Fresh Air from WHYY, April 16, 2009

Let's travel back to Tuesday, March 7, 1933. Newly elected President Franklin Roosevelt had just called his Cabinet together for the first time. The average age was 59; the predominant gender was male, except for Frances Perkins, Roosevelt's controversial pick for secretary of labor. Although the men sometimes acted like schoolboys and passed notes about her during Cabinet meetings, Perkins managed to achieve many of her "bright ideas," like the minimum wage, work-hour limitations and the Social Security Act. Indeed, if Perkins had completely realized her vision, national health care would have long been an American reality.

Fresh Air from WHYY, April 1, 2009

"Pet fashion shows, Chihuahua social networking, veterinary antidepressants [and] ambulance-chasing animal lawyers" are just the tip of what Philadelphia-based journalist Michael Schaffer says is a kind of pet-obsession iceberg in the lives of the American middle class. In his new book One Nation Under Dog, Schaffer takes a close look at the $43 billion industry that's grown to help enable that obsession, explaining how that booming market reflects our evolving ideas of consumerism, family, politics and domesticity.