Thursday, April 22, 2010

Michael Parenti vs. God and His Demons

Part Two is now available! See link, above.

New World Notes News
Vol. 3, No. 17 & 18 -- April 25, 2010

This Fortnight in New World Notes, radio programs #112 & 113, April 27 & May 4:

Michael Parenti
vs. God and His Demons

Good guy, in Parenti's book:
unorthodox thinker & monk Giordano Bruno
(burned at the stake by the Inquisition in 1600)

In brief:

In a telephone interview with me of April 6, political scientist Michael Parenti discusses his new book, about Organized Religion, God and His Demons (Prometheus Books). We'll replay the conversation over two installments of the radio program.

In the first part (NWN #112), Parenti talks about rampant child sexual abuse by the Christian (and other) clergy and the coverup thereof--and now, at the Vatican, the coverup of the coverup. He talks about the oppressive Buddhist theocracy in Tibet before the Chinese Communists took over. He talks about our society's ignoring some sins frequently denounced in the Bible--e.g., charging high interest rates ("usury")--while we piously condemn "sins" the Bible never mentions (gay marriage, abortion). And he rebuts creationism, "Intelligent Design," . . . and some of the conclusions of Charles Darwin.

In the second part (#113), Parenti discusses the unholy alliance of the Church, the nation-state, and economic power; ... FEMA's enlistment of the clergy to preach obedience to authority if and when martial law is imposed; ... and the Christian Right's takeover of the Air Force Academy. He ends with praise for 2 unorthodox 16th-century Christians--Montaigne and Giordano Bruno--and explaining why, despite everything, he's not an atheist.

Bad guys, in Parenti's book: Televangelist Robert Tilton, Cardinal
William Levada. For his services in protecting pedophile priests as
Archbishop of Portland (Oregon, 1986-1995) and then Archbishop
of San Francisco (1995-2005)--and in bankrupting the Archdiocese
of Portland--Levada was promoted to Cardinal and given a very
high church office in Rome--Head of the Inquisition. Sorry: "Prefect
of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith."
As for Tilton, that "giant sucking sound" you hear is money being
removed from the wallets of the poor and desperate.


Notes and credits

http://www.michaelparenti.org/
http://www.prometheusbooks.com/

This week's song: Roy Zimmerman, Creation Science 101
Next week's: Roy Zimmerman, Jerry Falwell's God

New World Notes installments from #10 are archived at A-Infos Radio Project/radio4all.net. Installments beginning with #90 are archived also at The Internet Archive, in a variety of file formats. Either link should get you a reverse-chrono listing of available installments.

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "very noses") of WWUH-FM, a community service of that beacon of light in darkest Connecticut, the University of Hartford.

Feedback to kdowst at hotmail period com. Free weekly NWN email newsletter (which much resembles the weekly blog entry) on request.

Series Overview: Political and social commentary in a variety of genres. Exploring the gap between what we want ... and what they're trying to make us settle for.

Coming Soon -- Tuesday debut date shown:

  • May 11 -- Suppressed by The Press. The top 10 vitally important stories (2000-2009) that commercial journalism didn't want you to worry your pretty little head about. With contributions by Robert Freeman and Robert Parry.
  • May 18 -- Chris Hedges on the Empire of Illusion

Parenti & dust jacket

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):



A-Infos Radio Project http://www.radio4all.net


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Sunday, April 18, 2010

The Unheard Voice of the Majority


Our principal archive, radio4all.net, has been encountering some problems.
If you have any difficulty listening online or downloading any recent
installment of the radio show, please try our other archive at
The Internet Archive.


New World Notes News
Vol. 3, No. 16 -- April 18, 2010

This Week in New World Notes, radio program #111, April 20:

The Unheard Voice
of the Majority

Joe Bageant, with crummy truck, posssibly at Gunther's Garage

In brief:
Social critics from both Left and Right feel that we're lonely kooks muttering in the wilderness. That's what the Powers That Be want us to feel and, through their mass-media, make us feel. Guess what: (1) We're right & they're wrong; (2) we're the majority; and (3) Leftists and Tea Partiers agree with each other on many issues. More than we agree with the Powers That Be.

By way of proof, the show offers words by "minority" types the "mainstream" media seldom quote: African-Americans Mumia Abu-Jamal & Glen Ford, Afro-Caribbean Englishman Benjamin Zephaniah, Appalachian White Joe Bageant, & moi. (Yes, I know, it's an All Male Cast this week.)

Does any articulate thoughts & feelings close to your own?

