Dangerous Words: A Political Memoir

MUCKRAKING MEDIA CONSPIRACY CIA TERRORISM RIGHTS FBI UN-AMERICAN REPRESSION DOOMSDAY NARCISSISM COLD WAR SURVEILLANCE LITERACY ANTI-NUCLEAR ANARCHISM FATALISM FREEDOM LIBERATION REACTIONARY MERGER DISINFORMATION PEACE MISSILES ALTERNATIVE CONTRAS DOUBLESPEAK FASCISM DRUGS SECRET IMPERIAL SUPERPOWER MULTIPOLAR RELIGION ECOLOGY CRIME NON-ALIGNED DISSENT DEMOCRACY...   (Links Below)

  Dangerous Words: A Political Memoir

   By Greg Guma

Contents

Audio Prologue ON THE AIR: Burlington Reflections (May 2016)
(One month later Burlington College was closed)


Independent Politics (1989), Vermont Solidarity Conference discussion, moderated by Greg Guma, with Terry Bouricius, Sandy Baird, Ted Glick, Howie Hawkins, Eric Chester, Brian Tokar, and Barbara Nolfi

Part One: Education of an Outsider (1960-1968)

Getting to Know “My Own Kind”
Going Negative in Parochial Prison

Muckraking and the American Dream

Conformity Comes to Main Street

College before the Revolution

New Journalism & the Underground Press

Dawn of the Counterculture

1968: When the World Was Watching
Coming to Vermont (VTDigger series)

Part Two: Fragile Paradise  (1968-1978)

Covering the Community
Bennington Holds a Culture War.  VTD Version

Moving Toward Advocacy
Living with Polarities (VTD)

Chicago, COINTELPRO, and the War at Home

Breakdown at Bennington  VTD Version

Reality Check in the Nixon Era

Nixon: Lessons of an Electronic Messiah

Bad Vibes in Vermont’s Peaceful Valley

Those Lead-Laced Blues

Part Three: Prelude to a Revolution (1974-1978)

Heart of the Problem

The Dionysian Alternative
The Years of Living Bureaucratically (VTD)

Burlington: Evolution of a Business Town

Alternative Voices in COINTEL Times. VTD Version 

Building a Queen City Agenda

Educating Minds & Influencing Hearts

Queen City: Finding the Weak Spot

From City Hall to the Streets
The Mayor & The Connector (VTD)

Reclaiming Vermont’s Untold History

Hard Times in Duvalier’s Haiti
Baby Doc’s Haiti: Low Expectations

In Duvalier’s Haiti: Poverty and Privilege

Media, Art & the Lloyd Legacy

Alternative Media: The Phoenix & The Vanguard

Spooking the Anti-Nuclear Movement

Counterterror: The Berster Case
Kunstler Takes the Case
When Dissent Becomes a Crime
Crackdown in Germany
Scare Tactics & Media Games
Manufacturing Terror: Verdict & Lessons
Berster Case, Center for Global Research, (1st of 6 pts)
Berster, pt 6, Perception Management

 Part Four: Maverick Chronicles  (1976-1996) 

In a Time of Democratic Distemper

Teachers and a School Without Walls
Threats to Civil Liberties: The FBI-Census Case
Burlington at the Tipping Point
Over the Years with Bernie Sanders
Searching for Peace in the Cold War
Nicaragua and the Road to Contragate
Restless Times & Nagging Questions
2005 Epilog: Reflections of an Editor (TF) 

The story continues in...
 PLANET PACIFICA

2015 Epilog: Running for Mayor
The Campaign Was Just the Beginning

Advocating Freedom in a Global Age
CGR: Archive (80)
TF: Old Archive (86) New Annotated (133)
ZNet: Archive (43)

Video/Audio: Archive (31)

The People's Republic: Vermont & Bernie Sanders

Listen to "The People’s Republic: Episode One" 

Listen to “The People’s Republic” podcast

Episode One: July 12, 2019
All Episodes Index

It was time for a change, real change... 

a revealing look at the rise of Bernie Sanders and the progressive movement that changed Vermont

“The best book on the pre-Congress years” - UVM Library

“Sympathetic but honest”  - Socialist Worker

Available in paperback from Maverick Media

Mentioned in 2019 articles and interviews 

with the author in the Washington Post, New Republic, Wall Street Journal, Mother Jones, Jacobin, Politico, and VTDigger

Discussed during the 2016 Presidential campaign in...
Mother Jones: How Bernie Sanders Became a Real Politician
New York Times: Bernie Sanders' Revolutionary Roots
CNN: Can Bernie Sanders Win Black Voters?
Politico: 14 Things Bernie Has Said about Socialism
Politico: Bernie Sanders Has a Secret
Washington Post: Sanders is in with the enemy, so old allies say
CNN: How Bernie Sanders Turned Himself into a Serious Contender
Mother Jones: Here's How Bernie May Be Changing Politics for Good
Washington Post: Sanders Prepares for His National Debate Debut
New York Times: Setting Bernie Sanders Apart from the Debate Field
Mother Jones: Here's What Bernie Sanders is like as a Debater
CNN Video: What is Bernie Sanders' Debate Style?
ABC: What to Expect from Bernie Sanders in Tuesday's Debate
International Business Times: Bernie Sanders' Debate Plan
Washington Post: A Somewhat Reluctant Socialist

