Never able to take responsibility for its ineptitude, (or criminality) America is busy today, months into the Covid-19 outbreak, poking an accusatory finger directly in the chest of China. That its blame campaign is transparently false, and the lethal combination of systemic corruption and colossal malfeasance that lay behind the growing death toll in the United States is patently obvious to almost everyone, seems not to matter to either presidential candidates, or to a media content to amplify their bilious indignation; it's an election year, afterall.

Davide Mastracci is managing editor at Passage, the Canadian online publication providing "thoughtful political, economic, and cultural ideas from a left-wing perspective." Mastracci's has previously worked at HuffPost Canada and Vice News, and has been published throughout Canada and overseas too. His recent article, 'Don’t Blame China For Your Government’s COVID-19 Failures' appears at ReadPassage.com.

Davide Mastracci and a new take on an old peril in the second half.

Welcome to Gorilla Radio's continuing Post-Covid broadcast. We are NOT for now broadcasting live from the basement of the SUB building at the University of Victoria, but instead have moved production to my (ahem) home studio. This interview is recorded April 7th, 2020.

Triage is the current reality in hospitals struggling to handle the influx of patients sickened by the Covid-19 influenza+ pandemic. Already, guests of this show have reported pseudo-euthanasia policies in France and Spain. It's clear, in times of emergency our medical systems accepts, when resources are short, some must perish that others be saved. But, what happens when the philosophy and practice of winnowing the wounded into essential and expendable categories extends further than the battlefield, or surgical theatre?

Stephen Corry is CEO of Survival International, an organization dedicated to "A world where tribal peoples are respected as contemporary societies and their human rights protected." He's written numerous articles on the subjects of "scientific racism" and ideology of "fortress conservation", and is the author of the book, 'Tribal Peoples for Tomorrow’s World'. Corry and Survival International have interceded on behalf of the rights of tribal peoples in South America, Asia, and Africa where their efforts standing up for the Kalahari Bushmen in Botswana earned Stephen the honorific of “liar, devil and loose cannon” from its government. Stephen Corry's articles too appear online at, among other places, CounterPunch where I found his recent article, 'It’s Time to Clean Ecofascism Out of Environmentalism'.

Stephen Corry in the first half.

And; the race to replace the long-time Green Party of Canada leader, Elizabeth May is on. Dimitri Lascaris is a Canadian lawyer, human rights activist, and reporter for the Real News Network. He currently holds the position of Justice Critic in the Shadow Cabinet of the Green Party of Quebec, and has put himself forward to fill May's considerable boot print on the national stage.

Dimitri Lascaris and moving the Green agenda forward in Canada in the second half.

And; long-time Gorilla Radio contributor, Janine Bandcroft will be here at the bottom of the hour with the Left Coast Events Bulletin of some of the good things to be gotten up to in and around our town in the coming week. But first, Stephen Corry and taking the Eco from ecofascism.

Welcome to Gorilla Radio's continuing efforts, NOT broadcast live from CFUV Radio in the basement of the Student Union Building at the University of Victoria, but emanating live-to-tape via Skype from our home-based ... studios on this date, April 17th, 2020.

Despite floor to ceiling, seven days-a-week coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, little has been said about how those living in the more remote reaches of this country, Canada are coping. Here in advertised, Super Natural British Columbia, thousands live far from hospitals and other amenities taken, until recently at least, as granted. How is the extended shutdown of the economy effecting those communities, and what challenges and benefits do rural, and super-rural life present and afford in these weird times?

Ingmar Lee is a long-time BC-based environment defender, who describes himself as a "rotten, belligerent, iconoclastic, ungrateful, unrepentent, and unpleasant treehugger." Besides these qualities, Lee has spent a life-time investigating truth, questioning accepted wisdom, and making enemies of journalistic hacks, greedhead money-grubbing business leaders, and political fraudsters like the spinmeisters at the CBC and CTV who describe his years of dedication and accomplishments as "environmental zealotry", "eco-terrorism", and the deeds of "a raving nutcase." Ingmar has appeared many, many times on Gorilla Radio over the past nineteen years, covering the issues those same critics chose to sacrifice on the alter of careerism.

Ingmar Lee and the pros and cons of living on edge of a crashing society.

The "Big Lie" concept is certainly not new, but in today's "post truth" World, that once cynical tool of despots has become a condition of life, (like water for fish) so ubiquitous it is largely invisible for we immersed in it. Nowhere is reality less evident than in the field of nature conservancy, where the comfortable certitude of unassailable good will being met by equally good deeds in truth bears little scrutiny.

Dr. Mordecai Ogada is a scientist, educator, author, and Executive Director of the Nanyuki, Kenya-based, Conservation Solutions Afrika. His book, 'The Big Conservation Lie', co-authored with Kenyan journalist, John Mbaria, is an unblinkered examination of the conservation industry in Africa, and searing indictment against the detrimental effects its malpractice visits against the environment and Africans, both human and non-human.

