The Defense Department wasn't Woke, It was an Agent for Empire and Repression (G&R 418)

This week, Israel bombed Hamas leadership in Qatar in a brazen attack within the Arab state. This is a two year genocide in Gaza, moves to annex the West Bank, a 12 day war with Iran, a two month war in Lebanon, and attacks on Tunis, Yemen and Syria. In this encore episode from 2020, we offered personal recollections, talked about the larger historical context in which it occurred, considered the consequences of the attacks–prolonged Mid-East wars and heightened repression at home, discussed the way the attacks and wars were manipulated for “patriotic” reasons, and talked about how it effects the U.S., in the era of (2020) Trump.-------------------------------------------------------------------Outro- "Green and Red Blues" by Moody🔗 Links🎧 G&R: Remembering September 11th (https://bit.ly/3IdYqK5)🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

Donald Trump recently reverted the name of the Dept. of Defense to Dept. of War. He, and his cronies, claim that the Dept of Defense is too woke and needs to return to a "warrior culture." Never one to be confused with a genius, Trump misses the history of why the Department of Defense came into being in 1947 and how it was a blueprint for America being a military, economic and political super power, , i.e. an "American Empire." In our latest, we talk about the history of the National Security State, recent adventures in the waters off of Venezuela, domestic military operations in Chicago, and the White House meme-ifying Trump as Lt. Col. Bill Kilgore (played by Robert Duvall) in Apocalypse Now as he saber rattles a federal invasion in Chicago. -------------------------------------------Music- "G&R Blues" by Moody🔗 Links🔗 G&R:America’s Disorder: The Frontier, Violence, Cowboys, and Trump, w/ Richard Slotkin (https://bit.ly/3MR11sf)🔗G&R: The Democrats are a Party of War! Liberals and the Military-Industrial Complex (https://bit.ly/3D8LXEC)🔗 G&R: Worse than McCarthyism? Prof. Ellen Schrecker on Trump’s Repression (https://bit.ly/4mTD0S1)🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

In 1989, and again 1990, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled flag burning a First Amendment protected action. In 2025, Trump has issued an executive order banning flag burning. Trump's executive order mean absolutely nothing. But, it is part of his administration's greater plan to roll back civil liberties in the U.S. In our latest, we talk with legendary civil rights attorney Ron Kuby, who advocated for the flag burners in 1989, about flag burning, McCarthyist strategies by the administration today, anti-semitism, New York mayoral politics and more.Bio//Ron Kuby-criminal defense and civil rights lawyer based in New York. He was a partner to the late and great William Kunsler. He's also a widely respected legal commentator. ---------------------------Outro- "Green and Red Blues" by Moody🔗 Links🔗 Ron's website:https://www.kubylaw.com/🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

Encore of our 2023 Labor Day episode.Green & Red celebrates (American) Labor Day . . . we talk a little about the history of the day, the co-optation strategy behind it, and current conditions for labor and unions in the U.S. Labor in the U.S. has momentum, and the organizing efforts and strikes are ramping up. ------------------------------------------------------Outro- "The Preacher and the Slave" by Utah Phillips🔗 Links+G&R: May Day vs Labor Day. How the ruling class stops radical organizing. (https://bit.ly/3KOdx9W)+ G&R: The New McCarthyism, w/ Jodie Evans of Code Pink talking about New York Times smear campaign (https://bit.ly/47XoBwA)🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

