The Real News Podcast

In this episode of Rattling the Bars, TRNN Executive Producer and former Black Panther Eddie Conway discusses the differences between prisons in Cuba and in the United States. Of the two, only one incarcerates children, only one deliberately isolates prisoners from their families and communities, and only one uses long-term solitary confinement as a routine punishment—and it's not Cuba. "In Cuba you don't have solitary confinement," Conway says. "Because that's inhumane."Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Recent developments in a criminal case against a popular Black police chief reveal just how focused American law enforcement is on "bullshit" crimes. The prosecution of Kelvin Sewell for his role in an investigation involving two parked cars has dragged on for nearly six years. Now prosecutors face a hearing over alleged misconduct, but the fact that Sewell was indicted at all raises serious questions about how much law enforcement in America is about projecting inequitable power.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

As Brad Naylor and his brother slept in their parents' home, they were surprised to hear their door kicked open and see guns drawn at 5:00 in the morning. According to the police report, the smell of marijuana lead these officers to enter a home without a warrant and without the consent of the owners. In this episode of PAR, we examine this terrifying experience as another example of the phenomenon of overpolicing, and we explore the high social, political, and financial costs it exacts from small-town America.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Around 400 union distillery workers in Bardstown, Kentucky, hit the picket line yesterday after rejecting a contract offer from Heaven Hill Distilleries, which included healthcare price hikes that reduce take-home pay, cuts to overtime, and drastic scheduling changes. Heaven Hill produces some of the most popular bourbon brands in the world, including Evan Williams, Elijah Craig, and Old Fitzgerald. According to the website Inc. Fact, the company averages annual profits of over $500 million.In this mini-cast, we talk with Matt Aubrey, president of UFCW Local 23D, to get an update on the strike and workers’ demands.Additional links/info below...Bruce Schreiner, AP News, "Big Bourbon Producer Heaven Hill Faces Strike in Kentucky"WLKY, "Employees on Strike at Heaven Hill in Bardstown Demanding Better Working Conditions"Inc. Fact, "Heaven Hill Distilleries: Revenue, Growth & Competitor Profile"Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org):Jules Taylor, "Working People Theme Song"Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

It’s been 20 years since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Since then, the US has channeled an unfathomable amount of its resources into the military-industrial complex, accelerating its metamorphosis into a nonstop engine of war and militarization with a decaying civil society attached to it. For the past 20 years, as the authors of a bombshell report by the National Priorities Project at the Institute for Policy Studies have estimated, endless militarization since 9/11 has cost the US a staggering $21 trillion. In the first segment of this week’s Marc Steiner Show, we talk with Lindsay Koshgarian, program director for the National Priorities Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, and one of the co-authors of the report, which is titled State of Insecurity: The Cost of Militarization Since 9/11.Tune in for new segments of The Marc Steiner Show every Tuesday and Friday on TRNN.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

(Content Warning: bullying, harassment, suicide.)Evan Seyfried was a loving son, brother, and friend, and a dedicated worker. For 19 years, with a virtually spotless record, Evan worked at a local Kroger grocery store in Milford, Ohio, where he eventually became the dairy department manager. From October 2020 to March 2021, however, Evan suffered a torturous litany of bullying, harassment, and sabotage, according to a lawsuit filed by the Seyfried family. As the lawsuit alleges, it was this treatment, which was the result of a "conspiracy" involving numerous actors, including management-level supervisors at the Milford store, that caused Evan to eventually suffer a "transient episodic break" and take his own life. In this episode, we talk with Evan's mother Linda, his father Ken, and his brother Eric about the beautiful person he was, the horrific treatment he endured, and the need to hold those who wronged him accountable.Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org): Squire Truck, “A Journey into the Great Unknown”Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

