Jovanni, Shiloh, and Monisha share an insightful look back at 2023 and share their hopes and predictions for 2024. The massive ongoing shift to multi-polarity, the view of Ukraine and Palestine as the year ends, and understanding how to pursue and maintain revolutionary optimism in a pessimistic world are all touched on. Thank you to everyone who has supported Fortress On A Hill as we enter our seventh year!!!
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Fortress On A Hill is hosted, written, and produced by Chris ‘Henri’ Henrikson, Keagan Miller, Jovanni Reyes, Shiloh Emelein, and Monisha Rios. https://bit.ly/3yeBaB9
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00:00:13
Don: This is Fortress On A Hill, with Henri, Danny, Kaygan,
00:00:16
Jo vonni, Shiloh, and Monisha
00:00:18
Jovanni: Welcome, everyone, to Fortress On A Hill, a podcast about U.
00:00:21
S.
00:00:21
foreign policy, anti imperialism, skepticism, and the American way of war.
00:00:27
I'm Jovanni.
00:00:28
Thank you for being with us today.
00:00:30
With me are my two co hosts, Monisha and Shiloh.
00:00:36
How are you guys doing today?
00:00:37
Shiloh: Hey Jovanni, I'm doing well.
00:00:39
It's good to see you.
00:00:41
Monisha: Yeah, same here.
00:00:43
It's good to see both of you.
00:00:45
Jovanni: Yep, today we reflect on 2023, the political dynamics that
00:00:49
happened, the continuation of the endless wars, the shift in geopolitics,
00:00:55
and anything else that comes to mind.
00:00:57
As we reflect, I look forward to the new year.
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We do so with the knowledge that a great crime is being committed
00:01:04
against the people of Palestine, while the world watches and feels
00:01:07
powerless to do anything about it.
00:01:09
Guys, let's each mention three or four things that impacted us,
00:01:13
or impacted you, and, and uh, or that you are focusing on 2023.
00:01:18
And uh, three things, or four things that uh, that you forecast for 2024,
00:01:24
or that you look forward to in 2024.
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How'd that sound?
00:01:27
Sounds golden.
00:01:28
Shiloh: I think I'll be kind of brief, but just crawling,
00:01:32
crawling to the end of 2023 here.
00:01:35
The three things I'm going to mention are kind of gonna, uh, Build into Sinceri, but
00:01:42
the first one is like, um, George Santos being expelled from, from Congress that
00:01:50
was impactful one because it, it just showed the, like, circus that is the U.
00:01:57
S.
00:01:57
Congress and just how easy it is to, even down to his name.
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And somehow he's still like, got voted in and was making laws that impact everyone.
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So that.
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Yeah, it was lighthearted in ways and then the, the also heavy in that like
00:02:19
this clown, this queen of a person was actually making moves that impact
00:02:24
people and yeah, um, and then the, the second thing, um, for 2023, um, was
00:02:35
just, yeah, just kind of a little bit of frustration around the supposed, as
00:02:41
I said, Just this system that we have, like, not being able to, so far, some
00:02:47
states are starting to, but not being able to block, uh, Trump from, from
00:02:53
running and being the front runner, um, which will go into the forecasting
00:02:57
for 2024, I think more and more, like, yeah, just feeling kind of powerless, um,
00:03:05
powerless against the machine that is U.
00:03:08
S.
00:03:08
politics.
00:03:09
Um, and then, yeah, what we're all, what we're all kind of, uh, the sadness
00:03:16
that we're all swimming in, I think, right now is just the genocide and
00:03:20
ethnic cleansing of, of our siblings in Palestine, our dear friends that are
00:03:25
Palestinian, dear friends that are anti Zionist Jews, and just all of that.
00:03:31
Yes, heaviness all around, um, and again, just feeling powerless, um,
00:03:38
that my money is going into this, this harm and this violence, um,
00:03:44
my, my tax money and all of that.
00:03:47
Yeah, I think it, it is a shift that, you know, the world's
00:03:51
eyes are, are being opened.
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I know a lot of, a lot of places and a lot of people were
00:03:56
already eyes wide open to U.
00:03:58
S.
00:03:58
imperialism.
00:03:59
Um, but the, I think the Western world in particular is
00:04:04
becoming more aware and seeing.
00:04:08
Seeing this just, yeah, uh, right in our, in our faces on our phones.
00:04:14
It's hard to, hard to ignore the impacts that the U.
00:04:18
S.
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has around the world.
00:04:20
So those are the, those are the three things.
00:04:22
Oh, I guess I could get into one event that really impacted me, um, just last
00:04:29
month, uh, myself in a large group of, uh, Anti imperialist, anti militarist
00:04:37
veterans made a trip out to Washington, D.
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C.
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to speak out against the genocide in Gaza and to call for a ceasefire and we
00:04:49
got to meet with, um, The, like, actual legit, uh, lawmakers who, you know,
00:04:57
who actually give a shit about people.
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Um, it's a very small handful of them.
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Um, but we got to meet with, um, Rashida Tlaib and she just, yeah, we shared just
00:05:11
One of the best hugs I've ever experienced in my life and it just felt, it was
00:05:15
just really impactful and um, sharing my story with her and her sharing a bit
00:05:20
of herself with us was something that, yeah, that I keep, that I keep with me.
00:05:26
So, those are the, yeah, those are the three.
00:05:29
Three quick things that I'm thinking about.
00:05:32
Jovanni: Did you guys occupy a congressional office as well?
00:05:36
Shiloh: We did, yeah.
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We went to a senator after meeting with Representative Tlaib and some others.
00:05:44
Senator Gillibrand's office.
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She's a senator from New York who's very, uh, very much tied to
00:05:51
AIPAC and, and Israeli funding.
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And this was the day before they all left for Veterans Day weekend.
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And there's about 15 veterans in her office.
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And.
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She refused to meet with us, refused to even have a phone call with us,
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um, and her, yeah, her staff was less than kind, and just not trying
00:06:18
to hear anything we wanted to say.
00:06:21
We occupied her office, uh, for a few hours.
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A good handful of us were arrested, um, just trying to get a phone call
00:06:32
with her, um, and uh, oh, what's that clown's name, from, uh, from
00:06:40
Pennsylvania came out mocking us, um, waving an Israeli flag and just laughing
00:06:47
as we were being arrested and just.
00:06:49
Just showing his ass to everyone, um, yeah.
00:06:53
And then the next day, you know, it's just like, such a, such a slap in the
00:06:58
face to see Senator Gillibrand's social media the next day, just like shaking
00:07:02
hands and being all chummy with a bunch of, bunch of veterans, because it
00:07:06
was the day before Veterans Day, but.
00:07:09
Jovanni: Couldn't be bothered.
00:07:10
That's a big tall um, um, was he a senator, congressman?
00:07:15
Shiloh: Yeah, he's a senator from Pennsylvania and I'll look up
00:07:18
Jovanni: his name.
00:07:19
He walks around with like a hoodie and everything, he's supposed to be
00:07:21
like a, like a worker's man, person,
00:07:24
Shiloh: whatever.
00:07:25
He's a man of the people and that's what he ran on as a democrat, uh,
00:07:29
but he's actually the, Largest recipient of, uh, of J Street,
00:07:35
which is a shell company for APAC.
00:07:39
Jovanni: John Fetterman.
00:07:39
Shiloh: John Fetterman, thank you.
00:07:41
Yeah.
00:07:41
Yeah.
00:07:44
He didn't want to talk to us.
00:07:45
Yeah.
00:07:46
Jovanni: So, uh, what are the things that you're looking forward to in, uh, in 2024?
00:07:49
Shiloh: Oh, the things I'm looking forward to in 2024?
00:07:53
A few things.
00:07:53
Yeah, I don't know if looking forward to is the right word.
00:07:57
I guess anxiously awaiting this whole election season and all the
00:08:02
shitstorm that that's gonna be, is Trump gonna be able to run?
00:08:05
I don't know.
00:08:06
We don't really know yet.
00:08:08
Um, he can't run in Colorado apparently, or he's not gonna
00:08:11
be on the ballot at least.
00:08:13
Um, are the Democrats really gonna put up with Uh, Joe Biden, who's
00:08:18
older than the state of Israel.
00:08:20
I don't know.
00:08:22
Like that's, that's something to see.
00:08:24
Um, I think it's just going to be.
00:08:27
The biggest shitstorm we've ever seen as far as an election year goes.
00:08:31
Um, uh, something else I'm looking, I guess I am looking forward to is just the
00:08:37
movement that the BDS movement is making.
00:08:40
Um, I think people are starting to see like that.
00:08:45
Individual like consumer boycotts and divestments and sanctions really
00:08:50
do hold power, um, and yeah, that, that movement's getting a lot of
00:08:57
traction when a lot of people would kind of write them off beforehand.
00:09:01
Um, and then another thing I'm looking forward to is just the, we're seeing
00:09:06
the veil like kind of ripped off as it was being like slowly pulled back,
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but now it's being ripped off on U.
00:09:12
S.
00:09:13
imperialism and, uh, and that is exciting and terrifying, I think,
00:09:19
at the same time, but lots of world shifts happening and yeah.
00:09:24
I feel like it's just a snowball right now, we're snow, snow
00:09:28
plowing through to 2024 right now.
00:09:32
Jovanni: On that, on that, uh, BDS, it's also not only Israeli
00:09:36
products that are, that people are boycotting, but also American products.
00:09:39
I mean, you saw that they hit that, um, that, uh, with the
00:09:44
coffee place, uh, Starbucks.
00:09:48
Starbucks took a big hit, globally, uh, for their support of Israel and,
00:09:52
uh, I believe McDonald's as well.
00:09:53
I believe they're closing, I believe, uh, they closed Starbucks
00:09:57
or McDonald's restaurants in Malaysia and in other countries because they
00:10:01
were, because of the financial hit that they were, they were getting.
