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The AIH Transcript for December 7, 2016

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

CAROL OFF: Hello, I'm Carol Off.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Good evening. I'm Jeff Douglas. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

JD: Tonight.

CO: Take this job claim and shove it. Donald Trump has been very vocal about the number of jobs he saved at an Indiana plant. But I guess says the President-elect should save his breath.

JD: Did she blow it by not coughing up a former Liberal volunteer and entrepreneur turned down a ticket to an expensive Liberal fundraiser. Now she wonders if paying to play would have gotten her work.

CO: A lack of vision, after paying thousands for surgeries to treat her son's disease. A Toronto mother says the Ontario Government should see its way to covering the expense.

JD: Seeing the whole board. Former chess champion Garry Kasparov says it will not hurt Canada's strategic interests to impose new sanctions on Russia.

CO: Can’t just hand it a thimble and send it to a tiny room with a stack of tiny magazines. Instead an American entomologist has created a whole new way to collect sperm from honeybees and then he preserves it.

JD: And it's not a thumbnail sketch so much as an elaborate thumbnail portrait because that one very old nail belonged to a sailor on the Franklin expedition and analyzing it has revealed a surprising story about how he died. As It Happens the Wednesday edition, radio that looks forward to our guests offhand observations.

[Music: Theme]

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Part 1: Carrier union head, OHIP eyesight teen, honey bee sperm bank

Carrier union head

Guest: Chuck Jones

JEFF DOUGLAS: It's fair to say that Donald Trump likes to put on a show, especially when he's the star of said show. So it probably comes as little surprise that his announcement about keeping the Carrier factory in Indianapolis and saving more than 1,300 American Jobs was little more than a show. At least that is according to the union president representing Carrier employees. He doesn't call it a show though. But one of the words he's using does start with “Sh”. Chuck Jones is the president of the United Steelworkers Local 1999. We reached him earlier today in Indianapolis and a warning Mr. Jones uses some strong language.

CAROL OFF: Mr. Jones, if you would help us break down the numbers how many jobs will actually stay in the United States?

CHUCK JONES: Well, we'll talk about that in Indianapolis Carrier facility. There'll be seven hundred and thirty bargain unit, which is our members that will have a job here in Indianapolis and then the company also said they're going to retain another 70 other supervisory jobs and you know clerical and whatnot — so total eight hundred.

CO: And so how many and how many jobs did Mr. Trump say he was going to save at the time?

CJ: He was saying over eleven hundred. But the 350 research and development jobs were never going anywhere. In February, when company announced that they were moving a facility to Monterey, Mexico they made a statement that point time that research and development jobs were stay in here in Indianapolis about 350. So what Mr. Trump and Mr. Pence did they're taking credit for saving jobs that the company had already announced many months ago that weren’t going anyway. So what had happened when they came out prior to them coming into facility and announced that they'd saved eleven hundred jobs our people thought that they had got a reprieve and they are going to have a job. Only to find out no they don't. And I've got a major issue with that. They never gave us the numbers until last Thursday at noon when Mr. Trump and Mr. Pence came in to visit the plant. The company met with us prior to and they broke it down on how many jobs were going to remain.

CO: When you heard Mr. Trump made his make his announcement when he was there saying how many jobs he saved and how did you react?

CJ: I knew shortly prior to that that that was bullshit. That wasn't true. I didn't say nothing. I was thinking of a lot of things, but far as actually saying anything — no I didn't.

CO: You knew when he was saying it that it wasn't true?

CJ: That's correct.

CO: Well how did that make you feel?

CJ: That he's a liar.

CO: And would you have said that to him if you had the chance?

CJ: Yes I would have.

CO: But you didn't get the chance?

CJ: I didn't take the chance.

CO: But you were in the third row, did you feel tempted to say, “Hey wait a second?”

CJ: No. The people that some of them are losing their jobs and some of them are keeping jobs were in that room. And feel like that was a proper place to enter into a discussion like that and that we would be better served if we told our membership that day and the next day what the actual numbers was. That wasn’t time and place to do that.

CO: But you knew at the time and they didn't?

CJ: I knew at the time and they didn't, that's correct.

CO: How did you feel when given that these are your co-workers, your friends, and people who look toward you as their representative and you knew this wasn't true?

CJ: You know I knew it wasn't true. Two hours after we heard it and all I mean we met with the company at noon. He probably come on stage at 2:30 and you know why in the world would you get up here and basically lie and mislead the people?

CO: Why would you?

CJ: Why would you?

CO: Do you have an answer to that?

CJ: You have to ask him that. I don't know. Hell he's one that was tossing out false numbers not me.

CO: But he must have known that this was eventually going to come out?

CJ: Well, you know I can't answer for him. You know it's worked for him pretty much through the primaries and through the election process of saying one thing. He also got up there and said that he never made no promises to keep these jobs here in this country. And I watched a lot of his speeches because he was always entertaining. And he said numerous times if I was president, these jobs would not be going to Mexico. Now you're saying you never said it. Now you're not telling the people you know that 550 or you aren't going to have a job. I've got a problem that.

CO: We spoke with one of their workers at the Carrier plant, Paul Roell. And we spoke to him a couple of times before and after the election and he was he believed in what Mr. Trump was said he was going to do. He believed it was about Carrier. Do you think that some of the workers like Mr. Roell have changed their minds about Mr. Trump now that you've got the full story?

CJ: Well, no probably not. You know you probably take the majority of the 730 people that are safe and their jobs are going to stay here. You know probably are buying what he said. But I'm not damn sure you'd get the other 550 is not going to have a job to buy into what he said.

CO: Did you, can I ask how you voted? Or did you support Mr. Trump?

CJ: Yeah, how I voted. I've been voting for 40 some odd years and I held my nose and I voted for Hillary Clinton, probably one of the worst votes I've ever cast in my whole entire voting career. I wasn't giddy about her. By no means, but had come down to it in my opinion it was well I hate to say it, but choice of the lesser of two evils.

CO: The CEO of the company, United Technologies, which is the parent company or for your case yes he was on CNBC saying that the huge incentive was the amount of business contracts from the U.S. Defense Department that the company gets. He also said that they they're going to invest $16 million dollars in the factory in Indianapolis. But that's for automation to actually drive the costs of labor down to make it more competitive with Mexico, so that investment that they promised with this deals ultimately means there will be fewer jobs at your plant does is it not?

CJ: That is very correct. And you know we have been through automation before. You know and we never have stood in thw way because we know these companies got to be profitable so sometimes things come in automation. It costs our people jobs and we don't necessarily like it. But it's part of manufacturing.

