Eleanor LeCain discusses the state of the women’s movement with Eleanor Smeal, President of the Feminist Majority, and women’s economic security with Terry O’Neill, President of the National Organization for Women (NOW).
This Can’t Be Happening – 11.04.15
Host Dave Lindorff and guest Linn Washington, a Philly-based investigative reporter and colleague of Dave’s on the news site thiscantbehapppening.net, discuss Tuesday’s election results in Pennsylvania and recent comments by Supreme Court Justices Breyer and Scalia, all suggesting that a historic moment has arrived in which the US death penalty obsession may finally be ended. Lindorff notes that in Pennsylvania voters elected three new state supreme court judges, all liberal Democrats who owe their win in considerable part to black and other minority voters in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and other urban areas of the state. Washington, who has written extensively about the state’s racist death penalty system, withthe fourth-largest death row in the nation, and says that with Democrats now in a 5-2 majority on the formerly Republican high court, and with the new Democratic governor already having imposed a moratorium on the death penalty, it could be that the death penalty could be ruled unconstitutional under the state’s constitution. Meanwhile Justice Breyer has virtually called for a test case to be brought to the Supreme Court this year, and Justice Scalia, a staunch backer of execution, has stated publicly that he thinks the votes are there now to declare the death penalty in the US unconstitutional.
Leid Stories – 10.06.15
Puerto Rico: U.S. Supreme Court to Hear Case on Political Status
Ferguson, Missouri, Being Readied for Forced Bankruptcy
Among 13 new cases the U.S. Supreme Court will review in its current term is Puerto Rico v. Valle. The case asks whether a person tried, acquitted or convicted under U.S. federal law can be prosecuted for the same crime under Puerto Rico law. The case seemingly is about constitutional protections against double jeopardy. But at the heart of it is the long-simmering—and unresolved–issue: What is the political relationship between the United States and Puerto Rico?
Lyle Denniston, legal historian and constitutional literacy adviser to the Philadelphia-based National Constitution Center, and Dr. Victor M. Rodriguez, professor of Chicano and Latino Studies at California State University of Long Beach, tackle both issues.
In a commentary Leid Stories reveals that the City of Ferguson, Missouri, is being readied for a forced bankruptcy.
Leid Stories – 10.01.15
The Constitution and Citizenship: The Dred Scott Decision (Conclusion)
We conclude today the discussion on the Dred Scott decision of 1857 – a case often cited as producing the worst ruling in the history of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Legal scholar Paul Finkelman, who teaches constitutional law, legal history, and race and the law at Albany Law School in New York, gave us, in two consecutive weeks, a detailed background of the case and the constitutional questions it raised.
Dred Scott, enslaved at birth – around 1799, in Southampton County, Virginia – sued for his freedom and the freedom of his wife and two daughters, on the grounds that they had lived in Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory, where slavery had been outlawed. But the Supreme Court, in a 7-2 ruling, said that no person of African ancestry ever was meant to be a citizen of the United States, nor to benefit from any rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.
Today we hear from Justice Stephen Breyer, an associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court, on the matter.
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!
Leid Stories – 09.24.15
The Constitution and Citizenship: The Dred Scott Decision (Part 2)
Last week, when the nation observed Constitution and Citizenship Day, Leid Stories began a discussion on how these two things are connected and are at the root of American “identity.”
One case, decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1857, proved then, and still proves to this day, that neither the Constitution nor citizenship was meant to be of benefit to all Americans. Known as Dred Scott v. Sandford, the court ruled that African Americans, specifically, whether enslaved or free, were neither meant to be beneficiaries of constitutional rights nor its protections as citizens.
Legal scholar Paul Finkelman, who teaches constitutional law, legal history and race and the law at Albany Law School in New York, is presented here discussing the constitutional origins of the issue of citizenship in a detailed examination of the landmark Dred Scott case.
Why is this case important? Why should you know about it? Because it is the formal articulation—by the nation’s highest court, no less—of the answer to the still-roiling question: Who is a citizen of the United States of America?
Leid Stories – 09.17.15
On ‘Constitution and Citizenship Day,’ Dred Scott Decision Still Relevant
On this day in 1787, delegates to the Constitutional Convention signed the document in Philadelphia—a date officially commemorated since 1940.
Constitution and Citizenship Day extols the two things that are the core of American ideology and identity. But not so for a large segment of America, historically and even today.
Legal scholar Paul Finkelman, who teaches constitutional law, legal history and race and the law at Albany Law School, discusses the constitutional origins of the issue of citizenship in a detailed examination of the landmark Dred Scott case.
Project Censored – 09.15.15
9/11 and the Rise of Neoconservative Foreign Policy. For this 14th anniversary 9/11 special program, co-hosts Mickey Huff and Peter Phillips speak with Media Roots journalist and filmmaker Robbie Martin about his new film “A Very Heavy Agenda.” The film looks in depth at the Kagan family and the rise of neoconservative foreign policy prior to and since the events of 9/11. Tune in for a detailed discussion about the development of the US policy driving American Empire.
Leid Stories – 09.14.15
Analyze This!: ‘News’ That’s Missing The Whole Point Kim Davis, the clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky, who refuses to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples because such unions offend her beliefs as an Apostolic Christian, returns to work today, still holding to her “moral conscience” and demanding an “accommodation” that would exempt her from affixing her name to official marriage …
Black Agenda Radio – 09.07.15
– The number of inmates in solitary confinement in California’s prisons should be sharply reduced following settlement of a suit brought by prisoners. California leads the nation in the number of inmates held in solitary confinement, with nearly 3,000 prisoners languishing in isolation. The Center for Constitutional Rights represented the inmates in court. We spoke with the Center’s deputy legal director, Alexi Agathocleous.
– Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser was shouted down by protesters when she announced draconian proposals that would target each of the city’s 10,000 people on parole or probation for surprise searches by police, on the street or in their homes, night or day. Ex-offender found to be in violation of any of a long list of rules, could be detained for 72 hours, and then put on a path back to prison. Mayor Bowser claims she’s just responding to a rising homicide rate.
– Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo is an activist with the Hands Up Coalition-DC and an editor and columnist for Black Agenda Report. She calls Mayor Bowser’s plan The Fugitive Slave Act of 2015.
– Ajamu Baraka is also an editor and columnist for Black Agenda Report. Baraka is a co-founder of the U.S. Human Rights Network. He currently lives in Colombia, South America, where he recently took part in a conference of the principal Afro-Colombian self-determinationist organization, the Black Communities Process, or PCN. Colombia is the United States’ closest ally in the region, and holds the world’s record for killing labor organizers. It is second only to Syria in the number of internally displaced persons, most of them Afro-Colombians driven from their traditional lands. Ajamu Baraka says Colombia is one of the most important countries in the African diaspora.
– An independent, Black-produced film on the Ferguson rebellion is making the rounds, this summer. We spoke with producer and director Ralph L. Crowder the Third about his latest documentary, titled, “Hands Up Don’t Shoot Our Youth Movement.”
– Resistance to standardized testing in the public schools is growing by leaps and bounds. Much of the momentum is centered in mostly white suburban districts, but more Black and brown parents are deciding to OPT their children OUT of the high-stakes testing regime. About 20 percent of New York state public school students opted out, in the past school year. Peter Farruggio is on the faculty of the University of Texas, Pan American campus. He’s a long-time educator and anti-privatization activist. We asked Dr. Farruggio if the Opt-Out campaign has gotten big enough to be called a movement.