Pinter on Truth, Lies, and War

Part 1: New World Notes #395, 29:05 (Sept. 29)
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Part 2: New World Notes #396, 28:54 (Oct. 6)
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Too ill to travel to Stockholm, Pinter delivers his
Nobel address by video from London, December 2005.

Playwright Harold Pinter's Nobel Prize acceptance speech of 2005 (newly edited by KD) is a stunning indictment of U.S. wars and imperialism since 1945.

Pinter contrasts dramatic art--where "truth" is elusive, perhaps unknowable--with public life. Here truth can be known. But citizens don't know the truth because the government is lying and deceiving nonstop to cover up its imperialist plundering and its vicious wars of aggression.

The heart of the speech is a stunning denunciation--and survey--of U.S. military aggression abroad since 1945. Pinter pays particular attention to the then-current war against Iraq and the proxy wars of the recent past (notably against the Sandinista government of Nicaragua, under Reagan).

Ten years on, this remains a powerful and moving indictment of U.S. foreign policy--and of the foreign policy of the U.S.'s "lapdog," Pinter's own country, the United Kingdom.

With an introduction by KD and (in Part 2) a relevant song by Ethan Miller & Kate Boverman.

Stockholm

2015 marks the 10th anniversary of Pinter's Nobel speech and the 85th anniversary of his birth (in October 10, 1930, in Hackney, London, UK). He died in 2008.

Thanks to the Nobel Prize Committee for the video of Pinter's address.  I have cut approximately six minutes from near the beginning of the speech (a close analysis of parts of certain Pinter plays) and shortened several long pauses.  The speech is otherwise complete.

Trump, Iran, and Government Lies

New World Notes #394, 27:52 (September 22)
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Voice of the Establishment (one of many):
House Speaker John Boehner (R, Ohio)

The Establishment is aghast at presidential candidate Donald Trump. Why? Because Trump cheerfully acknowedges that the System is thoroughly corrupt and serves the interests only of the wealthy and powerful.
 
KD connects the Establishment's rejection of Trump ... the phony Congressional "debate" over the phony "Iran nuclear crisis" ... and the huge gap between the Official Explanation of our government's policies and what those policies actually are.
 
Then Richard Saunders discusses many of the government's baldfaced lies and fake "crises" that have served as pretexts for war for more than a century--with a little help from the corporate-controlled media.

Plus a song by David Rovics.

Richard Saunders is Coordinator of the Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade.

Thanks to the Global Research News Hour for the Saunders interview (of September 2013), which I have excerpted and edited.

Consumed

Part 1: New World Notes #392, 28:10 (September 8)
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Part 2: New World Notes #393, 28:13 (September 15)
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Consumerism and overconsumption, from the perspective of "evolutionary psychology." A radio adaptation (by me) of the video documentary, Consumed: Inside the Belly of the Beast.

It's an interesting view of our addiction to consumer products and (relatedly) of our estrangement from nature. The piece offers some very good insights from the fields of psychology, sociology, and economic history. Introductions by K.D.

Part 2 includes also some reflections on the same theme by economist/philosopher Charles Eisenstein.

Steve Jobs introduces Apple's iPad

This two-part program was originally broadcast in February 2013.  

Thanks to Robin Upton, producer of Unwelcome Guests, for introducing me to the documentary.

Note: If you have any problems downloading the programs from the links at the top of the page, here is an alternative source of the program (broadcast quality MP3): Part 1 and Part 2 

Labor Day Musical Special

New World Notes #391, 29:13 (September 1)
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Bindery workers assembling the Sears, Roebuck catalog (1942)
(Click to enlarge.)

