of this trend and West Virginia has created a unique support program called “Healthy Grandfamilies.” It’s a training program designed to support grandparents when they become caregivers the second time around. This episode originally aired in February 2020 and was recently honored with journalism’s national Edward R. Murrow award.

Our cultural divides start early in America - some even in childhood. As kids, we learn where we come from and where we belong. Those divisions can really run deep. When Us & Them host Trey Kay was a kid at George Washington High School in Charleston, West Virginia, you were either a ‘hiller’ or a ‘creeker.’ The sorting followed class lines and separated kids based on their family’s income. Trey goes back to his old neighborhood to see if others remember it the way he does. Some of their differences were subtle while others were as basic as the clothes they could afford. But what he learned from these adult conversations is that they had a lot in common. They were all self-conscious and knew that even their shoes could define them. Another thing they all share? The pain of those 40-year-old wounds can sometimes still sting.

America has faced a pandemic, a polarizing election and racial equity battles in the past year. But there’s been another crisis continuing to fester — the opioid epidemic. Deaths are up with more than 1,200 West Virginians dying from overdoses last year. The fight for sobriety now deals with its own tragic divide — When is someone sober?

The road to recovery comes in many forms. For some abstinence works. But others, especially those addicted to opiates, find they need help to get off of such powerful drugs. For their recovery they turn to medication-assisted treatment. That approach has split the treatment world and created a stigma around sobriety.

Fifty years ago, a band of Black musicians stood up to racism and now they’ve been honored for that action. Bass player John Smith is the surviving member of “The In Crowd,” a Charleston, West Virginia band that played popular tunes in the 1960s. One night at the Charleston Athletic Club, a multi-racial couple was refused service and the band took a stand. John Smith says, “If they couldn’t dance, we wouldn’t play.” There were consequences for that action and now, finally, John Smith and his deceased colleagues have been honored for the role they played in pushing back against racial discrimination.

We’re an aging nation.

Today 16% of Americans are over 65. In the next few decades that will double as the youngest Baby Boomers move into old age. But in West Virginia, that future is now. It’s the third oldest state in the nation and more than 20% of its residents are over 65. At the same time, West Virginia’s birth rate is low because young people are leaving. That generational imbalance will increase in coming years.

The numbers show a growing crisis. More seniors want to stay in their homes and the industry has shifted from a nursing home model to one focused on aging in place. That’s led to an explosion in home-based support and care services. But now, those companies struggle to find the workers they need to provide services for the growing elderly population.

Many West Virginians have trouble with their teeth. In fact, there’s a big gap between folks who can reliably access an affordable dentist and those who can’t. That’s no surprise when half the state’s counties have fewer than six dentists. A recent national ranking shows West Virginia is second to last in overall oral health care. A state report shows that by third grade, 56 percent of children show signs of tooth decay, and 12 percent of adults have had all their teeth extracted.

People who don’t have good oral health habits and access to regular and quality dental care elevate their risk of other critical health care issues such as heart disease, cancer and diabetes. About more than aesthetics or any toothless hillbilly stereotype, access to dental care is a dangerous culture divide that might look like a class gap but is deeper and far more serious.

There are so many young people in the U.S. who are not in school, or working, or training for work, that there’s a name for it. They are ‘disconnected youth’ and West Virginia has one of the highest rates in the nation - 17 percent. It’s a tough group to track down because there’s a stigma attached to this status. However, a few programs are trying to bridge this gap - to connect with young people and give them a pathway and support to train for a job and a career. On this episode of Us & Them, host Trey Kay explores why some young West Virginians struggle so much to move forward, and we'll hear from a few Mountain State leaders who talk about how we might help them.

West Virginia has trouble keeping people. In the past decade the state has lost more than 3 percent of its population. There were more deaths in the state than births, and more people left the state than moved in. It leaves a lot of people wondering what the future of the Mountain State will be. Demographic changes from one census to the next shows some of the costs. West Virginia will soon lose a congressional district as a result, but there are other consequences. West Virginia is older than most states and its young people are leaving. However there are efforts to stem the tide. One goal is to remake the Mountain State into the Start Up State and to attract and keep a new generation of remote workers to call West Virginia home.

Our country is seeing a new flavor of partisanship. We practice a tribalism that’s so intense and personal, it defines much of our life. Who we call friends. Which family members we relate to. Even, how we cast our vote. What drives the divisions between us? On this episode of Us & Them, we ask how central a lack of trust is to this polarization. After a year of extraordinary social, racial, political and economic upheaval, some people say they’ve lost trust in one another, our institutions and our government. Polls show distrust is as high as it’s been in six decades. What do we risk if we’re unwilling to trust in our fellow Americans?

The pandemic has taught us the value of the internet; for work, school, even to order the essentials of life. The past year has also exposed the brutal realities of the digital divide. Access to reliable, fast internet is essential for city and country dwellers. In this episode of Us & Them, we’ll hear about the internet challenges from residents of rural Pocahontas County, West Virginia. Its stunning rolling farmland is home to the Green Bank Observatory, a high tech facility that can communicate with distant planets. Despite more than a decade of federal initiatives across the country, internet service in this isolated area cannot match speed with grazing cows or is nonexistent. One customer there calls it “dependably unreliable.”

After more than 10 years of federal money and a lot of inaction, we look at why high-speed internet service hasn’t found its way into more rural West Virginia homes.

It’s been a year since the coronavirus started a global pandemic. A third of Americans now know someone who has died from COVID-19. The virus has forced daily decisions to stay healthy and safe. We’ve accepted a level of isolation into our lives - distancing from people and staying at home as we can. And we’ve seen medical researchers develop treatment measures and new vaccines.

In this episode of Us & Them, we revisit some of the people Trey Kay met over the past year. Teacher Tega Toney explains what she’s learned along with her students and colleagues. Trey checks back with the family of Eli and Amy Snell to see how their five kids are doing with remote classes. And we’ll catch up again with traveling ICU nurse Eva Crockett who’s spent the year moving from one hospital to another to treat COVID patients.

The COVID-19 vaccine continues to roll out but there’s no obvious fix for other long term medical consequences of the pandemic. A recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows the deadliest year ever for overdose deaths in the twelve months between June 2019 and June 2020. Lethal overdoses were up by 20%. Isolation, anxiety and boredom, three triggers for drug abuse, have created the so-called mental health ‘shadow pandemic.’ And for West Virginia, an existing shortage of healthcare professionals means there are not enough workers for hospitals, clinics and treatment centers that are seeing more patients in distress.

COVID-19 numbers show the pandemic has hit Black and Brown people hard. The coronavirus is about three times more likely to put African-American and Latino people in the hospital and they are twice as likely than whites to die from COVID. The reasons for this disparity are as old as they are complex. Inequities in health care are rooted in the historical racism of our institutions. They are part of the reason some people of color don’t trust public health efforts or the healthcare industry in general.

Older people are the most vulnerable to COVID-19. That’s a challenge when people in their 60s, 70s and 80s are full time caretakers for grandkids. The opioid epidemic has made more than 2.5 million children nationally part of a ‘Grandfamiliy,’ a household headed by someone over 60. Social distancing isn’t an option when grandparents are tending to diapers, making meals and overseeing homework full time. Some are even essential workers. And COVID has only exacerbated opioid addictions and deaths. Through it all, families are still coming together to give their kids a home.

It’s been nearly a year since COVID-19 came into our lives. It’s changed everything and forced all of us to stop and reconsider how we live day to day. These considerations and adaptations are something the Us & Them team has carefully explored over the past year. The Story Collider podcast — a show that features people telling true personal stories about their relationship with science — has been listening to Us & Them’s pandemic reports and invited host Trey Kay to share a story about how he’s lived and worked through the pandemic. They wanted to know what’s helped him make sense and get clarity on this whole COVID -19 experience.

