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Tag Archives: Two-Party Dictatorship

Free Speech Radio Presents Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor at Impact Hub (Oakland), On Two-Party Dictatorship, Socialism, & True Democracy

12 Mon Dec 2016

Posted by ztnh in Anti-Capitalism, Anti-Fascism, Anti-Imperialism, Anti-Totalitarianism, Civic Engagement (Activism), Democracy Deferred, Free Speech, Philosophy, Political Science, Presidential Election 2016, Racism (phenotype), Sociology

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Anita Johnson, Anthony Kapel "Van" Jones (b. 1968), Barry Morris Goldwater (1909–1998), Bernie Sanders, Davey D, Donald John Trump (b. 1946), Dr. Barbara Ransby, Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, Dr. Michelle Alexander (b. 1967), Fight for $15, Hard Knock Radio, KPFA, neoliberalism, Norman Solomon, Obama administration, Occupy Wall Street, Pacifica Radio Network, Stephen Kevin "Steve" Bannon (b. 1953), transcript, Two-Party Dictatorship, urban economics, Women's Magazine

LUMPENPROLETARIAT—At a recent presentation in support of Dr. Bill Ayers‘ new book, Demand the Impossible, Dr. Bernardine Dohrn encouraged everyone to attend an upcoming SF Bay Area presentation by radical scholar Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, an associate professor at Princeton University and the author of a new book entitled From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation (2016), “an examination of the history and politics of Black America and the development of the social movement Black Lives Matter in response to police violence in the United States.  [Dr.] Taylor has received the Lannan Foundation’s Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book.”  Dr. Cornel West has described her as “the most sophisticated and courageous radical intellectual of her generation.”

For those, who were unable to attend, free speech radio’s Women’s Magazine as well as Davey D, co-host of Hard Knock Radio, broadcast excerpts of the presentation, which was delivered before at Impact Hub in Oakland, California on December 5, 2016 by Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor.  This KPFA benefit was hosted by Hard Knock Radio co-host Anita Johnson. [1]  (Working draft transcripts below.)  Listen (and/or download) here [2]; and here [3]; and here [4].

Messina

***

KPFA BENEFIT—[5 DEC 2016]

Monday, December 5, 2016 – 7:30 pm
Impact Hub Oakland, 2323 Broadway (near Grand), Oakland
Advance tickets: $12 : brownpapertickets.com :: T: 800-838- 3006
or Books Inc (Berkeley), Marcus Books, Pegasus (3 sites), Moe’s, Walden Pond Bookstore,Diesel a Bookstore, Mrs. Dalloway’s
$15 door

Winner of the 2016 Lannan Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book

The eruption of mass protests in the wake of the police murders of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and Eric Garner in New York City have challenged the impunity with which officers of the law carry out violence against Black people and punctured the illusion of a postracial America. The Black Lives Matter movement has awakened a new generation of activists. In this stirring and insightful analysis, activist and scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor surveys the historical and contemporary ravages of racism and persistence of structural inequality such as mass incarceration and Black unemployment. In this context, she argues that this new struggle against police violence holds the potential to reignite a broader push for Black liberation.

“Ultimately, From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation is an essential read for anyone following the movement for Black Lives. The text chronicles a portion of history we rarely ever see, while also bringing together data and deep primary source research in a way that lucidly explains the origins of the current moment.”  —Los Angeles Review of Books

“This brilliant book is the best analysis we have of the #BlackLivesMatter moment of the long struggle for freedom in America. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor has emerged as the most sophisticated and courageous radical intellectual of her generation.”  —Dr. Cornel West

“Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s searching examination of the social, political and economic dimensions of the prevailing racial order offers important context for understanding the necessity of the emerging movement for black liberation.”  —Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s writings on Black politics, social movements, and racial inequality in the United States have been published in Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture and Society, Jacobin, New Politics, the Guardian, In These Times, Black Agenda Report, Ms., International Socialist Review, Al Jazeera America, and other publications.  She is assistant professor in the department of African American Studies at Princeton University.

Anita Johnson began her journalistic career at Youth Radio in 1994.  She was the senior producer for YR’s weekly talk show on WILD 94.9, and served as senior producer for 106.1 KMEL’s Street Knowledge, hosted by Davey D.  By 1997, she was submitting national segments to Marketplace and NPR’s Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition.  In 2000, Anita co-founded KPFA’s Hard Knock Radio, a public affairs program covering news, views and Hip-Hop.  In 2009, with the assistance of The Association of Independents in Radio, she founded Beyond The Odds, a multimedia arts project created to illuminate the impact of HIV and AIDS on low-income and minority young adults (under 25), through the use of the Web.  In 2010, she co-produced the documentary film CoInTelPro 101.  A well-respected Hip Hop artist as well, she has performed with singer/guitarist Carlos Santana.

KPFA benefit

Learn more at KPFA.

***

WOMEN’S MAGAZINE—[12 DEC 2016]  (synopsis)

““Deeply rooted in Black radical, feminist and socialist traditions, Taylor’s book is an outstanding example of the type of analysis that is needed to build movements for freedom and self-determination in a far more complicated terrain than that confronted by the activists of the 20th century.”  —Michael C. Dawson, author of Blacks In and Out of the Left

Keeanga-Yamahtta is assistant professor in the department of African American Studies at Princeton University.  Her book, From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation, won the 2016 Lannan Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book.

Taylor spoke on Monday, December 5, at Impact Hub in Oakland. She addressed the current crisis as well as the historical entwining of race and class in American politics, and possible ways forward for a multiracial working class-oriented social justice movement.”

[Women’s Magazine intro audio collage]

KATE RAPHAEL:  “Good afternoon.  Welcome to Women’s Magazine.  I’m Kate Raphael.  Even before the catastrophe of the elections, I was feeling pretty demoralised about the state of politics on the left in this country.  And I felt like I needed to understand more about Black Lives Matter and the movement building around that, and how it relates to movements, that have been bubbling up, like the Fight for $15 and climate justice.

“And one of the books, I picked up to help me understand those movements and the context in which they’re operating, was called From Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation” by Keeanga Yamahtta-Taylor.  I found it to be one of the most nuanced and thoughtful accounts and analyses of the moment we’re in, that I’ve read in a very long time.

“So, I was super excited when I saw that Keeanga Yamahtta-Taylor was gonna be speaking in Oakland last week.  And I was even more excited to realise that this was a KPFA-sponsored event.  And, so, I would be able to bring you her talk as well as offer the chance to get her book or a copy of her talk as a thank-you gift for your pledge to KPFA this holiday season.

“Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is associate professor of African-American Studies at Princeton University.  She received the Lannan Foundation‘s Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book for her book From Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation.

“Feminist historian Barbara Ransby calls the book “a must-read for everyone who’s serious about the ongoing praxis of freedom.

“We are going to listen to a good bit of Taylor’s talk on Monday night, which focuses a lot on the election and its aftermath, but also touches on the themes, she explores much more deeply in her book.  Before we get to that, I just want to let you know that you can get a copy of her complete talk on CD for a pledge of $75 dollars to KPFA.  You can get the book, itself, for $80 dollars.  Or you can get, both, the book and the CD for just $130 dollars, which is only about 35 cents a day.  And I really can’t recommend it highly enough.

“I know a lot of people are having potlucks and listening groups, meetings to talk about what’s going on.  This CD would make a great conversation-starter for one of those discussions.  Your book group would definitely love to read this book and discuss it.  You don’t need to wait until the end of the show to call and pledge your support for this radio station and this programme.  Help keep us on the air.  The numbers to call:  510.848-5372 or 1.800.439-5732, 1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Or you can pledge securely online at kpfa.org.  We deeply appreciate whatever support you could give us.

“Here is Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor speaking at Impact Hub in Oakland last Monday night [December 5th] at an event hosted by Hard Knock Radio‘s Anita Johnson.”  (c. 4:33)

DR. KEEANGA-YAMAHTTA TAYLOR:  “I’m gonna talk about some of the themes in my book.  But I’m gonna try to do so within the context, um, of the catastrophe—the election of Donald Trump.  [snip (Women’s Magazine edited the following bit out of this broadcast.)  So, um, so, I’m gonna try to combine both of these things.  And we can talk more specifically about the book in the discussion.  But I feel like, you know, given the issues, that I’ve written about, that actually this—the whole Trump thing, really, is something, that we have to try to engage with and understand.  So, that’s some of the context behind the talk.  Uh, okay.  [Audience Member:  “Yes!”]  Okay. [chuckles] 

“Um,] it’s difficult to comprehend how eight years ago, after the election of Barack Obama, the national conversation was whether or not the U.S. was going to become a post-racial society.  Forbes magazine ran an editorial with the headline, Racism In America Is Over.  Eight years later, any fantasy about the United States being a post-racial society has gone up in flames with the ascendance of Donald Trump to the highest office in the country.

[snip: see Hard Knock Radio transcript below for the full text of this speech excerpt]

“In other words, the lesser evil always cuts the path for the greater evil.  Where Obama used the machinery and logic of deportations to banish 2.5 million people from the United States, it has set the stage for Trump to do this in an even larger way.  Where the Obama administration embraced the values of so-called choice and privatisation and gutting public education, Trump will do it in an even more fantastical way, that finishes the job of attempting to kill public education in this country.  Obama’s failure to deliver any significant reforms for working class and poor people made a mockery of his attempts to tell people to vote for him in order to secure his legacy. (c. 16:40)

“And the insistence of liberals to defend this agenda, the thin gruel of the Obama agenda, with only the most scant whiff of criticism leads to their own paralysis when the right does the same thing, but just on a larger scale.”

KATE RAPHAEL:  “You’re listening to Women’s Magazine here on KPFA, 94.1 FM and online at kpfa.org.  I’m Kate Raphael.

“We’re listening to talk by Keeanga Yamahtta-Taylor, that was at the Impact Hub in Oakland.  Taylor is the author of a wonderful book called From #Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation.  And we’re offering this book to you along with her talk as a thank-you gift for your pledge to KPFA of just $130 dollars, which is just about 35 cents a day. (c. 18:44)  [snip]  ”  (c. 23:34)

DR. KEEANGA-YAMAHTTA TAYLOR:  “But there are other ways to measure discontent beyond polls and election results.  We saw the first wave of discontent with Obama’s role with the emergence of Occupy Movement in 2011, and, then, the eruption of Black Lives Matter in the summer of 2014.  Both were products of the widening gap of inequality in the United States.  That inequality was at the heart of the Occupy Movement and its popularisation of class inequality in the U.S. though the slogan of the 99% versus the 1%.  (c. 22:54)

“But this inequality was also important in how we understand the emergence of Black Lives Matter.  Black Americans, of course, took the brunt of the economic crisis in 2008.  It was, in part, how we understand the deep wells of support, that existed for Obama and his campaign’s ability to tap into the anger with the federal government’s abject disregard for what was happening in black communities.

“We cannot understand, for example, the social catastrophe happening across black Chicago, where it was just announced last week that there will be 700 homicides in that city, the vast majority of which affect young black people.  You cannot understand that social catastrophe in Chicago without understanding the persisting effects of the economic crisis, that never really ended in many black communities.  (c. 23:53)

“Chicago has the third-highest black unemployment rate of any major city in this country.  It has the third-highest poverty rate of a large city in the United States.  Its black middle class is being gutted because of municipal, state, federal budget cuts, that have wiped out public sector jobs in postal work, teaching, and other positions, that have historically been the bedrock of black economic stability.  The breakdown of this civic infrastructure, in combination with the existing crisis of mass incarceration and what Michelle Alexander has called The New Jim Crow, the persistence of unemployment and underemployment and of under-resourced public services and institutions has created the pretext for deepening police presence in black communities and, as a result, is exacerbating all of the conditions, that justify the presence of the police in the first place.  (c. 24:53)

“As living conditions in black communities have become harder, the police have been given license to respond with arrests and brutality.  And, while the emergence of Black Lives Matter has exposed the extent to which violent policing is institutionalised in this country, it nevertheless continues.  The police are on pace to kill 1,200 people this year, more than last year, when newspapers first began to count, and, substantively more than the 928 a year, the FBI had been suggesting as an average two years earlier.

“If you want to understand why the black vote was depressed compared to 2008 and 2012, it can be found in the inability of the American government to aggressively intervene and prevent the murder of black citizens by the state, whether it’s with the policing of black communities or the water crisis in Flint, the expectation that black Americans would be a firewall for Clinton was as offensive, as it was reflective of a kind of liberal contempt for the daily struggles of working class and poor people. (c. 26:09)

“There is just the expectation that, no matter what is happening in your life and how terrible things might be, and no matter how unresponsive the Democratic Party may be, you still have to vote for them.

“And, then, the bitterness directed at people when they don’t respond in such a way is even more contemptuous.  This is true when liberals blame depressed black voter turnout for the election results.  But it is also the case when they blame working class whites for, quote, ‘voting against their interests’, as if, somehow, voting for the neoliberal, yet civil, politics of the Democratic Party are in the interest of the working class.  And, as an aside—[audience finally starts to respond with faint applause; it seems the audience consists of mostly nonplussed registered Democrats.] [5]

“Working class interests are never on the ballot in bourgeois elections. [scant applause and at least one cheer; the biggest audience reaction thus far] 

“But, when it comes to the fate of ordinary white people, who, despite the media and academic fascination with it for the moment, these are people, who are also regularly ignored.  We have heard all sorts of dime-store psychology about the so-called white working class, most of it thinly-veiled elitism.  White workers feel entitled.  They’re only interested in themselves.  They are privileged.  They are racist scum.  They are just bad.  (c. 27:30)

“In total, it reflects the political establishment’s contempt for the struggles of regular people.  If you only read these reports or assessments, you would think there was no inequality experienced by white working class people, or that ordinary white people were just living the high life.

“But, when we consider the experiences of white working class people within the context of the attacks on working class standards, in general, we get a different picture.  And what would happen, if we told the story of black Chicago and other black communities across this country?  It’s part of the same story of what’s happening to ordinary white people.

“For example, there is the continuing crisis of opioid, or narcotic, addiction in this country.  While people are quick to point out how differently it is received compared to the War On Drugs directed at black communities in the 1980s and ’90s, which is undoubtedly true, what does this crisis at this particular moment tell us about the conditions of working class life and working class people?

“There are two million people, addicted to opioids in the U.S.  Half of those people are addicted to heroin.  From 2009 to 2014, almost half a million people have died from opioid overdoses, a fourfold increase from 1999.  Earlier this year, it was reported that their had been a decline in the life expectancy for white women and a plateauing of life expectancy for white men.  In fact, it is unprecedented for life expectancy to reverse in a so-called first world country. (c. 29:20)

“In the United States peer countries, life expectancy is growing.  Why is life expectancy for white women in decline in this country?  Drug overdose, suicide, and alcohol abuse.

On transcending race (phenotype), or identity politics, and confronting class struggle

“So, if we told the stories of the destruction of working class black life alongside the stories of the destruction of working class white life, it could allow us to see that the anxieties, stresses, confusions, and frustrations about life in the world today are not owned by one group, but are shared by many.  It would not tell us that everyone suffers the same oppression or exploitation.  But it would allow us to see that, even if we don’t experience a particular kind of oppression, every working person in this country is going through something.  Everyone is trying to figure out how to survive.  And many are failing.  (c. 30:23)

“If we put these stories together, we would gain more insight into how the white working class and poor have as much stake in the fight for a different kind of society as anyone else.  We wouldn’t so casually dismiss their suffering as privileged because they do not suffer as much as black and brown people in this country.

“The privileges of white skin run very thin in a country where 19 million white people languish in poverty.  Apparently, the wages of whiteness are not so great to stop millions of ordinary white people from, literally, drinking and drugging themselves to death to escape the despair of living in this so-called greatest country on Earth.

