time once again for community form and we're very lucky to have with us live in the studio this morning margaret flowers and kevin zeese margaret flowers is a contributor at popular resistance dot org co director of its our economy and is a maryland pediatrician after graduation from the university of maryland school of medicine in one thousand nine hundred and completion of pediatric residency at john hopkins hospital in baltimore she worked first as a hospitalist and then in private practice she left practice in two thousand and seven to advocate full time for single payer health care system both the state and national levels and she is host of the clearing the fog radio show along with kevin zeese kevin zeese is a contributor also at popular resistance at argo director of its our economy and attorney who has been a political activist since graduating from george washington law school in one nine hundred eighty he works on peace economic justice criminal law reform and revising american democracy and reviving american democracy and he serves as president of common sense for drug policy and is a co founder of the drug policy foundation now known as drug policy alliance margaret and kevin thank you very much for coming and spending time with us this morning and they've been having  a bit about popular resistance how did that come about so our popular resistance dot org is a project that came out of our work organizing the occupation in washington d c back in the fall of two thousand and eleven and  basically it's a website that covers the movement resistance that's going on across the united states a lot of people aren't aware of because the commercial media doesn't talk about it but on a whole range of issues people are standing up and fighting back and we in addition to lifting that up  show what that people are doing to create alternative solutions like alternative economies nubile energy thing and show that all of our movements are connected that we you know we have the root causes are the same for all of the issues that we're fighting on know alone and then we after that was phase ended we got together people who were involved in that movement and other social justice movements is that what we do now to kind of build this movement to a bigger national movement that really can have some impact on issues so after that kind of process of listening to each other we came up with popular resistance and it's a movement that covers the social economic and environmental justice and tries to push those issues for an addition to covering the movement we also participate and so we run various campaigns we've just finish net neutrality campaign which we successfully completed and won and we are involved in the campaign to stop the trans pacific partnership and fast track for other global corporate trade agreements these rigged agreements they call falsely call free trade  which is and we are also involved in lots of climate issues where we have a project called we are cove point which is trying to stop an export terminal for frac to gas very important issue and it would affect all the fracking on the east coast if we stop that  point we can really impact a fracking in the whole marcellus shale so as we take on issues with the idea of bringing together groups like net neutrality for example everyone's affected we need the internet to do our work and everybody got involved we pulled people in from various issues same with the you know the rig trade agreements they have they will affect every aspect of our lives and so food and water g m o's banking health care energy everything is impacted by it so brings people together in crisis solidarity of a mass movement because that's what we think are our philosophy you need a mass movement to win and you proceed on two tracks challenging what's going wrong in the country and building what you want to see happen so let's stop the machine create a new world and that's why we've been pursuing a strategy of pulling this mountain together with lots of other people we don't do it alone obviously it's interesting you bring up cove point because here in washington state we have got multiple terminals they were trying to build  them have been due to public resistance projects have been stopped for now right so and it reminds me again of your connecting all these things together when we were fighting the multi basically billion dollar stadiums here in town you know that if that again was happening across the country but you didn't know that based on media coverage right and if we had only known that imagine how things could have changed  but you know the interesting thing about cove point one other reason that it's so important is that they're actually building this refinery an export terminal in a residential neighborhood this is never been done before imagine this huge refinery and literally that the entrance to the plant the across the street there's a recreational field along the side of the property where this plant is their daycare centers and schools and school is crazy right across the street and it's on a peninsula so if there's an explosion people hundreds of families will have to drive towards the terminal to escape but it's only it's only three miles from a nuclear power plant on top of that but and the company that owns it lied to the federal energy regulatory commission about it they they listed the population of a center that was sixteen miles north and population of a center that was eight miles south and they left out forty five thousand in between that and the and the federal agency is not doing its job so we've actually been involved in beyond extreme energy which is a coalition focused on the federal energy regulatory commission we shut it down for a week in november we're going back in may bring more people hopefully and shut it down again and try to push them to stop approving pipelines and other other infrastructure so it's in the same thing and when we know where we are called plant is focused on co point we also have a coast to coast call we're having people who working on the west coast as well as these coast on these