Redacted Tonight (April 2019 - March 2020): Recent Episodes
RT
With reality now seeming like a Shakespearean comedy, perhaps only comedy can truly bring truth to the people. DC-born comedian Lee Camp and a talented cast do just that with RT America’s first comedy show - Redacted Tonight with Lee Camp. This is not your grandparents’ satire program. Every week Redacted Tonight will provide comedy news with a punch. This weekly satire show tackles all the real news stories the mainstream media failed to mention and provides new angles on the ones they do.
It seems like Bernie Sanders is running away with the DNC primary, and the corporate media are freaking out. It's really funny to behold and Lee is here to make fun of it with you. Both Chris Matthews and Chuck Todd have made Nazi allusions about the so-called "Bernie Bros" in the last few weeks, and that didn't stop the momentum of Bernie's anti-establishment campaign. Now the media have started to create a narrative that the Russians are supporting both Sanders and Trump. We'll see how it ends at the Democratic National Convention, where the DNC no doubt have more tricks up their sleeves. Also this week, Lee reports on Weinstein's conviction, Assange's extradition hearing and its similarities to a case where the US is refusing to extradite a CIA agent who ran over a British kid and escaped the country, and more on "Taking The News From Behind."
Naomi Karavani reports on how Attorney General William Barr is cracking down on cities that have said they won't help the Department of Immigration Control & Enforcement to deport immigrant residents within their communities. Communities that don't collaborate with ICE have taken the moniker "Sanctuary Cities." Finally, Natalie McGill looks into how climate change coverage from the US corporate media has been sparse. It doesn't reflect the extent of the climate crisis as explained by the scientific community.
We have a big interview for you this week. Ron Paul came on the show to discuss the multitude of corrupt practices that hold up the USA. Lee and Paul discuss the military industrial complex, the impending economic collapse, and the persecution of Julian Assange. But before the interview, Lee opens the show with fearmongering stories from the New York Times. He goes paper-shredding on their coverage of the coronavirus and a patently false story about how Bernie Sanders isn't bringing new voters into the Democratic Party.
Anders Lee finishes off the show by fact-checking the fact-checkers on one of the many stupid stories our corporate media chooses to focus on instead of discussing important issues. Michael Bloomberg's campaign released a video that had been altered with cricket sounds after he made the comment that he was the only candidate on the stage who had started a business. So, were there crickets on stage? There are two answers: No and "Why are you wasting your time with this story?"
A new Yale study says what we already knew about universal healthcare – it’s a lot cheaper than the for-profit healthcare system and saves a significant number of lives. Lee looks at the forces keeping our horrific system alive. In ‘Taking The News From Behind’, Lee covers how the state of Georgia is in two legal binds, with Greg Palast and Abby Martin, the Boy Scouts of America went into bankruptcy amid their child sex abuse scandal, and the New York Times declared the “end of Australia as we know it” because of the climate crisis. Natalie McGill takes a look at the unequal distribution of subsidies the Trump administration released to struggling farmers in the wake of his trade war with China. Anders Lee reports on how the field of economics consistently fails to address the structural cause of the problems it analyzes.
Lee "shreds some paper" at the top of the show. He takes apart a front page of the Washington Post that is filled with hyperbole and vitriol, including an attack on Trump for being too supportive of Chinese President Xi Jinping. China is facing the coronavirus pandemic and it seems like a great time to be sympathetic to them. After all, Trump started a trade war with China in his early days as POTUS.
Many fear the Democratic primaries will continue to devolve into chaos as the establishment tries to stop Bernie Sanders. Lee sat down with Sanders' former national political outreach coordinator, Nick Brana, to understand what's happening now and where it might lead. Nick is one of the founders of the Movement for a People's Party. He wants progressive voters to break away from the DNC. Naomi Karavani finishes off the show by diving into some of Mayor Bloomberg's more offensive and misleading recent tweets.
Buttigieg appeared on the national stage out of nowhere during the 2016 election for DNC chair. Now we’re being told he’s a front-runner in their primaries. His deep connections with US intelligence might help explain his success. In ‘Taking the News From Behind,’ Lee follows the drama and technical glitches in the DNC primaries so far, he lets Bloomberg expose himself as a racist, and he gives a positive update from Julian Assange in London. Anders Lee reports on how the US justice system is failing to bring the wealthy and corporations to justice. Instead they’ve been making show trials of B-list celebrities to create the perception that they’re doing their job. Naomi Karavani finishes off the show on the suppression of graduate student unions.
Our guest today is Wayne Hsiung, a lawyer and co-founder of Direct Action Everywhere, who is currently facing felony charges for recording animal abuse across the country. Anders Lee reports on a little-known story from American history in which a small group of plutocrats attempted to overthrow the government. Their big mistake was trying to bring the patriotic General Smedley Butler into their conspiracy. And Natalie McGill caps off the show by fact-checking a Trump administration official’s response to the story that her boss was trying to cut Medicaid.
Donald Trump made his third State of the Union address this week and despite the recent impeachment drama with the DNC, there’s still a lot of bipartisan support for the terrible actions of our government. Lee watched the speech and found several points of agreement between the parties on issues such as the US’ prison-industrial complex and our foreign interventions. The Iowa caucus debacle, Brexit, and the Kentucky gun rights protests are covered in ‘Taking The News From Behind’.
Trump has shifted his ‘Muslim Ban’ into a ‘Travel Ban’ affecting several African nations. Naomi Karavani reports that it will now include Nigeria, Myanmar, Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Sudan, and Tanzania. However, immigrants with enough money will be able to pay their way around it. Natalie McGill finishes off the show with the story of how telecom companies are taking advantage of Ajit Pai’s net neutrality repeal.
When the US attempted to replace the Venezuelan executive branch from across a continent, Adrian Pine and David Paul joined a group that was invited into the Venezuelan Embassy by the government of Nicolas Maduro. They held the embassy for a month despite being besieged by supporters of the coup who were bolstered by US law enforcement. Pine, Paul, and two other activists now face a trial where they aren’t allowed to bring up that they were acting on behalf of a legitimate government who the US wanted to replace. Lee discusses the trial and all of its implications for international law.
R. A. The Rugged Man is a rapper with a long career and a lot in common with Lee’s worldview – specifically, he’s critical of the superficiality of the mainstream media and the corporate world. He started his career by irritating the record labels and deciding to go his own way. Now he has found success in rap and film making. They discuss his career, his family, and the entertainment world.
The ‘peace deal’ for Israel-Palestine announced by the Trump administration this week is a complete joke and Lee is here to tell you why. In ‘Taking The News From Behind’, Lee covers the DNC conference announcements that are stacked against the populist Bernie Sanders, signs of an economic recession, and Jamie Dimon’s take on how socialism erodes society over the backdrop of multiple banking scandals. Natalie McGill reports on Microsoft’s move to bully the IRS and dodge taxes. Anders Lee reviews the impeachment that’s going nowhere. He also offers Congress several stronger arguments for removing the president.
Joe Biden was recently confronted by an environmental activist who asked him to explain why he deserves the votes of people concerned about climate change. He refused to answer the question in a move that should concern Biden fans. Lee dissects the interaction. Lee sat down this week with Ramesh Srinivasan, an academic whose work focuses on the intersection between technology and social development, and who recently published ‘Beyond The Valley’. His book is about the potential for modern communication technology in addressing social inequality, as well as the dangers it holds. Naomi Karavani finishes off the show with a report on new findings about the CIA’s MKULTRA mind control program.
The legacy of Martin Luther King Jr is misrepresented every year on the US holiday that carries his name and encourages service. This year, the FBI even made a tweet for him. Lee is here to remind you that MLK didn't just believe in service. He stood against capitalism, militarism, and racism. He died for what he believed, and the FBI played a role in his assassination. In 'Taking The News From Behind,' Brazil announced charges against Glenn Greenwald for cybercrimes, a chemical weapons investigator spoke at the UN and undermined the case claiming Bashar Assad gassed Syrian citizens, Apple admitted they don't want people to fix their phones because it takes from their profits, and more.
Anders Lee sits down with Lee to explain how the Second Amendment protesters in Virginia were responding to a bill that had nothing to do with their rights to own guns. Virginia legislator Carter Lee received death threats over a bill related to the rights of government employees to strike. The bill was misinterpreted by his GOP rivals and the VA police union. Their misinterpretation sparked a massive protest. Naomi Karavani closes the show out with a report on how China has decided to ban plastics manufacturers that pollute too much. So one US company has decided to take its dirty production processes to Louisiana.
