consumer of energy it would create a massive new demand for alternative energy which means a new high paying jobs for americans working on the cutting edge of clean technologies this is definitely something worth keeping your eye on that's it for your take my take tonight if you'd like your comments and questions heard on the segment the big picture listen up we want to know your take send us your comments by visiting the tom hartman facebook page but a twitter at tom underscore hartman or in the chat room on the message boards or through the blog at thom hartmann dot com you can also leave a message on our rant line at two two five three six fifty three zero six agree disagree sound off it's all welcome but remember that your comments may be used on the air. just. the good the bad and the very very big new. ugly good bill gates in an interview with the b.b.c. gates was asked to respond to president obama's call to increase taxes on the

wealthiest americans gate's. the united states has a huge budget deficit so taxes are going to have to go up and i certainly agree they should go up more on the rich than everyone else. that's just justice i don't feel like. people like myself are paying as much as we showed. of course mitt romney has destroyed people like gates claiming they're riddled with envy however bill gates and other billionaires like warren buffet who feel the same way have far more money than romney and view pay more taxes as doing their fair share to help the country and the economy it bill gates in the league of extraordinary rich americans are ready and willing to pay their fair share in taxes and capitalism vultures like mitt romney should be too well said bill the bad sniper crosshairs in missouri five democratic state senators missouri return to work tuesday only to

find large orange crosshairs stickers plastered over their new office nameplates the crosshairs covered the doors of only four democratic women in the state senate and the door of the democratic minority leader some of the senators remove the stickers only to find larger ones covering the doors later in the day in response the missouri capitol police have increased security around the democratic offices and the capitol as a whole but they have no leads on the possible call republicans routinely use crosshairs for political purposes most notably sarah pail and we all figured the rhetoric would be toned down after the get gabby giffords shooting last year tragically that's not the case this year. and the very very ugly rick don't google my name santorum president obama discussed his plans to increase access to higher education in his state of the union speech on tuesday in response to those plans santorum sold told c.b.s. news on wednesday that it's no wonder president obama wants every kid to go to

college indoctrination that occurs in american universities is one of the kids to the left holding to have maintain power in america. and kids learn more about the world and science they tend to vote for democrats more maybe that says something about sometimes republican party more than it says about the so-called indoctrination by the way i guess the only indoctrination prefers is the kind of teaches kids that same sex marriage eventually leads to man on dog marriages it's very clear. right now at this very moment odds are someone is get on a plane someplace with a condom full of heroin or cocaine shoved up some hole in their body all

probability is happening right now as we speak ten twenty four and t.s.a. security has no chance of finding none at all unless they want to bust out the k.-y. jelly and latex gloves but think about this that balloon could just as easily be filled with c. four plastic explosive instead of heroin and once that person is on the plane you can go in the bathroom pull out the balloon and well you can imagine what would happen and like the drugs t.s.a. security has no chance of finding explosives and because those high tech x. ray scanners that are in the airports all around the nation shooting doses of radiation at us and displaying our new bodies to t.s.a. agents. they only look at the outside of our bodies they're not keeping us safe from a terrorist attack so why the hell are we using them because we're scared stupid we're scared stupid because bush and cheney made us that way after nine eleven we got hit pretty bad but instead of telling americans we'll be ok and we'll come out

of the stronger than before bush and cheney freaked out and so did the rest of the nation instead of treating nine eleven like the crime it was and working with our allies to find those who committed it and bring them to justice in the same way clinton brought to mcveigh to justice we went on the war path we started a war in afghanistan that we're still fighting today we went to war in iraq we started an unknown number of covert wars all around the world in countries from somalia to yemen to pakistan everything our nation has done in the name of security after nine eleven has been over kill and his stereo especially if you ploy in these x. ray porno scanners in our airports back in one thousand nine hundred eight a team of radiation experts were shown some new technology by the food and drug administration in hopes of getting their takes on the public health risks of this new technology that new machine was called the secure one thousand or what is now

known as the church of x. ray porno scanner it was being used in a few prisons to make sure inmates were bringing weapons it but the machine made the radiation experts uneasy as the director of new jersey's radiation protection program joel poti said i think this is really a slippery slope i'm concerned with expanding this type of product for the traveling public. the inventor of the secure one thousand a guy named stephen w. smith agreed but he assured the health experts that places i think you are not going to see these in the next five years is lower security facilities particularly power plants embassies courthouses airports and governments i would be extremely surprised in the next five to ten years at the secure one thousand sold to any of these famous last words because three years later nine eleven happened we all got scared stupid by the bush administration and now these machines are in

