I find it ironic that we’re getting ready to spend $50 million to arm and train the “moderate” Syrian rebels so they can fight against ISIL in the Middle East yet, according to the Republican party, we can’t afford to pay for food stamps, Medicare and Medicaid or even Social Security (even though we’ve paid into some of those programs to insure we’d be covered as we age).
It’s also ironic that as we face imminent danger from the effect of climate change, many of those same members of Congress who voted to send the cavalry to Iraq and Syria continue denying that we need protection here, now.
Although Lindsey Graham is trying to scare us into war by saying
This president needs to rise to the occasion before we all get killed here at home
we got more honesty from the president during his address to the nation, in which he said,
…we have not yet detected specific plotting against our homeland…
There are, however, imminent threats from the rising seas and extreme weather events as a result of climate change. To address that, people will converge upon New York City this weekend for the People’s Climate March on Sunday and a slew of events surrounding what is expected to be the largest climate march in history.
I invited RL Miller, co-founder of Climate Hawks Vote on the show this morning to talk about the march and how we can use our votes as a tool to protect ourselves from the effects of climate change.
In the past few weeks, the issue of domestic violence has emerged front and center thanks to some brutish pro football players beating up women and children. So, in the interest of learning to better protect ourselves, I invited Ellen Snortland on the show this morning. Ellen is an author, self-defense advocate and instructor has been featured on Dateline NBC with her book, Beauty Bites Beast. Her new book, The Safety Godmothers, teaches teens how to defend themselves too.
Amy Simon of She’s History has been as enamored of the Ken Burns’ PBS series The Roosevelts as I am, so she joined in today to tell us a bit more about Eleanor Roosevelt.
I’ll be back to wrap up the week tomorrow with no-nuke activist Harvey Wasserman and for Flashback Friday, Natalie Merchant from 2000. Talk to you then, radio or not…
