05/28/13 05/28/13 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] >> from pacifica, this is democracy now! >> [indiscernible] we are not tories. >> students and teachers in chicago rally as the city plans to close 50 schools and the

largest mass school closing ever in a single u.s. city. some 30,000 students will be affected, most of them african- american. then, billionaire business tycoon penny pritzker appears headed for confirmation as commerce secretary despite her role in the subprime lending scandal. >> what do have to say to those who lost significant sums of money because of this venture? >> senator, i regret the failure of superior bank. it was not an outcome or situation that i felt -- i feel badly about that. >> if confirmed, penny pritzker would become one of the wealthiest cabinet secretaries in u.s. history. we will speak of senior editor of "david moberg in these david. and then, alice walker. why am i a writer?

wide to have a conscience? i think all people who feel there is injustice in the world anywhere should learn as much of it is they can bear. that is our duty. >> we will speak with alice walker about her newest book, "the cushion in the road: meditation and wandering as the whole world awakens to being in harm's way." her newest collection of poems, "the world will follow rajoy," and a new film about her life, "alice walker: beauty in truth." all of that and more coming up. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. diplomats have ended an arms embargo on syria, raising the possibility some european countries could begin selling weapons to rebels fighting president bashar al-assad. european union renewed economic sanctions against syria but failed to reach a consensus on

extending the same arms ban after britain and france sought to ease it. british foreign secretary william hague hailed the move. >> the european union has agreed to bring to an end the arms embargo on the syrian opposition, and to maintain other sanctions on syria and the other existing sanctions on the syrian regime. this is the outcome the united kingdom wanted. it has been difficult for many nations and that is why we have had this long discussion today. all over the last 12 or 13 hours or so. but i think it is the right decision. >> following the decision, russia now says it will move ahead with deliveries of anti- aircraft missiles to syria. the al-assad regime received another boost saturday when the head of the lebanese militant group hezbollah about to commit his fighters to defending the syrian president. in the latest sign of spillover from the conflict unidentified gunmen reportedly killed three soldiers at a lebanese border

checkpoint today before fleeing into syria. meanwhile, arizona senator john mccain paid a surprise visit to syria on monday were he met with leaders of the rebel group free syrian army. mccain has pushed for more direct u.s. involvement in the conflict including arming the rebels. journalists with the french newspaper le monde are reinforcing claims the syrian government used chemical weapons against rebel forces. they say they witnessed multiple chemical attacks. following one attack, a newspaper photographer reportedly suffered blurred vision and respiratory trouble for days. car bombings hit shiite areas in the iraqi capital baghdad. more than 100 more were wounded. the blasts were the latest sign iraq is reaching zero level of sectarian violence not seen in years. a u.s. marine was killed in a gunbattle with police early sunday in texas after allegedly killing one person and wounding five others in a shooting rampage that spanned dozens of miles.

officials said the 23-year-old esteban smith had been stationed at camp lejeune in north carolina. a new york times investigation has found right wing groups that complained of extra vetting by the irs or engaged in activity that actually did appear to merit extra scrutiny. the groups reportedly tested rules limiting political activity for certain tax-exempt organizations by sponsoring political ads and organizing members to campaign for republican presidential candidate mitt romney. tax rules prevent social welfare groups from participating in elections as their primary activity. one group that complained of undue irs scrutiny spent thousands on ads for a republican congressional candidate, failed to report the spending on its tax return, and denied participating in such activities on a form. in cambodia, at least 23 garment workers were injured monday night when police used stun batons to disperse a protest at a factory of a clothing for this