00:10:04
Because people, people don't realize that although they're private companies,
00:10:09
right, um, But they represent the U.
00:10:12
S.
00:10:12
overseas, you know, so when you're overseas, you go to Starbucks, you
00:10:16
know, you are, you're going, uh, and the United States is a brand.
00:10:21
America is a brand overseas, and people, you know, people, uh, It promotes
00:10:25
itself as a brand and people think of the United States as jeans and, and hip
00:10:30
hop and, and that's why particularly young people, when they think about the
00:10:33
United States, that's when they think about, um, pop culture, pop music,
00:10:38
shoes, um, Starbucks, um, McDonald's, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, right?
00:10:43
So getting that, so those become symbolism of the United States.
00:10:46
So, um, because of U.
00:10:48
S.
00:10:48
support, you know, those companies are also getting hit.
00:10:51
You know, as a way for people to pretty much, you know, show their support or, you
00:10:56
know, or their anger of what's happening.
00:11:00
Shiloh: If only we could boycott the weapons companies, but we're
00:11:03
not the ones using them, so we can't really boycott that.
00:11:07
Yeah.
00:11:08
Yeah, lots of movement in the BDS movement.
00:11:11
Uh, lots of gains being made there and just like, yeah, it's just like, uh, with
00:11:18
social media and whatnot, you can like really quickly get some momentum going.
00:11:24
Like as soon as, as soon as, uh, yes, uh, a company gets shown to be
00:11:30
a supporter of Israel or, or the U.
00:11:34
S.
00:11:34
Like you're saying, it just gets shut down by the people real quick.
00:11:38
So that's really exciting to, to come into our power as, as people
00:11:43
and to see like that we do actually through consumerism, but we do
00:11:47
actually have power in some ways.
00:11:50
I think that's always important to, to have examples of.
00:11:54
Monisha: There's some really important things, Shiloh, that you touched on,
00:11:58
particularly around the veil being lifted.
00:12:01
Um, and the topic of elections, um, so yeah, those are things that I'm
00:12:08
definitely looking forward to talking to about, but also talking to, you know,
00:12:14
because those are things that, um, we're all going to be facing the impacts of.
00:12:21
Great synopsis, great analysis accompanying your, your, um, I don't
00:12:27
even want to call them highlights because, They're lowlights.
00:12:32
Yeah.
00:12:33
Exactly.
00:12:33
Um, yeah, yeah, it's, uh, but I really appreciate too how you, you still have
00:12:42
some hopefulness about things that can happen, you know, the potential that
00:12:48
exists, um, in what's happening right now.
00:12:50
And I think that that's really important.
00:12:53
Shiloh: Yeah.
00:12:53
It's really important.
00:12:54
If you, if you don't have hope, you kind of.
00:12:57
You don't have anything.
00:12:58
Like, hope is a, is an action.
00:13:01
It's a discipline.
00:13:03
And it's really hard to hold on to those threads sometimes.
00:13:08
But if you don't have hope, you don't have, you don't
00:13:11
have anything at that point.
00:13:14
Monisha: Yeah.
00:13:14
And I like, um, also how you're not approaching hope in a bypassing way.
00:13:23
Um, you know, where I think not to be judgmental of folks, because
00:13:28
we never know where people are.
00:13:30
Um, but I think especially now with what's happening, you know, we see a lot of
00:13:35
folks sticking their head in the sand.
00:13:38
Um, and needing to maintain, like, some toxic positivity.
00:13:42
I just want peace, you know, and all that, without, um, participating in
00:13:47
the creation of that, you know, making sacrifices to create peace, uh, and
00:13:52
whatnot, like, even beyond boycotts, even in their social circles, speaking
00:13:57
out, you know, actually confronting reality, um, So, yeah, I think, um, the
00:14:04
other, I guess that's something else that I gather from, from what you've
00:14:07
shared is the, the need to balance that hope with action, um, to not use.
00:14:12
Like the whole idea of spiritual bypassing of, you know, all of that that comes with
00:14:17
wanting to, to achieve peace sometimes, um, people use it as a, a, a way of
00:14:25
avoiding, but there's no point to me.
00:14:27
There's no point in, in holding onto hope if we're not doing the thing
00:14:32
that creates what we're hoping for.
00:14:34
Yeah.
00:14:35
Okay.
00:14:36
That's my spiel.
00:14:38
Jovanni: Absolutely.
00:14:39
MMonisha.
00:14:40
Monisha,you want to go?
00:14:41
Monisha: Sure.
00:14:42
Yeah, thanks.
00:14:43
So, so 2023 for me, obviously being here in Puerto Rico, I'm really paying
00:14:49
more attention to what's happening here.
00:14:51
Um, you know, the, the.
00:14:54
Continuation of the Fiscal Control Board's undermining of human rights in Puerto
00:15:00
Rico via the austerity measures that are being implemented via the interventionism,
00:15:06
um, politically, economically, you know, through the economic dictatorship that
00:15:14
we're under, um, through them, a lot of what people have seen happening in
00:15:21
Ukraine because of the, like, you Natalie Jaresko was the, imposed as the finance
00:15:30
minister after the coup, um, and brought all of the austerity measures, really
00:15:35
hurt the people, the working people of Ukraine, part of the puppet government.
00:15:40
And we have a similar thing.
00:15:41
She actually was assigned to be the, the head of the fiscal control
00:15:47
board here in Puerto Rico for a period of time until recently.
00:15:50
Um, um, I think it was after.
00:15:53
The, the violence in Ukraine began was when her term ended, um, but implementing
00:16:01
basically the same things to strangle the people, privatizing everything, all
00:16:07
of everything that should be public, that should be accessible to everyone,
00:16:11
the basic needs and human rights that we have, um, privatizing all of it in the
00:16:15
name of paying off the, the illegal debt.
00:16:18
Um, that the people of Puerto Rico did not, um, have a say in the criminal
00:16:24
government and the bondholders and the investors and everybody else created.
00:16:29
We had no part in that, but we're the ones suffering from that.
00:16:33
Um, so that's been a big deal in 2023 here in Puerto Rico, the collapse
00:16:37
of our health care system, the collapse of our education system.
00:16:42
Um, pretty much the, the politicians that are there now in regardless of their
00:16:49
stance on, on, um, uh, status are for the most part, um, for privatization,
00:16:59
for, you know, all of these things because they're benefiting from it.
00:17:03
Um, there's a lot of corruption.
00:17:06
The Independence Party, not as much.
00:17:08
Um, but there's still, you know, no political entity is perfect regardless
00:17:13
of the, the aspiration that they hold.
00:17:16
Um, so, so yeah, there's that.
00:17:20
Um, we're still a colony.
00:17:22
Um, the Status Act, another version of the Status Act came out and it's
00:17:28
currently, I think, I haven't checked in a couple of days on what What
00:17:33
the status of the Status Act is.
00:17:35
I believe it passed the House and was in the Senate.
00:17:37
Um, recently, a group called New York Boricua Resistance did a webinar on it.
00:17:44
And I discussed it as, uh, we critically analyzed it as an element
00:17:50
of hybrid warfare, lawfare, political warfare, psychological warfare.
00:17:56
We talked about economic warfare, a little bit involved with that, but,
00:18:01
um, So that's the conversation around Puerto Rico's status gets passed
00:18:06
around, um, usually doesn't move.
00:18:10
Um, the difference between this piece of legislation, proposed legislation, and
00:18:15
ones in the past is it's supposed to, to make the The next plebiscite that we have
00:18:21
of our status binding, the ones, all of them leading up to this point have been
00:18:26
non binding, which basically just means that, um, for anybody who's not familiar
00:18:31
with how the supposed so called process of decolonization of Puerto Rico goes
00:18:39
with the United States, um, there is a, uh, Pretty much rigged, um, vote that
00:18:48
takes place every so often where the, the people of Puerto Rico, and I'm saying this
00:18:55
with air quotes and a lot of sarcasm, the people of Puerto Rico vote on whether or
00:18:59
not they want to either join the United States as a state, stay as a colony,
00:19:04
which according to the failure of the UN, they, they consider us conveniently
00:19:10
to be a self governing territory, which is a complete lie, Why, um, or to
00:19:15
become an independent sovereign nation, um, which terrifies the, the, the U.
00:19:23
S.
00:19:23
empire, um, for some reason.
00:19:27
The status act demands in a sense that the next plebiscite vote is binding.
00:19:35
Because Congress doesn't have to listen to what we say.
00:19:40
Congress ultimately, at the end of the day, makes the decision on what
00:19:43
happens with Puerto Rico, regardless of how any type of voting process
00:19:48
takes place here in Puerto Rico.
00:19:50
So to me, I personally don't have a whole lot of faith in this process.
00:19:56
I don't trust the United States and no one should on the planet.
00:20:00
Um, we see how.
00:20:02
They have consistently, um, disregarded treaties.
00:20:09
We see how they're behaving now.
00:20:11
We see how they've behaved since their inception.
00:20:14
Um, so, yeah, but that's, that's what's happening.
00:20:18
So there's going to be some conversation about that in the U.
00:20:21
S.
00:20:22
Um, voters most likely will not be exposed to a lot of those conversations.
00:20:26
They won't be aware of what's happening.
00:20:28
Supposedly there is, uh, supposed to be greater oversight over
00:20:32
the voter education process.
00:20:35
Uh, which is supposed to more effectively educate potential voters in Puerto Rico
00:20:40
about the various status options, what are the implications of these options,
00:20:45
and what are the processes involved in, if any of them were voted on.
00:20:49
For example, if Puerto Ricans, if the Puerto Ricans who chose to participate
00:20:56
in the plebiscite vote voted in favor majority, uh, for independence,
00:21:02
then there has to be an entire plan.
00:21:04
They have to be educated on that.
00:21:06
Beforehand, and the same with statehood and etc.
