Beneath the Surface  Monday 5-6pm on KPFK 90.7FM, streaming live and archived at www.kpfk.org   

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On tonight’s Beneath the Surface:

Robert McChesney  has a new mega book out from Monthly Review Press, called (appropriately) The Political Economy of Media enduring issues, emerging dilemmas. We talk to McChesney about the deeper reasons the media trivializes, ignores or distorts the issues we all face.  What’s wrong with the coverage of the elections, the candidates, the economy, the world and more.  Danny Schechter, who also joins us, says about McChesney’s book: “As Chomsky is to linguistics, Ben & Jerry’s to ice cream and Elvis to shaking one’s hips, McChesney is to media analysis. He is the King: there is no one more definitive.”

Danny Schechter, News Dissector has a new  book project – it’s called Plunder. He says, “A plummeting economy, failing banks, rising unemployment, rocketing inflation just does not seem to engage the way the partisan wars do. We live in a sports crazed country, and a celebrity obsessed culture. We want to debate personalities, not problems. We like red carpets and balance sheets in the red. Anything else is a bummer, man. Tips on how to make millions sell; arguments on how we are all losing don't.”  Well we don’t shy away from the economic analysis on BTS so we’ve asked Danny back to give us the news!  Don’t miss it.

And we haven’t forgotten the Russia-Georgia conflict (or the way it has been brought to you by our media):  ….. joins us for a trenchant analysis by Gary Brecher the War Nerd. His writing on the conflict is like no other –  Brecher titled his piece “Georgia Tries out the Bush War Doctrine, Loses Badly.”