American Labor celebrated in some really good contemporary songs--by Anne Feeney, The Foremen, Mad Agnes, John McCutcheon, Utah Phillips, and David Rovics. Featuring (in order of appearance)

David Rovics, The Day the Minimum Wage Workers Went on Strike. An upbeat celebration of the working class and of strength in solidarity ... with some very nice banjo picking

Mad Agnes, Katie. A witty and sharp critique of bourgeois life from the perspective of the long-suffering--and admirable--cleaning lady

The Foremen, Workin' on an MBA. Comic satire of the cushy life & boundless self-pity of the men in the gray flannel suits--set to a tune that recalls a chain gang work-song. Yep, one of those voices is Roy Zimmerman's

Utah Phillips, Moose Turd Pie. Spoken, with a little guitar. Utah recalls (with only the slightest hint of exaggeration) the worst job he ever held

Anne Feeney, Business News / Hallelujah, I'm a Bum! A beautiful rendition of an 1890's song about unemployment. A fine homage to Simon & Garfunkel's 1965 classic "Silent Night / 6 o'Clock News" and a good song in its own right

John McCutcheon, Doing Our Job. McCutcheon applies Cal Ripken Jr.'s modest remarks upon breaking a major-league record to working people generally. A long-overdue celebration of the best of American working-class values.

This installment was previously broadcast in September 2010.

Charles C.Ebbetts, Lunch: Rockefeller Center (1932)

Ralph Nader and Chris Hedges

New World Notes #390, 28:15 (August 25)
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Ralph Nader

A conversation between two great Progressive activists and essayists: Ralph Nader and Chris Hedges. (Technically, Nader is interviewing Hedges.) They discuss

• the corruption of the System, including the Democratic Party
• the oppression by the 1% of everyone else
• the sad plight of college students and other young people in the ravaged American economy
• the necessity of nonviolent popular rebellion

And they agree that--by staying within the corrupt and corporate-controlled Democratic Party--Left-ish presidential candidate Bernie Sanders is doing more harm than good.

Introduction by KD.

Chris Hedges

Excerpted from an installment of the KPFK-FM program, Ralph Nader Radio Hour, July 11, 2015. Audio courtesy of ralphnaderradiohour.com.

Chris Hedges' new book is Wages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt (Nation Books, 2015).

Taken for a Ride

Part 1: New World Notes #388, 28:26 (August 11)
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Part 2: New World Notes #389, 27:22 (August 18)
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Boston

A documentary on how General Motors destroyed America's light-rail transit systems and then created the Highway Lobby. That forced Americans to buy cars, build millions of miles of new road, and suffer the bad results--greater expense, long commute times, destroyed cities, air pollution, and worse.
 
Jim Klein directed this 1996 documentary film, which I have (at long last) adapted to radio.

Los Angeles "Red Cars" (streetcars) slated for destruction

In Part 1: How GM bought up and intentionally destroyed city trolley systems, replacing the rapid and efficient streetcars (which commuters loved) with slow, crowded, polluting diesel buses (which commuters hated). GM built the buses and secretly owned the bus-line companies, but their real goal was to force people to buy cars.

In Part 2: How GM--aided by the oil companies, road-building companies, tire companies, and others--formed the "Highway Lobby" to ensure that almost all funding for transportation would be spent on new roads.  And about the struggle by cities to halt the growth of urban highways and promote more sensible--and more humane--transportation systems.

Alas, the Lobby--in cahoots with Silicon Valley--has a vision for the future: automated cars, and three times as many of them.

Atlanta

From Serving Money to Serving Life

New World Notes #387, 29:05 (August 4)
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A new audio collage by Chazk (aka Virtual Renderings), slightly condensed by me. It features selections from David Korten's Earth Day talk in Seattle (2015).

Korten shows that the fundamental maxims of corporate capitalism--"the Sacred Money and Markets Story"--are both false and preventing us from saving our environment (among other bad effects). Based on a synthesis of principles from religion, science, and mysticism, he proposes a different set of maxims--the "Sacred Life and Living Earth Story."
 
As usual, Chazk interweaves with the spoken words several relevant song passages, film clips, and other interesting audio.

With a brief introduction by me.

David Korten was a professor at Harvard Business School.  He is now an activist warning of the dangers--to society and to the planet--of unrestrained corporate capitalism.  His best-known books are When Corporations Rule the World (1995, 2001) and The Great Turning (2007).