00:21:10
So there's that, um, the third thing, obviously, is Palestine, um, and through,
00:21:19
through this process, I've been kind of peripherally involved in the BDS movement
00:21:26
since, um, right after COVID started, um, and At the time I was involved
00:21:33
with a group called Psychologists for Social Responsibility and there was
00:21:38
a huge effort from within that group from some psychologists, not many,
00:21:43
unfortunately there's still a lot of Zionist influence in, in, inside that
00:21:47
group, um, who, who for a long time really struggled to educate, inform,
00:21:53
and move the group to support BDS.
00:21:55
And finally that was achieved and I got to be part of, of that, um,
00:22:01
the tail end of, of achieving that.
00:22:04
However, um, the, the American Psychological Association, uh, uh, for
00:22:09
folks who are not aware is basically the psychological warfare arm of the U.
00:22:13
S.
00:22:13
defense.
00:22:14
It is a defense industry, um, and it is Zionist heavy.
00:22:19
And so, um, I was involved with APA for a while, and right now there's
00:22:28
a lot of heat coming down toward the psychologists, and there has been a lot
00:22:32
of harassment, just like in, in most academic spaces, in most professional
00:22:36
spaces, um, where Zionism is king, they have made life Very difficult and, and
00:22:44
scary at times, um, for psychologists as well, who are themselves Palestinian,
00:22:50
who have been outspoken in support of BDS, and especially lately who have
00:22:56
been outspoken, um, against the genocide and calling for ceasefire, et cetera.
00:23:01
So I've been paying a lot of attention to that, um, and, It's
00:23:05
been interesting how, I think in the antiwar movement, I know there's not
00:23:11
a lot of attention given to the APA.
00:23:15
I think there's not a lot of information.
00:23:17
I know I'm constantly trying to educate people on this and trying to,
00:23:20
to organize, um, a targeted response to the APA with protests, um, with
00:23:27
social media campaigns, et cetera.
00:23:30
But there's not a whole lot of investment from the peace movement in that direction,
00:23:33
which I think is It's an issue that needs to be corrected because we're
00:23:38
really missing an opportunity to go after another weapons manufacturer.
00:23:44
The American Psychological Association needs to be viewed
00:23:47
as a weapons manufacturer.
00:23:48
Psychologists are contracted at these, these more well known weapons
00:23:54
manufacturing facilities, companies.
00:23:58
Especially in relationship to the development of artificial intelligence
00:24:01
and autonomous weapons, um, they're involved in human engineering, which
00:24:04
is now called human factor engineering.
00:24:07
There's a whole lot, there's a whole lot to that history.
00:24:10
Um, so, yeah, that's something that I'm still trying to help get
00:24:16
folks to, to see, so that it can be added into a lot of the organizing
00:24:21
effort, organizing efforts that are.
00:24:24
are currently underway.
00:24:25
Um, and the, the fourth thing is, um, like what Shiloh was
00:24:31
mentioning about, oh, no, sorry.
00:24:34
This, it's the Zone of Peace campaign that the Black Alliance
00:24:37
for Peace has initiated.
00:24:39
If folks are not familiar with what's happening, um, always in
00:24:44
the Western Hemisphere with regard to Latin America, um, and U.
00:24:49
S.
00:24:49
policy toward Latin America, the Monroe Doctrine, all the various implementations
00:24:53
of that, the militarization of Latin America to serve the interests of U.
00:24:57
S.
00:24:57
imperialism, and so on and so forth, um, the, Jovanni, what's the, FALAC
00:25:04
puts out a statement, but I can't remember the, what the acronym means.
00:25:08
I For CELAC.
00:25:10
Jovanni: CELAC is the it's a community of Latin american and Caribbean states.
00:25:15
Monisha: Okay, thank you.
00:25:16
So CELAC, the community of Latin American and Caribbean states, consistently
00:25:20
puts out a statement about creating the Americas as a zone of peace, calling for
00:25:26
the Americas to become a zone of peace.
00:25:29
It stops there at the statement, um, and so the Black Alliance for Peace took the
00:25:36
initiative to start, um, kind of like a coalition, I guess, um, but around
00:25:45
really helping to encourage and, and, um, Organized grassroots efforts toward
00:25:52
creating a zone of peace, starting with the people where the power is, like
00:25:55
Shiloh was saying, um, rather than leaving it up to politicians and their, their
00:26:01
own interests and like, performative solidarity, et cetera, et cetera.
00:26:05
Um, you know, statements are great, but then we have to actually do things.
00:26:09
So.
00:26:10
So, Black Lives for Peace with the Zone of Peace campaign is actually
00:26:13
doing something and, um, the org that I'm involved in, Soli Puerto Rico, um,
00:26:19
we're one of the founding, um, like, orgs to, not founding the, the campaign,
00:26:25
but to join it and endorse, endorse it, um, and it's been really great to, to
00:26:33
Connect with others, um, throughout Latin America, throughout the Americas, um,
00:26:38
including North America, and talk about, you know, how can we, um, as peoples,
00:26:45
um, united with the, the goal, you know, we all want to live in peace and what
00:26:50
does that look like in our daily lives?
00:26:52
What can we do to achieve that?
00:26:55
And there are seven core demands to the campaign so far, um, to dismantle
00:27:04
SOUTHCOM, shutting down all of the U.
00:27:07
S.
00:27:07
military bases in the region, ending U.
00:27:10
S.
00:27:10
NATO military exercises in the region, disbanding U.
00:27:13
S.
00:27:13
sponsored state terrorist training facilities like WINSEC, Western
00:27:17
Hemispheric Institute for Security Cooperation, which some folks may know
00:27:21
more as the School of the Americas.
00:27:24
Oppose military intervention in Haiti, return Guantanamo to Cuba,
00:27:29
and to end all illegal sanctions and blockades of states in our region.
00:27:34
To include all economic warfare, lawfare, and to recognize and support sovereignty.
00:27:41
So I think this is a really important campaign.
00:27:43
Um, I think it's important that it is being led by the Black Alliance for Peace.
00:27:48
Um, and the, I think the capacity for this campaign to really affect, um,
00:27:57
foundational change, not necessarily superficial change, but I think that the,
00:28:02
the potential for foundational change to, to systems, um, in our region that
00:28:07
govern, uh, how, what happens in our region now, um, I think that this has
00:28:12
the potential for upending those systems.
00:28:15
Um, so that leads me into what I'm hopeful for for 2024 is that this campaign
00:28:23
grows, that there's more involvement, um, from people that we're able to
00:28:29
really connect the dots more intimately and in a more human way of how U.
00:28:34
S.
00:28:34
imperialism operates in our region and that we can employ, you know, a
00:28:39
lot of the same principles that exist in, um, and organizing in the U.
00:28:45
S.
00:28:45
about like amplifying particular voices over others and so on and so forth and
00:28:49
that you know to me this gives me a lot of hope that those of us who are
00:28:53
in the global south area of our region who are the ones you know not only us
00:28:59
obviously but the the nations trapped the turtle island nations trapped inside
00:29:04
the the arbitrary borders of the U.
00:29:06
S.
00:29:07
um but that you know This will give us the opportunity to see each other,
00:29:16
to humanize one another, to be able to reach each other in ways that imperialism
00:29:21
tries to stop us from doing, and to, to really, um, build our collective power.
00:29:28
More meaningfully, um, and more tangibly, um, so that we can
00:29:34
achieve those, those demands.
00:29:36
Um, oh, I should also mention the objectives, um, of the campaign.
00:29:43
So, there's three.
00:29:45
The first is to build a people's That's plural.
00:29:48
A people centered campaign that coordinates anti imperialist, anti
00:29:51
war, and pro peace organizations, political parties, labor and social
00:29:55
justice orgs, as well as movements across our region to move our
00:29:58
Americas toward building alternative institutions and centers of power.
00:30:02
Number two, strengthen an America's wide consciousness
00:30:05
among the peoples of the region.
00:30:07
And number three, established peoples centered America's wide coordinating
00:30:10
structures that would facilitate the successful expulsion of the US EU NATO
00:30:15
axis of domination from our region.
00:30:18
Um, so those are very big goals, but I think that They're achievable
00:30:23
if we can organize ourselves well, um, so that brings me to the second
00:30:29
thing that I'm hopeful for is that, um, particularly for folks in the U.
00:30:33
S.
00:30:33
who, like Shiloh, you were mentioning the kind of like awakening that's
00:30:36
happening, um, in a more accelerated way now, um, that, that shredding of
00:30:41
the veil, um, I hope that that continues so that in such a way as to help people
00:30:50
see that the electoral politic aspect of organizing is not where we need to
00:30:55
be putting all of our attention, um, because it's not where we need to be.
00:31:01
There are so many other, uh, entry points.
00:31:06
There are so many other, like, strategically valuable places that
00:31:10
we need to be putting our energy.
00:31:13
Um, when you mentioned about, like, we can't boycott the weapons manufacturers
00:31:18
because we're not buying them.
00:31:19
We can boycott them by organizing the workers.
00:31:24
To remove their labor from those places.
00:31:27
Right?
00:31:27
So in that way, we don't have the power as consumers, but
00:31:30
we have that power as people.
00:31:32
We have that power as, as people who are economically suppressed,
00:31:36
oppressed and repressed.
00:31:37
Um, um, so yeah, and I think too, like, I'm hopeful that the, the weaponization of
00:31:47
identity politics by the imperial state.
00:31:50
is one of those parts of the veil that gets shredded because, like, if we turn
00:31:56
a critical eye toward recent years, like, let's turn The entire time that Trump
00:32:02
was running in his first campaign, people were, like, full speed organizing against
00:32:10
it, because so many of us could see the fascism, we could see it, we were living
00:32:16
it, you know, and we knew, we knew what was coming down the pipes, and we were
00:32:19
doing everything we could to stop it, in all of the ways that we knew how.
00:32:24
And look where we are still, you know.
00:32:28
So that's, that's probably one of my biggest hopes for 2024 for the U.