20 years ago this week Hurricane Katrina made landfall on the Gulf Coast. On August 29th, the levees broke and created a humanitarian crisis rarely seen before, seen too often now. Over 1800 people died and over a million evacuated with hundreds of thousands being permanently displaced in the aftermath. In the neighborhood of Algiers, a group of anarchists and radicals started the Common Ground Relief to provide mutual aid to the communities impacted by the hurricane, but also by their places in the margins of New Orleans. Over 100,000 volunteers passed through New Orleans over a three year period and it became to largest anarchist inspired organization in modern U.S. history. In our latest, we talk with one of the co-founders of Common Ground, and one of our long time homies, scott crow about Hurricane Katrina, Common Ground and the "long slow history of disaster." We discuss the themes of collective liberation, mutual aid and direct action and how they fit into that history. Bio//scott crow is an international speaker, author and story teller who is proudly from a working class background. Producer- emergency hearts. He is co-founder of Common Ground Hurricane Relief.-------------------------------------outro- "Green and Red Blues" by Moody🔗 Links🔗 scott's website: https://www.scottcrow.org/📰 scott crow: "Insurrectionary Utopias Part 1: Ideas Towards a Liberatory Mutual Aid" (https://bit.ly/483NoS6)🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

Contrary to what happens in many other parts of the world and within Trump’s GOP, the Democratic Party leadership shuns street protests. In fact, discouraging street politics is part of the it’s strategy of punching left. In the latest G&R, we talk about street protests, the corporate Democrats and how political parties and figures have used protest to their advantage in other parts of the world. -----------------------------Outro- "Street Fighting Man" by Carla Olson🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

Since 2008, and even more since 2018 and 2023, private equity firms have been buying up real estate and rental properties across the U.S. No firm has preyed up on peoples' precarity more than private equity firm Blackstone. The fimr is the largest landlord in the United States by... a LOT. It owns 100,00 more rental units than its next closest competitor. In our latest, Scott talks with Jordan Ash, the housing director at the Private Equity Stakeholder Project (PESP) about private equity, Blackstone and the housing crisis. Bio//Jordan Ash lives in Minnesota and has worked for over twenty-five years doing community and labor organizing. He currently leads the housing work for the Private Equity Stakeholder Project , a nonprofit watchdog organization focused on the impacts of private equity firms, hedge funds, and similar Wall Street firms on workers and communities. Prior to this, he spent more than a decade doing research and strategic campaigning for labor unions, and over a dozen years working for the community organization ACORN, where he played a leading role in the group’s campaign against predatory mortgage lending.------------------------------------------🎶 Outro- "Green and Red Blues" by Moody🔗 Links//💰 Private Equity Stakeholder Project: https://pestakeholder.org/😲 Schumer’s son-in-law works at Blackstone (https://bit.ly/4lArRDJ)🏘️ Private Equity Stakeholder Project report on private equity and housing (https://bit.ly/4oJu7LH)🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

We’re living in challenging times with an escalating climate disaster devastating communities from Texas and Louisiana to Richmond, CA. Few institutions are as responsible for these crisis as Wall Street and Big Insurance companies. We’re also living in a time where large numbers of people have taken to the streets to confront those responsible for these crises. Moderated by Green and Red co-host, and long time climate finance campaigner, Scott Parkin, this panel discussed the role of major financial institutions in providing loans,investments and insurance to fossil fuel companies destroying communities from the Gulf South to Richmond, CA, and about the resistance to these companies. Panelist Bios//* Christa Mancias is the Executive Director for The Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe of Texas. She has spent many years in the movement along with her family and relatives fighting for Native Indigenous rights and Environmental justice. She continues to help with the Frontline Fights against Border Wall issues, LNG Terminals, Pipelines, Fracking, SpaceX and the continuous destruction and erasure of the Carrizo Comecurdo’s Sacred Sites throughout Texas. *James Hiatt has more than a decade of firsthand experience in the petrochemical industry, he understands the tough choices many workers face—trying to make a living while dealing with the impacts these industries have on health and the environment. Born and raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana, his deep connection to the community inspired him to seek a better way forward. In 2023, he founded For a Better Bayou, a nonprofit focused on helping Southwest Louisiana shift away from extraction-based industries toward a more sustainable, community-focused economy.* Mary Mijares is a first-generation immigrant born in the Philippinesand raised in Richmond, CA. As a campaigner for Amazon Watch, Mary seeks to uplift the demands and support the resistance of Indigenous organizations across the Amazon basin in international campaigns that challenge the fossil fuel industry and its financiers.*Connie Lu began her organizing journey as a student at Dartmouth College, where she was part of the successful campaign to divest the endowment from fossil fuels. Through a fellowship with the unfortunately now-defunct Divest Ed, she learned about climate finance as a crucial strategic piece of climate justice movements, and why we build people power instead of appealing to elites. Event co-hosted by Stop Billionaire Summer, the Green and Red Podcast and Gulf South Fossil Finance Hub.--------------------🎶 Outro- "Green and Red Blues" by Moody.🔗 Links//Stop Billionaire Summer: https://www.stopbillionaires.org/🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

