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Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Yves Engler, Steve Poikonen March 26, 2022

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Welcome to Gorilla Radio, recorded March 26th, 2022

Fortified with the assurance of a majority government, Canada’s prime minister jetted off to Europe for “emergency” meetings at NATO’s HQ in Brussels last week. It’s fitting too in this instance that Justin Trudeau’s political mandate, like that of the Kiev regime, was neither poll earned, nor an expression of the country’s confidence in his leadership, but rather wrested from an NDP leadership too weak to defend democracy. In Ukraine, power was seized the old-fashioned way – from the barrel of a sniper rifle – as democrats bled in the streets. For Canadians, already hemorrhaging treasure in support the fascists over there, the real bleeding is perhaps yet to come.

Yves Engler is a Montréal-based activist, and author of 12 books, mostly on Canadian foreign policy, including his latest, ‘Stand on Guard For Whom? A People’s History of the Canadian Military’. He’s also a prolific essayist whose many articles appear at numerous sites online, including at his website, YvesEngler.com, where his recent articles have focused on Canada’s growing involvement in the crisis in Ukraine, including ‘Ukraine No-Fly Zone “Could Lead to End of Human Civilization“.’

Yves Engler in the first half.

And; a too brief ray of light shone down on journalist and publisher, Julian Assange last week. The world’s preeminent political prisoner wed behind the walls of London’s Belmarsh Prison, where he’s been held contrary to all norms of British and international justice for nearly three years. The saga of Assange’s struggle for freedom is well known to listeners of my second guest’s Pre-News News Program, Slow News Day, available at Rokfin. It’s where you go to get informed BEFORE the s*it hits the fan!

Steve Poikonen is an activist, documentary filmmaker, contributor to the Union of the Unwanted and MCSC Networks, and host of Slow News Day. He’s also been an organizer with Action4Assange, co-host of the #FreeAssange Vigil, and has participated in and helped organize multiple actions for Assange’s release in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere in the U.S.

Steve Poikonen and justice denied again for Julian Assange in the second half.

But first, Yves Engler and the dreadful inertia dragging Canada further into the mire of war.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio and serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Dave Lindorff August 2nd, 2021

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Welcome back to Gorilla Radio’s Home Edition, recorded August 2nd, 2021

And welcome too to the dog days of planet Earth. As the northern hemisphere swelters in record-setting fashion, perhaps its time we talked again about Global Warming and its inevitable consequences?

Or we can turn to a quick Olympics update of the latest in the Simone Biles saga… She whaaat!!! …And now, what were we talking about again?

Fact is, sea levels will rise as the last of the World’s ice melts. What that means for humanity is too terrible to contemplate, so most of us just don’t do it. But, one of the impending calamities missed even by those who plan for the coming crises is, what happens to our massive and still growing, mostly toxic waste dumps located at near sea-level?

Dave Lindorff is a longtime, Izzy Award-winning journalist, author, and documentary filmmaker. He’s also founder of the web news site, This Can’t Be Happening.net, where his latest piece, “Coastal Landfills Are No Match for Rising Seas” appears.

Today for the whole hour, Dave Lindorff and America not wavering but sinking…

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: https://cfuv.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.com

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, J.B. MacKinnon, Eva Bartlett June 17, 2021

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Welcome back to Gorilla Radio’s Home Edition, recorded June 10th and 12th, 2021

After the shock, fear, and uncertainty had subsided somewhat, benefits of the pandemic soon became apparent. Who didn’t marvel in those early days at the serene stillness; the peace and quietude settling over the cites like a muffling snowfall; surprising commuters and putting a halt to our frantic everyday? And didn’t the stars seem closer; the air fresher? And, wasn’t there too an unaccustomed moment to hear ones thoughts; to take time to think?

Bestselling, award-winning Canadian author J.B. MacKinnon’s first book, ‘The 100-Mile Diet’, (co-written with Alisa Smith) was an international sensation, catalyzing the locavore movement. He followed that with ‘The Once and Future World: Nature As It Was, As It Is, As It Could Be’, the poignant examination of Nature’s past, the parlous anthropocene present, and our possible futures. His latest is ‘The Day the World Stops Shopping‘ a book he says began as a thought experiment and work of “imaginative reporting” that World events caught up with.

J.B. MacKinnon in the first half.

And; the result of last month’s Syrian presidential election was hardly surprising. The besieged country’s leader Bashar al-Assad won by a margin poll-watching cliches like “landslide victory” can’t do justice. Equally unsurprising was the Western press and “World Community” reaction to that victory.

Eva Bartlett is an independent Canadian journalist and activist who has lived in and reported extensively from Syria over the last decade. She’s been one of the few Western witnesses to the destruction of war from where the missiles and bombs land, and one of even fewer to fix properly the blame on those responsible for it. Eva was in Syria again witnessing both the reelection of Assad, and widespread celebration of national survival.

Eva Bartlett and Syria, still standing after a decade of war in the second half.

But first, J.B. MacKinnon and stopping what we must, and can’t, stop: Shopping.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: https://cfuv.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.com

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Rebecca Gordon, Dave Lindorff February 25, 2021

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Welcome back to Gorilla Radio’s Home Edition recorded on the dates, February 15th and 17th, 2021.

