Ralph welcomes Samuel Levine who heads the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the Federal Trade Commission to give you tips on how to use this government agency to protect yourself from corporate fraud and abuse. Plus, director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group, Dr. Michael Carome stops by to give us the latest warnings about harmful medical devices and his take on the safety of the mRNA Covid vaccine.

Samuel Levine serves as Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. Before assuming this role, he served as an attorney advisor to Commissioner Rohit Chopra and as a staff attorney in the Midwest Regional Office. Prior to joining the FTC, Mr. Levine worked for the Illinois Attorney General, where he prosecuted predatory for-profit colleges and participated in rulemaking and other policy initiatives to promote affordability and accountability in higher education.

We announced what we call a “click to cancel” rule. And this is a rule about subscription plans. What the proposed rule says is that companies – vendors – should make it no more difficult to cancel a subscription than it is to sign up… It’s very easy for consumers to sign up for these services. We want to make it just as easy for consumers to exit these services.

Samuel Levine Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the FTC

Earlier this year, we announced a market study sending subpoenas to major social media platforms to ask them what they’re doing to stop the huge proliferation of fraudulent ads over social media. We’re also doing a study now on the franchise relationship and the potential power asymmetries between franchisee and franchisers. We’re looking at the cloud computing market. We have a whole host of initiatives right now that are not geared around law enforcement but are geared around shining a light on often opaque industries to help shape public policy and eventually shape FTC law enforcement as well.

Samuel Levine, Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the FTC

Dr. Michael Carome is an expert on issues of drug and medical device safety, FDA oversight, and healthcare policy. He is the director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group.

In 2002, Congress passed for the first time what’s called the Medical Device User Fee Act… So, the companies now pay the FDA for the review and oversight of their products. Those user fees fundamentally changed the relationship between the FDA, the regulatory agency, and the medical device companies that are regulated by the agency. And that relationship which should be in part an adversarial relationship now is viewed as a partnership by both the agency and the medical device industry. The agency even in some of their documents refers to these companies as “partners,” as “customers.”… Customer satisfaction is key for the FDA and their customers in their eyes - rather than patients and the public - are the companies.

Dr. Michael Carome, Director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group

The FDA in our view had a very rigorous process for requiring the testing of those (Covid 19) vaccines… And we ourselves looked independently at the clinical trial data… We quickly concluded that independent of the FDA and any corporations that these vaccines were highly effective and very safe… Since then, there have been hundreds of millions of doses received by hundreds of millions of people across the world and they really have prevented serious complications and probably prevented millions of deaths with some very limited and rare adverse effects.

Dr. Michael Carome, Director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group

Squishing the federal cop on the corporate crime beat is a prime priority for lobbyists in Congress.

Ralph Nader

In Case You Haven’t Heard w/ Francesco DeSantis 1. In Arlington, Amazon has halted construction of their much-vaunted second headquarters – or “HQ2” according to the Washington Post. Some may remember the race to the bottom in terms of corporate tax cuts and subsidies that ensued across much of the country in 2017 and ‘18 when Amazon suggested cities and states could compete for this development. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez famously opposed these giveaways to Amazon and was pilloried for that in the mainstream press. Turns out, she was right on the money. Despite the fact that Amazon is postponing the construction of this facility, they are still poised to reap over $150 million in taxpayer subsidies from the state of Virginia.

2. Harvard University has accepted a $300 million donation from hedge fund manager and right wing billionaire donor Ken Griffin, according to the oped-will-harvard-ever-have-enough-20230417-5kmpotqurnhcfbd5mxr4emiedq-story.html">New York Daily News. In exchange, Harvard will rename their Graduate School of Arts and Sciences to the Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

3. In Palestine, trade unions have issued an open letter calling for global solidarity. This letter urged global publics to eliminate procurement from companies complicit in Israeli apartheid and the occupation, divest pension funds from State of Israel Bonds, and specifically called on “port workers and their unions to refrain from loading/offloading Israeli ships, as was done in Oakland, California,” noting that many port workers and unions did the same when combating apartheid in South Africa.

4. The American Prospect reports that in Florida, nursing home interests are dumping money into the campaign coffers of Republican state leadership to grease the wheels for a bill which would immunize themselves from lawsuits related to wrongful death in their facilities. As David Dayen tweeted, “Ron DeSantis's War on Woke masks his actual War on Lawsuits.”

5. NorthJersey.com reports that a new law in New Jersey has gone into effect, guaranteeing workers a week of severance for every year of service when large employers issue mass layoffs. This law was enacted following the Toys R Us bankruptcy, wherein longtime workers were only granted severance after a massive public pressure campaign.

6. Dashcam videos obtained by WIRED show how self-driving cars – currently being recklessly tested in San Francisco – are clogging streets, delaying public transportation, and creating dangerous conditions on the roads. “Autonomous cars in San Francisco made 92 unplanned stops between May and December 2022—88 percent of them on streets with transit service, according to city transportation authorities, who collected the data from social media reports, 911 calls, and other sources, because companies aren’t required to report all the breakdowns.”

7. In a novel approach, CODEPINK is using digital tools to crowdfund an ad in a major newspaper. This ad urges President Biden to play peacemaker and “End the War in Ukraine.” Supporters can view and donate to the ad at CODEPINK.org.

8. A recent article in the climate-focused magazine Grist covers the choices facing the Biden administration regarding the Colorado River. The administration has put forward two bleak plans: “One …would dry up Arizona to preserve California's strong water rights; the other would spread cuts among the states and risk litigation from California.”

9. Ben Jacobs reports that, in a speech to the NRA convention, former President Trump appeared to endorse ending home rule in Washington, DC. In typical Trump prose, he said “I think we have to take it over, take over management of our capital." This is a continuation of the assault on DC’s sovereignty which recently came to a head when President Biden chose to join with Republicans to block DC’s revised criminal code.

10. UNITE HERE, the hospitality workers union, grew 18% in 2022, per Bloomberg Law. This stunning growth is second only to the Teamsters, which we covered on this segment last week. As the reinvigorated labor movement continues to expand, we might expect to see this kind of growth among other major unions, such as the United Auto Workers.

