Episode 257 – The Case for Palestine with Dan Kovalik

Macro N Cheese – Episode 257
The Case for Palestine with Dan Kovalik
December 30, 2023

[00:00:00] Dan Kovalik [Intro/Music]: They have two democratic presidents, leading to the worst humanitarian crises on earth through their policies. So, there is no lesser evil in the American political landscape.

I saw a video of a girl, she must have been 10 years old, and she had been removed from the rubble, and they asked her, ‘what are you going to do?… you’re going to leave?’…she goes, ‘I’m never going to leave, and if they kill me, I will be a seed that they plant for the resistance.’ She’s like, 10 years old. That’s how we have to be.

[00:01:35] Geoff Ginter [Intro/Music]: Now, let’s see if we can avoid the apocalypse altogether. Here’s another episode of Macro N Cheese with your host, Steve Grumbine.

[00:01:43] Steve Grumbine: Alright. This is Steve with Macro N Cheese, and today’s guest is none other than Dan Kovalik. Dan has been on here several times with me, so his introduction will be a little shorter this time.

Dan Kovalik is an American human rights labor lawyer and peace activist. He’s contributed articles to tons of publications, written many books… including, Cancel This Book and Nicaragua, both of which we covered here.

Without further ado, let’s bring on my guest, Dan Kovalik. Welcome to the show, sir.

[00:02:13] Dan Kovalik: Hey, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

[00:02:16] Grumbine: Absolutely. I’m really beside myself… angry, frustrated. I don’t even think those terms capture how disgusted I am with what’s going on in Gaza right now, and the Zionist war against the people of Gaza.

I’ve got my own ideas, beliefs, and frustrations. But one of the things that feels absolutely certain, is when you’re an oppressed people- living under someone else’s rule, and they’re dominating you and destroying you- when you fight back… I don’t see how that is an act of terror.

In my mind, if somebody is harming me- harming my family, stealing our land, stealing our home- anything I do is fair game at that point. And if you don’t want that to happen, don’t steal my land. Don’t put your boot on my neck.

And I know, it’s all the rage to try to be fair and balanced. But to me, there’s one victim here and that’s the people of Gaza. And there’s one oppressor, that is a conglomerate of oppressors with the US backing, of Zionist Israel, right wing Zionist Israel. I’m not talking about Jewish people. I’m talking about Zionists and this neocon government under Bibi Netanyahu.

What are your thoughts? Help me understand Gaza.

[00:03:46] Kovalik: I agree with you. First of all, if you look at what happened October 7- as you are suggesting- this conflict did not begin on October 7th, though we’re led to believe it did. This conflict- well, depends on when you want to say it started- but certainly a good starting place is 1948 in the Nakba when 700,000 to 900,000 Palestinians were violently displaced by Israelis, who came in to take over their land and their homes. And the takeover of land and homes has continued since that time.

Gaza itself has been penned in with a giant fence since about 2007, in what is now- some refer to as- the largest open-air prison in the world. Others call it the biggest concentration camp in the world, where Israel has regulated the water they get, the food they get. And they’ve kept all those things, by the way, intentionally, to a minimum.

So, these are an imprisoned people in Gaza, that are treated worse than animals- is the truth of it. And as you say, the violence of the oppressor is not the same as the violence of the oppressed. If you took the example of a slave and a slave owner. For a slave owner to say, ‘Oh my God, on October 7th, my slaves, they rose up and they mostly attacked the overseers in the fields who were whipping them, but yeah, they also killed some of my family.’ There wouldn’t be a lot of sympathy for the slave holder, is the truth of it.

And I think that that analogy is a fair analogy. And actually, on October 7th, it should be noted that, it looks like- even by Israel’s own numbers- that about 2/3 of the people killed, were military targets, were military people. 1/3 were civilians. It’s not clear that Hamas targeted civilians. A number died in the crossfire.

Some, by the way, it appears, by the Israelis themselves. By the Israeli military themselves. Either through panicking or by applying- what they call- the ‘Hannibal Directive.’ That is, they don’t want to allow their people to be taken as hostages, so they kill them first.