“If we put these separate stories together into a single story, we could make better sense of why socialism is rising in popularity.  White people have taken to the streets over the last five years to protest the growing racial and economic inequality in this country.  13 million people voted for an open socialist.  And many believe that if Sanders ran against Trump, he very well could have beaten him.  51% of 18- to 29-year olds say they are against capitalism.  Even if they are not fully convinced of what should replace it, 48% of millennials support health insurance as a, quote, ‘right for all people’.  And 47% agree that basic necessities, such as food and shelter are, quote, ‘a right, that the government should provide to those unable to afford them’. (c. 32:10)

“In the 1970s, 61% of Americans fell into that vague, but stable, category of the middle class.  Today, that number has fallen to 50%.  It is driven by the growing wealth inequality, that exists here.  In the last year alone, the 1% saw their income rise by 7%.  The 0.1% saw their income rise by 9%.  In general, the richest 20% of households in the U.S. owned 84% of the wealth in this country, while the bottom 40% owned less than 1%.  In other words, there are 400 billionaires in this country.  They are the reason why there are 47 million poor people in this country.  You cannot have untold obscene wealth, unless you have untold obscene poverty.  That is the law of the market. (c. 33:06)

“And how does such a tiny percent of the population unjustly hold on to their wealth, even when millions agree that it should be redistributed?  Racism, immigrant-bashing, homophobia, transphobia, sexism, nationalism.  They get us to fight each other, while they horde their wealth.

“Our stories are not all the same.  We do not have the same experiences.  But our hardships often emanate from the same source—a market-based economy, that privileges the wealthy over the welfare and lives of the people who create that wealth.  And they keep our stories separate from each other, so that we never understand the entire story, only our particular part of it.

“But, even with great effort to keep our side divided and confused, millions of people are coming to grips with the harsh reality of an economic system, that guarantees them nothing but a future of hardship and an inability to ever get ahead.  But the knowledge, alone, of the existence of racism, inequality, poverty, and injustice does not necessarily equip our side with the political tools needed to fight the battles of today or to fight for a socialist future. (c. 34:32)

“We need struggle.  We also need politics because we must contend with the political establishment, that wants to lower our expectations to believe that the existing society is the best that we can expect from humanity, that we dare not think beyond the existing parameters of electing a Democrat or Republican to change the world we live in.

“Clinton lost, in part, ‘cos she ran a campaign of low expectations, a campaign cynically pivoted around the notion that ordinary people shouldn’t ask for too much, and that we must be realistic about the possibilities.  Donald Trump promised to change the world.  And Hillary Clinton promised to make the trains run on time.  Bernie Sanders, for all of the excitement, that his campaign generated for rightly demanding more, his commitment to remaining in the Democratic Party has effectively neutered his political revolution.  Expecting the Democratic Party to fight for the democratic redistribution of wealth and resources in this country is like expecting to squeeze orange juice out of an apple.” (c. 35:50)

[host cuts into the playback of the audio recording to appeal for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA]

KATE RAPHAEL:  ” [snip]”  (c. 41:31)

[host returns to the playback of the audio recording of the speech, but fast-forwarding to the Q&A portion of the presentation with Anita Johnson]

ANITA JOHNSON:  “My first question is this.  This past October marked the 50th Anniversary of the Black Panther Party.  And the former chairperson of the Black Panther Party, Elaine Brown had an interesting, interesting perspective about Black Lives Matter in contrast, or in comparison, to the Black Panther Party.  To quote her directly, it says:

I don’t know what Black Lives Matter does, so, I can’t tell you how it compares to what the Black Panther Party was.  I know that the Black Panther Party was.  I know that lives were lost, the struggle we put into place, the efforts we made, the assaults on us by the police and government.  I know all that.  I don’t know what Black Lives matter does.  So, if you can tell me, I can give you my thoughts. 

“End quote.  Um, how would you articulate what Black Lives Matter does and, then, how does it also fit into the history of Black Resistance?” (c. 42:25)

DR. KEEANGA-YAMAHTTA TAYLOR:  “Well, I mean [transcription pending]

[snip]

[PLEASE CHECK BACK LATER.  THIS TRANSCRIPT IS CURRENTLY UNDER CONSTRUCTION.]

[snip] (c. 59:59)

Learn more at WOMEN’S MAGAZINE.

[This transcript will be expanded as time constraints, and/or demand or resources, allow.  Email us, if you would like to volunteer any transcription labour to the common stock of knowledge for the betterment of society.]

***

[Working draft transcript of actual radio broadcast by Messina for Lumpenproletariat and Hard Knock Radio.]

HARD KNOCK RADIO—[12 DEC 2016]  (synopsis)  “Hard Knock Radio is a drive-time Hip-Hop talk show on KPFA (94.1 @ 4-5 pm Monday-Friday), a community radio station without corporate underwriting, hosted by Davey D and Anita Johnson.”

[Erica Bridgeman(sp?):  “—and 89.3 KPFB in Berkeley; 88.1 KFCF in Fresno; 97.5 K2ABR in Santa Cruz; and online at kpfa.org.  The time is 4pm.  Up next, Hard Knock Radio.”]

[Hard Knock Radio introduction audio collage]

DAVEY D:  “Wutup, everybody?  Welcome to another edition of Hard Knock Radio.  Davey D, hangin’ out with you this afternoon.  On today’s show, we’re gonna hear activist and scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta talking about the police murders, the Donald Trump election, and the challenges, that wait before us.  All that and more, coming up after the afternoon [news] headlines.”

[KPFA News Headlines (read by Max Pringle) omitted by scribe]

DAVEY D:  “Wussup, everybody?  Davey D, hangin’ out wit’ you this afternoon.  You know?  Being in the [SF] Bay Area, we are very fortunate because we have—we’re, we’re a hub.  A lot of people from all walks of life, um, especially of the progressive persuasion, make it a point to roll through here and share their wisdom and insights, as to the happenings of the day.

“And, um, you know, a few days ago, we were blessed to have, um, activist, scholar, assistant professor of African American Studies over at Princeton University, Keeanga-Yamahtta.  (c. 7:39)

“She came through and talked about the new book, From #Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation—a political analysis of the #BlackLivesMatter movement, the history of policing and race in the United States—and, during the conversation, got into Donald Trump and the collapse of the Democratic Party—that’s right, the collapse of the Democratic Party—and, even more insightful, the failings of the Obama administration.  A lot was covered in this incredible conversation, took place last week at the Impact Hub, here, in Oakland. (c. 8:21)

“I wanted to share that with you this afternoon, as we continue on in Week Two of our [free speech radio KPFA] Holiday Fund Drive.  I want you all to pull up a seat.  I want you all to open up your ears and your hearts and your minds and take in some of this information and, really, as you do that, appreciate the fact that in many places we don’t have the opportunity to accommodate the array of voices, that exist out in our community.  You know; if we were on one of the corporate entities, it would be, like: Well, I’ve never heard of this person. But, if it’s Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton, then we can hear that.  And that can be good and bad, depending on where you sit.

“But there are so many young, brilliant, minds, that are out there, that are on the rise, that are making moves, um, and have shrewd political analyses of the situations at hand.  And we need to make space for them.  And these airwaves have been able to do just that.  (c. 9:23)

“And, so, without further ado, let’s check out Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta speaking about black liberation, Black Lives Matter, the rise of Donald Trump, the failings of Obama, and the collapse of the Democratic Party, right here, KPFA, Hard Knock Radio, KPFA.  Here we go.”  (c. 9:43)

[Broadcast cut to audio from presentation by Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor at a KPFA benefit at Impact Hub in Oakland, CA, on 5 DEC 2016.]

DR. KEEANGA-YAMAHTTA TAYLOR:  “I’m gonna talk about some of the themes in my book.  But I’m gonna try to do so within the context, um, of the catastrophe—the election of Donald Trump.  So, um, so, I’m gonna try to combine both of these things.  And we can talk more specifically about the book in the discussion.  But I feel like, you know, given the issues, that I’ve written about, that actually this—the whole Trump thing, really, is something, that we have to try to engage with and understand.  So, that’s some of the context behind the talk.  Uh, okay.  [Audience Member:  “Yes!”]  Okay. [chuckles]  (c. 10:36)

“Um, it’s difficult to comprehend how eight years ago, after the election of Barack Obama, the national conversation was whether or not the U.S. was going to become a post-racial society.  Forbes magazine ran an editorial with the headline, ‘Racism In America Is Over’.  Eight years later, any fantasy about the United States being a post-racial society has gone up in flames with the ascendance of Donald Trump to the highest office in the country.  (c. 11:09)

“Trump ran his campaign on a vile mix of fake economic populism with the worst and most naked race-baiting and demonisation of oppressed people seen in a presidential election, probably, since Goldwater—Barry Goldwater—in 1964.  He referred to Mexican immigrants as rapists, drug dealers, and criminals.  He seamlessly conflated Islam with terrorism, at one point, favourably retelling a false story about an American general dipping bullets in pig’s blood before murdering Muslim soldiers, as a worthy strategy in the ongoing and misnamed War On Terror.  He has defended the use of racial profiling and advocated it as a national policing strategy.

371px-steve_bannon_2010-wiki

Steve Bannon, alt-right (i.e., white supremacist) ideologue

“When you take these statements and include, at least some of the people he is nominating to be included in his cabinet, then what we are talking about is a dramatic shift from the optics of the nation’s first black president and a black family living in the White House to an administration, that will be openly hostile to the most basic aspirations of black people.  Trump’s first act, as president-elect, for example, was to hire Steve Bannon, who has bragged about his associations with the so-called alt-right, or as we used to say, white supremacists, as his chief strategist.

“So, we are about as far from post-racial, as you can possibly be in this country.  And it is reasonable to expect that, if, and when, Trump cannot deliver on his promises to bring jobs back to the United States, or when massive tax breaks to the rich don’t equate into a higher standard of living for ordinary people, that he and his cabal of racist rogues and reactionaries will double down on racism as an explanation. (c. 13:07)

It’s not only the alt-right, or white supremacists, but liberals, too

vanjonesberkeley050312-kpfa“And, so, how did this happen, that we have gone from the nation’s first black president to an openly racist billionaire, who is surrounded by bigots?  Many people have described it in a way, that I would describe as simplistic.  The best example of this, I think, is Van Jones, who has described Trump’s victory as a, quote, ‘whitelash against black voters’, almost characterising Trump’s victory as revenge for the election of Obama in 2008. (c. 13:38)

“A related version of this assessment is expressed when people, as an article in Huffington Post did last week, compare the rise of Trump to the end of Reconstruction, the reemergence of Republicans, as a period of redemption, when white supremacy became the actual law of the land and Jim Crow was imposed.  There is a lot of history to unpack there.  But it really is a simple rendering of a more recent history, that conveniently leaves the Democratic Party unscathed, while dramatically overstating the depths of conservatism, racism, and reaction in the country.

“The first problem with this narrative is that it promotes a mistaken story that African-Americans, somehow, have benefited from the presence of Barack Obama in the White House and those benefits have come at the expense of ordinary white people.  (c. 14:34)

“This is a story, that has no basis in reality.  African-Americans continue to experience unemployment at twice the rate of whites.  38% of black children continue to live in poverty.  And a shocking 55% of black workers, mostly black women, make under $15 dollars an hour.

“It was precisely the inability of the Obama administration to improve the conditions of ordinary black people, that gave rise to the Black Lives Matter movement.  This is the thin gruel, working class and poor black Americans have received from two terms of Obama. (c. 15:18)

“The second problem with the whitelash story is that it overstates the depths of white racism and conservatism, while simultaneously underestimating the white opposition to the Trump agenda.  We certainly don’t want to downplay the extent to which racism played a critical role in Trump’s success.  We have seen how Trump’s rise has unleashed violent white supremacists and given them the confidence to organise out in the open.  There have been well over a thousand cases of hate crimes reported since the election, a number higher than even in the aftermath of 9/11.  So, it cannot be underestimated.  But it should not also be overstated.  (c. 16:01)

“For example, there are numbers, that disrupt the narrative of a generalised right-wing sweep across the United States with white people universally lining up behind Trump waiting to receive their marching orders. [audience silence]

“58% of Americans, all Americans, think Obamacare should be replaced with federally-funded health care for all.  Most Americans support raising the minimum wage.  61% support, at least, a $10 dollar minimum wage.  59% support a $12 dollar minimum wage.  And 48% support a $15 dollar minimum wage, which has been demonised by Democrats and Republicans, alike. [audience silence]

“61% of Americans say the rich pay too little in taxes.  This is an increase from 52%, who said that a year ago.  69% of Americans believe that providing affordable housing is important.  63% of Americans say money and wealth distribution is unfair.  53% of white people think the country still has work to do for, quote, ‘blacks to achieve equal rights with whites.’  50% of whites say, quote, ‘blacks are treated less fairly by the police than whites’.  64% of white Democrats support Black Lives Matter; and 29% of them, say they, quote, ‘strongly support the Black Lives Matter movement’.

“Even 20% of Republicans think that the movement, the Black Lives Matter movement, will help achieve racial equality in the United States.  So, how do we square this with the election, itself?

“We must begin with the fact that tens of millions of Americans didn’t vote at all.  There are 238 million eligible voters in the United States.  And, of that number, only 60 million voted for Trump.  Now, on its own, yes, that is 60 million people, who voted for a vile, racist, and sexual predator.  And, even within that number, five percent of people, who voted for Trump—something like 12 million people—said he was unfit to be president.  [faint audience reaction]

“But, in the larger scope of things, it means that only one in four eligible voters chose Trump.  This is hardly representative of what, quote, white people think.  And it’s hardly representative of a right-wing sweep across the country.

On the two-party dictatorship of Democrats and Republicans

“But when your political choices are constrained within the parameters of the existing two-party system, voter discontent can go in one of three places:  your party, the other party, or no party.  American politics is always a dance between the three.

“In this case, the line of reasoning, that blames the loss of the Democratic Party solely on Fox News, FBI letters, race-baiting, bad messaging, um, or the, the evil Russians, means that there is no accounting or reckoning with the political shortcomings of the party.  None of those explanations actually address how the party failed to connect with the basic ideas of fairness and justice, that are at the core of those statistics, that I read off.

“Instead, the Democrats ran on the idea that Trump was just too negative; he wouldn’t be a good role model, when in fact, according to Hillary Clinton, America is already great.  It was a message, that was, and remains, completely out of touch with the reality experienced by millions of Americans. (c. 19:50)

“But when it’s the Democrats, who have been in power for eight years, overseeing the numbing inequity and injustice of the status quo, it made it difficult for them to argue for a radically different political agenda.  Clinton promised to be the third term of Obama, failing to realise that, for millions of voters, two terms was enough.

“Eight years ago, Obama ran on the promise of hope and change.  But, from the beginning, he seemed to be more interested in cultivating an image of bipartisan agreement with, uh, the Republicans.  Instead of using his mandate to push an agenda based around the demands and needs of black and Latino working class voters, all who were responsible for putting him into office.

“For his first full year in office, Obama had a supermajority in Congress and squandered it.  That’s exactly the reason why Democrats lost control of Congress in the first place.  (c. 20:50)

“So, with big expectations and big hope come even bigger disappointment when you fail to deliver.  Embedded inside of every right-wing backlash is the failure of the liberal establishment to deliver an alternative or a better way.  You cannot understand the emergence of Richard Nixon without understanding the failures of the Johnson administration.  From the incompleteness and inadequacy of the War On Poverty and the Great Society to the debacle of the Vietnam War, you cannot understand the rise of Ronald Reagan without understanding the failure of the Carter administration to address rising inflation, cripplingly high interest rates, and the erosion of working class living standards in general. (c. 21:40)

“In other words, the lesser evil always cuts the path for the greater evil.  Where Obama used the machinery and logic of deportations to banish 2.5 million people from the United States, it has set the stage for Trump to do this in an even larger way.  Where the Obama administration embraced the values of so-called choice and privatisation and gutting public education, Trump will do it in an even more fantastical way, that finishes the job of attempting to kill public education in this country.  Obama’s failure to deliver any significant reforms for working class and poor people made a mockery of his attempts to tell people to vote for him in order to secure his legacy.  (c. 22:31)  [Note: The Women’s Magazine broadcast (see above) featured an edit, which cuts to a different part of the speech:  “And the insistence of liberals to defend this agenda, the thin gruel of the Obama agenda, with only the most scant whiff of criticism, leads to their own paralysis when the right does the same thing, just on a larger scale.”]