The New York Times has done it again – they’ve uncritically published an outrageous story claiming that political unrest, this time in Latin America, was caused by Russian bots. Gareth Porter has just written ‘The CIA Insider’s Guide to the Iran Crisis’ with friend of the show John Kiriakou. He sat down with Lee to discuss what’s really happening between the US and Iran and how it mirrors the US’ war against the people of Vietnam. Natalie McGill finishes the show by taking down a journalist who called the police on a Target manager over a mispriced toothbrush.
The Democratic primary in 2016 was a dirty affair rife with voter suppression, DNC corruption, & corporate propaganda undermining Senator Sanders. 2020 is likely to be the same, so Lee goes over California's DNC scheme to stop progressives and independents from weighing in on their primary. In 'Taking The News From Behind' a new study finds that increasing the minimum wage significantly reduces suicide rates, the shocking scale of military spending on wars in the Middle East over the past two decades, how lies about Iran continue to fall apart, and more.
Naomi Karavani compares the French strike movement against the austerity politics of Emmanuel Macron to US homegrown strikes. The French have been engaged in a radical protest movement for over a year now and, despite multiple offers from their government, they refuse to stop. US labor can learn a lot from them. Natalie McGill finishes the show off with a report on how the FDA fast-tracked the opiate Dsuvia, which it rightly suspected would lead to deaths if it were rolled out.
Rania Khalek comes on to explain what's happening at the moment in Iraq and Iran. She's a journalist based in Lebanon, whose work is focused on the Middle East. Lee and Khalek review the action from the last week and she fills in the details that haven't been widely published by media in the US. They destroy the idea that General Soleimani, the man credited with crushing ISIS in the region, was a terrorist. She also provides context on how Iran has been demonized by the US.
In the second half of the show, Lee speaks with Mike Monetta, the executive director of Wolf-PAC. Wolf-PAC is a political action committee that works on getting the influence of big money donors out of US politics. This is a major issue corrupting democracy in the US. They discuss the best way to achieve Wolf-PAC's goals, the main obstacles in their way, and which states have already done good work on the issue. Anders Lee finishes off the show with a new segment called 'Fact Jackers.' This week, he dismantles the myth, spread by Joe Biden, that the former VP has been a defender of social security and Medicaid throughout his career.
We are not at war with Iran, but Trump tried his hardest to make that happen this week by assassinating General Qassem Soleimani. Since then, the mainstream media has been losing their minds with indecision over whether the ‘orange man’ is bad or the illegal assassination of an enemy of the US empire is good. Lee dives into why the US wants war with Iran, how the media has helped, and what you can do to stop it. Among many other stories, he also covers the wildfires in Australia, the fossil fuel investments of a quarter of our representatives in Congress, a fracking boom that won’t help calm the climate crisis, and an embarrassing election for the US and its chosen puppet in Venezuela.
Natalie McGill makes her first appearance of 2020 to report on a new move from the fossil fuel industry to co-opt youth activists and greenwash the environmental movement. Corporations and their drive for profit are leading humanity off the climate change cliff, and they know that people know. So now they’re using children to clean their consciences. Anders Lee ends the episode on current union activity in the US. We’re seeing the most union activity in the US in decades as inequality skyrockets and corporations who crush union organizing are also getting more of a fight out of their workers.
Garland Nixon is the co-host of Fault Lines on Sputnik Radio. He sat down with Lee to discuss the current stand-off between the US and Iran. When the US assassinated an Iranian general with a drone last week, they set off a conflict that the whole world feared. General Qassem Soleimani was one of the most popular figures in Iranian politics and his murder forced Iran to make a potentially world-ending decision. Nixon and Lee sound off on what it means.
Julian Assange continues to sit in a British prison awaiting his potential extradition to America. In his rare public appearances, he seems sickly and many of his supporters worry about his health. Christine Doff and Andrew Smith are helping to organize a vigil to save his life, and they came on the show to discuss Assange’s condition and their plans to help him. They will organize vigils around the world to coincide with his extradition hearings.
It’s 2020 and the Redacted team takes a look back at their highlights from the year on America’s mass incarceration industry. Tune in to learn about the reality that the US places millions of its citizens in through the over-policing of low-income communities, draconian sentencing, and a for-profit industry that allows businessmen to capitalize on the labor of the unfortunate people placed in their cells. The episode covers the corporate media’s dehumanization of prisoners, the real US prison population, jails profiting from prisoners’ phone calls to their families, racist policing, and more. There’s even some good news in the release of Cyntoia Brown last January.
This is a special episode with the correspondents. Naomi Karavani looks at some of the headlines from the last week. Mike Bloomberg has used prison labor to make fundraising calls for his campaign, Virginia school district is giving its students one day off a year for civic engagement, and Amazon's "Ring" is caught up in a creepy lawsuit after their cameras and speaker systems were hacked. Anders Lee sat down with Sam Knight. Knight reports for the District Sentinel, a DC-based news site. They discuss the corporate rot that's undermining journalism in the US, Trump's impeachment, and the DNC primary.
Natalie McGill finishes off the show with a review of some of the dumbest tweets from the last week. Mike Bloomberg makes his third appearance in the episode with his thoughts on making the West Wing an open office plan, a GOP politician compares Trump's impeachment to the crucifixion of Jesus, and major media sources refer to the 1921 massacre of black people in Tulsa, OK as 'race riots.'
This highlights episode from the last year focuses on the military-industrial complex. Unfortunately, there’s always material for this episode, enjoy! We cover how the Pentagon failed an audit that found they had $21 trillion in unaccounted spending. We also look back at Trump’s decisions to keep troops in Iraq and Syria, Naomi Karavani’s reports on the School of the Americas, and the assassination of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi; and Natalie McGill on the financial industry taking advantage of soldiers.
Naomi Karavani hosts this episode of Redacted Tonight: VIP. She opens the episode with some of the dumbest news from the week, including professional misconduct from ICE and police departments across the country.
The interview this week is with Ray Kemble, who is the subject of a fracking documentary ‘Blowout: Who’s Next?’ Kemble’s township in Pennsylvania was targeted for fracking, and his community’s health has been seriously impacted since. He brings contaminated water from his land into the studio to highlight the real impact of fracking.
The Washington Post recently did something shocking... journalism. They received documents through FOIA requests that proved the government was actively lying about the Afghanistan war. These lies were an open secret and now they’re proven. Lee opens the show this week by reviewing the revelations from the FOIA releases. In ‘Taking The News From Behind’, Lee looks at the British election, voter suppression in Wisconsin, Boeing’s decision to shut down production of the 737, and a fatal flaw in Lexus’ technology. Naomi Karavani reports on a company that helps some of the most despicable figures in the US to scrub their reputations using digital media strategies. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos had an embarrassing incident in her campaign to save her name from her brother’s bloody name and her professional background. Natalie McGill closes the show on a union busting story centered around Hearst Magazine.
Lee shreds the headlines from the Washington Post as they completely misrepresent the point on climate change, American public opinion, and the US’ war on Venezuela. Nicole Roussell is the producer of the Sputnik Radio news show Loud & Clear. She sits down with Lee to grapple with the consequences the recent elections in Britain and Israel. They also discuss Trump’s impeachment, the 2020 election, and US-China relations. Anders Lee finishes the show with a review of the worst tweets from the last week.
Project Censored released their list of the top censored stories in the US over the last year. Among many stories they show us how Facebook is a tool of US foreign policy, indigenous protesters are rocking the environmental movements, slavery is still in effect across the world, and the Israel Lobby manages to guide US politics. Natalie McGill sits down with Lee to report on a movement from Big Pharma to keep raking in massive profits from the US government’s refusal to reign in their corrupt machinations. Anders Lee finishes the show off with a look at the latest UN climate negotiations in Spain. The COP 25 has some dodgy corporate ties.
Maryam Henein came on the show to discuss how the big data companies censor news that’s inconvenient to their business models. You might’ve heard of shadow-banning and algorithmic censorship. Henein has done the research on it. We also learn what happened to journalist Max Blumenthal after police arrested him on false charges the other week. Spoiler: he has good news. Naomi Karavani ends the show with a new segment destroying some of the worst opinions thrown down on Twitter in the last week.
President Obama sucked on climate change. The GOP are actively bad on climate too, but it’s important to remember that inaction on climate is bipartisan. This show kicks off with a look back at how the DNC, the GOP, and the corporate media have allowed global warming to develop to the point of an existential crisis. Under Obama they slapped BP on the wrist for filling the Gulf Sea with oil and the Paris Climate Accord failed to address the scientific reality of what needs to be done to control the greenhouse effect. Under Trump things have only gotten worse. In ‘Taking The News From Behind’, Lee looks at the British election, the extension of the PATRIOT Act, Facebook’s role in the development of facial recognition software, and more.
