i am sam sachs in for tom hartman in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture with an economy in turmoil a nation in crisis in years of failed economic policies it's clear we need some new revolutionary ideas to get america back on track we know romney and ryan aren't the people to give us these new ideas but maybe dr jill stein is the green party's candidate for president of the united states joins me in just a moment also paul ryan has close ties to a certain labor union that sounds crazy right well if you know what's going on at this union then it shouldn't be too surprising that story coming up a little later and what would america be like if we held corporations accountable for their actions like the big banks were destroying our economy or big oil for destroying our environment while some countries do punish out of control corporations and the united states should be doing the same thing tom we'll explain in tonight's daily tick. and we begin tonight with the seventy year old idea rewind with me back

i'm sam sachs in for tom hartman coming up in this half hour a previous conversations with great minds that tom had with g.m.o. expert jeffrey smith in november the state of california will vote on whether or not genetically modified food should come with special labeling corporations that peddle g m o's like monsanto are spending big bucks to make sure that doesn't happen in this conversational understand exactly what monsanto is trying to hide so here it is tom's conversations with great minds with jeffrey smith. for tonight's conversations of the great minds i'm joined by jeffrey smith jeffrey is a leading consumer advocate in the fight against the use of genetically modified foods he's council leaders on every continent influence some of the first state laws in the united states regulating the use of g.m.o. those genetically modified organisms jeffrey has been described as the leading world expert in the understanding and communication of the health issues surrounding genetically modified foods is the author of numerous critically acclaimed books on genetically modified foods inclu

i'm sam sachs in for tom hartman in washington d.c. and tonight we bring you a special edition of the big picture we'll be revisiting two previous conversations with great minds had recently one with award winning filmmaker tom shadyac another with m.s. in b.c. host and author chris hedges and we begin tonight with tom's conversation with tom shadyac the man behind such films as a splinter a pet detective the nutty professor and bruce almighty and this conversation chidiac talks about what motivated him to hang up all the fame and fortune making blockbuster movies to pursue a more meaningful project trying to find out what's wrong with the world how we can fix it and ultimately how we can be happier those are questions that aren't going away anytime soon so here it is tom's conversations with great minds with filmmaker tom shadyac. conversations with great minds i'm joined by renowned filmmaker tom shadyac he's been a director a producer a screenwriter an actor a comedian you name it he's done it and his movies are some of the most wid

and welcome back to the big picture i'm sam sachs in for tom hartman coming up in this half hour the fukushima nuclear power plant is still facing major obstacles and the potential for more devastation more than a year since this nuclear disaster started but that's not stopping the japanese government from restarting the nation's nuclear power plants the heck is going on here and republicans have introduced their new tax rate proposal which would raise taxes on the middle class while giving the wealthy elite a nice tax break surprise surprise what kind of tax reform is really needed in america in order to make everyone pay their fair share again. why don't you take a look at some of these pictures coming out of tokyo over the last few weeks hundreds of thousands of people have rallied in the streets of japan in what many are calling the largest peaceful protest that nation has seen in decades. and they're protesting nuclear power and they're in the streets because their government has recently restarted two nuclear reactors for the first time since the march eleventh two thousand and

and welcome back to the big picture i'm sam sachs in for tom hartman coming up in this half hour every day big oil pumps hundreds of thousands of tons of carbon into our atmosphere polluting our skies and destroying our environment while big oil's actions have gone largely unchecked one democratic congressman wants to change that my next guest thinks that's a bad idea and what do you do if you're the n.r.a. and you're afraid of stronger gun regulations well you start a conspiracy theory and twist the words the constitution i don't know the n.r.a. is exploiting the colorado shooting massacre to whip up fear among gun nuts in america and tonight's daily take. at the top of the show we talked about how a global food crisis is being made worse by dwindling resources and rapid climate change and that we're going to talk about a solution honestly it's a small solution but it's a start democratic congressman jim mcdermott introduced legislation last week to place a tax on carbon emissions basically all those greenhouse gases that are being pumped into our skies by the energy industry congress

every american athlete who win as medal in london also wins a cash prize and an olympic size sachs bill from uncle sam. almost $9,000 in taxes for taking home a gold. more than $5,300 for a silver and just over $3,500 in taxes for winning a bronze. the men's relay team that helped push phelps over the top owes the government nearly $63,000 so far for its combined efforts. ryan lochte's tax bill is more than $23,000 and all the u.s. athletes owe close to $250,000 in taxes so far. florida gop senator marco rubio introduced a bill wednesday that would eliminate the taxes, calling the system a mess. he said the medal tax is a classic example of this madness. democratic house minority leader nancy pelosi was talking about the need to deal with the bush era tax cuts when she was asked about the medal tax. >> it's not without the greatest respect and regard for the skill and talent of our olympians but the fact of the matter is we have a serious matter to deal with here. >> senator rubio said the athletes' success at the olympics should be celebrated and not taxed. >> just ahead, ryan lochte describes his pe