The show courageously declines to play the song, "Smile on your brother / Everybody get together, / Try to love one another right now." However, we do go out on a bit of "Fingertips, Part 2" . . . .

Top: Mumia Abu-Jamal. Bottom: Glen Ford (at MIT, in January 2010)

Notes and Credits

The video of Benjamin Zephaniah's "Rong Radio Station" is worth a look. Thanks to fellow radio guy Tereza Coraggio, producer of Third Paradigm, for turning me on to it.

New World Notes installments from #10 are archived at A-Infos Radio Project/radio4all.net. Installments beginning with #90 are archived also at The Internet Archive, in a variety of file formats. Either link should get you a reverse-chrono listing of available installments.

Series Overview: Political and social commentary in a variety of genres. Exploring the gap between what we want ... and what they're trying to make us settle for.

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "Executive Dining Room") of WWUH-FM, a community service of that beacon of light in darkest Connecticut, the University of Hartford. Feedback to kdowst at hotmail period com.

Coming soon -- Tuesday debut dates shown:

  • April 27 & May 1 -- Two-part interview with Dr. Michael Parenti on his new book about organized religion, God and His Demons

Top: Dr. Kenneth Dowst. Bottom: Benjamin Zephaniah

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):



A-Infos Radio Project http://www.radio4all.net


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Saturday, April 10, 2010

Reproductive-Rights Crusader Bill Baird



Our principal archive, radio4all.net, has been encountering some problems.
If you have any difficulty listening online or downloading any recent
installment of the radio show, please try our other archive at
The Internet Archive.


New World Notes News
Vol. 3, No. 15 -- April 10, 2010

This Week in New World Notes, radio program #110, April 13:

Reproductive-Rights Crusader
Bill Baird

Moments before the bust: Baird tests Massachusetts' crimes-against-chastity
law at Boston University, April 6, 1967. Most graphics: Click to enlarge.


In (not overly) brief:

What John Brown was to Abolition, Bill Baird was and is to reproductive rights, including the right to abortion and the right to purchase contraceptives. The latter was still illegal in Massachusetts (and elsewhere) in the 1960s! Seeing a woman die from an attempted coat-hanger abortion changed his life. He determined to change the law.

One way to do this is to break the law, get convicted, appeal the conviction, and invite the Supreme Court to declare the law you broke unconstitutional. This method is probaby easier than persuading the Massachusetts legislature to vote in favor of any bill that even hints at encouraging "sin." So, in a talk at Boston University in 1967, Baird methodically broke just about every provision of the law that prohibited transfer, possession, display, or even discussion of contraceptives.

For reasons unknown, the authorities had neglected to bust Cardinal Cushing--even though the Archdiocese of Boston had been flagrantly violating the law for years by distributing a pamphlet titled "The Rhythm Method." They didn't neglect to bust Baird for displaying a contraceptive diaphragm and giving a can of Emko Foam to an undergraduate.

Baird had to explain to the arresting officers what a diaphragm was. None had ever seen one. One guessed that it was a large rolled condom.

Top: IUDs make great tie clips. I won't spoil the story by retelling it here.
Hear it from Baird at about 25:30 [min:sec] into the show. Actually, the
now-notorious Dalkon Shield (left) made a better tie clip than
contraceptive device.
Bottom: Fellow-traveller Michael Luckman at Saint Patrick's Cathedral,
in 1968, protesting yet another anti-birth-control encyclical from the
Vatican (Pope Paul VI).


It worked. After a fashion. Baird v. Eisenstadt became a milestone in the struggles for reproductive rights and privacy rights. Roe v. Wade cites the decision five or six times.

Baird also founded the nation's first abortion clinic.

He survived assassination attempts, 8 criminal convictions, prison brutality, the firebombing of his clinic, the breakup of his family, and the absence of any help from Planned Parenthood, NOW, ACLU, & other potential allies.

A scary, stunning, and often very funny story, well-told by Baird himself.

Notes and credits

Baird's words were recorded at a panel discussion on civil liberties--titled Courageous Convictions--held at the University of Hartford on February 16, 2010. Edited for radio by moi.

Baird's Web site: http://prochoiceleague.org/

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "imprimatur") of WWUH-FM, a community service of that beacon of light in darkest Connecticut, the University of Hartford. Feedback to kdowst at hotmail period com.

Top: The Massachusetts jury agreed with Baird, convicting anti-abortion
terrorist John Salvi of murder in 1996.
Bottom: Reproductive-rights rally at Union Square, September 2009.
Women's-health-care pioneer Merle Hoffman stands at the mic (left).


