so. you know. well i'm tom harvard in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture the u.s. supreme court handed another victory to rich guys who like to see more money in our politics right now in arizona public financing election was yesterday so is the right wing court officially killed publicly financed elections and pave the way for one party rule in america as parliament prepares to vote on an austerity measure that would spin greece into an economic turndown outrage public workers have

started a forty eight hours strike and taken to the streets of the debt default hanging in the balance who's going to win the standoff in the mediterranean people of greece are the banks stars of the i.m.f. and the republicans argue that the only way to avoid a greek style financial crisis here in america is to slash government spending but new data shows exactly what happens when governments tighten their wallets and let's just say it doesn't lead to economic prosperity. you need to know this another day another just supreme court decision in favor of big money in our politics yesterday in another five to four ruling the right wing of the supreme court struck down an arizona law that provides public financing of elections what was intended to level the playing field between people with huge

fortunes and rich friends and just average folks running for office by supply and matching public funds to candidates who are being outspent by private money a lot made sure that electoral politics in arizona wasn't a whoever has the most money wins sort of game the high court ruled that any attempt by the government to equalize all. opportunities as in making sure both candidates are on a level playing field financially is unconstitutional but what is constitutional to this conservative supreme court out is pretty good question corporate takeover of our democracy as decided last year in the citizens united case makes that point so how does this really make sense isn't fewer and not more corrupt of corporate dollars in our elections a good thing and did the supreme court just kill off public financing of elections here offer his take on the issue is sean parnell president of the center for competitive politics sean welcome thank you for having me tom great to have you here with us why do you hate democracy. i don't i love democracy i also love free

speech simply put the government has no role in deciding how much political speech should be in the campaign process they should not be deciding when a candidate has spoken too much we're too little that's up for candidates that's not for their supporters that's for voters that we're not talking about speech your retirement money well money enabled speech so you're going along with the boston versus what are actual arguably the buckley versus the way her decision of the supreme court that money and speech are the same thing i don't think that the founders ever would have thought that i mean jefferson warned about the danger of overblown influence of wealth bateson warned about it hamilton talked about it twice the federalist papers this is this is this is a pretty radical with early modern with the supreme court has brought this you know actually it's not i mean buckley viva layo has for thirty five years then a defining case thirty five in terms of the modern well i point i mean this is this

is not something that the founders ever would have a badge well before or before buckley though if there was not a broad attempt to limit the ability of citizens can contribute to candidates and causes of well there was no number of there were they in virtually every state there were laws about about how much money could. we spent in elections in one thousand and seventy of the children at that that said corporations can't participate in federal elections or any election at all in any way there were some laws but certainly not to the extent that there was after watergate that really triggered a rush to campaign finance regulations by corruption some of them are in fact corruption some of them are pro incumbents some of them are designed to stifle unwelcome speech just because the supreme court says something is right or is true doesn't mean it isn't this for. sure the slaves were property and the supreme court said it in eight hundred eighty nine in what was the case. and what the

separate but equal plessy versus ferguson sure supreme court said i have a lot of a lot of stupid puts over the years i'm very happy to hear that you're not stuck on precedent a lot of people when citizens united came out were absolutely hysterical over the idea that supreme court had overturned what turned out to only be a twenty year old precedent so i'm very glad all the overturned it's only come from you know so he did not just tell him act it was not overturned also because the tell because that someone who will dismiss it it's too true it was a campaign that the tillman act concerned campaign contributions to candidates well it was my point frankly i mean you know if you want to get here in the weeds and you stay there for thirty seconds because people's eyes glaze over sure is i think you know the decision that was wrongly decided was smart versus madison and i think the whole concept of judicial review should not exist it's not the constitution but that's you know that's that's where me and phyllis schlafly agree and we'll just you know but shouldn't you know let's assume tomorrow the. mccain feingold was back

in place where the dead all across the nation states like laws like arizona had like maine had like portland oregon had where if you get enough signatures and if you can prove you know another you're improving. you have some basis since from support among the populace that federal funds or state funds are used to support your candidacy and and when somebody tries to outspend you because they happen to be a millionaire or a billionaire or they have buddies who are the state will to to level this but again what possibly could be. because it's not the government's role to try and establish a level playing field as the supreme court has said the idea that the government can try and hold down the speech of some in order to elevate the speech of others is wholly foreign to the first a member of the opposite of that is is. no not

