Conservative economic policies are eating middle-class Americans alive – and killing us, too. For any society to work, people’s basic needs have to be met, whether they have a job or not, and whether the economy is in an upswing or a downswing. As FDR laid out in his Second Bill of Rights, those basic needs include things like access to food, healthcare, housing, education and gainful employment. Unfortunately, thanks to 34 years of failed Reaganomics policies, the ability of Americans to meet those most basic of needs has all but disappeared.

A new report out from the Center for American Progress (CAP) highlights just how big a hit America’s middle-class families have taken from conservative economic policies. As CAP points out, for a typical middle-class married couple with two children, the combined costs of healthcare, day care, housing and savings for college and retirement increased a staggering 32% between 2000 and 2012.

As result, it’s become next to impossible for middle-class families to do some of the most basic of things, including having a place to call home. Housing costs have increased 28% over the past 12 years, meaning that fewer and fewer families can afford to purchase a home and build equity in it in preparation for retirement. And, Americans’ are also unable to buy a home and take on a mortgage because they’re taking 20 years to pay off the mountains of student loan debt they’re graduating college with.

Read more here.

-Thom

Tonight on The Big Picture on RT TV at 7pm and 10pm... Beyond the climate march...what's next? (check your local listings for stations or stream at RT or Free Speech TV, and catch past shows on Youtube)

Be sure to check out our new videos: CARBON & LAST HOURS - both narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio

Get your tickets now - now for a special evening with Sami Yusuf (9/26 at 8pm) featuring music from Sami's new CD, The Centre - to benefit the Foundation for Traditional Studies - at The Strathmore in N. Bethesda, MD

Need to Know: Why the founders would have dumped ALEC
- America's Lawyer Mike Papantonio, Ring of Fire Radio

Screwed: ISIS...product of Libertarian economics?
- Austin Petersen, The Libertarian Republic

Your Take / My Take Live: Call Thom LIVE at (202) 904-2134 TONIGHT 7-8pm ET (check local listings)

Beyond the climate march...what's next?
- Julian Boggs, Environment America

Free excerpt, read book for free at Truthout, buy the book!

The Daily Stack

Hour One: Thom talks ISIS and climate week with America's Lawyer
- Mike Papantonio, Ring of Fire Radio

Article: "Attorney General Eric Holder to step down" by Juliet Eilperin.

Article: "UN backs strong laws against foreign extremist fighters" by Asharq Al-Awsat.

Article: "Full text of Barack Obama's speech to the UN General Assembly".

Article: "Obama urges world to unite against ISIS network of death".

Article: "Bush Rejects Taliban Bin Laden Offer" by Kathy Gannon, Oct. 14, 2001.

Article: "G.O.P. Error Reveals Donors and the Price of Access" by Jonathan Weisman.

Article: "Saudi Arabia, key to Obama’s strategy, beheaded at least 8 people last month" by Ishaan Tharoor.

Article: "Wisconsin voter ID law ruling threatens chaos on election day" by Zoe Sullivan.

Article: "‘Why Did You Shoot Me?’: Video Shows Cop Shooting Unarmed Motorist During Traffic Stop" by Evan McMurry.

Article: "Ebola, AIDS Manufactured by Western Pharmaceuticals, US DoD?" by Dr. Cyril Broderick.

Book: The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance by Laurie Garrett.

Book: Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic by David Quammen.

Article: "Can Statins Help Treat Ebola?" by David S. Fedson and Steven M. Opal.

Article: "Real threat to Wisconsin voters worse than ‘militia’" by Meredith Clark.

Hour Two: The GOP plot to ambush the midterm elections
- Kevin Jackson, The Blacksphere

Clip: "Paul Weyrich - "I don't want everybody to vote" (Goo Goo)".

Article: "Wisconsinites Scramble To Get Voter IDs In Seven Weeks Before Election" by Alice Ollstein.

Article: "Something’s Rotten In Georgia As GOP Cries Voter Fraud To Keep Minorities From Voting" by Jason Easley.

Article: "Illinois Republicans Stand Behind Candidate Who Confessed to Committing Voter Fraud in 2008 and 2012" by Adalia Woodbury.

Article: "31 In A Billion: Election Expert's Report Shatters Right-Wing Media Voter ID Myths" by Meagan Hatcher-Mays.

Article: "US scientist Professor Yoshihiro Kawaoka's mutated H1N1 flu virus 'poses a threat to human population if it should escape,' says critic" by Steve Connor.

Article: "Exclusive: Controversial US scientist creates deadly new flu strain for pandemic research " by Steve Connor.

Case: "Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project" by Wikipedia.

Article: "Humanitarian Law Project" by Wikipedia.

