An Armao On The Brink

The news has been so intensely bizarre lately that we had to take a minute to talk about it all rationally. Former and maybe future President Trump is on trial for paying a porn star to shut up about their sex-capades, Trump won't shut up about jurors and witnesses despite a gag order, the press is catching flak  for giving airtime to Trump and writing about the jury. While meantime in DC Repu...

It’s been months since we have put the war in Gaza and the even longer battle rocking Ukraine on our agenda, but these awful conflicts have not died out and, in fact, are threatening to spread wider. I have teamed up with Wall Street banker Mark Wittman and International educator Jim Ketterer,  colleagues from the old WAMC Roundtable,  to talk about the suffering, the threat of worse to come and t...

Outspoken UAlbany students talk with Prof. Rosemary Armao about the mess Boomers have left them in politics, racial equality,  health, and climate control and about what they intend to do to change the world. This is a chapter full of smarts, passion and hope. Ethan Pausel is a Long Island native and a sophomore in biology at UAlbany. He hopes to be working soon on innovations in biomechanical eng...

Travel can literally transport you to a different place, take you out of time, and make you forget your troubles and the world's. Or it can go all wrong.  In this week's chapter veteran globetrotters Hawley Johnson, Drew Sullivan, and Aida Cerkez along with host Rosemary Armao tell funny, awful and exhausting stories about their worst bad trips.

Since 1966 Americans have enjoyed freedom of information, a right to access the documents and the workings of government. Since 2002 journalists have celebrated Sunshine Week during March as a reminder that transparent government is less corrupt and more responsive. That right is badly under attack right now. Bureaucrats hide and withhold documents, flagrantly and with impunity, many journalists h...

The envelopes are all opened, the gowns and jewelry packed back up but we're not done talking about the Oscars. Why do those gold statuettes matter, what do they have to do with real life, why should we care? Columnist/author Kate Cohen rewrites the big speech in Barbie, women's right activist Pamela Nugent scolds Oppenheimer for a missed chance at lobbying for peace, film enthusiast and s...

It's not only in the movies where it's hard to tell sometimes if behavior is heroic or reckless, inspired or foolhardy. Aleksei Navalney gave his life to oppose authoritarian rule in Russia -- but might he not have lived on in exile and done more? Wikileaks publisher Julian Assange went on trial fighting extradition to the US where he faces espionage changes that could put in behind bars -...

What if politicians were serious about solving America's screwed-up immigration system? Could it be done? What happens if Putin prevails in Ukraine after two years of war and dwindling opposition to him from the West? Is there any way to avoid the now routine crises of impeding government shutdowns? Political analyst and reporter Mary Ann Sharkey and investment banker Mark Wittman return for P...

What if China makes a move to take over Taiwan? What if Donald Trump wins a second term and begins to put into motion the scary authoritarian ideas he's talking about? What do we do then? Does America or Americans personally need a Plan B in case of a new Cold War or election catastrophe? Now is the time to begin planning according to Mary Anne Sharkey a veteran investigative reporter and poli...

Did you ever wonder what the point of reading was when you know you are going to forget everything about the book in your hands including maybe even its title within a year? Does it count as reading if you listen to the audiobook? Is reading a Kindle different from turning the pages of a real one?  Are book clubs fun or just a lot of pressure? If stranded on a desert island for an indeterminate ti...

Food critic Steve Barnes of the Albany Times-Union, Tiim Howland of Primal, Your Local Butcher, and nutrition professor and butcheress Emily Petersen defy all those vegans and vegetarians out there who have telling you that meat will make you sick, ruin the planet and promulgate cruelty to farm beasts. All lies. The latest chapter of Armao on the Brink is a hymn to animal protein timed nicely just...

Veteran Capital District columnists Fred LeBrun of the Times Union and Andrew Waite of the Gazette in Schenectady give us the low down on outmigration of citizens from New York and horrible handling of immigrants coming in. The also assess the many faults and a few graces of NY's first female governor and fantasize about who they'd choose as the ideal governor. 

