• Guest: Climate skeptic Marc Morano, communications director for Senator James Inhofe. Global Warming.
• Guest: Ravi Batra, professor of economics at Southern Methodist University, Dallas.
• Iraq, sectarian cleansing, Senator John McCain, Zawahiri, Iran.
• Torture memos.
• Guest: Christy Harvey, Director of Strategic Communications at the Center for American Progress.

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

Thursday 03 April '08 National show

• Clip:
  [Inhofe]: "And since you were quoting the bible, I quickly ask for my, for Romans 1:25, because I couldn't remember it verbatim, but I have it in front of me now. "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator — who is for ever praised. Amen"."
  [Boxer]: "Would you repeat that, please?"
  [Inhofe]: "Yes. "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator — who is for ever praised"."
  [Boxer]: "Yes, liars should not be praised, you're right about that."
  Bible battle over polar bears. Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-CA). Ranking member Jim Inhofe (R-OK).
• Clip:
  "We'll be eight degrees hotter in 30 or 40 years and basically none of the crops will grow... "
  Ted Turner: Global warming could lead to cannibalism. Billionaire environmentalist says world has too many people.
• Article: 'No Sun link' to climate change.
  "Scientists have produced further compelling evidence showing that modern-day climate change is not caused by changes in the Sun's activity.

  The research contradicts a favoured theory of climate "sceptics", that changes in cosmic rays coming to Earth determine cloudiness and temperature.

  The idea is that variations in solar activity affect cosmic ray intensity.

  But UK scientists found there has been no significant link between cosmic rays and cloudiness in the last 20 years.

  Presenting their findings in the Institute of Physics journal, Environmental Research Letters, the University of Lancaster team explain that they used three different ways to search for a correlation, and found virtually none.

  This is the latest piece of evidence which at the very least puts the cosmic ray theory, developed by Danish scientist Henrik Svensmark at the Danish National Space Center (DNSC), under very heavy pressure.

  "
• Guest: Climate skeptic Marc Morano, communications director for Senator James Inhofe, minority leader of the US Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. Thom said Marc's side have been using the "The Great Global Warming Swindle" which says global warming is due solar radiation. 'No Sun link' article. Svensmark is saying they misinterpreted his data. Inhofe has rarely spoken of the solar theory. Global dimming, cleaning up the air. Antarctic warming or cooling? "The "small bit of ice" falling down is a cork blocking more ice.
• Bumper Music: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly, Ennio Morricone.
• Clip:
  "My primary concern is this. If the polar bear is listed under the rationale that global warming could cause a decline, then thousands of other species will follow. How can we possibly preclude any species on the planet from being listed under this rationale? The consequences to our society would be dramatic and devastating. Virtually every human activity that involves the release of carbon into the atmosphere would have to be regulated by the federal government; driving to work, harvesting corn for ethanol production, building a new road, whole cities could be sued for not restricting the number of cars that can be on the road within the city limits."
  Senator John Barrasso, Wyoming.
• If global warming is real, it is going to require a systemic response to it. We have to look at every dimension of what we're doing and basically say it's time to get the carbon out. Thom was in Sudan recently, and it is already hell. In Sudan, the desert is moving south. Glaciers are vanishing, including on Mount Hood. This increases flood risk. This will mean less water in the rivers for India, and therefore less food. Thom saw it in Sudan. See his pictures from Darfur on Thom's web site here and here and also over at Talk Radio News.
• Bumper Music: It Don't Get Any Better Than This, George Jones.
• Ice is increasing in Antarctica only in one area. Greenland is losing. Convert the sun on the desert to split water.
• Bumper Music: You can leave your hat on, Randy Newman.
• Article: Octopi Get Leg Up on Sexual Competition.
• Club of Rome. Thomas Malthus. Britain dealt with overcrowding by exporting people. As technology changes the carrying capacity of the planet increases. Julian Simon said there was nothing to worry about. Daniel Quinn's web site pointed to his.
• Article: New Limits to Growth Revive Malthusian Fears.
• Bumper Music: If you like Barack Obama, Obama Rama.
• Book: "The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight" by Thom.
• Article: The Auction-Rate Lockout.
• Guest: Ravi Batra, professor of economics at Southern Methodist University, Dallas. Author of "Greenspan's Fraud: How Two Decades of His Policies Have Undermined the Global Economy" and "The New Golden Age: The Coming Revolution against Political Corruption and Economic Chaos", "The Myth of Free Trade: The Pooring of America". Everything he has said is true. Three problems. They are still in denial. Oil price. We're eating oil. There's less left to spend on other things, including mortgages. We should look at the relationship between productivity and wages. Supply and demand, productivity and wages are main sources. Minimum wage.

