well i'm tom hartman in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture. super pacs raise more money in january than campaigns themselves who's really running for president the g.o.p. candidates are getting a billionaire's also will we see a brokered convention in the republican party and could third party candidate make a splash come november more on those topics and more into nights alone liberal rumble and inside the daily take how has corporate america created a nation of drug addicts. you need to know this meet the two thousand and twelve republican candidates for president no not these guys they're just the front men i'm talking about these guys . these are the guys actually running to control the office of the presidency of

the united states you don't need to know the names in fact you don't they don't want you to know their names but these are the faces behind the super pacs those opaque front groups that were created by the supreme court's citizens united decision and through them millionaires and billionaires and corporations even foreign corporations the pay three hundred bucks to open a u.s. branch and spend unlimited amounts of money to build up or destroy the political candidates of their choice want proof that it's the super pacs running for control of the white house and not people like romney or santorum last month the super pacs actually raised more money than the candidates did themselves in january the individual campaigns of romney santorum gingrich and paul rate in two point one million dollars at the super pac supporting these candidates beat that raising twenty two point one million dollars and that doesn't even include other right wing super pacs like karl rove's american cross and g.p.s. it's on its way to raising over one hundred million dollars but hasn't yet started

spending it in a big way so it isn't so far seen as affiliated with a candidate and unlike campaign contributions to which people can only go to twenty five hundred dollars there's no limit for super pacs so the average donation last month was a whopping sixty three thousand dollars that's almost three times more money than the media american earns in a year and so if that's just pocket change compared to what the big go to the actual folks running to control the white house are dumping into super pacs let's take for example ron paul his name is on the ballot but the millionaire behind ron paul is a man named peter thiel a hedge fund manager who gave more than one point seven million dollars to ron paul's super pac endorse liberty last month his donation accounted for seventy percent of all of ron paul's super pac funds in january so a vote for ron paul is a vote for wall street hedge fund manager super fifteen and. fund manager peter thiel and those who hear rich gingrich's name will be on the ballot in virginia but

the billionaire behind gingrich is this guy because he no owner sheldon adelson who dished out ten million dollars just last month again bridges winning our future super pac accounting pretty nigh ninety percent of all the donations so vote for gingrich is actually a vote for can see because you know mogul sholay ableson who actually makes a lot of money outside the united states with casinos in macau and in china and hong kong and then there's rick santorum is name will be on the ballot but and all over google but the millionaires behind santorum who are actually running to control the white house are mutual fund executive foster friess and oil and gas mogul william door who conifer one point six million of the two point one million that santorum super pac red white and blue fund raised in january so a vote for santorum is really a vote for friesan door which brings us to mitt romney who super pac restore our future dwarfs all the other super pacs and fund raising raising thirty six point

eight million dollars so far and unlike the other super pacs restore our future spreads the wealth around doesn't rely on one sole funder instead it receives six figure contributions from twenty five different people less so a vote for romney is a vote for a whole slew of millionaires and billionaires most i'm from wall street if you're from big oil and then there's this guy texas billionaire harold simmons he's sort of a free agent simmons cut a five million dollars check to the karl rove affiliated super pac american crossroads g.p.s. which hasn't endorsed any candidate yet but will throw its treasure chest be behind whoever comes out on top in the republican primary and considering that simmons has given over sixteen million dollars to karl rove's american crossroads and you may as well consider him one of the front running guys who will run the white house the republicans when the republicans don't want you to pay any attention to the men and women behind the curtains they want you to just vote for the front man you think is

best and believe that that front man will represent you good luck on that. it's wednesday are you ready to rumble joining me on the panel for the rise along liberal pete executive vice president with the national taxpayers union and will rock political reporter with the daily caller welcome to you both good to see both let's get started it's no secret there's a growing level of discontent among conservatives with the. the the pack shall we say the group that i was talking about not they're not there billionaires but the people themselves there's even talk about a possible brokered convention chris christie and mitch daniels are being thrown around. here's an interesting statistic since one thousand nine hundred fifty two when president bush was elected in the us there have been fifteen republican presidential ballots how many other than last time of the two thousand and eight

