i am john harbin here in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture president obama declares his plan on how to lower the nation's debt without jeopardizing the country's most vulnerable the poor and the elderly all america by it and most importantly will congress. and it seems not paying their taxes came back to haunt general walker today to talk to the activists who crossed g.e.

billions in stock losses in just a few minutes and officials in bolivia are pushing for a new law granting mother nature the same rights as you and me so how will this heal the world mentality fly in the united states. president obama delivered his big speech today outlining his deficit reduction plan the president pledged to cut four trillion dollars out of the deficit over the next twelve years reducing domestic and defense spending getting more bang for the buck in medicare and in the bush tax cuts for the very very wealthy millionaires and billionaires and closing corporate tax loopholes but far more important than any of the financial details of that speech. that will be endlessly dissected by the way is the larger frame moment this is really

a thing of great consequence in my opinion for the first time in thirty years an american president has repudiated rejected really the world view of reaganomics here's how he set it up. this debate over budgets and deficits is about more than just numbers on paper it's about more than just cutting and spending but it's about the kind of future that we want to benny's regularly called our reagan not by name unfortunately but directly called out the republican strategy of trying to bankrupt our nation in order to have an excuse to destroy our social safety net. but as far back as the one nine hundred eighty s. america started amassing debt at more alarming levels and our leaders began to realize that a larger challenge was on the horizon then he pointed out that it didn't need to be

this way you know without a single republican vote all of the president didn't point out that in fact we knew gay marriage warning that it would lead to a great depression bill clinton raised taxes on the rich and bingo gave us not just a balanced budget but a surplus until george w. bush became president of course and reverted back to full blown reaganomics we went from deficit to surplus america was actually on track to becoming completely debt free and we were prepared for the retirement of the baby groups but after democrats and republicans committed to fiscal discipline during the night we lost our way in the decade but thought we increased spending dramatically for two wars and an expensive prescription drug program but we didn't pay for any of this new spending instead we made the problem worse with trillions of dollars in

unpaid for tax cuts. tax cuts that went to every millionaire and billionaire in the country tax cuts that will force us to borrow an average of five hundred billion dollars every year over the next decade to give you an idea of how much damage this caused to our nation's checkbook consider this in the last decade if we had simply found a way to pay for the tax cuts and the prescription drug benefit our deficit would currently be at low historical levels in the coming years and then he came right out and said it the republicans want to use this budget crisis that they created to totally change america but one vision has been presented and championed by republicans in the house of representatives and embraced by several of their party's presidential candidates a seventy percent cut in clean energy

a twenty five percent cut in education a thirty percent cut in transportation cuts in college pell grants that will grow to more than one thousand dollars per year that's the proposal to vision that says if our roads crumble and our bridges collapse we can't afford to fix them. if they're bright young americans who have the drive in the will but not the money to go to college we can't afford to send them. go to china and you'll see businesses opening research labs and solar facilities. south korean children are outpacing our kids in math and science they're scrambling to figure out how they put more money into education was ill is investing billions new infrastructure and can run half their cars not on high priced gasoline but on biofuels and yet we are presented with a vision that says the american people the united states of america the greatest

nation on earth. can afford any of this vision that says america can afford to keep the promise we've made to care for seniors. it says instead of guaranteed health care you'll get a voucher. and if that voucher isn't worth enough to buy the insurance that's available in the open marketplace well tough luck you're on your own put simply it ends medicare as we know it's a vision that says up to fifty million americans have to lose their health insurance in order for us to reduce the deaths and worst of all this is a vision that says even though americans can't afford to invest in education at current levels or clean energy even though we can't afford to maintain our commitment on medicare and medicaid we can somehow afford more than one trillion

dollars in new tax breaks for the wealthy think about it. in the last decade the average income of the bottom ninety percent of all working americans actually declined meanwhile the top one percent saw their income rise by an average of more than a quarter of a million dollars each that's who needs to pay less taxes they want to give people like me a two hundred thousand dollar tax cut it's paid for by asking thirty three seniors each to pay six thousand dollars more health costs that's not right is not going to happen as long as i'm president.

