it's happening online so we're going to have a great interview with someone who's come up with a new company i think you'll like it and of course we couldn't do it alone or show without a little bit a happy hour so there's a great local bar murphys tonight decided that they would host as and let us do our there happy hour in there let me tell you a little bit more about the conference so some of the big topics for discussion are of course the economy of course people are talking about unemployment and if you walk over here with me you'll see probably one of the biggest topics in the news these days we want to talk about wisconsin you want to talk about occupy it's small money versus big money and to talk about the corruption within our political system is incredibly important but i have to say there's something that i feel is missing from net roots nation and it's something you guys hear me talk about all the time and that is our civil liberties the erosion of our civil liberties and things that are happening by this democratic president under his leadership talk about having a democratic president the now is chosen he can play judge jury and executioner all

in one we talked about drone strikes drone strikes and the impact that they have abroad this kill list where the president sits in his office and decides who's going to be executed all on his own there's only one panel on civil liberties in this entire conference and so we decided to go around asking people why they think that is why that's missing from the discussion here. i guess i didn't notice it and she knows that nothing. i mean i imagine you're seeing. here is you can see some people out there care kind of they're disturbed by it but they also don't understand why it is that the organizers of this event chose not to put more emphasis on it and this is what i talk about all the time is that when it comes to the left to day democrats today progressive today suddenly we are completely. silent when it comes to the crimes the constitutional tearing that

we're seeing under president obama and i don't know why the left doesn't care because when it was george w. bush that was doing it you know there was a lot of outrage and so unfortunately just like what we see in the mainstream media just like what i criticize and s.m.b. see the supposedly liberal channel for the same problem still exists here today at the net roots nation conference which is that when it comes to the erosion of civil liberties when it comes to the executive abuse of power these are things the nets were at netroots nation chooses to miss. ok guys so here we are with our first interview at netroots nation in providence rhode island and i gotta say there's a lot of bad news these days right a lot of depressing news out there if you want to talk about the economy not only in the u.s. but if you look at europe if you look at china if you look at india everywhere growth is slowing and we do have

a crisis of unemployment if you look at wisconsin you see labor unions dying down and there's just a lot of problems in the world right if you want to talk about stop and frisk policies you want to talk about a police state that if you ask me is growing and so sometimes to counter some of that not only do we need just some real talk about it but you also need some comedy and so tonight i have two very special guests with me tonight for us a very to me thurston who's the comedian and author of the book how to be black as long as well as iran james who hosts the radio show this week in blackness so guys thanks for joining me tonight thank you i was your intro really really. truly deserve. everything the world would we do it was good and you know she was just up and first she looked at you again but the camera is a. little bit of a. response and we'll give it. our new one so i'm going to start with you because see your book is called how to be black your. so how do you or is the whole point

that there are that there isn't a way to just you know there's no one in the right book i'm a capitalist first. and a thoughtful person the second you know the there is a man though the title is a farce it's a satirical and comedic memoir and set of advice so if you buy the book and read it you're not going to genetically become black that's a much harder process and much riskier and i don't have the funding from nasa to pull it off instead i use the power of words to try to share this. i don't know i don't know you should have said i was white before i read your book and i don't even know what your dad what james why does his full name yeah she dropped she just intuitively she was like she usually because of the book i was a liberal they sometimes they're you know many of the names get a little odd when i'm in the power of a very serious discussion we had in all this right because we look at what's going on in the country on one hand you have the first black president in this country which is a big deal and then you have to get on that

a second then you have this whole burger he wasn't born here he's a muslim kind of conspiracy and i mean how do we how do you counter that how do you you know there's also critiques that maybe he's not black enough because he's only have bike because he's an elitist and he went to harvard why does it have to be like that all the time there's a whole lot of gray area right now is america that's why it has to be like that apparently that's exactly what we do i don't know if you were you'd like actually opened up this thing we have a history books and apparently you always noticed that america treats people horribly all the time and if you just like watching my own why would they do this to the president like actually you should we have a book that says that they were going to do this sort of first black president up front that's just is what it is what it is the things i say i mean certainly it is yes. it is built into you know every first has a lot of challenges obama's one of the big. first you have these