A free archive of Chazk/Virtual Renderings' audio collages is available: see the link on the sidebar to the right of this page (under "Worth a Look").

The "Seven Sisters" and the Oil of the Middle East

Part 1: New World Notes #385, 28:50 (July 21)
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Part 2: New World Notes #386, 28:56 (July 28)
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The "Seven Sisters" was Big Oil. It was the cartel of huge private oil corporations that ended up owning almost all the oil in the Middle East. They stole and kept this treasure by hook and by crook, in violation of many laws, with help from corrupt monarchs abroad and muscle from the U.S. government, armed forces, and CIA.

We adapt to radio a new video documentary on the very subject.

Part 1 takes us from the founding of the cartel in 1928 (by Standard Oil, Shell, and BP) to the creation of OPEC in 1960.

Of note in Part 1: The story of how BP came to own all of the oil in Iran--and how, in 1953, Iran's parliament tried to regain control of the country's oil--and how the United States government responded by overthrowing Iran's democratic government and installing the Shah as dictator of Iran. (We then gave Iran's oil to US-based oil companies, not back to BP.)

Man of the Year: The last prime minister of democratic Iran, Mohammad Mossadeq (January 1952). For his crimes against Big Oil, the CIA ousted him and installed a brutal dictator, the Shah.

Part 2 takes us from the creation of OPEC in 1960 to the fate of Iraq today (its oil weath again taken away from the Iraqi people and again handed over to the big oil companies). Includes the Suez crisis, OPEC price hikes, Iraq's nationalizing of its oil in 1972 (succeeding where Iran in 1953 had failed), the Iranian revolution, and Gulf Wars I and II.

Introductions by K.D.   

New World Notes previously broadcast these two installments (as NWN #273 & 274) in May-June 2013.

Dispatches From the Class War

New World Notes #384, 27:51 (July 14)
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T.E. Lawrence ("of Arabia") astride Vincent SS100

Insightful comments on class conflict in America--some recorded, some read aloud--by Noam Chomsky; Nicholas Kristoff; Paul Burchheit; yours, truly; and (very briefly) George Carlin.  Plus a song on the same theme by Jonathan Blackshire.

Three Populists

New World Notes #383, 28:30 (July 7)
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Tommy Douglas

Three notable & highly entertaining populists, in their own words:

• Canadian reformist politician Tommy Douglas (d.1986), telling his comic fable about unresponsive politicians, Mouseland
• Texas journalist & commentator Molly Ivins (d. 2007), speaking in Berkeley, CA, around 2005. (Don't miss her stories about governor Rick Perry.)
• Texas commentator, agitator, & former state official Jim Hightower, with some recent brief podcasts.

Each offers a witty critique of The System--and a call to action.

This installment was previously broadcast, as NWN #187, in October 2011.

Molly Ivins recording courtesy of Scooter, of "The innerSide" on KPFT-FM (Houston, Texas). Jim Hightower's commentaries are from his Web site: http://www.jimhightower.com/air

Molly Ivins

George Carlin Memorial

Part 1: New World Notes #381, 28:59 (June 23)
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Part 2: New World Notes #382, 28:43 (June 30).
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Ceorge Carlin, ca. 2008

On the seventh anniversary of his death we celebrate the political and cultural satire of the great stand-up comedian George Carlin. We focus on the last two decades of Carlin's long career--by which time his political views had moved well to the left of center.

Carlin is one of the most astute critics of capitalism, imperialism, American popular culture, and American arrogance--and certainly the funniest. He died on June 22, 2008.

Sketches in Part 1:

• Religion = B.S.
• Airlines English
• The War on Homelessness
• Euphemisms

1960s

Sketches in Part 2:

• They own you / the class system
• Airport security / germs / parents
• The Book Club
• American B.S. / children

With brief introductions by KD.  Suitable for airplay: naughty words have been bleeped.

