The Real News Podcast

In the wake of the recent Nicaraguan elections, the US imperialist war machine is once again directing its wrath at the governments of Nicaragua and Cuba. In response, anti-imperialist leftists around the world are rightly denouncing the onslaught of US aggression, sanctions, and propaganda, but many are also pushing for the left to engage in serious debate about how revolutionary governments can maintain systems of democratic accountability and hold true to the principles from which they were born.In this segment of The Marc Steiner Show, Marc talks with Circles Robinson, who has been living between Nicaragua and Cuba since late 1984, about the Nicaraguan elections and the need for such debate to take place, both within Nicaragua and the broader left sphere. Before moving to Cuba, where he now works as editor of Havana Times, Robinson worked in Nicaragua for the National Union of Farmers and Ranchers and edited the Nicaragua Farmer's View.Tune in for new episodes of The Marc Steiner Show every Tuesday and Friday on TRNN.Pre-Production/Studio/Post Production: Stephen FrankRead the transcript of this interview: https://therealnews.com/democratic-accountability-keeps-revolutions-aliveHelp us continue producing The Marc Steiner Show by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer:Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-pod-mssSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/nl-pod-stGet The Marc Steiner Show updates: https://therealnews.com/up-pod-stLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

For years, prisoners, activists, and legal advocates have been drawing attention to the inhumane conditions at Rikers Island, New York’s most infamous jail complex. But the COVID-19 pandemic turned what was already a dire situation at Rikers into a full-blown humanitarian crisis. With cells grossly overcrowded, guards and medical staff largely absent, and an interior crumbling from disrepair, Rikers became a hotbed of contagion and needless death. What’s worse, as Judge Jonathan Lippman recently wrote in The New York Times, “90 percent of the human beings subjected to the appalling conditions at Rikers are there pretrial, many because they cannot afford bail. Almost 1,600 have been waiting for a trial for over a year. Almost 700 have been waiting for more than two.”In this episode of Rattling the Bars, TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway speaks with Olayemi Olurin about the ongoing crisis at Rikers and the renewed wave of outrage from the public and elected officials who are demanding that the jail be closed for good. Olurin is a public defender and staff attorney at the Legal Aid Society and an analyst at the Law & Crime Network.Pre-Production/Studio/Post Production: Cameron GranadinoRead the transcript of this interview: https://therealnews.com/we-want-rikers-closed-and-no-new-jails-in-its-placeHelp us continue producing Rattling the Bars by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-pod-rtbSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/nl-pod-rtbGet Rattling the Bars updates: https://therealnews.com/up-pod-rtbLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Ten years ago, the landscape for workers’ rights and organized labor in the state of Wisconsin changed dramatically with the passage of Act 10 under Republican Gov. Scott Walker. Act 10 was a hammer blow to the labor movement that essentially stripped collective bargaining rights from public sector workers, made it much more difficult for workers to organize, and forced unions to take massive concessions on healthcare, retirement benefits, and much more. Soon after, in 2015, Walker signed legislation that turned Wisconsin into a “right to work” state, issuing another blow to unions in a state once heralded as a bellwether of the labor movement. But all hope is not lost. In the wake of this coordinated assault on workers and unions, many are using the tools available to them to build up their communities and rebuild working-class power in Wisconsin.As part of a special collaboration with In These Times magazine for “The Wisconsin Idea,” TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez traveled to Wisconsin with Cameron Granadino (TRNN) and Hannah Faris (In These Times) to speak with teachers and organizers around the state about how Act 10 impacted their lives and work, and how they are rebuilding out of the rubble. In the first installment of this series of special reports, Alvarez speaks with Maricela Aguilar Monroy, an undocumented educator and organizer who has spent most of her life in Milwaukee, and who is working to strengthen the community that has provided a home for her so it can continue to provide a home for others.Pre-Production: Maximillian Alvarez, Hannah Faris, Alice Herman, Cameron GranadinoStudio: Cameron GranadinoPost-Production: Cameron Granadino, Stephen Frank, Kayla RivaraThe Wisconsin Idea is an independent reporting project of People’s Action Institute, Citizen Action of Wisconsin, and In These Times.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-podSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/newsletter-podLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

