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Join us for a delightful travelogue visit to Las Vegas, Nevada, the NUWU Southern Paiute Tribe, Creech AFB & the Nevada National [Nuclear] Security Site-- to celebrate the great explorer Christopher Columbus on his special day in 2026. Stay to the end as the narrator discovers American ideals and goals on this special day. Contact: [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is a family story merged with our troubled human world -- a conversation with the youngest granddaughters of Catholic Worker founder -- Dorothy Day. Kate Hennessy begins by reading from her book "The World Will Be Saved By Beauty" about her grandmother missing her birth. But throughout life she and her sister, Martha, were embraced by their mother -- Tamar -- and grandmother. They grew up within the Catholic Worker movement and their memories of their family reveal the close tie between family life and the international movement striving to ease the struggles of their poor neighbors and to secure a safe -- anti-nuclear -- world. This conversation between sisters is, also, a story of a country seeking a moral center. This recording took place in Dorothy Day's bedroom in Mary House of Hospitality in NYC. Contact us at [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For this edition of BCR's Park Bench Chat, Rebecca and I sat down to talk with good friends -- Maria and Barry Kessler -- and our neighbors strolling in Riverside Park's "You've Got Mail" garden -- about the state of our U.S. American democracy. We handed out bags of chips to anyone who could answer a trivia question about the US government. Our focus gravitated to a consideration of the three words that open the Preamble to the US Constitution -- "We the people ..." -- and who this group is now and in the past. Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Politics on the UWS is in a liminal place where a new reality is aborning. Of course, this nation exists in "between" places where possible versions of democracy are tried and then abandoned.  This week the social democratic version has gained a foothold in our Upper West Side neighborhood – and maybe American politics. Eli Northrup – Bronx Public Defender and justice policy wonk -- was elected the new State Assembly person for UWS’s District 69. We spoke with Eli and his campaign manager – Courtney Curd -- on the Sunday before the Tuesday Primary in Riverside Park – opening our mics to citizens to talk to the politician. Then, we recorded at the Northrup After-Election Party at Amity Hall Bar in Morningside Heights. Here are the sounds of an iteration of American politics – one that we at Bar Crawl Radio hope takes hold on our country’s disperse imaginations and future governance. Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Columbia University’s “College Walk” -- on West 116th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue -- became part of the University’s campus in 1953 with the understanding that "College Walk" would remain available to pedestrians. Massive iron gates, put up in 1967, were designed as an ornamental decoration which would not be used to restrict access. But the gated closed on Oct. 12, 2023, when the University restricted campus access to Columbia ID holders ahead of planned demonstrations over the war in Gaza. And have remained closed until now – May 2026. We talked with leaders of Morningside Heights community who want Columbia's gates unlocked. This four-part program includes: Dave Robinson -- President of the Morningside Heights Community Coalition -- talks about the goals of the MHCC and why his neighbors want Columbia University Campus opened. 00:00:00Skyler Gluck -- former senior reporter of the Columbia Spectator -- summarizes the history of the creation of "College Walk" and its closing three years ago and his reporting why it remains closed. Mohsen Mahdawi -- Palestinian activist and Columbia student targeted by Trump for deportation. 00:08:41Skyler Gluck, Michael Thaddeus -- faculty in Columbia Mathematics Department -- and Cody Stuart Madsen -- VP of Operations for Book Culture -- describe the impact of the closing of the Columbia campus on the student body, faculty, business and those who live and work in Morningside Heights. 00:24:32Toby Golick -- Professor Emeritus of the Cardozo Law School -- covers the legal case to open the campus. And Ian Boldiston -- the Communications Director for City Councilperson Shaun Abreu who represents Morningside Heights -- explains NY City's position on the closing of the Columbia campus. 00:50:42 Contact: Alan Winson -- [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In Elon Musk’s “dark MAGA” there is no truth.—which for historian Jill Lepore creates a fear that everything might collapse because everything is so fragile and so fake, so untrustworthy -- and so -- unreal.    