a lot certainly what you're what you're not seeing is that there is a lot of money in america on all sides of the political spectrum unless you're truly talking some fringe ideas you know restoration of the monarchy and that sort of thing the democrats don't have a problem raising money republicans don't have a problem raising money people who have ideas all across the political spectrum are able to raise money and one of the things that actually limits that his campaign can't but why should. the thing i mean it why not that i think like all the other all the other but most of the other o.e.c.d. nations when most of the e.u. nations say money is not speech well because he should speak we have a first amendment and the first thing not say money is speak you know it does not but the important thing to remember is that money and mabel's speech if that good that holds true whether you want to take one hundred dollars getting people to go to support you enable speech getting about your supporters enables there are

a lot of thing yes the media is enable speech all of that can be done without actually not very effectively without money to enable you to convey your message or really not political advertising i could be answer back over to that was a certainly because violation of the first amendment i mean can. have a right to sit to distribute their message i agree with you that it would be it would be a violation of first amendment let me out what you are arguing for would allow the banning of political ads is banned spending money so how do we are prevented we just have we have just have twenty seconds left how do we prevent this nation from becoming a nation where only the rich where the friends of the rich have political office well we don't have that system system right now and we're not heading in that direction there are candidates all over the country not have great personal wealth who are running for office who are willing who are able to few and far between having their friends which will have to leave it there thank you tom thank you for

dropping by. thanks for this most recent ruling look for even more corporate owned candidates to spring up that means more people who deny global warming more war hawks more shills for wall street billionaires will have more on this radical supreme court tonight steely take. it's time for a daily poll your chance to tell us what you think here's today's question supreme court struck down an arizona law that provides public financing of elections is this the end of any public financing your choices are yes. or no what you think will be open until tomorrow morning. crazy alert the human billboard an australian volleyball player is exploring a unique way to finance her and her partner's bid to make the two thousand and twelve summer olympics in london she's selling ad space on her body for ten thousand dollars each claire kelly is offering up one inch by one inch squares on

her left arm to be tattooed with the sponsors logo for fifty thousand dollars she's willing to tattoo her right shoulder for a sponsor the money earned will be used to join the volleyball world pro tools are a necessary first step to make it into the olympics crazy or not you can't fault her for chasing her dream now only if we can get members of congress to tattoo themselves with their corporate sponsors of the feeling republicans wouldn't have any clean skin left. coming up what do you get when you cut government spending republicans say prosperity i'll tell you the real answer after the break and show you the data that proves republicans are lying to us or comes to the bottom. it website needs twenty four seven live streaming news towns what to do about the ongoing financial hardship unlimited free high quality videos for download. and stories you never find on mainstream news. go believe that there's so many

political. posts in morning on our team don't rush to spend. a little. don't ride the bus in greece a two day strike has shut down the nation's public transportation system and riot police are now clashing with protesters in the streets of athens as the greek

parliament is set to consider eight forty billion dollar austerity package on wednesday the targets working people with spending cuts and tax hikes passing these austerity measures is the last hurdle for greece before they receive a bailout from the i.m.f. and the european union previous spending cuts by the greek government have already pushed unemployment in that nation to above sixteen percent from the public is not taking any very very kindly to even more austerity doctors ambulance drivers public transit workers and air traffic controllers among others have launched a forty eight hour strike in protest of the austerity package being shoved down their throats by bankers at the i.m.f. it is austerity really the right way to to fix greece leaders in europe are worried that a greek default could unleash a financial crisis across the continent but it is running that nation into the ground with forced us thirty measures the best way to avoid fiscal calamity and who has the upper hand in this negotiation anyway the greek government leaders of the

i.m.f. and the e.u. are thousands of greeks in the streets of athens for more on this i'm joined by mark weiss brought home ponder of the center for economics and policy research plug in back thanks great to be here great to have you with us greece's unemployment rate is already at sixteen percent and it seems that at least a good chunk of this is the result of these forced austerity measures if they cut even more government spending lay off even more people unemployment going to go up revenue collection is going to go down. how is this supposed to work well it's it's really not going to work. if you want the argument that the european authorities and the i.m.f. would. they would say that eventually the economy recovers because wages fall enough because of the huge unemployment and that the economy becomes more internationally competitive and recovers through an improving trade balance that's

the theory that's the theory they dumped on us twenty years ago too with you know this this whole well that's a whole other argument that we have seen that played out i mean you're talking about milton friedman and and chill a. happened in the many of the former soviet soviet states you know it's more like what they tried in argentina from one thousand nine hundred ninety eight to two thousand and two and actually that's a good comparison because argentina after suffering through three and a half years of recession trying to do these policies that they're imposing on greece and ireland and portugal and spain they said you know and they did very well the economy shrank sharply but only for one more quarter and then it grew sixty three percent over the next six years and pull the eleven million people out of their own some quick stats you know the stories that we're hearing in the in the in the general media that the greeks are lazy in fact they these are o.e.c.d.