And let’s compare that to what Israel’s doing in Gaza, where 40% of the victims there are children. And the vast majority, I saw at one point 90%, were civilians. In fact, it’s the greatest percentage of civilians killed in any conflict, even including World War II. So, even the way Israel’s prosecuting this war is despicable.

So yes, I agree with you. I think that anyone who knows the situation is going to be sympathetic to the Palestinian people. And that’s why you see this outcry. That’s why you see these mass protests throughout the world. Because people know- again, a lot of people know anyway- the injustices the Palestinians have suffered. And they know that this war against them, is not so much a war as it is a turkey shoot. That it really is Israel, just wantonly murdering civilians, destroying hospitals, destroying mosques, destroying Christian churches, destroying museums.

Over a hundred significant historic sites have been destroyed. And again, these are Christian. These are Muslim. I don’t know if some Jewish sites were destroyed, but I wouldn’t be surprised by that either. This is reprehensible.

More journalists have been killed, so far by Israel in this conflict, than any conflict we know of. More UN staff people have been killed by Israel, than any conflict since the United Nations was founded. By any measure, this is a horrible operation that Israel’s carrying out, and it’s getting more grisly and awful by the day, as they get more desperate.

And they are desperate, because while they are very good at murdering children and destroying hospitals, they’re not really that adept at confronting the armed resistance in Gaza. They’re losing that battle pretty handily.

And so, to make up for that, they’re engaged in this orgy of violence against the civilian population. Which we’ve seen before. We saw that with the US in Vietnam, for example. Probably one of the best examples.

And the US in Korea as well. So, I think you’re on the right track.

[00:09:06] Grumbine: I have been sold my entire adult life, that the only thing preventing the evils of the Republican Party, is the Democratic Party. And everything that the left- those that were willing to even play in electoral politics, and those who saw the Bernie Sanders campaign implode on itself, not once, but twice when I think about everything people were asking for and the things that people stood for, the sensibilities of that massive movement in the United States- the idea that anybody voted for this annihilation of Gaza, this support of these proxy wars, is crazy.

I’m not foolish enough to believe this is a Democrat only problem. I know it’s a capital problem, it is the ownership class.

It is not necessarily a ‘we the people’ problem. Because I don’t believe ‘we the people’ really have any hand in selecting our president, they’re selected for us. But in this case, what Biden has done, in terms of not standing for a ceasefire, is criminal. Even Bernie Sanders, up until recently, had been resistant in calling for a ceasefire.

The only person that actually said anything was Rashida Tlaib. Of course, she’s written off as just another Palestinian terrorist, that’s the narrative.

[00:10:44] Kovalik: Right.

[00:10:45] Grumbine: And it’s not just Republicans, it’s Democrats too. This government has signed on for this genocide. What is it exactly that I would be voting in support of? What about this represents the best of America and the righteous path forward? I don’t understand how anyone, in clear conscience, can sell what’s happening in Gaza right now as foreign policy success. How does this represent the will of the people? Help me understand that.

[00:11:28] Kovalik: Well of course, it does not. And the polls show that a majority of Americans want a ceasefire. I think some, like 80 %, of Democrats want a ceasefire. So, Biden is betraying, in a big way, his own supporters. But as you say, this is how it is during every administration. Every time we think we might be voting for the lesser evil, they show themselves to certainly be as evil as the other party.

Obama is a great example of that. And Obama really got away with it. Obama is still remembered in a very fond way, even though he engaged in atrocious foreign policy. He was ‘Mr. Drone Man’… he killed, I believe, more people with drones than any other president. He dropped more bombs than George W. Bush, he destroyed Libya during his tenure.

He was not a man of peace by any stretch of the imagination, even though he won a Nobel Peace Prize. And he was awarded it before he had been in office for very long, which was strange, but everyone had so much hope in the guy. But he was as bad as anyone. He also started, by the way, the war in Yemen, which is not discussed very much, which led to the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. I think only to be now exceeded by Gaza.

