and chief annette wright daily lives chatterton democratic strategist and president of the chattering group and or as cooper conservative commentator and senior fellow at the national center for public policy research this week thanks thanks to all of you for joining really bridget this week my dealt with in these times broke a story revealing that mitt romney had actually encouraged employers who are part of a business organization and fit the national federation and about as be proactive in forming their employees about who they should vote for take a listen. i hope you make it very clear to your employees what you believe is in the best interest of of your enterprise and therefore their job and their future in the upcoming elections and whether you agree with me or you agree with president obama or or whatever your political view i hope i hope you pass those along to your employees nothing illegal about you talking to your employees about what you believe is best for the business. because i think that will figure into their their

election decision there since then we've seen several c.e.o.'s notify their employees letters going out georgia pacific the koch brothers and whatnot used to be that we have laws that you know an employer can say their employees please do this job this way but not you know they basically couldn't harass them whether it was sexual harassment or political harassment and citizens united blew up the political harassment part of that made it legal. how how is this adam how is this not coercion well it's not first off this much ado about nothing you know your job if you vote for this guy who that's not true what he said in this he said to employers or employees what you think is in the best interest employer isn't going to be walking down the street with the guy to the booth and watching him vote and then even knowing exactly how he voted and second the big problem i see with this is that he didn't say go tell your employees to vote for me he didn't call for them to. say you think of how you employ you would have voted obama. obama bumper

sticker it is his cubicle or his place of work to lose here i don't really think it's that big of a deal either and to be honest we may not agree on a lot tonight but we're probably going to agree on this i don't think it's that big of a deal i couldn't agree with you more completely you know the ballot is still secret when we walk into the voting booth no one knows who we vote for i deal in voter files every day i know if you voted i don't have a clue who you voted for so i still think there's an enormous amount of privacy in voting am i surprised that this happened no not at all but the truth is that unions do this is that ministers and research unit so comments to unions are democracies unions and the leadership of the united like idiots but i don't know a major ship of a bunch of mars and the like in stalinist if they will answer why would a democracy it is very simple you go unions are elected into existence they can be elected out of existence union leaders are elected and actually leading the way

right now in fighting the secret ballot so i'm stuck but your eyes it's amazing to me all that he says is give your employees a heads up give them notice this is the very thing the obama people administration is telling defense employers not to do don't tell people that they're about to get laid off don't tell people the place because they're not if you know there's no way the congress is going to is going to let sequester asian go through it all year but you're changing your changing the topic that i you know i apparently all three of you are of the of the opinion that this is this is not the use of you know corporate power in a way that is unbalanced and i disagree but just leave it at that because i think we have a consensus here stand on the topic of mitt romney there's a new revolving door it's now at the mitt romney headquarters the back in august they hired george to be bush's deputy assistant for economic policy pierce scranton to be their economic policy adviser turns out just three months earlier he was a lobbyist for wall street pushing for nuking dodd frank. and cutting taxes on the

bank's toure's might this have something to do with why romney is like so enthusiastic about doing away with dodd frank was oh sure i romney's been enthusiastic about doing away with dodd frank long before this guy ever came on board i mean that's been a part of mitt romney's policy since the moment dodd frank came in a into existence i think the entire republican party would burn it down if they actually had anything physical they could do that this is something about mitt romney the he's hiring a lobbyist to be is just economic policy adviser nothing we didn't already know which is that mitt romney is in the pockets of every big bank and every big lobbyist and every big corporation in america he is bought and sold by those guys he is one of those guys he sits next to them when they eat lunch or whatever country club they belong to so the only reason that i'm not fired up about this is to me news it ten no big deal this is more mitt romney's america is going to look like all the big corporations and all the really rich white guys get to sit at a table and all the rest of us get to work our butts off for nothing that's going to be mitt romney's america and that's what the status quo is the definition of