Three experienced journalists dash and praise the media for how they did recently covering three big stories: the Iowa caucus, right-wing political attacks on universities, and, the really important one, Taylor Swift's sexuality.

Two Finger Lakes NY animal doctors dish on the real life of veterinarians from their high suicide rate to sky-high prices they charge, You'll learn the truth about doggy accupuncture, holistic veterinary practices, and pheremones for aggressive cats. Why is there a shortage of vets nationwide and did vets really prefer it when pet owners had to stay outside in their cars during the pandemic.

In the An Armao On The Brink Season Two Premiere, Bosnian writer & reporter Aida Cerkez talks with us about watching her country decline into authoritarian, divisiveness, violence and war in the 1990's. She warns us that it's happening in the US, in the Middle East and in Europe all over again. Is is already too late?

New York Master Gardeners talk about what keeps them busy during the state's long dark winters when weeding and watering are out. There's winter sowing and houseplants and composting with worms, not to mention skimming seed catalogs and concocting dishes with the herbs and vegetables you've just harvested. There's also worrying to be done about whether long dark winters are a thing...

Two deeply knowledgeable journalists with years working in and around Ukraine say the West doesn’t seem to fully get the stakes in the war there. The public and congress have lost interest but Putin hasn’t and he’s aiming to crush Ukraine and remake Russia. Failure to stay alert and to continue to thwart him puts the security of Europe and of the US at risk.  You can help in the effort to keep Rus...

You can express horror at an atrocious terrorist attack and you can reaffirm Israel’s right to defend itself. You are even allowed to express sorrow that civilians are getting killed in the process. But expressions of support and understanding for the Palestinian people caught up in Israel’s US-supported onslaught of Gaza are met with vitriol. Two guests on this week’s On the Brink are Palestinian...

Twenty years after his plagiarized and made-up stories in the New York Times scandalized the country as well as the journalism profession.., Jayson Blair talks about lying politicians, AI and deep fakes, and the steep price of media people don’t believe.. Now a life coach and podcaster, Blair speaks with insider’s knowledge about Donald Trump’s deceit and Charissa Thompson’s fantasy sideline quote...

Proving that they are better at nepotism than the Trumps, Armao sisters, sons, a granddaughter and the family matriarch take up mics this weeks. The older generation recalls memorable Thanksgivings from the past including how we got to watch. TV at the dinner table for the first time in 1963. Then the younger generation reveal the full story of how an after-dinner board game turned violet. You’ll...

We Boomers are pretty much leaving a mess to clean up for today’s college students and new voters. Three UAlbany students from around the state join On the Brink this week to talk about the burden of gun violence, the uncertainty of new technology, war, division, and lessons learned in the trauma of live shooter drills and the masked days of Covid restrictions  On the Brink is available on all the...

Election Day offers hope that with the right choices, things can change for the better. This week, three women journalists, ardent feminists, talk about choices on the ballot in November 2023, matters not on the ballot that should be—guns, and women’s rights left unresolved despite years of voting. Ann O'Neill is a retired journalist and award-winning long-form storyteller who haunted newsroom...

This week’s chapter of On the Brink is a special one, not about topical issues of the day, but about life and death and that lingering in-between our parents go through in aging and illness. Three daughters talk about what it takes to care for loved ones as they edge toward the brink, how hard it is, how important to do this job with graciousness while also trying to stay sane, how it can make you...

This week’s episode again — as it must — centers on looming war in the Middle East and ongoing war in the US House of Representatives but we also talk about new research on the old worries about fading memory. No, you DON’T have dementia. Yet. We have chosen Tuesdays as the best day to release new episodes. Our guests will be two fabulous journalists from my time at the Baltimore Sun. Like me, Can...

The debut episode. Lifelong journalist, and former WAMC Roundtable panelist Rosemary Armao hosts "On The Brink"; a podcast discussing the most important topics of the moment. Topics that are bringing society and culture to the brink of edge.  Former Washington Post editorial writer Joann Armao, and licensed nurse practitioner Lisa Armao join Rosemary for the first episode. This week the...