Free Forum with Terrence McNally

Aired 08/11/09I like it when someone does something better than they have to, or takes stands or risks they don't have to take. RICK STEVES has a comfortable business and a comfortable place in our culture and media. He helps people learn how to make travel less stressful and more enjoyable. But in TRAVEL AS A POLITICAL ACT, he sticks his neck out. He has traveled to and written about Iran, El Salvador, Turkey, for instance, in ways that challenge what passes for conventional wisdom. Of course, conventional wisdom is often a contradiction in terms, conventional meaning parochial, provincial, small minded, with little possibility of wisdom. Not only that, STEVES serves on the board of NORML and has given keynote speeches calling for legalization of marijuana. Though RICK STEVES received degrees at the University of Washington, his real education came in Europe - since 1973 he's spent four months a year there. Spending one third of his adult life living out of a suitcase has shaped his thinking. Today he produces Europe Through the Back Door guidebooks, a travel series in America on public television, a weekly hour-long national public radio show, and a syndicated weekly column.info: http://www.ricksteves.com/

Aired 07/28/09MICHAEL LEWIS is one of my favorite popular writers. He writes about sports, business, Wall Street, Silicon Valley, political campaigns, now fatherhood - in bestselling books and for the New York Times Magazine and Vanity Fair, among others. He's smart and he has a sense of humor. Malcolm Gladwell says he's one of our best storytellers.LEWIS was a trader at Salomon Brothers before he wrote his first best-seller, LIAR'S POKER about the excesses of Wall Street in the 1980s. He continues to write about that world with a couple of books in 2008 -- Panic: The Story of Modern Financial Insanity and The Real Price of Everything (editor) -- and a column for Bloomberg. His newest book, Home Game, is about fatherhood, so we'll talk about that, but even more we'll talk about Wall Street, madness, greed, the crash, and how we're dealing with it.MICHAEL LEWIS received a BA in art history from Princeton University and an MSc in economics from the London School of Economics. He worked as an investment banker for Salomon Brothers before leaving to write LIAR'S POKER. Other books include MONEYBALL, on the Oakland A's, Billy Beane, and baseball's new wave of Ivy League general managers; PANIC: The Story of Modern Financial Insanity; and his newest, HOME GAME: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood.

Aired 07/21/09HENRY JENKINS is the Provost's Professor of Communications, Journalism, and Cinematic Art at the University of Southern California. Until recently, he served as the co-founder of the Comparative Media Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His newest books include Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide and Fans, Bloggers and Gamers: Exploring Participatory Culture.www.henryjenkins.org/

Recorded 06/05/09Christianity, Judaism and Islam are both peaceful and violent. Robert Wright discusses what circumstances bring out the best and worst in religion.Is religion a force for good or ill?This question has been more energetically debated over the last few years, globally, due to the West's confrontation with radical Islam, and in the U.S., to the political emergence and activism of evangelical Christians. This was brought to a head with the misadventures of George W. Bush, from Teri Schiavo to Bagdhad.Robert Wright takes on big questions, and he's taken this one on in his new book, The Evolution of God. He follows the changing moods of God as reflected in ancient Scripture, to see what circumstances brought out the best and worst in religions.According to Wright, "The moral of the story is simple: When people see their interests threatened by another group, this perception brings out the most belligerent parts of their religion. Such circumstances are good news for violent extremists and bad news for moderates. What Obama is trying to do -- make Palestinians feel less threatened, and make Muslims generally feel more respected -- may now, as it did in ancient times, bring out the tolerant side of a religion."Wright is a visiting scholar at the University of Pennsylvania, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation, and founder and editor of www.bloggingheads.tv His books include: Three Scientists and Their Gods: Looking for Meaning in an Age of Information; The Moral Animal: Evolutionary Psychology and Everyday Life; and Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny. www.meaningoflife.tv and www.bloggingheads.tv.

Aired 06/30/09JANE MAYER, one of our nation's foremost investigative journalists will join us for at least the last half hour, maybe a bit more. Her best-selling 2008 book, THE DARK SIDE, was chosen by the New New York Times, The Economist, Salon, Slate, and Bloomberg as one of the best books of the year.In THE DARK SIDE, MAYER reported (to quote a review by Andrew Basevich), "Since embarking upon its global war on terror, the United States has blatantly disregarded the Geneva Conventions. It has imprisoned suspects, including U.S. citizens, without charge, holding them indefinitely and denying them due process. It has created an American gulag in which thousands of detainees, including many innocent of any wrongdoing, have been subjected to ritual abuse and humiliation. It has delivered suspected terrorists into the hands of foreign torturers. Under the guise of 'enhanced interrogation techniques,' it has succeeded, in Mayer's words, in 'making torture the official law of the land in all but name.' Further, it has done all these things as a direct result of policy decisions made at the highest levels of government."The country learned about all this and rejected Bush's Republican successor, John McCain, in favor of former constitutional law professor, Barack Obama. So has everything changed for the good?I'd say not nearly enough.Just in the two months since President Obama released the torture memos, a former FBI interrogator testified to the failures of the CIA's so-called enhanced interrogation techniques, a former aide to Colin Powell said the interrogations were aimed at building the case for the Iraq war, a coalition of advocacy groups has launched a campaign to disbar twelve former Bush administration attorneys.The Obama response? While continuing to preach "move forward, don't look back" when it comes to investigating or prosecuting possible crimes committed in pursuit of the above listed policies, the Obama administration has withheld photos of detainee abuse, defended the military tribunal system, and floated plans for a system of "preventive detention" for accused Terrorists.We will talk with JANE MAYER about the past, the present, and the future of actions and crimes committed by the US government to defend us from terror.