This week as the negotiations for a Global Plastic Treaty fail in Geneva, Switzerland over a cap on plastic production, we look at the undue influence of the fossil fuel and plastic industries. False solutions to the climate crisis, and now the plastic pollution crisis, are part of an industry playbook to misinform the public and deflect from actual solutions. In the case of plastics, it's promoting plastic recycling that doesn't actually work. In our latest, we talk with researchers Davis Allen and Rebecca John to discuss industry strategies to undermine any progress on curbing plastic pollution. Bios//Rebecca John is a Research Fellow at the Climate Investigations Center. She is also a freelance journalist and award-winning documentary film maker. As a Producer and Director of the acclaimed “Extreme Oil” / “Curse of Oil” series for PBS /BBC her work was awarded a Cine Golden Eagle for News Analysis. Other award-winning and nominated series and films include “Churchill” for PBS & ITV, “The Secret World of Richard Nixon” for The History Channel/BBC and “Ambush In Mogadishu” for PBS Frontline/ BBC (winner of the Edward R. Murrow Overseas Press Club of America ‘Best Documentary on Foreign Affairs Award’). Davis Allen is a Senior Investigative Researcher at the Center for Climate Integrity, where he identifies and compiles evidence of the fossil fuel industry’s historical — and ongoing — deception. Prior to joining CCI, Davis completed a PhD in History at Case Western Reserve University.-----------------------------------------------------------Outro- "Green and Red Blues" by MoodyLinks//+ "‘Maddening’ Proof Plastics Industry Knew Recycling Was False Solution in 1974, New Document Shows" (https://bit.ly/45QWEHE)+ "The Fraud of Plastic" (https://bit.ly/4lt3Xd6)+ Plastic pollution talks fail as negotiators in Geneva reject draft treaties (https://bit.ly/45xljzF)🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.

Scott talks with organizer and comrade Patrick Young (@patrickjyoung.bsky.social) about the state of resistance eight months into the Trump Administration. They get into the act of disobedience that the Texas Democrats take to avoid federal redistricting. They also talk about the mass non-compliance trainings happening, how DC is preparing for a possible Trump takeover and the latest Gaza actions. Bio//Patrick Young: labor organizer, climate organizer. Worked with a number of labor unions. Rising Tide North America, Shutdown DC and more recently the Movement Infrastructure Project. ------------------------------------------------------------Outro- "Green and Red Blues" by Moody🎙️ Follow Green and Red🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/greenandredpodcast🌐 Website: https://greenandredpodcast.org💬 Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/M24GyqrS📰 Follow us on Substack: https://greenandredpodcast.substack.com🌌 Follow us on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/podcastgreenred.bsky.social💚 Support the Green and Red Podcast🎉 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/greenredpodcast☕ One-time donation: https://bit.ly/DonateGandR🌍 Our Networks🎧 Labor Podcast Network: https://www.laborradionetwork.org📢 Anti-Capitalist Podcast Network: https://linktr.ee/anticapitalistpodcastnetwork📻 Listen on WAMF (90.3 FM) New Orleans: https://wamf.org✊ Unions Power America Sweepstakes: unionpowerusa.com🎬 A Green and Red Podcast production👨‍🏫 Produced by Bob (@bobbuzzanco) and Scott (@sparki1969)✂️ Edited by Scott🔔 Subscribe for more analysis on U.S. politics, leftist strategy, and anti-establishment resistance.