Dr. Mordecai Ogada and discerning the Big (conservation) Lie.

With workaday pursuits like bus driving, hospital cleaning, picking up garbage, and delivering pizzas being hailed as heroic, is the idea of heroism losing its cache?

If Wikipedia is to be believed, a hero is one who, "in the face of danger, combats adversity through feats of ingenuity, courage, or strength..." and in the current atmosphere, perhaps the mundane is now elevated, but there's another kind of courage, strength, and ingenuity of purpose not less heroic, if less easily defined.

Kathy Kelly is a long-time peace and justice activist, essayist, author, and recipient of numerous awards for her peace service, including multiple nominations for the Nobel Peace prize.

She is a founder of Voices in the Wilderness and Voices for Creative Nonviolence, co-authored the book, ‘Prisoners on Purpose: a Peacemakers Guide to Jails and Prison,’ and wrote, ‘Other Lands Have Dreams: from Baghdad to Pekin Prison.’ Her recent article, 'He’s Got Eight Numbers, Just Like Everybody Else' chronicles the struggle of Father Steven Kelly, entering his third year of imprisonment in America for resisting the relentless progress towards the ultimate holocaust, nuclear anihilation.

Kathy Kelly and Fr. Steve Kelly, a hero not just like everybody else

Welcome to Gorilla Radio, continuing to broadcast, not live from the basement of the Student Union Building at the University of Victoria, but live-to-tape via Skype, for the foreseeable...

There has been much written on the World after Covid in the vein of how this unprecedented cessation of the economy for millions could prove to be the pause in business as usual desperately required; our opportunity to assess the many, many ways our current consumerist culture is destroying individual people, human and animal communities, and wrecking the planetary environment every living thing depends on. It is, as some say, the "silver lining" of this dark situation. While all that may well be true, there are others using this moment to press fast forward on all the most egregious sins of our societal paradigm, taking advantage of the distraction and disarray. Just one such case is the promotion of regime change in Venezuela. Long a project for Washington and its satraps, the Trump administration has used the global medical emergency to drive another nail into the heart of the Bolivarian Revolution.

Joe Emersberger is a Canada-based writer whose work appears at FAIR.org, VenezuelAnalysis, and The Canary and is primarily focused on media lies, distortion, and confabulation. His recent article, 'Media Struggle to Defend Washington's Cruelty Toward Venezuela and Iran as Corona Virus Spreads' appears at Fair.org.

Joe Emersberger and life in a time of siege, sanction, and plague.

Welcome to Gorilla Radio's continuing Post-Covid broadcast. We are NOT for now broadcasting live from the basement of the SUB building at the University of Victoria, but instead have moved production to my (ahem) home studio. This interview is recorded April 7th, 2020.

Triage is the current reality in hospitals struggling to handle the influx of patients sickened by the Covid-19 influenza+ pandemic. Already, guests of this show have reported pseudo-euthanasia policies in France and Spain. It's clear, in times of emergency our medical systems accepts, when resources are short, some must perish that others be saved. But, what happens when the philosophy and practice of winnowing the wounded into essential and expendable categories extends further than the battlefield, or surgical theatre?

Stephen Corry is CEO of Survival International, an organization dedicated to "A world where tribal peoples are respected as contemporary societies and their human rights protected." He's written numerous articles on the subjects of "scientific racism" and ideology of "fortress conservation", and is the author of the book, 'Tribal Peoples for Tomorrow’s World'. Corry and SI have interceded on behalf of the rights of tribal peoples in South America, Asia, and Africa where their efforts standing up for the Kalahari Bushmen in Botswana earned Stephen the honorific of “liar, devil and loose cannon” from its government. Stephen Corry's articles too appear online at, among other places, CounterPunch where I found his recent article, 'It’s Time to Clean Ecofascism Out of Environmentalism'.

Stephen Corry and taking the Eco from ecofascism.

Welcome to the new, post-pandemic outbreak breakdown of Gorilla Radio. As regular listeners will know, CFUV has shuttered the studios, so live interviews are no longer possible. What I'll present in the new not normal are live-to-Skype interviews on the most pressing issues of this weird moment. Janine Bandcroft is an educator and social events publisher, broadcaster, and she is too the 'Green Vegan Grandma' on Youtube, where her latest video, “What to do when there's nothing to do” appears. Janine decided to self-isolate early on in the Corona virus crisis, and so has a head start on the rest of us.

Janine Bandcroft in the first half.

And; Spring has officially sprung, the toilet paper crisis has passed, and food security and social mobility issues are, or soon will foremost on our minds. While the initial shock of the new abnormal has ebbed, the next shoe to drop will be the failure of the supply chain. So, what better way to spend your mounds of self and/or imposed social isolation time than learning how to grow your own food! Christina Nikolic operates the increasingly busy, Organic Gardener's Pantry. She also teaches organic horticulture. She is too a past director of SOUL, or the Society for Organic Urban Land Care, and spends, she says, what time there is left, "in the garden, smiling while spreading mulch." But first, Janine Bandcroft and “What to do when there's nothing to do”

Christina Nikolic and growing for your life in the second half.

