Loud & Clear

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Amanda Starbuck, senior food researcher and policy analyst on the food team at Food & Water Watch.

The economic aid bill that Congress passed last week would open Small Business Administration loans to some farmers. The move came after big banks steered the earlier $500 billion that Congress had appropriated to large corporations that used up all the money before most actual small businesses could even complete their applications. An existing $10 billion aid package provided funding for aquaculture, nurseries, and cooperatives, but allotted nothing for small farms with fewer than 500 employees.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said over the weekend that he was “confident” the US would soon allow the annexation of the occupied West Bank. Netanyahu and his governing partner Benny Gantz, who is now speaker of the Knesset, plan to ask the United States for its support in annexing at least those Israeli settlements that are on Palestinian lands in the West Bank before July. Netanyahu has told confidants that he believes the Trump Administration will give him whatever he wants. Ariel Gold, a peace activist and a member of Code Pink, joins the show.

Brazil’s right-wing president, Jair Bolsonaro, is facing a perfect storm of political crises that could force him from office. Bolsonaro was already a president without a political party. He was under fire for his responses to massive fires in the Amazon and to the coronavirus pandemic. Then his two sons found themselves under criminal investigation for money laundering and promulgating false campaign information. Now, Bolsonaro’s star Minister of Justice resigned dramatically and called the president a criminal. Can Bolsonaro survive? Brian and John speak with Aline Piva, a journalist and a member of Brazilians for Democracy and Social Justice.

Monday’s segment “Education for Liberation with Bill Ayers” is where Bill helps us look at the state of education across the country. What’s happening in our schools, colleges, and universities, and what impact does it have on the world around us? Bill Ayers, an activist, educator and the author of the book “Demand the Impossible: A Radical Manifesto,” joins Brian and John.

In this segment, The Week Ahead, the hosts take a look at the most newsworthy stories of the coming week and what it means for the country and the world, including ongoing controversy over the reopening of businesses in states throughout the country and Donald Trump’s bizarre medical advice. Sputnik News analysts and producers of this show Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Monday’s regular segment Technology Rules is a weekly guide on how monopoly corporations and the national surveillance state are threatening cherished freedoms, civil rights and civil liberties. Web developer and technologist Chris Garaffa and software engineer and technology and security analyst Patricia Gorky join the show.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Sputnik News analysts and producers Walter Smolarek and Nicole Roussell.

Friday is Loud & Clear’s weekly hour-long segment The Week in Review, about the week in politics, policy, and international affairs. Today they focus on Trump’s latest bizarre medical advice, the growing economic crisis, and the international implications of the Coronavirus pandemic.

Politics are an important factor in reporting on the coronavirus, not just in the United States, but around the world. President Trump said in his daily press conference yesterday that the pandemic is serious only in what he called “Democrat states,” and not in Republican ones. Elsewhere around the world, governments are downplaying their rates of infection, or in some cases, pretending there are none at all, in an attempt to show that they are fully in control at home. At the same time, the United States is threatening Iran, Venezuela, and other countries. Is it just to distract the American people from the virus at home? Mark Sleboda, a foreign affairs and security analyst, joins the show.

Car caravan protests are planned in nearly 50 cities across the country tomorrow to demand the cancellation of rent and mortgages. Participants in the actions, who will be respecting all social distancing and other public health requirements, are calling on the government to not only declare a moratorium on evictions, but to declare that no debt will accumulate to landlords and banks while the pandemic is going on and tens of millions are out of work. Brian and John speak with Nino Brown, an activist with the Boston Teachers Union and an organizer for tomorrow’s Cancel the Rent action, and Sputnik News analyst Walter Smolarek.

It’s Friday! So it’s time for the week’s worst and most misleading headlines. Brian and John speak with Steve Patt, an independent journalist whose critiques of the mainstream media have been a feature of his site Left I on the News and on twitter @leftiblog, and Sputnik producer Nicole Roussell.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Mike Wong, the Vice President of the San Francisco chapter of Veterans for Peace.


