well it's now been two years since the supreme court handed down its decision on citizens united allowing the floodgates to open for corporate spending in our political system and today protests took to. took place across the country an action called occupy the courts here in d.c. protesters gathered on the steps of the supreme court and were met with the police presence and arrests congressman dennis kucinich meanwhile introduced an amendment yesterday to have the supreme court to decision overturned saying that because of citizens united american democracy has been put up on the auction block so two years in public opinion soured and now for the overturning of citizens united to actually have a chance joining me from our studio in los angeles is john amano founder of crooks and liars john i want to thank you for joining me tonight and first of all let me just ask you know we have seen some effects obviously of citizens united especially in the midterm in two thousand and ten more money spent than ever before but do you think that we've seen the worst of it yet or is it just the tip of t

so two years in public opinion soured and now for the overturning of citizens united to actually have a chance joining me from our studio in los angeles is john amano founder of crooks and liars john i want to thank you for joining me tonight and first of all let me just ask you know we have seen some effects obviously of citizens united especially in the midterm in two thousand and ten more money spent than ever before but do you think that we've seen the worst of it yet or is it just the tip of the iceberg. it's just the tip of the iceberg and thanks for having me on it's really it's really cool to be with you alone and the amount of money that we're going to see coming in the general election is just going to be obscene and you know what's been really good to me larry as you've even seen it yourself is that newt gingrich has been complaining about mitt romney's super pac money those at this point since we have the republican primaries go in they have bash in each other with all these anonymous corporate donations i mean it flipped the election for romney even though romney now offi

what makes i did different now under citizens united before citizens united if anything?it's indirect. citizens united direct impact was on corporate and union donations to independent expenditure groups. back in 2008 or 2004, you saw wealthy donors making direct expenditures on behalf of candidates, they could bye they are own ads, give to these groups, 527 groups, the swift groups. there was also a legal cloud of suspicion hanging over that kind of activity, sort of unsettled. what citizens united, it released a safety valve on that, it basically said you can give as much money as you want to a super pack, whether you're a corporation, or a labor union or an individual or any combination of the three if mitt romney is the one designating what the differences are. >> i wanted to ask you if in terms of like a level playing field, these opportunities have been made available by citizens united, are democrats taking advantage of those as well as republicans? >> they are. you know, they didn't really want it to be this way. when barack obama won the nomination, a lot of outs

as a result as a result of corporate personhood and the supreme court decisions like citizens united our democracy frankly is in peril and jeff clements as someone who can help us he's the author of the new book corporations are not people he joins us now welcome thank you tom good to be here great to have you with us before we get into the end of the book what what got you into the law and into the massachusetts a.g.'s office well it's a long story i'll give you the short version and i was actually out of college a canvas there with greenpeace really and i was going door to door in places of rural virginia to suburban washington d.c. and other places like that talking about environmental protection and the balance of people and and corporate power even then that's really what the environmental movement is about how we make it a more just better society for all of us and i went to law school because i saw that's where the battles were taken the we could talk about it but in the meantime the courts and the law were actually creating the results we all lived with and i wanted to have a

united states district court here in washington d.c. no you see the case involves two foreign nationals one a canadian citizen working in the united states the other a canadian and israeli citizen studying in the united states both wanted to get involved in the two thousand and twelve election one working on behalf of president obama the other on behalf of conservatives and both argued that the ban on campaign contributions was a restriction of their first amendment rights after all foreign nationals have freedom of speech while residing in the united states and as the supreme court ruled in citizens united money is speech the court ultimately ruled that while they can speak freely they can contribute freely writing quote the united states has a compelling interest for purposes of first amendment analysis in limiting the participation of foreign citizens and activities of american democratic self-government and in thereby preventing foreign influence over the u.s. political process but yesterday it was up to the supreme court to give the ultimate say in the matter you know that same supreme court that ruled in citizens united that corpor

on the anniversary of the supreme court's crazed citizens united decision the man behind this movement to put an end to the bizarre idea that corporations are people and money is speech david cobb joins me for tonight's conversations with great minds and from wisconsin to the halls of congress and our nation's heartland american citizens have had quite a week standing up for democracy to touch and how corporations were dealt a big blow this week and asked the signals a new wave of public backlash is in tonight's big picture rubble. today at over one hundred fifty cities across america demonstrators rallied in front of federal courthouses and even in front of the supreme court here in washington d.c. to protest the two year anniversary of the citizens united decision this day of action encourage people to fight back against the radical ruling of the supreme court the declared corporations are people and money is speech a ruling that has put our democracy up for sale to the highest bidder i had the honor of speaking at the rally in front of the supreme court earlier today. the supreme co

