Doug Gurian-Sherman is the senior scientist in
the Food and Environment Program at the Union of Concerned
Scientists. Doug recently released the report, "CAFOs
Uncovered: The Untold Costs of Confined Feeding Operations."
Doug was the senior scientist at Washington DC's Center
for Food Safety from 2004 to 2006.
Bob Fitrakis is co-author with past This is Hell!
guest Harvey Wasserman of "How the GOP stole America's
2004 Election & Is Rigging 2008" (Free
Press) and, with another past This is Hell! guest Steve
Rosenfeld, of "What Happened in Ohio?" (New
Press). This week, Bob co-wrote the Counterpunch article,
"Did
the Supreme Court Just Elect John McCain?," again,
with Harvey Wasserman. Bob is publisher of Free
Press.
Paul
Roberts, author of 2005's "The End of Oil:
on the Edge of a Perilous World" (Houghton
Mifflin) which was a finalist for the New York Public
Library Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism.
In June, Paul will release his new book, "The End of
Food" (Houghton
Mifflin). Paul appeared on This is Hell! back in 1999
to discuss his Harper's article, "The Sweet Hereafter:
Our Craving for Sugar Starves the Everglades and Fattens
Politicians," for which he was a finalist for the National
Magazine Award. In the May/June issue of Mother Jones, Paul
wrote the article, "The
Seven Myths of Energy Independence: Why forging
a sustainable energy future is dependent on foreign oil."
And our irregular correspondents were:
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth from Chicago's
south side ...
Loretta Napoleoni, author of "Rogue Economics"
(Seven
Stories) returns to This is Hell! Loretta was on our
show back in 2003 when we talked with her about her book,
"Terror, Inc.: Tracing the Money Behind Global Terrorism."
Loretta, an economist herself, is one of the world's leading
experts on money laundering and terror financing.
Michael Hudson is a former Wall Street economist
whose specialization was in the balance of payments and
real estate at Chase Manhattan Bank, Arthur Anderson, and
later at the Hudson Institute. In 1990 he helped established
the world's first sovereign debt fund for Scudder Stevens
& Clark. Michael was Congressman Dennis Kucinich's chief
economic advisor in the recent Democratic primary presidential
campaign. He has also advised the US, Canadian, Mexican
and Latvian governments, as well as the United Nations Institute
for Training and Research. A Distinguished Research Professor
at University of Missouri-Kansas City, he is the author
of, most recently, "Super Imperialism: The Economic
Strategy of American Empire" (Pluto Press). This week,
Michael wrote the article, "Hillary
Joins the Vast, Rightwing Financial Conspiracy."
Michael
Grunwald is a reporter at The Washington Post and
a senior writer at TIME magazine. Michael is a winner of
the George Polk Award for national reporting, and the Worth
Bingham Prize for investigative reporting. He is the author
of "The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida and the Politics
of Paradise." Michael has done a significant amount
of writing on the Army Corps of Engineers including his
recent article, "How
the Army Corps is Swindling Americans."
live from Rome, Anuradha Mittal returns to This
is Hell! for the first time since 2005. Anuradha is the
executive director of the Oakland
Institute a progressive policy think tank she founded
in 2004. Anuradha is expertise is in trade, development,
human rights and agriculture issues. After working as the
codirector of Food
First, the Institute for Food and Development Policy.
This week, she released two reports: "Food Price Crisis:
A Wake Up Call for New Policies to Eradicate Hunger"
and "The Status of International Food Aid Negotiations."
And our irregular correspondents were:
Kevan
Harris,
'The Radical Pessimist,' pissed off a lot of people over
what he said about Tibet and Zimbabwe ...
LaddieO.com
gave a web and technology report from the hermetically sealed
clean rooms at URL Labs ...
and Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth from Chicago's
south side.
Haifa Zangana, author of "City Of Widows:
An Iraqi Woman's Account of War and Resistance" (Seven
Stories). Haifa was a prisoner of Saddam Hussein's regime.
She is a weekly columnist at al-Quds newspaper and a commentator
for The Guardian, Red Pepper and al-Ahram Weekly.
Gary Brecher writes the War Nerd column at eXile.ru.
Gary’s first book, aptly named "War Nerd,"
is due out on June 1. This week, Gary posted the article
"Who
Won Iraq's 'Decisive' Battle?" at eXile.
