| Striper Wars Eye of the Whale The Man who Knew Too Much
Black Genius Recently Posted Ventura Schedule
The Warning
JFK Assassins
Jesse Ventura
Saving Stripers Will Require Tighter Net of Regulations
by Dick Russell
Martha's Vineyard Gazette, Friday, February 6, 2009
Twenty-five years ago, the striped bass were on the verge of disappearing altogether from our waters. Federal scientists trying to pinpoint a cause listed pollution in the Chesapeake Bay spawning grounds as one probable reason — from residues of the banned pesticide DDT to the new phenomenon of acid rain. The other factor was clearly overfishing, and only this could be addressed immediately. As a longtime summer fisherman on the Vineyard, I got deeply involved in what soon became a coastwide grassroots campaign to try to save this magnificent fish from the endangered species list.
It worked. After Maryland declared a five-year moratorium on striper fishing in its bay waters on Sept. 11, 1984, and the other states along the migration route followed with similarly strong conservation measures, the striped bass made an amazing comeback. Less than 10 years later, managers declared it a fully recovered fishery. As Scientific American said in 1995: “The resurgence of striped bass along the eastern coast of the U.S. is probably the best example in the world of a species that was allowed to recoup through tough management and an intelligent rebuilding plan.”
Today, sadly, the question is whether we may be witnessing a déjà vu. Last fall, Maryland’s young-of-the-year index of annual spawning success in the Chesapeake — where more than 75 per cent of our striped bass come from — fell to its lowest level since 1990, when the population was just emerging from its near-total collapse. An average of only 3.2 fingerling stripers were taken in each seine-haul, well below the long-term average of 11.7. Although some experts blamed a late cold front that may have killed many larvae, this marked the third time in the last seven years that the survey has been alarmingly lower. The mega-spawning years of 1989, 1993, 1996 and 2001 haven’t been remotely approached — yet the allowable catch levels and quotas remain based on a theoretical abundance of fish from the 1990s.
Last November, scientists from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science published a study showing that a chronic wasting disease called mycobacteriosis — now at epidemic proportions, detected in sixty per cent of the Chesapeake’s striped bass — eventually kills them. The disease began showing up a decade ago, sometimes in the form of skin lesions and often eating away at the fish from within. For humans handling infected fish with an open wound, scientists advise wearing gloves to avoid fish-handler’s disease that can lead to arthritis-like joint problems. Mycobacteriosis has now spread to the Delaware Bay system, and has been seen in striped bass all along the coast, including Massachusetts.
David Gauthier, lead author on the recent study, calls it a stress disease. Since a higher mortality rate seems to occur during the summer, it’s possible that low-oxygen dead zones could be forcing the bass out of their preferred cold water into warmer areas. (Early in December, another scientific report concluded that the 25-year, $6-billion effort to clean up the Chesapeake has so far been a dismal failure). Many of the diseased fish are also emaciated, so an even more likely stressor is a lack of food — bay anchovies and the striper’s preferred prey, young menhaden. The Chesapeake Bay Ecological Foundation recently determined that malnutrition observed in more than 5,000 stripers is a consequence of such ecological depletion. A single company, Omega Protein, kills millions of menhaden annually to be ground up into fish meal and fish oil. A harvest cap implemented by regulators in 2006 has not proved effective, because menhaden landings since then have averaged 30 per cent below the cap.
At the same time, illegal catches of striped bass are escalating. At the end of January, investigators announced having broken up a black market involving watermen and fish dealers who sold millions of dollars’ worth of striped bass illegally taken from the Chesapeake Bay and Potomac River to restaurants and shops around the U.S. The problem has been widespread in Connecticut and Rhode Island, too, and this is probably the tip of the iceberg.
What is to be done? For many Vineyard fishermen, striped bass last season were few and far between. Fish taken in the June catch-and-release derby were one-quarter of what they’d been only a few years before. The annual fall derby also saw a dramatic drop in landings. Some have placed the blame on huge mid-water herring trawlers discarding striped bass bycatch; off Chatham, fishermen once saw dead stripers stretching for three solid miles. Since herring also serve as important forage, clearly the trawlers need more onboard observers and stricter regulation. But curtailing them isn’t going to be a panacea.
In January, an act “relative to the conservation of Atlantic striped bass” was introduced for the first time in the Massachusetts legislature. It calls for much greater restrictions on recreational fishing, cutting the allowable take in half and changing size limits to protect a greater number of fecund female fish (one striped bass a day could be landed between 20 and 26 inches in length, or of greater than 40 inches). The bill also would prohibit commercial sale of wild stripers, already a law in seven of the coastal jurisdictions along the migratory route (Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, the Potomac River, and South Carolina), as well as in federal waters three miles offshore.
While I don’t sell my catch, I have resisted supporting such a measure until now; I don’t like the idea of taking away part of anyone’s livelihood. However, I have reluctantly concluded that banning commercial sale is a conservation necessity. Already farm-raised striped bass comprise more than 60 per cent of the market; the taste, and the price, is comparable to that of wild-caught fish. Fish raised in ponds or other enclosed systems are not tainted with mercury, PCBs and other contaminants found at levels high enough in ocean stripers to warrant health advisories against consuming them in many states. The Environmental Defense Fund recommends that people eat only farm-raised stripers, and the Massachusetts legislation would require any sold to bear a tag from the grower or distributor.
