Left Forum 2017 - Reality Check: Time for Radical Resistance and Green-Left Collaboration

 

This is a panel from Left Forum 2017, held June 2 - 4 at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City. The conference theme was "The Resistance."

From the Organizers:

The converging crises of fascism, endless war, climate change, mass migrations, and economic/racial/gender oppression create unprecedented urgency for united, radical action – in the street and in the voting booth. At previous Left Forums – and over the past many decades – progressives have debated the merits of working to “reform” the Democratic Party versus building a united independent radical political front.

Moderator:

Gloria Mattera, Green Party of New York

Panelists:

Chris Hedges is an author, critic and was a foreign correspondent for nearly two decades for The New York Times, The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor and National Public Radio. He is the author of the bestsellers American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy, the Triumph of Spectacle and War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. He writes an online column for Truthdig.

Medea Benjamin is the co-founder of the women-led peace group CODEPINK and the co-founder of the human rights group Global Exchange. She has been an advocate for social justice for more than 40 years. Described as "one of America's most committed -- and most effective -- fighters for human rights" by New York Newsday, and "one of the high profile leaders of the peace movement" by the Los Angeles Times, she was one of 1,000 exemplary women from 140 countries nominated to receive the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the millions of women who do the essential work of peace worldwide. She received numerous prices, including: the Martin Luther King, Jr. Peace Prize from the Fellowship of Reconciliation, the Peace Prize by the US Peace Memorial, the Gandhi Peace Award, and the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation Award. She is a former economist and nutritionist with the United Nations and World Health Organization.

Dr. Jill Stein, Green Party 2016 Presidential Candidate

Margaret Kimberley, Black Agenda Report. Her Freedom Rider column appears weekly in Black Agenda Report, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City

Linda Thompson, Left Elect (Not actually a panelist, but she said a few words at the end.)

Note: The Left Forum asked me to film and stream their nightly plenaries, and with only 20 minutes between the scheduled end of this panel and the start of the next plenary, I was unable to stay to the end. If I had I would have missed the start of the plenary. As it turned out I was able to film the presentations, missing only the Q&A.

You can see a complete, if somewhat glitchy, livestream of this panel here.

Please visit these Left Forum links:

Website: http://www.leftforum.org/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theleftforum/?fref=ts
Twitter: https://twitter.com/leftforum
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLeftforum

Remembering Past Wars . . . and Preventing the Next

April 4, 2017, 6-8 p.m. Busboys and Poets, 5th and K Streets NW, Washington, D.C.

An event to mark 100 years since the United States entered World War I, and 50 years since Martin Luther King Jr. made his famous speech against war. A new movement to end all war is growing.

2:42 Michael Kazin, professor of history at Georgetown University, author of War Against War: The American Fight for Peace 1914-1918.

19:38 Eugene Puryear, journalist, activist, radio host, and author of Shackled and Chained: Mass Incarceration in Capitalist America.

35:56 Medea Benjamin, cofounder of CODEPINK, author of books including Kingdom of the Unjust: Behind the U.S.-Saudi Connection.

52:33 Reiner Braun, peace activist based in Germany, co-president International Peace Bureau, Executive Director of the Germany office of the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms.

1:02:53 Maria Santelli, executive director of Center on Conscience and War, founding director of the New Mexico GI Rights Hotline.

1:12:03 Jarrod Grammel, conscientious objector.

1:15:22 Nolan Fontaine, conscientious objector.

1:21:56 David Swanson, director of World Beyond War, author of books including War Is A Lie and When the World Outlawed War.

1:39:08 Q&A

Sponsored by World Beyond War, and Center on Conscience and War, Code Pink, with thanks to Busboys and Poets.

Multifaith Anti-Drone Conference - Session 3

 

Stony Point Center, Stony Point, NY; April 8 -9, 2016

Medea Benjamin - Drone Warfare: It's a Matter of Faith

Download the audio at the a-Infos Radio Project.