Thursday, June 23, 2016

Black Agenda Report and CPR News Interview: Orlando Massacre and U.S. Foreign Policy

The killing of 49 people in Orlando, Florida is the subject of my Black Agenda Report column this week. In Orlando Massacre and U.S. Foreign Policy I discussed the difficulty in acknowledging killer Omar Mateen's apparent mental illness, his closeted sexuality and also his evocation of jihad. He was the son of an Afghan exile and existed in that peculiar world of people who have been officially elevated but who also live through years of unresolved grievance and paranoia. The corporate media have also ignored the fact that the FBI reportedly tried to turn Mateen into an informant.

I talked about all this on Community Public Radio News today with Don DeBar. Don also reports on U.S. policy in Syria, comments from Russian president Vladimir Putin on NATO's threats against his country and the uncounted ballots from California's recent presidential primary. I start at about 7:00 minutes into the program.