a viral president who is by default black because it's america and the way you painted that picture he stuck between a rock and a hard place like two black not black enough the source of the criticism and the beauty of him i think is that he knew it going in that he's not like thanks to you about it he's a celebrity really kind of all over shoulders most of the time which for me like that's part of the magic of the moment and it's oddly he's the product of america and so that is part of his american act around like this done from either isn't so good when he's like he knew what he was walking into he's accepting it as gracefully as anybody ever got a job to do when we go out and say we were just talking about this for the interview began it sounds like the most miserable job on the arab land but i can't imagine why you would. have to wonder every day why did we do this it was the why is there just what are you doing if any of this worth it and then we just call the every possible mean he's a socialist she's a fat ass just because they have

a job that people don't think they should have one day you cash out and you know there are a lot of presidents that approve this bill clinton is an example of that and i guess that's where a lot of people think that ends up being worth it because post being president you get a lot of money coming your way but i do want to have to bring the discussion down a little bit unfortunately you know the way that i set the self is that yeah there is a lot of really depressing horrible stuff going on out there but things that we should be talking about if you ask me so that you can actually work through that but if you want to talk about unemployment if you want to talk about the fact that the u.s. has the biggest prison population in the world when i talk about the fact that we have an education crisis on our hands or you know and and you bring in a race into that there were one in three black chawner now are living in poverty. you're being defensive your brain is one hundred percent right. and you're messing up the whole thing but sort of it's how do you actually talk about that realistically as i feel like everyone always wants to completely separate and act like a all. these issues are not connected at all of the drug war and the prison population

and poverty have nothing to do with each other yet they do how do you get people to talk about that honestly. without doing. this i mean people i think it's first important to say why they don't want to talk about race is as an exhausting topic for people is uncomfortable and to some degree is the question in this country folks are like we did that already like you had your riots and your protest my and you had some poems you got a black president and oprah winfrey and jay z. and jay z. were watching the throne what else do you want for was and just go ahead and sort it out and the problem is the actual reality is that the so many policies so many systemic connections that lead to crazy horrible outcomes for certain types of people both poor and brown or people and so bringing that up in part just have to

keep doing it you have to sometimes let the idiots die so there's no way to help process because of the worst elements are never going to change you have to acknowledge that some of the younger people really are going to engage and you find ways to bring it up in methods and packages there are new that are going to get rid of kind of the way that people bring it i don't mean i'm interrupting for a moment here is that recently we obviously saw this story with trayvon martin become something of a media sensation normally you don't see stories like this get that much coverage but then you know what do you think of the fact that everyone's going on t.v. . you know where the honey does that make it become kind of like the token black kid story again or or know or is that more powerful so can we like the idea i saw a lot of people mocking the hoodie thing or whatever and i've actually appreciated the people who are trying to show the absurdity of my god he was in a hoodie and therefore dangerous and so i felt like that's what people were trying to do of course he would. because they're black red yellow diversity points i look

at me and when i heard it on the national television making a point all right cool but i appreciated the overall concept of the whole thing and this is i don't think of this as a token thing what happened was it wasn't that this was so horrendous that a kid got shot because in the black community we're familiar with it yes kids get shot for dumb reason but a cop by other people that was the problem was kid does nothing on arm get shot dude walks away from it like everything is cool that was we were the outrage and i feel like people didn't get that popular oh a lot of people die yes but there was a situation where the killer just like my bad you mean he scared me and he gives everybody are i cool just go about today you can you're free and that's what i want to freak the hell out and said no this cannot stand we're going to stand up for this and you also have as with any sensational police brutality murder crimes have moment you have information you have the nine one one tapes you have the testimony of the girlfriend you have the picture of this kid and for me the hoodie was

a humanizing thing when the president stepped in lightly as he did in that part of if i had a son he'd look like trayvon which is just a biological fact it was also certainly this could be your kid and we we do symbolic gestures of solidarity all the time the yellow ribbons the live strong bracelets the black armbands when someone dies the flag at half staff those are token gestures either i think it's the people don't know what to do but they've made them feel connected in a part of this larger issue where so many people with such a dramatic case like that could have been my kid and let me ask you just been running out of time to you when it comes to you i mean stop and frisk policies in new york rabbi and i mean that's and it's come under a lot of criticism and same thing if you look at the majority of the people that have been stopped and frisked they have been minorities and most of these people that are completely leggo right now they're not criminals by any chance by any means but i mean what does that legalize racism yeah. here's and here's the problem

