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Democracy Now! celebrated 20th anniversary, The Riverside Church in NYC last night

Author:  Published Date: December 6, 2016

Democracy Now! began in 1996 on nine radio stations and is now broadcasting on over 1,400 stations—both public television and radio, a testament to the hunger for authentic voices. In these times of war and elections, movements and uprisings, we need Democracy Now! more than ever.

Amy Goodman & Juan González were joined in New York City by Harry Belafonte, Noam Chomsky, Danny DeVito, Danny Glover and special musical guests Patti Smith and Tom Morello to celebrate two decades of Democracy Now!

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Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzales, two of the hosts from Democracy Now since the beginning introduce the evening of their 20th anniversary event at the historic Riverside Church last night. Juan Gonzales spoke of how the show was only supposed to be temporary, located of 34th St near 8th Ave, born out of Pacifia and WBAI radio, only up in order to cover the 1996 Presidential election. “It’s been quite a ride”, said Gonzales.

 

Showing footage throughout the 20 year history of Democracy Now on a screen on the stage, beginning with the battle of Seattle in 1999 with protestors preventing delegates from entering Global Trade talks and shutting down the city’s downtown area. Police shot teargas and rubber bullets into the crowd. 600 were arrested and the talks collapsed along with the chief of police of Seattle.

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Long time activist and singer to songs such as Island in The Sun, Banana Boat Song and Try to Remember, nearling the age of 90, Harry Belafonte took to the podium at the Riverside Church. He said,, “If there’s a platform on which I might stand and speak my opening remarks might be something like, “Welcome to the 4th Reich'”. He went on,, “Myself and others would be forever committed to seeing that America would remain a free and open, Democratic society”. “WE’RE IN NEED OF DEMOCRACY NOW” and also told Obama to use the power of the Executive office to free his friend and our leader Leonard Peltier. http://www.freepeltiernow.org/ An innocent man, Native American activist Leonard Peltier was arrested in 1976 in connection with the deaths of two agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and wrongfully convicted in 1977. With no evidence whatsoever, the FBI decided to “lock Peltier into the case”. Government officials presented false statements to a Canadian court to extradite Peltier to the U.S. Meanwhile, in a separate trial, Mr. Peltier’s co-defendants were acquitted by reason of self defense. Unhappy with the outcome of that trial, prosecutors went judge shopping and venue hopping to secure a conviction. FBI documents prove that they went so far as to manufacture the so-called murder weapon. According to court records, the United States Attorney who prosecuted the case has admitted on several occasions that no one knows who fired the fatal shots. Although the courts have acknowledged evidence of government misconduct—including the coercion of witnesses, the intentional use of false testimonies, and the concealment of ballistics evidence reflecting his innocence—Peltier has been denied a new trial. Imprisoned for nearly 40 years—currently at the federal prison in Coleman, Florida—Peltier has been designated a political prisoner by Amnesty International. Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, 55 Members of Congress and others—including a judge who sat as a member of the court in two of Peltier’s appeals—have all called for his immediate release. Widely recognized for his humanitarian works and a six-time Nobel Prize nominee, Peltier also is an accomplished author and painter. The Peltier case has been examined by renowned author Peter Matthiessen (“In the Spirit of Crazy Horse”) and by a documentary film produced and narrated by Robert Redford (“Incident at Oglala”). Author Jim Messerschmidt (“The Trial of Leonard Peltier”) is convinced Peltier was convicted because the prosecution enjoyed free rein to manipulate highly inconsistent and contradictory circumstantial evidence. Supporters worldwide believe freedom is long overdue for Peltier. The power to commute Peltier’s sentence of two life terms rests with President Obama who has said “freedom and justice for all must begin with freedom and justice in the lives of individual human beings”. Why not Leonard Peltier?
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Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine took to the “alter” singing “Flesh Shapes the Day,, If you take a step towards freedom freedom will take 2 steps towards you” At the end up his performance he asked members of the audience to come up on stage,,,
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Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine,,, with audience members on the ‘stage’ at Riverside Church last night. “Are we in this together people?” Tom asked and the audience members jumped in solidarity. Singing This Land Is Your Land,, by Woody Guthrie
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Medea Benjamin of Code Pink to the left of Tom Morello at the Riverside Church last night for the 20th Anniversary event for Democracy Now!
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Shot from balcony of Riverside Church
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Imagine Justice from the Light Brigade
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Introducing Noam Chomsky,, Nermeen Shaikh, Producer & Co-Host of Democracy Now. Nermeen spoke of her “singular achievements” of how she had the pleasure of teaching Noam how to use Skype, which was the one thing in life he had not yet mastered” and the greatest dissemination I’ve made to public knowledge”.
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Noam Chomsky, Professor Emeritus at MIT for 60 years, world-renowned political dissident, linguist and author, who spoke about Donald Trump’s election. Well, I’d just like to begin by saying a word about what a privilege and honor it is to be able to participate in the celebration of the remarkable success of Democracy Now! for these many years and, in particular, the quite astonishing achievements of Amy Goodman, Juan González, their colleagues, in showing us how we might aspire to achieve democracy now. It will be a long struggle. And again, it’s an enormous pleasure to be able to share this occasion with people like Harry Belafonte, who has been such an inspiration and being in the forefront of this endless struggle for many hard years. Noam Chomsky spoke about the climate saying,, “Well, the effects are quite real. COP 21, the Paris negotiations, could not reach a verifiable treaty because of the refusal of the Republican Congress to accept binding commitments. The follow-up conference, COP 22, ended without any issue. We will soon see, in the not very distant future, even more dangerous, horrifying consequences of this failure right here to come to term to address in a serious way this impending crisis”.
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A discussion with Amy Goodman, Harry Belafonte, Juan Gonzales and Noam Chomsky, the first time Belafonte and Chomsky sharing a platform, Amy spoke about Harry being banned from the Copacabana before going off to war as an African American then headlining it upon his return. marching in Selma with MLK Jr and Noam marching against the Vietnam war as he was rising in his academics willing to give up his career. See more at https://www.democracynow.org/live/democracy_now_s_20th_anniversary_celebration
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Legendary singer and activist Patti Smith performed “Power to the People”
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Actor and long time activist, Danny Glover spoke about Martin Luther King Jr speaking at the Riverside Church April 4th 1967. “I would be remiss if I would stand on this stage without mentioning one of the great moments on this stage nearly 50 years ago, when a young minister, a liberation theologist, a—one of the most extraordinary human beings of this century, any century, stepped here and, with all his consciousness, with all the pain it took, denounced the war in Vietnam—Dr. Martin Luther King, on this stage—knowing that he spoke for his heart and his consciousness, knowing that he was doing something that he was going to be vilified. Yet he spoke up.”
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Actor and Producer Danny DeVito pays Amy a brief visit on stage with the rest of the Democracy Now crew telling all in the audience and watching on the Live Stream that he wears his DN hat every day. He said, “Democracy Now is where we’re going to get the Real truth.”
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Former Democracy Now journalist Jeremy Scahill, now runs the journalism site, The Intercept,, told of his experiences with Amy Goodman and how he pursued her for a position there while living at the Catholic Worker. Jeremy Scahill is a founding editor of the online news publication The Intercept and author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army, which won the George Polk Book Award.

 

Author: Cat April Watters

On a Truth Diet! Purging myself of all the LIES from Society.