00:32:34
S.
00:32:34
in particular is that folks will see that, um, we need to shift our
00:32:39
tactics in how we organize ourselves and how we relate to each other, um,
00:32:44
particularly folks who align more or less, um, who May not yet be in a place.
00:32:54
We have to be realistic about how things are in the US.
00:32:57
Racially, the violence that's there, etc.
00:33:00
It's going to be hard for folks to go into One of the weapons manufacturing
00:33:06
places that is primarily employed by right wing thinking, you know, by
00:33:16
homophobic, transphobic, racist, white supremacist mindsets, that's going to
00:33:21
be really challenging and it's going to take a lot A lot from us to, to go
00:33:25
into those places and try to humanize those workers to, to reach the goal.
00:33:31
Um, but I hope that that's something that we can arrive at, and then
00:33:34
the last thing, I hope that like Jovanni, when you were talking about
00:33:37
people are starting to boycott U.
00:33:38
S.
00:33:39
products now, expanding the BDS, I definitely think that that should happen.
00:33:44
Um, I hope it happens sooner rather than later.
00:33:47
And I really hope that, like, I'm, I'm so incredibly moved and encouraged
00:33:53
by South Africa, um, raising the issue of genocide to the ICC.
00:33:59
Um, and calling for Israel to be, you know, U.
00:34:02
S.
00:34:02
needs to be right up in there with them and, um, if they could be retroactively
00:34:08
charged for all the war crimes, all, all of them, that would be, that
00:34:15
would just be like the greatest gift.
00:34:16
It's not going to happen like that, of course, but, um, yeah, I hope that
00:34:21
more countries will get a backbone.
00:34:26
You know, and do the same thing.
00:34:29
I hope that more countries will, will stop being so scared of the United States and
00:34:35
scared of Israel and actually do the right thing instead of also, like, maintaining
00:34:41
their complicity by preserving their own self interest and their greed and whatnot.
00:34:46
But that's what I hope for.
00:34:47
Free Palestine, free Puerto Rico, free Turtle Island, free
00:34:50
everywhere, US out of everywhere.
00:34:53
Jovanni: Awesome.
00:34:53
Thank you, Monisha.
00:34:54
Monisha, I got a couple questions to ask you.
00:34:56
So, the The, um, the plebiscite that you were talking about, that's the
00:35:01
same plebiscite that, uh, AOC and, um, Lidia, Torres, well, that's the one
00:35:07
that they're promoting here in Congress.
00:35:10
Monisha: Yeah, and what's interesting is, so there was an older one that
00:35:13
they did, and both their names were on it, but the, on this one,
00:35:17
I think because it's now in the
00:35:18
Jovanni: Lidia Velasquez, that's her name, right?
00:35:21
Monisha: Lidia Velasquez, but I don't think AOC's name is on this.
00:35:24
The Senate version of it, because she's a representative, right?
00:35:27
Not a senator.
00:35:29
So, yeah, I don't know if, if her name can be on it, but yeah, it's the same one.
00:35:34
Jovanni: Awesome.
00:35:34
Also, I want to ask you about, when you mentioned, Duresco, something
00:35:38
came to mind, also, that early this year, Uh, there was circling, uh, of
00:35:44
Ukrainian troops being trained at, at the, uh, at the old Roosevelt Road,
00:35:50
uh, base, whatever came out of that.
00:35:54
So
00:35:54
Monisha: I haven't seen anything else.
00:35:55
I live directly near there, so I hear all of the air traffic,
00:36:00
um, that goes in and out.
00:36:02
I can see training exercises happening from time to time, but it
00:36:06
doesn't seem like there's been any change to their frequency or type.
00:36:11
Then what I've been used to, like, hearing and seeing, so I'm not sure, I don't know.
00:36:18
Um, it did raise quite a stink among Vieques obviously, um, for folks who
00:36:23
are listening, Vieques are people from the island of Vieques that the U.
00:36:26
S.
00:36:27
um, militarized and used as a, a practice range for all but real war
00:36:32
exercises for 60 something years and we're still struggling with.
00:36:37
The UXO and all of the stuff and so it did get discussed on social media.
00:36:45
I'm not sure if anybody did press releases on that or nothing else came out.
00:36:51
About it to lead to more action on the part of the community.
00:36:56
So it was just kind of hearsay.
00:36:59
Anyway, sources told that the,
00:37:03
Jovanni: so I got, I got it from a news article from one from clarity.
00:37:06
That right?
00:37:06
Yeah.
00:37:07
No, what's the clarity that it was either clarity that or
00:37:09
the, I think it was clarity.
00:37:11
Yes.
00:37:11
Yeah.
00:37:12
That one or the one that's, uh, the Metro was a Metro.
00:37:14
The one that's in San Juan.
00:37:16
Monisha: Yeah.
00:37:17
I didn't see that one.
00:37:18
I'd only seen the one from clarity that.
00:37:21
And in it, they, they say that a source, sources say, you know, but
00:37:24
there was nothing else to confirm it and not that I doubt them at all.
00:37:28
It's just that.
00:37:30
There was, it was rumored, the sources were saying this could
00:37:34
happen, not necessarily that it was going to happen, but that it
00:37:37
has, it was being talked about.
00:37:39
So, yeah, our ears are still to the ground here, keeping an eye on what happens with
00:37:45
that, and if there's anything that we see, we're definitely going to raise hell.
00:37:50
Jovanni: Also, one last thing you mentioned about the, uh, um, the zona
00:37:53
piece, I believe that was initiated by By either Chavez, he was Chavez
00:37:59
when he was in power, uh, about the, uh, Declaration of Zone of Peace.
00:38:03
I think one of the initiatives that they were trying to do at the time was to end
00:38:07
the last active conflict in, in South America, which was the conflict of, uh,
00:38:12
the Colombian government against the, uh, Colombian guerrillas, uh, where,
00:38:18
where Chavez was, was acting as a, uh, mediator between the government and.
00:38:24
The farc and now Cuba is acting as a mediator between the Columbia government
00:38:30
and the, and the, uh, ELN, um, which is also another gorilla, uh, in the
00:38:36
mil militia in in, in, uh, in Columbia.
00:38:40
What's funny about it is that both countries, because of.
00:38:43
Their, their involvement in trying and trying to bring those conflicts,
00:38:46
I mean, the conflict between the Colombian government and the FARC
00:38:49
is like the oldest active guerrilla conflict in the Western Hemisphere.
00:38:53
I mean, it's been going on since, at least since the 50s, I believe.
00:38:57
And, uh, uh, it came to a close, um, a few years ago, uh, but the, the ELN,
00:39:04
it's still active and, uh, and, and, uh, right now Cuba is acting as a mediator.
00:39:10
They're meeting in Havana.
00:39:12
But what's funny is because of those two countries acting to try to bring closure
00:39:17
to those, to those long conflicts, right?
00:39:19
Both countries was designated as, uh, state sponsors of Tists because of
00:39:22
that . Um, and, and, uh, uh, and Cuba was, was, was added to the list of state
00:39:29
sponsors of terrorism, um, uh, a country because of their involvement with the,
00:39:33
with the ELN and their involvement with the, uh, mediating between them
00:39:37
and the, and the Columbia government.
00:39:40
Monisha: I was not aware of, of that specific connection.
00:39:43
Thanks for, for telling me that.
00:39:46
Jovanni: Yeah.
00:39:46
Thank you.
00:39:47
Thank you.
00:39:47
Yeah.
00:39:47
Thank you.
00:39:48
Very, um, very valuable.
00:39:50
Um, a lot of, a lot of input that you put there.
00:39:54
Thank you.
00:39:55
Um, guess who's next?
00:39:58
Guess that's me, right?
00:39:59
Um, so yeah.
00:40:00
Monisha: What's on your mind, Jovanni?
00:40:01
Tell us everything.
00:40:02
So,
00:40:03
Jovanni: uh, I've been, I've been, uh, taking notes on my phone all week,
00:40:08
actually dodging things here and there, and then and I just put them together.
00:40:11
I put like three at the top, three or four things together, right?
00:40:16
Um, and obviously a lot of things that happened in 2023, um, a lot
00:40:20
of movement, like, like, uh, Shiloh mentioned earlier, like, I mean, there
00:40:24
was huge tectonic shifts going on.
00:40:28
Um, I think Lennon was the one who coined that there were decades.
00:40:32
That nothing happens and there's days that decades happens
00:40:35
and that's what's happening.
00:40:38
Um, you know, a lot of things moving, a lot of moving parts, a lot of
00:40:41
things happening, you know, around the world, just so hard to keep up.
00:40:44
Um, so one of the things that, that inspired me in 2023.
00:40:49
Was the revolt in the Shahe, um, against France.
00:40:54
Uh, that's Shahe is the area of Central Africa.
00:40:57
Uh, so most of those countries in the Shahe, uh, were part of, you know,
00:41:02
uh, French colonialism, you know, uh, they were colonized by France for
00:41:06
like, uh, um, over a hundred years.
00:41:09
Uh, but there were successive cos going on since, um, 20, 21, 2 and three.
00:41:15
There were several cos um, where the.
00:41:20
The president of the government that are, you know, francophone or francophile,
00:41:25
francophile governments were overthrown by nationalist governments, right?
00:41:30
By revolutionary nationalist governments.
00:41:32
Um, or, not all, you know, they didn't necessarily have to be a revolutionary
00:41:38
nationalist government, but they were, some of them were overthrown by
00:41:41
governments that pretty much wanted to distance themselves from France, right?
00:41:45
Um, so, the countries That pretty much enacted coups or broke relations with
00:41:54
France were pretty much Chad, Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Gabon.
00:42:02
In 2023, it was Niger that overthrew the government on a coup.
00:42:08
Um, and pretty much broke relations with France and told, uh, France to,
00:42:12
uh, go home and send all their troops.
