"Gaza Starts Grim-Looking Year" Special.
705P ET: John Gapper, Financial Times, with Simon Constable, DowJones, co-host, re how the credit catastrophe of 2008 points to mrket failures, gloom, and a kind of numb fear similar to the families robbed by the Pied Piper, re the coming cars crash, newspaper/magazine crash, retail crash. In '09, Not Much to Cheer About Either
720P: Kerry Grace, Wall Street Journal, with Simon Constable, DowJones, re the delayed fuses of rotten mortgages, theft, brown lawns, ghost towns, wrecked families, accelerated despair, in the U.S. housing market that looks to become black humor in the new year. "My house is worth half what I bought it for!" "You still have a house?" Home Prices Slide; Confidence Hits Low
735P: Professional Roundtable Harry Siegel, Politico.com , with Diana West, author, Jim McTague, Barron's, re the political prospects for Congressional catastrophe in the new year with a majority party in the White House; re the Blago appointment of the combative and clever Roland Burris ("...neither a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit."), re the Paterson/Kennedy/Bloomberg/Cumo quartet in NY; re the 111th Congress.
750P: Continued re the Franken/Coleman imbroglio, re the best and worst political events of the year.
805P: Ethan Perlson, Benjamin Sarlin, DailyBeast.com, re the Gaza War hits Facebook, re Gaza and the Hamas war on the web, at Facebook, Twitter and the new tools of the information age, re the viral bashing of Israel, re the viral boosting of Hamas propaganda and the usual storybook fiction of Palestinian victimology.
820P: Bob Zimmerman, author, re the 2008<http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=315533893763712>">second least active sun since records were kept and what a lack of sunspots means; re Space X; re NASA vs the Obama Team; re the space race in 2009, re best and worst space moves of the year.
835: Financial Professionals, with John Tamny, RealClearMarkets.com, Simon Constable, Dow Jones, Aaron Task, Yahoo Finance, the Why 2009 Will Be Worse Than 2008, Worldwide, a Bad Year Only Got Worse Paulson says crisis sown by imbalance
850P: Continued, Unemployment Insurance: A Safety Net in Need of Repair - Another Boneheaded Move Ahead from The Fed Obama, Deflation & Recovery Mutual funds suffer $320bn outflow
905P: Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents Major Jewish Organizations, from Jerusalem, re the Gaza crisis and the Hamas War on Israel; re the limitations of the IDF operations, re the Egyptian cooperation with Israel, re what does Cairo want?
920P: Charles Fourelle, Wall Street Journal, re Iceland collapses, re the Iceland market was down 95 percent in 2008, re the search for cash and credit, re the rebuilding of the republic and public anger, re "Did Iceland Die For Our Sins?" Iceland's Fall: The Isle That Rattled the World Iceland is an extreme casualty of an era in which it was easy to borrow money. The tiny isle became so leveraged that its collapse has rattled the world
935P: Pete Earley, author, "Comrade J: The Untold Secrets of Russia's MAster Spy in America After the End of the Cold War, re "Tretyakov, who had been assigned to the Russian mission at the United Nations since 1995 and to Ottawa before that, gave the FBI 5,000 secret SVR cables and more than 100 Russian intelligence reports, according to one U.S. intelligence official cited by Earley. Tretyakov apparently first tried to defect around 1997 but agreed to remain as an "agent in place," passing secrets to the FBI until October 2000, when he vanished from a Russian residential compound in the Bronx with his wife, daughter and cat...." David Wise, Wapo. Comrade J: The Untold Secrets of Russia's Master Spy in America After the End of the Cold War.
955P: Exeunt re Gaza update, re the Hamas rocket arsenal and the threat on Dimona and Tel Aviv. If not for bad news, no news at all.
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KFI-AM 640 Los Angeles, 7-10P Pacific Time.
705P PT: Jeff McCracken, Wall Street Journal, re the day the music and the orchestra died when Lehman Brothers failed, the weekend of September 13-14; re The Weekend That Wall Street Died The financial crisis that led to Lehman's collapse and sent Merrill scrambling marked a shift on Wall Street. Instead of CEOs banding together, it was every man for himself.