fascism is the merger of corporate and state interests in the world that you live in apparently only white men work as lobbyist the truth of the matter is it's not been very effective on the part of the obama administration to have this anti lobbyist policy what it means is people who study people from only with people who understand and have taken the time to know the details of the very people who are often kept out from participating in the process i think that is a ridiculous standard and all of it. just for the poor well of appealing to you at home as i don't like to lobbyists we don't like lobbyist so we don't elect lobbyists but we select them by how talented and capable and effective they are who is we the people that join. others know the people that join the stockholders create corporations and those corporations select and in some instances small businesses hire and i have never again and i have never ever ever and i've owned stock for years and years i mean not not big time but i don't start for. i've never

gotten a proxy state in this is where think it hiring these five lobbyists here's their c.v.s. do you approve or not but never underestimate the reasons you like i do i go to shareholder meetings you're allowed to go to the shareholder meeting and you may make a promise to demand good luck trying that we've got several successes with stopping companies from wasting money on climate change for instance. i think we're also overlooking the fact that our own president currently employees at least fifty five lobbyists or former lobbyist like us in the current administration for one kathleen sebelius said this is one of the problems i'm i will equal opportunity bashes this is one of the problems that we have you know when reagan came into office there were fewer than a thousand lobbyists here registered in the city now there's thirty thirty three thousand or something like that sure but we're looking like as if you know one more lobbyist and only one that we know well no i think it's our work in the administration not only is it that he's beginning to economic advice from a guy who was lobbying for the industry that crashed our economy absolutely i mean

that it actually happened we have that argument consistently over there you think the banks are said nothing to the question i think that the policies put up before the bush administration started in one thousand nine hundred under the clinton administration led to this problem and fannie mae and the other government subsidized mortgage winters which the bush administration tried to stop and the democrats like barney frank tried to prevent so yes kate is so what about when eric schneiderman went after the banks two years in two thousand and five and said what you guys are doing is wrong we're going to stop this because going to lead to a great depression and the bush administration pulled out of their back pocket eight hundred sixty law and said no we're going to use a lot of ways never been used before to stop a state a.g. from from can from regulating the banks in a way that would have prevented the crash that bad somehow bill had. absolutely a state attorney general had no business trying to regulate the entire american bank exactly how you are but i think mr barney frats was chaminda of the committee with jurisdiction and he had a democrat. eddie and endless to me as well and sit on his butt literally making

this it look as if you're already in the senate for two months and one day two months and one day out of the entire obama presidency really actually passes pretty good love it's all glazed over that talk about through the last two years of the bush administration the bush administration gramm of the reality tell us have one bank putting them back more of your imported out of committee which is going to seize was on the take it's amazing he's sitting there dating the lobbyist and that's not newsworthy but he sat there as the song that you are you know now your gear green in downtown las vegas you apparently it wasn't a problem lawmakers shouldn't date lobbyists either so we have i got to be honest i mean i'm sorry how many lobbyist thirty three thousand if we're not allowed to date lobbyist i don't know why one town right the fire nobody left to go fight some redskins everybody having to feel because there's nobody else in town ok slowly but surely the wal-mart workers strike is spreading on monday workers with the retail giant oklahoma walked out on the job to protest what they claim are intimidation

tactics against employees by wal-mart last week in a dozen states nearly one hundred wal-mart workers held demonstrations outside their stores and earlier this month as many as sixty wal-mart workers were on strike outside a store in southern california and wal-mart's fifty year history only once the employees successfully unionized and so wal-mart closed that stores in canada given the declining union rates over the last several decades isn't it time to put in place more protections for unions for democracy in the workplace or which is that unions or democracy in the work where unions are democracy at work we disagree on that because when you say that i hear stalinist tactics that take away from the ability of the owners of the company only investors of the company to be able to get it i could not be more wrong unions are responsible in this country for the eight hour workday they are responsible for the five day work week they are responsible for osha laws they are responsible for the fact that we do not have twelve year olds working in factories ask anyone else i'm doing well asked the temples of congress probably broke every worker's right. in this country they have