“But there are other ways to measure discontent beyond polls and election results.  We saw the first wave of discontent with Obama’s role with the emergence of Occupy Movement in 2011, and, then, the eruption of Black Lives Matter in the summer of 2014.  Both were products of the widening gap of inequality in the United States.  That inequality was at the heart of the Occupy Movement and its popularisation of class inequality in the U.S. through the slogan of the 99% versus the 1%.

“But this inequality was also important in how we understand the emergence of Black Lives Matter.  Black Americans, of course, took the brunt of the economic crisis in 2007 and 2008.  It was, in part, how we understand the deep wells of support, that existed for Obama and his campaign’s ability to tap into the anger with the federal government’s abject disregard for what was happening in black communities. [6]

“We cannot understand, for example, the social catastrophe happening across black Chicago, where it was just announced last week that there will be 700 homicides in that city, the vast majority of which affect young black people.  You cannot understand that social catastrophe in Chicago without understanding the persisting effects of the economic crisis, that never really ended in many black communities. (c. 24:03)

“Chicago has the third-highest black unemployment rate of any major city in this country.  It has the third-highest poverty rate of a large city in the United States.  Its black middle class is being gutted because of municipal, state, federal budget cuts, that have wiped out public sector jobs in postal work, teaching, and other positions, that have historically been the bedrock of black economic stability.  The breakdown of this civic infrastructure, in combination with the existing crisis of mass incarceration and what Michelle Alexander has called The New Jim Crow, the persistence of unemployment and underemployment and of under-resourced public services and institutions has created the pretext for deepening police presence in black communities and, as a result, is exacerbating all the conditions, that justify the presence of the police in the first place. (c. 25:02)

“As living conditions in black communities have become harder, the police have been given license to respond with arrests and brutality.  And, while the emergence of Black Lives Matter has exposed the extent to which violent policing is institutionalised in this country, it nevertheless continues.  The police are on pace to kill 1,200 people this year, more than last year, when newspapers first began to count, and, substantively more than the 928 a year, the FBI had been suggesting as an average two years earlier.

“If you want to understand why the black vote was depressed compared to 2008 and 2012, it can be found in the inability of the American government to aggressively intervene and prevent the murder of black citizens by the state, whether it’s with the policing of black communities or the water crisis in Flint, the expectation that black Americans would be a firewall for Clinton was as offensive, as it was reflective of a kind of liberal contempt for the daily struggles of working class and poor people. [Davey D cut into the speech to appeal for listener sponsorship of free speech radio; the Women’s Magazine broadcast an extended portion of this particular speech excerpt.  (See above.)]” (c. 26:15)

DAVEY D:  “Wow.  Wow!  And bravo!  Bravo!  Bravo!  Bravo!  That is the voice of Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta, assistant professor of African American Studies at Princeton Univeristy, speaking at the Impact Hub last week, talking about her new book, From Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation and addressing the election of Donald Trump and his rise, the collapse of the Democratic Party, and the failings of the Obama administration.

“I have said similar things over and over again.  It’s hard for people to wrap their heads around it.  But, so help me gawd, the folks from Ferguson were just in town last week.  They were in town last week.  And they had long said, they had long said, there was deep, deep dissatisfaction with what was going on in the White House.  And they were saying this back before Mike Brown.  And, when you went to those places, when you went to the Midwest and you went down south, you heard it over and over again.  But it was something, that many people said:  What choice do they have?  Who else they gonna go for?  It can’t be true.  It’s an exaggeration.  Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

“Now, the facts are comin’ out.  The numbers are being shown.  The analysis is being put forth.  And those voices, that have often been suppressed, usually, by corporate media, who had a punditry and consultant class, speaking on behalf of people, whose real thoughts and real sentiments were never being reflected.  How could it, when you’re making a hundred thousand dollars a year sitting on MSNBC speaking to folks?  You’re not really in the cuts with people day in and day out to really pick up where they’re comin’ from.  (c. 28:23)

“But anybody who’s listening right now, who’s livin’ paycheck to paycheck, anybody out here, who is living on the margins, understands pretty clearly that it wasn’t all joy in Mudville.  And I’m glad Dr. Yamahtta is really breaking this down. (c. 28:43)

[Davey D continues with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA, the world’s original listener-sponsored free speech radio station, which PBS and NPR later copied, but in a non-free speech manner with corporate underwriting.]  (c. 29:21)

“We also have Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s entire speech, included in a robust package, KPFA Prayer and Protest Pack, which includes Ralph Nader, Chris Hedges, Bill Ayers, Eve Ensler, Ayesha Curry—that’s right, the wife of, uh, Steph Curry—and the sister, who you’re hearin’ now, Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor.  We’re asking for a $180 pledge for that.  All this you can break up into easy installment monthly payments.  Let me give out the phone number, folks.  1.800.439-5732.  1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Or donate online at kpfa.org.  Again, 1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Or donate online at kpfa.org. (c. 30:35)

“And, before we go right back into the, um, another excerpt from this incredible speech, I wanna give a shout out to William in Fresno, who put up $600 dollars and said if we can get people to pledge and it comes up to a total of $600 dollars, collectively speaking, we get to keep his money from Fresno.  And we wanna do that.  In other words, we can double our efforts.  1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Or pledge online at kpfa.org.  A $75 dollar pledge gets you the [complete] speech, that you are listening to [excerpts of] right now.  You can get this speech in a package, which includes Ralph Nader, Chris Hedges, Bill Ayers, Eve Ensler, Ayesha Curry, and many others for a $180 pledge.

[snip]  (c. 31:39)

“Let’s go back and listen to another excerpt from Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, speaking at the Impact Hub about Black Lives Matter, black liberation, the rise of Trump, the collapse of the Democratic Party and the failures of Barack Hussein Obama.  We’ll be right back.”  (c. 32:00)

DR. KEEANGA YAMAHTTA-TAYLOR:  “There is just the expectation that, no matter what is happening in your life and how terrible things might be, and no matter how unresponsive the Democratic Party may be, you still have to vote for them.

“And, then, the bitterness directed at people when they don’t respond in such a way is even more contemptuous.  This is true when liberals blame depressed black voter turnout for the election results.  But it is also the case when they blame working class whites for, quote, ‘voting against their interests’, as if, somehow, voting for the neoliberal, yet civil, politics of the Democratic Party are in the interest of the working class.  And, as an aside—[audience finally starts to respond with faint applause; it seems the audience is mostly nonplussed registered Democrats.] [4]

“Working class interests are never on the ballot in bourgeois elections. [scant applause and at least one cheer; the biggest audience reaction thus far] 

“But, when it comes to the fate of ordinary white people, who, despite the media and academic fascination with them for the moment, these are people, who are also regularly ignored.  We have heard all sorts of dime-store psychology about the so-called white working class, most of it thinly-veiled elitism.  White workers feel entitled.  They’re only interested in themselves.  They are privileged.  They are racist scum.  They are just bad. (c. 33:26)

“In total, it reflects the political establishment’s contempt for the struggles of regular people.  If you only read these reports or assessments, you would think there was no inequality experienced by white working class people, or that ordinary white people were just living the high life.

“But, when we consider the experiences of white working class people within the context of the attacks on working class standards, in general, we get a different picture.  And what would happen, if we told the story of black Chicago and other black communities across this country?  It’s part of the same story of what is happening to ordinary white people.

“For example, there is the continuing crisis of opioid, or narcotic, addiction in this country.  While people are quick to point out how differently it is received compared to the War On Drugs directed at black communities in the 1980s and ’90s, which is undoubtedly true, what does this crisis at this particular moment tell us about the conditions of working class life and working class people? (c. 34:37)

“There are two million people, addicted to opioids in the U.S.  Half of those people are addicted to heroin.  From 2009 to 2014, almost half a million people have died from opioid overdoses, a fourfold increase since 1999.  Earlier this year, it was reported that their had been a decline in the life expectancy for white women and a plateauing of life expectancy for white men.  In fact, it is unprecedented for life expectancy to reverse in a so-called first world country.

“In the United States peer countries, life expectancy is growing.  Why is life expectancy for white women in decline in this country?  Drug overdose, suicide, and alcohol abuse.

On transcending race (phenotype), or identity politics, and confronting class struggle

“So, if we told the stories of the destruction of working class black life alongside the stories of the destruction of working class white life, it could allow us to see that the anxieties, stresses, confusions, and frustrations about life in the world today are not owned by one group, but are shared by many.  It would not tell us that everyone suffers the same oppression or exploitation.  But it would allow us to see that, even if we don’t experience a particular kind of oppression, every working person in this country is going through something.  Everyone is trying to figure out how to survive.  And many are failing. (c. 36:18)

“If we put these stories together, we would gain more insight into how the white working class and poor have as much stake in the fight for a different kind of society as anyone else.  We wouldn’t so casually dismiss their suffering as privileged because they do not suffer as much as black and brown people in this country.

“The privileges of white skin run very thin in a country where 19 million white people languish in poverty.  Apparently, the wages of whiteness are not so great to stop millions of ordinary white people from, literally, drinking and drugging themselves to death to escape the despair of living in this so-called greatest country on Earth.

“If we put these separate stories together into a single story, we could make better sense of why socialism is rising in popularity.  White people have taken to the streets over the last five years to protest the growing racial and economic inequality in this country.  13 million people voted for an open socialist.  And many believe that if Sanders ran against Trump, he very well could have beaten him.  51% of 18- to 29-year olds say they are against capitalism, even if they are not fully convinced of what should replace it, 48% of millennials support health insurance as a, quote, ‘right for all people’.  And 47% agree that basic necessities, such as food and shelter are, quote, ‘a right, that the government should provide to those unable to afford them’. (c. 38:03)

“In the 1970s, 61% of Americans fell into that vague, but stable, category of middle class.  Today, that number has fallen to 50%.  It is driven by the growing wealth inequality, that exists here.  In the last year alone, the 1% saw their income rise by 7%.  The 0.1% saw their income rise by 9%.  In general, the richest 20% of households in the U.S. own 84% of the wealth in this country, while the bottom 40% own less than 1%.  In other words, there are 400 billionaires in this country.  They are the reason why there are 47 million poor people.  You cannot have untold obscene wealth, unless you have untold obscene poverty.  That is the law of the market. (c. 39:01)

“And how does such a tiny percent of the population unjustly hold on to their wealth[, even when millions agree that it should be redistributed]?  Racism, immigrant-bashing, homophobia, transphobia, sexism, nationalism.  They get us to fight each other, while they horde their wealth.” (c. 39:21)

DAVEY D:  “Phew!  I just want those words to simmer with folks for a minute.  It’s 94.1 KPFA, Hard Knock Radio.  That’s some raw truth this afternoon.  Dr. Keeanga Yamahtta-Taylor bringing heat, sobering heat, reflecting an anger, that so many people have right now, speaking and giving voice to folks, who have seen their voices, uh, ridiculed, marginalised, and not allowed to see the light of day because of a punditry class; there’s a consultancy class.  There are stormtroopers for a 1%, that have blocked any sort of dissent from seeing the light of day.

“And I’m glad that she was able to come to the City of Oakland, to speak at the Impact Hub to a packed house and speak this truth.  And we have these [free speech radio] airwaves to put it out there so folks can understand that they’re not alone in what they were feeling.  (c. 40:35)

“A lot of people were made to feel bad, as they said:  You know, I’m not really feelin’ what’s goin’ on with the choices.  And how many of you all were browbeaten to death?  Oh, what are you gon’ do?  You have no choice.  You’re an idiot.  How many people heard that?  Raise your hand, if people said that to you and looked down their nose and made you feel like was a piece of crap ‘cos you had a political analysis, that didn’t see the light of day, but, nevertheless, was something, that was true.  And it was true for millions of people out there.  The key to it: many people just stayed the hell on home.  (c. 41:13)

“And it’s important that we understand that truth.  It’s important that we start to listen to some of those voices and make the change, make the necessary adjustments.

“We’re just gettin’ started with the speech, folks.  You ain’t heard nothin’ yet.  It goes better.  It gets deeper.  It gets heated—it gets hotter.  We have it for you.  (c. 41:39)

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA, the world’s original listener-sponsored free speech radio station, which PBS and NPR later copied, but in a non-free speech manner with corporate underwriting.]  (c. 41:50)

“Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, assistant professor over at Princeton University, putting out a new book called Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation.  The key to her speech, here, this afternoon is talking about the rise of the Occupy Movement, the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement were reflections of people not having their interests addressed and this widening gap of inequality.  (c. 42:20)

“No, it wasn’t just a bunch of hippies wanting to, uh, pitch tents in the middle of your city.  That wouldn’t have been allowed because in many of those places you had a homeless population and a marginalised population, that would have ran them out, if that was the case, if it wasn’t really resonating with the folks, that were in existence there.

“What you think Occupy Oakland was able to have a foothold in downtown Oakland, which is crime-ridden, had it not been for the population there?  That was:  Man, I feel what you sayin’.  But that was something that we were gonna ignore—that mass inequality.  (c. 43:03)

“And I’m glad this sister’s connecting the dots.  I saw this when I was in the midwest.  Folks are living in poverty. [7]  We saw that in the crack era.  People, that really studied the crack era, knew that there was a whole lotta folks across the board, that was addicted to crack.  But they painted it as a black thing only and ignored that there was a lot of places, like in Cheyenne, Wyoming and, uh—what is that city up there in Idaho? I’m gonna remember the city, that’s right there, um—Boise, Idaho.  It’s a lot of folks smokin’ that dope there.

“20 years later, you have people hooked up on heroin and opiates and all that.  She’s breakin’ it down this afternoon.  I want us to sit with that raw truth.  And we have the opportunity to present it to you on these airwaves. (c. 43:53)

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA, the world’s original listener-sponsored free speech radio station, which PBS and NPR later copied, but in a non-free speech manner with corporate underwriting.]  (c. 45:27)

“We’re gonna have to do that.  We’re at this crossroads now.  We can’t go down this same path anymore.  There’s a lot of people, that want us to stay exactly where we’re at.  I think the time has changed.  The time has come for this change [of progressives and others finally rejecting the anti-working class Democratic Party and the two-party dictatorship].

“And, so, one of the things, that we’re committed to doing here is providing those critical voices, providing that space for these conversations, making sure that these issues see the light of day.  So, 1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Or donate online at kpfa.org, as we—this is holiday season.  All this is tax-deductible.  You want your money going into the coffers of the military-industrial complex?  Or maybe into an entity, that will speak out against it?  I would encourage you to follow the latter.  (c. 46:22)

“Let’s listen to a little bit more from Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor.  And I’ll come back and talk to you some more.”  (c. 46:29)

DR. KEEANGA-YAMAHTTA TAYLOR:  “[Our stories are not all the same.  We do not have the same experiences.  But our hardships often emanate from the same source—a market-based economy, that privileges the wealthy over the welfare and lives of the people who create that wealth.  And they keep our stories separate from each other, so that we never understand the entire story, only our particular part of it.]

“But, even with great effort to keep our side divided and confused, millions of people are coming to grips with the harsh reality of an economic system, that guarantees them nothing but a future of hardship and an inability to ever get ahead.  But the knowledge, alone, of the existence of racism, inequality, poverty, and injustice does not necessarily equip our side with the political tools needed to fight the battles of today or to fight for a socialist future.

“We need struggle.  We also need politics because we must contend with the political establishment, that wants to lower our expectations to believe that the existing society is the best that we can expect from humanity, that we dare not think beyond the existing parameters of electing a Democrat or Republican to change the world we live in. (c. 47:29)

“Clinton lost, in part because she ran a campaign of low expectations, a campaign cynically pivoted around the notion that ordinary people shouldn’t ask for too much, and that we must be realistic about the possibilities.  Donald Trump promised to change the world.  And Hillary Clinton promised to make the trains run on time.  Bernie Sanders, for all of the excitement, that his campaign generated for rightly demanding more, his commitment to remaining in the Democratic Party has effectively neutered his political revolution.  Expecting the Democratic Party to fight for the democratic redistribution of wealth and resources in this country is like expecting to squeeze orange juice out of an apple.  (c. 48:23)

“No, we must build independent organisations and political parties, that are not connected to the Democratic Party, that don’t rise and fall with the electoral cycle.  We have to build organisations, that are democratic, multiracial, and militant with a foundation in solidarity—solidarity, meaning that, even if you don’t experience a particular oppression, it doesn’t matter because you understand that, as ordinary people, our fates are connected and that one group’s liberation is dependent on the liberation of all of the oppressed and exploited.