Jeff Faux is founder and former president of the
Economic Policy Institute (http://www.epinet.org/)
where he is currently a distinguished fellow. Jeff's most
recent article was a piece in The Nation entitled, "Is
This The Big One?" Jeff is also a contributing
editor to American Prospect and a member of the editorial
board of Dissent.
Michael Massing, a contributing editor at the Columbia
Journalism Review, who also writes frequently on the
press and foreign affairs on the pages of the New
York Review of Books. Michael's article, "The
Volunteer Army: Who Fights and Why?," appears in
the April 5th issue. Michael's article in the March/April
issue of CJR is "Out of Focus: How indie dogma undercuts
the documentary."
writer Doug Henwood will discuss the latest issue
of his Left Business Observer (http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/).
Articles include, "Obamamania: Want Change With That?"
in which he calls Senator Barack Obama "just another
Democrat with a sleazy real estate agent in his past."
So you're thinking Doug's a big backer of Senator Hillary
Clinton's presidential campaign, right? Guess again. Doug
calls her politics "bellicose and neoliberal."
In the most recent issue of LBO, Doug also takes on past
This is Hell! guest Naomi Klein's latest book as well as
the coming recession.
Spencer Ackerman wrote the American Prospect cover
story "The
Obama Doctrine." The subtitle asks, "Barack
Obama is offering the most sweeping liberal foreign-policy
critique we've heard from a serious presidential contender
in decades. But will voters buy it?"
Eric Umansky returned after just four weeks because
he's written another amazing article. This time, it's for
Columbia Journalism
Review and it's called, "Lost Over Iran: How the
press let the White House craft the narrative about Tehran's
nukes."
And our irregular correspondents were:
live from Budapest, the host of the Hungarian TV show
"Feszti Korkep," Todd Williams ...
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth from Chicago's
south side ...
and, from San Francisco, Kate O'Donnell gaves us
a "Science Researcher's Perspective."
Greg
Mitchell, editor of Editor
& Publisher and author of "So Wrong For So
Long: How the Press, the Pundits - and the President - Failed
on Iraq" (Sterling).
Maude Barlow is the head of the Council of Canadians,
Canada's largest public advocacy organization. She is a
past winner of the Right Livelihood Award (the "alternative
Nobel") for her work on water justice. We spoke with
Maude about her new book, "Blue Covenant: The Global
Water Crisis and the Coming Battle for the Right to Water"
(The
New Press).
Peter Erlinder is a law professor at William Mitchell
College of Law. Peter's work focuses on issues like the
death penalty, civil rights, claims of government and police
misconduct, and criminal defense of political activists.
He is also an attorney on appeal for past This is Hell!
guest Dr. Sami Al Arian in appeals to the US 4th
Circuit, the 11th Circuit and the Supreme Court of the United
States - all of which have declined to intervene in Dr.
al Arian's case. Despite al Arian being acquitted, he is
still being detained in a federal prison. Now, Sami is in
the midst of a hunger strike in protest for his continued
incarceration. Due to the hunger strike, he is in danger
of irreversible renal failure. Peter had just written the
Jurist article, "The
Torture of Sami Al Arian."
Nir Rosen is a fellow at the New America Foundation
and author of "In the Belly of the Green Bird: The
Triumph of the Martyrs in Iraq" (Simon
& Schuster). And get Nir's description of himself
at his web site (http://www.nirrosen.com/blog/):
"a freelance writer, photographer and film-maker who
has worked in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and other
popular tourist destinations." We talked with Nir about
his Rolling Stone article, "The
Myth of the Surge."
This week's irregular correspondents included:
Nicholas Hale reported from the UK with his "Fool
Britannia" ...
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth ... the original
Moment of Truth, since 1997 ...
and Dave Buchen, 'Our Man in San Juan,' told us
what's happening in Puerto Rico.
Ken Silverstein is the Washington editor of Harper's
Magazine. We discussed his article in the March issue
entitled, "Beltway Bacchanal: Congress Lives High on
the Contributor's Dime."
Theresa Hitchens is the director of the Center
for Defense Information where she heads their Space
Security Project. Theresa is the author of "Future
Security In Space: Charting a Cooperative Course."
She wrote the Scientific American story, "Space
Wars - Coming to the Sky Near You?" which appears
in their March issue.
James Suggett writes at Venezuelanalysis.com.
