• How long has the government been lying to us in order to impoverish the middle class?
• Kentucky and Oregon voting today.
• Guest: Hank Stern, managing news editor, Willamette Week. Oregon is one of the most normal states.
• Guest: Mark Dice, founder of the Christian Group "The Resistance". Why is he boycotting the Starbucks' logo... does it really offend him or is he just looking for attention?
• Guest: Jeff Sharlet, the Revealer, author of "The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power".
• "Full Monty Alert": Guest: Jennifer Moss. Naked activism.

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

Tuesday 20 May '08 show

• How long has the government been lying to us in order to impoverish the middle class?
• Kentucky and Oregon voting today.
• This is the sixth year of the program.
• Article: Behind the Rise in Prices: A Plan to Torpedo the Dollar, Danny Schechter, May 19 2008.
• Article: Numbers racket: Why the economy is worse than we know, Kevin Phillips, Harpers, May 2008.
• Article: The Index of Missing Economic Indicators; The Unemployment Myth, Austan Goolsbee, November 30, 2003.
• Article: Let’s Be Serious, Bob Herbert, May 20 2008.
• Bumper Music: Cowboy In Me, Tim McGraw.
• John McCain has fired 5 advisors because of so much corruption.
• Book: "Greenspan's Fraud: How Two Decades of His Policies Have Undermined the Global Economy", Ravi Batra.
• Thom's dad could raise a family and have a pension with 2 years college; he bought a house, and house and car were paid off when he died. Thom's children can't do what his dad did. Reagan, George HW Bush, Clinton, Greenspan have seen to that. Why? An economically safe middle class is dangerous in their minds.
• Bumper Music: Do Ya, Electric Light Orchestra.
• Wagner Act.
• Article: Scrooge & Marley, Inc. - The True Conservative Agenda, Thom Hartmann, June 18, 2004.
• The reasons for previous emergences of a middle class. There are three firewalls - organized labor, (employee free choice act - unionfacts.org ad), anti trust legislation (Monopoly, Sherman Anti-trust Act), tariffs. The Lexus was heavily supported by the Japanese government.
• Bumper Music: I’ve Been Working on Vacation (I’ve Been Working on the Railroad), The Freedom Toast.
• Contest. Before the last segment of the show, go to thomhartmann.com and post a comment in response to today's "On the Program" entry. The winner gets a signed copy of .
  The winner was neclark for:
  

  …If’n the Good Lord had wanted us to strut around buck-nekked, we woulda been BORNED that way!!...

  …oh, wait…

  Pray tell what, exactly, distinguishes the Marc Dice type of aggressive Xtian prudery from that practiced by ”Islamo-Fascist Burka-Nazis”?

• Social Security Trust Fund.
• Oregon is one of the most normal, average states in America, where a lot of companies test products out, and a lot of politicians test their strategies.
• Guest: Hank Stern, managing news editor, Willamette Week. Oregon is one of the most normal states, but also the most polarized with the most liberal and the most conservative voters.The right wing are throwing ballot measures into Oregon because it's relatively cheap, then if they are successful, roll them out elsewhere. On the plus side there are medical marijuana and assisted suicide. People are passionate but reasonable. Rally. Obama's organization. Obama will win convincingly. Thom was at Coos Bay a couple of weeks ago, as Steve Novick was, and Bill Clinton had been there. In Oregon Senator Gordon Smith is a solid Republican except he turns moderate just before elections. Senator Ron Wyden is a Democrat, not up for re-election. Democrats Jeff Merkley and Steve Novick are challenging Smith.
• Bumper Music: Bring Me To Life, Evanescence.
• Guest: Mark Dice, founder of the Christian Group "The Resistance". Why is he boycotting the Starbucks' logo... does it really offend him or is he just looking for attention? Mermaid. Thom is not offended by it. Matthew 24/5. They are using this to get attention for the issues. Thom said Jesus healed them not told them to become Christians
  

