WZBC 90.3 FM Newton

David Yaghoubian: Biden’s Recent Middle East Trip: Long on Controversy, Short on Accomplishments; Frederick Clarkson: Christian Extremists’ Embrace of Political Violence Threatens Democracy; Nadia Marin-Molina: Labor Department Issues New Protections for Exploited, Threatened Immigrant Workers; Bob Nixon: This Week’s Under-reported News Summary.

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, allowing for the criminalization of abortion, our ability to safely access information and health care online is in danger. How are tech companies responding? Also on the show: It’s good to be shocked by the news coming out of the January 6 committee; it’s shocking. But suggesting that ALL of this is new and revelatory is a narrative that serves us poorly. ...

We dig into the archives and listen to two very different stories about consumption. First, we speak to global journalist Nithin Coca who has written a series of pieces for Mongabay.com about Indonesia’s alarming headfirst dive into the coal industry. We discuss the high-level corruption that allowed coal to take off in Indonesia, examine the lax regulatory standards that imperil workers while allowing the country to keep export prices low and learn about the environmental degradation that the Indonesian coal boom is causing. Then we revisit our conversation with Lara Gilmore, who along with her husband, chef and restaurateur Massimo Bottura, run the world-renowned Osteria Francescana in Modena, Italy. ...

The crisis deepens in Haiti with hundreds killed amidst deepening inflation and food insecurity " who's fueling the violence?

President Biden recently visited Israel, where he lavishly spoke of the "special relationship" between the US and Israel, and swore unwavering loyalty to that slavish Israeli-Palestinian bond. He didn't even mention Israel's recent assassination of US-Israeli reporter Shireen Abu Akleh. In response to Biden’s prostration before the Israeli Apartheid state, we offer Historian Walter Hixson’s thoughtful analysis of that "special relationship" from our archive edition of This Week in Palestine, broadcast originally in January, 2022.

We live in the Age of Complicity. There were the Wall Street enablers of 2008, who knew all too well what lay ahead. The Hollywood enablers, who gave people like Harvey Weinstein a pass. And the Washington enablers, who used to be “normal,” but succumbed to the psychopathy of Donald Trump. Why do they do it? Our guest on this week’s WhoWhatWhy podcast, former Republican operative Tim Miller, offers some answers. The author of the new book Why We Did It, Miller talks with us about why so many went along with and continue to support Trump and his lies. ...

This week on Talk World Radio, I’m discussing what to do about Ukraine. See also https://worldbeyondwar.org/ukraine and https://defusenuclearwar.org