biking abdulla to keep the arab spring at bay and a controversial race based bake sale at u.c. berkeley unfortunately highlights a growing around a minute in the publicans push on this case of white privilege rights feelings. over the weekend with women who witnessed what may be a very important step forward in equal rights and one of the most unlikely places in the world saudi arabia yesterday saudi arabia's king abdullah announced that for the first time in his nation's history women will be able to vote and run for office in local elections beginning in two thousand and fifteen is a huge leap forward in a nation that's tori's for cracking down on the rights of women some say this is the latest effort by king abdulla to shield his wealthy and will rich nation from the uprising of the arab spring that has toppled dictators next door back in march

king abdullah announced a ninety three billion dollars aid package full of new jobs and services to quell unrest from disaffected saudis who may try to bring the arab spring to the kingdom of saudi arabia so far it appears to be working so what does this all mean is this really a giant step forward for women's rights or merely a gimmick for the monarchy to keep our increasingly volatile middle east or both her off or her take as a new shape hussein author of a new face point and columnist at forbes woman how he composed and ms magazine and she welcome him to his home after having me tom thank you for joining us can you describe how women are treated since in saudi arabia today well you know what it's really interesting actually because we've seen a consistent theme throughout the middle east and throughout the arab spring and demanding more rights and that per forefront of every single one of these movements have really been women and we've seen. from iran we've seen in tunisia we've seen

it in libya but what's unique about the uprising that's taking place in saudi arabia right now is that women really began it and this is a country where women are really treated like infants you know you can't travel you can't go to the doctor you can't drive without a written permission by either your father or your husband or a male guardianship so the arab spring has already arrived in saudi arabia it arrived in the form of an online campaign that started back in may to define the supply the country's notorious ban on women driving and it was an online campaign led by a young woman named i'll sharif and her detention and her arrest back in may lead to an international outcry to really remove this ban and saudi arabia is actually the only country in the world where women are not allowed by law to drive out. kuwait is very sort of kuwait actually isn't that similar there is no other country in the world where women are not allowed to drive but in kuwait women still don't

have the vote yeah so that's the one similarity looks now in saudi arabia how it has been given them hope you can decision by king abdul is the. true one you know just in terms of the practical vote i mean we have elections in north korea you know vote as you know. so both those levels are pretty well so i really don't think it's a big deal in the media has kind of taking this up like it's this huge victory for women but women were demanding the right to vote not just the right to sorry to drive not just to start the engine of their car and this is was about is about political mobility it's about social mobility it's about being able to participate in your society and move in your society without meal guardianship so the fact that they've gotten this right to vote and that's how the king has responded you know it sounds like a really big deal and it sounds like a really big news because you're a. it's such an ultra conservative society in such ultra conservative country but

the vote is not even going to take place until twenty fifteen and he women's rights issues still remain unaddressed so this is such big news in the media and you know a lot of my friends were calling me and everybody was like to hear about this news and i was like it completely sounds like a handout it is a handout what about i mean are they going to be able to drive to the voting booth that's my question are in for years apparently but on the other hand if if women have the vote and they have the right to run for office how long after those moments are voting and start running for elected office will they begin giving themselves the rights we call you back reclaiming those rights will we will this is my question i mean will there though will there presence in government in these you know local shura council is will it really mean anything is it more symbolic has another country. has in other countries meant anything in the middle east or that in areas that are culturally similar you know i really think that it's more

symbolic i think it's kind of i mean obviously a handout if it wasn't they would have addressed what the women's demands are i mean the reason that they started with the driving ban is because women were demanding an overhaul of the entire saudi system it wasn't just about driving their cars but that this is how the king has responded with a vote it's like you haven't even addressed what we were talking about in the first bush so if you think that they're going to the women of saudi arabia are going to come back to the driving ban and start beating that drum you know i really hope so i hope they don't let this go and i don't think they will let this go and i really hope you know in four years i mean who knows that nobody in the middle east nobody in the arab world this movement that was the across this region across this continent is it's really driven by young people i don't think they're going to let it go i mean they have been told for too long to wait to ask for it step by step to take it you know one step at a time and i think people have had it it's a youth driven movement and i think you know they're not going to let their demands

go and i think for years as for yours too. so to what extent do you think that the days of of the monarchy and patriarchy are limited not just in saudi arabia but in the entire week in the entire region i think it's it's outdated i mean i think i think all of these guys should have a big calendar you know in their study or in you know maybe in every room and in their kingdoms and their pals there's just counting the days because we've got the internet now we've got social media now i mean look what happened in egypt look what's happening in iran and there's only so long that you can. the youth up there you can be people down people are unemployed they're hungry i mean this man that started. uprising in yemen he was a college educated man who's who didn't have a job and he was selling fruit on the street and the police took away his permit to sell his fruit and he set himself on fire and that's how the movement started

