The Mark Riley Show – 09.30.15

– Trump’s tax plan would raise deficit $12 trillion: analysis, It seems everyone who tries to revise the tax system would add stupid money to the deficit. But that’s Okay, Donald will simply call the people who came up with this number “losers”, and “weak”.

– Visas to import talent help copycats to take US jobs abroad. What, you mean somebody’s gaming the system? Here’s where immigration reform ought to happen, and right away.

– Missouri finds Planned Parenthood didn’t mishandle fetal tissue. Think that will stop the political gasbags that are trying to defund Planned Parenthood? They do this because they think they can get away with it.

– Police killing in Delaware brings calls for inquiry. This guy was in a wheelchair! And of course, he was black.

– Georgia executes woman on Death Row despite clemency bid and Pope’s plea. Yes Francis did call for the abolition of the death penalty, but in the US, the executions will keep on coming.

– Slavery reparations call overshadows Cameron’s visit to Jamaica. Not quite sure how this happened, but reparations has become a front burner issue outside the US. And it seems, Cameron’s “nothing to see here” attitude isn’t going over well at all.

– Russia launches first airstrikes in Syria. Putin ain’t playin. He says he’s going after Islamic State, but he also says he’s helping Assad, thereby putting Obama in a box.

– House GOP hardliners agitate to have one of their own in a leadership role. These folks at least know what they want. Did progressives in Congress get one of their own in a leadership role? Must have missed that one.

– Top Republican admits Benghazi committee is all about attacking Hillary Clinton. If that’s the case, Obama should call for its immediate abolition. Wanna take odds he won’t?

– House Republicans are quietly advancing their next tactic to dismantle Obamacare. And the time, unlike the other 50 times, they’re serious!

GLAXOSMITHKLINE Fined $488.8 Million Dollars For ‘Massive Bribery Network’ With Doctors

Think that the medical doctors don’t get kickbacks for prescribing certain medications? Think again! China has fined the British pharmaceuticals giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) $488.8 million (3 billion Yuan) for a “massive bribery network” to get doctors and hospitals to use its products. Five former employees were sentenced to two to four years in jail, but ordered deported instead of imprisoned, according to …

Leid Stories – 09.16.15

The Ferguson Commission Report: An Exercise in Futility?
CNN Takes Its Turn As Carnival Barker At Two-Ring Circus
The Ferguson Commission—a 16-member blue-ribbon panel appointed last November by Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon to look into underlying causes of the rebellion that enveloped the city three months earlier, after the police shooting of Michael Brown—concluded its task two days ago with a 198-page report.
Titled “Forward Through Ferguson: A Path Toward Racial Equity,” the report makes 169 recommendations in four areas it identified as requiring urgent attention— the law-enforcement/criminal-justice system, issues uniquely related to local youth, economic development, and entrenched racism.
Our guest, Al Gerhardstein, a Cincinnati-based civil-rights attorney with a long history of successfully litigating police-brutality cases and forcing court-ordered reforms in the criminal-justice system, discusses the Ferguson Commission’s report.
CNN takes its turn tonight as carnival barker at the two-ring circus it’s calling a presidential debate. Leid Stories in a commentary explains how CNN is merely filling its role as one of “The 3 M’s” in this political season.

It’s All About Food – Bruce Friedrich and Alycee Lane – 09.15.15

Bruce Friedrich, Farm Sanctuary’s director of policy and engagement, oversees Farm Sanctuary’s work on legislation, litigation, policy, and engagement. Before joining Farm Sanctuary, Bruce worked for two years as a public school teacher in inner-city Baltimore (where he was his school’s “Teacher of the Year”), for six years at a homeless shelter and soup kitchen in Washington, D.C., and for 15 years at PETA, where he was vice president for campaigns. He is a popular speaker on issues of animal rights and effective advocacy, has appeared many times on CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC, and is a regular contributor to The Huffington Post.
Alycee J. Lane is a former professor who taught African American literature and culture at UC Santa Barbara. She is author of Coming in from the Cold, a blog in which she analyzes political and social issues through the prism of Martin Luther King, Jr. s philosophy of nonviolence. A student of Engaged Buddhism, Alycee in 2012 participated in the year-long Commit to Dharma course offered by the East Bay Meditation Center under the tutelage of Larry Yang. She earned her Bachelor of Arts from Howard University, Doctorate of Philosophy from UCLA, and Juris Doctor from UC Berkeley (Boalt Hall). Alycee currently lives in Oakland, California.

John Whitehead – Public School Students Are the New Inmates in the American Police State

In the American police state, you’re either a prisoner (shackled, controlled, monitored, ordered about, limited in what you can do and say, your life not your own) or a prison bureaucrat (police officer, judge, jailer, spy, profiteer, etc.). When you’re a child in the American police state, life is that much worse. Microcosms of the police state, America’s public schools …

Kali Holloway – Surprise! Donald Trump’s Father Was Probably in the Ku Klux Klan

According to a 1927 New York Times [3] article, it seems that the father of billionaire Republican presidential candidate and professional bile-spewer Donald Trump may have had ties to the Ku Klux Klan. The Times piece, subtitled “Klan Assails Policemen” and recently unearthed by Boing Boing [4], identifies a man named Fred Trump as among those arrested for participating in …

Justin Gardner – U.S. Police Routinely Travel to Israel to Learn Methods of Brutalityand Repression

When McKinney, TX police officer David Eric Casebolt brutally took down a teenage girl at a pool party in June, he was using a form of martial arts called Krav Maga in which he trained exclusively. These combat techniques were developed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). This is a small reflection of a larger reality that exists in U.S. …

Leid Stories – 08.20.15

Police Killings: The Problem That Won’t Go Away

Election 2016: Leid Stories Measures the Political Temperature

Leid Stories discusses the fatal shooting yesterday of a black teenager by white police officers in St. Louis, Missouri, which once again has ignited a firestorm over police use of force and the racial dynamic that persists in the policing of communities of color throughout the United States.

Eighteen-year-old Mansur Ball-Bey was shot and killed after fleeing a house where two white police officers were conducting a search, St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson said yesterday. Ball-Bey pointed a gun at them as he fled, Dotson said, of the killing, which prompted local protests that recalled the police killings a year ago of Kajieme Powell in St. Louis and Michael Brown in Ferguson.

A “poll” of Leid Stories listeners registers the political temperature of the 2016 presidential campaign.

Jill Suttie – Study Shows Mindful Meditation Helps Reduce Racial Bias

The shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and the choking death of Eric Garner in New York City have shaken American society to its core, triggering waves of protests. Most Americans seem to feel that racism played a role in these deaths—that they never would have happened if the victims had been white. While we struggle to make …

John Whitehead – Drivers, Beware: The Costly, Deadly Dangers of Traffic Stops in the American Police State

Trying to predict the outcome of any encounter with the police is a bit like playing Russian roulette: most of the time you will emerge relatively unscathed, although decidedly poorer and less secure about your rights, but there’s always the chance that an encounter will turn deadly. The odds weren’t in Walter L. Scott’s favor. Reportedly pulled over for a …