Approximately 1,200 active market striper fishermen in Massachusetts average selling about 850 pounds for around $2,000 a year, hardly a significant portion of income for a commercial fisherman. There could, however, be a dedicated fund to buy back commercial striped bass permits on an amortized basis, perhaps coming from a recreational saltwater fee. A century ago, market hunting drove many species of game birds and animals to near-extinction until the practice was outlawed. In recent years, we have seen red drum become a recreational-only species in Florida, and sea trout and redfish in Texas, because there weren’t enough fish to also support a commercial industry. Given all the problems striped bass are facing today, if we’re to preserve them for future generations, there appears to be little choice but to follow such precedents.
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 Letter to the incoming President of the United States
by HOMERO ARIDJIS
from Sierra, November-December, 2008
Homero Aridjis, Mexico's ambassador to UNESCO, is a poet, novelist, and founder of the Group of 100, an international organization of writers and artists focused on Mexican environmental problems.
Mr. President:
In February 2001 your predecessor made his first trip abroad, meeting with Mexican president Vicente Fox at his ranch in Guanajuato. After September 11, 2001, the United States put Mexico on the back burner. Bring this relationship back to the fore.
Our history and destinies are entwined. Migrations play a huge role in our shared reality. In the 1990s I proposed the monarch butterfly as the symbol of NAFTA's environmental cooperation, for nothing embodies our tri-national environment more than this fragile butterfly's spectacular annual migration across North America. Give your full support to the North American Monarch Conservation Plan to prevent further habitat loss. Gray whales also migrate from Baja California to Alaska; safeguard them by opposing more oil drilling in the Bering Sea.
As for the human species, it's time for comprehensive immigration reform that will benefit rather than penalize people on both sides of the border. Recognize the vital place of immigrants in U.S. society and ensure they are treated as befits your country's democratic principles. State in your inaugural address that the science is indeed in on global warming and that the United States will accept responsibility for its share of carbon emissions and embark on a revolution in energy policy. You might begin with a wall of solar panels reaching across the border--the border fence is an offense.
Corn was first domesticated in Mexico some 7,000 years ago. Mexicans say, "Sin maíz, no hay país"--"No corn, no country." We depend on subsidized U.S. corn, which is cheaper than Mexican corn. But as more U.S. corn goes into ethanol, tortilla prices rise, which led to the "tortilla riots" in the winter of 2007. Stop feeding corn to cars, stop subsidizing corn-based ethanol, and back research into second-generation biofuels.
Remember that what's good for the planet is good for the USA.
Homero Aridjis
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STRIPED BASS IN TROUBLE AGAIN:
WHAT IS TO BE DONE
By Dick Russell December 13, 2008
The comeback of the Atlantic striped bass has been called the foremost example of a fisheries management success story, proving that if strong enough regulations are put in place, even a fish population in the worst straits can make a dramatic turn-around. As I documented in my book, Striper Wars: An American Fish Story, this was only achieved because of the pressure applied on public officials by fishermen all along the coast. I also warned, however, that this could be all for naught if attention was not paid – and quickly – to a chronic bacterial infection among the Chesapeake Bay’s striper population, a disease that seems to be linked to their not getting enough to eat. The menhaden, their food of choice, is being overfished by a single corporation, Omega Protein, that grinds the little fish up into fish-meal and processes them into fish-oil.
Since my book was published in 2005, the situation has not gotten any better. In fact, all indications this year are that it’s a whole lot worse. The annual index showing how well striped bass have spawned in the Chesapeake is the lowest since 1990, when they were only beginning to emerge from their near-total collapse. At the same time, marine biologists at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science have released a report stating that the mycobacterial infection is a “stress disease” now detected in more than 60 percent of the bay’s stripers and one that ultimately proves fatal. Among their findings, the scientists noted that older females are more likely than males to die from the disease. No surprise, then, that spawning success is way down.
Fishermen in many different locations along the Eastern seaboard are reporting their worst seasons since the dire days of the early 1980s. There is a lack of forage for stripers in New England waters too, where “factory-sized” midwater trawlers are encircling huge schools of herring with nets as big as a football field. Never has the need for an ecosystem-based approach to management been more apparent. Yet the big commercial interests continue to have inordinate influence over the supposed regulators.
In the Chesapeake region, a group of scientists came out in early December to flatly state that the 25-year, $6-billion effort to clean up the bay has been a dismal failure and needs to be completely revamped. A few days later, the federal EPA asked for an exemption to exclude poultry farms from the environmental reporting required of other industries – even though they release pollutants into the air from millions of tons of manure left by their flocks (as much as one-third of the nitrogen fouling the bay waters comes from the air). This is yet another example of the Bush administration’s blatant gutting of environmental laws in its final days.
So what is to be done? In the 1980s, faced with a pollution problem that everyone knew could not be solved overnight, there was only one thing to do: stop the fishing pressure. Moratoriums and no-sale laws went into effect all across the coast. As the striped bass population heads for what may be a second great crash, it’s time to move in that direction again. Already there is no commercial fishing for stripers allowed in Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, the District of Columbia and South Carolina, nor in federal waters beyond the three-mile state limit. A bill will soon be pending in the Massachusetts Legislature to follow suit and make striped bass a no-sale gamefish.