company nike. thousands of workers, most of them women, have blocked a road outside the factory. they're demanding an additional $14 a month on top of their $74 per month minimum wage. earlier this month, at least two workers were killed and a collapse of a cambodian factory that made shoes for the japanese company asics. last week's killing a british soldier in london has sparked a wave of anti muslim hate crimes. on monday, right-wing protesters marched through london chanting anti muslim slogans. on sunday night, a mosque in the north of england was firebombed. british police have arrested 10 suspects in connection with the death of soldier lee rigby, who was run over and then slashed with meat cleavers. one of the main suspects had reportedly been captured in kenya in 2010 and handed over to british authorities on suspicion of attempting to work with the somali militant group al-shabab. the british human rights groups

said the suspect reported being tortured in kenya. they also said british intelligence services attempted to recruit him as an informant last year. police in france are searching for a man who stabbed a french soldier in the neck while he was on patrol near paris. the soldier survived saturday's attack which a police spokesperson said bore similarities to the one in london three days earlier. great don't have to be a observer to see the similarities. be agreedhave to observer to see people are taking inspiration from acts abroad and replacing them here. >> at least four people were killed and afghan capital kabul friday when taliban militants launched a coordinated attack on a compound affiliated with the united nations. the hours long assault began with a suicide bombing outside the international organization for migration. far crumble leaders and the colombian government have reached an agreement on land

reform and what could be a major step toward a long-awaited peace deal. the plan would provide farmers with loans and other aid as well as creating a land bank for redistributing farmland. more than half of farms in colombia are roughly owned by 1% of landowners. cuban diplomat carlos fernandez read the joint statement from colombia and the farc which came during peace talks underway in cuba. >> what we have agreed to in this accord is the beginning of .adical transformation it is centered on the people, the small farmer, access to and distribution of land, a fight against poverty and the stimulation of production. >> in the u.s., lawmakers or lawyers for maricopa county sheriff joe arpaio say they will appear federal judge's ruling that his office violated the

constitutional rights of latinos by targeting them for traffic stops and illegally detaining them based on the race and ethnicity. on friday, u.s. district judge murray snow ordered the sheriff's office to stop using race as a factor in who it stops. the ruling came as part of a class-action lawsuit brought by latino drivers. the sheriff's office is facing some personal rights lawsuit filed by the u.s. justice department. and oregon, a 17-year-old boy has been arrested for allegedly plotting to blow up his high school in an all-out attack them off in both explosive devices and guns. investigators reportedly found six bombs in grant acord's bedroom. rallies were held across the globe saturday to protest agricultural giant monsanto and its genetically modified seeds. organizers said march against monsanto actions were held in 52 countries and 436 cities around the world, including new york city and mexico city. >> we are marching for clean food because it is our birthright.

all in favor say aye. >> aye! >> we are marching for the labeling of genetically modified foods because we have the right to know what is in our food, say aye. >> aye! >> mexicans would be converted into slaves. one would have to buy their seats for this company year after year. in actual road, we would be selling off our nourishment. we would not have control of our food sovereignty. >> those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with aaron maté. >> welcome to all our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. it is almost june and students across the country are counting down to the summer break. today we look at chicago where a record number of schools are preparing to close their doors for good. in a controversial vote last

week, the chicago board of education voted to close 50 of the city's public schools. it is the largest mass school closing ever in one u.s. city. some 30,000 students will be effected, around 90 percent of them african-american. chicago mayor rahm emanuel has pushed for the closures, saying the city will save more than $500 billion, half of its deficit. proponents say will hit schools that are underperforming and underutilized. a vocal coalition of parents, teachers, and students has fought back. >> a protests of public hearings, closure opponents have denounced the plan as discriminatory for overwhelmingly targeting african-american and latino neighborhoods. they warn the closures will lead to overcrowded classrooms, and endanger those students forced to walk longer distances to their new schools. after the vote, alex lyons of the group save our west side schools said the school district is putting children in harm's way. >> i am very, very disappointed and upset and the rubber stamp