So now you have two democratic presidents leading to the worst humanitarian crises on earth, through their policies. So, there is no lesser evil in the American political landscape. That is a fact. And that’s because the government is held captive by the ruling class. It is a government by and for the very super rich, and it doesn’t matter who’s in office, largely. I hate to say that, but that’s the truth of it.

And that’s not a cynical view, it’s a realistic view. And it’s a Marxist view of the situation. And so really, I think at the moment, the only real viable means to challenge the war machine, since it is a bipartisan issue- even Bobby Kennedy, who I had some hope in because he talked about trying to end the endless wars and shut down our 800 to 1000 military bases in the world and cut back the CIA, he’s terrible on the Palestinian/ Israel issue, he may be worse than any of the candidates in truth, so there is no viable candidate who’s going to save the day here- the only viable option for us, is to take to the streets and protests.

The ballot box right now is not really a realistic forum for Americans to change policy, because our representatives don’t represent us. The other evidence of this is- think about it, congress has barely been functioning since the summer, because remember, there wasn’t a speaker of the house because the Republicans dethroned their own speaker of the house and then took a while to elect the new one, so really, there hasn’t been much legislative work done since the summer, and now we’re in the Christmas break- but the only thing debated seriously during all that time was military funding for Israel and Ukraine. All the while you have an increased homeless problem, you have people without health care, you have people in huge student debt, consumer debt, you have serious social problems in this country.

The only business of Congress for months, has been how much money are we going to give to fight wars and to the defense industry. That is not a democracy. They are not representing our interests or our well being, and we have to act as such. I just think you have to be realistic about that.

[00:15:54] Grumbine: I’m continuously gaslit by people who are ‘true believers.’ They believe in electoralism, and these ‘hopium-style’ pontifications from various talking heads. And they devour MSNBC and other mainstream media. Ultimately, some of these people are unwilling to look at this critically, the Palestinian conflict, what the US role is.

My focus is the convergence of eco-socialism, class analysis, and Modern Monetary Theory. I’m desperate to get people on board with that. The various people that would be willing to run for office, they don’t have a clue about economics. The vast majority of alt-media has no clue about economics. How in the world could you do something great to save us from climate destruction? They wouldn’t know what to do.

Marianne Williamson was talking like a full fledged Zionist, didn’t know any better, unread on the subject. I have no idea what’s going on with Brother West these days. I never was on Bobby Kennedy’s train. When he was all about free markets for energy, that eliminated him immediately. Nothing to do with him at that point. What constituency are you speaking for? I am all about ending war, period. I’m all about making sure that the working class have their needs met. None of that is being put forward by anyone.

And so, do we have agency within this government? Do we have means to affect the outcomes through the election process, or is the only way to make an impact, through building parallel systems. Making the weight of the old system fall on itself, and create a way for us to organize outside of it.

I’m of the belief that that’s the only path forward. I don’t see an electoral path to change what’s going on in Gaza and Ukraine. I see no path where our voice impacts the system, which tells me that we don’t matter.

So, you said the only way forward, in your eyes, is to take to the streets. But taking to the streets is typically pop-up action, there’s no follow through. How do you make an impact?

What does history teach us, with sustained movements, about organizing. Is it Black Panthers, do we look to them? Do we look at the civil rights movement? Where do we find the model for which to organize, to go forward. The Green Party has been around forever and has done really nothing, with all due respect.

[00:19:10] Kovalik: No, it hasn’t.

[00:19:12] Grumbine: I’ve seen no impact whatsoever, anywhere, because this leviathan is a monster. It’s not just a military around the world, it’s a police force domestically. It’s a million things that prevent us from being able to say, ‘What the hell are you doing killing children in a freaking hospital?’

Dan, I’m lost.

[00:19:37] Kovalik: Yeah well, there’s every reason to be angry about what’s happening. I agree with the memes that say, ‘If you wondered what you would be doing in Nazi Germany during the Holocaust, you know now’… and I believe that. What is happening in Gaza is on a level of brutality that we’ve never seen in our lifetimes. It could only happen with US support militarily, financially, diplomatically, politically.

And so, what does that call for? What does it call for if, again, let’s assume you did live in Nazi Germany, and you knew that the Holocaust was happening? You would be obligated to resist it any way you could. And I think there would be extreme forms of resistance that would be called for, and no one would question that.

