CounterSpin

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CounterSpin is the weekly radio show of FAIR, the national media watch group.

  1. 1 DAY AGO

    Rayan El Amine on Voices From Gaza

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260206.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   The Nation (2/3/26) This week on CounterSpin: “What do you call a ceasefire agreement under which people keep dying? That is the question the people of Gaza have been asking themselves for the past few months.” And it’s the question that kicks off a new issue of The Nation magazine, which they call “A Day for Gaza.” Since a “ceasefire” was declared four months ago, Israel has killed, very conservatively, 420 Palestinians. More than 70,000 overwhelmingly Palestinian people have been reported killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, including more than 300 journalists and media workers. This is without mentioning the destruction of more than half of all religious and cultural sites in the Gaza Strip. The UN has reported Israeli soldiers recording videos in which they mock Palestinians and Palestinian education, before destroying schools and universities. If it ended today, the loss of life, and home, and culture, and history in Palestine would take countless years to reckon, if it could be reckoned at all. But here in the US, we’re being told by media that the conflict is winding down, because there’s a ceasefire in effect; and we are to interpret all events going forward in those terms. That pretense is mainly expressed through a simple drop in coverage, which by itself says, “Not so much to see here anymore, time to move on.” As an interrogation of and a pushback against the suggestion that because powerful people’s words have changed, there is no longer a desperate, attention-worthy crisis in Gaza or for Palestinians, The Nation lifts up the voices of Palestinians themselves, as a kind of intervention into a media conversation that presents Palestinians as subjects—sympathetic or not, depending on the story—more often than as actors, who have the basic right to determine their own future. The issue was edited by writer and translator Rayan El Amine. We hear from him this week on CounterSpin. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260206El-Amine.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at the arrests of journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260206Banter.mp3

    28 min

  2. 30 JAN

    Jenna Ruddock on DHS Domestic Surveillance

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260130.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   Free Press (1/26/26) This week on CounterSpin: There are reports that people out in the street opposing ICE abductions of their neighbors are chanting, “We’re not cold, we’re not afraid. Minnesota made us brave.” Around the country, people who never called themselves “political” are moving out of their comfort zone to register their opposition to violent, state-sanctioned power being unleashed on their communities in the service of racist authoritarianism. The spark is the murders by ICE of Keith Porter, Renee Good and Alex Pretti—that’s just this year—but the resistance in Minneapolis isn’t sprouting from nowhere; it has roots. Corporate news media evince little understanding of the kind of local, neighbor-to-neighbor communication and connection that has existed for decades, and that today is pulling people together across race, gender, age, class, religion lines in Minneapolis. That’s just one way elite media remove themselves further every day from the conversations people want to have. But elite reporters could at least use their proximity to power to talk about what the state and corporate forces are doing to try and squelch the growing resistance, including basic rights you’d hope journalists would care about, like that of people to witness actions carried out with their money and in their name. Our guest put together a report on how “DHS Is Expanding Domestic Surveillance While Targeting Efforts to Document and Dissent.” Jenna Ruddock is Advocacy Director at the group Free Press. We hear from her this week on CounterSpin. Transcript: ‘The State Is Exercising Surveillance Over Us, But We Can Push Back’: https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260130Ruddock.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at press coverage of the Minneapolis clampdown, and at the lack of recent coverage of Gaza. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260130Banter.mp3

    28 min

  3. 23 JAN

    Dedrick Asante-Muhammad on State of the Dream 2026

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260123.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies (1/19/26) This week on CounterSpin: In 1967, when Martin Luther King came out against the Vietnam War, and called the US the “greatest purveyor of violence in the world today,” corporate news had nothing but emphatic condemnation. Life magazine called that speech “demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi.” And the New York Times sniffed in a way today’s readers will recognize, writing that when King argued that the war on Vietnam is “a barrier to social progress in this country,” he fused “two public problems that are distinct and separate. By drawing them together, Dr. King has done a disservice to both.” The elite press corps that now pretend they honor King show that they never heard, much less understood, him or the totality of his vision—or that of those that share that vision today. That’s the space that the coalition headed by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies is stepping into with their new report: State of the Dream 2026. We’ll hear from Joint Center president Dedrick Asante-Muhammad. Transcript: ‘There’s an Attack on Racial Equity Analysis Because They Feel It Changes the Conversation’: https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260123Asante-Muhammad.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at recent press coverage of Kalaallit Nunaat. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260123Banter.mp3

