Between The Lines - Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele: Linking racial bias in criminalization of African Americans with Campaign to Abolish Death Penalty (Week Ending Dec. 9, 2011)

Award-winning Investigative Journalist Robert Parry (1949-2018)

Award-winning investigative journalist and founder/editor of ConsortiumNews.com, Robert Parry has passed away. His ground-breaking work uncovering Reagan-era dirty wars in Central America and many other illegal and immoral policies conducted by successive administrations and U.S. intelligence agencies, stands as an inspiration to all in journalists working in the public interest.

Robert had been a regular guest on our Between The Lines and Counterpoint radio shows -- and many other progressive outlets across the U.S. over four decades.

His penetrating analysis of U.S. foreign policy and international conflicts will be sorely missed, and not easily replaced. His son Nat Parry writes a tribute to his father: Robert Parry’s Legacy and the Future of Consortiumnews.

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The Resistance Starts Now!

Between The Lines' coverage and resource compilation of the Resistance Movement

"The man who predicted Trump presidential win now says Trump impeachment could happen," AM Joy with Joy Reid, MSNBC, Jan. 21, 2018
"Sketchy Kazakh money finds its way into Trump dealings," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Red flags seen in many Trump real estate deals," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Secret Money: How Trump Made Millions Selling Condos To Unknown Buyers," BuzzFeed, Jan. 12, 2018
"The Scandals of Donald Trump: Presidential Edition," The Atlantic, May 15, 2017
"Here's what we know so far about Team Trump's ties to Russian interests," Washington Post's ongoing compilation
"What Comey Was Investigating, Explained," The Moscow Project, Center for American Progress

"Donald Trump's Financial Ties to Russian Oligarchs and Mobsters Detailed In Explosive New Documentary from the Netherlands," Dutch TV documentary, Alternet.org, May 12, 2017
Ongoing compilation of Trump's creeping authoritarianism," MotherJones.com
Full resource list ...

SPECIAL REPORT: "The Resistance - Women's March 2018 - Hartford, Connecticut" Jan. 20, 2018

Selected speeches from the Women's March in Hartford, Connecticut 2018, recorded and produced by Scott Harris

SPECIAL REPORT: "No Fracking Waste in CT!" Jan. 14, 2018

Jen Siskind Jennifer Siskind, local coordinator for Food and Water Watch, describes the campaign to stop fracking waste in Connecticut, which so far has led to fracking waste bans in 34 towns around the state. Interviewed by Richard Hill on Mic Check, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT

SPECIAL REPORT: "Resistance Round Table: The Unraveling Continues..." Jan. 13, 2018

Lindsay Kanaly The panel discusses Trump's long history of racism and the Republican voter suppression juggernaut confronting Democrats leading up to the 2018 elections. Special guest: Lindsay Kanaly, a lead organizer of the Women's Marches planned for Jan. 20, 2018. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill on Resistance Roundtable, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT.

SPECIAL REPORT: "Capitalism to the ash heap?" Richard Wolff, Jan. 2, 2018

Richard Wolff, Economics professor Richard Wolff declares U.S. capitalism to be beyond repair and suggests the need for a radical alternative. Interviewed by Richard Hill

SPECIAL REPORT: Maryn McKenna, author of "Big Chicken", Dec. 7, 2017

Maryn McKenna, investigative journalist and author of Big Chicken, talks about the widespread use and dangers of antibiotics in commercial poultry, beef and fruit production. Interview by Bill Duesing, Richard Hill and Guy Beardsly on WPKN's Organic Farm Stand.

SPECIAL REPORT: Nina Turner's address, Working Families Party Awards Banquet, Dec. 14, 2017

Nina Turner, president of Our Revolution, talks about the fight ahead for progressives as she receives the Working Families Organization Award for Exceptional Leadership Towards Advancing Progress. The event was held in Meriden, CT. Produced by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Dec. 12, 2017

Working Families Party of CT talks strategy and issues for 2018.
Lindsay Farrell, executive director of the Working Families Party of Connecticut, discusses the state's electoral landscape and lays out the issues and strategies that could lead to progressive victories in 2018. Interviewed by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Dec. 9, 2017

Disturbing developments in the Trump/Republican Agenda
Focus on the tax bill, destruction of our public lands, North Korea and Trump's private CIA. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill. Special guest: Jo Macallero of Rise and Resist.

