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Sarah Anderson: Military Contractors’ Stock Prices Soar After Trump Assassinates Iranian General; Garett Reppenhagen: Veterans For Peace Fight to Stop U.S. Endless Wars; Saya Ameli Hajebi: Sunrise Movement Organizes for Major April 22 Climate Strike, Influence Presidential Election Debate; Bob Nixon: This Week’s Under-reported News Summary.

The ability of citizens to speak out against injustice is a living, vital tool; interference in political expression by the state cuts democracy off at the root.

We interview Professor Stephen Zunes, one the country’s leading scholars of U.S. Middle East policy and of strategic nonviolent action. Recently he wrote the piece “There’s No Evidence Iran Is Responsible for the Deaths of Hundreds Americans.” We can be assured that Trump’s wars in the region have resulted in untold death and destruction and undermine democratic movements.

On the heels of being impeached by the House of Representatives, Trump unsurprisingly created a diversion, having a key Iranian General assassinated by US drones. But as tensions in the Middle East mounted, the price of oil somehow remained relatively steady. Why was this the case? This week we talk oil with energy expert Daniel Dicker. We discuss the current state of global oil markets, learn the important differences between sweet and sour crude, and examine Dicker’s contention that the best thing for the environment would be much higher oil prices.

Today the Palestinian voice you will hear is that of our old friend Mazin Qumsiyeh speaking at the Community Church of Boston. Mazin has a doctorate in Biology, and taught at both Duke and Yale Universities, but is back in Palestine at Bethlehem University where he has founded the Palestine Natural History Museum. Mazin came to Cambridge to speak at the annual Science for Palestine Conference at MIT. Most of us know Mazin as an activist, but he is a passionate scientist who sees the Intersectionality between science, climate change and social justice.

Posted on January 12, 2020 by davidswanson Talk Nation Radio: Roger Hallam on Extinction Rebellion Roger Hallam is a PhD researcher on civil disobedience at King’s College London and an organic vegetable farmer. He has been a vegan for 34 years. In 2018 he co-founded Extinction Rebellion. He has also just authored a terrific short book called Common Sense for the 21st Century: Only Nonviolent Rebellion Can Now Stop Climate Breakdown and Social Collapse.

"2020 was to be the year when the bold commitment made by hundreds of companies to eliminate deforestation from their supply chains was met. Instead, the failure to achieve this goal can be measured by the sharp rise in deforestation since 2014. Yet despite this bleak picture – and the need to act being more urgent than ever – there’s another story to tell about the last decade...."