Thanks to Scooter, of The innerSide radio program (KPFT-FM, Houston), and to Colorado Free Radio for some of the recorded material. The Carlin routines in Part 1 were previously broadcast in New World Notes #179 (June 2011).

The Backlash Against Women

New World Notes #380, 28:50 (June 16)
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Writer and activist Jennifer Roesch explores the apparent contradiction in our culture: rampant hypersexualiztion and commodification of women but also increasing repression of women's sexuality. In combatting the former, she argues, we should be careful not to promote the latter. Let's not recreate the 1950s--the late 1960s are a better model of progress and liberation.

For Roesch, the ultimate cause of both sleaze and repression is capitalism run amok. And we can't have sexual freedom without social and economic freedom.

Roesch spoke at the Socialism 2013 conference, June 27, 2013.  Audio (which I have condensed and edited for radio) courtesy of wearemany.org.

The Empire Turns on its Citizens

New World Notes #379, 27:46 (June 9)
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Chris Hedges

Two short talks by journalist/essayist Chris Hedges on the bad effects of empire at home.

As empires buckle under their own weight, the harsh measures of control they use to subjugate countries abroad are turned on their own citizens. We see the evidence all around us: government spying on everyone, economic plunder, militarized police, trumped-up charges against dissenters, and the world's largest prison system.
 
The goal of the repression is to crush dissent and opposition, says Hedges

Hedges selections are taken from an interview with Sonali Kolhatkar, February 9, 2015, courtesy of Uprising Radio; and from a speech in Newark, NJ, October 9, 2014, courtesy of Building Bridges Radio. Many thanks to producers Sonali Kolhatkar, Ken Nash, and Mimi Rosenberg.

Renegades

Part 1: New World Notes #377, 29:27 (May 26)
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Part 2: New World Notes #378, 29:36 (June 2).
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A 2-part broadcast of a fine talk by historian Thaddeus Russell. Russell is the author of the extremely interesting book, A Renegade History of the United States (Free Press, 2010)

Part 1 focuses on work and leiure. The leisure we enjoy today--weekends, vacations, etc--was not granted freely by employers. Rather, it was taken without permission by "renegade" workers of decades past. These included slaves, drunken craftsmen, unmotivated factory hands, etc. For instance, plantation slaves established the practice of "vacation"--much to the annoyance of their masters. (They'd agree to return in exchange for not being punished.)

Without the groundbreaking work by these renegades, we might still be working for 14-16 hours a day. (Maybe that should be "goldbricking" rather than "groundbreaking.")

Thaddeus Russell

Part 2 focuses on sex and on women's rights. Many rights and freedoms enjoyed today by U.S. women (and their male friends) were won for them--not by feminists--but by 19th & early-20th century prostitutes & madams. These include the right to own property; to acquire wealth; to dance, smoke, and drink in public; to wear attractive clothing; to give or receive oral sex; to have interracial intimacy; and to use contraceptives.

A rollicking good story, well-told by Thaddeus Russell.

These two installments of New World Notes were previously broadcast in April 2011.

The Hidden Ideology of the News Media

Part 1: New World Notes #375, 28:39 (May 12)
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Part 2: New World Notes #376, 28:41 (May 19)
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Another in our series of classic talks by Progressive political scientist Michael Parenti.  This one--one of his best--dates from 1997.
 
Parenti demolishes the myth of "the liberal media."  With wit, humor, facts, and examples, he shows that the US news media are little more than the propaganda arm of the the most powerful corporations and the government.

Parenti spoke in Burlington, Vermont--at the same university that had fired him for his antiwar activism 25 years earlier.

Gay Rights as a Free-Speech Issue

New World Notes #374, 28:39 (May 5)
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Paul Siegel  (Photo by Kenneth Dowst)

Civil-liberties activist Paul Siegel has advice for people, particularly gays, challenging discrimination in court: Think 1st Amendment, not 14th. This intelligent and often funny talk should have wide appeal.