11. Checking in on out of control police practices, two stories stand out: In New York, Ars Technica reports that the city has begun rolling out “hulking, 400 lb” police robots after being forced to withdraw the project over civil liberties concerns in 2021. Mayor Eric Adams recently slashed budgets for city services like libraries, yet each of these robots will cost around $75,000. In Memphis, the MPD is facing backlash after unveiling a new unit which will “arrest unaccompanied minors that sell food, play loud music, are 'inappropriately dressed' or dancing in the street in Downtown Memphis" per Commercial Appeal. Cardell Orrin, the executive director of the nonprofit advocacy group Stand for Children, compared this to the “Pre-Crime Unit from [the movie] 'Minority Report,'” and added that “targeting minors for a subjective concept like ‘inappropriate clothing’ is a coded criminalization of Black culture and Black youth.”

12. A bombshell new Economy.pdf">report from the Corporate Research Project at Good Jobs First reveals that since the year 2000, large companies in the United States have paid “$96 billion in fines and settlements to resolve allegations of covert price-fixing and related anti-competitive practices in violation of antitrust laws.” The companies that have been forced to pay the most include Visa Inc. – at a whopping $6.2 billion – along with Deutsche Bank, Barclays, MasterCard and Citigroup, though the report makes clear that price fixing occurs in many sectors ranging from automotive parts to power generation to healthcare services. Philip Mattera, who authored the report, is quoted saying “Large corporations which are supposed to be competing with one another are often secretly conspiring to set prices…In doing so, they cause economic harm to consumers and contribute to inflation.”

In a live Zoom event in conjunction with the American Museum of Tort Law, Ralph welcomes safety expert, Russell Kendzior, who runs the National Floor Safety Institute to discuss where, why, and how slip-and-falls happen, how to prevent them, the legitimacy of slip-and-fall lawsuits, and the role of the Consumer Product Safety Commission for a phenomenon that for older adults every year causes over 36,000 deaths and $50 billion in medical costs.

Russell Kendzior is the President of Traction Experts, Inc. and founder of the National Floor Safety Institute. Mr. Kendzior is internationally recognized as the leading expert in slip and fall accident prevention and has been retained in more than 1,000 slip, trip, and fall lawsuits. He hosts the podcast The Safety Matters Show, and he is the author of several books, including Falls Aren’t Funny: America’s Multi-Billion Dollar Slip-And-Fall Crisis.

This concept of simply testing to an internationally-recognized consensus standard and labeling the product is really what we’re asking the government to do. We’re not demanding any level of performance, but simply tell the consumer.

Russell Kendzior

You can participate in the public review process— the process whereby commissioners are asking members of the public for comments… It’s important that the people of our country have a voice, and that they be represented, and that the safety of these products that are contributing to six million hospital emergency room visits a year need to be better managed.

Russell Kendzior

We should emphasize that all these situations [involving slips, trips, and falls] in the court of law are under tort law… It's good to talk about them as torts, because people often don’t recognize how important tort law is to protect them, to help compensate them, to disclose to the larger audience the hazards for their own protection, and to engage in prevention.

Ralph Nader

In Case You Haven’t Heard with Francesco DeSantis1. In a major blow to Governor Greg Abbott, the Texas House of Representatives voted 86-52 in favor of an amendment to bar state funds from being used for private school vouchers, according to KXAN. This was achieved through a coalition of Democrats and rural Republicans in the Lone Star State, per NBC.

2. The Washington Post reports that greater numbers of assisted-living facilities are rejecting Medicaid and evicting seniors from their homes. One particularly harrowing story involves Shirley Holtz, a 91 year old with mobility issues and dementia who was evicted from her hospice care because the facility decided to refuse Medicaid payments.

3. In a statement responding to the ProPublica report on undisclosed gifts received by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin stressed that “Supreme Court Justices must be held to an enforceable code of conduct, just like every other federal judge. The ProPublica report is a call to action, and the Senate Judiciary Committee will act.” However, the Judiciary Committee has been hamstrung by Democratic absences, particularly that of California Senator Dianne Feinstein, who has missed nearly 60 votes since February, according to judicial-nominess-17889123.php">The San Francisco Chronice.

4. Barak Ravid reports that the U.S. has blocked the release of a planned United Nations Security Council statement decrying the Israeli police raid at the al-Aqsa mosque, one of the holiest sites in Islam, during Ramadan.

5. More Perfect Union has issued a statement saying “Months after 440 Planned Parenthood nurses and staff in five Midwest states voted to unionize, management has fired 2 members of the union’s bargaining team and issued ‘final written warnings’ to all 11 other bargaining team members threatening immediate termination.”

6. From Truthout, Rep. Pramila Jayapal has filed an official constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United. A constitutional amendment is currently the only means available for reversing this catastrophic decision.

7. In a video obtained by Gothamist, NYPD officers arresting a man wearing a Black Lives Matter sticker on his bike helmet were recorded bragging about “milking” overtime, referred to a female arrestee a "liberal [c word]," and joked about committing the arrestee to a mental hospital. This comes as Mayor Eric Adams announced that NYPD officers who work for five years will now make approximately $50K more per year than teachers with the same amount of time, an overall increase of $5.5 billion to the most expensive police department in the country, according to CBS.

8. Robert Costa of CBS reports that former Rep. Dennis Kucinich is advising Robert F Kennedy Jr. on his presidential run. Costa went on to say that Kucinich could be the campaign manager or a top political adviser, and that Kucinich has urged Kennedy to focus more on the environment than his signature anti-vaccine message.

9. Kansas Public Media KCUR reports that Republicans in that state overrode the Democratic Governor’s veto and authorized genital inspections on minors in order for children to play sports. Somehow, the party advocating for adults to inspect children’s genitals is calling the other party “groomers” with a straight face.

10. From Deadline: Progressive lawmakers are calling on the Department of Justice to investigate the Warner Brothers merger with Discovery. In a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and DOJ antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter, the signatories allege that the merger “appears to have enabled” the company to “adopt potentially anticompetitive practices that reduce consumer choice and harm workers in affected labor markets.” They went on to argue that the merger has led to the “hollowing out” of an “iconic American studio,” and cited the cancellation of projects and the removal of content from the HBO Max platform.

11. Dueling court orders have resulted in uncertainty about universal access to the abortion pill Mifepristone. Regarding the order to suspend the drug, Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden issued a statement declaring “I believe the Food and Drug Administration has the authority to ignore this ruling.” The Senate Finance Committee oversees the FDA.

12. The Austin American-Statesman reports that, less than 24 hours after Daniel Perry was convicted of murdering Garrett Foster, a Black Lives Matter protester in 2020, Governor Greg Abbott announced that he would pardon the convicted killer as soon as a request "hits my desk." While the killer claimed that he was acting in self defense, he had mused on social media that he might “kill a few people on my way to work.”

