Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the implications of the high number of former Koch Brother’s operatives who now make up Donald Trump’s campaign team that is headed by Cory Lewandowski, who for the last seven years worked for the Koch Brothers organizing Tea Party events and get-out-the-vote efforts for Republican candidates for office. Lee Fang, an investigative journalist with The Intercept joins us to discuss his article at The Intercept, “Political Operatives Abandon Koch Network for Donald Trump” and why Trump has been so successful in mobilizing his base of support because the very people who helped organize the Tea Party are now running the billionaire’s campaign with apparently no ties to their former bosses, the billionaire Koch Brothers.  

Part 2

Then we examine Putin’s surprise announcement that Russia is pulling out most of its forces from Syria just as the peace talks in Geneva get underway. James Gelvin, a professor of History at UCLA, who specializes on the Middle East, particularly Greater Syria, joins us to discuss the likelihood that by declaring “mission accomplished” in Syria, Putin is pressuring Assad to be more flexible in the peace talks although what kind of peace is possible remains in doubt as this destroyed and divided country may end up like Somalia on the Mediterranean.

Part 3

Then finally with Syria possibly joining a list of forever wars, we look into a number of the world’s “frozen conflicts” that started with the end of the Korean War and today include Kashmir, Israel-Palestine, Ethiopia and Eritria, FARC and the Colombian government and Russia and Ukraine. John Feffer, the Director of Foreign Policy in Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies joins us to discuss how wars may stop but not end and his article at The Huffington Post “To End No Wars: 5 reasons peace in Syria (and elsewhere) is beyond our grasp”.

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with an assessment of last night’s Univision-Washington Post Democratic presidential debate in Florida aimed at the Latino vote which to a large extent dealt with immigration.  Martha Arevalo, the executive director of the Central American Resource Center (CARACEN), who specializes in immigration advocacy work, community outreach and Latino strategic communications, joins us to discuss how both Sanders and Clinton handled the questions in Spanish from an undocumented native from Guatemala whose husband has been deported, leaving her and her children to fend for themselves. We also examine the unsafe criminal and political environment in Central America that drives immigrants north, recently made clear by the assassination of the Honduran human rights activist Berta Caceres. 

Part 2

Then we get an analysis of President Obama’s explanation and defense of his foreign policy in a lengthy article by Geffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic from Shibley Telhami, the Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland who recently served as a senior advisor to the U.S. Department of State. We discuss Obama’s frank criticism of allies who are “free riders” on defense and his aversion to greater U.S. involvement in the Middle East.

Part 3

Then finally with North Korea now under severe sanctions that cut off supplies of jet and rocket fuel, we will examine whether trying to punish the North Korean regime further for its missile and nuclear tests will ever get Kim Jong-Un to give up his “crown jewels”, a growing if antiquated nuclear arsenal. Bennett Ramberg, who was a foreign policy analyst in the Bureau of Politico-Military Affairs at the State Department joins us to discuss his article at Reuters “It May Be Time to Return U.S. Nukes to the Korean Peninsula” and the need to try a different approach to the North Koreans by stop trying to threaten them, but start talking to them.