<The following news program script (except for any inserted material indicated) was prepared by Straight Facts Information Services [SFIS] and its subsidiary Straight Facts Radio [SFR], and broadcast live on the Wednesday edition of the KOOP evening news program, KOOP- FM, 91.7 MHz, Austin, Tx on the date indicated below. This material comprised a major portion of the total content of the program.> <KOOP broadcasts at 3,000 watts during mainly daytime hours on a frequency niche shared with KVRX (nighttime), student radio of the University of Texas at Austin. The listening audience is within the Austin metropolitan area, with a population of approximately 1 million.> <Unless otherwise indicated, all material is (c) 2000 by SFIS. Reproduction for nonprofit, noncommercial purposes is authorized if fully attributed to SFIS. Selected material from past programs is published in Straight Facts (political newsletter). For a sample copy, send name and mailing address to: Straight Facts, PO Box 150116, Austin, Tx 78715-0116; or E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > < READ LIVE: Disclaimer > The viewpoints expressed on the KOOP evening news program do not necessarily reflect the views of Texas Educational Broadcasting Co- op, Incorporated, KOOP Community Radio, its Board of Directors, management, staff, or volunteers. Unless otherwise attributed, viewpoints expressed solely represent the editorial viewpoint of the program producers and other participants in the program. The KOOP evening news program is a presentation of the News and Public Affairs Collective of KOOP Radio, in cooperation with the Grassroots Media Network. <CD: Start OPENING SIG MUSIC under voice > Major portions of the following news program have been produced by Straight Facts Information Services as a service to KOOP Radio. <Bring up OPENING SIG MUSIC > <News Intro (live)> <Fade out music > Good evening, and welcome to this special edition of the KOOP evening news program, produced by Straight Facts Radio, for August 16th, 2000. I'm Mark Wright. <<RUSSIA>> <<SUBMARINE CRISIS>> Our top story ... The Russian Navy agreed today to accept help from other nations in trying to rescue more than 100 crew members trapped aboard a crippled nuclear-powered submarine that's lying wrecked and with power failing on the floor of the frigid Barents Sea. \PATRICK E. TYLER and SABRINA TAVERNISE NYT August 16, 2000\ Till now, interimperialist rivalries, and Russia's concern to shield its military secrets, have apparently been obstacles to any international cooperation to render aid. The submarine disaster may also reflect the deterioration of Russian technological and military capability since the overthrow of the Soviet workingclass state nearly a decade ago. The "cowboy capitalism" that replaced the socialized system has been characterized by economic decline, rampant corruption, and Russia's fall from a superpower status. One more attempt was made this morning to attach a rescue capsule to the outside of the submarine Kursk, and the Russian Navy was planning to make one more attempt. But United States military officials are skeptical that any of the crew members remain alive aboard the Kursk. An anonymous US government official questioned whether any crew members had survived the mysterious explosion that sent the submarine to the ocean bottom on Saturday. While Russian officials have said they heard banging from sailors trapped inside the submarine, that tapping ended today, according to Russian military officials. Today the Russians were awaiting the arrival of a British mini- submarine to assist in their rescue efforts, and claimed they were willing to accept help from other nations as well. <<COLOMBIA: ATROCITY>> Turning to the South American nation of Colombia ... ... where the United States government has been funnelling billions of dollars in military aid on the pretext of pursuing the so-called "Drug War". Reports are emerging today that the Colombian Army may have ambushed a group of school students, killing 6. \Reuters/NYT August 16, 2000 \ Today, Colombian President Andres Pastrana, in an effort to avoid embarrassment, head off protest, and portray official "concern", ordered an investigation into the allegations that army troops armed with assault rifles and grenades ambushed the school group and killed six. The attack, in which five children were also injured, apparently took place yesterday near the town of Pueblo Rico, as 60 pupils aged six to 12 strolled through the countryside with teachers and other adults. A regional army commander initially claimed the youngsters had been "accidentally" caught supposedly in the cross-fire of what he said was a clash between soldiers and some National Liberation Army guerrillas near the town. But survivors of the ill-fated school trip insisted there'd been no guerrillas in the area, and that troops had pinned the students down for 45 minutes. (quote) "Those who fired at us were soldiers. ... There were no guerrillas. ... One soldier started crying and said he had killed innocent children'' said