CO: Do you think that day that the company will keep the jobs that is promised now to keep you think that eventually when all the heat is off it'll move the movie operations south?

CJ: My opinion is just speculated by all terms, but my guess would be in two years they're going to put in the $16 million, they're going to get automation in there and then once they get it up and running I wouldn't be surprised at all to see an automated process on these assembly lines moved to Monterey, Mexico.

CAROL OFF: Mr. Jones, thank you.

CHUCK JONES: Thank you.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Chuck Jones is the president of United Steelworkers Local 1999. We reached him in Indianapolis. And we have posted that interview to our website if you'd like listen again or share www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Jazz]

OHIP eyesight teen

Guest: Aiden Wellsman, Flora Wellsman

JEFF DOUGLAS: At first his vision was blurry, since then it has all been a blur. Earlier this year 16- year-old Aidan Wellsman learned that he had a degenerative disease called Keratoconus and it would not stop at blurriness. Doctor said that he needed two surgeries or he may go blind. But those surgeries are not currently covered by the Ontario Health Insurance Plan of OHIP. And they cost about ten thousand bucks. Last week Aidan got those surgeries, but he got them because his family paid for them and they don't think that's fair. We reached Aidan Wellsman and his mother, Flora Wellsman at their home in Toronto.

CAROL OFF: Aidan, how are you doing after your surgery from last week?

AIDAN WELLSMAN: Well, right now I'm starting to do better. I've gotten off painkillers and I can actually be out of bed. Right after the surgery probably for the first three days or two days after the surgery was when it was at its worst. I was on some pretty heavy painkillers and it was hard, but I got I think I started to get through it.

CO: And you're recovering you think you're recovering OK?

AW: Yeah. I'm starting to get I think better now. It's still it's not perfect, but it's on the way.

CO: And how badly was your vision deteriorating before you had this?

AW: At the start it was sort of I would just be I wouldn't be able to read the board that much and I thought oh I just need glasses. It's not a big deal right? it happens to a lot of people and then it started to gradually get worse. I had trouble even just reading normal things that I should be able to read. Even some big writing because things are just sort of blurred together and a lot of it was reading. There was times even though when I just wake up in the morning and I go to school I'd be in school in the morning and things are just be all blurry. I'd be walking through the hallways and I just sometimes couldn’t even tell people's faces and I think of them I know. And then I'd end up getting a lot closer to them and I'd just awkwardly sort of turn away because I realized that someone I don't know.

CO: That's just terrible. So then in October you got a diagnosis what did the doctors tell you is going on?

AW: So yeah, in late September I went to my optometrist. She said these glasses aren’t working, we can't correct your vision. And I think you might have something worse. So she had me go in and get some scans done. The doctor showed me the scans and I could see my eye had it was really abnormal shape it kind of my cornea was coming off my eye. And the doctor told me that with this over time that sort of bump is going to get bigger and it's you know your vision is going to get a lot worse and you probably — if left untreated — you would end up going blind.

CO: I know your mother is behind you. Can I ask her a few questions?

AW: Yeah, here she is.

FLORA WELLSMAN: Hello, Flora Wellsman here.

CO: Hi Flora, it’s Carol. When you learned that your son was losing his sight and you had to get the surgeries. What did you think when you found that that wasn't covered?

FW: I was shocked. I couldn't believe it. I thought at first that they were wrong. And so I phoned my health insurance company and was shocked to find out that they told me no it wasn't covered and then I contacted Kathleen Wynne because I'm a constituent in her riding.

CO: This is the premier of Ontario?

FW: Yes, and she's my MPP as well. So I contacted her office and by phone and I explained the situation and was told that they would get back to me. But I really I couldn't believe that our government Ontario Health Insurance Plan wouldn't save the sight of a 16-year-old boy.

CO: And while you're doing all this you know you're watching your boy — your 16-year-old — loose his eyesight?

FW: And he was losing it daily. It was getting worse and worse. It happened so quickly, I couldn't believe that within I think it was maybe in around in about six weeks’ time it went from I can't read the blackboard, I think I need glasses. To my son might go blind. I remember that phone call talking to the doctor at the clinic when they looked at the scans and how shocked I was. I mean I just you never think it's going to happen to your child and just trying to cope with that was difficult. We knew well we have to go ahead with these procedures that the doctors are recommending and somehow figure it out.

CO: And you did you went ahead and financed it yourself?

FW: Actually we haven't managed to finance that yet. We're still working on it. So we have a friend of mine that told me of a site called www.gofundme.com. And she posted, she put up our family and then I'm just still trying to get OHIP to realize that B.C. covers this, Quebec covers this, the Health Board of Canada has approved this. Other provinces partially cover this. It shouldn't be a pilot study or a case study any more. It's 98 per cent proven to be an effective treatment.

CO: You did you did learn from the Ontario government, from OHIP that they would cover one of these surgeries, but only after he was actually legally blind. How did you react when you were told that?

FW: Well, that was a procedure it's a corneal transplant. And first of all, I couldn't believe that they would require a 16-year-old boy to wait until he goes blind. And so also we found out that cornea transplants don't have the success rate that cross linking and intacts, the two procedures that were recommended for my son that he had on Friday. There is a better there's a better success rate with those procedures. Also there's been talk about a pilot study that cross linking can be covered through the pilot study. But the problem with that is that one procedure could be covered, but not the other. And so he would have had to have the cross linking operation and have his laser's remove his cornea which is the most painful part of the operation. And then wait two weeks and then have a second the intacts operation at a different location because the hospitals don't have the equipment to do the second one and he'd have to have his corneas removed, live through all of that pain and trauma again and then miss over a month of school instead of just missing two months. And it was such a small savings. We would still have to be paying over $8,000 out of pocket.

CO: Now the government, the health ministry says it's going to do more research. They're going to find out if this is the right type of surgery for them to fund. How do you respond to that?

FW: Well, we've just been to see the doctor yesterday and already he has recovered some of his sight his sight before the operation was 20/40 in one eye and 20/50. In other words he was already visually-impaired in one of his eyes and now he is no longer visually-impaired and his eyes aren't even healed yet.

CO: And you expect him to regain his sight completely?

FW: Not completely. Not completely, No, but it will be better. He won't be visually-impaired. And he'll have to get special hard contacts that will help it even more.

CO: Can I just say one last word I just have one last exchange with Aidan.

AW: Hello.

CO: Hi Aiden. So Aiden, you must be so relieved to know that you get so much of your vision back.

AW: Oh yeah. Honestly it's amazing. I think that`s all I can really say about that. I'm just it is a little overwhelming to know that I'll be able to get all that back and not have to worry about any of this throughout the rest of my life.

CO: I'm so glad that's the case and I appreciate that you would speak with us.

