Politics, News and Opinion from a Liberal in MN — Visit Climate Files Radio at http://www.climatefilesradio.com for more enviromental, climate change and political news from this podcaster.

Civilianism #78 / Which Direction?

Which direction will the U.S. take in the next four years? Will we do the right thing and leave these wars behind and do what’s good for America, or continue to sink money and blood into foolish military campaigns?
This podcast discusses Iraq, Afghanistan, militarism, climate, congressman Waxman’s new job, and more. Audio clips of Cindy Sheehan, mystic Caroline Myss, Michael T. Klare and even Jerry Springer are played.

The U.S. obsession with tasers is spreading to England, which is a terrible idea!
Antiwar.com has Iraq war news.
Read about H.Res. 1531 here, introduced by Congressman Nadler:

Introduced on 11/20/08 — This is the first resolution urging President Bush not to pardon senior administration officials for crimes the President authorized. It urges Congress to investigate those crimes and any pardons relating to those crimes, and urges the Attorney General (current or future) to appoint an Independent Counsel to prosecute those crimes.

The Interview with American author and mystic, Caroline Myss, from New Dimensions, which has podcasts here.
Cindy Sheehan’s interview is from the Jeff Farias show.
Safe Climate or Endless War? It’s a choice we will have to make soon, because we can’t fight climate change smartly and terrorism militarily at the same time.

The Radio Ecoshock show with the Michael T. Klare (author of new book “Rising Powers, Shrinking World”) can be found here.
For a very irritating pro-war attitude, see James Cartwright: Perpetual war speech last week at the MOAA

The AccoLade, a Saudi “girl band” website is a on Myspace here.

Download this episode here or subscribe on the right.

Music played: In this Moment: Beautiful Tragedy (from the Podsafe Music Network) and Hero’s Song by Brendan James from the music of Body of War.

Civilianism #77 / Islamoracism and our National Addiction

Filed under: Democrats, Election 2008, News and Politics, Podcasts — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — shellius @ 5:46 pm November 19, 2008

The U.S., according to journalist Chris Hedges, is addicted to war and the dehumanization of an Other. This has serious consequences in the form of collateral damage, which is what his latest book is about. Our war on terror is actually a war on people, because the numbers of civilian dead is climbing, and our next president has said he wants to escalate the war in Afghanistan instead of end it. That means we have to step up our efforts at organizing for peace and pressuring our government to give up seeking revenge and start to focus on a peaceful future.

Who is Eric Holder? Obama’s new Attorney General.

Chris Hedges talks about the Iraq war and his new book about Collateral Damage.
You can see the entire Miami Book TV event from last week at CSPANjunkie.

Obama advisers: Bush era war criminals will walk.

Obama: Warming must be tackled now.
Good speech! This ones gives me real hope for the future.

Congress has fast-track power to Kill Bush rules.
Good! I hope they come through and do it.

What is Islamofascism? It’s a meaningless made-up word that racist people use to justify all sorts of bad attitudes towards people who are from the Middle East or Muslim. It’s a way to demonize them and justify our being at war with them. We have to make sure this war in Afghanistan stops as soon as possible because we are spreading terrorism instead of stopping it and it’s just plain immoral to be trying to solve problems by bombing people. Time to evolve. We need to convince President Obama to end the war in Afghanistan even as he is bringing soldiers out of Iraq, before they are redeployed. It’s time to start to get invovled in a real peace movement, one that looks at the root cause of terrorism and fights it as the crime that it is, not a dehumanizing war where we drop bombs on civilians. Collateral damage is not acceptable now and it never was. (There is no such thing as “avenging” 9/11, no matter what Rachel Maddow says.) An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind.

This episode also covers news about Obama, the Iraq status of forces agreement, automakers headed for bankruptcy, the G20 summit and more. You can download it here or subscribe on the right.

Take action on the bailout issue by visiting Break the Bailout by visiting http://www.BreakTheBailout.com — we need to show Congress that we will hold them accountable.

Music by American Sex Machine, Little Green Bag and Michael Franti, The Future

Civilianism #76 / Veterans, War is Poison

Congrats to our new President-elect Obama! It will be interesting to see how his presidency shapes up in the coming weeks. But remember, he isn’t the president yet, so technically he can’t be blamed for anything yet either.

Recorded on Veterans Day. Although I am against American militarism, and even though I feel there are far better and more honorable ways to serve your country than by harming other people and destroying their country, I wish all veterans well, especially the anti-war veterans who have realized the truth.

Lawrence Velvel on our new president-elect and his policy on Afghanistan: Read here.

Download this podcast here or subscribe on the right.

From The Real News Network: More U.S. missile strikes kill civilians in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Pakistan and Afghanistan are moving backwards instead of forwards. The U.S. can no longer help militarily because we are creating new terrorists by our actions. Read here

The interview from Alternative Radio is Andrew Bacevich, who wrote “The New American Militarism” in 2005. The interview is from 2006 and he gives a historical perspective on the history of how Americans relate to their military and the MIC.

Wall Street Journal: Intelligence policy to stay largely intact under Obama? Read here.

G20 Finance Ministers Call for Growth and Stability. Read here.
Guido Mantega warns that emerging economies are tired of appearing at meetings with industrialized countries only to be allowed to “drink coffee.”

OMB Watch article on what bush is doing with new rules and regulations.
Midnight at the White House: Bush Using Rules to Cement Legacy

Obama and Iran comments from Informed Comment . Why is he still talking tough on Iran?

IPS News US/IRAQ We have to share this pain
by Dahr Jamail

Winter Soldier: Eyewitness Accounts of War

Civilianism #75 / Regime Change and Interview

Regime Change 2008! On Tuesday, if everyone gets out and votes, everything changes. For the better! Interview with Independence Party Senate candidate, former Senator Dean Barkley of Minnesota*. Then, a discussion of the election and a message from Noam Chomsky from The Real News. Remember to VOTE on November 4th and vote your conscience. Just avoid the line with McCain’s name on it.

*This is a slightly abbreviated interview. For the entire interview go to this page and download the whole thing. Here is the Independence Party (of MN) website and here is Dean Barkley’s website.

I also explain what happened to my interview with Rosa Clemente of the Green Party and why I have retracted my support for the Green Party presidential ticket this year.

Download this podcast here or subscribe on the right.

THIS is our year for regime change and the whole world is watching!

I would love to hear from you about your voting experience this year. Was it easy or tough, optimistic or dismal? Send me your reports and I will read them or play them in the next podcast. Call my Skype voicemail — 320-300-4273 — with your reports and comments.

Music from the Pisshead Blues Band. The two songs are called 1) Timecard and 2) Need to Know.