And honestly, I believe that’s the case now, I think this calls for drastic action. The protests have been good and I applaud everyone for doing them, but I do think those have to intensify, they need to grow. And honestly, they need to be more disruptive. They need to disrupt the economy, they need to disrupt the lives of politicians.

I don’t think any of these politicians who are supporting the war, which is almost all of them, should be able to sleep at night, should be able to go out to restaurants, should be able to be seen in public without being harassed.

In the same way, again, that you would view a Nazi during World War II. You would not feel any compunction about challenging them, in a very serious way. That really is what it calls for, is rebellion on that kind of scale. Are people up for that? I’m not sure. So far I don’t see evidence of it. I certainly see maybe little glimmers of it.

I think shutting down Grand Central Station- here’s the thing, I applauded it and it makes me so happy that they shut down Grand Central Station, but at the same time- shutting down Grand Central Station today, is not the same thing as it would have been 100 years ago. And why?… because, the capitalists don’t ride the subways.

Maybe they did in the past. They certainly used to use our roads for their cars. They don’t probably do that anymore. They fly in helicopters, private jets. If you shut down a major commercial airport, they wouldn’t care because they have their own private airports.

The point is, one has to think very strategically about how do you disrupt the lives of the people that are actually making the decisions about these things, knowing they no longer walk amongst us. They used to have to walk amongst us. That is not true anymore. And so shutting down Grand Central Station or shutting down a tunnel during rush hour, it’s a great symbolic act. But if we’re realistic, the only people at inconveniences are mostly working class people.

Because even more ‘well-to-do’ Americans, who you wouldn’t count as the ‘ruling class’, they’re not going on the subways either. We really have to think like Saul Alinsky, who was a great organizer. You have to really think, ‘how do we disrupt the system in a way that will force it to react?’… and I think we need to start thinking about those things.

Again, without compromising my freedom from prison, I think some very drastic measures are probably in order, is the truth of it. Because what we’re seeing is an abomination, is a genocide. And again, if you’re confronting a genocide and you know that it’s happening, what are you going to do about that? Are you going to withhold taxes? Are you going to be like the War Resisters League, who don’t pay taxes, that’s an idea.

Those are the drastic actions that need to happen, because otherwise, what you’re saying is true. The ruling class doesn’t give a damn. They don’t give a damn what we think. That’s for sure.

[00:24:34] Intermission: You are listening to Macro N Cheese, a podcast brought to you by Real Progressives, a non profit organization dedicated to teaching the masses about MMT, or Modern Monetary Theory. Please help our efforts and become a monthly donor at PayPal or Patreon, like and follow our pages on Facebook and YouTube and follow us on TikTok, Twitter, Twitch, Rokfin, and Instagram.

[00:25:25] Grumbine: I know that economics is my area and you’re a peace activist, your focus is on geopolitics. When they receive our tax, they delete it. They don’t respend it. It’s a fiat currency. They make it freely. So, when the government decides it wants to give Israel a billion dollars, it can give it a billion dollars, simply by going into a computer and typing it into their account and hit send. It doesn’t require any of our ‘tax dollars’.

When money is spent into the economy, that does its thing, and when it’s taxed, it deletes it. And this is the rule of a fiat, that’s why we keep seeing money explode and grow. When you have a fiat system like this, taxation itself is merely meant to keep you needing the dollar. Its purpose is not a funding mechanism in any way, it is only to keep you tethered to the currency.

The fact is, you are forced to pay your tax in U.S. Dollars. So, not paying your tax, doesn’t prevent the government from spending a trillion more. It could spend as much as it wants in the military industrial complex, irrespective of how much money it spends into the economy.

And this is one of the most difficult things, because this concept of taxpayer money started with Margaret Thatcher. In fact, she famously said, ‘there is no such thing as public money, there is only taxpayer dollars.’ And her and Reagan created this blowback against public spending.

And this all transpired back in 1972, with the removal of Bretton Woods and putting us onto a free floating fiat regime, which has beautiful potential and also monstrous potential, as we’re seeing today.

