All Things Considered

Monday through Friday, 3pm - 7pm; Saturday and Sunday, 4pm - 5pm

Melissa Block, Robert Siegel, Audie Cornish

Since its debut in 1971, All Things Considered has delivered in-depth reporting and transformed the way listeners understand current events and view the world. Every weekday afternoon, hosts Robert Siegel, Melissa Block, and Audie Cornish bring listeners breaking news mixed with compelling analysis, insightful commentaries, interviews, and special - sometimes quirky - features. WNIJ airs a one-hour edition of the program at 4pm on Saturday and Sunday.

Local Host(s):

Guy Stephens

Genre:

News/Talk

Composer ID:

5187f5a3e1c80ade92b5bd89|5187f57fe1c80ade92b5bceb

Chewing Chia Packs A Superfood Punch

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The chia plant is "a petite nutrient-packed powerhouse" writes Wayne Coates. There is evidence that the Aztecs used the seeds as early as 3,500 B.C.

Credit / Sterling Press

Credit Sterling Publishing /

Wayne Coates is a professor emeritus at the University of Arizona and an ultra-runner. He first encountered the chia plant more than two decades ago.

By NPR Staff

Originally published on Sun July 15, 2012 5:10 pm

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When you hear the word chia, you probably think of chia pets. Maybe you even mutter that catchy slogan: "ch-ch-ch-chia."

Or maybe not, but lately, chia seed has been getting buzz beyond those terra cotta figurines. It's becoming a popular health food. Rich in fiber, protein and the highest plant source of Omega 3s, the little seeds pack a major nutritional punch.

Wayne Coates grows and sells chia seeds and has a book called Chia: The Complete Guide to the Ultimate Superfood.

12:47 pm

Sun July 15, 2012

'Oklahoma!' Actress Celeste Holm Dies At 95

By Jeff Lunden

Originally published on Sun July 15, 2012 5:10 pm

Academy Award-winning actress Celeste Holm has died. A star on both stage and screen, Holm was best known for roles in Gentleman's Agreement, All About Eve and Oklahoma! She was 95.

Holm died early Sunday morning in her Manhattan apartment with her husband, family and close friends by her side. She had been hospitalized a couple weeks ago following a fire in actor Robert De Niro's apartment in the same building.

If there was one role that put Holm on the map, it was as the coquettish Ado Annie, in the 1943 hit musical, Oklahoma!

4:20 pm

Sat July 14, 2012

Miners Weather The Slow Burn Of Coal's Demise

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Credit Guy Raz / NPR

Equipment for transporting and housing coal sits idle in Cowen, W.Va. Since the natural gas boom, several mines in Webster County have either slowed or shut down operation, laying off hundreds of workers.

Credit Michael Tomsic/NPR

Rich Lewis worked as a miner for almost two decades before being laid off by Arch Coal. He says he's considering taking a job at another mine, but it's not certain that mine will stay open.

By Guy Raz

Originally published on Sat July 14, 2012 7:21 pm

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At some point today, you will probably flip on a light switch. That simple action connects you to the oldest and most plentiful source of American electricity: coal.

Since the early 1880s — when Edison and Tesla pioneered the distribution of electrical power into our homes — most of that power has come from the process of burning coal.

4:12 pm

Sat July 14, 2012

Pennsylvania Cuts Medicaid Coverage For Dental Care

Credit Erika Beras

Marcia Esters hopes charity will pay for dental work that Medicaid used to cover.

By editor

Originally published on Sun July 15, 2012 6:41 am

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Marcia Esters needs crowns fused to six of her bottom teeth and new dentures. But because of changes made to Medicaid in Pennsylvania, she now has to pay for it all herself.

"It's thousands of dollars' worth of work that I cannot afford," she says.

Esters also uses a wheelchair. Because she couldn't get get her teeth fixed, she has spent the last few months eating pureed food and avoiding people.

"I don't go anywhere unless I have to," she says. "If you could look or feel halfway decent, it just helps, it really does."

3:31 pm

Sat July 14, 2012

'Sunny Chernobyl': Beauty In A Haze Of Pollution

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Credit Manan Vatsyayana / AFP/Getty Images

Garbage litters the banks of India's holy Yamuna River on World Water Day 2010. For decades, the Yamuna has been dying a slow death from pollution. According to Blackwell, even its most ardent defenders refer to it as a "sewage drain."

Credit AFP / AFP/Getty Images

According to Blackwell, environmental problems aren't always caused by the presence of something toxic. They can also be caused by the absence of something. Take, for example, Brazil, where intense soybean agriculture has been inching its way into the Amazon, posing a threat to forested regions.

Credit Victor Drachev / AFP/Getty Images

The abandoned village of Vezhishche in Belarus sits within the exclusion zone established after the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster. The zone was one of Andrew Blackwell's first stops on his tour of the world's most ruined places.

Credit Peter Parks / AFP/Getty Images

The coal-centric economy of Linfen, China, has earned it a reputation for being one of the most polluted cities in the world.

Credit Elizabeth Dalziel / AP

Guiyu, China, is known for its electronics recycling workshops, but Blackwell says the town has a strangely rural, even agricultural, feel. "There are giant piles of keyboards, which reminded me a lot of bales of cotton," he says.

Credit Todd Korol / Reuters/Landov

Blackwell also visited the tar sands in Alberta, Canada, which would supply the oil for the controversial Keystone XL pipeline through the U.S.

Credit Victor Drachev / AFP/Getty Images

Credit /

Credit Lucian Read / Courtesy of Rodale Books

Andrew Blackwell is a journalist and filmmaker living in New York City.

By editor

Originally published on Sun July 15, 2012 3:04 am

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In some of the dirtiest places on Earth, author and environmentalist Andrew Blackwell found some beauty. His book, Visit Sunny Chernobyl, tours the deforestation of the Amazon, the oil sand mines in Canada and the world's most polluted city, located in China.

Blackwell says his ode to polluted locales is a bid for re-engagement with places people have shrunk away from in disgust.

Radioactive To Its Core

His first stop was the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster, Chernobyl.

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3:04 pm

Sun July 15, 2012