The Attorney General of Missouri has filed a lawsuit against the Chinese government and several Chinese institutions, arguing that they covered up information about the spread of the coronavirus, silenced whistleblowers, and did little to try to control the disease. Beijing has responded by calling the suit “absurd” and pointing out that as a sovereign entity, it cannot be sued.



There’s no end in sight for the UK’s coronavirus lockdown because, according to the British press, Prime Minister Boris Johnson is so frightened because of his own coronavirus experience that he doesn’t dare ease up. Meanwhile, the establishment is fawning over the Labour Party’s new leader, Keir Starmer, after his first appearance as leader during Prime Minister’s Questions. Neil Clark, a journalist and broadcaster whose work has appeared in The Guardian, The Week, and Morning Star, joins the show.



Thursday’s weekly series “Criminal Injustice” is about the most egregious conduct of our courts and prosecutors and how justice is denied to so many people in this country. Paul Wright, the founder and executive director of the Human Rights Defense Center and editor of Prison Legal News (PLN), and Kevin Gosztola, a writer for Shadowproof.com and co-host of the podcast Unauthorized Disclosure, join the show.



Loud & Clear’s series, In the News, is where the hosts look at the most important ongoing developments of the week and put them into perspective. Sputnik news analysts Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.


A regular Thursday segment deals with the ongoing militarization of space. As the US continues to withdraw from international arms treaties, will the weaponization and militarization of space bring the world closer to catastrophe? Brian and John speak with Prof. Karl Grossman, a full professor of journalism at the State University of New York, College at Old Westbury and the host of a nationally aired television program focused on environmental, energy, and space issues, and with Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space and a contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Amanda Starbuck, senior food researcher and policy analyst on the food team at Food & Water Watch.

Farmers across the country are destroying their crops, plowing over their fields, and dumping milk because the supply chain is broken and they are finding it impossible to get their goods to market. How can this breakdown happen in a country that prides itself on the most efficient and technologically advanced supply chain technology in the world?

President Trump yesterday temporarily suspended all immigration applications, saying that the action was necessary to protect Americans from the coronavirus. Civil liberties groups immediately said they would file suit. And a group of migrants in an ICE facility have been on a hunger strike. Those hunger strikes are expanding. Juan José Gutiérrez, the executive director of the Full Rights for Immigrants Coalition, joins the show.

Donald Trump has once again threatened to carry out an act of war against Iran, this time by destroying its ships in the Persian Gulf. Is this an exercise in the politics of distraction as the Coronavirus ravages the United States? Brian and John speak with Mohammad Marandi, an expert on American studies and postcolonial literature who teaches at the University of Tehran.

The U.S. government at all levels is consumed by infighting over how to respond to the Coronavirus pandemic. A right wing mobilization supported by President Trump is demanding that the economy reopen against the guidance of public health experts, but is the Democratic Party’s single-minded focus on the personality of Donald Trump drawing attention away from the systemic changes needed to save lives? Jim Kavanagh, the editor of thepolemicist.net, whose latest article in The Polemicist and forthcoming on CounterPunch is “Joe or No,” joins the show.

Wednesday’s weekly series, In the News, is where the hosts look at the most important ongoing developments of the week and put them into perspective. Sputnik news analysts Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Wednesday’s regular segment, Beyond Nuclear, is about nuclear issues, including weapons, energy, waste, and the future of nuclear technology in the United States. Kevin Kamps, the Radioactive Waste Watchdog at the organization Beyond Nuclear, and Sputnik news analyst and producer Nicole Roussell, join the show.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Professor Wolff, a professor of Economics Emeritus, University of Massachusetts, Amherst and founder of the organization Democracy at Work whose latest book is “Understanding Socialism.”

Today is Loud & Clear’s weekly series about the biggest economic news of the week with special guest -- Prof. Richard Wolff.

