• Show live from KKZN-AM 760, Denver.


• "Brunch with Bernie" with Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont.


• Guest: Cary Carrigan, Program Director, Newstalk 1080am KUDO radio, Anchorage.


• Guest: David Sirota. His new book, "The Uprising: An Unauthorized Tour of the Populist Revolt Scaring Wall Street and Washington".


• Guest: Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman.

Topics, guests, upcoming events, quotes, links to articles, audio clips, books & bumper music.

Friday 29 August '08 show

• Show live from KKZN-AM 760, Denver.
  
• "Brunch with Bernie" with Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont. As an independent, this is Bernie's first convention. We can't sustain four more years of damage. The media focus on everything but issues, treating it like sport. Bernie:

  And that just diminishes what democracy is supposed to be about, what politics is supposed to be about. We live in a society where good and honest people have different points of view. We should respect other people's points of view. But what we should be discussing is what are the problems facing America? And what do the candidates say and do, and what is their history in addressing those problems? And I think if we get away from the gossip and I think if we get away from the drama and if we simply look at what each of these candidates stands for, there is no question that hands down Obama should win and he should win by a lot.
  
  Unfortunately, what media will focus is on gossip and process and tactics and everything else but the issues that impact the American people.
  
  The reality is that our country is in more serious trouble today than at any time since just, since the great depression. Whether it is an economy in which the middle class the sinking and poverty is increasing, in which we are seeing the most increasingly unfair distribution of income and wealth that we have seen since the 1920s. You know, the Republicans talk, as Obama mentioned last night, about an ownership society. The reality is that fewer and fewer Americans own more and more of the United States. We have the richest 1% owning more wealth than the bottom 90%. That inequality is growing.
  
  What about health care? What does John McCain have to say about health care? Well, it's four more years of Bush. Well, under Bush over seven million Americans lost their health insurance. The cost of health insurance has soared. Millions of people who even have health insurance are finding it very hard to find a doctor. Prescription drugs are the highest, we pay the highest prices in the entire world. Do we need four more years of that?
  
  Whether it is Iraq, and here is the irony of McCain prizes himself, prides himself on his foreign policy experience. Well it is the president of Iraq who ends up adopting essentially, or supporting, Obama's position on a withdrawal timetable for the withdrawal of our troops. Obama goes to France and the conservative president of France virtually endorses Barack Obama. Obama goes to Europe and hundreds of thousands of people come out and say, 'we once again want to see the United States be the kind of leader in this world that we know it can be'.
  
  Whether you look at the issue of Social Security. Get away from foreign policy. Social Security. Do people really want to trust their retirement in the volatility of the stock market? Do you really want to do that? Or do you think we should make sure that Social Security remains strong for our kids and our grandchildren which we can do easily. And Obama wants to make it strong by asking the wealthiest people to contribute more by removing the ceiling, which I think is exactly the right thing to do. The ceiling is now $104,000. And McCain wants to move us toward privatization.
  
  So I think if you just look at the issues; the economy, healthcare, global warming, foreign policy, Social Security; pay attention to the issues, don't get distracted by all of the media gossip out there, I think we're gonna win a strong victory.

  Thom watched Fox, etc. instead of attending the big ceremony. Hannity asked several Democrats why Obama should be president, none of them said it was because he has leadership skills. Bernie inspires people. The power of oil companies, money spent lobbying. Palin, inexperienced VP, McCain's health history.
  
  Will Palin decline, is it a stunt? Timing is to switch attention from Obama speech, and it's to pick up Hillary supporters. McCain, Navaho Indians, land dispute so could mine.Chess move. McCain sacrificial lamb. They want to lose to avoid the problems? Bernie does not think it is a slam dunk for Obama. Methanol. Clean coal. Renewable energy. Sarah Palin does not even know what the duties of a Vice President are. McCain is introducing Palin as a union member, yet the RNC is running ads against unions. Outrageous. Why is Obama not further ahead? Race? There's an email going around saying Obama is Jewish. Palin, it's about Alaska oil. McCain has opposed ANWR in the past. Wiki says she is for limited drilling, but is not in the pocket of oil.
  
• Bumper Music: Satellite Radio , Steve Earle.
  
• Bumper Music: Change, Bart Crow.
  
• Bumper Music: Democracy is coming to the USA, Leonard Cohen.
  
