Kansas City Iraq Vet, Tomas Young, featured in the film Body of War is in the VA hospital, possibly facing abdominal surgery.  This week's show starts off with a re-broadcast of an interview he gave Tell Somebody in the fall of 2005.

In the second half of the show, Democracy Now's Denis Moynihan talks about how Amy Goodman, along with Moynihan and a DNow staffer were detained by Canadian authorities as they tried to go to Goodman's speaking engagement in Vancouver.  Apparently authorities feared DNow had come to badmouth the Winter Olympics.

On this edition of Tell Somebody, Richard Tripp, cabdriver, author, and former homeless person tells us about Survival 09, the Care of Poor People Event to help provide food and clothing to those in need. www.coppinc.com

Pitch Blog on Richard Tripp: http://blogs.pitch.com/plog/2009/01/this_mans_face_is_familiar.php

Then, 30-year veteran intelligence officer and CIA analyst Ray McGovern returns to Tell Somebody in an interview recorded on the 46th anniversary of the assassination of JFK to talk about the upcoming Khalid Sheik Mohammed trial in NYC, Obama's Afghanistan dilemma, and why Obama might need to watch his back.

 Tom Klammer

www.tellsomebody.us

email: mail@tellsomebody.us

right-click on the .mp3 filename below and choose "save target as" to save a copy of this show to your computer, or subscribe to the podcast, for free, at the iTunes store.

At the Honeywell.com website, a picture I suppose representing happy Kansas City Plant employees accompanies this message:

To sign up for the beryllium medical surveillance program contact Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU) at 1-866-812-6703.

On November 6, 2009, the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority of Kansas City Missouri met, and after going through the motions of listening to testimony in opposition, voted unanimously to approve the latest step in a complicated leasing scheme to facilitate the building of a new nuclear weapons components plant in southern Kansas City.  Part of the deal is about $40 million in tax abatements and incentives to improve infrastructure that will also benefit the Kansas City stop on the North America Super Corridor.

The private developers for the project and their PowerPoints,  as usual, got the lion's share of the time before the PIEA commissioners and staff, but opponents made some important points.

Tom Klammer  www.tellsomebody.us    mail@tellsomebody.us

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KKFI's Bill Clause talks about his play, 1937: One Helluva Year, a fact-based drama-comedy-musical about the about the struggle for racial equality, womens rights and workers rights in 1937 Kansas City.

A. Phillip Randolph and and the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters figure prominently in the play, so we go to the archives for a 2004 Heartland Labor Forum interview with Larry Tye, author of Rising From the Rails -  Pullman Porters and the Making of the Black Middle Class.

Finally, we go to a meeting of the Kansas City Planned Industrial Expansion Authority to hear activists testify against the plans to use city tax abatement and a complicated leasing scheme involving the federal government and private developers to build a new nuclear weapons components plant, leaving behind a toxic mess at the old plant.  The show ends with a brilliant spoken word performance by The Recipe.

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In the first segment of the show, I talk with Gershon Baskin, founder of the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information (IPCRI).  Baskin spoke recently at the Jewish Community Center in Overland Park, Kansas on the topic "Is Peace in the Middle East Possible?" Founded in Jerusalem in 1988, IPCRI is the only joint Israeli-Palestinian public policy think-tank in the world, and is devoted to developing practical solutions for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 

In the second half of the show we hear from filmmakers Lexy Lovell and Michael Uys on their documentary The Good Soldier.  The film is the subject of Bill Moyers Journal on PBS November 6, 2009, and features 5 soldiers from World War II to Iraq, including past Tell Somebody guest Edward Wood.

Tom Klammer  www.tellsomebody.us  send email to mail@tellsomebody.us

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Edward Wood is a World War II veteran featured in the documentary film The Good Soldier.  In this edition of Tell Somebody, originally broadcast in October, 2007, Wood talked about what was then his new book, Worshipping the Myths of World War II - Reflections on America's Dedication to War.

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Tom Klammer

www.tellsomebody.us

mail@tellsomebody.us

Rhonda LeValdo is the host of Native Spirit Radio, a weekly show that airs on KKFI in Kansas City every Sunday at 5pm Central Time.

