Intelligence Agencies, Space Junk, Skydiving, Office Satire

How the US Intelligence Community Works Guest: Ryan Vogel, JD, Founding Director of the Center for National Security Studies, Utah Valley University The CIA, FBI and NSA released a declassified assessment over the weekend that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a campaign of cyber hacking and fake news to undermine the 2016 presidential campaign and hurt Hillary Clinton’s chances of getting elected. President-elect Donald Trump got a more detailed briefing and his incoming chief of staff says Trump now accepts that Russia was behind the hacks. For weeks, Trump has been very critical of that conclusion and frequently blasted intelligence officials and agencies on Twitter. Also over the weekend, the president-elect named former Indiana Senator Dan Coats as director of National Intelligence, which is a position some of Trump’s advisers suggested was unnecessary, so it was unclear whether Trump would even fill it.  Just what does the Director of National Intelligence do? And to what extent are intelligence assessments a matter of opinion that Presidents and politicians can choose to accept or reject?  NASA’s Space Junk Problem Guest: Don Kessler, retired NASA Senior Scientist, Chairman of National Research Council Committee for the Assessment of NASA’s Orbital Debris Programs If you’ve ever gotten a chip in your windshield from a pebble on the freeway, you know the danger of high speed. So imagine the damage even a paint flake can do hurtling through space at seven times the speed of a bullet. A window on the International Space Station recently got a small crater from what was probably just that – a tiny flake of paint that came off a satellite or rocket. Earth’s orbit has become increasingly hazardous in the 50 years people have been sending stuff up there. Tens of thousands of pieces of debris are floating around up there, colliding to create even more debris, which pose a threat to the space station, shuttles carrying astronauts and satellites with important work to do.  Skydiving to Stay Grounded Guest: Erin Ptaschinski, Undergraduate Major Advisor, Academic Advisor in the Psychology Department, UC Berkeley, professional skydiver  Our next guest is a world record holder, along with 64 other women who flung themselves headfirst out of an airplane at 20,000 feet, then linked hands to form a snowflake formation as they fell, heads still pointing to the ground. It’s called vertical formation skydiving, and for Utah native Erin Ptaschinski, it’s a pretty dramatic way to relieve stress.  Workplace Satire: How to Look Smart in Meetings Guest: Sarah Cooper, satirical blogger and author of “100 Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings.” Meetings are workplace kryptonite for a lot of us. Ten minutes in, professionalism evaporates – we grimace, fidget, roll our eyes involuntarily anytime someone says, “Let’s take a step back here.” Or “Go back a slide.” Or when the meeting comes to a standstill so two people can check their schedules for the best time to set up another meeting. Each of these pet peeves appears in the book, “100 Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings.” It’s the satirical work of stand-up comedian Sarah Cooper. Fences and A Monster Calls Guest: Rod Gustafson, parentpreviews.com Denzel Washington hits the big screen again as an African American father who is struggling to know what to protect in an everchanging world. His movie "Fences" is now in theaters. DNA Injection Device Guest: Mike Alder, Director of the Tech Transfer Office, BYU; Brian Jensen, PhD, Professor of Mechanical Engineering, BYU; Jonathan Chichoni, CEO of Blöcks Imagine a device equipped with four million needles. They’re very tiny, mind you. But even four-million microscopic needles are bound to hurt. Luckily, this particular device is not meant for human torture. It’s meant for speeding up the process scientists use to inject DNA or other molecules into tiny cells for research.