13. From Bloomberg Law: The International Brotherhood of Teamsters reported gaining 206,000 members in 2022, an increase of 20% from the previous year. Many credit this growth to the new leadership in the union, which took power in 2022. Teamsters President Sean O’Brien responded to this news by tweeting “Just getting started.”

We continue our indictment of the U.S. war machine by welcoming William Hartung of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft to break down the bloated military budget and what we can do about it. Then Cindy Sheehan, joins us to talk about her journey as the mother of a fallen soldier to become the most prominent anti-war activist of the Bush/Cheney era. Plus, Ralph comes down hard on states that deny their citizens Medicaid.

William Hartung is an expert on the arms industry and US military budget, and a Senior Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. He is the author of Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex, and the co-editor of Lessons from Iraq: Avoiding the Next War.

The Pentagon wants to get rid of some of these weapon system programs, and the Congress says “Oh no, we’re going to continue them because… it’s a jobs program. It creates jobs, or it retains jobs that are already in shipyards or elsewhere.” Of course, you can never get these members of Congress to understand that a billion dollars in civilian infrastructure investment in this country creates far more jobs than a highly capital-intensive billion dollars in another unneeded weapons system.

Ralph Nader

I think there’s three pillars…What are the costs of this—the opportunity costs?...What do we need to defend ourselves?...And then I think people need to feel like they can influence the government. I think a lot of people have given up. They forget that citizens’ movements have had tremendous victories in the past, and they can do so again.

William Hartung

Cindy Sheehan is the mother of Casey A. Sheehan, who was killed in action in Iraq on April 4, 2004. She is an anti-war activist, the founder of Gold Star Families, and an organizer of the 2018 Women’s March on the Pentagon. She is the author of Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox Newsletter on Substack.

I think that as long as you stay in the safe zone of only criticizing Republicans if you're a Democrat, or only criticizing Democrats if you're a Republican, then they give you a platform, they let you use your voice on this national stage. But once I recognized that the Democratic Party were, at that point, enablers of the Bush/Cheney war of terror around the world, and I left the party, then I started to be even more marginalized. And I lost so much support.

Cindy Sheehan

What gave me a little bit of hope was the county DA of New York indicting and arresting Donald Trump— for things I think were far less damaging and far less criminal than what the other living presidents like George Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama did. I think that if the DA can prosecute Donald Trump for something less than mass murder or genocide, then maybe my DA in my county I live in can prosecute George Bush for murdering my son.

Cindy Sheehan

In Case You Haven’t Heard

1. CNN reports that seven investigators from the Centers for Disease Control fell ill “while studying the possible health impacts” of the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. These investigators experienced sore throats, headaches, coughing and nausea, the same symptoms many residents have reported. In testimony before the Senate in March, Alan Shaw, CEO of Norfolk Southern, said “I believe that the air is safe. I believe that the water is safe.”

2. A contingent of left-wing youth at the recent protests in Israel burned their IDF enlistment orders. While this exceedingly courageous act garnered much attention on social media, the sad reality is that the overwhelming majority of Israeli youth are in fact more right-wing than older Israelis and far more right-wing than young people in most every other country. A 2021 poll written up by Haaretz, revealed that “nearly half of ultra-Orthodox and national religious Israeli youth expressed hatred toward Arabs and noted support for stripping them of their citizenship, a sentiment shared by 23 percent of secular youth.”

3. A new poll, published in Forbes, shows the impact of Governor Ron DeSantis’ education policies: “91% of prospective college students disagree with the governor’s policies, 1 in 8 graduating high school students won’t attend college in Florida due to the education policy in the state, [and] 1 in 20 current college students in the state plan to transfer because of those policies.”

4. The Huffington Post reports that Amazon spent $14.2 million on anti-union consultants in 2022, up nearly $10 million from 2021. This is clearly in response to the successful unionization vote at the JFK8 facility under the auspices of the independent Amazon Labor Union last year.

5. In a related story, Bloomberg reports that a federal appeals court has ruled that Elon Musk “must delete his 2018 Twitter post suggesting that Tesla...workers could lose stock options if they formed a union, as it violated labor law.” The panel of 5th circuit judges unanimously opined that “Tesla’s history of labor violations supports the NLRB’s finding that employees would understand Musk’s tweet as a threat to commit another violation by rescinding stock options as retaliation,” for union organizing.

6. Rep. Rashida Tlaib is collecting signatures on an official letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland calling on him to end the Justice Department’s campaign to have Julian Assange extradited to the U.S., according to the Intercept. So far, other signatories include Reps. Jamaal Bowman, Ilhan Omar, and Cori Bush, with Reps. Ro Khanna, Pramila Jayapal, and AOC expected to sign on before it is sent.

7. A new report in the Intercept details the increasing size of settlements being paid out to victims of police violence in the 2020 protests, including tear gassing and “kettling” – the police tactic of trapping and surrounding protesters, usually to carry out mass arrests. Due to the legal structures in place, local taxpayers, not police departments, will foot the bill for these settlements.

8. In a historic shift, the Vatican has responded to calls by Indigenous activists and repealed the so-called “Doctrine of Discovery” which “legitimized the colonial-era seizure of Native lands and form the basis of some property laws today.” The Vatican acknowledged that this doctrine “did not adequately reflect the equal dignity and rights of Indigenous peoples." This was reported by the indigenous-led news service Indian Country Today.

9. From Reuters: The Biden Administration “plans to send Mexico an "act now or else" message in coming weeks in an attempt to break a stalemate” over Mexico’s decision to nationalize energy and other key resources. Under the rules of the neo-NAFTA trade agreement signed in 2020, the U.S. is entitled to international dispute talks, but has not called for them thus far, instead opting to work with the Canadian government to threaten retaliatory measures against Mexico. U.S. Republicans meanwhile are calling for an invasion of our southern neighbor.

10. Bowing to ranching and mining interests, the Intercept reports President Biden is continuing a Trump-era policy of rounding up wild horses in order to clear more land for cattle grazing and extraction. Once the horses have been corralled, the mares will be dosed with contraceptives. Manda Kalimian, president of the wild horse and environmental advocacy group Cana Foundation, is quoted saying “We feel betrayed, because we thought this was an administration that really believed in wildlife protections.”

11. Mark Joseph Stern of Slate reports that Judge Reed O'Connor struck down a “major provision of the Affordable Care Act requiring insurers to cover a vast amount of preventive care cost-free.” These include contraception, cancer screening, the HIV prevention drug PrEP, and much pregnancy-related care. The ruling applies nationwide.

