for the bread. and what drives the world the fear mongering used by politicians who makes decisions to break through that sort of a being made who can you trust no one who is in view with a global mission origi where we had a state controlled capitalism is called sasha's when nobody dares to ask we do our t. question more.

welcome back to the big picture i'm sam sachs coming up in this half hour where in the world is tom hartman he joins me in just a moment from one of the happiest places on the planet also a tiny island nation in the indian ocean is scared of sinking sea with the president of the nation is doing to prepare and what we in america should be doing to prepare for global climate change as well and later i'll tell you all about a sad story coming out of wall street the plight of the banks there is coming up in tonight's daily take.

all this week thom hartmann is doing his radio show live from reykjavik island iceland which according to a recent poll is one of the happiest nations on earth roughly half of the residents around the world say they are happy with life but in iceland seventy three percent say they are happy so what's up with up joining me now to give us an update on what he's up to and what life is like in the progressive paradise of happy iceland is none other than tom hartman tom welcome to your show a sam and in the u.s. i think it's thirty three percent said only thirty three percent of the u.s. . so what would what makes iceland so much happier than the united states. well first of all you know it's a relatively small populations there's a sense of social cohesiveness but it's a stir there's a strong social safety net here people people collaborate get along with each other they've got cradle to grave health care cradle to grave basically social security you know if you have a child you get nine months off maternity and paternity leave it's you know it's

one of those nordic. social democracies so it's your earlier guest was talking about the you know social democrats or democratic socialists it's that kind of nation and people really like it here well you know we here we have our left political dynamic and they have a political dynamic over there too and on your radio show you interviewed libertarians and conservatives so what is it what is it like being a libertarian in a conservative in iceland in regard to the social safety net in regard to universal health care cheap college you know you know social safety nets what's it like over there. you know it's such a contrast i mean i'm sitting here across in the middle of a mind blowing blizzard across from the navy. blue the volcano that jules verne made famous is the entrance to the the middle of the

earth you know you think that this is like the most god for the place on earth and in some places or for saken rather and and yet the the political parties the the people participating there's you know a genuine sense of you know. ok we're all here in this together when i had the libertarian fellow on the one this is a spokes person that you know one of the people very up in the libertarian party i said you know if you want to privatized the social safety net programs do away with free health care cost about five hundred dollars a year to go to college here you know if you've got to worry about student loans and things do away with the social security system all that and he was like well you know in principle people will as libertarians we would want to privatized all those things but we would want to do it here in iceland unless everybody agreed to it. and i want to have that conservative on from the from the national you know party from the conservative party. you know i said conservatives the united states think the we should not have a national health care system easy you know not that we are you can argue where

it's the effect of are you crazy and you know we like our national health care system and i still what about to social security system you know and he's like not that's that's that's we want that so i think mostly what makes people conservative here is they don't want to join the european union. and i mean things are working their i mean the social safety net programs are working they haven't gone through with thirty years of funding cuts and you know putting in you know mr managers in charge of these programs to so that the libertarians in america can say oh well we need to get rid of them they're not working now and i think they're working a lot harder to be a libertarian in a place where all these programs are functioning. it is i mean you know the libertarian that i spoke with and the conservative that i spoke with both have their their ideology conservative is i would say probably more progressive than bill clinton was you know then the the the new democrats that's the conservative party here but the libertarians are are very much like libertarians everywhere you

know get rid of government bloody bloody bloody. but like i said he was you know we're not going to force this on people and you know as long as things are working . you know i mean they're crowdsourcing their constitution are there because of the banks stirrers crashing the system here isn't in two thousand. just to either two thousand or two thousand and one right after the millennium and change they cried they had three state owned banks your whole profits in those banks went to the state help pay for their social security system and health care and everything all kinds of great stuff and the conservatives who are running the government went in they said hey why don't we privatized some things let's start with the state banks and so they privatized the banks and it's the people that they sold them to. start and and they deregulate. deregulate them to and so the banks just started loaning out money like there was no tomorrow and it created this incredible real estate