For Lepore -- it is a fear created by the “Artificial State.” Back in January of this year – 2026 -- BCR hosts spoke with William Hartung about his political stand-up routine and his recent book “The Trillion Dollar War Machine: How Runaway Military Spending Drives America into Foreign Wars and Bankrupts Us at Hone.” It was a BCR episode in which jokes and world destruction did a cha cha. Hartung is an expert on the US military industrial complex at The Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Recently, Bill emailed his Substack readers several articles on Silicon Valley’s hard right tilt towards advanced militarism. He had been reading a copy of  Jill Lepore’s soon-to-be-released book – “The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State.”  Bill’s email was somewhat scary. It appears that Elon Musk and Peter Thiel and Palmer Luckey have embedded themselves into US government policy-making -- and profiting from dismantling our democracy. Their “firms are enabling genocide and aggression abroad and profiting from repression at home.” I replied to Bill’s email and asked if he wanted to meet and talk about what he was finding – his response was immediate: “YES” – all caps with exclamation – “Let’s do something, the sooner the better.” Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Throughout human history the political dissident has been imprisoned, tortured, murdered. Today’s dissident opposing the U.S. war machine is silenced by corporate media and punished by U.S. courts. And mostly – unseen. Why do they do it – when there is no chance of success? BCR podcast has been asking American dissidents that question for years.  For BCR #273, we asked Gal Beckerman of The Atlantic about his new book – “How to Be a Dissident.” We wanted to explore why a person would purposefully break the law to engender human rights and world peace. Mr. Beckerman's book is organized by ten qualities of the dissidents now and in the past. We focused on three: The dissident practices "hopeful pessimism" -- faces imprisonment and death as an individual but within a community of fellow protestors -- has little concern for outcomes and is thus "reckless" in their actions. What I got from our conversation: Gal's journey in writing "How to be a dissident" began with a nightmare of being interrogated for some act of civil disobedience he committed which led him to the question: Should I be a dissident--to help bring about a humane future for my young daughters? I suggest that readers of Beckerman's book start with this question. Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This BCR conversation with Carl Dix was recorded at Gebhards Beer Culture Bar on the UWS. Mr. Dix is a leader of the RevCom Corps for the Emancipation of Humanity. Our conversation focused on his his experiences with the U.S. military when our country was at war North Vietnam. In a recent email, Mr. Dix wrote me: “My experience with the US military was an important part of what formed my political perspectives … [It] is relevant to what is happening today given that people in the military are being ordered to carry out war crimes and crimes against humanity.” Carl Dix is a co-founder of the Revolutionary Communist Party of the USA. He has worked against police brutality and was part of the campaign to end “Stop and Frisk” in NYC and has protested the Trump administration as a member of Refuse Fascism which works against authoritarianism through mass demonstrations. I asked Mr. Dix about the link between his work now and his experiences of the U.S. military during the war in Vietnam which included a 2-year imprisonment in Leavenworth Penitentiary for registering as a conscientious objector. Alan Winson BCR Producer and Co-Host [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For many of us, our country is walking a tightrope between democracy and autocracy. I am a US American civilian. I avoided serving in the US military during the Vietnam War. My father and son were in the military – one in WWII – the other a never-deployed Marine. Despite these secondary contact with our armed forces, I do not understand the US military mind and culture. I do know it is the most lethal force in human history. For this BCR series -- "Nature of the U.S. Military" -- I ask US Veterans to help me understand the nature of our armed forces.  And ask them -- if push comes to shove -- will our military uphold this republic of and by the people – or follow the orders of a corrupt Commander-in-Chief Captain Matthew Hoh helped get me starte. Matthew Hoh is a Senior Fellow with the Center for International Policy and a member of the Eisenhower Media Network. Matthew Hoh served nearly a dozen years as a US Marine with experiences in overseas wars in the American occupation of Iraq between 2004 and 2007 -- and Captain Hoh contributed to US policy and operations at the Pentagon and State Department. In 2009, Matthew Hoh resigned his position with the State Department in Afghanistan in protest of the escalation of that war. Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I spoke with Steven Fechter about his newest novel -- "The Big Breeze" -- the story of Joseph Bye a phenom baseball pitcher who at the peak of his career was hit by a car and crippled.  