Green & Red: Podcasts for Scrappy Radicals

Indigenous women led movements have continued to disrupt the  construction of Canadian oil giant Enbridge Energy's Line 3 pipeline with over a thousand arrested. Police have escalated in a multitude of ways (felony charges, high bails, rubber bullets, tear gas, etc) against water protecting pipeline opponents.     We know through the bold investigative journalism of The Interce...

Green and Red commemorates Labor Day with labor Journalist and founder of "Payday Report" Mike Elk (@MikeElk).  We begin by talking about the historical origins of Labor Day in the U.S. (where Labor Day occurs in September rather than on May 1, like most of the world) and we pay tribute to the late Stanley Aronowitz.      We had a wide-ranging discussion with Mike Elk, who began by giving up updat...

Last week, Hurricane Ida, a category four storm, made landfall on the Gulf Coast. Over a million people were without power and 16 were killed. The hurricane then moved up the east coast hitting New York and New Jersey with powerful winds and floods. At least 52 people are reported dead in the Northeast. Ida made landfall on the 16th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Katrina was a category 5 storm...

Jessica Reznicek is a land and water defender who worked with the Catholic Worker Community in Des Moines, IA. In 2016, she began to organize against the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline in Iowa.  When the regulatory, political and even civil disobedience channels didn't work, she concluded the system was broken. Then, she, and a fellow Catholic Worker, began to disable construction...

America's forever war in Afghanistan ended with the withdrawal of U.S. troops after a twenty year war and occupation. A speedy summer offensive by the Taliban through quickly led to the fall of Kabul. Images of the Taliban in the Afghan presidential palace, crowds running after departing American aircraft and frightened Afghans remembering earlier Taliban rule pervade our screens. Since the te...

This weekend, we saw the Taliban seize Kabul ending the 20 year war and occupation of Afghanistan. Afghan president Ashraf Ghani fled the country. The sudden and dramatic Taliban gains came as the U.S. withdrew its ground troops from Afghanistan. Aid groups are warning of a humanitarian crisis unfolding. Since January, nearly 400,000 have been displaced. Over 1,000 civilians have been killed or in...

Last month, whistleblower Daniel Hale was sentenced to 45 months in prison after pleading guilty to violating the Espionage Act in March. During his time in the Air Force from 2009 to 2013, Hale worked with the National Security Agency and the Joint Special Operations Task Force at the Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, where he helped identify targets for assassination. He later worked as a contract...

Since the protests in Cuba on July 11th, the U.S. media has been promoting aggressive action if not intervention against Havana.  But even segments of the self-described Left, especially social democrats in New Politics magazine, have been attacking the Diaz-Canel government, supporting the protests in Cuba, and dismissing the larger political-cum-power issues at play in this episode. Scott a...

Sarah Koster is Green and Red's public health guru and most frequent guest and we just had another great discussion about COVID with here.  Despite government and media claims in June that the crisis of COVID was ending, we're seeing a resurgence in cases, especially due to the Delta variant, lagging vaccination rates, and less mask wearing.  Sarah breaks down the nature of the new varia...

Woke Up This Morning, Got Myself a Podcast!  Madison Lynn (@dickexpert) and John Palmucci (@gabagoolmarx) of the new "Fresh Kills" podcast (@freshkillspod), which  features "garbage takes by garbage guidos," joined us to talk about  their new entry into social media, their takes on left politics and  cancel culture, among other issues, and whether New Jersey or Youngstown ...

It's our hundredth episode. We've done a lot in the 17 months (to the day) since we launched Green and Red.  The themes of our scrappy little show include lifting up movement organizing and direct action; critiques of corporate liberalism and reformist politics, the far right & the status quo; sharing people’s history; poking at the sacred cows of the “left” (NGO industrial complex, Brook...

Green and Red Podcast had a great conversation with Professor Richard Wolff (@profwolff) about economic theories, the vital role of the government in subsidizing and supporting corporations and banks, China's economic strength,  how the Federal Reserve creates money for people who already have great wealth, growing inequality, and the continued importance of Karl Marx.    A lifelong...