of the. this vision is less about reducing the deficit than it is about changing the basic social compact in america ronald reagan's own budget director said there's nothing serious or courageous about this point hit that ronald reagan in there and this the president pointed out is fundamentally on an anti american. thought a vision of the america i know the america i know is generous and compassionate the land of opportunity and optimism yes we take responsibility for ourselves but we also take responsibility for each other. for the country we want in the future that we share were nation that built a railroad across a continent and brought light to community shrouded in darkness we sent a generation to college on the g.i.

bill and we saved millions of seniors from poverty with social security and medicare we have led the world in scientific research and technological breakthroughs that have transformed millions of lives that's who we are this is the america that i know but the president said even most rich people in america realize how twisted and sick my words not his the republican vision is being poor and right now is he said that he and warren buffet and most of the rich people frankly don't need more tax cuts and that in fact most of not even a lot them like the german businessman said they don't want to be rich people in a poor country and then finally the president completely rebutted reagan's idea that government is the cause of our problems instead government is was created by our founders to work for the american people and it can again even after the ravages of thirty years of reaganomics we believe the government can make

a difference in people's lives we have the obligation to prove that it works by making government smarter and leaner and more effective. regardless of how the details shake out or even what compromises come out of the negotiation process this was an historic speech even if when the details are worked out the final result isn't anywhere near as progressive as we'd like frankly a compromise that fully expect nonetheless it's historic because it repudiated reaganomics flat out for the first time from the white house a reclaimed to the good goodness of the american people the possibility that we can make a country that works and through coldwater right into the faces of the conservatives and republicans who want to take us back to the days of scrooge and marley even after the compromise and sausage factory work is done this is a bill that can't be undone it may well be the beginning of the end of reaganomics

mr president good idea. it's time for our daily poll your chance to tell us what you think here's today's question will the republicans crash our economy by pushing back a vote on raising the debt ceiling until july and choices are a yes or no other republican hostage crisis is in the works or be no no way they'll throw women children and poor people out on the streets and then blow up the economy so far more than sixty percent of you say yes but i got to tell morgan dot com let us know what you think the poll be open till tomorrow morning. coming out if you ever wondered what and who are the driving forces behind the tea party movement i'll talk to the director of a documentary that is uncovering the truth behind the money that's funding the so-called grassroots movement.

let's not forget that we had an apartheid regime right. i think. even one well. whenever the government says they're safe get ready because their freedom.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else here's some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm sorry there's a big picture. for .

yesterday we talked about how the tea party is using girl activism to silence progressive voices on the internet what we discovered was that most of those activism isn't springing up from the grassroots but instead being organized and paid for by super wealthy millionaires and billionaires today we're going to talk about how progressives are fighting back with their own forms of gruel activism they go to this documentary by tacky old quality astro turf wars astroturfing is something we use to describe grassroots organizations these citizens' groups are bogus and what we're really seeing is the fine and the proper property and the more determined to find out if these charges were true or when some of the funding mysteriously will fund. since it is nice to pose help. americans for prosperity as

a grassroots organization supposedly you. i'm not getting a penny for what i'm going. to be fronting for the oil industry. and revealing how that alternate citizen authorized but it's a movement that is sweeping the nation all across the country to me involved millions of people. the. thirty three being secretly guarded to suit you changes of american school for the elites so as exposing the astroturf nature of today's tea party movement the right way to go and deal a generalized movement joining me now to talk about this issue and his film is director producer talkie oldham talking welcome to the program thank you very much and thank you for joining us in our new york studio what does the average american not know about the tea party. well last year the fact that there's a lot of corporate money behind that and there's

a lot of free market audiology driving the group sort of brain effectively deciding the talking points for the tea party movement over the last eighteen months why is it that the media in the united states i mean typically if they were to introduce a representative government or a head of state or. or even an organization that's you know hey this is so and so with greenpeace or you know you know what it is or whatever why do they ignore the public masters behind the tea party why is there never any mention of that when they when they talk to dick armey or they talk with representatives of the tea already in the american media. well i think if you'd asked me that same question maybe four months ago i would have said i don't know but what you're saying i think this year and especially since it's a party movement went from being just a protest movement to actually having a side in the way the country is run especially in. light houses around the country

