CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Human Rights, Political Prisoner, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Truth to Power
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The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism is Un-American
The men who wrote United States Constitution and the first Ten Amendments to it known as the Bill of Rights were mostly not Christians. America was not created as a Christian country. That is a myth. Nor was it founded on Judeo Christian principles. This is another myth. The founding fathers were deists. They were products of the enlightenment. They did not believe in a god that played any role in human affairs. They understood from European history the terrible consequences of not separating church and state.
Today’s Christian nationalists, evangelicals who are in truth white nationalists, are relentless in their attempts to tear down the wall of separation between church and state guaranteed by the first amendment. They want a theocracy where their fundamentalist religion rule us. These people have substantial political power. They are much of Trump’s base.
Guest – Attorney Andrew Seidel, a Constitutional litigator with the Freedom From Religion Foundation and the author of the just published book The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism is Un-American.
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United States Supreme Court Cases Roundup
The Supreme Court is poised to hear several highly charged disputes as the justices return to the bench in 2020. It promises to be one of the most politically volatile terms in recent memory.
Since October, when the term opened, the court has heard high-profile disputes over LGBT rights in the workplace, the scope of the Second Amendment, and the deportation status of nearly 700,000 young undocumented immigrants.
The remaining cases on the court’s docket are equally explosive. The justices will confront novel separation of powers questions, including whether to release to investigators the financial records of Donald Trump. The Court will be asked to draw new lines between church and state. And for the first time since Trump’s two nominees joined the court, the justices will hear a case on abortion. profvwolfe.com
Guest – Attorney Zachary Wolfe teaches writing at George Washington University in Washington D.C., before which he worked at the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund. Zak is the editor of Farnsworth on Contracts and author of Hate Crimes Law.
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CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Cuba, Guantanamo, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Surveillance, Truth to Power
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- Michael Smith and Guest Host Natasha Bannan Discuss 61st Anniversary of Cuban Revolution
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Venezuelan Embassy Protectors Could Face Fines And Prison
The first week of January 2020 marks the 61st anniversary of the Cuban revolution. The Cuban people now have some of the best healthcare in the world, free education through college, adequate housing, and a high-level of culture.
The attitude of the American government has been one of almost unrelieved hostility including violence and an ongoing economic, financial, and commercial blockade.
Unable to reverse the Cuban revolution United States sought from the beginning to contain its influence. From the 1960s the governments of Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Uruguay and recently Bolivia were overthrown by American sponsored coups because of their friendly position towards Cuba. As of today the Venezuelan government is being targeted by the United States.
In violation of international law in May of 2019, the United States government attempted but failed to overthrow the democratically elected government of Nicolas Madura in Venezuela.
The United States had at that time attempted to install Juan Guida as the president of Venezuela and Guida’s right wing supporters attempted to take over the Venezuelan embassy in Washington DC. Under international law, the embassy is the property of Venezuelan government and is considered untouchable.
A number of Americans, known as the Embassy Protectors, moved in to the embassy to prevent its hostile takeover. The State Department, Secret Service, and the Metropolitan Police force laid seize to the embassy. Electricity and water were cut off. No food was allowed in.
Although the coup against the Maduro government failed the Embassy Protectors were arrested when the US government raided the Venezuelan embassy. Four of the protectors including today’s Law And Disorder guest Attorney Kevin Zeese were arrested and face trial. If convicted they could be fined up to $250,000 and given a one year prison term. Embassy Protectors
Guest – Kevin Zeese is a US lawyer and political activist. He helped organize the 2011 Occupy encampment in Washington DC. Kevin Zeese is currently the co-director of The Organization Popular Resistance.
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U.S. Anti-Immigration and Just Futures Law
Anti-immigrant discourse and policy has defined a large part of the Trump Administration since 2016. We take a look into attacks against immigrants in the United States and related rule making in the last few months.
Guest – Paromita Shah is the Executive Director of Just Futures Law, a new movement lawyering organization dedicated to ending the deportation and mass incarceration industrial complexes. Paromita has spent over 20 years in providing innovative legal and advocacy support to lawyers and legal advocates, grassroots groups and organizers, in the fight against criminalization and immigration enforcement. She has worked to support immigrant communities impacted by policing and immigration enforcement and has worked on issues like immigration detainers, gangs, and technology surveillance.
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CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Human Rights, Political Prisoner
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Center For Constitutional Rights Project: ALEC Attacks
On December of 2019, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the CCR, sued in Arizona a number of Arizona lawmakers who are participating in a closed meetings of the American Legislative Exchange Council known as ALEC. ALEC brings together legislators, corporate leaders, conservative activists, and lobbyists to draft and promote model legislation across the country.
On December 4, 2019 the date the suit was filed, ALEC was holding its annual States and Nations Policy Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona, an elite suburb outside of Phoenix.
