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February 3 - Do We Now Have a Plutonomy?; "Hoffman and the Terrible Heroin Deaths in the Shadows"; The War on Drugs on the Heroin Front
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We begin with the new study from the Institute of New Economic Thinking that is a front page story in Monday’s New York Times “The Middle Class is Steadily Eroding: Just Ask the Business World”. Robert Johnson, the Executive Director of the Institute for New Economic Thinking, who was formerly Chief Economist of the US Senate Banking Committee and Budget Committee, joins us to discuss stark evidence that our economy is becoming a plutonomy with the top 5 percent of earners accounting for almost 40% of personal consumption spending in 2012, up from 27% in 1992. |
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Then we examine the drug overdose death of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, apparently from heroin laced with Fentanyl. Jeff Deeney, a social worker and a writer based in Philadelphia joins us. He has an article at The Atlantic “Hoffman and the Terrible Heroin Deaths in the Shadows” and we will discuss the growing epidemic of overdose deaths from batches of Fentanyl-tainted heroin across the mid-Atlantic and the increased infection rates among injecting drug users of drug-resistant bacterial infections. |
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February 2 - Governor Christie in the Shadows at the Super Bowl; The Super Bowl as a Celebration of Corporate Power and Privilege; Argentina's "Mad Queen"
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We begin with the main event in New Jersey, the Super Bowl, which should be a moment for Governor Christie to be basking in the spotlight, but instead he is likely to be seen lurking in the shadows as the deepening political scandals surrounding him show no signs of abating. Salvadore Rizzo, who covers New Jersey state government for the Star Ledger joins us to discuss charges by Christie’s former close aide that the governor knew about the bridge closures while they were happening and Sal Rizzo’s latest article at the Star Ledger “Bridge Scandal: When did Christie learn about the lane closures?” |
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Then we look into the corporatization of the Super Bowl as private and corporate jets pack the nearby Teterboro Airport and the bulk of tickets for today’s event are way beyond the reach of average citizens. Pulitzer-prize winning investigative journalist formerly with The New York Times, David Cay Johnston joins us to discuss the Broncos versus Seahawks game at MetLife stadium as a celebration of corporate power and privilege with luxury suites up to a million dollars complete with private chefs and climate-control. |
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Then finally we examine the latest political and economic crisis in Argentina were there is a run on the banks with the peso in free fall and people lining up for blocks to buy dollars while President Cristina Kirchner is all but AWOL to the point she is seen by many a “mad queen”, out of touch with her people and possibly out of touch with reality. Robert Cox, the former editor of the Buenos Aires Herald, who has been called the hero of Argentine journalism for risking his life to report on kidnappings, torture and the murder and disappearance of thousands during the Dirty War of the 1970’s and 80’s, joins us to discuss the latest self-inflicted wounds to a country rich in resources and talent. |
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January 30 -A Cold War Flashback Over Russian Cheating; A Beijing-Based Journalist Who Recently Had His Visa Pulled; How Free Trade Agreements Drive Inequality
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We begin with an apparent return to the Cold War in the form of an arms control treaty signed by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 that the U.S. suspects the Russians have cheated on. Daryl Kimball, the Executive Director of the Arms Control Association joins us to look into concerns that the U.S. briefed NATO allies on over Russian test flights of the R-500 ground-launched cruise missile that have been going on since 2008, complicating U.S. diplomatic engagements with Russia on cooperating to end the war in Syria and bring Iran’s nuclear program under international control.
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Then, with China’s Foreign Ministry refusing to grant visas for New York Times and Bloomberg News reporters in China, we will speak with journalist Paul Mooney, who has been based in Beijing since 1994, but in November his visa application was rejected by the Chinese government with no reason given. We discuss why the current leadership in China is trying to intimidate foreign journalists into towing the party line and the extent to which revelations about massive corruption among top Communist Party officials and their families by the New York Times and Bloomberg have reached the Chinese people and led to efforts to restrict the ability of foreign reporters to do their jobs. |
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Then finally we speak with Clyde Prestowitz, the former counselor to the Secretary of Commerce who has an article at the Los Angeles Times “The all-too-real costs of free trade to average Americans. The Country is not better off when trade deal gains go only to the very rich”. We discuss the apparent contradiction in President Obama’s State of the Union address where he decried the growing income and wealth disparity in America, while calling for a free-trade agreement, the Trans Pacific Partnership that is likely to ship more jobs overseas in exchange for cheap imports that the unemployed will not have the means to purchase at Wal-Mart. |
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January 29 - Is Ukraine on the Brink of Civil War?; The Egyptian Military's Crackdown on the Press; The Life and Legacy of Pete Seeger and the Hudson River
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We will begin with an update on the crisis in Ukraine following a warning by its first post-independence president Leonid Kravchuk to parliament that the country was on the verge of civil war. Jeffrey Mankoff, the Deputy Director and Fellow with the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Russian and Eurasian Program joins us to discuss the struggle within the country between the pro-European majority and the pro-Russia minority, and the wider impasse between Europe and Russia, between democratic values and power politics.
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Then we examine the assault on press freedom by Egypt’s military government with 20 journalists from Al-Jazeera facing charges of belonging to terrorist groups, harming national unity and social peace and spreading false news. An expert on the Arab media, Marwan Kraidy, a professor at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania joins us to discuss the military’s intimidation of the Egyptian press and the role of the chief backers of the military regime, Saudi Arabia in influencing Arab media and spreading the Saudi Royal Family’s model of feudal politics and reactionary religion. |
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Then finally, we speak with John Cronin, the Senior Fellow in Environmental Affairs at the Pace Academy for Applied Environmental Studies and the founder and CEO of the Beacon Institute for Rivers and Estuaries. The author with Robert Kennedy Jr., of “The Riverkeepers”, he worked for decades with Pete Seeger on cleaning up the Hudson River. He joins us to discuss the life and legacy of Beacon New York’s most famous resident Pete Seeger, who eschewed celebrity and lived by the motto, “think globally but act locally”. |
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January 28 - "How America Abandoned Egypt's Arab Spring"; "The Rich Don't Always Win," Will They Lose Tonight?; Obama Speaks to a House Divided Against Him that Uses Dog Whistle Coded Racism
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We begin with an update on Egypt now with the generals back in charge three years after the revolution, and the Supreme Commander Field Marshal Sisi having just been given the army’s approval to run for president. Ambassador Cynthia Schneider, the former US Ambassador to the Netherlands now a Professor of Diplomacy at Georgetown University, joins us to discuss her article at CNN “How America Abandoned Egypt’s Arab Spring” and whether the presidential election in April will mark the end of Egypt’s flirtation with democracy.
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Then, with President Obama expected to discuss income and wealth disparity in his upcoming State of the Union address, we speak with Sam Pizzigati, whose latest book is “The Rich Don’t Always Win: The Forgotten Triumph over Plutocracy that Created the American Middle Class.” He joins us to discuss his latest article at The Washington Spectator “Plutocrats Ponder in the Alps” and the likelihood of Obama taking the Congress to task for enacting the agenda of the plutocrats at the expense of a viable middle class and living wages for working Americans. |
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Then finally, in advance of the State of the Union, we discuss what kind of House the president is addressing, given that half of the room appear to have made a career out of demonizing Obama in ways that are both racist and disrespectful to the office of the presidency. Ian Haney Lopez, a Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley joins us to talk about his new book “Dog Whistle Politics: How Coded Racial Appeals Have Reinvented Racism and Wrecked the Middle Class” and whether or not Obama will call out his tormentors in Congress who use race to unite and motivate their dwindling base. |
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