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Law and Disorder is a weekly independent civil liberties radio program airing on more than 150 stations and on Apple podcast. Law and Disorder provides timely legal perspectives on issues concerning civil liberties, privacy, right to dissent and practices of torture exercised by the US government and private corporations.
Law and Disorder February 10, 2020
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Prejudential: Black America and the Presidents
America was settled and set up as a slave owning country. When it broke free of England it was finally able to expand westward, across the Appalachian mountains, committing genocide against the native Indian population. This is the sordid and hidden root history that truth telling historians have revealed to us.
In her new book Prejudential: Black America and the Presidents, author Margaret Kimberley explores America’s relationship with race through the lens of the presidents who have been chosen to represent all the people.
Ten of the 12 initial presidents of the USA were slave owners. Andrew Jackson, whose picture graces our twenty dollar bill, was an Indian killer. Lincoln was never an abolitionist. He wanted America for white people only and had a plan to send the formerly enslaved out of the country. One such plan briefly came to fruition in Haiti.
What about Presidents Roosevelt, Johnson, Clinton and Obama? Were they more sympathetic to the interest of black Americans?
Guest – Margaret Kimberley, a New York-based writer and activist. She has been an editor and senior columnist for Black Agenda Report since it’s inception in 2006. She is a contributor to the anthology In Defense of Julian Assange.
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Unchained At Last: Unarrange A Marriage; Rearrange A Life
Worldwide, increasing numbers of women and men are putting off marriage until they are older. Many are forgoing it altogether. In Denmark, for example, among women in their late 30s or early 40s, 29 percent are unmarried. That’s true for 18 percent in Italy, 22 percent in Lebanon; and 32 percent in Libya.
That’s why the following statistic is so shocking: Each year, before they reach the age of 18, 12 million girls will marry. It happens in every country, and cuts across religions, ethnic, and cultural divides. Over 650 million women alive today were married as girls.
Child marriage is a human rights violation. It places girls’ well-being and personal development at risk. Child brides are often isolated and feel disempowered. They are deprived of their fundamental rights to health, education and safety. Children aren’t physically or emotionally ready to become wives and mothers.
They have heightened health risks, from life-threatening complications in pregnancy and childbirth, to being victims of domestic violence or of contracting HIV/AIDS. They have limited access to education and economic opportunities, and a higher chance of living in poverty.
Guest – Fraidy Reiss, the founder and executive director of Unchained at Last. The nonprofit helps girls and women plan escapes from forced marriages and then rebuild their lives.
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Law and Disorder February 3, 2020
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Attorneys-Activists Supporting The Defense of Julian Assange
A recent Washington Post op-ed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden connected Brazilian prosecutors’ recent decision to file charges against American investigative journalist Glenn Greenwald with the U.S. government’s efforts to prosecute WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Snowden wrote, in part, “The most essential journalism of every era is precisely that which a government attempts to silence. These prosecutions demonstrate that they are ready to stop the presses—if they can.”
Snowden is among many who have spoken out since Greenwald was charged with cybercrime on January 21. Members of the press and human rights advocates have called his prosecution an attempt to intimidate and retaliate against him and The Intercept for critical reporting” about officials in Brazilian President Bolsonaro’s government.
Both Snowden and Greenwald serve on the board of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. Listeners will recall that Greenwald is one of the journalists to whom Snowden leaked classified materials in 2013.
Snowden, who has lived with asylum protection in Russia since 2013, noted that although even some of Greenwald’s critics have recently supported him, Julian has not experienced such solidarity. The Courage Foundation, though, is advocating on his behalf and running his defense fund as he languishes in a London prison, under conditions that have raised global alarm, while he fights against extradition to the United States. DefendWikileaks.org
Guest – Attorney Debbie Hrbek, founder of Hrbek Law, is working other legal organizations in the defense of Julian Assange. Hrbek Law represents creative professionals, entrepreneurs and artists, including independent labels, writers and managers.
Guest – NYC attorney Nathan Fuller, Executive Director of the Courage Foundation.
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Senate Impeachment Trial Analysis
The Democrats appear to have failed in their effort to remove President Donald Trump from office. The Republicans hold a 53 to 47 majority in the Senate, which is trying Trump. A joke going around is that even if Trump shot a senator on the Senate floor he would still win acquittal by a vote of 53 to 47, unless he shot a Republican. Then the vote would be 52 to 47
Trump was charged with withholding congressionally approved military aid to the Ukraine and trying to enlist help from the president of the Ukraine if he, the Ukrainian president, announced a corruption investigation of Joe Biden.
Secondly, Trump is charged with obstruction of justice because of Trump’s not cooperating with the Democratic Party investigation. The Democrats went after Trump on the narrowest of grounds. Trump’s corruption and war crimes were ignored. Trump’s lawyers defended him on the grounds that even if true he did nothing wrong. Then they asserted that a sitting president can block witnesses at his own impeachment trial, an authoritarian notion that destroys the checks and balances system of our constitution.
The failure of the Democrats to impeach Trump will certainly benefit Trump in the upcoming election.
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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Law and Disorder January 27, 2020
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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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