Latest Content for Old Mole Variety Hour

Today across the planet two familiar forces -— corporate capital and the broad left — are furiously contesting for the resources and authority to direct the mobilization necessary to restore a habitable planet in the little time that remains. The left’s energy networks are ... Read more

  Alice Childress, Paul Robeson and Lorraine Hansberry; Illustration by Jonathan Aprea via Wikimedia Commons, NYPL   Patricia Kullberg hosts this episode of the Old Mole, which includes the following segments: Who will own the sun and wind? Today across the planet two fa... Read more

Black artists of music, song, theater, fiction and poetry have a long association with radical left politics.  During the 1940’s and 50s, the socialist sympathies of Black artists like Paul Robeson, Lorraine Hansbury, and Alice Childress turned them into targets of the FBI,... Read more

Desiree Hellegers hosts this episode of the Old Mole, which includes the following segments: Police Reform: During the protests following the killing of George Floyd the police were on the defensive and the City Council discussed replacing the police in responding to menta... Read more

During the protests following the killing of George Floyd the police were on the defensive and the City Council discussed replacing the police in responding to mental health emergencies, in intervening in school disorder, in dealing with the homeless, in investigating polic... Read more

February 9 marked the fifth anniversary of the murder of 17-year-old Quanice “Moose” Hayes at the hands of Portland Police The event was marked by hourly online screenings of the film Silent Voices, : The film was written by Moose’s grandmother Donna Hayes. We bring audio f... Read more

Last week, Jan Haaken spoke with director AJ Wone about his new documentary DiaTribe, which screened at the opening night of the Cascade Festival of African Films. The film is a loving tribute to Portland-based Oby Addy, Ghanaian drummer and educator who died in 2012. The f... Read more

Mystery writer Diane Chamberlain combines her love of mystery writing with her concern for voter registration in her most recent novel, The Last House on the Street. Larry Bowlden reviews the 2021 novel about how the lives of two women converge in a story about voter regist... Read more

Patrica Kullberg reads exceprts from an essay she wrote for the 70th anniversary of the 1948 flood that wiped out the local World War II era local housing project known as Vanport. In the essay, she discusses the anti-racist organing by Vanporters that led to a new era of C... Read more

  Jon Nelson hosts this episode of the Old Mole, which includes the following segments: In Memoriam: Bill Resnick talks to Jane Slaughter, long time editor of the monthly publication Labor Notes, about the life and work of Mike Parker, who died this past January. Parker w... Read more