Anders Lee sits down with Lee to discuss Israel. The US recently decided to classify the Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories as legal, despite them being very illegal. It’s hard to know what will happen there as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will face corruption charges. Naomi Karavani closes the show out with a report on an explosion that happened last week at a Texas chemical plant. The explosion happened soon after the Trump administration loosened regulations on the industry.
Ben Norton is a journalist with the Grayzone and he sat down with Lee at the top of the show. They discuss US foreign policy relating to Bolivia, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Mexico, and more. These Latin American countries are seeing their left-wing governments attacked by US-backed right-wing movements and sanctions. The story extends back into history and includes some of the same characters from the last round of US coups in Latin America such as the School of the Americas and Elliot Abrams. Norton spent several months in Venezuela reporting on the US-backed coup earlier this year.
After the break Lee and Norton continue to discuss US foreign policy and move onto bipartisan support for US imperialism from both corporate political parties. Natalie McGill finishes the show with a report on the continued push for voter suppression laws from the GOP. They are going after college students with more Voter ID laws targeted at college students in North Carolina, Iowa, and Wisconsin. These laws put obstacles in the way of young people to dissuade them from engaging in the democratic process.
Lee had an extended interview with Peter Janney, author of Mary’s Mosaic, a book about Mary Meyer, one of JFK’s lovers, who is believed to have been killed by the CIA to help cover up their involvement in JFK’s assassination. They discuss the man they accused of Mary’s murder, Ray Crump, and how he was acquitted due to lack of evidence and to the strong legal counsel of Dovey Roundtree, one of the first African-American women to pass the bar in D.C. Peter also reveals he believes his own father, a CIA official, may himself have played a part in the conspiracy.
Lee goes over policy advances won by the left since the Occupy movement shook the world. Popular activism has moved the dial on universal healthcare, raising the minimum wage, environmental action, and more. Deeper into the news, we look at the failed coup in Venezuela last weekend and an environmental stance taken by the European Investment Bank which has decided to stop financing fossil fuel projects.
Naomi Karavani looks back at the role the School of the Americas has played in overthrowing democratic regimes in Latin America. Graduates of the school were central to the recent Bolivian coup but their history is long and dark. Natalie McGill ends the show with a report on a database where the NYPD illegally kept hundreds of people’s fingerprints.
Naomi Karavani hosts the show this week. The US has spilled nuclear waste in the Marshall Islands and they’re refusing to clean it up, while demanding that anti-US graffiti be cleaned. Also, an immigration officer fears deportation now that his Mexican birth certificate has been revealed. Lee sits down with Roslyn Fuller, a political scientist who recently published ‘In Defense Of Democracy.’ They discuss how the wealthy propagandize us to believe that we cannot trust the unwashed masses to take part in government. Fuller’s scholarship dissects these lies and shows us that we really can have faith in democracy.
Anders Lee finishes the show off with a report on the New York Police Department’s latest attempts to police the subway system. They’re spending a lot more money than they can save while making life harder for the poorest people living in NYC.
The indigenous president of Bolivia was forced to resign before the end of his term this week after a US-led coup succeeded. Lee briefly reviews the recent history of US-backed coups taking out left-wing political movements across Latin America. He recalls violent actions supported by the US in Honduras, Nicaragua and Venezuela. If given more time, this list of leftist governments taken out in the interests of US businessmen could extend right across Latin America. Lee covers Michael Bloomberg’s apparent presidential aspirations, the attempted arrest of the founder of Code Pink on the falsified charge of assaulting Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, and more poverty porn from your corporate media.
Natalie McGill sits down with Lee to look at a new case in which HUD is rolling back rules that protect people from discrimination in the housing market. Under these rule changes, banks and landlords would be able to avoid legal troubles for discriminating against people by blaming it on an algorithm. Anders Lee finishes off the show with a report on the recent election outcome in Seattle’s city council race. Jeff Bezos had put $1.5 million into the race to unseat Kshama Sawant. Sawant is a member of Socialist Alternative and, among many victories, she led the drive to increase Seattle’s minimum wage to $15. She also ended up winning the election, proving that grassroots campaigning can still compete with big money politics.
The New York Times is pushing 5G like nobody informed them about the potential health effects of unrolling a powerful network of radio waves right across the country. In headline after headline and ad after ad this week, they have been rolling the 5G train forward. Lee addresses their marketing on VIP today. Katie Halper is the host of the Katie Halper Show and the co-host of Useful Idiots with Matt Taibbi. Halper and Lee discuss the unfolding story in Bolivia, corporate media propaganda, competition within the news-comedy scene, and the Democratic primary that’s currently driving us all insane. Useful Idiots has interviewed both Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard.
In the second half of the show, Naomi Karavani takes a look at the evidence that American colleges have been purchasing the contact information of young people with low SAT scores. The institutions are using that information to encourage more students who they can turn down to apply for their schools. This pads their rejection statistics and makes them look more attractive to other applicants.
Whistleblowers are in the news again, as the US rests its impeachment hopes on a CIA agent in the White House. This anonymous leaker is being treated like a hero by the nation and the DNC establishment. The affair highlights the short memory of our society, as Lee reminds you this week of people who have been punished for revealing painful truths to the American public. His list includes Chelsea Manning, Julian Assange, John Kiriakou, Max Blumenthal, and a human rights lawyer receiving retribution from Chevron Oil Company for outing evidence about their hand in spilling oil in Ecuador. In other news, Lee reports on the California fires, where the rich are hiring private firefighters, on the release of 500 inmates in Oklahoma, on developments in the Epstein story, and on the OPCW hiding evidence in the Syria chemical weapons lie.
In the second half of the show, Anders Lee and Lee discuss how the website Deadspin lost its verve when it was acquired by private equity investors. The new owners tried to turn the popular culture and sports website into a sports website and lost most of their staff in the process. A misguided grab for profit took them down just like in the next story. Naomi Karavani covers how doctors are trying to upsell women in need of breast inspections with 3D mammograms that have no proven benefit. This is another move in a trend where US medical care manages to become worse and more expensive at the same time.
Lee tears apart several headlines from the Washington Post, on issues such as electoral victories for the DNC (the other corporate party) and alarms about climate change from a newspaper that’s in the hands of the fossil fuel industry. Natalie McGill reports on the recent revelation that the Children's Health Insurance Program, aka CHIP, is dropping coverage for children at every opportunity. Now more than a million children in the US aren’t covered by medicaid or CHIP. Nothing demonstrates a successful society like children without access to medical care.
In the second half of the show Lee interviews Trinity Tran, the co-founder of Public Bank LA. The civic organization recently got a statewide bill signed that allows Californian cities to create their own public banks. Public banking is a threat to one of the US’s largest industries, the big banks. Municipal banks threaten private banks because they directly compete with the for-profit institutions for personal banking and business loans. Tran and her colleagues used grassroots organizing to push a revolutionary policy and won a victory that terrifies the financial industry.
The FBI is notorious for acting like it’s interested in national security while actually just protecting the status quo from those who oppose it. This week’s show takes a look at the current targets of the FBI, including anti-war and anti-racism activists who they are spending tax dollars to frame and harass. The US is also focusing energy on securing oil fields in Syria while expressing false concern for the region, USAID is using its resources to propagandize citizens of the US into believing our regime change propaganda in Venezuela, and Max Blumenthal was arrested in a move that seems to intimidate journalists.
Naomi Karavani reports on the details surrounding the assassination of al-Baghdadi. The leader of ISIS was killed by US troops this week in a story that Trump thought was his moment. However, his historic unpopularity really took the glory out of his announcement. Natalie McGill finishes the show by reporting on a trend across the country in which landlords are pushing invasive technologies onto their renters that allow them to be tracked and recorded.
Lee shreds the headlines in the opening of the show with a look at a new war game intended to make people feel like they’re really in the chaos of war. These games are also the military’s main recruitment tool, so they clearly want the reality of war to look cool. Redacted Tonight correspondent Anders Lee explains what the media isn’t telling you about the massive protests in Chile.
In the second half, Lee interviews the founder and head of the record label Die Jim Crow, Fury Young. He’s making albums exclusively with people formerly and currently locked up in prison. Young was inspired by Michelle Alexander’s book, ‘The New Jim Crow,’ and it led him to this road for activism. It’s a road on which he helps to expose the voices of people who have been locked up.
What is really happening in Syria? Lee presents the US’ true purpose in the region and it isn’t altruistic. He also looks at several American protests not being given their due attention in the news, including strikes, disruptive fossil fuel protests, and actions against facial recognition technologies. Natalie McGill sits down with Lee to discuss a new trend in the opioid epidemic. Finally, Anders Lee reports on the Chicago public school teachers’ strikes.