vote that was taken by the board of elections to take our kids from the classroom and put them on the front row of killings, , seeing war zones things a kid should not seek to go to school. >> the vote to close some chicago schools may be historic, but it already follows around 100 other school closures in chicago since 2001. ahead of the vote, a group of parents filed two lawsuits saying these new closures violate the americans with disabilities act and illinois civil rights law. >> to discuss the chicago closures, we're joined by two guests. in chicago, we're joined by jesse sharkey. in new york, we are joined by diane ravitch, author of the bestselling book, "the death and life of the great american school system: how testing and

choice are undermining education." we welcome you both to democracy now! jesse sharkey, explain the latest and wide these schools are being closed and what you are doing about it. >> thank you for having me on, first of all. it has been a shift in rationale about why they're closing schools. what they have said is it will save money and that the budget deficit to worry about. now they're saying it will allow them to better serve the students. both rationales are averages. as far as saving money, the district or the city will spend $300 million to renovate a new .tadium for a basketball team we do not believe it will say this much money. we definitely don't think this will help the students being affected. in all of the previous rounds, we found the university chicago

research shows over 90% of the students wind up with a worse educational outcome as a result of their schools being closed. this will be harmful to the students and the public school system as a whole, and to the people who work there as well. >> when the closures were announced in march, chicago mayor rahm emanuel was across the country on a ski vacation with his family. when he got back, he defended the plan to close some of his city's schools. >> to deal with the 54 schools was not taken lightly, but take it with the notion of how do we make sure that every child can get to a quality school with a quality education? >> i want to bring in diane ravitch. the argument here is there is around 100,000 empty seats that are wasting taxpayer money. what is your response to that? >> over the past several years, we have seen federal government and a lot of local governments saying that kids need smaller schools.

in new york city, many schools have been broken up into five or six schools and many new small schools have been created. all of these schools could have served as the ideal small schools. there's really no reason to close them rid many people think it may have been paid back to the teachers' union for having the strike last september. other cities that have closed schools have found no cost savings because the children still need services, still need teachers, so there really is no cost savings. emanuel's part, he's fallen in the footsteps of his predecessor arnie duncan. arne duncan had this idea that the way to improve schools is to close them, which is a ridiculous idea. he closed three schools in 2002 and two years later he announced his reform plan, which he called renaissance 2010. the heart of that plan was to close schools and open new ones and that was somehow miraculously going to improve education.

not only did not improve education in chicago, it did not improve education and in this latest wave of school closings by rahm emanuel, $3 the first three schools that are now attacking closed and reopened have been closed again. >> how significant is this school closure -- schools closure, i should say, in the context of education in america and the united states? >> what is a terrible is the people have come to accept the added that closing schools is a reform strategy. as i mentioned, the one who started this was arne duncan. >> secretary of education. >> we announced it in new york city or the mayor has closed like something up 150 schools. mass of school closings under way in philadelphia and detroit. in city after city, the civic

and business elite and whoever is put in charge of the superintendent has taken the position they will close schools. what they're mostly doing is privatizing them. closing schools argument is not simply about public schools getting better, which it -- they don't and the kids are not sent to better schools, but equally low performing schools. not all the schools being closed [indiscernible] it is part of a larger scheme to advance privatization, to create private schools that are non-union. chicago now has about 75,000 children in non-union charter schools. >> the mayor says to close this massive debt? >> that is their claim. the mayor has also said there is not enough money but he will refuse to consider raising new taxes. he also set aside about a quarter billion dollars a year, sort of a real-estate sludge

find, finance fund. we do see this as an attempt to close schools and replace them with nonunion charter schools. chicago has had signed on to the gates compact which adds 62 to articles in the next four years. even if they close traditional public neighborhood schools, what some of these schools have been around for over 100 years and survived two world wars and a great depression but have not survived this mayor. talking about closing schools because there are too many "seats" their opening many other schools. the rationale begins to fall apart. the rationale keeps shifting. this is the third set of justifications they have made. >> the choices the city of chicago is making, where they put the money and where they take it out? is right, it ise not about saving money or giving

