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Marina Sitrin talks about her essay that appears in the book,  THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING — the first book out about the Occupy Movement. And investigative reporter Greg Palast talks about his latest shocker, VULTURES’ PICNIC: In Pursuit of Petroleum Pigs, Power Pirates, and High-Finance Carnivores.

Marina Sitrin
Marina Sitrin is one of the original organizers of #Occupy Wall Street. She was one of those who started meeting in early August to create the NYC General Assembly that led to the creation of OWS.

She came to the work with a lot of experience of similar movements, first from her study of the movement in Argentina that arose ten years ago during that country’s economic crisis. She edited a book about it – Horizontalism: Voices of Popular Power in Argentina. She consulted with the Spanish March 15 movement and recently returned from talking with protesters in Greece.

Francesca caught up with her at her office in the CUNY Graduate Center in NY on November 21 to interview her about her essay in a new book, the first book about the Occupy Wall Street movement. It’s called THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING: How The 99% Woke Up. Marina Sitrin’s essay is entitled, “The Chills of Occupied Power: The First Month of Occupied Wall Street.”

A lawyer, as well as a writer and activist, Sitrin is a member of Occupy Wall Street’s legal working group.

Greg Palast
Greg Palast is the Sam Spade of investigative reporting. Like his hero, Raymond Chandler’s character Philip Marlowe, Palast is the consummate gumshoe, staking out his targets while freezing his bleeps off in back alleys in Baku or devising clever ruses to ensnare them in their palatial homes. His targets? BP executives, corrupt rulers of oil soaked dictatorships, and the financial vultures that scavenge the debts of poor countries, making them even poorer.

Palast’s new book, Vultures’ Picnic, uncovers the connection between predatory finance and dirty energy. Along the way he reveals the nuclear and oil industries’ flagrant disregard for safety — case in point: BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster, Palast says, wasn’t an accident — it was a crime scene. It’s gripping–and scary–reading.

Greg Palast does his investigating for BBC television, the Guardian and DemocracyNow! He is also the author of the The New York Times bestseller Armed Madhouse and other books.

Read an excerpt from Vulture’s Picnic
Palast’s website, including documents related to his latest investigations.