Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the recent White House Summit to Counter Violent Extremism and Obama’s efforts to bridge the growing divide between the West and Islam that has been met with derision from the Republican Right who are demanding that Obama hold the Muslim religion itself responsible for the actions of terrorists rather than as the president tried to made clear, quoting Obama, “we are not at war with Islam but at war with those who pervert Islam”.  Following an outburst from former New York City Mayor Giuliani who seems to think the president is so soft on terrorists that he does not love America, we look into the bizarre symbiosis between the forces that are radicalizing Islam and the reactionaries in the West who want to declare a religious war. Joining us is Ani Zonneveld, the Founder and President of Muslims for Progressive Values, whose group was among the Muslim reformists who were not invited to the White House summit that was dominated by conservative American Muslim groups. She discuss her open letter to the new king of Saudi Arabia at Al Jazeera, “Open Letter to Saudi King Salman bin Abdul Aziz: Saudi Arabia should curb Wahhabi ideology to alleviate human suffering in the Muslim world”, and her efforts to reform a religion that has been captured by Saudi Arabia’s Wahhabi ideology which Ani Zonneveld argues is at the root of all the ills in the Muslim world.

Part 2

Then we speak with Robert Scheer, a journalist, author and Editor-in-Chief of Truthdig about his new book, just out, “They Know Everything About You: How Data Collecting Corporations and Snooping Government Agencies are Destroying Democracy”. We discuss this double jeopardy facing American citizens of corporate and government spying, and the recent White House summit in Silicon Valley which called for a private and public sector partnership to combat cyber-crime and cyber-terrorism which was boycotted by the heads of Microsoft, Yahoo, Google and Facebook whose overseas business has been severely impacted by Edward Snowden’s revelations that the NSA was intercepting and collecting data stored by giant American tech companies. 

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with an overview of recent disasters, setbacks and reversals that has U.S. foreign policy blowing up in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Russia, Ukraine, Somalia and Yemen. Roger Morris, who served on the National Security Council under presidents Johnson and Nixon and is the author of “Between the Graves: America, Afghanistan and the Politics of Intervention” and “Kindred Rivals: America, Russia and their Failed Ideals”, joins us to discuss the failure upon failure of our foreign policies, particularly in the Middle East where the legacy of the ill-fated Bush/Cheney intervention continues to haunt us.

Part 2

Then we look into the partisan folly in Washington that promises more gridlock, dysfunction and possibly another government shutdown, only weeks after the new Republican majority in Congress promised that they were going to get things done. Veteran Capitol Hill staffer Mike Lofgren, who was a senior analyst on the House and Senate Budget Committees, and is the author of “The Party is Over: How Republicans Went Crazy, Democrats Became Useless and the Middle Class Got Shafted”, joins us to discuss the ineptitude of House Speaker Boehner and the paralysis of Senate Majority Leader McConnell.

Part 3

Then finally we examine a recent report by the `National Academy of Sciences, “Climate Intervention”, and speak with Peter Frumhoff, the director of science policy at the Union of Concerned Scientists where he is also chief scientist on climate change. We assess the viability of proposals to inject millions of tons of sulfate aerosols into the stratosphere to reflect sunlight and cool the earth, as well as less drastic and far more beneficial ways to reduce CO2 by using solar power in the third world to electrify rural areas and improve living standards and literacy.