SHOWS 76-100
SHOWS 76-100
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The proposed treaty misleadingly named the Free Trade Area of the Americas, the FTAA, has little to do with trade and is part of an ongoing process to create of a social order where absolutely nothing is free: every necessity and pleasure of life, and all functions of society will be operated for the profit of a small group of multinational corporate investors. In a sort of Orwellian newspeak, advocates of the process claim that it is the solution to poverty and inequality, and that it will increase prosperity for everyone. The reality on all counts, as you will hear tonight, is just the opposite.So-called "free trade" is the culmination a process of enclosure of public space that one of our speakers on the program tonight, historian Ian Boal, has called "the long theft." In our first hour, a panel of seven speakers who will discuss the threat posed by the FTAA.-- and the negative effects of its predecessor treaties on the workers, family farmers, women and ecosystems of the nations where these treaties have been implemented. In our second hour, Professor Ian Boal will discuss a new book, the Battle of Seattle, which chronicles the ideas, history and social movements against corporate globalization |
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Community forum on the myths and realities of US forein policy and the war on terrorism in Auburn, NY |
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When examining the US government's actions and alliances, it becomes plain that neither civilization nor sadism are it issue. Natural resources and corporate profits are the issue, and no amount of sadism is too much where protecting those profits are at stake. Tonight a look at oil, repression an resistance. We'll begin with a documemntary from St Cloud, Minnesota on what has come to be called the School for Assassins funded by taxpayer dollars and located at a US Army installation at fort benning georgia... Then, an interview with Al Gedicks on the Resource Rebels, as he traces the development of multiracial, transnational movements in the US, Asia, Africa and Latin America that are countering resource extraction and providing direction for environmentalists and anticapitalists alike. |
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FCC Chair Michael Powell is only the latest of a decades long line of government officials who have spoken out of both sides of their mouths about government regulation of the broadcast spectrum. The argument they have made is that the free market will provide broadcasting that best serves the public interest by giving the poeple what they want. At the same time, these government boosters of so-called deregulation have in no way suggested giving up the government's power to decide who gets to use the broadcast spectrum, and who doesn't. We are all aware of totalitarian nations with their government media, or of stories of journalists jailed or executed for critical reporting. American censorship takes a softer, more hidden form - most media is controlled by people who are benefitting from the present government policies - no accident because as media makers, they have been instrumental in shaping the public consensus. The owners of the press are free to say what they want, but most of us are not free to be owners. As a result of a recent supreme court decision lifting the ban enforced by the FCC on one owner dominating the various information streams available to a community, most of us could soon have less access to real information than a resident of Stalin's Russia or Hitler's Germany. This process is already well underway, as we'll hear tonight, even in two areas believed to be havens for diverse ideas: book publishing and public broadcasting... |
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Since September 11, safety and security has been on the minds of many people as well as on the lips of government officials. An office of "Homeland Security" has been established whose most notable acts appear to be the harassment of people who express criticism of the Bush Administration and rounding up immigrants based on their race. Also, sealing the borders from dangerous individuals like John Clarke, an anti-poverty activist from Toronto, who was denied permission to give a speech in Michigan this month. In an e-mail detailing his interrogation by US officials Clarke said he was asked whether he was an anarchist or socialist, and whether he knew the whereabouts of Osama bin Ladin. The supposedly security-consious government seems to be facilitating two disasters waiting to happen: the continuancre of indefensible and intrinsically deadly nuclear reactors which would cause tems of millions of deaths if breached due to a terrorist attack, and a financial system that eerily resembles the period just preceding the Great Depression of the 1930. In our first hour of the program, we'll hear from anti-nuclear activist Harvey Wasserman about how to shut down nuclear plants such as Indian Point near New York City that is putting 20 million people at risk, including us. Then, in our second hour, Wizards of Money with Smithy returns with an analysis of the effect that the dismantling of banking regulations put in place after the 1930's depression may have on our not too distant future. |