I am not someone who enjoys advocating that commercial fishermen be put out of the striped bass business, or denying supermarkets and restauranteurs the right to sell the fish. I’ve resisted calling for this extreme a measure for a long time. But I’m afraid its time has come, coupled with stronger limitations on the millions of recreational anglers who are taking far too many of the big spawning females – and with curtailing the slaughter of tons of baitfish, menhaden and herring. The striped bass has been called the aquatic equivalent of the American bald eagle. We can’t let this most majestic of our fish species once again find itself on the brink of disappearing.
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Dick Russell is back
on the trail of the JFK case
By Lisa Pease
October 24, 2008
 Dick Russell’s second book on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, On the Trail of the JFK Assassins, is an important contribution to the subject's literature. Russell intertwines some of his previously published articles with chapters of never-before-published information, offering updated perspectives on previous revelations and adding new information to the case.
Russell’s combination of talents is rare in the research community: he brings a reporter’s process, a novelist’s flair, and a researcher’s deep curiosity to the case. The result is an eminently readable volume. It’s far easier to tackle this series of articles than his 800+ page previous volume, The Man Who Knew Too Much, which Russell notes his friends have jokingly called The Book That Grew Too Much.
I must thank Lachy Hulme, an Australian friend of Russell’s, for prompting Russell to resurface his previous articles originally published in The Village Voice, Harpers Weekly, Argosy Magazine, New Times, High Times, and other outlets. In retrospect, these pieces were remarkably insightful. For example, at a time when some of the leading voices in the community were desperately trying to pull the case away from the milieu New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison first discovered, the nexus between the intelligence community, the anti-Castro Cubans, and the CIA’s Mob associates, Russell kept the focus on this crowd and added to the evidence with interviews of some of the case's most colorful characters.
Jim Garrison gets a fairer treatment here than in much of the literature, a welcome relief from the Garrison bashing most critics feel compelled to perpetrate. Indeed, much of what we have learned since the HSCA has served to bolster Garrison’s position. The title of Russell’s book is itself a nod to Garrison’s earlier account of his own investigation into the case, On the Trail of the Assassins.
Russell shows his obvious fascination with intelligence agents, the "spooks" who inhabit that netherworld between observable reality and the covert world we civilians rarely encounter, who perform operations most Americans know nothing about, sometimes to their later chagrin. A character who called himself by the pseudonym "Captain Sam" quite aptly describes why pursuing the truth through the people closest to the crime can be a frustrating endeavor:
"[T]here’s one thing you should know from the start. Half of what I’ll tell you might be the truth, and the other half bullshit. But all of it is what I was told. That’s part of the game in the intelligence business. You confuse your own operatives with false information; maybe nobody knows the full truth about a particular assignment."
And therein lies the rub of investigating covert operations. Even those who want to help can unintentionally mislead, despite the best of intentions. And then there are the others, who mislead on purpose. Russell appears to have walked a fine line between letting the spooks have their say without giving weight to statements that contradict provable facts about the case.
Ironically, I was just about to write up, for a presentation I was preparing, the story of Luis Castillo, who appeared to be a CIA asset hypnoprogrammed to assassinate a foreign leader and then kill himself afterwards. He was arrested in advance of his assignment by authorities, and his weapons were confiscated. Nonetheless, at the appointed time, he mimed shooting a gun at someone else, from within his prison walls, and then mimed killing himself. I had just pulled out the Turner/Christian book on the Robert Kennedy assassination, which contained a brief discussion of Castillo, when Russell’s book arrived in my mail. I had no idea that Russell, along with Jeff Cohen, the founder of Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), had done extensive research on the Castillo case, and had talked to Victor Arcega, the man who was able to uncover, through hypnosis, some of Castillo’s hypnotic programming. Russell’s article on Castillo is, I believe, a must read, not the least for how Dr. Herbert Spiegel helped spike a book deal on Castillo. There’s a reason such stories rarely reach the public, and it’s not always because the story isn’t true. It’s because it isn’t provably true, which is an unfortunately high standard. I’m grateful that Russell gives us the data and lets us make up our own minds.
One of the most interesting throughlines across the old and new articles is the focus on the CIA’s mind control programs and possible connections between those programs and certain participants in the JFK assassination story. While I’ve never believed Oswald was under hypnosis at the time of the Kennedy assassination, the topic is endlessly fascinating, and, I believe, very important to understand the Robert Kennedy assassination, which is touched on in passing in this volume. I’m not at all convinced that Luis Castillo, for example, was in Dealey Plaza, as some of his memories suggest. But it seems obvious to me he was used in a CIA program involving an assassination plot against the leader of another country, albeit (and thankfully) an unsuccessful one.
One of my favorite articles in the book was "The Media, the CIA, and the Cover-Up." Russell recounts key points in the media history of the case, and shows the direct connections between key stories in the cover-up and the CIA assets behind those stories. I’ve longed to read just such an article for years. It was a pleasure to find the people behind the media cover-up and their connections to the Agency so clearly laid out here.