Our favorite music is that music that gets in your face, flips over tables and fights those in power. Consolidated was a band that did that very thing. Since their formation in the late 80s, they've used music to speak out on corporate greed, fascism, homophobia, and animal rights. Now they are returning to the music scene with more of the anti-capitalist fascist-fighting same.  We talk with...

The fight against Enbridge's Line 3 pipeline continues to escalate. Since we last talked about it, Indigenous women-led movements on the ground have been disrupting construction along the pipeline route. Last week, the Giniw Collective, Earth First!, Rainforest Action Network and others took more action. G&R co-host Scott Parkin returned last week with Jake Conroy (@_jakeconroy) from the Crank...

In our third episode of our ongoing conversation about the New Left, we pay tribute to the memory of the great New Left historian Walter LaFeber of Cornell University.   We talked about the historical importance of the New Left, especially in the study of U.S. foreign relations, the so-called Wisconsin School, William Appleman Williams and others, and then discussed Professor LaFeber's contri...

Since the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015, the financial sector has put $3.8 TRILLION into the fossil fuel sector. That's $3.8 trillion into oil, gas, coal and Indigenous and human rights abuses across the globe. These banks notoriously fund projects like the Dakota Access Pipeline and Enbridge's Line 3 Pipeline. The banking sector keeps Big Oil flush with cash contributing trillions to the climat...

In the past few years, "canceling" someone from prominent platforms or careers has become an increasingly controversial topic in today's cultural and political circles. A comedian or other public figures says, Tweets or does offensive things and a public backlash, often fueled by politically progressive social media, ensues. It's destroyed careers. It's targeted people by mistake. How does cancel...

This week, thousands of water protectors descended on northern Minnesota  to join the Indigenous-led struggle to stop the Line 3 tar sands  pipeline.  Over 150 were arrested on Monday blocking construction on  Candian oil giant Enbridge's construction site. Hundreds more occupied  an Enbridge drill pad on the Mississippi River as the company prepared  to lay pipe unde...

Noam Chomsky has been cited as "America's greatest intellectual" who “makes the powerful, as well as their liberal apologists, deeply uncomfortable.” His participation in the New Left, in both intellectual and activist circles, is part of our history.  Bob and Scott speak with Professor Chomsky about the history of the New Left, the anti-Vietnam movement, the Black Panthers, Feminism, the des...

Beginning on May 9th, the Israeli Defense Force attacked  Palestinian populations in Gaza for 11 days leaving 250 dead (including 66 children), more than 1700 injured and over 6000 homeless. This most recent attack by the Israelis was in relation to Israeli settler provocations against Palestinians in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. We talk with Dr. Ussama Makdisi (@UssamaMa...

The 1980s saw a new consciousness of environmental awareness, particularly around the Earth’s rainforests. Scientists had discovered that, aside from their enormous biodiversity, rainforests also helped to keep carbon from being released into the atmosphere.     Corporations in the U.S. and Europe saw tropical rainforests as a means  for profit. For a long time, Indig...

In this episode, we talk with Angela Castillo and Lorena Rodriquez with Colombia Conexion- SF Bay (@colconxnsf) about the mass uprisings happening in cities across Colombia. The U.S.-backed right-wing government of Ivan Duque Marquez has pushed a neo-liberal tax reform bill that has sparked mass protest across the country. The Duque government has responded with horrific police brutality resulting...

In part two of this two parter, we continue our discussion with writer Harbeer Sandhu (@SuperbHerb) about the social, political and epidemiological crises happening in India.  Recently returned from a trip to India, Harbeer talks with us about the impact of COVID in India, the lockdowns in Punjab, the general strike in January and the politics and policies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's BJ...

In part one of this two-part episode, we talk with writer Harbeer Sandhu (@SuperbHerb) about the social, political and epidemiological crises happening in India.  Recently returned from a trip to India, Harbeer talks with us about the impact of COVID in India, the lockdowns in Punjab, the general strike in January and the politics and policies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's BJP party, In p...

We continue our discussion of Jimmy Carter's presidency, focusing on his foreign policies, intervention, and support of terror groups.   In Asia, Carter supported the murderous regime in Jakarta as Indonesia invaded and slaughtered the people of East Timor, and he worked with China to prevent Vietnamese reconstruction and encouraged China to invade Vietnam in 1979.   He also cooperated with the Ch...