Leid Stories

Leid Stories Proudly Presents “Free Your Mind Friday” - 03/07/14

Well, here we are, by popular demand, at the premiere of “Free Your Mind Friday!”

It’s a re-branded, re-scheduled “Open Forum,” but with the same purpose and intent—to be the gathering place for the vigorous exchange of information, opinions and ideas.”

Leid Stories’ listeners had everything to do with it. Fridays (as opposed to Tuesdays) allow for a review of the week’s major issues, they said, and they liked “Sarah from Dallas”’s idea of having an opportunity to exorcise burdensome thoughts before the weekend. Mission accomplished on both counts.

So, free your mind. Let’s hear what you have to say about whatever you think is worth [re]considering.  

Leid Stories - Blowing the Whistle on the Snowden-Greenwald-Omidyar-NSA Connection - 03/06/14

Edward Snowden has said that his motivation for looting an estimated 1.7 million classified  files from the National Security Agency was to expose the NSA’s indiscriminate, wholesale violations of privacy rights in pursuit of the clandestine interests of the surveillance state. He carefully selected media outlets to tell various aspects of the story based on the files, he said. The London-based Guardian newspaper and contributing reporter Glenn Greenwald were clear favorites.

But after a few stories that gained international attention came a noticeable lull that was broken by news that Greenwald had struck a $250-million deal with Pierre Omidyar, the billionaire owner of Paypal, a longtime cooperator with the NSA’s data-collection program and, recently discovered, co-funder with the U.S. government of ultraright groups seeking to topple the government in Ukraine.  Greenwald and a small posse of “leftist” journalists are now employees of Omidyar’s recently launched multimedia venture, First Look Media.

Questions abound. Did Snowden get punked by the person he said he entrusted his classified cache to? Is Greenwald a checkbook journalist? Is Omidyar now the “owner” of Snowden’s looted files? Did Greenwald strike a deal also with the U.S. government to hand over certain files?

An EyeOpener report by independent commentator James Corbett puts the issue in perspective.

Leid Stories - 03/05/14

Why the Ukraine-Crimea Crisis Should Make Us Change Our Politics

If nothing else, the Ukraine-Crimea crisis should cause us to re-examine our basic political philosophy and orientation. Why? Because it clearly hasn’t happened at the leadership level; across the board, they’ve run out of good, innovative ideas and new ways of doing things.

Leid Stories raises a number of examples that illustrate the stagnation of progress in many spheres of American life, owing largely to an unwillingness, incapacity or downright refusal to embrace new ideas and realities. No “modern” nation, let alone a “world-leading” one, would tolerate a 2-million-plus prison population, or ninth-place standing in the world on Internet speed, or one-in-seven poverty rates, or would engage in Cold War bloviating and call it diplomacy. In its policy making the United States is its own conundrum, having a futuristic vision of itself that cannot be accomplished with vapid ideas and ways of doing things.

Leid Stories expands on this theme and asks the question: The system is impervious to change. What, then, are our political choices?

Leid Stories - 03/04/14

Detroit Seeks Court OK on Bank Payoffs; Coalition Readies for Showdown;

Obama, Congress Mull $1 Billion in Aid to Ukrainian Fascists  

State-appointed city manager Kevyn Orr late yesterday filed a motion with the federal judge overseeing Detroit’s $18-billion bankruptcy seeking approval of an $85-million settlement Orr said he had worked out with two creditor-banks to end costly interest-rate swap deals from 2005. Judge Steven Rhodes had rejected two previous proposed settlements.

 Meanwhile, grassroots groups opposed to Orr’s appointment, the bankruptcy, and drastic cuts to pensions and city services have formed a coalition and are getting ready for a courtroom battle.

Abayomi Azikiwe, editor of the Pan-African Newswire and a Detroit organizer for the Workers World Party, updates the situation in Detroit.

Gaining no traction with veiled military threats against Russia in the Ukrainian crisis, Washington instead will buy its way in with an immediate $1-billion “aid” package to help its would-be client—the ultranationalist “government” that ousted the democratically elected president. No such legislative speed or money to solve problems at home, says a Leid Stories commentary.

Leid Stories - 03/03/14

Venezuela, Ukraine Crises Reheat Battle for Hemispheric Hegemony

The dynamics of the crises in Venezuela and Ukraine—and, now, Crimea—are changing almost by the minute, pointing up complex issues that go far deeper than Secretary of State John Kerry’s supersimplistic, and predictably standard, explanation that they are about “freedom and democracy.”

Dr. Gerald Horne, who has written extensively on struggles against imperialism, colonialism, fascism and racism and teaches graduate courses in diplomatic history at the University of Houston, expands his Feb. 28 discussion with Leid Stories (check podcast) that places these crises in proper historical, ideological and geopolitical perspective. 

Particular attention is given to the roles of the United States and Russia, and hemispheric hegemony.

