i kind of the loans show up at the real headlines with none of the mercy and i live in washington d.c. now tonight we're going to have our monday hangover panel i am going to talk taxes last buyer tax with some it's so complicated how software companies are lobbying to keep it difficult for you to pay up and the buffett rule then one cold joins us to discuss sanctions against iran are we forgetting history underestimating the possible global economic effects and it is stopping cyber spying weeks we're going to talk about the new effort to mobilize against cispa and i'll ask what it really

takes to make an internet protest a success we'll have all that have more for you tonight including a dose of happy hour but first take a look at the mainstream media has decided to. write so president obama arrived in colombia this weekend for these summits of the americas to meet with more than thirty other heads of state and thanks to an embarrassing episode of a secret service before the president got there well major media is going crazy. not so secret service issued pesos and presidential polling is the shakedown the white house just wants to go away new fallout this morning on the prostitution scandal rocking the u.s. secret service president obama has made it clear there will be a thorough and rigorous investigation into an alleged sex scandal involving the secret service and the u.s. military secret service sex scandal eleven secret service agents and officers and five u.s.

troops working with them they supposedly brought the prostitutes to this hotel in the lead out eleven agents now placed on administrative leave following bombshell accusations they solicited prostitutes have some tell and hard to hang you columbia shocking new questions about the president's inner circle and the secret service agents entrusted with protecting his life this could have severely compromised the president's security they found her in a room fighting with an agent after he failed to pay her the worst scandal in secret service history. i know it's get a few things clear here is this episode and embarrassing run for the secret service obviously can we really be shocked if the mainstream media is going absolutely nuts over a story that involves the secret service and prostitutes in a foreign country well absolutely not right has all of the elements that a scandal of says press desires but the thing is the mainstream media is going so incredibly overboard on this that they completely left out the reason the president is even there to begin with the americas and this year there's

a lot of talk about the think that back in two thousand and nine obama about point was greeted as a rock stars the newly sworn in president and so many around the world had hoped it as the man who promised so much change but this year was a whole lot different we saw the governments of mexico and colombia for the first time joining with the rest of the chorus put pressure on obama criticize him for america's completely out of date policies on cuba and this is one of the other you could say broken promises of the obama administration we heard a lot of talk of resenting our policies at least lifting the travel ban and some moves of the made on the right restrictions on academic religious or cultural groups traveling to cuba were lifted but still a long way to go another topic that was big of it was the drug war and its incredible failure some countries were as far as to call for all out legalization of all narcotics others just wanted to put the pressure on to again working as is.

do it perhaps the biggest takeaway from the summit was that it seems like maybe we're seeing shipped the maybe latin america central american countries want to be clear that if they have a concern with u.s. policies they're not going to be afraid to say it so you think you think that a waning geopolitical influence a critique of our outdated failing calls these would register even for a second all the mainstream media's radar when they cover the president's trip to colombia but of course not there's a secret service scandal so the news that actually bears any significance they chose to miss. all right so it's only monday but there's a lot to talk about because the news doesn't stop over the weekend even though technically you might not have been here in the office and this weekend i have a feeling that a lot of americans out there are busy doing their taxes and taxes are due tomorrow i don't take the opportunity to discuss how miserable the entire process is and

some of the biggest debates over our tax code down to it has been lobbying to make sure that you can do your taxes in five minutes and for those of us using tax preparing software like turbo tax instead of an accountant should we be free from iras penalties and the buffett rule for a book in the senate today but is the idea of taxing the rich going to go away if it fails so get ready for your monday hangover. one of the leaders. from. all right here to discuss with me is matt welch editor in chief of reason magazine and eric thompson senior editor at the atlantic. hello gentlemen thank you for joining me tak that is so much fun everybody let's talk about taxes right you actually posted some stats today i've decided to read for the audience here. the tax code and just about how miserable and complicated this is the tax code is now three point eight million words long

for everybody you know over the last ten years they have made about four thousand four hundred twenty eight change is for the tax code and he goes out to about more than one a day and the results are some seven point six four billion hours of paperwork for america so. why is there a tax code in a tax system so complicated. because we wanted to be complicated we're basically running a buffet and saying rather than have one person create a buffet we're going to ask everybody what do you want and everybody has a thing that they want one person says ok the thing i want to tax code is protection if i buy a home what i want is some money if i had a kid know what i want is just some money in exchange for working because i'm low income on the basis on the merits of each of these individual things they might be good to have in the tax code but what do you end up happening is your tax code is bloated because every single group wants something in there and it's theirs and it's very difficult to take it out because it's more important to that group to keep it in than it is for the broader country to take it out do you remember