kids a better education because there is solid research that shows most of the kids who moved from a closed school to another school, there's no change at all for them. this is really about the privatization movement under way across the country. i think rahm emanuel wanted to be the biggest, baddest in the boldest by closing the most schools. >> what is happening in chicago instead, where the money is going? >> it is going to tax breaks for billionaires like penny pritzker and other people who are developing and building the city. this is not about children or the education. rahm emanuel does not have an educational plan, but economical development plan bridge this is where the schools fit in, to close schools and open more privately chartered schools. >> jesse sharkey, the impact on students, we heard one parent say in the beginning and that

this will for students into a longer walk to school and it happens across king lines. >> we are concerned about safety. one thing about saving money, one part of the plan which will save money and be very detrimental to students, they intend to massively increase class size. both in the schools that are receiving closed students, the students of closed schools, and also across the district. we know small class size is educationally effective, especially preliminary school students in the lower grades and disadvantaged students -- the exact students started by disclosures. we think classroom sizes will spike because of this. safety is a concern as well. we're talking of 50 schools and some of the toughest neighborhoods in chicago. they have not had sort of adequate planning time to make safety plans.

when this was announced in late march, the people responsible for helping kids get to school safely did not even know their schools were on the list. the district is scrambling to play catch up. to make a massive, radical, and frankly, irreversible experiment here with people's children. >> this is happening under a democratic and ministration, diane ravitch. you served as secretary of education under george h.w. bush. how does this philosophy, approach compare? >> i was assistant secretary of education. what has been most disheartening, those who care about public education across the country, is president obama and army duncan launched basically the same program as no child left behind, only more punitive. no child behind was one of the remedies the last one of the remedies is that scores did not go up and up and up as schools

closed. arne duncan launched something called race to the top, which said, here are billions of dollars and if you accept any of this money, one thing you agree to is to close schools. he calls a turnaround, a transformation. here is a democratic administration that has bought the republican line of fully. i was asked by reporter, how are republican so willing to collaborate? i said president obama has adopted the republican position on education, which has always been -- testing, choice, and accountability. the accountability is people get fired and schools closed. the democratic agenda has been based on equity. the kids with the greatest needs should have the smallest class sizes and the most resources. that is the reason for federal aid to education, to try to level the playing field. president obama has abandoned

the traditional democratic approach, unfortunately, and embrace the republican approach. that is why it is a little push back in congress. >> this is one of the most vocal campaigners against the chicago school closures, 9-year-old boy, third grade student at marcus garvey elementary school in johnson named asean britt he brought the crowd to its feet as he spoke out against mayor rahm emanuel. >> rahm emanuel thinks we are all toys. he thinks he can come into our schools and move our kids. [indiscernible] he don't care about these kids. they need safety. [applause] rahm emanuel does not care about our schools. he is not caring about safety. he only cares about his kids and

what he needs. he don't care about nobody else but himself. [applause] we are going to city hall. we are not toys. we. toys. education is our right, that is why we have to fight! that isn is our right, why we have! have! ] >> his school was initially on the chopping block but it is one of four schools spirit and last week's vote. , want to thank jesse sharkey vice-president of the chicago teachers union, and diane ravitch, assistant secretary of education under george h.w. bush, best-selling author of over 20 books, including, "the

death and life of the great american school system: how testing and choice are undermining education." when we come back, we stay in chicago to talk about penny bytzker, the person chosen president obama to be the secretary of commerce. stay with us. ♪ [music break]