This week’s show opens with a review of the spat between Hillary Clinton and Tulsi Gabbard. Clinton called Gabbard and Jill Stein Russian assets, and Gabbard hit back by bringing up Clinton’s war monger record. Naomi Karavani rips into the lies of the fossil fuel industry as climate change becomes more and more undeniable. Lee interviews journalist Don DeBar about US foreign policy and our subservient media. They discuss Trump’s belligerent moves and how they fit in with the US’ imperialist drive. This is currently playing out in Syria with the Kurdish people. They also discuss the failure of America’s left to oppose war.
The show this week opens with Lee reviewing a recent push in the media to classify the US as a rogue state that doesn't live up to its role as a leader on the world stage. As he notes, this argument completely ignores that the US has always used violence, intimidation, and deceit to achieve its own goals. This behavior is nothing new. In the second half of the show Anders Lee comes on dressed as the Monopoly man to report on how the 1917 Espionage Act has been used by both Obama and Trump to scare potential whistleblowers from revealing the US’ ‘rogue’ activities. Then Naomi Karavani caps the show off with a look at a recent case where a Californian energy utility shut off power to its clients to prevent forest fires. The company, PG&E, had decided to spend money they should've spent on updating their equipment on lobbyists and PR consultants.
VIP opens with Lee discussing some headlines from this week. He questions why Bolton is being lauded for his criticism of Rudy Giuliani despite also being a terrible person.
Also, Redacted Tonight correspondent Natalie McGill delves into why electric vehicle owners are subject to outrageous taxes and fees brought on by the powerful fossil fuel industries. Lee sits down with author and journalist Tim Shorrock to discuss potential peace with North Korea, and why South Korea plays an important part in the peace process.
This week, Lee shows you a successful example of deplatforming. A Trump official was expected to speak at Georgetown University. He’s part of the enforcement of the US’ border policy, a policy which includes the detention and abuse of asylum seekers. A group of protesters shut him down and he eventually left. Then, Lee looks deeper into a week of news including Ellen Degeneres’ friendship with the war criminal President George W. Bush.
Naomi Karavani sits down with Lee with a story about the new market of commercial killer drones. The armed drones will complement Jeff Bezos’ plans to have his packages delivered by their more peaceful kin. Natalie McGill finishes off the show by introducing you to the president’s new labor secretary, the son of late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Eugene Scalia, like his father before him, is no stranger to screwing over marginalized people given his history as a lawyer who has stood up for corporations that railed against workers’ rights.
VIP opens with Lee shredding some headlines from this week. The corporate media always reliably give him some great material to make fun of including lackluster coverage of a US puppet government in Ecuador being chased out of the capital by protesters. Also, Redacted Tonight’s new correspondent Anders Lee digs into the dark side of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as he runs for reelection. There’s more than just the blackface scandal.
In the second half of the show, Lee sits down with the editor-in-chief of Consortium News, Joe Lauria. They discuss the biggest aspects of the impeachment inquiry that the Democrats and Republicans don’t want to talk about. The Ukraine corruption story unveils more than just corruption from the US president. It might cause chaos across the political spectrum.
The show this week opens with a perspective on impeachment that's lacking in the mainstream media. Donald Trump proved that he was an impeachable president before he even won the presidency. He proved himself a deceitful businessman, a rapist, and a racist. He also clearly profited from the presidency. He governed in his first term as all of those things and now his impeachment is beginning for none of those things. In Taking The News From Behind, Lee digs into a strange connection between Twitter and an expert in psyops, the GM strikes, and the burgeoning revolt in Haiti.
In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill discusses a scam in the housing market referred to as ‘reverse mortgages.’ This deceptive practice is leaving older Americans homeless. And Anders Lee caps off the show by lambasting new theories in political science that are vaguely reminiscent of race science. Some ‘experts’ are arguing that your politics have a genetic component.
The show this week opens with Lee shredding an NPR headline where the foreign minister of Hungary declared that having Radio Free Europe, a part of the US’ propaganda network, in his country would be an insult. NPR chose to cover the story without truly dealing with why Hungarian officials might consider their presence an affront.Then Naomi Karavani makes her VIP debut in our new segment. She looks at a recent study which found healthcare costs in the US are so out of control that if those resources were redirected we could absolutely afford universal coverage.
In the second half of the show Lee speaks with Daniel Silver. He is the author of ‘Unravelling the Puzzle of the Los Angeles Times’. In the book Silver dissects several articles from this popular newspaper to explain how this type of propaganda is crafted. What is being said. What is being left out. How it’s being said. And how that’s used to influence what the reader thinks about the topic.
This week, Washington – the ‘belly of the beast’ – saw Shut Down DC protests blocking roads in a bid to stop business as usual. They did so to protest against accelerating climate change. Lee opens the show with a frank discussion on why we need radical strategies right now, as the threat of climate change continues to grow without any significant challenge from our governments, our industries, or our social institutions. Then Lee ‘Takes the News from Behind’ in an exciting week when Trump’s impeachment proceedings were announced and attention was brought to the corruption of Joe Biden and his son. There’s also good news about 3D printing, and word of genetically modified mosquitoes getting out of control.
In the second half of the show, we introduce new Redacted Tonight correspondent Anders Lee. In his first report on the show, Anders and Lee explore the world of the pro-gentrification YIMBY movement. And finally, Naomi Karavani caps off this week’s show with a look at an unlikely legal victory against the FBI. The website antiwar.com was being surveilled by the agency, because the FBI loves war. So they sued and won with the support of the ACLU. The court proceedings determined that the FBI slandered the website and forced the federal agency to destroy its records on the pro-peace journalists.
This week, Lee interviews the editor-in-chief of the Grayzone, Max Blumenthal. Blumenthal has made enemies of establishment media-types by questioning the official narratives thrown down by the intelligence community. One of its most recent fumbles was in Syria, where they had tried to take advantage of a civil war to topple Bashar Assad. Through his first-hand experiences and his expertise on American foreign policy, Blumenthal is able to vividly describe the complexity of the situation in Syria.
Lee opens the second half of the show by tearing apart one of the US’ most famous newspapers, the Wall Street Journal. Then, Natalie McGill finishes off the show with an update on the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan.
Japanese officials recently admitted that they were going to be forced to dump the irradiated water from Fukushima’s nuclear plants into the ocean. Despite their stupendous failures, the executives of the companies responsible were just found not guilty of professional negligence for injuries caused by the meltdowns.
The show opens this week by looking at the newest piece of war propaganda being spewed from the mouths of US militarists and their puppets in the media and Congress. A Saudi Arabian oil field was attacked this week and even though Houthi rebels from Yemen took credit for the attack, the US intelligence community wants to point the finger at Iran. They really want to make war happen with Tehran. When Lee ‘takes the news from behind’ this week, he reports on Jeff Bezos’ decision to strip healthcare coverage from part-time workers at Amazon and a climate denial operation that was recently uncovered in Britain.
In the second half of the show, Naomi Karavani sits down with Lee to discuss the EPA’s move to roll back clean water protections implemented under President Obama. The Obama administration expanded water protections to include more bodies of water than they had before, including streams. These protections get in the way of industries that benefit from being able to pollute local environments. Trump’s administration is rolling back these protections to accommodate corporate fears that human health is getting in the way of their profits. Natalie McGill caps off the show with a report on a Californian regulation targeting companies profiting from the gig economy. California lawmakers recently passed a bill to classify gig workers as actual employees who are entitled to benefits that they were cheated out of all along.
Lee sat down with RT correspondent Michele Greenstein, who just came back from covering the protests in Hong Kong. She tells Lee about the complex story on the ground. Many have legitimate grievances, but she also points out that the leaders among the protesters have connections to Washington.
Lee also spoke with Anne Peterman, the director of the Global Justice Ecology Project. Peterman is skeptical of the narrative that we can solve climate change by just planting billions of trees. She believes that we need to confront the fossil fuel industry and protect the ecosystems that we still have.
The show this week opens with Lee lambasting the deposition of a Sackler family patriarch. Richard Sackler spent hours in front of lawyers and a camera while seemingly forgetting everything about his professional life. This would be funny if he hadn’t profited from hundreds of thousands of deaths across the country over the last several decades. In “Taking the News From Behind,” Lee celebrates the firing of John Bolton and looks at the Pentagon’s intention to further censor our media.
In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill sits down with Lee to report on the trend of doctors’ offices using Groupon to sell their services. Then Naomi Karavani finishes the episode by covering some recent good news. A court found the notorious terrorism watchlist unconstitutional.
