Peter Joseph is the founder of the Zeitgeist Movement, a grassroots, worldwide organization that advocates an alternative economic system based on sustainability, cooperation and human need. His most recent book, ‘The New Human Rights Movement,’ delivers a startling exposé about the violent oppression that defines our economic order, while issuing an urgent call for global activism to unite to replace it. Abby Martin sits down with Joseph to talk about the contradictions and crises of capitalism...
Dec 19, 2017•46 min•Transcript available on Metacast On July 30th, Venezuelans elected a people's body called the "Constituent Assembly." The Empire Files was on-the-ground in the weeks prior. U.S. politicians, press and opposition in Venezuela called the process a "coup" and further proof they need foreign regime-change intervention. Abby Martin addresses the criticisms with Head of the Presidential Commission to oversee the Constituent Assembly process, Elias Jaua, speaks to supporters and participants of the Assembly, interviews historian Chris...
Dec 19, 2017•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast Abby Martin talks to Venezuelans on the streets of Caracas and investigates the main claim that there's no free press, and that there is no food in the supermarkets. Using hidden cameras, she takes you through local grocery stores and the underground black market currency exchange, the main source of inflation in the country. Abby sits down with economist Pasqualina Curzio to learn more about the nature of the black market and chronic shortages of goods. Knowing that world leaders are calling fo...
Dec 19, 2017•21 min•Transcript available on Metacast Abby Martin goes on the deadly front lines of the anti government protests in Venezuela and follows the evolution of a typical guarimba—or opposition barricade. She explains what the targets from the opposition reveal about the nature of the movement and breaks down the reality of the death toll that has rocked the nation since the unrest began, and how a lynch mob campaign came after her and the Empire Files team for reporting these facts. Hearing from peaceful opposition marchers, to Chavistas...
Dec 19, 2017•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this sequel to The Empire Files’ report on trafficked Filipina domestic workers, Damayan’s Linda Oalican provides a deeper context to the epidemic of human trafficking by guiding us through the history of colonialism, resistance and US domination of the islands. From the centuries of Spanish rule and decades of US brutality, through the evisceration of the Philippine economy, this episode is a must-watch primer on why human beings are now the nation’s top export. LISTEN TO PART I: http://bit....
Dec 19, 2017•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast Human trafficking is a hidden industry that brings in $150 billion in illegal profits every year. In the United States, tens of thousands are trafficked annually—the biggest clients being major hotel chains and foreign diplomats. The Philippines is one of the largest labor exporters in the world. 6,000 Filipinos—mostly women—leave the country every single day to work, because of mass unemployment and poverty. Tricked by placement agencies, thousands end up living as virtual slaves. Damayan, a Ne...
Dec 19, 2017•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast Out of the periphery of most online users, there’s a vast, hidden space used by people who want to remain anonymous, which filmmaker Alex Winter explores in his documentary Deep Web. The film focuses on the Silk Road, a black market hosted on the Darknet using bitcoin cryptocurrency, and the trial of Ross Ulbricht, who was given a double life sentence without the possibility of parole for creating and hosting the site. Abby Martin and Alex Winter discuss more about the Deep Web, the Drug War, an...
Dec 19, 2017•27 min•Transcript available on Metacast With all the discussion of the contentious 2016 election, the most shocking fact is often ignored: that millions of people had their votes stolen through malicious, means. The Republican Party is currently working to purge millions more voters leading up to the 2018 election. To explain this major attack on our supposed democratic process, Abby Martin interviews investigative reporter Greg Palast, who has done the most extensive work uncovering this massive disenfranchisement campaign. FOLLOW //...
Dec 19, 2017•27 min•Transcript available on Metacast Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is an internationally-recognized human rights crime—but those being impacted are harshly punished for not only acts of resistance, but even mere advocacy for their rights. Getting detailed facts about Israel’s imposition of Military Law in the West Bank, Abby Martin visits the the Ramallah offices of Addameer—the most prominent prisoners’ rights organizations in Palestine—for a shocking investigation into the use of Israeli jails and arbitrary laws as a weapo...
Dec 19, 2017•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast While the Israeli state espouses multiculturalism and diversity, it oppresses not just the Palestinian population, but also any Black person within its borders. From warehousing African asylum seekers in giant prison camps, to criminalizing and carrying out eugenics programs against its Ethiopian Jewish citizens, Israel’s treatment of Black people reveals that the Zionist project is not just about Jewish supremacy, but also white supremacy. In this on-the-ground investigation, Abby Martin talks ...