LeValdo is an Acoma Pueblo Tribal Member from New Mexico, a member of the Native American Journalists Association, and currently teaches at Haskell Indian Nations University.

She was honored by the Emily Taylor Women's Resource Center at Kansas University as one of their Women of Distinction.

In this edition of Tell Somebody, Rhonda LeValdo talks about her radio show and some of her other accomplishments.

(right-click on the .mp3 filename below and choose "save target as" to save a copy of the show, or subscribe to the Tell Somebody podcast for free at the iTunes store).

Tom Klammer  www.tellsomebody.us mail@tellsomebody.us

Last August, R. Crosby Kemper III, Executive Director of the Kansas City, Missouri Public Library, lectured the members and staff of the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority about what he called "this weird Alice in Wonderland world we've created where nothing can be done in Kansas City without tax incentives becasue everybody expects theat there will be a tax incentive."  On this edition of Tell Somebody, Kemper gives his views on tax abatement in Kansas City.

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Physicians for Social Responsibility co-founder Dr. Victor Sidel comes to Kansas City for a forum on Healthcare vs. Warfare: We Pay - Who Profits?

Kansas Citian Ed Asner is featured in the radio play It's Up to Us Alone.

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Former CIA analyst Ray McGovern lamented that nobody has read the torture memos Obama released last April - we read the section on waterboarding.

Proposition One for nuclear disarmament activists Ellen Thomas and Jay Marx are the in the studio with Springfield MO activist Midge Potts and Kansas City Activist Ann Suellentrop, then hear Self-Destruction performed by Priest and 3-3-7 of The Recipe, and we close with a song by local artist Margo May.

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What is the News Hour on PBS neglecting to tell you about it's healthcare reform experts?  How are the right wing extremists swift-boating the Bill of Rights?

On this edition of Tell Somebody, hear how the News Hour introduces a healthcare expert with major conflicts of interest, hear Thom Hartmann's explanation of a major Supreme Court decision that "is" even though it never was, listen to how Andrew Card's own response to a question by Kansas City activist David Quinley leads him to a pre-emptive claim that he is not a war criminal, even though he is perceived by many to be one, and compare Card's justification for Shock and Awe with what Ray McGovern had to say about it on a recent show.   

Journalist and film maker Sue Wilson came to Kansas City to show her new media reform documentary Broadcast Blues at the Kansas International Film Festival and to talk about the film and the importance of community radio on Tell Somebody.

From the the website www.broadcastblues.tv

The Movie the Media Does Not Want You to See!
Clear Channel neglects its emergency system, disaster strikes, and people die.  Pentagon Pundits profit from the same war they promote.  Fox News gets a court ruling that news does not have to be true.  And Hate Radio Rules.
 
Media Policy is killing people in this country.  Literally.  And it is harming our democracy, too.  Lies and misinformation are churning our Union into chaos.
 
Until now.  We the People are taking the media back!

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On this week's Tell Somebody, David Swanson, co-founder of www.AfterDowningStreet.org, talks about his new book Daybreak, Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union.

After that, we climb aboard the Mad As Hell Doctors motor home as it angrily speeds down I-80 towards Des Moines, ultimately headed for Washington D.C.  Dr. Paul Hochfeld tells why they're mad as hell about sham healthcare reform.  www.madashelldoctors.com

But before all that, I have a comment on the twice-delayed appointment of Mary Lindsay to the Kansas City, MO Tax Increment Financing Commission.  Lindsay's appointment was finally approved by the city council two days after the broadcast.

And stick around to the end of the broadcast - former CIA analyst Ray McGovern has a few quick words about the importance of supporting community radio and shows like Tell Somebody.

Tom Klammer

mail@tellsomebody.us

www.tellsomebody.us

A bit of commentary on Glenn Beck, his witch hunt of Van Jones and his on-air fantasies of murder, and an excerpt from Bill Moyers June 2008 keynote speech at the National Conference on Media Reform in Minneapolis put on by Free Press.

www.freepress.net

Josh Stieber was in middle school on 9/11/2001.  Fear and terror and panic were contagious.  Josh joined the Army and did a tour in Iraq.