hominy of those did not carry the name nixon dole or bush. fraction three four one one one one hundred sixty four goldwater miller it was the only one since nine hundred fifty two they didn't have one of those three and prescott was fifty two in fifty eight and the bushes were eighty eighty four eighty eight ninety two two thousand two thousand and four and so will be two thousand and twelve there's a lot of talk about you know they're going to roll jeb. he's he speaks spanish he's he's articulate he's the guy that popular you know the nerds or they actually is yeah and he's the guy that they were going to put out in two thousand and karl rove blew that up much to the chagrin of the bush family well and former governors of course carry that kind of cost that they were in charge of an entire economy somebody like mitch daniels has really high marks for fiscal stewardship maybe that's what a ticket needs sort of if it's going to be iraq has a lot of negatives he's got

a lot of people who dislike it has and i'm not sure that it always should and i all have a lot of people who dislike him and a lot of us like christie but he's very popular in new jersey i think i mean you're definitely right that there's it's kind of always been there that this isn't the republican party's a team you could say this may be kind of a b. team but look at all these candidates or up right now they have their merits mitt romney had a very successful tenure as governor of massachusetts. care system good liberal like yeah yeah and you know these are you know then to his credit by the way that health care system was first proposed in one thousand seventy three by richard nixon and the romney care version is almost identical to nixon and obamacare is almost identical to nixon care as well yeah and they can't really run away from it which is one thing that conservatives still have a problem with right so it is those who ends up the cost curve down health care i think they all have. but that was that was the whole selling point for your selling

point and that was the selling romney claims he has. he is coming from a guy. you proposed wage and price controls and sent the economy almost into a tailspin and they said it was a nixon was easy and we're all keynesians and he said no keynes is new wasn't actually a good keynesian even though you was right wage and price controls are not keynes but it would be a democrat have it today you know so so what do you think about the chances of a brokered convention schedule is a seriously are all the time most of the debate when you look at the polling numbers of how many people want anyone but romney and then of course when they look at santorum all the same thing as happened with gingrich with rick perry you know these guys get into prominence for a while but he didn't start getting into the other hand you look at the number of people who are participating in their republican primaries in these states and it's like nine hundred people seven hundred people you know thirty eight thousand people it's it's such a small slice of the republican party maybe you guys have got nothing to worry

about from. one brokered convention is still i mean it's extraordinarily unlikely the system is kind of built to avoid things like that you think and yes there's a little bit household word for the reservation and i mean you know there hasn't been sort of that works i mean there hasn't been i can venture the last time republicans went into a convention they didn't know the outcome i was seventy six and i came down to the mississippi delegation and reagan versus ford i don't think anybody is quite sure what that what he look like even today but yeah neither if none of these guys can. be ron paul becomes kingmaker but so i guess possible because of our effective operation and we're going to delegates left and right which could bring about so well speaking of all this buddy roemer the former governor of louisiana who was running as a republican has decided he's still a republican but he's not going to be running for president of the republican ticket instead he's throwing to the citizens of iraq thing so this is a like is this are americans like the others in the shadowy group who was put

together by a bunch of hedge fund managers and billionaires on wall street we still don't know all of them. they're hiding behind total secrecy that rate of twenty two million dollars their own fourteen states ballots including california they say they've got enough money to get a fifty states on their website they're promoting mayor bloomberg i give you a clue behind this thing and and mitch daniels oddly enough and then they're saying that their executive committee and we don't know who these people are they're going to have a national vote and whoever wins the vote is going to be the candidate and they're going to put their candidate up as a third party candidate but if the executive committee doesn't like who they vote for and odds are i'd think of an internet poll would probably end up being ron paul will say no i'm not going to be that person and they'll put up their own their own and there's a lot of talk about it being a bloomberg somebody ticket. isn't this evidence the just the existence of this thing more evidence that we're not we're not a democracy anymore were plutocracy it's an oligarchy we've got

a bunch of billionaires who are creating a political party just for the purpose of putting a billionaire up as a candidate not so sure i don't think roemer necessarily has much credibility are they has a real chance of the third party and independent challenges even well financed ones i think have a salutary effect on our so-called two party system ralph nader for example does a good job keeping the democratic party intellectually honest for noting debates within the parties perot did that somewhat with the republicans but actually split some of those votes and libertarians do that with republicans to weigh i think these are healthy things i don't think this is a third party you know there's no ideology here third parties come out of ideology that is coming out of twenty two billion dollars from a bunch of billion the ideology is centrist that's what they're advocating for they're looking forward to the centrist candidate they're looking for like the tom friedman fantasy k.o.a. tom friedman's a billionaire who's a pitchman for billionaires time friedman is nothing more than

a corporate shill the new york times out of our times you can believe it yeah up. i don't know about all right but i mean it's a centrist third party movement that's probably going to be not all that effective and it's something that's largely innocuous you think there's like a conspiracy here like like some plutocrat. you know. for lack of a better phrase like a loon bird i mean mike bloomberg so pretty centrist guy he's a very he's buying for the billionaires i mean it can cost him seventy seven dollars a vote when there are well he's got a lot of money you know so i guess there is what will continue that this will actually get into the maybe some debate and stick around president obama's introducing a new corporate tax plan does it have any shot of making it through congress more rubble coming up after the break. we just put a picture of me when i was like nine years old and just you know lived through.

i make sense and i am a total get a sense that i was grabbing him and. he was kind of yesterday. i'm very proud of the world without you it's a place. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so. you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else here's some other part of it and realized everything you thought you don't know i'm sorry is a big issue. for

. a. lot about the lone liberal rumbold but i'm joined by peter executive vice president

asheville taxpayers union and will ron political reporter with the daily caller welcome both of you back tim geithner unveiled president obama's corporate tax policy today grand you do corporations the united states effectively pay the fewest taxes among the thirty four o.e.c.d. nations and when you add in bad taxes which are paid in most other nations we're way long our corporations are way way lower and so we've got the top marginal tax rate thirty five percent but the amount of actual tax dollars paid is lowest in the eyes and a code out of the country sorta like the situation in. sixty when when john kennedy came along and said you know million millionaires and billionaires like me don't pay taxes even though the top tax rates ninety one percent so let's close some of these loopholes and drop the rate that's what obama's saying it's close loopholes drop the rate of twenty eight percent twenty five percent specially for domestic manufacturers. g.'s tax return last year nine hundred feet high when you break down

ninety five more than twenty thousand pages yes they paid no taxes no taxes given that thirty of the fortune five hundred corporations paid more last year to their lobbyists than they did and taxes because this thing have a chance. there has to be some kind of common ground here and i think we're starting starting to reach it a lot of flaws in obama's proposal but the philosophy of going forward is more on the base reduce the rates you're seeing that developing on democratic members of congress ron wyden senator from oregon i k. hagen senator from north carolina so will it happen you know what action year but i'm not certain favor of this i think that this is a good plan i would love to see something that's not just revenue neutral this is revenue neutral i'd like to see something that actually raises the corporate tax rates the states up to something close maybe even thirty percent lower than the o.e.c.d. average i mean you know we're well below fifty percent what was it like about

whether it's lowering the corporate tax rate just i would like the idea of some of the corporations that profit off the commons you know to better xterm allies in their cause they're dumping pollution into our air that are making use of our education our educated citizens that are that are making use of our court system that are making use of our currency they're taking all these things that you and i are all paying for their tax dollars and then up in a damn penny towards or i'd like to mr pants on the revenue neutrality though is still an open question in this plan there are some analyses that suggest about two hundred fifty billion extra is going to be raised through this over ten years save it and you know the point that alongside over ten years is not a lot not huge but you put that also alongside some of his budget proposals you see the interaction of obama's budget tax proposals with this tax reform plan that's still being worked out and we may very well see but isn't he really putting republicans in a corner with this thing because he's basically saying ok you want to cut taxes cut taxes so i mean if you're saying this is like