bubble here. that reached the point where the banks have loaned out like somewhere between ten and fourteen times the entire gross domestic product of the country the annual gross domestic product a country and that the real boom popped all over the world i mean this was happening not just in iceland they got the idea from us in one thousand nine hundred nine when phil gramm you know pushed through gramm leach bliley to do away with glass steagall and and because they are banks and and you know the british were doing the same thing and so the not quite to such a great extent so in these banks collapsed they. that. sold to like vulture funds sold them like bad debts you know so here's a bank it's got a hundred million dollars for the mortgages we'll sell it for ten million dollars because that's all we think we'll ever collect on these mortgages so these but your funds came in and bought them and to this day the icelanders don't know who's behind these vulture funds who owns them they may well be american banks they could

be you know anybody from anywhere might be you know billionaires iceland nobody else so you know they bought them for like pennies on the dollar and and then out in the they and the assumption was the by the government and everybody the country everybody assumes that when they bought these banks some penny for pennies on the dollar and the there were all these mortgages that were worth pennies on the dollar that they would go to people and say ok you've got to get a four hundred thousand dollars mortgage on a house that was originally forty thousand dollars back fifteen years ago we're going to drop that back down into forty thousand dollars because that's what we paid for the back that's what we bought the loans for but instead the banks toure's went to the person with the four hundred thousand dollars mortgage and said pay us every penny and we want to one hundred cents on the dollar i mean it's a crime here but you get the point and and not only that the same year that they got the banks there's got this thing go on this was a couple years back. they also got

a law passed and nobody noticed that it any bank repayments would be indexed to the inflation rate so in a court you know when the country crashed the currency relative to the euro other currencies crashed and so that hit the country with with a fair amount of inflation since substantial inflation so now that four hundred thousand dollars or reaches a six hundred thousand dollars mortgage that the banks just bought for forty thousand dollars and now they're demanding six hundred thousand dollars on so those of you so what's happened is that the people who were debt free before the bank crash they're doing fine they were happy the people who were so. on mortgages people who had bought a mortgage with the last two or three years many of them are kind of hung out to dry and that's caused a bit of a political split here wow that's incredible. yeah we have just a minute left here tom i understand that you are not tipping anybody while you're in iceland but there is no it's amazing and there's that eighty four percent

unionization here and it was a cab we have a local producer here for the show and i said what i took the case is we don't ship here and where it took him to dinner after the show tonight i said how much to add to the city but you know serious that we are going to put ice on my wife and he said because everybody in this country is paid a living wage and i said is that the law do you have a high minimum wage he said there is no minimum wage law he said instead because we have you know pretty much everybody in the you know in the unions get together with the employers they figure out what's a reasonable wage and that basically becomes the national minimum wage and changes you know according to conditions and inflation and what he says everybody has got a job is still went quite well thank you very much and and up until a couple years ago the unemployment rate here was between one and two percent so. that's a crisis yeah yeah so i know before you left you told me. the ground was rumbling a little bit nicely and the ball canuck activities and you've been over there now

just just as unpredicted incredible wildstorm but beyond that things are just fine all right well keep up the. fascinating interviews on the radio show and tell us the truth out of iceland and hopefully you'll get back here soon. i do my best sam thanks a lot for having all right thanks joe. and of course barring any volcanic activity tom will be back hosting the show next week. up next why are bankers on wall street throwing up good one cover the heart breaking news regarding bank to bank stir bonuses and tonight still ahead. what drives the world the fear mongering used by politicians who makes decisions to break through that sort of to be made who can you trust no one who is human view and with a global missionary see where we had a state controlled capitalism is called sasha when nobody dares to

ask we do our tea question more. while republican lawmakers stick their fingers in their home whenever science puts forth more evidence of global climate change other nations around the world are preparing including the tiny island nation of malta. floating right in the middle

of the indian ocean maldivians afraid that rising temperatures and thus rising sea waters are threatening the very existence of the nation itself last week the president of maldives mohamed nasheed warned australia to prepare for a wave of immigrants should the nation fall below new sea levels as nasheed said quote it is increasingly becoming difficult to sustain the islands in the natural manner that these islands have been and quote there are roughly three hundred fifty thousand people who call maldives homes in the nation could be the first casualty in fast approaching freak global weirding. it's time to stop ignoring the reality of climate change orning tom had for us a few weeks back. what will we're doing weather as become a total reality and it's going to get a lot worse fast here are some of the numbers when thomas jefferson wrote the declaration of independence global c o two is around two hundred eighty parts per billion where at that and by the way where it had been for hundreds of thousands