Reflecting on his expericences there, Josh came to believe that love can be just as contagious and just as powerful a force as fear was, and set off on foot and bicycle across the country.  Josh and a companion stopped on the side of the road outside of Sedalia, Missouri, and talked on the phone to Tell Somebody. 

Earlier the same day, Senators Kit Bond, John McCain and Mitch McConnell hid out in Childrens Mercy Hospital in Kansas City for a supposed healthcare town hall with a hand-picked audience of partisan supporters.  Tell Somebody heard from the protestors across the street.

And finally, we go to the archives to hear from Julie Pierce, featured in the film Sicko,  whose husband died after Cigna insurance denied treatment for him, and look back to when whistleblower Wendell Potter was still working for Cigna.

Tom Klammer   mail@tellsomebody.us     www.tellsomebody.us

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On this edition of Tell Somebody, we start out with what Kansas City, MO public library director and former regional bank CEO Crosby Kemper had to say to the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority about out-of-control tax abatement.

Next, Sen. Claire McCaskill held a town hall meeting on healthcare reform in Kansas City on August 24, and we'll hear a few minutes from that.  (If you like, you can listen to the whole one-hour event here:

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D, MO) Healthcare Townhall Meeting

And last, but not least, the second half of the show is about post-coup Honduras.  Alice Kitchen and Judy Ancel were part of a Global Exchange Delegation to Honduras, August 7-15, 2009, and they came to Tell Somebody to tell you about their experience there. (You can read/download a pdf of their report here:

Report on the Honduran Coup by Global Exchange Delegation

Tom Klammer    mail@tellsomebody.us     www.tellsomebody.us

On Monday, August 24, 2009, Sen. Claire McCaskill held a town hall meeting on healthcare at the Swinney Gymnasium at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.  Tell Somebody was there.  Here is audio of the one hour event.

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Twenty-seven year veteran retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern returns to Tell Somebody to talk about the Downing St. memos and why they are still relevant seven years on, but first he tells how single-payer healthcare saved his life.  Twice.

Tune in to Tell Somebody Tuesdays at 6pm Central Time on 90.1 FM KKFI, Kansas City Community Radio, streaming live around the world at www.kkfi.org.  You can also subscribe to the Tell Somebody podcast for free at the iTunes store - just search for KKFI - , or find links to downloadable mp3's of past shows at www.tellsomebody.us.

For more information, send an email to mail@tellsomebody.us .

Kansas Advocates for Better Care (KABC)  is a non-profit organization whose mission is advocating for quality long-term care for adult care home residents. 

Mitzi McFatrich is the Executive Director of KABC, and she talked recently to Tell Somebody about the history of KABC and about the help and information they offer to those dealing with long-term care issues.

Their website is www.kabc.org, and they can be contacted via email at info@kabc.org, by phone, toll free throughout Kansas and in the Kansas City, Missouri area at (800) 525-1782 or at their Lawrence, KS number at (785) 842-3088.

Dr. Margaret Flowers of Physicians for a National Health Plan (www.pnhp.org) is the featured guest on this edition of Tell Somebody.

Dr. Flowers was one of 13 single-payer healthcare advocates arrested in May for demanding that a single-payer healthcare reform advocate be included "at the table" with all the for-profit healthcare campaign donors at U.S. Senate Finance Committee hearings. 

Dr. Flowers was able to testify before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee in June, and on August 4th was heard on Tell Somebody.  Right-click on the mp3 file at the bottom of this posting and "save as", or subscribe to Tell Somebody, for free, at the iTunes store to hear what she had to say.

Links to Dr. Flowers' testimony and more information, including contacts for local advocacy, here http://tellsomebodyradio.blogspot.com/2009/08/dr-margaret-flowers-next-up-on-tell.html

Also this week, the Department of Energy is looking for a national dump site for mercury.  In an inter-governmental agency memo, Mark Holecek, Acting Manager for the National Nuclear Security Administration Kansas City Site Office (ie., the 'old' Kansas City WMD plant at Bannister Rd. and Troost) said, in effect, "pick me, pick me!"