“And there are so many good examples of this happening now.  And that’s important because an emboldened right, when we look at the intense political polarisation, that exists, we can see what an emboldened right can do.  It becomes a source of attraction for people, who are frustrated about the conditions, that they face and the uncertainty, that exists in the world.  But it also produces a certain response from the left.  It is not an overstatement to say that in the last month tens of thousands of ordinary people took to the streets—black people, Muslims, Latinos, Arabs, Asians, Native people, and white people—to reject the [2016 presidential] election, to reject Trump, and to reject racism. (c. 49:45)

“At high schools and college campuses across the country, students walked out of classes and began to organise to declare their campuses sanctuaries for undocumented students and others, that Trump has threatened to use the power of the state to abuse.”  (c. 50:04)

DAVEY D:  “She’s still just getting started.  Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, speaking at the Impact Hub.  We have less than ten minutes in this show.

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA, the world’s original listener-sponsored free speech radio station, which PBS and NPR later copied, but in a non-free speech manner with corporate underwriting.]  (c. 51:02)

“It is so important that we have these types of conversations ‘cos it is what this show is about.  It is what this station is about, ultimately and ideally—to give voice to the voiceless [i.e., the silenced and the censored].  To allow this space and allow these words to resonate with so many folks, that are listening.  And some of these people, that are calling right now—thank you.  (c. 51:30)

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA]  (c. 51:50)

“We have to talk about the collapse and the failures of those we entrusted to do our bidding, who didn’t do our bidding, but used us and, then, pivoted, and then danced with the devil, literally, danced with Wall Street, danced with developers, danced with big pharma, danced with big agribusiness, danced with everybody but us.  Now, culturally, they can communicate to us.  I like that Obama, for example, might have rappers in the White House.  That’s a cool thing.  But it ain’t cool, if the policies, that the communities, which those rappers come from aren’t really being reflected in what gets pushed out.  And you can’t give the excuse that he was being blocked by Congress ‘cos he didn’t do it when he had a supermajority the first two years.  He didn’t do it.  Remember, police brutality was on the docket then.  Have we forgotten Oscar Grant was shot [by police] before [Obama] even got into office?  And there was a robust movement.  And that Andreas Grimes [sic] was shot in, in New Orleans?  And there was a movement down there.  And Robert Taylor, um—I’m gonna forget his name, Taylor—Tolan, Robbie Tolan was shot in Houston in front of his mom when the police thought that Robbie’s car was stolen.  All those movements were kinda squelched down, in terms of how the pundits talk about what we know in those communities.  They were out there.  And people were demanding redress.  This is when there was a [Democratic] supermajority in Congress and the Senate.

“Did we see any movement on that?  No, we did not.  (c. 53:30)

“And this is what the sister is talking about.  This was simmering for a lot of people.  But people went along, tried to figure it out.  They even bought into the argument that chess, not checkers, was being played.  And here we are.  It looks like the chess game wasn’t in our favour, huh?  (c. 53:48)

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA]  (c. 54:00)

“We have to have these conversations.  We should arm ourselves with the information, that will spark this.  Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is giving us the language, is giving us a framework in which we can broach these conversations.  It’s so important.  (c. 54:17)

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA]  (c. 55:01)

“[Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s] book is the winner of the 2016 Lannan Cultural Freedom Award.  Her book is praised by everybody, from Cornel West on down.  Michelle Alexander sees it as, like, this is what we need.  In fact, I would say it’s like a continuation of where Michelle jumps off, in terms of just giving us framework.

“But we have to invest.  So, it’s not just pledging to the station, but making an investment, so we can have these airwaves.  In the upcoming months, it’s gonna be important for all of us.  It’s going to be important for all of us to have access to some sort of media apparatus where we can speak truth to power.

“Do you know Donald Trump has talked about putting two new people in the FCC?  And he wants to overturn net nuetrality protections, meaning that when we go online we’re not gonna have a free and clear internet.  The thing, that people, that we were fighting against for five years is gonna be gone.  These airwaves is going to be real important.  The voices of folks, who have these political analyses—and more importantly, as in the case with Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor.  She’s giving you solutions.  She’s talking about:  Look, you gots to look at the poor folks, that live in Appalachia. You got to look at those poor folks, that live in the Pinoles, in the Sacramentos, rider’s[sp?] side, around that area. You gotta look at the folks in those poor, rural communities. And you have to marry the stories of inequality, that exists in the inner cities. Then, find out that you have the same string, or purse-holder, making life miserable for everybody.

“You can call them 1%.  You can call them oligarchs.  You can call them tyrants.  But we’re gonna have to deal with that.  There’s no getting around that. (c. 57:00)

“So, 1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Thank you, Lily from Pittsburg.  Thank you, Ellen from Alameda.  Thank you, Margaret out of Bolinas.  Thank you Judas from Lambertville, New Jersey.  A lot of people are calling in.  There’s too many names to read off.  (c. 57:20)

[Davey D continued with his remarks, focusing on appeals for listener sponsorship of free speech radio KPFA]  (c. 58:59)

“And I want to thank everybody from the bottom of my heart for calling this afternoon.  You understand the importance of having the voiceless be given voice.  These airwaves will do that.  And we promise to do that forever and ever and ever and ever, to quote Outkast.  Mike [Biggs], Big Mike is smiling.

“1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Pledge online at kpfa.org.  I’ll say the words one last time.  1.800.439-5732.  1.800.HEY-KPFA.  Pledge online at kpfa.org.  I wanna thank everybody calling in.  Thank you, Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor for your speech.  Thank you, Impact Hub.  Thank you for everybody listening.  Flashpoints, you take it away.”  (c. 59:48)

Learn more at HARD KNOCK RADIO.

***

[1]  Impact Hub, 2323 Broadway (near Grand), Oakland, California.

[2]  Terrestrial radio transmission, 94.1 FM (KPFA, Berkeley, CA) with online simulcast and digital archiving:  Women’s Magazine, this one-hour broadcast hosted by co-host Kate Raphael, Monday, 12 DEC 2016, 13:00 PST.

[3]  Terrestrial radio transmission, 94.1 FM (KPFA, Berkeley, CA) with online simulcast and digital archiving:  Hard Knock Radio, this one-hour broadcast hosted by co-host Davey D, Monday, 12 DEC 2016, 16:00 PST.  [N.B.:  For some unfortunate reason, Hard Knock Radio usually removes their audio archives from public access two weeks after the initial broadcast date.]

[4]  Terrestrial radio transmission, 94.1 FM (KPFA, Berkeley, CA) with online simulcast and digital archiving:  Special Programming,  this one-hour broadcast hosted by co-host Kate Raphael, Wednesday, 14 DEC 2016, 15:00 PST.  [From listening to bits of the live broadcast, (c. 37:00) this sounded identical to the Women’s Magazine broadcast from 12 DEC 2016.]

[5]   This is a KPFA benefit, which was likely attended by the usual aging Berkeley Baby Boomer demographic of gentle silver-haired souls, who lived through the 1960s and remain true to the spirit of social justice.  But, being KPFA listeners, most accept the status quo two-party system.  This particular audience demographic is typically much more enthusiastic when the speakers are far less (or non-) critical of their Democratic Party apologism.

Since at least 1999, the KPFA News Department has been dominated by a faction, which is aligned with the Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club.  So, their reform-the-Democratic-Party-from-within ideology has resulted in KPFA and Pacifica’s News Departments filtering the news through a Democratic Party apologist lens, discouraging many free speech radio listeners from thinking of alternatives to the two-party dictatorship or the unresponsive Democratic Party.

Political commentators have correctly observed that Trump, actually, succeeded in usurping the language of working class populism, which Bernie Sanders had championed during the 2016 presidential primary elections.  Obviously, it’s incorrect to say this is why Hillary Clinton lost the election, as she did receive millions more votes from American voters than Trump.  Clinton lost the election because of the electoral college system, which can reject the national will of the American people, or rather they redefine the will of the people through the antidemocratic scheme of the electoral college.

But, certainly, Clinton’s failure to even pay lip service to working class populism further narrowed the already narrow two-party presidential contest, such that Trump was able to win the electoral college election, despite losing the popular vote (i.e., the real vote).

And, of course, Obama talked a good game during the 2008 election cycle.  But, as many of us anticipated, he immediately turned his back on his constituency.  Once in office, the Obama administration turned his energetic movement for hope and change into a private political action committee (PAC) with an email list, which never met again.  Many liberals and Democratic Party apologists, such as Norman Solomon and Robert Reich, argued that the movement slacked off, that the people no longer pushed Obama in the right direction once he was in office.  But that argument falls apart when we recall that by 2011, there was mass discontent with the status quo, even under the ostensibly progressive Obama administration, which coordinated a brutal nationwide crackdown against the Occupy Movement, which by late 2011 was going global.  When Obama came into office in 2009, he did everything he could to cover for Wall Street.  Not one white collar criminal went to prison, unlike during the 1980s with the Savings & Loan crisis under Reagan.  But the Occupy Movement was never able to pierce the veil of the two-party dictatorship.  They struggled with defining any political objectives and shunned the notion of allowing any spokespersons to emerge with a focused agenda.  They were attacked, beaten, and their encampments obliterated by the Obama administration.  Then, some weeks later, most of those same people, either, acquiesced in (or voted for) another four years of Obama and his antidemocratic, anti-working class Democratic Party.  They were unable to imagine alternatives, or to call for opening up the presidential debates, or for ranked-choice voting, or proportional representation in Congress.  In short, the Occupy Movement squandered its political power.  It was important for many reasons.  But this was an object lesson, which few activists or scholars (outside of the Green Party and other alternative political parties, such as the Peace and Freedom Party) have pointed out publicly until now by Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor.

[6]  Indeed, as a student of heterodox economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, I lived on the Troost line, Waldo Heights Apartments nearby the Presidential Gardens housing complex.  And the poverty along Troost Avenue and to the east of the Troost line, the historically-dividing line of racial residential segregation was extreme.  Many homes to the east of Troost were boarded up and abandoned.  And many families living in the impoverished apartment buildings, multiple generations with their parents and grandparents all mired in intergenerational poverty and with the younger generations being given much opportunity to break out.

My spouse is an educator; and she worked in the Kansas City schools for a period of time, which showed her the most stressed classrooms with strained teachers barely able to contain the neediest children, even in early childhood education with extreme behavioural problems and needs.  She doubted that, if she continued to work in that environment, she would be able to avoid changing and becoming as callous toward the kids as the overextended teachers with whom she was working had become.  I don’t think all the teachers were like that.  I also saw some of the warmest and loving teachers at my son’s elementary school, which was just west of the Troost line.  But, as Davey D points out, there is extreme poverty in the midwest, which we too often ignore.  The Democratic Party does not care about this poverty.  Democrat politicians never even use the word poverty or poor in their speeches.  Instead, they make vague references to the middle class.

***

[Steve Bannon image by Don Irvine, used via fair use and creative commons (CC BY-SA 2.0).]

[13 DEC 2016]

[Last modified at 12:18 PST on 22 DEC 2016]

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2016 United States Presidential Debate #3, Censored Under the Auspices of the Commission On Presidential Debates

19 Wed Oct 2016

Posted by ztnh in Democracy Deferred, Free Speech, Political Science, Presidential Election 2016

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Amy Goodman, austerity economics, battleground states, Chris Hedges Mdiv (b. 1956), Chris Wallace (b. 1947) (Democrat), Democracy Now!, Donald Trump, Dr. Eddie Glaude, Dr. Eric Foner (b. 1943), Dr. Jill Stein, Dr. Michael Froman (b. 1962), economic austerity, Green Party, Hillary Rodham Clinton, KPFA, Kristen Clarke, Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (Est. 1963), leaked Podesta emails, Natasha Stoynoff, neoliberalism, Nermeen Shaikh, Pacifica Radio Network, Phyllis Bennis (b. 1951), police state, ranked-choice voting, Steve Schmidt (b. 1970), strategic voting, Supreme Court of the United States (Est. 1789), the surveillance state, transcript, Two-Party Dictatorship

Vote_12345LUMPENPROLETARIAT—The partisan, antidemocratic Commission On Presidential Debates has held the third and final 2016 presidential debate this evening.  And, as promised, popular alternative parties have been banned from participating.  The 2016 U.S. Presidential Elections have been hijacked and censored under the auspices of the partisan, antidemocratic, and dastardly Commission On Presidential Debates.  What does this mean for our democracy when two corporate-backed political parties, in concert with the dishonest corporate media, are able to saturate the media with unpopular candidates, cartelise the political process, and effectively shut out any and all competition?  And what does it say about the state of our political imagination when our leading intellectuals fail to challenge this travesty of democracy, this two-party dictatorship?

Free speech radio KPFA, per Democracy Now!, has promised to expand the debates. [1]  But, overall, coverage of the 2016 Presidential Election has been narrowly focused upon the two corporate parties, the Democratic and Republican parties and their rhetoric, both, in for-profit and non-profit media.  Even in free speech, non-commercial broadcasting, it seems we can’t break out of the narrow two-party framing of election news coverage.  There have been token gestures made to alternative political parties, so-called third-parties.  But, overall, the KPFA, Pacifica Radio Network, and Democracy Now! coverage, the nation’s leading progressive election coverage, has been hindered by an NPR-like editorial slant, which marginalises alternative rigged 2016political parties, legitimates a two-party system, and fails to comprehensively question the antidemocratic institutionalised banning of political alternatives and political diversity in the United States.  At free speech radio KPFA there is one faction, currently calling itself SaveKPFA, which is committed to this ideology.  They’ve captured most of the prime time-slots as well as KPFA‘s News Department.  So, consequently, the overall election coverage at KPFA, which radiates throughout the national Pacifica Radio Network, leans in favour of the Democratic Party, at the expense of countering the corporate media’s narrow two-party framing, and at the expense of raising the political consciousness and of broadening the political imagination of its audience.  And this, of course, is in contradiction to most of free speech radio KPFA’s own progressive narratives and political ideals, which are typically championed on the airwaves before and after election cycles, but which are lesseroftwoevilsfortunecookiebyflickrusergoatchildshunned and occulted during election cycles.  During election cycles, all issues are subordinated to the uber-issue of the bogeyman candidate, which everyone must fear, whether it’s Bush or McCain or Romney or Trump.  This cyclical fomenting, by the liberal and progressive media, of fear-based decision-making, which bolsters the ideological trope of voting for the least worst or the lesser of two evils, by which liberals and progressives then challenge themselves to push that evil Democratic president and Congress to do right, has only functioned to perpetually shift the political centre to the right.  Such liberals invoke President Roosevelt, who goaded his constituency:  Make me do it.  But they never do (perhaps, since 1963).  The typical liberal or progressive response to a failure to see meaningful progressive political change is that there has not been enough protest.  But such observers never seem to recall that when the Occupy Movement rose up to make Obama do it, and even became a global movement, the Obama administration crushed the Occupy Movement in the United States in a nationwide coordinated crackdown in concert obamaoccupyflickrusergoatchildwith many of the nation’s mayors.  Then, in 2012, Democracy Now! fixated on ostensible bogeyman Republican Mitt Romney, helping to steer attention away from the neoliberalism of the Obama administration, and helping to get him re-elected.  This created a sociological form of Stockholm syndrome, by which the same liberals and progressives, who suffered repression during Obama’s raids on Occupy Movement encampments, somehow turned around and voted for him again.  In 2016, it’s clear, for example, that Democracy Now! is ideologically aligned with Hillary Clinton‘s Democratic Party campaign, as they focus all of our attention on a dualistic narrative between Clinton and Trump, which casts Clinton as the sensible option, no matter how bad the evidence of her political record, and despite the common ideological thread of neoliberalism, which runs through Democratic and Republican administrations, whilst marginalising the Green Party, who promises a social justice alternative.

