GR 04-84

GR 04-84 101.9 FM 104.3 Cable 'cfuv.uvic.ca'
Monday December 29, 2008

5:00:00 3:00 Welcome to GR's year end round-up show. We'll depart the usual format and call on no guests, but Janine Bancroft will join us at the bottom of the hour to offer her assessment of the year past. Like its predecessor, 2008 was bloody, full of outrageous injustice both here at home and away in the lands under military occupation. But, it too possessed extraordinary moments and extraordinary people that gave us hope for a better 2009. Some examples of the former being the unprecedented shut-down of the Canadian parliament to avoid a non-confidence vote going through, and the not unprecedented shut down of the provincial legislature by the B.C. government which failed to see the value in sitting. And in the latter case, fantastic developments in alternative energy technologies, and the growing acceptance of the necessity for a new economic and social paradigm broke through. Over the next hour, I'll look back at some of the most significant occurrences over the last year, and try determine why they occurred, and what they portend for the coming year. But first, the last Christmas song of 2008 from the Putamayo World Christmas, Ini Kamozi and 'All I Really Want for Christmas.' Take it, Ini.

5:03:00 4:00 Music - Ini Kamozi (tape)
5:07:00 3:00 Script

Welcome back to GR's year-end review. As the weekend saw an unprecedentedly vicious bombing of Gaza, followed by yet another land invasion by the murderous Israeli regime, killing more than 200 men, women, and children we look back to January of this year when Palestinians broke down a portion of the wall surrounding embattled Gaza, breaking if only for a moment Isreal's ruthless siege of the occupied territories. An estimated 750,000 Gazans, nearly half the population of the strip of land illegally cut-off from the rest of the world streamed across the fallen wall into Egypt, buying up essential, and not so essential items, to take back to their families. Freelance photojournalist and long-time GR contributor, Jon Elmer explained the greatest jail break in the history of the world...

5:10:00 7:00 Elmer Clip: "I think that, basically the situation is..." out: "...dare I say, it was the Palestinians themselves that did this."

Jon Elmer from February of this year. Today, the body count of Palestinians killed in Israel's recently launched version of 'Shock and Awe' is approaching 300; with more to follow.

5:17:00 3:25 David Rovics - They're Building a Wall #5

5:21:00 3:00 Script

Welcome back to Gorilla Radio's year-end round up. As the murderous career of George W. Bush reaches its twilight, it's tempting to think the era of America's international criminality is coming too to an end; but sadly, there's little evidence that 2009 will be any more humane than bloody 2008. America's media is determined yet to instill in the population a pervasive and never-ending state of panic. Fear has come to define the modern Home of the Brave; fear of the other; fear of the economy; fear of the future. More than 75 years ago, another American president facing an economic disaster addressed a frightened nation and uttered the now iconic phrase: "There is nothing to fear, but fear itself." Today, as with much of the rest of the body politic, that sentiment has been turned on its head. Twenty-four hours a day, we hear there is everything to fear, and only the militarists and their corporate paymasters can help us; if only first we hand over our paycheques, our pensions, and all the other gains working slobs have gained since Franklin D. Roosevelt's fearless proclamation of the last century.

The great shining oratory of Barack Obama is no match for action. In the first month since his election to the American presidency, Barack Obama, and that same fawning media that trumpeted the Bush slaughters, has done everything they can to diminish hope and optimism for real change. What we have left it seems is a more eloquent weapon of mass destruction in the White House, preparing the public mind to accept through fear the continuance of the global holocaust.

5:24:00 5:45 Daniel Cioper - Home of the Brave #8
5:30:00 11:00 Janine Bandcroft
5:41:00 :45 Cart
5:42:45 3:00 Script

Welcome back to GR's year-ender. 2007 was a particlularly bloody year for the citizens of Afghanistan, and for the Canadian soldiers patrolling the occupation there. Throughout his tenure as minority-government leader, Stephen Harper has contended Canadian Forces' presence in that theatre of the now rarely referred to 'Global War on Terror' is due to the Canadian citizens killed at the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001. That more than three times the number of our compatriots killed there have perished since in Afghanistan, or that the premise of his argument is patent nonsense is never mentioned by the "opposition" in parliament, or questioned by either the State or corporate media. Canada's power elite is on the same page as their counterparts in America, and throughout the countries comprising the coalition of willingly co-opted democracies. Their attitude toward those they dominate is exemplified by Stephen Harper's unprecedented closure of parliament rather than face a non-confidence vote he was sure to lose. In 2007, Stephen Harper drove the final spike into the heart of Canadian democracy, and it looks as though Michael Ignatieff, coronated by the Liberal party during the House closure, will serve too as handmaiden to the interests of a global elite whose wars and occupations he seldom questions. In 2008 we are as former Canadian Neil Young once sang, "finally on our own."

5:45:45 3:40 Daniel Cioper - I Don't Need No Democrat #9

5:48:30 4:00 Script

As both the year and our time here winds down, a brief look now at what the next year is likely to bring us: For Canadians; we are without representation for the first time in the nation's history and at next month's end, Stephen Harper's Conservatives will present their vision of our economic future. In the meantime, they'll try to scare the wits out of us all. They have already begun promising billions of the dollars earned by dint of the sweat and tears of the workers, to the auto industry. Tax collectors will thus be given orders to squeeze further blood from those true contributors to the wealth of the nation for the benefit of parasites. Programs will be cut, resulting in taxation without representation; the recipe for revolution in times past and places other.

Israel has shown already what the miserable, suffering under brutal military occupations can expect; and the Palestinian resistance has shown what the occupiers of Iraq and Afghanistan will likely receive for their efforts. In America, Barack Obama will refuse to prosecute the crimes and criminals that have over these last terrible years run roughshod over both the constitution, (that "damn piece of paper!") and international law. By this time next year, a hopeless Obama can expect the kind of popular support his predecessor now enjoys, as war and rumours of war continue, and the world economy lay in tatters. But hope will persist, because that is our nature, and nature will always prevail.

So, be of good cheer and have a Happy New Year; and remember, we are the only ones that can save the world!

5:52:30 4:50 Daniel Cioper - We Are the Ones #13
5:57:20 3:00 Upcoming, best wishes - Kinnie Starr - Rise # 2 - out (if necessary).
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