When judges or legislators break the law to enrich themselves in ways that would land you or me in jail, it damages democracy.

Republicans — and a few Democrats — have done a pretty good job of putting the grift in grifter. Most recently, the notoriously corrupt Senator Tommy Tuberville told a reporter for the UK Independent newspaper that efforts to ban his ability to make millions off insider information in the stock market would discourage other grifters from going into politics and, somehow, that would be a bad thing.

"I think it's ridiculous," Tuberville told the newspaper. "They might as well start sending robots up here... I think it would really cut back on the amount [sic] of people that would want to come up here and serve."

This is beyond disgusting: Tuberville and every other legislator or judge who wants to make money by exploiting insider information on the stock market should find a different occupation. America already has too many crooks in the vital bloodstream of our politics and governance.

Read more at HartmannReport.com.

-Thom

Thursday's Daily Stack

Article: "How Government Insider Trading Corrodes Democracy" by Thom Hartmann.

Article: "Trading on Private Information: Evidence from Members of Congress" by Serkan Karadas.

Article: "What Congress Traded in 2021" by Andrew Ross Sorkin, Jason Karaian, Sarah Kessler, Stephen Gandel, Michael J. de la Merced, Lauren Hirsch and Ephrat Livni.

Article: "Tucker Carlson calls on Burr to resign amid reports of stock selloff" by J. Edward Moreno.

Article: "David Perdue's stock trading saw an uptick as coronavirus took hold".

Article: "Conflicted Congress: Sen. Tommy Tuberville" by Business Insider.

Article: "Trump ambassadors sold stocks as president downplayed pandemic and virus was spreading" by Brian Schwartz.

Article: "Insider Trading in Frist and Delay's Office: Story Growing" by josh orton.

Article: "Sen. Burr's Brother-in-Law Called Stock Broker One Minute After Call With Senator" by Robert Faturechi.

Article: "Stock Trading Ban for Lawmakers Gains Momentum on Capitol Hill" by Jonathan Weisman.

Article: "Trump-loving GOP senator says no one will run for office if you ban lawmakers from trading stocks" by Brad Reed.

Article: "Did Sen. Feinstein Benefit from Insider Trading Related to the Pandemic?" by David Leonhardt.

Article: "Sen. Kelly Loeffler Dumped Millions in Stock After Coronavirus Briefing" by Lachlan Markay, William Bredderman, Sam Brodey.

Article: "Rand Paul discloses 16 months late that his wife bought stock in company behind covid treatment" by Isaac Stanley-Becker.

Article: "Dozens of Federal Judges Had Financial Conflicts: What You Need to Know" by Michael Siconolfi, Coulter Jones, Joe Palazzolo, James V. Grimaldi.

Article: "Why Did Martha Stewart go to Prison?" by Natalie.

Audio: "Brian Baird - Insider trading in the Halls of Congress and in the "Lobby"." by .

Article: "Berserk Frontier passenger had to be restrained by six co-flyers, claims 'DNA was stolen'" by Apoorva Singh.

Article: "Oklahoma Considers Database For Pregnant People As Roe Hangs In The Balance" by Alanna Vagianos.

Article: "Why the Mississippi abortion rights case is so important" by Jessica Glenza.

Case: "Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization" (abortion).

Case: "Roe v. Wade" (1973).

Article: "'Periods for Pence' Campaign Targets Indiana Governor Over Abortion Law" by Mitch Smith.

Article: "Trump continued his relationship with Kim Jong Un after leaving White House: report" by Sarah K. Burris.

Article: "Haberman book: Flushed papers found clogging Trump WH toilet" by Mike Allen.

Article: "Kimmel Spots Legal Fine Print That Could Keep 'Pathetic' Trump Out Of Office" by Ed Mazza.

Article: "Investigators Find Gaps in White House Logs of Trump's Jan. 6 Calls" by Luke Broadwater, Jonathan Martin, Maggie Haberman and Michael S. Schmidt.

Book: All Honorable Men: The Story of the Men on Both Sides of the Atlantic Who Successfully Thwarted Plans to Dismantle the Nazi Cartel System by James Stewart Martin.

Case: "Adkins v. Children's Hospital".

Site: MoveOn.org.

Site: Indivisible.

