In the first half, Alan Collinge, an outspoken advocate for the millions of Americans whose lives have been ruined by unconscionable practices of student loan lenders, discussed various aspects of this ballooning problem. In contrast to every other type of loan, federal student loans have no statutes of limitations, and no bankruptcy rights, he noted. Surprisingly, the middleman companies that collect on the loans, actually make far more money when the payments are delinquent, and fees keep piling up. So with these kinds of predatory loans, the lenders actually want the borrowers to go into default, he lamented. He cited that the interest alone now exceeds some $90 billion each year, and that is money taken out of the American economy.

Collinge believes interest collected on the loans should be brought down to just a minimal amount to cover administrative costs, and also spoke in favor of passage for legislative bill HR 2366 that would restore bankruptcy rights for student loan borrowers. When considering getting a loan for attending college, he recommends going through a private bank rather than a federal program, so that you can retain more financial rights. If already in default, he cautioned against dealing with a third party agency, as they often add more costs on to be repaid.

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Retired U.K. Ministry of Defence official Nick Pope has been investigating UFOs and other mysteries for many years. In the latter half, he spoke about his new documentary Aliens at the Pentagon, which untangles the numerous threads of the December 2017 revelation about the US military's secret UFO investigation-- the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP). "With the AATIP story," he remarked, "we almost have too much information,"-- the public has been presented with a barrage of details including alleged mystery metals, video footage of anomalous objects, and various players like the wealthy entrepreneur Robert Bigelow, Senator Harry Reid, and rock star Tom DeLonge.

With AATIP, Pope continued, there was a "believer" faction within the US government that did not rule out the possibility that UFO phenomena was extraterrestrial or paranormal, and through the program, they were able to investigate the issue with taxpayer money. One roadblock, Pope disclosed, was that some of the senior people at the Pentagon became convinced there was a "demonic" aspect to UFOs and the paranormal and wanted nothing to do with it. He also reported that the US Senate Armed Services Committee has interviewed some of the military involved in the 2004 Nimitz incident that AATIP studied, and is considering holding hearings.

News segment guests: John M. Curtis, Lauren Weinstein