same issues that we were going to use were you know at and so these are all unifying issues and energy is it's such a major part of our economy that we got energy wrong we can get most things right so we've got to get energy right talk a bit about more of your leaks is where you get the information from a classified document so that we've been involved in the struggle for more than three years and the transpacific partnership is an international agreement that's being negotiated between twelve different countries pacific rim countr agreement of the twenty nine chapters only about four or five of them are about trade and the rest of the chapters are about things that multinational corporations have wanted from congress but they haven't been able to get in through the front door so they're there putting them into this agreement and then for the first time in the history of the us they classify the text of the agreement so whereas in the past we were able to see what they were negotiating now and not only are we shut out but our members of congress have very restricted access they have to go through a very extended process to apply to see summaries of the tax they can go into a room when they're if they're approved very few have done that and they can it's read and retain only they can't bring staff they can't bring a camera they can't bring no paper and pen and write they can't do anything that's going to allow them to actually show people what's in the agreement and then when they come out they can talk about the specifics of the actually threat with prosecution if you tell your constituents what's in this agreement you can be prosecuted right the trade representative recently met behind closed doors with the house democrats and told them if they leaked anything that was told to them in that meeting they would be prosecuted so what but six hundred corporations are devising the obama straight on the details and they see it live on their compound their laptop and they can make suggestions take out that comment take out that phrase add this paragraph they got that paragraph so there's been five years or six years now almost of secret negotiations with some of the top corporate lawyers in the country helping to write it and what's going to what the aggressive we know thanks to leaks from wiki leaks we've seen some of the negotiating positions in the us is very aggressively pushing for greater corporate power it's the most corporate of all if you look at it if you make a football field and you look at the ninety yard line that's where the u s para goes australia which is very corporate about sixty and that's part of the closest to us everyone else is for the left of the football field so we are way out there on corporate power obama is pushing a corporate agenda like no other country in the world do you want to just talk about with the recent ch yes at the investor state dispute settlement the investor chapter is critical it is really what defines the agreement and it's essential for the corporations because what it does is begins to create a whole new area of corporate law that's designed for corporate power and the centerpiece of that is these trade tribunals which will give the corporations the power to sue governments if there is a public interest action you know raising raise wages for workers stopping be and so they can they get sued before the special trade tribunals where there are three judges almost always they'll be corporate lawyers on leave from their corporate job being lawyers then going back to their corporate job and nothing to do with the domestic l public is that this is not supposed to known by the public until four years after the t p p isn't acted or four years after they stopped negotiating so it's a super secret it's not just a secret while they're negotiating it while they're passing it to secret for years after they what that is is the piece of lesson legislation that congress would have to pass the president has asked for it it would allow the president to sign this agreement before it goes to congress and they would have very limited time to read the contents of this very technical language very limited debate no amendments and just an up or down vote fast track is something that's been used in the past to pass the kinds of agreements that wouldn't get through if there was a true transparent and democratic process so nafta were used you know  over one hundred a trade agreements that have been passed without fast track right now with smaller ones that actually did have review so it's not necessary to pass them trade agreements it's necessary if you're trying to sneak something through that the public wouldn't approve  protesting at and then the house is the key to and you do have some members in washington state who are undecided so you really should be contacting members two zero two two two four three one two one two two zero two four three one two one and that will actually be driving phone calls towards senator wyden and the senate finance committee because we expect them when they come back from their break on april thirteenth to probably enter this fast track legislation then so that's a key time before they come back  thousands of phone calls we did that a year ago in january when they try this again and we had sixty thousand phone calls and hundreds of thousands of e mails sent to congress so stop fastrack dot com can become a wave an avalanche of citizens saying no to fast track i think we can hour you're going to have allow these corporations to come in and say you know you can't raise the wages here you know you can't stop fracking here you're giving them power over over our core economies so it's a bizarre thing to support i understand without thinking about why they would support it because more trade is good but the realit rezoned saying that if you pass this law in secret and it undermines our ability to protect ourselves we are not going to obey and expressing opposition faster and right a very early seattle is voting the seattle city council on monday at two o'clock will be there yeah so we're excited and we hope that it passes