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Amy Goodman

Amy Goodman (born April 13, 1957) is an American broadcast journalist, author, and co-founder (1996) and main host of Democracy Now!, a progressive global news program broadcast daily on radio, television and the Internet.

Quotes

 * The media are using a national treasure--that's what the public airwaves are. And they have a responsibility to bring out the full diversity of opinion or lose their licenses.
 * 2008 Winter Soldier Testimony.

 * In the meantime, it just makes it a little harder to smile. But so does the world.
 * Whom the Bell's Palsy Tolls'' (referring to her fall 2007 bout of Bell's Palsy).

 * I see the media as a huge kitchen table that stretches across the globe, that we all sit around and debate and discuss the most important issues of the day, War and peace, life and death. Anything less than that is a disservice to a democratic society.
 *

2003

 * During an Iraqi protest of the US invasion ABC's "Peter Jennings said to Chris Cuomo, "What are they doing out there? What are they saying?" And Cuomo said, “Well, they have these signs that say 'No Blood for Oil,' but when you ask them what that means, they seem very confused. I don't think they know why they're out here." I guess they got caught in a traffic jam. Why not have Peter Jennings, instead of asking someone who clearly doesn't understand why they're out there, invite one of them into the studio, and have a discussion like he does with the generals?
 * Independent Media in a Time of War (2003).

 * You have not only Fox, but MSNBC and NBC-yes, owned by General Electric, one of the major nuclear weapons manufacturers in the world. MSNBC and NBC, as well as FOX, titling their coverage taking the name of what the Pentagon calls the invasion of Iraq: 'Operation Iraqi Freedom'...They research the most effective propagandistic name to call their operation. But for the [capitalist] media to name their coverage what the Pentagon calls it-everyday seeing 'Operation Iraqi Freedom'-you have to ask: if this were state media, how would it be any different?" There are "immigrants now in detention facilities, they have no rights, not even a lawyer. And we have to be there ad we have to watch and we have to listen. We have to tell their stories until they can tell their own
 * Independent Media in a Time of War (2003).

2004

 * [On the interview on Election Day 2000 with then-sitting president Bill Clinton, the Clinton administration threatening to ban her from the White House, and Access journalism]: Well, first of all, we hadn't agreed to any ground rules. Clinton called us. Second, we wouldn't have agreed to any. The only ground rule for good reporting I know is that you don't trade your principles for access. We call it the "access of evil."
 * Bill Clinton Loses His Cool in Democracy Now! Interview on Everything But Monica: Leonard Peltier, Racial Profiling, Iraqi Sanctions, Ralph Nader, the Death Penalty and Israel-Palestine, democracynow.org, 22 June 2004.

The Exception to the Rulers written with David Goodman (2004)

 * Going to where the silence is. That is the responsibility of a journalist: giving a voice to those who have been forgotten, forsaken, and beaten down by the powerful. It is the best reason I know to carry our pens, cameras, and microphones into our own communities and out to the wider world.

 * We must build a trickle-up media that reflects the true character of this country and its people. A democratic media serving a democratic society.

 * We have a decision to make every hour of every day, and that is whether to represent the sword or the shield. Democracy now.

 * In 1981, the KKK's Grand Wizard claimed that his greatest act "was engineering the bombing of a left-wing radio station," because he understood how dangerous Pacifica was.

 * It's still much the same. On any given day, you can listen to the news on CNN or National Public Radio, then tune in to a Pacifica station. You would think you were hearing reports from different Planets. We inhabit the same planet, but we see it through different lenses.

 * I began hosting Democracy Now! in 1996, when it was launched as the only daily election show in public broadcasting. Listener response was enormous. Suddenly the daily struggles of ordinary people workers, immigrants, artists, the employed and the unemployed, those with homes and those without, dissidents, soldiers, people of color-were dignified as news. I call it trickle-up journalism. These are the voices that shape movements-movements that make history. These are people who change the world just as much as generals, bankers, and politicians. They are the mainstream, yet they are ignored by the mainstream media.

 * Why has Democracy Now! grown so quickly? Because of the deafening silence in the mainstream media around the issues-and the people that matter most. People are now confronting the most important issues of the millennium: war and peace, life and death. Yet who is shaping the discourse? Generals, corporate executives, and government officials.

 * In a society where freedom of the press is enshrined in the Constitution, our media largely acts as a megaphone for those in power. That's why people are so hungry for independent media-and are starting to make their own.

 * Vibrant debate and dissent exist in this country, but you are not reading or hearing about this in the mainstream press.

 * If you are opposed to war, you are not a fringe minority. You are not a silent majority. You are part of a silenced majority. Silenced by the mainstream media.

 * We are a compassionate people. But people cannot take action if they don't have accurate information.

 * This is not a media that is serving a democratic society, where a diversity of views is vital to shaping informed opinions. This is a well-oiled propaganda machine that is repackaging government spin and passing it off as journalism.

 * imagine if the U.S. media showed uncensored, hellish images of war-even for one week. What impact would that have? I think we would be able to abolish war.

 * The Bush team has invoked a basic principle of propaganda: Control the images and you control the people.

 * The lesson had been learned from Vietnam-a lesson in manipulation. In Iraq, there would be no daily television images of the human toll of war. The government and the media would portray a clean war, a war nearly devoid of victims.

 * When George W. Bush and his foot soldiers can't build an airtight legal case, suspicion and xenophobia will suffice.

 * That is one of the media's most serious responsibilities, to open up the discussion.

 * People across the political spectrum are outraged by the profiteering corporations-Bush's corporate criminal sponsors, including Enron, World Com, and Halliburton-robbing our treasury, raiding our pensions, ravaging our wilderness areas, and running away with the loot.

 * Media should not be a tool only of the powerful. The media can be a platform for the most important debates of our day: war and peace, freedom and tyranny. The debate must be wide-ranging not just a narrow discussion between Democrats and Republicans embedded in the establishment. We need to break open the box, tear down the boundaries that currently define acceptable discussion. We need a democratic media.

 * A democratic media gives us hope. It chronicles the movements and organizations that are making history today. When people hear their neighbors given a voice, see their struggles in what they watch and read, spirits are lifted. People feel like they can make a difference.

