melissa harris-lacewell

"We need to be covering the left as much as we cover, with anxiety, the right," notes Nation contributor and Princeton professor Melissa Harris-Lacewell. The lack of coverage of progressive movements, protests, and actions in the face of a loud, angry, and well-funded right wing can be disheartening, but we know they are out there, and in some cases fighting hard to keep a Tea Party backed Republican party from taking back seats in Congress during the midterms. Melissa joins us in studio to discuss the upcoming elections, the media message, and what progressives can do to fight back. "We have to build that independent left. It has to be so strong and so radical and so militant and so powerful that it becomes irresistible." Who better to say such a thing than Naomi Klein, Nation columnist, author of The Shock Doctrine and No Logo, and longtime rabblerouser? Naomi makes a special visit to the GRITtv studio to talk about the recent G20 meetings in her hometown of Toronto, about Obama's recent return to a kind of populism, the looming midterm elections in the U.S., her reporting on the BP disaster in the Gulf, and what we can do to channel the growing rage in this country and in the world into a true progressive movement. Naomi Klein noted as well, "We don't have the ability to make the economically disposed-of people visible." Indeed, all over the country people are struggling just to survive in the current economic climate. Invisible People is a project aimed at doing just what Klein asked--making those people visible again. In this clip, they bring us the story of Jean and her kids.

Melissa Harris Lacewell quotes South Pacific, a progressive musical of its time, saying, “You have to be taught to hate and fear, you have to be taught from year to year, it has to be drummed in your dear little ear.” Alarmingly, schools in Arizona and Texas have incorporated Rogers and Hammerstein’s ideas into their educational policies. Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed a bill cutting state funding to schools offering ethnic studies classes. Texas revised its history books to emphasize heroic segregationalists and question the need for separation of church and state. Lacewell wonders, Are young people inherently progressive enough to disregard these institutions?

Melissa Harris-Lacewell of The Nation explains that when people buck the narrative of identity politics, they are immediately credited with being "independent thinkers."

Amidst all the hullabaloo over the health care bill in the past week, President Obama quietly signed the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act, otherwise known as the HIRE Act or the jobs bill. But is the bill, mostly a collection of temporary corporate tax breaks, really going to put people to work--or will it bypass those most in need, often communities of color and urban residents? Melissa Harris-Lacewell, Nation columnist and Princeton professor, and Judith Browne-Dianis, executive director of The Advancement Project, join us to discuss jobs, race, and whether the White House has already missed some big opportunities.