as well what you're saying in wisconsin for example a lot of paperwork i think are really starting to pay attention to people like the quote brothers and these groups who are plain deciding the direction of the tea party movement so originally i would have agreed with you but i think he's trying to i think there's a lot of attention now and the key is for progressives can they actually can make some of the people in the tea party movements of the truth behind what's going on i guess i guess to rephrase that and just rhetorical you know go on from there you know why is that when a tea party republican member of congress for example is in it is right and they're not it is just a koch brothers funded tea party but in any case republicans have always had the money democrats have had the ground game largely through the unions and things like that are republicans now gaining an advantage in the ground game as well with the tea party. absolutely i think that was the big game changer that if you go back i

mean the taper id movement is considered to have begun early two thousand and nine but really if you look at the kind of people the koch brothers who are a billionaire oil barons basically and a lot of the movement that they established which these called either the free market movement or the lives here in movement for thirty years they've been slowly building a network of grassroots groups and think tanks educational institutions it's what i call the coat of course of basically a vast network of interconnected groups with the sole purpose of trying to effectively get government out of the right i think out of oil party movement. business of over privatized america bicycling. for example no regulation. nor health and safety laws those kind of things effectively would govern the

business should be self-regulating and i think that with the tea party movements what it's done is that it's given a public frights through a very effective propaganda campaign it's given to public for a lot of what's been going on for a long time it's not just the last guy playing months it's the seeds of the tea party movement planted i'm hearing i do a radio program for three hours every day and have for nine years now and i'm getting more and more from people who say you know i showed up at the tea party protests i thought i was a tea partier and now i'm realizing that basically i've been a sucker that there's a bunch of page shells out there we talking points about free markets and deregulation and really what they want is more profits for giant corporations and you know to what extent do you think that this waking up i'm starting to see or hear is happening in america by by people who had identified themselves as members

of the tea party. well i think what you're saying is absolutely music to my ears because i couldn't believe what i was filming when i was filming but so many people were actively thinking that they were fighting for their own rights and for the freedoms and the founding fathers and this kind of propaganda that was going on and blatantly ignoring the fact that there was a lot of corporate money and ideological money coming in the siding what was going on the fact that people are waking up now i think is inevitable consequence of you can you can use propaganda for a while to tell people what they're fighting for is freedom the problem that the free market movement is now facing is the now actually gaining power in places like wisconsin and what has happened is you can use propaganda so far but when the actual consequences of what you're trying to do the same by the people massive job loss or massive job cuts tax cuts for the rich while you're effectively cutting

jobs and wages for everybody else people do start to realize that maybe there was a lot of rhetoric and maybe i'll go to motional involved in something their way but the reality is not quite what i bought into as they're definitely waking up thanks so much for joining us tonight my pleasure and updated television version of his documentary titled the billionaires tea party will be soon hitting the airwaves take a look at this. i think it's a series of offices and i think people are very much aware of how their thoughts are things and their feelings and how the actions are actually pieces. we hear. experience in the early interest this is not some corporate sponsors thing and they're not going to stop a spell elected from the congress that's what this little bit about this is the center of deception.

these people have a perfect right to do it and. their involvement. speaking of progressive activism a transnational corporate tax dodger g.e. got a helping spoonful of it this morning the organization us on cut a movement the works to make corporations that earn billions in profits pay their fair share of taxes targeted g.e. for a fake with a with a fake press release press release made to look like he came from g.e. communications department pledge to give back to the american people the three point two billion dollars tax credit g.e. received last year it read g.e. c.e.o. jeffrey immelt has informed the obama administration that the company will be gifty in its entirety twenty ten tax refund or three point two billion dollars to the u.s. treasury on april eighteenth tax day and will furthermore adopt a host of new policies and secure its position as

a leader in corporate social responsibility g then denied it authored the press release and the associated press admitted fault in claiming that it was authentic when it reported the story on the heels of the press release g.e. stock fell eight cents today so to g.e. get what it deserved and should progressive's keep pouring into joining me now are two of the people behind today's cokes and are boyd and justin whereas from the u.s. uncut andrew and justin welcome to the program. thank you very much good to be here great to see you guys i actually this morning before i got up a little better i was six thirty or seven in the morning i was reading the a.p. news and i thought and there was the story from g.e. and i almost forward it to my producers go and they look to those who had to do this. or that let me check this you know more later. but that was the original that was when they he was reporting you know as a why did you guys do this and how did you do it. i think

