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Cody Hounanian: Biden Student Debt Forgiveness Plan a Good Start, But More Must be Done; Jenna Grande: Big Oil Donates Over $2.6 Million to GOP Seditionists; Paul Casson: Adirondack Mountain Research Center Tracks Industrial Pollution and Climate Change; Bob Nixon: This Week’s Under-reported News Summary.

The film "Powerlands" explores the treatment of Indigenous people around the world—not in terms of media imagery, but in terms of the resource extraction that is stealing water, minerals and homelands. It talks not just about harm but about resistance, and so it also contributes to the seeing of Native communities in their full humanity. We talk with Powerlands filmmaker Ivey Camille Manybeads Tso. PLUS: Even Time Magazine ran a piece critical of Joe Biden’s call for the hiring of 100,000 more police officers and some $13 billion to police budgets—calling it a part of a “manipulative message that if we feel unsafe, it is because we have not yet invested adequately in police, jails and prisons.”

Cecile Pineda (author of Devil’s Tango: How I Learned the Fukushima Step by Step) died at home on 8-11-2022. Her friends and students miss her voice, her humor, her deep scientific knowledge and her rebellion – all inside her art of writing. This replay of her 2014 appearance, along with Harvey Wasserman, has an eerily contemporary cast. In August 2022 nuclear power is still being sold as a solution to climate change.

It is estimated that over 2.5 million homes are equipped with solar panels in the U.S. And the popularity of capturing the natural power of the sun to heat and cool our homes is on the rise – according to the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) solar panel installations have increased by 43% in just the past couple of years. This week’s guest on Sea Change Radio is Sachu Constantine, the Executive Director of Vote Solar, a policy advocacy organization committed to expanding access to affordable solar energy. Constantine provides an update on net metering legislation in California, gives us a glimpse into what’s happening in the community solar space, and looks at hurdles to solar that the Trump Administration mounted.

In 1948 most, but not all, of the Palestinian population were forced out of the territory that eventually became the State of Israel. Palestinians who remain now comprise 20% of the official citizenship of Israel, and therefore have elected representatives in the Knesset. Israel's official claim to be a democracy is based on this. But the Palestinians don't have equal rights at all. They are second class citizens, by law, in a Jewish apartheid state. The Palestinians' elected representatives in the Knesset are a miniscule minority with little, if any power -- a token representation at best. Today we feature Dr. Edmund Ghareeb in a Conversation with Palestinian Knesset member Sami Abu Shehadeh.

Public interest in the Russia-Ukraine war ebbs and flows. While the war slogs on, the advantage seems to shift back and forth, as new weapons and new troop deployments reshape the battlefield. Just when international attention seems to lag, a new threat arises, like the shelling of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear reactor — and the world holds its collective breath. To bring us up to the minute, we’re joined on this week’s WhoWhatWhy podcast by Sam Ramani who teaches in the department of political science at Oxford University, and is a member of the Royal United Services Institute in London. He has spent much time in Russia and Ukraine, has studied Russia’s wars in Chechnya and Syria, and is the author of two upcoming books about Russia. Bla bla bla ...

This week on Talk World Radio we’re discussing dramatic political developments in Pakistan with Professor Junaid S. Ahmad who is the Director of the Center for the Study of Islam and Decoloniality and teaches Law, Religion, and Global Politics in Islamabad, Pakistan. He does a wide array of consultancy on issues related to international law and international affairs. Junaid is also the founder and Chair of the Palestine Solidarity Committee (PSC) – Pakistan.