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July 1 - A Member of "Yo Soy 132" on Mexico's Elections; The Domination by Mexico's Media Monopolies; The Role of the "War on Drugs" in the Election; Why the Opposition Leaders Fall Short
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We begin with a spokesperson for the Yo Soy 132 student movement that began as a reaction to the promotion of the PRI candidate Pena Nieto by Mexico’s media monopolies. Paula Santoyo, who MC’d last night’s massive silent protest in the Zocolo joins us. |
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Then we speak with Dr Andre Dorce Ramos, who is a lecturer at the Communications Sciences Department in Universidad Autonomo Metropolitana in Mexico, and is the obmudsman with Public Broadcasting Channel 22. We discuss the flagrant political bias of Mexico’s media monopolies and how much the alternative media used by Yo Soy 132 is penetrating the political landscape. |
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Then George Grayson the author of “The Executioner’s Men: Los Zetas, Rogue Soldiers, Criminal Entrepreneurs, and the Shadow State They Have Created” joins us to discuss the impact of the bloody and brutal war on drugs on Mexico’s election. |
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Then finally Anne-Marie O’Conner joins us. She writes for The Washington Post from Mexico City and we discuss the unlikely possibility of an upset victory by the PRD candidate Lopez Obrador who she recently profiled in The Washington Post. |
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| MUSIC: Molotov - Gimme The Power; Manu Chau - Politik Kills; Natalia Lafourcade - Un Dereche De Nacimiento; Mexican Institute of Sound - Mexico |
June 28 - Roberts Redeems The Supreme Court; The Affordable Care Act's Impact On Women and Children; Health Care Reform At Last!; Protesting The Wal-Martization of America
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We begin with the Supreme Court’s unexpected ruling upholding Obama’s signature Affordable Care Act. First John Dean joins us to discuss the legal reasoning behind the Court’s 5 to 4 decision. He is the former Counsel to President Nixon, and was chief Minority Counsel to the House Judiciary Committee and Associate Deputy Attorney General of the United States.
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Then Dr. Susan Wood joins us to discuss what the Affordable Care Act means for women and children, who would have suffered most of the impact of its repeal. She is a Professor of Health Policy and Executive Director of the Jacobs Institute of Women’s Health at George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. |
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Then we hear from Paul Starr who is a Pulitzer-Prize winning Professor of Sociology at Princeton University and was a Senior Advisor to the Clinton health plan and is the author of “Remedy and Reaction: The Peculiar Struggle Over Health Care Reform”. We discuss how the Affordable Care Act will be enacted in the face of Republican resistance and Mitt Romney’s vow to repeal it on his first day in office. |
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Then we speak with one of the leaders of a demonstration against Wal-mart opening a new store in downtown Los Angeles. Maria Elena Durazo, the Secretary-Treasurer of the L.A. County Federation of Labor joins us to discuss why she and 10,000 protesters are marching to oppose Wal-mart, a retailing giant whose six heirs to the fortune of founder Sam Walton, today own more wealth than the bottom 30% of Americans. |
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| MUSIC: Dirty Projectors - Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie; Dinosaur Jr. - Feel The Pain; My Morning Jacket - Look At You; Pete Seager - Union Maid |
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June 27 - NRA Orchestrates Congressional Farce; For-Profit Colleges on the GI Bill; Was the Turkish Warplane Provoking Syria?
