Peace Talks Radio

By awarding the prize to Gore and the IPCC, the Nobel committee seemed interested in promoting the link between climate change and the threat to peace. Could the unchecked effects of climate change lead to conflicts and civil war within nations, or war between nations? Could a collective effort to save the planet from the harmful consequences of climate change actually promote peaceful cooperation within and between nations?

We talk with two scholars who have studied the possible links between climate change and conflict. First we visit with Dan Smith, Secretary General of International-Alert, an independent peace building organization that works in over 20 countries to promote lasting peace and security in communities affected by violent conflict. He’s the author of the report “A Climate of Conflict: The Links Between Climate Change, Peace and War." Later in the program we hear from Dr. Thomas Homer-Dixon (Ph.D.) He's written extensively on the links between environmental stress and security. He oversees the Peace and Conflict Studies Department at the University of Toronto.

"Our argument is not to say that climate change will cause conflict, but to say that climate change, interacting with other factors – other weaknesses, if you like – in the political, social, economic makeup of a country – can, seriously, increase the risk of armed conflict."

~ Dan Smith, International-Alert, author of A Climate of Conflict: The Links Between Climate Change, Peace and War

Host Suzanne Kryder talks with Lynne Twist, author of The Soul of Money: Transforming Your Relationship With Money and Life and financial advisor and author Brent Kessel who wrote It's Not About The Money: Unlock your Money Type to Achieve Spiritual and Financial Abundance.

Lynne Twist has had a long career as a global activist, fundraiser, speaker, and mentor. She works to end world hunger, empower women, nurture children and youth, promote economic integrity and spiritual authenticity, and preserve the earth's natural heritage through the Hunger Project, Pachamama Alliance, Institute of Noetic Sciences, and State of the World Forum. She has raised hundreds of millions of dollars and trained thousands of fundraisers to be more effective in their work.

In the second part of our program, we talk with Brent Kessel, one of the top 250 financial advisors in the U.S. according to Worth Magazine. If you go to his website www.Brent Kessel.com, you can take a quiz to determine your money type. There are eight types. Most people are mixtures of each but once Brent finds out which types you are, he can help you understand your relationship with money and address any conflict you might have over it. Kessel has also studied meditation with many of the worlds' most revered teachers.

In his more recent public appearances, Tibetan Leader, the Dalai Lama, has been targeting his peace and compassion message to young people. To him, teaching compassion and peace to our young is the best hope for peace in the future. A look at efforts to teach peace in the schools, this time on Peace Talks Radio.

First, a visit with Azim Khamisa, director of the Tariq Khamisa Foundation, a non-profit organization that takes programs on nonviolence and forgiveness into schools. The foundation memorializes Mr. Khamisa's son Tariq, who was delivering pizzas in San Diego in January 1995 when he was shot and killed by a 14-year-old gang member who had been challenged to prove himself to his gang by firing a gun into Tariq's car. Mr. Khamisa joined with Ples Felix, the grandfather and guardian of the shooter, to create the foundation and develop the school programs.

Also on the program, a journalist-turned-teacher who has been on a one man crusade to bring peace curriculum to schools in the Washington, DC area. From 1969 to 1997, Colman McCarthy wrote columns for the Washington Post. In his years as a columnist and journalist, he had the opportunity to interview Nobel Peace Prize winners and other figures that, he says, inspired him, in 1982, to begin teaching courses courses on nonviolence and the literature of peace in high schools and universities in the DC area. In 25 years, he has taught more than 7,000 students in his classes. McCarthy has edited two books for use in Peace Studies classes and in 1985, he founded the Center for Teaching Peace, a nonprofit that helps schools begin or expand academic programs in Peace Studies.

Finally we go to Seattle, Washington where teacher Lori Markowitz manages an organization called "Bridges To Understanding." She oversees programs in some Seattle schools that promote global understanding and compassion to students. "Bridges to Understanding" has Seattle school kids connecting with kids in Thailand or South Africa, swapping stories and pictures over the internet. Some get to connect live and in person when they visit the U.S. We talked with both Lori Markowitz and Teleia Thurman, a student who participated in one of the programs. Our host is Carol Boss.

"Kids are our future leaders. If we can teach them, now, that from

conflict you create your brother or sister, you create love and unity - if you apply the principles of nonviolent peace making and forgiveness - maybe,someday, we'll have world peace."

-Azim Khamisa, Founder of the Tariq Khamisa Foundation

"Each of us in our hearts, is yearning for peace. All governments claim they want peace. So, I began to wonder. If that's the case, why aren't we teaching ourselves how to go about it? I wanted to see if that could be taught, whether it could be learned and whether students would be receptive to it."

Listeners will hear about three Nobel Peace Laureates. The peacemaking diplomacy of 1950 Peace Prize winner Ralph Bunche is recalled. 1997 Nobel Peace Laureate Jody Williams talks about her campaign to ban landmines and speaks of personal repsonsibility in peacemaking. The microcredit work of 2006 Nobel Peace Laureate Muhammad Yunus is explored.

Also, a remarkable story of forgiveness leads to a program for teaching nonviolence in schools, author Byron Katie talks about the search for inner peace, young people of disparate faiths work together on community projects, and 9/11 Families turn their grief into action for peace.