Lee interviews Zach Vorhies, a Google whistleblower, on VIP this week. Vorhies chose to become a whistleblower when he saw that Google had begun pushing their own corporatist worldview and suppressing dissenting voices after Trump came to power. They began to act as gatekeepers for what they considered to be authoritative news, but they were actually going after the right and left wing while boosting friendly voices. Before the interview, Lee responds to questions that viewers had about his segments on the democracy protests in Hong Kong and Universal Basic Income policies in last week’s show. There is nuance with both stories and the truth lies within that nuance.
Universal Basic Income has become a popular policy conversation over the last several years as inequality has continued to grow without any action being taken to stem it. Lee covers this policy suggestion to open this week’s show. In other news, we look at the man who was recently released from jail after 30 years for stealing $50, Chicago’s marijuana legalization will also see the criminal records of people arrested for possession of marijuana cleared, and a performance outside of Julian Assange’s jail from Pink Floyd guitarist Roger Waters. Naomi Karavani reports on Israel’s recent 48-hour bombing spree in Syria, Jordan, Palestine, and Iraq. And to finish the show Natalie McGill reports on the newest creepy action from Amazon.
To open the show this week, Lee goes deep on Hurricane Dorian and the president’s idea of nuking it. As experts pointed out, nuking Dorian would’ve just created a radioactive hurricane and given Hollywood more dumb ideas. He also takes a look at the protests in Hong Kong and their ties to the American regime-change NGO, the National Endowment for Democracy. The publication Popular Resistance covered those connections in a recent article that adds a level of intrigue to the story of Hong Kong’s nonviolent democracy protests.
In the second half of the show, Lee interviews Netfa Freeman of the Black Alliance for Peace. The Black Alliance for Peace have put together a list of demands for all of the candidates running for office. The list includes cutting the US military budget by 50 percent, opposing the militarization of the police, and closing military bases. Netfa believes that the US needs to start complying with the international standards of human rights.
On this week’s show, experts are seeing signs of recession as the economy struggles to keep growing and President Trump continues to undermine international confidence in the economic stability of the US. Lee Camp then memorializes the damning legacy of David Koch, covers the fires in the Amazon, and Johnson & Johnson’s relatively small fine for their part in creating the opioid epidemic. Natalie McGill reports on the future of local investigative reporting. Gannett, the largest newspaper publisher in the US, recently announced its merger with Gatehouse Media; the man who owns Gatehouse also owns an energy firm that invests in global natural gas production. Naomi Karavani returns with a story about the plastics industry, which continues to push the use of the petroleum product without any thought to making plastic packaging more environmentally sustainable.
This week Redacted VIP opens with an interview with Ronald Purser, the author of a book on the commodification of mindful living. Purser and Lee Camp go over the many ways that consumer culture and marketing have taken advantage of the trend toward mindfulness and similar practices.The practices people are using to escape the never ending stress under capitalism have been commercialized by capitalists. The marketers won't leave you alone for a second of your life, including when you're using yoga, meditation, or mindful walking to escape the everyday stresses of living under capitalism.
In the second half of the show Lee sits down with Jen Deerinwater. Deerinwater is a writer, and an activist for Native American issues and the rights of people living with disabilities. Lee and Deerinwater discuss her work with native communities and Elizabeth Warren's offensive history of using her claim to be a Native American to get ahead in her professional life.
This week’s episode features some of the best rants and stories from Lee Camp, Naomi Karavani, and Natalie McGill. Enjoy recaps from the Redacted team that cover systemic racism’s roots in everything from climate change to public school funding, as well as mainstream media ‘feel-good’ stories that reflect the failures of American society and Big Oil’s payout to newspapers for ads that mirror editorial content and greenwash the effects of climate change.
Natalie McGill hosts this week’s Redacted VIP, which kicks off with her interview with Joey Mogul, a human rights lawyer from Chicago who has represented men and women tortured by former Chicago police commander Jon Burge in the 1970s and 80s. In the second half, Lee Camp interviews peace activist and author Sander Hicks, who was recently warned by the FBI to avoid attending the New Horizon Conference, an annual meeting led by Iranian journalist Nader Talebzadeh.
Lee begins by taking a look at the democracy protests that you aren’t hearing about. The MSM has been focusing heavily on protests in Russia and Hong Kong – meanwhile, protests are raging in several countries that the US supports. Lee then covers a recent story of inhumanity from Boston PD, a lung cancer vaccine that was developed in Cuba and is unavailable in the US, and more. Natalie McGill reports on an investigation from the Guardian revealing that Monsanto collected intelligence on journalists, activists, and scientists who have criticized the company.
Lee reviews Max Blumenthal’s recent interview with Nicolas Maduro, the embattled president of Venezuela. Maduro and Blumenthal discuss the differences between how the international corporate media presents the crisis in Venezuela and the real situation on the ground. In the second half of the show, Lee sits down with peace activist Medea Benjamin of Code Pink to discuss the US’ support for Saudi Arabia’s war crimes in Yemen, the current move for war with Iran, and the US’ special relationship with Israel.
The show opens this week with a look back at stories that have made the move from fringe ideas that were mocked in the media to accepted truths in society. Lee and other independent journalists were raising the alarm about issues such as GMOs, Monsanto’s pesticides, climate change, and the insanely flawed American electoral system for years before they became widely derided. Even though society has come to accept that these issues deserve derision, it was the people exposing them who were made fun of before, and the people covering them up won’t receive any condemnation.
In the second half of the show, Lee reports on recent mass shootings, the FBI’s newest moves to criminalize conspiracy theories, and recent developments in mass surveillance in the US. The show ends with a special treat: the executive director of the Movement for a People’s Party, Nick Brana, joins Lee on the show to talk about third-party electoral politics and the failures of anyone trying to reform the DNC.
American foreign policy gets destroyed in the first half of VIP. Walter Smolarek from Sputnik sits down with Lee to talk about Trump’s recent moves with North Korea, as well as US foreign policy regarding Iran, Russia, China, and Venezuela. Smolarek highlights how dangerous the times we live in are, and how ridiculous the mainstream media’s coverage of these dangers is. Lee also talks to Kaela Bamberger of Extinction Rebellion DC. Her organization recently used their bodies and some glue to block members of Congress from getting to the Capitol building for a floor vote. They’re trying to get Congress to declare a climate emergency. She explains why disruptive, nonviolent civil disobedience is a necessary tool for any movement trying to save society from extinction.
The second debates for the DNC primary took place this week, and the supposed party of American democrats failed to seriously tackle issues such as climate change, America’s expansive war machine, and growing inequality. Lee opens this show by taking the DNC’s presidential wannabes to task over their weak stances. Then he reports on continuing safety issues with the Boeing 737, temperature high records across the planet, and the growth of violence in Africa as the US military expands its presence there.
In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill looks at the story of an Ohio utility company that bought out seats in their state’s legislature in order to win a $1.1 billion bailout of its failing nuclear power plants. The bailout bill also removed subsidies for renewable energy sources. And to finish the show, Naomi Karavani takes on a trend among some of the worst people in American politics, supporters of gerrymandering. In several states they are using prison populations to make their redistricting efforts seem more fair even though prisoners cannot vote in the majority of states.
To open the show this week, Lee revels in the death of the Russiagate conspiracy theory after years of concentrated propaganda from the corporate media. A former CNN correspondent, Krystal Ball, reported on the failures of the media to report critically on the story, while pundits like Lee, Aaron Mate, Glenn Greenwald and Max Blumenthal held a strong vanguard of critical reporting against the Trump-Russia collusion narrative. The whole time, they were attacked by the corporate media for their criticism and now the story is dead, you can bet they won’t receive an apology.
In the second half of the show, Lee sits down with Jesse Ventura to discuss what it’s like to be an anti-war voice in the US’ corporate media infrastructure. Ventura is currently an RT anchor but he was supposed to host a show on MSNBC during the early years of the Iraq war. He was barred from his MSNBC show for expressing anti-war views and his multimillion dollar contract stopped him from reporting for anyone else for three years. His humanitarian perspectives are also bolstered by his service as a naval seal and a term as the governor of Minnesota.
To open the show this week, Lee delves into the Mueller hearing. The House brought Robert Mueller downtown to discuss the Trump-Russia collusion investigation. He managed to say nothing during hours of testimony. It was really quite impressive. The highlights, surprisingly, came from Republicans poking holes in the narrative that the media spent the last three years trying to prove. In ‘Taking The News From Behind,’ you’ll hear about Britain’s newest conservative prime minister, a fun conspiracy theory from Kamala Harris about Colin Kaepernik and the Russkies, and more.