airports all across the country and as for the concerns by radiation experts in one thousand nine hundred eighty eight they were largely ignored and their calls for greater research were drowned out by a massive lobbying effort by security corporations who knew that they could make a fortune off these x. ray porno scanners they knew that they could exploit our fear and they did company rapid skin which built some of these machines and spent four hundred twenty thousand dollars just in two thousand eight hundred phone lobbying lawmakers their return on that investment in lobbying was two thousand and nine contract for one hundred seventy three million dollars worth of these machines for our airports former homeland security director michael chertoff who played his part in hyping up fear while working for the bush administration went on to become a lobbyist and then went on t.v. telling the american people that these machines were needed to keep us safe and

guess who is one of chertoff lobbyists rapid skin so we all bought it hook line and sinker and now we're all being a radiated when we board airplanes a little regard to the health risks and there are risks. according to research as many as one hundred americans could get cancer from these scanners every single year and in boston union reps at logan airport worry that these scanners may be responsible for cancer clusters that are showing up among t.s.a. agents and despite requests from the union the t.s.a. has yet to provide individual dosimeters to t.s.a. agents to wear or to measure the radiation they're getting hit with from the scanners so senator susan collins is introducing legislation this week to call for a new independent health study of these scanners and some people might argue that one hundred cases of cancer plus a few sick t.s.a. agents out of the billions of passengers and flights here is a risk we're willing to take to stay safe but these scanners as i said earlier

don't work if someone wants to blow up a plane they will and ultimately our best security is actually the other passengers around us on the plane when no one's going to let that happen again these scanners are security theater brought to us by the bush administration and lobbyists who are making millions after all they work so well with their why isn't israel which is under more threat than the united states using them and why is your a band that it's time to stop being scared it's time to stop being doused with radiation and getting groped in the name of so-called security we need to become the land of the free and the home of the brave again as the airport security agent in germany said to me a year ago when she said i don't have to take off my shoes before walking through the metal detector we're not that frightened so enough with the x. rays and don't touch my junk. that's it for the big picture tonight for more information or to see any segment of the show you may have missed check out our website it's on arbonne dot com and don't forget democracy begins when you show up

when you participate get out there and get active tag your student. mission free accreditation free in-store charges free arrangement three. three stooges free. download free blog morning videos for your media projects a free media dog our t.v. dot com.

it's. more news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images where world has been seeing from the streets of canada. the giant corporations are old today.

but. bucket of the loan show at the real headlines with none of mercy me live out of washington d.c. now it's not really catch back up with a host of artie's capital account lauren lyster who's in davos and she's going to bring us all of the latest then you thought sopa and pipa are bad but we're going to revisit accept the anti-counterfeiting trade agreement that has just signed in a secret ceremony in japan by a few more countries but protesters are already coming on the streets are going to get all the details there and then newt gingrich has some

a lofty ideas for space and colonizing the moon while everyone's laughing about that we should wonder if the military really has plans for using space as the next war zone or have all that morphy tonight including a dose of happy hour but first take a look at the mainstream media has decided to miss. all right so it's yet another day and we have more obsessive coverage coming from the mainstream media about the republican candidates as they prepare for the florida primary they're continuing to stoke these fires on the battle between new king bridge and. by days until florida's republican presidential primary just hours from the c.n.n. debate mitt romney newt gingrich locked in a dead heat in the polls and this debate could be a game changer newt gingrich today is trying to rally conservatives out of tea party rallies hitting mitt romney pretty hard if you look at the polls it does seem that newt gingrich is surging as he did in south carolina beginners' doesn't have

a lot of money but he does have a super pac spending a lot of money in support of him at this point. so aside from most of the pointless banter that last little clip there really did pick up on something interesting the fact that newt gingrich's entire campaign is essentially being kept alive thanks to funds from just one single man. give this to me is worth is around twenty one billion and he and his wife have almost singlehandedly kept newt gingrich's campaign alive newt gingrich basically has kept on life support by sheldon adelson he's the son of an immigrant cab driver and the country's wealthiest according to forbes worth over twenty one billion just behind the koch brothers to a large extent gingrich's candidacy is possible thanks to billionaire if you know mogul sheldon adelson in just the past month alone he and his wife have pumped ten million dollars into the program which super pac winning our future the to give spy mr adelson ten million dollars in one month that we are aware of we've been told

that there is much more to come for him. now this ladies and gentleman is the perfect example for you of citizens united in action those that study campaign finance say that the two contributions of five million dollars apiece by adelson are the largest known political donations in u.s. history so that is how far our political system has been corrupted to where one single donor can give as much money as they want to a super pac with absolutely no restrictions and in this case it's ten million dollars i think that it's good that at least m s n b c is all over the story today but they're the only network doing so the problem there are two is that they don't take this even further they'll focus on just this one man's or question his motives how they affect the gingrich campaign but hello just because we know how much he's giving doesn't mean that he's the only one that we should be worried about it's the entire system as citizens united this created the fact that there are so many campaign contributions coming in from various super pacs that we have no idea about