Article: "FBI Identifies ISIS Militant Responsible For Beheadings" by Nicholas Salazar.

Article: "US attorney general questions whether marijuana should be in same legal category as heroin" by German Lopez.

Talk Radio News Segment:
- Victoria Jones

Article: "Attorney General Eric Holder To Resign" by Leah Schwarting.

Article: "Mass. Gov. Deval Patrick Rejects Speculation He Will Replace Holder as AG" by TWC.

Movie: "Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer".

Article: "Obama Warns Of ‘Hundreds Of Thousands’ Dead From Ebola, If Disease Unchecked" by Luke Vargas.

Article: "Iraqi PM: Islamic State Planned Attacks On US, Paris Subway Systems" by Nicholas Salazar.

Site: "Goats for the old Goat".

Site: Governor Free Don Siegelman.

Article: "TRNS News Notes- 9/25/14" by Victoria Jones.

Article: "TRNS News Notes- 9/24/14" by Victoria Jones.

Hour Three: How climate change may affect your health
- Dr. Kris Murray, EcoHealth Alliance

Article: "How Climate Change Exacerbates the Spread of Disease, Including Ebola" by Renee Cho.

Article: "Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)" by WHO.

Article: "Middle East respiratory syndrome - coronavirus (MERS-CoV)" by WHO.

Brad Blog threatened by GOP operative
- Brad Friedman, The Brad Blog

Article: "GOP Operative Threatens BRAD BLOG With Legal Action After FL Probe Confirms Our 2012 Reports on Deceptive Voter Registration Scheme, Fraud" by Brad Friedman.

Article: "The Roosevelts: An Intimate History" by Ken Burns.

Book: The Woman Behind the New Deal: The Life and Legacy of Frances Perkins, Social Security, Unemployment Insurance by Kirstin Downey.

Article: "It's Time for the US Middle Class to Make a Comeback" by Thom Hartmann.

Site: Democratic National Committee.

Site: Move to Amend

Site: Progressive Democrats of America

Site: Working America (AFL-CIO).

Article: "CHP agrees to settle, officer resigns in beating case" by Ryan Parker, Kate Mather, Richard Winton.

Quote: "I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat" - Will Rogers".

Article: "Denver Area Students Walk Out Of School In Protest" by Colleen Slevin and P. Solomon Banda.

Article: "Electoral fraud" by Wikipedia.

Article: "Mass Vote Registration in Georgia Brings Accusations of Voter Fraud" by Pema Levy.

Article: "Myth of Voter Fraud" by Brennan Center for Justice.

Article: "Is Voter Fraud a Real Problem?" by U.S. News & World Report.

Article: "24th Amendment" (voting, poll tax).

Friday on The Thom Hartmann Program, 12-3pm ET

It's Friday and that means it's Brunch with Bernie...America's Senator Bernie Sanders will be here talking about all the important issues of the week and he'll be taking YOUR calls too!

Also, Lamar Waldron drops by to talk about the Warren Commission report, 50 years on.

Plus, it's Anything Goes Friday...your turn to choose the topics we talk about...what's on your mind?

And, the best of the rest of the news along with your calls right here on...

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Can we keep the momentum going from the People's Climate March?

Vote here!

Thom's newest book!

Death by “Drive-by Doctoring”

Another Day, Another Company Ditching ALEC

The Good - The Bad - And the Very Very Levisomnously Ugly!

The Black Ice Threat to the Arctic...

Lone Liberal - How Factions are Hurting Democracy

Lone Liberal - Austerity economics is fueling global terrorism...

Isn’t It Time to Declare Neoliberalism Dead?

Full Show 9/24/14: Reaganomics Is Fueling Islamic Extremism

Tonight’s “Lone Liberal Rumble” discusses Obama’s ISIS speech at the UN, how Boehner’s lawyer is backing out of the Obama lawsuit and the right wing media’s attack of Sunday’s massive climate change march. Thom talks the UN Climate Summit with Mary Sweeters and John Deans of Greenpeace USA and how companies are ditching ALEC over climate change with Labor Economist Jane Carter. In tonight’s “Daily Take” Thom discusses how we need to take the profit motive out of our health care system.

How the GOP Plans to Ambush the Midterm Elections

Papantonio: Eric Holder Resigns, Hallelujah!

Climate Change Discussed at Clinton Global Initiative...

Singer Sami Yusuf talks about Humanitarian Work and Music...

Is it over for ALEC?

Milton Friedman Started the Syrian Civil War...

Caller: Unions are Job Insurance

Thom and Louise Hartmann founded the New England Salem Children's Village (NESCV) in New Hampshire in 1979. With states delaying payment for the children they entrust to the village, they need help with cash flow. Can you help? Now on Facebook.