  Auction rate preferred shares - prospects of liquidity? They are still paying interest. If things stabilize for a couple of months, but not likely soon. Sell piecemeal.

  Buying gold a good move? Yes, but it may not rise quickly in the next 3-4 months because has already gone up sharply. Find a broker you can trust. Gold stocks.

  What to buy with proceeds from house? Spread in CDs. FDIC guarantees 100,000 per account per person per bank.

  If we switched from oil, paradigm shift for economy? Oil monopoly on gas stations. Break down the companies.

  What do we do about undue influence of Kuwaitis? Other sovereign wealth funds. As the dollar falls oil goes up, as oil goes up, dollar goes down. Bail out borrowers, raise minimum wage sharply, break up oil companies.

  New Fed powers a power coup? Glass Steagall Act dismantled. Deregulation. Bring the act back.

  Money is the blood circulating in the economic body. The money is in the hands of a small part of the population, not circulating.

  Negative aspects of supply side economics. Growth before and after. Debt before and after. Other statistics.

  Don't let one bank split your money between others to keep accounts to $100,000, keep in control yourself. Buzzflash books.

• Bumper Music: Stand By Me, John Lennon.
• Bumper Music: Blaze Of Glory Bon Jovi (video).
• Article: Rep. Issa: 9/11 was ’simply’ a plane crash.
• Lies that were told to the 9/11 rescuers.
• Clip: CNN’s Ware: Long-Term U.S. Presence In Iraq ‘Could Actually Ferment Further Resentment Towards’ The U.S..
  "If anyone is telling you that the cleansing of Baghdad has not contributed to the fall in violence, then they either simply do not understand Baghdad or they are lying to you".
• Clip:
  "The sectarian cleansing of Baghdad has been–albeit tragic–one of the key elements to the drop in sectarian violence in the capital. Now, the US military says that violence has fallen by as much as 97% over the past year, and it’s certainly true that we’re not finding the dozens of bodies on the streets tortured and mutilated, each morning, that we once were. Now, there’s a number of factors, but the cleansing of Baghdad is definitely a part of it. It’s a very simple concept: Baghdad has been divided; segregated into Sunni and Shia enclaves. The days of mixed neighborhoods are gone. They are literally protected by either Iranian backed or U.S. backed militias, who night and day guard those neighborhoods to prevent rival death squads, be they in government uniforms or be they under al-Qaeda banners - coming in and taking victims. They are also walled off — LITERALLY — by massive concrete blast barriers that the U.S. forces put in place. So, what’s happened is that the cleansing of Baghdad means there’s simply less people to kill and of those who remain, they are much harder for a death squads to get to - it’s as plain as that."
  CNN’s Ware: Sectarian Cleansing In Baghdad ‘One Of The Key Elements To The Drop In Sectarian Violence’.
• Video: "The Power of Nightmares", Adam Curtis.
• Article: Al Qaeda’s Zawahiri Rebuts McCain: It’s ‘In The Interest’ Of Al Qaeda To See Iran Fail.
  "The dispute between America and Iran is a real dispute based on the struggle over areas of influence, and the possibility of America striking Iran is a real possibility. As for what might happen in the region, I can only say that major changes will occur in the region, and the situation will be in the interest of the Mujahideen if the war saps both of them. If, however, one of them emerges victorious, its influence will intensify and fierce battles will begin between it and the Mujahideen, except that the Jihadi awakening currently under way and the degeneration state of affairs of the invaders in Afghanistan and Iraq will make it impossible for Iran or America to become the sole decision-maker in the region."
• Bumper Music: What Do Ya Think About That, Montgomery Gentry.
• Bumper Music: I'm A Nazi, Rush Limbaugh / WNNX-FM (Atlanta, GA).
• Clip:
  "And if they -- you know, if Hillary doesn't get it -- you have to understand the mindset of a lot of these feminists and women. They think they're owed this -- just like Obama supporters think they're owed this. These women have paid their dues. They've been married two or three times; they've had two or three abortions; they've done everything that feminism asked them to do. They have cut men out of their lives; they have devoted themselves to causes and careers. And this -- the candidacy of Hillary Clinton -- is the culmination of all of these women's efforts. And if it gets stolen from them, in their minds -- not actually stolen, but if the country or if the Democrat [sic] Party rejects this wonderfully great, lying woman in exchange for a rookie, radical black guy who can't tell the time of day, they are going to be so miffed. They are going to be so upset. These Democrats are absolutely right about the anger over all this, because they are -- both sides of this equation think they are owed this nomination. "
  Limbaugh: "[A] lot of these feminists and women ... think they're owed" a Clinton win; "they've had two or three abortions".
• Clip:
  "I have long told you, for example, Undeniable Truth of Life No. 24, written back in 1987: Feminism was established so as to allow unattractive women easier access to the mainstream of society. And even to this day, people pooh-poohed this and say it's insensitive: "How can you possibly say something like that?" Well, because I mean it, because I believe there's something to it."
  The "Truth" according to Limbaugh: Feminism established "to allow unattractive women easier access to the mainstream of society".
• Sub prime mortgages.
• Bumper Music: How Did This Country Get So Bad?, Us the Band.
• Article: The Green Light.
  "As the first anniversary of 9/11 approached, and a prized Guantánamo detainee wouldn’t talk, the Bush administration’s highest-ranking lawyers argued for extreme interrogation techniques, circumventing international law, the Geneva Conventions, and the army’s own Field Manual. The attorneys would even fly to Guantánamo to ratchet up the pressure—then blame abuses on the military. Philippe Sands follows the torture trail, and holds out the possibility of war crimes charges."
• Article: Memo: Laws Didn't Apply to Interrogators.
• "On April 20, 1795, James Madison, who had just helped shepherd through the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and would become President of the United States in the following decade, wrote, "Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other."