Dec 19, 2017•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast People of the Sikh faith, commonly mistaken for both Muslims and Hindus, are frequent targets of bigoted hate crimes—in fact, the first victim of post-9/11 hate crimes was a Sikh man. In 2016, attacks against Muslims—and people perceived to be Muslims, in particular Sikhs—has reached an all-time high. With 70% of Americans not able to properly identify the Sikh community, Abby Martin visits a place of worship to learn about their experience in the United States and who they are as a people. Prom...
Dec 19, 2017•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast Steve Bannon has been propelled over the last year from fringe media outlier to top propagandist of the U.S. Empire as Trump's Chief Strategist. From his Wall Street roots and apocalyptic film career to his cultivation of alt-right bigots at Breitbart News, Abby Martin exposes Bannon's true character in this explosive documentary. Dissection of Bannon's ideology of "economic nationalism" and desire to "Make America Great Again" reveals the danger of his hand in Trump's agenda. FOLLOW // http://t...
Dec 19, 2017•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast In a rare, candid conversation, Abby Martin interviews a former Israeli Army combat soldier who served as an occupier in Palestine’s Hebron City. Eran Efrati spent years as a sergeant and combat soldier in the Israeli military, but has since become an outspoken critic of the occupation of Palestine and Israeli apartheid. Efrati gives explosive testimony on the reality of his service and explains how war crimes are institutionalized, as well as how systematic the oppression against Palestinians r...
Dec 19, 2017•27 min•Transcript available on Metacast For the first time in modern history, a fringe wing of Christian extremists have obtained the highest seats of power in the US government—from Mike Pence to Betsy DeVos. This new development is coupled with the emergence of the Alt Right, the Trump movement, and the rise of fascist movements abroad. Renowned journalist and author Chris Hedges has embedded himself in what he calls “Christianized Fascism” and warns that this is the biggest danger we face under Trump. FOLLOW // http://twitter.com/e...
Dec 19, 2017•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast Abby Martin goes on-the-ground to the epicenters of state-backed settler terrorism in Palestine’s West Bank, in Part II of her report on illegal Israeli settlements and home demolitions. This installment visits both the rural countryside of Duma—interviewing the surviving members of the Dawabsheh family, victims of a horrific arson attack that left three dead—and the urban center of Hebron, a glaring example of Israeli apartheid under intense military occupation. [[LISTEN TO PART I HERE: http://...
Dec 17, 2017•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast The demolition of Palestinian homes for Israeli settlements reached a ten-year high in 2016. While this activity led by the fanatical settler movement is illegal under international law, it is completely aided and abetted by the Israeli government. With hundreds on notice to be evicted and their homes destroyed, Abby Martin goes on-the-ground throughout the West Bank investigating this dire human rights situation. She speaks to residents living under regular settler attacks from encroaching sett...
Dec 17, 2017•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The complete version of Abby Martin's three-part series covering Chevron's disaster in Ecuador, on teleSUR's The Empire Files. Abby launches a deep investigation into Chevron Texaco's intentional spilling of 19 billion gallons of oil and waste in Ecuador's pristine Amazon rainforest--and the 25-year-long legal battle that followed. Featuring interviews with victims, expert and Ecuadorean heads of state, this documentary reveals the full breadth of Chevron's crime, and its outrageous acts against...
Dec 17, 2017•1 hr 4 min•Transcript available on Metacast Join Abby Martin as she investigates why there are thousands of bodies on the US Mexico border--and uncovers a hidden war--in this full-length documentary, originally aired as a two-part series. Discover what is not only a shockingly high body count, but a humanitarian crisis manufactured by the U.S. government. Sinister tactics by a bloated Border Patrol, a for-profit prison pipeline, and a court system that looks more like a slave auction, all surround the senseless death of thousands. From NA...
Dec 17, 2017•47 min•Transcript available on Metacast The increased aggression towards Russia from US politicians and media is made more clear when taking into account the real history of the post-Soviet period. The hidden story of Boris Yeltsin’s presidency explains how deeply the US government, along with Western capitalist institutions, cheered, shaped and exploited the country after the fall of the Soviet Union, paving the way for the political system they all condemn today. To uncover just how much the US Empire has interfered in Russia’s poli...
Dec 01, 2017•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast Leading scholar on US-Russia relations addresses the claim being trumpeted by politicians and media on both sides of the political spectrum that Russia is now the "number one" threat to the United States. Given the proxy wars in Syria and Ukraine, Dr. Cohen tells host Abby Martin that the real alarming danger today is "a new, multi-front Cuban missile crisis." Dr. Stephen Cohen is Professor Emeritus at Princeton University and New York University where he taught Russian Studies. He has been a no...