Aired 06/23/09LYME DISEASE and the documentary, UNDER OUR SKIN(opening in LA Friday June 26)ANDY ABRAHAMS WILSONproducer/director/cameraLORRAINE JOHNSONCEO, California Lyme Disease AssociationRICHARD HORWITZ MDPhysician, President, International Lyme and Associated Diseases Education Foundation MANDY HUGHESLyme disease patientLyme disease is one of the most misunderstood and controversial illnesses of our time. Difficult to test accurately, tens of thousands of people go undiagnosed-or misdiagnosed with such conditions as fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, autism, MS and ALS. The Centers for Disease Control admits that more than 200,000 people may acquire Lyme disease each year, a number greater than AIDS, West Nile Virus, and Avian Flu combined. And yet, the medical establishment-with profound influence from the insurance industry-has stated that the disease is easily detectable and treatable, and that "chronic Lyme" is some other unrecognized syndrome or a completely psychosomatic disorder.Learn more about the film at http://www.underourskin.com/Learn more about Lyme disease atwww.lymediseaseassociation.org www.ilads.org www.lymedisease.org

Aired 05/19/09REZA ASLAN is the author of "NO GOD BUT GOD" and his new book, "HOW TO WIN A COSMIC WAR: God, Globalization and the End of the War on Terror"REZA ASLAN says the only way to win a cosmic war is not to engage in one.That may seem obvious to some, but he's also saying that unless we recognize that we've been pulled into a cosmic war -- what that means and how it changes things -- we haven't got a chance of "winning" or even making the best of the situation."A cosmic war is a battle not between armies or nations, but between the forces of good and evil. The ultimate goal of a cosmic war is to vanquish evil itself, which ensures that a cosmic war remains an absolute, eternal, and ultimately unwinnable conflict. Cosmic wars are fought not over land or politics but over identity."1900 - 1/2 of world's population identified as members of major religions2000 - 2/3 of world's population identified as members of major religionsAslan believes the days of wars between nation states are over. When globalization frees people from national identity, it's replaced by other identities - especially religion. We must strip the conflict between Islam and the West of its religious connotations, and we must address the actual grievances that fuel the Jihadist movement.A recent Gallup poll (see below) appears to back him up. According to AP: "Joblessness and poverty are a more potent source of tension between Muslims and wider European and U.S. society than religious differences, [according to] one of the first major studies of Muslim integration since the Sept. 11 terror attacks."REZA ASLAN has a fairly unique resume. Born in Iran, emigrated wih his family to Enid, Oklahoma as a child. Degrees in religion from UC Santa Clara, UC Santa Barbara, and Harvard Divinity School, as well as an MFA from the Iowa Writers Program. His first book, NO GOD BUT GOD: The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam offers more than a history - and the guy can write.The first time I interviewed him was just after Hamas had won the Palestinian election. We both hoped that having to actually run things would move Hamas in a positive direction. The US, Israel, and others weren't willing to find out.We pick up the conversation this week, looking at the lessons of history, the lessons of the recent past, and hopes for the future.http://www.rezaaslan.com

Aired 05/12/09DAVID KORTEN author, AGENDA FOR A NEW ECONOMY:From Phantom Wealth to Real WealthDAVID KORTEN is the author of WHEN CORPORATIONS RULE THE WORLD and THE GREAT TURNING: From Empire to Earth Community. He is co-founder and board chair of YES! Magazine, and a board member of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE)http://www.yesmagazine.orghttp://www.livingeconomies.orgRANDY HAYES has been highly successful waging corporate accountability campaigns with Rainforest Action Network and International Forum on Globalization. He's working to launch a media campaign to "Ecologize the Economy."http://www.worldfuturecouncil.orghttp://ran.org KORTEN's got some big ideas, HAYES does too -- and a knack for activism. I'll talk with both about taking advantage of the current crises to transform our economy and, in turn, our future reality.

Aired 05/05/09MATT TAIBBI is a fire-breathing, shoot-from-the-hip reporter, columnist and blogger, whose March Rolling Stone article, "The Big Takeover," paints a dark picture of greed, corruption and power.http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/132859You can learn more about Taibbi's work at:www.trueslant.comwww.alternet.org www.rollingstone.com

Aired 05/05/09One of Ronald Reagan's most famous and successful quotes is from his 1980 debate with Jimmy Carter, "There you go again..." No one can remember what it was about or whether it was accurate, but it worked.I bring it up because a new book makes clear that that same line applies all too well to the right in this country. "There you go again..." - bringing up the same old stereotypes, same old fears, same old prejudices...Today's first guest MIKE LUX has a new book out -- THE PROGRESSIVE REVOLUTION: How the Best in America Came to Be -- in which he traces the role progressives have played in leading the US to so many of its best advances, battling every time the right's determination to keep progress at bay. Needless to say, we are at another of those moments today. After 30 years of dominance by the right, disaster is clear to all, and change is on the move. We'll talk about the history, the present moment, and what we all need to do to keep moving forward to a more progressive future.www.theprogressiverevolution.comwww.anewwayforward.org