Month: September 2008

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Bailing Out Out Wall Street: Deregulation of banking and finance was a reckless move, and   DOUG HENWOOD has some ideas about a better bailout.
Doug writes for the Left Business Observer and The Nation, where his piece “Crisis of a Guilded Age” appears in the new issue.

Also: Why do Obama – and McCain — think the US can win in Afghanistan? ROBERT FISK of The Independent says “The Taliban are better trained, and – said to say – increasingly tolerated by the local civilian population.” 
Fisk has been covering the Middle East for 32 years and has received the British Press Awards’ International Journalist of the Year award seven times.  His new book is The Age of the Warrior.

Plus: The Burning of Grapes of Wrath: John Steinbeck’s 1939 novel about Okies moving to California in the depths of the Depression is an American classic – 15 million copies have been sold. But in Kern County, the book was publicly burned, and banned from the library shelves.  RICK WARTZMAN tells that story – his hew book is OBSCENE IN THE EXTREME: The Burning and Banning of John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath.
Rick will be speaking Thurs Oct 2 at 7pm at Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena.

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The Wall Street Bailout: “Wall Street is vanishing before our eyes,” HAROLD MEYERSON says, and “Wall Street’s investment banks plainly deserve to die.”  Harold is executive editor of The American Prospect and op-ed columnist for the Washington Post.

Plus: Echoes of Nixon in the McCain campaign: McCain’s transition director, William Timmons, was Assistant to the President in the Nixon White House – he worked on the John Lennon deportation effort; and is Sarah Palin the next Spiro Agnew?  RICK PERLSTEIN will comment – his new book is Nixonland.  Rick will be speaking at the Nixon Library in Yorba Linda at 730pm on Wednesday.

Also: The next American war: Pakistan?  After the Marriott bombing in Islamabad, Obama and McCain both want more US strikes into Pakistan.  TARIQ ALI says the “effects on Pakistan could be catastrophic, creating a severe crisis within the army and in the country at large. The overwhelming majority of Pakistanis are opposed to the U.S. presence in the region, viewing it as the most serious threat to peace.”  Tariq’s new book is The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power. 
Watch Tariq on TomDispatch video. READ Tariq in The Guardian.

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Wall Street’s Epic of Destruction: WILLIAM GREIDER of The Nation will comment
– he says “What is being swept away is the monumental arrogance of celebrated financiers, and the fraudulent gimmicks that created lots of new billionaires by selling bad paper to the world’s investors.”

Iraq: the Forever War.  DEXTER FILKINS has covered the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001 for the New York Times.  Robert Stone noted “The contrast of his eloquence and humanity with the shameless snake-oil salesmanship employed by the American government.”  Filkins describes “an arid, hopeless policy” in an unforgettable book: The Forever War.
Dexter Filkins will be speaking at the downtown LA Public Library ALOUD series Thurs 9/18 at 700pm.

Plus: Moral relativism: who are we to judge other cultures?  What makes us think our standards should apply to everybody in the world — Isn’t that the problem with fundamentalist religions of all types?  On the other hand: do we live in a different world from Sarah Palin – or is it okay for us to make moral judgments about her?  STEVEN LUKES will explain – he teaches social theory at NYU and his new book is Moral Relativism.

More stuff to read: my new piece on McCain, Nixon and John Lennon at TheNation.com.

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Tracking polls show McCain taking the lead nationally in the last few days, and the ABC/Washington Post poll shows white women favoring McCain 52-41 since he picked Sarah Palin to be his running mate.  The Obama camp points to the electoral vote polls which still show him ahead 243-179, with 116 tossup.  HAROLD MEYERSON will comment – he’s executive editor of the American Prospect and op-ed columnist for the Washington Post.

Plus: The forces of repression were all too evident in St. Paul last week at the Republican National Convention.  The arrest of Amy Goodman and her producers was only the tip of the iceberg.  We’ll speak with Chuck Samuelson, head of the ACLU of Minnesota, about the violations of constitutional freedoms, and the legal efforts to redress those offenses.
Watch video from CityPages of police attacking journalists

Also: A reporter investigates his own past as a drug addict: DAVID CARR of the New York Times looked up police reports and medical files and interviewed dealers and fellow junkies to find out what he did during his “detour into narcotics” in Minneapolis.  His book is The Night of the Gun: A Reporter Investigates the Darkest Story of His Life: His Own— it’s a recovery narrative like no other (which also has an amazing web site).  David also went back to St. Paul last week to report on politics at the state fair and on the police attacks on Rage Against the Machine concerts.

More stuff to read: my new piece at TheNation.com, “Sarah Palin and the Jews.”

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“The Dark Side” – that’s where Dick Cheney said we would have to go to “achieve our objectives” in the White House’s war on terror.  JANE MAYER has been investigating what “the dark side” really means.   Her conclusion: “the dark side” violated the constitution and American freedoms, and also made it harder to pursue Al Qaeda.  Jane Mayer’s new book is THE DARK SIDE: The Inside Story of how the War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals.  She’s a staff writer for The New Yorker and award-winning author of books about Ronald Reagan and Clarence Thomas.

Plus: Your Minnesota Moment:
The Republicans are convening in St. Paul, trying to deal with the media sharks circling around John McCain’s vice-presidential pick Sarah Palin — and her pregnant unmarried 17-year-old daughter, her Troopergate scandal, the fact that she was for the bridge to nowhere before she was against it, and her status as the least qualified major party vice presidential candidate in modern history.  JOHN NICHOLS will comment from inside the convention hall in St. Paul — he is Washington correspondent for The Nation, and writes “The Beat” blog at TheNation.com.  He says the convention “is Palin’s party, not McCain’s.”