720P: Tom Polansek, Wall Street Journal, Black Sea Region Wheat Exports Surge, reThe Black Sea region has muscled its way into the exclusive club of the world's top wheat exporters and is expected to continue stealing business from the U.S.
735P: Professional Roundtable with Larry Johnson, No Quarter and State (ret), Ann Marlowe, Forbes.com, Kerry Patton, Human Terrain Program, re the Gaza crisis and the IDF armor offensve to secure the rocket sites and decapitate Hamas; re the Obama administration inherits Gaza and Afghanistan (after the handover of the Green Zone), re the Centcom surge in Afghanistan. Pakistan Closes NATO Supply Route Pakistan closed a main road used to ferry supplies to U.S. and allied troops in Afghanistan after launching a fresh offensive against militants in the area. NATO says it is considering alternative routes.
750P: Continued re Afghanistan and Taliban, and the failed state and rogue state of Pakistan: Taliban Kill 20 Afghan Police
805P: Professional roundtable with Jodi Schneider, CQ, Melik Kaylan, Forbes.com, Craig Unger, re the best and worst political events of the late and melodramatically perfect year, re the 111th Congress promising the sitcoms of Roland Burris, Caroline Kennedy, Al Franken/Norm Coleman, and that's before the opening gavel.
820P: Continued re the stimulus package meets Mitch McConnell, re the Obama team meets the Senate rules.
835P: Stephen Cohen, NYU, re Russia in winter, re Putin and Medvedev and the challenge of the oil plunge, re the nat gas cut-off to Ukraine, re the Russian ambitions in the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.
850P: Continued Moscow and Kiev seek allies in gas dispute EU adopts low profile during showdown.
905P: Robert Lee Hotz, Warming Earth Blows Hot, Cold and Chaotic Three independent research groups have concluded that 2008 was a comparatively cool year on Earth -- a feverish chill on our warming world; re climate change and the unpredictability of North Temperate Zone agriculture.
920P: Mary Kissel, Asia Wall Street Journal, from Hong Kong, re the decline and fall of the Asia Tigers: Singapore down 2%, South Korea exports down 17%, China contraction unplotted but turmoil certain with the internet and the fragmenting of regions.
935P: Tom Donlon, Barron's author, "A World of Wealth: How Capitalism Turns Profits into Progress, re the J.M. Keynes warning that every madman dictator (or publicity swollen politician) bases theory on a dead economist and his or her obsolete theories, re the inevitability of monetarists (central bankers) printing money to fight slow down and thus guareteing inflation to be followed by another recession; re the housing bubble and the current global depression, or credit freeze, or unnamed dread; re what the recovery will look like and what governments are doing to stop it.
935P: Exeunt Lou Ann Hammond, carlist.com re "Is this the end of the car dealership?"





I enjoy the movie theme/background music that is used to introduce each of John Batchelor's on-air segments. My favorites are from Bourne Identity and Last Of The Mohicans. I would recommend the theme music from the Showtime series The Tudors and HBO's series Rome. Ironically, David Bamber who played Cicero an Rome, portrays Hitler in Valkerie. How's that for dramatic and political range?
I would like more info on John Batchelor's discussion of Sergei Tchernakov, former Russian spy, who defected to the US in recent years. I only heard the last 8 minutes of John's discussion of the topic,i.e., post Soviet Russia, in which I am interested. Did John refer to a book written by Mr. Tchernakov? What's the title & publisher of the book?
The book is referred to above, as the last interview in the last hour on WABC: Peter Earley's Comrade J.
I am trying to figure out the name of one of the bumper songs played nearing the end of your show and where can i get it. I this it is done by Al Jolson
and I think it might be called: "Midnight'
Can you send me the Title and a copy of the song file.
Thanks.
Years ago you listed the titles of the bumper songs (mostly film scores) on your web page. I do not find that list here. Can you add it back for us please?