ChomskyRequiemforAmericanDream2016News and media outlets should just admit their political preferences, the way the press used to admit their partisanship openly, before media outlets began feigning political neutrality.  Or, perhaps, as progressive elder statesman Dr. Noam Chomsky has noted:  “The indoctrination is so deep, that educated people think they are being objective”.  Corporate journalism claims journalistic objectivity.  Yet, in reality, we know that most American media outlets are Democratic-leaning or Republican-leaning.  This is obvious when we look closer at Democracy Now!, the left‘s most popular daily newscast.  It’s obvious from their media coverage, news framing, lines of questioning, and commentary that their editorial board is dominated by Democrats with a political agenda to contain and manage political messaging to the left of the Democratic Party.  They should just admit it, so the people can have some semblance of political transparency.  The individuals, who control and operate media outlets, either, vote or they don’t.  They, either, care about politics or not.  It’s inevitable that such concern or indifference will influence editorial decision-making.  In any event, each political position one holds, personally or publicly, whether pa640px-howard_zinnssively or zealously, carries with it real political implications, which directly or indirectly influence the political environments of each political agent.  We recall historian Dr. Howard Zinn:  You Can’t Be Neutral On a Moving Train.  As for Democracy Now! and Pacifica Radio, the effect upon the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election, as with past elections, is to steer progressives away from alternative political parties and keep them corralled within the neoliberal Democratic Party, perpetually constraining political diversity and political imagination within a narrow two-party box.  Thinking outside the box, literally, becomes outlawed.

Messina

***

2016 United States Presidential Debate #3, which was censored by the antidemocratic Commission On Presidential Debates, using arbitrary rules to only allow Democratic and Republican candidates, took place on 19 OCT 2016 at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas.

***

[Working draft transcript of actual radio broadcast by Messina for Lumpenproletariat and Pacifica Radio.] [1]

PACIFICA RADIO—[19 OCT 2016]  [KPFA board operator:  “[…] and online at kpfa.org.  It is five o’ clock.  Flashpoints will be back tomorrow.  Now, we take you live to a Democracy Now! special of our third and final presidential debate.”]

AMY GOODMAN:  “[From Pacifica,] this is Democracy Now! [theme music]

HILLARY CLINTON: You know, it is—it’s just awfully good that someone with the temperament of Donald Trump is not in charge of the law in our country.

DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, because you’d be in jail.

MARTHA RADDATZ: Secretary Clinton—

AUDIENCE:  [cheers, applauds, and whoops]

rigged 2016AMY GOODMAN:  “Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton face off in Las Vegas tonight in the final debate before the presidential election.  We’ll air the entire debate live at 9pm (eastern) and host a roundtable discussion before and after the showdown, looking at the state of the race, from the mounting sexual assault claims against Donald Trump to the WikiLeaks disclosures about Hillary Clinton to Trump’s claim that the election has already been rigged.” [2]  (c. 1:04)

DONALD TRUMP: They even want to try to rig the election at the polling booths.  And, believe me, there’s a lot going on.  Do you ever hear these people?  They say, ‘There’s nothing going on.’  People that have died ten years ago are still voting.  Illegal immigrants are voting.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I’d invite Mr. Trump to stop whinin’ and go try to make his case to get votes.

Amy Goodman 17 APR 2016 Berkeley, CAAMY GOODMAN:  “All that and more, coming up.  Welcome to Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, and our special, “War, Peace, and the Presidency.” [theme music fades out]  I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.”

NERMEEN SHAIKH:  “Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are preparing to face off tonight in Las Vegas in their final debate before next month’s presidential election.  We’ll be broadcasting the debate live in an hour.

“The final debate comes as Trump’s campaign is reeling from a series of accusations of sexual assault from nine different women.  Trump has denied these allegations.  On Tuesday, People magazine published an article quoting six different people who all corroborated People magazine journalist Natasha Stoynoff’s account of being sexually assaulted by Donald Trump in 2005 at his Mar-a-Lago resort.  Stoynoff says Trump pushed her against the wall and kissed her against her will.

“Clinton, meanwhile, is facing questions about newly released and leaked emails, which reveal everything from Clinton’s State Department prioritising friends of Bill Clinton, while assigning aid contracts after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, to Clinton bashing environmentalists and anti-fracking advocates during a meeting with the building trades union in 2014, where she said the activists should, quote, ‘get a life’.

AMY GOODMAN:  “We’ll talk about all this and more in this Democracy Now! three-and-a-half-hour special.  We’re broadcasting live for the next two-and-a-half hours—actually, three-and-a-half hours.

“In this first hour, we’re joined by seven guests.  Eric Foner, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, professor at Columbia University—his most recent book:  Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad.

“Eddie Glaude is chair of the Department of African American Studies at Princeton University.  His new book is Democracy in Black: How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul.

“Phyllis Bennis will be joining us from Washington, D.C., a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.  She has written a number of books, including, most recently, Understanding ISIS and the New Global War on Terror.

“Chris Hedges will be joining us from the University of California-Berkeley, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist.  His most recent book, Wages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt.

“And Kristen Clarke will be with us, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

“Megan Ming—Megan Ming Francis is joining us here in New York, assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Washington.  Her most recent book is Civil Rights and the Making of the Modern American State.

“Later in the broadcast, after we air the showdown at 9:00 (eastern) between Trump and Clinton, we’ll also be speaking with May Boeve, who is executive director of 350 Action.  We’ll be talking about whether or not the candidates or the moderator, Chris Wallace of Fox News, will raise the issue of climate change.

“So, we welcome you all to Democracy Now!  And we’re going to start with Megan Ming Francis.  Megan, what are you looking for the candidates to talk about?  And what do you think of the state of this race?” (c. 4:47)

MEGAN MING FRANCIS:  “Oh, man.  So, what I’m looking for them to talk about today is, I want them—this is their time to make a closing argument, right?  This is their closing statement.  And I think so much about campaigns is about: How strong do you close?  I think one of the biggest issues, that has been brought up in each of the debates are questions around the economy.  Right?  So, I expect them to discuss the economy.  There’s questions and issues I would like them to [delve] into much more around the economy, issues around predatory capitalism and getting back to, kind of, the Bernie Sanders arguments around the economy being rigged, not in terms of, kind of, the Trump arguments around the economy being rigged, but very much getting back to some of these Sanders arguments about the economy being rigged.

“I also am really curious, at least in this debate, about how they both take questions around the Supreme Court, about who they think and what is their criteria for deciding who should be on the highest court, and also for their vision of actually appointing federal judges.

“In terms of this last question, the state of this race—oh, my goodness.  It’s like I—you know, I teach elections; and I’ve taught it for now a decade.  And this is the craziest.  This is just the craziest election and campaign.  And it has changed the way, that I teach in my class, in terms of how you might get voters to the polls and capture voters and also the median voters as well.  So, I’m looking forward to the debate.  I think it’s a little crazy.  This debate—I mean, this whole election cycle has been something for the history books.”  (c. 6:27)

NERMEEN SHAIKH:  “Well, one of the reasons, just to bring in Professor Eric Foner, that this election season has been so extraordinary, as many people have pointed out, has to do with the rise of a candidate like Donald Trump.  So, as an American historian, Professor Foner, could you explain what you think accounts for this extraordinary rise?” [3]

DR. ERIC FONER:  “Well, you know, looking at history, I think Trump is almost a combination of a number of figures, both, in our history and abroad.  There’s no individual predecessor to Trump, really, but there are precedents.  And he didn’t just come out of the blue.  You might say he’s a combination of George Wallace, who really was the first to show how white resentment against the gains of the Civil Rights Movement, overt racism, could be really mobilised in a modern campaign and be pretty successful, not only in the South; but he did very well in primaries in Michigan and other states like that.  But Wallace was not really talking about the economic, issues that Trump is.  (c. 7:32)

“You might throw into the hopper Ross Perot in 1992, who is the model of the sort of businessman, who had no political experience, and came in with that as his selling point.  You know?  Nobody can bribe me.  I’m a billionaire.  And, you know:  I can fix things.  I know how to get things done.  But Perot was also the guy, who introduced trade into the political dialogue.  Perot was the first one to say:  We are losing jobs because of these trade agreements.  Trump, of course, has picked that up.

“But on the more personal element and the, really, you know, wilder element of Trump, you have to go to a guy like Berlusconi, maybe, in Italy, who also had this kind of sexual element—”

DR. MEGAN MING FRANCIS:  “Mm.”

DR. ERIC FONER:  “—to his appeal, with his going to sex clubs and parties with young prostitutes and, you know, kind of reveled in this.  And I think many of his supporters thought that was pretty cool, as—the male supporters, let us say—as many of Trump’s male supporters don’t seem to be pretty bothered by all the revelations, that have come out.

“So, there are precedents, but you put them all together, and, as was said, it’s a kind of oddball election, no question about it.”  (c. 8:39)

AMY GOODMAN:  “But, of course, sex clubs are different from women saying that he sexually assaulted them.” [4]

DR. ERIC FONER:  “No, that is true.  But underage prostitutes get pretty close to that; you know.  But it’s more the sexual component.  George Wallace, Ross Perot were pretty—pretty dull types, you know?  Nobody ever accused them of any of this stuff.  So, but, you know, it’s almost the maverick quality, that appeals to at least some of these voters.”

NERMEEN SHAIKH:  “And, Chris Hedges, you recently, just to continue with Professor Foner’s line, you wrote a piece recently, titled ‘Donald Trump: The Dress Rehearsal for Fascism.’  Could you lay out the argument there?” [5]

CHRIS HEDGES, Mdiv:  “Well, that’s what we’re watching.  Trump, for all his shallowness and narcissism and imbecility and self-destructiveness, nevertheless, has been able to run a fairly close race with Hillary Clinton.  We just saw from the leaked Podesta emails that the Clinton machine promoted, consciously promoted, especially through the press, what they call these ‘Pied Piper’ candidates, listing Trump, Cruz and—I forget the third—Trump and Carson.  And the idea was that they wanted to give them legitimacy.  They wanted to push the more mainstream candidates, like Jeb Bush, closer to the lunatic fringe.  And that’s because, fundamentally, there is no difference between Hillary Clinton and a figure like Mitt Romney.  You know, what they’re battling about is what Freud called the narcissism of minor difference. [6]

“And the danger with this election is that the longer the policies of neoliberalism, austerity, the security and surveillance state—in essence, the paralysis on the part of our corporate state to deal with the suffering, grievances, and mounting rage of now over half the country who live in poverty—the more these lunatic fringe candidates, like Trump, these figures of ridicule—reminds me very much of what happened in Yugoslavia—the economic meltdown of Yugoslavia vomited up figures like Radovan Karadžić, Slobodan Milošević, Franjo Tuđman, who were buffoonish figures before they achieved political power, much like much of the Nazi Party in Weimar.  And I think that’s what we’re watching. [7]

“And, if we don’t reverse the structural mechanisms by which we are disenfranchising and refusing to deal with the most fundamental rights and issues affecting, now, a majority of the American population, then we will get a fascist or a kind of quasi-protofascist, Christianised fascism, embodied in a figure with a little more intelligence and political savvy than Trump.  And that’s why I find this election so frightening and so dangerous.

“I think it’s the fact that the power elites, embodied by figures like the Clintons and Barack Obama, have been utterly, utterly tone deaf to what’s happening, and are playing a very, very dangerous game by, on the one hand, promoting a figure like Trump, because, of course, his outrageousness gives her a kind of credibility, without understanding that another four years of what’s been happening [i.e., a continuation of the Obama administration’s neoliberalism]—and it won’t be an effective political strategy anymore, and it won’t be funny.” [8] (c. 12:13)

NERMEEN SHAIKH:  “Professor Eddie Glaude, let’s get your perspective on this.  Earlier in the summer, you wrote a piece called ‘My Democratic Problem with Voting for Hillary Clinton.’ [9]  Now, some say that Clinton’s victory is now more or less a foregone conclusion.  You also talked about the necessity of strategic voting.  Can you talk about both the arguments, that you’ve made in light of where we stand today in the campaign and with the election less than a month away?”

DR. EDDIE GLAUDE:  “Sure.  You know, I think that it is—it is reasonable to conclude that Hillary Clinton is going to win. [10]  I think the internal polling for the Republican—on the Republican side suggests that Donald Trump is going to go down pretty badly, that it’s going to be a pretty decisive victory.  Some, like [Republican operative] Steve Schmidt, are predicting that she’s going to win upward to 400—get to 400 in the Electoral College, some at 380.  People are declaring that this is going to be the destruction of the Republican Party.

“And a lot of this has to do with—right?—the fact that Donald Trump moves between being, as I’ve said before, a lunatic and an adolescent.  And we can talk about him; but in kind of orienting us to this campaign, to this election cycle, by emphasising the ridiculousness of, and the bombasity of Donald Trump, we have turned our attention away from, I think, Hillary Clinton and the policies, that have defined the Democratic Party up to this point.  And I think Donald Trump is just an exaggerated indication of the rot that’s at the heart of the country, and that Hillary Clinton is the poster child for, I think, a failed economic policy, that has left so many fellow Americans behind, and particularly the most vulnerable. (c. 14:00)

“So, what I’ve said is that we needed to suggest to Hillary Clinton that—and suggest to the Democratic Party that—business as usual was no longer acceptable and that I couldn’t vote for her; and I couldn’t do that.  I can do that because I’m in a blue state, and that there are some who are in a red state, who can vote their conscience; but if you’re in a battleground state, it makes all the sense in the world, given who Trump is, to not vote for her—to vote for—to not to vote for Hillary Clinton—I mean, to not vote for Trump and to vote for Hillary Clinton.

“So, in this case, part of what I’m trying to suggest is that we need to be very mindful in this moment, even as we say she’s going to win.  We need to understand who she’s appointing as her transition team.  We need to understand that personnel is policy.  We need to see what her position will really be in terms of how she will govern economically, who she’s going to pick and choose for attorney general position.  Who’s gonna populate her government?  And I think once we get a better sense, or if we pay attention to what she’s doing, we will be even better mobilised and organised to bring pressure to bear on her presidency, once November 8th happens.” [11] (c. 15:08)

AMY GOODMAN:  “So, what do you think about this, Chris Hedges, this idea of strategic voting?”

CHRIS HEDGES, Mdiv:  “I think it’s an utter failure.  I mean, one of the things that the WikiLeaks Podesta emails show is that they were putting in place this neoliberal policy—Froman, who was then a—he’s now a U.S. trade representative—he, at the time, was at Citibank.  In October, before Obama even achieved power, he’s sending out a list of Cabinet positions, all of which—most all of which came to pass.  That’s certainly happening now.

“I think that we have to step outside this corporate two-party duopoly and begin to empower right now the third party, you know, that I think represents or challenges corporate power most effectively, is the Green.  It has issues; you know.  It functions well in cities like Richmond, California, doesn’t function as well in other places.  But, if they can poll 15 percent, that gives them ballot access in 2020 in a few dozen states, and it gives them $10 million.  I think that now is the time to, as Syriza did a decade ago, to fight back because we have very little time left.

“One of the things we have to remember is that we have a large number of supporters of Donald Trump who celebrate American violence through the gun culture, open racism, neo-confederist movements, nativist movements.  And Trump, I think, has made clear now, on the campaign trail, that he will essentially attempt to discredit the system if he loses.  And right now they are working within the system.  But unleashing that rage, you know, or essentially legitimising that rage and that kind of violence after the election will begin to really rend the fabric of American society. (c. 17:08)

“We have no more time to play around.  We haven’t even spoken about the issue of climate change.  We know, from the leaked emails, that Hillary Clinton is a fan of fracking.  She brags about promoting fracking in Poland and other places as secretary of state.  We just—the kind of weakness of the system itself cannot, I think, sustain much more of this assault without dramatic and frightening blowback and ramifications.  And I think Trump is systematic of that.

“So, as I’ve said many times, I think we have to do what many—Podemos and many parties in Europe—have done.  We have to walk into the political wilderness.  We have to build movements.  And we have to build alternative third parties that challenge this system because the inevitable result is a kind of frightening police state.  Legally, it’s already in place; physically, in marginal communities, they’ve been turned virtually into mini police states.  The system of mass incarceration will not be affected in any meaningful way.  Of course, it was the Clintons that put much of it in place.  We just saw this very courageous prisoner strike, where the prisoners did work stoppages because, they said, the only way to stop this system of neoslavery is to stop being a slave.  And I think that is a level of political consciousness, that the rest of us have to begin to attain.” (c. 18:40)

AMY GOODMAN:  “So, Professor Glaude, your response to Chris Hedges’ rejection of strategic voting?”