>> "teach your children well." this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with aaron maté. >> we turn now from the chicago school closings to a former

chicago board of education member -- the billionaire business tycoon penny pritzker. she appears headed for confirmation as commerce secretary. her family started the hyatt hotel chain and is a close friend of president obama. in 2008, she served as the national finance chair of his presidential campaign. at her confirmation hearing thursday republican senator jon thune of south dakota asked her about her ties to superior bank, a chicago-based bank owned by her family. superior failed after penny pritzker and her family expanded subprime lending. >> there were a number of banks that had claims they lost over $100,000 in savings including one who reportedly deposited her entire account was superior and month before it failed. what you have to say to those who lost significant sums of money because of this venture? >> senator, i regret the failure of senator bank. it was not an outcome or

situation that -- i feel very badly about that. >> if confirmed, penny pritzker with a net worth of over $1.5 billion, would be by far the wealthiest member of the current cabinet. and one of the wealthiest, secretaries in history. bloomberg news reported pritzker recently inadvertently understated a portion of her income by at least $80 million in the form required for nomination. last year she received over $53 million in consulting fees from her family's offshore trust in the bahamas. >> as an air of the hyatt hotel chain and former head of the chicago board of education, pritzker has come under scrutiny for her clashes with labor unions. according to the afl-cio, the hyatt has exhibited a broad pattern of labor abuses, including aggressive outsourcing, low wages, and the mistreatment of housekeepers. hotelthe hotels worker -- workers union and the chicago teachers union have opposed nomination. chicago teachers union president karen lewis said --

by davidwe're joined moberg. his recent article is headlined, "3 troubling things to know about billionaire penny pritzker." toid moberg, welcome democracy now! what are those three troubling things? >> one of the things has to do and the anti labor record it is a record simply not up attacking labor unions -- although, there are to the prominent examples. one is this battle with the night here, where the hyatt has refused to reach an agreement with the hotel union as based on the pattern that other major hotel chains have already adopted, and it has pursued a pattern of subcontracting of

work and general harsh treatment of its work force at the hotel's. in terms of another prominent pritzker waspenny one of the prime instigators of passage of a law in the state of illinois that took away many of the rights from the chicago teachers union and provoked a long strike here in chicago. first of all, there has been the specific anti liver record, but more broadly, there has been a policies that pritzker has promoted that work to the disadvantage of working-class people in chicago and around the country. a history of

conflict of interest that the pritzkers have shown in terms of the ways they have used their public ties to advance their own private interest. for example, in terms of superior bank, one of the other important things to know about the pritzker record, as a family they got financial aid from the federal government to take over the failed savings and loan. when they ran it into the ground and that many depositors high and dry, they managed to set up an arrangement with the federal deposit insurance corp. that permitted them to actually make money off the failure of the bank, and all of this at a

the bank was leading to these lawsuits for many of the depositors. i think there are at least two reasons why this nomination was particularly disappointing from obama, even that is quite understandable given the close ties that obama and penny pritzker have had. one of those troubling issues is economic. we are still coming out of one of the worst recessions in history of the country, and the recession was triggered by a housing bubble based on subprime lending and securitization of that thenme loans collapsed as the economy began to slow down.

penny pritzker and the pritzker family's activities through superior bank really established subprime lending forstry and set the stage his eventual collapse of the economy. practicethe business record of e pritzkers is simply not what the president of any party, but especially the democratic party, should be advancing as the model. and the second concern beyond this economic issue broadly speaking that has hurt the vast majority of working people in this country, there is a political issue. as a lot of people have noted as for a number of years the democratic party that once

claimed to be the party of working people has drifted more and more to try to compete with the republican party to be the party of the rich. any kind of ties that are oflected in the lengths obama to pritzker and through pritzker beyond to many of the other financial titans in the democratic party. that all represents a kind of drift of the party itself in american politics away from any kind of representation for workers interest. >> david moberg, i want to ask about the previous nomination. president obama had already attempted to nominate penny pritzker or did nominate her in his first term, but she ultimately had to pull out.