As a canonized work of fantasy fiction, a Hollywood institution, and a global cultural phenomenon, JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings is in a class all its own. Not only has the series had tremendous cultural staying power since its original publication in the 1950s, renewed for generations with Peter Jackson’s film adaptations, but it became a lifeline for many people quarantining throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Why have Tolkien’s works captivated us for so long? What does it tell us about our world and about the world Tolkien created that each perpetually has so many revealing things to say about the other? How has the series become the subject of an unending interpretive battle between reactionaries and revolutionaries who want to claim it as their own? And what does it mean to truly love Lord of the Rings for what it is, warts and all?In the inaugural episode of her new TRNN podcast Art for the End Times, writer and editor Lyta Gold dives deep into one of the most complex, lore-filled, and culturally enduring works in the fantasy canon with journalist, researcher, and diehard Lord of the Rings fan Talia Lavin. Lavin is the author of the critically acclaimed book Culture Warlords: My Journey Into the Dark Web of White Supremacy, and her writing has been featured in outlets like The New Yorker, The New Republic, The New York Times Review of Books, the Washington Post, the Village Voice, and more. She also writes regularly on her Substack The Sword and the Sandwich.Pre-Production/Studio/Post Production: Stephen FrankRead the transcript of this podcast: https://therealnews.com/reading-lord-of-the-rings-in-the-end-timesHelp us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-podSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/newsletter-podLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

This week, PAR continues its coverage of the overt abuses of police power by examining new data that shows just how dangerous—and even deadly—systematic over-policing can be. PAR hosts Taya Graham and Stephen Janis break down several cases that show how police use pretextual car stops to expand their power, challenge the constitutional rights of citizens, and expand the reach of the country’s law-enforcement-industrial complex.Post Production: Adam ColeyHelp us continue producing Police Accountability Report by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-pod-parSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/nl-pod-parGet Police Accountability Report updates: https://therealnews.com/pod-up-parLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