At public meetings helping to grease the skids for a complicated leasing arrangement involving city tax breaks and private developers to build a new nuclear weapons components plant, , Kansas City plant officials usually push how well they claim to have cleaned up the old place.  But in his pitch to have the old KC WMD plant considered as a waste dump, Holocek writes:

"The Kansas City Plant presently stores a quantity of  a liquid alloy of mercury that is commercially used for its reduced melting point.  For both environmental protection and practical reasons, it might be advantageous to consider including other liquid alloys of mercury within the mission of the proposed elemental mercury storage facility..."

rather than just the 99.5% pure mercury that the DOE folks stressed at the public meeting.

I had a couple of questions for the mercury managers - in the second half of the show you can judge for yourself the quality of their answers.

Lots more on the Kansas City WMD plant here:

http://kcnukeswatch.wordpress.com/

http://kcnukeswatch.wordpress.com/2009/06/19/piea-passes-kc-nuke-plant-resolutions-61909/

http://www.nukewatch.org/KCNukePlant/index.html

In the summer of 1967, U.S. Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Bryce Lockwood, Russian linguist,  boarded the spy ship U.S.S. Liberty in Rota, Spain and was below decks when the ship was hit by an Israeli torpedo that killed 25 - sailors, marines, and a civilian.

In an account that originally aired on two editions of Tell Somebody sandwiched around the 2008 presidential election, Lockwood tells his story of surviving the attack.

Lockwood was awarded the Silver Star for his acts after the torpedo strike.

I'm posting this as a companion to my interview with James Scott about his new book Attack on the Liberty.  James Scott is the son of another Liberty Silver Star holder, John Scott.  You can download an mp3 of that show here:

http://www.tellsomebody.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=509525

On June 8, 1967, fighter jets and torpedo boats attacked a defenseless U.S. spy ship off the coast of Egypt.  After an assault lasting over an hour, 34 U.S. sailors, marines, and civilians were dead, 174 wounded, and the ship was in danger of sinking with a house-sized torpedo hole in its side.  The attackers?  The Israeli Air Force and Navy.

Investigative journalist James M. Scott, son of a Liberty survivor, has written a new book, Attack on the Liberty - the Untold Story of Israel's Deadly 1967 Assault on a U.S. Spy Ship (Simon & Schuster 2009).

From the back cover of the book:

"The specter of the Liberty has haunted the Navy and the intelligence community for decades.  The underlying question the attack raised in 1967 still resonates: how do politics and diplomacy impact battlefield decisions?  In the case of the Liberty, the White House - afraid of offending Israel's domestic backers at a time when it needed support for its Vietnam policy - looked the other way.  Likewise, Congress failed to formally investigate the attack or hold public hearings.  No one was ever punished."

This edition of Tell Somebody features an interview with James M. Scott about his book on the Liberty.

The author's website:

www.jamesmscott.com

Lots of links, survivor stories, pictures, etc., at John Gidusko's site:

http://tinyurl.com/ussliberty/

The show also has an update on the proposals make the old Kansas City WMD plant into a national mercury dump, while a complicated boondoggle to build a replacement plant proceeds.

http://www.nukewatch.org/KCNukePlant/index.html

http://kcnukeswatch.wordpress.com/

Tom Klammer

www.tellsomebody.us

mail@tellsomebody.us

Be sure to scroll down for links to past shows - also scroll through www.tellsomebody.us

We talked a lot on Tell Somebody about bad media coverage generally, and specifically on the subject of healthcare reform:

Tom Klammer: Who Sits at the Health-Reform Table?

Recently on Counterspin on KKFI, we heard about a Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting online petition demanding that TV networks stop their blackout of single payer.  I read more at www.fair.org, and then I contacted FAIR's communications director, Isabel Macdonald, who told us more about the petition, and gave a preview of coming attractions in FAIR's magazine Extra!

And, again, please hold up your hand if you already knew that 85% of the non-nuclear components for the US nuclear weapons arsenal are made right her in Kansas City.  GSA/NNSA/PIEA and a compliant Kansas City, MO city council have worked a tax break deal with private developers to boondoggle- er I mean build - a new WMD plant, and DOE is looking at dumping waste mercury in the old plant. 

