Journalist/historian Gareth Porter returns, with commentary on the killing of Rabbani and the expansion of night raids on civilians; Jeff Paterson of Courage to Resist gives us the latest on Pfc. Bradley Manning’s detention and upcoming court martial; film reviewer Gary Chew on Moneyball.
Porter talks about the September 20 assassination in Kabul of former Afghan President Rabbani, and similarities to the suicide bomber attack on the US base in Khost on December 30, 2009. Porter offers the history and context on these events that is so often missing in US media. Porter says that there are no meaningful peace talks with the Taliban and other insurgents now underway, and notes that even with US support, the Karzai government cannot even control Kabul. Porter details his recent article about the major expansion of night raids, now including civilian targets, and argues that these sweeps amount to collective punishment, and alienate the people.
At 37:30, we talk with John Paterson, program director of Courage to Resist about the current status of Bradley Manning. We listen to the group that disrupted Obama at a San Francisco fundraiser in April with a song about Manning and his treatment. Paterson reports that Manning is being treated much better at Leavenworth than he was at Quantico, although Rep. Dennis Kucinich has been denied permission to visit Manning. Paterson says that pretrial arguments will start this fall, with the court martial likely next year. You can support Manning and learn more here and here.
At 1:01:30 we are joined by Gary Chew, our official movie reviwer, who tells us his impressions of the new Brad Pitt movie about the Oakland A’s baseball team, Moneyball.
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