John “Make War Not Peace” Bolton Announces New Military Strategy

Loud & Clear

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by international relations and security analyst Mark Sleboda.
National Security Advisor John Bolton yesterday announced a new national counterterrorism strategy, saying that it focuses on disrupting “all terrorist groups, which the document defines as including “radical Islamist terrorist groups.” But it also goes further. The document also focused on Iran, which Bolton said has been “the world’s central banker for international terrorism since 1979.”
Friday is Loud & Clear’s regular segment on the midterms, taking a look at political races around the country in the runup to midterm elections in November. Jacqueline Luqman, the co-editor-in-chief of Luqman Nation, which hosts a livestream every Thursday night at 9:00 p.m. on Facebook, joins the show.
The Senate voted this morning 51-49 to move forward and have the vote on Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination. It’s currently scheduled for tomorrow. Brian and John speak with Jane Cutter, the editor of Liberation News, which you can find at liberationnews.org.
Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke has been on trial for allegedly shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald on October 20, 2014. Three other officers have been charged with lying about the investigation and covering up the events. This is the second day of deliberation for the jury on Van Dyke’s charges, and they have reached a verdict of guilty on second-degree murder and 16 counts of aggravated battery. Aislinn Pulley, an organizer with the Black Lives Matter movement, joins the show.
Brazilians will head to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president. The country’s most popular politician, Luis Ignacio Lula da Silva, has been banned from the race due to highly disputed charges, and the Workers Party is running Fernando Haddad in his place. Jair Bolsonaro is a far-right fascist candidate who is slightly ahead in the polls despite being protested widely in the streets. Aline Piva, a journalist and a member of Brazilians for Democracy and Social Justice, joins Brian and John.
This Sunday marks the 17th anniversary of the US and allied invasion of Afghanistan, the longest war in American history. What began as an effort to destroy al-Qaeda in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks became a futile exercise in nation-building and then transformed into a never-ending policy of killing anybody who could someday pose a threat to the United States. Will this war ever end? Brian Terrell, a long time peace activist and also co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, joins the show.
It’s Friday! So it’s time for the week’s worst and most misleading headlines. Brian and John speak with Steve Patt, an independent journalist whose critiques of the mainstream media have been a feature of his blog Left I on the News and on twitter @leftiblog, and Sputnik producer Nicole Roussell.