Natalie McGill opens the second half of the show with a report on how private equity firms are making a habit of buying struggling urban hospitals that cater for the poor and uninsured, only to bleed their assets and sell the property to developers. The only reason these hospitals are cash-strapped is because of a deeply flawed for-profit healthcare system. To end the show, Naomi Karavani looks into the media trend of taking stories that actually show the complete failure of American society to protect people living within it, and turning them into ‘feel-good’ tales of people overcoming diversity.
This week, Lee opens the show with commentary on a video of CNN’s Jim Acosta bumbling through a question that any journalist should be able to answer with ease: “Should Julian Assange be prosecuted for reporting on confidential information?” Acosta responds with a longwinded non-answer while he waits for his questioner to be removed from the room. The interaction accurately illustrates the relationship between corporate journalists and the powerful people they protect.
In the second half of the show, Lee sits down with Patrick Henningsen, the founder and editor of 21st Century Wire. Henningsen reported from Syria in 2017 and has based his journalistic career on questioning the narratives that are fed to the American people in order to strengthen narratives favored by the military industrial complex. They discuss the US’ growing economic wars, the war on WikiLeaks, and our military conflicts in Syria and Iraq.
The show opens this week with a look at recent activity from ICE. They have been pursuing a rapid agenda of deportation that’s seemingly attempting to rival the record of President Obama. Lee relays advice from the ACLU on what an undocumented immigrant should do if ICE shows up. In other news, he reports on the excesses of the CEO of Uber, spying from Google, and a messed up move from the charity store Goodwill.
Naomi Karavani brings you a story from the military industrial complex. The Pentagon, in an irregular move, is being told that they now have to justify any military base they build. And Natalie McGill finishes the episode off with a story of corruption from District Attorney offices across the country. Many of these offices are keeping money from accounts that are meant to help nonviolent offenders stay out of prison.
To kick off the show this week, Lee sat down with criminologist Alex Vitale, author of ‘The End Of Policing.’ In light of the news that the NYPD officer who killed Eric Garner will not face charges, people need to start questioning whether it’s fine that the police seem to be able to murder people without seeing repercussions. Alex Vitale has spent his career doing research into police brutality and has written about an interesting solution: community policing.
In the second half of the show, Lee talks to standup comedian Krish Mohan. Mohan is a political comedian, similar to Lee, and they both mine the dark depths of social dysfunction, bigotry, state violence, and censorship of their material. These topics evoke a variety of responses from their audiences during the discussion. Some people are happy to hear their realities reflected in comedy, and others are enraged to hear their worldviews questioned.
This week, Lee ponders why Jeffrey Epstein is going down now when his status as sex offender has been public knowledge for years. Lee also looks at the Iran nuclear deal and Europe’s efforts to circumvent the US’ aggressive attitude toward the Middle East powerhouse. Natalie McGill reports on the trend in the fast food industry toward selling meatless alternatives to the burgers they’re famous for. Arby’s has chosen a stranger route – meat shaped to look like vegetables. Naomi Karavani caps off the show with a report on vigilante activity at the border from armed militias.
Lee opens this episode of VIP with a bit of media criticism by taking a look at a typical day at the top of CNN’s news cycle. While the US is trying to add Iran to its stack of wars and prepare for a future ridden with environmental catastrophe, CNN focuses on sports, crime, and an election that’s more than a year away. He also shows a clip from an old interview with Bruce Dixon, a prolific activist and the co-founder of Black Agenda Report.
In the second half of the show, Lee interviews Daniel Haiphong, the author of ‘American Exceptionalism and Innocence.’ The ideas of American exceptionalism and meritocracy rely on rewriting US history to erase the humanity of the people who were indigenous to the land, slaves, the victims of US militarism abroad, as well as the American working poor. The belief in American exceptionalism unites the DNC and the GOP. Haiphong seeks to crack that narrative to paint an accurate picture of the US.
Lee opens the show this week by bringing your attention to a rash of extreme weather events hitting the globe. As the climate continues to change, we can expect to see more extreme versions of the extreme heat, extreme floods, and other extreme “natural” disasters. In the news, Lee covers Trump’s historic expedition to North Korea, a creepy new anti-war think tank created by George Soros and the Koch Brothers, a Supreme Court decision that backs up the wealthy by defending partisan gerrymandering, and much more. Naomi Karavani tells us about a new technology being developed that claims it can identify aggression and therefore stop crimes. Natalie McGill reports on how the nonprofit ‘Teach For America’ serves as a direct pipeline to the charter school movement that is siphoning off tax dollars to underfunded public schools.
We bring you two great guests this week. VIP starts with Professor Richard Wolff, who sat down with Lee to discuss the current state of the US economy. Investigative journalist Aaron Mate is the guest on the second half of the show. Mate has been one of the most prominent journalists debunking the Russiagate narrative.
Lee reviews an interview between Jake Tapper and VP Mike Pence, in which Tapper seemed more upset than Pence that Trump didn’t bomb Iran. Then, onto more news, including Facebook’s new cryptocurrency, the Pentagon’s contribution to climate change, and the recent revelation that the New York Times gets the approval of national security officials before publishing stories. Natalie McGill reports on how Republican lawmakers in 16 states have proposed over 100 bills that restrict the ways citizens can propose ballot initiatives. They did it in response to citizen-led ballot initiatives that legalized medical marijuana, raised the minimum wage, and more. Naomi Karavani tells us how 30 years of the TV show COPS has acted as a recruitment tool for the police and repeatedly violated the rights of people arrested on the show.
John Kiriakou is a whistleblower who went to jail for revealing the US’ torture program, and host of the news show Loud & Clear on Sputnik Radio. Lee sat down with him to discuss several current intelligence industry-related stories, including the revelation that the FBI never had a chance to see the DNC servers that were used to push the Russiagate narrative. Lee also spoke with photojournalist Michael Nigro, who has spent his career following protest movements and taking amazing footage of brave people engaged in direct action. He was arrested in New York last weekend filming protesters with the Extinction Rebellion movement.
The US used to be one of the most well-developed countries in the world, with world-renowned highways, community libraries, abundant public swimming pools and parks, and more. The government has let all of this fall into disrepair. Lee takes a look at this situation and its consequences, as well as the war propaganda directed at Iran, Pompeo’s announcement that the US might interfere in UK elections to undermine Corbyn, and more stories the corporate media aren’t telling you. Naomi Karavani sits down with Lee to report that the US has been kicking medical researchers from China out of the country and accusing them of being spies. Natalie McGill looks into a recent investigation that found nearly 400 current and retired police officers who are members of private Facebook groups that promote racism, Islamophobia and the formation of anti-government militias.
The first half of VIP this week is dedicated to a speech Bernie Sanders recently made in defense of returning the Democratic Party to the politics of FDR. His argument rests on the idea that the US political system should guarantee a slate of economic rights to every citizen. Lee sat down with ‘Move to Amend’ National Director Kaitlin Socio-Belknap to discuss the depth of America’s democracy deficit, how her organization plans on getting a constitutional amendment passed to fix it, and why this is the best route to fix the problem.
Lee opens this show with a look at the Western media’s fetish for anti-North Korea propaganda. News outlets have a tendency to report that Pyongyang has executed various officials in barbaric ways. They’ll say someone was eaten by dogs, shot with an anti-aircraft cannon, or worse. Then that person will show up on TV, unexecuted and alive. This demonization does nothing to make the world safer and more peaceful. From the news, Lee reports on sexual abuse in the Boy Scouts, an Ecuadorian tribe who defeated big oil in court, and UN officials say that Julian Assange’s treatment amounts to torture. In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill sits down with Lee to discuss how West Virginia is trying to disarm their teachers. They’ve criminalized teacher strikes. West Virginian educators went on strike last year and won a small pay rise, so no wonder they want to stop them from taking any impactful industrial action. Naomi Karavani finishes the show by reporting on the American Medical Association’s decision to oppose Medicare-for-all policies. Universal healthcare would take away income for many American medical professionals.
Lee Camp reviews a recent study showing that without drastic action on climate change, organized society could collapse by 2050. Lee also talks with comedians Ron Placone and Graham Elwood. All three occupy a space of comic punditry on the left where they have to fight against corporate power and Trumpism while remaining vigilant about corporate Democrats. This has landed them in the same boat with the battle for net neutrality, skepticism about Russiagate, supporting climate action, and opposing growing inequality. And the whole time they’ve had to protect their own platforms from YouTube suppression.
Natalie McGill interviews Marilynn Winn, executive director and co-founder of Women on the Rise, an Atlanta-based grassroots organization aimed at creating better lives for women who have been impacted by the criminal justice system. Naomi Karavani sits down with Jordan Chariton, the founder of the independent news group Status Coup. Chariton was one of the first and most prolific journalists reporting on the Flint Water Crisis.