you know even even the supreme court justice who voted in favor of citizens united against the f.e.c. all said that disclosure was vitally important it was up to congress to pass constitutional laws that provided a kind of disclosure we still don't have it congress in both the house and senate side did not pass the disclose act in two thousand and ten when they had a chance to we've not really gotten any closer to that since then and this is just i mean it's a little more than a p.r. victory for the campaign finance field who has had really nothing to cheer about for about forty years that really isn't a p.r. victory though i mean i don't hear anything it is what people are cheering for and i don't mean to me like they're winners yeah i mean that's the thing that this decision did almost nothing would be like in baseball if we got the statistics for the game. three months after the fact that's about the situation that we have right now in our campaign elections are basically who's being funded by what the money that is disclosed comes out. way after the fact you have money now

citizens united really means citizens denied.enied a -- a fair playing field, denied an ek quilt quitable influence in our political system, denied a right to be truly heard, denied the right to even know who is spending all of this money. while much of the focus this week is on citizens united, we must realize that the corruption of our campaign finance system did not suddenly happen two years ago. the citizens united decision sparked a renewed focus on the need for reform. but the supreme court laid the groundwork for a broken system many years ago. in 1976, the court held in buckley versus vallejo, that restricting candidate campaign expenditures violates the first amendment right to speech. it established the flawed precedent that money and speech are the same thing. since then, the influence of money has continued to play an increasing role in our nation's elections. sadly, in many cases a candidate's ability to either raise money or self-finance can outweigh the quality of a candidate's ideas or dedication to public service

(laughter) citizens united is a very, very sad decision. of the worst supreme court decisions ever made. >> stephen: if someone wants to support your call for a constitutional amendment against citizens united is there a place they can go. >> we have a web site, we have 120,000 people have already signed the petition. we would like more on the the second anniversary of this disastrous decision. there's going to be demonstrations all across the country. >> stephen: it has to be passed through both houses of congress and then ratified by two-thirds of the states? so by may? >> absolutely. absolutely. >> stephen: senator sanders, thank you so much for joining me. senator bernard sanders, the book is "the speech." we'll be right back. >> stephen: that's it for "the report," everybody. good night! (cheers and applause) captioning sponsored by comedy central

simply going to follow the strict scrutiny test and say that in montana or state election law citizens united does not require us to overturn our state law i predict that this case will go up to the united states supreme court just as i predict that this movement that is growing across the country is going to get legs and will politicize ever more i'll tell you time in a nutshell what we're seeing is the functional equivalent of the abolitionist movement or the women's suffrage movement or the civil rights movement you're seeing a number of i think of them as fronts and a long campaign for real democracy in this country there's a political front there's an electoral front and there is a legal front and i think that what we're seeing with the montana supreme court decision is just a harboring or of things to come to and and i mean arguably in eight hundred fifty six and dred scott the supreme court ruled the people in that case african-americans were property and then in twenty town the supreme court ruled the property was people it's like the mirror writers of each other and both provoked an

to protest the two year anniversary of the citizens united decision this day of action encourage people to fight back against the radical ruling of the supreme court the declared corporations are people and money is speech a ruling that has put our democracy up for sale to the highest bidder i had the honor of speaking at the rally in front of the supreme court earlier today. the supreme court said that in their implicitly in their citizens united decision that they were expanding freedom to worship to have the freedom to year with these corporate persons just have to say this was the main rationale of solution but in fact the consequence of that is is that the freedom of real persons has been diminished over the freedom of these giant corporations finance franklin roosevelt and rallies like this are translated into real change this week portland maine became the latest city in america to pass a resolution calling on congress to amend the constitution to overturn citizens united and declare that corporations are not people joining a long line of other cities from los angeles to boulder

politics very negatively and only nine percent have a positive view of the supreme court ruling citizens united so if this thing is hurting small businesses which produce fifty one percent of all the all the employment the united states and seventy one percent of the new public private sector jobs is the time to say no to congressionally or something somehow overturn citizens united but you know that comes to me as a bit of a surprise none of those numbers seem unusual it would seem for twenty or thirty or forty years the impression of small business people has been that successful large corporations have had an advantage and whether it was lobbying whether it was and working with state house and even larger bill if the issue here is whether or not there are certain constitutional rights that up tame those constitutional rights may be popular that may be unpopular but if they obtain they do and i don't see any move that's going to successfully change the fact that the constitution has guaranteed the right to certain people to be able to use their resources to protect their right to vote you hea