In the second segment of this week’s Marc Steiner Show, we bring you the latest installment of our ongoing series “Not in Our Name,” which highlights the diverse voices of Jewish activists, artists, intellectuals, and others who are speaking out against the Israeli occupation. For this installment, Marc is joined once again by author and activist Shane Burley to examine a recent article Burley wrote for Tikkun magazine, “Jew-Hating Is Never About Jews.” In a crucial, cross-generational discussion, Marc and Burley explore changing attitudes among Jewish leftists not only regarding the violence of Israeli occupation, but regarding the existence of the Israeli state as an essential piece of Jewish identity. Shane Burley is the author of Why We Fight: Essays on Fascism, Resistance, and Surviving the Apocalypse (AK Press, 2021) and Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It (AK Press, 2017). His work has appeared in a range of outlets including NBC News, Jacobin, Al Jazeera, The Baffler, The Daily Beast, Truthout, In These Times, and Protean magazineTune in for new segments of The Marc Steiner Show every Tuesday and Friday on TRNN.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Surveillance footage reveals police assaulting an unarmed man on his own property. While the use of force in the video is shocking on its own, what is even more shocking is the fact that the state of Texas is currently threatening the victim with 10 years in prison. On this week's PAR, we take an in-depth look into the common practice of stacking charges to intimidate citizens into taking plea deals, as well as the lack of accountability for aggressive police tactics that violate people's civil rights. We also examine the possibility that police may have targeted the victim in question for previously posting a YouTube video that exposed excessive force.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

For many around the country, the new school year has already begun. And many districts are pushing forward with in-person schooling, even though we are in the midst of another COVID-19 spike, with new cases around the country rising to their highest point since January. Large swathes of the population are still unvaccinated, including 50 million children nationwide under the age of 12. Combined with the fact that vaccine and mask mandates have become another contentious subject of culture war hysteria and with the more contagious Delta variant causing a critical mass of new hospitalizations, school districts around the country appear to be on yet another collision course with COVID-19 that will likely lead to panicked returns to remote learning.This week on Working People, we talk with Casey Scully, a former elementary school teacher and current high school math interventionist in Charleston, South Carolina—a state that is second only to Tennessee in terms of new COVID-19 cases. We discuss the path that led Casey to become an educator, how she has navigated the past year and a half, and what she and her coworkers are currently experiencing with schools reopening.Additional links/info below...Casey's Twitter pageDan Levin, The New York Times, "The U.S. Reaches a Daily Average of 100,000 Covid Hospitalizations for the First Time Since the Winter Peak"Tina Hesman Saey, ScienceNews, "Schools Are Reopening. COVID-19 Is Still Here. What Does That Mean for Kids?"Jeff Amy, AP News, "Schools Reopen with Masks Optional in Many US Classrooms"AP News, "COVID: S. Carolina School District Back to Virtual Classes"The New York Times, "Tracking Coronavirus in South Carolina: Latest Map and Case Count"Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org)Jules Taylor, "Working People Theme Song"Jules Taylor, "Carolina King"Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!

Author and activist Shane Burley has observed and reported on the movements of the far right for many years, including the recent violent demonstrations by Proud Boys and other right-wing groups in Portland, Oregon. In the first installment of this week’s Marc Steiner Show, Burley issues a dire warning: The far right is continually working to recruit people who have been disaffected by capitalism and harness their rage for reactionary ends. To stave off the violent threats posed by the far right and build real political power, the left needs to find ways to tangibly improve people's lives. Shane Burley is the author of Why We Fight: Essays on Fascism, Resistance, and Surviving the Apocalypse (AK Press, 2021) and Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It (AK Press, 2017). His work has appeared in a range of outlets including NBC News, Jacobin, Al Jazeera, The Baffler, The Daily Beast, Truthout, In These Times, and Protean magazine.Tune in for new segments of The Marc Steiner Show every Tuesday and Friday on TRNN.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-real-news-podcast--2952221/support.Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.Follow us on:Bluesky: @therealnews.comFacebook: The Real News NetworkTwitter: @TheRealNewsYouTube: @therealnewsInstagram: @therealnewsnetworkBecome a member and join the Supporters Club for The Real News Podcast today!