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November 27 - What the Syrian Opposition Wants; What More Could Go Wrong With the U.S. and Pakistan?; How Will the "Occupy L.A." Encampment End?
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We begin with Radwan Ziadeh who is an important member of the Syrian opposition and we discuss the Arab League’s imposition of sanctions on the Assad regime following the League’s recent ejection of Syria from the organization of which Syria was a founding member. As the portent of civil war looms, we discuss what actions the UN should take to stop the slaughter. |
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Then we look into the latest source of tension between the US and Pakistan following a NATO airstrike that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. Marvin Weinbaum joins us. He was the former Afghanistan and Pakistan Analyst at the Bureau of Intelligence and Research in the State Department. We discuss the growing tensions between the erstwhile allies that could get out of hand as the US tries to exit from Afghanistan. |
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Then finally we have a discussion on the upcoming eviction of the “Occupy LA” encampment at City Hall, scheduled for midnight Sunday. Clark Davis, the media coordinator for “Occupy LA” joins us in the studio along with Tom Hayden, an anti-war activist and founding member of Students for a Democratic Society. We discuss what looks like an impending clash between police and protestors and how it can be avoided. |
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MUSIC: Nashaz - Men Waein; Atif Aslam - Tere Liye; Velvet Underground - I Found A Reason; Vampire Weekend - The Kids Don't Stand A Chance |
November 24 - Tahrir Square Explodes Again; How American CEO's Fire Workers, Extract Wealth and Reward Themselves; Giving Thanks For Living Better
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We begin by going to Tahrir Square in Egypt to get an update on the second Egyptian revolution, first from Rabab El Mahdi who is a professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.
Then we speak with Joshua Hersh, who covers U.S. Foreign Policy and the State Department for the Huffington Post. He is in Cairo covering the upcoming Egyptian elections. |
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Then we hear from a veteran financial reporter and Wall Street insider William Cohan, the author of the new book “Money and Power; How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World”. We discuss how corporate America is sitting on piles of cash that, rather than investing it in plant and equipment or on R&D, the top executives are using their idle billions to buy back company stock in order to reward themselves at the expense of the workers they are laying off. |
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Then finally on Thanksgiving, in the spirit of being thankful for positive social trends that offer hope in a time of economic distress, political polarization, deadlock and dysfunction, Stephan Schwartz, a Senior Fellow at the Samueli Institute joins us to discuss how some communities are tackling hunger and homelessness in a humane and healing manner, separate and apart from government programs or Church-related charity. |
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| MUSIC: Arcade Fire - Half Light II; Sharon Jones and The Dap Kings - Money; My Morning Jacket - Thank You Too |
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November 23 - The Revolution is Just Beginning; The Neocons as Elder Statesmen; Senior Advisor to Ron Paul on Foreign Policy
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We begin with attorney and activist Zevin Zeese who has been active in third party politics and served as Ralph Nader’s press secretary and spokesman in 2004. He has been active in the “Occupy D.C.” movement and we discuss how the growing disgust with Congress might benefit third party movements as well as the future direction of the occupy movements. |
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Then the author of “They Knew They Were Right; The Rise of the Neocons” Jacob Heilrunn joins us to critique the latest Republican presidential candidate’s debate on national security that featured a panel of questioners representing the pantheon of neoconservative hawks responsible for the last decade’s disastrous wars and deficits. We discuss the candidate’s performance and positions as well as the possible return of the neocons. |
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Then finally Bruce Fein joins us. He is a Senior Advisor to the Ron Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign and we talk about the Republican outlier whose defense and foreign policy stance is at odds with the rest of the Republican presidential candidates. And although Ron Paul elicits rousing cheers from the debate audience, he is treated with uncomfortable scorn by the other candidates on stage and is largely ignored by the press. |
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| MUSIC: Shabazz Palaces - Are You.. Can You.. Were you? (Felt); Rolling Stones - My Sweet Neoncon; Built to Spill - You Were Right; Black Sheep - The Choice is Yours |
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November 22 - To Cut Or Not To Cut; Will The Pentagon Take a Hit?; Robocops on Campus
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We begin with an analysis of the so-called sequestration or trigger that has now been pulled to cut 1.2 trillion in federal spending across the board. We speak with Nicole Woo, the Director of Domestic Policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research about these proposed cuts, 600 billion of which will come out of discretionary spending that was already cut recently by 900 billion dollars. |
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Then we examine whether or not the Pentagon will take a hit from the automatic budget cuts that are currently in place but will not come into effect for a year. Pentagon Watchdog Dina Rasor, the Chief Investigator for the Follow the Money Project, joins us to discuss the likelihood of cuts being renegotiated and the hysterical overreaction by defense hawks to the proposed cuts that, if enacted, would still leave us with a military budget higher than Cold War levels when we actually had a real enemy. |
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Then finally we speak with Bob Ostertag who is professor of Technocultural Studies and Music at UC Davis where some of his students were recently pepper-sprayed by police, widely seen in video that has gone viral provoking outrage around the world. We discuss how such an over-reaction was justified by campus authorities and why U.C. police are so heavily armed, while police at private universities are mostly unarmed. |
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| MUSIC: The Beets - I Need More Allowance; Super Furry Animals - At Least It's Not the End of the World; Dirty Projectors - Police Story; Built To Spill - Planting Seeds |
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November 21 - The Supercommittee Strikes Out; Spain Votes in More Austerity; Are We Telling the Egyptian Generals to Stand Down?
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We begin with the latest on the Congress’ Supercommittee, the co-chairs of which just announced their failure to come to an agreement. Economist and professor of political science at Boston University Thomas Ferguson joins us to analyze the bad deal that became no deal because Republican’s not only refused to budge on the Bush tax cuts and agree to a modest increase from 35% to 39% for the richest Americans, but actually wanted to cut taxes for the 1% even further. We’ll discuss what might come next for a government of the 1%, by the 1% and for the 1%. |
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Then we look into the results of the elections in Spain with the Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Spain’s largest newspaper El Pais. Antonio Caño joins us to explain the resounding victory by the conservatives who are promising more austerity for the Eurozone’s fourth largest economy that has 45 out 100 young Spaniards out of work and feeling indignant. |
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Then finally we discuss the renewed demonstrations in Tahrir Square, Egypt, where many protesters now feel they quit the Arab Spring protests too soon and handed the revolution to the military which has shown an unwillingness to cede control. The former Chair of the Political Science Department at the American University in Cairo, Sheila Carapico, joins us to discuss what will make the generals give up power and return to their barracks. |
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| MUSIC: Rolling Stones - You've Got The Silver; The Clash - Career Opportunities; The Kinks - Get Back In Line; The Roots - Guns Are Drawn |
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