 * Social change does not spring forth from the minds of generals or presidents-in fact, change is often blocked by the powerful. Change starts with ordinary people working in their communities. And that's where media should start as well.

 * In closed-door meetings, nameless trade bureaucrats from 146 countries and multinational corporations were now saying, in effect, you can pass your laws in your democratically elected legislatures to protect workers or the environment. We'll just overturn them at the WTO.

 * While the networks were quoting the police saying that they weren't using rubber bullets, independent media reporters were uploading minute-by-minute images as we all picked up the bullets off the street by the handful. While the networks caricatured protesters, showing an endless loop of a single smashed store window, the IMC reporters were interviewing the mothers, fathers, daughters, and sons who had come together to protest against the threat that the WTO posed to their communities. In the IMC dispatches, these people had real names, real jobs, and real concerns.

 * What the corporations fear most is that grassroots activists and independent journalists will utilize the same model that companies have used to grab power: globalization. Grassroots globalization.

 * The same could be said of Henry Kissinger. While many in the United States still see Nixon and Ford's former secretary of state as an elder statesman, the rest of the world sees him as a war criminal responsible for the deaths and suffering of millions in Chile, Vietnam, Laos, Argentina, East Timor, and Cambodia, to name a few.

 * But the true power of this country does not lie in its military, government, or corporations. It lies with individual people struggling every day to better their communities. We must build a trickle-up media that reflects the true character of this country and its people. A democratic media serving a democratic society.

2006

 * Our job is to provide a forum for people to speak for themselves, to describe their own experiences. This breaks down stereotypes and bigotry, things that fuel racial profiling, which ultimately endangers us all.
 * "It’s Bigotry that Should Be Silenced" article (2006)

Static: Government Liars, Media Cheerleaders, and the People Who Fight Back (2006)
co-authored with David Goodman

 * Hope lies in fighting back. (conclusion)

 * Those who are scorned today are tomorrow's visionaries. (conclusion)

"Introduction: Unembedded"

 * Declaring war on the media is a desperate and risky move. But the corporate media, so compromised and atrophied by its own complicity in promoting the lies of the Bush administration, is woefully unprepared to do battle. If the past is any guide, as the government aims a sword at the heart of our civil liberties and freedoms, the media will provide sporadic resistance at best, and at worst, will help drive the sword home.

 * It's a sad day when the government no longer has to cover up its dishonesty because the American media does it for them...This is the state of the corporate media today. It's a symptom of what we call the access of evil: journalists trading truth for access. The public unwittingly mistakes the illusion of news for reality.

 * We can't even call this a "mainstream" media. It's an extreme media-a media that cheerleads for war. Instead of learning from the media what is actually going on in the world, we get static-a veil of distortion, lies, omissions, and half-truths that obscure reality. As bodies pile up in Iraq and New Orleans, many people are mystified, wondering where it went so wrong. We need a media that creates static of another kind: what the dictionary defines as "criticism, opposition, or unwanted interference." Instead of a media that covers for power, we need a media that covers the movements that create static-and make history. We are not waiting for this alternative media; people are building it right now. Blogs, Indymedia centers, independent filmmakers, and other grassroots media have opened a new way to understand what is happening in the world today.

 * we need a media that cuts through the lies and fakery that obscure the truth. A media that is fiercely independent. Unembedded. Journalism that works to inform, not to deceive. The soldiers and civilians in harm's way in Iraq deserve no less. The citizens of the devastated and abandoned Gulf Coast are counting on it. And the people shackled in America's secret gulags cry out for it.

 * Free speech is democracy's last line of defense. We must demand it. Defend it. And most of all, use it-now.

2007

 * As global temperatures surge, so do oil-company profits, and U.S. soldiers in Iraq...the alarm has sounded: We need a sane energy policy that decreases our oil consumption (the Germans and French, “Old Europe,” use half as much per capita as we do in the U.S.). The potential for environmental disaster, and the prospects of protracted wars for oil, demand no less.
 * "Global Warring, Global Warming, Global Warning" article (2007)

 * The twin crises of war and climate change, inexorably linked by our thirst for oil, need a concerted global solution–one that won’t be obtained by cowboy diplomacy. The United States must pursue global consensus, not global conquest–before it is too late.
 * "Global Consensus, Not Global Conquest" article (2007)

2008

 * Elected officials will not solve our media crisis alone. The grass-roots movement for media reform is growing, and with mass layoffs in newspaper and broadcast newsrooms, critical elections, burgeoning military budgets and multiple wars and occupations, and with emergent and accessible digital-media tools and networks increasingly available to most people, there is no better time to join it.
 * “This Way to Better Media” article (2008)

Introduction

 * Using fear, electoral fraud, and the smokescreen of terrorist attacks, the Bush administration has given us a lesson in how quickly a nation can be hijacked and core tenets of democracy trampled.

 * Our government now routinely invades the privacy of its own citizens, then pulls the cloak of national security over its operations to hide its deceptions and blunders from public view. The economy has been trashed, inequality is now at levels not seen since the Great Depression, and at least 5 million more Americans live in poverty than did at the start of the Bush presidency. Many eminent historians and economists are concluding that George W. Bush has earned the distinction of being the "worst president ever." Where is the outrage? The U.S. corporate media and the Democrats complain politely, and then resume their deferential posture to enable the next disaster. The media, so helpful in launching the Iraq War by acting as a conveyor belt for Bush administration lies, has shifted targets and now passes along White House propaganda about Iran.

 * Great change begins with small steps taken at home.

Conclusion

 * Protesting is an act of love. It is born of a deeply held conviction that the world can be a better, kinder place. Saying "no" to injustice is the ultimate declaration of hope. But the corporate media ignores and ridicules grassroots activists who speak out. Concerned citizens are thus left wondering: Where are the millions marching in the streets to defend human rights, civil liberties, and racial justice? Where is the mass revulsion against the killing and torture being carried out in our name? Where are the environmentalists? Where is the peace movement?

 * activists and peacemakers are everywhere. And they are changing how politics is done.

 * Public libraries are a cornerstone of democracy. They are part of the public commons, a sanctuary for the free exchange of information and ideas. But they are under threat. From book banning to government surveillance, libraries have been a target in the "war on terror."

