A senior water policy fellow at the UWM School of Freshwater Sciences appeared Tuesday on the “The Daily Show With Trevor Noah,” playing straight man to comedian Michael Kosta on a five-minute segment about the Great Lakes.
Fellow Dan Egan, who is also a reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, discussed the problems facing the Great Lakes in banter with Kosta’s buffoonery. The two were shown taking a boat ride on Lake Michigan in Chicago with spectacular drone footage of the water and city skyline.
Egan was appointed to the fellowship, a position supported by both UWM and the Brico Fund, in May. His duties include producing in-depth news stories about the most pressing issues facing the Great Lakes. He also is promoting his recent book, “The Death and Life of the Great Lakes,” published by W.W. Norton & Company.
“When I look out across Lake Michigan,” said the clowning Kosta, “I can’t even see the other side. So who’s to say that it isn’t an ocean?”
“It’s a lake,” Egan deadpanned.
It’s the second time this year that Egan has appeared on national media promoting issues of the Great Lakes. In June, he and Associate Professor Harvey Bootsma were guests on NPR’s “Science Friday with Ira Flatow.”
Egan, a native of Green Bay, is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist for explanatory reporting, in 2010 and 2013, for stories he wrote on the impact of invasive species on the Great Lakes for the Journal Sentinel. Some of his sources were drawn from UWM faculty.
