Government

Yesterday, Anne Arundel County Executive John Leopold was suspended from office after a judge found him guilty of two counts of misconduct in office. The verdict came down after sordid details were revealed during the trial that accounted how Leopold used his staff to conduct personal and political tasks, which included emptying his catheter bag and keeping a dossier on political opponents. This hour, we examine the verdict, and discuss its repercussions with Andrea Segel of The Baltimore Sun and Allison Bourg of The Capital.

The 433rd Maryland General Assembly gets underway today. Last year, lawmakers wrestled with some hot-button issues: same-sex marriage, gambling expansion; lawmakers had to come back for two special sessions to settle everything. Will this year prove calmer than the last?

Web Extra: John Wagner on whether there's the will to make it more difficult to bring issues to referendum

Web Extra: Wood and Wagner on how much influence O'Malley will have on this legislative session

Civil rights activist Rev. Jesse L. Jackson was in Baltimore recently to protest the state’s plans to build a $70 million juvenile detention facility here. The facility, supported by the O'Malley administration, would hold teenagers who have been charged as adults. These teens are now being housed at the Baltimore City Detention Center, in the same building where adult inmates are held. We report the state's position on the need for the jail and hear from two activists who oppose it: the Rev.

In the wake of the Newtown massacre, which left 27 people dead, Baltimore County Police Chief Jim Johnson talks guns and public safety.

Michael Griffin of Maryland's Department of Assessments and Taxation tells us why you should apply for the Homestead Tax Credit before the December 31st deadline if you haven't already.

An experimental Alzheimer's treatment at Johns Hopkins Medicine uses electricity to stimulate memory centers in the brain. Nathan Sterner talks with professor Paul Rosenberg who's leading the trial at Hopkins.

Tom Hall visits an exhibit at Maryland Institute College of Art honoring influential fiber artist Lenore Tawney.

Two stories in this hour: Baltimore native Matthew VanDyke, journalist-turned-self-styled freedom fighter, has just returned from Syria to tell about his experiences with the rebels trying to overthrow the Assad regime. He is working on a film about the civil war in Syria. Then, Gregory Johnson, former Fulbright fellow in Yemen, explains why that country has become the U.S.’s most urgent terrorist concern. Johnson is the author of The Last Refuge: Yemen, Al-Qaeda and America's War in Arabia.

With the number of Americans in poverty at its highest level since the 1960s, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges and cartoonist Joe Sacco chronicle poverty's advance in four areas of the country -- a native American reservation, an impoverished New Jersey city, a rural mining region, and the farms where migrant workers toil under harsh conditions. Hedge's vivid commentary and Sacco's trenchant illustrations are published in Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt by Nation Books.