commission

Seth Wessler joins us, along with Irasema Garza, president of Legal Momentum, Wanda Fossett with Community Voices Heard, and Carmen Cordero, welfare rights activist with the Hartford-based group Vecinos Unidos. They discuss food stamps, poverty, and why this might be the best opportunity we have to rebuild the social safety net. Dean Baker of the Center for Economic And Policy Research, Beat the Press, and author of a new book, False Profits: Recovering from the Bubble Economy, has some words for Democrats and Republicans alike who want to focus on "fiscal responsibility" while millions of Americans still struggle for jobs: they're heading "180 degrees the wrong way." From our friends at Tactical Technology Collective, this second video in the series shows how ordinary citizens from around the world used basic video technology to record events and corrupt actions and effect change. Imran Malik has just returned from a trip to Haiti providing medical aid--he went to medical school in Pakistan and got his first experience with emergency relief during the earthquake there in 2005. He also plays drums in Pakistani-American punk band The Kominas, who were featured in Taqwacore, a documentary on Muslim punk bands. He joins Laura in studio to talk about punk rock, Haiti, Muslim identity, and the problems with the U.S. health care system.