12. Remember the egg shortage? According to CNN, Cal-Maine Foods – the largest egg producer in the nation – reported that their revenue doubled and profits surged to 718% last quarter as consumers struggled to afford the basic food item. Corporate greed, plain and simple.

We are joined for the full hour by geopolitical financial expert and financial historian, Nomi Prins, to discuss her new book, “Permanent Distortion: How Financial Markets Abandoned the Real Economy Forever,” which highlights the huge gap between the high-flying stock market, versus back down here on earth, where average people struggle to make ends meet.

Nomi Prins is an economist, author, geopolitical financial expert and financial historian. She is the author of several books, including Collusion: How Central Bankers Rigged the World, All the Presidents’ Bankers, Other People’s Money: The Corporate Mugging of America, and It Takes a Pillage: Behind the Bonuses, Bailouts, and Backroom Deals from Washington to Wall Street. Her latest book is Permanent Distortion: How Financial Markets Abandoned the Real Economy Forever.

The idea of “Permanent Distortion” is that when the financial system needs it, it gets the money. And lot of it. And in an uncapped way. And in an unregulated way. And in a non-transparent way. When the real economy needs it, it’s years of debate.

Nomi Prins

There’s no such thing as, “This bailout didn’t cost taxpayers money.” Because…money that goes into the banking system does not go into the real economy. Which means there is a shortfall in the real economy. Which means that money cannot be reallocated into the real economy. Whether that is to build bridges, or hospitals, or to enhance our education system, or help workers. Because it’s going somewhere else.

Nomi Prins

There are people that will say, “Well, SVB (the failure of Silicon Valley Bank) has nothing to do with Glass-Steagall,” and that’s just simply wrong. Any over-leverage in the banking system that can take down the rest of the banking system— or that can create that sort of lack of confidence, instability, creation of money to save it that doesn’t go into the real economy— is a part of that problem.

Nomi Prins

There’s a huge propaganda machine. And it’s interesting that the destabilization of the real economy comes so frequently from the speculation of the paper economy.

Ralph Nader

In Case You Haven’t Heard

1. In Israel, the planned judicial reform law has sparked nothing less than a popular uprising, with Haaretz reporting that as many as half a million protesters have taken to the streets. Prime Minister Netanyahu is wheeling and dealing like mad to cling to power. Barak Ravid reports that Netanyahu sacked the Minister of Defense after he called for suspending the judicial reform push. Itamar Ben-Gvir, leader of perhaps the most extreme party in the right-wing coalition government, has threatened to quit the coalition if the judicial overhaul is delayed – but may have been appeased by a promise from Netanyahu to make the National Guard answerable directly to Ben-Gvir, per the Jerusalem Post. Axios reports that Jewish Democrats in Congress met with the Israeli Ambassador and warned him that if the bill is pushed through, it will be harder for them “to talk about Israel the same way they used to.”

2. A new paper published in the Harvard Environmental Law Review – by David Arkush of Public Citizen and Donald Braman of the George Washington University Law School – posits whether fossil fuel companies should be charged with homicide. The authors argue these corporations “have not simply been lying to the public, they have been killing members of the public at an accelerating rate, and prosecutors should bring that crime to the public’s attention.”

3. In the wake of the Silicon Valley Bank collapse, Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders has introduced legislation that would bar big bank executives from serving on Federal Reserve Boards. Chairman Sanders said “The Fed has got to become a more democratic institution that is responsive to the needs of working people and the middle class.”

4. The Huffington Post reports that Rep. Ilhan Omar has introduced a bill to “Condemn Anti-Muslim Hate.” The bill was crafted to honor the 51 Muslims killed in Christchurch, New Zealand in 2019, and it was introduced on the first day of Ramadan. Omar is quoted saying “We...know that this increase in hate is not isolated to only Muslims. Church bombings, synagogue attacks, and racial hate crimes are also on the rise. In order to confront the evils of religious bigotry and hatred, we must come to understand that all our destinies are linked.”

5. An investigation by Morgan Baskin of DCist found that “local developers are buying rent-controlled apartments, clearing out existing tenants, and marketing to housing choice voucher holders” because the DC Housing Authority engages in routine over-payments. In so doing, these developers are “eroding affordable housing.”

6. In Brazil, Democracy Now! reports that the Lula government has successfully removed “almost all illegal gold mining operations…from Yanomami Indigenous territory.” Lula campaigned on the promise to remove these mining operations, which have “displaced people, devastated the land and food resources, and contaminated rivers with mercury.”

7. Ever have a hard time canceling a subscription or recurring fee online? In a video by More Perfect Union, FTC Chair Lina Khan explained how the agency is taking aim at a pervasive corporate manipulation tactic nicknamed “click to subscribe, call to cancel” in which companies make it easy to sign up for a service, but make it very difficult to cancel it. The new rule – called “click to cancel” – would mandate that (1) it must be as easy to cancel a service as it is to sign up for it and (2) consumers must be able to cancel using the same method they used to sign up.

8. From PBS: In Florida, Governor DeSantis is expanding the “Don’t Say Gay” censorship law to high-schools. Supporters of this bill had previously insisted that it was only intended to curtail discussions of sensitive topics for young children. This expansion clearly undermines that argument.

9. In Chicago, the International Committee of the Democratic Socialists of America hosted Cuban Ambassador Lianys Torres Rivera at the 35th Ward - 8th District Office for a meeting with local elected officials and faith leaders. They discussed the harmful U.S. embargo and strengthening goodwill between the people of Cuba and the United States. This meeting was attended by Cook County Commissioner Anthony J. Quezada and Aldermen Carlos Ramirez-Rosa, Byron Sigcho Lopez, and Rossana Rodriguez.

10. From the chocolate-factory-west-reading.html">New York Times: At a chocolate factory in Reading, Pennsylvania, a massive explosion has left at least seven dead and more missing. Activists are calling for a thorough and swift investigation into the factory’s owners, the R.M. Palmer Company.

Ralph welcomes economist, attorney, and investigative journalist, James Henry for his expert take on what is going on in the banking system and what we can do to keep it from blowing up. And Professor and former Nader’s Raider, Alison Dundes Renteln, takes on the commercialization of our universities in her book “The Ethical University: Transforming Higher Education.”

James Henry is a leading economist, attorney, consultant, and investigative journalist, who has written and spoken widely on the problems of tax justice and development finance. He is a lecturer and Global Justice Fellow at Yale University.

The first thing we learn from the history of banking crises in the United States is that banks are really the Achilles heel of capitalism. This keeps happening. And we got used to a period when banking crises— we thought— had been taken care of, that we could just assume that someone in the Fed, or in the US Treasury, or regulators at the global level would understand all this stuff and they would reform the system.