The coronavirus has changed everything. People around the globe have spent nearly a year sheltering at home, adhering to restrictions and requirements to avoid the contagious COVID-19. Imagine what that experience is like for someone who’s homeless. If your only option for a warm bed is a group shelter, will you take it - or will you stay on the street? Across the country, shelters meet public health requirements to make congregate housing as safe as possible. On this Us & Them episode, we look at the challenge people face when deciding how to shelter from the virus.

2020 presented new levels of outrage over police killings of Black and Brown people in this nation. Police killed George Floyd and Breonna Taylor which prompted protests, marches and rallies to denounce racially motivated police brutality. A Black Lives Matter march in Kingwood, West Virginia set up a flash point for that tiny town. Black protestors and their allies faced off with white people who say Kingwood has no race problem. The angry white crowd outnumbered BLM marchers and showed the raw seam of rage that has come to define racism in this country. In this Us & Them episode, host Trey Kay speaks with one woman pushing back at the fear and outrage of racial hatred in America.

2020 has required a lot from us all. It’s been a year of challenge and adaptation. Us & Them host Trey Kay recalls the line in a holiday classic “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” that says, “we’ll have to muddle through somehow.” None of us had any idea how much muddling 2020 would demand. We’ve faced the pandemic and its consequences and a contentious national election that highlight the divisions in our nation. The year presented a series of choices with a clear outcome: sink or swim. Moving ahead, Trey looks at the adaptations he’s made and which he might adopt long term. Oh, and spoiler alert: he’s learning to like swimming outside in ice water!

This year has tested us in many ways. Restrictions and stay-at-home orders prevent people from sharing familiar traditions and worshiping together. Some say the coronavirus has tested their faith and beliefs. Not only do they mourn those who’ve died, they miss gathering with their congregations, whether it’s in a pew or kneeling on the floor for daily prayers. Many churches, mosques and synagogues now offer online services in a virtual realm, which can open new doors. Faith practices in the time of COVID-19 look and feel different, but how has the virus changed our spirituality?

2021 will offer us all some new beginnings. Political leaders take office with the prospect of a COVID vaccine on the horizon. However, millions of people are reeling from the economic consequences of the pandemic. Millions more are angry over the election outcome. How do we move our democracy forward? Our Us & Them virtual dinner party is back - this time, for dessert. Our guests, from across the divide, will talk about how honest, open conversation can help us come together.

This is a season when many people turn to family, friends and food. As we enter the end-of-the-year holidays, group celebrations are discouraged to reduce COVID-19 infections. We are in uncertain times, dealing with many things that are out of our control. A contentious election and a global pandemic leave us divided and apart, while searching for comfort and familiarity. While food traditions have changed this year, they can still bring joy. Our cuisine shares our legacy even when we aren’t physically together. On this episode of Us & Them a look at how people across the country seek to connect with others by adopting new food traditions.

The coronavirus has divided the world’s workforce into some new categories. White collar workers are remote employees who can do their jobs from home. Blue collar workers are often essential, front-line workers who must show up on the job to keep the supply chain and service industries moving. Essential medical workers keep our hospitals and clinics open. And there’s another group of workers on which the success of all the above — and some argue our very economy — rely: child-care workers.

Early on in the pandemic, many states declared day-care facilities to be critical care sites and ordered them open to care for the children of our essential workers. Months later, those businesses face continually evolving regulations designed to keep children and workers safe. The success of our services and our economy is banking on them.

The 2020 presidential election has offered a host of unexpected twists and turns. The candidate’s varied approaches to campaigning during a pandemic. The president’s own COVID diagnosis. The death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and a fast confirmation process for her successor just before election day. A record number of citizens participated in this election. However, the process highlights and confirms our divisions. As votes are counted and winners declared, it’s possible that some Americans will dispute the outcome — clear evidence of the “Us & Them” all around us. So how do we move forward?

Keep politics away from the dinner table! This year’s contentious campaign season offers fresh reasons for that advice. But Us & Them host Trey Kay decided to host a virtual dinner party with guests whose politics reach across the divides. They came to the video chat potluck showing off some family favorite foods. The guests were ready to disagree and see how the conversation would go. Along the way there were some good meals… honest conversation… and even a few surprises. Join us for the dinner party and you’ll also get recipes from Trey and his guests!

The 2020 political campaigns are in high gear and the elections are just weeks away. This year, one West Virginia man watches from the sidelines, knowing what it’s like to put on a statewide campaign. Four years ago, Bo Copley was an unemployed miner who got the chance to ask then-candidate Hillary Clinton a question that resonated with many people. In 2018, Copley waged his first political campaign for the U.S. Senate. A new documentary, “The Campaign of Miner Bo'' airs this fall on many PBS stations and shadows Copley’s unsuccessful run for office and the things he learned from the experience. Documentary filmmaker Todd Drezner, a New Yorker who voted for Clinton, tells the story of the unlikely candidate as a way to learn about a West Virginian who voted for Donald Trump.

For this episode, Us & Them host Trey Kay has a talk with Copley and Drezner.

The coronavirus has created an economic nightmare. About a million jobs have disappeared in six months and more layoffs are likely this fall. In West Virginia, the pandemic doubled the state’s unemployment rate. That means 75,000 West Virginians are looking for work. Many of those searching for work are young people who’ve just graduated. How are employers and educators dealing with this disruption? Are students redefining their hopes for the future? We’ll look at the training that can match workers with jobs.

Black and Brown people in America continue to die at the hands of police officers and that's created a season of hate. George Floyd’s killing ignited a sense of racial outrage that has spread around the world. U.S. cities continue to see protests against police brutality and riots over racial injustices. We’ll hear about a new podcast “Sounds Like Hate” that looks at racial extremism, white power groups, the DNA of hate in America and specifically, the story of a woman who walked away from her life as a white supremacist.

The coronavirus confronts every aspect of our society - with our health care systems front and center in the crosshairs. When hospitals canceled nonessential medical procedures at the beginning of the pandemic, it created an economic free fall. U.S. hospitals have lost $200 billion dollars and laid off nearly a million workers. Urban hospitals and clinics have faced a run on equipment and supplies. While rural facilities have seen fewer COVID-19 cases, they took the same hit to their income and revenue. Now the question may be - just how healthy is our health care system and which institutions will survive to help redefine the future of medicine?

The race is on to develop a vaccination that can bring an end to the coronavirus pandemic. Researchers around the world are working on an immunization to slow or stop the outbreak. As that effort ramps up, there’s clear evidence that childhood vaccination rates for existing infectious diseases have plummeted. Parents and families have postponed or cancelled routine healthcare appointments fearing COVID-19 contagion. Standard immunizations for diseases like measles, mumps, diphtheria and pertussis are down between 40 and 50%. Whether we’re talking about a coronavirus vaccine or standard childhood disease prevention, some - people are eager to get vaccinated while others refuse. How are people likely to respond to a COVID vaccination when it’s finally developed?

At the peak of the opioid crisis, drug companies sent 12 million hydrocodone pills to Kermit, West Virginia - a town of about 350 people. Cars would line up at the one pharmacy with people waiting to pick up pain pills. The so-called pain clinics of a decade ago are gone. In their place, a continued need for addiction treatment and recovery resources. Lawsuits against big pharmaceutical companies continue to bring in settlements, but so far, Kermit hasn’t seen any money from the litigation. We head to Mingo County to see how the community is healing and what the future might look like.

COVID-19 forces big changes in our society and for our medical systems. When patients with mental health conditions are forced to stay at home isolated, the resulting social distancing can be particularly dangerous. Counselors and therapists are just learning how to use virtual care and teletherapy to support their patients. One group of disorders, eating disorders, can affect a person’s physical health. If they’re left untreated, these conditions can become fatal. We’ll hear how one doctor treats her patients virtually, and helps them stay healthy.

Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the liberal wing of the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down a Louisiana abortion law. The narrow decision may be a relief to abortion rights supporters, but political watchers speculate the ruling could ignite voters in November. It may bring out those who favor a presidential candidate determined to curtail abortion rights.

The Louisiana case was something the Us & Them team was aware of last November when we released an episode called “Abortion Divides.” Last week, we learned the Public Media Journalists Association honored our program with a national award. We’re delighted to have our work recognized by our peers in the public media universe.

To acknowledge this recent honor, we are reposting this episode just as we released it back in November 2019. It captures some of the passion people bring to the issue - but it also brought together two women on opposite sides who found more common ground than they -- or we -- expected. We hope even though the subject of abortion is emotionally charged, people can find a way to speak civilly about their differences.

COVID-19 has forced millions to stay at home for months. Isolation can feed anxiety and depression and now tens of millions of Americans say that potent combination threatens their mental health. Calls to help centers and suicide hotlines are up in what some call a shadow pandemic. Nearly a quarter of Americans have applied for unemployment insurance since March, when the pandemic forced businesses to shut down and people to stay home. Studies show a correlation between unemployment and suicide. In the past few months, counselors and therapists have shifted to tele-health, using phone and video chats to connect with patients and clients. Some say the changes offer a new set of clinical options that could change the way we define therapy in the future.

Much of the recent work of our Us & Them team has focused on our day-to-day experience as we live through a global pandemic. But we need to shine our light on the deadly consequences of police

brutality. Racial inequality is America’s most toxic “us and them” issue. George Floyd died from a Minneapolis police officer’s chokehold. Police officers in Louisville shot and killed Breonna Taylor. Officers in Atlanta shot and killed Rayshard Brooks. The reactions to those and other killings have resulted in peaceful protests AND violent riots across the country. Those actions have prompted several Us & Them listeners to request that we re-post an episode we produced two years ago. It’s called “The Black Talk.” In the light of all the calls and demands for change in the matter of racial equality, we are going to honor that request and repost the episode as it was originally released on February 28, 2018. Here’s to the dawning of a time, when this kind of “Black Talk” can become a historical footnote.

The coronavirus highlights many of our vulnerabilities, including the system we use to get food from the farm to the table. Lately, the pandemic has forced U.S. farmers to face the unthinkable. They plowed under perfectly good vegetables when schools and restaurants shut down and their market vanished. Livestock producers have euthanized hogs and chickens. They couldn’t get the meat to consumers when workers got sick and packing plants closed. The growing season also brings migrant workers to U.S. farms. They come for jobs they need. But this year, some come wearing face masks, worried they may take the virus home to their families.

It’s about 10 weeks since the coronavirus pandemic shut down much of the country, including West Virginia. While state officials are now reopening businesses, the pandemic is far from over. Seventy-eight West Virginians have died due to COVID-19. 250,000 unemployment claims have been filed. But the pandemic has exacted another toll — it’s fractured many of the state’s healthcare institutions. When the state was in quarantine mode, hospitals delayed and canceled many medical procedures. People shied away from elective surgeries that are just the kind of procedures that make money for hospitals. As a result, revenues are down and some health care systems have laid off staff to keep costs down. Recently, WV’s Governor lifted those restrictions to allow elective medical procedures. As medical systems come back on line, Trey speaks with Dr. Clay Marsh -- WV’s “COVID-19 Czar.” He sees the pandemic as an opportunity to fix the parts of the state's healthcare system that are failing some West Virginians.

West Virginia’s 2020 school year, from kindergarten through college, is wrapping up unlike any other. In recent years, Mountain State communities have been devastated by man-made crises and natural disasters, but nothing has affected the state’s education system like a world-wide pandemic. The coronavirus forced an extended Spring Break in March that quickly became a season of virtual classrooms and distance learning. Teachers have converted lessons into online assignments. Parents juggle their work with home-based tutoring. And schools deliver millions of meals to low-income students. As this truncated school year comes to an end, we hear from West Virginia families trying to make it work and teachers who say they’re learning valuable lessons they will use in the future. But we’re all learning something unfortunate; during a pandemic, all students aren’t equal.

Ten years ago, the Upper Big Branch Mine exploded in West Virginia. 29 men died and an investigation uncovered that a legacy of overlooked safety measures contributed to the disaster. A new play called “Coal Country” focuses on the stories of the men and their families. It aims to put a spotlight on prejudice against the rural working class… to bridge a divide between city dwellers and those who work with their hands underground. Co-creators Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen interviewed the families and the production weaves their words with the music of Grammy-award winner Steve Earle to help people understand another America.

The coronavirus pandemic prompts many reactions from people. Some people can be overwhelmed with fear and anxiety. Others step up to help where they can. U&T host Trey Kay splits his time living in West Virginia and New York. A few weeks ago, he got a message from someone trying to help Eva Crockett, a West Virginian traveling nurse looking to help treat COVID patients in New York City hospitals. This person wanted to know if Trey could help Eva find a place to stay in the Big Apple. Trey ran up a “Bat signal” on social media -- asking his New York friends for help. The response was overwhelmingly positive. For Trey, New Yorkers helping a West Virginian who was willing to help New Yorkers felt like an “Us and Them” moment.

A global public health crisis in the form of an invisible virus, now officially divides us from each other. We’ve learned to call it ‘social distancing.’ But the coronavirus is creating or reopening many layers between us and them. There are divides between workers: some must show up while others work virtually and millions more have lost their jobs as businesses shutter and the economy grinds to a halt. Families see divides as they decide how many generations can safely live under the same roof. And the government creates divisions as national, state and local leaders have different responses to the pandemic.

In many cities and towns, there are people in charge, and there are people who get things done. Joe Slack is an instigator for community change in West Virginia’s Upper Kanawha Valley. He sees the needs in his region, one that’s been hit hard by one economic disappointment after another. But Slack is a self-described squeaky wheel. He connects people, helps identify realistic opportunities and then works to make things happen.

Appalachia is a unique region of the country. Its namesake mountain range boasts a tangle of thick forests where the economy has relied on forestry, manufacturing and mining for jobs. The Kanawha River winds through West Virginia upstream from Charleston and was once a hotbed of mining operations and chemical plants. But these prime economic movers washed away in what two local mayors describe as an “economic tsunami.” At a time when the world is concerned with a virus that has killed people and created economic turmoil, Trey revisits a part of his home state that’s familiar with uncertainty. But it’s a place where the people find ways to keep going. He speaks with local politicians from one of the nation’s most rural states, who are looking to reshape the local economy one business at a time. This corridor is home to a ribbon of small cities and towns where people work hard to attract outside investment. That’s paying off with new ventures that are putting some people back to work.

Homelessness is one of the things that divides us in America. It’s an Us

& Them issue that can spring from, and inform our views on other social

topics. The number of homeless people nationally has dropped in the past

decade, but there was an increase between 2017 and 2018. A West Virginia man

saw a need and is trying to help. He owns and supports a homeless encampment

that gives people a place to live. At the same time, he balances the reaction

from local residents who worry about homeless people who are now, their

neighbors.

Chemical addictions and the opioid crisis have

divided millions of U.S. families. An addicted parent can abandon

responsibilities to their children. When a grandparent steps in to help, it

creates a new kind of family structure. Some call it a grandfamily. Addictions

can create a generational Us & Them divide in a household. It also

spotlights underlying financial issues that cause a strain between parents and

their adult children.West Virginia and other Appalachian states are

at the epicenter of this trend. But there’s a new effort called “Healthy

Grandfamilies.” It’s a training program designed to support grandparents when

they become caregivers the second time around.

There are now more students of color at some universities and colleges in the U.S. In the past decade at Western Illinois University, the non-white student population nearly tripled to one-third of the enrollment. The change helped fill classrooms and satisfy the school’s mission. But it’s part of what pushed the school’s first African-American president out of his job.