and we have no idea who they're coming from according to probe just in the first four presidential primary states alone super pacs have so far spent nearly twenty million dollars on campaign activities so this is why we're seeing a nationwide movement to get citizens united overturn this is why we're seeing amendments brought up in congress resolutions passed in more than fifty cities in the u.s. thus far and it means. the media they pay very little attention to all of that so i guess it would make sense that they also paid no attention to a new bill that's being brought up in congress by two democrats in the house right now see last year democrats tried to get the disclose act passed to increase the transparency in election spending but they failed to pass it by just one single senate vote so now we suddenly hear republicans like gingrich and romney and john mccain the moaning the negative influence of money in the election so thanks to this mood and this momentum democrats are going to give it another go now this updated version of the disclose act or disclose to as it's colloquially being called would do the following it would require super pacs corporations outside

groups to stand by their ads but one of those i approve this message on the back end of that possibly even with the name of the top five funders in the at would also force corporations to disclose campaign expenditures to their shareholders it would require lobbyists to disclose their campaign expenditures to these groups and would require timely disclosure by the super pacs and the five who once before don't get me wrong by no means is a still perfect and by no means is this bill anough you know we really need is for citizens united to be overturned in this bill doesn't change the legal ruling at all but it's a start it's an attempt to at least in some way get the democracy back to expose to americans who is influencing their democracy with their money but in order for legislation like this to be noticed for the momentum to be build we need the media to actually pay attention to it to fight to get the money out of the political system now that can happen without the press also taking part so i'm asking the mainstream media this time to cover not only one donor or another but the entire

problem i'm asking them to take a look at the efforts being made to take back this toxic ruling and give us back our transparency i'm asking them to choose not to miss. well the world economic forum in davos is still underway with business and political leaders meeting and greeting and finger pointing and trying to solve the world's economic woes while basking in a luxury at a mountain resort yesterday we heard from german chancellor angela merkel today china got a little bit of grief and u.s. secretary treasury secretary tim geithner has now arrived right after an interview with bloomberg came out where he announced that if president obama wins a second term he does not plan to serve alongside him so how is davos taking the news and does it affect the weight of geithner is yet to be made statements earlier from davos i caught up with lauren lyster host of the capital account here on r.t.e.

and i first asked her if there have been any reactions to governors announcements. you know i think this is really a bigger story from what i could tell from everybody else that was maybe on the east coast because i was getting tweets from different guests and from dozens of different people about this saying hey when you see timothy geithner ask him about what he said about you know not serve in the obama administration again if obama gets reelected and maybe that obama would sack him more all of these reports and speaking about that interview but here yes word is that timothy geithner had arrived but if he's here he's maybe whisked away into some. meetings behind closed doors that i am not aware of and definitely not privy do because he's not officially on the program until tomorrow so there wasn't a whole lot of buzz about that that as far as i could see here in davos but i'll get back to you as soon as i hear more ok go i can't wait to hear that day but in the meantime today he's having all closed doors meetings tomorrow he'll finally be

giving a speech that's open to the press to we have any idea what exactly it is that he might be saying you know i'm just wondering if with this announcement that he won't be staying on if maybe tim geithner isn't going to carry as much weight on the international stage anymore. well there's been a question of how much weight timothy geithner plays on the international stage he's always asked about europe and anyways him but we have heard reports about european leaders you know shutting him out and saying get your own house in order before you tell us what to do and other meetings that he's been a part of over the time that this crisis has been dealt with so i don't know how much he's been able to play a role although of course there are always always leaders coming out saying oh we appreciate is employed and we value what he's saying so from what i've heard he is expected to address the eurozone crisis and that is an important part of what he's talking about because that's such a big part of this forum because it's such a big part of the concerns that the global economy has right now is the eurozone

crisis and a lot of people here from prime minister david cameron to george soros saying the solution for the eurozone crisis is no solution and the prognosis at this point is still bad so i think that that's a big part of it but timothy geithner's program tomorrow is about the outlook for the u.s. i believe and and for that i would imagine some of the talking points that we would typically imagine that things are getting better and things are on the up and up and all of these kind of selling points that politicians make and bureaucrats make and that we then you know dissect and discount every day. maybe the whole use the state of the union is getting stronger obama's line there although you know i guess you could say that we've also seen a little bit of anger and resentment from some european nations when you have timothy geithner coming in and telling them that they need to get their house in order and so you know in that respect i'm just wondering if ben bernanke is announcement that interest rates are going to stay where they are he doesn't see them changing until at least two thousand and fourteen if that there is any way you know what the talk is over there at davos because some are saying well hey that's