James Henry

Alison Dundes Renteln is a Professor of Political Science and Anthropology at the University of Southern California where she teaches Law and Public Policy with an emphasis on international law and human rights. She is co-editor, with Wanda Teays, of The Ethical University: Transforming Higher Education.

We really should be thinking about how to make universities a place for learning, and the production of knowledge, and making the world a better place. And the book is really an attempt to argue for reimagining universities so we return to the mission of universities, which is not to promote future corporate leaders… but to produce people who will contribute in many different ways in society.

Alison Dundes Renteln

It’s really quite remarkable that in an institution that’s supposed to be devoted to democratic deliberation, intellectual life, justice, opportunity broadly defined, that the decisions are made by the administrators and the board of trustees— largely in secret.

Ralph Nader

In Case You Haven’t Heard1. For the first time ever, a new sympathies-middle-east-shift-palestinians.aspx">Gallup poll shows that Democrats sympathize more with Palestinians than Israelis, by a margin of 48% to 39%. This represents an 11 point shift in attitudes since just last year. Republicans still sympathize far more with Israelis, by a margin of 78 to 11 per cent.

2. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, sent a 03-13-letter-to-secdef-and-secarmy-re-havana-syndrome-animal-tests.pdf">letter to the Pentagon last week urging them to cease testing pulse radiation on animals in connection with the “Havana Syndrome” hoax. In 2020, PETA criticized the Army for reversing a previous ban on weapons testing on dogs, cats, marine animals and nonhuman primates and last year accused the Army of hiding such weapons tests after the service rejected a Freedom of Information Act request for documents relating to the experiments, POLITICO reports.

3. The Texas Education Agency has announced a takeover of the Houston school district. The elected school board will be replaced by state-appointed managers, who will wield tremendous power. Houston Public Media reports that “they can control the budget, school closures, collaborations with charter networks, policies around curriculum and library books, as well as hiring or firing the superintendent.”

4. At a recent town hall, Rep. Pramila Jayapal was asked by an activist from Seattle for Assange whether she thought it was time to free Mr. Assange. She responded with a simple “yes” and invited the activist to continue the conversation. Rep. Jayapal chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

5. A wild story in Creative Loafing Tampa covers “How a Florida city targets unwanted residents using police and code enforcement.” The story follows a Jewish woman who moved to Florida from New York. “Last March, the cops broke into her home when she wasn’t there to inspect alleged code violations, using an illegal search warrant. Body camera video...revealed them making jokes about Anne Frank...Her home security camera system showed the police going through her personal belongings and code enforcement personnel looking through her garbage...[she] faced criminal charges for the alleged violations—an uncommon practice in the state.”

6. Common Dreams reports that last week, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez met with Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki, who lobbied her and other US officials to oppose construction of a new US base in Okinawa. He also urged the US to ease tensions with China. Okinawa hosts over 70% of US military presence in Japan. Tamaki stressed that toxic PFAs contamination of soil and water from the bases are “worsening and require immediate studies by the US government.” She told the Okinawa Times that her office will review the contents of the meeting and consider what action is necessary. Governor Tamaki also met with Senator Todd Young of Indiana and Rep. Jill Tokuda of Hawaii, as well as aides of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Senator Ed Markey, and the Senate Armed Services Committee.

7. Following the abysmal performance of New York Democrats in the 2022 midterms – and their obstinate refusal to implement any reforms – york-democrats-2024-house-majority-pac-war-room.html">Slate reports that national Democrats are quietly forming a “shadow party” apparatus in the state. The House Majority PAC has already committed $45 million to New York races in 2024. Further, the PAC is building out “an entire electoral operation, hiring its own staffers...to handle opposition research, rapid response, messaging, and more.” Typically, these functions are handled by the state party.

8. From the LA Times: The Los Angeles School District is in the midst of a massive, three-day long strike by bus drivers, custodians, special education assistants, and cafeteria workers – in short, the lowest paid school employees. These workers are represented by the Service Employees International Union Local 99 and are demanding a 30% salary increase, plus $2 more per hour for the lowest paid employees. This would raise the average salary for these workers to an already meager $36,000 per year. Max Arias, executive director of Local 99 called this strike the “workers’ last resort.”

9. From the Guardian: Rather than submit to a subpoena from Bernie Sanders, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz abruptly quit. This ends his third tenure as CEO of the company.

In a lively and insightful roundtable discussion, Ralph hosts former Marine company commander, Matthew Hoh, who when not deployed also worked in the Pentagon and the State Department and independent and unembedded Iraq war correspondent, Dahr Jamail. They mark the twentieth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and discuss the consequences of that misbegotten and illegal war. Plus, we hear a clip from Ralph’s and Patti Smith’s antiwar concert tour conducted in 2005.

Dahr Jamail is the author of Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq, as well as The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption. He is co-editor (with Stan Rushworth) of We Are the Middle of Forever: Indigenous Voices from Turtle Island on the Changing Earth.

It’s hard to even articulate the level of suffering (in Iraq). And this is the country that exists today, that I got to leave, the military got to leave— at least for the most part. But the Iraqi people can’t leave. And this is what they have to live with today.

Dahr Jamail

Matthew Hoh is a Senior Fellow with the Center for International Policy. Mr. Hoh took part in the American occupation of Iraq, first with a State Department reconstruction and governance team and then as a Marine Corps company commander. When not deployed, he worked on Afghanistan and Iraq war policy and operations issues at the Pentagon and State Department. In 2009, he resigned in protest from his post in Afghanistan with the State Department over the American escalation of the war.

This consistent line of violence directed against the Iraqi people to achieve American political aims had been established for decades. And I went into it thinking that somehow we were different… “If I go into this war, I can affect the people around me because I am going to be good and I am going to be moral and I am not going to do bad things.” And that’s a complete fallacy. That’s an incredible mistake.

Matthew Hoh

We have to go into this history because it’s going to happen again and again and again. The warmongers are active again on the Ukraine War now. More and more, we’re moving toward a conflict with Russia...Who knows what will happen, because there’s no break on our government. It’s as if it was a dictatorship when it comes to foreign policy.

Ralph Nader

In Case You Haven’t Heard1. From Jewish Currents: Last May, amid rising antisemitic attacks by the far-right, Anti-Defamation League president Jonathan Greenblatt announced that the organization would devote more energy to combating anti-Zionism and described Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), and the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) as “extremist” and the “photo inverse of the extreme right.” Within the group, staffers dissented to this rhetoric. Greenblatt called a special meeting over Zoom to address this dissent, ending by stating “[if] you...can’t square the fact that anti-Zionism is antisemitism, then maybe this isn’t the place for you.”