For this episode, we look at how campus diversity can divide a community and Trey has a conversation with Jack Stripling, Senior Writer at The Chronicle of Higher Education about his article, “Fear of a Black Campus: How an ugly campaign to force out an African American president exposed racial fault lines in a mostly white town.”

When we learn our history, we see things that reflect our past. Paintings of famous battles and statues of men who were heroes to some. But how we interpret our legacy changes. Time can warp our notion of a once righteous cause. There are examples around the world of ways we have edited our past. In the U.S., recent decisions to move Confederate monuments and take down Confederate flags. But the effort to cleanse the past is global. And in places with a much longer history, the disagreements can be

more contentious and complex.

For this episode, Trey travels to Skopje, North Macedonia to speak with locals about controversial statues honoring Alexander the Great. He also visits a cemetery in Corinth, Mississippi to visit the graves of soldiers decorated with the Confederate battle flag. Trey also examines the origins and evolution of the song Dixie.

North America’s early experiences with Us & Them come from our history with indigineous people. In the 19th century, a nascent U.S. government used treaties with Native tribes and nations to take land and resources. Those treaties relocated Native people to reservations. More than a century later, from 1950 - 1970, U.S. programs were still moving people around. Approximately 100,000 Native Americans were part of what one U.S. official called a “one way ticket from rural to urban poverty.”

For this episode, Trey speaks with reporter Max Nesterak about his American Public Media documentary, “Uprooted: The 1950s Plan To Erase Indian Country.”

Music can entertain and inspire, and it can be a path into another person’s world. On this episode, two different musicians with roots in Appalachia make music that spans the globe. Some of it carries a political message. One man takes his music to places where people struggle with war and disasters, as an offer of healing. The other uses his string band heritage to write songs that sound familiar but carry a message of change.

Democracy may need a reboot, or a kickstart. Pick your favorite term, but the fact is, our system of government requires our participation. When we lose trust, it suffers. “We the Purple” is a campaign designed to encourage engagement. Its partners will help tell the American story in a way that rewards active individuals who want to restore democracy’s foundations. What’s at stake if we don’t get it right? Very little, except political freedom, social and economic justice and our entire way of life. Trey speaks with “On The Media” host Bob Garfield about The Purple Project for Democracy.

Do you disagree with any of your close friends or family members about abortion? When’s the last time you actually talked about it? For many of us, the abortion debate defines Us & Them. Sometimes, it’s better to avoid the conflicts. State laws now include abortion restrictions. Next year, the U.S. Supreme Court hears a case that could change the right to legal abortion. We’ll hear from the protest lines and learn how some people who disagree, choose to talk across the divide.

Paying taxes is one of those things we just can’t avoid… except for the local tax measures we get to vote on. One of the best examples is school spending. When local school officials ask for additional money for new academic programs or school buildings, taxpayers must approve it. There’s one man who has worked with citizen’s groups in dozens of places to fight against more money for public schools. He’s been successful in many places and his efforts highlight the Us & Them in all of these communities. For this episode, Trey speaks with APM Educate producer Alex Baumhardt about her time getting to know the “Bond Buster.”

For decades, coal was king in West Virginia. It paid good wages, paid the bills for many local services through taxes, and kept small towns alive. But more of our nation’s electricity is starting to come from other sources like wind and solar power. Coal is losing out. This Us & Them episode brings us three tales of coal and its future in Appalachia. Two of those tales come from men who grew up in the same neighborhood street in Charleston, WV and now hold very different perspectives. One owns mines, the other is an environmental lawyer. Our third tale comes from a journalist who has covered the coal industry for decades. He says West Virginia needs to look at another energy player - natural gas - to determine its future.

We’re in the midst of the 2019 hurricane season, and people in the Bahamas are still digging out from Hurricane Dorian. In 2018 hurricane Florence hit the coast of North Carolina, which left 51 people dead and caused $24 billion in damage in the state. Disaster relief programs provide assistance to many, but in the U.S. some people are not eligible for any of that help. Undocumented migrant workers who harvest crops and perform other temporary jobs can lose everything when disaster hits.

For the past three years, the Us & Them team has tracked the case of James Means since the 15-year-old boy was shot and killed by 62-year-old William Pulliam on the East End of Charleston, W.Va. The case got national attention partly because Pulliam is white and Means was black.This week, the story came to a sad

unexpected conclusion.

Science and faith can offer a different perspective of the world... of life... and of what we believe. When you mix in a third ingredient - politics - the dynamic can become toxic. Whether you consider evolution versus creationism or the causes of climate change, there are people who say their religious beliefs make it difficult for them to have faith in science. However, some scientists say there is nothing in theology that separates them from their faith and beliefs. This episode looks at people of faith and people of science to find some common ground. Trey speaks with Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, a respected climate scientist, as well as a devoted evangelical Christian – two descriptions that some Americans don’t think naturally go together.

The Us & Them team has tracked the case of James Means — a 15-year-old boy who was shot and killed in Charleston, WV by William Pulliam back in November 2016. The case got national attention partly because Pulliam is white and Means was black. It was one of a number of shootings that focused on questions about

racial injustice in our legal system. Last month, Pulliam agreed to plead guilty to second-degree murder. A week later, he wrote to the judge and asked to revoke his plea. This week the judge called Pulliam into court to get a clarification.

Last spring, we put out an episode called “Farm Wars.” It was about Arkansas farmers' never-ending battles with “pigweed” or as some call it “Satan’s Weed.” It’s incredibly hard to get rid of. There’s a controversy in that state over a herbicide called “dicamba” that’s used to keep the weeds at bay, but has divided the farming community. For more than a year and a half, Us & Them host Trey Kay and his colleague Loretta Williams have tracked the Arkansas dicamba saga. In their last report, they told us that farmers and the state government had set some rules they hoped everyone could live by. Now, Trey checks in with Loretta and Arkansas Public Media’s Dan Breen to see how this year's growing season is going.

Spoiler Alert: There are a lot of “cupped” leaves on trees surrounding Arkansas soybean fields

For nearly three years, the Us & Them team has tracked the case of James Means - a 15-year-old boy who was shot and killed in Charleston, WV, by William Pulliam, who was 62 years old at the time. The case got national attention partly because Pulliam is white and Means was black. It was one of a number of shootings that focused on questions about racial injustice in our legal system. A week ago, it seemed like there was conclusion to the protracted prosecution, when Pulliam agreed to plead guilty to second degree murder. This week, he wrote to the judge and asked to revoke his plea.

MAD Magazine, once the touchstone of American satire and snark, is winding down its publication after 67 years. Trey says, as a kid, MAD’s adolescent-focused, subversive content helped him connect with his inner “wise ass.” It made him feel smarter and stupider at the same time. And now he’s trying to reconcile an Us & Them world without MAD firing its arrows toward the sacred cows of our culture.

For nearly three years, the Us & Them team has followed the James Means’ case - a 15-year-old boy who was shot and killed in Charleston, WV, by William Pulliam, who was 62 years old at the time. The case got national attention partly because Pulliam is white and Means was black. It was one of a number of shootings that focused on questions about racial injustice in our legal system. Pulliam’s trial was scheduled to begin late this summer, but instead there’s been a surprise outcome.

**Two men, one a British citizen of Pakistani heritage, and the other a former housing

police officer in the Boston area, were unlikely to meet, until the terror attacks of September 11th, 2001. But after the Bush Administration launched the War on Terror, Moazzam Begg was detained and held at the U.S. Detention Camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba where Albert Melise was a guard. You can’t get much more Us & Them than that. We’re rebroadcasting this episode, which was recently honored with a first place award for Long Documentary by the Public Media Journalists Association.**

U.S. immigration policies are very much in the spotlight recently with reports on conditions at some of the southern border detention camps and fresh concerns about children being held apart from their parents. Recently, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called these facilities “concentration camps” and was swiftly rebuked by people on the right and left. To be clear, the U.S. government holds immigrants -- who have entered the country illegally -- while they’re being processed. The question is: what do we call these places? Are they Detention centers -- as the government refers to them? Detainment camps? Is Ocasio-Cortez misinformed and perhaps, hyperbolic when she injects a loaded term like “concentration camp” into the discussion? To get a better perspective on this, Trey thought it’d be a good time to check in with author Andrea Pitzer about her book, One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps.

