AlternativeRadio

The pandemic has revealed a huge systemic failure in the ability of the U.S. to effectively attend to the well-being of millions of its citizens. World-class inequality has exacerbated the situation.  You don’t need a degree from MIT to figure out the score. The rich get the gold and most of the rest of us get the shaft. Once the dust settles post-pandemic there will be a lot less competition out there. Amazon, Walmart and a few other giants will be left with ear to ear grins and swollen bank accounts. Their wealth would make the robber barons of old swoon with envy. The capitalists love to pay lip service to competition but their real goal is total monopoly control. Politics? The same deal. Your choice is limited to two establishment parties.

The ruling class, and there is such a thing, assiduously attends to its needs. That is to say, to maintain and expand its power and wealth. How does it do that? By manipulation, propaganda and political influence. It deploys divide and rule tactics to not only distract most people but goads them to turn on one another. The idea is to get people to look down and not up at those who are in control. So your class enemy is not gazillionaires such as Jeff Bezos or Mark Zuckerberg but it’s the poor guy down the street, out of work, who is behind in his rent, and his family doesn’t have enough food to eat. The boot is on his neck. How to get it off? Organize and resist.

Despair. We all experience it. It can lead to demoralization. What’s the antidote? Engagement. Finding kindred spirits and acting collectively. Building bonds of solidarity. Working toward the common good. John Lewis, long-time Georgia Congressperson and civil rights icon had this advice: “Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble.” Recorded at the Sanctuary for Independent Media.

The decades-long one-sided Washington policy in favor of Israel reached new heights during the Trump regime. The peace process is a joke. The ever-expanding Jewish-only colonies, known euphemistically as settlements, have grown ever larger. The possibility of a sovereign, viable Palestinian state has dramatically receded. Yet, despite the occupation, the Palestinians practice, what is called in Arabic, al-sumud, steadfastness. They stay on the land and resist. What’s next?

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the JCPOA, the Iran Deal, was a major diplomatic accomplishment. By all accounts it was successful. However, it was unilaterally abandoned by the current president. The UK ambassador to the U.S. called Trump’s move “an act of diplomatic vandalism.” Biden indicates he may return to the deal. Iran and the U.S. have been locking horns ever since the 1979 Islamic Revolution which overthrew the Shah, a major U.S. client. In the fading days of a fading president, there are reports that Trump may launch an attack on Iran. He’s been dissuaded by his advisors, for now. Meanwhile, U.S. sanctions on Iran, perhaps the most severe in history, during a pandemic, can only be described as cruel. Who suffers? Ordinary Iranians.

The U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 is one of the great crimes in modern history. No one has been held to account. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died, many more wounded and millions became refugees. Washington’s insane action unleashed a cascade of disasters across the Middle East from Syria to Libya and sparked the rise of jihadi groups. But Western intervention in the region has a long history. One can mention the 1916 Sykes-Picot agreement or the Balfour Declaration the following year and right down to the inheritor of European imperialism: the United States. Any country that says no to Washington’s diktats is threatened with “obliteration” as the current occupant of the White House warned Iran. The Empire’s subjects at home, the American people, are largely kept in the dark about what their country is doing abroad.

This recording, recently discovered in the piles at AR, features the great radical historian talking with students at UNM. He is asked about getting past the culture of denial of the powerful. Drawing on his vast knowledge of history he says, “It always takes time and persistence. Every movement looks like it is hopeless in the beginning. It seems people have no power. But then people took risks. The most important thing we can do is not to hold back. Resist authority. The more people speak out it encourages others to do the same. The American system is controlled but it has little openings. We have to take advantage of those openings.” He tells the students about his friend and fellow WWII vet, Kurt Vonnegut and a letter the New York Times refused to print. A perfect companion to the Back Seat Interviews I did with him that same day as we drove from Santa Fe to this event in Albuquerque and back. Recorded at the University of New Mexico.

As a political ideology, fascism developed in Mussolini’s Italy, a century ago. At its core, fascism conjures up a mythic past. There is nostalgia for a so-called purer time. Its advocates deploy a raw appeal to nationalism. Opponents are demonized. Politicians spew racist dog whistles. Minorities are scapegoated. Fascists use fear, one of the most powerful human emotions, to manipulate people. And there is always the implied threat and actual use of violence. The great radical historian Howard Zinn said, “You can’t be neutral on a moving train? Is this a moment where you want to be neutral? The train is moving. You have a choice.

We are in “unchartered territory,” as the media incessantly remind us. We are on the eve of an election amidst a pandemic. The president has declared in advance that the election is a “hoax,” it is “rigged.” He would not even commit to saying he would honor the outcome. “We’ll see what happens,” he says. He knew early on how deadly the coronavirus was, telling Bob Woodward it’s a “killer“ and a “plague.” And yet in public continued with happy talk: “It’ll just go away…It’s fading…And we have it totally under control.” In addition to a colossal Covid-19 failure he has whipped some of his supporters into a frenzy. Vigilante groups, men with guns threaten to kidnap governors. Things are not just getting “curiouser and curiouser” as Alice would say but more and more dangerous.

India is often called the world’s largest democracy. Narendra Modi is the prime minister. He was elected in 2014 and again in 2019. Prior to becoming prime minister, he was chief minister of the state of Gujarat, where in 2002, a massacre of Muslims took place. Modi denied any involvement. But the State Department was not convinced and banned him from traveling to the U.S. He is a longtime member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or the RSS. “Its founding ideologues,” Arundhati Roy, says, “were greatly influenced by European fascism-they openly praised Hitler and Mussolini.” The RSS expounds the doctrine of Hindutwa, Hindu nationalism and is the parent organization of India’s ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party, the BJP. The BJP, under Modi, has openly embraced Hindutwa and has demonized Muslims and immigrants. His army continues the decades-long occupation of Kashmir.