703 - Dispatches from Weimar America (Surveillance and Unchecked Power in USA)

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Episode #703 - Dispatches from Weimar America (Surveillance and Unchecked Power in USA)

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⌚ Sat 27 December 2014  ☻Mark Crispin Miller, Alfred McCoy, Naomi Wolf, Heidi Boghosian, Chris Hedges, Susan Lindauer

Download Hour1 Download Hour2This week, a range of speakers contribute complimentary perspectives on life in modern USA. We examine the methods, history, purposes and trace the implications of the mass surveillance state and its accompanying machinery of social domination by perpetuating fear among the US citizenry. How to respond to an amoral government which appears set on establishing a totalitarian state, or of destroying society in the effort?

We begin with the soundtrack of a short RT interview of Mark Crispin Miller about Project Censored's "forbidden bookshelf" project of republishing in electronic form books which the authorities have tried to suppress. He introduces his the first 5 books, starting with Douglas Valentine's The Phoenix Program: America’s Use of Terror in Vietnam, echoing ideas from episode 693.

Our next piece is an interview of Professor Alfred McCoy by Jeff Blankfort. McCoy explains the extent of the surveillance systems currently underway, which far exceeds the Snowden disclosures. Our second hour concludes with a short interview of Naomi Wolf, author of The End of America, who slightly softens her skepticism of Snowden's whistleblower status. However, Wolf reminds us that there has been minimal independent verification of his story, and the commercially-controlled media of western 'democracies' continues to trumpet his 'revelations', as if to underline to everyone that the world is in a continuous surveillance state.

Next we hear a panel discussion of Heidi Boghosian, the author of "Spying on Democracy", followed by a customarily outspoken Chris Hedges who provides a personal reflection on the psychology of the super-rich, drawing from his experience as a student from a lower working class background who attended a school for the upper class. To underline the implications of Hedges' discussion of an unaccountable and amoral power, we present a radio adaptation of "The Strange Case of Phillip Marshall", a video broadcast on PressTV, featuring CIA whistleblower Susan Lindauer and journalists Wayne Madsen and Kevin Barrett. We conclude this week with a historical parallel from Heidi Boghosian, who notes that public outrage about mass surveillance was sufficient to force the US executive to desist, although as we have heard, not permanently.
Thanks to TUC Radio for the Alfred McCoy interview.
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