June is Gay Pride month across the U.S. and around the world. It’s a celebration of increased social acceptance and expanded legal rights. But as Trey has learned, despite that, there are still attitudes and even words that continue to cause pain. An Us & Them episode we called “Revisiting the Grand Palace” stirred up just such a reaction from Mark Yozie, a self-described proud, gay man living in the Mountain State. He was incensed at our story, and in this episode, he and Trey meet to talk things out. And we offer a tribute to “Maw Maw,” a gay man who was sent to a West Virginia mental institution in the 1960s for violating sodomy laws.

Two college freshman spend a night together. There’s inexperience, miscommunication and things go wrong -- really wrong. One of them calls what happened sexual assault, the other calls it rape. But together, they’ve found a remarkable way to recover, heal and learn. For this episode, Trey speaks with Stephanie Lepp, the producer of the podcast “Reckonings” about the story of Anwen and Sameer and one night that has changed their lives.

It’s a tough time to be a soybean farmer in the U.S. Soybeans are a $40 billion business in America, but crop prices plummeted last year because of the trade war between the U.S. and China. That has many farmers taking steps to boost their crop yields and effective weed prevention is one approach. For years, farmers kept even the stubborn “pigweed” at bay with herbicides like Monsanto’s Round-up. But over time, weeds become resistant to the chemical. Monsanto and other companies have another product that relies on a chemical called “dicamba,” which effectively keeps the weeds at bay. But, there’s a problem: dicamba can evaporate and drift from where its sprayed and harm other sensitive plants. In 2017, the drifting chemical damaged some three and half million acres of valuable crops. In this episode, Trey Kay and Loretta Williams travel to Arkansas to report on a simmering battle -- more like a civil war -- that pits farmer against farmer and forces them to consider the line between doing what’s good for their business and doing what’s good for their neighbor.

Two and a half years ago, an African-American teen named James Means was shot and killed in Charleston, WV. An older white man, William Pullman faces first-degree murder charges. The trial was scheduled

for this week, but instead, the Means family learned there's a new twist in the case. They talk with Trey and Lacie Pierson of the Charleston Gazette for an update.

In Charleston, WV back in November 2016, William Pulliam, a 62-year-old white man, shot and killed James Means, a 15-year-old African-American boy. The case made national headlines. Reports say during his confession, Pulliam told police, “The way I look at it, that’s another piece of trash off of the street.”

Trey has met with lawyers and others grieving such a loss. Multiple delays have pushed back Pulliam’s trial. One delay was to assess Pulliam’s mental competency, a move the Means’ family just doesn’t understand. In December 2018, Pulliam was finally declared mentally competent, and his trial is scheduled to start in early May 2019.

With so many delays, the Means family, has little confidence in the legal system. As the trial date approaches, they’re waiting for justice.

America has a drug addiction crisis. Recovery could take decades. Opioid addiction has hit

Appalachia harder than any region in the nation. This episode, Trey talks to Caitlin Esch, a reporter for The

Uncertain Hour podcast produced by APM’s Marketplace. Caitlin has spent years

tracking the challenges of the drug epidemic in Wise County, VA, where opioid

addiction, and now methamphetamine and cocaine abuse takes lives and devastates

families.

Measles cases have spiked in the first quarter of 2019 with

outbreaks in ten states. Vaccinations prevent many communicable diseases, but

measles is back. Epidemiologists believe it's because some parents do not

immunize their children. As a result, the so called “herd protection” from

disease that public health officials rely on, is weaker. The option to forgo

vaccinations varies from state to state and is based on laws that are different

across the country. Some states allow vaccination exemptions based on a person’s

religious or philosophical beliefs. However some lawmakers are rethinking their

vaccination policies because of the recent up tick in measles cases - and

they’re looking to an unlikely part of the country as a model: Appalachia.

In the winter of 2016, we told the story of Anne Kelly Skinner, a Charleston, WV lawyer, who was transitioning from male to female. As Anne's body became less dude-like and more womanly, she was pleased. However, she worried her voice wouldn’t match her new body. There are many physical challenges for transgender people, one that doesn't get a lot of attention is how a trans woman learns to sound like a woman. If a woman sounds like a guy, can she truly feel like a woman? We revisit Anne, three years later, to find out how she’s doing and if she has found what she calls, her femme voice.

As a West Virginia teenager, Amber Miller dropped out of school, took drugs and robbed homes. She wound up on the wrong side of the law and served time for a felony. In a youth correction center, she turned her life around, but after her release, had trouble finding a job to support her two sons. Like 8% of Americans with felony conviction, Amber had to “check the box” on job applications admitting to her criminal past. The felony on her record was like a ‘scarlet letter’ and most employers were reluctant to hire her. Amber was committed to change, but was society willing to give her a second chance? Trey speaks with Amber and West Virginia politicians about the state’s plans for helping felons get back into the workforce.

How old were you when you first learned that police may think of you as a threat?

You’ve never been told that?

Chances are you’re not African American. In this episode, Trey Kay examines “The Black Talk,” which is the sober conversation that many black families have with their teenage kids – particularly teenage boys – about how they should conduct themselves when stopped by the police.

Spoiler alert: Black parents, like any parent, want their kids to come home alive.

We’ll also learn from a chapter of Charleston, West Virginia’s Civil Rights legacy from a minister mentored by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Throughout history, men have been seen as the dominant gender. Why is this? Some assume the model goes all the way back to the primitive cave man. Others believe the gender pecking order was commanded by God. In this episode, Trey speaks with John Biewen and Celeste Headlee about their “Men” series for the "Scene On Radio" podcast. In this episode we dive deep into how, when and why men invented the patriarchy, and how it hurts everyone.

Moazzam Begg, a British citizen of Pakistani heritage, and Albert Melise, a former housing police officer in the Boston area, were unlikely to have their life stories intersect and become friends; but then September 11 happened.

After the Bush Administration launched the War on Terror, Begg was detained and held at the U.S. Detention Camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Melise was a Gitmo guard. You can’t get much more Us & Them than that.

It’s that time of year again, when Trey’s Twitter and Facebook feeds flare up with posts about a “War on Christmas.” Every year there’s hubbub over how saying “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” is TOO politically correct, or that a nativity scene doesn't belong on government property. Christmas traditionalists feel there’s an attack on this sacred holiday, while secularists seem bothered that this religious holiday has a privileged place in a country known for its separation of church and state. For this (mostly fun) episode, Trey and historian Adam Laats ponder the nature of this so-called “war.”

Back in the 1990s, Trey got into Culture Clash, a trio of Latino comedians who do social satire. He loved that they skewered public figures and poke sacred cows. Culture Clash enjoys making the audience squirm, no matter what part of the political spectrum they're on. Their critically acclaimed work in the 90s had to do with tension along the U.S.-Mexico border. Recently, they’ve been reviving and updating their pieces because – if you haven’t heard – news from the border is pretty relevant these days.

Last year, 72,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. A lot of those deaths -- about three-fourths -- were caused by opioid medication prescribed by doctors or substances like heroin obtained on the street.

A disproportionate number of the dead are from West Virginia. For several years, the state has led the nation in per-capita opioid-related deaths.

In this episode, hosts Trey Kay and Chery Glaser talk about the origins of the Appalachian drug epidemic. They're joined by Los Angeles crime reporter Sam Quinones, the author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic, and by Ian Kessinger, a former addict who now runs a recovery clinic in Elkins, West Virginia.