millions of years the industrial revolution fueled by coal and oil raise that number to around three hundred parts per million the highest level in two point one million years around the time of the presidency of teddy roosevelt we had three hundred fifty parts per million the upper limit this is the absolute upper limit of what you know scientists climate scientists tell us is safe for humanity we hit that in the mid one nine hundred eighty s. and look at look at what's been going on here we are in two thousand and eleven this is from c o two no doubt or and you know we're we're close in a four hundred parts per million or per billion or a per million so and this is just this is a so astounding really when you consider we're we're pumping thirty billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the air every year right now at this rate by the end of the century will be at eight hundred thirty five parts per million our planet will be functionally uninhabitable at least the way that we're working right now we have to go to near zero worldwide carbon emissions within

a decade or we're going to see some serious disasters so get involved is a bunch of great groups out there three fifty two or c o two now dot org amanda's organization and others show up participate and let your old elected officials know that you're concerned about this issue. so what some of names you know sometimes there's meanings several people's names mean other things in different languages people are named after days of the week seasons sometimes there's heritage several people are named after their parents or grandparents and sometimes there's just letters and sounds as was the case with a man arrested in wisconsin last week what began as a normal arrest of a man in possession of a concealed weapon and marijuana turned anything but normal when police found out that what the perps name was which was be. bop no i didn't just

scat that's really his name. doodoo is uppity bop bop originally born jeffrey. t. the man just recently changed his name to these out doo doo is uppity bop bop back in october just in time for it to be scrawled on a mug shot according to zoppot a facebook account enjoys such activities as eating standing like standing walking and even thinking we all like to think sometimes he likes thinking go figure as it does take a lot of thinking to come up with a name like that according to reports in the in the squad car. told police that he will quote get even with them unclearly plans to do that exactly maybe by making the officers spell his name.

so there's a really really sad story coming out of wall street today that i wanted to close the show with you tonight it's it's a story that i'm sure all of us can sympathize with that just tugs at our heartstrings and makes us remember that despite the individual hardships we might encounter in our own lives there are other people around the world who have it much much worse it's a story about the tragedy of underpaid bankers you know those poor saps who go to work day in and day out on wall street risking carpal tunnel syndrome as they manipulate money from their keyboards leaving themselves vulnerable to infections from the bluetooth pieces locked in their ears for hours on end and even putting themselves at risk of paper cuts as they sort through fraudulent foreclosure documents sadly these hardworking and risk defying bankers might take

a hit when it comes time to collect their two thousand and eleven bonuses which will be dished out over the next few weeks according to several surveys wall street bonuses are expected to be down twenty percent from what they were in two thousand and ten yet sixty two percent of bankers said they expect the same bonus or a bigger bonus than they received in two thousand and ten so something doesn't add up meaning there's going to be a lot of unhappy bankers in the next few weeks of course it should be noted here that total compensation which includes salaries benefits in bonuses is on track to far exceed two thousand and ten levels at the nation's seven biggest banks. but there's something about that bonus it's that bonus that gives the bankers meeting forget about sky high salaries they must have the bank busting bonus too it's the cherry on top it's the all of in their martini it's the bonus and if tragically they don't get their bonus then guess what the bankers are walking as the york post

reports of the executives at one wall street firm known as jeffrey's group are threatening to walk out of their job if their bonuses aren't up to par with the rest of the big banks after all how else will they be able to pay their mortgage on their fifth home if you weeks ago tom weighed in on the issue of compensation on wall street and if it was up to him these bankers should be happy with any money they did nowadays there is tonight still ahead. i'll give you one point six million reasons why these banks toure's don't deserve a nickel in bonuses one reason one reason for each child who is homeless in america one point six million according to a new study by the national center for family homelessness there are currently one point six million children homeless in the united states of america that's one in forty five kids or roughly one student per school classroom who doesn't have

a home to go back to after school that tragic number has soared since two thousand and seven since these guys these banks years wrecked our economy and also soared alongside child halmos these guys in their bonuses the organization the new bottom line is projecting that banks are bonuses at these seven banks will break a new record this year with fact cats raking in one hundred fifty six billion dollars in banks pay and bonuses one point six million children are living in the streets. of course the only reason these banks can give themselves lavish pay and bonuses is because we the taxpayers bailed them out three years ago remember that we gave citigroup twenty five billion bucks we gave j.p. morgan chase twenty five billion dollars we gave wells fargo twenty five billion bucks we gave bank of america fifteen billion bucks we gave goldman sachs ten billion bucks