AW: Thank you.

CO: And say goodbye to your mom for me.

CAROL OFF: Good bye to you both, thank you.

AIDAN WELLSMAN: Yes thank you so much.

JEFF DOUGLAS: That was 16-year-old Aidan Wellsman and his mom, Flora. We reached them in Toronto earlier today. They are calling on the government of Ontario to cover the surgery Aidan needed to prevent him from going blind.

[Music: Ambient]

Honey bee sperm bank

Guest: Brandon Hopkins

JEFF DOUGLAS: Here's a sentence in which the words are surprising, but the sentiment is kind of like duh. It goes like this: not long ago it was very hard to collect and preserve sperm from bees. So you see what I mean, what I am seeing is obvious especially the collection part. Why I am saying it is not. The reason I'm saying it is that one researcher has come up with a technique for extracting the stuff and more importantly a technique that extends its life when it is frozen. Brandon Hopkins is an entomologist at Washington State University. He has been collecting the first ever honeybee samples for a gene bank run out of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. We reached Mr. Hopkins in Pullman, Washington.

CAROL OFF: Mr. Hopkins, how do you take sperm from bees? I'm sure it can't be easy?

BRANDON HOPKINS: That's a good question. It's actually far easier than one might guess. You really just catch the male honeybees and then squeeze them and the stuff kind of pops out the other end.

CO: And do they survive that?

BH: They don't survive it, unfortunately. But they don't survive the process naturally either. So when they mate naturally, they die from that event.

CO: So after they after they give it up that's it for them they give themselves?

BH: That’s it. The life of a male honeybee is pretty sad.

CO: And when you do after you get it out of them — squeeze it out of them — how do you then collect that?

BH: Yeah, it gets a little more technical then. You have to do it under a microscope and we finally pulled the glass pipette. I guess you could think of it like a straw and that's attached with some tubing to a syringe. And so then we draw up these small volumes — 1 micro liter usually for each male — and then we just do that over and over and over again.

CO: And how many Drones have contributed to your science?

BH: Tens of thousands all of them.

CO: Did you personally squeeze each one?

BH: (Laughs) I did a lot of them, but we have collaborators that help with this work as well.

CO: So you have a team of squeezers?

BH: Not a team, maybe just a couple of us.

CO: But still a lot of a lot of drones?

BH: Yes it does require a lot of drones and really a lot of times most of them are either mature or don't produce seamen. Of those that we get to actually collect semen there's usually you know five to ten times that many that are sacrificed without even producing any semen.

CO: Now when you have this sperm what do you do with it?

BH: There's a couple of things. We use it for breeding and a lot of people don't realize that they've been able to do artificial insemination like they do for cattle and other mammals is that we can instrumentally, artificially inseminate queens. So we can collect that semen and inseminate queens and have those queens you know either produce the next generation of queens for us or go on to just had a full sized colony. But just recently you know unique to our lab here at Washington State University we've begun to cryo-preserve or freeze the honeybee semen so that we can transport it and preserve it for breeding purposes.

CO: And this is this is the development in that that you are doing this cryo-preservation that you couldn't do before. What have you come up with as a technique to freeze this sperm?

BH: In a lot of ways we've just applied some of the science with all of the millions are probably in this case billions of dollars they've invested in the cryo-preservation of important agricultural species like cattle and sheep and horses and pigs and we've applied that to honeybees.

CO: And why do you want to preserve it?

BH: There are two main reasons. One of them is for conservation purposes. Outside the North American South American continent honeybees are native species and there's a great number of subspecies of very unique characteristics. Some of those subspecies are being lost just because of humans moving bees around and loss of habitat the same kind of issues we have here. The second reason is for commercial purposes and that's to sort of bring the bee industry into the modern era of breeding like with cattle for example, they've had the use of cryo-preservation for 40 or 50 years and that has led to rapid improvement of desirable traits like milk production for example or disease resistance. And so we'd like to be able provide that technique to the bee breeding industry.

CO: Is the fact that they the industry is having so many problems and so many of the bees are having so many problems with the Colony Collapse Disorder and all kinds of mites. Does that increase the motivation to find a way to preserve the sperm?

BH: It definitely increases the motivation. I think that might be part of the reason why it hasn't been developed until this point because before Varroa mite and the issues such as Colony Collapse Disorder there wasn't maybe that drive the need for this type of breeding in the industry. But now people are you know are more aware of than ever that bees are essential for feeding us. You know they provide all the fruits and vegetables that we've come accustomed to having.

CO: And University of Washington's now has a permit the only permit issued by the government of the United States to import honeybee semen from other countries. What does that allow you to do?

BH: What it allows us to do is to tap into the original source population of honeybees because honeybees aren't native to North or South America. They're an old world species here in the U.S. anyway. We haven't been allowed to bring in honeybees or their germplasm since about 1920 to 1923. So we've been sort of stuck with whatever genetics we had at that time which is even at that time was really not fully representative of the original population and that really hampers breeding efforts.

CO: Who will have access to the sperm bank?

BH: Yes, so one thing is there is sort of two different sperm banks now. We have been doing this since freezing honey bee semen and bring it in since 2010 from these old world sources and we provide those genetic resources through the sale of queens so we use that semen and produce queens and then provide those queens to the industries in the U.S. that's probably close to two million queens a year that are needed. And the second one is that we've kind of developed this technique and shown the potential that the USDA has a program called the National Animal Germplasm Program and they've got you know the giant cryo-preservation systems and tanks that hold the genetics of all the important cattle breeds and sheep and horses and chickens and oysters sperm and all kinds of stuff in there. And so we've begun to work with them to preserve domestic stocks.

CO: Well, good work.

BH Well, thank you.

CAROL OFF: Mr. Hopkins, thank you.

BRANDON HOPKINS: Thank you for talking with us.

JEFF DOUGLAS Brandon Hopkins is an entomologist at Washington State University. He has developed the technique to better preserve sperm from honeybees. We reached him in Pullman, Washington.

Back To Top »

Part 2: Pay to play, Franklin expedition nail

Pay to play

Guest: Slyvie Leduc

JEFF DOUGLAS: Today in the House of Commons. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took more heat over accusations of so-called pay-to-play fundraising. Here is what opposition interim leader Rona Ambrose had to say.

SOUNDCLIP

RONA AMBROSE: Oh Mr. Speaker, in September a prominent Liberal organizer sent invitations to a fundraiser with the prime minister in those invitations. He said it was important to attend and donate to the Liberal Party. Quote, “so that our issues are heard and we begin to form relationships and open dialogues with our government. Not with the Liberal Party of Canada, with the government. The prime minister either understands that this is unethical and potentially illegal or he is just willfully breaking the rules. Which is It?