In 1974, a fierce controversy erupted over some newly adopted school textbooks in Kanawha County, West Virginia. School buildings were hit by dynamite and Molotov cocktails, buses were riddled with bullets, journalists were beaten and surrounding coal mines were shut down by protesting miners. Textbook supporters

thought they would introduce students to new ideas about literature and multi-culturalism. Opponents felt

the books undermined traditional American values.

Election season’s over, but we sure haven’t put politics behind us. Not with the holidays approaching. Some families avoid talking politics over the turkey, but other family gatherings descend into political fights. Trey takes us on a visit to a family with deep political divisions — but they also have a trick for keeping it friendly.

Political debate in this country has become anything but civil. Who do you blame? Nearly a third of Americans surveyed by NPR blamed “the media.” In this episode, Red State host Trey Kay goes to a Trump rally to see how reporters are treated, and Blue State host Chery Glaser talks with a West Coast journalist about how journalists should respond.

The midterm election results seem to deliver conflicting messages depending on where you live. In California, candidates were rewarded for opposing President Trump -- critics like California’s new Gov. Gavin Newsom won big. But in West Virginia, Sen. Joe Manchin was returned to office while siding with the president on key issues. What's going on?

Trey talks with Cherry Glazer of KCRW in California in the latest episode of “Red State Blue State,” our weekly chat between Trump Country and the Blue Bubble.

Researchers say science makes it clear that there's a direct, systematic way we should be teaching kids to read. But lots of people discount the science of reading. They say teaching kids to sound out words is boring, and kids will learn to read naturally if they're read to and exposed to lots of books. This is more of an angry argument than a polite debate. It's been raging for years. And there's a lot at stake. Millions of American adults are not proficient readers.

Trey talks with Emily Hanford about her radio documentary, “Hard Words.”

When we cast a ballot, it's personal. About as personal as it gets.

That’s easy to forget when we talk about big blocks of voters, like congressional districts or entire states.

So Blue State host Chery Glaser takes it to the personal level and talks with two voters.

In Southern California, Linda Rife is a music composer. She identifies as "liberal," but she’s registered as an independent.

In West Virginia, Deana Samms is a family therapist and an evangelical Christian. She voted for Donald Trump in 2016 but struggled with that decision.

The migrant caravan moving through Mexico is nowhere near the U.S. border, but it's smack dab in the middle of the nation’s politics. As we draw near the midterm election, this week's episode brings us views on immigration from Angelenos in the “Blue Bubble” and red-state West Virginians at a rally with Vice President Mike Pence.

According to the National Center for Health Statistics, in the last 2 years, 2 million people misused prescription opioids for the first time. “Steve,” a curious kid from New Hampshire, found his mom’s Oxycodone pills in the medicine cabinet and liked the way they made him feel. Before long, he wanted to see what the big deal was with heroin, and doubted that he’d become addicted. As it turns out, he got hooked on his first try. In this episode, we’ll hear Steve’s struggle to stay clean and how his addiction became a family affair. We’ll also hear his parents speak openly—at times, brutally--about the limitations of “being there” for an addict.

In the past, President Trump has called climate change a hoax. Then this week, Trump told 60 Minutes that he believes the climate is changing — but that the change isn’t caused by humans, and it will probably change back. Trump said the economy is more important than the climate, so trying to fight climate change makes no sense. He said it would cost jobs, and for no good reason.

These two related issues – climate change and energy jobs – get very different reactions in California and Appalachia. You’ll hear those reactions in this installment of “Red State, Blue State,” our weekly chat between Trump Country and the Blue Bubble.

West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin voted to confirm Brett Kavanaugh, President Trump’s pick for the U.S. Supreme Court. Manchin was the only Democrat in the Senate to cross party lines, and he did it in a very public way. Manchin’s vote didn’t surprise many Mountain State voters, but it left a lot of people in other states asking, “Why is he even a Democrat?”

That question came from listeners.

“Red State Blue State” is a collaboration between Us & Them and KCRW in Santa Monica, California. Each week until the midterm election, we’re presenting a new segment co-hosted by Trey Kay in West Virginia and Chery Glaser in Southern California.

Why did rural Americans love Donald Trump so much in 2016? Some say they’ve felt left out of the economic recovery. Others say the culture is changing in ways that makes rural people feel uncomfortable. Others say it was simply because Trump made rural people feel like they mattered. Trey talks with three journalists who live in rural places and report on rural issues talks with three journalists who live in rural places and report on rural issues. Trey asks what they're hearing from the people they talk with every day. Trey is joined by Tim Marema, editor of “The Daily Yonder,” Madelyn Beck, a reporter at Harvest Public Media, and Mason Adams, a freelance writer based in Appalachia.

There have been times time when the U.S. Supreme Court seemed to be apart from the partisanship that’s infected other government institutions. But President Trump’s choice of Kavanaugh -- and the sexual assault accusations against the him -— have sent Americans on the Left and the Right running to their corners. “Red State” host Trey Kay went to a Trump rally to talk to supporters and “Blue State” host Chery Glaser brings us the voices of fearful protestors.

If you really listen, we sound like two different countries: Red America and Blue America. Then again, most of us aren't listening. As we head into the midterm elections, WVPB and KCRW are teaming up to try to change that. “Red State, Blue State” is a weekly conversation between West Virginians and Californians about the issues that divide us. Trey co-hosts the series. Over the next six weeks, we’ll bring you “Red State Blue State” as an Us & Them extra.

We’re excited to announce that West Virginia Public Broadcasting has invited Us & Them to be a regular part of their radio programming. Starting this week, West Virginia audiences are going to hear stories about America’s culture divides -- many that our devoted podcast listeners have been enjoying since 2015 – but now… On The Radio!!! Can you tell that we’re excited?

The Village Voice and Billboard Magazine have compared Stephan Said to Woody Guthrie because uses his music to bridge divides between people. He's taken his guitar to war zones in Iraq, refugee camps in the Mediterranean and to ravaged Houston after Hurricane Harvey. When he gets to these places, he sits down with local folks to play music and help the healing begin.

The start of the football season has once again, seen players standing up, kneeling down or not showing up for the national anthem. Some see this as a question of patriotism, others as an issue of free expression. If it seems football has, perhaps unwillingly, become a platform for civil rights issues, well, keep it mind that didn’t start with Colin Kapernick but with James “Shack” Harris, the first African American to be named in the NFL as a starting quarterback.

Americans tend to sort themselves into tribes that share similar culture, ideas and values. Trey recalls kids at his West Virginia high school sorting themselves into different camps, and how the way one dressed was often a defining factor, right down to the shoes.

Are America’s schools hostile to religion? There’s been a tussle over this issue since the early 60s, when the Supreme Court ruled that prayer and school-sponsored Bible reading were unconstitutional. Since then, evangelical Christians have claimed that God and religion have all but been driven out of education and secular Americans, concerned about blurring the wall between church and state, have been vigilant over any erosion of that separation. The fact is religion has been a part of America’s classrooms ever since there were public schools. And before the court weighed in, some public schools welcomed preachers and priests and even rabbis into classrooms. They called it Weekday Religious Education. And here’s a surprise… a version of Weekday Religious Education is still going on today.

Things have changed in the old neighborhood. There are cool little restaurants and cafes, funky little shops and a vibrant art and music scene. On one side, you have the newcomers— people who came here to open new businesses and live in this trendy neighborhood. On the other side you have the old guard — the people who grew up here, before it was trendy, and have been watching the place they call home rapidly dissolve all around them. For this episode of the Us & Them, we look at the evolution of neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Chicago and New Orleans and learn how all of this change is anything but simple.