everybody got his move is actually resonated with an entire country and then it resonated with an entire region and it's even happening in america people are not able to even selves or their families and and the power balance is just so. close to these tipping points thanks so much thank you so much for having me time to see the priests here we'll see if this really is or is not a big step forward in women's rights in saudi arabia let's hope that at least is a good incremental step because giving women more rights is one of the things in the abstract in general we can save our planet for example i want to start i want to stop the destruction of the environment. one stop the war. one of the big problems that we have is population which has seven billion people or less and want to and you know it's historically what we've said is that and by the way that human population that human footprint is using more than fifty percent of the total net photosynthetic output of the planet in other words aff of sunlight captured by

plants we're consuming which leaves every other species on earth to compete with us and while over half of the world's fresh water we're one species is consuming so our population when jesus was around at that time two thousand years ago there's a quarter billion people on the magna carta was cited was a half a billion people when jefferson became president there was a billion people one thousand eight hundred by the time that population doubled in one hundred thirty years so that when f.d.r. was sworn in there were two billion people it took and it took him to the other is fourteen years of believe it when j.f.k. was sworn in. as being over thirty years when j.f.k. was sworn in one thousand sixty three billion people jury forty four billion people one hundred seventy four thousand nine hundred eighty six five billion people george w. bush to two thousand two thousand one six million people and now we're getting seven billion people the question has been what's driving this relentless it's a lotion in the human population and arguments about put forward that it's

a women need access to birth control or they need access to fully developed economies but there is birth control and there's fully developed economies in the world where women are having six eight ten twelve kids what is it it's power we find out that when women have equal power population will stabilise in one single generation so when women women have equal power nations are less likely to go to war and are human footprint to ministries it's good for all of us let's hope this is a good first step inside iraq. it's the good the bad of a very very live for asli ugly good john hopkins university scientists there think they may have discovered the key of hearing aids at least in a test tube into research results published last week a new treatment about the removes the cellular membrane around the virus disarms

the virus he going from infecting and into the individual's immune system works in humans this could be huge news for the entire world as just last year thirty three million people were infected by aids and one point eight million people die every year due to the virus in response to the discovery a molecular biologist at john hopkins university said that science has finally broken the code of a it's a bad breath the city of bay monette alabama the city has a secret weapon to fight crime jesus beginning this week begun it is putting into place operation restore our community a program that will give criminals a choice between going to jail for their misdemeanor offenses are going to church on sunday for a year. besides the new program being flat out unconstitutional it's also discriminatory i suppose those who worship not wish not to worship jesus like someone who's jewish or muslim is forced to go to jail but the program is getting

a lot of support from both the police department and the local churches but pastor robert gates is just one of fifty six north baldwin county ministers participating in the rock initiative you show me somebody who falls in love with jesus and i'll show you a person who won't be a problem to society but that will be an influence and a help to those around i guess the pastors never heard of george tiller eric rudolph or anders breivik. and a very very ugly. lindsey graham with america's still locked in two wars and another number of other covert wars neocons like lindsey graham are beating the drum for another full out war in pakistan after news came out that pakistan's rogue intelligence agency may be responsible for attacks on americans in afghanistan graham went on fox news sunday to call for military action against pakistan but if they continue to embrace terrorism as part of their national strategy we're going

to have to put all options on the table including defending our troops that the experts believe that we need to elevate our response they will have a lot of bipartisan support on capitol hill the best ride because with a nation struggling with a terrible economy in a debt problem what we really need is another war and one against a nuclear power about maybe we should stop listening to the same guys who got us in these wars in the first place and yukon's like lindsey graham who are very very. coming out there's a specific race privilege in america the most right you were oblivious to break it down as do it. drives the world the fear mongering used by politicians who makes decisions completely break through it through and it made who can you trust no one who is you in view with noble mission would see where we had a state controlled capitalism and scald satchels when nobody dares to

ask we do our t. question more. fun. your take my take is your chance to have your questions opinions and criticisms heard here on the big picture our first comments and i came to us via twitter it

