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March 15 - Changing The Focus To Public Morality; Are We Hurting The Regime Or The Iranian People?; Killing The Planet For Oil
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We begin with the fallout from the resignation letter by a Goldman Sachs executive and explore the broader issue of public morality at a time when Republican presidential candidates are campaigning on enforcing a holier-than-thou private morality, mostly about sex. Mike Lux, the CEO of Progressive Strategies joins us to discuss how the focus in this election can be turned to address the morally bankrupt behavior and toxic and destructive environment of Wall Street |
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Then as the screws turn on Iran with today’s closure of its access to international bank transfers, we look into Iran’s aggressive and defensive foreign policy and the extent to which sanctions are hurting the Iranian people but not the regime. Nader Hashemi, a professor of Middle East and Islamic Politics at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver joins us. |
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Then finally as the rising price of gas becomes the central issue in this year’s election campaigns, we talk with Michael Klare about his new book, “The Race For What’s Left: The Global Scramble For the World’s Last Resources” and discuss how costly and increasing risks will be taken to extract the last drops of oil, exposing the environment to greater danger. |
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| MUSIC: Nina Simone - Funkier Than A Mosquittos Tweeter; LCD Soundsystem - Tribulations; Dirty Projectors - Cannibal Resource; Xavier Rudd - Messages |
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March 14 - The Morally Bankrupt Bank; Billionaires Decide the Nation's Leaders; A Wry Look at British Politics
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We begin with the bombshell dropped on Wall Street today in the form of an op-ed in the New York Times by a former Goldman Sachs executive who wrote “Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs”, accusing the company of being morally bankrupt, with a working “environment now as toxic and destructive as ever”. William Cohan, a contributing editor to “Fortune” and author of “Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World” joins us. |
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Then we examine how SuperPACs are determining who will run for the presidency in this election, and likely who will be the next president. Ari Berman, a contributing writer to “The Nation” and an Investigative Journalism Fellow at the Nation Institute joins us to discuss the overwhelming influence of SuperPACs on our already money-driven electoral system and how a handful of billionaires will determine the political fate of the nation. |
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Then finally British humorist Martin Lewis joins us to take a wry look at the current visit of U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron to the White House at a convenient time for Cameron when back home his friend and neighbor Rebeckah Brooks, the former head of Rupert Murdoch’s British Media empire, is being arrested along with five others for conspiring to pervert the course of justice. |
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| Music: LCD Soundsystem - Time To Get Away; Dirty Projectors - No More; Vampire Weekend - The Kids Don't Stand A Chance; The Beatles - Baby You're A Rich Man |
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March 13 - Gas Gouging With Impunity; A Soldiers Perspective On The Afghan War; Why We Should Put Bush And Cheney On Trial
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We begin with the sudden drop in President Obama’s approval rating to an all-time low that is apparently due to the high price of gas. The nation’s leading expert of oil and gas markets, Fadel Gheit, joins us to explain how Wall Street speculation accounts for 30% of the price at the pump. He is Senior Vice President for Oil and Gas at Oppenheimer and Company and has testified many times to the Senate and the House of Representatives about oil price speculation. |
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Then joining us in the studio is Sean Parnell, the author of “Outlaw Platoon: Heroes, Renegades, Infidels, and the Brotherhood of War in Afghanistan." He served with the 10th Mountain Division for six years and retired as a captain, having served on the Pakistan/Afghanistan border where his platoon suffered the highest casualty rate since Gettysburg with over 80 % casualties. We get a soldier’s perspective of the war in Afghanistan which, following the recent massacre of civilians, may end sooner with an accelerated U.S. withdrawal. |
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Then finally we speak with Elizabeth Holtzman, the youngest woman ever elected to the U.S. Congress. She is the co-author of “Cheating Justice: How Bush and Cheney Attacked the Rule of Law, Plotted to Avoid Prosecution – And What We Can Do About It”. We discuss why we can’t move on and how the failure to take action against a former president who has committed crimes stands as an indictment of the society that permits the impunity. |
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| MUSIC: The Roots - Guns Are Drawn; Bright Eyes - When The President Talks To God; Beastie Boys - In A World Gone Mad |
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March 12 - An Already Vexed Relationship Turns Sour; Another Side of Afghanistan; The P.P.P. Pollster on Tomorrow's Mississippi and Alabama Elections
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We begin with an assessment of the damage done to the NATO mission in Afghanistan by the U.S. Army Staff Sergeant who murdered 16 Afghan civilians, including nine children asleep in their beds. A former Assistant Secretary of Defense in charge of manpower, Lawrence Korb joins us to discuss the stress of multiple deployments on service personnel and the impact this tragedy may have on the planned U.S. withdrawal. |
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Then we speak with Kim Barker, the author of “The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan”. The former South Asia Bureau Chief for the Chicago Tribune, she is now the Edward R Murrow fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and we discuss the vexed and tragic relationship between America and Afghanistan and, at time of acrimony and distrust, Kim Barker’s affection for the Afghan people, their culture and their country. |
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Then finally we speak with Tom Jensen, the Director of Public Policy Polling who has just released a poll of the likely outcome of tomorrow’s Republican Primary elections in Mississippi and Alabama where Santorum and Gingrich are splitting the conservative vote to the extent that Romney may eek out a narrow victory in one or both states. |
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| MUSIC: M. Ward - Right in the Head; Fionn Regan - Shadow of an Empire; Green Day - American Idiot; Sam Cooke - A Change is Going to Come |
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March 11 - Is Freedom Doomed in Syria?; Is McCain Still Running Against Obama?; What is in the Book of Revelation
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We begin with the failure of former U.N. head Kofi Annan to get an agreement to stop the year-long bloodshed in Syria, and get an analysis of where the civil war in Syria is heading and whether we will end up with a Somalia on the Mediterranean with remnants of the regime and rebels fighting over chemical and biological arsenals. Robert Baer, a former CIA officer who knows both sides, Syrian Army Generals and the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood, joins us. |
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Then following the HBO movie “Game Change” that revealed the fractious inner-working of the McCain/Palin campaign, we examine the candidate who lost the last presidential election but has since bitterly campaigned against President Obama and his foreign policy, recently calling for a war against Iran and for a bombing campaign against Syria. A former classmate of John McCain’s at the Naval Academy who spent eight years as a POW in North Vietnam, Dr. Phillip Butler joins us to talk about the man who is still running against Obama. |
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Then finally we speak with Elaine Pagels, a Professor of Religion at Princeton University and the author of a new book, “Revelations: Vision, Prophesy, & Politics in the Book of Revelation”. We discuss the appeal of damnation and destruction that America’s religious right has for this apocalyptic vision of a war between good and evil and their investment in the end times that has brought about a peculiar alliance with the right-wing government of Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu. |
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| MUSIC: Bob Dylan - Masters of War; Sonic Youth - Do You Believe In Rapture; Arcade Fire - Neon Bible |
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