A conversation with two veterans of American wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan – about their work with “We Are Not Your Soldiers” – informing high school and college students about the morally unpleasant truths of the US military.

In 2008 the anti-war organization – “World Can’t Wait” -- invited American war veterans to share their military experiences with high school and college students – challenging the American culture’s overly positive patriotic narratives.

Joe Urgo grew up in a white conservative, middle-class NYC neighborhood. He tells young Americans about his experiences in Vietnam in the US Air Force. In 1971 -- Mr. Urgo helped organize the Winter Soldier Investigation detailing the war crimes of American soldiers in Vietnam and Cambodia.

Shaniyat Turani-Chowdhury is a freelance investigative journalist living in Queens, NY. He writes about Middle East politics, war and climate change – and most recently reported on the effect of Israeli airstrikes on the Lebanese people. In 2020 Shanityat ran for Congress on a Free Palestine platform.

CONTACT: barcrawlradio@gmail.com

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For this BCR series I have been asking American peacemakers: “What are we talking about when we talk about ‘The American’?”

This program looks to a Jesuit priest and peacemaker Thomas Merton. At the end of “The Root of War” published in The Catholic Worker in 1962 – Thomas Merton wrote – “The first job of all is to understand the psychological forces at work in ourselves and in society.” That in a nutshell is the purpose of my conversations with American peacemakers.

Merton’s autobiography -- “The Seven Storey Mountain” -- is about “a young man who led a full and worldly life and then, at the age of 26, entered a Trappist monastery.” In Kentucky, Merton focused his thoughts and prayers on nonviolence and influenced all the major peacemakers of the second half of the 20th Century -- Martin Luther King, the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tuto, the Berrigans, Dorothy Day and on and on --

Father John Dear will help us delve into Merton’s non-violence. Dear was born in North Carolina – graduated with top honors from Duke University – received two masters degrees in theology – and was ordained a Catholic Jesuit priest in Baltimore in 1993. John has worked with people scheduled to executed – served at a community center for low-income African-American women and children in Virginia – worked as pastor to parishes in the high desert of New Mexico and founded Pax Christi New Mexico. Worked at a Jesuit Refugee camp in El Salvador. On and on –

In a recent email, John described himself as follows:

Just so you know, like Merton, Dorothy Day, and Dan Berrigan, I consider myself a Christian anarchist. I'm done with America.

It helps to be arrested 85 times and spend time in jail and have several felony convictions. I don't believe in America; I think it's all a lie.If anything, we're global citizens, or citizens of God's reign of universal love and peace. We're all one.

That's where I'm at; and I get that from those three -- very few hold it.

If this sounds like something you want to ask me about, then ok, let's talk,

All the best, peace,

John

In January 2014 Dear left the Jesuits for reasons that become obvious in this conversation.

Alan WInson

barcrawlradio@gmail.com

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This is the third in the BCR series "Talking About The American" -- We are asking American peacemakers to try to explain how they see the qualities of our countrymen. This episode – How’d we do with AIDS?

I was in Syracuse for a Veterans for Peace pro-Palestine rally at the James M. Hanley Federal Building. Before the rally I had breakfast with Christian Caurla – an Italian journalist – at the home of Michael Desalvo -- where he and his partner Nick Orth – have provided home-based care for people with AIDS since October 1992.

That morning -- Michael served Chris and me a delicious frittata with brussels sprouts. While we ate – I asked Michael about the Syracuse Friends of Dorothy Catholic Worker House which he and his partner renovated – and about their early hospice work with people with AIDS.

Michael supports the Dorothy House with his work as a hairdresser.

CONTACT Alan Winson barcrawlradio@gmail.com

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Rob Fersh talks about collaborative problem solving and his new book, co-authored with Mariah Levison “From Conflict to Convergence: Coming Together to Solve Tough Problems” –

As our country divides up its wealth between a few gazillionairs and the rest of us – coming together seems a worthwhile goal.

