Keeping Democracy Alive with Burt Cohen

Keeping Democracy Alive with Burt Cohen

By Burt CohenSociety & CultureNewsPolitics
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Keeping Democracy Alive with Burt Cohen episodes

  • Nonviolent Refusal To Cooperate: The Irish Set The Standard
    Gandhi and Nehru took their inspiration from the Irish, people like Arthur Griffith. Who? Though violence gets all the headlines, rendering the powerful suddenly powerless though noncooperation is by far the most effective tactic. Our guest Professor David C. Cochran argues that we should look for inspiration today to the underappreciated but incredibly impressive founding of rebel Dail Eireann 100 years ago. We are faced with great challenges today, such as the threat of fascism. It’s good to remember that unjust rulers know what do do when faced with violence, but they are befuddled and helpless against creative and bold nonviolent resistance. And the goal is to win.
    1 hr
  • New Orleans at 300: Cultural Spectacle Vs. Ruling Racism
    It’s African and Catholic. Caribbean and European. Our guest Jason Berry’s new book is called City of a Million Dreams: A History of New Orleans at Year 300. And talk about colorful. For cultural identity, Allen Toussaint clashes with Robert E Lee. New Orleans is a deeply spiritual and noisy culture. Funerals are moments of dancing in the streets. From its founding by whites from France in 1718  through the neglect of poor neighborhoods after the disastrous 2005 flood, according to Jason Berry, its strength is its diversity of folkways. America as a whole can learn from the model.
    1 hr
  • Democrats More Hawkish Than Trump?
    Had Obama announced pull back of troops from Syria and Afghanistan, our guest Major Danny Sjursen says there’d probably be a ticker tape parade. But because of our reactive hatred for all things Trump, a bizarre thing happened: Democrats opposed the pullout. Oddly General Mattis became the good guy as he resigned over the step toward peace. Sjursen, who served combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and teaches at West Point, is no fan of Trump, but he is more strongly against needless wars. In 2016, Clinton was exceptionally hawkish and we lost. Where are Democrats this election year on foreign policy? Sjursen sees anti-interventionists like Republican Rand Paul as the most in touch with the majority of Americans on foreign policy. He argues that, based on a lot of history, “centrists” won’t win in 2020. Democrats, he insists, should re-connect with the majority who are for ending these wars.
    1 hr
  • Sparking Prosperity for Everyone
    Liberal-initiated efforts to eliminate poverty have been top down for about 50 years. But to be successful, development can’t be done to them from on high; it has to be done by the people most affected. We shouldn’t have low expectations of poor people, that’s been part of the problem. People are locked out of participating who can be and would like to be productive. There is ample proof such an approach works. Our guest today, Robert Friedman argues that for just a Few Thousand Dollars (the title of his book), a great many more low income Americans can contribute to their own and their children’s futures. The plan differs significantly from Universal Basic Income. And Friedman argues not only does it work but it is actually revenue neutral. Some 2020 presidential candidates have already started to pick up the idea.
    1 hr
  • A Wall Won’t Work. A New Marshall Plan Just Might.
    Of course Trump’s wall is useless. If we want to stem the flow of refugees from Central America, and stop wasting billions of tax dollars, a new Marshall Plan is needed. What motivates Central Americans to make the thousand mile foot trek? As retired Army Strategic Analyst Ed Corcoran reminds us, the Marshall Plan worked. It effectively addressed economic desperation. Working with indigenous people, American aid could once again work. Military solutions promise instant gratification and economic development addressing corruption and actually boosting economic soundness takes the long term, soit’s harder to sell. But when we Americans believe in and act on our own traditional values, stability can result. And increase our national security at the same time.
    1 hr
  • Angela Davis: Rising Star Again
    After nearly 50 years, she’s back in the news, and she keeps on pushing.  Angela Davis gained fame/notoriety as the Afro-coiffed California professor/activist speciously charged with helping Jonathan Jackson trying to free his brother George, author of Soledad Brother, from prison. In 1971 there was a worldwide movement to free her from prison (she was eventually found not guilty). In 2019, she’s back in the news after a committee in her home town of Birmingham Alabama rescinded its invitation to honor her with a human rights award. All because she advocates for Palestinian rights as part of civil rights. On this show History and Jewish Studies professor Marc Ellis explains what is going on and how it has thrust her back into the international spotlight, and how the snub may actually end up greatly helping her cause.
    1 hr
  • Great American Populism for 2020 Wins
    What is “populism?” It sure is not Donald Trump. Our guest today former Oklahoma Senator and chair of the DNC, Fred Harris, who ran for president in 1976, says of the media “to call Trump populist is complicity in a lie. Demagoguery is not populism!” Here’s how Fred Harris defines populism: “when everybody does better, everybody does better.” Coming from the now deep red state of Oklahoma, Fred Harris shares a little history: left-leaning populism was especially powerful throughout the heartland. He talks about his “redneck kinfolks” who shared his liberal populism. There was something called the “green corn rebellion.” And of course to win in 2020, Democrats can not again skip over this heartland. He says we can connect, if we communicate our message clearly and strongly. The mushy middle won’t do it; boldness is required. And Harris believes his is “intellectually sound optimism.” Listen in to see why.
    1 hr
  • From History Vantage Point: When Did the GOP Move to the Dark Side?
    This is not your father’s Republican Party. Conservatism has been left behind, replaced by the politics of cruelty. The common good is no longer a concern; Trumpism has openly enshrined greed, and the old checks and balances of democracy as its enemy. Ridicule, vilification, and demonization are now the order of the day. How and when did this happen to what had been an upstanding political party since its creation with Abraham Lincoln? Washington College history professor Richard Striner looks at how and when the once-great Republican Party shifted to the dark side. It did not start with Trump, of course. The question is: can it end with Trump? Listen in!
    1 hr
  • How Trumpism Liberates Americans from Complex Realities
    It’s a uniquely powerful new tool: undermining peoples psychological ability to know and accept reality. In his new book: State of Confusion; Political Manipulation and the Assault on the American Mind, nationally renowned clinical psychologist and author Bryant Welch answers such questions as: Why the majority of American women voted for Trump, how fundamentalists ignore blatant immoralities in their adoration of people like Trump and Roy Moore. Bryant argues that in the place of potentially disturbing reality, a kind of ecstatic experience provides a comforting liberation to many who feel left out of and confused by recent social progress. Optimistically, this may be a needed wake up call for our seriously endangered democracy.
    1 hr
  • Time to Move Democracy From the 18th Into 21st Century
    Democracy in 18th century America worked fairly easily. Nearly 250 years later, we are the least democratic of all the world’s republics. Right, left, or independent: nearly all Americans feel frustrated that the ability for average citizens to have power over our government is just not there. But there’s a rebirth of interest in civics and democracy, thanks to the shocking elevation of Donald Trump to the White House. Opportunity arises out of such problems. On this show, former social studies teacher, current documentary film maker, and democracy activist Lisa Elaine Scott talks about such things as the pro-slavery basis of the electoral college, how democracy can be the antidote of capitalism run amok (which FDR warned us about), the duopoly, proportional representation as a major tool in wresting democracy back from the plutocrats. And lots more. Outdated Democracy? We are anything but powerless!
    57 min

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