Highlights include a funny account of what was and wasn't allowed into the Yellow Pages ... stories of clueless school administrators who think the 1st Amendment does not apply to teenagers ... and the story of a gay student suspended from school and "outed" to her parents for the crime of kissing her girlfriend.

I recorded the talk, "Gay Rights as a Free-Speech Issue," live at the University of Hartford on April 27, 2010. I have edited and condensed the talk for radio. Originally broadcast on NWN (#118) in June 2010.  With a new introduction by me (May 2015).

Paul Siegel is a longtime civil-liberties activist. His day job is Professor of Communication at the University of Hartford

http://www.aclu.org

Bad Buisiness: Nuclear Power

New World Notes #373, 27:17 (April 28)
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 Mid-20th-century propaganda. Coming soon! Nuclear-generated electricity that's clean, plentiful, and too cheap to meter

Vermont's creaky nuclear power plant was finally shut down. Not for the 500 best reasons but because it simply wasn't profitable to run. Turns out, nuclear power never did make any business sense, anywhere, and it's making less business sense each day.  Noted management consultant Jeremy Rifkin and veteran power-system administrator David Freeman each explains why.
 
So why do government and the nuclear industry keep promoting this failed product? In part, because it's a fig-leaf for nuclear weapons development, says Freeman.

Freeman talk--condensed and edited by KD--courtesy of tucradio.org.  The video of Rifkin's remarks is available on YouTube.

Entergy Corp.'s Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant (2004)

Work, Debt, and Crisis

Part 1: New World Notes #371, 29:11 (April 14)
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Part 2: New World Notes #372, 28:19 (April 21)
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A fine audio collage--originally titled Capital Games--by Chazk, a.k.a. Virtual Renderings. An intriguing and sometimes rocking blend of satire, music, and also analysis by several voices (among them Richard Wolff's).

The piece explores the economic problems of our time--fallling wages, consumer debt, overwork, unemployment, decline of manufacturing, corrupt politicians, crooked banks and bankers, soaring corporate profits, and stratospheric executive salaries ... among others.

More by Chazk. An extensive, free archive of Chazk's / Virtual Rendering's collages is available.  You'll find a link in this Web site's "Worth a Look" section, on the gray sidebar on your screen's right.

Women, War, and Violence

New World Notes #370, 29:18 (April 7)
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Modern warfare kills and injures many more civilians than soldiers--and female civilians are especially hard hit. Filmmaker Lisa F. Jackson discusses rape as a war tactic in Congo. Then Ynar Mohammed speaks of the violence against and oppression of women in Iraq ever since the U.S. invasion and overthrow of Saddam Hussein. Plus some commentary by KD and a song by Bonnie Raitt.

This installment is a replay of one of New World Notes' first broadcasts, #16, from June 2008. With a new introduction by KD.

Thanks to Mike McCormick and his show Mind Over Matters for the Jackson talk, and thanks to democracynow.org for the Ynar Mohammed interview.  I have edited and condensed both.

Illustration: Jacques-Louis David, Intervention of the Sabine Women, 1799

The Body Toxic

New World Notes #369, 29:03 (March 31)
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Journalist Nena Baker discusses the hazardous chemicals increasingly present in everyday products--pizza boxes, butcher paper, microwave popcorn bags, dental floss, tin cans, clothing, upholstery, you name it.

She focuses on a group of chemicals known as "endocrine disrupters" or "hormone mimics." These chemicals are doing serious harm to our bodies--and government agencies lack the power to regulate their use. There's some hope, though.

Baker's talk is based on her book, The Body Toxic: How the Hazardous Chemistry of Everyday Things Threatens Our Health and Well-Being (http://www.thebodytoxic.com/). She spoke in Seattle on April 1, 2010. I have slightly condensed the talk, which was originally broadcast on Mike McCormick's Mind Over Matters in Seattle. The uncut version is here.  Thanks to Mike.

New World Notes previously broadcast this installment, as #148, in January 2011.