"Introduction: Beyond the Nine-Second Sound Bite"

 * My goal as a journalist is to break the sound barrier, to expand the debate, to cut through the static and bring forth voices that are shut out. It is the responsibility of journalists to go where the silence is, to seek out news and people who are ignored, to accurately and clearly report on the issues-issues that the corporate, for-profit media often distort, if they cover them at all. What is typically presented as news analysis is, for the most part, a small circle of pundits who know so little about so much, explaining the world to us and getting it so wrong. While they may appear to differ, they are quibbling over how quickly the bombs should be dropped, not asking whether they should be dropped at all. Unfortunately, as a result, people are increasingly turning away from the news at a time when news media should be providing a forum for discussion-a forum that is honest and open, that weighs all the options, and that includes those deeply affected by U.S. policy around the globe. I am not talking about a fringe minority or the silent majority, but a silenced majority, silenced by the corporate media. The media's job is to be the exception to the rulers, to hold those in power accountable, to challenge, and to ask the hard questions-to be the public watchdog. The media also need to find stories of hope, to tell stories that resonate with people's lives in the real world (not the reel world).

 * This is what independent media is all about: unembedded, investigative, international journalism.

 * I see the media as a huge kitchen table that stretches across this globe, one we all sit around to debate and discuss the most critical issues of the day: war and peace, life and death. Anything less than that is a disservice to a democratic society.

"Pacifica Radio at 60: A Sanctuary of Dissent" (April 15, 2009)

 * When you hear someone speaking from his or her own experience—a Palestinian child, an Israeli mother, a grandfather from Afghanistan—it breaks down stereotypes that fuel the hate groups that divide society. The media can build bridges between communities, rather than advocating the bombing of bridges.

 * In this high-tech digital age, with high-definition television and digital radio, all we get is more static: that veil of distortions, lies, misrepresentations and half-truths that obscures reality. What we need the media to give us is the dictionary definition of static: criticism, opposition, unwanted interference. We need a media that covers power, not covers for power. We need a media that is the fourth estate, not for the state. We need a media that covers the movements that create static and make history.

 * With more channels than ever, the lack of any diversity of opinion is breathtaking. Freedom of the press is enshrined in the Constitution, yet our media largely act as a megaphone for those in power.

 * As we confront unprecedented crises—from global warming to global warring to a global economic meltdown—there is also an unprecedented opportunity for change. Where will innovative thinkers, grass-roots activists, human-rights leaders and ordinary citizens come together to hash out solutions to today’s most pressing problems?

 * On this 60th anniversary of the Pacifica Radio Network, we should celebrate the tradition of dissent and the power of diverse voices to resolve conflict peacefully.

2010

 * In order to make the cuts promised, Obama would have to raise taxes and cut social programs such as Social Security and Medicare. Or he could cut the war budget. I say “war budget” because it is not to be confused with a defense budget. Cities and states across the country are facing devastating budget crises. Pensions are being wiped out. Foreclosures are continuing at record levels. A true defense budget would shore up our schools, our roads, our towns, our social safety net. The U.S. House of Representatives is under pressure to pass a $33 billion Afghan War supplemental this week. We can’t afford war.
 * “We Can’t Afford War” article with Denis Moynihan (2010)

 * Sunday’s network talk shows barely raised the issue of the largest intelligence leak in U.S. history. When asked, they say the midterm elections are their main focus. Fine, but war is an election issue. It should be raised in every debate, discussed on every talk show.
 * "War Should Be an Election Issue" article with Denis Moynihan (2010), about the leak of “The Iraq War Logs”

 * As the 2010 elections come to a close, the biggest winner of all remains undeclared: the broadcasters. The biggest loser: democracy...The place where we should debate this is in the major media, where most Americans get their news. But the television and radio broadcasters have a profound conflict of interest. Their profits take precedence over our democratic process.
 * "Rich Media, Poor Democracy" column with Denis Moynihan (2010)

The Silenced Majority: Stories of Uprisings, Occupations, Resistance, and Hope with Denis Moynihan (2012)

 * We need a media that covers grassroots movements, that seeks to understand and explain the complex forces that shape our society, a media that empowers people with information to make sound decisions on the most vital issues of the day: war and peace, life and death. Instead, the media system in the United States, increasingly concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer multinational corporations, spews a relentless stream of base "reality" shows (which depict anything but reality), hollow excuses for local news that highlight car accidents and convenience store robberies larded with ads, and the obsessive coverage of traffic, sports, and extreme weather (never linked to another two words: climate change). Perhaps most harmful of all, we get the same small circle of pundits who know so little about so much, explaining the world to us and getting it so wrong.

 * The corporate media came late to Occupy Wall Street, offered superficial, often derogatory coverage, and, with a few exceptions, still haven't gotten it right

 * Skeptical of the corporare media, people have developed their own.

 * At the heart of the Occupy Wall Street movement is the critique that wealth and opportunity are not equitably distributed, and our media system, largely controlled by corporations, contributes to that status quo.

 * The Internet has created a seismic disruption to the balance of power in the media. It is getting easier and easier to post your thoughts, photos, or videos. Yet the Wild West of the Web is being tamed. Small Internet service providers are being driven out of business, with corporations like Comcast, Time Warner, Verizon, and AT&T dominating the market. Privacy, security, and the freedom to publish without fear of censorship are dwindling with each merger, with each effort by corporate lobbyists to further restrict the open Internet in favor of a narrow profit advantage.

 * By stripping away the profit motive, by removing the Wall Street bankers from the picture, solid, disciplined, nonprofit journalism is possible.

2014

 * While law-abiding Muslims are forced to hide in their homes, and animal-rights activists are labeled as terrorists for undercover filming of abusive treatment at factory farms, right-wing hate groups are free to organize, parade, arm themselves to the hilt and murder with chilling regularity. It’s time for our society to confront this very real threat.
 * "The Grand American Tradition of Violent White Supremacy" article with Denis Moynihan (2014)

Democracy Now!: Twenty Years Covering the Movements Changing America (2016)

 * This bears repeating: the sixty-two wealthiest people-a group that could fit on a bus-control more wealth than three and a half billion people.

