3-29-11 - Rosie's Harpo Studio Announcement!

In case you missed it...

DWTS, GAINING WEIGHT, AND AIRPORT BODY SCANNERS
Rosie started today's broadcast discussing last night's Dancing With The Stars!  She loves Kirstie Alley on the show.  Rosie thinks she looks great and thinks she's a great dancer too.  Rosie also enjoys Ralph Macchio.  Rosie likes DWTS in general but said she doesn't always understand the judges critiques, probably because she's never danced ballroom.  No one in the studio thinks Wendy Williams is a very good dancer.  Rosie took a call from a listener who loves Kirstie too and called her "feisty" and "young at heart."  Rosie agreed.    Rosie said she thought there was a lot of flirting going on between Kirstie and her partner and said she wouldn't be surprised if they were "knockin boots" when it's over! 

Rosie was sad to report she gained back five of the pounds she lost while on vacation.  But today she is fully back to her diet and recommitted.  Janette read an article recently about gaining weight that said one of the places people are programmed to gain weight is on vacation so she shouldn't feel bad.  Bobby said he knows performers who will diet before vacation in preparation for the weight they will surely gain when they are on it. 

Rosie said she flew back from Miami on Jet Blue because it's hard to get Tracy to fly American Airlines.  Rosie said Tracy will calculate the difference in the tickets and then tell her how many prosthetic limbs or cleft palates that money could have provided.  During their trip they had to make the choice of whether or not to be scanned or to have a pat-down.  Rosie was selected to go through the full body scanner but chose to opt out.  Just before she left on vacation she read that the TSA may have miscalculated the amount of x-ray radiation they estimated the machine gives out by up to 10 times!   Not to mention after stripping down to almost nothing she said she's just waiting to be in a tabloid article of "celebrities are just like us!"  Because she opted out she received a pat-down.  Rosie and the woman giving her the pat-down were both very uncomfortable.  The woman who patted Tracy down found traces of explosives on her gloves so she had to go have a private search!  Janette warned never go into a private room for a search because you could either get strip-searched or die!  Everyone laughed at Janette's doomsday philosophy and wondered what the heck she was talking about!  Turns out she was referencing to THIS ARTICLE she remembered from 2007.  Rosie said the entire screening process was very anxiety provoking and nerve-wracking.  She took calls from listeners who also shared their own stories.  Rosie took a call from a listener who is a breast cancer survivor who worried about the amount of radiation.  She said when she questioned the TSA about it they told her there was no radiation and didn't provide any other alternatives. Rosie agreed that the TSA needs to be more forthcoming with the risks and the options to opt out and said you cannot even believe you're in America when it's happening to you.  Rosie also questions the need for the scanners because the people insisting we have them at every airport are also the ones profiting from it!  Bobby doesn't see a problem with the scanners and is fully willing to go through them.  Rosie thought we should be fully informed of our rights before we go through and Bobby agreed with that.  Rosie took another call from a listener who was also a breast cancer survivor who had just had reconstructive surgery before she went through a scanning machine at the airport.  She said the TSA personnel couldn't recognize what they had seen on her scan and they pulled her to the side and searched her.  She said she felt humiliated and violated and began to cry.  Rosie thanked her for calling in and sharing her story and congratulated her on beating breast cancer. 

All this talk of radiation, made Rosie think about what's happening in Japan.  She said when the news of the nuclear crisis in Japan hit the news, she began to google the Chernobyl survivors (or if there were any).  Rosie only found one woman who survived the cleanup who is still alive today.  She has illnesses due to radiation poisoning and her message to the cleanup workers was to RUN AWAY as fast as you can.  She said there is no way the government is telling you everything that's going on because they don't even know and they don't want you to know the truth because the nuclear industry is so powerful. 

Rosie took a call from a listener who has son with Autism who had a feeding tube and hates to be touched. She wondered what would happen to her son if he had to go through a scanner or get a pat-down.  Rosie told a story about Blake getting a pat-down after 9/11 when he was very young and still very speech-delayed.  Rosie had to keep telling the TSA personnel that he couldn't understand their directions.  Rosie said she would never let one of her children get scanned.    Rosie then took several more callers on the topic of airport body scanners.

ROSIE WILL TAPE HER NEW SHOW AT HARPO STUDIOS!
Rosie was happy and excited to announce that she will be taping her new show that starts in September 2011 at Harpo Studios in Chicago!  She thinks she'll do it where she will work one week on and then have one week off.  She and Kelli will keep their home base of New York and they will still have joint custody of the kids.  Rosie gets access to Oprah's entire team and the entire studio!!  Rosie is very excited to head out there in July and spend the summer in Chicago.

Rosie said she's been watching Season 25: Oprah Behind the Scenes and loving it (though it makes her a little nervous now knowing she'll be working there).  She mentioned how Oprah had a live tweet-a-thon during the last episode of the show and during Part 1 of her Master Class.  Follow Oprah on Twitter HERE.   Bobby loves all those shows too and said he also loves Lisa Ling's Our America.  Rosie said some of the Oprah staff will stay on and they will also hire some new people. 

Rosie was so excited when she was tweeting with Oprah yesterday about the film I Am!  Oprah then called Rosie last night to ask her what Tom Shadyac was like in person and Rosie told Oprah how amazing he is.  Jeannie was in the studio yesterday and she agreed.  She said Tom beats going to church and said his perspective on the world is fascinating.  Rosie knows the film I Am is "right up Oprah's alley" and follows along with what Oprah tries to do with her own life.  Rosie is hoping Oprah will help get his movie seen by even more people. 

