CODEPINK Radio

On this episode of CODEPINK Radio. We start off going over the attempted arrest and assault of our own Medea Benjamin. Next, our new Middle East Campaign manager, Enas al Saffadi, interviews Palestine expert on the recent tragedies in Gaza. In the second part, we are joined by Leonardo Flores to take us through the recent coups in Bolivia and Venezuela. 

CODEPINK Co-Founder, Jodie Evans and Jane Fonda discuss Jane's weekly actions in Washington D.C. and this Friday's War and Climate Change action. 

CODEPINK's Paki Wieland hosts and talks with CODEPINK's Ariel Gold about her recent trip to Iran life for Iranians under U.S. sanctions with Jamal Abdi, National Iranian American Council. Next we discuss the outcome of the Kings Bay Plowshares 7 Trial with Sam Husseini, Institute for Policy Accuracy.

Hosted by CODEPINK's Teri Mattson, Why is Latin America on Fire?

CODEPINK's Ariel Gold and Teri Mattson discuss Jewish activism from the US-Mexico border to Palestine.

How do people become activists and  human rights defenders? Our first guest is Carolyn Karcher, editor of Reclaiming Judaism from Zionism, discusses that an increasing number of Jews are learning the truth behind Zionist ideology, which has degraded the Jewish religion. The ethics of Judaism are based on pursuing justice, love thy neighbors and repair the world. Yet, none of these are followed by Israelis to Palestinians.  Recognizing that Israel is committing war crimes under the facade of Jewish identity, Jews are grappling with this and renouncing Zionism. In her book, Carolyn collects stories to change hearts and minds, starting with Rabbis explaining Zionism's harmful beliefs and to reconstruct Judaism by going back to ethical principles. Next, Carolyn takes us through the imperialistic and nationalistic history of Zionism starting before WWII. Does Israel represent Jewishness?Visitors to Israel don’t see behind the apartheid wall. Ariel and Carolyn discuss the transformative experience of visiting Hebron, the epicenter of the occupation. Israel blatantly attempts to blind the realities of what is truly happening in Palestine. They turned a religion that was built on loving thy neighbor into a religion of hate

Our second guest, Abby Stein, author of Becoming Eve. She discusses the similarities between Auschwitz and the current actions taken by ICE at the Southern Border. These similarities launched the Never Again movement, which points out society’s short term memory and to look at world atrocities through the lens that legal governments could persuade an entire society that millions of people are the source of their problems, by convincing them that we can get rid of them and everything will be great. Never Again asks us to remember that this did not happen that long ago in Germany.

Paki is joined by CODEPINK Latin America Campaign Coordinators, Leonardo Flores and Teri Mattson, to illuminate the hypocrisy of the United State’s treatment of Venezuela and Honduras. Latin America has been suffering for 500+ years under European and American colonialism and more recently from corporate intervention and extractivsm.

Leonardo starts us off by reviewing policies that that has led Venezuela to it’s current standing. First, aggression started with the 2002 coup under the Bush Administration. Under the Obama Administration, an executive order was signed that VZ was an unusual threat, even once calling VZ the greatest threat to the US in the Western Hemisphere. The Trump Administration doubled down on policies by enacting sanctions that have killed approximately 40,000 Venezuelans and counting.

Next, Teri, recently back from a trip to Honduras,  discusses the massive Neo liberal economic model in Honduras that 100% privatization has created much more poverty than alleviated, heinous violent attempts to grab land, especially on the Caribbean coast, and mining concessions, that all cause disastrous effects. President Hernandez's brother is on trial for Narco-Trafficking just started last week. The brother of US installed president resulted from a coup and named as a co-conspirator in the trial, so then why are we only hearing about VZ being a Narco-Trafficking state? Why is none of this covered in the media? Honduras houses the largest military base in Central America. Once a country accepts a base, the US does not challenge (human rights violations, corrupt government officials). What happens in Honduras purposely stays out of the media.

We discuss the impact of the assassination of Honduran environmental activist Berta Caceres for her work against the extraction industry. She is a martyr that inspired many indigenous environmental activists.  The Honduran indigenous community is up against giant transnational corporations. It is comparable to what the western expansion was in the States, using land grabbing to exterminate native people. This is the modern version of it, but we hear so little by the media, especially the violence inflicted.