    28 min

  4. 16 JAN

    Setareh Ghandehari on ICE Violence, Jon Schleuss on Pittsburgh Paper Shutdown

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260116.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   Fox 9 (1/15/26) This week on CounterSpin:  Headlines today on January 15: “North Minneapolis ICE shooting: Children Hospitalized After Flash Bang, Tear Gas Hits Van.” And from the official Homeland Security website: “ICE Announced the Arrest of More Worst of the Worst Criminal Illegal Aliens From Across the Country, Including Those Convicted of First-Degree Rape of a Child, Homicide and Arson.” So did the hospitalized children commit the rapes, homicides and arson? Is that why they were attacked? Or are we supposed to just muddle it all together, so that we now think “immigration equals crime”? What happens if we do that? What would happen if we didn’t? We’ll hear from Setareh Ghandehari, advocacy director at Detention Watch Network. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260116Ghandehari.mp3   TNG-CWA (1/15/26) Also on the show: We see reporters being physically attacked by purported “law enforcement,” and criminalized and threatened by the federal government, as they just try to do their job of witnessing and reporting the actions of powerful state actors. At the same time, we see corporations telling us that journalists aren’t really important; AI can do whatever it is that they do. And if a newspaper doesn’t make the quarterly profit that shareholders have said they want, well, what more evidence do you need? The closure of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette will mean a lot to people. But who will be brought on to speak on the meaning of the shutdown, and where it fits with other predations on our right to know what is happening around us? We’ll hear from Jon Schleuss, president of the Newspaper Guild-CWA. Transcript: ‘We’re Seeing the Result of Decades of ICE Being Able to Act With Impunity’: Transcript: ‘‘We’re Looking to Save News for the Folks in Pittsburgh’: https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260116Schleuss.mp3

    28 min

  5. 9 JAN

    Michelle Ellner on Venezuela Invasion

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260109.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   AP (1/6/26) This week on CounterSpin: For millions of people around the globe, the US under the administration of convicted felon Donald Trump has acted—it’s beyond “illegal”; it’s sort of “a-legal,” as if laws meant nothing—they’ve kidnapped the leader of a sovereign nation, and declared that Trump will henceforth “run” that nation. If you think flagrant bullying, Mafioso, might-makes-right behavior is what international law is created to combat, and basic human decency is designed to reject—you would be supported by the majority of the world’s people. But alas, you live in the US and rely for your world view on US media, and thus you are fed authoritarian apologies disguised as disinterested analysis, like that from AP’s headline on January 6: “Trump’s Vague Claims of the US Running Venezuela Raise Questions About Planning for What Comes Next.” Because, you see, the problem about Trump’s claim that his weirdo government will now run the country of Venezuela isn’t that that is crazy with a capital K, but that Trump “has offered almost no details about how it will do so.” Nation of Change (1/5/26) Our conversation and understanding of our political power is so warped that even a thoughtful piece from Nation of Change says: “The White House has not explained how it intends to legally justify the detention of a foreign head of state, the reported civilian deaths, or the long-term scope of a military “quarantine” designed to coerce a sovereign nation.” When we really need to accept that they will just not justify it, and will simply declare that anyone who asks for justification is a terrorist. And news media will report that as one side of a two-sided argument. As a CounterSpin guest said recently: “The cavalry is not coming. You’re it.” We’ll talk about the Venezuela invasion, as neither a beginning nor an end, with Michelle Ellner, Latin America campaign coordinator of CODEPINK. Transcript: ‘People in Venezuela Can Oppose the Government But Still Reject US Intervention’: https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260109Ellner.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at media coverage of ICE’s murder of Renee Good. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260109Banter.mp3 Featured Image: January 4 rally in Caracas protesting the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro (photo by Rome Arrieche via Venezuelanalysis—1/5/26).

