CounterSpin

https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230804.mp3   Washington Post (7/25/23) This week on CounterSpin: As contract negotiations went on between UPS and the Teamsters, against a backdrop of a country ever more reliant on package deliveries and the people who deliver them, the New York Times offered readers a lesson in almost-but-not-quite subtext, with a piece that included the priceless line: “By earning solid profits with a largely unionized workforce, UPS has proved that opposing unions isn’t the only path to financial success.” The tentative agreement that both the union and the company are calling a “win win win” presents a bit of a block for elite media, so deeply accustomed to calling any union action a harm, and any company acknowledgment of workers’ value a concession. Teddy Ostrow will bring us up to speed on Teamsters and UPS. He reports on labor and economic issues, and is host and lead producer of the podcast the Upsurge. Transcript: ‘The Narrative Here Is That Workers Fought and They Won’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230804Ostrow.mp3   Lever (7/25/23) Also on the show: Despite how it may feel, there’s no need for competition: You can be terribly worried about the devastating, galloping effects of climate disruption, and also be terribly confused and disturbed by the stubborn unwillingness of elected officials to react appropriately in the face of it. What are the obstacles between the global public’s dire needs, articulated wants, desperate demands—and the actual actions of so-called leaders supposedly positioned to represent and enforce those needs, wants and demands? Wouldn’t a free press in a democratic society be the place where we would see that conflict explained? Independent media have always tried to step into the space abandoned by corporate media; the job only gets more critical. Matthew Cunningham-Cook covers a range of issues for the Lever, which has the piece we’ll be talking about: “The GOP Is Quietly Adding Climate Denial to Government Spending Bills.” Transcript: ‘We Line Up Policy With Campaign Contributions From Oil and Gas’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230804Cunningham-Cook.mp3  

  https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230728.mp3   Houston Chronicle (7/11/23) This week on CounterSpin: Listeners may have heard that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott installed barrels wrapped in razor wire in some parts of the Rio Grande to block migrants from crossing and harm those that try. As revealed by the Houston Chronicle, Texas troopers have been ordered to push people back into the river, and to deny them water. The cruelty is obvious; the Department of Justice is talking about suing. But there are other ways for immigration policy to be inhumane. Advocates have long declared that Biden’s asylum restrictions (which look a lot like Trump’s asylum restrictions) are not just harmful but unlawful. And a federal judge has just agreed. We learn about that from a participant in the case, Melissa Crow, director of litigation at the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies. Transcript: ‘People Have to Be Able to Access the Asylum Process, Regardless of Manner of Entry’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin3230728Crow.mp3   New York Times (10/23/17) Also on the show: In October 2017, the New York Times ran a story headlined “Why the Athletic Wants to Pillage Newspapers,” that began, “By the time you finish reading this article, the upstart sports news outlet called the Athletic probably will have hired another well-known sportswriter from your local newspaper.” In January 2022, the Times bought the Athletic for $550 million, saying that “as a stand-alone product…the Athletic is a great complement to the Times.” It’s now July 2023, and the New York Times has announced it’s shutting down its sports desk, outsourcing that reporting to…the Athletic. Dave Zirin joins us to talk about that; he’s sports editor at The Nation, host of the Edge of Sports podcast, and author of many books, including A People’s History of Sports in the United States. Transcript: ‘The Athletic Is the Negation of Local Sports Coverage’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin3230728Zirin.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at some recent press coverage of Europe’s economy. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin3230728Banter.mp3    

  (Haymarket Books, 2023) This week on CounterSpin: If corporate news media didn’t matter, we wouldn’t talk about them.  But elite, moneyed outlets do, of course, direct public attention to some issues and not to others, and suggest the possibility of some social responses, but not others.  It’s that context that the African American Policy Forum hopes folks will bring to their new book, based on years of research, called Say Her Name: Black Women’s Stories of Police Violence and Public Silence. It’s not, of course, about excluding Black men and boys from public conversation about police violence, but about the value of adding Black women to our understanding of the phenomenon—as a way to help make our response more meaningful and impactful. If, along the way, we highlight that ignoring the specific, intersectional meaning that policies and practices have for women who are also Black—well, that would improve journalism too. We’ll talk about Say Her Name with one of the key workers on that ongoing project, Kevin Minofu, senior research and writing fellow at African American Policy Forum. Transcript: ‘We Need a Gender-Inclusive Understanding of Police Violence’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230721Minofu.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at recent press coverage of campaign town halls. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230721Banter.mp3  