>> citizens united. >> wait. what we have seen in the past -- what we see in the past is not incremental and what we have seen in the past two years in terms of the effect has not been. the very -- very candidacy of newt gingrich is emblematic that it is not. >> hold on. let me say something. $5 million check written bay by a loan billionaire to go to air in south carolina is more than an incremental change. it wasses entry entirety of the media. >> you are missing the point. in so many prior campaigns, almost the entirety of the advertising comes from the same special interests. this was not different. >> one individual. >> so what. >> it is not a democracy. >> power of money to influence the debate has been a pervasive problem for years. >> money had to be collected from multiple individuals. not given by one. >> it could have been one corporation, one union. >> no, it was than. no, it was than. that's not opened up. >> it was. it was in terms of the way it was done. >> this debate has been going on for four ye

house and senate and now what you are talking about is horrendous situation made much worse by citizens united-- you are talk about politicians being adopted, if you like, by corporate interests or very wealthy individuals. becoming wholly owned subsidiaries of very wealthy entities. furthermore, what people i think do not fully perceive about citizens united is that it is going to make a kind of nervous senate and house even more nervous when they come up to vote on an issue dealing with wall street or the insurance companies or the -- they are going to think twice. if i vote this way, when i go home in a few days, am i going to have millions of dollars of ads attacking me for that vote. so no question in my mind that what we need to do is pass a constitutional amendment, ted deutsche, of florida in the house and i, i think -- introduced that amendment which essentially overturns citizens united and says the very radical statement that corporations are not people and congress and state legislatures have the right to address campaign finance reform. >> senator, i want to -- i want to sort of p

some folks say you have to overturn citizens united.are other folks like you and myself who say, no. you have to up the ante. because you're sayingç i'm in favor of nonprofit money. i'm in favor of rich guys spending their money. i just have an issue with corporations, which is lacking in integrity on a few levels. do you think folks that are just pushing against citizens united and don't want to do the hard work of realizing that that leaves the pipeline from the nra and the unions and all the nonprofits and for that matter all the mike bloombergs of the world, they have a free run. do folks understood that? >> it's almost like you -- let's say we returned citizens united. the congress passes some kind of reform that says anybody can spend as much as they want, they just have to fully disclose it. i'm sure it's still a government-bought auction. if you don't go all the way, i like to go all the way here. and that is publically financed campaigns. i said it before. i'm going to say it again. the $25 donation from the grandmother in dub

stephen colbert joke run is exposing the joke that citizens united. bernie sanders is here tonight. >> now that i have the super pac -- can i run as supporting stephen colbert? >> yes, you can as long as you do not coordinate. >> good to have you with us tonight, thanks for watching, republicans and democrats spent the week hammering mitt romney for his record at bain capital. today the obama campaign got in on the action and we'll have more on that coming up in the program. >>> i've said all week romney is going to have to come clean with the american people and talk about his record at bain. romney's campaign thinks this television ad is an adequate response. >> this is the business mitt romney helped start. and this one. and this steel mill. mitt romney helped create and ran a company that invested in struggling businesses. grew new ones and rebuilt old ones. creating thousands of jobs. those are the facts. >> all right, if romney wants to talk about facts, we could talk about facts. let's start with the facts surrounding this company, steel dynami

finally there's a direct challenge to citizens united. supreme court case which led to unlimited, unidentified corporate spending in politics. the 2010 case was so dangerous, so wrongly decided, president obama addressed it in his state of the union address. >> with all due deference to separation of powers, last week the supreme court reversed a century of law that i believe will open the flood gates for special interests. including foreign corporations to spend without limit in our election. >> what did sam alito think now? that was the night he was shaking his head no. even though they dealt with the federal election law, it was widely interpreted to strike down any state law with corporate spending bans. so here's a map of the 24 states with hair own laws restricting corporate spending before citizens united? quite a few. a lot of them in the middle of the country. 23 out of the 24 states stopped enforcing their own restrictions. only one state, montana, defended its own law. and now the montana supreme court has agreed. this guarante

to go into this and citizens united, new dispensation. you are allowed to run ads without identifying the contributors and nailing somebody politically and not have your fingerprints anywhere on it. that's what's going on. the republican voter likes this, i will be surprised. i think the voter when they see what's happening, especially the conservatives and what's being done deceptively of mitt romney, they will turn their backs on the courts and say this is a truly activist court. they said you can do this thing to us and kill our democracy. i believe it's equity against equality and the republican voters when they are voted to count as much as anybody else's. they don't like the attitude towards the election process. >> chris matthews, we are so grateful. i know you will be anchoring your own show and you normally spend workingpreparing rational, but thanks for joining us. >> thank you. >> coming up, i wonder what newt gingrich thinks of citizens united now. here's newt in 2010. >> first of all, the citizens united case and the work the

