Radical Democrats Radio

What's in The Canada Files this week? First, today is Nakba Day, so Editor Aidan Jonah and host Adam Riggio (that's me!) will talk about how The Canada Files is demonstrating Palestinian solidarity on this most awkward independence day. in more detail, we discuss the recent coup attempt in Venezuela that makes the Bay of Pigs look like the Battle of Guadalcanal, where an American mercenary group tried to organize a ragtag crew of incompetents to ride across the Caribbean and kidnap or kill President Nicolas Maduro. We contrast the vilification of Maduro with the fascistic presidency of Ivan Duque in neighbouring Colombia. Finally, I discuss some research I'm doing on how popular reaction to COVID may drive more people to wasteful suburban development, and the ecological destruction such a movement could cause.

Our latest collaboration with the Canada Files, their managing editor Aidan Jonah and I discuss the recent defeats for progressive candidates at the ballot box, what were the seeds of those defeats, and what real progressives can do to escape losing hope.

Canada Files Managing Editor Aidan Jonah joins Adam for a talk about the upcoming rent strike for all regions of North America under lockdown to slow the spread of COVID.

Radical Democrats Radio is launching a new series in collaboration with The Canada Files, a journalism startup building progressive media for foreign and domestic news and analysis. Today, we're talking about the constantly escalating conflict between the United States and Iran, as well as some reflections on the future of Canada's progressive political party, the New Democrats.

The third episode of People Vs Power! Our featured interview is with Leah Kalsi, a candidate for the New Democratic Party in the district of Willowdale in north Toronto. She's an autism analyst whose frustration with the Ontario government's ignorant cuts to social services drove her to community activism and her candidacy for Canada's federal parliament.

I'm also talking with my friend Dapinder Singh Randhawa about the housing crisis among international students and Indian immigrants in western Brampton.

Plus, this is the first podcast since starting Radical Democrats Radio that includes a vocal musical outro. God help you for staying long enough to hear that.

The People Vs Power series of Radical Democrats Radio returns with two new interviews with progressive political leaders.

- We talk in Adam's backyard with Branko Gasperlin, the NDP candidate for the Etobicoke-Lakeshore district, the southern end of the old Toronto borough of Etobicoke. We talk about what made Branko the man he is today, a life of public service that he sees taking him to represent his communities in Parliament in Ottawa.

- A sometimes-difficult phone conversation with Bev Buckway, former mayor of Whitehorse and recent chair of Yukon's federation of municipalities. We chat as best we can through signal interference about the nature of the housing crisis facing northern cities like Whitehorse, and chat about the unique circumstances of Canada's Arctic lands.

People Vs Power

Episode 1: Where We Stand Now

Hello (0:00); What is People Vs Power? (0:45); We are a progressive show (3:19); How our elections work (4:45); Fixed election dates (5:00); Full partisan disclosure (7:50); What you can do to help win an election (8:01); About our hosts’ progressive candidate: Branko Gasperlin (9:22); How our hosts joined electoral politics (10:42); Regular segment: Tory Crimes! (17:00); But also Liberal Crimes (18:11); What Liberal MP will stand up for people in poverty? (21:55); Trudeau’s indifference to Trump’s concentration camps (22:54); Canada’s immigration detention camps (23:50); Liberal indifference to rural, northern, Indigenous poverty (24:27); Doug Ford’s Ontario (26:08); Bri on Ford’s cuts to create a docile populace of paupers (26:50); Adam on Ford’s stinking corruption (28:58); François Légault’s Québec (31:56); Redefining secularism in racist terms (32:36); The nationalist and fascist history of the concept of “La vivre ensemble” (34:41); And that’s our show! (37:42); An appeal to the coming refugees from England (39:57).

How the harms people suffer under a cruel government spread beyond policies and institutions, all the way into people's hearts and everyday lives. How we create a society without friends.

Radical Democrats Radio returns with Stories About Autism and Doug Ford's Ontario. Music by the man of Mumbai, Toronto, and bloody St. John's Newfoundland, FamLi.

Contrary to popular belief, taking Indigenous knowledge and culture seriously doesn't harm Western culture. In fact, it makes us stronger. My reflections this episode turn on the work of Anishinaabeg Canadian philosopher Leanne Betasamosake Simpson. I try to understand and explore her epochal ideas.

My interview today is with Ian Borsuk, an environmental activist and community organizer from Hamilton, Ontario.