00:42:14
Like, keep in mind that France has bases in all these countries, you
00:42:18
know, these other countries, right?
00:42:19
And France pretty much, uh, controlled these countries economy.
00:42:24
Um, and one of the things that, that, uh, and a lot of these countries are
00:42:29
very rich, very rich in minerals, very rich in material and raw material, very
00:42:34
rich in, in, uh, in, uh, commodities and everything, but the people see
00:42:39
very little of, of the wealth that's being extracted from those countries.
00:42:44
Most of this wealth goes to France, right?
00:42:47
Or other European countries.
00:42:49
Um, so that right there.
00:42:51
You know, cause revolts and people's revolts.
00:42:53
And, uh, and there's one character, there's one person, um, which was
00:42:59
very inspiring for a lot of people.
00:43:00
What's, um, his name is Captain Ibrahim Troy Ray, uh, he's
00:43:06
from Burkina Faso, right?
00:43:08
And he, I believe he's like, he was an army captain, I think like 32
00:43:11
years old, but he became like an incarnation of, uh, Thomas Sankara.
00:43:16
Uh, Thomas Sankara was a revolutionary, uh, uh, leader of that country.
00:43:21
Uh, Burkina Faso, um, also led a revolt.
00:43:26
Uh, against colonialism and neocolonialism and, was setting the,
00:43:30
uh, the country in the path towards, uh, liberation and self sufficiency
00:43:34
until he was killed in, in, in 87.
00:43:36
So, this person became in the minds and the imaginations of, of his
00:43:42
people, you know, the reincarnation of, of Thomas Shankara and, and, uh,
00:43:46
he was very, uh, became very popular.
00:43:49
So, yeah, so nevertheless, um, France, the U.
00:43:52
S.
00:43:53
and others, Britain, they tried to reverse.
00:43:56
Um, what was happening in, in the Chahal, and there's this, uh, economic
00:44:02
community of West Africa, ECOWAS it's called, and these, uh, these,
00:44:07
uh, this community of West Africa pretty much is a Western shill.
00:44:11
It's like, uh, it's like the OAE, like the, uh, like, like the OAF
00:44:16
here in the United States, kind of, and not United States, but in the
00:44:19
US, in, in the Western Hemisphere.
00:44:22
Uh, but this is, this is mostly focused on economic issues.
00:44:27
Uh, but also in political issues in the Central and the West African countries.
00:44:31
But anyway, they were threatening a, uh, a An invasion, to muster up
00:44:36
an invasion to, uh, against Niger in post, uh, sanctions on Niger.
00:44:41
They gave Niger a deadline that if they don't reconstitute the, the president
00:44:46
that was overthrown by this date, that they were going to intervene militarily.
00:44:50
Uh, France was supporting, US was supporting and everything.
00:44:54
And, but they weren't able to do that because the other countries
00:44:56
that I mentioned before, you know, Chad, Guinea, Mali, uh, threatened.
00:45:02
Was that if they, if they uh, uh, get themselves involved militarily into
00:45:06
Nigeria, they will come into the red, they would come to support Nigeria,
00:45:10
and then there will pretty much be a declaration war against them as well.
00:45:13
So it was kind of like a, went for all and all for one type of thing, you
00:45:17
know, so Kowa kind of backed the away.
00:45:19
But yeah, so that was, that was, um, that was inspiring.
00:45:22
That was inspiring, uh, seeing that, uh, um, these countries, you know,
00:45:27
stood up, uh, to Western, uh, economic power and military power, you know, they
00:45:32
consolidated amongst themselves, and, and, and they, uh, um, support each other, and,
00:45:39
you know, they, and these powers couldn't do anything about it, and they're,
00:45:44
you know, they're right now tracking.
00:45:45
Um, another thing that, that also, um, That I'm tracking, it also inspired me,
00:45:51
was the BRICS Summit in South Africa.
00:45:54
This was the 15th BRICS Summit.
00:45:57
If all of you don't know what BRICS stands for, it means it's an economic
00:46:03
relationship between Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.
00:46:10
Hence the acronym BRICS.
00:46:13
Um, it's funny because the name, they didn't give themselves that name, the
00:46:18
name that the, uh, was one of those, uh, stock firms that gave them that
00:46:23
name, um, early, um, about 15 years ago, um, I forgot which stock firm, it
00:46:29
was an American stock firm actually.
00:46:30
Um, they gave them that name because the relationship, they
00:46:34
were coming together, right?
00:46:35
And pretty much the founders of this economic relationship was, you
00:46:40
know, Brazil, Russia, and China, then India got involved, and then
00:46:45
South Africa was the last one.
00:46:47
But in this summit that happened in August 2023, uh, they
00:46:50
announced, uh, six new members.
00:46:53
Uh, to add the BRICS.
00:46:54
So now it's called BRICS Plus, right?
00:46:55
And the six new members is Egypt, Iran, uh, Saudi Arabia,
00:46:59
Argentina, Ethiopia, and the UAE.
00:47:02
Uh, most of them, most of the country, Egypt, uh, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the
00:47:08
UAE, and Ethiopia, uh, are countries that are heavy on, on, on, on petroleum, right?
00:47:15
So, that right there, pretty much.
00:47:18
Having that is having, having consolidated that power, that petroleum power, uh,
00:47:26
within this organization, pretty much, uh, make, make the bricks, uh, economically,
00:47:33
um, higher than the G seven who also know who the G seven, you know, pretty much the
00:47:38
great seven countries, you know, the, um, the, the seven wealthiest countries in the
00:47:43
world, uh, uk, us, um, France, Germany.
00:47:49
Uh, Japan, um, and two others, uh, make the BRICS, make the G7s, but the BRICS
00:47:55
will path them in economic activities now, um, those countries, which, you
00:48:01
know, I thought that was inspiring that, you know, that it's, it's an organization
00:48:06
that is not centered in the West.
00:48:08
But it's central elsewhere in the rest, uh, and that they have this
00:48:12
cooperation with each other, and it was kind of inspiring, and then also
00:48:16
opening up to other global majority countries to come in and whatnot, and,
00:48:21
uh, have this, this, uh, this economic, uh, cooperation with each other.
00:48:26
Uh, so yeah, so the six countries will become officially members
00:48:29
in January, in January 2024.
00:48:32
However, with the election of, uh, Uh, uh, Javier, uh, uh, Mila, Javier,
00:48:40
what's his last name, Javier, uh, Mila, Mila, in, in Argentina, which is, he's
00:48:47
pretty much a, you know, very extreme libertarian, pretty much in with, with,
00:48:52
uh, with the IMF, uh, he want dollar right the economy, uh, he wants to
00:48:58
enact, uh, austerity back in Argentina.
00:49:01
He wants to break.
00:49:03
He wants to break relations with Brazil, China, and Russia, uh, et cetera, and
00:49:08
then he, and during his election campaign, he pretty much pledged allegiance to
00:49:13
the United States and Israel, so he pretty much formally submitted the,
00:49:17
uh, the letter to Lula in Brazil saying that Argentina will be withdrawn from
00:49:22
the BRICS, so, so now instead of six countries, now it's five countries.
00:49:27
Um, so, But yeah, so that was inspiring for me, uh, um, you know, the, you know,
00:49:32
the new trade routes that's happening, you know, and then the, the linking, the
00:49:36
linking between the, the BRICS, China's, uh, uh, uh, BRI, which is the Belt and
00:49:42
Road Initiative, and the Central Asian Economic Union, which is made up of, uh,
00:49:48
former Soviet, uh, countries in Central Asia, you know, the economic, these
00:49:52
economic coalitions with each other, right, and, Um, that, you know, that's
00:49:57
kind of inspiring as well, because, you know, now you're seeing the, you're
00:50:01
seeing the, the world, the globe, kind of moving away from, from what was called
00:50:08
the core, the core being central, you know, North Atlantic, you know, Canada,
00:50:13
United States, and Western Europe, moving away from the core, from the center, you
00:50:17
know, and pretty much doing business with each other, and pretty much by doing so,
00:50:21
affirming their sovereignty, affirming their own development without being
00:50:24
managed from, from the, uh, the West.
00:50:27
Which I thought that was, I think that is very, um, you know, inspiring,
00:50:33
um, also the de dollarization that's happening as well, which means that,
00:50:37
uh, currently the countries when they do business with each other, they
00:50:40
have to do business with what they do commerce with each other with dollars.
00:50:44
So a lot of countries have to, um, manage to have dollar reserves and
00:50:48
then that's how they, they purchase.
00:50:50
Goods in the global market with dollars, uh, but the only country that
00:50:54
print dollars is the United States.
00:50:56
No other countries do that, right?
00:50:57
So they have to, they have to sell the commodities in dollars, they have to
00:50:59
buy the goods in dollars and everything.
00:51:01
So now, um, with all this economic activity that's going on with all these
00:51:07
countries, right, now these, um, and all these economic allegiances and all
00:51:11
these economic interrelations that's happening, now countries are starting to
00:51:14
bypass the dollar and having You know, bilateral relations, um, buying with
00:51:21
their own currencies or other currencies, et cetera, right, which is a good thing.
00:51:27
Um, one of the things that was funny, Marco Rubio, Senator in, in, in, in
00:51:32
February, in, in Florida, he complained about the de dollarization that's
00:51:36
happening because his word is it's going to be harder to sanction countries.
00:51:40
So if countries.
00:51:42
Those are not used dollars, it'd be harder to sanction them.
00:51:44
Right now, the reason sanctions are so effective on countries is because
00:51:48
countries need to use dollars to get goods, and then by denying them dollars
00:51:52
by, you know, it kind of makes them hard to buy things in the market, right?
00:51:56
So if countries are doing business with each other not using the dollars, right,
00:52:00
so it's kind of harder, in Marco Rubio's words, it's harder to sanction them.
