Society's Child
What makes a 'protest song' anyway? We also talked about some lesser known songs that didn't quite 'make it', but nevertheless struck a powerful chord with some because they record a truer version of history the victors would prefer we forget.
We were joined by Tim Trepanier, singer-songwriter and travelling troubadour from the prairie lands of Canada. Lead singer and guitarist for folk band Relic, we even convinced Tim to play a couple of his tunes for us live on air!
Running Time: 02:19:00
Download: MP3

'Tower-power': Heat emanating from the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System, the world's largest solar farm of its kind, has allegedly killed and injured dozens of birds and other wildlife in the Mojave desert
After years of regulatory tangles around the impact on desert wildlife, the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System opened on Thursday but environmental groups say the nearly 350,000 gigantic mirrors are generating 1000 degree Fahrenheit temperatures which are killing and singing birds.
According to compliance documents released by developer BrightSource Energy last year, dozens of birds were found injured at the site during the building stage.
"You'll know when it pops off," says Robert Bowen, the school's campus police officer. "If you get engaged with one of the shooters, you'll know it."
"When you get shot, you need to close your fingers and keep 'em in," adds Tammy Kozinski, the drama teacher. "When the bad guy and the police come through, they'll step all over you, and who will be saying they're sorry?"
"Nobody!" the students cry in unison.

A Gurkha regiment helps place sandbags outside homes along the river Thames in Staines.
Two people were killed late on Friday in the stormy weather and the high winds left more than 16,000 homes in north Wales without power.
A cruise ship passenger died and another was airlifted to shore after their 22,000-tonne vessel was hit by a freak wave in the English Channel. Water crashed through a window, injuring a number of the 735 passengers. An 85-year-old male passenger and a woman passenger in her 70s were airlifted off the ship. The male passenger later died.
In Holborn, central London, a woman died and a man was taken to hospital after a building collapsed on to a car. The accident happened at 11.05pm last night opposite Holborn tube station, a Metropolitan police spokesman said. "There were two occupants in the car and a woman was pronounced dead at the scene. A man was pulled from the car and was taken to hospital, where he is in a stable situation at the moment."
A man also died in hospital on Friday night after being hit by a falling tree in his garden in Gwynedd during Wednesday's storm.
As 230 U.S. Olympic athletes gear up to compete in the 2014 Winter Games, the only thing colder than the slopes at Sochi is the fact that any prizes awarded by the U.S. Olympic Commission (USOC) will be taxed by the IRS. Many Americans don't realize that the U.S. taxes income earned abroad, and as such even the winnings of Olympic athletes are subject to the reach of the IRS. The USOC awards prizes to U.S. Olympic medal winners: $25,000 for gold, $15,000 for silver, and $10,000 for bronze. Relative to each athlete's income tax bracket, some top earners such as Shaun White could end up paying over a third (39.6 percent) of their winnings to the IRS.
Additionally, because the U.S. is one of only a handful of developed countries that tax income earned abroad, it is likely America's competitors will not be subject to such a tax. Taken together - the tax on Olympic athletes and the tax on income earned abroad - it can be said the U.S. has officially "earned the Gold" for having one of the most backwards and illogical tax codes in the world.
Today is the 90th anniversary of the first use of the gas chamber to execute a prisoner on death row.
An unsuccessful attempt to kill convict Gee Jon by pumping gas directly into his cell led to the use of a specially built gas chamber to finally carry out the sentence on February 8th 1924.
The last person to be executed in the gas chamber in the US is Walter LaGrand - a German national - who was executed in Arizona on March 3, 1999.
Six states, Arizona, California, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri and Wyoming, authorize the use of lethal gas under certain circumstances.
Whatever the means of execution, a condemned inmate is usually able to request a last meal of their choice.
This meal is supposed to symbolise the condemned making peace with those responsible for their death. We look back at some of the extraordinary culinary requests made by inmates.

Army Chief of Staff Ray Odierno testifying on Capitol Hill in Washington.
Data obtained by The Associated Press shows that the number of officers who left the Army due to misconduct more than tripled in the past three years. The number of enlisted soldiers forced out for drugs, alcohol, crimes and other misconduct shot up from about 5,600 in 2007, as the Iraq war peaked, to more than 11,000 last year.
The data reveals stark differences between the military services and underscores the strains that long, repeated deployments to the front lines have had on the Army's soldiers and their leaders.
Every zoo which is a member of the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria (EAZA), kills approximately five animals per year, bringing the total among the 247 EAZA constituent members to 1,735, according to the estimates of the association's spokesman David Williams Mitchell, cited by the Associated Press.
However, this statistic exempts all zoos and animal parks across the continent that do not belong to the organization.
Comment: Different animal species are going extinct every day because the agricultural industry wants its profits above their - and our - lives; the greed of conscienceless scientists is causing the death of animals due to the GMOs; Hollywood is killing animals for entertainment; sadists kill animals because they have the opportunity and they want to.
In all times through history, the respect humanity showed to the animals who cohabit our planet reflected the health of the society as a whole. News as the above and
Barbarians! Shameful! Marius the giraffe killed and dissected at Copenhagen zoo despite worldwide protests
Second giraffe named Marius at risk of being put down in Denmark
tell us that our current society's sickness has reached very dangerous levels. Read a very interesting discussion on the subject that is taking place in our forum.












Comment: A wonderful example of just how far modern human society is from being "civilized".