Rob Fersh is the Founder and Senior Advisor of the Convergence Center for Policy Resolution. Before that he worked on international conflict resolution and directed U.S. national policy consensus projects on health care coverage for the uninsured -- and U.S.-Muslim relations. Before that -- Rob headed up a major NGO working to alleviate hunger in the United States. He has worked for Republican and Democratic representatives -- Leon Panetta and Patrick Leahy and Edmund Muskie. In 1994, Rob received the Prudential Foundation Prize for Non-Profit Leadership.

He is married, has four children, and three grandchildren. And is a good friend of my sister Barbara Zweig.

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This BCR Podcast series will be asking American peace activists a question borrowed from Raymond Carver:

“What are we talking about when we talk about ‘The American’ ?”

This episode looks at an anti-Vietnam War, anti-nuclear peace activist, longtime incarcerated American criminal – and Catholic priest – Philip Berrigan. Brad Wolf joined me via Zoom to help. Recently, Brad edited a collection of Berrigan’s writings, entitled -- “A Ministry of Risk”. Brad is a former lawyer, persecutor, professor and community college dean and is the executive director and co-founder of Peace Action Network of Lancaster PA. and he organized the "Merchants of Death War Crimes Tribunal." Brad was featured on Bar Crawl Radio when we covered the Kateri Peace Conference in Fonda, New York earlier this year – BCR #236.

Alan Winson

barcrawlradio@gmail.com

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TALKING ABOUT "THE AMERICANS": BURYING GAZA BABIES

On December 9, 2024 -- I talked with several of the nearly 50 protestors holding a mock funeral on a plot of grass at the front of the Syracuse Federal Building. It was a rainy and cold morning as several peacemakers neatly ripped away the grass and created a shallow oblong hole into which a half dozen babies in the form of bloodied pillows were placed. An oversized tombstone stood at one end of the "grave." Homeland Security officers arrested three of the "grave diggers" who were given citations and released. The action was organized by John Amidon a leader of Veterans for Peace and Pax Christi Upstate, New York.

Amongst others, I spoke with Clare Grady of the Kings Bay Plowshare 7 and Yana Uones who was born in Egypt and now is a Philosophy student at Binghamton University. Throughout the event, Yana read the names of Gazan children killed. Also, I spoke with Jade Ebanks who jhad ust returned from Gaza where she volunteered as a wound care nurse. Jade described the horror she witnessed.

CONTACT -- Alan Winson - barcrawlradio@gmail.com

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For this BCR recording we were at the Hollow Nickel Bar in Brooklyn NY. Why a hollow nickel -- check out their website. We had a wild, funny and crucially important conversation about the work of the Church of Stop Shopping with Rev. Billy and Vera Anderson, They had just finished their Saturday morning "Earth Riot" radio show at WBAI.

Rev. Billy is an enactment of activist actor and writer Billy Talen; he leads the Church of Stop Shopping -- a New York City performance community preaching the imminent 'shopocalypse' when the world ends due to rampant and unholy consumerism. And Vera Anderson was on Bar Crawl Radio when we were out West with the Nevada Desert Experience’s 60 mile Peace Walk to the entrance of the Nevada Nuclear Test Site -- See BCR #219. Vera is a musician and a mental health advocate in NYC and Las Vegas and she is on the board of the Nevada Desert Experience and Pace e Bene advocating for nuclear abolition.

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Once again -- recording on the porch of Gebhard's Beer Culture Bar located in Manhattan's Upper West Side -- BCR hosts Rebecca McKean and Alan Winson talk with the four composers and performers and leaders of Composer's Concordance about "contemporary [classic] music." This music movement has been described by the New York Times as “unpredictable … irreverent …and ingenious.” For over four decades Composer's Concordance has presented concerts in all sorts of New York City area venues of inventive experimental music.

Gene Pritsker -- Milica Paranosic – Peter Jarvis – and Seth Boustead -- talk about the history of the organization, their compositions and the ongoing joy of breaking contemporary boundaries of what is considered artful music in an unstable era.

For our regular listeners if you would like a link to complete versions of the music played in this program -- make a request to email barcrawlradio.com

HINT: This program is best heard with a set of good headphones.

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