Rebecca Solnit wrote, of the Battle in Seattle and the upcoming Copenhagen conference:Anniversaries of a whole host of revolutions seem to fall in y...
Rebecca Solnit wrote, of the Battle in Seattle and the upcoming Copenhagen conference:Anniversaries of a whole host of revolutions seem to fall in years ending in nine -- from 1789 in France to 1959 in Cuba and 1979 in Nicaragua. And then, in our calendar of nines, there was the fall of the Wall and the Battle of Seattle.It's 2009, and the biggest front of global action is on climate change. The US has moved from the flat denials of the Bush era to an acceptance of the problem, but solutions still elude us. As always, the people will have to lead.We are joined by Rick Rowley of Big Noise Films, Han Shan, formerly of the Ruckus Society and coordinator of Clean Up Ecuador with Amazon Watch, Margrete Strand of the Blue Green Alliance and the Sierra Club, and Eddie Yuen, co-author of Confronting Capitalism: Dispatches from a Global Movement, to discuss the alliances built in Seattle and where the movement is now.Then Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, fills us in on the World Trade Organization, ten years after the huge progressive victory in Seattle in 1999. The WTO may not have expanded, but it hasn't gone away, either.David Solnit, co-author with his sister Rebecca of The Battle of the Story of the Battle of Seattle and organizer with Mobilization for Climate Justice, is working on the next round of the global justice movement: the Copenhagen climate talks. He joins us from San Francisco to fill us in on where the movement is going now.We also bring you excerpts from Rick Rowley and Jill Friedberg's film This Is What Democracy Looks Like, shot during the Seattle protests, and Shaya Mercer's award-winning documentary Trade Off, also shot during the Battle in Seattle. Their work is an example of some of the amazing independent media that came out of the Seattle action.Finally, for World AIDS Day, we bring you video from Avert.org, raising consciousness for the need for universal access to lifesaving HIV/AIDS treatment, prevention and care. Check out their video, with music from SDIA.
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