was hard to miss last week's headlines about the united states postal service pain and dire straits the postal service would be fine profitable in fact if it weren't for a bit of poison pill legislation slipped into pay into place during the bush years that requires the u.s.p.s. to set aside over just a ten year period and of cash to pay the health benefits of retirees for the next seventy five years seriously post office has to pay billions a year into a fund to pay for retirement health care for employees who are not yet even for no other government or corporate group or agency has ever been asked to do this it was purely to create a crisis in the postal service so republicans could demand that it be broken up and privatized or give to their campaign donors for the private delivery services. and create a crisis that did according to the postmaster general the postal service will be broke by next summer unless the federal government can step in and take action but

the action being proposed is darrell ices republican house plan it creates a special board that can lay off employees even if they're protected by collective bargaining agreements basically a lowing up union rights so you could end up with a guy who works a second job delivering pizza delivery in your bills personal mail and checks for pizza wages ironically darrell issa of california republican who's leading the charge to destroy the post office would probably himself not actually be able to be hired by the post office as a letter carrier because of his criminal past any of what the republicans are up to democrats on the other hand are suggesting that the post office just paid for its retirement benefits the same way every other government agency and most corporations do which would instantly solve the problem the problem is republicans like their allies control the house of representatives which is where all taxing and spending legislation must originate huge obstacles still stand in the way of a rescue package for the postal service which expects to lose more than eight

billion dollars this year and while waiting for congress the administration actually agree on a plan the postal service is desperately trying to cut costs on its own including plans to close thousands of post offices all across the country but at this point future is very much in the air so one of our viewers tweeted our wonderful vote by mail in oregon and washington will go away if the u.s.p.s. is allowed to die a bonus for cons who hate it. that's very true it's not the only ripple effect that the complete closure of the u.s.p.s. would have in the united states the post office is the second largest employer in the united states wal-mart which makes it the largest unionized employer in the entire nation republicans are desperate to destroy that union which regularly goes for the democrats so you can see how important this battle is and why they put in their ways and the legislation in the first place our next comment is also from

twitter last week after the execution of troy davis i asked of psychopaths had taken over america they were are we have benj full nation of psychopaths a bloodthirsty people who can sleep just fine at night knowing that the united states may have just executed an innocent man. if you've watched the republican debates and seen the crowds applaud death and seen gov rick perry said that he has no trouble sleeping at night over the two hundred thirty four people he's killed in texas and it sure seems like we're. your state has executed two hundred thirty four death row inmates more than any other governor in modern times have you. do you struggle to sleep at night. with the idea that any one of those might have been innocent. never struggled with it at all it's just he's never struggled with that at all and imagine putting two hundred thirty four people to death and never even

thinking about it and this is a person that worth considering as president of the united states. is that who we are so brad responded to my question and tweeted is water what. well brad as i mentioned in last week's take your blood analysis of the troubling state of affairs in the united states is unfortunately true and it goes far beyond our criminal justice system everywhere you look whether it be the endless wars in the middle east or the crimes carried out on wall street in the name of endless greed or the way that we consume energy without giving a second thought to the havoc that we're wreaking on the planet our behavior today is anything but logical there's always been a psychopathic strain in our culture and all of modern culture for that matter and that in the last century was suppressed in some places by a more compassionate approach to the environment a more compassionate criminal justice system and still social safety nets that have

allowed us to care for each other to create we societies like our ancient tribal ancestors lived in here in america these measures to root out psychopath they are being overturned left and right by people whose behavior suggests they may well be psychopaths themselves so it's time for the united states to do some soul searching will we become a nation of people who genuinely care for each other and build institutions to respect and help each other or will be will we become a brutal libertarian nation where it's every man for and self and the country is run by psychopaths choice is ours and they continue because the upcoming election will have a lot to do with determining that future but in the meantime brad i think every good turn deserves another so your tweet inspired my producers to do you got this clip which happens to be one of my all time favorite movie moments. and we.

well it's. drugs it's going to take. for other time. it's. c. l. yes we believe that it had said for your take my take that out if you like your comments and questions heard on this segment a big picture listen. we want to know your to send us your comments by visiting the martin facebook page via twitter that tom underscore apartment or in the chat room of the message boards through the blog thom hartmann. can also leave a message general rant line at two two five three six fifty three zero six agree disagree sound odd it's all welcome to remember that your comments made the news on the year.