GEOFF REGAN: The right honorable prime minister.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: Mr. Speaker, with all these questions it's important to reinforce the fact that at the federal level we have among the strongest principles of rules around fundraising in the country. And that those rules are always followed. This is important because Canadians need to have confidence in the transparency, accountability and secureness of our political financing system. Canadians can and must be reassured.

JEFF DOUGLAS: So that was the prime minister responding to the opposition interim leader Rona Ambrose in Question Period today. Sylvie Leduc received one of those fundraising invitations that Ms. Ambrose asked the prime minister about. At the time her I.T. startup had a proposal before the federal government. Now she's wondering if she perhaps should have coughed up the cash and gone to the party. We reached Sylvie Leduc on the street in Montreal.

CAROL OFF: Ms. Leduc, you received an invitation to a Liberal fundraiser a few months back. What was the ask in that letter?

SYLVIE LEDUC: Essentially to join a perception/cocktail party with the prime minister providing I was prepared to make a fifteen-hundred dollar contribution which is advertised on the Liberal Party website as being or joining I should say the club.

CO: OK and this is the subject heading was “A Special Evening with the Right Honorable Justin Trudeau.” And fifteen-hundred dollars was the price tag what did you understand you would get for that fifteen-hundred dollars?

SL: Well, at the onset with the first email it was just basically we want you to join Laurier Club and I guess for doing this you will also have a cocktail reception with the prime minister. I didn’t see more than that to it because I thought I said I knew the rules of the party in terms of what the different types of participation or donation allow you if you want. So I didn’t see anything more than that from the original invitation.

CO: So when did it start to become something you raised your eyebrows?

SL: Honestly, the first email I kind of said no sorry a little bit too steep for my financial means. I kind of explained what I was doing and I left it there OK. Then I got basically an answer back where someone said oh well you know given that you're an entrepreneur and I did mention that I was looking for investors. You know you should come because they'll be potentially investors, business people and so on and so forth. It kind of left a you know I would say a funny taste in my mouth, but I didn't I just said in my mind from the onset I doubted that I was going to go. For the money for the fact that I'm not very good at cocktails, that's not my cup of tea. And the fact that I wasn't sure that from even a business perspective that this was let's say a good step.

CO: You're an entrepreneur and you have an IT startup that you hoped that the government might be interested in. Can you tell us did you have a thought that you might be able to get help for your company if you went to the cocktail party?

SL: To be honest with you, at the time, I kind of went you know what. It's a 50/50 shot. I don't know who's going to be there. I'm not the type of person who go up to a prime minister and say hey by the way you know I'm trying to contact some of your ministries and here's what I'm doing. So you know my thought process was I may come out of there empty handed. But what triggered it is. As the news started to flow out in the last few weeks then it’s the response email that I received which basically kind of confirms what we're seeing right now and I kind of went whoa.

CO: OK so what you’re talking about the news is that this whole idea of pay-to-play that you would get you a get access for making a contribution and you sent to the fundraiser you said to who was inviting you to this you said well I don't know I've got this company starting and I don't know if it's useful to me. What did you get in the way of a response?

SL: The response was basically we wish you all the best, but you know as an entrepreneur looking for investors even more reason to with cash because you know you may be potentially meeitng investors or business partners.

CO: In fact, you sent us the e-mails and that says since you are on the lookout for investors and partners I would suggest considering this event as there will be a lot of networking going on. What did that suggest to you in light of what you've learned about pay-to-play?

SL: You know that there was the possibility and I'm not saying again it's a certainty because you don't know who's going to be there. The work that I'm doing may not fall under anybody's radar screen from a business perspective. So I was really you know a top-up and a gamble.

CO: And in the end was the federal government interested in your startup?

SL: Unfortunately not.

CO: And did it any time you think gosh maybe I should have gone to that cocktail party?

SL: That's why all of this is now out in the open. I had given myself a timeline that if by the end of this year this thing was taking off; I was going to close the project. And I'm reflecting on all of this and then to have the news of the cash for access started to come out. I kind went whoa I will take full responsibility in the sense that maybe I shot myself in the foot in September by not going.

CO: That you should have paid-to-play?

SL: Well maybe, as I said, there's no guarantee. I want to be very clear on that. But I sure broke all the potential by not going is what I'm trying to say.

CO: At the same time you have you have been a volunteer for the Liberal Party — the federal party — you wrote in your letter I've done volunteering in lieu of monetary donations during your election campaign. I've started town hall meetings. You've made all these contributions. When you say it's left a bit of a bad taste in your mouth what do you think of your contribution to the Liberal party compared to what happened to you in this?

SL: Well, you know when I decided to become a volunteer for the Liberal Party it was because I was becoming a bit of a cynic when it came to politics. I was kind of disengaged, my DNA, my values are Liberal values and I kind of went you know what, let's get involved. So in hindsight it's still the party of my choice because amongst what I was offered right now at the federal level they are the one that represents most of my values. Will I get involved the way I did last year and the hours I put in and you know everything else? The answer is no.

CAROL OFF: Ms. Leduc, thank you.

SYLVIE LEDUC: My pleasure. Bye bye.

JEFF DOUGLAS: We reached Sylvie Leduc on the street in Montreal.

[Music: Percussive]

Conservative leadership

JEFF DOUGLAS: When you're one of 14 people are competing for the same job, it can be a little tough to distinguish yourself. Just ask the Conservative leadership candidates, but just try and find them alone because if they're all in the same room they'll just talk over each other. Last night the candidates were in Moncton, New Brunswick, for the second official debate of their party's leadership race, although at times it was kind of more of a group agreement than a debate particularly when it came to attacking the Liberal government. But some — including Maxime Bernier — did take the opportunity to take a shot at Kelly Leitch and to draw unfavorable comparisons to a certain President-elect. Here is some of what Mr. Bernier said.

SOUNDCLIP

MAXIME BERNIER: She always said that in the campaign that we must look at our immigration system in Canada and as you know we're not like in the U.S. We don't have the same problem that the U.S. has with illegal immigrants. I don't know why. Why. Ms. Leitch she's playing a kind of a karaoke version of Donald Trump in Canada. It is not the same thing. We I think we are opening to integration and we don't need this version karaoke of Donald Trump.

JEFF DOUGLAS: in the end though, Ms. Leitch used her last rebuttal to reject the claims Mr. Bernier and others made. Spoiler alert that won’t really surprise you at all: she isn't about to stop talking about screening for so-called Canadian Values. Here is Kelly Leitch’s final pitch at last night's debate.