The book includes some fascinating interviews. Russell recounts a long interview with Senator Richard Schweiker (R-Pa.), who became increasingly concerned by the "fingerprints of intelligence" he found all over Lee Harvey Oswald during his work with the Church Committee.
Richard Sprague, who briefly headed the House Select Committee on Assassinations before the CIA’s media assets started a drumbeat for his removal, noted in his interview with Russell that he had become more interested in the media’s coverage of the case than the facts of the assassination itself, a sentiment I share. To me, one of the points of studying the history of the Kennedy assassination is to explore how someone gets away with such a crime, how the crime can be effectively covered up for years, and how the cover-up, in the end, when unraveled, presents some of the best evidence of conspiracy itself.
Speaking of cover-ups, there's an interesting little story in here regarding a favorite subject of mine, Gordon Novel. Most people who know Gordon know he can lie with the best of them. But few understand why he lies about this case. Russell shows no particular curiosity along those lines, which is a shame, since he has such a provocative tidbit to share that, with some additional context, could become a lot more interesting.
One of my favorite chapters had to do with Russell’s hilarious, amateurish trip to KGB headquarters in Moscow, accompanied by an associate who—well, you just have to read his account. I could see the ending coming a mile away, and was bemused that Russell did not, at the time.
This book will appeal to a broad cross-section of readers. People with only a casual interest in the JFK case will find much to ponder here. Researchers who have been at this for years will learn some startling new information throughout, and especially at the end of the book in Russell’s dynamite interview of Doug Horne, the ARRB's key medical evidence researcher. Those who enjoy spook tales will laugh at the various characters Russell interacts with throughout the 320-page volume. And because the book is a series of self-contained chapters and articles, it's easy to reach "closure" every few pages. I'm not fond of books that keep me up all night while I search for an appropriate stopping point. The truth about this case is, after all, disturbing enough.
www.realhistoryarchives.com
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"A bestselling author and a leading expert on the JFK assassination, Dick Russell (The Man Who Knew Too Much) here compiles a fascinating selection of his latest research into the assassination of our thirty-fifth president. These pieces cover every aspect of the JFK assassination, from the shots, to the subsequent investigation, to the Warren Report. Russell’s research analyzes newly declassified information and continues to build upon his painstakingly detailed investigations. His unrivalled scholarship has created one of the most comprehensive and authoritative examinations of the assassination to date. Russell has come closer than ever to solving the ultimate question: Who killed JFK?"
Skyhorse Publishing Inc.
November 2008
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The Warning
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For the past six months, I've been assisting a production team in putting together a new, web-based documentary called "The Warning." It's a very timely film, which incorporates interviews with five prominent authors - Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Naomi Klein, Joe Conason, Naomi Wolf, and Chris Hedges - concerning the perilous pass that American democracy has come to over the past eight years. I hope you'll click on the image at left to check out the dvd, and then click here to order "The Warning." Dick Russell |
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A "Warning" To Us All
October 30, 2008 in News by Michael Austin
"Patriotism is not pinning a flag pin to one lapel to free up both hands, so you can tear up the U.S. Constitution."
-Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., in The Warning.
The new production company/website Truthtopower.tv has just released its powerful first film, The Warning, featuring exclusive interviews with five recently-published authors Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (Crimes Against Nature), Naomi Wolf (The End of America), Chris Hedges (American Fascists), Naomi Klein (The Shock Doctrine) and Joe Conason (It Can Happen Here). Director/Writer/Producer J.P. Sottile wisely steers clear of cinematic fireworks, keeping a tight focus on the writers’ frightening observations about the subversion and erosion of American Democracy in recent years. Privatized warfare, illegal torture and wiretapping, corporate and religious influence, the ballooning power of the Executive and more are exposed as the film warns just how slippery a slope the U.S. is sliding down. The Warning is an excellent example of the kind of patriotic dissent the country needs right now.
Find out more and get your own copy here. |
The film was shown recently on LinkTV (Tuesday Nov. 4 at 8:30 pm...)
| PRAISE FOR "THE WARNING"
Your film "The Warning" is the most analytical, comprehensive, and uncompromising of the many DVD reports now available on the crises facing the United States as a democracy and a world leader. Your panel of experts are all genuinely expert. They are articulate, informed, and interesting. The film is also brilliantly cut and edited. I hope that you get a large audience and that the film plays a major role in the forthcoming national debate on how to reform the American system after the disasters of the Bush-Cheney years.
My congratulations.
Yours,
Chalmers Johnson,
Author of Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic. |
Invictus Sunday, March 1, 2009
Five Remarkable Interviews in "The Warning"
The producers of a unique documentary sent me a DVD copy of their independent documentary, "The Warning." They hoped they would get a good review, and they needn't have worried.
"The Warning," written, produced, and directed by Joseph P. Sottile, consists entirely of interviews with five well-known liberal authors (see below). Rather than questions and answers, the interviewees are allowed to speak for themselves. Occasionally, they even read appropriate selections from their works.
But rather than a boring word fest, the seriousness of the work gives it a riveting feel. The subject is nothing less than the descent of the United States into a ruthless totalitarian state, which relies on state torture, an imperial executive, widespread surveillance, the conscious use of fear-laden propaganda, a docile press, and the influence of a radical Christian core of believers to spread the program in institutions throughout civil society.
