haiti

The single-payer health care plan that recently passed the Vermont state assembly "is truly an example of democracy at its finest. It is the people of Vermont banding together as human beings and as a community," according to Mary Gerisch of the Health Care is a Human Right campaign of the Vermont Workers Center. Organizing around human rights framework, Mary notes, helped unite the people around a universal plan that leaves no one out. Mary joins Laura in studio to explain how Vermonters managed to do the impossible, why she's sure the Senate will do the right thing, and how other states can follow Vermont's lead. "If these actions are allowed to stand in these places, there's going to be an assault on public workers around this nation. They are the testing ground to see how people are going to respond to this. And people are responding gloriously, whether it was Indianapolis, whether it was in Madison, they came out. Even those workers who may have been exempt from this takeover, even those workers came out," says actor and humanitarian Danny Glover. Danny Glover has a long history of activism and hasn't slowed down. Just recently, he flew back to Haiti with exiled former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and stopped in Indiana to lend his voice to the struggle of workers there to retain their right to organize. Glover stopped in New York to speak to the memorial gathering for the Triangle Shirtwaist workers, and he took some time to chat with Laura about the struggles of people around the world right now. Then, last night the New York State Capitol could've been mistaken for Madison, as protesters danced and sang inside the hall and then spent the night to protest Democratic Governor Cuomo's budget cuts. The bill passed, but Laura has a few thoughts looking forward to Monday's We Are One actions. 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.