Living in the USA

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Is poverty caused by bad choices made by women?  If poor women had better values,  would everything be better?  KATHA POLLITT comments – she’s a columnist for The Nation.
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Plus: LA prosecutors have been concealing evidence from defendants in criminal cases, evidence about misconduct by jail guards—that’s what the ACLU of Southern California says in a new lawsuit. MARK ROSENBAUM of the ACLU will explain – he says  “In Los Angeles County, we have a system of injustice for all criminal defendants.”

Also: What happens if Republican vote suppression tactics succeed in November, and Mitt Romney is elected because Democrats who are poor, young or minorities were prevented from voting?  What do we do then?  HAROLD MEYERSON has been thinking about that – he writes for The Washington Post op-ed page and The American Prospect.

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TOM FRANK asks the question: “Given the rigged, rotten nature of the higher-ed game, why would people play by the rules?”  The answer: lots don’t.  Tom wrote about fake degrees and phony college credentials — and their larger social and cultural significance — for his column in the August issue of Harper’s.

Plus: the fight for MOCA, the Museum of Contemporary Art in LA — it’s not a battle between “populists” and “aesthetes”; it’s a takeover by the corporate mentality.  CHRISTOPHER KNIGHT explains — he’s art critic for the LA Times and he blogs at Culture Monster.

Also : PETER EDELMAN is one of my heroes — he resigned from the Clinton adminstration in protest against Clinton’s treatment of the poor in “the abolition of welfare as we know it.”   Today he talks about how we can end poverty in America now – and what’s stopping us. 
Peter’s new book is So Rich, So Poor: Why It’s Hard to End Poverty in America.

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SARAH VOWELL talks about the “orgy of imperialism” that led to the Americanization of Hawaii.  She has one of the great American voices—first on “This American Life,” then in a series of wonderful books that became best-sellers. She’s been a frequent guest of Jon Stewart’s and David Letterman’s.  Now her newest book is out in paperback – it’s called Unfamiliar Fishes.

Plus: Islamophobia and its Discontents:  LAILA LALAMI talks about living with anti-Muslim bias.  Laila teaches creative writing at UC Riverside; her novel is  Secret Son,  and she wrote the recent cover story for The Nation on Islamophobia.

Also: “Mr. Satan Goes to Wall Street“: it’s a new street-theater musical comedy by the award-winning guerrilla-theater company the Imagination Liberation Front. Mr. Satan will perform this summer, for the Occupy Wall Street troops in Zuccotti Park – and in the streets outside of the Republican and Democratic national conventions.  Benefit Wed. 8pm at Sacret Fools Theater in E. Hollywood; info HERE; contribute HERE (to “Imagination Liberation Front”).

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The United States has never understood Afghanstan – and probably never will.  That’s what RAJIV CHANDRASEKARAN says – he’s a Washington Post reporter who has spent years covering the wars Afghanistan and Iran.  Now he has a new book out – Little America: The War within the War for Afghanistan.

And we will have our political update from HAROLD MEYERSON—he writes a column for the op-ed page of the Washington Post, and he’s editor-at-large of The American Prospect.

Also: The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century: A Social Justice Hall of Fame: from Gene Debs and Clarence Darrow to Bruce Springsteen and Michael Moore — PETER DREIER has a list.  He teaches politics at Occidental College, he writes for The Nation, the L.A. Times, and The American Prospect, and his new book about the 100 greatest Americans is out now from Nation Books.