00:52:06
Uh, third thing that, uh, that caught my attention and that I'm following
00:52:10
is the, the failure of the Ukraine counteroffensive, which was, um, which was
00:52:15
propped up to be this big thing that was supposed to happen in the spring of 2023,
00:52:19
and then got pushed back to the summer.
00:52:22
Um, this was supposed to break the back of the Russian army, um, the Ukrainian
00:52:27
was supposed to, um, reach, um, uh, the coast by the end of the summer,
00:52:33
they were supposed to be in Crimea, you know, having beach parties and
00:52:36
everything, because they did a whole theatrical, uh, commercial on it, you
00:52:40
know, all this, you know, promotion, how successful this was going to be.
00:52:45
Uh, they weren't able to, they hit a pretty much a Russian wall and.
00:52:49
The West was just throwing, uh, armament after armament and, you know, the, the
00:52:55
Western countries were kind of depleting their, their, their shells and the
00:52:58
armaments and, and all the weaponry that was sent into Ukraine and it was
00:53:02
just being, you know, Destroy one after the other, um, you see countries like
00:53:07
Germany, for example, they, you know, they use all their last reserves, you
00:53:11
see, um, complain about, you know, they're using all their reserves and
00:53:15
everything to send to Ukraine and nothing was happening, there weren't any goods.
00:53:18
So now what's happening now that, that, uh, Ukraine kind of, if you don't
00:53:23
notice, kind of left the, uh, the, the, the main, um, People aren't talking
00:53:28
about Ukraine no more, it's now kind of hard talking about it, now the, the
00:53:31
Ukrainian president Zelensky is just pretty much going around the world, you
00:53:35
know, kind of begging for more money, because You know, it has been a failure.
00:53:39
I mean, there, this, this country was pretty much pushed into this war.
00:53:44
I mean, this year as well was the 10th anniversary of the war in
00:53:48
Ukraine, which is, it happened 10 years ago with the coup in 2014.
00:53:53
And when they started attacking the, uh, the Russian speaking populations
00:53:57
within Ukraine, it was, And Eastern, Eastern Ukraine, um, et cetera, right?
00:54:02
And then with the intervention of Russia, uh, uh, little, almost two years ago now,
00:54:07
uh, it kind of escalated, intensified after that, um, but yeah, and, uh,
00:54:13
pretty much to a push by, by, you know, by NATO and the, and Western, you know,
00:54:16
European countries to, to pretty much, um, commit suicide, pretty much, that's what
00:54:22
happened, you know, because they're, you know, self afflicted, and, Um, injuries.
00:54:26
Um, they lost a huge amount of the population.
00:54:29
They got millions of people that, that, that went, that went to Russia.
00:54:34
Millions of people that went to Western Europe.
00:54:37
Hundreds of thousands of people killed in the battlefield.
00:54:39
You know, so, so this country pretty much is broken into pieces
00:54:42
because They were used as cannon fodder to, to hurt, to hurt Russia.
00:54:48
In the words of, of Hillary Clinton, you know, they were trying
00:54:50
to get the Afghan trap on Russia using Ukraine, um, and it failed.
00:54:55
Um, yeah, and lastly, uh, things that, uh, that I'm tracking, you know, um,
00:55:02
is what's happening in Palestine.
00:55:04
Obviously, that has impacted.
00:55:07
I mean, in fact, a whole lot of people like Shiloh said earlier,
00:55:10
it's, you know, it's happening broadly in life, people are anybody with a
00:55:16
smartphone can see what's happening.
00:55:18
And we're footing the bill, uh, this thing can end tomorrow if, if the U.
00:55:22
S.
00:55:22
just stop, um, uh, enabling it and sending billions of dollars to, to Israel.
00:55:30
Um, just this week, I believe they pushed another packet.
00:55:34
Of a hundred billion dollars, uh, worth of am ammunitions and armament to Israel.
00:55:40
Um, here in the United States Congress, um, I think they
00:55:42
bypass Congress, actually.
00:55:44
They bypass Congress and they just send it to them.
00:55:46
And that's on top of the $4 billion that, that the United
00:55:49
States sends to Israel a year.
00:55:51
To sustain them, et cetera.
00:55:53
Um, and every time other countries, every time they, they convene a session at the
00:55:59
UN to try to, to, uh, uh, sanction Israel, try to do some type of, uh, resolution
00:56:06
against Israel, the US and about three other countries, um, small countries like
00:56:10
micro Micronesia and Palau, for example, and Israel, um, veto it or us veto it.
00:56:18
We won't let it happen.
00:56:19
We'll let it pass it.
00:56:20
Um, Egypt, which is a neighboring country right, you know, right on the border
00:56:25
with With, uh, Gaza has to ask, has to ask permission, uh, to Israel and the U.
00:56:32
S.
00:56:32
before sending an aid to Gaza, you know, which is, it's just huge
00:56:36
humiliation to, to the, you know, to, to the Arab, Arab nations.
00:56:40
Egypt is the most populous country in the Arab world, has the largest military
00:56:45
in the Arab world, uh, yet they have to ask permission to send, um, Uh, aid into,
00:56:50
into Gaza, which is very troubling, very humiliating to, uh, to you, to Arab people
00:56:56
whose sentiments is on the right place.
00:56:58
The, the, the issue in Palestine is in the hearts of every Arab person,
00:57:03
uh, yet these, uh, these heads of states, they're totally captured,
00:57:08
uh, by, by the West, by the U.
00:57:11
S., by Israel.
00:57:13
And they, uh, seem to be, uh, unable, unwilling to do anything, you know.
00:57:18
And let's give him permission to do so.
00:57:23
So yeah, those are the four things that I've been tracking, four things
00:57:27
that I'm looking into and following.
00:57:31
Things I'm looking forward to is the end of the Ukraine war.
00:57:35
Which is, which is also going to be a, which also is already,
00:57:40
the war is lost already.
00:57:42
Um, you know, people in Congress, people in the West are pretty
00:57:46
much turning away from Ukraine.
00:57:47
Um, it's already a lot to cause.
00:57:50
You know, NATO has been defeated again.
00:57:52
You know, they got defeated in 2021 in Afghanistan.
00:57:55
They're being defeated again in Ukraine.
00:57:57
Um, but yeah, you know, I'm looking forward to this, the end of this carnage
00:58:01
that's happening in, in Ukraine that has cost a lot of hundreds of thousands
00:58:06
of lives, hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian, hundreds of thousands of, of
00:58:11
Russian lives, um, and others, you know, to come to an end, to come to a close.
00:58:15
A second thing I'm looking forward to is the end.
00:58:18
of the Zionist Apartheid State of Israel.
00:58:22
Um, if you notice that recently in Congress they passed a resolution Equating
00:58:30
Zionism to anti Semitism, and I think every congressperson, it was a bipartisan
00:58:35
thing, every congressperson voted for it, but one Republican Congress voted against
00:58:42
it, and Rashida Tlaib, she voted present, you know, but everybody else voted, voted
00:58:48
for it, which is wrong, which is wrong.
00:58:51
Zionism is not, um, equivalent to anti Semitism.
00:58:55
Zionism is, is an ideology that was created In Europe, um, is,
00:59:02
uh, Jewish supremacy, um, you know, Jewish nationalism, uh,
00:59:07
which is racialized, racialized, uh, Judaism, which is a religion.
00:59:12
Um, so that's what Zionists is, and then, and, and the State of Israel is
00:59:18
a Zionist, enacting a Zionist policy.
00:59:22
Uh, I mean, apartheid policy, but it's not the same as anti Semitism, uh, anti
00:59:27
Semitism being, uh, tied to language, uh, tied to a people of a region, which
00:59:33
is people of the Middle East, people in what we call West Asia, uh, you know,
00:59:38
are Semitic people, including Arabs are Semitic people, including Palestinians
00:59:41
are Semitic people, um, so yeah.
00:59:45
So that, uh, I'm looking forward to the end of this.
00:59:50
This, uh, this state that was created by the U.
00:59:52
N.
00:59:53
was first created by Britain, by the U.
00:59:55
K., um, it was started off by U.
00:59:58
K., but was actually created by the U.
00:59:59
N., um, in 1948, um, and, uh, without the input of the people that
01:00:07
were already living there, which was the Palestinians, and that's,
01:00:09
that's the origin of this conflict.
01:00:11
Um, it's not religion, it's, it's not hatred towards Jews.
01:00:15
Is, is, uh, is the, uh, um, the ethnic cleansing, is the displacement, is the,
01:00:21
uh, people by immigrants from Europe.
01:00:25
Claiming that the lands is theirs.
01:00:27
Um, so yeah, I mean if you look at back at South Africa, for example, apart,
01:00:33
thi South Africa doesn't exist anymore.
01:00:35
People, you study South Africa, the country exists, but apartide
01:00:40
South Africa doesn't exist anymore.
01:00:42
It's in the history books.
01:00:44
Um, yeah.
01:00:45
And that's what I'm looking forward to, um, next year, that the apartide zionist
01:00:51
state of Israel is in the history book.
01:00:53
And then we have, we look forward to a more inclusive, more peaceful,
01:00:58
um, you know, state in that area.
01:01:01
Um, and then further, lastly, I'm looking forward to the furthering
01:01:05
of the multi polar world.
01:01:07
Uh, which is, which is forming as we speak, um, just like Shiloh mentioned
01:01:12
earlier, the shift that's happening is, is moving towards a world where
01:01:16
the West is not centered, but there are, there are multiple centers around
01:01:20
the world, um, you know, what I would like to see instead of a multipolar
01:01:26
is a pluripolar world, pluripolar world, which was, uh, coined by, by
01:01:32
Chavez and, uh, and, uh, Evo Morales.
01:01:36
Uh, which means a world that with no centers of power, you know, a world where,
01:01:40
you know, where states are, are more in cooperative mode than in competitive mode.
01:01:47
And that is my, and that's my story and that's what I'm sticking with.
01:01:51
Go ahead.
01:01:52
Monisha: May
01:01:53
Shiloh: it be so.