while the two years since the citizens united ruling we've seen shifting attitudes not only as public discontent growing towards the influence of money in politics but so was the discontent from republican candidates both newt gingrich and mitt romney of recently bemoaned the negative campaigning done by super pacs we see digging up the dirt on candidates as exist in our system for a long long time there's just more money and mortgages ations putting that kind of stuff out now and in fact if play such a vital role and is so ingrained that sometimes the candidates themselves forget what their own campaign's put out to attack their competitors take mitt romney at last night's debate for example. the rhetoric on immigration governor has been intense as you well know as all four of you know anyone who watches television you've had an ad running saying that speaker gingrich calls spanish quote the language of the ghetto what do you mean by that i haven't seen the ad so i'm sorry i don't get to see all the t.v. ads we did double check just now governor that ad that we talked about where i q

thousand twelve which bans all corporate political expenditures in state elections and while citizens united dealt with federal elections overwhelming majority of elections which do take place in united states are the state and local levels which is what the nine hundred twelve corrupt practices law in montana specifically addressed but after the supreme court's ruling of citizens united conservatives in montana got a little cocky groups within the state took aim at that law claiming that it violated their first amendment rights but luckily for montana their supreme court disagreed they argued the supreme court ruled in favor of citizens united only because the d.o.j. failed to make the case the government had a compelling interest in the meeting speech but they being the montana supreme court ruled the while the d.o.j. could not make their case the state of montana could stay argued they had a compelling interest in limiting direct corporate political expenditures for four reasons one a small population two low costs of elections in the state three large out of state interest in the state l

the very first case to challenge citizens united.ich opened the flood gates of corporate cash in politics. montana is holding the line. attorney general steve bullock joins me next. stay with us. ut without my covergirl. are you crazy? i want to look natural, not naked! but all you need is 3. lashblast for volume, outlast -- for kissing... simply ageless to help you look easy breezy beautiful covergirl. ♪ imagine zero pollutants in our environment. or zero dependency on foreign oil. ♪ this is why we at nissan built a car inspired by zero. because zero is worth everything. the zero gas, 100% electric nissan leaf. innovation for the planet. innovation for all. >>> ed show survey tonight. i asked does mitt romney need to come clean about his record at bain capital? 98% of you say yes. 2% of you say no. coming up, will montana's ruling hold up in the country's highest court? stay tuned. when i grow up, i want to fix up old houses. ♪ [ woman ] when i grow up, i want to take him on his first flight. i want to run a marathon. i'm going to o

president and the rest of us will do what's right and fight back against corporate personhood and the citizens united decision that made it possible for these oil barons to threaten a sitting president of the united states and corporate personhood now go to move to amend or that's the big picture for tonight for more information on the stories we covered visit our websites of thom hartmann dot com free speech dot org r t dot com also check out our two you tube channels the links to tom hartman dot com this entire show is also available as a free video podcast on i tunes and we have a free tom hartman i phone i pad app in the app store and send us feedback on twitter at tom others who are by facebook at tom underscore herman our blogs message boards and telephone comment line for thom hartmann dot com and don't forget democracy begins when you show up and participate get out there and get active tag your it occupies something a seat about. what drives the world the fear mongering used by politicians who makes decisions to break through it's already been made who can you trust no one who is you in view

supervisor kim: i want to request to be added as a co- sponsor for the citizens united resolution.ervisor mar: please add me as well. supervisor campos: colleagues, any other comments? do we need a roll call? supervisor avalos: i would also like to be added and i think we could have had is about a while back. supervisor campos: anyone else? can we take this same house, same call? this resolution is adopted. can we call item 31? >> resolution urging the restatement of the 31 categories of music that were eliminated by the national academy of arts and sciences for grim consideration on april 6, 2011. -- for grammy consideration on april 6, 2011. president chiu: i feel in many ways the same way as supervisor weiner, except for the people in our city who are directly impacted. it feels strong, the impact on them. i will repeat what i mentioned. at the request of local musicians, respected, grammy- nominated musicians, i move to table item 31. it is at their urging, because we can focus on other ways to create more diversity in the music industry, and respect for cultural forms, whether

the very first case to challenge citizens united.ened the flood gates of corporate cash in politics. montana is holding the line. steve bullock joins me next. stay with us. bored with your one trick lipstick? then lead a double life! with new blast flipstick from covergirl. creamy color on one end, shimmery color on the other. so you can flip your look from demure, to daring. new blast flipstick from covergirl. with less chronic osteoarthritis pain. imagine living your life with less chronic low back pain. imagine you, with less pain. cymbalta can help. cymbalta is fda-approved to manage chronic musculoskeletal pain. one non-narcotic pill a day, every day, can help reduce this pain. tell your doctor right away if your mood worsens, you have unusual changes in mood or behavior or thoughts of suicide. antidepressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. cymbalta is not approved for children under 18. people taking maois or thioridazine or with uncontrolled glaucoma should not take cymbalta. taking it with nsaids, as