Wednesday, June 25, 2014

The Climate Justice Movement with Tim DeChristopher

Tim DeChristopher
Tim DeChristopher is an American climate activist and co-founder of the environmental group Peaceful Uprising. On December 19, 2008 Tim disrupted a highly disputed Bureau of Land Management oil and gas lease auction of 116 parcels of public land in Utah's red rock country by successfully bidding on 14 parcels of land (totaling 22,500 acres) for $1.8 million. Tim had no intention to pay the $1.8 million. Tim was removed from the auction by federal agents, taken into custody, and questioned. DeChristopher served 21 months in prison, from July 2011 through April 2013.

Tim DeChristopher, center, stands by
environmental authors Janisse Ray and Bill McKibben
Tim outbid industry giants on land parcels which, starting at $2 an acre, were adjacent to national treasures like Canyonlands National Park. Two months later, incoming Interior Secretary Ken Salazar invalidated the auction. Bidder 70 is a documentary film about Tim DeChristopher and his actions of civil disobedience. In this program, Tim DeChristopher was interviewed by Terrence McNally who is a journalist and radio host.

Tim DeChristopher
"At this point of unimaginable threats on the horizon, this is what hope looks like. In these times of a morally bankrupt government that has sold out its principles, this is what patriotism looks like. With countless lives on the line, this is what love looks like, and it will only grow." ~ From Tim DeChristopher's statement to the court at his sentencing hearing.
Source: Free Forum Q&A - TIM DECHRISTOPHER: Activist, Civil disobedience (bidding) at public lands auction landed him 21 months in prison

Download or Play Tim DeChristopher Part 1
Download or Play Tim DeChristopher Part 2
Download or Play Tim DeChristopher Part 3
Download or Play Tim DeChristopher Part 4


Music includes David Letterman - Environmental Activist Tim DeChristopher, Capitol Steps - Told You So, Judge Haywood Explains His Ruling - Movie Judgement At Nuremberg, David Rovics - The Next Attack, Dr. Janning Commends Haywood's Verdict - Movie Judgement At Nuremberg, Compassionate Conservatives - Guantanamo Bay, Capitol Steps - Pardon Me George, Joan Baez -There but for fortune, Capitol Steps - Hillary's Way, Movie Jesus of Nazareth(1977), Harry Truman 1948, Capitol Steps - Gun Nuts Boasting They Can Open Fire, Harold Ickes - Hoover Dam Dedication, David Rovics - The Village Where Nothing Happened, John McCutcheon - Duct Tape, Tom Paxton - George W. Told The Nation, David Rovics - The Commons, Hugh Birdsall - Bombs Away Lock and Load, Hugh Mundell - Africa Must B Free By 1983, L. Niehaus - Mosaics For Saxophone Quartet

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Happy Birthday Elizabeth Warren!







Elizabeth Ann Warren is an American professor and politician and the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts and a member of the Democratic Party. Elizabeth was previously a Harvard Law School professor specializing in bankruptcy law. Elizabeth is an active consumer protection advocate whose work led to the conception and establishment of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Elizabeth has written a number of academic and popular works, and is a frequent subject of media interviews regarding the American economy and personal finance. June 22 is Elizabeth's birthday.
Source: Elizabeth Warren: Fixing the Banks, Lifting the Middle Class

Download or Play Elizabeth Warren Part 1
Download or Play Elizabeth Warren Part 2
Download or Play Elizabeth Warren Part 3
Download or Play Elizabeth Warren Part 4



Music includes David Rovics - We Just Want The World, Dave Lippman - Teenage Immigrant Welfare Mothers on Drugs, R-Three - That's OK (head out of the sand), David Rovics - Santiago 10000 miles, Capitol Steps - Guantanamo, David Rovics - Sixty Thousand More, Mario Cuomo - 7-16-1984, Capitol Steps - When I'm 84, David Rovics - Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Capitol Steps - The Supremes, Death of Democracy - Movie Network, EVERLAST - I Get By, Holly Near - Singing For Our Lives, Its A Beautiful Day - White Bird, Johnny Cash & Willie Nelson - Folsom Prison Blues, John Williams - Indiana Jones theme song

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Would the world be better off without religion?

Blaise Pascal
In the words of seventeenth-century mathematician, philosopher, physicist and Catholic, Blaise Pascal, “Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.” Does religion breed intolerance, violence, and the promotion of medieval ideas? Or should we concede that overall, it has been a source for good, giving followers purpose, while encouraging morality and ethical behavior?