This week he wrote on the tensions between Colombia and
their neighbors Ecuador and Venezuela. His writing included
"Venezuela, Ecuador, Argentina strengthen ties, embark
on 'true geopolitical shift'" and "OAS supports
Ecuador, Venezuela on 'path of true peace'."
David Rose is a contributing editor at Vanity
Fair and a special investigations reporter at The
Observer. He wrote "Gaza
Bombshell" which appears in the April issue of
Vanity Fair. And what a bombshell it is. "With confidential
documents, corroborated by outraged former and current U.S.
officials, David reveals how President Bush, Condoleezza
Rice, and Deputy National-Security Adviser Elliott Abrams
backed an armed force under Fatah strongman Muhammad Dahlan,
touching off a bloody civil war in Gaza and leaving Hamas
stronger than ever."
This week's irregular correspondents were:
Kevan
Harris, 'The Radical Pessimist,' returned ...
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth ... the original
Moment of Truth, since 1997 ...
Elvis
DeMorrow came creeping out of the Konspiracy Korner.
Eric Umansky writes for Mother Jones and his article,
"Department
of Pre-Crime," is in the March/April issue. In
the story, Eric discusses, "Locking up Americans for
thinking bad thoughts. Catching 'terrorists' by encouraging
terrorist acts. Sound like sci-fi? Welcome to the Bush administration's
'strategic overinclusiveness' trap." Eric has written
for Slate, Washington Post, New York Times Magazine and
New Republic. He also blogs at ericumansky.com
David Leigh has been working with Rob Evans at
The Guardian on 'The
BAE Files.' BAE is Europe's biggest arms company, while
they deny any allegations they have engaged in large-scale
corruption to sell arms overseas, David and Rob have published
documents and other evidence gathered from around the world
that dispute BAE's assertion.
David is the Guardian's investigations editor and a professor
of reporting at City University in London. He was also a
producer at the acclaimed TV investigative program, "World
in Action."
Diana Johnstone is the author of "Fools'
Crusade: Yugoslavia, NATO and Western Delusion" (Monthly
Review Press). Last week, she wrote the story, "NATO's
Kosovo Colony." She is the European correspondent
for In
These Times.
This week's irregular correspondents were:
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth ... the original
Moment of Truth, since 1997 ...
British historian Andy Worthington is the author
of the book, "The Guantanamo Files: The Stories of
the 774 Detainees in America's Illegal Prison."
Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University,
and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion. Gary's most
recent article, "The
Independence of Kosovo," is posted at Counterpunch.
He's also the author "Servants, Shophands and Laborers
in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan," "Male Colors:
The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan,"
and "Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and
Japanese Women, 1543-1900."
author Juan Cole writes the blog "Informed
Comment: Thoughts on the Middle East, History, and Religion."
Juan's most recent writing also includes the Salon.com piece,
"Pakistan
turns scary for Bush's war on terror" and Juan's
the author of "Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle
East" (Palgrave). Juan is also the President of the
Global Americana Institute.
journalist Sheila Kaplan wrote the story, "Great
Lakes Danger Zones?", posted at the Center for
Public Integrity and created with the support of the Nation
Institute Investigative Fund. It's "the report that
top officials of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
thought was too hot for the public to handle—and the
story behind it."
Our irregular correspondent was:
from Chicago's near South Side, Jeff
Dorchen delivers a Moment of Truth ... the original
Moment of Truth, since 1997.
John Miller is a professor of economics at Wheaton
College and writes for Dollar and Sense. We talked with
John about his latest article, "Stormier
Weather: The economic recovery that's been officially
underway since late 2001 is probably over—too bad many
Americans never got to experience it."
writer and researcher Alex de Waal is a fellow
of the Global Equity Initiative at Harvard University, program
director at the Social Science Research Council in New York
City, and co-director of Justice Africa in London. He recently
was part of a debate on Darfur in Newsweek.
His most recent writing includes, "Making
Sense of Chad."
John Feffer is the co-director of Foreign Policy
In Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies. He is the
author of the 2003 book "North Korea, South Korea:
U.S. Policy at a Time of Crisis" (Seven Stories). John's
on to tell us about his TomDisptach article, "Asia's
Hidden Arms Race: Six Countries Talk Peace While Preparing
for War."
Malinda Markowitz is a working registered nurse
in a hospital and also the President of the California Nurses
Association/ National Nurses Organizing Committee. Malinda
came on to compare presidential candidates health policies.
