In my exclusive interview on today's BradCast with ANN RAVEL, former Chair of the Federal Elections Commission (FEC), we cover quite a bit of ground. From the reasons she has decided to run for office in California, to the apparent violations of federal election laws at the heart of the Trump impeachment inquiry into the quid pro quo with Ukraine, to the absurd campaign finance laws that allowed two now-indicted Rudy Giuliani associates to buy their way into the White House and directly effect U.S. foreign policy, to the Stormy Daniels affair, and to our shamefully broken FEC. [Audio link to show follows below.]

Ravel, who also previous served as Chair of California's Fair Political Practices Commission (or FPPC --- a more functional version of the FEC, but for the state of CA) and as Deputy Asst. Attorney General during the early years of the Obama Administration, is now running for State Senate in CA's 15th District, which includes San Jose in the Northern California Bay Area. After a lifelong career of public service, this is her first actual run for elected office.

We begin today's conversation with a few thoughts on the "local" issues regarding Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E)'s preemptive blackouts for hundreds of thousands of customers to avoid their above ground power lines sparking wildfires. The bankrupt for-profit power utility, the state's largest, has been found liable for billions of dollars after several deadly recent fires, thanks to a failure to properly maintain or bury power lines amid increasingly warm and dry climate changed weather. We discuss whether the state should simply take over the company, following Gov. Gavin Newsom's scathing remarks on Thursday citing PG&E's many deadly failures, which he attributed to "dog-eat-dog capitalism and corporate greed meeting climate change."

Then it's on to many issues of national importance --- as highlighted of late by several matters related to Trump's ongoing impeachment inquiry --- regarding our broken FEC, which does not currently even have a quorum of Commissioners to either meet or vote as we head into the most critical election year in the history of our nation!

Ravel, who resigned as FEC Chair "in abrupt and dramatic fashion", according to the Mercury News in February of 2017, "declaring in a public resignation letter that the Federal Election Commission is on a gridlocked road to nowhere," offers her many insights on...

• Campaign finance laws apparently violated by Trump in soliciting a "thing of value" from a foreign entity. That impeachable and criminal violation of law is at the heart of Trump's attempted withholding of military aid and the strong-arming of Ukraine in exchange for dirt on the Biden family and the 2016 election. "There is no question whatsoever that there was a crime at the heart of this," Ravel tells me. "And I'm appalled, having also been at the Department of Justice at the beginning of the Obama Administration, what has become of a Department that is supposed to be doing justice for the people";

• Attorney General Bill Barr and the Dept. of Justices' failure to refer that matter, exposed by a whistleblower complaint, to the FEC for civil charges, as per a longstanding agreement between the two federal agencies. "That was the general understanding that always was the principal we operated by at the FEC";

• The FEC's lack of ability to take immediate action on such a charge, even if it had been referred to them, given the FEC's current lack of a quorum. "Had it been referred as a complaint, that would begin the statute of limitations. And there is a five-year statute. So at some point, assuming there are other Commissioners appointed, ever --- by McConnell, or the Democratic Minority Leader, and assuming that the President makes the nominations --- it could, in the coming five years, actually take some action";

• The obscene lack of campaign finance laws following Citizens United and other woeful "dark money" rulings from SCOTUS in recent years. Those High Court rulings have allowed men like Rudy Giuliani associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman to run an influence operation to purchase access to the White House and Republican members of Congress and actually effect U.S. foreign policy in the Ukraine matter in exchange for a few hundred thousands dollars (of unknown origin) given to Trump's SuperPAC, to Giuliani, and to other Republican officials and organizations. While Parnas and Fruman were recently indicted, their charges were based on lying to officials about the source of the money. Had they simply used their own, as we also recently discussed with Brendan Fischer of Campaign Legal Center (which filed the original complaint to the FEC about the pair's donations last year), the influence operation would have been perfectly legal under current law, she confirms. "And that is a whole other problem with our campaign finance system...That will only be fixed if there is a different Supreme Court";

• Why isn't the case of Trump's hush-money payoffs to porn star Stormy Daniels a bigger matter, given that Trump is known to have "directed" a campaign finance law felony conspiracy in making the payments, and then failed to report them to the FEC as required by law? To Ravel's consternation, Democrats in Congress, to date, have yet to make the matter a central point in their impeachment inquiry, and the short-handed FEC is otherwise unable to bring civil charges for Trump's willful violation of the law. She notes that fines levied against the Obama Campaign years ago were for far less serious violations of campaign finance law. "I often say, to much laughter, that I consider myself an expert in Stormy Daniels. I think this is scandalous. It is a campaign violation, without question, and it was being done at the behest of the President."

Those are just some of the many topics discussed on today's program with Ravel.

Finally, after some breaking news on a ruling late today by a federal judge ordering the DoJ to turn over unredacted grand jury testimony and other materials from the Robert Mueller probe to House Democrats working on impeachment, we take a quick look at the quickly snowballing fate of Rudy Giuliani, who finds himself in deeper and more embarrassing --- and potentially criminal --- straits by the hour. For now, Trump is standing by his man. But probably not for long. So, for a musical close to to the week, we turn to the inimitable Randy Rainbow, who recently threw Rudy entirely under a bus...

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With a short, semi-pause in the hot impeachment action on Capitol Hill, we take the opportunity on today's BradCast to catch up on a number of non-impeachment related stories (mostly). [Audio link to show follows below.]

Among the many covered on today's program...

• With climate change induced temps soaring, humidity plummeting and hot, nearly hurricane force desert wind gusts buffeting much of the state, wildfires are again breaking out again in both Northern and Southern California, despite the state's several privately-owned for-profit utility companies preemptively shutting down power to as many as half a million customers. That, to avoid still more liability for failing to maintain and/or bury their power lines which have been found as the cause of many recent deadly fires in the global warming-parched state. Gov. Gavin Newsom had some choice words on Thursday about those utility companies, such as Pacific Gas and Electric (PG+E) and Southern California Edison, placing profits over safety for many years in what he blasted as "dog-eat-dog capitalism [and] corporate greed meeting climate change";

• As the years-long probe by Trump's State Department into the phony "scandal" surrounding Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server as Secretary of State finally concluded very quietly last week --- having found "no persuasive evidence of systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information” --- yet another top Trump Administration official is being investigated for his use of private email accounts to conduct official business. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross is at least the 9th senior Trump official who has been revealed to have done so, as he faces both a civil lawsuit over the practice, and as the National Archives and Records Administration has just opened an official probe;

• In only somewhat impeachment-related news, Donald Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who refused last week to answer a Congressional subpoena from House impeachment investigators while parting ways with his personal attorney, is now said to be looking for a new criminal attorney. The former NYC Mayor is reportedly a person of interest in at least two different federal probes, both criminal and counterintelligence, being carried out by federal prosecutors in the Southern District of NY (the office Giuliani once led as U.S. Attorney);

• In U.S. healthcare news, open enrollment on the federal Affordable Care Act healthcare.gov exchange is set to begin on November 1, with as many as 20 new insurers and an average drop in the cost of premiums of 4%. Despite years of attempts by Republicans and Donald Trump to try and undermine "Obamacare", its marketplace is apparently stabilizing even as a ruling is now pending at any time from a federal appeals court in the GOP challenge to the law seeking to strike down the entire Act as unconstitutional;

• And, in related-ish news, a court in Massachusetts has temporarily delayed an ill-considered attempt by its Governor to institute the nation's strictest ban on vaping, in supposed response to a recent outbreak of lung injuries, a number of them deadly, due to the use of black-market THC/cannabis vaping cartridges. Gov. Charlie Baker's attempted ban, however, would prevent the sale of all nicotine vaping products, which are not tied to the recent outbreak in any way, thus endangering the lives of an untold number of smokers and former smokers who would be prevented from using life-saving nicotine vapor devices in the state. Shamefully, a number of other states are in the process of implementing similarly deadly bans, thanks in no small part to horrifically irresponsible media coverage that has equated safe nicotine vaping (and safe marijuana vaping in locations where it is both legal and regulated) with the use of contaminated black-market THC vaping devices;