  Good Jobs First (7/6/23) This week on CounterSpin: Media talk about “the economy” as though it were an abstraction, somehow clinically removed from daily life, instead of being ingrained & entwined in every minute of it. So white supremacy and economic policy are completely different stories for the press, but not for the people. Our guest’s recent work names a simple, obvious way development incentives exacerbate racialized inequality: by transferring wealth from the public to companies led by white male executives. Arlene Martínez is deputy executive director and communications director at Good Jobs First, which has issued a trenchant new report. Transcript: ‘You Are Exacerbating the Racial Wealth Gap Through the Use of Subsidies’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230714Martinez.mp3   Free Press Also on the show: CounterSpin listeners are well aware of the gutting of state and local journalism, connected to the corporate takeover of newspapers and their sell-off to venture—or, as some would say it, vulture—capitalists. Florín Nájera-Uresti is California campaign organizer for the advocacy group Free Press Action. We talk to her about better and worse ways to meet local news media needs. Transcript: ‘What Californians Really Need Is Community-Centered, Truly Local and Responsive Journalism’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230714Najera-Uresti.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at recent press coverage of Israel/Palestine and cluster bombs. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230714Banter.mp3  

  Common Dreams (7/5/23) This week on CounterSpin: The Earth recorded its hottest day ever July 3, with an average global temperature of 17.01°C. The record was broken the next day, with 17.18°C. Common Dreams‘ Jake Johnson (7/5/23) collected international responses, including a British scientist calling it a “death sentence for people and ecosystems”; and reported (7/5/23) IMF estimates that world governments dished out nearly $6 trillion in fossil fuel subsidies in 2020, and those giveaways are expected to grow. At Truthout (7/3/23), Victoria Law wrote about extreme heat’s impact on the incarcerated, including people in their 30s dropping dead in prisons with inadequate cooling systems. One source described his cell: “No air gets in and no air escapes.” Public Citizen (6/16/23) points to House Appropriations Republicans, larding spending bills with “poison pill” riders that fuel the crisis and block alternatives. And a database from the new climate group F Minus reveals how many state lobbyists hired by environmental groups also lobby for fossil fuel companies, entrenching those influence peddlers in state capitols with a veneer of respectability, even as public opinion of fossil fuels plummets. Orange skies burning over many parts of the US may not be the rockets’ red glare, but they’re signs of war nonetheless. The battle is less well understood as a fight between humans and climate change, as one between those who want to forcefully mitigate disastrous impacts and those who want them to continue, for the simple reason that it’s making them rich. There is no way to fight climate disruption without fighting climate disrupters—this week on the show. Emily Sanders watched appalled as CNBC‘s Andrew Ross Sorkin (6/26/23) “interviewed” Chevron’s Mike Wirth recently, leading her to write “How (Not) to Interview an Oil CEO” for ExxonKnews (6/29/23). She’s editorial lead at the Center for Climate Integrity; we’ll ask her about that. Transcript: ‘It Felt Like a Wasted Opportunity to Hold Oil Executives to Account’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230707Sanders.mp3   And: When media illustrate pushback against the fossil fuel industry, it generally looks like activists with signs; but there are myriad points of resistance, at different levels of community, offering multiple ways forward—but all of them in the same direction. In 2021, HuffPost reporter Alexander Kaufman discussed attempts of local representatives to have a say in building codes, and industry’s reaction. Democracy Collaborative‘s Johanna Bozuwa joined us during 2019’s California wildfires and power outages, to explain the potential role of public utilities in the climate crisis. Transcript: ‘The UN’s Report Laid Bare How Little Time Was Left’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230707KaufmanBozuwa.mp3  

  (CC photo: Ted Eytan ) This week on CounterSpin: The US public’s belief in and support for the Supreme Court has plummeted with the appointment of hyper-partisan justices whose unwillingness to answer basic questions, or answer them respectfully, would make them unqualified to work at many a Wendy’s, and the obviously outcome-determinative nature of their jurisprudence. Key to that drop in public support was last year’s Dobbs ruling, overturning something Americans overwhelmingly support and had come to see as a fundamental right—that of people to make their own decisions about when or whether to carry a pregnancy or to have a child. The impacts of that ruling are still reverberating, as is the organized pushback that we can learn about and support. We hear from Taryn Abbassian, associate research director at NARAL. Transcript: ‘Huge Majorities Vote in Favor of Abortion Access and Reproductive Freedom’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin063023Abbassian.mp3   Also on the show: Meaningful, lasting response to Dobbs requires more than “vote blue no matter who,” but actually understanding and addressing the differences and disparities of abortion rights and access before Dobbs, which requires an expansive understanding of reproductive justice. CounterSpin has listened many times over the years to advocates and authors working on this issue. We hear a little this week from FAIR’s Julie Hollar; from Kimberly Inez McGuire, executive director of the group URGE: Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity; and from URGE’s policy director, Preston Mitchum. Transcript: ‘Huge Majorities Vote in Favor of Abortion Access and Reproductive Freedom’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230630DobbsDecision.mp3  

