Michael Parenti on "Political Liberties and Economic Democracy"

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Bread line, Louisville, Kentucky, 1937. Photo by Margaret
Bourke-White. All Graphics: click to enlarge.

New World Notes News
Vol. 2 No. 48 -- December 8, 2009

This week in New World Notes, radio program #92, Tuesday, December 8:

Michael Parenti on
"Political Liberties and
Economic Democracy"

Workers' Summary

The best parts of Parenti's lecture and Q&A at the University of Hartford on November 4 are here. Parenti argues that improvements in public policy--and in living conditions for the non-rich--resulted from struggle from "below," not from the goodness of the governing elites' hearts. Average citizens fought for greater political liberties as tools to compel concrete improvements in their lives.

This program includes fine parts on airport security, Saddam Hussein, the Maine anti-gay-marriage referendum, and Parenti's forthcoming book on organized religion, God and His Demons.

Egypt, 21st Century

Notes

www.michaelparenti.org

The first 20 or so minutes of Parenti's lecture--on the dislike of democracy by the Framers of our Constitution--with parallels drawn to the Classical world--are not included in this installment of NWN. This omitted segment is intellectually substantial and well worth hearing when you're in the mood for some serious history & political science. Some later parts are snipped as well. I've made a complete, uncut, unedited recording of the entire presentation and Q&A (1h, 12m) available for anyone who cares to hear same. The introduction is by University of Hartford President Walter Harrison.

Recorded live by moi.

Free subscription to weekly New World Notes email newsletter upon request. (Subscribers list is totally confidential.) The newsletter essentially duplicates the weekly blog entry--but some people like the weekly reminder.

Dr. Michael Parenti (plaid shirt)

Coming Soon -- Tuesday debut dates on WWUH shown:

• December 15 -- Afghanistan: Won't Get Fooled Again!
• December 22 -- Christmas Special ... including reflections on the sack of Fallujah (5th anniversary) and the sack of Gaza (1st anniversary)

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):

• Tuesdays, Noon to 12:30 PM, WWUH-FM 91.3 (West Hartford, CT) & http://wwuh.org/ (Noon to 1:00 PM on October 13)
• Saturdays, 6:30 to 7:00 PM, WHUS-FM 91.7 (Storrs, CT) & http://www.whus.org/
• Saturdays, 7:00-7:30 PM, KRFP-FM 92.5, Radio Free Moscow (Moscow, ID) & http://www.radiofreemoscow.com/
• Any time: Listen to or download any installment ... or subscribe to a podcast ... at A-Infos Radio Project: http://www.radio4all.net/index.php?op=result&action=series&series=New+World+Notes

"Freedom of Speech" by Norman Rockwell. No comment.

Joyce Malcolm on the Meaning of the 2nd Amendment

Listen to or download this radio show now (Broadcast qlty. 192 kbps--41 MB)
Listen to or download this radio show now (Good quality 64 kbps -- 13 MB)
Listen to or download this radio show now (32 kbps for dialup -- 7 MB)
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All graphics: Click to enlarge

This week in New World Notes, radio program #90 (Tuesday, November 24):

Joyce Malcolm on the Meaning
of the 2nd Amendment

In a nutshell:

An offbeat look at guns & gun-banning. I tell of my own development from a capgun-slinging 7-year-old to a liberal-academic gun-banner ... to somebody who knows a little about guns & gun laws and thinks the NRA is not totally wrong about everything.

Then historian & legal scholar Joyce Lee Malcolm discusses the meaning of the 2nd Amendment & the recent landmark Supreme Court decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, which affirmed the right of the individual citizen to keep & bear firearms.

Heller, though, applies only to the District of Columbia! Next year, in McDonald v. Chicago, the Court will decide whether the individual right applies to the rest of the country as well.

Joyce Lee Malcolm

Thought experiment

What do you understand this sentence to mean?--

• A well-educated workforce being necessary
  to the prosperity of a free State, the right of
  the people to buy and read books shall not
  be infringed.

Does it, say, guarantee only the right of an employer to provide printed instructional materials as part of a formal job-training seminar?

Does it empower the government to ban the possession of racy novels or other literature having no connection with earning a living?

This week's song: Fred Eaglesmith, Time to Get a Gun

Miss part or all of our last 2 programs?

Our radio adaptation of the documentary Sir! No Sir! is good for the soul and good for the blood pressure. Learn more, listen online, or download the audio for future listening by clicking on this link.

No comment.

Coming soon -- Tuesday debut date on WWUH shown:

• December 1 -- Joyce Malcolm asks, Is There a Right of Self-Defense? -- The U.S. vs. the U.K.


• December 8 -- Michael Parenti on Political Liberties and Economic Democracy

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):

• Tuesdays, Noon to 12:30 PM, WWUH-FM 91.3 (West Hartford, CT) & http://wwuh.org/ (Noon to 1:00 PM on October 13)


• Saturdays, 6:30 to 7:00 PM, WHUS-FM 91.7 (Storrs, CT) & http://www.whus.org/


• Saturdays, 7:00-7:30 PM, KRFP-FM 92.5, Radio Free Moscow (Moscow, ID) & http://www.radiofreemoscow.com/


• Any time: Listen to or download any installment ... or subscribe to a podcast ... at A-Infos Radio Project: http://www.radio4all.net/index.php?op=result&action=series&series=New+World+Notes
  

Malcolm's latest (Yale University Press, 2009)--nominated for a
Pulitzer Prize. More information at www.joyceleemalcolm.com .