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report, with more on the disgraceful and dangerous California private utilities power blackouts, the deadly costs of Trump's rollbacks of clean air standards, and Congressional testimony from former Exxon scientists who detail how the oil giant spent decades and millions of dollars lying to the public about climate change...

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On today's BradCast, Donald Trump needs a LOT of defending --- on virtually every front today. Lucky for him he's still got quite a few willing chumps, suckers and patsies willing to go down with his ship, from elected officials in Congress, to entire media networks invested in his criminal wingnuttery, to the best team of shameless lawyers his dirty money can buy. [Audio link to full show follows below.]

We kick off today with the remarkable argument offered by one his shameless attorneys in a federal appeals court in Manhattan, where a lower court judge recently ruled against Trump in his suit to block his longtime tax accountants at Mazars USA from turning over eight years of his tax and other financial documents as subpoenaed by state prosecutors. The probe is into payments made while Trump was in the White House to reimburse his then-attorney, now-convicted felon Michael Cohen for hush-money payoffs to porn star Stormy Daniels just prior to the 2016 Presidential election.

After the lower federal court judge virtually laughed the Trump attorneys out of court earlier this month, finding their argument that a President may not be indicted or even investigated at the federal OR state level to be "repugnant to the nation's governmental structure and constitutional values," Team Trump quickly appealed to the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which heard his argument today.

During today's hearing, the 3-judge federal panel, citing an infamous quip about Trump's ability to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue without losing any supporters, queried Trump attorney William Consovoy on whether law enforcement officials would be Constitutionally allowed to investigate or do anything about it, if that literally occurred. The President's attorney said no, they could not. It's a hypothetical that I've raised several times in the past, in response to the absurd, Constitutionally-weak, decades-old DoJ Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) opinion memo asserting that a sitting President may not be criminal indicted. That OLC memo, never tested in a court of law, though cited by Robert Mueller when he failed to bring criminal Obstruction of Justice charges against the President despite mountains of supporting evidence, will now almost certainly have its day before the Republican's stolen U.S. Supreme Court in this matter.

Then, the many desperate attempts made by Republicans last night and today to try and defend the President following Tuesday's "damning" testimony to House impeachment investigators by Bill Taylor, Trump's acting Ambassador to Ukraine. The veteran diplomat rocked D.C. with his meticulously detailed recounting of how he learned that Trump was personally behind the quid pro quo pressure campaign to withhold nearly $400 million in military assistance to Ukraine unless its recently elected President, Volodymyr Zelensky, publicly promised an investigation into Joe Biden and the 2016 election.

With no clear messaging campaign to push back against the explosive charges at the heart of the ongoing impeachment inquiry, Republicans from the White House to Congress to Fox "News" have been flailing over the past 24 hours. The White House Press Secretary released a statement attempting to tar the longtime civil servant and military veteran Taylor as a "radical unelected bureaucrat waging war on the Constitution"; Trump's former Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker took to Fox "News" to declare that "abuse of power" is not actually a crime; and Trump's far-right allies in the U.S. House stormed a secure room in the basement of the Capitol in a faux "riot" (reminiscent of the infamous "Brooks Brothers Riot" in Florida in 2000) to stall the planned impeachment deposition of Defense Department official Laura Cooper, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia. It is believed Cooper was to testify on the Pentagon's finding that the White House's withholding of Congressionally-allocated military assistance to Ukraine was, in fact, unlawful.