Hey, it’s Independence Day - the official birth of our nation! Watching fireworks on July 4th may be as close as some of us get to expressing a shared love of country with fellow citizens. As you very well know, there is a great deal of polarization in our nation. To work through many of our differences, we have to do more than just stand next to each other on patriotic holidays. In the spirit of celebrating our country’s founding and with the hope of encouraging the bridging of some of our nation’s divides, we’re re-releasing a piece that features a friendship between Vassar College professor, Hua Hsu and one of his more unconventional students, Dave Carrell, an Iraq War veteran.

Places like Lake Tahoe, Nantucket and Colorado ski country are playgrounds for the wealthy. To make the playground run smoothly, there’s a dire need for people to cook food, bus tables, clean rooms, mow lawns, manicure golf courses and operate ski lifts. It all works well until those same workers don’t have a place to lay their heads at night. For this episode, Trey speaks with a few journalists across the country, who’ve been reporting about a shortage of affordable living accommodations for workers in affluent vacation communities.

Trey Kay has observed how things have changed significantly for LGBTQ people where he lives in New York. But he’s not sure if anything’s changed in a more conservative place like West Virginia, where he grew up. A recent Pew survey shows that more than half of West Virginians believe the Bible is the literal word of God. An even higher percentage of Mountain State residents think homosexuality should be discouraged. Trey went back home to visit some old friends, and to see what it’s like to be gay in Appalachia today.

America and Iran used to be close allies, but since the Iranian Revolution began in 1979, the relationship has been akin to a bad divorce. After President Trump’s announcement to pull the U.S. out of the Iran Nuclear Deal, cable news has been abuzz with political pundits and foreign policy scholars reacting to the latest chapter of the tortured relationship. But there are Iranian and American love stories that have worked out. Trey’s friend Essi Zahedi risked life and limb to flee his country during the Iranian Revolution. His motivation for leaving wasn’t just about politics or religion, or fear for his safety. A major reason was to be with the American woman who captured his heart.

In today’s culturally polarized society, discussing whether the planet is warming and if humans have an impact on the climate is a topic that’s often avoided. Why? Because speaking about it can be akin to touching the “third rail” of religion and politics. Us & Them’s Trey Kay speaks with a person whose professional and personal lives revolve around the highly charged topic of climate change. Katharine Hayhoe is a respected climate scientist, as well as a devoted evangelical Christian – two descriptions that some Americans don’t think naturally go together.

As the United States works through what the American Medical Association describes as “the worst drug addiction epidemic in its history,” we revisit the story of Dimitri. This former junkie was delivered from a 27-year heroin addiction by a controversial treatment that seems to work miracles for people addicted to opioids. Since kicking the habit, he’s been an evangelist to other junkies, spreading the good news about the wondrous drug that instantly cured him.

Back in 2015, we aired an episode called “Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is” that didn’t go over so well with a bunch of our listeners. We received messages saying that Trey mishandled a conversation between a physicist who defends climate science and a former public school teacher who’s an evolution skeptic. With the hope of finding a better way around the culture war aspects of science debates, we’re putting that episode (and ourselves) under the microscope.

As promised, we are posting some additional segments from our last episode, My Friend From Camp that we just couldn’t fit in. If you haven’t heard that episode yet, by all means, head over to your Us and Them feed and have a listen to that one first. These segments will make a whole lot more sense once you’ve heard the full episode.

Former Guantanamo detainee Moazzam Begg about the meaning of the term jihad.

Former Guantanamo MP Albert Melise explains why he wanted to re-enlist and go back to the island.

Andrea Pitzer, journalist and author of One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps, on whether or not she thinks the United States will ever face up to what was done at Guantanamo Bay and black sites around the world.

Moazzam Begg, a British citizen of Pakistani heritage, and Albert Melise, a former housing police officer in the Boston area, were unlikely to have their life stories intersect and become friends; but then September 11 happened. After the Bush Administration launched the War on Terror, Begg was detained and held at the U.S. Detention Camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Melise was a Gitmo guard. You can’t get much more Us & Them than that.

For a little more than a century, there’s been at least one concentration camp somewhere on earth. The fact that camps still exist and that humans can justify forcing other humans into such inhumane living conditions is the “us and them” dynamic taken to the most vile extreme. For this episode, Trey interviews journalist Andrea Pitzer, author of One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps. She says that the legacy of camps started in Cuba and continues there to this day.

How old were you when you first learned that police may think of you as a threat?

You’ve never been told that?

Chances are you’re not African American. In this episode, Trey Kay examines “The Black Talk,” which is the sober conversation that many black families have with their teenage kids – particularly teenage boys – about how they should conduct themselves when stopped by the police.

Spoiler alert: Black parents, like any parent, want their kids to come home alive.

Despite all the fuss about sex education in America, students get precious little of it. Jonathan Zimmerman, an education historian, tells Trey how Americans spend more time arguing about what kids should learn about human sexuality in schools than they actually do teaching anything about it.

On Friday, January 22nd, 2016, I was in New York City preparing to head to West Virginia. So was a blizzard called Jonas. The blizzard that took the East Coast by storm hadn’t hit by the time I rolled into in Harrisburg, PA. I was assured by meteorologists that I shouldn’t try driving down I-79 to Charleston, but that I could make it to Pittsburgh without encountering snow. This podcast tracks my experience on the Pennsylvania Turnpike between the Bedford and Somerset exits, and the TWENTY-SEVEN AND A HALF hours I remained there, trapped in snow.

What do you do when a panhandler hits you up for some money? Whatever your answer is, what experiences or facts inform your policy for giving or not giving? People have strong opinions on this. With this episode we try to separate the facts, suppositions and ideology.

Everyone knows the song "Amazing Grace." People who don’t

even consider themselves spiritual or religious find it meaningful. And

while John Newton penned the hymn to connect with Christians, it has

transcended religion and become a folk song and an anthem for civil rights.

But the origins of the song are just a bit more complicated...

Merriam-Webster declared that the word for 2017 is 'feminism.' The term was the most-looked-up on their online dictionary, and there were 70% more searches for the word this year than in 2016. Trey feels this couldn’t be more timely because this year, he’s seen women effecting a change in the balance of power in ways that he’s never experienced before. In a way, he sees the whole thing like an earthquake that’s been a long time in coming. He’s trying to wrap his mind around what the New Year might hold for the sexual misconduct “tsunami” the earthquake has unleashed. To try to get a handle on all of this, Trey sits down with his friends Lauren Schiller of the Inflection Point podcast and Nancy Giles of the CBS Sunday Morning Show and The Giles Files podcast.

We revisit the story of “Steve,” a young New Hampshire man that we met back in the spring of 2016. In our episode called “The Changing Face of Heroin,” we followed him and his father as he reported for the last visit of a court ordered drug rehab program. As you can imagine, kicking a powerful opioid habit isn’t easy, but in many ways our guy remained committed to the program. Sometimes, it was nearly impossible and during those times the strain on his family and loved ones was immense. For this new episode, we learn how everyone is doing more than 19 months later.

On November 21, 2016, William Pulliam, a 62-year-old white man, shot James Means, a 15-year-old African-American boy, after the two had an argument outside of a Dollar General Store in Charleston, WV. The shooting conjured memories of the death of Trayvon Martin after it was reported that in his confession, Pulliam told police, “The way I look at it, that’s another piece of trash off of the street.” In this episode, Us & Them host Trey Kay works to understand who are Means and Pulliam, but moreover, what can this senseless killing tell us about race relations in small town America in 2017.

Trey speaks with journalist Linda K. Wertheimer, the author of Faith Ed: Teaching About Religion In an Age of Intolerance. In her book, she has a chapter titled “The Church Lady,” where she recounts her experience of her family moving from western New York to a town in Ohio. The Wertheimers were the only Jews in that community. Linda and her brother felt confused and ostracized when a lady came to their classroom each week to lead a class that felt less like social studies and more like Sunday school. Linda recalls all of her classmates singing, “Jesus Loves Me,” but she was the only one who didn’t know the words.