SOUNDCLIP

KELLY LEITCH: The discussion of Canadian Values and screening with face-to-face interviews for immigrants is not racist or xenophobic or anti-immigrant. In fact, two-thirds of Canadians want to have this discussion. Every country in the world is having this discussion. And just because the media and the elites don't want to have this discussion doesn't mean we should be afraid of it. Many of my colleagues on this stage I know are intimidated by the media, but I'm going to continue to talk about this because this is common sense. This is what Canadians want to talk about.

JEFF DOUGLAS: That’s Kelly Leitch wrapping things up last night and we did learn one thing from the first bilingual debate. You can't fake your French. The candidates will have until January 17th to brush up on those lessons before the third debate in Quebec City, which is French only, bonne chance.

[Music: Instrumental]

Franklin expedition nail

Guest: Jennie Christensen

JEFF DOUGLAS: They got most of their information from a thumb nail. Canadian researchers are challenging the theory that lead poisoning is what killed members of the Franklin expedition and their evidence comes from one sailor’s nails. All one hundred twenty nine members of the Franklin expedition died on their trip to explore the Northwest Passage in the mid eighteen-hundreds and lead poisoning from food cans has been blamed at least in part for their deaths. Jennie Christensen is the lead researcher of this new study. We reached her in Sydney, Vancouver Island.

CAROL OFF: Ms. Christensen, how did you get your hands on these nails?

JENNIE CHRISTENSEN: Back in ’86, Dr. Owen Beattie had an expedition up to Beechy Island and Exhumed the bodies of the three crewmen that had perished early on in the expedition. And he had taken tissue samples at that time. And they've been housed for a good 20 years at the Canadian Museum of History in Ottawa. And when I was presenting on some other research that I was working on an archaeologist mentioned to me hey you know why don't you use your techniques to study the Franklin expedition led mystery? I said wow that would be fantastic. How would I ever go about doing that? And it took about a year-and-a-half to finally find the samples and get permission from the museum and the Inuit Heritage Trust to fly to Ottawa and take the tissue samples.

CO: And these were a thumbnail and a toenail of a man who had died in probably around 1845, is that right?

JC: He died on January 4^th, 1846 John Hartnoll, and he was 25-years-old. So the tissue samples are about 170-years-old and perfectly preserved and in his icy grave.

CO: When you mentioned that the lead mystery. Tell us what that is, the lead poisoning story that surrounded these deaths?

JC: Well, when Owen Beattie had been doing his initial research into the Franklin expedition and those three crewmen, he analyzed the tissue samples and found that they were elevated in lead. And looking at the history of tin cans, which was quite a new technology at the time where they used lead solder, they were improperly sealed and then plus you have the lead pipe through up to the refitted ships that were used. There was a lot of potential for lead exposure on the expedition. So the lead mystery started around that time and as you know time has progressed and technology has progressed and more tissues and artifacts have been found. The story keeps kind of twisting and turning over time depending on the perspective or what tissues that researchers have been looking at. And our work is just another perspective based on our tissue that that we have found.

CO: And what did your research indicate about the possible causes of death of these of these sailors?

JC: Well, we had two surprises. The first surprise was when we first analyzed the tissues on the surface the lead concentrations were astronomically high and so high that they weren't realistic. And that flagged to us that something was wrong. And that's when you Stantec, which is where I was working at the time and Canadian Light Source collaborated, so that we could analyze these tissues using the [unintelligible]. And that allowed us to create these beautiful maps of this cross section of the toenail which showed that guess what? The toenails were dirty or were covered in dirt and possibly coal dust that was filled with lead. And that allowed us to see which layers of the nails were not contaminated by external sources. So then we could streamline our analysis to those places to look at what he was actually exposed to and that for the second surprise came in, which was there were no elevations in lead. He actually had quite normal healthy levels in his blood at the time which indicates that there wasn't any recent exposure to lead during the expedition. The only time the lead started becoming elevated was after he had contracted tuberculosis and probably lost a good 50-60 pounds of weight and his bone likely started deteriorating a bit. And led throughout your life will accumulate in your bones. About 94 per cent will sit in your bones throughout your life. And so as his bones and body were deteriorating to the disease at least the let back into that system, but only when he was probably on deathbed.

CO: And so your theory is that he that John Hartnoll died of TB?

JC: Oh that's not a theory. Dr. Beattie and his team, Dr. McKay they had done an autopsy on the three men on Beechy Island and confirmed that they likely died of tuberculosis with signs of pneumonia. So when we discovered that it wasn't lead related we started looking at other elements more nutritional type elements in his nails and that's when we looked at zinc and copper. That was the third surprise, which was oh my goodness this guy's severely zinc-deficient compared to you know today's healthy range and zinc-deficiency can lead to immunosuppression. And while we're not saying you know zinc-deficiency caused his death I think we have a really unique situation where these young men — he was 25 — these young, inexperienced men in the arctic where it is 24 hours darkness and minus 60 degrees. He's malnourished, Zinc-deficient, under extreme stress and then to top it all off — to kind of push them over the edge — you get the introduction of a tuberculosis bacteria. And I think that the fact that all three of the first deaths on the expedition were from tuberculosis and representing both ships suggests that that bacteria was present and likely affected more than just those three men.

CAROL OFF Ms. Christensen, it's fascinating we are interested in the mysteries of the Franklin expedition will always continue and I thank you for telling us about this.

JENNIE CHRISTENSEN: You're welcome. Thank you so much for having me. Bye.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Jennie Christensen is the founder of TrichAnalytics. That's a company that analyzes biological tissue as you might have gathered. She's also the lead author of a new study about how members of the Franklin expedition died. It is published in the Journal of Archaeological Science. We reached Ms. Christensen in Sydney on Vancouver Island.

[Music: Ambient rock]

Follow up: former German soldier

JEFF DOUGLAS: It seems an unlikely story. A former German soldier leaves his life savings to the small Scottish village where he was held as a P.O.W. But as you heard last night the late Heinrich Steinmeyer, never forgot the kindness of the people of Comrie, Scotland. We spoke to George Carson Jr. about the gift, his mother was one of the villagers who befriended the young German soldier. Many of you were moved by the story and shared your own surprising connections to some of the people who lived in Comrie.

CAROL OFF: On our website www.cbc.ca/aih Martha McDonald wrote. My husband and I lived in Comrie for six months in 2008. We became friends with George Carson Sr. whom we met on our first day of hiking. He was an avid hill walker and storyteller. I cannot imagine a nicer people or place.