a year more running of morgan stanley ten billion dollars and we gave u.s. banks six and a half billion bucks that's more than one hundred sixteen billion dollars we dished out to these banks rather than putting their executives in prison and we gave them all that money not so that they could turn around and give themselves one hundred sixty five billion dollars in pay and bonuses but instead so that they could save us and save our economy. we gave them a rescue line on the promise that they would then lead despite lending to small businesses to help keep americans in a job basically so that they could help the homeowners who they'd conned into buying exploding mortgages and they could help renegotiate the terms of those mortgages to avoid foreclosures so that they could do it banks are supposed to do keep our money safe but they didn't do any of that instead they just pocketed they stashed it in swiss bank accounts they bought new yachts so they could watch from

afar just how bad this great depression was screw the ninety nine percent of us who aren't c.e.o.'s on wall street so they could watch millions of americans lose their jobs their homes and watch one point six million children who through no choice of their own are now living in a homeless shelter a car or just on the side of the street you know how much it cost these banks two years to renegotiate the terms of all the nation's underwater mortgages something that would instantly stop the foreclosure crisis. it cost us seventy one billion dollars less than half of the fat paychecks and bonuses that they plan to pay themselves this year less than half they could give every homeowner in america who's underwater a break of five hundred forty three dollars a month enough to keep their families in their homes and still hand themselves eighty five billion dollars in pay and bonuses far more than banks was made back before reaganomics brought us all this. and as far as those one point six million

kids who are almost goes if the banks are decide to forego their bonuses this year and were paid like normal small town bankers if they said you know what we really screwed this economy up we took all of us to experiment and there are people in the streets across america madam as we're going to hold off on the lavish pay and perks and bonuses this year if they did that that money could give each of those homeless kids a full ride to college a ticket off the streets and out of the slums and right into the university to become the next doctor scientist or engineer. this isn't just an economic crisis in america this is a borel crisis and this isn't about punishing success it's about calling out irresponsible excess it's about cracking down on gluttony in wall street and it's about figuring out as a nation whether or not it's worth having multimillionaires and multibillionaires raking in that kind of pay for producing absolutely nothing and pain on average

about half the income tax that normal workers pay when more than a million children in america don't even have a home if we want to stop this injustice in america and we need to roll back reaganomics and full crackdown on wall street's high crimes and kick corporations out of our politics go to move to amend or to join the fight. and that's the big picture for more information on the stories we covered visit our website said tom hartman dot com free speech at oregon dot com also check out our two you tube channel is there a link said tom foreman dot com this entire show is also available as a free video podcast on i tunes and we have a free tell marvin i phone and i pad app at the app store you can send us feedback at twitter at tom underscore hartmann on facebook at tom underscore arbonne on our blogs message boards and telephone comment line at tom foreman dot com and as tom always says don't forget democracy begins with you get out there get active occupy

something tag your it we'll see tomorrow. morning's today violence is once again flared up. these are the images and seeing from the streets in canada. china operations are rule the day. this is our time. to reclaim the american dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth that out of many we are one that won't we breathe oh we hope. to me the american

dream is to live in peace and prosperity and freedom and a government under socialism is not a government a free. man. you . have very motivated out cross the country who are activists who are willing to fight for what they think is right for themselves but the fact is already we're bridge and. we are counting. property drowning and i think it's threatened by it's cutting off our. it's making the marker see. all but impossible.

wealthy british style. that's what i'd like for. all. markets why not this scandal find out what's really happening to the global economy with max kaiser for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines tune into cars a report on our. mission and free credit taishan free transport charges free. range mentions free risk free fees to tide free. download free broadcast quality video for your media projects and free medio dot r.t. dot com you.

will. be a. that

is not to combine to boost the euro zone and push states under the brussels umbrella but critics say it could be dealing with cash flowing to satisfy an elected technocrats. iran begins right even richmond at a secure facility on the ground a developer in the west has been damaged vocative move towards building atomic weapons and. it being generous to give us weapons out of the area at no charge so could you really have ill feelings against them. with washington at odds was of a child this many ordinary americans are sank sold to venezuela's while program as a shield against the winter chill.