here in seattle and we know the u s trade rep in the white house have noticed seattle so congratulations the city council for standing up cities make a difference and the city is a very powerful city bellingham city council as they did  passed unanimously this last week against tb they were under the radar now i think that may have put put the white house and trade rep on notice because and on the radar in seattle seattle they're aware what you're doing and again just as an example these natural gas and oil export facilit that are being pushed across the country obviously on the coastal regions especially that would be a type of project that under the t p p s these corporations if the citizens shut these down these corporations could then sue you for example the u s government for their expected money they would have made at that facility had it been built that's right and the atlantic the atlantic when they're negotiating very much focuses on export of gas to europe that's a big aspect of the terrible thing for the whole issue of climate change and the local environments where these cereals exist ye so talk a little bit about margaret you are one of the speakers tonight at the event put on the annual public meeting of physicians for a national health plan a western washington chapter be here in seattle again well so we had twenty ten we passed a federal law the affordable care act and it didn't solve the problem people i think are are more people are starting to see that now that we're five years out and they see that while more people have health insurance they're still struggling to see the health professionals that they need to see they're still struggling to pay their medical bills out of pocket costs are still high and so it seems like we're really say more enthusiasm for people to to support a single payer you know it's basically a universal publicly financed health care system that's about health you know surprise instead of profit for these large medical corporations and western washington as one of our washington state is one of the states that has health care as a human right campaign and so they've you know people here have been organizing which is fantastic and we have one in maryland from montana as one pennsylvania maine oregon so we do see folks that are that are organizing and educating and pushing for both at the state level and the national level there is a piece of legislation that congressman john conyers has reintroduced this congress it's called the expanded and improved medicare for all act h r six seven six and you know it's one of these friends of struggles that is really critical so you know if if we could solve the healthcare crisis with a single payer system it would really it would boost our economy it really couldn't criticize the ac or obamacare we want to call it and now people are saying it's not all it was cracked up to be you know you get these headlines in the paper about x millions more and now i have insurance but lines are much more important because they have insurance that's useless they can't afford health care or the payouts from you know co pays and out of pocket costs that come with the insurance is this going to make it so people don't get health care they need  it's privatized insurance or the health care system even more and it's put the burden more on the consumers busts rather than on the insurance companies and they've got these terrible narrow networks where i mean by that they don't  a lot of the major hospitals and so if you have a you know diabetes problem or a cancer probably have to go to a major hospital it may not most likely not be covering your insurance and so what that means you pay for it so it's this is fraudulent headline that you're covered  people are starting to catch on to the game here of what really happened and so now people want to real solutions and that's going to keep growing as a law that you know you had those still have a lot is gushing about the realities of the a cia and so you have to we have to start with education so that's why markets here you know that help been bamboozled into thinking we're getting something really actually have things taken away from us and we're paying for it this is another one of those issues that really for me it's not just about access to health care it's health care is really part of the broader struggle for social and economic justice because if we just give people access to health care and we don't address education and you know having a job with a living wage or a house that you can afford to live in or being able to get healthy food or breathe clean air and drink clean water if we don't address all these issues we're not going to solve the health crisis completely in this country and so and in addition to that we're not going to get a single payer health system if just the people who care about a single payer health system are out there fighting we all need to come into this fight and recognize that affects every one of us and that if we work together we can when we're actually starting to see some wins on other issues that were you know people didn't think could actually happen the net neutrality battle that we just thought that was a surprising when to a lot of people right and although in showing a new type of political power that didn't exist which is the internet community people of the internet you know if they get educated about something they can really act and they can create those kinds of tidal waves of action that have a cult following every where wherever he goes he's being harassed about it it's like a major yes we did we did a protest at a fundraiser of his this week and he heard about had to move the fundraiser to a secret location you know so this is like what is that how you that's what told this is not an option to have the internet as a common carrier which is no discrimination that's what neutrality is everyone has equal access to money doesn't buy you a better place and so we were told that's not on the table not politically possible not be discussed eight days came out a leak in the wall street journal they were going to steer