with it it's not just that oh they're targeting black and latino boys that's really what it is that they're going after care they're waiting for them as they go to school and come out of school because of being made late to class and they're destroying the relationship like you wonder why people who don't trust the cops because this is your relationship with the police like why would you go to that person who would make sure live hell every three weeks when something bad actually happens that's that destroys the whole community and it's well beyond like i was just interviewed for this back and the idea and the thing with especially with stop and frisk a lot of a lot of the uncomfortable minutes with it is that this is not even something that we're surprised by and the whole of his life oh literally mothers teach their child what to do when you're stopped by a cop how not to be confrontation out of these awful way is right by your mother we're taught that from the like being a baby and so in all of this and you're in your earlier question about racism and how do we discuss these things it's because our country does not like its own history but we want to get really honest about that's why every time you bring up

don't ever bring up slavery i don't want to do those things because we can't handle that the actual the actual reality of what we what has happened and what's what's been done the country can't handle so that's why it's costly sort of a road when you bring up race when you connect the dots this happens because of a and this happens because of the it's like no no because the you have to acknowledge history and that's something that we have a very hard time doing this and the last thing on the last thing that i want to bring out and you can work your solution into that there's a running out of time here. and you guys obviously use comedy to talk about these topics so i'm going to tell me why you think that's so important if it's better for us to try to laugh through it or if it's easier to try to laugh their anger now and then at the same time if we're talking about this issue of poverty so much of inequality in the country and you have the occupy movement and it's now been around for eight or nine months but have you notice of occupy movement is probably with the exception of oakland not so much a minority movement i mean is there is it to why. i should have bring more people

together so there's a lot in the whole lot. of risk here's what we should do we should use technology and our insights to build an i phone app that allowed young black and latino boys to avoid the path of the stop and frisk is available how do you have fun without being beat up by the cops no safety from police that's the app that we should be working on comedy is great you know what i explained so much but i think one of the reasons it works because it doesn't threaten people if you give folks a laugh you can open up a little bit the kind of engagement topic that maybe they wouldn't feel comfortable with on your last point i passed my so i do it on the left with with with occupy i've actually this is what i'm the last person to answer this because i've had beef with occupy because i've pointed out possibly some of the monotone monochromatic way that they rolled over the same time you speak of oakland and then there are places like motherhood that specifically people of color doing things within you know the i can opt out operate outside of the they're still

a part of that so yes it is way too white absolutely but everything which white is way too white like if i feel like we're going to run out of flicks and how do you want to go down the list of like what's to white give on the things that actually white but the point is that if good can come out of them we're all for it it's just a question of when we point out certain things especially people of color and they also started yelling you're defensive it's like well that's problematic and now how are we supposed to be allies and work together as a group if i can ever point out my own issues that you might not share because you actually have the privilege of not having to deal with the same nonsense that i have and humor is awesome otherwise i would just be a large black guy yelling at you he's still just a large black american where you live that are going to be like yeah i got to wrap it up but thank you so much for joining us tonight a baritone a person and the line james all white things guys here why do you want to get the book didn't work. because it's time to take our first three. states this week that we're going to speak to a number of occupiers. that are here in this group these things this year they're

speaking on a number of channels including talking about occupier. technology innovation all the developments around russia we've got the future covered. ok so i think i would have been around for a while a have almost nine months out and some people out there like to say if the movement lacks a message they haven't made a difference personally i think you guys know this we watch the show often i beg to differ and part of how we're seeing that difference in the incorporation of the

occupy movement is the fact that they're here at the net roots nation conference of the biggest progressive conference that's out there they're on a number of panels and so today we have two of those occupiers with us we have nick espinosa and matt brown hamlin two guys thanks for joining me and if you could first do a quick introduction of yourself for the viewers so they know what occupy or from how you got involved. because the mills the from occupy minneapolis and occupy homes with a sort of my family is currently in foreclosure or fighting to save our whole along with many of the families of the twin cities and. my name's not run around when i live in washington d.c. and i run an occupier homestudy org and i'm on my own campaign or i'm a member of the net roots and the way i want to be involved in this movement is adding my skills in the online space to help people fight off what's so what do you guys think about the fact that occupy is that net roots i mean are you with me is that is that kind of a big step for the movement or. her or not or is that expected. i think it's great

