Free Forum with Terrence McNally

June 25th NYTimes headline: “2019 might be the year of the protest” - mass demonstrations in Prague, Hong Kong, Russia, Kazakhstan, and the UK. The President of Algeria, the President of Sudan, and Governor of Puerto Rico leave office after protests. What’s going on? Why are nonviolent protests working? And what might that mean for us here in the US where the global climate movement has called for a general strike September 20th? I speak with ERICA CHENOWETH, Professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School and author of WHY CIVIL RESISTANCE WORKS: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict.

CNN did their best to turn presidential debates into Wrestlemania, pitting moderates against progressives, pushing the story that their policies are too bold and will elect Trump. Tuesday night Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren held their ground. With that in mind, here's my 2012 interview with Ralph Nader about his book, The Seventeen Solutions: Bold Ideas for Our American Future, recorded at the time of the Obama-Romney debates. Let’s see how many of his bold ideas are on the table in this campaign?

The documentary FOR SAMA takes us inside the heartbreaking suffering of the people of Aleppo during the long and brutal siege by al Assad and the Russians. Waad al-Kateab began shooting students spraying revolutionary graffiti on university walls. The revolution rises around her – as does the overwhelming response. Best Doc, 2019 Cannes Film Festival and Doc Grand Jury Prize, 2019 SXSW Film Festival. I interview directors Waad al-Kateab and Edward Watts, and Dr. Hamza al-Kateab, who ran the last hospital in East Aleppo. Don’t miss this podcast. You will get a unique feel for Syria. Learn more at forsamafilm.com

In the US today, we see how even one person willing to oppose the popular consensus can dictate our nation’s response to climate change. Meanwhile China has leapt into the vacuum created by our retreat. In her provocative new book, Will China Save the Planet?, BARBARA FINAMORE, Senior Attorney and Asia Senior Strategic Director, Natural Resources Defense Council, explores China’s big picture, long-term strategy to seize the leadership of the global response and reap the technological, economic, and political benefits.

We go deep into the archives to bring you my 2002 conversation with THOMAS HOMER DIXON on his insightful and provocative book THE INGENUITY GAP, in which he asks whether we’re going to be able to generate and implement useful ideas fast enough to solve the problems we ourselves are creating. Problems like the surveillance capitalism of Facebook and Google, the jobs we’re losing to robots, and the crisis of climate change. In the book and interview, he said there was still time but the hour was getting late – and that was 17 years ago.

When the three richest Americans have more wealth than the lowest 50%, shareholder capitalism is not working. In EVERYTHING FOR EVERYONE: The Radical Tradition that is Shaping the Next Economy, NATHAN SCHNEIDER reminds us of a hopeful alternative – cooperatives - jointly owned, democratically controlled enterprises that advance the economic, social, and cultural interests of their members. Schneider previously wrote a book on the Occupy movement. You can learn more at nathanschneider.info

As the Democratic candidate debates begin, here's my March 2018 conversation with ARLIE HOCHSCHILD. In her book, STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND, based on five years research in Southern Louisiana, she asks, why residents of the nation's second poorest state vote for candidates who resist federal help? Why, when corporations devastate their lives and their land, do they most hate the government? And I ask, how can we come up with a story that can change their minds? Listen to get a sense of what we're up against in 2020.

I’m always interested in what the US can learn from other countries. So I was immediately attracted to JOSHUA GOLDSTEIN’s new book A BRIGHT FUTURE: How Some Countries Have Solved Climate Change and the Rest Can Follow. When Goldstein (and co-author Staffan Qvist) did the research and the math on what it was going to take to reduce carbon emissions enough to avoid the worst of climate change, they concluded that rapid development of renewables would need a large and fast buildout of nuclear power to replace fossil fuels as backup for wind and solar. You may not agree with them, but I think this conversation is worth a listen.

This 2003 interview traces the evolution of Dr. Weil’s work and thinking from his earliest understandings of health and healing to his ongoing commitment to train a new generation of physicians. Weil’s definition of integrative medicine: rooted in the connection of medicine with nature and the natural healing potential of the organism, it utilizes the magic of the doctor/patient relationship to treat the whole person. Hyla Cass MD joins the conversation.

The idea of the frontier has been central to American identity. Its image of endless promise fostered our belief in the US as exceptional. Today America has a new symbol: the border wall. As GREG GRANDIN sees it, America’s constant expansion helped deflect domestic political and economic conflicts outward. But the 2008 financial crash and unwinnable wars in the Middle East turned Americans inward, leading to the rise of reactionary populism, racist nationalism, extreme anger, polarization - and Trump.