EDDIE GLAUDE:  “Well, I think we agree on principle.  And part of what I think—where we agree is that we have to keep Trump out of office. [12]  And the question for me is that: How do we do that?  And one of the ways I’m thinking we need to do it is to vote strategically.  And that is, in those places where we can—for me, blank out or—vote for Jill Stein, we should.  And in those places where—the battleground states, where it matters, where Trump has a chance to win, I think we need to turn out in massive numbers and make sure that he doesn’t win those states.  I think we have to do two things simultaneously.

“And I think he’s right in this regard:  I think that what we’ve seen and what we’ve witnessed in this moment is the bankruptcy of a particular economic ideological philosophy, that has left so many—so many people behind.  And I think we need to dare to imagine a new world.  But I think it’s going to require strategic and tactical thinking.  And I think, on its face, Chris and I aren’t disagreeing.  I just think there are ways to get to the same—to the same end.  There are different ways to get to the same end.” (c. 19:59)

AMY GOODMAN:  “We want to bring in—we want to bring in someone that people might not be expecting would weigh in.  And that is the legendary musician Bruce Springsteen, Bruce Springsteen who was interviewed on Channel 4 in Britain, who describes Donald Trump as a “flagrant, toxic narcissist.” [* Is Bruce S. the only one to weigh in?  Is he the most important?  If so, why?  Is it because he bashes Trump and feeds into the narrative, which implies Hillary Clinton is the sensible candidate?]

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN:  I mean, I know some Trump voters, you know.  But I think that he’s really—he’s really preyed upon that part of the country because he gives these very glib and superficial answers to very, very entrenched and very difficult problems; but they’re answers, that sound pretty good if you’ve struggled for the past 20 or 30 years. So—

MATT FREI: You can understand his appeal?

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: Yeah, yeah, I can understand that there’s somebody with simple answers to very complicated questions, who sound like they’re listening to you for the first time.

MATT FREI: Do you think the people who like him are racists?

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: No, no, I don’t believe that—you can’t generalise like that.  You know, I think—I think there’s all kinds of people that are interested in him for a variety of different reasons.

MATT FREI: Do you think that rage will go away after this election?

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: No, no.  I don’t know how it’s going to manifest itself, but it will manifest itself somehow, you know?

MATT FREI: Do you think there might be some trouble?  I mean, you know, we’ve already seen some strife on the streets and—

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: Well, the trouble at the moment is, is you have Donald Trump who is talking about rigged elections.  And he’s not—he has a feeling he’s going to lose now, which he—of course, he is going to lose.

MATT FREI: You’re confident?

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: Oh, yeah.  Oh, yeah.  He’s going to lose.  And he knows that.  He knows he’s going to lose.  And he’s such a flagrant, toxic narcissist that he wants to take down the entire democratic system with him if he goes.  If he could reflect on these things, maybe he’d have—but he’s such an unreflective person.  And he doesn’t—he simply has no sense of decency and no sense of responsibility about him.  And the words, that he’s been using over the past several weeks really are an attack on the entire democratic process.

MATT FREI: And is that dangerous?

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: Yeah, it is.  I think it’s very dangerous.  He does have a lot of people’s ears.  And I don’t think he’s going to go quietly into the—you know, gently into the good night.  I think he’s going to make a big a mess as he can.  And I don’t know what that’s going to mean, but we’ll find out shortly.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: That was Bruce Springsteen speaking to Britain’s Channel 4. So, Professor Eddie Glaude, you know, this election—tonight’s debates come as both Clinton and Trump are among the most unpopular candidates, I mean, in decades, in American history. And younger voters are reportedly especially dismayed by the state of the race. A recent survey, which was reported in the BBC, found that many younger voters would rather see a giant meteor destroy the Earth than vote for either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. So, Professor Eddie Glaude, can you talk about that, first what Springsteen said about Trump’s appeal and then where young voters stand today in this race?

[snip]

PHYLLIS BENNIS:  ” [pending] ”

JillSteinItsInOurHandsFlickrDemocracyChroniclesAMY GOODMAN:  “Candidates.  We are joined right now by Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein. [13]

“Dr. Stein, welcome back to Democracy Now!.  Can you respond to the debate, that you just watched for an hour-and-a-half?—the last presidential debate, that you were excluded from—all three of them—this one took place at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas.” (c. 3:21:26)

DR. JILL STEIN:  “You know.  What a—what a distressing, um, you know, hour-and-a-half to sit through:  Donald Trump‘s psychosis and Hillary Clinton‘s distortion of her record and what the future would look like.

“And the picture, they paint of unbridled militarism, which is already robbing us blind, taking up almost half of our discretionary budget, almost half of your income taxes, only making the world a more dangerous place.  That’s terrifying enough.

capitalist-venn-diagram-by-flickr-user-goatchild“Add, to that, what they want to do with the economy.  Trump is all about more trickle-up, actually, not trickle-down.  He wants more tax breaks.

“But, you know, Hillary is also not being clear with us about where we’re going and what her track record is.

“Hillary laid the groundwork for the financial crash of 2008—not Hillary alone, of course, but she was certainly supporting the policies of Bill Clinton, that not only sent our jobs overseas, but which also laid the groundwork for Wall Street deregulation and, in fact, enacted Wall Street deregulation, not to mention the anti-immigrant legislation, the anti-African American legislation, that opened the [door] to this racist War On Drugs and the endless expansion of mass incarceration procedures, particularly of people of colour.  It’s a very dystopic future.  (c. 3:22:57)

“And, you know, I think it’s really important for us, as Americans, to look at what we’re facing.  This is a race to the bottom.  We have to exit this incredible spiral downward.  The sooner we exit this the better.

“Those who would say that you have to vote for the lesser evil, now.  You know, it’s really important to look at the track record for that because the lesser evil simply paves the way to the greater evil because people just stop coming out to vote for lesser-evil politicians and a lesser-evil party, that’s throwing you under the bus. [14]  The base doesn’t come out.  So, the Congress flips from being blue to being red, as the Democratic Party has thoroughly established itself as a lesser-evil party.

if-not-now-when-bob-groves-coaching“So, when is it gonna get better?  You know?  If we don’t stand up to fight now, when exactly are we gonna stand up and fight?

“And what is really important to remember is that there are, actually, enough people right now 43 million young people right now locked in [student loan] debt, that if that word, alone, got out, we have the numbers.  That is a plurality.  That is a winning plurality, let alone 27 million Latinos, who have had it, who understand that the Republicans are the party of hate and fear and the Democrats are the party of deportatio, detention, and night raids, and imprisonment of children and families in these horrific private prisons. (c. 3:24:21)

“So, you know, we have a very bleak reality.  And, for people—you know, everybody knows Donald Trump is terrifying and dangerous.  But to think that we are secure with Hillary Clinton in the White House, where Hillary Clinton is telling us right now that she wants to start a war with Russia over Syria, creating a no-fly zone, which means, folks, get ready.  It’s going to be hard not to slide into World War III, here, with Hillary at the helm, starting off her four years or whatever her term is, starting off with declaring war on Russia by enacting a no-fly zone.

“We need a weapons embargo to the Middle East.  We need to put a freeze on the bank accounts of our supposed allies, who are continuing to fund terrorist enterprises.  We got this mess going.  We can shut it down.  We need a new offensive in the Middle East.  It’s called a peace offensive.

“We’re not gonna hear that from either of the corporate sponsored political parties, who are rolling in dough from the weapons industry, from the fossil fuel giants, from the war profiteers, from the big banks.

“We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.  In the words of Alice Walker, the biggest way people give up power is by not knowing we have it to start with.” (c. 3:25:45)

AMY GOODMAN:  “Um, let me ask you the question, that was put to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton around whether you will accept the results of the November election, Dr. Jill Stein.” [15]

DR. JILL STEIN:  “Well, put it this way.  If there’s evidence of fraud, we would certainly challenge that in court.  And, in the Green Party, we have sort of led the charge in pursuing election fraud.  So, we wouldn’t be—we wouldn’t hesitate to do that to the extent, that it is possible.

no-in-free-speechflickrgoatchild“However, let me just tell you.  There’s no question about there being a rigged election here.  Not in the terms, that Donald Trump is saying.  But, you know, the media, actually, has been enormously rigged on his behalf—four billion dollars of free prime-time media.  Hillary had over two billion.  Bernie Sanders had under half a billion.  And, of course, I’ve had practically zero.  So, you know, between that and the rigged debates, which the League of Women Voters, themselves, called a fraud being perpetrated on the American voter, the silencing of opposition voices through the fear campaigns and the smear campaigns.

“We don’t create a better democracy out of our wounded democracy by silencing opposition voices.  We could move to a ranked-choice voting system in the blink of an eye.  That could be done right now on an emergency basis, so that we actually liberate voters to vote their values.  They can rank their choices.  If your first choice loses, your vote is automatically reassigned to your second choice.  But the Democrats won’t pass it.

“My campaign had filed this bill in the Democratic legislature in Massachusetts 16 years ago.  They won’t let it out of committee—” [Amy Goodman cuts in swiftly to interrupt Dr. Jill Stein]

AMY GOODMAN:  “Let me ask you—”

DR. JILL STEIN:  “—because they rely on fear, because they’re—”

AMY GOODMAN:  “Let me ask you something very quickly before the end of the show, Jill [since we didn’t bother to have you on until the last eight minutes of this three-and-a-half hour broadcast].”

DR. JILL STEIN:  “Sure.”

AMY GOODMAN:  “And that is:  Five percent of the vote, nationally, that is a very important threshold.  Can you talk about what would happen, what the Green Party needs to reach and how much money they would get in matching funds from the government?” (c. 3:27:53)

DR. JILL STEIN:  “Thank you, Amy.  Five percent would be an absolute game-changer. [16]  And the polls suggest we are something under that, but not by far.  And, in fact, the polls do not tap unlikely voters, which is our base, that is millennials, that is people of colour and Latinos, really disenfranchised voters.  That’s who will be coming out to vote for us.

“So, we may be, actually, very close to that five percent threshold.  We could even be beyond it.  So, it’s really important that people—” [Amy Goodman cuts in swiftly to interrupt Dr. Jill Stein]

AMY GOODMAN:  “But if you get it what happens?” (c. 3:28:23)

DR. JILL STEIN:  “If we get that five percent, we not only have ballot access, then, in most states, so that when we begin the election campaign, not only in the next presidential [election], but on all the down-ballot races as well.  We have to first fight for ballot status, which has taken us like the first year of the campaign.  It means we can hit the ground running.  It also means that we are, then—we receive ten million dollars as a legitimate major party.  With ten million dollars—” [Amy Goodman cuts in swiftly to interrupt Dr. Jill Stein]

AMY GOODMAN:  “Well, we have to leave it there.  We have to leave it there.  I wanna thank you for joining us, Dr. Jill Stein, as well as all of our guests.  That does it for our special.  I’m Amy Goodman with Nermeen Shaikh.

“This is Democracy Now!, DemocracyNow.org, War, Peace, and the Presidency.  Thank you so much for joining us.”  (c. 3:29:06)

[KPFA CART, i.e. announcement for a ‘new age’ show airing on Sundays]  (c. 3:29:40)

Learn more at PACIFICA RADIO.

[This transcript will be expanded as time constraints, and/or demand or resources, allow.  In the meantime, you can see Democracy Now!’s transcript working draft, except don’t count on them to transcribe Dr. Jill Stein’s epic final salvo.  As of Monday, 24 OCT 2016, 07:59 PDT, Democracy Now!’s transcript hasn’t been updated, or expanded, since the initial transcription on 19 OCT 2016.  Just as Democracy Now! stealthily marginalised Dr. Jill Stein and the Green Party, they didn’t bother to transcribe the most important and meaningful political platform campaigning of the final debate.  And, of course, they only gave Dr. Jill Stein less than ten minutes to attempt to undo the damage of being totally shut out of the debates and even out of the consciousness of Democracy Now!’s editorial agenda.]

[As of Wednesday 26 OCT 2016, 12:48 PDT, Democracy Now! has completed the transcript.  It is freely accessible for the time being.]

***

[1]  Terrestrial radio transmission, 94.1 FM (KPFA, Berkeley, CA) with online simulcast and digital archiving:  Special Programming: Presidential Debate – October 19, 2016, this three-and-a-half hour broadcast co-hosted by Democracy Now! co-hosts Amy Goodman and Nermeen Shaikh, Wednesday, 19 OCT 2016, 17:00 PDT.

[This ‘Expanding the Debate’ Democracy Now! special covering the final presidential debate (of three) is also available from Democracy Now! as an archive for the time being.]

Also see the following related articles:

  • 2016 United States Vice Presidential Election Debate; 4 OCT 2016.
  • 2016 U.S. Presidential Debate #1, Censored Under the Auspices of the Partisan Commission On Presidential Debates; 26 SEP 2016.
  • Ralph Nader Radio Hour Presents Green Party Presidential Candidate Dr. Jill Stein; 19 SEP 2016.
  • Commission On Presidential Debates Will Ban Alternative Political Parties In Upcoming 2016 U.S. Presidential Debates; 19 SEP 2016.
  • CNN Hosts 2016 Presidential Election Town Hall Featuring the Green Party; 18 AUG 2016.
  • 2016 Green Party National Convention; 6 AUG 2016.
  • Clinton Cash:  The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich (2015) by Peter Schweizer; 1 AUG 2016.
  • “Why Hillary Clinton Doesn’t Deserve the Black Vote” by Michelle Alexander; 27 JUL 2016.
  • Democratic National Convention 2016, Day One; 25 JUL 2016.
  • Republican National Convention 2016, Day One; 18 JUL 2016.
  • Flashpoints:  2016 California Presidential Primary Election Special; 7 JUN 2016.
  • Hard Knock Radio: Presidential Election 2016, A Failed Democracy; 7 JUN 2016.
  • California Presidential Primary Election 2016, Tuesday, June 7, 2016; 7 JUN 2016.
  • Green Party Presidential Candidate Dr. Jill Stein Joins Rally Against Privatisation of the U.S. Postal Service; 6 JUN 2016.
  • Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! Discusses Election 2016 on PBS; 26 MAY 2016.
  • Why Is Election Day Not a Federally Recognised National Holiday?; 24 MAY 2016.
  • The Secret History of Superdelegates by Branko Marcetic; 17 MAY 2016.
  • Dr. Michael Eric Dyson’s Democrat Partisan Apologia 2016; 16 MAY 2016.
  • Bernie Sanders Rally Held In Sacramento’s Cal Expo Bonney Field, 9 MAY 2016; 9 MAY 2016.
  • Dr. Glenn Greenwald on Hillary Clinton’s Support for Brutal Dictators and More; 24 MAR 2016.
  • The Trump Party by Political Prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal; 23 MAR 2016.
  • The Green Party’s Dr. Jill Stein on Democracy & Ranked Choice Voting; 21 MAR 2016.
  • Activist and Indigenous Leader Nelson García Assassinated; 16 MAR 2016.
  • Presidential Election 2016: Voting Democrat to Vote Socialist; 16 MAR 2016.
  • Economic Journalist Doug Henwood Assesses the USA’s Right; 7 MAR 2016.
  • Activist Berta Cáceres Assassinated; 3 MAR 2016.
  • Hillary Clinton, US/NATO Imperialism, & the Lynching of Gaddafi; 3 MAR 2016.
  • Historical Archives: Third-Party Challenge to Unconstitutional Prop 14; 2 MAR 2016.
  • Black Agenda Report: On the USA’s Black Electorate, Circa 2016; 1 MAR 2016.
  • My Turn: Hillary Clinton Targets the Presidency (2015) by Doug Henwood; 29 FEB 2016.
  • Hillary Clinton & USA Imperialism Versus Honduran Democracy; 17 JAN 2016.
  • Dr. Laurence Schoup On the Empire of Neoliberal Geopolitics; 15 JAN 2016.
  • Project Censored: Ann Garrison, Edward Herman, Rwandan Genocide, & Burundi; 1 JAN 2016.
  • US News:  Presidential Candidates Given Topics Ahead of Time

[2]  By invoking, here, Donald Trump’s cries about a rigged election, Amy Goodman seems to dismiss any notion of electoral malfeasance, especially, as Democracy Now! then plays a clip of Trump complaining of election-rigging, followed by a clip of Obama admonishing him to “stop whining”.  Yet, isn’t it, essentially, rigging the election to shut out all competition to the two corporate political parties?  Isn’t it election-rigging when broadcast media and the press engage in grossly uneven election coverage, which heavily favours the corporate candidates?  Isn’t it election-rigging to have presidential debates with only the same two corporate political parties every single election?  Isn’t it election-rigging when the popular will of the people can legally be overridden by super delegates or an electoral college?  Wasn’t it election-rigging when Obama called Bernie Sanders to the White House for a meeting, prior to the Democratic National Convention, which marked the transition of Bernie Sanders campaigning against Hillary Clinton to campaigning for Hillary Clinton?  Isn’t it election rigging when Hillary Clinton cheated during the Democratic Primary, as revealed by WikiLeaks, and colluded with the chair of the DNC Debbie Wasserman Schultz to undermine Bernie Sanders’ campaign?