  New Republic (6/14/23) This week on CounterSpin: 70% of House Republicans belong to the Republican Study Committee, which just released a budget that calls for curtailing programs supporting racial equity and LGBTQ rights, natch—and also for increased cuts and access hurdles for Social Security and Medicare. It’s a tale as old as time, how some people want to take resources explicitly designated for seniors and disabled people and funnel them to rich people, in supposed service of “saving” those popular social programs. We’ve been asking for debunking of that storyline for years now from Nancy Altman, president of the group Social Security Works, and author of books, including The Battle for Social Security: From FDR’s Vision to Bush’s Gamble. We’ll get some more debunking this week, because when it comes to Social Security, it seems everything old will always be new again. Transcript: ‘The One Part of Our Retirement Income System That Works Is Social Security’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230623Altman.mp3   Daniel Ellsberg (CC photo: Christopher Michel) Also on the show: Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg died last week at the age of 92, and elite media did that thing they do, where they sort of honor someone they discredited in life, burnishing their own reputation as truth-tellers while still somehow dishonoring the practice of truth-telling—of the sort that afflicts the comfortable. CounterSpin spoke with Ellsberg many times over the years. We hear just some of those conversations this week on the show. Transcript: ‘What the Government Permits You to Know—That’s Not a Democracy’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230623Ellsberg.mp3  

  (City Lights, 2023) This week on CounterSpin: The stories news media tell are something different than the facts they report. The facts may say what happened where; the stories tell us who’s the hero and who’s the villain, how important the fight is, and whether we should care about the ending. It’s not always easy to discern, but it’s critical—which is why narrative has been taken up as an important tool by folks looking to change the world for the better, in part by changing the stories we tell ourselves and one another. Sonali Kolhatkar is the host and executive producer of the daily radio and TV program Rising Up With Sonali, and the racial justice and civil liberties editor at Yes! Magazine. Her new book, Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice, will be published this month by City Lights. She joins us this week on the show. Transcript: ‘Intentional Storytelling Is a Way We Can Fight for a Better World’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230616Kolhatkar.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look back at recent press coverage of work requirements. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230616Banter.mp3  

  (image: PCBA) This week on CounterSpin: This country has a long history of weaponizing drug laws against Black and brown communities. Harry Anslinger, the first commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, ran an anti-marijuana crusade in the 1930s, saying, “Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.” Concerns are justified about what the legalization, and profitizing, of marijuana means for the people and communities most harmed by its criminalization. We hear about that from Tauhid Chappell, founder of the Philadelphia CannaBusiness Association and project manager for Free Press’s News Voices project. Transcript: ‘Despite Legalization, the People Harmed the Most Are Not Able to Benefit’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230609Chappell.mp3   (CC photo: Janine Jackson) Also on the show: Lots of people are concerned about what’s called the “digital well-being” of children—their safety and privacy online. So why did more than 90 human rights and LGBTQ groups sign a letter opposing the “Kids Online Safety Act”? Evan Greer is director of the group Fight for the Future. She tells us what’s going on there. Transcript: ‘These Bills Will Make Children Less Safe, Not More Safe’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230609Greer.mp3  

  NBC (11/2/22) This week on CounterSpin: Corporate media have never been the right place to look for thoughtful, inclusive consideration of affirmative action. For them it’s an “issue,” a political football, rather than a long effort to address the real historical and ongoing discrimination against non-white, non-male people in multiple aspects of US life. But when it comes to the role that anti-discrimination, pro-equity efforts have had on Asian-American communities, there are particular layers of mis- and disinformation that benefit from exploring. Listeners will know that Asian-American students are being used as the face of attempts to eliminate affirmative action or race-consciousness in college admissions. It looks like the Supreme Court will rule on a watershed case this month. We talk about it with writer and cultural critic Jeff Chang, author of We Gon’ Be Alright: Notes on Race and Resegregation, among other titles. Transcript: ‘The History of Affirmative Action Has Asian-American Influence All Over It’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230602Chang.mp3   We also hear some of an earlier discussion of the case Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. vs. Harvard that CounterSpin had with Jeannie Park, founding president of the Asian American Journalists Association in New York, and co-founder of the Coalition for a Diverse Harvard. Transcript: ‘This Case Was Never About Defending Asian Americans’ https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin230602Park.mp3 Transcript: “This Case Was Never About Defending Asian Americans”