The Last Photograph of Franz Kafka
It's Friday morning, September 12, 2025, 08:14, and this Web page is finished. I've updated this Web page with some more about Trump trying to illegally rename the Department of Defense. Previously I"d added the link to the official archive on the WBAI Web site. The original top of this page follows the arrow. ⇒ This was a our 39th anniversary program. We talked a lot about the program'\s history. Pickles of the north and I talked about the anti-vaccine cranks who are now in positions where they can stop or make difficult the access to vaccines, which most people know are vital to surviving the many infections which we're exposed to in the modern world. We also talked about Donnie Bonespur
Trump's inept but murderous adventures in both of his presidencies. I may be updating this Web page a bit, so you might want to check back for those updates.
You can now listen to this program on the official WBAI Archive.
The next regular WBAI LSB meeting will be held on Wednesday Septemober 10, 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:
These meetings are set to begin at 7:00 PM.
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.
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Here is WBAI's current Internet stream. We can no longer tell if the stream is working without testing every possible stream. Good luck.
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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.
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This is the 39th anniversary of this radio program.
I came to WBAI as a producer in November 1981. I was on Gay Rap the Weekly Program for and About the Gay Male Community for a number of years. I had wanted to do a free-form live radio program, so when a brilliant Program Director only programmed 167 hours a week on hour was left open on Sunday night/Monday morning. I asked for it and had to go through the unprecedented task of applying for it in writing. No one had been made to do that in those days. And then I had to revise my written request.
Back of the Book first aired on September 8, 1986. I was all alone then. The program went on for two hours every other week. On that first program I read the parable "Before the Law" by Franz Kafka. I read it again on this program.
In 1998, I got permission from then Program Director Samori Marksman to bring radio's Pickles of the North, who had been doing another program on WBAI, onto Back of the Book as a co-host.
The program continued in its 1 AM to 3 AM time slot on alternating Sunday nights/Monday mornings until November 2010, when an interim Program Director declared war on some producers and overnight programs. I've always thought that this program got caught up in his ridiculous revenge on other producers because I said on some occasions when pitching that nobody on WBAI could cure cancer. That interim Program Director was a big pusher of snake oil premiums and conspiracy hoaxes of all sorts. He reduced the program to one hour every other week and the time slot went from the 1 to 3 AM time slot to the current 5 AM to six one.
Then came the COVID-19 pandemic. The last time we were at WBAI's studios was March 7, 2020. There was a lockdown soon after that date and WBAI Management told us all to stay out of the radio station. We had been doing Back of the Book as a free-form live radio program up till that time, but then we had to start pre-recording programs and sending them in. So we're sort of doing a free-form pre-recorded radio program now.
On June 9, 2024, there was a regime change at WBAI, and so far we haven't had any changes made to the program, its time slot or its frequency.
The program has survived through a number of General Managers and Program Directors over the years. We've also been though seven different Presidents of the United States.
We have talked about current events and especially about science topics. Although since the second Trump administration we just can't refrain from saying something about the terrible things he's doing.
We're hoping to keep doing this for a while longer and we hope that we bring something good to you, the listener.
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This week HHS Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr. gave a stupid performance at a Senate Finance Committee hearing. Kennedy Jr. got grilled, and just relied on saying, You're wrong,
to statements and questions that he dared not answer.
Also this week Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo announced that he wants to end the mandatory vaccinations for measles, mumps, rubella and other immunizations for school children in his state. Regarding mandatory vaccinations he said that he wants to get rid of, All of them. All of them. Every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and slavery.
I guess that Florida Surgeon General Ladapo never got vaccinated against making stupid statements. And Florida may become the big petri dish for America over the next few unvaccinated years. We'll see if people who lose their children to preventable diseases thank him in the future.
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Donnie Bonespur
Trump has been wearing a red hat for the past couple of weeks that says, Trump was right about Everything,
which I think shows a profound insecurity. He's in charge of a huge military establishment, he's arguably the most powerful person in the world and yet he wears a ridiculous hat with such a childish statement on it. I think this is very clear evidence of a serious mental illness.
This week Trump had some branch of the United States military blow up a boat which he says was in international waters and he claims to have killed 11 people on that boat by what looks like a missile strike. Even if they were drug smugglers summary execution without a trial is illegal in most places, including in the united /States of America. The United States is not at wart. This is either piracy on the high seas or else an act of war. The New York Times published an article Friday morning saying that in 209, during Trump's first term, he had Navy Seals go into North Korea in an effort to plant a device that would gather information regarding Kim Jong Un's plans for negotiations about that country's nuclear program. The Seals had a hard time getting to their destination and may have alerted a North Korean fishing boat to their presence when they bobbed up to the surface of the water to see if anyone was around. When the boat, full of unarmed, civilian fishermen, started looking around in the water the Navy Seals opened fire on them and killed everyone on that boat, reportedly knifing the dead men in their lungs in order to make them sink in the cold water. The Seals then left the area without planting their spying device. Trump's negotiations failed to do anything to even slow down the North Korean nuclear weapons program and they now have a number of nuclear weapons on ICBMs some of which can reach the west coast of the United States. What was done by the Navy Seals was a crime. And Trump is the person who directed the crime. Trump is a convicted felon in America. He is clearly a murderer internationally. Will anything be done about this?
I guess it was in keeping with his belligerent fantasies that Trump this week also said he was changing the name of the Department of Defense
to the Department of War
all on his own. Of course this is something else he can't do unilaterally. It was renamed the Department of Defense in 1947, when Congress passed and President Truman signed the National Security Act of 1947. Any change in the name would need to be similarly passed by Congress and then Trump could sign it into law. Trump assumes that Congress will give him what he wants. He has already allowed that Pete Hegseth incompetent to style himself as the Secretary of War. I wonder if there might be some legal issues that could result from Hegseth signing himself that way in some circumstances? In any event we are seeing Trump acting out as someone who dodged the draft when he had the possibility of a chance to become a part of the United States military and who now wants to make up for it by being ostentatiously bellicose when it's safe for him to be like that. What will this fantasy queen do if Congress doesn't grant him his fantasy?
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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.
Our very own Uncle Sidney Smith, whose program Saturday Morning With the Radio On used to alternate with us, has a blog these days. You can reach his blog here.
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.
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