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Is the "war on terrorism" a response to the September 11 attacks, or is it part of larger and long-lanned attempt to gain and keep control of Central Asia and its wealth in order to shore up a US economy teetering on the brink of collapse? What do drugs and oil have to do with it? Mike Ruppert has been publicly critical of the offical story presented by the government in the wake of the 9-11 attacks. Ruppert is a former narcotics detective from the Los Angeles Police Department who was forced out in 1978 after he attempted to expose what he'd learned of the Central Intelligence Agency's role in drug trafficking. He is the publisher of From the Wilderness Newsletter which focuses on reporting on the role of drug money in the us economy, and covert government operations that maintain control of that cash flow on behalf of US economic interests. Tonight we're going to hear most of the sound track of "The Truth and Lies of 9-11" a more than two-hour video based on a lecture Ruppert gave at Portland State university last November. Ruppert has offered 1000 dollars to anyone who can impeach the authenticity of his sources. He presents a series of facts to support the theories he advances. You decide to what extent he's made his case... for more info see Ruppert's website www.copvcia.com |
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Lois Gibbs, environmental justice activist of "Love Canal" fame gives a lecture and discussion on grassroots organizing against toxics. |
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Tonight's program is devoted entirely to a lecture and discussion by Professor Ward Churchill, Meet the New Boss, Same as the Old Boss: Globalization, Genocide and Resistance. The talk was was given last month in Toronto as part of a lecture tour of several canadian cities. In it, Churchill makes the link between present day corporate globalization, the enslavement of Africans and Eupoean colonization and genocide in the Americas. For those who want to change the injustices of the present, he asserts, one must rectify the past actions that made the present possible. |
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Recent legislation under the rubric if anti-terrorism has codified into law the undercurrent of xenophobia in American and Canadian society. These laws direct their harshest provisions toward the human rights of non-citizens, but, as we will hear on the program tonight they ultimately cast a shadow on the liberty of all of us. |
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Argentina was once the most prosperous nation in South America. Then it came under the tender ministrations of the International Monetary Fund, was privatized, globalized and sold off to the highest foreign investor. In December its outraged and starving people have took to the streets and brought down the government. In the United States, the gap between rich and poor is growing,and while the stock market soars the average person struggles harder and harder to keep themselves out of poverty. "We are all Argentina" was a cry echoed by protesters at the World Ecomic Forum in New York City this weekend. It was meant as a gesture of solidarity, but also as a warning to the people of America to wake up . In the our first hour a panel on the effects of neoliberal policy in the US. In our second hour, an eyewitness to the Argentine December uprising. |
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Following the Sept 11 attacks, commentators remarked that Americans were experiencing for the first time what it was like to be targeted for who you are. African American scholar and theologian Cornell West made the rejoinder that this was a new experience perhaps for white Americans but not for black Americans. Most white people, even those who pride themselves on their lack of prejudice, are unaware how different theie life experience is from that of Black people, thought we supposedly live in the same society, and that this difference is rooted in a history that has shaped the present in deep ways. Tonight, in commemoration of Black history month, some perspectives on the American experience through the lense of race. FULL
REPORT: Torn From the Land BACKGROUND:
How AP Did the Story of "Torn From the Land"
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The World Economic Forum, according to its website, is a member-based institution comprised of the heads of the 1,000 most powerful corporations in the world. Essentially, its goal is to homogemize economic and governmental systems worldwide in a manner that benefits corporations and their investors - the process known as globalization. The WEF claims it is working to benefit humanity by creating prosperity through this system. The reality is that most of humanity has suffered greatly as a result of the WEF's agenda, while a small group of investors, corporate leaders and their political allies have accrued enormous wealth. They have done this through the smoke and mirrors process known as free trade, which is neither free nor trade. It's a process of moving production to subsidiarys or contractors located in a country where the workers are paid slave wages and kept from rebelling by a government that gets a cut of the action. These products are them shipped back to the US and called "trade." Meanwhile, these corporations leave in their wake destroyed lives and poisioned land as they hop from country to country for their next quick buck. This coming week, the World Economic Forum will meet at the swanky Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York City to gorge themselves on delicious food and fine wines, pat themselves on the back and plan how to do more of the same. Our so-called democratically elected leaders, far from putting a stop to this corporate rampage will be there, on bended knee, offering them more US taxpayer dollars robbed from hardworking people, offering them US troops to keep their victims suppressed all over the world, offering them the protection of the New York City police which stands ready to beat the living daylights of the protestors that are converging on New York City to confront them. If this description of events seems exagerated, its only because you haven't heard stories like the one you're about to hear next on your evening news... Click here for more info on the multi-billion dollar airline bailout For more info on the Public Information Network, you can contact George Draffan on the web at www.endgame.org or call (206) 723-4276. Copies of the book are available through his website. |