Coming Soon -- Tuesday debut date shown:

  • April 20 -- The Unheard Voice of the Majority


Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):


Except in Massachusetts (and other states) in the 1960s--where
education was considered a "crime against chastity." The "chastity-
through-ignorance" movement flourished again in the W. Bush
years with the preposterous & discredited (but that never stopped
'em!) "abstinence-only sex education." When it comes to anti-sex
lunkheadedness, the Evangelical Protestants have reached parity
with the Catholic hierarchy. (In my experience, the Catholic
congregants are a good deal saner than the Pope, Cardinal Cushing,
Jerry Falwell, Joe Biden, & the entire Bush Administration, combined--
including former Postmaster-General John C. Potter!)

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Friday, April 2, 2010

False-Flag Operations, Part 2


New World Notes News
Vol. 3, No. 14 -- April 3, 2010

This Week in New World Notes, radio program #109, April 6:

False-Flag Operations,
Part 2

Spanish Plots . . . Spanish Treachery . . . England Believes It
Foul Play . . . Crisis Is At Hand. . . . Any resemblance to the media's
role in the invasion of Iraq is strictly coincidental. Somebody check to
see if Judith Miller's grandfather worked for Hearst. . . . The Maine
exploded in Havana harbor on February 15, 1898.
Most graphics: Click to enlarge.
A current U.S. Navy history of the Maine notes that "The survivors
of the disaster were taken on board . . . Spanish cruiser Alfonso XII. The
Spanish officials at Havana showed every attention to the survivors of the
disaster and great respect for those killed. The court of inquiry convened
in March was unable to obtain evidence associating the destruction of the
battleship with any person or persons, but public opinion in the United
States was so inflamed that the Maine disaster led eventually to the
declaration of war on Spain 21 April."
That last sentence is disingenuous. In fact, the McKinley
Administration had decided to go to war with Spain long
before the Maine exploded and used the misfortune to rouse
public support for launching a war that had few justifications.


In brief:

"False-flag" ops are incidents used to justify war or abolition of civil liberties. These incidents are staged, or misrepresented, or imaginary.

This week I review the major types of "false-flag operations"--with details on the battleship Maine (1898) and U.S. Air Force provocations of the USSR during the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962). Guess who saved the world in 1962. Nikita Khrushchev! Then ex-MI-5 agent Annie Machon discusses terrorism by both sides in Northern Ireland (1990s), operations Gladio (post-WWII) and Northwoods (1962), and 9-11. Last, she details the huge loss of civil liberties in the U.K. following 9-11.

Top: Sheet music. Bottom: New York Journal and Advertiser.


Notes and credits

Annie Machon speech of May 14, 2007, courtesy of London Sound Posse. The complete speech (1h, 8m) is available here.

See also last week's installment, #108: False-Flag Operations: An Introduction (scroll down).

This week's song: Chumbawamba, Passenger List for Doomed Flight 1721. Download your own copy for free from Chumba's Web site (scroll to bottom of the page).

Correction: In the program I state that the Maine probably exploded from spontaneous combustion of damp "black powder" (gunpowder). The Navy has concluded that spontaneous combustion of coal ignited the powder in an adjacent storeroom. The Navy's brief & good history of the Maine is worth a look.

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "nihil obstat") of WWUH-FM, a community service of that beacon of light in darkest Connecticut, the University of Hartford. Feedback to kdowst at hotmail period com.

While Annie Machon smiles (top, with fellow spy David Shayler),
the Goddess of Liberty weeps at Spanish perfidy.


Coming Soon -- Tuesday debut dates shown:

  • April 13 -- Reproductive-Rights Crusader Bill Baird
  • April 20 -- The Unheard Voice of the Majority

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):

Top: Secret pen-pals Nikita Khrushchev and JFK. It was the chubby bald guy on the left who, at the expense of his career, prevented the World War III that the generals on both sides (especially ours) were trying hard to bring about. For details & more illustrations, see this site's post, The Story Behind the Greatest Speech You Never Heard.
Bottom: Back in the old days, though, the entire commercial media did not march in lock-step to the rulers' drummer. The waiter depicted is President McKinley. Hey! Those traitorous socialists at the Boston Globe are failing to Support Our Troops!
Cuba was a cakewalk, but the conquest of the Philippines--the U.S.'s main objective--proved a bloody and long struggle. The fiercest opposition to the Yankee invaders was mounted by Muslim insurgents, the "Moros." Some empires never learn--or, more likely, don't give a damn. Mark Twain scathingly denounced the campaign in "A Defence of General Funston" and other essays.



A-Infos Radio Project http://www.radio4all.net

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