BURLINGTON SNOW - By Allen Ginsberg

Bernie Sanders' election as mayor of Burlington, Vermont, in 1981 caught the attention of the entire nation and inspired progressives throughout the world. Originally published in 1989, just before Sanders won his first race for the US House of Representatives in 1990, The People's Republic: Vermont and the Sanders Revolution was the first comprehensive analysis of Sanders' mayoral years and the progressive movement in Vermont. It remains the most intimate and revealing. 

Greg Guma's exploration of the "revolution" goes far beyond Sanders and his impact on Burlington. The factors behind the initial surprise victory, the tension between leftist ideals and pragmatic politics, the evolution of an effective political coaliton outside the two-party system -- all these topics and more Guma investigates, with an eye on global political implications as well as the immediate local impact. The People's Republic is for all those interested in progressive politics and political history, not to mention those in places where a similar "revolution" is possible.

A fast-moving description that illustrates one of the great efforts at innovative government of the past fifty years…

--Pierre Clavel, Cornell University

If you were going to create somebody to write about Bernie Sanders’ years as socialist mayor of Burlington, you might make him a fortysomething Vermont journalist and bookstore founder and former government worker who almost ran for mayor of Burlington himself…That’s what you have in Greg Guma.

—Mark Satin, New Options

A treasure house of first-hand information and perceptive, if often controversial analysis of great value to anyone concerned to explore realistically the possibilities for combining third-party electoral politics with other methods of working for justice, peace, environmental sanity and genuine democracy.

– David Dellinger, author/activist

If you are at all interested in Vermont and Burlington, and public policy, get this book.

– Phil Hoff, former Vermont Governor

PROGRESSIVE ECLIPSE: Burlington After Bernie 

More Books from Maverick Media HERE 

Uneasy Empire

How an international establishment has used fear of socialism, communism and terrorism to justify repression and a massive military establishment. Pointing past nationalism and corporate empire, Uneasy Empire: Repression, Globalization, and What We Can Do combines a radical critique with hopeful solutions and a vision of democratic globalism through which people can regain control of their futures.

Spirits of Desire

Set during the spirtualist craze of the 1870s, Spirits of Desire follows a group of extraordinary people, including Russian theosophist Helena Blavatsky, paranormal investigator Henry Olcott and Oneida Community leader Theo Noyes, as they search for the truth about ghosts through a notorious family of Vermont mediums. The trail leads them into a world of seances, deadly elementals, astral forces and past lives.

Dons of Time

Unsolved mysteries collide with cutting edge science and altered states of consciousness in a world of corporate gangsters, infamous crimes and top-secret experiments. Based on eyewitness accounts, suppressed documents and the lives of world-changers Nikola Tesla, Annie Besant, Ignatius Donnelly and Jack the Ripper, Dons of Time is a speculative adventure, a glimpse of an alternative future and a quantum leap to Gilded Age London at the tipping point of invention, revolution and murder.

Prisoners of the Real: An Odyssey

An intellectual journey from Pythagoras to planetary consciousness -- and a new vision of freedom & cooperation. 
  
Prisoners of the Real makes the connection between solar and lunar knowledge, illuminating the cost of our preoccupation with certainty and order. 

NEW PODCAST

Listen to "Prisoners of the Real: From Here to Paradise" on Spreaker.   
Exploring insights from linguistics, psychology, physics, literature, philosophy and management science, Prisoners of the Real opens the door to a new vision of freedom and cooperation – Dionysian leadership.

Video Preview: Dionysus Rising

"Dionysian leaders use artistic methods to invent structures of reality. Although they acknowledge that scientific and artistic processes have equal worth, they de-emphasize logical reasoning and deduction and focus on metaphorical thinking. Their interest is not definition but discovery.”