Rosie said June 1st, 2011 will be their last Rosie Radio broadcast.  Janette has been doing Martha Stewart Living Radio and although she loves it, they haven't offered her anything permanent.  She's not sure she fits the Martha Stewart brand, per se but said she would welcome the opportunity if it arises!  If not, she's hopeful she will get something with Sirius but she's also looking elsewhere.  Meanwhile her house fell apart.  She has extensive water damage and also has to do some structural changes to it to the cost of $46,000!  When her father visited that house he told her it was built incorrectly and at the time she was annoyed but now she realizes he was right.  She loves the house though and said she would have bought it anyway. 

Did you listen to Janette on Martha Stewart Living Radio last week?!  Wasn't she awesome?!  Don't forget to join the Facebook page to keep Janette on Sirius and post on Martha Stewart Living's Facebook page to tell them how much you enjoyed Janette!!! 

Rosie asked Janette if she was nervous about not having a job after June and she said she was.  Everyone on the staff said they were nervous about it.  Rosie asked how the job prospects are today. Pete and Janette said they haven't seen many prospects out there.  Rosie said this next move will be a big transition for everybody.  She said if you would have told her a year ago that this is what would be happening in her own life she never would have believed it.  And she said the only thing that is constant is change.  Janette agreed and said in life we go through the doors that open and sometimes what we do with our lives is based on what's presented to us.  As for me, I put in my resume to become a substitute teacher.  I will miss connecting to you all though, terribly.  But I would rather have had this opportunity and had to say goodbye to it than to never have had this opportunity at all though, right?  That's what I tell myself anyway....

THOUGHTS ON CHRIS BROWN REVISITED
Since yesterday's show, Rosie has been researching Chris Brown's past and his music.  All the research she did on him really made her understand him even more and where he is coming from.  She wanted to make it clear that she never was condoning violence but she's also not going to pretend it doesn't exist.  Rosie said she simply has compassion for Brown and she can't pretend she doesn't.  Janette said we've all become Shirley Jackson's The Lottery waiting for the next person to stone and that's what Chris Brown's story does to us.  Rosie read what Russel Simmons said about it and how we all cannot be defined for the rest of our lives by what we do at such a young age.  He also said in the world Chris Brown grew up in, it was normal to him.  Not that it's right, but it was normal.  Rosie said it's hard (if not impossible) to completely exorcise our past from our lives.  She also enjoyed what Kevin Powell had to say in his open letter to Chris Brown and she read parts of it on the air.  Rosie thought Kevin's take was pretty interesting and said she would love to talk to him.   

THE PRESIDENT'S SPEECH, DONALD TRUMP AND THE BIRTH CERTIFICATE WARS
Rosie and the staff briefly discussed Obama's birth certificate and Donald Trump's display of his own birth certificate in an attempt to cater to the Tea Party.  Turns out it's Trump's birth certificate that is now in question because it doesn't have a seal or signature of the city register.  Also, Donald Trump saying no one knew Obama in Kindergarten is not true.  Rosie wondered why people like Piers Morgan are looking to Donald Trump on his opinion of President Obama's speech!

In regards to Obama's speech, here's the gist: Bobby loved it and Janette hated it.  Rosie said, "surprise, surprise."  Then there was a heated debate between Bobby (ever the Obama supporter) and Janette (ever the naysayer conspiracy theorist) regarding the speech.  Bobby defended that we're not in an actual war and Pete, Rosie and Janette DID think we're in another war.  Janette called it another preemptive war and wished the President would just be honest and say the reason we're in this war is because we're protecting our interests - NOT that we're defending injustices. If we were in the businesses of defending injustices Janette wanted to know why we aren't interfering in places like Congo and Darfur.  Bobby said the instability of the Mideast is a bigger problem for America than Darfur and Congo.  Janette said that's fine, but she just wished the President would be honest about our reasons for going there.

Rosie took several callers with varying opinions about the speech and the "war" with Libya.  Janette read a quote from last night's speech and Rosie compared it to Bush's speech before the war with Iraq.   One caller asked Janette what she would have the President say and Janette said she would prefer for the President to just be honest about our reasons that we're protecting U.S. interests!  Pete said so far our "non-war" with Libya has cost us $550 million in materials alone.  

TRACY'S SON'S SURGERY AND PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES IN THE WORKFORCE
Rosie said Tracy's son Wyatt is having open heart surgery next week.  Wyatt is 7 years old and has  Down Syndrome.  Rosie said it's hard for a child so young who doesn't really understand what is happening to him but Tracy is doing her best to prepare him for the hospital.  Rosie wondered if his panic seemed multiplied because he can't articulate what is bothering him.

Last week, Bobby went to a Home Depot in Florida and asked an employee with special needs to direct him to a certain department. The gentleman struggled so hard to answer his question Bobby said he then felt horrible for causing him so much distress.  Bobby knew the man just wanted to be part of the working force and be treated the same as everybody else.  Jeannie said it pleases her so much when she sees special needs kids in the community, making their own money.  She said she just loves it.  

Rosie said she will often ask people with a physical disability what happened to them and though she has always received a positive response from the people she asks, it can make the people she's with very uncomfortable.  But Rosie feels like it's better to just address it.  She took a call from a listener who has a huge birth purple mark over her shoulder and down her arm.  She wishes people would just ask her about it rather than stare.  And she complimented Rosie for doing so.

Rosie closed the show with a "peace out."

and that's what you missed - kw