Dec 01, 2017•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast In her first on-the-ground report from Palestine, Abby Martin gives a first-hand look into two of the most attacked refugee camps in the West Bank: Balata and Aida camps. With over seven million displaced Palestinians around the world, hundreds of thousands are refugees inside their own country—many live packed into these refugee camps after being ethnically cleansed from their villages just miles away. They are blocked from returning home, in violation of international law. Watch the essential ...
Nov 30, 2017•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast A historic gathering is taking place against the Dakota Access pipeline at Standing Rock. Thousands of people, and around 300 Native nations, have gathered to stop Big Oil’s pipeline, which threatens sacred Native grounds and the environment. To give an eyewitness account of this growing movement, as well as essential historical context, Abby Martin interviews legendary Native leader Dennis Banks. Banks is a founder of of the American Indian Movement (AIM), a leader in the 1973 Wounded Knee stan...
Nov 30, 2017•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast Previewing Abby Martin’s on-the-ground investigation in Palestine, The Empire Files looks at the long history of Zionist colonization, expansion and expulsion of Palestine’s indigenous inhabitants. Giving critical historical context the occupation today, this timeline explores the creation of the state of Israel and how it came to cover so much land since. From the early settlements, to the Nakba, to it’s conquest of the West Bank, Abby Martin reveals the brutally honest root of what is behind t...
Nov 30, 2017•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast Abby Martin interviews Ecuador's United Nations representative and Chair of negotiations creating a new international instrument to hold transnational corporations accountable for human rights and environmental crimes. Transnational corporations--many with larger economies than the countries they operate in--have enjoyed immunity from charges for destroying the environment and taking human lives. But Ecuador is leading a fight in the UN to create an international treaty and standards that can ch...
Nov 29, 2017•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Puerto Rico’s massive debt has been discussed at length in Congress and the media, all omitting the most important fact: the history of being a colonial subject for over 500 years, still owned and controlled by the United States. Abby Martin talks to two professors of Latin American studies, Luis Barrios and Danny Shaw, about the long struggle of Puerto Rico to break the shackles of US and Spanish colonialism—from indigenous resistance to the Young Lords in Harlem. Learn how the US Empire obscur...
Nov 29, 2017•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast Obama’s high-profile trip to Hiroshima was accompanied by a media storm that gave endless justifications for the US use of the atomic bomb on Japanese civilians. The myths are widely accepted in society, and underpin the notion of American exceptionalism. Abby Martin interviews Dr. Peter Kuznick, co-author with Director Oliver Stone of the bestselling book and HBO series "The Untold History of the United States,” about the real story behind the use of the atomic bombs—as well as the untold histo...
Nov 29, 2017•27 min•Transcript available on Metacast Few corporations in the world are as loathed—and as sinister—as Monsanto. But the threat it poses to people and planet could be reaching new heights, as the World Health Organization has recently upgraded Monsanto's main product as carcinogenic to humans. With protests against the agrochemical giant held in over 40 countries in May, learn why the global movement against Monsanto is of critical importance to our future. In this episode of The Empire Files, Abby Martin issues a scathing expose on ...
Nov 29, 2017•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast With thousands of advertisements seen by Americans everyday, and a corporate media that reinforces the needs of Empire, propaganda in the U.S. is more pervasive and effective than ever before. The manipulation of public opinion through suggestion can be traced back to the father of modern propaganda, Edward Bernays, who discovered that preying on the subconscious mind was the best way to sell products people don't need, and wars people don't want. To get a deeper understanding of how propaganda ...
Nov 29, 2017•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast As the flailing Hillary Clinton camp steps-up its attacks on Bernie Sanders, her poll numbers continue to drop—and for the first time, have her losing to Donald Trump in a general election. On the cusp of the Democratic Party Convention, millions of Sanders' supporters are wondering what to do other than vote for a 'lesser of two evils.' To gain some insight, Abby Martin interviews Kshama Sawant, an open socialist who just won re-election to Seattle's city council—who also ran an insurgent campa...
Nov 29, 2017•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast On Memorial Day and Veterans Day, politicians will speak at ceremonies all over the country and repeat their favorite mantra: "Support the troops." This pledge is hammered into the American psyche at every turn. But there is a hidden, dark history that shows that the politicians are in fact no friend to service members--but their greatest enemy. An easy way to prove this truth is to look at how they so quickly betray and abandon their soldiers after purposely ruining their lives, and even after ...
Nov 29, 2017•31 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