2. The Congressional Workers Union continues along its long road. The union reports 100% of staffers for Senator Ed Markey voted to unionize; once recognized, this will be the first ever unionized Senate office. Additionally, while the Republican majority in the House has sought to arrest unionization efforts, a new report from Demand Progress’ Kevin Mulshine (a former counsel at the Office of Congressional Workplace Rights) contends that they can continue their efforts under the Congressional Accountability Act.

5. In Georgia, judges denied bail to 22 of 23 citizens engaged in peaceful protest against the Cop City project. These protesters are charged with “domestic terrorism,” according to NPR. Many prominent civil liberties organizations signed a letter objecting to this decision, including Amnesty International, the National Lawyers Guild, Greenpeace, Human Rights Watch, Palestine Legal, the American Friends Service Committee, and CODEPINK. Additionally, an independent autopsy published in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution suggests that – contrary to the police’s statement at the time – murdered protester Manuel “Tortuguita” Terán was in a cross-legged, seated position with their hands raised when they were shot to death by Georgia police.

6. From The Hill: Following a two-year battle, Gigi Sohn has requested that President Biden withdraw her nomination for the Federal Communications Commission. This follows three confirmation hearings and a nasty media campaign against Ms. Sohn, who confounded “Public Knowledge” alongside Laurie Racine and David Bollier. The opposition to her nomination came primarily from Republicans, but Democrats caving on this nomination is just another in a long pattern. The FCC is now left with a 2-2 partisan deadlock.

8. Editors for Saturday Night Live will strike if they can’t reach a deal on their contract by the end of the month, the LA Times reports. According to the Motion Picture Editors Guild, editors are “paid far below industry standards.”

10. From the Guardian: In Kingston, New York – a post-industrial town where the median per-capita income hovers around $32,000, and nearly one in five residents live below the federal poverty line – rents have skyrocketed up to 30% in the last three years. Now, using emergency rent control measures a board of tenants is seeking an unprecedented citywide rent reduction. Amid fierce resistance from the landlord lobby, this issue is now winding its way through the courts.

In a jam-packed program full of abundant insight, Ralph first welcomes back Dahr Jamail to discuss his work “We Are the Middle of Forever: Indigenous Voices from Turtle Island on the Changing Earth” about what we can learn from indigenous people who have survived incredible disruptions to the climate to their families and to their way of life. Then Karen Friedman from the Pension Rights Center gives us an update on how they are fighting to save our hard-earned money. And finally, Cal Berkeley grad students, Sandra Oseguera and Jesus Gutierrez explain the university’s “inverted priorities” as it spends millions of dollars on football coaches’ salaries and real estate while shutting down campus libraries.

Dahr Jamail is the author of Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq, as well as The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption. He is co-editor (with Stan Rushworth) of We Are the Middle of Forever: Indigenous Voices from Turtle Island on the Changing Earth.

One of the themes of the book is the difference between the Western settler-colonialist mindset of: What are my rights? I have my rights. Versus a more Indigenous perspective that we came across time and again in the book of: We have two primary obligations that we are born into. One is the obligation to serve and be a good steward of the planet. The other obligation is to serve future generations of all species. So, if I focus on my obligations, it’s very very clear that I have plenty of work to do in service to those. If I focus only on my rights, I’m going to be chronically frustrated.

Dahr Jamail, editor of We Are the Middle of Forever: Indigenous Voices from Turtle Island on the Changing Earth

Karen Friedman is the Executive Director of the Pension Rights Center. She develops solutions and implements strategies to protect and promote the rights of consumers, and for more than 20 years has represented their interests in the media and before congressional committees.

Social Security is the strongest system we have. While opponents of Social Security have tried to undermine confidence in its future, the truth is that Social Security is one of the most universal, efficient, secure, and fair sources of retirement income…It’s not going broke, folks. It's a great system. That’s all propaganda, meant to scare the bejesus out of you.

Karen Friedman

Sandra Oseguera and Jesús Gutierrez are graduate students in the Anthropology department at The University of California, Berkeley.  Last month, campus administration announced their plan to close the Anthropology Library, one of only three dedicated Anthropology libraries in the US. In response, stakeholders including students and faculty have organized to demand that the Anthropology Library be protected and fully supported by the University.

[Fighting to save the library] has been a wonderful experience of community and collaboration among many stakeholders. However, we the grad students see ourselves as the keepers and also the main users of [the Anthropology Library’s] collection because all of our research really relies on the resources that are there.

Sandra Oseguera

The library is a really valuable space. It’s not only a space for simply going in and accessing a book. It’s also a space of encounter. The kind of thing that the University is trying to destroy is essentially this possibility for having a happenstance run-in with a book that you may not necessarily have intended to type into the catalog system or with a person who you may not otherwise run into.

Jesús Gutierrez

The situation at Berkeley has become grotesquely inverted, in terms of the University. They have millions for football and other sports and paying coaches huge salaries. They have millions for administrative officials. But they want to shut down one of the great Anthropology libraries in the Western World.

Ralph Nader

In Case You Haven’t Heard1. The vet-artificial-turf-pfas-forever-chemicals-glioblastoma-cancer-phillies-1980-20230307.html?utm_campaign=Daily+News+Twitter+Account&cid=Daily+News+Twitter+Account&utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=social">Philadelphia Inquirer reports that six former Phillies players have died of the same brain cancer. All six played between 1971 and 2003. The paper obtained samples of the astroturf used between 1977 and 1981, and found 16 different types of PFAS, otherwise known as “forever chemicals.” Researchers only discovered that PFAs were present in artificial turf in 2019, so it is unknown whether these chemicals are linked to this cancer cluster.

2. Reps. Barbara Lee and Mark Pocan, both outspoken progressives, have introduced the “People Over Pentagon Act” which would cut $100 billion dollars from the defense budget. The Biden administration requested $813.3 billion in Pentagon funding in 2022. This bill would redirect these funds to healthcare, education, combating the climate crisis, and more. Public Citizen is fighting hard to advance this legislation.

3. The Hill reports a bipartisan group of Senators have introduced a bill to lift the embargo on Cuba. This “gang” is primarily made up of Senators representing states with large agricultural sectors, including Senators Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Jerry Moran of Kansas, among others. Senator Moran is quoted saying “the unilateral trade embargo on Cuba blocks our own farmers, ranchers and manufacturers from selling into a market only 90 miles from our shoreline, while foreign competitors benefit at our expense.”