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TERRY GROSS of NPR’s “Fresh Air” is heard by more than 4 million listeners on more than 400 stations.  She talks about what went wrong in her interviews with Hillary Clinton, Nancy Reagan, and Bill O’Reilly.  Her book, All I Did was Ask: Conversations with Writers, Actors, Musicians and Artists, is out now in paperback.  (originally broadcast 2/2006)

Also: REBECCA SKLOOT talks about how racism, poverty and science came together in the case of  a poor black woman whose cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine.  Rebecca’s best-selling book is THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS.  (originally broadcast April, 2010)

And: Barack Obama’s mother, the amazing Ann Dunham: she married a black man – Barack Obama Sr. — when she was 18, then he left her after Barack Jr. was born; she got him into the best school in Honolulu, and then she left for Java and worked with poor women in the third world for more than a decade.  JANNY SCOTT of the NY Times tells that story – her book is A SINGULAR WOMAN–it’s out now in paperback.  (originally broadcast  July 2011)

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CHRIS HAYES of MSNBC and The Nation talks about the pervasive failure of our elites –which shows that it’s time to move beyond meritocracy, even though it triumphed with the election of Obama.  Our new goal, he says, should be equality.  His new book is Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy.

Also: how the market has taken over intimate life, from dating to marriage to childraising and even to death: Berkeley sociologist ARLIE HOCHSCHILD explains.  Her new book is The Outsourced Self.

Plus: GAIL COLLINS, the New York Times op-ed columnist, has been spending time in Texas, to see how the Lone Star state has hijacked our future.   She will report on her findings — alarming, and, of course, hilarious.  Her new book is As Texas Goes: How the Lone Star State Hijacked the American Agenda.

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Growing up next door to a plutonium weapons factory: KRISTEN IVERSENtalks about her  “hauntingly beautiful memoir that is also a devastating investigation into the human costs of building and living with the atomic bomb” (Kai Bird).   The site is Rocky Flats, outside Denver; the book is Full Body Burden —  READ an excerpt in The Nation HERE.

Also:  HAROLD MEYERSON explains what happens if America loses its unions – a necessary question after Wisconsin.  Harold’s new piece for the Washington Post is HERE — and for The American Prospect HERE.

Plus:  LILLIAN HELLMAN was the most successful woman playwright in American history and a hero of the fight against HUAC – and also, ALICE KESSLER-HARRIS says, “A Difficult Woman” – that’s the title of her new bio on “the Challenging Life and Times of Lillian Hellman.”   Alice is professor of American history at Columbia University and past president of the Organization of American Historians.

For the record: our shows on KPFK have been pre-empted for the fund drive.

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What should young people do when faced with the ruinous cost of college?  Mitt Romney has the answer: don’t ask the government to help, but instead “shop around” to find the best deal in the marketplace of educational choice.  TOM FRANK says “massive indebtedness changes a person, maybe even more than a college education does.”   Tom wrote about student debt for the June issue of Harper’s; his new book is Pity the Billionaire.

Also: A PEOPLE’S GUIDE TO LOS ANGELES – the indispensable new book – offers an assortment of eye-opening alternatives to L.A.’s usual tourist destinations. It documents 115 little-known sites in LA where people have fought for equality and justice.  Co-author LAURA PULIDO will explain – she is s Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity at USC.  A People’s Guide is our featured thank-you gift in the KPFK fund drive today – please call and pledge during the show: 818-985-5735.

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Report from Fukushima: REBECCA SOLNIT visited the disaster zone in northern Japan.  “Disasters in the West are often compounded by the belief that human beings instantly revert to savagery in a calamity,” she says.  “But in Japan, the greater problem seems to be conformity.”  Rebecca wrote a Fukushima diary for the London Review of Books.  She’s the author of A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster.

Plus: Tomorrow night, 5/10, George Clooney will host an Obama fundraiser at his house in Laurel Canyon – it’s the biggest presidential fundraiser in history, $12 million, and demonstrators will be there, calling for more aggressive action to prevent foreclosures.  PEGGY MEARNS of the Campaign for a Fair Settlement will explain – the message to Obama is “Keep Americans in our houses, and we’ll keep you in yours.”

Also: Politics and economics: HAROLD MEYERSON says “the good times are gone – long-term prosperity may be a thing of the past.”  Harold writes a column for the Washington Post op-ed page and is editor-at-large of The American Prospect.