Intense battles took place yet again last night in working class suburbs of Paris with large migrant populations. French authorities have been brutalizing migrants, most of whom come from North and West Africa and the Middle East for years. But now, a combination of cramped quarters, a lack of economic opportunity, police abuse, and the coronavirus is inflaming tensions. Gilbert Mercier, Editor in Chief of News Junkie Post and the author of “The Orwellian Empire,” joins the show.

As the nation was preoccupied by President Trump’s impeachment last fall and early winter, and then with the coronavirus, several states across the country were busy purging their voter rolls, most commonly for the false reason that they had changed their residences. More than 16.5 million voters from Wisconsin to Georgia to Ohio to North Carolina and Texas were dumped from the voter lists and are not eligible to vote. The move, with no due process, is illegal. So why have the courts been reluctant to take up the issue? Brian and John speak with Lee Camp, a writer, comedian, activist, journalist, and host of the television show “Redacted Tonight,” on RT America, his latest book is called “Bullet Points & Punch Lines,” and his work is at leecamp.com.

Loud & Clear’s series, In the News, is where the hosts look at the most important ongoing developments of the week and put them into perspective. Sputnik news analysts Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Tuesday’s regular segment is called Women & Society with Dr. Hannah Dickinson. This weekly segment is about the major issues, challenges, and struggles facing women in all aspects of society. Hannah Dickinson, an associate professor at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and an organizer with the Geneva Women’s Assembly; Nathalie Hrizi, an educator, a political activist, and the editor of Breaking the Chains, a women’s magazine, which you can find at patreon.com/BreakChainsMag; and Loud & Clear producer Nicole Roussell join the show.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Jodi Dean, a professor of Political Science at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and a commentator on political issues, whose latest book is called “Comrade,” and Ted Rall, an award-winning editorial cartoonist and columnist, whose work is at www.rall.com.

President Trump on Friday wrote several provocative tweets, saying, “Liberate Michigan,” “Liberate Minnesota,” and “Liberate Virginia” and urging residents of those states to protest in favor of their 2nd Amendment rights. Those tweets led to thousands of protestors marching on statehouses demanding an end to the coronavirus quarantine. Meanwhile, debate continues in Congress over the next steps on Coronavirus relief and economic recovery, and all conventional logic about the 2020 presidential election has been upended.

Coronavirus is ravaging the economies and societies of countries all across Latin America. Peru on Sunday reported 15,000 cases, the second most in Latin America behind Brazil, and the Finance Minister in Lima said that the economy there is in shambles. The virus is spreading through Brazil’s favelas and through the poor neighborhoods of Mexico City. Guatemala is trying to cope with a new outbreak caused when infected deportees arrived from the United States. Some governments in the region have acted proactively, but other politicians, especially Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, refuse to even acknowledge the seriousness of the pandemic. Patricio Zamorano, an academic and international analyst and Co-Director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, COHA, joins the show.

Monday’s segment “Education for Liberation with Bill Ayers” is where Bill helps us look at the state of education across the country. What’s happening in our schools, colleges, and universities, and what impact does it have on the world around us? Bill Ayers, an activist, educator and the author of the book “Demand the Impossible: A Radical Manifesto,” joins Brian and John.

In this segment, The Week Ahead, the hosts take a look at the most newsworthy stories of the coming week and what it means for the country and the world, including the anti-China sentiment being launched by both corporate political parties, the anti-shutdown protests in a few places, and the economy. Sputnik News analysts and producers of this show Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Monday’s regular segment Technology Rules is a weekly guide on how monopoly corporations and the national surveillance state are threatening cherished freedoms, civil rights and civil liberties. Web developer and technologist Chris Garaffa and software engineer and technology and security analyst Patricia Gorky join the show.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Sputnik News analysts and producers of this show Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Friday is Loud & Clear’s weekly hour-long segment The Week in Review, about the week in politics, policy, and international affairs. Today they focus on the media’s bent against China even and especially in these serious times, Trump’s unrealistic and dangerous plan to reopen the country, and Bernie Sanders endorsing Joe Biden for president.