We compare the stark contrasts between the foreign extraction industries. VZ president, Chavez believed the natural resources should be used for the benefit of the developing society. He re-nationalized the oil industry to put profits to work. Oil profits lead enormous strides, including 2.8 million public housing units, approximately 9 million people housed. The contrast to this in Honduras is telling of US corporate interest. We hear so little about the impunity, land grabbing, water and gold extraction which comes with devastating violence all for external benefits backed by OUR tax dollars. The Irony and hypocrisy in profound, VZ is vilified even though they support their people and Honduras is kept out of media.

Recently, we learned at the trial of Hernandez’s brother that El Chapo was financing right wing candidates. Who hired him to finance, the most powerful cartel working to undermine the Venezuelan government? The right wing in VZ has links to military and aims to portray VZ as a Narco state. On a global scale, there are five to seven battling cartels that will control all capital resources beyond borders. This is rooted in ideology and global capital. These cartels exist to supply to the US’s high demand for drugs.

With Indigenous People’s Day next week, we remind you indigenous people represent a culture, a heritage and spirit and have always been on the front line.

Our first guest is Hassan El-Tayyab, of the Friends Committee on National Legislation who works to end the Saudi backed war on Yemen. Hassan takes us through Saudi’s role in Yemen, the world’s worst huminitarian crisis. He takes on the mainstream media's role in covering the war in Yemen. Hassan takes us through how coalition gets critical legislation passed.

"If it’s one person it’s a tragedy and if it is too many it becomes a statistic?" The suffering in Yemen is on such scale that it is hard to comprehend. Paki asks listeners to ponder how to get people to pay attention to the human tragedy that is beyond the statistics.

Fo the second part of show we speak with CODEPINK’s Co-Director, Ariel Gold, who discusses the Boycott Saudi Campaign, including the reasons to boycott, history of boycotting Saudi and the myths being portrayed to the public by Saudi leaders. Ariel details the horrific acts of torture being done to women prisoners, including Loujan Althathloul by Saudi Arabia, under the current Crown Prince MBS.

Last year, investment companies pulled out of the annual investment forum following the gruesome murder. This year, Davos in the Desert, headed by Jared Kushner, has big players coming back in, including Goldman Sachs, CitiGroup and BlackRock. CODEPINK is leading the boycott 'Davo’s in the desert’ campaign. Learn more about our boycott Lush Cosmetics, Six Flags, Vice Media Company and musicians (including Nick Minaj) scheduled to perform in the absolute monarchy state.

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CODEPINK Co-Founder, Jodie Evans, starts by sharing her experience along with other anti-war activists disruption at yesterday’s United Against a Nuclear Iran (UANI) summit taking place on the margins of this week’s United Nations meetings. She goes into detail on the lies being told to the public on Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

The first guest is Lindsay Allen, Executive Director of the Rainforest Action Network. RAN was founded in 1985 to stop the destruction of the Amazon Rainforest. She goes into detail on the climate crisis, fires in the Amazon, how big corporations are leading these crises. Lindsay discusses how we can target banks and looks to the Occupy Movement to show it is possible to take down these financial institutions.

We need to funnel our energy from the streets and target these companies and pull the financial rug out from under the fossil fuels and agricultural business sectors. Some outstanding facts being explored are the #1 investor in Amazon Rainforest deforestation is BlackRock and Chase Bank has funneled 196 billion dollars to fossil fuel companies.

Lindsay ends the first half by urging us to put our bodies in the way to stop pipelines because that increases our dependence on oil, turn out in the streets. We can make the difference because companies are assessing what their customers care about and to shut down banks. She encourages listeners to take the small steps and think about what makes you uncomfortable enough to match the challenge of going after these institutions.

Nancy and Jodie share their experiences at Friday’s Youth Global Climate Strike. Nancy fills guest’s in on her CODEPINK campaign to divest from BlackRock. She discusses the horrific effects of the war economy, the myths the CEO’s of investment companies tell the public and what we can do to stop these corporations.

Lastly, they go over the top ten ways the military and climate change are intertwined.

We ask you to ponder war, what is it good for?

CODEPINK's Paki Wieland will be discussing the situation in Kashmir with Pakistani Feminist & anti-war activist, Sameena Nazir, looking at both the roots of the current uprising and possible solutions to the situation. Pakistan's Prime Minister, Imran Khan, recently visited with President Trump. The purpose of this visit and the United States follow-up will be topics of discussion.

Hosted by CODEPINK's Paki Wieland, guest speakers include the anti-nuke nuns Ardeth Platte and Carol Gilbert, and our two DC Interns Clara Trippe and Raegan Davis are our guests. We will look at past activities upon which we, in the present, are continuing to work for a just, nuclear weapon free world. These intergenerational CODEPINK identified women will share their visions and aspirations.

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