i mean i think occupy is continuing to push the dialogue to create new possibilities and to continue to hold people accountable and create. create a kind of national dialogue to bring some of these issues to the forefront about wealth inequality about corporate cover they should have our of our country and i think it's great to be in the online community has always been a place where the american left does actually have a really vibrant for teak of the current system and the political parties so i think it's a natural fit to see you know occupy folks like us here in gauging and folks who are more traditionally involved in democratic online. but so that's the thing right is this is more of a democratic conference if we think about it and this is one of the questions that i feel like no one's ever going to stop asking the occupy movement is what do you really want are you going to work with the democratic party or you know work completely outside the system i mean i'm one person is obvious i can't speak for the entire movement but for me it's about creating power outside of outside of the

existing power structures to hold them accountable that doesn't mean that we're not going to work with politicians but it also doesn't mean that we're going to endorse flat out any democrat going to hold people accountable or continue to push them. i mean and i think the biggest piece with occupy and what we can you especially with what we're doing with occupy homes is we're demanding answers to problems that haven't been addressed in the political system and as long as the people of either party democrats or republicans failed to address these critical questions like the foreclosure crisis we're going to be people like us demanding answers so it's there is a way to get engaged in this community to push elected officials to do the right thing by homeowners and hold banks accountable in certain banks for security and i think that's absolutely the sort of activity that occupy wall street and the occupy homes and that they want to see out of that why do you think it is i mean if you want to talk about the foreclosure crisis right this is something that millions of americans. i have been hit by that they're experiencing. on

a daily basis but it's not really what you hear so much in the mainstream media it's not so much we hear about from politicians on capitol hill or even from president obama or mitt romney wright who is now going to be the republican nominee essentially and so why this foreclosure crisis kind of like out of sight out of mind issue because it helps the banks for it not to be i think it's one of the biggest things the banks the front and the right to keep people out of there is critical for a change in a culture where you're not supposed to talk about being in foreclosure because you've done something wrong in the surge is not true it's not their fault it's the bank's fault and a lot of the reason we're trying to do this work soccer is to lift up stories of homeowners fighting and saying i'm not going to just give the bank my keys now as those stories get lifted up we can engage you in the political debate and it needs to be for let me address something that i think i mean no one's going to deny if there are divisions within the occupy movement there are problems within the occupy movement you two gentlemen are you know very well address and refined looking with

their oh there are people out there and i was just speaking in fact to somebody who's. from occupy providence here and i said you know where the occupy providence people they were supposed to be outside on the street outside of net roots of a conference and they ran into problems because they have this anarchist element because they have other elements and there's just a lot of division and debate and argue man and so it seemed like the whole thing kind of fell apart i mean you know it was hard to deal with that so that people don't only see perhaps you know i mean when there's been a lot of talk or if you want to talk about protests and clashes with police people always point to an artist elements or black bloc tactics how do you keep the attention away from just that and i think one of the things that we've seen with the occupiers. is that when it's about a specific family and their fight to keep their all against the back and rallying the community around them it's really hard for those sorts of divisions to exist in . because if you know this is very grounded work this is about you know this family

at this address in the house that they've had for you know years or generations and so i think that's something that at least with our work directly we've been able to stay very focused on on how we're working in organizing to help people fighting off those are in effect so is the targeted campaigning you think the better way to go about it there's tons of issues going on this medical student rippling our third generation right now so in my mind it be great to see more projects like occupy homes excel in with specific political demands as the push contradictories for families but also more transformative that is to change the way the system is working so where is this where the american spring break is we kept hearing the occupy going to come back with them engines after the winter and so what if they're not actually physically occupying space anymore where is this brain because aluna i feel like it's kind of dying down a little i guess maybe it's because i'm in the thick of it but i see it every day and every every week there are new small occupy groups that are coming up and

approaching us going occupier homesite org and saying how can i get involved you want to organize people in our community you really mean that someone who's losing their home want to do something and i think it is happening i think you have to keep in mind and i know you've seen a lot of reporting on this there's a very coordinated crackdown around the country by city government some police departments an occupy protest they were trying to do everything they could to take away public space from the smooth and it has had its negative effects but let's be fair about what some of those very deliberate because of the power of this movement show that. this is not going away any time soon these problems are only getting worse the foreclosure crisis isn't going away and i think people are going to continue to be inspired by what's happening around the world and fun ways to play that well in many ways what's happening around the world too is that the economy continues to be in a worse and worse state around the world you know we're definitely not out of this hole that were and and secure and to ask you kind of an election question because do you have a presidential election coming out in november and while the occupy movement isn't supporting one. r.t.