01:01:54
May it be so.
01:01:55
Burn it all down, it sounds like.
01:01:57
You're just done with all of, all of it.
01:02:01
I'm, the thing that's, that's, uh, listening to both you and Monisha, the
01:02:07
thing that keeps just, just echoing in my head is, you know, with all this,
01:02:11
um, Monisha talking about the, all the systems and structures that are
01:02:16
collapsing in Puerto Rico and just, yeah, all the war and violence, um,
01:02:24
happening at the, At the behest of the U.
01:02:27
S.
01:02:28
and different empires, like, what, what is giving you hope?
01:02:33
What is, what is you keep, what's keeping you in the fight and not like Monisha
01:02:38
said, putting your head in the sand?
01:02:40
What's, uh, yeah, what gives you hope, um, for 2024?
01:02:46
Jovanni: I mean, we have, well, just like you guys mentioned earlier, I
01:02:48
mean, we have to have revolutionary hope, just like you mentioned earlier,
01:02:51
not having hope is not an option.
01:02:52
We need revolutionary hope.
01:02:56
We need to be aware of what's happening and take part in whatever
01:03:00
our capacity is to take part in.
01:03:03
Here in San Antonio, for example, we've been doing our part with
01:03:09
the Palestinian, you know, ethnic cleansing that's happening now.
01:03:16
Go into the community has been mobilized here.
01:03:19
We've been going to here in San Antonio.
01:03:21
We have City Hall.
01:03:22
It's something that's called a citizen to to be heard, which is on Wednesday,
01:03:29
which is, you know, anyone can go to the City Hall and present their.
01:03:35
Present their, uh, you know, comments or present problems, you know, and the
01:03:39
mayor is there and then the, the city council persons are there as well and
01:03:44
everything, and then you get like three minutes, um, to, to uninterrupted,
01:03:49
three uninterrupted minutes, um, to present your case, present, you know,
01:03:53
your, you know, what you have to say.
01:03:55
Um, so ever since this conflict has started, we've been, the community
01:04:00
here in San Antonio, we've been going every Wednesday, every Wednesday, uh,
01:04:05
we've been going down to, uh, to City Hall and pretty much people after
01:04:09
people, people after people, right, giving their testimonies on, you know,
01:04:13
on, on what's happening in Israel.
01:04:16
I know that we're a city and you say that, well, you know, your city,
01:04:18
that's something with foreign policy.
01:04:20
That city doesn't have nothing to do with it.
01:04:21
But San Antonio is a, is.
01:04:24
It's part of this program called, um, uh, City, uh, Friendship Cities.
01:04:30
So we have several, several Friendship Cities, and then they have, um, and
01:04:35
this program of Friendship Cities.
01:04:36
One of the, one of the cities that we're friends with is Tel Aviv.
01:04:39
We're demanding that our, that our city, drops, you know, Tel Aviv as,
01:04:45
as one of the Friendship Cities.
01:04:47
You know, apparently, apparently the city of San Antonio had
01:04:50
given Israel about 19 million.
01:04:52
All right, 19 million dollars.
01:04:55
Um, so yeah, so we're, we're demanding for our mayor to drop, um, to drop the, uh,
01:05:03
Tel Aviv as a friendship city, which is interesting because he wrote the first,
01:05:07
the first week that we started going, um, and like I said, we were filling the city
01:05:12
halls, the media was there, and they were, you know, they were interviewing people
01:05:15
on the spot and everything, and he put out a statement saying that he's not going
01:05:18
to drop it because, um, It has nothing to do with foreign policy and, and, and, you
01:05:25
know, friendship, you know, that's what, that's what the world needs is friendship,
01:05:28
you know, just by, you know, just give us, give us like this little milquetoast,
01:05:32
you know, uh, you know, uh, you know, statement, a little, yeah, you know,
01:05:39
a little milquetoast statement there, right, saying that, you know, people need
01:05:42
to talk and peace, you know, dialogue and blah, blah, we need cooperation,
01:05:47
friendship is essential, right?
01:05:49
However, uh, Houston, and you say it has nothing to do with, with foreign policy.
01:05:55
But Houston, for example, is also a friendship city, uh, city,
01:05:59
and they had a friendship city relationship with the Russian
01:06:02
country, with the Russian, uh, city.
01:06:05
And as soon as the Russian intervention started, right, they dropped
01:06:08
that city like it was hot potato.
01:06:10
They just dropped it.
01:06:11
So, so they can't tell us that, that San Antonio can't do the same.
01:06:16
You know, uh, they're choosing not to do it.
01:06:18
That, that's the thing.
01:06:20
Uh, apparently there's a, they're forcing.
01:06:22
A, a vote here in San Antonio by, for next year, for the eighth or 9th of
01:06:28
January, uh, people are, are asked to go to, to City Hall, uh, flood City
01:06:34
Hall again, and, uh, pretty much push their concert, the cons members, you
01:06:39
know, to this vote to drop, to drop, uh, Tel Aviv off the, uh, um, the
01:06:44
friendship study list of, of San Antonio.
01:06:47
So things like that, take part in whatever you can take part in.
01:06:50
You know, I know that it could be overwhelming, you may feel powerless,
01:06:54
you know, watching the news, you might feel, or other people just look the other
01:06:58
way, just like nothing is happening, like, you know, we're in the holiday
01:07:01
season, people out there shopping, like, nothing is happening, it doesn't concern
01:07:04
them, it's not affecting them in any way, so yeah, we don't think about it,
01:07:08
but yeah, but, you know, keep talking about it, uh, it's another thing that
01:07:12
I, that I was seeing in social media, that, that the more people Flood social
01:07:18
media with things about Palestine.
01:07:19
The harder it is to shadowbind and the harder it is to, to, um, to,
01:07:25
to close people's account or, you know, or, or, um, not close it.
01:07:29
What they've been doing, they're suspending people.
01:07:31
It's hard to suspend people because there's so many people, so many people
01:07:34
putting a piece about Palestine, which is something that I think
01:07:36
either you or, either you said it or Monisha said it that, um, that people,
01:07:42
the veil is coming out, people are seeing it, which is something that
01:07:45
we didn't see like 15 years ago.
01:07:47
10 or 15 years ago, uh, the only, the only narrative that we'll get every time,
01:07:53
every time Israel will get on the, on this killing spree, the only narrative that
01:07:57
we'll get was the narrative from Israel, but now they don't control the narrative
01:08:01
anymore, um, and people are pretty much pushing back with the, with the, with the
01:08:05
counter narrative of what's happening.
01:08:08
And, uh, yeah, yeah, so things like that give me revolutionary hope.
01:08:12
Um,
01:08:14
Monisha: before I say what, what gives me hope, I want to calm
01:08:17
myself out because I had intended to talk about the Congo as well.
01:08:24
Um, and I did not.
01:08:26
Um, I got lost in the sauce.
01:08:28
And I, I bring that up related to this because of How, um, the struggle for
01:08:38
the liberation of Palestine and the, the, the genocide that's happening
01:08:44
is part of what has brought light to what's happening in Congo, the
01:08:49
genocide there, and Israel and U.
01:08:51
S.
01:08:51
involvement there, um, as well as the huge, huge contradiction that it's
01:08:56
the very technology that we're using to expose the, the genocide against
01:09:02
Palestinians that is the result of the genocide against Congolese People.
01:09:07
I have a lot of feelings about that contradiction and I don't know what the
01:09:12
answer is to that, but I'm thankful that.
01:09:15
Now, at least, um, there's, it's being talked about more, um,
01:09:22
and we can become more aware.
01:09:24
And it makes me think about what does give me hope, um, is with mutual aid
01:09:32
initiatives, with food sovereignty movements, with the things that are doing
01:09:37
like what the Zone of Peace campaign talks about and like creating new structures.
01:09:42
Creating new systems for us to survive and thrive with and, and relate to
01:09:47
each other through so that we stop being unwitting and or unwilling
01:09:53
participants in these genocides, just by way of the nature of consumerism.
01:10:01
And I'm, I'm hopeful that the more Congo gets talked about.
01:10:06
Um, the more raw that contradiction becomes for people and we start to take
01:10:13
more responsibility in that way, you know.
01:10:17
I don't think we have an answer to that right now because we need our technology
01:10:22
to do the work that we're doing.
01:10:24
We need to be able to communicate with each other.
01:10:27
And now it's like every time I, I pick up my phone, which is constantly
01:10:31
now, I'm like constantly checking TikTok, Instagram, et cetera.
01:10:35
Um, I feel it.
01:10:38
I'm like thinking of the hands and the bodies, the eyes, the souls, the
01:10:45
spirits, the lives of the people in Congo that are the reason why this phone's
01:10:53
even in my hand to be to begin with.
01:10:56
Um, so, yeah, I guess in a weird way I'm trying to say that, um, the con the the
01:11:05
the the What's the word I'm looking for?
01:11:07
Jovanni.
01:11:07
You know it.
01:11:08
Like Exacerbation of the contradiction there of, of, you know, us being forced
01:11:16
to look at all of these things, um, is going to force us to change our way
01:11:23
of life and I see the people who are already working toward that and have been
01:11:27
working toward that for years through farming, through mutual aid work, um,
01:11:33
through, you know, trying to reduce our dependency on Globalization and on,
01:11:41
on these very systems that oppress us.
01:11:43
Um, so yeah, that's where my hope lies.
01:11:45
And that's why even though oftentimes I, I get very frustrated and, and
01:11:51
feel hopeless and feel despair and, and feel just like frozen.
01:11:55
Um, I look to those folks because they're constantly.
01:12:01
doing the thing, you know, they're growing food.