Now, even though you could very easily construct the argument that the city council set the table for waste dump proposals, a compliant citizenry is letting the council-critters and Congressman Cleaver win easy points with vacuous statements against violating the neighborhoods of the Kansas City plant. 

Former Kansas City Plant employee Maurice Copeland and PSR/Peaceworks KC rep Ann Suellentrop fill out the second part of the show.  Having trouble with all the alphabet soup?   Right click on the mp3 link, save it, and give a listen.

Tom Klammer

www.tellsomebody.us

mail@tellsomebody.us

Alternative Radio director and founder David Barsamian sits down at his home in Boulder, Colorado to talk with Tell Somebody.

This edition of Tell Somebody has a guest host.

Nilufar Movahedi is the host of two shows on Iranian music, culture and politics on 90.1 FM KKFI - Saba Wind of Love is for English speakers, followed by Sayeh for Persian speakers.  Saba and Sayeh can be heard on 90.1, streaming at www.kkfi.org , on Sundays at 3-5 pm Central.

On this edition of Tell Somebody, Nilufar talks with an Iranian-Canadian who blogs at www.sidewalklyrics.com under the name "Pedestrian."

They talk about the June 12 election in Iran, coverage of election and its aftermath in the Western media, and related issues.

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/44093

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/07/02-5

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/070109b.html

President Obama held a town hall meeting on healthcare in the White House recently, with Charlie Gibson and Diane Sawyer on hand, pretending to be journalists.  Single payer advocates were excluded, but corporate interests were, once again, very well represented.  A woman in a bright yellow jacket was seated on the front row of the event in the East Room of the White House could be the poster child for corporate health care interests. 

Local activists working for single-payer healthcare are the main focus of this week's show, but we start with a little coverage of WMD in Kansas City. 

Most people don't know that a plant in Kansas City produces about 85% of the components for the United States' nuclear weapons arsenal.  The General Services Administration and the National Nuclear Security Administration have teamed up with private developers,  compliant Kansas City politicians, the KC Planned Industrial Expansion Authority (PIEA)- a state chartered quasi-city agency - and the Lathrop & Gage law firm  to come up with a $600 million + Kansas City tax-abated, PIEA-owned new WMD components plant built in a soybean field they contrived to have designated as "blighted."

We have some short excerpts from the latest PIEA hearing, where boosters speak and power-point at length, and critics, including a former employee charging poor work place hazard handling are removed by security.

After that, we listen to Dee Berry and Mary Lindsay, local activists with Heartland Healthcare for All talking about why Single Payer Healthcare is the only healthcare 'reform' worthy of the term, and what they are doing to get the word out.

Links and contact info for Single Payer:

Mary Lindsay - citizenpower@aol.com

Dee Berry  - dberry7@sbcglobal.net

Physicians for a National Health Plan - www.pnhp.org

Heartland Healthcare For All - www.heartlandhealthcareforall.com

Single Payer Action - www.singlepayeraction.org

Links for Kansas City WMD Plant:

http://www.nukewatch.org/KCNukePlant/index.html

http://kcnukeswatch.wordpress.com/page/3/

***************

Tell Somebody is a weekly public affair program airing on Tuesdays at 6pm Central Time on 90.1 FM KKFI, Kansas City Community Radio, podcasting via the iTunes store, and www.tellsomebody.us

Tom Klammer - host - Tell Somebody

www.tellsomebody.us

comments or questions?  send an email to mail@tellsomebody.us

 The FCC is seeking public input as they formulate a national broadband strategy. They are seeking public comments until July 8th –

The media reform advocacy group Free Press recently released a paper: Dismantling Digital Deregulation: Toward a National Broadband Strategy . The paper argues that America’s broadband failure is rooted in poor policy decisions made by the FCC. Free Press believes the FCC must learn from their past mistakes in order to create a national broadband strategy that finally delivers fast, open and affordable Internet to everyone.  