On Redacted Tonight this week, Lee opens the show by taking a look at collaboration between Microsoft and the Pentagon to secure American elections. New viewers of Redacted might be surprised to learn that this scheme will actually undermine American election integrity more than it has already been undermined. Then, Lee dives into the news of the week, including an update on the prosecution of Julian Assange, a rash of 200 tornadoes that have hit the US recently, and electoral victories for the European Green Party.
In the second half of the show, Naomi Karavani and Lee discuss how President Trump is attempting to bypass Congress to sell weapons to Saudi Arabia. Congress has attempted to block support for the genocide in Yemen, but the Trump administration wants to get around those restrictions by declaring a state of emergency. Then, Natalie McGill finishes off the show with a report on how US law enforcement agencies are already using facial recognition software that’s proven to be biased. But grassroots activists and legislators in NYC and San Francisco are fighting back.
This week on Redacted Tonight, Lee sits down to interview three journalists from RT America. The show starts off with a conversation with news correspondent and documentarian Dan Cohen. Among many topics, Cohen and Lee discuss the recent report from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which found that chemical weapons attacks on Syrian civilians that were blamed on the Damascus government had been staged. The independent journalism community had long-suspected that this was the case, but the report provided solid evidence for their skepticism.
In the second half of the show, Lee talks with the hosts of ‘Watching the Hawks,’ Tyrel Ventura and Tabetha Wallace. They cover the push for war with Iran, an effort to clean the ocean, and the threat to journalism posed by the persecution of Julian Assange. WikiLeaks published the embarrassing secrets of a war machine that was given boundless power to act how it wanted. Assange showed us the crimes of the global elite, and now he’s being threatened with 200 years in jail for his work.
Lee opens the show this week by exposing the world of astroturf community organizing. This is where wealthy interests pay organizers to make fake grassroots campaigns against progressive issues. Astroturf campaigns have targeted people fighting against fossil fuel infrastructure projects, war, and the health insurance industry. Recent reporting uncovered institutional backing for the violent counter-protesters in the showdown at the Venezuelan Embassy in DC last month. Then Lee brings attention to the many people who engaged in direct action protests over the last week including the 80 disability rights activists who were arrested in Washington DC and the Italian dock workers who refused to load a ship with weapons headed to the genocide in Yemen.
In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill reports on how five states are suing the Trump administration over a new Centers for Medicare & Medicaid rule that won’t allow home healthcare workers to deduct union fees from their Medicaid-funded paychecks. This is yet another attack on worker protections that will disproportionately affect women — especially minority and immigrant women. Then Naomi Karavani finishes off the show by uncovering a corporate connection with the newest attack on abortion rights in several right wing states.
This week on Redacted Tonight VIP, Lee sits down with Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese. They are the co-founders of the radical political blog Popular Resistance! They are also two of the creators of the Embassy Protection Collective which spent the last month holding the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington D.C. for the government of Nicolas Maduro while the US was supporting a coup from Venezuela’s right wing.
They were invited into the embassy and given keys before the US sent the legitimate ambassador home in order to replace him with an ambassador representing the coup backers. The intention was that the Embassy Protectors would hold the diplomatic building until Venezuela signed an agreement with another nation to watch the building, this is called a Protective Powers Agreement. However, before that could be done Zeese and Flowers found themselves besieged by an aggressive and highly-coordinated group of counter-protesters 24/7. The group blocked food from being delivered, had the building’s electricity and water turned off, threatened and assaulted the peace activists, broke into the building, and vandalized the property without any interference from the police. The police did however target the peace activists. Lee sat down with Zeese and Flowers to discuss their adventure and their reasons for fighting against US intervention in Venezuela.
Lee takes you through the controversial history of one of the most hip media empires out there – VICE. Also, a stunning revelation about your sunscreen, a look at the multi-trillion-dollar subsidies received by the fossil fuel industry, and the Trump administration’s idea to make itself look better by changing the definition of poverty. Naomi Karavani brings you a story from the southern border where regular Border Patrol agents have taken over the role of determining which immigrants have a credible argument for asylum. Natalie McGill reveals how, despite vowing to do so last year, the White House has done nothing to lower prescription drug prices. This has prompted some states to propose their own legislation.
To open this episode, Lee reports on the bipartisan consensus for America’s military adventures. Democrats and Republicans are practically unanimous in supporting the US’ regime change operation in Venezuela, and now that seems like it has failed, they’ve moved on to pushing for war with Iran. Supporters of peace, on the other hand, have been marginalized and ignored in the political debate.
In the second half of the show, Lee interviews investigative journalist Dave Lindorff. Lindorff covered the Pentagon’s accounting fraud in an article for the Nation. The $21 trillion in unaccounted adjustments in the Pentagon’s budget over the last two decades is a scandal that has received shamefully little coverage in the news. Lindorff is one of a few journalists who have actually worked on the story. In the interview, they talk about the Pentagon’s failed audit, the nuance of unaccounted adjustments to the budget not being the same as money that was spent, and how Alexandria Ocasio Cortez got that wrong while still bringing major attention to an important story.
Lee opens the show by tearing apart the political record of Joe Biden. The Democratic mainstream is pushing Biden onto the voting public despite his rocky history filled with significant examples of racism, misogyny, and the shaming of people living in poverty. Lee reports on Israel’s latest human rights violations in Gaza, the world’s largest open-air prison. He also looks at the contradiction between a strong stock market and the insane poverty being experienced by the majority of Americans. Natalie McGill brings you a story from the FDA, which is ending a decades-long program that allowed medical device manufacturers to use a private internal database to hide reports about injuries their devices caused. Naomi Karavani looks at one state that’s suing ICE to stop them from arresting immigrants in their court houses.
Ariel Gold of Code Pink is the guest on VIP this week. Activists with Code Pink, Popular Resistance, and ANSWER Coalition were given the keys to the Venezuelan Embassy as US-Venezuela relations deteriorated in the last month. They took the name 'The Embassy Protection Collective'. For two weeks they held the building for the legitimate Venezuelan government without much opposition, but then a horde of pro-coup Guaido supporters started to harass them night and day with the support of the Secret Service and the DC Metro Police. Gold has been assaulted physically and sexually by the violent counter-protesters. Lee and Gold discuss the situation in Venezuela, what's happening at the Venezuelan Embassy in DC, and how law enforcement agents have taken the side of the counter-protesters.
In the second half of VIP, Lee reports on the most anti-war candidate running for the DNC's presidential nomination. Tulsi Gabbard recently tweeted about the senseless death and violence that the US is causing in Afghanistan. In the tweet, she calls for US troops to come home. Gabbard has been courageous in her opposition to militarism. Lee also covers the story of two Reuters reporters who were jailed in Burma for exposing state corruption. The journalists were recently released, unlike another high-profile journalist who's currently being persecuted for revealing state corruption, Julian Assange.
Lee opens the show by tearing apart an interview with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who admitted that when he was in the CIA, they lied, cheated, and stole to get what they wanted. Lee then reports on the situation at the Venezuelan Embassy in DC, the removal and censoring of alternative media voices from social media, and the sentencing of Assange in the UK. Naomi Karavani dives into a story wherein the NYPD attempted to crack down on gangs and ended up arresting a bunch of young black kids who weren’t affiliated with gangs. In true form, they still charged them as gang members. Natalie McGill reveals that big oil is paying major papers like the Washington Post and New York Times to place ads in their publications which mirror editorial content. These ads are meant to greenwash the effects of climate change that were caused by the corporations.
This week, Lee brings you a special extended interview with the author of a new book that delves into the modern history of US imperialism surrounding the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Max Blumenthal just published ‘The Management of Savagery: How America’s National Security State Fueled the Rise of Al Qaeda, ISIS, and Donald Trump’.
Lee peruses responses to the release of the Mueller Report from the corporate media. Lee reports on the global explosion of actions connected to Extinction Rebellion and the arrest of two executives from the pharmaceutical industry. Natalie McGill reveals attacks from Silicon Valley on your private information. And Naomi Karavani closes the show with a story about the war between progressive Democrats and the liberal think tank Center for American Progress.
Joe Lauria is the editor-in-chief of world-renowned independent news publisher Consortium News. He is also a coordinator of the Unity4J Vigil series that has been put on over the last half year to support Julian Assange. Lee spoke to Lauria about the persecution faced by Assange. Lee also interviews Rabbi Michael Pollack, the co-founder and executive director of March On Harrisburg (MOH), which uses direct action, community organizing, and lobbying to push democracy reform.
