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This week on Uprising:

* Occupy Wall Street Protests Sweep the Nation
* Special Report from Occupy Los Angeles
* Killing the Cranes: A Reporter’s Journey Through Three Decades of War in Afghanistan
* Judge Allows Alabama Immigration Law – Toughest In the Nation – To Take Effect

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Occupy Wall Street Protests Sweep the Nation

Senate Democrats have just announced a plan to add a 5% surtax on American millionaires to fund President Obama’s American Jobs Act. A surtax is an additional tax upon existing taxes. Obama’s proposal involved taxing those making $250,000 or more but Democratic Senators, saying there is less Congressional party support for it, are aiming at higher incomes. According to the LA Times, “[t]he surtax would hit all forms of income, including capital gains.” Senator Majority leader Harry Reid says it could be voted on in the next few days. The proposal comes at a time when the so-called Occupy Wall Street movement calling for economic justice and decrying corporate greed, is spreading like wildfire across the country including at multiple locations here in Southern California where this program is produced. Groups are taking up the “Occupy” banner every day, applying it to their existing economic justice work, or starting new sit-ins in dozens of cities like Boston, Maine, Austin, New Orleans, New Jersey, and San Francisco, and leading media outlets to label it the “Tea Party of the Left.” In New York, the birthplace of the movement, the occupation continues in its third week. Over the past two weekends activists have been subjected to brutal and mass arrests by the NYPD. But, infused by the recent involvement of unions, the ranks of the occupation have swelled. There was a major demonstration on Wednesday, the largest yet of the three -week long occupation.

GUEST: Karen Higgins, Boston based RN, one of three co-presidents of National Nurses United, the largest union and professional association of nurses in the US

Find out more at www.nationalnursesunited.org.

Here in Los Angeles where Uprising is produced, we headed to downtown Los Angeles where the Occupy LA movement is in full force. It started on Saturday October 1st and has joined in solidarity with other existing economic justice actions throughout the week. Here is a special report from Occupy LA.

Killing the Cranes: A Reporter’s Journey Through Three Decades of War in Afghanistan

Ten years ago today, and less than a month after the September 11th terrorist attacks, US forces began bombing one of the poorest, most war-torn countries in the world – Afghanistan. Ruled by the heavily oppressive and fundamentalist Pakistan-sponsored Taliban regime, Afghanistan was targeted for harboring Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. As the bombs rained down, the US supported the so-called Northern Alliance or United Front rebels as their ground support. These militants had a history of US support against the Soviet war when they called themselves the Mujahadeen, but most of them were just as brutally oppressive and fundamentalist as the Taliban. Today, many of these figures, rewarded for their fealty to American dollars, occupy high positions in the Afghan central government, one of the most certifiably corrupt institutions in the world. Few non-Afghans know intimately the sordid history of Afghanistan, its various wars, foreign interventions, and internal dynamics. One person who has witnessed and documented firsthand much of Afghanistan’s recent history is journalist and writer Edward Girardet. As a foreign correspondent for a number of major news outlets like the Christian Science Monitor, US News and World Report, and more, Girardet began his relationship with Afghanistan in 1979, just a few months before the Soviet Union invaded and began a ten year long occupation. Drawing on his 30+ years of reporting from Afghanistan, Girardet has written a new book, “Killing the Cranes: A Reporter’s Journey Through Three Decades of War in Afghanistan.” In it, he chronicles his experiences during the Soviet occupation, his time with Ahmad Shah Massoud, the leader of the Northern Alliance, who was assassinated just days before September 11th, 2001, as well as the start of the US war, the initial fall of the Taliban, and more. Girardet points out the numerous policy blunders of the US in Afghanistan and attempts to suggest solutions to end the longest war the US has ever waged.

GUEST: Edward Girardet, reporter and author of Killing the Cranes: A Reporter’s Journey Through Three Decades of War in Afghanistan

Judge Allows Alabama Immigration Law – Toughest In the Nation – To Take Effect

Classrooms are missing students, produce is spoiling in the fields, and construction crews are short of workers in the state of Alabama since the controversial immigration bill HB 56 went into effect on September 29th. Originally slated for implementation in early September, it was delayed due to a challenge in Federal court. The Associated Press reports that the recent ruling by Judge Sharon Blackburn leaving major provisions intact will likely be appealed by the Obama administration and plaintiffs in two other lawsuits. HB 56 is being called the nation’s toughest immigration law, allowing police to check the citizenship status of individuals they reasonably suspect to be undocumented, and requiring school officials to ask for proof of citizenship from all newly enrolled students. HB 56 also makes it illegal for a landlord to rent property to undocumented immigrants. Judge Blackburn blocked four more extreme measures, including one that made it a crime to harbor or transport undocumented people. Early this year the Pew Center estimated that 4.2 percent of Alabama’s workforce, or about 95,000 undocumented workers were employed in the state between 2009-2010. Even before implementation last week local sources reported the legislation drove a significant number of immigrants out of Alabama. The Alabama Huntsville Times last week reported on one member of the local Associated Builders and Contractors observing, “[t]here was a big misconception that there were long lines formed by Alabamians who wanted these labor-intensive jobs.” Alabama schools are also scrambling to mitigate damage done to attendance. The Alabama Department of Education recently released statistics analyzed by Politico, showing a dramatic rise in absences of Latino students coinciding with last week’s ruling on HB 56. Over 2,200 of them missed school on Monday, double the usual number.

GUEST: Maria-Elena Hincapie, Executive Director of the National Immigration Law Center

Find out more at www.nilc.org.

Sonali’s Subversive Thought for the Day

“Truth is by nature self-evident. As soon as you remove the cobwebs of ignorance that surround it, it shines clear.” — Mohandas Gandhi