a blatantly political move probably you know it comes out as does romney released his moves and i mean that's that's interesting. time yeah we have the realities romney's plan would cut taxes on rich people and raise taxes on poor people and i mean if this whole plan is. twenty percent across the board and i know you want to raise you see you want to take the top but is that a lot of x. minus twenty five percent obama's twenty percent i mean project you have a corporate tax plan i mean this is i mean it's just stepping up but it's interesting from a philosophical perspective of a democratic president it may look you know as you're talking about a consensus developing that our corporate tax rate is just too high and just making american corporations uncompetitive but it's not available scale it's not there just get around it and that's that's why let's make it let's make it less bright and i have to tom believe impact simplification of the byzantine pacs code yeah we could probably slim that other frigging consensus on this and it's a little exposure to face exploding gradkowski laws in this play aren't silvano

let's talk about the occupy movement the koch brothers for a minute here the american legislative exchange council elec alec is this weird group that's been around for a couple of decades pretty much nobody knew about it until they got exposed largely by i think the center for american progress in the fog's research be they have these twice annual meetings where corporations pay tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to sit next to state legislators state senators and state representatives who pay anywhere from twenty five to one hundred bucks a membership dues and they're funded ninety eight percent of their total funding comes from corporations corporate trade groups and corporate foundations and they they sit around and come up with model legislation which the legislators and well over ninety percent republican take back to their states nader deuced everything from the arizona anti immigration law to the wisconsin anti-union laws to the you know the let's knock people off the voter rolls was that but it disenfranchise five million people seems to me that this is alec is the poster child for corrupt

corporate influence in our government is not times to do so about this i don't think this is any worse than what the national conference of state legislatures cuz that's a liberal or centrist counterpart where they're funded gather i don't. their funding source i know from personal experience that some of the issues alec works on have ben constitutional tax and budget reforms using article five to propose a convention of states to offer a balanced budget amendment and ratify it that's been the position they've taken for ten twenty years. yet it's like it's like the republicans are constantly saying you know we need to make you abortion illegal but when we get in power we're not going to do that because we need to yell about it next time around what alec is really doing though is he is putting forward legislation this disenfranchising democrat voted at her city's design their own you know pieces of legislation for people university departments will be going to go to but they don't have commitments from legislators to introduce them i mean you had one of these pieces

actually introduced into a state legislature we didn't have to go with the original alec brand of the top woman i figured it was the legislator forgot to cut that off or tell her people hey we write it and it's i mean do you think the occupy folks are the right guys to be spearheading this the wildly unpopular occupy movement and i think somebody has to you know i just i don't i'm concerned about a a group that is funded by billionaires and corporations literally writing our laws is that there's something inside him or about i mean interesting i mean there's a lot of legal leads and in this legislation i mean i would argue that i'm not sure a lot of state reps are actually smart enough to come across come up with great pieces of legislation in there i mean there's our losses you know the amount of money they have as the regulations are regulatory environment has become so byzantine and complex at this point that you know you do need experts you know at

least looking into vising and that happens with all sorts of legislation on left leaning organizations that advised lawmakers on things like taxes all over the country by no means unique to that money only hazily had a. democratic state representative from the state was constant in the show who showed up down in new orleans for the alec meeting and paid his hundred dollar registration fee and after the first medicaid came out because they figured out that he was a progressive democrat and they thought he was a spy sure enough you know he he was or at least he became one after they kicked him out and he said that the you had state legislator lobbyist state legislator lobbyist state legislators are paying one hundred bucks to be there in some cases they get free trips medications and all in hotels all kinds of things lobbyist paid one hundred thousand dollars to be there they were voting everybody had an equal vote on whether legislation would be introduced to the particular states that seems to me like corruption. well when you get the regulatory environment is so you know

