Day: December 21, 2021

Will Putin be Trapped Into War With Ukraine By His Own Hawkish Rhetoric?

We begin with the growing likelihood that a war will break out between Russia and Ukraine as Russian state media intensifies its propaganda campaign raising the specter on an impending western attack of Russia’s vital interests while President Putin digs the hole deeper in terms of his hawkish rhetoric to the point it may be difficult for him to retreat. Joining us is Robert Kuttner, the co-founder and co-editor of The American Prospect and the Ida and Meyer Kirstein Chair at Brandeis University. He was formerly an assistant to the legendary I.F. Stone, a chief investigator for the Senate Banking Committee, and for 20 years wrote a column at Business Week.  His books include Can Democracy Survive Global Capitalism? and The Stakes: 2020 and the Survival of American Democracy, and he joins us to discuss his article at The American Prospect, “The Narrow Path to Averting War Over Ukraine.”

The Geopolitical Upheavals Ahead From Climate Change

Then we examine the geo political upheavals ahead as climate change will create so much environmental destruction in our future which will be so profound that anything short of the emergence of a new form of global governance to protect the planet and the human rights of all of its inhabitants will be needed by mid century before we all face unimaginable disasters. Joining us is Alfred McCoy, who holds the Harrington Chair in History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The author of Policing America’s Empire: The United States, the Philippines, and the Rise of the Surveillance State and In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of U.S. Global Power, his latest book, just out, is To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change, and we  discuss his article at TomDispatch, “Catastrophic Global Disorder Beckons Unless We Act Swiftly on Climate.”