made the workplace a safer place for movie and american workers to call it style and mystic is absolutely correct to call it is at a good as the tempos of people that would gladly take every single one of those jobs that are in dispute both in california and in oklahoma the poor stewardship of this administration in destroying opportunity is making people desperate for nine or an hour to go out i would argue if there are people willing to take those jobs because we have destroyed the unions and and because we have as in part as a consequence of that we've outsourced all these jobs you know outside the united states and you know this is what work is i mean we've got insane trade policies we've got insane labor policy is destroying the middle class ok first off and by the way this is the this is bill clinton signed nafta get the deputy destroying unions as a result of jobs going overseas right i mean what we're talking about what it does is it actually raise the sort of political power to to argue in favor of those jobs here what happened you know. i did see what happened wisconsin let me say this unions artificially push up salaries yes it creates

a lower demand for workers are usually questions that salary is about equal to do that kind of work should make more money it's not a question of should there's not morally answer on what a particular job gets it's what the marketplace will bear examine it's what people ought to be a well what about it and they're going to really make what on average public school teachers anybody think a teacher i was actually the only parent roughly about thirty eight thousand dollars a year i'd say i know that right if that's all a public school teacher is worth in this country if it was not for teachers in government they would make even less or not does he and other unions argue for the workers of this country for them to be paid fairly for good work it worked out for teachers when you were young that was going to merit i'm going to graduate with a degree they could read like like they were back in the fifty's sixty's and seventy's at the peak of unionization your point that the unions are artificially raising wages is absolutely right the norm i mean you can go back and go back and read anything from adam smith to you know forward. the norm in an economy total

laissez faire no regulation no involvement than the norm is is is scrooge marley it is it is what you saw it is go for it is right smiling way above and it is let alone is that is what dickens wrote it let me finish it is what dickens wrote about it is a small very wealthy upper class a very small mercantile list and professional middle class and huge class of the working poor that's what an economy normally produces if you keep all your hands off as you're suggesting as you're suggesting and so you're absolutely right that unions come in and say we are going to we are going to say we're not going to work unless you push some of that money down from the top that was not the economy in america from eight hundred eighty eight in one nine hundred twenty arguably one of the periods of time when we had the most laissez faire attitude that this country's ever had and it is simply and as a rule and in one thousand nine hundred the average income in today's dollars was ten thousand and five we don't have the inflow and we had an influx of people coming into our country because it was such a bountiful place of opportunity people were getting their hands cut off their

fingers cut off they were dying in a country where they were all of the older working roma were trying your strategy the failed strategy of the socialist credit and people were fleeing the area coming to america were no price that because there were no socialist cultures in one thousand nine. hundred to live just as you describe are more rubble after the break . you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for lengthly you think you understand it and then you

glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom hartman welcome to the big picture. here is mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that many americans call a dollar. i'm sorry i'm just a guy who cares an awful lot about you sir are a fool you know what kind of mind they're terrorist cells in your neighborhood all want the usa to defeat terrorism they are liberal and the christian public school can secure beliefs about it because it's going to the corporate media distracts us from what you and i should care about because they're profit driven industry that

sells a sensationalistic garbage he calls it breaking news i'm having martin and we're going to break that. big picture rubble joining me are adam by lead lose chatterton and whores cooper let's get back to it thursday the new jersey state assembly signed onto a resolution expressing strong opposition to citizens united and called on congress to amend the constitution to get rid of that ruling in jersey is now the ninth state to support amending the constitution to prevent corporations millionaires and billionaires and basically buying our elections and our politicians already california connecticut maryland massachusetts or why you new mexico rhode island and vermont have adopted similar resolutions and here's one reason why

a new report by open secrets reveals that these non party affiliated groups and individuals in total have spent more than a half billion dollars this election cycle or the total amount of spending by every by all the non party groups in every election since one thousand nine hundred come in. no problems out of no not at all i don't think we spent enough on the election activities i think this is a very very important critical the election that's coming up the issues there are billionaires we absolutely ought to be more invested in one of the ways that we show that investment is resources that we spent ok more billionaires lose no i actually think that more money in politics is actually an ok thing but i do think all of this corporate money and i think the fact that these corporations and the donations that are coming into these super pacs are relatively hidden they're hard to find is not the way to do it let's do it like virginia does it virginia you can take any kind of money you want if you're running for state office in virginia from