The complaint asks the court to find that attendance at the closed door meetings for the purpose of deliberation on legislation with corporations and lobbyists by lawmakers from Arizona violates that states’ open meeting law and asks that all notes and materials from the secretive meetings be made accessible to the public and for legislators to be enjoined from attending these meetings in the future.
Dominic Renfrey of the Center for Constitutional Rights said “ALEC’s pay-to- play model strikes at the very heart of democratic lawmaking. And not surprisingly it is people of color and those on the margins that suffer the most from ALEC’s attacks.”
Bitly/stopalec
Guest – Dominic Renfrey who helped organize the lawsuit. He’s the Advocacy Program Manager at the Center for Constitutional Rights. Dominic focuses on the intersection of corporate abuses in various activity areas, including international human rights law, the Occupied Palestinian Territories, the operations of private military corporations, and the interference of corporations in the operations of state agencies and decision-making bodies.
Guest – Jacinta Gonzalez is the Senior Campaign Organizer of Mijente, a plaintiff in the lawsuit, and a part of the National Immigrants Rights movement.
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The Report Movie And CIA OIG Torture Report
Hosts Heidi Boghosian and Michael Smith talk about the recent film titled The Report where one of the film’s characters plays the Senate investigator who uncovered and documented America’s extensive use of torture.
In the summer of 2009 attorney General Eric Holder appointed special Justice Department prosecutor John Durham to conduct a preliminary investigation into whether federal laws were violated in connection with the interrogation of certain detainees in U.S. custody. In this August 31, 2009 lively first half hour discussion, hosts Michael Ratner, Heidi Boghosian and Michael Smith discuss and detail why the investigation does not go after higher-ups within the US torture program, how tortured confessions are used to support war and that interrogators did not act alone.
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CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Human Rights, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Truth to Power, War Resister
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President Donald Trump, Ukraine, The Bidens And Impeachment
The late critic of American politics Gore Vidal often referred to the United States as the United States of amnesia. Even though it was only five years ago in 2014 that the Obama-Biden administration spent $5 billion to help overthrow the democratically elected government of the Ukraine, this fact is omitted in the mainstream press’ coverage of the current Ukraingate impeachment inquiry that the Democratic Party is conducting in the House of Representatives.
The purpose of the American sponsored overthrow of Ukrainian government it is thought by some observers, was to open up the natural resources of the rich Ukraine to American economic interests and secondly to incorporate the Ukraine into the North American Treaty Organization, the military alliance headed by the USA, which sought to further surround Russia militarily on its western border.
After the overthrow, with Joe Biden as then Vice President, his son Hunter got a position on the Board of Directors of Berksema, the large Ukrainian national gas company. Although he knew nothing about the workings of the gas industry Hunter Biden was paid $600,000 a year.
This is the background to President Donald Trump‘s now famous call to the president of the Ukraine asking him to investigate the Bidens. It has been alleged by the Democrats, but not proven, that Trump withheld $400,000,000 American dollars to purchase American weapons until Ukrainian president Zelensky announced a corruption investigation.
Guest – Aaron Maté is a contributing editor at the nation magazine and has the new Internet show Pushback on The Gray Zone. He won the 2019 Izzy Award for achievement in independent media for his coverage of Russiagate.
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The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and the Chicago Police Murdered A Black Panther
Around 7AM, 50 years ago on December 4, 1969, attorney Jeff Haas was in a police lockup in Chicago, interviewing the fiancée of Fred Hampton. She was telling him how the police pulled her from the room as Fred Hampton lay unconscious on their bed. She heard one officer say, “He’s still alive.” She then heard two shots. A second officer said, “He’s good and dead now.” She looks at Jeff and asked, “What can you do?”
The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and the Chicago Police
Murdered a Black Panther is Haas’s personal account of how he and People’s Law Office partner Flint Taylor went after Hampton’s assassins, and ultimately prevailed over unlimited government resources and an FBI conspiracy. His book isn’t just a story of justice delivered, it also portrays Hampton in a new light as a dynamic community leader and an inspiration in the fight against injustice.
Guest – Jeff Haas is a longtime member of the National Lawyers Guild who has dedicated his career to working for justice. In 1969 he and three other lawyers set up the Peoples Law Office in Chicago, whose clients included the Black Panthers, SDS, and other political activists. Haas went on to handle cases involving prisoners’ rights, police torture, and the wrongfully accused. He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with his wife and children and continues to represent victims of police brutality.
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CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Human Rights, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Truth to Power, War Resister
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CCR Attorney Brings GTMO Cases To Highest International Court
The International Criminal Court was established in 1998 and began sitting in 2002. To date there are 123 countries who have ratified the Rome Statute that created the ICC and participate in it.