For the motion: Matthew Chapman who is an author, filmmaker and co-founder of Science Debate and A.C. Grayling who is a renowned atheist and Professor of Philosophy

Against the motion: Dinesh D'Souza who is President of The King's College and author of What's So Great About Christianity and Rabbi David Wolpe who was named the #1 Pulpit Rabbi in America by Newsweek.

Source: intelligence2 Debates: THE WORLD WOULD BE BETTER OFF WITHOUT RELIGION

Download or Play Without Religion Part 1
Download or Play Without Religion Part 2
Download or Play Without Religion Part 3
Download or Play Without Religion Part 4


Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Do Guns Reduce Crime?

What are the causes of violent crime? Many factors have been considered in as the cause of violent crime. Does alcohol or drug use, poverty, lead exposure among children, child abuse, lack of love, poor judgement, violence in the media, poor parenting skills or guns affect crime? Coming up next six people debate if guns reduce crime.
For: Stephen Halbrook
Represents the NRA in suits against the DC and Chicago handgun bans
Halbrook's most recent book is The Founders' Second Amendment. Stephen filed a brief on behalf of over 300 members of Congress in the Supreme Court case of DC v. Heller, and won three Supreme Court cases on firearm issues. Holding a Ph.D. from FSU and J.D. from Georgetown, Stephen other books include Freedmen, the 14th Amendment, & the Right to Bear Arms, That Every Man Be Armed, Target Switzerland, and The Swiss & the Nazis.

For: Gary Kleck
Professor in the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University
Gary's research centers on violence and crime control, focusing on gun control and crime deterrence. Kleck is the author of Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control (1997) and Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America (1991), which won the Michael J. Hindelang Award of the American Society of Criminology in 1993 for making "the most outstanding contribution to criminology" in the preceding three years.

For: John R. Lott
Senior Research Scholar at the University of Maryland
Lott has held positions at the University of Chicago, Yale University, Stanford, UCLA, Wharton, and Rice and was the chief economist at the United States Sentencing Commission during 1988 and 1989. Lott is the author of Freedomnomics: Why the Free Market Works and Other Half-Baked Theories Don’t, The Bias Against Guns and More Guns, Less Crime.


Australian Gun Ban
Against: John J. Donohue
Leighton Homer Surbeck Professor at Yale Law School
Donohue’s recent work has used large-scale statistical studies to estimate the causal impact of law and public policy in a wide range of areas from civil rights and employment discrimination law to the effect of legalized abortion, guns, and the death penalty on crime. Donohue is the empirical editor of the American Law and Economics Review and a research fellow of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Against: Paul Helmke
President of the Brady Campaign/Center to Prevent Gun Violence
The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence is the nation's largest national, non-partisan, grassroots organization leading the fight to prevent gun violence, since mid-July 2006. Prior to this, Helmke was a lawyer in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where he served as mayor from 1988-2000. In the early 1990s Helmke worked with Jim and Sarah Brady to help build support for the Brady Law and the federal Assault Weapons Ban.

Against: R. Gil Kerlikowske
36-year Veteran of Law Enforcement
Kerlikowske was appointed as chief of police for Seattle in August 2000. Kerlikowske served as the police commissioner for Buffalo, New York. He has also worked as a patrol officer, as a detective in narcotics and robbery, and as a hostage negotiator in St. Petersburg, Florida.

Moderator: John Donvan
Author and correspondent for ABC News.
Source: intelligence2: GUNS REDUCE CRIME

Anti-Americanism
Myths Of Anti-Americanism

Peter Slen interviewed Max Paul Friedman about rethinking anti-Americanism. Max Paul Friedman is an associate professor of history at American University and the author of "Rethinking Anti-Americanism."
Source: Book TV at American University: Max Paul Friedman, "Rethinking Anti-Americanism: The History of an Exceptional Concept in American Foreign Relations"

Tehran Removes Anti-US Posters

Download or Play Guns Reduce Crime Part 1
Download or Play Guns Reduce Crime Part 2
Download or Play Guns Reduce Crime Part 3
Download or Play Myths Of Anti-Americanism



Music includes Jack Johnson Feat & Ben Harper - With My Own Two Hands, Poison Girls - Abort the System, Buffalo Springfield - For What It's Worth, Graham Nash - Military Madness, Robert Oppenheimer 1965, Curtis Mayfield - We Got to Have Peace, Gil Scott-Heron - The Bottle, George Carlin - Euphemisms, Meg Ryan - When Harry Met Sally Movie(1989), Kathryn Williams - Why Must We Be So Brutal, Willie Nelson - Whatever Happened To Peace On Earth?, Louis Armstrong - When the Saints Go Marching In, David Rovics - Two Mommies And Two Daddies, Alice Gomez & Madalyn Blanchett & Marilyn Rife - Sacred Flutes