On Nov. 7, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega secured a fourth consecutive term in the country’s latest round of national elections with Rosario Murillo, Ortega’s wife, serving as Vice President. Prior to his current run as President, which began in 2007, Ortega had headed the government throughout the 1980s, first through the Junta of National Reconstruction after the Sandinista National Liberation Front ousted the right-wing Somoza dictatorship in 1979, and then as President from 1985 to 1990. Nicaragua’s electoral authority has said that voter turnout in this week's elections reached 65% and that Ortega’s Sandinista alliance secured about 75% of votes cast. The United States is currently leading an international chorus rejecting the legitimacy of the elections and condemning the Ortega-Murillo government, with President Joe Biden threatening action against Nicaragua. “What Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, orchestrated today was a pantomime election that was neither free nor fair, and most certainly not democratic,” Biden’s official statement says. The “United States, in close coordination with other members of the international community, will use all diplomatic and economic tools at our disposal to support the people of Nicaragua and hold accountable the Ortega-Murillo government and those that facilitate its abuses.”The aggressive posture and threats of sanctions (or worse) from President Biden follow a well-worn path of flexed imperialist might, political and even military intervention, and self-serving definitions of democracy that the US has often deployed against left-wing governments throughout Latin America. In response, leftists of different stripes in North America and beyond have denounced President Biden’s threat while also claiming that accusations of rigged elections in Nicaragua or doubts about the leftist bonafides of Ortega’s government are entirely unfounded. But there is a lot more context that needs to be unpacked here, and doing so from a historically honest and anti-imperialist perspective is vital to understanding the very real political crisis in Nicaragua. In this interview, TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez speaks with professor and Latin American specialist William I. Robinson about the deeper historical context surrounding Nicaragua’s elections, the very real political crisis that many are not seeing, and the need for the internationalist left to oppose US imperialism while soberly assessing the abuses of the Ortega-Murillo government.William I. Robinson is Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Global, and Latin American Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara. He worked in Managua with the Nicaragua News Agency and the Nicaragua Foreign Ministry in the 1980s and was affiliated faculty with the Central American University in Managua until 2001. Along with authoring a series of analyses of the 2021 Nicaraguan elections for the North American Congress on Latin America, Robinson has authored, co-authored, and edited numerous books, including Global Capitalism and the Crisis of Humanity; David and Goliath: The U.S. War Against Nicaragua; The Global Police State; and A Faustian Bargain: U.S. Intervention in the Nicaraguan Elections and American Foreign Policy in the post-Cold War Era.Pre-Production/Studio/Post Production: Cameron GranadinoHelp us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-podSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/newsletter-podLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Recent federal elections in Norway and Germany saw entrenched conservative and neoliberal governments swept from power, replaced by an odd assortment of liberals, leftists, and Greens. In Norway, Europe’s largest oil and gas producer, a new ruling coalition has emerged between the social democratic Labour Party and agrarian Centre Party. In Germany, Europe’s economic powerhouse and its largest energy consumer, Chancellor Angela Merkel has stepped down after nearly two decades in power, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) is now the largest party, and the Greens drew nearly 15% of the vote, gaining 51 seats in the Bundestag. In the wake of record-setting rain and flooding in Germany this summer, as well as near-record heatwaves in Nordic countries, tackling climate change was a major concern for voters in the recent German and Norwegian elections. With new coalitions in power, what hope is there that each country, and the European Union writ large, will take substantive steps to address the climate crisis?In this interview, TRNN contributor David Kattenburg speaks with Jule Könneke and Rafael Loss about the recent European elections and what opportunities they present for Germany and Norway’s new coalition governments to take serious action. Jule Könneke is the former president of Polis180, a Berlin-based think tank on foreign and European affairs; she is also a climate diplomacy researcher at the German NGO E3G. Rafael Loss is the coordinator for pan-European data projects at the European Council on Foreign Relations’ Re:shape Global Europe project; he is also a co-author of the policy brief “Europe’s Green Moment: How to Meet the Climate Change Challenge.”Post-Production: Adam ColeyHelp us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-podSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/newsletter-podLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

With few exceptions, traditional accounts of the development of the modern world put European history at the center of everything, often focusing on the “Age of Discovery” and global expansion, the Enlightenment, and so on. “The history of Africa, by contrast, has long been relegated to the remote outskirts of our global story,” as Howard W. French asserts in his critically acclaimed and game-changing new book. “What if, instead, we put Africa and Africans at the very center of our thinking about the origins of modernity?”In this segment of The Marc Steiner Show, Marc talks with French about his new book, Born in Blackness: Africa, Africans, and the Making of the Modern World, 1471 to the Second World War, and about the forcibly forgotten history of Africa’s central place in the making of the modern world. Howard W. French is a professor of journalism at Columbia University and former New York Times bureau chief in the Caribbean and Central America, West and Central Africa, Tokyo, and Shanghai. He is the author of numerous books, including A Continent for the Taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa and China's Second Continent: How a Million Migrants Are Building a New Empire in Africa.Tune in for new episodes of The Marc Steiner Show every Tuesday and Friday on TRNN.Pre-Production/Studio/Post Production: Stephen FrankHelp us continue producing The Marc Steiner Show by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer:Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-pod-mssSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/nl-pod-stGet The Marc Steiner Show updates: https://therealnews.com/up-pod-stLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

