Democracy Now! Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Today's Headlines

• Probe: Justice Dept. Vetted Applicants for Political Beliefs
• House Delays Medicare Payment Cuts
• Drug Lobby Spent Record $168M in 2007
• Immunity-Backing Dems Netted Higher Share of Telecom Donations
• Mugabe Dismisses Calls to Delay Vote
• Israel Closes Gaza Border, Launches Attacks
• US Defends Palestinian Boycott
• 7 Americans Die in Iraq Attacks
• White House Rejected EPA Ruling by Ignoring Email
• 5 Killed in Kentucky Plant Shooting
• San Francisco Residents Seek “George W. Bush Sewage Plant”

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  From Political Prisoner to Cabinet Minister: Legendary Brazilian Musician Gilberto Gil on His Life, His Music and the Digital Divide

  Forty years ago, the legendary Brazilian musician Gilberto Gil was a political prisoner. Today, he is a cabinet official in the Brazilian government. As protests raged across the globe in 1968, Gil was at the center of a cultural and political revolution in Brazil known as Tropicalia. The movement was seen as such a threat to Brazil’s military dictatorship that Gil was jailed, then forced into exile, where he would become one of the world’s most celebrated musicians as well as a spokesperson for Brazil’s emerging black consciousness movement. Today, Gil remains one of Brazil’s best known artists, as well as the country’s Minister of Culture. He is now spearheading a different kind of anti-establishment revolution. This time it’s about democratizing the distribution of intellectual property rights. We spend the hour with Gilberto Gil in a wide-ranging interview on his life, his music, the black consciousness movement and the future of the internet. [includes rush transcript–partial]