High-profile confrontations between African-Americans and police officers have fueled tensions across the country. West Virginia is NOT a place where people are comfortable talking about these things. But in Trey's hometown of Charleston, some of the key players are now bringing this tension out into the open.

Errol Randle is a cop in Charleston, WV. He thinks police have to do more than arrest bad guys: they should also help fix struggling communities. He champions a program that encourages officers to resettle among Charleston’s high crime neighborhoods. While some residents welcome the boots-on-the-ground, embedded police presence, others are suspicious.

At a time when the President of the United States questions the patriotism of African American football players protesting social injustice, we present the civil rights struggle of another African American who, nearly 50 years ago, broke a color barrier in the NFL -- James “Shack” Harris, the first black player in history of NFL to earn a job as starting quarterback.

Like many from his state, Trey was weaned on the jingle “Coal is West Virginia!” For this episode, we meet two West Virginians who see the mining industry in completely different ways: one who believes coal is the lifeblood of the state's workers; the other who argues coal is to blame for keeping West Virginians poor.

Americans tend to sort themselves into tribes that share similar culture, ideas and values. Trey recalls kids at his West Virginia high school sorting themselves into different camps and how one dressed was a defining factor, right down to the shoes.

The tragedy in Charlottesville, VA makes us wonder if it’s possible to reconcile different versions of history. This episode features two American foreign correspondents of color who’ve sought to answer this quandary. They fly from Kenya to New Orleans to report on the angry protests over the dismantling of Confederate monuments.

When conservatives and liberals fight about school curriculum, the disagreements aren’t just about science and history. Even math has been a battleground in the culture wars. Also, Common Core was a hot button issue during the 2016 Presidential Campaign. Have you heard much about it lately?

Deanna McKinney’s been through one of the hardest things a parent can endure. Her teenage son was gunned down on her front porch by a kid looking to join a gang. Now she’s making meaning out of the tragedy by working to ensure a better community for the daughter her son left behind.

Everyone knows the song. People who don’t consider themselves spiritual or religious find it meaningful. John Newton penned the hymn to connect with Christians, but it has transcended that and become a folk song and an anthem for civil rights. The origins of the song are complicated -- Newton was a slave trader who did not renounce slavery until long after he wrote it.

Not that long ago, you could get locked up for being gay. A West Virginia man tells Trey about being sent to a mental institution for violating sodomy laws. While standing in front of the historic Stonewall Inn in NY’s Greenwich Village, gay activist Brendan Fay tells Trey how things have changed over the past five decades for LGBT people in America and around the world.

After four years of commanding a tank in Iraq, David Carrell, a Republican from Texas, had the opportunity to study at a liberal college in the northeast. He tells Trey what he’s observed about Red and Blue America.

When a neighborhood transforms, newcomers can feel unwelcome, while longtime residents feel threatened. But is there a sweet spot when everyone in the community lives in harmony?

Empathy... it's a word we've heard a lot in the past year. But what is it? And do we need it? Trey explains what he learned about empathy from... a textbook!

North Carolina repealed its notorious bathroom law, but not necessarily for the better. Transsexuals remain outside NC’s equal protection laws—whether in the bathroom or in the workplace. All of this has got me thinking about my friend Anne Kelly.

Essi and Katie fell in love before the backdrop of the Iranian Revolution and growing antipathy between America and Ayatollah Khomeini. Despite many fantastic twists and dangerous turns, their love has triumphed over archenemies' hatred.

Where some Trump supporters have been loud and proud, others have remained in the shadows. With the new boss installed, it’s “olly olly in come free!” Trey speaks with Trump voters about their hopes, dreams and expectations.

An Us and Them conversation turns ugly and Trey loses it. He becomes concerned about with his physical, mental and spiritual health.

The 2016 presidential campaign was one of the most brutal in America’s history. Trey was stunned by the outcome and is trying understand what the whole thing means. Are truth and bitter reality the new Us? Have our news sources become Them?

Mary Lou Bruner, who made headlines with her wild accusations about President Obama, is running for Texas State Board of Education. If elected, she’ll be responsible for guiding the nation’s second largest public school system. Could she influence the content of textbooks across the nation?

Something has shifted in the way our society thinks and talks about heroin addicts these days. Could it be that smack users seem more like ‘us’ and less like ‘them’?

Dimitri Mugianis has an undying love for drug addicts. He's a former junkie who's been clean for a decade. Now he feels a calling to help other addicts -- "my people," he calls them -- by using unconventional “shamanistic” treatment methods.

Anne Kelly always felt like she was born into the wrong body. She began life as a man, but is now transitioning into a woman. She’s got the looking like a woman part down. It’s the sounding like a woman thing that’s harder than she expected.

In 1969, James “Shack” Harris became the first African American quarterback to break the color line in the NFL.

How 27 hours of being snow-bound on the Pennsylvania Turnpike helps Trey file a report to the Keystone State’s “Office of Lessons Learned.”

Veteran journalist – or “cultural anthropologist” – Scott Carrier speaks with people fleeing war-torn Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries as they seek refuge in Europe.

Some feel there’s an attack on this sacred holiday. Others are bothered that this religious holiday has blurred America’s church/state separation. But is this really a war?

With acts of terrorism in Paris and San Bernardino, some Americans are suspicious of Muslim neighbors and immigrants. Warranted fear or paranoia?

Would Americans vote for an atheist president? A recent poll says no way. In this episode, a social psychologist tells us why this might be.

Jesus said, “Love your enemies." Today’s politicians ask God to bless America, but in the same breath, they call their political opponents "enemies." Labels help us organize the world along fault lines, but is this the best policy? In a polarized America, is it possible to love our enemies?

Not that long ago, you could get locked up for being gay. A West Virginia man tells Trey about being sent to a mental institution for violating the state’s sodomy laws.

Can we reconcile different versions of history? Two American foreign correspondents of color fly from Kenya to Louisiana to report on an unfinished civil war back home.

A recent photo essay depicting Appalachians has stirred controversy in that region. Some locals feel violated when outsiders come into their communities snapping photos. Are these shutterbugs depicting reality or reinforcing stereotypes?

When conservatives and liberals fight about school curriculum, the disagreements aren't just about science and history. Even math has been a battleground in the culture wars. Trey talks with historian Christopher Phillips.

Lots of American school districts have fierce fights over what kids should learn in school, but nobody fights like Texans. And no citizens have had a bigger impact on what goes into public school textbooks than Mel and Norma Gabler.

The Supreme Court says you can't have organized prayer in public schools. But most Americans don't agree with that call -- and some people are still finding ways to make sure public school children have a chance to hear about God.

Two men with strong opinions about evolution and climate change are willing to lay their money on the line.

The Condederate flag and the song "Dixie" -- two enduring Old South icons that make us wonder if the war ever ended.

The chair of the University of Minnesota's program for Sexual Health Education tells Trey most sexual health instruction focuses on adolescents and that maybe adults might also need some instruction.

Despite all the fuss about sex education in America, students get precious little of it. Jonathan Zimmerman, an education historian, tells Trey how Americans spend more time arguing about what kids should learn about human sexuality in schools than they actually do teaching anything about it.

If you give money to panhandlers, are you helping them or hurting them? And do they really need help? People have strong opinions. We try to separate the facts from the ideology.

Americans' attitudes toward gay relationships have changed dramatically in a short time. Trey Kay returns to his home state of West Virginia to see how this change is playing out in a state where 53 percent of residents believe the Bible is the literal word of God.

In 1974, Kanawha County West Virginia was an early battleground in the American culture wars. The fight focused on what children should learn in school. This documentary won a Peabody Award and a DuPont Silver Baton in 2009.

Decades before same-sex marriage became legal, the Reverend Jim Lewis of Charleston, West Virginia sparked outrage by blessing the unions of gay men and lesbians in his church.

A blue state secular liberal and a red state conservative Christian have an unlikely friendship. And a slug burger.