The role of the ICC is to bring to justice the world’s worst crimes known to humankind – war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. The United States of America is not one of the 123 countries who participate in this International Court. But it can still be investigated and tried if the crimes it commits were committed in one of the 123 countries.
Guest – Attorney Katherine Gallagher, senior attorney at The Center for Constitutional Rights will be appearing before the ICC in the Hague in Holland on December 4, 2019. Attorney Gallagher will be representing two men currently being held and indefinitely detained in the US offshore prison camp in Guantánamo Cuba. Katherine works on universal jurisdiction and international criminal law cases involving U.S. and foreign officials and torture and other war crimes, and cases involving private military corporations and torture at Abu Ghraib. Her major cases include Al Shimari v. CACI, the international U.S. torture accountability cases, and Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) v. Vatican, seeking accountability for the crimes against humanity of sexual violence by clergy and cover-up.
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In Defense of Julian Assange Book Launch
Margaret Kunstler, Aaron Mate, Nathan Fuller, Amy Goodman, and Barry Pollack spoke about the wrongly prosecuted Julian Assange on the occasion of the recent publication by OR Books of In Defense of Julian Assange composed of 39 authors offering a range of insights and perspectives. The event on November 21, 2019 took place at the home of the late Michael Ratner, Assange’s former attorney. We hear from Margaret Kunstler, Barry Pollack, Nathan Fuller and Amy Goodman.
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Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Human Rights, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Surveillance, Truth to Power, War Resister
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In Defense of Julian Assange
Whistle-blowing truth telling journalist and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange now sits in solitary confinement in London‘s infamous Belmarsh prison. The Trump administration has asked that he be extradited to Virginia for trial as a spy. Today we interview Margaret Kunstler and Tariq Ali who edited and introduce the just published book titled In Defense of Julian Assange. The book demonstrates convincingly what is at stake in his upcoming trial is the future of free journalism, here and abroad.
Julian faces a 175 year sentence under the century old Espionage Act, passed during World War I to be used against spies. He is charged with conspiring with Chelsea Manning to publish the Iraq war logs, the Afghanistan war logs, and State Department cables.
Former CIA director and current Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has called WikiLeaks a “non-state intelligence service.“ Hillary Clinton wanted him assassinated by drone. The United Nations special rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer recently visited him in prison and concluded that indeed he was being tortured. When he last appeared in court he was incoherent and couldn’t remember his name or date of birth.
WikiLeaks was launched by Julian Assange in 2006, three years after Bush and Cheney commenced the illegal catastrophic war against Iraq in 2003.
Julian is a computer genius. He invented a way for publishers like WikiLeaks to receive truth telling information anonymously. The first bombshell he published in 2006 was “The Iraqi war logs.“ He got them from whistle-blower Chelsea Manning who was then in the military. They showed a video of American soldiers in a helicopter committing a war crime by gunning down and executing a number of Iraqi civilians, two Reuter’s journalists, and several children. Then they chuckled about it. A photo of the murders is shown on the book’s cover. This leak, furnished by Chelsea Manning, was devastating to the United States. Other whistle-blower leaks followed. The government became relentless in trying to close down WikiLeaks.
Guest – Margaret Kunstler – a civil rights attorney who has spent her career providing movement support and protecting the rights of activists. A powerful speaker on human rights issues, Kunstler is a consultant to the emerging voices of Occupy Wall Street protesters and Anonymous supporters. Kunstler’s Hell No: Your Right to Dissent in Twenty-First Century America, co-authored with Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights, is the leading handbook for activists today.
Guest – Tariq Ali, writer, journalist and film-maker, born in Lahore and educated at Oxford University. He writes regularly for a range of publications including The Guardian and The London Review of Books. He has written more than a dozen books including non-fiction as well as scripts for both stage and screen.
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Music is Power: Popular Songs, Social Justice and the Will to Change
Throughout U.S. history social justice music has played many roles, from motivating soldiers on their way to war, to inspiring activists fighting police repression during the civil rights movements. In his new book, “Music Is Power” author Brad Schreiber chronicles a century of politically-conscious music, from Pete Seeger through Joan Baez, Bob Marley, the Sex Pistols and to modern-day rap music.
Perhaps associated largely with folk music, social justice music spans a range of musical genres, from rap, heavy metal, reggae, and psychedelia. Schreiber not only shines a spotlight on musicians’ different approaches, from soulful ballads to expressions of anger, but he also tells engaging stories behind the public figures who have brought music into our lives. There are many surprises in his animation of long-time favorites, many of whom overcame obstacles in bringing their messages of social justice to the recording industry and to the airwaves.
Guest – Brad Schreiber – award-winning author, journalist and screenwriter, his previous books include Death in Paradise, Becoming Jimi Hendrix, and Revolution’s End. He has received fellowships and awards from the National Press Foundation, Edward Albee Foundation, International Book Awards, Independent Publisher Book Awards and Los Angeles Press Club.
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