Leid Stories - 02/28/14

The Ukraine and Venezuela Crises, and U.S. Support for ‘Democracy’

Obama’s Shameless Objectification of Black and Latino Youth

Turmoil in Ukrain and Venezuela has dominated news headlines in recent weeks, apace with an escalation in the violent opposition to the now-ousted President Viktor Yanukovych and to President Nicolás Maduro’s United Socialist Party of Venezuela regime.

Generally, the media report both as popular struggles for freedom and democracy—echoing the open support and approval of the Obama administration. But what really is unfolding in these two countries? Noted historian, political scientist, social critic and author Dr. Gerald Horne, who has written more than 30 books and 100 scholarly papers and reviews on struggles against imperialism, colonialism, fascism and racism, goes behind the headlines.

President Obama yesterday launched at the White House an initiative to address key life challenges for African American and Latino boys and young men. Called “My Brother’s Keeper,” the initiative will focus on education, criminal justice and employment, he said, and nonprofits, businesses and foundations, which have already donated $150 million, will fund its satellite programs.

Leid Stories explains in a commentary why the noble goals of the program notwithstanding, Obama’s shameless use of “at-risk” populations to tout his philanthropic endeavor does not cancel out the political reality that his administration has done little to improve their lot.

Leid Stories - 02/27/14

Obamacare Could Cost Low-Income and Poorer Americans Their Homes

Nullification: The Power of Jurors to Balance the Scales of Justice

Jurors also are judges of the facts in a case and should exercise their power in the interest of justice, says our guest, Kirsten Tynan, executive director of the Fully Informed Jury Association. The organization has ramped up awareness of a central theme of its “juror education” program—a controversial concept called jury nullification, which says that jurors “must protect fellow citizens from the tyrannical abuses of power by government” by refusing to convict when the letter of the law conflicts with their consciences.   

And noted economist Paul Craig Roberts, former editor of The Wall Street Journal, reveals a very scary downside to the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare): Estate recovery.

It sounds incongruous—considering that it applies to Americans who hardly consider themselves as having “estates.” But low-income and poorer Americans are especially at risk of total financial ruin with the ACA, because they are herded into Medicaid, which will require many enrollees to forfeit their homes and other assets they might have to the state to cover the cost of their medical care. 

Leid Stories - 02/26/14

The IRP6 & the FBI, Chapter 5: Bogus Trial, Bogus Verdicts

Listeners Ask Questions About This Unusual Case

 

Leid Stories concludes last week’s (Feb. 19) discussion of the trial of six executives (the IRP6) of an African American-owned software company who on June 9, 2009 saw their Colorado City offices raided by 21 armed FBI agents and boxes of intellectual and other property taken under a warrant alleging fraud.

Investigative Resource Planning Solutions (IRP) was a sham operation and engaging in fraud because it racked up substantial balances with several IT staffing firms for help in creating software products that didn’t exist, a 25-count federal indictment charged, although a previous grand jury had found the same charges to be totally without merit.

A trial that can only be described as bizarre resulted in convictions of the six men, who currently are serving terms of up to 11 years.  

The IRP6 maintain that the raid, indictment and trial were designed to shut the company out of multimillion-dollar government contracts the company was on the verge of getting with an innovative software solution it designed and, eventually, to shut the company down permanently.  

Listeners ask questions of two guests who worked at IRP and now are with A Just Cause, an organization seeking the release of the IRP6 and a full federal investigation of the case.

Leid Stories - 02/25/14

Say It Like You Mean It! It’s Open Forum on Leid Stories!

There’s no point to having a strong opinion about something and keeping it all to yourself. Let’s hear it! Step up and grab some air space on “Open Forum,” where great minds gather to trade information, opinions and ideas.

Dare to share your view of the world and of issues and events that matter. Whether people agree or disagree, the main thing is to buttress your case with credible arguments. Do so and you will be hailed a champion, for there will be no way to challenge you.

Call in! Victory is yours … until it isn’t!

Leid Stories - 02/24/14

City Jobs, Pensions Take Huge Hit in Detroit’s ‘Adjustment’ Plan;

Obama’s Class Act: $140-Million High-Tech Project for Detroit Suburb

 

A draconian cost-cutting plan submitted Friday (Feb. 21) by emergency manager Kevyn Orr for approval by the federal judge overseeing Detroit’s disputed $18-billion bankruptcy set  off a series of strategy meetings by groups all over the city vowing both challenges to the plan in court and amped-up protests in the streets.

Leid Stories speaks to two members of Detroiters Resisting Emergency Management—a former attorney for the City Council and a retired Water Department worker—fresh from a news conference responding to Orr’s plan.

Meanwhile, President Obama, whose administration has avoided any direct involvement in the nation’s largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, announced Saturday (Feb. 22) that Canton Township, about 25 miles west of Detroit, will be the hub of a $140-million new-tech research and manufacturing institute specializing in lightweight and modern metals. It will “attract the good-paying jobs that a growing middle class requires,” a White House statement says. It is yet another example of Obama’s class-centered political priorities, Leid Stories says.