Building Bridges Radio: Your Community & Labor Report

Produced and Hosted by Mimi Rosenberg & Ken Nash over WBAI,99.5FM in the NYC Metro Area

WHO WE ARE

WORKERS OF THE WORLD TUNE IN! Introducing "Building Bridges: Your Community & Labor Report"

Our beat is the labor front, broadly defined, both geographically and conceptually. We examine the world of work and workers on the job as well as where they live. We examine the issues that affect their everyday lives, with a particular sensitivity towards human rights abuses, environmental concerns and the U.S. drive for global domination. We record their global struggles and provide analysis of their efforts to empower themselves and transform society to provide greater democratic, human, social, political and economic rights. Each program consists of feature stories, generally interviews, within a historical context, often accompanied by sound from demonstrations, rallies or conferences, and complemented and enhanced by poetry and instrumental or vocal -- people's culture.

Over the years Building Bridges has produced a weekly one hour program, Mondays from 7-8 PM EST, covering local, national and international labor and community issues over radio WBAI-Pacifica 99.5 FM in New York. We also produce half hour version, Building Bridges National, which is distribtued to over 40 broadcast and internet radio stations.


For more information you can contact us at knash@igc.org
In Struggle Mimi Rosenberg & Ken Nash

Michael Moore On Americam Violence; Austerity Cliff In the Fiscal Showdown  

Michael Moore On America’s DNA Of Violence
And What Is To Be Done

Michael Moore recalling his film "Bowling for  Columbine",advocated for the release of Native America leader, and artist Leonard Peltier, now falsely imprisoned for 37 years, and in the wake of the latest horrific gun violence seeks to understand what he refers to as the “DNA of violence rooted in American history”.
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Preventing The 99% From Being Thrown Over The Austerity Cliff In Fiscal Showdown
with
Robert Borosage, Co-Dir., Campaign for America’s Future

With politicians demanding cuts in public benefits, Robert Borosage counsels against buying into the “fiscal cliff” fraud. Borosage says, the problem is not deficits; it is "the lack of a foundation for sustainable growth that includes working people. Without a political movement to achieve the latter, very little progress will be made on the former." We must counter the spin and show how we can turn the conversation about debt and deficits to what really matters: putting people back to work, protecting the economically vulnerable and ending giveaways to the wealthy.

http://archive.org/stream/BuildingBridgesMichaelMooreOnAmericamViolenceAusterityCliffInThe
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Sandy a Disaster for NYC Public Housing Tenants  

Public Housing Tenants Hung Out To Dry In Wake Of Sandy  

When Hurricane Sandy slammed NYC, tens of thousands of public housing tenants were left without power, heat, and running water; elderly & disabled residents were trapped on the upper floors of the developments, oftentimes lacking food and water and life essential medical needs. Weeks after the wind roared and the water surged the voices of New York City Housing Authority (“NYCHA”) tenants continued to be drowned out, amidst the complacency of NYCHA to the still unresolved issues and conditions. When NYCHA management finally met with the tenants, long after Sandy came and went it was greeted by the pained and angry protestation of the tenants due to its failure to show concern for, response to and accountability for the horrible conditions that many still endure. The chorus of residents decried NYCHA’s response to refusing immediate rent abatements, to compensate them for their suffering and losses during & in the aftermath of the hurricane. Chanting "No services, no rent," many of the residents left the meeting in disgust to reconvene later, formulate demands and plan to take their complaints to NYCHA headquarters. 


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First Ever Fast Food Workers Strikes - 27:28  

Unionize McDonalds, Burger Kings, KFC, Taco Bell, Piazza Hut,

Papa John’s, Dominos, Wendy’s Say Their Striking Workers
In First Ever Fast Food Walk-Out

Hundreds of workers in an organizing campaign, Fast Food Forward, struck New York City’s largest fast food chains to call for decent wages to support their families, and the right to form a union without interference. Fast Food jobs have accounted for the bulk of new jobs added since the recession and are some of the lowest paid in the country. In New York, many workers report earning the state’s minimum wage, $7.25, and getting shifts totaling an average of only 24 hours a week forcing them to rely on public assistance programs to get healthcare and provide for their families.

Now, workers across the US, like those at Walmart, McDonald's, Macy's, LAX, JFK airports, NYC car washes and other retail and fast food stores are joining together to demand decent pay, despite facing retaliation and suspension for trying to form a union.

http://archive.org/stream/BuildingBridgesFirstEverFastFoodWorkersStrikes

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Bangladesh Fire: Walmart & Disney Refuse Responsibility - 28:13  

Walmart & Disney Refuse Responsibility For Worker Compensation In Bangladesh Fire Where Death Toll Soared to More than 121 And Where Labor Organizers Are Tortured and Disappeared
With
Kalpona Akter, Bangladesh Center for Worker Solidarity


Kalpona Akter, a garment worker since she was 12 years old, faces myriad criminal charges for organizing for labor rights in the garment industry and while she mourns brother labor activists who have been tortured, and others who have been assassinated she is unrelenting in her organizing against the conditions that led to the deaths & critical injuries of hundreds of Bangladeshi garment workers recently.  


Akter discusses the safety risks,  poverty wages, abusive treatment, unsafe conditions faced by workers who sew the clothes we wear, along with the government’s campaign of terror against labor rights activists. Akter places squarely before us the question of why Bangladeshi workers have to die sewing cheap clothing while the brands Walmart, H&M, Gap and Disney make millions and avoid responsibility and compensating the victims of the terrifying blaze for the conditions that resulted in the fiery deaths. 
 

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