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• Bumper Music: Give a Little Bit, Supertramp.
• Article: Silvio Berlusconi called as trial witness.
• Bumper Music: Free Falling, Tom Petty.
• Article: Democratic National Convention: Caterers find eco-standards tough to chew, Douglas Brown, The Denver Post, May 18 2008.
• Book: The Late Great Planet Earth, Hal Lindsey.
• The "Left Behind" book series, Jerry B. Jenkins, Tim F. LaHaye.
• There is a private face to the religious right wing, dangerous like the ideals of Hitler, Lenin, Mau, Pol Pot, Brother Douglas Coe (the "stealth persuader"), all of whom said to put them before parents, some even getting kids to kill their parents, saying it wasn't murder; it was for building the new nation.
• Article: Hillary's Prayer: Hillary Clinton's Religion and Politics, Kathryn Joyce and Jeff Sharlet, September 1, 2007, Mother Jones.
• Book: "Living History".
• Guest: Jeff Sharlet, the Revealer, author of "The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power". A very disturbing book. So-called Christian cult of some of the most famous and powerful. They minister to Brownback, Inhofe, Grassley and others. Strom Thurman. Pat Robertson's dad was their vice president. John Ashcroft, the former Attorney General. Ed Meece. Jeff stayed with The Family for a week. Jesse Helms visited. The former prime minister of Norway came. Hillary Clinton, article in Mother Jones. Barbara Ehrenreich did blurb for the book, put it in The Nation. She's a friend. Hillary Clinton's "Living History".
• Bumper Music: Move Along, The All-American Rejects (video).
• Senator Ted Kennedy has a malignant tumor.
• Bumper Music: You can leave your hat on, Randy Newman.
• Article: Woman leaves Calif., takes nearly-naked activism to Oregon, 12 May 2008.
• "Full Monty Alert": Guest: Jennifer Moss. Naked activism. She is using nudity as a form of public theater to bring causes to notice, and also for personal liberation. Public breast feeding. Sex education. Adam and Eve were naked. God made the body, man made the clothing. Legalize hemp. She wears a hemp g string. 4 July peace event, cover only genitals, in Ashland. Thom spoke at a nudist colony in the area 10 years ago.
• Bumper Music: Black Horse & The Cherry Tree, KT Tunstall.
• Clip: "As a matter of fact, in interviews in 1999 with respected journalist, and long time Bush family friend, Micky [David] Herskowitz, then Governor George Bush stated: ‘One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief. My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a chance to invade, if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it. I’m going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I’m going to have a successful presidency'." Cindy Sheehan, My Testimony for the Downing Street Memo Hearings, June 16 2005.
• Clip:
  [Joe Klein]: "I’ve done some research –"

  [John McCain]: "I have, too."

  [Joe Klein]: "And also checked with the Obama campaign, and he’s never mentioned Ahmadinejad directly by name. He did say that he would negotiate with the leaders, but as you know –"

  [John McCain]: "I kind of thought that Ahmadinejad was the leader. Maybe I’m mistaken."

  [Joe Klein]: "Maybe you are."

  [John McCain]: "Maybe. I don’t think so, though."

  [Joe Klein]: "According to most diplomatic experts, the supreme leader Ali Khamenei is the guy who’s in charge of Iranian foreign policy, and also in charge of the nuclear program. But you never mention him. Why do you always keep on talking about Ahmadinejad since he doesn’t have power in that realm?"

  [John McCain]: "Again, I respectfully disagree, when he’s the person that comes to the United Nations and declares his country’s policy is the extermination of the state of Israel, quote, in his words, “wipe them off of the map” then I know that he is speaking for the Iranian government, and articulating their policy, and was elected, and is running for reelection, as the leader of that country."

  [Joe Klein]: "One more question on that"

  [John McCain]: "The fact is that he’s the acknowledged leader of that country. You may disagree, that’s your right to do so, but I think if you asked any Average American who the leader of Iran is, I think they’d know."
  ‘The Fact Is’ John McCain Is Confused About Iran.

• Ellen Ratner of Talk Radio News in the studio. One reason Bush could bomb Iran would be to suspend elections. Thom thinks there will be pinprick strikes, he will get away with it. Ellen agrees but thinks it will backfire. Clip of Cindy Sheehan quoting Bush's biographer. NBC asked Bush if was going to invade Iran, bush smiled. She used to work in mental health, thinks Bush has an Electra complex, trying to outdo his dad in his mother's eyes. Jeb was the good son. Karl Rove short circuited plans for Jeb to be president. White knuckle sobriety, he's not worked through it, brain damage. Hearing with top oil company executives at Conyers, committee. Department of Justice audit, 1,000 FBI agents said they voiced concern abut interrogations and/or refused to participate. Carbon dioxide up 1.6% last year, Department of Energy, residential and commercial. Joint Chief of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen said one problem with Guantanamo is that countries will not take their "detainees" back; "frankly, we're stuck". Budget $525b excluding supplemental, 3.4% of GDP. John McCain does not realize that Ahmadinejad does not run Iran. He also spoke of the Cuban embargo. Tyranny will not forever endure. The embargo must stay in place. Iran evidence uncontrovertible, Fallon, Petraeus, Syrian bombing documents. Zell Miller lost it, must have brain disease.
• Bumper Music: What if you knew, David Rovics (video).