JD: And Patti Lewis emailed us to say I listened to the show astounded. My mother was Scottish and did her nursing training in Glasgow with a young woman from Comrie they called Mac; both immigrated to Canada following their training. Mac later returned to her wee village of Comrie and married her sweetheart, George. My mother and Mac remained in contact all their lives and I myself had the pleasure of visiting Comrie with my mother in 1983 and walked the hills with George Carson Sr.

CO: My mom passed away five years ago, Mac a few years before her and George a few years following. When I heard your story I thought this has to be young George. I immediately went to Facebook and found George Carson of Comrie and I sent him a message to say are you the son of Mac and George? I received a message back this morning. Yes indeed it's young George. It's truly a small world. Thanks for your stories if you missed our interview you'll find it at www.cbc.ca/aih. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook both @cbc as it happens. Our email aih@cbc.ca.

[Music: Cultural]

Montreal Christmas tree

JEFF DOUGLAS: The goal was to get a Christmas tree so big that it would rival the one at Rockefeller Center in New York. But as we have heard so often, size is not all that matters. And the tree that stands on Montreal's downtown is definitely tall it's nearly 27 meters. That's in the neighborhood of 88 feet tall. So what is tall. Trouble is it's also being described as ugly, lopsided and to bear. Kind of like Charlie Brown’s sad, mangled little tree; except no one's singing around this tree. Instead it's being mocked and it's being mocked around the world. And of course New Yorkers are laughing the loudest of all at Montreal’s Christmas tree. Here's what the hosts of NBC's Today Show said about it this morning.

SOUNDCLIP

HOST 1: Would we all agree that this year's Rockefeller Center Christmas tree is a beauty? It's is gorgeous 94 feet tall Norway spruce Well the city of Montreal said it won't do our tree this year. Getting one that was even taller, sorry to say they fell short. The Montreal tree is 70 feet tall and just look at it, a little on the thin side.

HOST 2: Wouldn’t you think in Canada they could get a good tree?

HOST 1: I know and look what they did; the top is flat.

HOST 3: You think it’s on purpose right?

HOST 1: Apparently this is kind of an artsy neighborhood. I think they did this on purpose.

HOST 2: I think they thought it was a tree they could actually get through the door.

(Laughter)

JEFF DOUGLAS: Those are some of the comments on NBC's Today Show this morning about Montreal's new Christmas tree, which is not 70 feet tall. It is 88 feet tall, still shorter of course than the one at the Rockefeller Center which as they said is ninety four feet tall.

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Part 3: Garry Kasparov on Russia sanctions, IOWA civil forfeiture Pearl Harbor: repeat

Garry Kasparov on Russia sanctions

Guest: Garry Kasparov

JEFF DOUGLAS: If anyone knows how to look several moves ahead, it's Garry Kasparov. Mr. Kasparov is, of course, a former world chess champion. He's also a critic of the Kremlin and he is in Ottawa today to try to convince the Canadian government that passing a law imposing new sanctions on Russia is a sound strategic move. So far though the Liberals aren't exactly convinced now before they were elected they promised to follow Washington's example and pass a so-called Magnitsky law. Now though they don't seem so keen. We reached Garry Kasparov in Ottawa.

CAROL OFF: Mr. Kasparov, why do you think that it's in Canada's interests to impose new sanctions on Russia?

GARRY KASPAROV: It's not just in Canada’s interest, it’s in the interests of the free world, because any sign of weakness demonstrated by Canada or the United States, European Union, NATO will embolden Putin to take these steps. Because while judging from Putin’s latest moves we could see that he made foreign policy aggressive foreign policy a staple of his domestic propaganda and that's why he needs to feed Russian public that has been suffering from a steady decline in living standards with some big news from Putin’s foreign policy victories. And any relief in sanctions will be trumpeted by Putin’s propaganda as another big victory for Putin and will embolden him to move forward.

CO: I want to ask about this particular law. This is based on this whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, who was thrown into prison after he exposed fraud in Russia and he died quite tragically in prison. So who does the Magnitsky law actually target?

GK: Let's make sure for those who was killed in prison. And he exposed the massive corruption case we're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars and the Russian justice system actually let people who were accused by Magnitsky to prosecute him and to put him in jail. The Magnitsky law originally was designed to target people who were involved in this case, who killed Magnitsky and who benefited from this corruption scheme by stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from Russian budget and harboring it out of Russia. But it will eventually be expanded to cover other violations of human rights and other similar cases in Russia. And that's why Putin’s regime was so aggressive trying to appeal it since Magnitsky law potentially could destroy Putin's grip on power among Russian elite.

CO: And I ask a bit more that because it doesn't this law does not target Vladimir Putin and it does go after the other kleptocrats that you have mentioned. But it's not against him so why should he care?

GK: his power in Russia is based not on democratic institutions, but on his ability to guarantee all people were loyal to him than the Russian elite, Russian bureaucracy Russian security forces that no matter what they do in Russia, stealing money, killing people they are always protected they are immune to Russian law and moreover, they will be able to place the money that they allocated through these operations Russia elsewhere in the world and still be protected. Because Putin could influence foreign leaders not to take actions against them. The moment you weaken Putin’s ability to influence this event and to convince Russian bureaucracy and Russian elite that he's all powerful both inside and outside of Russia that might lead to his demise.

CO: Now the arguments against having a Magnitsky law based in Canada and so far we're seeing that the Liberal government is resisting this idea it does exist in the United States it's before Congress. The argument in Canada is that well in the U.S. It has a great deal of clout that these kinds of sanctions can actually be quite intimidating from Moscow. The argument is that Canada does better with soft power that that's the best way for Canada to try and influence the world stage. And Mr. Putin why is that not a valid approach for a Canada to take?

GK: Because it never works and it will not work. When you’re dealing with a dictator who made these aggressive foreign polices sort of his political survival at home he doesn’t care about Canada or any other country trying to play softball with him. Soft power means that you can find a common ground and for Putin confrontation is the policy of survival. And he demonstrated over last years that if you show no strength in responding to his actions he will continue his aggressive policies.

CO: You know that President Vladimir Putin still has support a great deal of support in Russia that he is considered still to be quite popular for many reasons. And so why do you think that sanctions could actually shake his authority in power in Russia?

GK: Look I don't think you should talk to an informed Russian about Putin’s popularity. Vladimir Putin is not the president, he is the dictator. He is the man is staying in power for 17 years and no intention of leaving power so he'll stay Kremlin until the very end. And judging you know the popularity of the dictator from the polls conducted in the country it's at least naive because you know people accepted you know reluctantly accepted because you know they are afraid. Very often they are simply afraid to express their views. And it's hard to criticize them because most of them are born and raised in the Soviet Union. They know what is KGB not from books and from articles, but from their real life. If Putin is so popular why is he not running free and fair elections? Why is he jailing his critics and killing opposition leaders? So I don't think that you know we can argue the popularity of a dictator who destroy the opposition and jail his critics you know, eliminate free media and kill many opposition leaders and activists and also started wars with neighboring countries.