statistics they work an average of twenty one hundred twenty hours a year that's six hundred ninety more than a german four hundred sixty seven more than in the u.k. three hundred sixty five more than the o.e.c.d. average greek paid leave is twenty three days the u.k. minimum is twenty eight your money is thirty so it's not that they're lazy it's not that they're taking more time off the average retirement age of sixty one point seven there's not a phony number out there that fox news has been promoting but it's a phony number this is higher than germany france italy or the e.u. twenty seven average and greece had a strong economy they were the twenty second highest quality of life index in the world two years ago higher than the u.k. germany or france twenty fourth apple g.d.p. in the world productivity was hired as of two years. ago than france germany or even the u.s. and twenty percent higher than the u.k. how is it that i that you know a country that was working has crashed and and now the the e.u. and the i.m.f. are saying ok here's we're going to do this. well there are problems similar to the

ones of the other the other ones portugal ireland and spain all of them had the same problem in the sense that the world financial crisis and recession is push them over the brink in the banks just go up yes. and what the euro has contributed to is well because you had a big influx of capital that also went out of stern trees and you had bubbles there were result of the too big to what extent is the greek crisis the result of international banks or even greek banks for that matter playing the same kind of games that we saw the game the banks playing here you know states throughout the first decade of the twenty's or twenty first century well you have the same problems everywhere with the financial sector and but i think the main thing is that the recession is what hit them they have a problem too that you know the rich people there don't pay their taxes here which

is a bit out of the seventy eight percent out of twenty it's a little bit worse there. it's a bigger proportion of their taxes that they're missing than we are and so that's part of it too but mainly it is the it's the result of the world recession but instead of raising taxes on the rich or raising foresman of taxes on the rich increase what they are doing is they are now taxing people who are working at minimum wage they raise the income tax on the poor and the working poor that's right there's a lot of regressive changes that are part of that is so scary it is and actually i mean the reason this situation is so bad in greece is because they've done the opposite of what we did here instead of a fiscal stimulus they laid off ten percent of their government workers and they did the equivalent of a eight hundred billion dollar. reduction in spending in the deficit you know it would be like. a hundred billion in the united states this is you know andrew

mellons advice to hooters that's right it is that kind of a liquid everything and you know you know the markets priced in already eighty five percent chance that they're going to default so everyone knows it is not going to work in and a half a minute here to the what if they were to abandon the you and drop through the euro go back to the drachmas that is that where it's going to end up i think it very well might end up like that. and certainly it can't you know what the europeans are trying to do with the i.m.f. is trying to do to greece isn't going to work so there is one possibility here and mark thanks so much for being here tonight thank you thanks for sharing your expertise and thoughts with us always appreciate it what's happening in greece couldn't happen here think again with america on the edge of defaulting on its debt like greece what are our lawmakers in congress doing they're working on austerity measures like to to trillion dollars in spending cuts on the backs of the middle class that frankly are going to crash our economy just like in greece banks trees

ravaged our economy and yet the working class has to clean up the mess and we're already seeing at a state level just how harmful austerity measures are on the economy i mean here's the states are basically laboratories of democracy this is pretty straightforward stuff adam hirsch at the center for american progress laid this out since the recession twenty four state here's a real clear contrast that we can look at since the recession recession began in two thousand and seven two thousand and twenty four states have cut government spending on average about sudden a half percent on the other hand twenty five states have increased government spending an average of around eleven percent so here's the laboratory let's see what the results are of the states that cut spending or that increase spending excuse me we saw unemployment go down two tenths of a percent that's a good thing if you were unemployed people you saw one point four percent increase in private employment this is that think that increase spending employment goes up and he cannot. growth goes up i have one but in the states that cuts spending that

would be the twenty fourth day that is twenty five that increased twenty four states that cut spending you saw a one percent increase in unemployment others unemployment got worse more people are out of work you saw two point one percent decrease in private employment so you know in the in the outside of the governmental area which is relatively secure in the in the private economy or in the major economy or seen jobs just emirate is bleeding and you saw a contraction keep in mind when those states that increased government spending the economy grew by half a point in those twenty five twenty five states that cut government spending there was an average of two point nine percent economic contraction was a drop in economic activity pretty straightforward conclusion the more you cut higher unemployment less economic growth on average a ten percent cut translates if you if government spending there's a simple reason for this by the way way that out before we get back into the