4. Breaking news from the Intercept: Today, Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz is bringing to the floor a War Powers resolution requiring US troops to withdraw from Syria within 180 days. The Congressional Progressive Caucus is urging a “yes” vote on the resolution. This comes on the heels of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announcing that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has reached an agreement to move forward with the repeal of the Iraq War Authorization of the Use of Military Force, or AUMF. It remains to be seen whether the Republican-controlled House will reach a similar agreement.

5. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA, has opened an investigation into Tesla’s Model Y SUV after receiving complaints of steering wheels flying off while the vehicles were being driven. This probe will cover an estimated 120,000 vehicles from the 2023 model year, via AP.

6. From the Intercept: A new, proposed FDA rule would mandate that foods labeled “healthy” contain a major food group – dairy, fruits, or whole grains – and must be under certain limits on saturated fat, sodium, and added sugars. In response, General Mills, Kellogg’s, and Post Consumer Brands – which

collectively produce almost all cereal on the market – are bitterly lobbying against this rule.

7. In Israel, a video shows former Knesset speaker Avrum Burg – who has endorsed full equality for Palestinians – being roughed up by IDF soldiers for protesting against what he calls the “pogrom” in Huwarra. Huwarra has become a flash-point in Israeli politics. The New Arab reports Israeli Finance

Minister Bezalel Smotrich called for the village to be “wiped out” before retracting that statement under immense pressure.

8. From the Washington Post: Child labor violations are up 69% since 2018. This surge is driven in part by an increase in children working hazardous jobs like meatpacking.

Ralph welcomes William Kleinknecht, author of “States of Neglect: How Red-State Leaders Have Failed Their Citizens and Undermined America” about how red state governors and legislatures fight culture wars while starving education and health care, empowering polluters, engaging in voter suppression, and neglecting their citizens’ well-being in the interest of cutting taxes for their wealthy donors. Plus, Oliver Hall, founder of the Center for Competitive Democracy tells us all about how ordinary people can use an extremely underused legal forum, Small Claims Court.

William Kleinknecht is a longtime newspaper reporter who covered politics, government, criminal justice, and the environment for the Detroit Free Press, New York Daily News, and Newark Star-Ledger. He is the author of The Man Who Sold the World: Ronald Reagan and the Betrayal of Main Street America and States of Neglect: How Red-State Leaders Have Failed Their Citizens and Undermined America.

I wrote the book because when national news organizations talk about the red states, the focus is always on hot-button issues like abortion, immigration, election subversion, and even Critical Race Theory. And that’s by the design of the Republicans who run those states— that’s what they want people to be talking about because that fires up their base. What has gotten very little attention is just how damaging Republican leadership in those states has been for a longer period of time and across a much broader range of issues.

William Kleinknecht, author of States of Neglect: How Red-State Leaders Have Failed Their Citizens and Undermined America

I found that when I went to where the poorest people were— and the people who were suffering from environmental degradation or poor healthcare— I think they got it. I think it’s a different segment of their population that is the MAGA Republicans. And I didn't spend as much time around them because I was looking for where the damage was.

William Kleinknecht, author of States of Neglect: How Red-State Leaders Have Failed Their Citizens and Undermined America

Oliver Hall is a public interest attorney in Washington, DC. He is founder of and legal counsel to the Center for Competitive Democracy, which aims to strengthen American democracy by increasing electoral competition.

The fact is, in our increasingly corporatized world where transactions are automated, contracts are one-sided (contracts that corporations create with so much fine print you couldn’t possibly read it all, and ostensibly require you to sign away your rights), I think people get intimidated. Or they assume that they don’t have the right to pursue a claim in small claims court. And the fact is they do have that right. It can be done. And there's no reason more people shouldn’t do it, especially given the level and pervasiveness of corporate abuses, just in terms of everyday normal transactions that we all engage in.

Oliver Hall on Small Claims Court

I’ve been listening to Elon Musk speak out against government subsidies of corporations over the months— and talking about himself as a great capitalist entrepreneur— when, in reality, he takes all kinds of corporate welfare… Anytime he opens up a plant or starts a company like Starlink, he demands all kinds of subsidies, handouts, giveaways, grants, and especially a tax referral or tax holidays or tax breaks.

Ralph Nader on his Twitter exchange with Elon Musk

In Case You Haven’t Heard:

1. Former Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe, who opposed COVID aid, admitted that he retired due to complications from long COVID. He suggested that many other members of Congress are also struggling with long COVID but have kept that fact hidden from the public.

Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/republican-senator-opposed-covid-aid-retired-due-long-covid-2023-2

2. The Jewish Federations of North America, which represents nearly 150 Jewish federations, penned a letter calling on Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to drop the override clause, which would allow the Knesset to override laws deemed unconstitutional by the Israeli Supreme Court. The Federations warn that “such a dramatic change to the Israeli system of governance will have far-reaching consequences in North America.”

Source: https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/2023-02-21/ty-article/.premium/major-u-s-jewish-org-calls-for-negotiations-between-netanyahu-and-lapid/00000186-755e-dcba-a19e-f77fc52e00003. In Florida, legislators are considering a “Dealer Bill” which would block consumers from purchasing electric cars directly from manufacturers like Ford and Honda. If passed, consumers would be forced to deal with notoriously usurious car salesmen to purchase these vehicles. The sponsor of this legislation, state rep. Jason Shoaf received $10,000 from Braman Motors – owned by billionaire car magnate Norman Braman – one week after filing the bill.

Source:

4. On February 21st, over 30 members of CodePink occupied the offices of Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. They held a teach-in and ended by delivering demands for negotiations and peace in Ukraine to the armed services committee. CodePink is also one of the core sponsors of the upcoming March 18th antiwar rally in Washington D.C., along with nearly 80 other organizations including Veterans for Peace, Black Alliance for Peace, and US Labor against Racism and War.

Source for the action:

Source for the rally: https://www.codepink.org/piu20iraq

5. According to NPR CEO John Lansing, the network will lay off at least 100 staff – roughly 10% of its current workforce – and eliminate most vacant positions. Lansing blamed ever-declining ad revenues for precipitating this extreme cost-cutting measure.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/22/1158710498/npr-layoffs-2023?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_term=nprnews&utm_campaign=npr6. A startling report published in Rolling Stone shows there have been at least seven coups in Africa led by US-trained soldiers since 2021. The recent spate of coups has been a marked shift for the continent, which had seen an average of less than one successful coup per year between 2011 and 2021.