one young girl, speaking to reporters in Pueblo Rico. \Reuters/NYT August 16, 2000 \ <<AIR TRAVEL>> <<CONCORDE>> In other international news ... In what appears to be the end of commercial supersonic aviation, Britain has officially suspended the supersonic Concorde's Certificate of Airworthiness. \ALAN COWELL NYT August 16, 2000\ British aviation authorities today formally ruled that the Concorde supersonic airliner is unfit to fly, unless its manufacturers take steps to prevent the problems that led to last month's fatal Air France Concorde crash near Paris. \ALAN COWELL NYT August 16, 2000\ French authorities said today they were considering a similar step. It is considered unlikely that any alterations would be made to the planes because of their age and the high expenses already involved in continuing their operation. Air France had already grounded its five remaining Concordes immediately after the July 25th crash of a Concorde, which plunged to the ground 90 seconds after take-off, killing 113 people in the first fatal accident involving the supersonic plane. \ALAN COWELL NYT August 16, 2000\ British authorities said the accident's "primary cause" was a blown tire that expelled debris that ruptured a fuel tank. The withdrawal of the Concorde's airworthiness certificate by Britain's Civil Aviation Authority was the first such action against a commercial airliner in more than 20 years. British Airways, the only other Concorde operator, had already grounded its entire fleet of seven Concordes yesterday after learning that the airworthiness certificate would be revoked today. The grounding of the planes may mean that the entire fleet of Concordes will end up in museums. <<DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION>> Turning to national news ... Protests against the Democratic Party convention in Los Angeles continued today, with protesters confined inside a "police pen" near the convention site. Even some mainstream media observers have been disturbed as police in riot gear have viciously attacked demonstrators and even uninvolved bystanders with tear gas and special "crowd control" ammunition. Police have also beaten protesters and bystanders with batons, arresting approximately 300. Today, Marcia Hale, a top aide to the Gore campaign overseeing convention planning who watched the clash in Los Angeles from the roof of the convention complex, said Democratic party officials supported the police response. \TODD S. PURDUM NYT August 15, 2000\ (quote) "We knew what they were doing" Hale said, "and we supported them." \TODD S. PURDUM NYT August 15, 2000\ Like the Republican convention, the Democratic shindig is awash in money from powerful corporations, multimillionaires, and billionaires - making it an object lesson for revolutionary Marxists' assertions that these are the parties of America's capitalist ruling class. The Democratic convention is (quote) "a display of wealth, power and influence as gaudy as the Republican show in Philadelphia" reported the 'New York Times' Sunday. \JOHN M. BRODER/RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. NYT August 13, 2000\ (quote) "The Democrats have even topped the Republican Regents, the elite club of $250,000 donors, with a big-dollar cadre of their own, a group of 18 individuals and corporations called Leadership 2000 who have given or raised $350,000 or more" says the 'Times', noting that in the 18 months ending June 30th, the Democratic National Committee had collected over $118 million in so-called "soft-money" donations - unregulated gifts from various powerful interests. \JOHN M. BRODER/RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. NYT August 13, 2000\ As a result, says the 'Times', that's nearly erased "the traditional Republican advantage in such contributions." Over the same period, the 'Times' reports, the Republican National Committee reported $137 million in "soft-money" donations. \JOHN M. BRODER/RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. NYT August 13, 2000\ One of the major developments in the Democratic presidential campaign is the rift that's opened up between the Gore-Lieberman official ticket and many of the black stalwarts in the party, particularly focused on Lieberman's opposition to affirmative action. Lieberman has voiced support for California's Proposition 209, the racist 1998 initiative to ban state-financed affirmative action programs. Lieberman has repeatedly spoken out against affirmative action, although his spin-doctors are claiming he's only opposed to quotas. \Mark Sherman American-Statesman August 16, 2000\ Gore's selection of Lieberman appears to be a replay of the Clinton- Gore campaign's strategy in 1992 to embrace racist positions in an effort to win the white bigot vote. While Gore's selection of Lieberman has been hailed in the mainstream media as the first time an ethnic Jew has been placed on a major-party ticket, it actually represents a profoundly reactionary move to the right. Lieberman is by far one of the most rightwing spokesmen in the Democratic Party, who has