good news interest rates are going to stay low but at the same time it gives kind of a gloomy outlook for where exactly bernanke he thinks the economy is going to be headed over the next two to three years. exactly alone my question is for all these people that are bullish on the u.s. economy are saying things are getting better if things are getting so much better then why is the fed keeping interest rates at zero until the i can see for years that doesn't make me feel like things are getting better and that's making it so that savers still can't make any money and are oppressed which is a major concern for you and for people that aren't the speculators the jamie diamond the brian moynihan those guys that are here at davos as far as the reaction to the fed i think that we probably saw some from people that were asked in interviews about that that maybe we're doing press but as far as it being an important part of this forum i think very surprised at the lack or maybe i shouldn't say surprised i guess it's not surprising among this crowd that you wouldn't see it but there is a lack of attention to central banks in general criticism of central bank policy evaluating central bank policy of valuing the role of central banks that's just not

on the agenda there is one session i saw tomorrow on the prognosis for currencies for the dollar the euro and the you won which you know obviously the central banks play a large role in currencies but there's not a serious discussion about central banks or about the currency wars we see as a result of central bank policy and printing so that's kind the biggest takeaway for me interesting why i know that you know a few chinese business then were in the spotlight today and of course trying to get a lot of flak on the world stage for being a currency manipulator what not some people are saying pointing at specific bad businesses comparing them to you know the new colonist so what did they have to say for themselves and was it more of a defensive move. well you know i think that this is something that we see where china is both looked to as a beacon of hope because it's such a quickly growing economy still projected to grow nine percent second world's second largest economy driving

a lot of that growth at the same time there are concerns about the economy about housing about the fact that it is export driven and could be hurt by the eurozone crisis and be affected by moves in currencies that sort of thing so there are concerns and there are also concerns that you point to which is this perception of china and the reports i was reading coming out of the conversations had today and some of these sessions is that china is facing a perception problem that western countries think that maybe china is out to have a resource grab and a technology grab and not playing by the rules and china says the participants that spoke today said china is just trying to invest their money and not lose it not watch the the value of it diminish and that is why for the foreign investment in the sort of thing but what you can really see this clearly is if you look at it through the lens of what we've seen in the united states where you have high unemployment and people see china is growing and people accuse that china has taken manufacturing jobs and us politicians and maybe the media use that as

a scapegoat to say china is a currency manipulator china isn't playing by the rules so that there's an excuse and a villain but at the same time you don't see the u.s. actually labeling china a currency manipulator and taking that step the treasury has neglected to do that several times several years in a row since i've been covering this issue so at least two maybe more so essentially what you see is a lot of the politics that come into play but china was trying to reassure that it is. that it is playing for the rules it is investing for the proper reasons and i actually thought it was interesting i saw that the c.e.o. of nasdaq was saying in contrast to us it took to the u.s. when the u.s. had sarbanes oxley which was fresh regulations that corporate community was very disparaging. and was was not happy and was dismissive and that in contrast he said that china seems to be more and more looking towards good governance and striving towards that and it's really this perception issue are now lastly we didn't get to

the ts today but there is a theme to the world economic forum this time around it's about shaping new models and so you know you and i talked about the fact that their political leaders business leaders of over seventy billionaires there but in such crazy times you know is it really in their hands or they really think that they can shape the new models at this moment. that is a great question because so far you know you and i have been talking about this from the lens of the occupy protesters or you know the ninety nine percent that feel that they're shut out of the discussion and that's very hubris stick this one percent of elite around the globe to come together and say oh we can solve the world's problems but then there's another layer to this that i think is important to get to which is can anyone predict what the economy is going to do and claim to have any kind of solutions or new models that are going to actually solve that in a way that they can measure no matter how rich no matter how powerful no matter how

much political influence or what elected official they are because all we have seen from so many people is signs that the that nobody knows where the economy is going i mean that's something that c.e.o. their c.e.o. of pimco which is the largest bond fund in the world has told me that these are paranormal times where they don't know literally whether the whether the economy is going to move towards deflation or inflation what the impact of central bank policy is going to be if it's out of bullets which they believe it is this is something we hear from people like jim rickards who's author of currency wars and battle effect on things and how these are uncertain times as a result i mean really to act as though you know where the economy is going and that you have the policies in order to control it seems a little farfetched and i think that's probably why certain people have mixed emotions towards this world economic forum in davos a learned thing that much for filling us in and i. after the break we're going to ask should have the right to be forgotten online that is and online mobilization

and protests help prevent it from becoming law for now with a new focus shifted to accept after the break we're going to tell you about this international treaty and why people are trying to fight it. people calling what you said for free and fair elections. and we're still reporting from the. as you can hear behind me loud explosions.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harpur welcome to the big picture.