August 8 - A Real World Version of the "Hunger Games" Coming Soon; Chevron Fire Spikes Gas Prices; Teddy Bears Attack Belarus

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with a real world version of the hunger games, coming to a country near you. Michael Klare, the Director of the Five College Program in Peace and World Security Studies at Hampshire College joins us. We discuss his article in the current issue of Mother Jones, “The Hunger Wars in our Future: Heat, Drought, Rising Food Costs, and Global Unrest”.

Part 2

Then we look into the fire at the Chevron oil refinery in Richmond, California that is causing a sudden spike in gas prices on the west coast. Roger Kim, the Executive Director of the Asian Pacific Environmental Network who has been active in environmental issues with citizens in the community surrounding the refinery, joins us to discuss local anger at Chevron and why the refinery build in 1902 has had problems with fires following a 2007 fire that shut down the refinery for that year’s first quarter.

Part 3

Then finally we speak with David Marples the President of the North American Association for Belarusian Studies about how Europe’s last dictatorship has dealt with the attack of the teddy bears. Following the prank by a Swedish public relations firm that parachuted 800 teddy bears into a town in Belarus, the Swedish Ambassador to Belarus has been expelled by the country’s paranoid dictator Lukashenka, who retaliated in a fit of fury, firing a slew of generals in charge of air defenses for failing to protect the motherland.