Public Affairs

Ever wanted to have a better understanding of our energy usage and its effect on climate change?

Bill Leighty explains carbon dioxide emissions, possible energy sources, and climate change in a clear, concise way.

“Climate Change” is our vernacular for five imminent dangers caused by humanity’s unrestrained combustion of fossil fuels: Rapid climate change (warming), ocean acidification, sea level rise, species extinctions, and violent human conflict. Arresting climate change will require nothing less than transforming the world’s largest industry: Energy – from 85% fossil to 100% renewable energy resources, as quickly as we prudently and profitably can. We can do this, but we need to hurry.

Bill was (and still is) a high school science fair nerd, holds two degrees from Stanford including a BS in Electrical engineering, serves on multiple boards, and is a principal with Juneau’s Alaska Applied Sciences, Inc. which is a renewable energy R&D and science education company.

Sponsored by the Juneau World Affairs Council

Recorded May 12, 2015

A forum exploring the costs of healthcare in Alaska and how they affect Alaska’s fiscal future. Panelists will discuss reasons for the high healthcare costs in Alaska and possible solutions to reduce them. Panelists include:

Presentations:

• Are Health Care Costs in Alaska spiraling out of control?
  • Mouhcine Guettabi, ISER, Assistant Professor of Economics
• Health Care Costs in Alaska
  • Deb Erickson, Executive Director of the Alaska Health Care Commission
• Healthcare Costs in Alaska
  • Greg Loudon, Insurance Broker and Health Benefits Consultant for Parker, Smith and Feek
• Customer-Driven Health: The Race to Wellness
  • Doug Eby, Vice-President of Medical Services, Southcentral Foundation

When the Middle East is in the news, it can be hard to understand the context. Paul Barker traces the history of Iran and their relations with the United States with remarkable clarity and optimism.

Paul Barker was most recently Country Director for Save the Children International in Afghanistan. He will share insights about opportunities for improving relations between Iran and the U.S. in the context of popular feelings towards America by most Iranians, negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program, the threats and opportunities posed by ISIS, and U.S. desire to end its military engagement in Afghanistan.

Recorded May 4, 2015

What is cyberwar? Why doesn’t mutually assured destruction work with cyber threats? And why did all the computers in an underground nuclear facility start playing rock music at 3:00 in the morning?

A fascinating exploration of how cyber attacks happen and how it affects governments and private enterprise.

Lawrence Husick is Co-Chairman of the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Center for the Study of Terrorism where he concentrates on the study of terrorist tactics and counterterrorism strategies, with a particular focus on technology leverage as a defining characteristic of the modern terrorist.

The Juneau World Affairs Council presents “Greenland and the Changing Arctic: Climate, Culture and Self-Determination” with Richard Caulfield. Caulfield is an author and the provost of the University of Alaska Southeast. His doctoral dissertation focused on aboriginal subsistence whaling in Greenland and cultural dynamics of natural resource use in the Arctic.

This presentation was recorded April 15, 2015 @360.

The Juneau World Affairs Council presents “Comedy, Economics & Carbon Tax!” with Yoram Bauman.

Bauman has a Ph.D. in economics, but got into stand-up comedy after writing a parody of an economics text book in grad school. He’s authored several cartoon guides to economics and does some formal teaching, but considers stand-up his “job job.”

Recorded April 1, 2015