Pelosi's Taiwan Visit Marks an Escalation of War Drive Against China

Movement Protects Abortion In Kansas, Iraq Political Gridlock Explodes Into Protests, Free Dr. Mututlu Shakur and All Political Prisoners

In this episode of By Any Means Necessary, hosts Sean Blackmon and Jacquie Luqman are joined by Hannah Dickinson, professor and organizer with Geneva Women’s Assembly in Geneva, NY and Managing Editor of Breaking The Chains Magazine to discuss the victory for abortion rights in Kansas as voters rejected a referendum to overturn the state constitutional right to abortion, the dirty tricks employed by anti-abortion organizations and how the movement organized against this referendum, what the success of reproductive justice organizers proves about so-called “red” states and the popular opinion about abortion in the US, and what this effort reveals about the refusal of the Democrats at multiple levels to protect abortion rights and the power of popular movements to do what the Democrats will not.

In the second segment, Sean and Jacquie are joined by Hassan Ahmadian, assistant professor in the West Asia and North Africa Studies Department at the University of Tehran to discuss the storming of the Iraqi parliament by supporters of Iraqi scholar Muqtada al-Sadr and the roots of the current political stalemate in the country, the class and religious dynamics of support for Sadr in comparison to the support of other Shiite factions in the Iraqi government, why the new election demanded by Sadr and his supporters is unlikely to resolve fundamental problems that stem from Iraq’s 2005 constitution, and how the sectarian system put in place by the US occupation of Iraq contributed to the current political crisis.

In the third segment, Sean and Jacquie are joined by Jomo Muhammad, an organizer with the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement to discuss the campaign to free Dr. Mutulu Shakur as he requests compassionate release due to serious health issues he is experiencing, who Dr. Shakur is and his role in organizing for Black liberation and commitment to healing, how the mass incarceration system has kept Dr. Shakur in ill health and continued to imprison him as a punishment for his political activities, and what the movement can do to demand the freedom of Dr. Shakur.

Later in the show, Sean and Jacquie are joined by Ken Hammond, professor of East Asian and Global History at New Mexico State University and an activist with the organization Pivot to Peace to discuss Nancy Pelosi’s provocative and reckless visit to Taiwan in violation of the One China policy and decades of diplomatic agreements on the status of Taiwan, the history of China’s claims to Taiwan and its occupation by the nationalist forces who lost the Chinese civil war, the apparent approval and support for this visit by the Biden administration and why the US continues its new cold war drive against China, and the problems plaguing the US that Nancy Pelosi is ignoring as she chooses to prioritize imperial warmongering.

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