To find out more, visit http://www.guaranteedhealthcare.org.
And our irregular correspondents were:
LaddieO.comgave us a web and tech report
from the hermetically sealed clean room at URL
Labs ...
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth from Chicago's
Pilsen neighborhood ...
and everybody's favorite New York City high school teacher
Drew Youngren, who has a PhD in mathematics, had
his first appearance since last August.
Paul Rogers, professor of peace studies at Bradford
University, northern England, returns to This is Hell! Paul
is a weekly columnist on global security at openDemocracy.net,
the most recent columns being "A
mission impossible" and "The
Iraq Project." Paul also writes an international
security monthly briefing for the Oxford Research Group,
the most recent briefing is entitled, "Change
- From Iraq Through to Pakistan." His latest book
is "Why We're Losing the War on Terror" (Polity)
which focuses on the post-9/11 era and why a new security
paradigm is needed.
journalist Robert Parry, whose work can be found
at ConsortiumNews.com,
returns to This is Hell! In 1984, Bob won the prestigious
Polk Award for National Reporting by breaking many of the
Iran-Contra stories for Newsweek and The Associated Press.
His recent columns include, "Injecting 'Terror' into
Campaign 2008," "Where Would Obama Take the Nation?,"
"Bush Era's Last Legs" and "The Democrats-Praise-Reagan
Game."
Michael Klare is professor of peace and world
security studies at Hampshire College. Michael is the author
of author of "Resource Wars" and "Blood and
Oil" Michael wrote the TomDispatch.com story, "Something
Had to Give: How Oil Burst the American Bubble."
He's got a new book, "Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet:
The New Geopolitics of Energy," (Metropolitan Books)
coming out in April 2008. Michael was last on This is Hell!
in January 2007.
live from Toronto, writer, translator, activist Justin
Podur wrote Tuesday's ZNet story, "Colombia's
war and Venezuela's foreign policy." Justin is
also an editor for ZNet, which is part of Z Magazine. Justin
has reported from Haiti, Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina,
Brazil, Israel/Palestine, and Mexico. His work has also
appeared in Dollars and Sense, New Politics, New Left Review,
rabble.ca and India's Frontline. Justin is part of the Pueblos
en Camino collective (http://www.en-camino.org)
and runs the blog (http://www.killingtrain.com).
Gareth Porter is an investigative journalist and
historian who writes for both the Inter Press Service and
the Huffington Post. This week, he posted the story, "Bush's
Iran/Argentina Terror Frame-Up," at The Nation.
His most recent book is "Perils of Dominance: Imbalance
of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam" (University
of California Press). Back in January, Gareth reported on
the Strait of Hormuz controversy, "Official
Version of Naval Incident Starts to Unravel."
live from London, Celia Szusterman wrote the article,
"Pulp
friction: the Argentina-Uruguay conflict," which
was posted at openDemocracy.net this week. Celia is principal
lecturer in Spanish and Latin American studies at the University
of Westminster and an associate fellow at the Institute
for the Study of the Americas, University of London.
Lawrence Mishel is the president of the Economic
Policy Institute (http://www.epi.org/).
Lawrence was one of the co-authors in EPI's recently released
briefing paper, "Strategy
for economic rebound," and has been critical of
the Bush administration's stimulus package.
Our irregular correspondents were:
live from Seattle, Dr. Krys Bigosinski gave us a medical
report ...
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth from his digs
in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood ...
and, from San Francisco, Kate O'Donnell gaves us
a "Campaigners Perspective.'
Eric Janszen wrote the cover story for the February
issue of Harper's entitled, "The Next Bubble: Priming
the Markets for Tomorrow's Big Crash." Eric is the
founder and president of iTulip, Inc. He formerly served
as the managing director of the ventures firm Osborn Capital,
CEO of AutoCell, Inc., and Bluesocket, Inc., and entrepreneur
in residence for Trident Capital.
Ayesha Siddiqa is the author of "Military,
Inc.: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy" (Pluto
Press). Ayesha is a military analyst with a PhD in War
Studies from King's College, London. She contributes regularly
to Jane's Defence Weekly. She was the 'Pakistan Scholar'
at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars
in Washington DC.
Ayesha will discuss her book next Friday, February 1st,
at 4 PM in the International House, 1414 East 59th Street.