 * A global movement is challenging the grotesque levels of economic inequality that are the hallmark of the modern age. From the Arab Spring, to Occupy Wall Street, to antiausterity campaigns in Europe, to low-wage workers in the United States fighting and winning a livable wage, each part of the movement inspires the other. (p 168)

 * Independent media is the oxygen of a democracy. It is not brought to you by the oil or gas or coal companies when we talk about climate change. It's not brought to you by the weapons manufacturers when we talk about war and peace. It's not brought to you by the insurance industry or big pharma when we talk about health care. (Epilogue)

 * I see the media as a huge kitchen table that stretches across the globe that we all sit around and debate and discuss the most important issues of the day: war and peace, life and death...Anything less than that is a disservice to a democratic society. (Epilogue)

Introduction

 * Many have attributed low participation in US elections to voter apathy. I have never believed this. The low turnout is directly related to the many obstacles put in place that deter people from voting (for example, holding elections on just one day when most people are working, limiting hours that polling places are open, or requiring photo identification that disproportionately disenfranchises poor people and people of color). And then there are those who feel that there isn't a significant difference between the candidates, or that money distorts the process so much that their vote doesn't really count. Yet people are engaged in their communities all over the country.

 * There is a hunger for authentic voices-not the same handful of pundits on the network shows who know so little about so much, explaining the world to us and getting it so wrong.

 * There's a reason why our profession is the only one explicitly protected by the US Constitution: journalists are supposed to be the check and balance on power, not win popularity contests. The United States has 5 percent of the world's population but 25 percent of the prisoners. It's the job of journalists to put our microphones between the bars and broadcast the voices of those inside.

 * when you hear someone speaking for themselves-whether it's a Palestinian child or an Israeli grandmother, or an uncle in Afghanistan or an aunt in Iraq-it challenges the stereotypes that fuel the hate groups. It's not that you have to agree with what you hear. How often do we agree even with our family members? But you begin to understand where they're coming from. That understanding is the beginning of peace.

 * I believe the media can be the greatest force for peace on Earth. Instead, all too often, it is wielded as a weapon of war. That has to be challenged.

 * Even in this high-tech digital age with high-definition television and digital radio, still all we get is static: that veil of distortion, lies, misrepresentations, and half-truths that obscure reality.

 * We need a media that covers power, not covers for power.

 * Journalists have a special job. We have to cover the convention floor to question the delegates and politicians. We have to get into the corporate suites to see who is paying for the conventions. And we have to get out on the streets where the uninvited guests are sometimes thousands of them. These protesters have something important to say as well. Democracy is a messy thing. And it's our job to capture it all.

 * What gives me hope? It's the movements. Movements often start with a courageous act of resistance. These are not isolated acts. They are inspired by past movements. And they inspire future ones.

Chapter 6

 * Central to our reporting on climate change is the reality that global warming is real, is happening now, and is killing tens of thousands of people and displacing millions more. The warming planet presents an existential crisis for humanity.

 * Television stations pour millions of dollars into building flashy "Weather Centers" to grab their audience's attention. As they flash the words "Severe Weather" and "Extreme Weather," why not also flash the words, "Climate Change" or "Global Warming"? The public depends on broadcasters for most of their news and information, even in this internet age. The daily deluge of sensational weather reporting must include explanations of the deeper changes occurring on our planet.

 * Why does the climate change debate continue in the United States? Because oil barons, such as the Koch brothers, pour billions of dollars into foundations and corporations that obfuscate the issue or deny the problem exists at all.

 * Our responsibility in independent media is to cover the entire discussion, from the suites to the streets.

 * The young people at these climate summits have always amazed me with their eloquence and bravery.

 * We need to hear these silenced voices. That is the power of independent media: to give voice to the voiceless; to those who have been shut out of the debate.

2019

 * The United Nations, the Red Cross and other relief organizations have refused to work with the U.S. on delivering aid to Venezuela, which they say is politically motivated. Venezuela has allowed aid to be flown in from Russia and from some international organizations, but it’s refused to allow in the aid from the United States, describing it as a Trojan horse for an eventual U.S. invasion.
 * Over the weekend, U.S. officials ramped up pressure on the Maduro government. On Sunday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Maduro’s days in office are numbered. He also threatened more sanctions are coming. Republican Senator Marco Rubio of Florida tweeted the violence on the border, quote, “opened the door to various potential multilateral actions not on the table just 24 hours ago,” unquote. In what many saw as a cryptic threat to Maduro, Rubio tweeted an image of a bloodied Muammar Gaddafi as he was being killed following the U.S. bombing campaign of Libya. Rubio also tweeted photos of former Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega, who was removed from power during the U.S. invasion in 1989 and remained in a U.S. jail for years.
 * The Coup Has Failed & Now the U.S. Is Looking to Wage War: Venezuelan Foreign Minister Speaks Out, Democracy Now. (25 February 2019)

2020

 * We turn now to... a rare joint interview with the Squad. That’s the group of four freshwomen Democratic congresswomen who have taken Capitol Hill by storm: Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib are the first Muslim women elected to Congress. Ilhan Omar is a former refugee from Somalia. Tlaib is the first female Palestinian-American member of Congress. Ayanna Pressley is the first African-American woman elected to Congress from Massachusetts. And Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was just 29 years old when she took office last year, making her the youngest woman to serve in Congress. Born to a mother from Puerto Rico and father from the South Bronx, AOC has quickly become one of the most popular lawmakers in the country. All four members of the Squad have been active on the presidential campaign trail. Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Omar have been campaigning for Bernie Sanders. Ayanna Pressley has backed Elizabeth Warren. Last week, Congresswomen Ocasio-Cortez and Pressley boycotted President Trump’s State of the Union. Rashida Tlaib walked out during the speech. Ilhan Omar stayed, saying, quote, “My presence tonight is resistance.”
 * “Our Very Existence Is the Resistance”: An Hour w/ AOC, Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib & Ilhan Omar, Democracy Now!, February 10, 2020

 * On the first Earth Day, in 1970, over 20 million people in the United States — fully ten percent of the nation’s population at the time — rallied for an end to pollution, for an ecologically sustainable economy, for a greener future...Fifty years later, with the planet’s climate on a human-caused precipice, the numbers demanding change are far greater, the organizing is global, but the time is short.
 * "As Earth Day Turns 50, Imagine a Just, Green, Pandemic-Free Future" (April 23, 2020)