for another is it better for occupy if mitt romney wins i mean are you know are more people then probably aligned with certain progressive causes like people here in every it's going to be mobilizing but you know i don't know that i would go that far but i it would be great to see mainstream democrats care more about the foreclosure crisis and care more about setting bankers to jail for their crimes. i think we're going to miss of the outcome occupy is going to continue to do what it's doing i think if it is a matter of amarah me obama or romney these problems are going away i'm still i'm still you know people like obama still some real leadership and go after the bad russ the bankers break up these big banks that have a monopoly over over our democracy and that are taking people's homes away and putting this entire nation. while we never had a standing bankers arrested yet arriving there a lot of people there would like to see that i will see you know if that can be transferred to some kind of action mc matt thank you guys so much for joining us

tonight here. branding it's a big part of every convention and we know that the g.o.p. brand is about freedom and smaller government but i want to know what is the progressive brand i think a progressive as someone who just attempts to make things better for other people a progressive is somebody who wants to advance the a values of american country to the american nation to make it more inclusive for everybody and ensure that all americans can succeed equally a progressive to me is someone who moves towards solutions and who someone who is active not just reactive i think a lot of progressives care about the identity frame so like race gender class flame and are focused on building a movement in the us rather than just getting the same people locked in an office over and over again it seems like everyone had a different answer to that and i wasn't the only one that was confused by it is a really tricky. yeah that's a that's

a tricky question i don't know how to answer other than to say that like i think it definitely did evolve from other you know words that people feel uncomfortable with now so i decided to change gears and i thought maybe people would have a more coherent message when telling an independent voter like me who to vote for come november i expected to hear a lot about this guy but i was wrong if i was going to say who you should vote for i would say you should vote for your beliefs i don't think anyone should vote for the left or for the right i mean i think that ultimately you should vote. issue by issue in order to use to succeed i think. in the electoral vote you have to side with with either or you know you have to there's always there's always going to be something another party that's going to push for against whatever move when you're trying to push forward but nobody wanted to fight for my vote and this guy was

actually trying to lose it president obama he's not perfect there are some things that i would prefer that he had done differently i would have preferred that he had taken the fight to the republicans immediately after the election and not wasted so much time trying to accommodate them i wish that he had gone after the banks toure's immediately after the collapse of the economy i would have preferred that he had pulled our troops out of i reckon mediately i would have preferred that he had close guantanamo bay immediately but. the republicans are going to field anybody that would have done a job on any of those things that i thought was a better one it looks like all i've come away with is a discussion topic for next year is that roots selling progressivism one o one for the ellen show i'm jenny churchill. i gave her take another break but stay for you because there's still a lot more coming up from our show here asking that rates nation conference in providence next hour we'll talk to a man at the start of the new attack company about advertising at. getting what you

want so we advertise now we'll do a little monetary policy talk with matthew yglesias so stating. welcome back to the new center here in moscow top stories now. russia says there is no alternative to the un envoy in syria as russia proposes an international conference to resolve the conflict. in spain confirms it will last for funds to help the country's beleaguered banks self promotion she talks with the eurozone minister says the loan it needs is much more than the fourteen billion euros recommended by the international monetary fund. and russian to start with is the french open crowd looking have victory and all four grand slams. will be about the news team with more news stories in the meantime we returned to washington and the

. good lumber tour. was to build the most sophisticated robot which on fortunately doesn't give a darn about anything mission to teach creation why it should care about humans. this is why you should care only. our guys so here we are at net roots and obviously one of the big topics for discussion here is the economy a lot of talk about unemployment a lot of talk about tax policy not so much when it comes to monetary policy if anything they have one panel about the federal reserve but it seems like it's more of an introductory class to the fed then a real honest discussion about it and so here to talk more about that with me is matthew yglesias from slate and also author.