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We begin with the unprecedented vote tomorrow to hold the Attorney General in contempt of Congress based on trumped up false charges pushed by the NRA, who are the main reason why illegal guns flow unfettered into Mexico. Yet the NRA is rounding up votes in Congress to blame Eric Holder for allowing guns to cross the border. Dennis Henigan, the author of “Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths That Paralyze American Gun Policy” joins us to discuss this breath-taking exercise of cynicism and hypocrisy underway on Capitol Hill. |
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Then we look further into the disgraceful display of posturing and grandstanding in the House who, instead of voting on making student loans more affordable and available, are engaged in a spurious partisan witch hunt. David Halperin, a Senior Fellow at Republic Report joins us the discuss a real scandal involving student loans, where the biggest beneficiaries of the GI Bill, which is designed to help veterans, turn out to be the largely fraudulent for-profit college racketeers who are raking in billions in taxpayer money while ripping off our vets. |
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Then finally, as Turkey escalates its warnings to Syria following the shooting down of a Turkish warplane, we look into reports that question the plane’s mission which by some accounts might have been a provocation. Asli Bali, who is a professor at the UCLA School of Law, joins us to discuss military escalation on the 550 mile long border that Turkey shares with Syria. |
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| MUSIC: Bob Marley - I Shot The Sheriff; Stiff Little Fingers - Tin Soldiers; Major Lazer - Get Free; Xavier Rudd - Let Me Be |
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June 26 - The Junk Bond Deal That Made Mitt; "The Great Dismantling"; A Syrian Film Maker Who Testified Before the International Criminal Court
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We begin with Beth Healy, a financial investigative reporter with the Boston Globe who has uncovered Mitt Romney’s transformative 1988 business deal which turned a $10 million dollar investment into a $175 million profit for him and Bain Capital. We discuss this deal that was financed by junk bond king Michael Milken who at the time was under an SEC investigation that led to his conviction and imprisonment. A time Romney refers to as “the glorious days” of Drexel Burnham, quoting him, “it was fun while it lasted”. |
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Then the author of “Land of Promise: An Economic History of the United States”, Michael Lind, joins us in the studio. We discuss America’s economic history, in particular the current era we are in that began in the mid seventies, the “Great Dismantling” as Michael Lind calls it. An era where the household wealth and living standard of most Americans has stagnated or declined, while the wealthiest one percent have benefited from increased productivity, accruing most if not all of the additional wealth. |
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Then finally a Syrian-born film maker Sam Kadi joins us in the studio. The director of a new feature film “The Citizen” which is about a Lebanese immigrant who comes to America just before 9/11, he recently testified before the International Criminal Court in The Hague about the on-going slaughter of Syrian civilians by the Assad regime. Atrocities which film makers like Sami’s murdered colleague Basel and others, risk their lives to document. |
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| MUSIC: Titus Andronicus - Four Score and Seven; The Shins - No Way Down; Big Rock Candy Mountain; Built To Spill - Things Fall Apart |
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June 25 - The Supreme Court Upholds "Show Me Your Papers"; Darryl Issa the Modern McCarthy Witchhunter; Delusional Leftists Still Support Assad
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We begin with the Supreme Court’s decision handed down today in Arizona v The United States and speak with Rudolfo Espino who is a Professor of Political Science at Arizona State University and the Editor of “Latino Politics: Identity, Mobilization and Representation.” We discuss how law enforcement in Arizona will deal with what is left of SB 1070, the so-called “show me your papers” provision. |
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Then we speak with Matthew Miller who is the former Communications Director for Attorney General Eric Holder who this week the House of Representatives will likely vote to hold in contempt of Congress. At issue are documents that allegedly pertain to a botched ATF operation, “Fast and Furious”. But so far the lead inquisitor Representative Darryl Issa has refused to allow public testimony from the AFT which refutes his claims about an operation the Bush Administration set up in the first place, which Eric Holder only learned of a year ago. |
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Then finally award-winning investigative journalist Max Blumenthal joins us. He has been writing for the Lebanese newspaper Al Akhbar, and we discuss his clash with the pro-Assad bias of the newspaper that led to his recent resignation, as well as examine why some still consider Syria’s tyrannical ruling family of murderous kleptocrats, revolutionary leaders in the struggle against Western imperialism. |
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| MUSIC: Ry Cooder - Across the Borderline; M. Ward - Cosmopolitan Pap; The Roots - Guns Are Drawn; The Beatles - Revolution |
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