• From Thom's bio on the back of "ADD: A Different Perception":
  

  An inveterate traveler and sometimes a risk-taker, Hartmann has often found himself in the world's hot spots on behalf of the German-based Salem International relief organization or as a writer, a situation which causes his friends to sometimes wonder aloud if he works for the CIA (he does not and never has). He was, for example, in The Philippines when Ferdinand Marcos fled the country; in Egypt the week Anwar Sadat was shot; in Uganda during the war of liberation by Tanzania; in Hungary when the first East German refugees arrived; in Germany when the wall came down; in Peru when the Shining Path first bombed the presidential palace; in Beijing during the first student demonstrations; in Thailand when the military coup of 1991 occurred; in Barbados during the 2004 anti-government strikes and shutdowns; in Bogota and Medellin, Colombia, during the spate of killings of presidential candidates; in Israel, in the West Bank town of Nablus, the week the Intifada started there; on the Czech border the week Chernobyl melted down; in Kenya during the first big wave of crackdowns on dissidents; and in Venezuela during the 1991 coup attempt. He has been successful in avoiding some disasters, however. For example, he was out of the country when George H.W. Bush picked Dan Quayle as his running mate.

  
  
• Book: The Uprising: An Unauthorized Tour of the Populist Revolt Scaring Wall Street and Washington, David Sirota.
  "The Uprising is ... about the re-emergence of populist politics on both the Right and Left in America... The Uprising is all new, firsthand investigative reporting from across the country, showing how populism has become a dominant political force in both national and local politics. Sirota, a nationally syndicated newspaper columnist, takes us far from the media spotlight into the trenches where real change is happening - from the headquarters of the most powerful third party in America to the bowels of the U.S. Senate; from the auditorium of an Exxon Mobil shareholder meeting to the quasi-military staging area of a vigilante force on the Mexican border".
  
• Guest: Cary Carrigan, Program Director, Newstalk 1080am KUDO radio, Anchorage. David Sirota, columnist, author, was in the studio. Palin does not have enough experience, everybody is stunned. She looks good, a former Miss Wasila. She has baggage. Her experience has been part time PTA, part time city council member, Wasila mayor, 2 years governor in Juneau. There's an investigation into her and husband trying to get her ex brother in law state trooper fired. she started own investigation with the attorney general, a friend of hers, it's very convoluted. The Legislature's investigator, Stephen Branchflower, is really well respected.
  
  Thom was on the Jay Marvin show earlier, a caller said Palin's a wolf killer, aerial hunting. People voted twice to ban it, twice the legislature overturned and she offered a bounty for wolves. 14 pups were shot off season. They are talking about shooting bears from the air. There is a large gold and copper deposit, they want to make a mine the size of Delaware, and she said we don't need to protect the water. Salmon spawning areas. Her family fish there.
  
  David Sirota played devil's advocate and she's a smart pick in that she's a woman for Hillary supporters, and keeps the energy topic in the news. It would be hard for Obama to use inexperience against her, though it may be evident in the debates, yet Obama has a lot of experience; 12 years legislative experience, similar to Jack Kennedy, and he has more experience than George W Bush or Ronald Reagan did and he ran a community organizing program. The VP's experience is particularly important because of John McCain's age and health.
  
  43:25 Sarah Palin is 100% behind drilling in ANWR, and they have pulled that off as a plank of their platform. Her husband works there as an oil worker and is a union member. There are rumors that her 17 year old unmarried daughter is pregnant. Palin's 4 months old son has Downs Syndrome. She was 7 months pregnant before it came out that she was having a baby; she is very fit, tough, pretty.
  
  David pointed out that there is a very good chance that America will have the first black president or female vice president.
  
• It was an amazing Obama speech, now McCain has taken the news cycle.
  
• State Senator Ted Stevens is son is being investigated by the FBI for his involvement in an alleged payment scheme involving fisheries legislation brought by his father. VECO, an oil company up there, remodeled his house. Bill Allen the CEO of VECO pleaded guilty to bribery and conspiracy charges saying that almost a quarter of a million dollars in consulting fees was paid as a bribe to the younger Stevens. And Senator Ted Stevens has actually been indicted by a federal grand jury. So all of the major politicians in Alaska are under indictment or investigation for abuse of power, ethics violations.
  
  Sarah Palin's sister is divorced from a guy who is a state trooper. Sarah Palin allegedly got him fired. When the legislature decided to investigate it she went to the Attorney General and told him she wanted him to investigate first and interview everybody, she wanted to know everything that's happening. Which could be construed by some as witness tampering, or a preemptive to find out what she's going to have to defend herself against. But she's under ethics investigation for abuse of power in Alaska.
  
• Bumper Music: Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd.
  
• Ellen Ratner of Talk Radio News and her people have done a great job of radio rows and shows from places like the UN, the Sudan and the Democratic National Convention. But one host at the DNC is being impossible to pease and making a lot of noise. Please contact Talkers Magazine and tell them what a great job they have been doing.
  
• Article: A Case of Selective Justice? Adam Zagorin, Time Magazine, Oct. 04, 2007.
  
• Report: