WPKN: Politics, Policy, and Planet Podcast

Stanley Heller, Chief Administrator of Promoting Enduring Peace and Executive Director of Middle East Crisis Committee, examines the US-Israeli military strikes on Iran over the past 72 hours, and the mass casualty events they've created, including the more than 160 children and teachers killed when an airstrike hit an elementary school in the southern city of Minab.

The Labor Report welcomes with Gene Bruskin, veteran labor organizer, anti-war activist, and play write, known for leading one of the most significant private sector union victories of the 21st century, namely the successful effort to unionize 5,000 workers at the Smithfield Foods pork processing plant in North Carolina -- a victory which is documented in the film Union Time . Gene Bruskin shares...

Interview with Ben Linden, Amnesty International’s advocacy director for Europe and Central Asia, conducted by Melinda Tuhus. Between The Lines’ Melinda Tuhus spoke with Ben Linden, Amnesty International’s advocacy director for Europe and Central Asia, who assesses the current state of the war and prospects for a lasting peace.

Interview with Lily Mercado, a Connecticut activist with Dare to Struggle Connecticut conducted by Scott Harris. Lily Mercado talks about anti-ICE student protests that took place across the U.S. on Friday, Feb. 13 — and the organizing going on now among national student groups for the ‘Spring Surge to Melt Ice’ campaign.

Interview with Kamolika Das, local policy director with the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, conducted by Scott Harris. Kamolika Das talks about a current nationwide effort to raise revenue in states to replace billions of dollars in vital local and state funding for social safety net programs that were lost in last year’s Trump-GOP budget mega-bill that dramatically cut social programs...

Interview with Andrea Pitzer, journalist and author of the book, One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps, conducted by Scott Harris. Andrea Pitzer examines Donald Trump’s current violent mass deportation campaign and the haunting similarities to Germany’s rounding up, brutalizing and imprisoning immigrants, Jews and other minority groups in concentration camps in the 1930s.

Interview with Amanda Hollowell, chief of campaigns with Color of Change, conducted by Scott Harris. Amanda Hollowell talks about her group’s 20 years of critical work advocating for racial justice. She assesses the Trump administration’s aggressive attack on America’s long struggle to achieve a multi-racial democracy and implementation of discriminatory federal policies, underscored by President...

Interview with Josh Ruebner, policy director with the Institute for Middle East Understanding Policy Project, conducted by Melinda Tuhus. Between The Lines’ Melinda Tuhus spoke with Josh Ruebner, an adjunct lecturer in Georgetown University’s Program on Justice and Peace. Here he talks about the continuing humanitarian disaster in Gaza and implementation of the deeply flawed second phase of the ce...

Interview with Kevin Gosztola, publisher of the Dissenter Newsletter and author of Guilty of Journalism: The Political Case Against Julian Assange, conducted by Scott Harris. Kevin Gosztola talks about his recent Dissenter article, “FBI Spied on Washington Post Reporter Prior to Raiding Their Home,” the related Trump regime attacks on the First Amendment with the recent arrests of Don Lemon and Ge...

Interview with Helena Olea, deputy director, Alianza Americas, conducted by Scott Harris. Helena Olea discusses concerns about the growing humanitarian crisis impacting the Cuban people resulting from Donald Trump’s recent executive order blocking oil shipments to the island, shutting down their energy-generating capacity while threatening secondary sanctions on any nation that provides Cuba oil s...

Interview with David Daley, senior fellow in communications at the group FairVote and author of the national best-seller Ratf**ked: Why Your Vote Doesn't Count, conducted by Scott Harris. David Daley examines Donald Trump’s recent threats to “nationalize” this November’s midterm elections and Steve Bannon’s recent warning that ICE agents will surround polling places — all driven by MAGA’s false cl...

Interview with Christopher Vials, professor in the English Department at the University of Connecticut at Storrs, conducted by Scott Harris. Professor Vials, who studies the cultural impact of the U.S. far right, is the author of Haunted by Hitler: Liberals, the Left and the Fight against Fascism in the U.S. and co-editor of The U.S. Antifascism Reader. He assesses Donald Trump’s first 12 months b...

Interview with Silvia Baldwin, elected bargaining delegate and a strike captain with Starbucks Workers United union, conducted by Melinda Tuhus. Between The Lines’ Melinda Tuhus spoke with Silvia Baldwin, a barista who’s worked at a Starbucks store on the university of Pennsylvania campus in West Philadelphia for the past 3 1/2 years. She’s an elected bargaining delegate and a strike captain. Here...

Interview with Mike Tork, Veterans for Peace treasurer, and Anthony Aguilar, a retired U.S. Special Forces officer, conducted by Scott Harris. Mike Tork and Anthony Aguilar discuss the Veterans For Peace education campaign, including billboards, and reaching out to active-duty U.S. soldiers and National Guard troops, urging them to “follow the law and their conscience” and refuse to obey illegal o...

Interview with Jon B. Wolfsthal, director of global risk at the Federation of American Scientists, conducted by Scott Harris. Jon Wolfsthal discusses the Bulletin of the American Scientists’ announcement that their Doomsday Clock was recently set at 85 seconds to midnight, “the closest the Clock has ever been to midnight in its history, while calling for urgent action to limit nuclear arsenals, cr...

Interview with Steve Descano, Fairfax County Virginia Commonwealth’s attorney and co-founder of the new group, Fight Against Federal Overreach, conducted by Scott Harris. Steve Descano talks about the mission of the Fight Against Federal Overreach (FAFO) national coalition of district attorneys collaborating to ensure federal officials are held accountable when they exceed their lawful authority—v...

Interview with Pastor Doug Pagitt, executive director of the Minneapolis-based organization Vote Common Good, conducted by Scott Harris. Pastor Doug Pagitt talks about the extraordinary courage and resilience the nation has witnessed among his city’s ordinary citizens standing up to the brutal and cruel ICE secret police force that engages in lethal violence. He discusses what people across the co...

Interview with Eddie Lejuine, a 62-year-old fisherman from Cameron, Louisiana, conducted by Melinda Tuhus. Under the Trump administration’s push for U.S. “energy dominance” — albeit one that excludes renewable sources like wind and solar — there’s a building frenzy along the Louisiana and Texas Gulf Coast where construction of six liquified natural gas or LNG export terminals are now underway or p...

Interview with Stan Cox, a research scholar in ecosphere studies at the Land Institute, conducted by Scott Harris. Stan Cox, who formerly served as lead scientist at the Land Institute for 20 years, talks about his new book Anthropause: The Beauty of Degrowth, which indicts our obsession with endless expansion and poses a new model of degrowth to protect the Earth from climate collapse. Stan is th...

Interview with Greg Palast, filmmaker, journalist and author of several New York Times bestsellers including "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy," conducted by Scott Harris Greg  talks about his recent investigation, “How Venezuela’s New President Will Save Us from Trump’s Crazy: The Radical Pragmatist versus Rubio’s Vulture,” explaining how billionaire and Trump donor Paul Singer is one of the prim...

Interview with Madison McVan, a reporter with the Minnesota Reformer, an independent, nonprofit news organization where she covers the impact of the Trump administration in her state, conducted by Scott Harris. Madison McVan talks about Minnesota residents’ response to Trump’s deployment of a flood of ICE agents to the state; the federal agent killing of Alex Pretti, the 37-year-old intensive care...

Interview with Melvin Goodman, senior fellow at the Center for International Policy,  a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University and a former CIA analyst, conducted by Scott Harris. Melvin Goodman, whose most recent book is titled, American Carnage: The Wars of Donald Trump, talks about President Trump’s disastrous foreign policy including his attack on Venezuela and kidnapping of its p...

The Monthly Labor Report interviews Faye Guenther, president of United Food and Commercial Workers (Local 3000), who leads over 50,000 members across Washington state, northeast Oregon and northern Idaho. Faye discusses her progressive union's strategies that led to victories in five strikes in the past two years. Special guest: Michael Zweig Host: Richard Hill

Interview with FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez, the lone Democrat serving on the Federal Communications Commission, conducted by Scott Harris. Commissioner Gomez talks about her concerns regarding the concentration of media ownership, FCC censorship and interference in the exercise of First Amendment right to free speech, the future of public media and the expansion of broadband access.

Interview with Tamika Middleton, chief political and strategy officer with Women's March, and Saniyah Yolanda, student leader, conducted by Scott Harris. Tamika talks about the Jan. 20th Free America Walkout protest and other important work Women’s March is prioritizing. Student leader Saniyah Yolanda of the group Get Free, a youth-led progressive activist movement, talks about the work they’re do...