    28 min

  6. 2 JAN

    Best of CounterSpin 2025

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin260102.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   The Best of CounterSpin for 2025 features Silky Shah on mass deportations, Gregory Shupak on the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, Paul Offit on RFK Jr.’s pro-virus policies, Karen Thompson on policing pregnancy, Erin Reed on anti-trans pseudo-science, Farrah Hassen on criminalizing homelessness, Mumia Abu-Jamal on unheard stories and Tom Morello on music as protest. We call it the “best of,” but, as always, we are deeply thankful to all of the activists, researchers, reporters and advocates who appear on the show. These are just a few of the void-filling conversations it’s been our pleasure to host in the last year. 2025 was a rough one; we appreciate everyone who helps us stay informed, forward-looking and in communication. Transcript: ‘A Tribe of Rebels, People Who Struggle, Those Are the Stories That Rarely Get Heard’: Featured Image: Top row: Silky Shah, Gregory Shupak, Paul Offit and Karen Thompson; second row: Erin Reed, Farrah Hassen, Mumia Abu-Jamal and Tom Morello

    28 min

  7. 26/12/2025

    Kimberle Crenshaw on Anti-Blackness

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251226.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   AAPF (10/25) This week on CounterSpin: After every police killing of a Black person, every announced policy singling out Black immigrants as the cause of crime and disorder, every declaration, like that from Arlington National Cemetery, that as of now materials on Black and female service people will be scrubbed from the website—we hear from corporate media about how, boy, this country is for sure “reckoning” with “racism.” But then: If we reckoned with racism every time elite media claimed this country was “reckoning” with racism, seems like we ought to be fully “reckoned” by now. US corporate media have a white supremacy problem (and you see how that term lands differently than “racism”): They decide who they think, and hence you should think, is worth talking to, based on an accepted conflation of power with worthiness. They decide whose ideas are taken for granted and whose deemed marginal, and they tell us how to define progress: Is it moving toward actual equity, or just things quietening down? Who needs to be reassured, and whose lives is it OK to disrupt, whose basic humanity is it OK to question, day after day after day? A new report titled Anti-Blackness Is the Point, from the African American Policy Forum, engages this age-old if ever-morphing narrative. Kimberle Crenshaw is a leading legal scholar and justice advocate, the force behind the transformative ideas of intersectionality and critical race theory. She’s co-founder and executive director of the African American Policy Forum, as well as a professor of law at both Columbia and UCLA. We talk with Kimberle Crenshaw this week on CounterSpin. Transcript: ‘You Cannot Change a Reality That You Cannot Name’: https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251226Crenshaw.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at nonprofits and diversity, equity and inclusion. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251226Banter.mp3

    28 min

  8. 19/12/2025

    Derek Seidman on Starbucks Strike, Mitch Jones on AI vs. Environment

    https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251219.mp3 Right-click here to download this episode (“Save link as…”).   Truthout (12/8/25) This week on CounterSpin: Forbes reports the Starbucks workers strike as you might expect: “The company claims it already offers the ‘best job in retail.’ … Yet the union is demanding….” “The company says, ‘We’re ready to return to the bargaining table whenever the union is.’ But as of yet, the union is holding out for the company to present a contract that meets demands….” You get the idea: One party is generous, the other is ornery. But even Forbes has to acknowledge that even as the strike “drags” into a second month, “global support grows.” Derek Seidman has been following the strike. He’s a writer, researcher and historian who contributes to Little Sis and to Truthout, where he recently reported on the Starbucks strike and…what Walmart has to do with it? https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251219Seidman.mp3   Politico (12/17/25)   Also on the show: Sen. Bernie Sanders is the latest to join a broad group of more than 200 environmental and economic justice advocates that just sent a letter to Congress, calling for a moratorium on the construction of new data centers, the energy sources powering the boom (and, as some would say, predictable bust) of artificial intelligence, until, as Sanders says, democracy “has a chance to catch up.” Turns out as people learn more, opposition grows, and so, Politico notes, “The industry is taking out ads and funding campaigns to flip the narrative and put data centers in a positive light—spinning them as job creators and economic drivers rather than resource-hungry land hogs.” The letter to Congress was spearheaded by Food & Water Watch. We’ll hear from the group’s deputy director, Mitch Jones. Transcript: ‘These Two Powerful Corporations Have a Shared Interest in Trying to Bust This Union’: https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251219Jones.mp3   Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at press coverage of Bondi Beach. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin251219Banter.mp3

    28 min
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About

CounterSpin is the weekly radio show of FAIR, the national media watch group.

Information

  • Creator
    Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting
  • Years Active
    2005 - 2026
  • Episodes
    270
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Show Website
    CounterSpin

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