can you talk about what the reasons were and especially this issue of offshore accounts and the family's infighting over the enormous wealth and dividing it up? basically, the nomination was withdrawn for fear of the bad publicity that might come out concerning all of these different activities of the pritzkers. the family itself, including penny pritzker, have long relied on a variety of extremes of avoiding paying taxes, which itself is hardly the kind of model that one would hope for from the commerce secretary. and much of that has been done through offshore accounts and .helters of money a lot of accounts depict penny

pritzker as if she were simply kind of an unwitting beneficiaries of things done by other people, or in some cases, the victim of things done by other people. the offshore accounts are often described as being set up before she reached adulthood. well, she has been at all for quite a long while and there's no need for her to continue to shelter income in these tax havens overseas. the administration was worried about how this would look. but increasingly, it does not seem to care that much and given the kind of kid gloves treatment from both most of the republicans and democrats and the committee, there seems to be good reason for them not to

worry about any bad publicity this time around. penny pritzker is a longtime member of the hyatt hotel chain board of directors. some hyatt housekeepers say they clean as many as 30 rooms a day, getting paid as low as $2. workers at the hyatt and as hotel in west hollywood, california have fired -- filed a complaint over the electronic system used to monitor their productivity. al jazeera recently told to a hyatt housekeeper and activist cathy youngblood about the worker's conditions. >> i've been across this country talking to hyatt hotel employees in the different respect of hotels around the country. we have things like we need proper tools and equipment such as fitted sheets, like a vacuum cleaners, adjustable tools, we do need for management to listen when we suggest a better way of doing things. we're the ones who work in the

hotel. we are the front line, the first responders. i don't think any member of the board has worked in a hotel. so if they would just sit down and listen to someone like me, i think they could learn a lot. of course, i can learn a lot from them. but also, if you are a business person, would you want to know what is going on in your hotel? >> that is cathy youngblood. the housekeepers are represented by a unite here local 11. t think this nomination is trying to send a message? >> i don't think it was intended as any kind of message to the union, necessarily. i think it represents a kind of for theallous disregard concerns unions have for the interests that the interesunions

represent, the importance for the agreements and the overall economy to the political fortunes of the democratic party. have beenit may not given a great to look -- indeed, unite here, which eventually came out strongly in opposition to the nomination, had hesitated for a while about whether it was going to make a big campaign. >> david moberg, thursday, the confirmation hearing of penny pritzker. the republicans would have had a lot to ask penny pritzker. what did you think of their questioning? not to mention the democrats. things were lot of simply not pursued.

i think it represents a kind of deference that it's shown to people of great wealth and many of these situations by both parties -- in many of these situations by both parties. the democrats are less likely -- republicans are less likely to be growing on how people amassed a fortune and democrats are vying for the support of the same group of rich people as much as they can. i think the softball questioning reflex this more troubling turn of the politics of the country away from thinking about broad interest of working people -- not just labor

unions and institutions and toward a kind of difference and that is ach, bad economic policy and bad politics. in these times" " magazine senior editor and recent article, "3 troubling things to know about billionaire penny pritzker." when we come back, alice walker. stay with us. ♪ [music break]

>> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with aaron maté. we spend the rest of the hour with the legendary author, poet, activist alice walker. in her newest book, "the cushion in the road: meditation and wandering as the whole world awakens to being in harm's way." she discusses many of the dominant themes in her life and work, including racism,

activism, palestine, africa, and president obama. the collection of essays explores her conflicting desire for deep engagement in the world and for a retreat into quiet contemplation. alice walker is the first african-american want to be awarded the pulitzer prize for fiction. she won it in 1983 for her renowned novel, "the color purple." it was later adapted into a film and musical by the same name. alice walker is the subject of a new film that plays this friday at the seattle film festival and premiered in london on international women's day in march. the film is called, "alice walker: beauty in truth." this is a clip from the trailer. claimed her space because she needed to be a writer. it saved her life in many regards. transit in her right thing is

that part of her as a citizen, a citizen of the world, a woman, a woman of the world, and an activist. >> $3 cash for pair of catalog shoes was with the midwife charged my mother for bringing me. then, saido country mom, you being the last one. and we could not, like we've done when she brought your brother, send her out to be pen and let her pick out a pig. >> whatever perspective you have, when you read her work, you know she is talking to you. isd the you in her writing really quite universal. she putseresting, herself on the firing line and that she is herself. she doesn't conform to any idea of what a black writer should