We'll hear from Free Press' Campaign Director Timothy Karr.

http://freepress.net/files/changing_media.pdf

http://www.freepress.net/summit

Dismantling Digital Deregulation: Toward a National Broadband Strategy 

On June 10th we read in the Kansas City Star that former U.S. Representative Karen McCarthy is suffering from Alzheimer's Disease and is now living in a area nursing home.  We'll repeat part of an interview McCarthy gave to Tell Somebody last summer where she explains how she arrived at her decision to vote "no" to the bill giving Bush the green flag to invade Iraq.

Tell Somebody is a weekly public affairs program airing at 6pm Central Time Tuesdays on 90.1 FM KKFI in Kansas City, Missouri, streaming live around the world at www.kkfi.org.  You can subscribe to the podcast for free at the iTunes store. 

Tom Klammer

www.tellsomebody.us

David Himmelstein, M.D. — Harvard Medical School, co-founder, Physicians for a National Health Plan is the guest on this edition of Tell Somebody.

The following came in a press release from Public Citizen:

Two-Thirds of Bankruptcies Are Medically Related; National Health Insurance Needed Now

Statement of Sidney Wolfe, M.D., Director, Health Research Group at Public Citizen

A nationwide study showing that 62 percent of bankruptcies in 2007 were related to medical bills or illness underscores the need for a single-payer health care system.

The study, conducted by researchers at Harvard Medical School, Harvard Law School and Ohio State University (David Himmelstein, Steffie Woolhandler, Elizabeth Warren and Deborah Thorne) found the high bankruptcy rate even though more than three-quarters (78 percent) of the people having medical bankruptcies had health insurance - mainly private insurance - at the start of their illness. It is astounding that medically related bankruptcies increased by half from 2001 to 2007 - well before the current economic crisis.

Dr. Himmelstein, one of the authors of the study, will talk about it and why a single payer plan is the only solution that makes sense.

Dr. Himmelstein practices and teaches primary care internal medicine at the Cambridge Hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts and is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard. He was a co-founder of PNHP and one of two National Coordinators for the first five years of the organization. Dr. Himmelstein co-authored PNHP’s original proposal, its long-term care proposal, and its proposal for financing a national health program.

More information at www.pnhp.org

Tell Someobdy!!!!

www.tellsomebody.us

What is the true cost of Chevron? 

At http://truecostofchevron.com/, we read that

"Chevron shareholders were given a full account of the true costs of Chevron's global operations by a delegation of representatives of Chevron affected communities from the across the nation and around the world. Outside supporters filled the entryway, closing Chevron's front gate with a vibrant rally.

Representatives from Nigeria, Ecuador, Richmond and the Philippines, were joined inside by those representing communities from Burma, Kazakhstan, Iraq and Alberta to present to shareholders an alternative annual report, The True Cost of Chevron."

On this edition of Tell Somebody, I talk with Antonia Juhasz, principal author of the alternative report.

And, in a blog on the Women in Media and News website, WIMN founder and Executive Director Jennifer L. Pozner asks Will Media Report Dr. George Tiller’s Murder as an Act of Terrorism?

 http://www.wimnonline.org/WIMNsVoicesBlog/?p=1264

I talked to Pozner about media coverage of Dr. Tiller's murder last week and about media coverage of related domestic terrorism generally.

www.freepress.net

www.tellsomebody.us

On Thursday, May 14th, 2009, Free Press held a Summit on Changing Media at the Newseum in Washington, DC. 

Acting FCC Chair Michael Copps and Free Press' Senior Program Director Craig Aaron were among the featured  speakers.  Aaron's talk was headlined 'Journalism Is a Public Service.'

On this edition of Tell Somebody, I talked about the summit with Craig Aaron, and also aired the comments made by Michael Copps.

 

Rachel Corrie was killed 6 years ago while trying to save a Palestinian family from having their home demolished, and possibly from their own deaths, by a US-supplied Israeli bulldozer.

On what would have been Rachel Corrie's 30th birthday, I had the opportunity to see the play My Name is Rachel Corrie at the Unicorn Theater in Kansas City, and to meet again with Rachel's parents, Craig and Cindy Corrie.  I recorded a conversation with them the next day, and part of it can be heard on this week's edition of Tell Somebody.  More information on Rachel Corrie at www.rachelcorriefoundation.org.