CAROL OFF: Mr. Kasparov, I appreciate you coming on this show. Thank you.

GARRY KASPAROV: Thank you.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Garry Kasparov is a Kremlin critic and a former Russian chess world champion. We reached him in Ottawa.

[Music: Rock]

IOWA civil forfeiture

Guest: Jason Clayworth

JEFF DOUGLAS: Its critics call it highway robbery. But Iowa's civil forfeiture law says it is legal for police to stop suspicious vehicles and seize the property inside them even without laying a criminal charge. The practice is meant to allow police to crack down on drug dealers and other criminals traveling on Interstate highways. Advocacy groups however, say that officers make unconstitutional stops and seize cash simply to boost police agency revenues. And so this week Iowa disbanded its highway stop and search police unit. Jason Clayworth is an investigative reporter for the Des Moines Register. He has been covering civil forfeiture. We reached him today in Des Moines, Iowa.

CAROL OFF: Jason, how lucrative was this forfeiture business?

JASON CLAYWORTH: Well, depending on who you talk with it was quite lucrative for some departments. The state in Iowa had collected something around $55 million dollars in cash since the 1980’s on a surface that doesn't sound like a lot, but when you're talking about departments that have relatively small budgets sometimes even a single forfeiture can be a significant amount of money for them.

CO: But there were units — interdiction units — that were dedicated to this activity so how did they operate it?

JC: Well, it was the Iowa State Patrol — the state police — had a special unit of approximately 10 officers that was dedicated primarily to what they called the interdiction. And that was looking primarily for drug traffickers that traveled throughout the state of Iowa along its interstates. What critics say that that became was an avenue for the state to stop thousands literally tens of thousands of motorists and search their cars for what critics say are unconstitutional reasons. They’d pull them pull them over sometimes for going one or two miles over the speed limit and then conduct searches of vehicles and in some cases they would confiscate tens of thousands of dollars or other items from them.

CO: And how did they. Was it just random? How did they know which cars to stop? Who would be the likely people who might be carrying all that money?

JC: First the Des Moines Register first did a series of stories that first started this in 2013 actually. And at that time we started looking at who was being stopped and this interdiction team. These interdiction team members that worked with the State Police had stops somewhere around more than 20,000 vehicles along of a 5 year period that we had looked at and more than 85 per cent of those were from out-of-state. And so what the records and what the critics say is that they were targeting largely out-of-state vehicles and randomly searching them. Sometimes they would use drug dogs or whatever it is to go around these vehicles and obtain legal justification to do the searches. Sometimes the vehicle owners themselves would give the police permission to search their vehicles.

CO: Now and so nobody these people aren't charged. This isn't to actually arrest anybody with contraband or illegal substances or money. This is just this is the cash grab?

JC: Well that's certainly what critics of forfeiture say.

CO: Was it just in their cars or did they get it from any homes or anything?

JC: It can be used in in homes and has been used, but primarily is has been used in vehicle trafficking.

CO: And does anyone ever get their money back as they go and fight it?

JC: They do. And that's one of the key arguments about why the system is broken because lawyers that work and advocates for personal rights argue that the system is so difficult to maneuver through the system to get your money back that oftentimes the legal costs far exceed what the value of the property is. And so we found that most people never challenge their forfeiture even though they don't have any criminal charges against them.

CO: You did a story a couple of years ago about a young fellow who was traveling with his life savings he was hitchhiking around the country United States. And that he got he got scooped up and money taken. No charges. He hadn’t done anything wrong and he eventually got his money back after a fight?

JC: He did but the issue was — he is a prime example — you know he had something like $18,000 plus on him at the time he said that he was moving across the country to join family and what ultimately happened is he got his money back, but he had substantial attorney's fees something like a third of his refund went to his attorney cost. And so he was still out a substantial sum of money. And you know we see that with what happened just this week in Iowa where we have two gamblers traveling across state lines. They had something like $100,000 little over $100,000 dollars on them in their bankroll. They had just come from a tournament. And ultimately they were pulled over for what law enforcement alleged was a turn signal violation. The video showed that they had used their turn signal by the way. But they say they fought this. They got most of their money back. They agreed to get $90,000 back and then they turned around and they sued the state saying look we had all these attorney costs because you used unconstitutional reasons to stop this vehicle. We incurred legal fees and other costs. You owe us money. And ultimately what happened was this the state of Iowa agreed to pay these two gentlemen $60,000 to settle their complaint and again was on top of what they already returned.

CO: And is it this case has led the Iowa to decide that it is going to pull these units off the highway?

JC: Yes. Not necessarily just this case, but what advocates of reform of this law are saying is that that that by itself isn't enough. They're saying that the state needs to reform its reform its law so that it is based on a criminal conviction instead of what the current system is which allows civil forfeiture to go forward without that criminal complaint.

CAROL OFF: All right we'll leave it there. Jason, thank you.

JASON CLAYWORTH: Thank you, Carol.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Jason Clayworth is an investigative reporter with the Des Moines Register. We reached him in Des Moines.

[Music: Rock]

Hijab carnations

JEFF DOUGLAS: Janelle Venne wants to fight hatred with the flower. Today the Edmonton woman and other volunteers handed out fresh-cut carnations to women wearing hijabs at the University of Alberta LRT station. That is the same platform where a possible hate crime happened last month. Edmonton police say that a man confronted two young women wearing hijabs, pulled a rope from his pocket, fashioned a noose and said this is for you. Then taunted the women by singing Oh Canada this morning. Mark Connelly the host of Edmonton AM spoke with Ms. Venne and he began by asking her why she felt compelled to take action?

SOUNDCLIP

JANELLE VENNE: After seeing something like that. It's very disheartening. And some people are quite afraid that the hatred from the United States is now leaking into Alberta and we want to send a very clear message that racists don't speak for everybody. And we can very much combat that type of action by making our own positive actions in that area.

MARK CONNELLY: Why do you think we only react when something bad happens? Is there a need to maybe reach out more to the Muslim community in Edmonton?

JV: Absolutely. I mean we don't really have to wait for something terrible to happen in order to do something positive. I know that after seeing my works that I intend to do. There's going to be a few more actions happening in Calgary, where they don't really have to wait for something hateful to happen in order to do something positive.

MC: What's the reaction been like? I assume you posted on Facebook and letting people know what's going on. Have you get much feedback from people?

