neogaia

Episodes of my radio show where I play electronic dance music including House, Trance, Techno, Progressive, Drum & Bass, Chillout and everything in between!

Interview with Dave Zirin on how American Progressives should take sports more seriously and how they ignore Sports to their own peril.

From the page: "Every great social movement begins with a set of ideas validated, internalized, and then shared and amplified through media, grassroots organizations, and thousands, even millions, of conversations. A truth strikes a resonant chord, we hear it acknowledged by others, and we begin to discuss it with friends and associates.The new story spreads out in multiple ever-widening circles that begin to connect and intermingle."

As someone who majored in Culture & Politics this completely on the spot!

From the page: "Culture is the system of beliefs, values, perceptions, and social relations that encodes the shared learning of a particular human group essential to individual survival and orderly social function. It serves as the interpretive lens through which the human brain processes the massive flow of data from our senses to distinguish the significant from the inconsequential, assign meaning, and shape our behavior: "This plant will kill you. That one is food."

The cultural lens reflects both the individual learning of personal experience and the shared learning of the tribe, as communicated through its framing cultural stories. These stories, which the tribe's storytellers traditionally passed from generation to generation, shape our collective identity and relationships. "This is who we are, what we value, and how we behave."

The processes by which culture shapes our perceptions and behavior occur mostly at an unconscious level. It rarely occurs to us to ask whether the reality we perceive through the lens of the culture within which we grew up is the "true" reality. We just take for granted that it is."

So shady debt collectors have started to take their claims to courts that are inaccesible by public transit so that debtors will automatically lose and be unable to even show up to court! Article focuses on how car culture and cities designed for automobiles and not people disproportionally impact the poor negatively.

"The more cars in a community the worse it is for poor people, especially those in debt. A recent Wall Street Journal article titled "In Debt Collecting, Location Matters" reveals how companies trying to collect overdue bills can "shop around for the best places to bring their claims."

The article details what debt collectors look for when choosing a small claims court; the ability to pursue as much of a debtor's assets as possible, a sympathetic judge and, get this, a car dominated landscape. The WSJ explains: "Decatur Township [an Indianapolis suburb] has become the preferred courthouse for lawyers who collect soured debt on behalf of medical providers... Ms. Ricker says a lack of public transportation discourages many defendants from showing up in court, resulting in automatic wins for debt collectors."

Somewhere along the way debt collectors realized that people who can't afford to pay their medical bills are more likely to be carless and thus less able to attend a small claims court far from any bus service."

Michael Albert has some suggestions on how to relieve unemployment while giving most working people more leisure time!

Mitt Romney's Mexican roots! Great-Grandfather fled to Mexico as a Mormon. His father was born in Mexico but during the Mexican Revolution he moved back to the US.

More background about Rupert Murdoch. Did you know he was born into wealth? His father was a media mogul and he took over the business and turned into an even bigger empire.