do. >> i don't know any other black that experienced what she experienced. she cares the most of her community. >> from the trailer of the new film, "alice walker: beauty in truth." in addition to her new book, and a collection of her poetry has just come out "the world will follow joy: turning madness into flowers." alice walker, welcome back. congratulations on these two books for a first, talk about, "the cushion in the road: meditation and wandering as the whole world awakens to being in harm's way." what do mean by that? >> good morning. i mean my life is so full of so much activity and yet my heart and my soul are longing for my cushion, which is a meditation cushion, where i can

contemplate, i can drop into the deep source of our lives and draw a lot of richness from the. what a discovered, it is i would sit on my christian in meditation and i prepared just a beautiful place for that, and the phone would ring and the world would call. so in some ways, i was very torn and conflicted until i realized by dreaming it, at that part of my life when i was called to the world, my solution was to take my cushion with me on the road. so that is what i have tried to do. your activism when you join the civil rights movement in mississippi over 40 years ago. i wonder if he could talk about that experience and now it has formed her activism that still continues today? >> i activism actually started when i was leaving my home in ,eorgia on the greyhound bus

and my dad took me to the bus stop. it was such a small town, there is no station. the bus to stop on the side of the road. i got on the bus and feeling the joy and emotion of the movement starting up in alabama, mississippi, and other places, i sat in the front of the bus and i was immediately forced to the back of the bass. i had to make a decision whether i would risk a education -- i was 17 -- or whether i would keep on the bus and go to my first year of college and joined the movement at my school. this is what i did and that was really the beginning of my activism. years later, i went back to mississippi and worked in the movement. about -- >> how does it for my activism?

i see myself and all of the world were suffering and are badly treated and who are often made to feel they have no place on this earth. this earth actually belongs to all of us. the universe belongs to all of us. we mustn't forget it. i know firsthand how it feels when people tell you and make you think they can have everything -- they can have as much as they want, they can buy everything they desire, and you are supposed to have nothing. this is not right, it is not accepted. assatant ask about shakur who may have written about recently. earlier this month, the fbi added the former black panther to its most wanted terrorist list 40 years after the killing for which she was convicted. she became the first woman added to the list, and the reward for capture was doubled to $2

million. this is a clip from the film, "eyes of the rainbow: the assata shakur but canary." >> prisons are the big business in the u.s. and the buildings and running of prisons has become the fastest-growing industry in the country. factories are moving into the prisons, and prisoners are forced to work for slave wages. this super exploitation of human beings has meant the institutional station of a new form of slavery. those who cannot find work on the streets are forced to work in prison. >> that was assata shakur. the roadside after shooting in which assata shakur was severely wounded and she

went to trial and was convicted, a crime she says she did not commit, she escaped from prison and got political asylum in cuba where shias lived for decades. your thoughts on what most recently has happened, her being added to the terrorist list? oni see it as an attack cuba. i think the government, all of them in recent memory, have wanted to destroy the cuban people, really, and their insistence on their freedom and dignity. i think this is a way of saying that you have a "terrorist" there and we have a right to go in and get her. so this could cause a very big fight between these countries which is never have peace in my lifetime. toyou dedicated your book

people. is there revolutionaries, teachers and spirit to rights were well most inspiring power couples of the 20th century. why this dedication? >> because they were. it is just we did not know anything about it. i think if we said almost any north american who was silvia sanchez, they would not have a clue. i did not know very much. but she and the dow had this had thiship -- fidel partnership and marco revolutionaries together. she was very prominent in the cuban revolution. there is a new book about her call "one day in december" by nancy stout. this is a woman who can teach a lot of us about what it feels like and what it can be light to

come face-to-face with reality that your country is being not only stolen from you, but trashed, absolutely degraded. your mountains are destroyed, or reversed the mess, your children are badly educated -- if educated at all. so i think this book is crucial for people to have a guide, especially -- a guide to see what it is like to confront the forces that are literally destroying your children, horrible food, horrible laws, rich people permitted to own much more than anyone should own anything, and were people being continually ground into the dust. >> i want to ask about your travels. you have gone to carozza, rwanda, and eastern congo.