governor on down corporate money personal money in any amount you know what happens within twenty four hours of taken it you've got to tell the state and the state put it on the internet if you don't take the money then let's figure out where it's coming from if you're going to be bought and sold by r.j. are going back so i want to know if there's a secondary consequence of that and that is that the media has this is a huge money pot for the for the national media and for and for local media and they're looking at this and so. they make money when there's a horse race and they don't make money when it's obvious that this candidate is going to beat this candidate and so it's looking at these election cycles particularly since the mid eighty's when this really started picking up you know in and after the doctor was blown up when reagan stopped in force in eighty seven that it seems like the media will if a candidate is up those beaten down if a candidate is down they'll start bringing him up they're always trying to get it to even and because they want those advertising dollars that seems to me like a really screwed up system that is exactly what i have witnessed this election

cycle every time mr obama's been galloping away they give mr romney a leg up in the middle of the banks they sat with him they give him more time i think he's doing everything they can to help mr romney just to keep this race fair now if you believe but i've got a bridge in new york i want to i really do think that they they've got a two horse race they you know it was. the horse race when the american people tara pretty much figured out what was going to separate a male business there's sort of a billion dollars still hasn't been spent yet here the tenor is going to go business stewardship of the economy have nothing to do with the fact that this president is having such a hard time getting reelected nothing oh it was the media wow what did they go out entire about thirty seconds fifteen each go ahead i got something you know. like i like you said there's not enough money being spent and i think that if there was more to spend we might see better policy ok i will say this i don't know if there's a conspiracy afoot but i will say in all the big target states because this is something i deal with every day televisions ad time is gone it's actually been

going since july sold out so what's happening is they're auctioning it off on the web for ten times its normal price that the no local affiliates and the national are not just making money they are getting rich absolutely and that's my concern last question quick for paul ryan try to prove that he and mitt romney really do care about the forty seven percent by showing up to volunteer at a soup kitchen on monday become screwed up and showed up at the after the soup kitchen was already closed he then put on an apron and pretended to wash dishes for a photo op this is that had already been cleaned the operator's soup kitchen blasted the campaign for the impromptu visit saying that ryan didn't ask permission and now the soup kitchen is losing donors over the controversy facility's president was quoted as saying you can rest assured there has been a substantial backlash so the question is this your political philosophy hinges on the fact that private charity is bigger better than government that it isn't a bad idea to put private charity out of business it is a terrible idea to do that mess what government doesn't so many instances how about

just a little bit of fact checking here actually the operator of that facility invited him to come and this is an testified on the record it was the supervisor of that operator this is wait for your fact checkers on the record lows well you know i'm glad that they are trying to walk the walk but it's clearly if he really had ever been in a soup kitchen. he would know what one looked like and he would know that they were dirty they would know that those dishes had already been washed and he would know what he was doing he looked like a guy who had never been anywhere near a soup kitchen out of this clear ridiculous you know i really doubt that the vice presidential nominee is like hanging out at soup kitchens ever but the fact that we're sitting around and judging him based on whether or not he washed the dishes we have on employ know that he had made a phony rather than a very good job he was i. had a great so you all thank you very much here. so

your nobel peace prize winning european union is demanding that indebted nations like greece and portugal privatized all their water resources if they want to continue receiving bailouts as in you want to stay in the eurozone then hand over your most precious commons to trans national corporations this is in line with the broader privatization agenda that we're seeing all around the world especially here in the united states as water roads schools prisons you name it are all being privatized and taken out of the hands of we the people in my opinion these are assaults on democracy but one thing that europe as a done the one thing that europe has crossed it off and said no way are we privatizing that is the vote but here in the united states from coast to coast we have privatized the vote and in doing so we've removed the lynchpin holding together our democracy. several european nations including ireland germany and the