numbers the really simple reason for this is that when government spends money on people and government hires people government builds things whatever it may be government spending ends up in workers' pockets workers then go out into the private economy they go to the local store and local restaurant local movie theater they spend that money and those people then that makes payroll for other people and they buy products and those products then have to be manufactured by somebody and you know it's been mutilates the economy very straightforward this is econ want to learn so when states cut their money when they cut the money out of the economy a ten percent cut means that you're going to increase unemployment four tenths of a percent a one point six percent ten percent cut is going to mean a one point six percent loss in private employment we've seen this now from the numbers in the states and a ten percent cut in government spending means a one point six percent. economic contraction the economy actually gets smaller why

because rich people aren't the job creators it's people who spend money are the job creators and frankly in order to get this thing going government needs to be spending more money in the hands of the people who are the real job creators it's pretty straightforward stuff now at the same time in the in state houses all across the country where republicans are in control they're saying cut cut cut cut and what's happening is their unemployment is getting worse and worse and their economies are getting worse and worse here at the federal level here in washington d.c. republicans down the street in the capitol building are all saying cut cut cut cut and yet we know from these numbers that when you cut cut cut cut what happens an economy gets worse unemployment gets worse and more people are out of work why would the republicans want that in those states or here at the federal level i think senator chuck schumer a couple of days ago pointed out it well it certainly is beginning to look and i've

been saying it for a long time frankly but i think the rest of the world is figuring it out at the republican plan for two thousand and twelve that mitch mcconnell when he said last year his job was to make the president obama one term president the republican plan for next year is crash the economy make unemployment worse make lives miserable and then people will say ok let's throw the bomb out throw the president out with throw the democrats out and replace them with the republicans this is the republican strategy destroy the american economy and it's a horrible horrible way to play politics. coming up why has america missed the memo for all in the bankers on wall street accountable for their crimes.

let's not forget that we had an apartheid regime right. i think. even one well. whenever the government says they're going to keep you safe get ready because of their freedom. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so sleek you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear see some of the part of it and realize everything you saw. i'm sorry welcome to the big picture.

welcome back to the big picture i'm so marvin coming up in this half hour the flip flop of u.s. troops from afghanistan to iraq and back to afghanistan again has done little to

advance our goals in the middle east especially with new numbers showing the two year high in iraqi casualties so has our foreign policy turned into a giant black hole game and back here at home republicans are waging their own war against financial regulation letting banks tears run amok on wall street so is our nation's unwillingness to police or financial markets yet another tragic example of american exceptionalism. last week as president obama pitches afghanistan withdrawal plan to the american people he mentioned the iraq war as well and the progress that's been made in that country take a look. tonight we take comfort in knowing that the tide of war is receding

fewer of our sons and daughters are serving in harm's way we ended our combat mission in iraq with one hundred thousand american troops already out of that country and we've ended our combat mission in iraq except no one told the iraqi insurgents that on sunday two u.s. soldiers were killed in an attack in iraq earlier in the month another six u.s. soldiers were killed in this app and in total this month eleven u.s. soldiers have died fighting in iraq that's the most deaths in a single month in iraq since may of two thousand and nine again this is a war in which combat missions have supposedly and it what's going on here back in two thousand and two we had troops stationed in afghanistan to fight the taliban and find osama bin laden but then we sent those troops to iraq and bush's misguided illegal war and what happened in afghanistan it exploded so in two thousand and

nine president obama took troops out of iraq and something into afghanistan and now iraq is exploding so has our foreign policy in the middle east turned into a giant and deadly game of whack a mole how can we sustain this and when do we just cut our losses and clear victory and go home your offer is take is retired u.s. air force colonel cedric leighton a specialist in middle eastern security affairs as well as founder and president of cedric leighton associates colonel leighton welcome home thank you thanks for having me great to have you with us. if canada had you know if it became public knowledge that barack obama was actually born in kenya and an illegitimate president and canada invaded the united states to throw him out and save us from from a bad president. would do you think that you and i would be out on the streets fighting the canadians. probably because that would be one of those situations where you know we don't want foreign invaders we've never liked foreign invaders and other

people are the same way the iraqis don't like foreigners running their affairs and afghans don't vote for understanding that is where it's going. so shouldn't we say you know george aiken famously in one thousand nine hundred sixty six the republican senator from vermont said when a johnson when only fifty two hundred americans have died in vietnam oh well short of the fifty six thousand it was we had. at that point george aiken on the for the senate said why don't you just declare victory and go home i don't think. that would have been in vietnam that would have been a great great solution to that problem the only problem with that in this particular situation is what you do with all the other powers that are out there for example let's take iraq let's look at it would have rockets doing iraq is a nascent proto democracy and it would you have theories you have it wedged between of course saudi arabia which is the u.s. out of syria and iran will syria and iran or allies which is iran want to do iran.