Coffee Party TV

Dan Cantor and Jonathan Soros join Bill to explore the virus of money in our politics, and what we need to do to combat it.

The North Carolina government seems to want to prevent the People's voices from being heard at the polls, but, they are hearing from them anyway.

Above: the man at the center of the storm, Jason Richwine, speaks in July 2008: "On The Importance of Race and IQ in the Immigration Debate." Below: an excerpt from Jennifer Rubin's column in the Washington Post.

...[T]he Heritage Foundation is in a tailspin. To Politico and then to me, Heritage’s vice president of of communications, Mike Gonzales, denied that he or Heritage has hired acrisis management firm. If not, Heritage should. More details about the unsavory work of one of its anti-immigration report authors are coming to light. Chris Moody reports: “Heritage Foundation analyst Jason Richwine, the co-author of a study claiming the immigration reform bill pending in the Senate would cost taxpayers $6.3 trillion, wrote two articles in 2010 for a website founded by Richard Spencer, a self-described ‘nationalist’ who writes frequently about race and against “the abstract notion of human equality.”
 

Another report suggests that “Richwine is not the only scholar conservative immigration opponents in the current debate have relied on and who’ve published eyebrow-raising views in the past. The Heritage Richwine snafu will bring fresh scrutiny to other scholars, immigration advocates said.”

Former vice president of research Burton Pines is also denouncing Heritage’s work. He is quoted as saying; “It’s a new Heritage and it’s one that’s not standing by the principles of Ronald Reagan. I’m puzzled why they came out with this study and I’m more puzzled why they seem to be against immigration.”
 

In a word, it’s a mess. Only four months on the job, former senator Jim DeMint, who came to Heritage with no scholarly credentials, is caught in a firestorm of Heritage’s own making. A backlash that tarnishes the report and anti-immigrant forces more generally may undermine opponents of the Gang of Eight. But to the extent it raises questions about whether Heritage is still a respected think tank (and not a political oppo center), DeMint will find himself under the gun. A conservative scholar at another think tank emailed me, “I just don’t understand why [former president Ed] Feulner among others did not see this disaster coming.” More conservatives will be asking the same thing, I imagine. [Full article]

There is a corruption at the heart of American politics, caused by the dependence of Congressional candidates on funding from the tiniest percentage of citizens.

by Eric Byler

Annabel Park recently spoke to Diane Rufino, leader of the Eastern North Carolina Tea Party, at the "Honor the Oath" rally at the State Capitol in Raleigh.
 

Diane had drawn applause during her speech when she praised North Carolina's role during the Civil War, yet, she said that Rev. Dr. William Barber is wrong to remind us of historic struggles for racial equality in order to counter the TEA Party, and address modern day injustices. "Time to move on," she said.

Diane is eager to change the perception that the TEA Party and Republican party are dominated by white men. In her interview, she explained that catch phrases like "take our country back" do not imply going back to a time before the Civil Rights movement. Instead, she argued, TEA Party members and other conservatives want to go back to a time when there were "parameters." 

"When was that?" Annabel asked. Diane's fascinating answer provides a window into the complexity and agony of TEA Party conservatives struggling to respond to changes in America.

After the interview, Annabel remarked that she really appreciated Diane's openness and willingness to engage her in dialogue. "Despite whatever differences we may have, I respect her strength and her spirit of engagement. I think it's critical to open up dialogue like this to heal America's divide." [MORE]

by Eric Byler

The journey of Darren Wagner will help you touch the surface of an ocean of despair that has washed over Newtown and Sandy Hook, Connecticut. We had to stop filming after Darren told this story to Annabel. She was overcome with tears and could not muster a follow-up question. Behind the camera, I was crying too.

When we resumed, Annabel asked Darren about parenting, and social expectations of masculinity. Not so implicit was the fact that he had been crying, and his two teenage sons were right upstairs.

Before the Sandy Hook massacre, Darren had never really talked to his sons about his 11-year career as a Deputy Sheriff in Ohio. He had never told them about the horrific gun violence he had investigated, the tragedies he had witnessed, the "regret to inform" conversations he'd had, over and over again. He had never told them how gun violence had caused him to leave the law enforcement field and seek a peaceful life, a journey that led him to their mother, Georgia, and a quiet life in Australia, where Georgia and their two sons were born. [READ MORE]

by EYDER PERALTA, NPR

In her debut appearance today at a Senate Banking Committee hearing, Sen. Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts made federal regulators uncomfortable when she asked a simple question: When was the last time you took a big Wall Street bank all the way to trial? [READ MORE]

The city of Troy, Michigan was facing a budget shortfall, and was considering closing the Troy Public Library for lack of funds. Even though the necessary re...

Economist Richard Wolff and Restaurant Worker Advocate Saru Jayaraman talk about battling rampant capitalism, and fighting for economic justice.

Michael Moore’s Capitalism: A Love Story comes home to the issue he’s been examining throughout his career: the disastrous impact of corporate dominance on the everyday lives of...

video by Eric Byler & Annabel Park for Story of America

Thanks to an enforced climate of fear, law enforcement and security agencies remain deeply suspicious of photography in public places. Despite the fact that most public places are now covered in cameras erected by law enforcement and security...