Tent State University returns to UMKC Wednesday-Friday, April 22nd-24th with free food, speakers, and much more.  UMKC student and Tent State organizer Jessica Farmer came to the KKFI Studios to tell us about it.

Democracy Now host Amy Goodman is my guest on this edition of Tell Somebody.  Just ahead of an appearance in Kansas City in a benefit for 90.1 FM KKFI, Goodman talks about her book Standing Up To The Madness, Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times, co-authored with her brother, David Goodman.

After that, Part VI of Eyewitness to the Russian Revolution, a never before published account of the February Revolution in Petrograd, Russia in 1917, by Hugo Hakk, Estonian officer in the czar's army, used with permission of his daughter and translator, Liia Hakk.

A recent column by Democracy Now host Amy Goodman cites a study by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting that found that in the week before Obama’s health-care summit, of the hundreds of stories that appeared in major newspapers and on the networks, “only five included the views of advocates of single-payer—none of which appeared on television.” Most opinion columns that mentioned single-payer were written by opponents.

I thought it might be a good time to reach into the archives and give another listen to a December, 2004, conversation with Pulitzer Prize winner James B. Steele.  Jim Steele was co-author, with Donald L. Barlett, of Critical Condition, How Health Care in America Became Big Business & Bad Medicine.  Even after four-plus years, the diagnosis of the problem as laid out in the book holds up.

After that, Part V of Eyewitness to the Revolution, Hugo Hakk's account of the February, 1917 Russian Revolution breaking out in Petrograd, just translated this month by his daughter Liia Hakk.

Tom Klammer

A musical break by my alter ego and friends, Albert and the Labortones.

This started rattling around in my head several years ago and refused to not come out. 

I Want My Democracy.  NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Vandana Shiva on her book Soil Not Oil, and Part IV of Eyewitness to the Russian Revolution.

Vandana Shiva is a world-renowned environmental leader and thinker.  Her latest book is Soil Not Oil, Engironmental Justice In An Age Of Climate Crisis.  On this edition of Tell Somebody, I talk to Vandana Shiva about the book.

"A must-read for anyone who takes the future of the planet seriously,  Soil Not Oil dares us to imagine a world where people matter more than profits."

www.navdanya.com

www.southendpress.org

Then I finish up the show with Part IV of Eyewitness to the Russian Revolution.  Hugo Hakk, machine gun trainer/officer in the Czar's Army is on leave from the Eastern Front in WWI and finds himself in Petrograd just as the February Revolution is breaking out in 1917.  After a side trip to Finland, he's back in Petrograd on International Women's Day. 

Tell Somebody is a locally produced weekly public affairs program on 90.1 FM, KKFI, Kansas City Community Radio.

Tom Klammer

host and producer

www.kkfi.org

www.tellsomebody.us

This week on Tell Somebody, Ira Harrit, Program Director of American Friends Service Committee - Kansas City and co-chair of the KC Iraq Task Force talks about a rally on the Country Club Plaza in Kansas City, followed by "Breaking Bread" a dinner benefit with Iraqi refugees and Iraq War veterans on the weekend before the 6th anniversary of the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Then we'll talk with media activist Alice Kitchen and journalist Bruce Rodgers about a petition effort to convince KCPT, Kansas City's PBS affiliate, to stop pre-empting  Now and Bill Moyers Journal every time they have a pledge drive.  This effort resulted in an invitation from the television station for would-be media reformers to man the phone banks during a pledge drive to try to demonstrate that quality public affairs programming really can make the station money.  We'll talk about how that effort fared, and about the state of the media generally.

And finally, Eyewitness to the Russian Revolution, February, 1917, Part 3.  Hugo Hakk's account of revolution in Petrograd continues, as the young machine gun officer in the Czar's army returns to Petrograd on International Women's Day after a side trip to Finland.

March 16th marks the sixth anniversary of Rachel Corrie's death in Gaza after being run over by an American-supplied Israeli bulldozer.  The play My Name is Rachel Corrie opens at the Unicorn Theater in Kansas City on March 19th.  On this edition of Tell Somebody, you'll hear some comments former CIA analyst Ray McGovern made about Rachel while he was here in Kansas City in October, 2008, and then an interview with Rachel's parents, Craig and Cindy Corrie, that I recorded when they were here in October 2006.