And, then, there are the many Election Protection reports Greg Palast has filed about problems with the election process, which strategically invalidate ballots to game the election.  (See Greg Palast book and documentary film:  The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (2016).)  But, for some reason, Democracy Now! has avoided Greg Palast during this 2016 Presidential Election cycle.  If one searches Greg Palast within Democracy Now!‘s website, the most recent election protection reports available by Greg Palast are from 2012.

[3]  We notice that co-host Nermeen Shaikh leads with a question about the extraordinary rise of Donald Trump.  Just as the corporate media gives disproportionate airtime to Trump, somehow a similar phenomenon occurs on Democracy Now! (as well as on the KPFA News Department and most liberal).  Only, here, in liberal or progressive media, there is a fixation on Donald Trump so as to foment fear of a Donald Trump presidency amongst liberals and progressives to steer them toward voting for Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party and away alternative political parties, such as the Green Party or Libertarian Party, which can increase political diversity and possibility.  Instead, Democracy Now! engages in the false dilemma fallacy when it comes to their general line of electoral analysis.

[4]  We see, by this point in the discussion, the Democracy Now! hosts have managed to set the discussion’s train of thought squarely on the Donald Trump bogeyman track, as Amy Goodman is able to chime in another tidbit about the evils of Trump.  Yes, Donald Trump is evil, but so is Hillary Clinton and her neoliberal agenda.  But even more evil than the two of them combined is the erosion of democracy manifested by the narrowing of political discourse to two political parties, especially when they’re both funded by, essentially, the same corporate funders.

[5]  With this question, co-host Nermeen Shaikh attempts to make it seem as if she’s innocently continuing the previous guest’s “line” of thought, as if she’s not fixating on Trump.  But, in actuality, the line of thought being followed is the fixation on Trump-as-bogeyman initiated by co-host Amy Goodman and continued by Nermeen Shaikh.  Meanwhile, larger questions of erosion of democracy are ignored by the apparently partisan pro-Democratic Party agenda of Democracy Now! (and many liberal and progressive media outlets).

[6]  Continuing from footnote [5], it’s as if Chris Hedges is resisting being set up to be a shill for Hillary Clinton’s campaign by resisting contributing to a political framing, which casts Donald Trump as the bogeyman with Hillary Clinton as the implicit savior.  We see Hedges shift the focus away from his recent article, which was rightly critical of Trump and toward his less frequently aired critique of Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party.  Throughout this pre-debate discussion, Chris Hedges seems to provide the only sincere voice of reason.

[7]  This is a good point by Chris Hedges.  And it is true because of an argument your author has been making for years about one of the biggest problems with a two-party system, especially as it’s manifested in the United States.

This argument has to do with a perpetual rightward shift of the political center over time.  In the United States, political extremes, such as Donald Trump (or George Bush before him or Ronald Reagan before him), are allowed on the right-wing of the political spectrum.  But they are not allowed on the left.  Political extremes on the left are demonised, attacked, and marginalised in the dominant national political discourse.  What this does over time is shift the political center rightward, such that we have had two terms of an Obama presidency, which is literally to the right of Ronald Reagan.

[8]  The issue of credibility is a very real one for Hillary Clinton.  This last remark by Chris Hedges reminds us of other comments we’ve heard about Donald Trump’s campaign ground team, which seems to be virtually nonexistent.

Donald Trump seems to have no substantive political campaign staff, no local campaign offices where supporters could plug in.  His campaign seems to be entirely artificial, only held afloat by the millions, or billions, of dollars worth of free advertising awarded to him by an uncritical corporate media machine.  That is, the same corporate media machine, which has virtually erased alternative candidates from the 2016 presidential election.

So, if Donald Trump has no real campaign staff or strategy, then his campaign smacks of political opportunism.  It is not out of the realm of possibility that Donald Trump is working as a shill for the Hillary Clinton campaign.  In other words, since we know the Democratic and Republican parties have colluded to block out competing political parties from the presidential debates, they have colluded to agree to stage the questions to be asked, and so on, that both parties may have long been also colluding to coordinate talking points and memes, which are promoted through the corporate media echo chamber and ancillary outlets.  (And we are now learning more about such public relations, as with the Omnicom Group, the world’s largest public relations and propaganda firm in the world, such collusion is documented fact, not speculative fancy.)  Such a political-historical trend could very well have laid the groundwork for a new level of political theatre by which a decision has been made to coronate Hillary Clinton.  We know that political candidates, who win by an electoral landslide claim a political mandate to enact sweeping policy changes.  With Hillary Clinton going up against the weak opponent in Donald Trump, and not having to debate an astute and well-informed candidate, such as Dr. Jill Stein, on the debates or in public appearances, Hillary Clinton can appear more presidential, which is a silly and superficial descriptor or criterion for making an electoral decision.  But it’s a criterion, which many people use.

So, if Donald Trump is a shill for Hillary Clinton, then his apparent self-destructive gaffes make more sense, as his primary directive would be to espouse political positions far to the right of Hillary Clinton, whilst discrediting himself with adolescent gaffes to insure Clinton wins on Election Day.  Thus, with Dr. Jill Stein out of the dominant media picture, Hillary Clinton would be likely to win by a landslide, then claim a political mandate by which she could continue pursuing more of the same neoliberal policies, which the Obama administration has pursued, like the Bushes, like the Clintons, like Reagan, like the two-party establishment, and so on.  In such a scenario, it’s a win-win for them because Hillary gets the White House and Trump gets new levels of celebrity.  There’s even talk about a Trump TV Network being in the works already.  This further seems to corroborate the argument that Trump’s campaign has been political theatre designed to give Hillary Clinton credibility and a political mandate.

It seems Chris Hedges was suggesting this in his response.  But, of course, public figures must choose their words carefully, lest they’re smeared as conspiratorial.

[9]  Okay.  Here it seems as if Nermeen Shaikh is posing a question, which is critical of Hillary Clinton.  However, Professor Glaude is a Hillary Clinton supporter, who argues for fear-based voting, also known as strategic voting.  This, of course, is a political strategy, which insures that progressives will always be trapped in the neoliberal Democratic Party because they always fear a Republican presidency, which means that such thinking will always justify voting for the least worst in battleground states, instead of questioning our electoral process and advocating for ranked-choice voting and proportional representation in congress.

In Professor Glaude’s opinion piece in Time, he opens by outlining a decent critique of the status quo, which the Obama administration and the Clinton dynasty represent, correctly identifying neoliberalism as the defining feature.  But, then, he turns around and expresses deep fear of a Trump presidency because “Trump is worse”.  But, then, he continues to oscillate between ideals and fears, ultimately leaving the reader with more fear than idealism.  And Professor Glaude never shows interest in addressing, or grappling, with the antidemocratic problem of the two-party system.  Professor Glaude writes about “the function of politicians”, but he doesn’t seem interested in the function of political parties.  And this keeps his political imagination and discourse confined within a narrow two-party dualism.  But Professor Glaude writes poetically, as he dismisses in a passing remark at the end, the better alternatives to neoliberalism.  “The Sanders’ campaign was just one bloom.”  One imagines liberals taking delight in their ability to pick off such blooms every election, as they undermine all political challenges from the left in the Democratic Party.  The Democratic Party can co-opt the rhetoric from their competitors on the left, persuade voters to trust them, only to soon abandon campaign promises.  One may wonder why Professor Glaude completely ignores the Green Party, or alternative political parties, in general.  One may wonder why Professor Glaude doesn’t mention Dr. Jill Stein and her compelling campaign agenda and platform or the fact that Dr. Jill Stein has ballot access in enough states to win the electoral college.  Lumpenproletariat does.

[10]  But, for some reason, it doesn’t seem reasonable for Professor Glaude to question the electoral fraud and abuse on the part of the Hillary Clinton campaign, which would’ve disqualified the Bernie Sanders campaign.  Where’s Greg Palast when you need him?

[11]  Boom.  There it is right there.  This is that same old strategy, which has failed in the past.  Liberals argue that activists must create a huge wave of protest to ‘push’ the president to do right.  This was said about Obama’s presidency.  Yet, when the people did mobilise for massive socioeconomic justice around the Occupy Wall Street movement, President Obama coordinated a nationwide crackdown with many city mayors.  Activist encampments were raided and people were arrested and beaten.  Scott Olsen was shot in the head with a teargas canister at the Occupy Oakland encampments.  So, this is a bankrupt strategy, which liberals keep bringing up.  It never works.  The political center only shifts rightward overtime, such that we are likely to see a Hillary Clinton presidency, which is more conservative than even the Obama administration, which is widely understood to be to the right of the Ronald Reagan administration.

[12]  No.  Professor Glaude is promoting strategic voting, as a way of preserving some form of political legitimacy for the Democratic Party.  Chris Hedges, on the other hand, is calling for building alternative parties and supporting third parties, such as the Green Party, which has a much clearer and more progressive platform.

When Professor Glaude says they agree on opposing Trump, he attempts to associate Chris Hedges with strategic voting and all of the Democratic Party apologism, which goes with it.  It’s quite an insidious move, intellectually speaking because for Hedges to attempt to extricate himself from the Stop Trump meme, he’d likely appear sympathetic of Trump.

And it’s also quite a bizarre non-response to the question posed by Amy Goodman:  What do you think of Chris Hedges’ rejection of strategic voting?  And Glaude’s response is:  I think we agree on principle.  We agree we must stop Trump.  Therefore, how do we do that?  Well, through strategic voting.  It’s quite a convenient and circular line of logic Professor Glaude finds there and, in so doing, completely dodges the question and just gets back on track to repeating his argument for strategic voting.

[13]  For those of us, who view Democracy Now! and the Pacifica Radio Network, as the most important progressive daily news broadcasting, which radiates out to thousands of free speech radio stations throughout the nation, it is very disappointing and frustrating to see Democracy Now! ignore the Green Party and Dr. Jill Stein until the final eight minutes of the three-and-a-half hour broadcast.  And it borders on cruelty to only give Dr. Stein eight minutes to thoughtfully address as many issues as possible around the final presidential debate, which would make anybody sound like a crazed zealot of some sort.

And to further rub this in Amy Goodman never engages with any of the valid points, which Dr. Jill Stein makes, as if implying through her (and her co-hosts’) silence:  Yeah, whatever.  You’re right.  But you’ll never win because you are so thoroughly marginalised and kept hidden from the public, even on the Pacifica Radio Network and Democracy Now!.

Given only eight minutes to make her case, yes, it’s better that Amy Goodman just let Dr. Stein speak uninterrupted.  But Democracy Now! should have featured Dr. Stein throughout the broadcast, as done during the second debate, in which Democracy Now! interjected Dr. Stein’s responses, in real time, to the debate prompts.  It was clumsy, but it was better than nothing.  Or, better yet, Dr. Stein should have been invited to co-host the pre- and post-debate roundtable discussions, which could have helped keep the focus on the structural crimes of the Democratic and Republican parties and their collusion to stifle and suppress any and all political competition.  After all, the name of the show is Democracy Now!, as in the demand for true democracy, now!, as in we don’t have true democracy.  And part of the reason is that our most progressive and forward-thinking broadcasters, such as Democracy Now! tone down their critique of the two-party system and their neoliberal politicians during election cycles.  We have seen this ever since Democracy Now! began in 1996.  After the first 2016 presidential debate, Democracy Now! gave alternative presidential candidates a chance to expand the debate by replaying the debate the following day and, then, interjecting responses from alternative candidates willing to participate.  (Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson and vice presidential candidate William Weld were unable, or unwilling, to take advantage of Democracy Now!‘s invitations to expand the debates to get their political messaging out to the American people.)

[14]  On being thrown under the bus:  Even Amy Goodman has acknowledged, earlier this year, the importance of comparing the political track records of the candidates and comparing that to campaign promises, instead of focusing on trivial details and he said-she said gossipping and name-calling.  But, as the 2016 election campaigning got underway, we observed Amy Goodman and Democracy Now! contradict that logic of focusing on the political track records because they have completely given neoliberal Hillary Clinton a pass.

[15]  As noted above, Amy Goodman never engages with any of the valid points, which Dr. Jill Stein makes, and which Amy Goodman and the editorial board of Democracy Now! surely agrees with.  As Dr. Stein mentioned, for example, war profiteers, we may recall Amy Goodman’s New York Times bestseller, The Exception to the Rulers: Exposing Oily Politicians, War Profiteers, and the Oily Politicians Who Love Them.  But, for various partisan reasons, Amy Goodman cannot recall such things, or any points of agreement.  Instead, Amy Goodman can only play devil’s advocate and place spike strips in Dr. Jill Stein’s logical, intellectual, political discourse.

In this case, Amy Goodman attempts to derail Dr. Jill Stein‘s stump speech, in much the same way that Chris Wallace derailed Donald Trump‘s valid complaints against Hillary Clinton, who, as Trump said, should never have been allowed to capture the Democratic Party primary, as she cheated and the DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz was thereby disgraced (as much as the apologist corporate media would allow).  Bernie Sanders was cheated.  And the American people were cheated.  The only question (or comment) Amy Goodman saw fit to ask Dr. Stein was:  Will you concede?  Will you accept the results of the election?  That is, will you accept the status quo?  Evidently, for Amy Goodman, uncritical acceptance of electoral outcomes is more important than critical analysis of electoral issues and electoral fraud.  This was a dirty move by Amy Goodman, which is probably why they won’t bother to transcribe it at Democracy Now!‘s website.  Democracy Now! is focusing on, and magnifying, the issue of Donald Trump complaining about election-rigging and not vowing to uncritically concede.  So, this question seems part of a strategy to associate Dr. Jill Stein with some sort of unreasonable, or antidemocratic, electoral sabotage, which is in line with Donald Trump’s discredited rhetoric.

But, thanks to WikiLeaks, we know Hillary Clinton cheated during the Democratic Primary election.  But the biggest problem with the leaked Podesta emails, which exposed Hillary Clinton’s hidden skeletons, was not her collusion to undermine Bernie Sanders’ campaign, which was antidemocratic enough.  But the biggest problem was Hillary Clinton’s use of private, unsecured servers, for official government business.  This cynical evasion of public accountability by Hillary Clinton, who installed secret computer servers at her house to avoid having her communications publicly documented is the biggest crime of all.  And experts have described the consequences of this as literal treason.  (We’ll provide a link here to an interview, which addresses this.)  That is the biggest crime, for which Hillary Clinton has thus far evaded accountability, which in a just world would have held her to account and disqualified her from running for president.

[16]  Of course, Dr. Ralph Nader has talked about this during his five presidential candidacies.  But, instead of incorporating this knowledge into their broadcasts, Democracy Now! has largely fed into the two-party dictatorship and the antidemocratic spoiler vote meme, rather than talking about ranked-choice voting or educating the public about the various antidemocratic policies and rules and regulations, which perpetuate a cartelised two-party dictatorship.  For years, Democracy Now! has refused to truly educate their audience about basic ideas, which could dramatically change progressive politics.  But, instead, they’ve mainly acquiesced to the status quo.  That is a travesty of free speech media.