President Trump has said repeatedly over the past several weeks that he wants to reopen the country--and the economy--sooner, rather than later. But medical experts say that’s not realistic, or safe. The President has even named a panel, that includes Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, to restart the economy. But governors have rebelled and many have said they would refuse to entertain the President’s demands. Now they are coming up with their own plans to restart their economies. Dr. Krutika Kuppalli, an infectious disease physician and vice chair of the Infectious Disease Society of America’s Global Health Committee, and Dr. Jason Kindrachuk, an assistant professor of viral pathogenesis at the University of Manitoba and Canada Research Chair in molecular pathogenesis of emerging and reemerging viruses, joins the show.

The coronavirus pandemic has brought China’s amazing economic track record of nearly a half century of continuous growth to an end. Beijing announced yesterday that the economy had shrunk by a massive 6.8 percent in the first three months of the year, ending a streak that had survived Tiananmen Square, SARS, MERS, and even the Great Recession. Brian and John speak with John Ross, Senior Fellow at Chongyang Institute, Renmin University of China, and an award-winning resident columnist with several Chinese media organizations.

It’s Friday! So it’s time for the week’s worst and most misleading headlines. Brian and John speak with Steve Patt, an independent journalist whose critiques of the mainstream media have been a feature of his site Left I on the News and on twitter @leftiblog, and Sputnik producer Nicole Roussell.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Juan José Gutiérrez, the executive director of the Full Rights for Immigrants Coalition.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, has broad powers to detain and hold people indefinitely at the country’s borders. It has the power to imprison them, to expel them, or to release them to their families in the United States. In the age of the coronavirus, however, ICE also has the power to decide who lives and who dies. It has the power to decide who enters the country and who must deal with the ravages of the disease in the agency’s teeming, filthy, and overcrowded border prisons. That’s what’s happening in California, where some detainees are on a hunger strike.

Bernie Sanders this week formally dropped out of the Democratic presidential race and endorsed Joe Biden for president. Elizabeth Warren, who had been uncommitted, did the same thing. The endorsements are a result of a hard push by Democratic National Committee officials to unify the party around Joe Biden, a longtime moderate with a solid pro-war, pro-capitalist record. What do the endorsements mean for the American left? Was there a quid pro quo in the endorsements or will they be left in the cold? Ben Norton, a journalist with the Grayzone and co-host of the Moderate Rebels podcast, joins the show.

Thursday’s weekly series “Criminal Injustice” is about the most egregious conduct of our courts and prosecutors and how justice is denied to so many people in this country. Paul Wright, the founder and executive director of the Human Rights Defense Center and editor of Prison Legal News (PLN), and Kevin Gosztola, a writer for Shadowproof.com and co-host of the podcast Unauthorized Disclosure, join the show.

Loud & Clear’s series, In the News, is where the hosts look at the most important ongoing developments of the week and put them into perspective, including the biggest recent developments related to the pandemic and the economic crisis it has sparked. Sputnik news analysts Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

A regular Thursday segment deals with the ongoing militarization of space. As the US continues to withdraw from international arms treaties, will the weaponization and militarization of space bring the world closer to catastrophe? Brian and John speak with Prof. Karl Grossman, a full professor of journalism at the State University of New York, College at Old Westbury and the host of a nationally aired television program focused on environmental, energy, and space issues, and with Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space and a contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Krissy Kasserman, the Factory Farm Organizing Manager at Food & Water Watch.

Smithfield Foods is the largest pork processor in America and is the largest employer in the state of South Dakota, accounting for an astounding 130 million servings of meat every day. Yesterday the company announced that it would close indefinitely after scores of employees tested positive for the coronavirus, accounting for half of all coronavirus cases in the state. Meanwhile, farmers around the country are being forced to destroy fruits, vegetables, and dairy products because they can’t sell them. The Trump administration is working to slash the wages of migrant farmworkers, even as it works to send direct aid to farmers and ranchers hurt by the coronavirus pandemic.

