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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 4, 2019
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Government Shut Down Impacts
President Donald Trump set a record for the longest-ever government shutdown in history lasting nearly 35 days. There are many ways that the public will feel the impact of a government shutdown. 800,000 federal workers were either barred from working or forced to work without pay. That, despite the continued operation of so called essential services – many of which relate to public safety – that continued to operate. In prior shutdowns these have included border protection, in-hospital medical care, air traffic control, law enforcement, and power grid maintenance.
In 1996, for example, more than 10,000 Medicare applicants were turned away each day of the shutdown. In 2013, the Environmental Protection Agency halted site inspections to 1,200 different sites that included hazardous waste, drinking water, and chemical facilities. The Food and Drug Administration delayed almost 900 inspections.
We examine some of the lesser-reported impacts from the most recent government shutdown such as cybersecurity and food and chemical testing.
Guest – Attorney Melanie Benesh – As EWG’s Legislative Attorney, Melanie provides legislative and regulatory analysis of federal food, farm and chemical law. Melanie grew up in Omaha and received her B.A. from Marquette University. After college, she worked as a research assistant studying Fair Trade coffee in Chiapas, Mexico, and later as a community organizer for Voces de la Frontera in Milwaukee.
Guest – Larry Loeb has written for many of the last century’s major “dead tree” computer magazines, having been, among other things, a consulting editor for BYTE magazine and senior editor for the launch of WebWeek. He has written a book on the Secure Electronic Transaction Internet protocol. His latest book has the commercially obligatory title of Hack Proofing XML. Securitynow.com
Law and Disorder January 28, 2019
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Honoring the Legacy Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Today on Law and Disorder we bring you a special hour-long program honoring the life and legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King. Our listeners know all too well that the Nobel Peace Prize laureate was shot on April 4, 1968–51 years ago. Not so well known is the radical Dr. King, who said in the last months of his life that:
“Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world, declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo.”
Joining us are special guests Ruby Sales, a colleague of Dr. King’s and co-founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee; and Rev. Dr. Emma Jordan-Simpson, Executive Director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation (F.O.R.). We’re also joined by author and activist Matt Meyer, a board member of the AJMI.
Dr. King began close ties with A.J. Muste and with the F.O.R. during the Montgomery bus boycott, when FOR staff members Bayard Rustin and Glenn Smiley came to Alabama to support local efforts nonviolently challenging racial segregation. Dr. King developed a special relationship with former FOR chairman A.J. Muste, whose absolute pacifism King had, as a theological seminary student, questioned.
Before heading F.O.R., Muste was a prominent labor leader, helping to found the militant Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). And Dr. King, of course, was killed exactly one year after taking a staunch anti-Vietnam war position and in the midst of supporting a significant strike of sanitation workers, linking—as he had been—issues of race, class, and violence as King deepened his critique of the roots of oppressive U.S. society.
Guest – Ruby Sales is the founder and director of the “SpiritHouse Project”, a national organization that uses the arts, research, education, action and spirituality to bring diverse peoples together to work for racial, economic and social justice as well as for spiritual maturity. A life-long organizer, scholar and public theologian in the areas of civil, gender and other human rights, she was a member of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee and served as national convener of the Make Every Church A Peace Church movement.
Guest – Rev. Dr. Emma Jordan-Simpson is the Executive Pastor of The Concord Baptist Church of Christ, Brooklyn, NY. She has combined pastoral ministry with the social justice community. The former Executive Director of the Children’s Defense Fund she is now the Executive Director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation.
Guest – Matt Meyer is Secretary-General of the International Peace Research Association, Chair of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation’s Financial Advisory Committee, Africa Support Network Coordinator of the War Resisters International, and Senior Research Scholar at U-Mass Amherst. As current National co-chair of FOR and former Chair of the War Resisters League, he is second only to AJ Muste in holding the top post of those two historic US peace organizations. He is author of the recently published White Lives Matter Most And Other “Little” White Lies.
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Law and Disorder January 21, 2019
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White Lives Matter Most And Other “Little” White Lies
In a society in which entrenched racism persists, is it possible for white activists to meaningfully engage in anti-racist movements such as the movement for black lives?
Longtime peace activist, educator and author Matt Meyer examines that question in his new book White Lives Matter Most And Other “Little” White Lies. As we honor the life and legacy of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. we talk with Matt Meyer of whom Cornell West says “this legendary freedom fighter brings together the best of the peace movement and the best of the anti-racism movement. “
Guest – Matt Meyer is the International Peace Research Association representative at the United Nations, the national co-chair of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, and the War Resisters’ International Africa Support Network Coordinator. A noted educator, author, and organizer, Meyer focuses on an extensive range of human rights issues including support for political prisoners; solidarity with Puerto Rico, the Black Liberation movement and all decolonization movements; and bringing an end to patriarchy, militarism, and imperialism.
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Attorney Angela Davis: Arbitrary Justice
“In the halls of justice”, it has been quipped, “the only justice you find is in the halls.” H. Rap Brown, a leader of SNCC, the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee, said that justice in America means “just us”. There are 2.3 million people in American prisons today. A great proportion of them are African-Americans. If you assume Europe has the same social situation that we do in America, it is a telling fact that we have seven times as many prisoners. Part of the explanation for this phenomenon, In addition to the racist nature of the United States of America, is the power that the American prosecutor has. It is the power to choose whom to prosecute and for what crime. It is the power to obtain convictions, not to seek justice. It is a power that is discretionary and open to abuse. This abuse is rarely reviewable or punished.
Guest – Attorney and Professor Angela J. Davis author of Arbitrary Justice: The Power of the American Prosecutor. Her most recent book “Policing the Black Man” covers the key issues of the Black Lives Matter movement. Angela J. Davis, professor of law at American University Washington College of Law, is an expert in criminal law and procedure with a specific focus on prosecutorial power and racism in the criminal justice system. Davis previously served as director of the D.C. Public Defender Service, where she began as a staff attorney representing indigent juveniles and adults. She also served as executive director of the National Rainbow Coalition and is a former law clerk of the Honorable Theodore R. Newman, the former Chief Judge of the D.C. Court of Appeals. Davis is the author of Arbitrary Justice: The Power of the American Prosecutor
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