Eventually, he became a painter of baseball pitchers. Many years after the accident, he learned that he was run-over intentionally. In part this is the story of what Breeze will he do about it. But I did not want to ask Mr. Fechter about attempted murder but about baseball -- and an American culture obsessed with its heroes. “The Big Breeze” is a primer on the mind and spirit of the baseball pitcher – and how fame is treated in this country. Mr. Fechter also wrote the play «The Woodsman» which he adapted for the film starring Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick. Fechter’s reputation was established when he won first prize in the 2001 Slamdance Screenwriting Competition for “The Woodsman.” His website states his  goal is to “write daring stories that take audiences into unfamiliar emotional spaces.”  Recorded at 5Napkins Burger on Broadway and W. 84th Street in Manhattan. Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rebecca McKean and I started this program asking why so many U.S. Americans call Mayor Mamdani a "communist" and then explore the humanist idea that we all live in individual "landscapes" that form our perspectives and emotions -- and that those landscapes can be re-considered. We recorded at 5 Napkin Burger on Broadway and 84th Street in Manhattan -- speaking with David Andersson, the English-language editor of the Pressenza International Press Agency . We had talked with David in BCR #230 in June 2024 at the West Side Community Garden. And we invited N.J. high school honors student, Jeremy Maletzky -- who I had met at a talk at the Rosa Luxemburg Institute on ending the conflict in the Middle East a few weeks earlier -- to talk about "humanism" and the ideas of Mario Rodriguez Cobos -- an Argentinian, otherwise known as "Silo". Alan Winson [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A conversation with three men who recently traveled to Palestine to witness the state of Palestinian Christian communities living in Israel-occupied West Bank. What they experiences was horrific and hopeful. Horrific in the brutality of the young Israeli settler gangs and hopeful in the readiness of the Palestinian Christians to be accepted into a peaceful, co-existence with their Israeli neighbors. Their sojourn was organized by the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center located in Jerusalem. Sabeel organizes "Witness Visits" to Israel and Palestine; participants experience life under occupation in the West Bank firsthand, engage with Palestinian Christians and other activists, and then share their experiences in order to motivate positive change. This BCR program was recorded at Gebhard's Beer Culture Bar. Alan Winson -- Host [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

William Hartung -- senior researcher at The Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft -- reads from his new book "The Trillion Dollar War Machine" and talks about The Big Five -- the U.S. military industrial complex using American tax dollars to arm the world and make enormous profits. In the first half of the program Mr. Hartung talks about the insanity and stupidity of the U.S. arms policy. In the second half -- Bill shares a bit of the stand-up routine he will be delivering at the New York Comedy Club directly after our recording. Recorded Dec. 27, 2025 at Gebhard's Beer Culture Bar [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Anjali Mehta is a 31 year-old mountain climber challenging the "seven summits" to support international agencies fighting gender-based violence and to bring attention to the rights of transgender girl athletes. In the first part of this two-part BCR program, we asked Anjali about her mountain climbing experiences. See BCR #265. This program is the second part of our conversation; Anjali told us about her organization "What is the Power of We?" working to unite the efforts of the many agencies around the world working to end gender-based violence. For her next climb, Anjali will carry postcards with their stories to the summit of Mt Vinson -- the highest peak in Antarctica. If you would like to share your story or that of a loved one, you can use this form. Featured in this series is Nancy Kangas' rendition of Mary Oliver's "The Poet Dreams of the Mountain" and music from Wade Ripka's "Eastern Blokhedz" , "Four Celtic Voices" and "The Shrill Collective." Alan Winson BCR Producer and Co-Host [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Anjali Mehta is a 31 year-old mountain climber challenging the "seven summits" to support international agencies fighting gender-based violence and to bring attention to the rights of transgender girl athletes. In this first part of a two-part BCR program, we asked Anjali about her mountain climbing experiences. She told us about falling into a crevice and overcoming the challenges and the joy of reaching the summit. In the second part of our conversation Anjali told us about her organization "What is the Power of We?" working to pull unite the efforts of the many agencies around the world working to end gender-based violence. For her next climb, Anjali will carry postcards with their stories to the summit of Mt Vinson -- the highest peak in Antarctica. If you would like to share your story or that of a loved one, you can use this form. Featured in this series is Nancy Kangas' rendition of Mary Oliver's "The Poet Dreams of the Mountain" and music from Wade Ripka's "Eastern Blokhedz" , "Four Celtic Voices" and "The Shrill Collective." Alan Winson BCR Producer and Co-Host [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.