republicans are added again stirring up all white people think that they're the real victims before hundred years of slavery on this continent and then implicitly redirecting that resentment against an african-american president in an upcoming election this time is the college republicans at the university of california berkeley they're hosting a bake sale to claim that white people are victimized by affirmative action here's how they're doing it muffins of the bake sale will sell for two bucks for white people talk about half or asians a dollar for latinos seventy five cents for blacks and only twenty five cents for native americans oh and women get an additional twenty five cents off on each purchase u.c. berkeley's student government unanimously can downed the bake sale calling it correctly discriminatory but the president of the college republicans over the name is shawn lewis responded saying we agree that the event is inherently racist but

that's the point it is no more racist than giving an individual an advantage in college admissions based solely on their race or gender. to protest policies that aim to give minorities who have been kept down for centuries a strap to pull them selves up by you know bootstrap thing you know with a racist and bake sale makes perfect sense. here's the problem which these kids are ignoring how do we create a more equal society a more just society when one particular race and gender has had a four hundred year economic head start out all the others this is called white privilege and frankly most white people are unaware of it born into it it becomes like the air we breathe it's invisible to us and us it's pointed out or

and us were deprived of it like the fact that the average wealth of white households in america is twenty times greater than that of black households according to a pew research study in two thousand and nine white households own on average about one hundred thirteen thousand dollars worth of wealth mostly in housing and savings like one households on the other hand only about five and a half thousand dollars that's twenty to one a staggering wealth inequality strictly along racial lines and for hispanics it's not much better their average household wealth is one eight hundred that of whites and this inequality has actually gotten worse over the last twenty five years not better not only that blacks still are in about fifty seven cents of every dollar

that whites are for hispanics and fifty nine cents and there's a variation on this called male privilege most women in the workplace can tell you all about and again white men are generally unaware of or totally in denial of. based on this data if the college republicans really wanted to show reality is that holding a bake sale with arbitrarily rigged prices they should sell muffins and pay their workers based on the same wealth divisions in america as in hire whites blacks hispanics to do all the same jobs that pay black people only ten bucks an hour hispanics are only eleven bucks an hour and pay the white men twenty dollars an hour and the white women seventeen dollars the unemployment rate for white people in america is a percent for blacks it's in a depression era level of sixteen point seven s.

just over eleven percent for hispanics the civil rights act of one nine hundred sixty four didn't suddenly make everything equal in america it just laid the groundwork so the minorities can at least compete on a level playing field in the economy something they were barred from doing for our nation's entire history and of course without affirmative action programs there's no way the playing field could be imagined to be level because even if the descendants of slaves jump into a field to compete against the descendants of twenty generations of slave owners they're not starting from the same place and if a group of college republicans in california or even members of congress here in washington d.c. think the civil rights act alone was enough to give minorities a fair shake in america and they really are naive or just plain ignorant or maybe they could according to the research done by richard wilkinson and kate pickett at the equality trust the united states ranks dead last in social mobility among the

rest of the o.e.c.d. nations as in it's more difficult in america for somebody to get out of poverty and join the middle class than it is anywhere else in the developed world. when you add in institutional racism the fact that today when mit did a study having identically qualified applicants for real jobs submit resumes to big companies those with african-american sounding names were after as likely to get a call back as people with white sunny names sixty to ninety percent of housing units showed that whites were not shown to blacks forty six percent of whites get help from their family to make a downpayment on their first house as opposed to twelve percent of african-americans who on average pay a half point higher interest on that mortgage when it comes to education regardless of the school the studies are in as well minority students students are less likely to be placed in honors classes even when justified by test scores and according to

the c.d.c. when rates of serious school violations are matched one for one by race nonetheless people who are visible minority students are more likely than white students to be suspended or expelled from school racism is alive and well in america particularly subtle forms of racism like i just pointed out combined with the reality of white privilege and when used for political purposes it can help win elections look back at her walker bush is really horton ads or the fact that ronald reagan gave his first speech after being nominated for president and philadelphia mississippi a little town of six thousand people in the middle of nowhere that's famous for only one thing back in the one nine hundred sixty s. three civil rights workers were brutally tortured and murdered there that's why it's so important to call our recent beating gimmicks like this one from the college republicans at u.c. berkeley for what they are someone should add to the required curriculum class on

white privilege. because in so white people figure out what every person of color in this nation already knows things will continue to stay the same and during down economic downturns like this one actually get worse that's the big picture first night for more information on the stories we covered is it our web site the thom hartmann dot com free speech dot org and archie dot com also check out our two you tube channels are along said tom hartman dot com this entire show is also available as a free video podcast on i tunes and we have a free tom hartman i phone an i pad app at the app store you can send us feedback at twitter account or score of them on facebook at saumur school in our blogs message boards and so on comment line at tom. and no forget democracy begins when you get out there and get active tag your seat and.

wealthy british style. the. market.