Mark Winne is the author of "Closing the Food
Gap: Resetting the Table in the Land of Plenty" (Beacon
Press). For 25 years Mark was was the executive director
of Hartford Food System. He now writes, speaks and consults
extensively on community food systems.
Graham Fuller, was a senior political analyst at
Rand and Vice Chair of the National Intelligence Council
at the CIA. Graham is currently adjunct professor of history
at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver. He is the author
of three books on Islam including, "A Sense of Siege:
The Geopolitics of Islam and the West," "The Arab
Shi'a: The Forgotten Muslims," and "The Future
of Political Islam." Graham has also written the lead
article to the latest issue of Foreign
Policy. The story is entitled, "A World Without
Islam" and in it Graham considers which elements of
the current unpleasantness are due to Islam and which are
due to other factors.
And our irregular correspondents were:
live from Budapest, Todd Williams tells us what's
happening in Hungary ...
Jeff
Dorchen delivers a Moment of Truth from his digs
in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood ...
and, from San Juan, Dave Buchen gives us the lowdown
from Puerto Rico.
former UN weapons inspector in Iraq Scott Ritter
returns to This is Hell! to talk about his latest writing
including, "Presidential
Hopefuls Need a Reality Check on Iraq." His last
book was last May's, "Waging Peace: The Art of War
for the Anti-War Movement" (Nation
Books). On Wednesday, February 23rd Scott will discuss
"Iran: Still a Target?" at 7 PM in the Unitarian
Church of Evanston, 1330 Ridge. Joining Scott will be Edward
Peck, a 33 year veteran of the Foreign Service who served
as Chief of Mission in Baghdad from 1977 to 1980.
Ira Chernus also returns to This is Hell! Ira is
Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado
at Boulder and author of "Monsters To Destroy: The
Neoconservative War on Terror and Sin" (Paradigm).
He wrote the TomDispatch.com article, "Is
Religion a Threat to Democracy?: Faith Talk on the Campaign
Trail."
Thomas Geoghegan, author of "See You in Court:
How the Right Made America a Lawsuit Nation" (New
Press). Thomas is a Chicago attorney who has written
several books including the National Book Critics Circle
award finalist, "Which Side Are You On?" which
also received a special citation from the PEN/Martha Albrand
Award judges.
Thursday, January 24th, will discuss his new book at 6 PM
in 57th Street Books, 1301 East 57th.
Chris Hedges is the former Middle East bureau
chief for The New York Times and was part of Times team
that won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of global
terrorism. He also received the 2002 Amnesty International
Global Award for Human Rights Journalism. His most recent
book is, “American Fascists: The Christian Right and
the War on America" (Free
Press). He writes a column that can be found every other
Monday on Truthdig, the most recent being, "The
End of the Road for George W. Bush." This week,
Chris also posted the Nation piece, "Christianizing
US History."
And our irregular correspondents were:
Kevan Harris,
'The Radical Pessimist,' gave us his thoughts from Baltimore
...
Jeff
Dorchen delivered a Moment of Truth from his digs
in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood ...
and, from San Francisco, Elvis
DeMorrow took a break from the Konspiracy Korner
to give us a little travelogue on his Holiday trip to Beijing.
live from Karachi, Fatima Bhutto is a writer and
poet. She is the daughter of Mir Murtaza Bhutto, who was
killed in 1996 in Karachi when his sister, and Fatima's
aunt, Benazir, was prime minister. In the wake of her aunt's
death, Fatima recently wrote the article, "Farewell
to Wadi Bua."
Caroline Elkins is an associate professor of African
studies at Harvard University and the author of "Imperial
Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya."
Caroline wrote last Sunday's Washington Post opinion piece,
"What's
Tearing Kenya Apart? History, for One Thing."
live from London, Patrick Cockburn is the Middle
East correspondent for the London-based newspaper the Independent
(http://www.independent.co.uk/).
He was one of only a handful of journalists who remained
in Baghdad throughout the first Gulf War. Patrick is the
author of "The Occupation: War, Resistance and Daily
Life in Iraq," (Verso
Books) a finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics
Circle award for nonfiction. His recent writing includes,
"Conscience
and Empire," and "What's
Really Happened During the Surge?" His forthcoming
book, "Muqtada! Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia revival and
the struggle for Iraq," will be published in April.