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In our first hour, we'll hear from two Plowshares activists, Susan Crane and Phil Berrigan who were recently released from federal prison after serving sentences for destruction of US military weapons at an airbase in Maryland in 1999 with two others from the Plowshares movement. In the second hour of our program we'll explore the collaspse of the mighty Enron energy empire with Smithy, in part 8 of our ongoing series The Wizards of Money. Click here for more info on the WEF Click here for more info on the Northest Organic Farming Conference |
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A recent science fiction movie called the Matrix is set in a future world where humanity lies sleeping in a drug-induced collective illusion, connected to a monstrous machine that's sucking the life out of them while they dream that they are free people living out real lives. The hero of the film begins to wake and see through the illusion, and, he finds others who are also waking. He is told that he may return to his fairly pleasant dreams by taking a blue pill, or take a red pill and face the unvarnished truth. Tonights program will address our collective social illusions and make the case we are in fact already the sleeping subjects of a totalitarian one-world government that views our lives much the way that we view batteries in a flashlight - use them while they work, trash them when expended. First, a reading of "Escaping the Matrix" by Richard K. Moore of cyberjournal.org. Then an interview with John Stauber of PR Watch on how public relations techniques have been used to propagandize war and push harmful corporate products. We conclude with a talk by Professor of Philosophy John McMurtry of the U. of Guelph on f the one-world government by tyranny. |
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Politicians routinely campaign on being" tough on crime" and demand that citizens take" personal responsibility". Paeans to the so-called rule of law as a bulwark against tyranny are a staple of mianstream political thetoric of both parties. To what extent does this rhetoric reflect the reality of the conduct of our nation towards other nations, or the government towards citizens? As we will hear tonight on the program, in actual practice obedience to laws is only for the poor and the weak - might makes right,. For the first 90 minutes of the program we'll hear a recent speech by Professor Noam Chomsky on the US government's selective adherence to international laws concerning human rights and war crimes. Then we'll take a look at the function of laws inside our borders with a talk by Christiam Parenti focussing on the history of federal crime legislation as a means of social control of poor and working people. |
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The Bush administration has declared 2002 another year of war, and plans to mount attacks on more oil producing nations under the rubric of combatting terrorism . High on the list of possible enemies is Iraq, where the current president's father's administration, followed by the Clinton administration, pursued a similar course. We'll explore US policy toward Iraq, both its stated and unstated motivations. First, a talk by former UN sanctions administrator in Iraq, Dennis Halliday who resigned his post in protest against the conditions imposed on the Iraqi people following the 1991 war. Then, Fred Wilcox of Ithaca College will comment on his agreements and diagreements with Halliday's analysis. We'll conclude with an excerpt of a talk by professor Noam Chomsky analyzing the credibility of US government justifications for the decade long war against IRAQ. THE FULL AUDIO OF CHOMSKY'S SPEECH IS AVAILABLE HERE |
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The so-called war on terrorism didn't start after September 11. It has been going on for more than fifty years. It has had many names: the cold war, the Vietnam war, the drug war," humanitarian intervention" or "police actions". The war on Afganistan would have happened even without the September 11 attacks, the bluepeints for the invasion already existed. It just would have been packaged differently for us. War is always packaged in high moral terms, good and evil, defending democracy, protecting human rights - but it is best understood in terms of costs and benefits: who pays the costs and who benefits.In this program, a look at the connection between money and war. In our first hour journalist Bill Weinberg explains the wars presently being conducted in Latin America in context of the wars in western Asia and their connection to oil . In our second hour, an interview with 2 war tax resisters, who are criminals in the eyes of the state because they refuse to kill or pay for killing. |
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As we'll hear tonight, markets can't solve our envionmental problems because they are the primary culprits. Rather than working to restore abundance, political and corporate leaders are scrambling to corner the market on precious life-sustaining resources and using law and war to do so. In the first hour, two scientists who will discuss the threat to the food supply, health and the environment posed by policies designed to promote the expansion of corporate power. In out second hour, a new edition of Wizards of Money linking the creation of money with the destruction of the planet's water cycle. |