 * This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman. As the nationwide uprising against police brutality and racism continues to roil the nation and the world, bringing down Confederate statues and forcing a reckoning in city halls and on the streets, President Trump defended law enforcement Thursday, dismissing growing calls to defund the police. He spoke at a campaign-style event at a church in Dallas, Texas, announcing a new executive order advising police departments to adopt national standards for use of force. Trump did not invite the top three law enforcement officials in Dallas, who are all African American.
 * Angela Davis on Abolition, Calls to Defund Police, Toppled Racist Statues & Voting in 2020 Election, Democracy Now, (12 June 2020)

 * Speaking about what’s going on in the West Bank right now and about the whole issue of international solidarity, the global response to the killing of George Floyd. In the occupied West Bank, protesters denounced Floyd’s murder and the recent killing of Iyad el-Hallak, a 32-year-old Palestinian special needs student who was shot to death by Israeli forces in occupied East Jerusalem. He was reportedly chanting “Black lives matter” and “Palestinian lives matter,” when Israeli police gunned him down, claiming he was armed. These links that you’re seeing, not only in Palestine and the United States, but around the world, the kind of global response, the tens of thousands of people who marched in Spain, who marched in England, in Berlin, in Munich, all over the world, as this touches a chord and they make demands in their own countries, not only in solidarity with what’s happening in the United States?
 * Angela Davis on Abolition, Calls to Defund Police, Toppled Racist Statues & Voting in 2020 Election, Democracy Now, (12 June 2020)

 * Chadwick Boseman, the world-renowned actor known best for his groundbreaking role in the 2018 blockbuster hit Black Panther died on Friday at the age of 43 after a private four-year battle with colon cancer. News of his passing shocked the public and sparked a wave of tributes to the man who played Jackie Robinson, the first black athlete to play Major League Baseball; Thurgood Marshall, the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court; and of course superhero King T’Challa, all while being treated for cancer....The final tweet from the account of Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman has become the most-liked post in Twitter history. The social media company’s official feed announced the news. The original message – posted on Saturday... currently has more than 7m “likes”. (The previous most-liked tweet was by Barack Obama, with 4.3m.) The post said that his most famous roles were “filmed during and between countless surgeries and chemotherapy”. It added: “The family thanks you for your love and prayers, and asks that you continue to respect their privacy during this difficult time....”LA Lakers star Lebron James paid tribute to Chadwick Boseman before the Lakers playoff game against the Portland Trailblazers by taking a knee during the National Anthem and crossing his arms across his chest to give the Wakanda Forever salute.
 * Remembering Chadwick Boseman: Ibram X. Kendi on Legacy of “Black Panther” Actor, Cancer & Anti-Racism, Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, (31 August 2020)

2021

 * The death toll in Gaza has reached 213 as Israel continues to attack the besieged area by air, land and sea using U.S.-made warplanes and U.S.-made bombs. Health officials in Gaza say the dead include 61 children and 36 women. Over 1,400 Palestinians have been injured. The United Nations says 58,000 Palestinians have been displaced. Meanwhile, the death toll in Israel stands at 11 from rocket attacks fired from Gaza.
 * Gaza Physician: Israel Is Targeting Doctors & Health Facilities to Overwhelm Our Crumbling System, Democracy Now, (18 May 2021)
 * Israel is the largest recipient of U.S. military aid, receiving some $3.8 billion a year. In recent weeks, the Biden administration approved the sale of $735 million in precision-guided weapons to Israel. But House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Gregory Meeks is expected to ask for the sale to be delayed to give lawmakers more time to review it. Israel has relied heavily on U.S.-made weapons during its assault. Israel reportedly used a GBU-31 bomb made by Lockheed Martin to bring down a high-rise building on Saturday which housed the offices of many media outlets, including the Associated Press and Al Jazeera.Israel is also facing increasing criticism for targeting doctors and health clinics. On Monday, an Israeli strike damaged the only COVID-19 laboratory in Gaza. On Sunday, a massive Israeli airstrike killed Dr. Ayman Abu al-Ouf, who headed the coronavirus response at Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest hospital. He and two of his teenage children died in an Israeli bombing of the residential area of Gaza City that killed a total of 30 people. Another prominent doctor from Shifa Hospital, Mooein Ahmad al-Aloul, one of the only neurologists in Gaza, was killed in an airstrike on his home. Israel has also bombed many of the roads leading to Shifa Hospital, making it harder for ambulances to bring patients. According to the World Health Organization, Israeli strikes and shelling have damaged at least 18 hospitals and clinics.
 * Gaza Physician: Israel Is Targeting Doctors & Health Facilities to Overwhelm Our Crumbling System, Democracy Now, (18 May 2021)

 * The United States is on pace to spend over $7 trillion over the next ten years for the Pentagon. To put that number in perspective, the U.S. spends more each year on the military than China, Russia, India, the U.K., Germany, France, Japan, South Korea and Australia combined. While Republicans and Democrats are in sharp disagreements over the much smaller Build Back Better legislation, there is largely a bipartisan consensus when it comes to the military budget and foreign military intervention...
 * “The War Party”: Jeremy Scahill on How U.S. Militarism Unifies Democrats & Republicans, Democracy Now! (24 November 2021)

 * The new coronavirus variant Omicron is spreading across the world at an unprecedented rate. The World Health Organization warns cases of the heavily mutated variant have been confirmed in 77 countries, and likely many others that have yet to detect it.With international infections climbing, the Biden administration is facing renewed demands to follow through on his now seven-month-old pledge to ensure companies waive intellectual property protections on coronavirus vaccines and share them with the world.Now a group of vaccine experts has just released a list of over a hundred companies in Africa, Asia and Latin America with the potential to produce mRNA vaccines to fight COVID-19. They say it’s one of the most viable solutions to fight vaccine inequity around the world and combat the spread of coronavirus variants, including Omicron.
 * Achal Prabhala quoted in As Omicron Spreads, 100+ Firms in Africa, Asia & Latin America Can Make mRNA Vaccine If Tech Shared, Democracy Now!],  (16 December 2021)