Section One: The Rational Trap
The Creative Also Destroys * Deconstructing Leadership * Anatomy of Insecurity * Managers and Their Tools * The Corporate Way of Life * The Dictatorship of Time * Rules for Rationals * The Age of Adaptability * Living with Rational Management

Section Two: Philosophy of the Real 

Defining the "Real World" * Questions of Knowledge * The Path of Certainty * Man the Brute * Surrender to Authority * Rise of the Reasonable State * Hegel’s Dialectical Progress * The Ultimate Reality of Karl Marx *  Deadly Facts: Objectivity & a Culture of Conformity

Section Three: New World Disorders

The Outsider’s Choice * Life, Death and Lost Generations * Deconstructing Archetypes * 

The Bureaucratic Way * Rational Collectives * The Next Level: World Order * The Logic of Lifeboat Ethics * Evolutionary Cycles * Reframing Reality * The Language of Uncertainty * Language Grooves & Quantum Potentials

Section Four: 
Restructuring Reality – The Dionysian Way

Rediscovering Dionysus * Dionysus & Apollo * The Path of Invention * Humanity at the Turning Point * Narcissism & Grand Delusions * Community & Consciousness * The Eclipse of Free Expression * Autonomy & Self-Rule * Freedom of Amplified Speech * Dionysian Process: An Overview * Dionysian Process: Planning & Decisions * The Process: Info & Communication * The Process: Time, Participation, Enabling * The Game of Becoming

Planet Pacifica: Power & Politics Inside America’s Progressive Radio Network

Greg Guma’s examination of the original listener-supported radio network and challenges facing progressive media in an age of deception and decline in the credibility of journalism

New eBook now available: 

Planet Pacifica: 

Progressive Media’s Fragile Democracy

Before the Fall (2015 update) 

Audio: Talking to the PNB, July 2007 

Listen to "#10 Planet Pacifica: Managing Chaos" on Spreaker.

Original Introduction (2008)

The Road to Berkeley

Pacifica’s beginnings, a brief history of radio and TV, and how the author became a CEO

1. When Radio Was New; 2. The Early Days of the Tube; 3. Managing Pacifica: How It Began; 4. 9/11 Theories and Pacifica’s Fear Factor; 5. Applying for the Dream Job from Hell; 6. Challenge or Folly?

In the Bubble

Constraints, conspiracies, more Pacifica history, and an early assessment

7. Marooned on the Margin; 8. The Voice vs. the Authority; 9. Considering Rumors and Pacifica’s CFO; 10. How Campanella Struck Out; 11. Why Pacifica Radio Fights; 12. Practical Idealism & Pacifica Realities; 13. Managing Pacifica: Strategy & Struggles

A Listening Tour: February-March 2006

14. WBAI: The Legend That Lost Its Way; 
15. Facing Factions at WBAI; 16. WPFW: Avoiding the Tough Questions; 17. Mixed Messages at WPFW; 18. KPFT: Overhauling the “Texas Jukebox”; 19. Network or Movement?; 20. KPFA: Hanrahan v. Bernstein, et al.; 21. Roots of the Revolution; 22. KPFK: The Price of Stifling Dissent; 23. Tea & Tension at KPFK; 24. PRA: A Preservation Oasis; 25. Elections & Civic Media; 26. Following the Money; 27. Assessing Pacifica’s Deficit of Trust

Real Life

28. Rethinking the Experiment; 29. WBAI's Delicate Condition; 30. Uncovering Fault Lines; 
31. War at Home; 32. End of a Media Dream; 
33. What Can Be Done

Postscripts

34. Making Democracy Work, January 2008; 
35. Pacifica Ponders Spending Cuts, March 2008; 
36. Sawaya Goes on the Record, June 2008 
37. Pacifica Tackles Bylaws & Management, August 2008 
38. Quiet Meltdown on Planet Pacifica, September 2008 39. Budgeting for Triage 40. The Price of Democracy 41. Sawaya Resigns (Sept. 25, 2008: Current) 42. What Went Wrong?

Afterword: State of the News Media 2008

A Crisis of Fact; Will Newspapers Survive?; Radio’s Delicate Condition; The Future of Community Radio

Reviews by Pacifica Leaders

Greg Guma's journalistic eye precisely captures the essence of contemporary Pacifica as it stuggles with its own contradictions and the proliferation of competing media alternatives to re-establish a relevancy and significance slowly surrendered over the years in accommodation to the tantrums of strong personalities and the ethical compromises of identity-based politics…

Greg Guma's important inside narrative of a critical recent transitional period in Pacifica's complex history is an excellent read, well-contextualizing whatever chapters remain in Pacifica's uncertain future.

--Terry Goodman

*

What makes Greg Guma's new blog so extraordinary is that he is the first executive in Pacifica who has been willing, and able, to share his experiences…. I think that Greg's articles on his experiences at, and observations on Pacifica have been a real gift to the network. They ought to be required reading for all the PNB and LSB members. 

And for me, personally, they have been a tremendous validation of all sorts of observations and concerns that I have been expressing on the discussion lists for years, so for that I am very grateful to Greg for compiling all these stories.

-- Nalini Lasiewicz

While serving on the Pacifica Radio National Board I not only developed a real respect for Greg Guma and his leadership of the network and Foundation as executive director, but I worked in a faction of the Board at that time which tried to consolidate more responsibilities in that office. We wanted to give appropriate power and oversight to the Pacifica national executive director so that decisions on the day-to-day operations of the network could be made more effectively.

--Don White

Updated 6/09