So, when I think about the idea of ‘How do we impact them?’, withholding your tax, that may feel good, but it has no impact at all. And again, most people don’t know that.

When I think about ‘How would we actually demonstrate?’, I think you were right when you said disruption… blocking traffic outside of the Congress.

You see a lot of people going to jail. Right now, climate activists are being jailed. It’s a very crappy time to care, because all the tools for fighting back are gone. So, how do we fight back? I don’t know what to do.

[00:28:13] Kovalik: Again, there are some actions that I think do have a real impact. For example, people on the docks who have prevented shipments of arms going out. People who have had actions directly against defense companies, usually in the form of graffiti. But you could have more intense actions against them.

Again, you really have to go directly against the war machine, I think. And disrupt production of armaments, shipment of armaments, even maybe production of raw materials for armaments, steel, plastics. I think one has to really think about how you disrupt the economic mechanism for supporting the war effort.

If you look at what Yemen’s doing, for example, in their part of the world, I think it’s very effective, where they’re basically shutting down the Red Sea for shipping. Those ships have to go all the way around the Horn of Africa. Which is going to cost them billions of dollars. And that’s smart what the Yemenis are doing.

And that’s what we have to do. We have to do those sorts of things, those sorts of direct actions, and not concentrate on symbolic actions. They seem very afraid of the so called ‘insurrection’ on January 6th. I suppose you could try to duplicate that on a daily basis.

The one airport the Congress does depend upon- we know after 9/11 because it was thought they were going to shut down Reagan National Airport permanently after 9/11, because it’s right in the heart of D.C.- they thought that that should not be used again for commercial air traffic, because it was too vulnerable for terrorists to use, to attack Washington, DC.

So, the FAA thought about shutting it down permanently. And the members of Congress protested, because they said ‘we all depend on it to get back and forth to our home states.’

And so, if you disrupted Reagan National Airport in a severe way, that would have consequences. That’s what we have to think about. We really have to disrupt the system.

[00:30:53] Grumbine: People do what they feel empowered to do, what they feel capable and competent to do. And you can’t do something alone. You need a mass movement

[00:31:06] Kovalik: Yes, you do.

[00:31:08] Grumbine: And not just one little group, you need cross section. You need, basically, the civil rights movement all over again. You need the old anti-war movement back, with a purpose. You need large groups of people. A movement of movements. To be able to let them know that this is not acceptable.

Because the lack of options, the lack of imagination… everything is not going to be like the Bolsheviks. Even though I happen to have a warm spot in my heart for that, everything doesn’t have to be ‘Storming the Bastille.’ There are other ways, and it could just be checking out of the system and building a parallel system.

But in the end, there’s no mechanism for us to be able to move people who are, typically, just fearful, voter-minded people; ‘I’m going to cast my vote and that’s the end of my commitment to democracy, I’ve hit the ballot box, I filled out my ticket, I’ve submitted it and I’m done.’

I feel like there’s a whole lot of space in between that and revolution. I feel like there’s something that we’re not seeing because there’s no hope right now. I don’t see hope anyway, I see bursts of energy, but not sustained hope. Not belief that something good can happen, not a commitment to it.

And it’s always a very small group of people that are turned into fringe, made to seem crazy for seeing things so clearly. But in the end, do you see any evidence that Joe Biden is listening to the people?

[00:32:59] Kovalik: He’s listening, in the sense that, he understands that he needs to change his rhetoric. He’s at least pretending that he cares about civilians in Palestine. He’s listening to that extent, but he’s responding with platitudes that are meaningless. Because while he says he cares about the civilians, while he claims he’s told Netanyahu to go easy on the civilians, he’s also sending heavy armaments to Israel.

He’s also working behind the scenes to remove any human rights restrictions on reserve weapons and munitions, that Israel can tap into, even without congressional approval. So he’s not complying with what people are asking him to do, but he is listening. He understands that his base is furious about this and might abandon him over this.

And that’s something. That is something. I think, though, that again, the protests, in order to really be effective, need to grow, to be bigger, to be more pointed in what they’re protesting against, and how they’re targeting what they’re protesting against. And I think we could have an impact in concert with, frankly, what’s happening on the ground in the Middle East.