Article: "Lauren Boebert" by Wikipedia.

Site: Free The States (abolish abortion).

Hour Two: The Economic Impact Of the Ukraine or Taiwan War
- Economist Dr. Richard Wolff, Democracy At Work / Author of numerous books - his latest is The Sickness is the System (now also available as an e-book)

Article: "Prices climbed 7.5% in January, compared with last year, continuing inflation's fastest pace in 40 years" by Rachel Siegel and Andrew Van Dam.

Article: "The Fed is getting ready to raise interest rates" by Anneken Tappe.

Article: "Nixon shock" by Wikipedia.

Book: Free to Choose: A Personal Statement by Milton Friedman, Rose Friedman.

Article: "Nord Stream 2: The Russian pipeline that everybody's talking about" by Silvia Amaro.

Article: "Why aliens may look more like pasta rather than 'little green men'" by Tibi Puiu.

Article: "Shifting to a healthier diet can increase your lifespan by up to a decade" by Alexandru Micu.

Article: "Canada's NDP leader says trucker convoy aims to 'overthrow' gov't" by Al Jazeera.

Article: "Trucker convoy: 25 arrests made, 1,775 tickets issued since start of protests; Police say there's a 'concerted effort' to flood 911 line" by Ottawa Citizen.

Article: "How organizers with police and military expertise may be helping Ottawa convoy protest dig in" by Judy Trinh.

Quote: "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub" by Grover Norquist.

Article: "The hacked account and suspicious donations behind the Canadian trucker protests" by Anya van Wagtendonk, Benjamin Powers, Steve Reilly.

Article: "Us Posted Smallest Monthly Deficit In 2 Years In December" By Martin Crutsinger, Fatima Hussein.

Article: "Soup Nazi? Marjorie Taylor Greene Says Nancy Pelosi Leads Secret "Gazpacho Police"" by Wren Graves.

Article: "Transcript: The ReidOut, 2/9/22" (re Peter Thiel).

Article: "Peter Thiel" by Wikipedia.

Article: "Mary Trump book not nice to Uncle Don" by Chris Megerian.

Hour Three: Conversation With Great Minds - Johann Hari - Stolen Focus -Why You Can't Pay Attention and How to Think Deeply Again
- Johann Hari, Journalist & Author of 3 books including his latest, Stolen Focus / Johann studied Social and Political Science at King's College, Cambridge, and graduated with a Double First.

Article: "Your attention didn't collapse. It was stolen" by Johann Hari.

Article: "Ex-Facebook president Sean Parker: site made to exploit human 'vulnerability'" by Olivia Solon.

Article: ""We must stop tech platforms from distracting us by design"" by Thomas Moller-Nielsen.

Article: "Aza Raskin" by Wikipedia.

Article: "Michael Cloud" by Wikipedia.

Article: "Andrew Alvarez" by BallotPedia.

Article: "Experts hail big step forward in fusion technology in UK" by AP.

Article: "Nuclear-fusion reactor smashes energy record" by Elizabeth Gibney.

Article: "France announces a major buildup of its nuclear power program." by Liz Alderman.

Article: "Whitmer Calls On Canadian Officials To Reopen Ambassador Bridge" by Dylan Siwicki.

Book: The Hidden History of Big Brother in America: How the Death of Privacy and the Rise of Surveillance Threaten Us and Our Democracy by Thom Hartmann.

Article: "Facebook stock falls after exec highlights impacts from Apple privacy changes " by Emily Bary.

Article: "McConnell Says It's 'Not the Job' of RNC to Single Out Members, Calls Jan. 6 'Violent Insurrection'" by Lisa Hagen.

Article: "George Wallace" by Wikipedia.

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

It's Anything Goes Friday!

What does Build Back Better mean to West Virginians? Kathy Ferguson, Interim Executive Director - Our Future West Virginia

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

The Thom Hartmann Program, Occupying The Media 3 hours a day 5 days a week for "we the people"

And don't forget...Democracy is NOT a spectator sport...it begins with you...

Stolen Focus Why You Can't Pay Attention - Conversations With Great Minds - Johann Hari

Gangsters of Capitalism - Conversations With Great Minds - Jonathan M. Katz

Are Truckers Suckers To Foreign Troll Farm