And welcome to human civilization’s last minute and a half or so of existence. At least that’s according to some of the World’s foremost brainiacs, the folks over at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, and their famous Doomsday Clock. It’s been a grand run though, these last 10,000 odd years; but as the saying goes, “all good things must come to an end.” Pity too, because as recently as the turn of the new century, that clock had gone retrograde, granting us a full nine minutes grace. But now, just twenty years into George Bush’s “generational war” it looks like we may run out of generations before finishing it. My, how the time has flown!

Rebecca Gordon is an educator in philosophy at the University of San Francisco and for it’s Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good. She is too author of the books, ‘Mainstreaming Torture: Ethical Approaches in the Post-9/11 United States’, and ‘American Nuremberg: The U.S. Officials Who Should Stand Trial for Post-9/11 War Crimes, and a frequent contributor to LA Progressive, Responsible Statecraft, and The Nation Magazine’s TomDispatch column, where I found her recent article, ‘The Fire Next Time: Climate Change, the Bomb, or the Flame of Hope?‘.

Rebecca Gordon in the first half.

And; while it’s all fine and good to dance to the departure of the Orange Menace, a sober look at the wreckage he wrought, and what Dragon’s Teeth remain is necessary. That justice is still not seen to have been done in either the election, or in addressing who directed the mobs attacking the Capitol afterward both undermines the legitimacy of American democracy now, and sully its prospects for the future.

Dave Lindorff is an award-winning journalist, author, and founding member of the media collective, ThisCantBeHappening.net. Lindorff’s book titles include, ‘The Case for Impeachment: Legal Arguments for Removing President George W. Bush from Office’ and ‘This Can’t Be Happening! Resisting the Disintegration of American Democracy.’ Dave has charted the ruinously slow departure of the 45th president both at This Can’t Be Happening and here at Gorilla Radio.

Dave Lindorff and King Trump’s fourth act in the second half.

But first, Rebecca Gordon and counting down 100 seconds to a diminished tomorrow.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: https://cfuv.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.com

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Rebecca Gordon February 15, 2021

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Welcome back to Gorilla Radio’s Home Edition recorded on this date, February 15th, 2021.

And welcome to human civilization’s last minute and a half or so of existence. At least that’s according to some of the World’s foremost brainiacs, the folks over at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, and their famous Doomsday Clock. It’s been a grand run though, these last 10,000 odd years; but as the saying goes, “all good things must come to an end.”

Pity too, because as recently as the turn of the new century, that clock had gone retrograde, granting us a full nine minutes grace. But now, just twenty years into George Bush’s “generational war” it looks like we may run out of generations before finishing it. My, how the time has flown!

Rebecca Gordon and counting down 100 seconds to a diminished tomorrow.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: https://cfuv.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.com

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Jennifer Abbott September 16, 2020

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Welcome back to Gorilla Radio’s continuing efforts, NOT broadcast live from CFUV Radio in the basement of the Student Union Building at the University of Victoria, but emanating live-to-tape via Skype from our home-based … studios on this date, September 16th, 2020.

Are there any among you listening not worried about the state of the natural World; any unaware of collapsing populations of insects, of birds, of the fish great and small; any not lamenting the expected fate of the jungle cat, elephant, or polar bear? Are there any of you out there still willing to debate the issue; willing to question the fact and scope of the emerging calamity? And, are there any left who believe it’s not too late to avert climate disaster?

If that’s the case, I’m sorry to be the one to tell you: “Yes, it IS too late, baby”.

But, just because we are past the point of being able to preserve “our way of life” doesn’t mean we can’t still live full and meaningful lives.

Jennifer Abbott is an internationally renowned, award-winning documentary filmmaker. Her screen credits include, ‘A Cow at My Table’, ‘Us & Them’, the short, ‘Brave New Minds’, and the seminal film of our young century, ‘THE CORPORATION’.

Now, the writer, director, editor, sound designer, co-producer, and all ’round indy film bottle-washer has two titles premiering on the Canadian festival circuit, ‘The New Corporation: The Unfortunately Necessary Sequel’, again in collaboration with Joel Bakan, and ‘The Magnitude of All Things’, a deeply personal and poignant film, “explor[ing] the emotional and psychological dimensions of the climate crisis and the relationship between grief and hope in times of personal and planetary change.”

Today, Jennifer Abbott and The Magnitude of All Things.

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Dr. Tim Takaro August 18, 2020

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Before Covid-19 swallowed the World we worried about banal issues like the climate crisis and survival of terrestrial life on a way too rapidly changing planet. But even if the environmental problems of our creation are no joke, our elected officials seem unable to take the situation seriously; some apparently wanting to accelerate the process. Clearly, we have to try harder.

Right now, not far outside New Westminster, near Hume Park, along the Brunette River, twenty meters above the ground is a tree-sit. Activists there are barring the way of the infamous TransMountain Pipeline Expansion project by occupying the trees that stand in the way of the final leg of the TMX ‘s route to terminus in Burnaby.

Dr. Tim Takaro is a scientist-physician, health researcher, educator, and Associate Dean of Research at Simon Fraser University. Takaro has dedicated his career to studying the human health impacts of climate change, and the more difficult task of communicating to those in control of environmental policy the dire and imminent consequence of failure to alter our societal course. Tim was the first to occupy the trees along the Brunette, and says of the TMX, “In addition to the direct health risks of the project, I am considering the future of my children, their children and future generations around the world.”

Today, Dr. Tim Takaro on environmental intersectionality and obstructing passage of the TransMountain pipeline.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: http://cfuv.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/