2023

 * As Israel rejects growing international calls for a ceasefire in Gaza, there are mounting efforts to hold Israel and its backers accountable for committing war crimes in Gaza. Here in the United States, the Center for Constitutional Rights has sued President Biden, accusing him of failing to prevent genocide. Today CCR is seeking an emergency order to block Biden, as well as Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, from providing further military funding, arms and diplomatic support to Israel.
 * Amy Goodman, in:  “Failure to Prevent Genocide”: Biden Sued as U.S. Provides Arms & Support for Israel’s Gaza Assault, DemocracyNow!  November 16, 2023

Quotes about Amy Goodman

 * Amy Goodman has taken investigative journalism to new heights of exciting, informative, and probing analysis. She has tirelessly pursued the most challenging and hardest questions, relentlessly and courageously. She has made a unique contribution to creating the informed public that must exist if 'democracy now' is to be more than a dream."
 * Noam Chomsky, The Exception to the Rulers (2004)

 * (What's the most important piece of information that is not making it into the media coverage?) ED: I suppose it depends on what you watch. If you watch Amy Goodman of Democracy Now, for example, she has the time and inclination to tell a larger story.
 * interview included in Conversations with Edwidge Danticat edited by Maxine Lavon Montgomery (2017)

 * Amy Goodman is one of the most important voices in America. Her integrity and honesty remind us that a culture that cannot distinguish between illusion and reality dies.
 * Chris Hedges included as blurb in Breaking the Sound Barrier (2009)

 * Producing features on a diverse range of civic and political activities is far below NPR's and PBS's funder-friendly range of entertaining programs. On weekends, to counter the commercial vapidity and the ditto-head Sunday interview shows, PBS and NPR are just not there. They simply do not look for, or listen to, the rumble of people who are on the ground, acting with conscience, organizing to break through power. Meanwhile, smaller programs-such as Democracy Now with Amy Goodman-are picking up the slack of these larger outlets, despite their comparably modest budgets and staff size.
 * Ralph Nader, Breaking Through Power (2016)

 * She will go down in history as one of the voices of democracy's greatest champions.
 * Willie Nelson included as blurb in Breaking the Sound Barrier (2009)

 * The poem was inflected, you could say, by interviews I was hearing on Amy Goodman’s program, Democracy Now!—about Guantánamo, waterboarding, official U.S. denials of torture, the “renditioning” of presumed terrorists to countries where they would inevitably be tortured. The line “Tonight I think no poetry will serve” suggests that no poetry can serve to mitigate such acts, they nullify language itself. One begins to write of the sensual body, but other bodies “elsewhere” are terribly present.
 * Adrienne Rich, Interview (2011)

 * Amy Goodman and Democracy Now! represent what journalism should be: beholden to the interests of people, not power and profit. Her work is invaluable.
 * Arundhati Roy, The Exception to the Rulers (2004)

 * There are many Americans who would be mortified to be associated with their government's policies. The most scholarly, scathing, incisive, hilarious critiques of the hypocrisy and the contradictions in U.S. government policy come from American citizens. When the rest of the world wants to know what the U.S. government is up to, we turn to Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, Howard Zinn, Ed Herman, Amy Goodman, Michael Albert, Chalmers Johnson, William Blum, and Anthony Arnove to tell us what's really going on.
 * Arundhati Roy War Talk (2003)

 * We received very fair coverage in our campaign from Thom Hartmann, Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks, and Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! The folks at The Nation, In These Times, The Progressive, and a number of other smaller publications and blogs also worked extremely hard to allow us to convey our message to the American people. Ed Schultz, the Reverend Al Sharpton, Rachel Maddow, and Chris Hayes provided us with the very fair coverage we received on MSNBC. I was also pleased to have been on the Bill Moyers program on PBS on several occasions.
 * Bernie Sanders Our Revolution (2016)

 * Amy Goodman is not afraid to speak truth to power. She does it every day.
 * Susan Sarandon The Silenced Majority (2012)

 * A towering progressive freedom fighter in the media and the world.
 * Cornel WestThe Silenced Majority (2012)

 * Amy Goodman has carried the great muckraking tradition of Upton Sinclair, George Seldes, and I. F. Stone into the electronic age, creating a powerful counter to the mainstream media. Her programs have reached into homes across the country, educating a new generation of listeners on the realities of U.S. policy at home and abroad. The book she has done with her brother is a very welcome and important addition to the dissident literature of our time.
 * Howard Zinn, The Exception to the Rulers (2004)

Bill Moyers, Forward to Breaking the Sound Barrier (2009)

 * You can learn more of the truth about Washington and the world from one week of Amy Goodman's Democracy Now! than from a month of Sunday morning talk shows. Make that a year of Sunday morning talk shows. That's because Amy, as you will discover on every page of this book, knows the critical question for journalists is how close they are to the truth, not how close they are to power.

 * It takes the nerves, stamina, and willpower of an Olympic triathlete to do what Amy Goodman does. That's just who she is, this quiet-spoken tornado of muckraking journalism: Edward R. Murrow with a twist of Emma Goldman, a Washington Post reporter once noted-willing to take on the powers that be to get at truth and justice, then spreading the word of those two indispensable gospels to the republic and the world beyond.

 * "We stand with journalists around the world who deeply believe that the mission of a journalist is to go where the silence is," Amy Goodman said in December 2008 when she accepted the Right Livelihood Award for personal courage and transformation. "The responsibility of a journalist is to give a voice to those who have been forgotten, forsaken, beaten down by the powerful." And, at a time when the future of journalism is in question, this ringing rationale for our embattled but essential craft: "It's the best reason I know for us to carry our pens, our microphones, and our cameras, both into our own communities and out to the wider world." Right on.

title: Amy Goodman


text:
Sophocles

Sophocles (Greek: Σοφοκλῆς; 496 – 406 BCE) was a Greek playwright, dramatist, priest, and politician of Classical Athens. He was also a general for the Athenian Empire in the Peloponnesian Wars, and during his service he led the battle against the Peloponnesian Island of Samos.

Quotes

 * When ice appears out of doors, and boys seize it up while it is solid, at first they experience new pleasures. But in the end their pride will not agree to let it go, but their acquisition is not good for them if it stays in their hands. In the same way an identical desire drives lovers to act and not to act.
 * Achilles' Loves, only surviving fragment, often quoted as: "Love is like ice in the hands of children."