The Covid-19 interrupted Funding Drive 2020 show...

GR 10-58 101.9 FM 'cfuv.ca'

Thursday March 19th, 2020

FundingDrive

11:00:00 2:00 Welcome to the strangest of the one thousand and fifty-eight Gorilla Radio episodes I've presented here at CFUV over the last 21 years.

This was to be my contribution to the 2020 FundingDrive show, but that, like so much else around us was not meant to be. The microbe that stopped the World has stopped us too, for now.

But, and it's an enormous but, we will continue to produce radio, just not for the next while in the way we've done so for so long. That means, firstly; no more live broadcasting.

Virtually all of my shows have been done live from the basement of the SUB. There's no replacing the energy of live performance, but we'll try to bring the same urgency and vibrancy to our programming we always have.

For today however, I'll bring in some music, and some segments of interviews past, and perhaps a little blatherskiting. And, I'll remind; though the FundingDrive has hit a major roadblock, you can still express your support for the station and the show financially online at: supportcfuv.ca.

Here's something from long-time go to band, Transglobal Underground's great, Impossible Broadcasting disc.

11:02:00 5:24: Transglobal Underground – Impossible Broadcasting – 7-5

“ “ – The Khaleegi Stomp

11:07:30 2:00 Thievery Corporation – Radio Retaliation - Mandala

When Donald Trump treated the nation to his third State of the Union speech in January among the participants of his one-ring pantomime was Juan Guaido. Guaido's specialty act is impersonating the president of Venezuela, (and to be honest, it’s the only act this pony knows). But, tricky Juan found a receptive audience in the US Congress, receiving a standing ovation from both sides of that body’s undivided foreign policy establishment.

Joe Emersberger is a Canada-based writer whose work appears at FAIR.org, VenezuelAnalysis, The Canary and is primarily focused on media lies, distortion, and confabulation. I talked to Joe shortly after Mr. Trump's speech about Juan Guaido, Washington, and most importantly about Canada's policy towards the duly elected government of Venezuela and democracy more generally.

11:09:30 21:00 Discussion w/ Joe Emersberger

11:30:30 :30 Cart(s) - Chris Chandler

11:31:00 3:00 Benjamin Zephaniah – Naked – Rong Radio

11:34:00 2:00 Orbital – The Fire This Time - The Box

11:36:00 20:00 Discussion w/ Joe Emersberger

11:56:00 4:00 Transglobal Underground – Impossible Broadcasting - Radio Unfree Europe

Today, as Pestilence astride its white horse stalks the World ready to scythe humanity down to size, it seems fitting we ponder our society, ourselves, and our priorities to know best what and who to save before the end of all else. Serendipitously, my first guest undertook just such a sorting task, before the dread Covid-19 cocked its ugly head into our collective consciousness, questioning the legitimacy of privilege and daring suggest meritocracy has little to do with the ordering of our social hierarchy.

Meghan Bell writes fiction and poetry, and her critical essays on wealth, capitalism, and mental health appear online at The Walrus, The Tyee, among other places, and at Passage, the "Canadian publication of thoughtful political, economic, and cultural ideas" where I found her essay, 'I Was Born Wealthy, And Know Rich People Don’t Work Harder Than You'.

Bell is too the past publisher of Room Magazine, and co-founder of the Growing Room Literary and Arts Festival, (going on NOW through March 15th in Vancouver). Meghan is also a member of Resource Movement, a "community of young Canadians with wealth and/or class privilege working toward the redistribution of wealth, land, and power."

Meghan Bell in the first half.

And; as tax time rolls around do you find yourself wondering just what kind of government you're paying for? When it comes to foreign policy, the tribute our current Liberal government wrings from your pockets on pain of imprisonment is getting you nothing more than branch plant corporate imperialism; just as was the case with its Tory predecessors.

Yves Engler is a Montréal-based activist, essayist, and author whose articles appear at Dissident Voice, The Palestine Chronicle, Rabble.ca, and Pacific Free Press among other places. Yves is also a key organizer with Disruption Network Canada, which has mobilized activists to challenge politicians through peaceful, direct action.The latest of Engler's eleven books, 'HOU$E of MIRRORS: Justin Trudeau's Foreign Policy' questions the Liberals' progressive pretense, while challenging the persistent national delusion that Canadians are "a benevolent force in the world" despite ample evidence to the contrary.

Yves Engler and throwing stones in Canada's house of mirrors in the second half.

And; long-time Gorilla Radio contributor, Janine Bandcroft will be here at the bottom of the hour with this week's Left Coast Events Bulletin of some of the good things to be gotten up to in and around our town in the coming week. But first, Meghan Bell assessing society and our endpoint values.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: http://cfuv.ca.  He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/