earthquake

"Even knowing what's happening in Japan, we have Republicans saying we have to cut regulatory spending on places like nuclear energy," says Mike Papantonio, who notes the similarities between the refusal to learn from BP and the refusal to learn, now, from a deepening disaster in Japan. From the shift of the risk of dangerous fuels onto the taxpayers to the glib "every energy type has its dangers" dismissals, Mike breaks down the problems with the ways we talk about disasters, energy policy, and why we don't seem to want to invest in clean, safe fuels like solar and wind. "There's going to have to be a new kind of union movement. It's got to be one that is much more rank and file, much more bottom up, the organization has to be in the workplace, and in order to go beyond legalistically bargaining wages, people have to take action in the place that they work," says David Newby of the AFL-CIO. Laura caught up with David this past weekend in Madison at the largest protests yet, afte Scott Walker forced through the bill to bust public employee unions. He talks about the prospects for a new kind of union movement, different from the one of the past 40 or 50 years. Communities of color, Monica Adams notes, "were already organizing, we already knew about the wrath of Walker, we knew how he was over Milwaukee, we knew that he'd have targeted attacks." It was only natural, then, for Monica and her colleague at Freedom Inc., Kabzuag Vaj, to be at the center of the organizing against Scott Walker's cuts. Monica and Kabzuag discuss the issues beyond just attacks on unions, Walker's SB 1070 clone bill that attacks immigrants, and much more. "We have to be thinking about the people who don't get mentioned by name, because those are going to be the ones who get impacted the most," Monica notes. Distributed by Tubemogul.

"Writing is nothing like dying in, for, and possibly with, your country," writes novelist and essayist Edwidge Danticat in her book Create Dangerously: The Immigrant Artist at Work. But writing and creating can inspire action, whether it's revolution in the streets or simply managing to survive under seemingly hopeless circumstances.Edwidge was born in Haiti but moved to the US when she was twelve, and her writing focuses on both sides of the immigrant experience. She is also the editor of Haiti Noir, part of a crime noir series which ; looks at Haiti's dark side, and she joins Laura in studio to discuss the books, the ongoing state of Haiti, and the role of the immigrant and particularly the Haitian-American artist in the world.

"They are goading people into feeling like their country has been stolen from them," says FAIR's Peter Hart of Glenn Beck and other right-wing media personalities with what he terms a "conspiratorial worldview." It's not just using violent metaphors, in other words, it's creating a paranoid mindset that something dangerous is happening to the U.S. that can appeal to those already inclined toward paranoid thinking, like Jared Loughner. Peter joins us in studio to discuss the media narratives of the last few days following the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords and others in Tuscon this week, from the fantasies of Glenn Beck to the mainstream idea that the left somehow has an equivalent to Beck and Limbaugh. The term "McCarthyism" has been tossed around a lot lately, with the Right's refrain of "socialism!" and "Marxism!" at every move Obama makes. But McCarthyism had very real victims back in the 1950s, and Miriam Moskowitz was one of those victims. She served two years in federal prison for Conspiracy to Obstruct Justice after being investigated along with Harry Gold, whose testimony was later used to convict Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. GRITtv's Danya Abt and cinematographer Zac Halberd visited Moskowitz, now in her 90s, and discussed her story and her new book, Phantom Spies, Phantom Justice - Or How I Survived McCarthyism. We've reported this week on how little has changed since the Haiti earthquake one year ago today. The cholera epidemic is on the rise, a million people are living in tent cities and the Haitian government is in complete paralysis. We continue to follow the situation in Haiti, but how about a little positive news? We have a clip from the new film Haiti's Heroes, created by Haiti's only film school, Ciné Institute. Finally, a lot of people have talked this week about violent political rhetoric bringing the U.S. to a fever pitch, but there's something else keeping people on edge: that's economic catastrophe and despair. Laura wonders when we're going to talk about the destructive effects of having nothing. Distributed by Tubemogul.

"People are talking about the resilience of the Haitian people, but 1.3 million are still in tents," says Marie St. Cyr of Haiti, one year after the earthquake that devastated the nation. She points out that less than 4000 new housing units have been built, and communication is a mess. "I go to a meeting and the meeting is being held in English, who is it being held for?" she asks. Marie is chair of the Lambi Fund of Haiti, and joins us in studio to look at what still needs to be done to rebuild Haiti and how the U.S. can help.