With election cycles in constant motion, this time on Peace Talks Radio, we offer a conversation about the possible impact of electing mediators to public office. We'll talk with Dr. Dan Dana, a mediator and former candidate for the US House of Representatives in Kansas. After his failed, non-adversarial bid for office, Dan created the "Elect Mediators to Public Office" project. He believes that having more mediators in public office who use a non-adversarial approach to conflict resolution would result in better political processes and better government. Of the total U.S. work force, only 6 percent are lawyers. Yet 45 percent of the members of Congress are lawyers. Would more mediators in public office change political discourse? We'll talk with other mediators who have run for public office to learn how they hope to change public service including Texas Representative Henry Cuellar, 2006 Texas U.S. Senate candidate Barbara Ann Rodnofsky, and former mayor of Manzanita, Oregon, Hugh McIssac. Suzanne Kryder is host.

This time, what is religious tolerance and how can it be promoted? Many of the world’s religions believe they are the one true faith, and they encourage members to convert others to their faith. How, then, do people from different faiths find common ground and make peace? Our guests will discuss the definitions and limits of religious tolerance. Should we tolerate all religions, even those whose members are intolerant of other faiths? What steps can we take to make peace with people of other spiritual beliefs and non-beliefs? Is there anything we can learn from someone who believes differently from us? Suzanne Kryder hosts the discussion which includes Dr. Eboo Patel, executive director of the Interfaith Youth Core, headquartered in Chicago.

This time, we check in with "9/11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows," an organization founded by family members of those killed on September 11th who

have united to turn their grief into action for peace. By developing and advocating nonviolent options and actions in the pursuit of justice, the organization hopes to break the cycles of violence engendered by war and

terrorism. By acknowledging their common experience with all people affected by violence throughout the world, these survivors of tragedy work to create

a safer and more peaceful world for everyone. Carol Boss will hosts a discussion with Terry Rockefeller, Bruce Wallace and Anne Mulderry, all members of "9/11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows." All lost loved ones on that fateful day.

This time on Peace Talks Radio, Nonviolent Communication (NVC) with Marshall Rosenberg. NVC is a verbal technology for exchanging information and resolving differences peacefully. Marshall Rosenberg, who founded the NVC technique, is captured before a live Albuquerque audience talking about how this communication style helps to resolve conflict. He also helps members of the studio audience develop solutions to conflict scenarios using the principles of Nonviolent Communication. Co hosts: Paul Ingles and Suzanne Kryder.

The program was taped at the First Church of Religious Science Auditorium on February 7, 2005.

Taken Too Soon: The Cost of War is produced by Paul Ingles, who runs a non-profit media organization called Good Radio Shows, Inc. The program features some of the names and circumstances of the deaths of coalition forces, Iraqi and Afghan civilians, contractors and journalists killed since the fighting began in Afghanistan in October of 2001 and continuing up to the present day.

"I don't think there's been a program like this that has acknowledged the loss of life among civilians, contractors and journalists along side of military casualties," says Ingles. "I just felt it was important that people marking Memorial Day in the U.S. take a moment to contemplate a roll call that goes beyond just our own country's loss. All most Americans have heard is that 15, 8, 30 Iraqis died in a certain incident on a given day. These people had names and families just like the men and women of our armed forces. It seems appropriate to me to read some of their names."

The hour long program will contain about 135 names meant to represent the various casualty constituencies. A soldier from each state in the U.S. is included. Ingles used Defense Department information for the names of coalition casualties. Civilian, contractor and journalist names were drawn from press reports and websites devoted to tracking those deaths.

Ingles put an email call out to members of the Association of Independents in Radio asking for volunteers to help voice the special. Within a few days, he'd heard back from nearly 40 producers who said they'd be willing to voice a couple of minutes of names for the program.

"Since the program will consist primarily of a list of names, I thought it would sound better to have a variety of voices involved," adds Ingles. "Also I think it will create a sense of how we all are impacted by this loss of life."

Ingles estimates that the hour long program will contain about 135 names meant to represent the various casualty constituencies. "Sadly," says Ingles, "a complete reading of names at this pace, even with conservative estimates of civilian deaths, would require about 400 hours."

(Porgram produced in May 2006)

Peace Talks Radio, the series on peacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution returns this time to maybe the most challenging conflict terrain of all, our inner selves. How can we calm the turmoil within ourselves about who we are, how we are and how we relate to the rest of the world? On this edition of Peace Talks Radio, a conversation with a woman who offers one approach. Her name is Byron Katie who, in the mid 1980's, says she was in deep personal chaos trying to manage her life as a business woman and mother living in Southern California. More than miserable, she says she was deeply depressed, fearful, suicidal and living in a halfway house, unable to manage on her own.

Some 20 years later, the woman everyone calls Katie has written three best-selling books "Loving What Is,""I Need Your Love - Is That True?", and "A Thousand Names for Joy" co-written with her husband Stephen Mitchell. As the book titles suggest, Byron Katie found a way of dealing with her stress that turned her life around. She says, on a specific 1986 morning in that halfway house, she experienced what she called a falling away of self that led to an inner freedom. She insists anyone can achieve it utilizing a method of personal inquiry she's crafted that she calls, The Work.

"I realized that when I believed my thoughts, I suffered," says Katie. "But when I didn't believe my thoughts, I didn't suffer. And I've come to see that this is true for every human being."

In our program, host Suzanne Kryder interviews Byron Katie about The Work, and we hear both her and her husband Stephen Mitchell recorded before a standing room only crowd in a Santa Fe auditorium.