built his reputation particularly on demagogic grandstanding for imposing government censorship on movies, TV, radio, music, and other cultural media. The revolutionary Marxist Spartacist League denounces both Democratic and Republican Parties, calling them the "Partner Parties of Racist U.S. Capitalism". \WV 00/07/28\ (quote) "The tying of labor and blacks to the Democratic Party has been the chief mechanism in this country for holding back the class struggle and politically subordinating working people and the opporessed to their class enemy", say the Spartacists. The Spartacists also warn against supporting so-called "Green Party" candidate Ralph Nader, pointing to participation by the Greens in Germany in a bourgeois coalition government, including Green leaders' policy of attacks on the working class and support for the bloody imperialist war against Yugoslavia last year. (quote) "In reality, the Green Party platform is a version of what the liberal wing of the Democratic Party has been selling for decades" says the current issue of the Spartacist paper, 'Workers Vanguard'. (quote) "Despite his 'anti-corporate' rhetoric," says the paper, "Nader himself insists that his program is compatible with the traditional interests of the American state." Instead of bourgeois and petit-bourgeois "third parties", say the Spartacists, what's needed is a mass revolutionary party of the working class. (quote) "We oppose political support for any bourgeois party or candidate in principle" affirms 'Workers Vanguard', "and stand for the complete and unconditional independence of the working class from all parties and agencies of the capitalist class." "The working class and the oppressed cannot take a single step toward liberation if locked in an embrace with political parties of the class enemy" the paper continues, adding: "Break with the Democrats! No support to the Greens! Build a revolutionary workers party to fight for socialist revolution!" <<CRIME>> <<PRISON SYSTEM>> Turning to the growing oppression of the capitalist state ... Despite a reduction in the crime rate, the number of inmates in America's prisons has continued to grow ferociously, according to a report last week. \FOX BUTTERFIELD NYT August 10, 2000\ Despite as eight-year drop in crime, the population of the nation's state and federal prisons grew last year at 3.4 percent, according to a report from the US Justice Department. The main reasons the prison population has increased, even as crime has dropped, the report said, are that the number of inmates who returned to prison for parole violations increased, the length of the average prison sentence increased, and drug crimes, which are not included in the overall crime rate computed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, did not drop. The number of inmates who were returned to prison after being released on parole during the 1990's grew by 54 percent, as parole agents became tougher about revoking parole for technical violations like failing a drug test. In contrast, the number of criminals sent to prison for new convictions rose just 7 percent. The average length of time served was 28 months in 1998. That's up from 20 months in 1990, the report said, the result of tougher sentencing laws. The report also noted that the total number of Americans in all jails and prisons surpassed two million for the first time, reaching 2,026,596 at the end of 1999, the report said. The report also found that Texas, which has been on a record-setting prison expansion under Governor George W. Bush, the Republican presidential candidate, passed California as the state with the most prison inmates, though Texas has a much smaller population. Texas has a population of 20 million people compared with 32 million in California. But at the end of 1999, Texas had over 100 more inmates than did California. In addition, the report said 9.4 percent of black men ages 25 to 29 were in state and federal prisons in 1999, almost 10 times the rate for white men in their late 20's, which was 1 percent. Among Hispanic males in their late 20's, 3.1 percent were in prison. <Pause> And that concludes the Straight Facts edition of the news, produced by Straight Facts Radio. The next Straight Facts edition of "KOOP Evening News" is scheduled for broadcast on September 6th. Stay tuned for the remaining half of tonight's news program, in just a moment, produced by Texas Association for Public Transportation. <MUSIC break> <PSA 47> <TAPT production of news> <FADE IN CD: CLOSING SIG MUSIC> <LIVE CLOSE> And that brings us to the end of tonight's edition of the "KOOP Evening News" program. Be sure to tune in again tomorrow evening at 5:30 for another edition of the "KOOP Evening News". The next edition of the "KOOP Evening News" produced by Straight Facts Radio will be broadcast on September 6th. And stay tuned for "Left-In-Sight", coming next, right here on KOOP Austin, 91.7 MHz. <FADE OUT: Closing sig MUSIC> _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.wwpublish.com/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
