Having just gone through the 2020 presidential election, what better time to talk about the symbol of American democracy – the bald eagle. The bald eagle first appeared on the Great Seal of the United States in 1782 – holding in its talons an olive branch and 13 arrows. Less than 200 years later, the national bird of the United States was nearly extinct.

We are not alone in this world. We share it, obviously, with wildlife and marine life, and the vegetation that grows on land and in the oceans. How we treat those landscapes can have detrimental impacts to those other life forms.

In this week’s show, we look at one of the hottest places on Earth, Death Valley National Park in southeastern California and western Nevada. And this summer was especially hot. The park broke records in a number of categories as it experienced some of the hottest days ever recorded on Earth.  

The National Park System doesn’t pause for the upcoming presidential election. Throughout the summer it has been surprisingly busy, in light of the coronavirus pandemic, at many units of the park system. Indeed, there are many issues across the parks to pay attention to and discuss. To help us with that task, we’ve invited Kristen Brengel, senior vice president of government affairs for the National Parks Conservation Association, and Sheridan Steele, who spent nearly four decades with the National Park Service until 2015, when he retired.