  Reflecting on war's impact on the Executive Branch of government Madison continued his letter about the dangerous and intoxicating power of war for a president.

  "In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive [President] is extended," he wrote. "Its [his] influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war...and in the degeneracy of manners and morals, engendered by both.

  "
  Thom.
• "No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law."
  Amendment III, Bill of Rights.
• Guest: Christy Harvey, Director of Strategic Communications at the Center for American Progress, MicCheckradio.org. At CPAC last year, John Yoo debated with Bob Barr, a genuine libertarian. Barr was cheered as the man who introduced impeachment of Clinton. Yoo was booed as a professor. Yoo did a rant about 9/11 changed everything and civil liberties are not in the constitution. Non Barr said rights are guaranteed by the constitution and the Bush administration has been destroying it. The crowd turned. Thom was horrified. John Yoo's influence was more than we imagined. See "The Green Light" in the latest Vanity Fair. A memo from Yoo came out yesterday; it said Bush could ignore the 5th amendment, international law, etc., and interrogators are exempt. There's another secret memo mentioned in it from Oct 2001. Madison on war, the president's power. The third amendment. The memo was replaced after 5 months which included Abu Ghraib. Top down. Waxman going after the EPA, new rules about lead paint have too many loopholes.
• Bumper Music: Rebuild America First, Merle Haggard (free video online).
• Article: Fed called to answer for bailout of Bear Stearns.
• Ellen Ratner of Talk Radio News. Not good news. The Department of Labor says jobless claims up, the worst since Katrina. Obama said they need to expand unemployment benefits. Airline industry, FAA inspectors overseeing SW airlines raised concerns about inspections since 2003. Testimony. Yesterday United 777 flights were canceled. Banking testimony today, Chris Cox, Bernanke, Robert Steel, Federal Reserve guy. Chris Dodd's remarks. Oil subsidies, our priorities are screwed. Mukasey budget hearing, asking for new agents, analysts for border security, drug smuggling. Drug smugglers released for under 500lb, but people are jailed for a few tabs. The war on drugs is a war on poor people, black, and for prison profits, labor.