If we are not yet a fascist state -- and the film steps back from going that far -- we are clearly moving towards that. I would add that the election of Barack Obama may have slowed that descent, but to date, all the factors behind it remain in place, particularly what Kennedy in the film calls "the merger of state and corporate power."
The following text comes from the film's website (emphases in original):
Terrorism. Cronyism. Surveillance. The suspension of basic Constitutional protections. The Patriot Act. Pre-emptive War. Bad intelligence. Torture. Corporate power. Mercenaries. Occupation. The Unitary Executive. Neo-Cons. A never-ending war against "terror."
Something very strange has happened in America. Since 2001, America has taken a radical turn.
Five authors stood up and spoke truth to power, exposing shocking trends towards a police state, an accelerated corporate integration with the state and the blatant subversion of the U. S. Constitution.
Five mavericks asked questions the mainstream media refused to ask, and looked into the dark corners of a closing democracy, a changing economy and growing empire.
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr.: Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and His Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy
- Naomi Wolf: The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot
- Chris Hedges: American Fascists; the Christian Right and the War on America
- Naomi Klein: The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
- Joe Conason: It Can Happen Here: Authoritarian Peril in the Age of Bush
They expose the forces at work in the transformation of our democracy into a Unitary Executive that uses fear, emergency powers and the supremacy of military command to gather power into the office of the Presidency. The Warning traces the radical steps America had taken toward a new, wholly unconstitutional form of American government.
- The rise of super-patriotism
- Disdain for the importance of human rights and the rule of law
- Use of torture and secret prisons
- Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause
- Suppression of dissent
- A controlled mass media
- Obsession with national security
- Religion and ruling elite tied together
- Power of corporations protected
- Rampant cronyism and corruption
- Fraudulent elections
These steps lead to a potential tipping point, from democracy to something different. Something ominous.
T2PTV has created an affiliate program for the film for interested webmasters. I have chosen not to participate, in part because I want to keep this website ad free, but also because I'd rather all monies for this film go to its intrepid makers and marketers. The film is one I can recommend honestly, and because its message is important.
Posted by Valtin at 11:19 PM
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Jesse Ventura's Appearance Schedule
NATIONAL TV
5/11 "Larry King Live" / CNN-TV
5/18 "The View" / ABC-TV
5/18 "Hannity" / FOX News Channel
5/19 "FOX & Friends" / FOX News Channel
5/23 "Geraldo at Large" / FOX News Channel
NATIONAL RADIO
5/15 "Sean Hannity Radio" / WABC-AM
5/18 "Brian and the Judge" / FOX News Channel
5/19 "The Howard Stern Show" / SIRIUS XM Radio
5/19 "The Opie & Anthony Show" / SIRIUS XM Radio
5/19 "Vinnie Politan on Stars Too" / SIRIUS XM Radio
5/19 "Chris T & Meredith on Road Dog" / SIRIUS XM Radio
LOCAL RADIO
5/6 "The Brad Davis Show" / WDRC-AM (Bloomfield, CT)
5/6 "Gary O'Brien and Friends" / WDWS-AM (Champaign, IL)
5/7 "The Dave Elliott Show" / WGUF-FM (Bonita Springs, FL)
5/8 "The Jim Engster Show" / WRKF-FM (Baton Rouge, LA)
5/18 "The Jim Kerr Rock 'n Roll Show" / WAXQ-FM (New York, NY)
5/21 "The C4 Show" / WBAL-AM (Baltimore, MD)
5/22 "Toucher and Rich" / WBCN-FM (Boston, MA)
5/22 "Trapper Jack anf the Morning Show" / WDOK-FM (Cleveland, OH)
5/22 "The Rocky and Sue Show" / WKRZ-FM (Pittston, PA)
5/22 "Connie and Fish" / WQBW-FM (Greenfield, WI)
5/22 "Paul & Young Ron Show" / WBGG-FM (Miami, FL)
5/22 "The Regular Guys" / WNNX-FM (Atlanta, GA)
5/22 "The KBCO Morning Show with Bret Saunders" / KBCO-FM (Denver)
5/22 "The Todd N Tyler Radio Empire" / KEZO-FM (Omaha, NE)
5/22 "Jen and Steve Morning Show" / WXLO-FM (Boston, MA)
5/22 "The 98ROCK Morning Show" / WIYY-FM (Baltimore, MD)
5/22 "Tony and Kristie in the Morning" / WRMM-FM (Rochester, NY)
5/22 "The Jorge Sedano Show" / WAXY-AM (Miami, FL)
5/22 "The Rod Ryan Show" / KTBZ-FM (Houston, TX)
5/22 "The K92FM Morning Show" / WWKA-FM (Orlando, FL)
5/22 "Zito and Garrett" / WJBX-FM (Estero, FL)
5/22 "Atlanta's Country Morning Show" / WKHX-FM (Atlanta, GA)
5/22 "The Johnny Dare Morning Show" / KQRC-FM
5/22 "Danny Joe Crofford Mornings" / KABZ-FM (Little Rock, AR)
5/22 "Andrew Z in the Morning" / WVKS-FM (Toledo, OH)
5/22 "The Danny Bonaduce Show" / WYSP-FM (Philadelphia, PA)
5/22 "TJ Trout" / KZRR-FM (Albuquerque, NM)
5/22 "The Morning Show" / KINK-FM (Portland, OR)
5/22 "Lewis and Floorwax Show" / KRFX-FM (Denver, CO)
5/22 "Mikey Morning Show" / KIOZ-FM (San Diego, CA)
6/1 "Rover's Morning Glory" / WMMS-FM (Independence, OH)
REGIONAL RADIO
5/6 "Talk Radio News Service" / Washington, D.C.
ONLINE
5/8 "Common Sense with Dan Carlin"
http://www.dancarlin.com/disp.php/cs
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Remembering What I Liked About Jesse Ventura
By Brian Lambert - May 19, 2009, 8:42 PM - MspMag.com
By all appearances, our guy Jesse Ventura only has to clear his throat to be invited on damn near every talk show in the country. I mean, good lord, he's out there again flogging the paperback release of last year's book! But, like Ann Coulter (only better looking), Ventura is such guaranteed good copy, a font of such reliable, juice-injected sound bites that The View and Fox & Friends, and, even his nitwitness, Sean Hannity, would book him if they heard he was signing a credit card tab at the last Blarney Stone in Manhattan.
It is, of course, dangerous to get wistful about The Body. I mean, for every episode where he was disarmingly lucid and truly did cut through the burbling moats of bulls**t surrounding politics in America, we suffered through three episodes of petulant self-absorption, the net effect of which was that he never built any kind of organization beyond his own cult of personality.
But all that withstanding, you can't help but think we . . . the people of Minnesota . . . would be in a far, far better place today if he were still in the corner office at the capitol. As we try to cobble together an adult response to our state deficit we saddled with quiet, cordial, and calculating Tim Pawlenty, who, when you really cut to the nut of the drama up at the Legislature these days, is every bit the political narcissist that Ventura is, holding every school, hospital, cop, and teacher in the state hostage in order to protect his career viability.
Anyone in the media has an extreme conflict of interest when it comes to assessing Ventura. I mean, what reporter or pundit wouldn't want the guy back? He wrote himself. Hit the red start button and let the tape roll. It was so damned easy. (Even easier if you asked him a question he didn't want to answer. Good stuff . . . good stuff.)
But like I say, every so often, he'd hit it exactly right. That stuff about organized religion? Spot on. (Officially, of course, no one in "organized journalism" dared agree . . . in public.) Or my personal favorite . . . the time he was asked about a snowmobiling accident where a couple drunks trying to skip their machines over open water drowned themselves instead. "Thinning the herd," said Ventura, avoiding the usual lame, kneejerk eulogizing about "the tragic loss of two fine Minnesotans."
So there was Ventura last night "debating" Sean Hannity—who, yes, really did say that George W. Bush "inherited the fallout of 9/11." As we all remember, Ventura's MSNBC show crashed and burned weeks after the longest gestation period this side of a Siberian mammoth. (No one tells him what to do, much less where to turn and when to shut up.) But on Hannity's set, where the average non-wingnut usually caves to the torrent of fantasy facts ("Bill Clinton was offered Osama bin Laden on a plate five times . . . "), Hannity's three-card monty rhetoric, and constant self-beatification. Ventura swatted him down like a contented ox flattenening a horse fly with his great matted tail.
Then he was back this morning (Tuesday) on the predictably preposterous Fox & Friends, batting down the rote, paranoid assertions of co-host Brian Kilmeade. (As he did on The View, Ventura challenged the torture apologists in the room to explain why if torture is so effective and lawful we didn't use it on Tim McVeigh and John Nichols when we had good reason to believe there was imminent danger that right-wing militias might blow up another building full of daycare kids?)
Here he is on The View dispensing with Elizabeth Hasselbeck.
Ventura is good in these mostly ditsy, unashamedly theatrical settings because . . . well, they're a lot like pro wrestling. It's all heroes and villains. He always has the advantage in terms of physical presence, and in the case of transparent chickenhawks like Hannity and the Fox & Friends warrior anchors, none of whom ever got close to volunteering to fight for their country or having "Muslims" shoot bullets at them, he has the check-and-checkmate advantage of actual, experiential gravitas . . . even if you take that "jumping into shark-infested waters" and "hunting man" stuff with a dense block of salt.
So that . . . and the fact that it's hard to imagine him looking around and concluding that a compromise over cuts and tax increases to maintain vital services (and that includes) schools trumps whatever he may have said years ago about "no new taxes." I could be wrong. I often am. But Ventura, as out there as he was, had a set of core values that wouldn't let some stale promise from another economic era throw his constituents into misery.
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Jesse Ventura in the News
Jesse Ventura working on new series for truTVSeptember 30, 2008 |
This Friday, June 18, 2004 file picture shows former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. with what he called "his new look." Ventura will be working on a new conspiracy-theory series for truTV. (AP Photo/Jim McKnight) |
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Jesse Ventura will be working on a new conspiracy-theory series for truTV.
Production of a pilot featuring Ventura begins next month. The project comes from A. Smith & Co. Productions, which also produces "Hell's Kitchen" and "Trading Spaces."
Ventura will travel the country, investigating cases and getting input from believers and skeptics before passing judgment on a theory's validity.
"Ventura will hunt down answers, plunging viewers into a world of secret meetings, midnight surveillance, shifty characters and dark forces," truTV said in a statement.
Ventura, a former pro wrestler and Minnesota governor, hosted a weekly talk show that lasted two months on MSNBC in 2003. He was also a TV commentator for the XFL, an alternative football league that folded after airing for one season on NBC in 2000. Elected governor in 1998, he did not run for re-election in 2002. Jesse Ventura working on new series for truTV
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Jesse Ventura 2012?
September 02, 2008, by Domenico Montanaro, MSNBC
From NBC/NJ's Carrie Dann - MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. -- Ron Paul supporters may have found a new champion.
In boisterous remarks at today's Rally for the Republic, former Minnesota governor and professional wrestling personality Jesse Ventura suggested that he is open to a presidential run in 2012 if enthusiasm for "The Revolution" stays strong.
"If I see it over the next two to three years," thundered Ventura at the conclusion of a speech to several thousand Ron Paul supporters in the Target Center in Minneapolis. "If I see it start to rise up and if this country shows me that it's worth it for me, then maybe in 2012… ."
The crowd -- which has raucously booed allusions to this year's presidential candidates and cheered Paul's hands-off ideals at the all-day rally today -- burst into deafening applause at Ventura's suggestion.
"I will be watching," Ventura shouted over the ruckus. "If I see it, in 2012, we'll give them a race they'll never forget."
Ventura's prediction came at the end of remarks in which he questioned the U.S. government's involvement in a 9/11 plot, lambasted the Patriot Act, and advocated for gun rights so that "if our government gets out of control, we have the ability to rise up and change it." (He also prophesied success if such a citizen uprising against the U.S. government were to occur, saying "We threw everything we had at Vietnam, and they withstood it all.")
Ventura, a third party candidate who unexpectedly catapulted to victory in the 1998 gubernatorial election, hopes to be a political figure in the mold of Rep. Ron Paul, whose grassroots movement garnered surprising support during the primary season.
The former Minnesota governor toyed with a run for U.S. Senate this year but chose not to at the eleventh hour; before his remarks today, he told reporters backstage that he made that decision by coin toss.
"I wrote the book "Don't Start the Revolution Without Me," Ventura told fans today, shortly before declaring his possible run in four years.
"Well, I'm here."
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 Archetypal Psychologies: Reflections in Honor of
James Hillman
Edited by Stanton Marlan
ISBN: 978-1-882670-54-3
524 pp.
Price: $32.95
This unique collection of essays was inspired by the wide-ranging work of James Hillman. In keeping with the
"polytheistic" spirit of archetypal psychology, Hillman's writings have
enriched the entire spectrum of our cultural imagination, challenging thinkers
in such diverse fields as philosophy, religion, history, mythology,
language, urban studies, politics, the men's movement, feminist criticism,
ethics, art, film studies, poetry, analytic practice, and more.
In this volume, Stanton Marlan brings together the work of 29 leading scholars,
practitioners, and new voices as a testament to the fecundity and influence of
archetypal psychology around the world. Archetypal Psychologies highlights the
importance both of Hillman's original contributions and of current developments
in this field. Featured in the volume are an excerpt from the developing
official biography of James Hillman, a provocative current interview with
Hillman, and a series of rare photographs. This work provides a fascinating
exploration of the innovative ideas and current controversies generated by
archetypal psychology and of how its many-faceted approach to life and culture
intersects with and enriches contemporary society. It is certain to become a
classic text in the field of archetypal psychology.
Chapter 2. Legacy of the Ancestors by Dick Russell
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TROUBLED WATERS FOR GRAY WHALES
By Dick Russell - April, 2008
A new report compiled by the California Gray Whale Coalition paints a disturbing picture of what’s happening to the "friendly" whales that migrate annually from Arctic feeding grounds to the warm lagoon birthing areas of Mexico’s Baja peninsula.
As I described in my 2001 book, Eye of the Whale, gray whales require a healthy supply of tiny crustaceans called amphipods to fuel a round-trip journey as long as 11,000 miles. Amphipods need cold, nutrient-rich waters in which to thrive and, with the warming of the Arctic seas, scientists have seen their numbers decline steadily. The National Research Council has recently noted "a cascading and possibly irreversible sequence of changes in the Bering Sea ecosystem."
The new report ("Current Threats to the Eastern North Pacific Gray Whale") cites research by marine scientist Steven Swartz that the reproductive rate of the whales "has decreased from one calf every 2.4 years to one every 3 – 4 years." The year 2007 saw the lowest calf count in thirty years, and the calves are smaller than before. Lagoon fishermen have observed thinner adult whales trying to feed on the lagoon bottom, implying that they aren’t getting enough to eat before making the migration.
There has been a considerable drop in numbers of gray whales coming into the lagoons as well. Usually there are about 2,000 at Guerrero Negro, but at the midway point of the 2008 calving season, there were only some 600. The count at Laguna San Ignacio, customarily around 300, was only 120.
As a changing climate brings more temperate weather to Baja, water temperature is now two degrees cooler in the lagoons. Experts believe that’s one reason for the decline in numbers, as gray whales are increasingly seen coming up in the Sea of Cortez and other southern areas where they haven’t customarily journeyed.
