Monthly Archives: March 2009

Robert Higgs on C-SPAN

David Theroux writes:

Dear Lighthouse Reader,

I am very pleased to alert you to two, very timely, upcoming C-SPAN TV programs featuring Independent Institute fellows:

1. Senior Fellow Robert Higgs will be the featured guest in an exclusive, three-hour interview on C-SPAN2′s prestigious “In Depth” program to discuss his work as an author, economist and historian. With the deepening economic crisis, ongoing wars in the Mideast, enormous expansions of federal spending and power, and widespread public confusion, this comprehensive discussion with Dr. Higgs could not be more important and timely. The interview will examine his pioneering analysis of government power, how and why it grows, and its harmful affects. In so doing, the program will discuss his many books, including Depression, War, and Cold War, Neither Liberty nor Safety, Crisis and Leviathan, Against Leviathan, Resurgence of the Warfare State, and Competition and Coercion. Dr. Higgs is also editor of the Institute’s quarterly journal, The Independent Review.

The program will air as follows (times subject to change):

    Sunday, April 5, 12:00 noon ET (9:00 a.m. PT)
    Monday, April 6, 12:00 midnight ET (April 5, 9:00 p.m. PT)
    Saturday, April 11, at 9:00 a.m (6:00 a.m. PT)

2. Senior Fellow Ivan Eland will be interviewed by former presidential candidate, Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX), on C-SPAN2′s widely influential “After Words” program to discuss Dr. Eland’s new Independent Institute book Recarving Rushmore: Ranking the Presidents on Peace, Prosperity, and Liberty. Who were the best and worst U.S. presidents and how do George W. Bush and Barack Obama stack up in light of their presidential predecessors regarding whether their policies promote peace, prosperity, and liberty while upholding the Constitution all presidents are sworn to protect? Moreover, could traditionally revered presidents actually be among the worse? For example, did Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and Harry Truman adopt policies that led to economic hardship, unnecessary bloodshed, and the abuse of executive powers?

This program will air as follows (times subject to change):

    Saturday, April 4, at 10:00 p.m. ET (7:00 p.m. PT)
    Sunday, April 5, at 9:00 p.m. ET (6:00 p.m. PT)
    Monday, April 6, at 3:00 a.m. ET (12:00 midnight. PT)
    Sunday, April 12, at 12:00 noon ET (April 11, 9:00 a.m. PT)
    Sunday, April 19, at 12:00 noon ET (9:00 a.m. PT)

In addition, Dr. Eland will be speaking at our Independent Policy Forum based on Recarving Rushmore, “What President Obama Should Learn from His Predecessors,” to be held April 7th in the Independent Institute’s Conference Center in Oakland, Calif. (reception at 6:30 p.m., program at 7:00 p.m.). Joining him to speak will be Stanford University political scientist Andrew Rutten, who is Associate Editor of The Independent Review. (Map and Directions)

We hope you will be able to catch each of these programs!

Antiwar Radio: Charles Featherstone

Charles H. Featherstone, seminarian and freelance editor, discusses the use of religion to justify Israel’s Gaza invasion, the irony of browbeating Muslims for being anti-modern while citing an ancient biblical text, the eventual election of a Palestinian Arab as Prime Minister of Israel and the limited but significant opportunities for free expression in Saudi Arabia.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 38:39 — 8.8MB)

Antiwar Radio: Lora Lumpe

Lora Lumpe, Legislative Representative for the US Campaign to Ban Landmines (USCBL), discusses the campaign to end U.S. export and use of cluster bombs, the continued lethality of unexploded bomblets on civilians for decades after a war and the national call-in day to tell the U.S. Senate to “Give Cluster Bombs the Boot.”

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 17:19 — 4.0MB)

Antiwar Radio: Pepe Escobar

Pepe Escobar, writer for the Asia Times, discusses the importance of home-field advantage in the fossil fuel Great Game, how the U.S. empire of bases is used to dominate access to critical energy resources, the IPI (Iran, Pakistan, India) pipeline proposal that defies U.S. influence and the increasing cooperation of Russia and China on energy issues.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 26:36 — 6.1MB)

Antiwar Radio: Lawrence Wilkerson

Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Colin Powell during his tenure as Secretary of State, discusses how the Bush administration ignored the perfectly adequate Geneva Conventions guidelines for classifying war-zone detainees, the ethical and practical considerations of detaining and interrogating innocent civilians to “fight terror,” the counterclaim to Dick Cheney’s assertion that torture prevents terrorism and the end of an Israel/Palestine two state solution. Wilkerson also says he would cooperate with the prosecution of Dick Cheney for war crimes – not that that would ever happen.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 30:10 — 6.9MB)

Antiwar Radio: Gareth Porter

Gareth Porter, independent historian and journalist for Inter Press Service, discusses the latest campaign promise broken by Barack Obama, the semantic removal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq by calling them “advisory and assistance” brigades and Obama’s inability to say “no” to the military or to be truthful about his equivocations.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 21:06 — 4.8MB)

Antiwar Radio: Jim Lobe

Jim Lobe, Washington Bureau Chief for Inter Press Service, discusses the new Robert Kagan/William Kristol think-tank Foreign Policy Initiative, how a relatively small number of neocons use their positions in media as an echo chamber to increase their influence and his view of the ideological similarity between isolationists and neoconservatives.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 15:53 — 3.6MB)

Antiwar Radio: Nebojsa Malic

Nebojsa Malic, author of the “Moments of Transition” column on Antiwar.com, discusses the unacceptable-by-design Rambouillet Agreement, how the U.S.-led NATO war against Serbia set a precedent for future extralegal wars, the realpolitik goals behind U.S. interest in the Balkans and the current condition of the gangster state known as Kosovo.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 49:13 — 11.3MB)