a day do you think do you think a birthday is a good way to. remember barack obama's seat in a dress this year he said we need to simplify the tax system which he said all the time in two thousand and eight on the campaign trail will you support a tax code is too complicated for everybody we also need targeted tax breaks for companies that are exporting the manufacturing jobs of the future with a green technologies and then break for a single working mother he listed six huge changes to the tank rings with a tax code this happens every day it's the easiest thing easiest way to reward constituencies and it's the hardest thing to do right and so they don't know it's the same as saying the buffet is too big here are two more entries i mean that's the way you know how do you really simplify the tax code. and and keep everybody happy so that they still feel like at least you know maybe they don't want options and maybe at least feel like the system is fair i mean people come spoiled because there are so many types breaks that something they can take advantage of we are spoiled i mean my guess and i don't know if it agrees night my guess is it's the same with episode reduction you basically have to say look

a lot of people are going to lose something if we simplify the tax code tax is going to go up for some people that are really privileged right now taxes are going to go down for some groups that may make us feel uncomfortable but we're if we're all in it together then we can sort of take on the heat is one but it's going to have to be bipartisan it's going to be long and messy and it's going to look a lot like deficit reduction and we saw what happened there the first thing you have to do is take care of the mortgage interest deduction which is the single largest deduction in the code and it affects most people who are rich enough to hold a house it's an upper middle class and title meant if you go after that which is something that a lot of people squawk about and if you get republicans and democrats which wouldn't you know it would increase the overall tax if you got rid of it you could say this is a demonstration project this is distorting the market it actually led to the housing bubble to some degree we're subsidizing mortgages in this country so let's go after that as a demonstration project and then go after all the rest of them afterwards but of course there's not a lot of political courage in washington or anywhere else but also some other things that we hear you know the most about you is obviously the focus on the

income tax and so one of the things that you hear is that there are sixty percent of americans out there that don't even pay any income tax and it makes it seem like it's such an unfair system and so many people are really cheating it but then at the same time when you start factoring in right state taxes local taxes that's where you see where lower income americans really do actually pay more taxes you know payroll taxes are capped for people who make more than one hundred eighty or something dollars they start paying into that and also they are automatically called warren buffett is automatically qualify for medicare as soon as you turn sixty five regardless of his ability to pay for his own private health care so there's a lot of that half of the country doesn't pay and. federal income taxes and overall taxes because payroll tax is the same share of government revenue as income tax but that fifty percent eighty percent of the group makes less than thirty thousand dollars a year it's by far the vast majority of them are poor people who are getting what they call refundable tax breaks like earned income tax credit child care tax credit

and simply getting money from laws that were passed in one nine hundred seventy s. one nine hundred eighty s. one nine hundred ninety s. that we thought were good for low income working families and this is why reforming the tax code can you very difficult because who wants to be that person who stands up and says low income families don't deserve this tax break well it's a lot i guess you could say easier and probably a lot more politically popular at the moment to say that the rich should pay more taxes right so let's talk about the buffett rule first i don't know if the vote has actually happened right before the show started but basically the senate is supposed to vote in the buffett rule today out is it was expected to die this slow quiet death there the federal seemed simple it had a catchy name a catchy idea behind it that you should be paying more than the secretary does but if the buffett rule technically dies the senate does the is the idea that went there or do americans they still like this. my old colleague at the atlantic who's now in business week josh green said to the obi wan kenobi rule applied the buffett

rule which is if i die i will come back and only be stronger and the idea is that the buffett rule as a rule doesn't really matter that much what matters is that obama is running to raise taxes and i don't remember the last time a president ran on a campaign to raise taxes so we do something he has to beat the republicans at a political game so what he's doing is he's daring them to vote against a very small tax increase on a part of the country that americans don't have a lot of pity for so that when republicans do vote against the buffett rule he could run against that vote no that i think is with the buffett rule is about and not about any sort of particular important policy right when it's about also the cowardice to really run for raising taxes and defending the size. cost of government which no one really still feels comfortable in doing for a full throated way because most americans don't really necessarily believe that we should pay twenty five percent of g.d.p. for ever if not more on government right so you say we can tax these millionaires in a way that is politically popular perhaps but think about it if they had spend this