The new report also raises questions about the accuracy of the latest "field report" undertaken by the National Marine Fisheries Service, which estimated the gray whale population to have remained at approximately the same level as its last published estimate of 18,000-plus in 2001. At the International Whaling Commission meeting in 2007, the U.S. delegation said the population was at 17,000. These figures are already considerably below the approximately 23,000 estimated whales at the time grays were taken off the Endangered Species List in 1994.
Climate change may be the biggest threat to the gray whale population, but it is far from the only one. "The Federal Government has recently sold 29.4 million acres in the Chukchi Sea for oil lease sales," in the midst of the gray whales’ critical feeding habitat. With the Minerals Management Service’s Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) estimating a 33 to 50 percent chance of a 1,000-barrel oil spill in the area, clearly the impact on the whales would be huge.
Thirteen Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) terminals have also been proposed, along the gray whales’ near-shore migration route encompassing California, Oregon, Washington, Western Canada, and the Baja. Construction and operation of these terminals would cause underwater noise disruptive to the whales’ migration patterns.
Meanwhile, the Navy – blocked by the California courts from testing its sonar off the California coast for failure to adequately consider the impact on whales and other marine life – is now courting Alaska. Plans are afoot for the Navy to do sonar testing in the Gulf of Alaska in May, just when the gray whales are passing along the coast. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the environmental group that’s taken the lead in successful legal actions against the Navy, stated in a recent letter: "We urge the Navy, in preparing its EIS for the Gulf of Alaska, to substantially alter the approach it has taken thus far."
The mass mortalities of whales stranding in the vicinity of Navy sonar, according to the NRDC, "are likely only the tip of the iceberg of sonar’s harmful effects. Marine mammals are believed to depend on sound to navigate, find food, locate mates, avoid predators, and communicate with each other. Flooding their habitat with man-made, high-intensity noise interferes with these and other functions."
In response to all this, early in April California Assemblyman Pedro Nava called upon the U.S. Congress and the President to urge the NMFS "to undertake an immediate and comprehensive assessment of the California gray whale," and also requested the California Fish and Game Commission "to change the status of the gray whale to endangered."
Thirty years ago, gray whales first began approaching boatloads of visitors to Laguna San Ignacio, soon becoming known as the "friendly whales." As I wrote in my book, perhaps they have been trying to tell us something: "What is hurting them is hurting us. As the oceans go, so go we. Can we survive global warming? Noise pollution? The wanton carelessness about our habitats? Can we pretend to endure anything that the whales cannot? Can we come to grips with the suicidal tendency to destroy what sustains us? Is this what the gray whales are reaching out to communicate?"
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"Don't Start the Revolution without Me"
How I Came to Write a Book with Jesse Ventura
By Dick Russell
It all began, fittingly enough, in a bar in Baja. I’d heard that the governor had recently bought a house, not far from property of close friends where I often came to write during the winter. And, sure enough, one night at the local "spot" above the beach, there he was hanging out at a long table.
When the opportunity arose, I went over and sat down across from him. I’d actually met him briefly several years earlier, soon after he decided not to run for a second term in Minnesota, when he came to Dallas for the 30th anniversary marking President Kennedy’s assassination. Having heard that Mr. Ventura was a student of books about the tragedy, I gave him a copy of mine, The Man Who Knew Too Much. So that was how I re-introduced myself in Baja, and it turned out he’d liked the book very much.
A few days later, my wife and I were walking along our beach when we ran into the governor and his wife, Terry. We invited them up for a drink, which turned into dinner in the course of a long and memorable evening. What a raconteur he was! The Venturas came over once more while I was in the Baja, at which point he mentioned his interest in writing a memoir about his years as governor – and, if I came back next year, maybe we might work on it together.
When I returned, he hadn’t forgotten. We embarked on a series of weekly 90-minute interviews, which I taped in his living room about 10 minutes down the road. I would then transcribe our wide-ranging discussions, which covered everything from insightful and often amusing anecdotes about being an independent governor in a two-party system, to his thoughts on the Iraq War and economics, and much in-between.
I found that Jesse Ventura not only possessed an agile mind, but a remarkably original one. He came up with things that I’d never heard anyone say before! He was "politics, with a twist," you might say. And he sure didn’t pull any punches. The man was a breath of fresh air, as politicians go.
Over the course of six months, little by little the book came together. It was his idea to ultimately frame the story as a travel narrative, moving through reminiscences and rants as he and Terry made their long overland journey from Minnesota to southern Baja. We also decided to give Terry a real voice, with her perspective on what it was like to be the state’s First Lady adding a unique element to the story.
And it was his idea to create an ending for the book that would be, well, highly unusual and most likely extremely controversial as well. I won’t give it away here – but how could it be otherwise when you’re Jesse Ventura?
For me, the journey of assembling his story – of "becoming," in imaginative prose, a 250-pound ex-wrestler who became a maverick governor – was, to say the least, a whole lot of fun.
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"Don't be under any illusions that I'm a great man," Pete McCloskey
insisted, his steel-blue eyes fixed on his interlocutor. "I'm just
pissed off."...
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