Jon Jeter, author and two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist with more than 20 years of journalistic experience. He is a former Washington Post bureau chief and award-winning foreign correspondent on two continents joins the conversation with news about employment growth. Unemployment has remained at 3.6%. There are noises from some quarters saying that despite other signs, the labor market doesn't look like a recession and maybe rumors of our economic demise are exaggerated. Then they talk about a recent ruling by the Wisconsin Supreme Court that bars the use of most ballot drop boxes. The court also found that voters could not give their completed absentee ballots to others to return on their behalf. Voting rights proponents say this ruling will make it harder for voters, particularly those with disabilities — to return their absentee ballots.

Dr. Iyabo Obasanjo, Professor of Public Health at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg VA joins the show to talk about the rise of Monkeypox and the developments related to COVID variants, vaccines and immunity to new variants on the horizon.

Paul Wright, Managing editor Prison Legal News and executive director of the Human Rights Defense Center joins the show to talk about Oklahoma, that bastion of human rights, has scheduled 25 executions–you heard that right–between August and December. That means that the state will put to death 58 percent of the people on its death row, including prisoners with severe mental illness, brain damage, and credible claims of innocence. State Attorney General John O'Connor sought the execution dates just four days after a judge ruled that Oklahoma's three-drug death cocktail was not unconstitutional. A lawsuit had been filed by 28 death row inmates who argued that the last two executions were botched, with one prisoner screaming that his body was on fire before finally dying, and another who gasped for air for 30 minutes before dying. 

It's Friday and that means we close with News of the Weird