SPECIAL REPORT: On Tyranny - one year later, Nov. 28, 2017

Professor Timothy Snyder, author of the highly acclaimed resistance manual On Tyranny, discusses his book and offers a fresh assessment of the state of our beleaguered republic. Timothy Snyder, history professor at Yale, is introduced by Stanley Heller, administrator of Promoting Enduring Peace, a Connecticut-based organization that sponsored this event at the United Church Parish House in New Haven on Nov. 28. A brief interview with Snyder conducted by WPKN radio producer, Richard Hill, follows his talk.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Nov. 12, 2017

Lynne Ide, director of program and policy with the Universal Health Care Foundation of Connecticut, talks about the current state of health care coverage in Connecticut. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Nov. 11, 2017

Focus on the Republican tax plan, the just-released autopsy on the Democratic Party, and Internet censorship by Google, Facebook and Youtube. Including an interview with Hilary Grant, a lead organizer with Action Together Connecticut, who discusses the local results of the recent election, with hosts Richard Hill, Scott Harris and Ruth Baumgartner WPKN producers

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Two leaders from Redneck Revolt, an anti-racist, anti-capitalist movement, talk about their work organizing with white working class people in Suffolk County, New York. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Bruce Gagnon, coordinator for the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, describes the extent of -- and motives underlying -- the vast US network of military bases around the globe. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resisting U.S. JeJu Island military base in South Korea, Oct. 24, 2017

Joyakol, South Korean peace activist and singer, discusses the crisis on the Korean peninsula and focuses on the resistance to the U.S. huge military base being constructed on Jeju Island. The event was sponsored by the Greater New Haven Peace Council and this audio was recorded by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.
Joyakol discusses Americans' biggest misconceptions about the conflict between North and South Korea and the U.S., Interview by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.

SPECIAL REPORT: John Allen, Out in New Haven

John Allen, founding director of the New Haven Pride Center, Connecticut, talks about his new LGBTQ television show, Out in New Haven, which presents a range of political and cultural issues to the community. Interviewed by Richard Hill on WPKN's Rainy Day Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2018.

2017 Gandhi Peace Awards

Promoting Enduring Peace presented its Gandhi Peace Award jointly to renowned consumer advocate Ralph Nader and BDS founder Omar Barghouti on April 23, 2017.

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THANK YOU TO EVERYONE...

who helped make our 25th anniversary with Jeremy Scahill a success!

For those who missed the event, or were there and really wanted to fully absorb its import, here it is in video

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 1 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 2 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Between The Lines on Stitcher

Between The Lines Presentation at the Left Forum 2016

"How Do We Build A Mass Movement to Reverse Runaway Inequality?" with Les Leopold, author of "Runaway Inequality: An Activist's Guide to Economic Justice,"May 22, 2016, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York, 860 11th Ave. (Between 58th and 59th), New York City. Between The Lines' Scott Harris and Richard Hill moderated this workshop. Listen to the audio/slideshows and more from this workshop.

Listen to audio of the plenary sessions from the weekend.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker "Dirty Wars"

Listen to the full interview (30:33) with Jeremy Scahill, an award-winning investigative journalist with the Nation Magazine, correspondent for Democracy Now! and author of the bestselling book, "Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army," about America's outsourcing of its military. In an exclusive interview with Counterpoint's Scott Harris on Sept. 16, 2013, Scahill talks about his latest book, "Dirty Wars, The World is a Battlefield," also made into a documentary film under the same title, and was nominated Dec. 5, 2013 for an Academy Award in the Best Documentary Feature category.

Listen to Scott Harris Live on WPKN Radio

Between The Lines' Executive Producer Scott Harris hosts a live, weekly talk show, Counterpoint, from which some of Between The Lines' interviews are excerpted. Listen every Monday evening from 8 to 10 p.m. EDT at www.WPKN.org (Follows the 5-7 minute White Rose Calendar.)

Counterpoint in its entirety is archived after midnight ET Monday nights, and is available for at least a year following broadcast in WPKN Radio's Archives.

You can also listen to full unedited interview segments from Counterpoint, which are generally available some time the day following broadcast.