President Trump continues to blame China for the spread of the coronavirus and for the concurrent downturn in the global economy. The conservative media, meanwhile, has pushed a steady anti-China narrative. It appears that the President is preparing to launch a cultural war against China this election season. And he thinks it’s a winning strategy. KJ Noh, a peace activist and scholar on the geopolitics of Asia, and a frequent contributor to Counterpunch and Dissident Voice, joins the show.

While the rich are fleeing to secluded mansions and beach houses, poor and working class people are being left behind to bear the brunt of the Coronavirus crisis. And the widening inequality that’s been put on full display by the pandemic may be leading to a resurgence for the labor movement. And on a global scale, U.S. sanctions are making matters worse. Brian and John speak with Dan Kovalik, a human rights and labor lawyer who is the author of the book “No More War: How the West Violates International Law by Using 'Humanitarian' Intervention to Advance Economic and Strategic Interests.”

An unreleased dossier written by the British Labour Party says that party officials opposed to Jeremy Corbyn worked to lose the 2017 election in the hope that a resultant backlash would trigger a leadership move to oust him. The report shows that those officials, who worked at the party’s headquarters, became increasingly despondent as Labour rose in the polls, despite their secret efforts to sabotage the campaign. Neil Clark, a journalist and broadcaster whose work has appeared in The Guardian, The Week, and Morning Star, joins the show.

Wednesday’s weekly series, In the News, is where the hosts look at the most important ongoing developments of the week and put them into perspective. Sputnik news analysts Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Wednesday’s regular segment, Beyond Nuclear, is about nuclear issues, including weapons, energy, waste, and the future of nuclear technology in the United States. Kevin Kamps, the Radioactive Waste Watchdog at the organization Beyond Nuclear, and Sputnik news analyst and producer Nicole Roussell, join the show.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Professor Wolff, a professor of Economics Emeritus, University of Massachusetts, Amherst and founder of the organization Democracy at Work whose latest book is “Understanding Socialism.”

Today is Loud & Clear’s weekly series about the biggest economic news of the week with special guest -- Prof. Richard Wolff.

Israeli politics has undergone a dramatic realignment, with the main opposition alliance breaking apart and the once-dominant Labor Party effectively dissolving itself. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Resilience Party leader Benny Gantz said last night that they had made “major progress” in talks toward a coalition government. Talks are now extended until midnight Wednesday. Miko Peled, the author of “The General’s Son - A Journey of an Israeli in Palestine,” and of "Injustice: The Story of the Holy Land Foundation Five,” joins the show.

Our friend and frequent guest Steve Hedley was recently suspended from his position as the senior assistant general secretary of the UK’s Rail, Maritime, and Transport Workers Union after making a joke on his Facebook page about Boris Johnson contracting the coronavirus. He was predictably attacked by Britain’s right-wing media, and when he didn’t apologize for the joke, the attacks became more severe and sustained. Brian and John speak with Steve Hedley, the senior assistant general secretary of the UK’s Rail, Maritime, and Transport Workers Union.

Loud & Clear’s series, In the News, is where the hosts look at the most important ongoing developments of the week and put them into perspective. Sputnik news analysts Nicole Roussell and Walter Smolarek join the show.

Tuesday’s regular segment is called Women & Society with Dr. Hannah Dickinson. This weekly segment is about the major issues, challenges, and struggles facing women in all aspects of society. Hannah Dickinson, an associate professor at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and an organizer with the Geneva Women’s Assembly; Nathalie Hrizi, an educator, a political activist, and the editor of Breaking the Chains, a women’s magazine, which you can find at patreon.com/BreakChainsMag; and Loud & Clear producer Nicole Roussell join the show.