netherlands have experimented with and then ditched electronic voting machines in fact germany's supreme court ruled that evo two machines were unconstitutional and ireland sold theirs for a penny on the dollar as scrap metal but here in the united states we continue to put out more and more evo to machines owned by corporations that seem to have vested political interests that's despite the fact that it's pretty well documented to such machines may have flipped political races in favor of republicans take for example would happen in nebraska in one thousand nine hundred six republican chuck hagel running on an evo to machine company security security a huge contract to sell those machines to nebraska then decided to run for senate in nebraska against ben nelson and guess what despite being a long shot candidate bagel won or at least that's what is known voting machines calculator at least some of them the washington post said this following the surprise victory a victory against an incumbent democratic governor was the major republican upset

in the november election that says in nationwide and as bev harris who wrote the book on black box voting pointed out a goal inexplicably won nearly every voter demographic and one in largely african-american communities that had never even voted republican he was the first republican senator elected in the brassica twenty four years and he was elected in part on these voting machines something similar happened in georgia in two thousand and two according to polls heading into election day democratic senator max cleland had a five point lead over his republican challenger saxby chambliss but after the votes were counted on the machines chambliss ended up winning by seven points not a single poll heading into the election showed chambliss with a lead let alone a seven point lead yet that's what the corporate voting machine said happened no paper trail no record and chambliss went on to serve in the senate. despite all this weird stuff with you voting machines in two thousand and two george w. bush signed into law the help america vote act which set aside three point nine

billion dollars for polling stations to replace traditional voting methods with evo to machines and since then our use of the voting in our life has exploded ahead of the two thousand and four election the c.e.o. of a major evolving machine company promised to deliver ohio's electoral votes to george w. bush of course bush narrowly won ohio amid numerous well documented accounts of election fraud in that state including ballot box stuffing voter caging and you guessed it evoking machine manipulation in two thousand and seven three years after the election ohio's secretary of state concluded in an official study that the state's a voting machines had quote critical security failures that could impact the integrity of elections in the buckeye state and of quote in other words the ohio election could have easily been stolen or delivered to bush just as c.e.o. promised that's what happens when you privatized voting we handed over to private

for profit corporations and now history is repeating itself. heading into this year's election a quarter of all of its castle be on evolving machines that don't have paper trails and have been shown over and over again to be easily hacked and some of these machines just so happen to be owned by people affiliated with mitt romney as the free press reported bain alumni now raising big money as romney bundlers are also in the electronic voting machine business this appears to be a repeat of the infamous former c.e.o. of de bold wally o'dell who raised money for bush while his company supplied voting machines and election management software in the two thousand and four election in texas washington colorado hawaii oklahoma and ohio evo two machines will be used that are owned by a company called heart intercity heart inner civic is partly owned by a capital investment firm known as capital eleven investors of hiv capital used to

work at mitt romney's bain capital and two of them are currently bundlers for the romney campaign in other words the private operators of these evo two machines may have already picked the guy they want to win this is not how our democracy should work even if it's not this bad just looking this bad but this is what happens when you privatized the vote we've devoted many segments of the show to this creeping privatization agenda the efforts to inject the profit motive into our commons from water facilities in detroit schools in chicago to public parks in benton harbor michigan we the people's democratic control of our commons is being taken away by transnational corporations these are critical sins against democracy violations of democracy. but privatizing the vote itself is a moral sin and a mortal sin actually against democracy itself and this sin might be what hands this year's election to the oligarchy once again this is they've been doing since

two thousand thomas paine described the vote as the beating in our democracy if we could private it we could talk about privatizing schools or water supplies but the vote the thing that is at the center of the entire thing this needs to become a major issue we need to do like ireland and sell these machines as if they were just scrap metal pennies on the dollar and get rid of them and that's the way it is tonight friday october nineteenth two thousand and twelve for more information on any of the stories we covered visit our website to tom hartman dot com free speech dot org dot com if you missed any of tonight's show you can now watch it in h.d. on hulu at hulu dot com slash pictures also check out our two youtube channels there are links to thom hartmann dot com also to check out all the different ways you can send us your feedback and don't forget them ocracy begins with you just a spectator sport you get to participate show up go to move to amend or go to p.t.

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