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Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel are the creators of particpatory economics, called parecon for short. They debuted their theory in the early 90's and have continued to develop and refine it over the course of four books and numerous dialogs with critics. The lecture and discussion in this program was recorded last month at the third annual New England Anarchist Bookfair. The speaker is Michael Albert, who some of you may know as the editor of Z Magazine. |
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Many of the situations that most impact our lives result from decision making by people outside the official political process, in a realm where most of us don't even have a nominal say. Tonight we're going to look at grassroots efforts to create economic democracy In the first hour, a new edition of the Wizards of Money with Smithy on democratizing the monetary system, in the second hour a speech on economic human rights by Cheri Honkala, founder of the Kensington Welfare Rights Union |
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The biotechnology industry recently launched a 50 million dollar ad campaign designed to portray the genetic modification of food as motivated by, and necessary to, ending world hunger. Though individuals involved in the development of biotechnology may well have such motives, the reality is that the world already produces more than enough food to feed every person on the planet. Tonight we're going to look at biotechnology, its claims and its context: the economic and political structures of global capitalism and the profit motive In the first hour of the program, a presentation by British anti-biotech activist and author Luke Anderson. In our second hour, a report on the recent meeting of the World Trade Organization in Qatar by Canadian anti-corporate globalization activist Maude Barlow, and an analysis of the system of global capitalism from one of its opponents, British political scientist Alex Callinicos. |
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Anti--Racist activist Tim Wise speaks on the system of institionalized white supremacy, how it works, and how combatting it must be a part of any movement for a democratic society |
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In this program, a look at the connections between corporate power and US military activity abroad, and the role corporations have played and are playing in subverting any semblance of democratic freedoms and self-governance at home. Speakers include military analyst and author Stan Goff, talking about his article "The Evidence is a Farce" and author William Blum with an historical overview of US foreign policy since World War 2. And, four speakers from POCLAD, the Project on Corporations, Law and Democracy on the way US law aids corporations in subverting true democratic self-governance. |
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The International Monetary Fund and World Bank are scheduled to meet November 6-19 in Ottawa, Ontario. Their meeting was originally scheduled for last month in Washington DC, but was cancelled in the as a result of the Sept 11 attacks. Hundreds of thousands protesters were expected to challenge their actions in the streets of Washington. Tonight we're going to explore in depth how the IMF works, what it actually does, who benefits from its policies, and why many people call its activities economic terrorism. In our first hour. we'll hear a variety of perspectives the IMF and World Bank, inlcuding revelations from a former leading offical who had a change of heart and turned whistleblower. In the second hour , a new edition of Wizards of Money on monetary terrorism, how the IMF and Wall Street speculators profit by destroying the economies of countries throughout the developing through attacks on their currencies. |
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Three card monte is a con-game that presents itself as a game of chance. On street corners in every major city, confidence men make their living with three bent playing cards and an understanding of human behavior. The victim is asked to pick, out of the three cards sliding around the table, the one red card. , the dealer tells you he will double your money if you win. There is in actuality no red card for you to chose. After he showed you he had a red card, he replaced it with a black one. He palmed it. This is the dealer's primary skill. You don't notice becuase your attention is being distracted by his patter. You don't notice because you are altready convinced that one of the three cards sliding sround the table is red Analysts that we have presented over the last several weeks on this program have explained why the so-called War on Terrorism is not only unlikely to eliminate terrorism, but rather to increase the pool of people worldwide who have suffered at the hands of the US government, thereby resulting in increased risk that these people will turn to terrorism to address their grievances. Are its stated objectives the real objectives? What is the war on terrorism actually accomplishing? Tonight on the program, a look at how it is boosting the political fortunes of the Bush administration, being used to force through controversial energy and trade policies, giving the state increased power to attack political dissent and democratic freedoms, increasing the US military presence in oil rich countries, and in spite of the calls for unity, fueling racism within American society. |
SHOW
#100 - Sun. 4/21/02