***

[Dr. Howard Zinn image by Jared and Corin, used via Creative Commons (BY-SA 2.0)]

[‘Rigged’ image by source, used via fair use.]

[‘Lesser of two evils’ fortune cookie image by Flick user GoatChild, used via Creative Commons.]

[‘Obama Occupy’ image by Flickr user GoatChild, used via Creative Commons.]

[‘Requiem for the American Dream’ image by source, used via fair use.]

[‘Amy Goodman poster’ image by source, used via fair use.]

[Image entitled “Vote 12345” by UkraineToday (English Wikipedia, transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by Shizhao, using CommonsHelper, public domain).]

[‘In not now, when?’ image by source, used via fair use.]

[‘There’s no $ in free speech’ image by Flickr user GoatChild, used via Creative Commons.]

[21 OCT 2016]

[Last modified 13:02 PDT  26 OCT 2016]

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Free Speech Radio KPFA Presents Ralph Nader: Breaking Through Power: It’s Easier Than You Think

17 Mon Oct 2016

Posted by ztnh in Anti-Imperialism, Anti-War, Free Speech, Political Science, Presidential Election 2016

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

BreakingThroughPower.org, Brown Paper Tickets, Dr. Ralph Nader (b. 1934), Global Critical Media Literacy Project, KPFA, Mickey Huff M.A., MMT, Pacifica Radio Network, Perrine Kelly, Project Censored, Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (b. 1939), St. John's Presbyterian Church (Berkeley CA), transcript, Two-Party Dictatorship

nader-breaking-through-power-800x410LUMPENPROLETARIAT—Free speech radio KPFA publicly presents notable speakers, such as this evening’s presentation by KPFA Radio 94.1 FM, City Lights Books, and Project Censored. [1]

Before a capacity audience at St. John’s Presbyterian Church (Berkeley, California), Project Censored‘s Mickey Huff introduced the great civic leader, and five-time U.S. presidential candidate, Dr. Ralph Nader for a critical discussion of political activism, lobbying congress, and other strategies for political reform.  Dr. Nader is currently on tour, giving at least one presentation per day, throughout the San Francisco Bay Area and northern California this week, before moving on north to Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington.  The theme of Dr. Nader‘s presentation is defined by the spirit of his latest book, Breaking Through Power: It’s Easier Than We Think (2016).  The evening’s proceedings were filmed by a professional camera operator (not to mention countless smartphones).  So, there will likely be audio and/or video made available of this event in future. (We provide a rush transcript below.)  See BreakingThroughPower.org.  Tune in to free speech radio KPFA for more. [2]

Messina

***

BROWN PAPER TICKETS—[accessed 17 OCT 2016]

KPFA Radio 94.1 FM Presents

Ralph Nader
Breaking Through Power: It’s Easier Than We Think

Monday, October 17,  7:30 PM
St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Avenue, Berkeley
advance tickets: $15: T: 800-838-3006  or Books Inc/Berkeley,  Pegasus (3 sites), Moes, Walden Pond Bookstore, Diesel a Bookstore, Mrs. Dalloways   S.F. – Modern Times. $18 door, KPFA benefit   kpfa.org/events

InBreaking Through Power, Nader draws from a lifetime wagingand often winningDavid vs. Goliath battles against big corporations and the United States government. In this succinct, Tom Paine-style wake-up call, the iconic consumer advocate highlights the success stories of fellow Americans who organize change and work together to derail the many ways in which wealth manipulates politics, labor, media, the environment and the quality of national life today. Nader makes an inspired case about how the nation canand mustbe democratically managed by communities guided by the U.S. Constitution, not by the dictates of big businesses and the wealthy few. This is classic Ralph Nader, a crystallization of the core political beliefs and commitments that have driven his lifetime of advocacy for greater democracy.

“Ralph Nader is the grand progressive of our time. We overlook his words at our own peril! This book is required reading.”Cornel West

“Ralph Nader’sBreaking Through Poweris a brilliant analysis of corporate power and the popular mechanisms that can be used to wrest back our democracy. No one has been fighting corporate domination longer, or understands it better, than Nader, who will go down in history not only as a prophet but an example of what it means to live the moral life. We disregard his wisdom and his courage at our peril.”Chris Hedges, Pulitzer-Prize winner and author ofWages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt

“People are recognizing that our founding, fundamental values of fairness, justice, and opportunity for allthe very values that define our Americaare being shoved aside to create an un-America of plutocracy and autocracy. Ralph Nader’s new bookBreaking Through Powerprovides progressive boat-rockers with inspiration and a plan for reclaiming America from the greedy Plutocrats and Fat Cats who think democracy is for sale to the highest bidder.”Jim Hightower

“As America’s top Citizen Champion, Ralph Nader has dedicated his life to not just speaking, but activating, truth in the fight against power. InBreaking Through Power, Nader exposes the overriding demolition of daily life caused by plutocracy and elite rule, which is particularly poignant during this election year. With conviction and passionate clarity, and underscoring the simple fact that, ‘People matter, you matter.’ Nader goes beyond delineating the problem and provides a critical prescription to battle the toxicity of unjust powerone that every individual can, and must, embrace.”Nomi Prins, author,All the Presidents’ Bankers

“I read Ralph Nader for the same reasons that I read Tom Paine. He knows what he thinks, says what he means, and his courage is a lesson for us all.”Lewis Lapham

“Nader insists on speaking up for the little people and backs his arguments and decent sentiments with hard facts.”Publishers Weekly

Learn more at BROWN PAPER TICKETS.

***

[Working draft transcript of actual presentation on Monday, October 17, 2016, at St. John’s Presbyterian Church (2727 College Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94705) by Messina for Lumpenproletariat, Ralph Nader Radio Hour, and Pacifica Radio Network.  Transcript produced from audio recording by Messina.] [3]

Ralph Nader: Breaking Through Power: It’s Easier Than We Think
St. John’s Presbyterian Church
Berkeley, CA
Monday, October 17, 2016, 19:30 PDT
—

(opening speaker):  “[snip]  We wish to thank St. John’s Presbyterian Church for this space tonight.  And I also want to acknowledge the congregations in the wider community.  Now, the First Congregational Church, they are hoping with the [inaudible].  KPFA has a very special relationship with the [inaudible] community [inaudible] and feel a special solidarity with them.

“KPFA wrote a letter expressing [inaudible] and solidarity with the congregation.  And KPFA has stepped up [longer] and sponsored [inaudible] for the church.

“So, that church and that community are in [our] hearts.

“A shout out to KPFA’s volunteers and, in particular, the outreach volunteers, who are, faithfully, here, at all our events.  And we thank them [inaudible]. [4]

“So, once again, tomorrow evening the Middle East Children’s Alliance presents, and KPFA co-sponsors, a courageous Ali Abunimah, who will present ‘Turning Point for the Palestine Solidarity Movement: Can Israeli Apartheid Really Be Defeated?‘.  This event takes place at 7pm at the First Congregational Church in Oakland, not Berkeley, Oakland.  (c. 2:08)

“Undoubtedly, you have had tonight’s event, as well as Wednesday’s coming event, on your calendars for some time.  Today, and after tomorrow, October 19th, KPFA hosts Chris Hedges, who will discuss, with David Talbot, Chris’ new book, Unspeakable: On the Most Forbidden Topics In America.  This much anticipated event takes place at the Martin Luther King Middle School in Berkeley [California].  And it commences at 7:30pm.  We’ll have a rich and deep exchange between these two powerful intellectuals.

“Coming up next week, October 25th, you have the opportunity to hear Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Dina Gilio-Whitaker present “All the Real Indians Died Off”: And 20 Other Myths [About Native Americans].  This event takes place right here, at St. John’s [on October 25, 2016 at 7:30pm].  Please do check the KPFA website and check the dates and venues for these events.

“So, coming to you, tonight, Ralph Nader presents [snip].  (c. 3:48)  [Speaker mentioned that there will be a question and answer segment at the end in which Mickey Huff will select from audience questions a few questions for Dr. Nader to address.]

“At the end of the evening, Ralph will sign your copy of your book right here on this stage.

“So, let me tell you a little bit about Mickey [Huff, who will introduce Dr. Ralph Nader].  There’s much to be known about Mickey [such as the fact that he’s a pretty nice musician].  Mickey Huff is the director of Project Censored, a media research, education, and advocacy initiative, that started in 1976 and is currently housed at Diablo Valley College in California.

“Project Censored has expanded to approximately two dozen university and college campuses across the U.S. and has trained over 2,500 students.  And, if you look around, and if the average age of tonight’s audience is a little bit younger, it’s because Mickey Huff has brought several of his Diablo Valley students here tonight [hopefully, not just for extra credit]. [5]  We welcome them here tonight.  [audience applause]  (c. 4:55)

“Mickey is currently a professor of social science and history at Diablo Valley College, where he is co-chair of the History Department.  We, as listeners of KPFA, probably know Mickey as the co-host of the Project Censored show, which airs weekly on KPFA on Friday afternoons [snip].  (c. 5:26)

[snip]  (c. 5:43)

“And, as of this month, 2016, Mickey is the director of the newly-launched Global Critical Media Literacy Project, a social justice and education project.  [snip]  (c. 6:19)

“So, with that, let’s welcome Mickey Huff.  Thank you.”  [audience applause]  (c. 6:20)

MICKEY HUFF, M.A.:  “Good evening, everyone.  [weary audience response]  Good evening, again!  [audience responds more energetically, including your scribe]  That’s what we wanna hear—civic mobilisation!  Right?

“Tonight, it’s a, certainly, an honour, really, and a privilege to be here with all of you and, uh, in Berkeley, California.  And, again, it’s a great honour to be here to, both, introduce and to be in conversation with one of the most important and iconic figures in American history.  And I don’t believe that’s a hyperbolic statement.  I think back at so many things, that Ralph Nader has done in over the last half century, and it’s things, that [teams] of people haven’t been able to do or accomplish, or, or just haven’t wanted to.  And I want to build a little bit on what was just being said.  Of course, it’s kind of a momentous year, here.  And it is the 40th anniversary of the Project Censored and the Media Freedom Foundation. [audience cheering, applause] (c. 7:37)  [snip]   40th Anniversary Summit.  And you’re all invited.  We have a lot of great people, like David Talbot, Mnar Muhawesh.  (c. 7:54)  [snip]  (c. 13:10)

“But Ralph Nader wrote the foreword for our 2015 book.  It’s so gracious for him to do.  And, in it, he had a little, really,  I could say, humorous story.  Of course, it’s not really funny.  But he was talking about how reporters live in a climate of control.  And these cultures promote self-censorship.  And that’s often the case with the White House Press Corps, as they follow these kinds of conformist, self-censorship, kind of habits.

“And these same inhibitions operate on the campaign trails for presidential and congressional candidates.  Establishment reporters fall in a rut of self-restraint and boredom and wait for gaffs.  Even when third-party candidates, or citizens, point out crucial questions, that should be asked, including why candidates unreasonably restrict access by reporters, Ralph writes, or why third-party candidates aren’t allowed in the debates or why they’re relentlessly attacked by the corporate media.  (c. 14:11)   [snip]  (c. 17:30)

DR. RALPH NADER:  [pending]

(c. 1:28:00)  [unstoppable]  “I want action.  [audience applause]  (c. 1:28:43)

“And you’ve been very kind.  But the last thing I want to do, as you leave this gathering, is to say to yourself and to others:  Now, wasn’t that an interesting presentation?  [audience laughter]  I want you to go out with the collective fervour, that’s already in you, enflame it, as a kind of light, that will recapture our Congress, to whom we have given immense constitutional authority, that beats up against us.

“Thank you.  [audience applause] (c. 1:29:15)  [snip]  (c. 1:30:00)

MICKEY HUFF:  “Thank you, Ralph Nader.  [audience applause, cheering]

“There are a lot of questions and comments.  So, thank you to all of you, for your very thoughtful remarks.  (c. 1:30:12)  [snip]

[snip]  (c. 1:53:52)

Learn more about DR. RALPH NADER.

[This transcript will be expanded as time constraints, and/or demand or resources, allow.]

*

huff-nader-conclude-1-img_20161017_213258

huff-nader-breaking-through-power-img_20161017_213304

Dr. Ralph Nader and Mickey Huff conclude the audience Q&A

huff-nader-conclude-3-img_20161017_213300

huff-nader-conclude-4-img_20161017_213302

messina-nader-breaking-through-power-img_20161017_213648

Dr. Ralph Nader and Messina, who got to ask Dr. Nader a question about MMT (modern money theory).  (But, understandably, Dr. Nader couldn’t agree to being quoted for Lumpenproletariat, as he was not familiar with the website.

mickey-huff-at-nader-breaking-through-power-mg_20161017_213457

Project Censored‘s Mickey Huff is always a very accessible and kind person with all KPFA listeners.  This is especially commendable as it is not true, frankly, of all KPFA broadcasters, or broadcasters, generally.

perrine-kelly-tabling-for-kpfa-img_20161017_214018

Perrine Kelly, a longtime stalwart KPFA volunteer is photographed here tabling for KPFA in the lobby of St. John’s Presbyterian Church.  Perrine always has a wry smile for your author whenever we meet around the KPFA community throughout the years.  At one point, post-2007, SaveKPFA, the dominant faction at KPFA had “it in for me”.  Sometimes one may sing:  You’ll never know the hurt I suffered/Nor the pain I rise above/And I’ll never know the same about you/Your holiness or your kind of love/And it makes me feel so sorry…  But that will never be the case with Perrine.  She knows intimately the good and the bad, which we encounter in our collective struggles for free speech media and free speech community.  She is a fine KPFA friend.  It’s always nice to see her and all dedicated KPFA volunteers, who work thanklessly to make KPFA shine as brightly as possible.

***

[1]  The ticket stub reads:  “KPFA RADIO 94.1 FM, CITY LIGHTS BOOKS & PROJECT CENSORED PRESENT”.  But BrownPaperTickets.com simply reads:  “KPFA Radio 94.1 FM Presents”.  Meanwhile, Dr. Ralph Naders’s BreakingThroughPower.org describes a tour of speaking dates around northern California for this week.

[2]  Your author attended in the hopes of posing a question or two to Dr. Ralph Nader, which I did.  Unfortunately, we cannot quote Dr. Nader, as he was ‘not familiar with Lumpenproletariat.org.’  [We’ll contact Dr. Nader for a follow-up question or two.]  Attending KPFA events is also the only way, sometimes, to get the full information presented, as KPFA does not, cannot, or will not, air the full audio of their events for various reasons.

We’ll expand our transcription of the proceedings as time constraints allow.

[3]  $15 (advance tickets).  $18 (door).  This event was sold out; by Monday afternoon, tickets were no longer available online.  Only limited tickets would be available at the door on a first come, first serve basis.  (We got a pair of tickets at the door at approximately 19:34 PDT.  So, we missed the name of the first speaker.  After she concluded her remarks, Mickey Huff delivered a 12-minute introduction of Dr. Ralph Nader.  Dr. Nader was on by about 19:57 PDT.)

[4]  Indeed, it was nice seeing KPFA friends, Perrine Kelly and her partner, the concert violinist, tabling for KPFA in the lobby as well as other friends, such as Virginia Browning, another KPFA stalwart, throughout the audience.  These folks have been thanklessly volunteering for many years and they have borne witness to the disagreements between the various political/editorial factions within KPFA.  These are friends, who’ve been involved for decades in the free speech radio KPFA community, and whom your author has known since at least 2007.  And thanks to Project Censored, tonight’s event featured almost as many younger people as it did elder people.  So, that’s an encouraging sign to see that the free speech radio community will be carried on by generations, which came after the Berkeley Free Speech Movement of the 1960s.  Too often, these free speech radio events seem to, either, only interest the elders, who lived through the 1960s, or somehow only they seem to hear about them.

[5]  Although, the audience did thin out quite a bit at the end of Dr. Ralph Nader’s speech before the Q&A (question-and-answer period at the end).

***

[18 OCT 2016]

[Last modified  12:50 PDT  20 OCT 2016]

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