After that, hear the words of Hugo Hakk, young officer in the Army of Czar Nicholas, in part two of the multi-part Eyewitness to the February Revolution.  Hakk is on leave from the Eastern front in February, 1917, and finds himself in Petrograd (St. Petersburg) in the days leading up to the revolution.

The cold war ended years ago.  With economic, energy,  and climate crises front and center, are superpower nuclear arsenals still a major concern?  Dr. Ira Helfand of Physicians for Social Responsibilty gives his views.

Last October FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein sent a message to media reformers in Kansas City, and it is still relevant today.

And finally, the first installment of a never before published eyewitness account of the February 1917 Revolution in Petrograd (St. Petersburg) opens with 19 year old machine gun officer/trainer Hugo Hakk heading home from the Eastern front for a month's leave.

This week on Tell Somebody we'll hear the audio from "Fight for the Land", a runner up in You Tube's "Project: Report - Telling the Untold Stories" a national video competition held in partnership with the Pulitzer Center.  "Fight for the Land" was produced by Rhonda LeValdo, host of Native Spirit Radio, Kansas City's only Native American Radio show, airing on 90.1 FM KKFI/www.kkfi.org on Sundays at 6pm Central Time.

After that, most of this week's show deals with the Homelessness Marathon, an annual 14 hour broadcast being heard on KKFI and over one hundred other stations around the country starting Monday evening February 23rd.  This segment features an interview with Homelessness Marathon director Jeremy Weir Alderson

R. Crosby Kemper III quit his post as chairman and CEO of one of the biggest banking companies in the Midwest to become head of the Kansas City, MO library system.  Kemper will talk about why he took the job, the history of the library in Kansas City, library services and programs, and the upcoming "Big Read", an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts designed to revitalize the role of literary reading in American popular culture.  This year the "Big Read" selection is Tobias Wolff's Old School, which will be read daily on the air on 90.1 FM KKFI this April.

To save a copy of this show to your computer, right click on the .mp3 filename below and choose "save target as."

KKFI co-founder Tom Crane is in the studio telling some of the history of Kansas City's community radio station, as we look to past editions of Tell Somebody including Liia Hakk, who lived under German and Soviet occupations in World War II recalling the importance of radio to her family during the war, Jumana Musa, Amnesty International USA Advocacy Director for Human Rights and International Justice talking about her trips to Guantanamo Bay, Leslie Cagan of United for Peace and Justice on the importance of alternative media, and Iraq Veteran Against the War Tomas Young on the music of "Body of War", the Ellen Spiro/Phil Donahue film - all on this pledge drive edition of Tell Somebody.

An interview with the author of Killing for Coal, America's Deadliest Labor War, comments on media reform by Michael Copps, the new interim chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, and an excerpt from a speech on single payer healthcare by medical studtent Tim Lyon.

Mohammed Atwa is a Kansas City resident with Palestinian family members in Gaza. Mr. Atwa’s mother works for the UN and lives in Gaza, while his brother is a journalist for Ramattan, the only news organization reporting live on events in the Gaza Strip during the recent crisis. Mr. Atwa stated on the program "my house [in Gaza] was bombed. This is the second time actually that my house was bombed."

Listen online:

Ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern appeared weekly on Tell Somebody during the Obama transition.  In this edition of Tell Somebody, Ray reacts to reports of Leon Panetta's selection to head the CIA and discusses what he thinks are important qualification for the post, discussing at length some of his experiences at the agency.

Last week, so-called 'moderate' Democratic senators moved to drop "card check" from the Employee Free Choice Act.  The right-wing nutcakes have successfully spun a fairy tale about the loss of secret ballots, and the "moderate" Democrats have caved.

I thought this would be a good time to post an edition of Tell Somebody from last December where we heard about EFCA in some detail from the Kansas City-based Institute for Labor Studies director, Judy Ancel.

The second segment of the show has former CIA analyst Ray McGovern talking about U.S. torture policy, one of a series of weekly appearances by McGovern during the Obama transition last winter.

Tom Klammer

www.tellsomebody.us

mail@tellsomebody.us