Source: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/west-africa-coup-american-trained-soldier-1234657139/7. The EPA has approved several “green biofuels” which are in fact not biological and are instead made from waste plastic. One of these fuels is so carcinogenic even Chevron estimates that one in four people exposed to the fumes will develop cancer. The EPA claims they are too underfunded to properly evaluate these fuels.

Source: https://www.propublica.org/article/chevron-pascagoula-pollution-future-cancer-risk

Legendary investigative reporter, Seymour Hersh, tells us all about the story he broke that describes in great detail how the U.S. blew up the Nordstream pipelines in a covert “act of war” against Russia. Plus, Mickey Huff, of Project Censored joins us to speak to Ralph about the state of the so-called “free press.”

Seymour Hersh is the pre-eminent investigative journalist of our time.  He has won five George Polk Awards, two National Magazine Awards, and more than a dozen other prizes for investigative reporting. In 1970, Mr. Hersh won the Pulitzer Prize for exposing the My Lai Massacre and its cover-up during the Vietnam War. In 2004, Mr. Hersh exposed the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in a series of pieces in The New Yorker. Among his many books are The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House, Chain of Command: The Road From 9/11 to Abu Ghraib, The Dark Side of Camelot, The Samson Option, The Killing of Osama Bin Laden, and his latest, a memoir of his storied, decades-long career, entitled simply Reporter.

The pipeline industry all know that Russia didn’t [sabotage the Nord Stream pipeline]. Everybody knows they did not do it. There might have been some vagueness about who. But they were pretty sure all along who. Because who else threatened to do it, but the President and his Under Secretary Victoria Nuland? They’re the two that went public with it— much to the dismay of the people actually doing the covert operation.

 Seymour Hersh

We always saw the Russians’ great abundance of gas and the Russian delivery of gas to Europe—from Jack Kennedy in 1962— we saw it as weaponizing gas.

Seymour Hersh

It’s a famous notion that the CIA and all those secret groups, they don’t work for the Constitution. They work for the Crown. They work for the President.

Seymour Hersh

Mickey Huff is the director of Project Censored and the founder and host of The Project Censored Show, a weekly syndicated public affairs program. He is professor of social science, history, and journalism at Diablo Valley College. He has authored and edited several books including ​​United States of Distraction: Media Manipulation in Post-Truth America (and what we can do about it), Let’s Agree to Disagree, The Media and Me: A Guide to Critical Media Literacy for Young People, and Project Censored’s State of the Free Press 2023: The News That Didn’t Make the News—And Why.

[The Norfolk Southern crash] is a bipartisan disaster. It’s a direct example of what happens with regulatory capture. And it shows, once again, the gross failure of the corporate media— they’ll cover balloons, and the Super Bowl, and a bunch of other distractions, instead of things that really matter to working class Americans.

Mickey Huff, co-editor of State of the Free Press 2023: The News That Didn’t Make the News—And Why

You’re not allowed to ask the tough questions, Ralph. And anybody who’s been in the press pool long enough knows that. They don’t have to be told that. The censorship doesn’t have to be directly from the government, or even from the corporate owners. Reporters know that if they ask questions that don’t get answered too often, and get overlooked, they’re going to get yanked. They’re going to get called back to the office. They might end up losing their jobs because they don’t have copy and they don’t have stories.

Mickey Huff, co-editor of State of the Free Press 2023: The News That Didn’t Make the News—And Why

Encourage members of the press not to forget [the 20th anniversary of the US invasion of Iraq on March 19th]. That was a massive war crime— over a million innocent Iraqis died, the country destroyed, falling apart to this day— and Bush and Cheney are luxuriating in the US without any accountability whatsoever. There’s a lot of talk now on the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But very little talk about the US and its sociocide destruction of the Iraqi people. And I think that illustrates how important it is to ask questions on subjects that have been taboo or censored.

Ralph Nader

Ralph welcomes old friend, Judge Andrew Napolitano, to talk about why the U.S. government offered a plea deal to the supposed mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four others. He asks, “Why would the government agree to such a plea for the persons it claims are the monsters who murdered 3,000 Americans on 9/11?... What does the government fear?” Plus, Ralph gives us his take on the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. And then on a lighter note, we talk about the Super Bowl.

Judge Andrew Napolitano is a former Superior Court Judge, a syndicated columnist, and host of the Judging Freedom podcast. Judge Napolitano has taught constitutional law and jurisprudence at Delaware Law School and Seton Hall Law School, and he was Fox News’ Senior Judicial Analyst from 1997 to 2021. He is the author of several books on the U.S. Constitution, the most recent entitled Freedom’s Anchor: An Introduction to Natural Law Jurisprudence in American Constitutional History.

“I would try (Bush & Cheney) for war crimes for which there is no statute of limitations… the war crimes are well-known. The war crimes are leading us into war under false pretenses; intentionally targeting civilians in the Middle East; authorizing torture and purporting to protect it against state law if done in the U.S. and international law. These are all well-known war crimes for which the penalty is life in prison. They can also be execution… There is still an E.U.-wide arrest warrant live out there issued by Spanish authorities for the arrest of George W. Bush, because of the war crimes I have just summarized.”

Judge Andrew Napolitano

“George W. Bush, arguably the worst president in the post-World War II era for bringing us into two totally useless and very costly wars – Afghanistan and Iraq – which cost us in excess of two trillion dollars, which had over 850 thousand people killed – only five thousand were Americans – which destroyed the moral order in that part of the world for a full generation also instituted a regime of torture. I believe, Ralph, as do many of us who follow this – we haven’t seen it in writing – that Bush somehow pardoned or granted immunity to the torturers, because the torture was so vast and so extensive, and no one has been prosecuted for it. Obama and Holder who said loudly that they were against torture had every opportunity to do it. And they knew the names of the torturers, but it just didn’t happen.”

Judge Andrew Napolitano

“I do believe that Rupert Murdoch called up Donald Trump and said to him, to Murdoch’s credit - to his face, although it was on the phone – ‘you are just not institutionally, constitutionally, or temperamentally, or intellectually qualified to be the president of the United States and we will not support you.’”

Judge Andrew Napolitano

This is super Sparta on steroids—the aggressiveness, the lack of diplomacy, the lack of waging peace by the US government. It’s like they’ve mothballed the charter of the State Department, which was diplomacy. They’ve turned it into a bellicose agency, sometimes much worse than the spokespeople for the Defense Department.

Ralph Nader