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

  • Redlining: Government Policy Makes Racism and Poverty Worse
    It may not be as blatant as cross-burning but redlining is racism. Federal lending rules encourage banks to discriminate against mortgages for black people moving into white neighborhoods. While it was technically made against the law with the Fair Housing Act of 1968, as with so many other discriminatory rules, ways have been made to do it anyway. In her new book Redlining: A Memoir of Races, Change, and Fractured Community in 1960s Chicago, author Linda Gartz shares her parents experience owning property in a Chicago suburb, West Garfield Park. “There goes the neighborhood” turns out to be by design. And of course it does not have to be that way.
    1 hr
  • Democracy in the US/ Peace in Afghanistan?
    Success came Tuesday November 6th. It was indeed a blue wave. Now what? On the first half of the show, NH Democratic Party Chairman Raymond Buckley (who ran for national party chair) looks at what was learned, how progressives can move forward in the face of many uncompleted efforts and challenges. And on part two: could America’s longest war at last be coming to an end? With all sides in Afghanistan now agreeing on the need to beat the Islamic State and intense exhaustion after 17 years, columnist and professor Conn Hallinan talks about realities on the ground militarily and politically that may provide reasons for hope for peace at last.
    1 hr
  • Why Is There the Caravan From Our Ally, Honduras?
    Who is in the caravan and why don’t they stay in Central America and try to make it better? Because those who do often end up dead. Journalist Peter Tinti reports that in Honduras “Corruption is the operating system and it keeps people terrified.” Many people died when the current governing party looted tens of millions from the health care system to pay for their political campaign. Why don’t they come legally? They try, and the process is fixed against possible refugees who are often targeted if they try to go through channels. And as Tinti points out, there is a right to seek asylum.
    1 hr
  • Decolonizing And Democratizing Philanthropy
    It’s been said that “the tools that built the master’s house will never dismantle the master’s house.” Philanthropy today reaffirms the culture of colonialism: white saviors, white experts. Recipients are at-effect rather than at-cause of the well-meaning aid. In his new book Decolonizing Wealth: Indigenous Wisdom to Heal Divides and Restore Balance, Lumbee Tribe member author Edgar Villanueva says that the bottom line at philanthropies remains power and privilege. As a nearly 15 years as the lone indigenous philanthropy executive at the table, he calls for expansion of parties involved in decision making as a needed medicine for what ails philanthropy. He says we need to push the philanthropic industry to sit with the discomfort they have avoided and take in the reality of the colonial structure of it. And then democratize philanthropy to heal from the effects of colonization.
    1 hr
  • Grading for Equity: Teaching Humans, Not Rats
    America’s public education still relies on grading practices geared to the industrial revolution of the early 1900s. This antiquated system undermines effective teaching and learning and inadvertently filters students based on privileges. In his new book Grading for Equity: What It Is, Why It Matters, and How It Can Transform  Schools and Classroom, long term educator  and administrator Joe Feldman points out that currently teachers get no training in terms of grading. Stimulus and response that works for rats is not suitable for human children, he argues. There are better fairer ways to measure learning that actually encourage students to learn instead of damaging their potential. And we all know democracy can only survive with an educated citizenry.
    1 hr
  • The Triumph of Frat Boys//Why Trump’s Lies Are Believed
    On part one, veteran sports writer Robert Lipsyte shares his valuable and unique insights into the Kavanaugh/Trump “frat boys win” dynamic. The power of the pack: it’s there on sports teams, gangs, and nationalism. And on part two, writer Teri Kanefield shares her insights into why so many blindly believe Trump’s obvious lies. There is the basic fascist need to undermine the truth. Formerly agreed upon laws must be torpedoed for a dictator to get away with his actions. There is reassurance in believing simple lies instead of more complicated truths. And it’s all very dangerous to democracy.
    1 hr
  • Beating Stress and Anxiety in the Time of Trump
    You are hardly alone. Millions of Americans have been going though PESD since November 2016: Post Election Stress Disorder. It’s been a banner business time for psychotherapists. Some wake up with what they call a morning fright. Others have found themselves paralyzed with fear. There is a widely felt sense of being overwhelmed. But we are not powerless and we are not alone. In their new book: Beyond Resistance: Coping with the Stress of the Trump Era–An Essential Guide, co-authors Kathy Hertz and Donna Lipman talk about actions we can take to help us and the world. If we wallow in victimization, we thereby give the right wing more power when it is our power. And as with PTSD, if you feel the stress, that is a sign of good mental and emotional health. And, they suggest, all is not yet revealed, Trump may have given us an inadvertent gift.
    1 hr
  • Conservative American Dream Has Been Flipped on Its Head
    Ask today and everyone will tell you the American Dream is individuals becoming super rich. But the more traditional definition was one of equal opportunity and justice for all. Americans shared a belief in the social contract and a sense of society as a moral economy. So says historian Sarah Churchwell whose new book is Behold, America: The Entangled History of “America First”and “the American Dream.” Her research revealed that the conservative American Dream was “opposed to economic inequality and laissez faire capitalism,” and that “a hundred years ago billionaires were considered un-American.” The phrase “America First” however has no similarly benign roots. It’s always been a fig leaf for racism. The KKK used it as a slogan, and it still means the same thing. Can we still recover the conservative American Dream?
    1 hr
  • The First World War Armistice: Perspective at 100 Years
    The shooting in the first world war finally ended 100 years ago November 11. But did the war ever really end? Was anything resolved? So much of today’s world, from the mess of the Middle East to the power of martial fervor, there is much to learn from the terribly flawed armistice. Guest on this show Adam Hochschild, author of To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion 1914-1918 looks at: why did Wilson enter the war, what if the Germans had won, what was the British desire for war with Germany, the effects on today’s Middle East. Hochschild argues that, though little known, the American clampdown on freedoms in the late 19 teens was worse than McCarthyism. The power of propaganda then and now. What the winners did which paved the way for the rise of a Hitler. Instead of “making the world safe for democracy,” democracy was actually crushed. Self Determination, as touted by Woodrow Wilson, was a ruse. Did the war ever really end? Listen in and decide for yourself.
    1 hr
  • New Americans Energizing Democracy, Running for Office, Winning
    No matter how hard the Trump Administration tries to keep America ruled by moneyed white men, new Americans are successfully invigorating the democratic process. Often more dedicated to America’s principles than those of us who were born here and take it for granted, people from Latin America and other non-white places are running for office and winning. As discussed through stories of individuals throughout the country, in Detroit, the Southwest, Southeast,and the Midwest, author Sayu Bhojwani describes what it takesand how it can be replicated. The book is called People Like Us, The New Wave of Candidates Knocking at Democracy’s Door. She advises, “There is reason to be hopeful and wary. Both tenacity and fire are useful in politics and governance.”
    1 hr

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