AlternativeRadio

The great African American sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois in his 1903 classic book, The Souls of Black Folk, wrote, “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.” Well, here we are in the 21st century and the color line and racial injustice remain front and center. Some white people have acknowledged racism as a major issue. Others when challenged are defensive and uncomfortable. The murder of George Floyd brought out multi-racial demonstrations against police...

White privilege. What’s that? White people have choices and advantages simply because of the color of their skin. Many whites are unaware of it. Peggy McIntosh, a noted women’s studies scholar in her classic essay “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Backpack,” wrote: “I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance on my group. I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on...

Is it starry-eyed to think about not just regime change but something much larger: system change? The systemic failures of the current crisis and the calamitous fissures it has exposed has raised the question of the efficacy of reform, half-measures and tinkering around the edges. When under duress, the system is agile enough to make some concessions while crucially leaving the fundamental structures of power intact. From the outside systems can look invincible and impregnable. Just tell...

The five biggest corporations in the world by market value are Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Facebook. Their head honchos the Zuckerbergs, Gates and Bezos make the Vanderbilts, Morgans and Carnegies of the Gilded Age look like pikers. These “masters of mankind” as Adam Smith called them, love to pay lip service to competition. But you know what? They want absolute domination and control. Monopoly is not a board game for them, it is the essence of their very being. And they rely on...

What will tomorrow bring in the age of COVID-19? There is so much uncertainty. Arundhati Roy sees an opportunity. She writes, “Whatever it is, coronavirus has made the mighty kneel and brought the world to a halt. And in the midst of this terrible despair, it offers us a chance to rethink the doomsday machine we have built for ourselves. Nothing could be worse than a return to normality. Historically, pandemics have forced humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew. This one...

Can you believe it? A hundred thousand U.S. dead and counting. The real number according to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the leading infectious disease expert, is “almost certainly higher.” A World Health Organization official warns that the coronavirus may become endemic, i.e., like HIV, “it may never go away.” Science writer and author Sonia Shah states, “Over the past fifty years, more than three hundred infectious pathogens have either emerged or reemerged, appearing in places where they’ve never...

The standard narrative about the current crisis is that the coronavirus pathogen triggered an economic collapse. But what is crucially ignored is that neoliberal capitalism was already weak and stressed out, a pre-existing condition, if you will. That systemic weakness went into freefall when the pandemic hit. In its long history, capitalism has produced many booms and busts but this period, particularly since Reagan, has produced spectacular inequalities in wealth and income. Tens of...

It should be abundantly clear that part of the president’s m.o., almost an article of faith, is never accept responsibility when things go wrong. It’s always someone else’s fault: Pelosi, the media, the WHO, Obama, China, immigrants. And if you criticize the leader expect retaliation. Just ask Rick Bright, a top government scientist who was removed from his job he says because he opposed the president’s touting of hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malarial drug, as a coronavirus treatment. He has...

The term corporation is not in the Constitution, yet this entity has emerged over the years as the most dominant force in society. Although never oppressed like women and minorities, corporations have fought to win equal rights under the Constitution. Today, they have nearly all the same rights as ordinary people. Corporations have waged a persistent campaign to expand their power and to strike down regulation. They have systematically pursued and won legal privileges through the courts,...

What kind of bizarre twilight zone world are we in? The coronavirus pandemic is a global altering moment. It has exposed huge fissures of vulnerability. The dead from COVID-19 in the U.S. now exceeds Vietnam War levels. The health crisis has triggered an economic crisis. Tens of millions have lost their jobs in the largest mass unemployment since the Great Depression. The bread lines of the 1930s have turned into car lines as people wait for hours to get some free food. The lack of...

The conflict over Palestine is a century-long war involving a settler-colonial movement–Zionism–which succeeded in forming a national entity–The State of Israel. The term settler colonialism may not be well known but it accurately describes what has happened to multiple regions of the world from Ireland to Canada and from New Zealand to Palestine where indigenous populations have been subjugated and displaced. In the case of Palestine, the Zionist movement was supported by superpowers, first...

Today, fear stalks the globe. The grim reaper is taking a heavy toll. The coronavirus pandemic has led to many thousands of deaths and tremendous economic dislocation. In this climate of fear, authoritarian regimes from Saudi Arabia to Hungary, from Russia to Turkey, from Iran to the Philippines use the crisis as a pretext to curtail civil liberties, expand police power and surveillance, silence their opponents, settle old scores, muzzle the press and jail dissidents. The pattern repeats in...

CIA skullduggery is legendary from overthrowing governments to germ warfare to assassinations but its MK-Ultra program may be at the top of the list. MK-Ultra was the code name for the top-secret CIA project in which the Agency conducted hundreds of clandestine experiments, often on unwitting people, to assess the potential use of LSD and other drugs for mind control and psychological torture. MK-ULTRA, was essentially a continuation of experiments that began in Japanese and German...

The COVID-19 coronavirus disease pandemic has cast in deadly high relief that the United States, the richest country on Earth has a dysfunctional health care system. One should not even call it a system. “It’s unimaginable,” a CNN anchor commented upon seeing footage of hospital tents in New York’s Central Park and a refrigerator truck loading up corpses in Brooklyn. The reports of shortages of everything from testing kits to ventilators to masks to gloves to hospital beds boggle the mind....

After 40 years the economic doctrine of neoliberalism has reached a dead end. But not for everyone. The 500 richest people in the world, all of whom are billionaires, gained a combined $1.2 trillion in wealth in 2019. Advocates of neoliberalism preach a kind of economic fundamentalism, i.e., markets rule, tax cuts for the rich, deregulation, privatization and austerity. As Ganesh Sitaraman in The Nation magazine reports, "Neoliberal policies created gaping inequality, unleashing the...

The coronavirus pandemic has sent waves of fear across the globe. It is a dangerous moment. We are benumbed by the dizzying statistics of new cases and the number of deaths popping up all over the world. What is it? It is a novel virus named for the crownlike spikes that protrude from its surface. It can infect both animals and people and can cause various illnesses and can be fatal. How contagious is it? Very. The top government infectious disease expert says “We’re at a critical point now....

The Declaration of Independence declared equality as an American ideal, but it took a century to even partially realize that goal. One of the key periods of U.S. history is Reconstruction. They were the years following the Civil War. The era began with promises of egalitarianism. The 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution were revolutionary. They abolished slavery, guaranteed all persons due process and equal protection of the law, and gave black men the right to vote. In a few...

In 2018, the birth rate in the United States reached its lowest level in decades. This alarmed the patriarchal class that wants to control women’s bodies. Reproductive rights and access to abortion are under sustained political attack. Roe v. Wade is under threat. What role does misogyny play in gender relations? Feminist activists assert that declining birth rates represent a work slowdown, or strike, in the face of the poor conditions for those who do the work of bearing and raising...

From hanging chads in Florida, to purged voter rolls in Ohio to the Iowa caucus debacle, democracy is in trouble. The venerable system is in the ICU. There is still a pulse but the long term prognosis is not good. There are serious structural problems. Can anyone say electoral college or why elections are held on a workday? And then of course there is money. And the media. The experts sit around tables opining on who is surging and who is fading. It’s more like horseracing trying to handicap...

Rabbi Michael Lerner says many on the left are too quick to dismiss people who are religious. To reach people you disagree with, you can’t be condescending and arrogant. Is it possible to reach out to those who espouse views that are diametrically opposed to ours? How to do that? How can we navigate the treacherous currents that are running through our politics and by extension into our personal lives? What is the intersection of faith, politics and the left? 2CDs. Interviewed by David...