can you talk about experiences and what they left you with? >> the condo was the hardest because there i saw people will just do anything for gold and silver and whenever they can get and they care absolutely nothing about the suffering of the people. as you know, the congo is called the worst place on the planet to be if you are a woman. and i saw that in action. i saw the result of such horrible atrocities in that place. but this is something people should be very aware of in places where this type of atrocity has not yet happened because it is crucial to see ourselves always as a part of whatever is going on because we are. this is one planet and we are one people. we learn from each other. we learn the awful things just as clearly as we learn the good

things. if you want to see what is the possibility for are really dreadful future, even here, go to the congo and places where people are fighting over minerals and resources that actually the people who live there will never benefit from. >> you have also been to burma and you write about aung san suu kyi. >> i went to burma before she was freed from house arrest and we went and tried to get our cab driver to stop in front of her gate so we could just sort of their witness, but he was so afraid that he could not stop. he wanted us to get out of his cab because we put him in danger. but now she is out, of course. actually, when she was freed from her house arrest and started talking to the world herself, i have really kept up. i feel she is such an amazing

being and she is so smart, and has a good heart and is a practice meditators -- which i think is a value because it means her thinking is the kind of thinking that understands the harm you do to others is the harm you do yourself. you cannot think you can cause wars in other parts of the world and destroy people and drone them without this having a terrible impact on your own soul and consciousness. , "ther book of poetry world will follow joy," could you read a poem, it? >> i would love to. this is called "coming to worship the thousand year old cherry tree." the purpose is i was in japan as some point years ago for the tokyo book fair and i knew it

was going to be a lot of work and they did, too. the people who invited me insisted that only they take me to the countryside, a beautiful place, massage, but they also wanted me to see this thousand year old cherry tree. which reminds us old, a beautiful trees how long humans have been here and how it come to love this planet. this poem is a result of going to see this wondered, this incredibly beautiful cherry tree in full blossom. life is good. goodness is its character. all else is defamation. the earth is good. goodness is its nature. oops.

nature is good. goodness is its essence. people are also good. goodness is our offering, our predictable yet unfathomable flowering. andkful and encouraged, used with our peaceful inheritance, are peaceful and inheritance, may we not despair. herlice walker reading poem. tomorrow on democracy now! we will be interviewing julian his come in a , taking refuge from

the ecuadorean embassy. i was wondering if you have a message. what you think about wikileaks and his predicament right now? >> i think unless people are given information about what is happening to them, they will die in ignorance. i think that is a big sin. if there is such a thing as a sin, that is it. destroy people and not have them have a clue about how this has happened. i think people like julian to this place of sharing knowledge about what is happening, i think it is an honorable place. i know there have been charges against him for other things, but personally, i would have to be convinced. and looking at just what he has given us in terms of sharing

information that can help us, i think he is very heroic. >> alice walker, we have to leave it there, but we will do we2 on democracynow.org. >> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. we are asking you to go to the phone. we have just seen an interview with alice walker. this is the number that we need you to call. we ask you to make the call that makes it possible for link tv to happen. we offer you alice walker's latest book, "the cushion in the road." 866-359-ll right now, for, the book is yours

$150. we also have a double the needy. powerful conversation. you got a portion of it in today's broadcast but we continued the conversation after the show. that interview, as well as a a doubled, which is entry, two chapters. one of them is the speech that alice gave on the 30th anniversary of the pulitzer win prize open " the color purple appear " it was published in 1933. on the 30th anniversary, alice walker came to the east coast and spoken one of the book festivals in the country. this was at george mason er