George Orwell on the final Madam Miaow Resonance 104.4FM tonight at 5.30pm

MADAM MIAOW'S CULTURE LOUNGE 8/8
News, music and poetry
RESONANCE 104.4FM
Presented by Anna Chen
5.30-6.30pm Tuesday 3rd December 2013
LISTEN LIVE: http://resonancefm.com/listen
OR CATCH UP ONLINE: https://soundcloud.com/resonance-fm/sets/madam-miaow-says
(To listen to Madam Miaow's Culture Lounge series on Resonance FM for WINDOWS, download VLC media player)

GEORGE ORWELL: A LITERARY REVOLUTIONARY?
Guests: Professor John Newsinger and Paul Anderson. With Charles Shaar Murray.

The final programme in this year's series of Madam Miaow's Culture Lounge asks if George Orwell was as much of a right-wing anti-socialist as is claimed. Think you know the answer? You may be surprised.

Far from being turned off the necessity for revolution, John Newsinger makes the case in his book, Orwell's Politics, that Orwell remained truer to his progressive politics than the Stalinists who viciously denounced him.

In the year that the vast scale of covert government surveillance has been revealed, sales of Orwell's 1984 have shot up 7000 per cent. His X-ray vision is proving even more relevant in these turbulent times than we imagined, so it's vital to understand what it was he was saying.

Also in the studio, helping untangle the myth from the man, is author Paul Anderson, former editor of Tribune and deputy editor of the New Statesman — both publications for whom Orwell wrote — and who edited the book Orwell in Tribune.

With great themed music and lively discussion.

We're back next year. Thanks for listening. Have a wonderful festive season.

George Orwell: a literary revolutionary? — 5.30pm Tuesday 3rd December
Listen live
or afterwards
listen online

Previously …
https://soundcloud.com/resonance-fm/sets/madam-miaow-says



How the CIA funded the Halas Batchelor animated cartoon film of Animal Farm.

John Sinclair and modern heroes on Madam Miaow's Culture Lounge Resonance FM, 5.30pm today

John Lennon sings "John Sinclair"

MADAM MIAOW'S CULTURE LOUNGE 7/8
News, music and poetry
RESONANCE 104.4FM
Presented by Anna Chen
5.30-6.30pm Tuesday 26th November 2013
http://resonancefm.com/listen
https://soundcloud.com/resonance-fm/sets/madam-miaow-says
(To listen to Madam Miaow's Culture Lounge series on Resonance FM for WINDOWS, download VLC media player)

BREAKING A BUTTERFLY ON A WHEEL: MODERN HEROES
Guests: John Sinclair and Oliver Shykles. With Charles Shaar Murray.

What happens when the state gets nasty? A new breed of modern hero is emerging, casting light on what our "democratic" governments get up to: Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, David Miranda.

John Sinclair, now a grand old man of the counterculture, was an early victim of the US government and who subsequently became a cause célèbre. He was a militantly politicised hippy, the manager of the MC5 and a founder of the White Panther Party.

In 1969, he felt the full spite of the state when he was sentenced to 10 years for supplying 2 joints to an undercover narc. Only widespread protest — including John Lennon writing and recording a song, "John Sinclair" — got him an early release.

John Sinclair is in the studio today alongside Oliver Shykles from Queer Friends of Chelsea Manning, who'll be talking about Manning, Edward Snowden and why we should be wary of governments siezing extra powers.

With tips from Oliver Shykles on how to stay private.

Breaking a butterfly on a wheel — 5.30pm TUESDAY 26TH NOVEMBER
Listen live
or afterwards
listen online

Previously …
https://soundcloud.com/resonance-fm/sets/madam-miaow-says

Vultures backing Mitt Romney and other revelations from Greg Palast's excellent book launch

L to R: John Hilary, Greg, Anna, Nick Dearden, Laurie Penny (pic by John Paul O'Neill)

L to R: Oliver Shykles, Greg Palast, Anna Chen, Warren Ellis after the book launch at ULU (pic taken by Liz Milout)

VULTURES' PICNIC
A TALE OF OIL, HIGH FINANCE AND INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING
From New York Times bestselling author GREG PALAST

LONDON UK BOOK LAUNCH - PALAST'S INCENDIARY REVELATIONS
Tuesday 26 June 2012

Greg Palast told a rapt audience of 300 at last night's UK launch of Vultures' Picnic:
- How the Vultures are currently trying to raise over $500 million to buy the White House for the Republican hopeful Mitt Romney. Palast points out 'with these Vultures Obama has a fight on his hands to prevent them picking the bones dry of the democratic process'.
- Palast dug into the billionaires, the debt-exploiters, who are the chief funders of the Mitt Romney's Presidential campaign: people like Paul “The Vulture” Singer and his Vulture colleague known as “Goldfinger.”
- A panel chaired by writer and poet Anna Chen included writer Warren Ellis, journalist Laurie Penny, John Hilary from War On Want and Nick Dearden from the Jubilee Debt Campaign alongside Palast. Chen asked, 'In this unseen brinkmanship battle between the hedge funds and the banks, are we supposed to support the banks against the Vultures...and who is going to win'? Palast replied that this battle of the titans was like "war between the Bloods and the Crips" and sees a protracted war to the death.
- Palast continued, 'These Vultures just don't care about the system that made them billionaires. The Vultures are prepared to go right to the brink of economic collapse and wreck governments, like Greece, or the system itself. The stakes are very high, as it's ultimately between financiers to run the World and where elected politicians are marginalized; where the desire of vultures is to make politicians extinct'.
- Anna Chen observed that "Capitalism isn't dead, it just smells funny. Capitalism is mutating: it's going places, it's just not taking us with it."
- The panel were positive. Journalist Laurie Penny said 'I am, even though there has been a sustained attack on investigative journalism, very hopeful that bloggers and citizen journalists of all ages will challenge and watch every move of these so-called Vultures'.

Warren Ellis's "Money isn't real" comments here.

Azerbaijan whistle-blower Leslie Abrahams and Greg Palast

MORE PIX PLUS VIDEOS COMING SOON