01:12:05
They're, they're teaching us, to me, they're, they're an example of what we
01:12:09
should be doing by like, if I could go back really quick to what I was saying
01:12:15
about balancing our energies and maybe Using them less on electoral politics
01:12:23
and more on other things, like, that's some of the other things that was in
01:12:27
my mind when I was saying that, like, we need to be creating mutual aid
01:12:31
systems to sustain general strikes, to effectively remove ourselves from the
01:12:36
equation of these, these oppressive systems once and for all, um, and if
01:12:39
we're For more information visit www.
01:12:40
FEMA.
01:12:40
gov Always focusing on electoral politics.
01:12:43
We're not giving our time and energy toward the creation of a new society.
01:12:47
We're maintaining the old one.
01:12:50
So yeah, food sovereignty.
01:12:53
You know, um, that's where.
01:12:56
Where my hope really lies, as well as in the resistance of people, like,
01:13:00
the people's just sheer will to resist and survive, um, I think that, that
01:13:08
to me is an incredible example, um, you know, that a lot of us who exist
01:13:14
within the first world, who benefit from these people's Will to survive.
01:13:19
Um, we need to take a lesson from them in that way and be willing to suffer and be
01:13:24
willing to struggle, you know, with less.
01:13:27
Um, and I see people willing to do that.
01:13:30
So,
01:13:32
what about you, Shiloh?
01:13:34
Ah,
01:13:35
Shiloh: yeah, what gives me hope?
01:13:36
Um.
01:13:38
A few things big and small, um, small being, uh, small in stature, big in
01:13:47
heart, my four year old gives me a lot of hope, um, they, my partner and
01:13:54
I are very open and honest with them around, you know, to their level, like
01:13:59
what's going on in the world and what's going on in Palestine and Palestine.
01:14:04
Every day they ask me, you know, are they still fighting in Palestine?
01:14:07
So if they can wake up hopeful that it's stopped, I can wake up hopeful as well.
01:14:14
Um, I think, uh, the, uh, watching, watching Yemen just take matters
01:14:21
into their own hands and, uh, block the Red Sea, like, that's a big, a
01:14:27
big way of, um, exerting, exerting people power of like, you know,
01:14:34
stopping the, the chain, um, the.
01:14:37
The chain of weapons and the flow of weapons, um, and stopping the consumerism
01:14:44
in Israel, uh, um, and then I can see, like, yeah, like we were talking
01:14:50
about, the different actions of, of people power of, like, um, removing
01:14:57
yourself through the BDS movement, um, removing your own consumerism and,
01:15:02
and your own, uh, flow of, of money.
01:15:07
And then also, um, yeah, if you can't.
01:15:10
Or you can remove your, your consumerism and then you can also remove your labor,
01:15:16
um, and like you're saying, Monisha, like, if, if we're going to ask people to remove
01:15:22
their labor from the equation, then we have to have systems that support them,
01:15:27
um, so that, yeah, people aren't left out.
01:15:30
On Their Own, um, because we're still, yeah, living under
01:15:35
capitalism, so you have to labor to live, um, so that gives me hope.
01:15:41
And then also this, uh, just in the last, I think, week, maybe 10 days
01:15:46
or so, the first, uh, public, uh, conscientious objector, Tal Mitnick,
01:15:53
um, a teenager in Israel who's objecting to conscription into the Israeli army,
01:16:01
um, That gives me hope if, yeah, maybe possibly more, more people feeling, um,
01:16:10
emboldened to do that and speak out.
01:16:12
Um, yeah, I think a lot of the youth give me hope always, so that's
01:16:20
what's giving me hope right now.
01:16:21
And, um, yeah, hopefully we can all carry that into
01:16:25
Jovanni: 2024.
01:16:27
Speaking on Israel and, and, and the genocide they're committing, um, in broad
01:16:34
daylight, you know, in front of cameras.
01:16:36
It's astonishing because the first time I mean, this is not the first
01:16:40
ethnic cleansing or first genocide that's ever happened in human history.
01:16:44
But it's the first time it's actually happening in broad
01:16:46
daylight in front of cameras and people actually seeing it in live.
01:16:51
You know, while it's happening, you know, um, usually, um, and something
01:16:55
else that, you know, they seem to not get held accountable either, you
01:16:59
know, um, and that's more astonishing.
01:17:02
That's, I mean, it's a huge slap in the face of humanity and
01:17:05
whatever institutions and whatever values people claim they have.
01:17:09
My daughter, she, she wanted me to recommend a couple of movies, a few movies
01:17:13
actually, right, to, um, if you're new to the, um, if you want to know more.
01:17:19
Uh, of, you know, of Palestine through, through Palestinians, through the
01:17:24
eyes of Palestine, Palestinians, you know, and their experience and, and
01:17:29
what they've, what they're living.
01:17:31
Um, good movie is Farha.
01:17:33
Farha, I watched Farha, I recommend it.
01:17:36
You guys watched Farha as well, right?
01:17:38
That was, that was a pretty good movie, right?
01:17:40
Um, it takes place when the Nakba happened in 1948, uh, to
01:17:45
a, to a girl, uh, and her family.
01:17:48
What happened when the, uh, you know, the Israeli militias started showing
01:17:54
up at people's doors and just started pretty much, um, um, was that, was, start
01:18:00
depopulating areas, um, in Palestine.
01:18:04
There's another one called Born in Gaza.
01:18:06
It's a documentary.
01:18:08
There's one called Omar.
01:18:10
Another one is Habibi.
01:18:13
Another one is 200 meters, another one is the present, 3000 nights, salt
01:18:21
of the sea, salt of this sea, the crossing, pomegranates and myrrh.
01:18:28
Eyes of a Thief, and all those movies you can find on Netflix.
01:18:33
There's another movie that we actually screened here in San Antonio called Five
01:18:37
Broken Cameras, which is pretty good.
01:18:39
It's about a man who's documentary.
01:18:42
We're documenting, uh, the, the occupation in his neighborhood, and each time his
01:18:49
camera get broken, so he needs to get a new camera or he fixes it and whatnot.
01:18:52
And to take pictures of the abuse that's happening, um, in his neighborhood and by
01:18:58
the, uh, by the Israeli occupation forces.
01:19:01
Um, yeah, so I think this is a good place to wrap up for the night.
01:19:08
Um, I mean, I have mixed feelings about 2023.
01:19:11
I don't know about you guys.
01:19:12
I mean, there, there are ups and downs.
01:19:15
Um, notice I didn't notice, uh, notice I, uh, the, the, the points that are
01:19:20
like, you know, I, I started with are, are things that I thought was positive.
01:19:24
And then, um, and then with the down note, um, obviously the tragedy that
01:19:30
we're all witnessing, you know, genocide, ethnic cleansing right before our eyes.
01:19:34
The people doing it, you know, with impunity while we, here in the U.
01:19:37
S., flip the bill.
01:19:38
I mean, it's a slap in the face, like I said, you know, to everyone, to humanity,
01:19:42
to wherever, anyone who ever told us.
01:19:45
Uh, that, you know, that we stand for, for human rights, for truth, for democracy,
01:19:50
for this and that, you know, it's just a big humiliation, big, big snack, right?
01:19:55
Uh, but we must have, you know, revolutionary optimism.
01:19:59
We need to go forward.
01:20:00
We need to go push, we need to intervene whenever we can.
01:20:04
We need to take action whenever we can.
01:20:05
We can't put our head in the sand, like Monisha said, or look the other way,
01:20:09
or just act like nothing's happening.
01:20:11
Uh, we need to, we need to be, we need to be protagonists.
01:20:14
In this world, to be not just spectators, but protagonists.
01:20:17
Um, any last comments before we depart?
01:20:21
Y'all give me hope, too.
01:20:23
Oh, you too.
01:20:25
Shiloh: Same, same, just like, yeah, staying in community and, you know,
01:20:30
keeping those, those heart to heart connections that we have really, uh,
01:20:35
Yeah, just keep your own humanity, the psychopaths in power lost theirs
01:20:42
years ago, but we have to keep our own humanity, and we do that
01:20:46
through caring about one another.
01:20:49
Monisha: Yeah,
01:20:51
what Tyler said.
01:20:53
Jovanni: Interesting, uh, uh, someone told me a story, uh, over
01:20:56
a weekend, over last weekend.
01:20:58
Um, and, and we're talking about the same note, and it's about this elderly
01:21:03
person that was sitting, you know, with a sign about, you know, protesting wars
01:21:08
and, and motivation and everything.
01:21:10
And he was an elderly person, right?
01:21:12
And he was the only person standing on a daily basis.
01:21:16
He'll, you know, he'll He'll stand in the same spot with the same
01:21:20
signs, you know, and every, the same sign about ending wars and ending
01:21:24
the, uh, all the wars and whatnot.
01:21:28
Um, and someone stopped him and asked him, you know, why, you know, why are
01:21:32
you here day in, day out, you know, you know, every day with the same sign, you
01:21:35
know, and people just walk past you and they don't pay you any mind, you know.
01:21:39
Um, you know, you're not changing anything.
01:21:41
Why are you still doing it?
01:21:42
Um, and his answer was, you know, I don't do it to change people.
01:21:45
I do it so people won't change me.
01:21:48
You know, that was, that was pretty fun I thought.
01:21:51
But, uh, uh, well, yeah, thank you all for, for accompanying me tonight.
01:21:58
Uh, thank the listeners, thank you listeners for staying with
01:22:01
us, you know, throughout 2023.
01:22:03
Hope to see you again in 2024.
01:22:05
Um, please share us, you know, please share us with your friends,
01:22:09
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01:22:13
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01:22:17
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01:22:20
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I'm not sure, but I know we have a Telegram page, um, as
01:22:28
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01:22:31
Um, yeah, help us grow in this coming year and, um, here we try to,
01:22:36
you know, we try to keep it real.
01:22:38
Um, yeah, thank you.
01:22:41
And, um, take care everybody.
01:22:43
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01:24:01
Skepticism is one's best armor.
01:24:04
Never forget it.
01:24:05
We'll see you next time.
01:24:20
I hope you'll pay attention.
01:24:26
I will not detain you long.