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Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno joins The Great Battlefield podcast to talk about her career, being a leader at Human Rights Watch, her award winning book "There Are No Dead Here" (about human rights in Columbia) and her role at RepresentUS, where they're working to fight corruption and defend democracy.
Statement from Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno, Executive Director of the Drug Policy Alliance "While Trump is drawing from failed drug war programs to fund the wall, this is not a moment to applaud. The administration's obsession with building a border wall to stop drugs from flowing into the US is wrong-headed and wasteful. The US has spent decades trying to stop drugs through over-policing, walls, prisons, and large-scale deportations for drug offenses, with only devastation to show for it. Those resources would be better spent on programs and infrastructure that treat people with compassion and understanding by offering pathways that allow them to reach their full potential instead of incarcerating them."
This week we sat down with Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno, DPA’s executive director. We had a lot to catch up about since the last time she was on the show back in October 2017. Her new book, There Are No Dead Here: A Story of Murder and Denial in Colombia, was released in February and Maria explains how it created a little bit of controversy with a former Colombian president. We also talked about how DPA has been responding to Trump’s calls to ramp up the drug war, what’s needed to address the overdose crisis, and the future of marijuana legalization.
Lately, there have been countless articles about the rise of authoritarian regimes. One aspect of all of these regimes is, even as we’re seeing here in America, the dramatic extremes in corruption. Often fueled by power, money laundering, drugs, and simply all manner of crimes upon the public. Perhaps nowhere in contemporary times was this worse than in Columbia in the 1990s and 2000s. Amidst a complicated, murky civil war, drug cartels, corruption and unrestrained violence, the country came apart. What exactly happened, where is it today and what we can learn from it, is the subject a new and powerful book by Peruvian-American activist/writer Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno entitled There Are No Dead Here: A Story of Murder and Denial in Colombia. My conversation with Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno:
This week, Liberty and Rebecca discuss Don't Call Me Princess, All the Names They Used for God, Baby Monkey, Private Eye, and more great books. This episode was sponsored by Dreadful Young Girls and Other Stories by Kelly Barnhill and ThirdLove. Books discussed on the show: All the Names They Used for God: Stories by Anjali Sachdeva Don't Call Me Princess: Essays on Girls, Women, Sex, and Life by Peggy Orenstein I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer by Michelle McNamara A Girl's Guide to Joining the Resistance: A Feminist Handbook on Fighting for Good by Emma Gray Baby Monkey, Private Eye by Brian Selznick and David Serlin This Could Hurt by Jillian Medoff The Last Equation of Isaac Severy: A Novel in Clues by Nova Jacobs Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life by Nassim Nicholas Taleb What we're reading this week: MEM by Bethany C. Morrow A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle More books out this week: A Girl Like That by Tanaz Bhathena Daughter of the Siren Queen by Tricia Levenseller Where I Live by Brenda Rufener People Like Us by Dana Mele Eat the Apple by Matt Young A Princess in Theory: Reluctant Royals by Alyssa Cole The Tangled Lands by Paolo Bacigalupi and Tobias S. Buckell Raymond Carver's What We Talk About When We Talk About Love: Bookmarked by Brian Evenson Black Girls Rock!: Owning Our Magic. Rocking Our Truth. by Beverly Bond The Serpent's Secret (Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond #1) by Sayantani DasGupta The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist: A True Story of Injustice in the American South by Radley Balko and Tucker Carrington Chicago by David Mamet How to Think Like a Cat by Stephane Garnier Green Sun by Kent Anderson The Hush by John Hart Winter Sisters by Robin Oliveira Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman Summer Hours at the Robbers Library: A Novel by Sue Halpern The Strange Bird: A Borne Story by Jeff VanderMeer The Sea Beast Takes a Lover: Stories by Michael Andreasen There Are No Dead Here: A Story of Murder and Denial in Colombia by Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno Heart of Iron by Ashley Poston The Shape of Water by Guillermo del Toro and Daniel Kraus The Listener by Robert McCammon The Misfits Club by Kieran Crowley Behemoth: A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World by Joshua B. Freeman This Close to Happy by Daphne Merkin (paperback)