JV: Well, I have already accumulated in the last two years somehow about 3,000 people so I'm used to having about 100 likes on my posts and whatnot. But to see it shared and to see the outburst of community and an outrage has been phenomenal. And I think I started looking for funds yesterday at about 1:00 a.m. or something around there and we've already raised about $500 for flowers so that means that we can get 1,000 flowers for the LRT station at the U of A. I hope that we can hand out every single one today, but if we have some leftover We will definitely do it again on Thursday. And if we have extra money leftover we'll have a jar on the side. We will be donating that money to AMPAC the Alberta the Muslim Public Affairs Council.

MARK CONNELLY: And what do you hope that the young women who you're passing out the carnations to what do you hope they'll take away from this?

JANELLE VENNE: I hope they feel accepted and I hope that they feel safe because they deserve that just like anybody else in Canada.

JEFF DOUGLAS: That was Janelle Venne speaking to Mark Connelly host of Edmonton AM and Edmonton police do now have a suspect in that incident in custody.

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Pearl Harbor: repeat

Guest: Tom Gray

JEFF DOUGLAS: It has been 75 years since Edwin Hopkins died in the attack on Pearl Harbor. And yet this is the first time that his family has mourned that anniversary knowing he is buried in a proper grave. The 19-year-old sailor was one of four hundred twenty nine who died in the sinking of the USS Oklahoma. And until this year his remains had been buried in Hawaii in a collective grave. And that didn't seem right to his cousin Tom Gray. Carol spoke with Mr. Gray in April of 2015 in Guilford, Connecticut.

CAROL OFF: Tom, can you tell us about your cousin Edwin Hopkins, and what he was doing onboard the USS Oklahoma?

TOM GRAY: Yes, he was a young boy, he was 19. He had just finished his training up in the Ford Motor plant I think up in Michigan. He was a fireman third class, so he worked on the boilers and such. He boarded the ship in San Diego in California. I'm not sure but fairly soon after that it went to Hawaii. And at that point the Oklahoma, of course, was the first battleship that was struck during the attack. And I'm sure you know there was nine torpedoes at it turned over turned over capsized and he lost his life on that day.

CO: He hadn't been out very long then when this happened?

TG: No.

CO: Did you ever meet him?

TG: No I am actually. He's my second cousin he was my father's first cousin. So actually I know I knew his mother and father and his brother. But he was gone before I was born. But my father and he and his older brother they all went off to war. You know World War 2. And his brother was on the USS Hornet and my father was in the air over North Africa and the two you know two of them came back and one of them. And that was always a tragedy for us you know?

CO: Where is Edwin Hopkins buried?

TG: At this point, he's buried in the National Cemetery out in Hawaii it’s nicknamed the Punchbowl. And he went down with the ship. They raised the Oklahoma in 1943. At that point they took a lot of the remains and they identified them and buried in a cemetery out in Hawaii. That was in 1943. In 1949 they exhumed them and they were getting them ready to put into the new cemetery into the Punchbowl. At that time, there were a lot of bureaucratic infighting and are a lot of just decisions that were made at the time that it turned out to be almost impossible to allow him to be put into a cemetery. As Edwin Hopkins, so consequently he and a few other sailors were put in there as unknowns even though originally they were known. Their remains were you know recorded as Edwin Hopkins, let’s say.

CO: But they're all buried together? Or do they have their own graves?

TG: Well, there were actually I want to be clear on this. There are four graves and in each grave there are two caskets and there are approximately five guys in each casket. Now there's 385 unknowns that are from the Oklahoma in the Punchbowl Cemetery. But as it turns out a veteran of Pearl Harbor by the name of Ray Emery did some research in the ‘90’s and discovered the discrepancy on these 27 sailors my cousin being one that they initially were identified and then they were quote unquote “unidentified” and put into the cemetery. And our family was never notified. No one ever knew about this. You know his brother died, his parents died, my father died, my grandpa and no one knew. And what happened is my family was contacted by a group called the Oklahoma Family. It was made up of Oklahoma veterans and their relatives. They contacted my cousin and told her that hey Eddie Hopkins, we know where he is. So at that point we started going to the Navy and back and forth. It's gone. So the upshot of it all is that amazingly the Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work just made the decision hey you know what? The right thing to do is to exhume these people if we can identify them and return them to relatives from you know where we want. Some are going to stay in the Punchbowl; some people want their folks to come home.

CO: and you want Eddie Hopkins to come home?

TG: Yes I do, his you know my family has had a long history of military service with this country and because of that they really my hat's off to him without even realizing it because all my other cousins had the same opinion as I am and that is you know they our relatives the last generation did not let Eddie Hopkins memory die, they kept him alive through just you know discussion and they just wouldn't let him go. And they instilled that in all of us and I tell you as a group we all kind of hung in there to bring him home. And his mother never accepted the fact that he wasn't coming back. You know she just you know obviously the shock and all she just thought he had amnesia. But he's going to come home. But on their headstone up in Keene, New Hampshire, which is our family plot she put his name right on the gravestone with her and her husband — his mother and father — his names are under that gravestone and they put it there because they wanted him to come back home someday.

CO: And that's where he'll be buried then?

TG: If they can exhume and identify him then that's where he's going.

CO: And when do you hope that Eddie Hopkins will be in his final resting place?

TG: The announcement of the memo from the deputy secretary mentions that they're going to start the process in three to six weeks I think. And then if they figure takes five years to do all 385 IDs. But what we're hoping for is that these twenty-two sailors that are left by Katie Hopkins. They know we know I know he's in grave P1003. And I also even know the five people that are in the casket with him. So we're hoping because they have that kind of detail on just these just these twenty-two. They have that kind of detail. Let's start with them. So I'm really hoping in the beginning of this process that they'll go through this and we can bring him home sooner than later.

CAROL OFF: I hope it all works out. Tom, thank you.

TOM GRAY: Thank you very much.

JEFF DOUGLAS: From April, 2015 that was Tom Gray in conversation with Carol from Guilford, Connecticut. And it did indeed all work out. Edwin Hopkins’s remains were identified and in October of this year they were finally returned to New Hampshire and buried in his grave.

[Music: Ambient]

Northern Cree Grammy nomination

JEFF DOUGLAS: “Feel the Rhythm” is one of the songs on the latest album by the powwow drum and singing group Northern Cree. The album is called It's A Cree Thing and it has just been nominated for a Grammy Award for “Best Regional Roots Music Album. That, of course, is impressive on its own more impressive because the Alberta group has been around since 1982 and even more impressive because it is the seventh time that Northern Cree has been nominated for a Grammy. They haven't won yet, but maybe seven times the charm. As I said this song is not club music. That doesn't mean you're not going to move.

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Dec. 7, 2016 episode transcript

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