much energy on on making sure the bush tax cuts expired we wouldn't be having this conversation but they caved on this because americans perceived rightly or wrongly that the bush tax cuts was not just for the rich it was for the broader middle class and they didn't want their taxes raised and democrats were too afraid and the president was too afraid to say no sorry you need to have your taxes rest well the point is that nobody ever wants to have their taxes raised if aside from a few patriotic millionaires out there right that are part of this movement but in general when we really want to pay more i want to move on to some other little technical stories that just kind of i think show a sign of the times for example so that stole their growth this piece talking about into that they're a software developer and they create all these you know tax. issues that so much of. an image you see these. areas many people are turning facebook's timeline to share all kinds of experience from with others are concerned about the

security and safety of this new. wealthy british scientists are. the type of. market finiteness gundel. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike's cause or for a no holds barred look of the global financial headlines tune into kinds a report. download the official and see how to make a show on the phone called touch from the i choose option. life on the go. video on demand policies in mind bold comes an r.s.s. feeds now in the palm of your. question on the

call. get off some lunches see a story and it seems so poorly you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else 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.

all right it's time for you said it read it right take time to respond to my brilliance and engaging to your comments from facebook twitter and you tube because

you've got some to say i listen now first don't respond with your that watched her interview on big banks fully working their way back into the shady lead shady lending practices which almost brought down the world economy have baldwin commented on facebook for the base ever learn or is it that they just don't care you know i think that it's probably a combination of both i don't i don't think of the banks learned anything because nobody on wall street was ever actually held accountable for their practices no real trials no arrests just a little public shaving if you can even call it that and the regular regulations are put in place frank well those have been weak to say the least and the american people on the other hand they've suffered plenty for the actions of the banks millions still looking for jobs and millions underwater on their mortgages and whether or not the banks actually care obviously i can't speak for all of wall street but i think that we've seen one report an interview and statement after another and highlights how far removed wall street bankers are from the rest of the

country and the issues that most americans face next i want to share some of the feedback that we received from last happy hour stephanie have fun what commander sloan said on you tube finally they take a sip of that alleged martini the canadian dude commented on you tube now my big question is that real booze that they have in those martini glasses and donnelly daro tweeted out below to show love the show tonight finally got to see someone drink a martini andrew blake was great so more controversy around the martinis on happy hour with the plot thinking picturing your guest last week appeared to be enjoying a drink well we still can't tell you what's actually inside the houses but that would ruin all the fun anyway. i also want to respond finally to a viewer who wants to know where to send story ideas david who are not asked this question suppose i know of a possible story you guys might want to cover who can i get in touch with and we would love any stories or tips so if you guys do have something that you want to share with us feel free to e-mail t.a.'s producer at g.

mail dot com that's it my rant this week but i'll be back with more later in the week. after a meeting between iran and five un security council members in turkey over the weekend the iranian foreign minister said today that iran is ready to solve all nuclear disputes quote quickly and easily and yet another round of talks baghdad next month i once again the possibility of an external supply of enriched uranium is being discussed by the iranian foreign minister also urged for sanctions that have been put in place by the u.s. and other western countries to be lifted so we have to take a serious look at the economic policies or you can even call the economic warfare that's being waged against iran washington seems to think that sanctions are the key to holding off israel and getting iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions but if you look back at history sanctions are really just lead to the opposite joining me to discuss is juan cole teacher and writer of history at the university of michigan and author of the blog informed comment but i'm very nice to have you on the show

tonight now you just wrote a piece about this last week called why washington's iran policy could lead to global disaster and so i'm excited to hear your take because one of the things that we hear often especially from republicans is that president obama has this policy of appeasement when it comes to iran and that is so dangerous for the world but when you look at this saying that have been placed upon iran would you call that a policy of appeasement. oh no these are the most crippling sanctions that have been placed on any country since the case of iraq in the nineteen nineties but it's no longer a matter of just sanctions i think the the the us is now engaged in a blockade of iranian petroleum it's trying to prevent iran from selling its major export well what do you think that you know the chances are that iran my in this case basically start to agree to some of these other deals for example getting an

external source of petroleum because i one hand you could say that maybe these sanctions will backfire iran won't listen but then if we look at the results from this last round of talks we're now they're saying maybe we could resolve this quickly and easily according to the foreign minister you know what does that say there. well the iranians initially were enriching uranium to three point five percent that's to make fuel for nuclear reactors to make electricity they also have a small medical reactor that the u.s. actually gave them decades ago which however needs uranium enriched to almost twenty percent to produce the medical ice isotopes and when they started enriching to nearly twenty percent that set off alarm bells because people figure well it's not so far from twenty percent to ninety five percent and ninety five percent you can make a bomb so but the iranians weren't making medical isotopes from that level of