 * A lie never lives to be old.
 * Acrisius, fragment 59.

 * No man loves life like him that's growing old.
 * Acrisius, fragment 64.

 * A short saying often contains much wisdom.
 * Aletes, fragment 99.

 * Truly, to tell lies is not honorable; But when the truth entails tremendous ruin, To speak dishonorably is pardonable.
 * Creusa, fragment 323.

 * Do nothing secretly; for Time sees and hears all things, and discloses all.
 * Hipponous, fragment 280.

 * Heaven ne'er helps the men who will not act.
 * Fragment 288. (Plumptre's translation, as cited in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 1906)
 * Variant: Heaven never helps the man who will not act.

 * "How about your service of Aphrodite, Sophocles—is your natural force still unabated?" And he replied, 'Hush, man, most gladly have I escaped this thing you talk of, as if I had run away from a raging and savage beast of a master."
 * Plato, Republic, 1.329c. Translated by Paul Shorey.

 * If ills you do, ills also you must bear.
 * quoted in To Autolycus, Book II, Ch. XXXVII by Theophilus of Antioch

Phædra

 * Children are the anchors of a mother's life.
 * Fragment 685.

 * The truth is always the strongest argument.
 * Fragment 737.

 * The dice of Zeus fall ever luckily.
 * Fragment 809.

 * Fortune is not on the side of the faint-hearted.
 * Fragment 842.

 * No oath can be too binding for a lover.
 * Fragment 848.

 * Thoughts are mightier than strength of hand.
 * Fragment 854.

 * στέργειν δέ τάκπεσόντα καί θέσθαι πρέπει σοφόν κυβευτήν, ’αλλά μη στένειν τύχην
 * A wise player ought to accept his throws and score them, not bewail his luck.
 * Phaedra: Fragment 947.
 * A. C. Pearson, The Fragments of Sophocles (with additional notes from the papers of Sir R. C. Jebb and W. G. Headlam), Vol. 3 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1917)

Ajax

 * ἀλλ᾽ ἢ καλῶς ζῆν ἢ καλῶς τεθνηκέναι τὸν εὐγενῆ χρή
 * Nobly to live, or else nobly to die, Befits proud birth.
 * Lines 479-480

 * Of all human ills, greatest is fortune's wayward tyranny.
 * Line 486

 * Ὦ παῖ, γένοιο πατρὸς εὐτυχέστερος, τὰ δ᾽ ἄλλ᾽ ὅμοιος: καὶ γένοι᾽ ἂν οὐ κακός
 * Ah, son, may you prove luckier than your father, but in all else like him. Then you would not prove base.
 * Ajax, lines 550-551; English translation by Richard Jebb

 * χάρις χάριν γάρ ἐστιν ἡ τίκτουσ᾽ ἀεί ὅτου δ᾽ ἀπορρεῖ μνῆστις εὖ πεπονθότος, οὐκ ἂν γένοιτ᾽ ἔθ᾽ οὗτος εὐγενὴς ἀνήρ.
 * For kindness begets kindness evermore, But he from whose mind fades the memory Of benefits, noble is he no more.
 * Lines 522-524 (tr. R. C. Trevelyan)

 * Men of ill judgement oft ignore the good That lies within their hands, till they have lost it.
 * Line 964

Oedipus Rex

 * How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be When there's no help in truth!
 * Variant: Wisdom is a curse when wisdom does nothing for the man who has it.
 * Line 316.

 * I will never reveal my dreadful secrets, or rather, yours.
 * Variant: I will not wound myself nor thee. Why seek To trap and question me? I will not speak.
 * Variant: Nay, I see that thou, on thy part, openest not thy lips in season: therefore I speak not, that neither may I have thy mishap.
 * Teiresias (Line 332?).

 * The tyrant is a child of Pride Who drinks from his sickening cup Recklessness and vanity, Until from his high crest headlong He plummets to the dust of hope.
 * Line 872.

 * Fear? What has a man to do with fear? Chance rules our lives, and the future is all unknown. Best live as we may, from day to day.
 * Variant: Nay, what should mortal fear, for whom the decrees of fortune are supreme and who hath clear foresight of nothing? 'Tis best to live at random, as one may.
 * Jocasta (Line 1069).

 * I am the child of Fortune, The giver of good, and I shall not be shamed. She is my mother; my sisters are the Seasons; My rising and my falling match with theirs. Born thus, I ask to be no other man Than that I am, and will know who I am.
 * Lines 1080-1085. Translated by E. F. Watling in Sophocles: The Theban Plays published by Penguin Books.
 * Variant: I am Fortune's child, Not man's; her mother face hath ever smiled Above me, and my brethren of the sky, The changing Moons, have changed me low and high. There is my lineage true, which none shall wrest From me; who then am I to fear this quest?

 * The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves.
 * Line 1184, Second Messenger; one commonly quoted translation is, "The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities".

 * Time eases all things.
 * Line 1515.

This mighty man, this Œdipus the lore far-famed could guess, And envy from each Theban won, so great his lordliness— Lo to what a surge of sorrow and confusion hath he come! Let us call no mortal happy till our eyes have seen the doom And the death-day come upon him—till, unharassed by mischance, He pass the bound of mortal life, the goal of ordinance. [Tr. E. D. A. Morshead (1885)] He solved the famous riddle, with his brilliance, he rose to power, a man beyond all power. Who could behold his greatness without envy? Now what a black sea of terror has overwhelmed him. Now as we keep our watch and wait the final day, count no man happy till he dies, free of pain at last. [quoted by [[Thomas Cahill]] in Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea]
 * Let every man in mankind's frailty Consider his last day; and let none Presume on his good fortune until he find Life, at his death, a memory without pain.
 * Variant: Look upon him, O my Thebans, on your king, the child of fame!
 * Variant: People of Thebes, my countrymen, look on Oedipus.
 * Line 1529, Choragos.

Antigone

 * For God hates utterly The bray of bragging tongues.
 * Line 123

 * Our ship of fate, which recent storms have threatened to destroy, has come safely to harbor at last.
 * Line 163

 * I have nothing but contempt for the kind of governor who is afraid, for whatever reason, to follow the course that he knows is best for the State; and as for the man who sets private friendship above the public welfare — I have no use for him, either.
 * Line 181

 * Nobody likes the man who brings bad news.
 * Line 277; cf. "Don’t shoot the messenger."