Again, with what Yemen’s doing, with what Hezbollah is doing, with what the militants in Gaza are doing. They’re doing an amazing job of resisting what the US and Israel are doing to Gaza. And I do think we can help that effort by street protests, again, that I think are more targeted.

Now, I just got back from the West bank of Palestine. People were very clear to me, they felt very uplifted by the demonstrations in the United States. I want to tell people that, because I think that is important. Giving people help, giving people a belief that they’re not alone, that buoys their spirits, that buoys their resistance.

And I think that was true in Vietnam, in the sense that- who ended the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese did by winning, first and foremost- but I think the protests gave them moral support for their efforts, and maybe slowed down the war machine enough to help them win.

I certainly don’t want to leave people with the impression, that what they do is futile. I think any act of resistance is important

[00:35:32] Grumbine: Yes.

[00:35:32] Kovalik: And meaningful… and can have an impact.

I just think that it’s time to up our game, I really do.

Like Medea Benjamin, they need to go into hearings, disrupt the hearings, scream at the people holding the hearings. Scream at their Congress people, again, when they’re at a restaurant, or they’re on the street, or even in their homes. They should not be allowed to be comfortable while they’re supporting a genocide.

And I do think they are feeling a certain discomfort. I think a lot of that is happening. You see videos every day of Congress people being confronted by constituents, aggressively. And that needs to continue and it needs to be, in fact, increased.

So anyway, that’s my thought. I do think what is being done on the streets, does have meaning. Is it enough? Probably not. But I think…

[00:36:29] Grumbine: Got to start somewhere.

[00:36:31] Kovalik: It’s necessary. It may not be sufficient, but it’s necessary.

[00:36:39] Grumbine: That’s well stated. In your mind- being that you have been over there, you’ve been around people actively resisting- what is it like, as a person in the West Bank living there, for someone who’s living this hell right now?

I saw one picture in particular, that was just too much to bear, and it was a building that had fallen on a sleeping child… and it was horrifying. This has got to be- I hate to say ‘the new normal’, every day you’re waking up to something like this- it’s got to be horrible.

[00:37:20] Kovalik: Well, in Gaza, it is. Gaza is a hellscape. And I think their, just, surviving, is an act of resistance. And, just, not leaving, is an act of resistance, because that’s what Israel wants. They want to remove everyone from Gaza and put them in the Sinai desert. Just staying there, just living, just reproducing, those are acts of resistance, and they know that.

I saw a video of a girl, she must have been 10 years old, and she had been removed from the rubble… and they asked her, ‘What are you going to do? Are you going to leave?’ She goes, ‘I’m never going to leave, and if they kill me, I will be a seed that they plant for the resistance.’

She’s like 10 years old.

[00:38:06] Grumbine: Wow.

[00:38:07] Kovalik: That’s how we have to be. We have to be inspired by them too. And I think the other thing is- you kind of touched upon this- just like you can’t go to the ballot box and feel like your day is done, you can’t go to a protest or two and think your job is done. This has to be a lifelong struggle

[00:38:26] Grumbine: Yes.

[00:38:27] Kovalik: and you have to be in it for the long haul because this won’t be won overnight, and this war will end. It’s important when it does end, not to disarm and stop protesting because then there will be another phase of the struggle. People need to look at their lives in a different way.

Now, of course, I’ve organized my life in a certain way so that I can be pretty much a full-time activist. I know most people can’t do that. I’m sympathetic with that. Obviously, I’m in a very privileged position, but I think a lot of people, certainly from our socioeconomic backgrounds, can do a lot to become close to full-time activists. And I think they need to look at their life as an act of resistance, and to be engaged in the struggle constantly.

For me, especially given what I’m seeing in Gaza, there’s nothing else for me. What else am I going to do? Nothing else has meaning. Like, I don’t know, watching a movie or going out to listen to music. Those are all nice things and all, but it’s like, I don’t feel that I can do that at the moment, when I see all this carnage and certainly people in West Bank.