Subscribe to Counterpoint bulletins via our subscriptions page.

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Death Penalty Opponents Must Also Fight Racism in U.S. Criminal Justice System

RealAudio MP3

Posted Nov. 30, 2011

Excerpt of speech by Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele, senior community advocate, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, recorded and produced by Melinda Tuhus

The controversial September execution of Troy Davis in Georgia raised the profile of the death penalty in the U.S. and the fight to abolish it. Davis was executed after spending 20 years on death row for the killing of an off-duty police officer, a crime for which he maintained his innocence to the end. Opponents of the execution pointed out that there was no physical evidence linking Davis to the murder; witnesses recanted their initial testimony, and there were many doubts about how the state handled the case.

Now, groups promoting abolition of the death penalty are organizing community forums to galvanize support for action at the state level. One such forum was held at a local church in Hamden, Conn. on Nov. 22, focusing on the African American community and featuring four speakers.

One of the speakers at the event was Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele, senior community advocate for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. He talked about the need to bring together those campaigning against the death penalty with those organizing against the criminalization of African American men and women in the U.S. and expressed his belief that capital punishment will be abolished within the next two decades.

LUMUMBA AKINWOLE-BANDELE: Part of my task as an organizer with (the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund) is to do the flip of what litigators do, lawyers do. Lawyers are charged with the task of impacting and changing laws. I'd like to think we have the tougher job of having to impact and change minds, that we actually have the challenge of getting people to understand some fundamentals around not just the issue, but more importantly, their responsibility to act on the issue, and equally as important, their ability to impact the issue. We are and have been dealing with the issue of apathy in black communities that dates back centuries, and we do not believe we can win. That is one of my biggest challenges, that we do not believe we can win. When your grandparents have gone through the same thing, and their grandparents have gone through the same thing, what's to tell you that in 2011 that you have the ability to change this? So part of my task is beginning to engage black communities to talk about some of these tough discussions.

And we have to recognize that our communities – let's not talk about the state, let's not talk about the governors, let's not talk about the prosecutors – in our communities, we need to have a discussion on what justice is, because when we close the doors in our homes, we know we live among people who do support the death penalty. And unless we're able to engage people as family, as neighbors, as friends, and really have those discussions, it's not going to matter if we march on the DA's office. It's not going to matter if we sit in front of the governor's office the night before an execution. We have to have those discussions within our homes, our churches, our community centers, our schools, and come to a consensus that this is intolerable. Until that happens, we will continue to see more people executed.

We also have to have a more difficult discussion – and I wish I was bringing good news to you – but we have to have a more difficult discussion, because we are looking at two areas of organizing that are happening in isolation. We are looking at communities that are doing work related to the criminalization of African people, of black people, and outside of that circle in discussions we have another whole circle of people who are dealing with the issue of the death penalty. If the two are not connected, we will continue to have two different struggles that will continue to contradict each other. We have to have these discussions together. Some of the alternatives that are being discussed outside of those who are working on criminalization issues are alternatives that do not add up – are alternatives, in fact, that are counter our existence as black people. Increased policing is not the answer; tougher on crime laws are not the answer; and I hate to say it for those of you working hard on this, but believe me, life without parole also is not the answer. It's not.

So, am I saying that it's easy? Absolutely not. But until we have these collective discussions, we will continue to have this isolation that will prohibit us from moving forward. So we're looking at patterns that date back decades and centuries. We're looking at patterns that have, and speak to, some very fundamental traditions that this country has yet to really acknowledge. But I'd like for us to start at home. I'd like for us to really begin to engage each other. And we know who we are; we know those friends who say, "It is what it is." That's the only way we can find justice. Those conversations happen. We have to begin to engage people and really struggle with those conversations so that we can begin talking about what alternatives mean. I want us to begin to have these discussions in a very close, familiar way so we can really look at ways we can end the death penalty.

And let me say this. I guess the good news is I actually believe that within the next decade, maybe two decades, the death penalty will be abolished nationwide. I believe that. When I look at the trends, when I look at the kind of energy that's being mobilized around this, I actually believe it will happen. My concern is that this will not have any impact on the increasing numbers of black men – and now women – who are being thrown into prison. It's not an either-or. Thank you.