 * Money: There's nothing in the world so demoralizing as money.
 * Line 295

 * Nothing so evil as money ever grew to be current among men. This lays cities low, this drives men from their homes, this trains and warps honest souls till they set themselves to works of shame; this still teaches folk to practise villainies, and to know every godless deed. But all the men who wrought this thing for hire have made it sure that, soon or late, they shall pay the price.
 * Lines 295-303

 * Henceforth ye may thieve with better knowledge whence lucre should be won, and learn that it is not well to love gain from every source. For thou wilt find that ill-gotten pelf brings more men to ruin than to weal.
 * Lines 311-314

 * πολλὰ τὰ δεινὰ κοὐδὲν ἀνθρώπου δεινότερον πέλει
 * Numberless are the world's wonders, but none More wonderful than man.
 * Variant translation: There are many wonderful things, and nothing is more wonderful than man.
 * Line 333 (Ode I)

 * It is a good thing To escape from death, but it is not great pleasure To bring death to a friend.
 * Line 437

 * ὅστις γὰρ ἐν πολλοῖσιν ὡς ἐγὼ κακοῖς ζῇ, πῶς ὅδ᾽ οὐχὶ κατθανὼν κέρδος φέρει
 * For whoso lives, as I, in many woes, How can it be but death shall bring him gain?
 * Line 463-464; Plumptre translation

 * Grief teaches the steadiest minds to waver.
 * Line 563

 * Happy are they who know not the taste of evil.
 * Line 583 (Ode II)

 * Evil sometimes seems good To a man whose mind A god leads to destruction.
 * Lines 620-3

 * Show me the man who keeps his house in hand, He's fit for public authority.
 * Line 660

 * Think not that your word and yours alone must be right.
 * Line 706

 * The ideal condition Would be, I admit, that men should be right by instinct; But since we are all likely to go astray, The reasonable thing is to learn from those who can teach.
 * Line 720

 * Love, unconquerable, Waster of rich men, keeper Of warm lights and all-night vigil In the soft face of a girl: Sea-wanderer, forest-visitor! Even the pure immortals cannot escape you, And mortal man, in his one day's dusk, Trembles before your glory.
 * Line 781 (Ode III)

 * τοῖς πᾶσι κοινόν ἐστι τοὐξαμαρτάνειν: ἐπεὶ δ᾽ ἁμάρτῃ, κεῖνος οὐκέτ᾽ ἔστ᾽ ἀνὴρ ἄβουλος οὐδ᾽ ἄνολβος, ὅστις ἐς κακὸν πεσὼν ἀκῆται μηδ᾽ ἀκίνητος πέλῃ.
 * All men are liable to err. But when an error is made, that man is no longer unwise or unblessed who heals the evil into which he has fallen and does not remain stubborn.
 * Lines 1024-1027; cf. Book of Proverbs 28:13

 * ὅσῳ κράτιστον κτημάτων εὐβουλία
 * Wisdom outweighs any wealth.
 * Line 1050

 * There is no happiness where there is no wisdom; No wisdom but in submission to the gods. Big words are always punished, And proud men in old age learn to be wise.
 * Line 1347, closing lines

Trachiniae

 * A prudent mind can see room for misgiving, lest he who prospers should one day suffer reverse.
 * Line 296.

 * They are not wise, then, who stand forth to buffet against Love; for Love rules the gods as he will, and me.
 * Line 441.

 * Knowledge must come through action; you can have no test which is not fanciful, save by trial.
 * Line 592–593.

 * Rash indeed is he who reckons on the morrow, or haply on days beyond it; for tomorrow is not, until today is past.
 * Line 943.

Oedipus at Colonus

 * Not to be born is, beyond all estimation, best; but when a man has seen the light of day, this is next best by far, that with utmost speed he should go back from where he came.
 * Line 1225; English translation by Sir Richard Jebb

 * One word Frees us of all the weight and pain of life: That word is love.
 * Line 1616–18

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

 * Death is not the worst evil, but rather when we wish to die and cannot.
 * Electra, 1007.

 * There is an ancient saying, famous among men, that thou shouldst not judge fully of a man's life before he dieth, whether it should be called blest or wretched.
 * Trachiniæ, 1.

 * In a just cause the weak o'ercome the strong.
 * Œdipus Coloneus, 880.

 * It is better not to live at all than to live disgraced.
 * Peleus, Frag. 445.

 * War loves to seek its victims in the young.
 * Scyrii, Frag. 507.

 * If it were possible to heal sorrow by weeping and to raise the dead with tears, gold were less prized than grief.
 * Scyrii, Frag. 510.

 * If I am Sophocles, I am not mad; and if I am mad, I am not Sophocles.
 * Vit. Anon, page 64 (Plumptre's Trans.).

Quotes about Sophocles

 * ὁ δ’εὔκολος μὲν ἐνθάδ’, εὔκολος δ’ἐκεῖ
 * Sweet-tempered as on earth, so here below.
 * Aristophanes, Frogs
 * F. Storr, Sophocles, Vol. 1, LCL 20 (1912), p. ix

My special thanks, whose even-balanced soul From first youth tested up to extreme old age Business could not make dull, nor passion wild; Who saw life steadily, and saw it whole; The mellow glory of the Attic stage, Singer of sweet Colonus, and its child.
 * Be his
 * Matthew Arnold, Sonnet "To a Friend" (1849)

 * A bounding satyr, golden in the beard, That leaps with goat-feet high into the air,  And crushes from the thyme an odour rare, Keeps watch around the marble tomb revered Of Sophocles, the poet loved and feared,  Whose mighty voice once called out of her lair  The Dorian muse severe, with braided hair, Who loved the thyrsus and wild dances weird. Here all day long the pious bees can pour  Libations of their honey; round this tomb  The Dionysiac ivy loves to roam; The satyr laughs; but He awakes no more, Wrapped up in silence at the grave’s cold core,  Nor sees the sun wheel round in the white dome.
 * Edmund Gosse, "The Tomb of Sophocles"

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title: Sophocles