that you know to put it simply we weren't hearing what we wanted to hear from g.e. so we decided to say it for them and g.e. has paid no taxes in the last year and billions and billions of dollars in profits and in fact they're getting a tax refund from the u.s. government this year and so we just basically wanted to say listen we appreciate the tax refund but we want to give it back to you and we know that america needs it right now and we want to let you decide how we're going to give it back to you and what sort of what social services you're going to want that applied to and how it's going to happen so we decided to set for again so what do you think is going to come out of this. well you know not that this was our objective but geez stock declined by three point five billion dollars today for example so clearly it's a it's a it's a powerful tactic what we're hoping to get to have come out of this is a putting

a visual spotlight on g.e. and on sort of corporate tax avoidance in general and the prank sort of calls like basically creates a headline if only for a short amount of time while until a.p. took it down etc that people actually want to read this is a headline people want to see so it creates a kind of a momentum in expectation a sort of sense of what is possible what could be possible and what is right and then it helps to hold g.e. accountable to that they have to deny that they're doing the right thing and and then they're sort of in a in a sort of uncomfortable position and i think out it in a way and vishal rates a way they have a success so. you know we're advancing u.s. uncut there's ninety actions this tax day weekend from groups all across the country fighting against these devastating budget cuts. you know through three hundred million every sort of five hundred million dollars cut student tradition

for women for mothers and children seven hundred million cuts to local law enforcement while congress lets these corporate tax dodgers off the hook i mean that is wrong and i think america feels that in their gut and we're just giving a voice to that i'm curious just if you and andrew and and the others of you working together on this are concerned about retribution. i would be concerned well even if i could i just add right now that if we. under the under the patriot act if you interfere with commerce that's now considered terrorism and you can be you know grabbed you lose all your rights you could be sent to guantanamo and i doubt that the obama administration's going to do that but you know there could be some consequences to this. well i think we're going to concerned right now about g.e. doing the right thing and paying their taxes really you know all we did was we we basically said america if you want to hear g.e. say these things and then we're going to have to make them say and we're going to

say it's for them until they say it and so will g.e. come after us you know will the f.c.c. come after us i'm not sure you know but i think that the three point five billion dollars in market cap that g.e. shareholders lost today could have easily been a three point two billion dollars refund that g.e. paid to america but you know it's just icing the right kinds of behaviors and the larger thing in terms of interfering with commerce i mean i think our actions are attempting to make commerce more to increase commerce and united states i mean g.e. is taking profits out of the country not paying taxes on them that doesn't sound like it's a it's that sounds like it's interfering with commerce and the kind of commerce that lifts all boats so i say we are and hanson commerce not interfering with it in the in the sort of broader sense sense of things and are just very very quickly we have terms of retribution or whatever i mean this was a this was this is this is free speech this was satire there's

a whole range of legal and you know first amendment rights protections for for that kind of speech. and i'm not worried ok great. andrew justin you guys are doing great work but this was hysterical thanks so much for joining us and i don't think i get can i get one more word and get one more god which is just like you know what i said to the people twenty seconds the organization behind this is us uncut that's us uncut dot org it's a people powered organization we you know you can go to our website and start your own group and take the fight if you think that you know these tax dollars are doing is wrong just start your own group and had a bank of america you know do a do a direct action at a nearby of arise and now. that's that's the way to move this forward so i'm going with andrew and justin thank you both very much well transnational corporations can spend billions to buy members of congress to preserve their tax loopholes their

money is no good on main street we're activists and voters like you and me to make their voices heard a more creative ways. crazy or the pen the sparked an international incident at a recent meeting between czech president vaclav klaus and chilean leader sebastian pinera cameras caught the czech president red handed stealing a fancy pen and their informal meet and greet take a look at the scene from the ticket so you can see them. going to be that's. what. you'll see.