it internet where they're going to pay more you get faster websites and so we decided eight days before the meeting to occupy the f c c to put a mechanic market i went out there the first night by  that but another key piece of that is that while we were out there occupying really just to bring visibility has been and the f c c had never been really protested before so this was foreign to them and a lot of the employees came out and said thank you for being here because they believed in  challenge but the internet community rose up and they were they crashed their phones they crashed their servers they were me you know calling in e mailing in and so the f c c was just really barraged with this and then after that the chairman put that proposal on the table we had a record number of public comments on this four million people comment and what's really interesting is in the first round ninety nine percent of the comments were for reclassifying and it was only that one percent that that wanted to have discriminatory from a variety of sources it was really interesting coalition of radicals and reformers democrats and independents and that company turned up a nice business a really interesting coalition made that happen and so it's a real sign again of coming together solidarity and we can have power and that's really important people learn so only a few minutes left so talk about the importance of obviously the internet and net neutrality are a key tool towards changing things but balancing that with people that are spending way more time in front of their computers and not being out in the streets streets like you two consistently are so yeah i mean it is insufficient it's you know there are a variety of tactics that people can use  and certainly that's important but to to email and phone call and things like that and to your members of congress or whatever you need to you know target to get the social change that we need but one of the things that's that's exciting that we've seen over the last five years when we came into this struggle of organizing the occupy in freedom plaza in washington d c in the popular resistance well what we saw is that the traditional tools that we've used you know contacting our member of congress or you know writing letters to them aren't sufficient that we live in this very corrupt political system and so we have to build this culture of resistance and stand up and just really say to them no we're we're going to protest you and we're going to follow you we're going to hound you that's how new york won the fracking ban they made governor cuomo is life miserable everywhere he went and so this culture of resistance is growing and that means getting out in the street and it means being busy i want to plug seattle tempus in the before the legal era and someone had to come back and be part of that this afternoon but that's not example and when you have those kind of victories as born there as them and realize that you have power and you can make a difference and i because we are so told we have no power the reality is we do have power and if we use it we can make sure you can make seattle into a you have the everything you in seattle from the grassroots mobilizations to some good people in the city council to a mayor and you know a lot of things you can really build on here to make this a and then tonight margaret you'll be speaking at the annual public meeting of physicians for a national health plan western washington chapter seven o'clock it can hall door session at six university of washington campus free and then finally how do people find out more about your going to zation we encourage them to go to popular resistance dot org you can sign up for our weekly newsletter or we have a daily digest where you get an e mail each morning with a photo and a summary of each story that we posted the day before we post about twelve to twenty stories a day if you want to keep up with with what's not being covered the commercial media and see how much great thing you know how many great things are going on across the country as well as we we put a lot of we provide a lot of reports that are done on various issues so that you can get the facts about what's going on is much better start today with a popular resistance loser than it is at the newspaper you're actually seeing that there are people working to change the world for the better and you're not alone in trying to do that it really makes you more competent well with that we are time once again for community form and we're very lucky to have with us live in the studio this morning million by the way and bridget a million bill a is a founder and director of melka the movement for ecological learning and community action in ethiopia he also coordinates the alliance for food sovereignty for africa and bridget mugabe is a social scientist also with the alliance for food sovereignty and africa based in uganda i should also point out that you are both in town in seattle participating in the africa u s food sovereignty strategy summit that is taking place this weekend and is going to be event at town hall seattle that we will be mentioning here at the end of the the changing climate is a very critical thing how do you do in my culture we have a useful read we have a banana that for example and i was getting married my husband had to bring a specific type of banana as part of my  be another form of colonialism forcing and top down where us well us and worldwide corporations come in with the solution and are not even don't consult the farmers and the organizations that already exist representing millions of farmers  talk a bit more about just recently million you put out a press release regarding the mega seed corporations that are snatching up seed companies in africa could you talk about that i think  that they have they said they had nineteen ten twenty years ago they had nineteen one name viki's off badly but now they are only five of them of that so that's what we are all posing well we have just about a minute left bridget let's let you have the last word tell people who are listening if they it's not