KPFA - Letters and Politics

Guest: Ioan Grillo is a journalist and author specializing in crime and drugs.  He is the author of the books Gangster Warlords: Drug Dollars, Killing Fields and the New Politics of Latin America, El Narco: Inside Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency, and his latest, Blood Gun Money: How America Arms Gangs and Cartels. Photo credit: Rifles at the National Firearms Museum on Wikimedia   The post How America Arms Gangs and Cartels appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Timothy Brennan is the author of several books, including At Home in the World: Cosmopolitanism Now; Borrowed Light: Vico, Hegel, and the Colonies; and Salman Rushdie and the Third World: Myths of the Nation, and his latest, Places of Mind: A Life of Edward Said.  Professor Brennan teaches in the humanities at the University of Minnesota.   The post Edward Said: A Life appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Richard A. Walker is professor emeritus of geography at U.C. Berkeley. He created the pamphlet A Guide to the Art and Public Works of the New Deal: Washington DC. Find more at livingnewdeal.org   The post The New Deal’s Public Works Vs. Neo-liberalism’s Infrastructure appeared first on KPFA.

Part I – Reflecting on Biden’s First 100 Days Guest:  David Dayen is the executive editor of The American Prospect. He currently is authoring the Prospect Magazine special series First 100: An In-Depth Look at President Biden and the New Administration.  David Dayen is the author of Monopolized: Life in an Age of Corporate Power and Chain of Title, winner of the Ida and Studs Terkel Prize.   Part II: The Suppression of Speech in WWI and Why It Matters Today Guest: Eric Chester, taught economics at the University of Massachusetts in Boston and San Francisco State University. A committed activist for more than fifty years, he was vice-presidential candidate for the Socialist Party in 1996.  His latest book is Free Speech and the Suppression of Dissent During World War I. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons Photo credit: Manny Becerra via Unsplash   The post Reflecting on Biden’s First 100 Days appeared first on KPFA.

Part I – The Derek Chauvin Trial, Racism & The Law Guest: Justin Hansford is a Howard University School of Law Professor of Law and Executive Director of the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Center.  Professor Hansford is a leading scholar and activist in the areas of critical race theory, human rights, and law and social movements. He is a co-author of the forthcoming Seventh Edition of Race, Racism and American Law.  Part II – A History of the Kerner Commission Guest: Christopher S. Parker is Professor of African-American studies at Washington University. Photo credit: Wikipedia The post The Derek Chauvin Trial, Racism & The Law appeared first on KPFA.

Guest:  Michio Kaku is a professor of theoretical physics at the City University of New York, co-founder of string field theory, and the author of several widely acclaimed science books, including Beyond Einstein, The Future of Humanity, The Future of the Mind, Hyperspace, Physics of the Future, Physics of the Impossible, and his latest, The God Equation: The Quest for a Theory of Everything   The post Michio Kaku: The Quest for a Theory of Everything appeared first on KPFA.

Guest:  Hilary Holladay is a biographer, novelist, poet, and scholar of modern and contemporary American literature. She is a former director of the Jack and Stella Kerouac Center for American Studies and professor of English at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell.  Holladay is the author of several books, her most recent is The Power of Adrienne Rich: A Biography. The post The Power of Adrianne Rich appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Greg Grandin is professor of history at Yale University. He won the Pulitzer Prize in Non-Fiction in 2020 for his book The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America. He has also republished his book from 2006 Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Making of an Imperial Republic.  Professor Grandin served on the United Nations Truth Commission investigating the Guatemalan Civil War.   Photo credit: Wikipedia “Ten Thousand Miles From Tip to Tip” meaning the extension of U.S. domination (symbolized by a bald eagle) from Puerto Rico to the Philippines. The cartoon contrasts this with a map of the smaller United States 100 years earlier in 1798.     The post Greg Grandin: A History of US Empire & Expansion appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Robert Elder, professor of history at Baylor University. Author of the book Calhoun: American Heretic. The post John C. Calhoun: Defender of Racial Slavery & White Democracy appeared first on KPFA.

Part I – Border Outsourcing, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism Guest: Harsha Walia is the award-winning author of Undoing Border Imperialism (2013). Trained in the law, she is a community organizer and campaigner in migrant justice, anti-capitalist, feminist, and anti-imperialist movements, including No One Is Illegal and Women’s Memorial March Committee. Her latest book is Border and Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism. Part II – The White Power Movement  Guest: Kathleen Belew is a historian, author, and teacher. She is the author of Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America. The post Border Outsourcing and the Rise of Racist Nationalism & A History of the White Power Movement  appeared first on KPFA.