Back of the Book links for the May 31, 2025, program

Here's some of what we talked about on this radio program. Donnie Bonespur Trump's shenanigans, many of which sure do seem to violate the Emoluments clause of the Constitution. He's handing out pardons to people who've been convicted or who pleaded guilty to felonies, some very similar to the felonies that he was convicted of in New York, if they're political allies, and one even got a pardon after his mother appealed to Trump after having bought a lot of Trump's meme coin. Trump is destroying the country. We talked about more than that and I'll try to get some of that posted up here soon. So it might be worthwhile to check back in to see any updates to this page.

The next regular WBAI LSB meeting will be held on Wednesday June 11, 2025, at 7:00 PM. That meeting will be held on ZOOM, even though ZOOM compromises privacy and security.

Some years ago the WBAI LSB voted to hold its regular meetings on the second Wednesday night of every month, subject to change by the LSB, so we have the following schedule:

WBAI has a program schedule up on its Web site. The site has gotten many of the individual program pages together to provide links and such, so check it out.

WBAI is archiving the programs! WBAI has ~~permanently~~ switched to yet another new archive Web page! This one is more baffling than the previous one. For some time I was unable to post archive blurbs, then I could, and then I couldn't again. Now I can again and there are a whole bunch of archive blurbs up there now.

This is a link to the latest version of the official WBAI archive. The archiving software appears to have been at least partially fixed. To get to the archive of this program you can use the usual method: you'll have to click on the drop-down menu, which says Display, and find Back of the Book on that menu. We're pretty early in the list, so it shouldn't be too difficult. Once you find the program name click GO and you'll see only this Back of the Book program. Management has fixed some problems that we'd been having with the archives.

For programs before March 23, 2019, we're all out of luck. The changes that took place once WBAI Management took control of the WBAI archives seems to have wiped out all access to anything before that date in March. You'll have to click on the same drop-down menu as above, which says Display, and find Specify Date, it's the second choice from the top. You are then given a little pop-up calendar and you can choose the date of the program there. Then click GO and you'll see a list of programs that aired on that date. For those previous programs you can get the audio, but nothing else, since I can't post anything to those pages anymore. Good luck.

Since the former General Manager banned Sidney Smith from WBAI he's not alternating with us on the air. As of November 2020, Back of the Book airs weekly.

Donnie Bonespur Trump's Flood the Zone strategy continues. He's blatantly committing the crime of bribery, by getting people to bribe him, and accepting the bribes. He's pardoning all sorts of real criminals. He pardoned all of the January 6^th insurrectionists on January 20. Now he's pardoned Todd and Julie Chrisley who were convicted for bank fraud to the tune of $30,000,000. This is a lot like what Trump got convicted for in New York. They also had their own reality show, just as Trump had. Their daughter supported Trump politically and spoke at the Republican National Convention. Also pardoned were corrupt former Connecticut governor John Rowland who pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiracy to commit honest services fraud, mail fraud and tax fraud, ex-House representative Michael Grimm a Republican from New York, who was convicted of tax fraud, some rapper called NBA YoungBoy who ran a drug ring in Utah and who was in prison on a gun charge, Larry Hoover who was the founder of a gang that sold drugs in Chicago and elsewhere and who had been sent to federal prison after he'd been recorded continuing to lead his gang from behind bars, but this guy will stay in prison because he was also found guilty of murdering someone, and that was a state conviction, which Trump can't get him out of. One guy's mother attended Trump's meme coin gathering as the result of being a big enough sucker to buy that junk. Trump gave him a pardon too. Sounds like he got openly bribed for this particular pardon.

Ed Martin, the current US Attorney for the District of Columbia and now Trump's Pardon Czar posted on his X account, No MAGA left behind, implying that anyone who supports Donnie Bonespur Trump politically will be able to commit crimes with impunity, as the right-wing majority on the Supreme Court has declared that Trump can do. This Ed Martin guy, no relation I'm glad to say, is also the one Trump is having implement his weaponization of the Justice Department. As part of the revenge presidency. Nice people.

Meanwhile the acronym TACO, meaning Trump Always Chickens Out is gaining traction. The term was coined by Financial Times journalist Robert Armstrong in an opinion piece that discussed tariffs and their effects on the US markets. Armstrong referred to TACO Trade which describes Trump backing off on his highly touted tariffs and other financial shenanigans when people resist and there's political or economic pressure that he has to endure. At a press conference this past week Trump was questioned about the new term for his behavior and he didn't like it. The guy who creates nasty nicknames for his opponents can't deal with them doing the same thing. Trump is one of those people who can dish it out but he can't take it.

With all of this awful stuff coming from Trump and his underlings I read an opinion piece by David Brooks in Friday's The New York Times where Brooks says, Trump and Vance aren't just promoting policies; they're trying to degrade America's moral character to a level more closely resembling their own. That may be the most damaging thing that Trump is doing to the United States of America. It's worse than Trump's wallowing in bribery, the lying about almost everything and Trump's cowardly abandonments of Ukraine in its hour of need. This criminal presidency will have effects on people for years, and may fundamentally change how Americans in general behave.

There are a lot of issues that are considered hazardous to talk about on the air at WBAI, even though the gag rule was lifted in 2002. However, there is the Internet! There are mailing lists which you can subscribe to and Web based message boards devoted to WBAI and Pacifica issues. Many controversial WBAI/Pacifica issues are discussed on these lists.

One open list that no longer exists was the WBAI-specific Goodlight Web based message board. It was sometimes referred to on Back of the Book as the bleepin' blue board, owing to the blue background that was used on its Web pages. This one had many people posting anonymously and there was also an ancillary WBAI people board that was just totally out of hand.

In June 2012, I ended up having to salvage the bleepin' blue board, and so I was the moderator on it for its last seven years, until it got too expensive.

Sometimes we used to have live interaction with people posting on the Goodlight Board during the program.

There used to be a number of mailing lists related to Pacifica and WBAI. Unfortunately, they were all located on Yahoo! Groups. When Yahoo! Groups was totally shut down in December 2020, all of those mailing lists ceased to exist. One year earlier their file sections and archives of E-mails, had been excised leaving only the ability to send E-mails back and forth among the members. Now it's all gone. Older Back of the Book program Web pages tell a little more about those lists.

We like to stay interactive with our listeners. Here are the various options for you to get in touch with us.

You can also send me E-mail.

And now you can even reach me on Twitter

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WBAI related links

A WBAI Listeners' Web page

WBAI Management's official Web site

Back of the Book — May 31, 2025