invasive and so what i mean how so far mental regulations alone tell me one regulation that is means one regulation that is harming us yeah i mean half of it god frank yeah. one regulation that's trillion dollars that's the estimated cost that's imposed on the private sector from the entire regulatory state that's harming the economy nonsense so that as soon as it is washington he has a regulation the says here's your smokes they can do it can't amid all that crap. they're going to have to hire somebody to design a scrubber they're going to happen stall this rates going to create jobs are ok what about regulation is that you were just talking about that created the you know the private one c three you know the electioneering environment where you have the shadow where you five hundred one c three is working behind the scenes for candidates you don't think that's harmful you don't think protesting lack of regulation this is you know i mean i'm going to oh no it's the whole lack of regulation act on everything from the tillman act in one thousand so seven all the

way up to two. five zero one c three john mclean aviation you know. regulate resident obama brings those up he brought it up in his state of the union speech about milk clean up regulations got a great laugh out a dead one but that's one ok i agree with you that's one about two hundred ninety seven i billion dollars of compliance costs on the tax system we could easily cut that and how about it's about several just from a seven trillion dollars of that has vanished from our economy is rare as a result of the lack of regulation it was brought about by phil gramm when his wife wendy was on the board enron and he was pushing through the grammys blyleven blower class stiegel to deregulate the banks and the commodities futures modernization act to deregulate commodities so that enron could make a fortune on and it crashed our economy seven trillion dollars has vanished while the federal government let fannie mae and freddie mac. steal the supply and it had nothing to do with that and they are. with that and that was another good example of why government agencies like freddie and fannie

never should have been privatized anyhow it's time for a quick photo let's get to our last question here at the time was icons of childhood entertainment in america under attack by conservatives first it was the moffats markets then sponge bob square pants and now dr seuss take a listen to what lou dobbs had to say about the newest dr seuss film but more x. . the movie set to be released nationwide next month is about lower woodland creature who speaks for the trees and fights rampant industrialism. he cut down the street look back. i think he did it. universal pictures also promoting the movie partnering with companies to push eco friendly products so all the horror they go friendly products and you know that makes me wonder what other beloved cartoon characters might republicans attack next going to be captain america after all he must be an agent of the e.p.a. underdog because republicans never root for the underdog or dexter from dexter's

laboratory he's a scientist and republicans you know global warming all this stuff they just don't much like science these days where you think. probably what lou dobbs was attacking was more the movie itself and its depiction of the lorax then dr seuss's story the lorax i don't know what the harm is in it i just hope that they don't go after south park or archer or any of those so if south park can get pretty liberal pretty libertarian yeah yeah. yeah cartoons good that's that's i guess my end point there but going back captain america absolutely an agent of the f.b.i. and i say that they're going to be going after huey doing louis for trying to redistribute scrooge mcduck swells some. great to have you guys meeting will thank you very much thank you good to see tonight.

praise the lord move over roseanne has some new competition. it's me. it's an election year and can you keep a secret i am going to become your new president yeah it's true that's right u.f.o. phil is self-appointed intergalactic lee sponsored candidate for president announced yesterday that he has been granted the necessary authority to assume the role of president without having to wait for the november election in an interview with various media outlets u.f.o. feels that he is in possession of secret scrolls that are written by beans from another planet scrolls to give him the authority needed to assume the role of president without an election once president the alien a bastard plans to establish a senate for terrestrial alien relations create a system of pyramids throughout california and create a monument of his a guy on the leader of the good aliens at the current site of the statue of liberty and the filth lands to release all the top secret government u.f.o.

files to the public on d.v.d. and blu ray with special features maybe phil will call on the robotic pigeons the plans for some help to order a better. put in future of the need when i was like nine years old so she told the truth. i confess and i am a total get it and i was crap because he's gay and pretty. he was the jester. i'm very proud of the old with its place. you know sometimes you see

a story and it seems so for lengthly is think you understand it and then a glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything is ok you don't know i'm charming welcome to the big picture.