The right-wing war on education is well-documented. The battleground extends from elementary and middle school all the way up to Harvard and Columbia. Books have been cut from curricula and pulled from school library shelves. Teachers have been fired. Schools that teach critical race theory and diversity, equity, and inclusion are being threatened with defunding. The radical right wants to control what is being taught. They want to turn the educational system into an indoctrination machine. Their goal includes plans to abolish the Department of Education. Students who peacefully protest and exercise their First Amendment rights have been, in some cases, suspended, expelled, and even denied their diplomas. Some international students have had their visas cancelled and may face deportation. Jesse Hagopian says what’s at stake is the freedom to expose injustice and to tell the truth.
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[Noam Chomsky] The Right Turn
The U.S. is an imperial power. After World War II, it emerged as the global hegemon. The right turn accelerates under Reagan and continues today. Its salient features are a massive transfer of resources from the poor to the rich, an increase in state power and an aggressive interventionist foreign policy enabled by a huge military apparatus with bases all over the world. The empire’s activities are hidden under layers of deceit and subterfuge. A sophisticated propaganda system keeps the public basically unaware. No one has done more to expose actual U.S. domestic and foreign policy than Noam Chomsky. Recorded at the University of Colorado.
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[Bill McKibben] The Clean Energy Revolution
2024 was the hottest year ever recorded. 2025 will probably be even worse. Our planet is heating up. If present trends continue, a UN panel of scientists says it would be “disastrous for humankind.” Fossil fuels, including coal, are major contributors to global warming. So, what is the regime in Washington doing about it? It’s promoting fossil fuels with its mantra-like chants “Clean, Beautiful Coal” and “Drill Baby, Drill.” However, energy from the sun and wind is cheaper, more reliable, and better for the climate. And it’s growing faster than any energy source in history. Bill McKibben says, “Our liberation and our destruction are arriving at precisely the same time. Everything is going wrong, except this one big thing. Our species, at what feels like a dark moment, can take a giant leap into the light. Of the sun.”
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[Nader Hashemi] Gaza, Israel & the United States
Official U.S. policy in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is one of being the great enabler for Israel. A new study from the Cost of War Project at Brown University finds that the Biden and Trump regimes in the last two years have given Israel $21.7 billion in military aid. In addition, Washington extends crucial diplomatic and political support to Israel. Omar Shakir of Human Rights Watch says, "When you talk about double standards in international law and human rights, the United States is at the top of the list.” There’s one set of rules for the master and his allies, in this case, Israel, and another for everyone else. The Israeli genocidal assault on Gaza has turned it into a slaughterhouse. The likelihood of a viable Palestinian state seems distant.
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[David Korten] The Future of Humanity
We are at a dangerous moment in human history. Philosopher and thinker David Korten says, “We stand at a crossroads between two possible futures. In one future, we continue on the path of separation and likely bring the human chapter of creation’s journey to an untimely end. In the other future, we find our rightful place as responsible, loving members of the Earth community in an ecological civilization, helping to guide creation’s journey into a future of harmony and new possibilities.” The choice could not be more profound. It is, in a real sense, a test of what it truly means to be human.
Alternative Radio is an "unembedded" weekly one-hour public affairs program offered free to all public radio stations in the US, Canada, Europe, South Africa, Australia, and on short-wave on Radio for Peace International. AR provides information, analyses and views that are frequently ignored or distorted in other media. Visit alternativeradio.org for the complete catalog.
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