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On Monday the Brooklyn, New York district attorney stated that no criminal acts were committed by ACORN employees who were secretly filmed giving financial advice to a pair of right-wing activists posing as a pimp and prostitute. This manufactured controversy fueled right-wing criticism of community organizing in the past 2 years at the same time that the Tea Party movement was garnering accolades from Sarah Palin. Community organizing can be done by anyone of any political persuasion. But what makes a community organizer effective and capable of sustaining a truly progressive movement? Si Kahn started his lifelong career as a community organizer by volunteering for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in 1965. In the early 1970s he organized mine workers in Harlen County, Kentucky. For the last 30 years he has worked to end for-profit private prisons and immigrant family detention centers through Grassroots Leadership, an organization he founded and is retiring from on May 1st, 2010. In his new book, Creative Community Organizing: A guide for Rabble-Rousers, Activists, and Quiet Lovers of Justice, Kahn uses his lifetime of experience to enrich this guidebook for progressive activists. The book has forewords by Jim Hightower and Angela Davis.

GUEST: Si Kahn, author of Creative Community Organizing, founder of Grassroots Leadership