Lee opens the show this week with a deep dive into the crimes, espionage and intrigue revealed by WikiLeaks over the last decade. Chelsea Manning and other anonymous whistleblowers made these revelations possible, yet the people whose crimes were revealed aren’t facing punishment while Manning and Julian Assange are. Using these leaks, WikiLeaks has been able to show Americans the crimes that are being committed in their names around the world. They also inspired several protest movements, including Occupy.
In the second half of the show, Naomi Karavani reports on the tax-cut bill that Trump wanted to call the ‘Cut Cut Cut Act.’ The bill has resulted in a massive financial windfall for the ruling class and reduced tax returns for the rest of us. To finish the show, Natalie McGill tells us how the USDA is ready to finalize new rules that would replace federal inspectors at pig slaughterhouses with plant workers. This continues a trend of deregulation that tasks corporations with policing themselves while they endanger our planet’s future in order to make a profit.
Former MP George Galloway and Lee discuss Julian Assange. Galloway is a personal friend of Assange who used to visit him in the Ecuadorian Embassy. He believes Assange is being persecuted for embarrassing the global elite and that the British people might be able to stop his extradition to the US by applying public pressure. A recent report found that every extremist mass-murder event that happened in the US in 2018 was connected to right-wing extremism. There are also recent revelations that white supremacists are signing up for the military and police. These worrying reports are supported by the racist rhetoric used by President Trump and his supporters.
Lee starts off with the media’s response to the launch of the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders. We look at the recently unveiled story that the US has been waging a secret war on Somalia. Lee also covers the scandal that Canadian PM Justin Trudeau has put himself in. Then he draws positive attention to Patricia Okoumu – the climbing protester who has put her body on the line multiple times to protest the US’ trigger-happy stance on immigrant deportation. Natalie McGill brings Google and other big tech companies into the spotlight. Finally, Naomi Karavani brings you the scene at this year’s CPAC.
This week on VIP, Lee reveals more flaws in the story that Russian hackers handed Trump the 2016 presidential election when he reports on a conversation between three well-respected voices in media and scholarship. On the podcast Scheer Intelligence, legendary investigative reporter Robert Scheer interviewed Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor and part-owner of The Nation, and Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies at Princeton. They dissect all of the fantasy and farce involved in the Russiagate narrative, and Lee displays their conclusions along with his personal brand of rage-comedy. Lee then interviews John Leary, the executive director of Trees For The Future and author of ‘One Shot: Trees As Our Last Chance For Survival’.
Lee opens the show this week with an overview of systemic racism in the US today. Public school funding, climate change, the wealth gap, and exposure to pollution are all issues that disproportionately harm communities of color. Lee gives you the details. From the news, Lee reports on climate change and its impacts, leaked audio of Tucker Carlson showing his bigotry, the EU’s attempt to negotiate a peaceful end to the US’ failed regime-change operation in Venezuela, and he goes after Wal-Mart’s plan to get rid of its greeters. In the second half of the show, Naomi Karavani takes over the desk to tell you how several states are preparing laws that would make it significantly more expensive for protesters to block the construction of fossil fuel infrastructure projects such as pipelines. Natalie McGill caps the show off with a rare dose of good news from the Prison-Industrial Complex.
This week on VIP, Lee looks at the president’s move to dismantle the Iran nuclear deal in his interview with former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter. Ritter recently released the book, ‘Dealbreaker: Donald Trump and the Unmaking of the Iran Nuclear Deal.’ He is also a member of the whistleblower group Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. He believes that people will support peace when they know the truth, so he built a career undermining the lies that are spread to send us to war. Before the US invaded Iraq, Ritter was warning people that our government was lying when it claimed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Lee credits him as one of the people whose work woke him up to government corruption. In the interview, they discuss how understanding the WMD lie can help people understand other more recent efforts the US government has taken to use false information to justify war. Ritter also talks about what needs to happen to get the Iran nuclear negotiations back on track.
Lee discusses the blackouts in Venezuela and the evidence that the US considered sabotaging Venezuela’s electricity grid in order to destabilize the government before it happened. Lee also discusses the congressional war powers resolution to end support for Saudi Arabia’s genocide in Yemen, the bleak developments in Brexit, a controversy involving investigators at the International Criminal Court, the school strike for climate, and more news from the notorious pharmaceutical industry profiteers. Natalie McGill brings you a new report from Demand Justice which finds that a majority of Senate Democrats have been voting in favor of Trump’s picks for federal courts since 2017. Naomi Karavani looks into the “other” college scandal receiving less attention in mainstream media right now.
This week, Lee brings you another double-interview special with the renowned journalist and author Matt Taibbi, and the climate change activist and author Ed Fallon. Taibbi recently wrote an article for Rolling Stone about the $21 trillion in unaccounted spending at the Pentagon. Lee and Taibbi were part of a small cadre of journalists who reported on this story. Similarly, Taibbi and Lee both publicly remained skeptical of the Russiagate story over the last two years. In the interview, they also talk about the illegitimacy of the media, Trump’s “insane clown presidency,” campaign finance reform, and Taibbi's upcoming book ‘Hate, Inc.’ In the second half of the show, Lee talks to Ed Fallon. He is an activist, a former Iowa State legislator, and the author of ‘Marcher, Walker, Pilgrim.’ They talk about the state of climate change, ideas to overcome it, and the cross-country march that Fallon undertook several years ago to bring attention to environmental issues. Fallon tells us how to influence politicians with grassroots strategies such as bird-dogging, where people surprise politicians with important questions while on camera.
To kick off the show, Lee brings us back to fraud in the military industrial complex. It has recently been revealed that astronomical numbers of people have tried to blow the whistle on waste, fraud and corruption in the weapons industry. Their complaints, as Lee has reported before, were ignored on a massive scale. The Pentagon’s inaction on waste and fraud helps us to understand how its budget included $21 trillion in unaccounted spending over the last two decades. Further into the news, Lee looks at the Intercept’s decision to close the Snowden files, a massive fine handed out to Israeli banks for tax evasion, the fight between renewable energy and the fossil fuel industry, and more.
In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill sits down with Lee to talk about how the National Christian Foundation, which is the nation’s eighth-largest public charity, has donated $56.1 million dollars in the last three years to dozens of anti-LGBT and anti-Muslim hate groups. And to finish the show, Naomi Karavani reports on a class-action lawsuit against Nestle. It turns out that the multinational corporation’s Poland Spring brand isn’t spring water and it definitely doesn’t come from the Poland Spring that it’s named after.
This week, to start the show we take a look at a special type of story the media loves to cover – poverty porn. Stories that praise people who live in poverty for surviving all of the terrible conditions that poor people are forced to live with. Then, Lee brings you some news that is actually positive. In the VIP interview, Lee sits down with Ajamu Baraka, the former vice presidential candidate for the Green Party and an organizer and spokesperson for the Black Alliance for Peace. They talk about Baraka’s recent trip to Venezuela, whether third parties matter, why NATO is so dangerous, and the persecution of Chelsea Manning.
At the top of the show this week, Lee responds to the anti-climactic delivery of the Mueller Report. While mainstream journalists spent the last two years talking about Trump-Russia collusion in the 2016 election as a fact, Lee and a few other independent voices maintained their journalistic integrity and refused to jump to conclusions based on the word of the intelligence community. Now that the report has been delivered without charging a single person in the Trump campaign with colluding with Putin, one would think that this story could be put to bed. But as Lee demonstrates, the big voices in US journalism still haven’t apologized or let go of the narrative.
In the second half of the show, Natalie McGill takes us to Florida. Months after a majority of Floridian voters restored voting rights to 1.4 million ex-felons, the Florida House of Representatives baked a modern day “poll tax” into a bill they passed, which says those same ex-felons must pay all court fines and fees before getting that right back. To finish off the show, Naomi Karavani covers a movement of pro-second amendment cities that are copying Sanctuary Cities to protect the rights of their citizens to “bear arms.” The original Sanctuary Cities movement was intended to protect undocumented immigrants from ICE.
This week, Lee brings you a double-interview VIP special. To open the show, Lee talks to the internationally renowned investigative reporter and friend of the show Greg Palast. They discuss several topics including the disintegration of the Russiagate narrative, Palast’s continued coverage of a voter disenfranchisement program named Interstate Crosscheck, the lack of a good deal on Brexit, and Palast’s work uncovering the racist ideas driving the rebels in Venezuela.
In the second half of the show, Lee talks with Ford Fischer, the founder of a news startup called News2Share. Fischer is an independent journalist and entrepreneur who decided to start a media company that puts video cameras on the ground at protests of all kinds. Earlier this year, he spent a month in Paris to cover the Yellow Vest protests. He was also at Charlottesville when Heather Heyer was murdered last year, and he seems to be at new protests across the US every week.