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Global Upheaval Undermining Food Security – Matin Qaim
Matin Qaim, Director of the Center for Development Research at the University of Bonn, examines the various aspects comprising food security, namely local and global supply chains, the generation of income for local farmers, investments in the production of nutritious foods, as well as accounting for climate externalities. Attaining food security has become even more difficult given the disruptions around the pandemic, rising inflation, and the failed Black Sea grain deal. He asserts that small-scale farming and agroecological approaches are not necessarily low-tech and that certain technologies, if applied correctly, can assist smallholder farmers.
A Warning From Chomsky and Ellsberg
On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki we republish this interview with Noam Chomsky and Daniel Ellsberg from October 12, 2022.
“It’s beyond lunacy,” say Noam Chomsky and Daniel Ellsberg. In their 90s, the two men tirelessly fight to warn people of the need for urgent action to deal with climate change and the threat of nuclear war. Joining Paul Jay, they discuss the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the war in Ukraine, and the climate crisis.
Trump Says Socialism is His Enemy – He’s Right
Meagan Day, a journalist for Jacobin Magazine and member of the DSA, joins Paul Jay to discuss the challenges in building a broad democratic front that focuses on the climate crisis and defeating rising fascism; and organizing a socialist movement for a more radical transformation of the society.
The Political Economy of Saving the Planet – Bob Pollin part 1/2
The issue of banning (or not banning) fracking has been at the forefront of the 2024 presidential debates between former President Trump and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. Fracking, a technique that involves horizontal drilling to extract gas and oil from shale rock, risks methane leaks and other environmental hazards. Professor Bob Pollin, economist and Co-Director of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI), lays out the elements of a Global Green New Deal to avert climate catastrophe and achieve net zero emissions by 2050. Can we frack and still reach this goal?
U.S., Israel, and a Lawless New World Order – Nader Hashemi
Israel struck Iran — but could this war set off something far more dangerous?
Middle East scholar Nader Hashemi joins Paul Jay to break down what’s really behind the so-called ’12-Day War.’ Far from a clean victory, Hashemi warns the strikes have likely strengthened Iran’s hardliners, accelerated the push toward nuclear weapons, and crushed the country’s democratic opposition. But this may not be a simple case of Western overreach — it may reflect a deep strategic split between the U.S. and Israel.
As Jay argues, Trump may be seeking to normalize relations with Iran, not to promote democracy, but to pry Tehran away from China and regain leverage in the great power rivalry — especially with most of Iran’s oil flowing to Beijing. Israel, on the other hand, appears willing to risk regional chaos to achieve regime change and eliminate its last major regional adversary.
What’s lost in the Western media narrative is the reality that the Iranian people — not the regime — are paying the price. And what’s collapsing before our eyes is not just diplomacy but the very idea of a rules-based international order.
This war may be just beginning — and its consequences could reshape the global balance of power.
Towards a Green Economy: How Urgent is It? – Robert Pollin on Reality Asserts Itself (1/8)
Mr. Pollin tells Paul Jay the most likely scenario is that the level of CO2 carbon dioxide emissions are going to be twice the level that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, says is necessary to have a chance to stabilize the climate. This is an episode of Reality Asserts Itself, produced January 6, 2015.
Mr. Jay –
I used to read, and comment on, TRNN on a regular basis, until, that is, you treated Jill Stein of the GP with such dismissive disrespect – with the same “rationale” you do here. The fact is she was the best candidate, certainly in ’16 and, I would argue, in ’12, for anyone of a progressive bent with regard to both domestic and foreign policy. Hers was the only platform, actually ON THE BALLOT, that was, in fact, a more robust version of all the things Sanders purportedly stood for, things that, along with his supporters, he turned his back on and betrayed when he backed first Clinton and then Biden in order to do “the most important thing – beat Trump!” And that turned out sooo well, didn’t it.
The arguments are DP memes I have heard since ’00 when Nader got his 3% and the DP knew it had to nip that in the bud lickety-split, hence “spoiler” – as if the DP (and the RP) hadn’t been in the process of “spoiling” so much of our lives for so long, “Nader gave us Bush” – nonsense, the SC gave us Bush (and has been primed to give us Trump), and, le piece de resistance, “3rd parties can’t win” – more nonsense, anyone on a ballot can win if enough folks vote for ’em – all designed to shame those of us who voted for what we wanted and needed, things you yourself seem to favor, into voting LOTE for another lousy Dem, over and over, and to convince us that “we had nowhere else to go” – when in fact we did, and have had, for at least a quarter of a century.
And, to our shame, we bought it, and still do – we have earned the sobriquet “snowflake” because we melt every time and chicken out when someone waves “that awful Rep!” in our faces – if, instead, we had “screwed our courage to the sticking place” and voted in ever greater numbers for that 3rd party Prog each time – the DP, no doubt kicking and screaming, with many epithets, would have gotten the message by now – “we better do what the people want or we are toast” – in the end what a politician needs at election time, more than money, is VOTES. Votes are our ONLY leverage, and we refuse to use them. We have lost decades doing this – time we could not afford to lose.
For years I have heard, as now, “we need a third party!” – well we have had one for years, and we don’t vote for ’em – each time it’s, “well we gotta vote LOTE this time, but then we’ll ‘organize’, and next time ….” – but “next time” never seems to come” …. the DP is pleased as punch …
When I listened to you here now, I heard an echo from years ago, more respectful and less dismissive, perhaps, than then – but, I am sorry, sir, IMO, it is just as destructive now, as when I heard it then …..
It feels too much to me like staying with an abusive spouse to vote Blue. I won’t swallow. Maybe Trump will make things so bad, the nation will go the way of the Soviet Union and we might have a chance to create a real democracy from one of the pieces. I don’t see any change if Golden Leghairs wins- he is already seeking advice from Larry Summers about how to handle the Covid-19 crisis. We are truly on our own. The U.S. is too corrupt, violent, and powerful to be reformed. It needs to die. Trump will get us to the breaking point far faster than the senile sexual abuser from MBNM.
May be this is all correct. However the moment I heard that Bernie was back on the stage I saw the policy of the democrats concentrating around two points:
A. As happened the last time, Bernie needs to be “taken out”. Including all the Progressives circling around him. Most of them will simply abstain from voting.
B. Biden needs to loose the election for the Democrats which he will most likely manage. Why? The USA will shortly fall into the abyss – it is falling already. That ist to happen unter Trump and he is needed for that.
AFTERWARDS the Democrats will come in as knights in shining armour and save the day.
…… well, that is what it looks like to me from afar and I don’t pretend to really know all that much about the US.
I hope you are right;
I fear you are not.
Very good discussion. It galls this Sanders supporter to even consider voting for the DNC’s puppet, but Jay’s point about emboldened right-wingers seems on point.
Paul Jay obviously has given a considerable amount of thought for his argument of voting for Joe Biden in the light of a reelection of Donald Trump.
Unfortunately, when one scrapes away the rhetoric of voting for Biden it is a tacit vote of confidence for a member of the criminal and illegitimate US government and its lickspittles in the Democratic Party.
Voting for either of the two corporate parties is voicing support for opposition of real change in the US government.
Nobody points out that we got Trump because of Democratic administrations like Obama’s. I can’t see much difference between blue or red neoliberals. Both parties are warmongers and feed the military-industrial-congressional-(high tech?) complex. Neither party cares if we die. Besides, the huge discrepancies between exit polls and voter results in Super Tuesday primary states showed that vote tampering is a real thing, and next to no one speaks about that. Desire for change without hope looks like another Trump administration.