35,000 members of the Alliance of Health Care Unions, a coalition of 21 local unions representing over 52,000 workers at the healthcare giant Kaiser Permanente in states around the country, have set a strike date. Unless the company addresses the serious issues that workers have raised at the bargaining table, Kaiser workers will walk off the job on Nov. 15, and thousands more may join in what could become one of the largest strikes ever in the healthcare sector. The core issues that led to the potential strike not only involve adequate compensation for union workers, but also the dire concerns about healthcare workers being grossly overworked and under-resourced, as well as two-tier employment and the struggle to draw in and retain trained staff. On top of the essential concerns that directly impact the jobs and livelihoods of healthcare workers, the outcome of this high-stakes labor struggle will have huge implications for the future of healthcare in the US as we know it.In this special edition of Working People, TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez speaks with two Kaiser workers, Hannah Winchester, DPT, and Nicholas Eng, RNFA, about the work that they do, the changes they’ve experienced in the healthcare system, and the dire conditions that have led to a potential strike. Hannah Winchester is a home health physical therapist by trade; she is also her department’s Labor Partner, a shop steward, and a member of the bargaining team for the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals (OFNHP) Professional Bargaining Unit. Nicholas Eng has been a nurse for nearly 10 years; he is also an OFNHP shop steward and is currently on release for OFNHP to be present for contract bargaining and to help with organizing union members and actions, including strike planning.Post-Production: Adam ColeyRead the transcript of this interview: https://therealnews.com/35000-kaiser-permanente-workers-are-set-to-strike-and-the-future-of-us-healthcare-is-at-stakeAdditional links/info below…The Alliance of Health Care Unions website, Facebook page, and Twitter page:https://www.ahcunions.org/https://www.facebook.com/AHCUnions/https://twitter.com/AHCunionsOregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals website, Facebook page, Twitter page, and Instagram:http://ofnhp.aft.org/https://www.facebook.com/ofnhp/https://twitter.com/ofnhphttps://www.instagram.com/ofnhp/?hl=enOFNHP Cares - Member Hardship Relief Fund: https://www.gofundme.com/f/y3h5p-ofnhp-cares-member-hardship-relief-fund?qid=b651426291f2babae96217e9a9d1d90eNoah Lanard, Mother Jones, ““You Are Worth More”: Kaiser Permanente Workers Are on the Verge of a Historic Strike”: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/10/kaiser-permanente-strike-health-care-nurses-decades/Dave Muoio, Fierce Healthcare, “Nearly 32,000 Kaiser Permanente Workers Set to Strike Nov. 15. Tens of Thousands More Mulling Their Own Demonstrations”: https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/hospitals/nearly-32-000-kaiser-permanente-workers-set-to-strike-nov-15Working People, The Real News Network, “A Small-Town Hospital Goes After Its Union Nurses”: https://therealnews.com/a-small-town-hospital-goes-after-its-union-nursesBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Mansoor Adayfi, “Detainee No. 441,” was imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay for over 14 years without charges as an enemy combatant. As detailed in the description for Adafyi’s new book Don’t Forget Us Here: Lost and Found at Guantánamo, “Arriving as a stubborn teenager, Mansoor survived the camp’s infamous interrogation program and became a feared and hardened resistance fighter leading prison riots and hunger strikes protesting inhumane treatment and arbitrary detention. With time though, he grew into the man nicknamed ‘Smiley Troublemaker’: a student, writer, advocate, and historian.” In this special episode of Rattling the Bars, TRNN Executive Producer, legendary Black Panther, and longtime political prisoner Eddie Conway sits down with Adafyi to talk about his new book, his time at Guantánamo, the human cost of the War on Terror, and about the battle for survival in the dark heart of American empire.Pre-Production/Studio/Post Production: Cameron GranadinoRead the transcript of this interview: https://therealnews.com/surviving-the-darkness-eddie-conway-speaks-with-guantanamo-bay-detainee-mansoor-adayfiHelp us continue producing Rattling the Bars by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer: Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-pod-rtbSign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/nl-pod-rtbGet Rattling the Bars updates: https://therealnews.com/up-pod-rtbLike us on Facebook: https://facebook.com/therealnewsFollow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/therealnewsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!