enrichment before recently and they had to do it because they they lost their external sources for those for that reactor so yes if if the world would provide them with uranium suitable to make medical isotopes i'm sure that they would take that deal and if the if this is the big sticking point then that's fine with them but remember that the sanctions initially were put on to stop them from enriching altogether and that they wanted if you think that any sense that a sign that perhaps the thanks things are working in terms of trying to put pressure on iran. well the sanctions are putting enormous pressure on iran the iranian middle class is nearly disappearing people can't afford to travel anymore that the iranian currency is losing its value against the dollar it's bad times in

iran because of u.s. sanctions and now they even want to try to start of the government of the funds coming in from the oil sales so there isn't any doubt that enormous pressure is being put on iran but it can't have a total result you can't have the result of stopping their nuclear enrichment program altogether because that program is a guarantee from their point of view of future energy independence and we hear about energy independence all the time in america well that's what the iranians want to. so what we what might we see than instead right if the sanctions are not actually going to have an effect on iran's program of making a radio and if they can move towards energy independence as you said you know what are the adverse effects going to be on just the global economy. well the senses are being put on iran in order to get them to stop enriching uranium as i said because

israel and the west are convinced that the enrichment program is dual use that at some point the iranians will turn around and try to make a nuclear bomb the iranians deny this their supreme leader has said that atom bombs are tools of the devil they're not allowed in islam so i think one of the compromises that might come out would be if the iranians would cooperate with the united nations inspectors and they are cooperating to a large extent but the cooperation is not entirely satisfactory from the u.s. point of view if they if the iranians would open up more show the u.s. and its centrifuge design let them have more access to facilities they already have access to the nuclear facilities then i think that some compromise might might be achievable because what the americans really care about is that the iranians are not trying actively to make a nuclear weapon but in the meantime these sanctions are hurting the world economy

because they are reducing the amount of petroleum on the market. well let's talk about how long something like that can even last i mean right there is this oil blockade first the law doesn't have everybody support or western european nations are on board by china india said no dice you know we need that iranian oil pan and south korea have also asked for and factions in that sense and you know do you think that saudi arabia can really make up for that supply. well there are a lot of oil experts who have profound doubt that the saudis can replace your army and petroleum iran is exporting well it had been exporting something on the order of two and a half million barrels a day this not obvious where you would get the supplies to replace that remember it's not just a matter of replacing the iranian petroleum but also world demand is increasing

china's demand probably will increase about five percent this year and the older fields are declining so you not only have to replace the auto immune to troll you have but you have to provide for new demand and you have to provide for old field fields declining it doesn't seem to me plausible to force iran to keep all or even most of its petroleum in the ground but you could keep them from exporting two or three hundred thousand barrels a day maybe more but then that's going to hurt greece it's going to hurt spain is going to hurt italy we've got a major financial and economic crisis in southern europe and there's a point at which you're going to have a choice of having the euro collapse and greece go down or of lightening up on the run now i just want to ask you right there perhaps what we have a kind of a bad memory are we aren't so good at learning from our mistakes or learning from history so what specifically should we learn from history when it comes to the

policy towards iran right now. well the thing to remember is that this is not the first time that the u.s. has been involved in an embargo of iranian petroleum the embargo now is a financial one rather than a military one but in one nine hundred fifty one iran nationalized its petroleum it kicked out the what is now b.p. the anglo iranian oil company and as a result the british empire put a an embargo on iranian petroleum trying to convince nobody to buy it and then the us joined in under eisenhower and that embargo deeply harmed the iranian economy it caused labor strikes that caused crowd protests and weaken the prime minister and then the cia and the british intelligence on opportunity and they got up a plot to overthrow the elected prime minister of iran and his elected parliament

and to put the shah on the throne so that when you when you start something like thoroughgoing. embargoes against another nation it can draw you in because you want the policy to be successful if you're afraid that the embargo will slip and you'll lose chris stevens you might be tempted into covert action or even a military attack as happened with with iraq so these deep sanctions profound economic sanctions or even embargoes are a slippery slope and they can lead to an involvement in the other country of a massive sort. of thank you so much for joining us and i and i you know that we'll see if things don't change it looks like there's only going to be more rounds and it's only going to get more difficult and i have. well that's ahead so i read how the latest on the taliban's spring offensive in afghanistan and

its anti cyber spying we are going to talk to somebody chang about cispa and what makes a fix that's more on line protests. that are sometimes you see a story and it seems so for like sleep you think you understand it and then a glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't. charge welcome to the big picture. the local. law.

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