That was their view, everyone I was with, they were not… they hadn’t gone to a restaurant since October 7th. A friend of mine who hosted me there, her daughter is getting married tomorrow actually, and they canceled the wedding. They’re going to get married, but it’s only going to be immediate family. They’re not celebrating.

The patriarchs in Bethlehem- and I was lucky I made it to Bethlehem- Christian patriarchs wrote a letter to Biden saying they’re canceling Christmas. They literally said ‘we’re canceling Christmas, because you can’t celebrate anything when this carnage has happened.’

And I think it calls for that kind of dedication right now, from people who can give that.

[00:40:38] Grumbine: I saw Aaron Maté confront a politician on the quiet car.

[00:40:43] Kovalik: Yeah, I think a Senator.

[00:40:46] Grumbine: And when I think about the response to that, it would be easy for me- well, it would be hard- but I try to put myself in the Senator’s position. The reality is, instead of the Senator taking Aaron’s perspective seriously, he tried to get him removed.

And that was Aaron being the most polite person. He’d videotaped it, so you could see he wasn’t being mean or horrible, he was just making his case. But you could see the disdain, the absolute disgust, on the Senator’s face and the idea that someone would dare even speak to him.

[00:41:32] Kovalik: One of the peasants. Like when you saw I confronted Senator Fetterman and was thrown out. But it’s good for people to see that. It’s not good that the senators look at us as mere peasants, but it’s good that if they do, it’s good for people to see it, that that’s where we’re at. You can see what content they have for us.

They hate us. They absolutely hate us. If they didn’t hate us, they wouldn’t let us live the way we do. With our cities, again, with the growing homelessness, the growing crime and chaos. This society is falling apart and they’re doing nothing to stop it. Nothing.

And they do have utter contempt for us. And the more people see that and understand it, that’s all to the good, because people should have no faith in our elected officials at all. They have to be some of the most corrupt people in the world.

We always talk about corruption in other countries, but in terms of dollar amount, this has to be the most corrupt country in the world. What’s the figure that the Pentagon could not account for, something like, $21 trillion or something.

[00:42:46] Grumbine: Ridiculous. Yes.

[00:42:47] Kovalik: There can’t be another country in the world with a worse form of corruption, again, just dollar wise. But people need to understand that.

I think it is happening, if you look at the polls. People don’t trust the government. They don’t think their vote counts. They’re open to a third party candidate. Most people know that it’s fixed, but that has to really sink in. We have to act accordingly.

But again, I want to finish on a hopeful note. I do feel hopeful. I am very leavened by the protests in the United States. I’m surprised how big they are and how sustained they’ve been, and I applaud people for that, I do.

And I think that this could be the beginning of a new peace movement. And it could be the beginning of building a movement, for a truly democratic society, which is what we need.

[00:43:55] Grumbine: Sign me up.

[00:43:56] Kovalik: Yeah. So, let’s just move forward. That’s my two cents, I suppose. I am very leavened by what I see as the resistance of the Palestinian people. I mean, again, if they can endure what they’re enduring, we can do our bit.

[00:44:15] Grumbine: Thank you, Dan. I really appreciate your time. Tell folks where they can find more of your work.

[00:44:20] Kovalik: Well, I’m on Twitter @danielmkovalik and also I have a new book coming out, and you can pre order it now. And it’s called, The Case For Palestine that’s coming out in March, but you can pre-order it from Amazon now, or go to my publishing company, skyhorsepublishing.com.

[00:44:41] Grumbine: Awesome. Count on it. I hope I can talk to you about that when it comes out, sir.

[00:44:45] Kovalik: Thanks, Steve. I appreciate you.

[00:44:47] Grumbine: Alright. Thank you everybody. This is Steve with Macro N Cheese. My guest, Dan Kovalik. We are outta here.

[00:45:00] End Credits: Macro N Cheese is produced by Andy Kennedy, descriptive writing by Virginia Cotts, and promotional artwork by Andy Kennedy. Macro N Cheese is publicly funded by our Real Progressives Patreon account. If you would like to donate to Macro N Cheese, please visit patreon.com/realprogressives.