Some of Trump's defenders today have been arguing that Taylor's testimony highlighted that Zelensky didn't know about the withheld U.S. military assistance and, therefore, the Administration's pressure campaign could not possibly have amounted to a quid pro quo. That argument, however, was neatly eviscerated late today via an exclusive from Associated Press, reporting that Zelensky was aware of the White House pressure campaign and the potential of losing U.S. aid if he didn't play ball in Trump's political scheme, as early as May of this year.

Finally today, the stalled impeachment deposition was not the only hearing on Capitol Hill today. Desi Doyen joins us for some highlights from a House Oversight Committee hearing on Wednesday in which Exxon Mobil scientists testified about the oil giant's knowledge, decades ago, that the use of their product was endangering humanity by warming the globe, even as Exxon invested millions in an "immoral" public relations campaign to convince the world that the science on the matter was in doubt...

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On today's BradCast, it was (another) very bad day for Donald Trump, but a good day for Hillary Clinton, if anybody was able to notice, thanks to another shameful weekend by the mainstream corporate media. [Audio link to show follows below.]

Our stable genius President didn't make it any easier on himself by beginning his day with a grotesquely offensively comparison of his ongoing Constitutional impeachment inquiry to "a lynching". But it got far worse for Trump (if nowhere near as bad as an actual lynching), when his top diplomat in Ukraine, Bill Taylor, testified before impeachment investigators in the U.S. House. The veteran diplomat and foreign policy elder statesman spelled out, in no uncertain terms --- based on copious, contemporaneous notes --- that Trump had personally tied the release of nearly $400 million in military assistance for Ukraine to a quid pro quo requirement that Ukraine's President publicly commit to investigating Trump's 2020 political rival Joe Biden.

The testimony, according to House impeachment investigators, directly contradicts Trump, numerous top White House officials, and a number of Trump-appointees who offered earlier testimony. It also included a 15-page opening statement from Taylor, accurately described as "damning" by a number of Democrats.

Then, while you may or may not have heard about the news which was buried deep inside weekend papers on Saturday, the State Department --- Trump's OWN State Department --- concluded its years-long probe of emails sent to and from Hillary Clinton's private email server. The report, sent to Congress with little or no fanfare from either the media or the Trump Administration, found "no persuasive evidence of systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information" by Clinton or anybody else in the Department.

The faux "scandal" that Trump, his campaign and his party disingenuously used to help propel him to office in 2016 has officially ended with a barely imperceptible whimper. That, even as top White House officials from daughter Ivanka Trump to son-in-law Jared Kushner to Steve Bannon to Stephen Miller to Executive Agency heads like Education Secretary Betsy DeVos have all since been found to have carried out government business on private email servers and have even reportedly shared classified information on private texting apps.

We're joined today by longtime media analyst ERIC BOEHLERT to discuss not only the phony "BUT HER EMAILS!" scandal that Trump falsely described during his campaign as "worse than Watergate" --- and which even today results in "Lock her up!" chants at his unhinged campaign rallies --- but the corporate mainstream media's dreadful failure and stunning "whitewash" of its own role in colluding with the Trump Campaign by constantly over-hyping the baseless charges in the run up to the fateful 2016 Presidential election.

"The email story does not exist without the Beltway press," Boehlert tells me, noting their coverage of the end of State Department's probe on page 16 (NYT) and 6 (WaPo) on Saturday. "Most of the network newscasts never even reported on the story over the weekend.

"This email story ran from March 2015 to November 2016," he rails. "This story rolled for months and months. If you take one peek, in September 2015, on average, if you look at the Washington Post --- print and online --- they were publishing two Clinton email stories every day for the month of September 2015. We forget how bad it was. Pick your adjective. Mind-boggling. Numbing. Irresponsible. Reckless. And what's important [is] to not let this happen again."

But, of course, it will, especially given the lack of contrition for this failure evidenced by the story's coverage this weekend. "These are smart people," he says. "They play dumb on an epic scale." Boehlert aptly compares the media's failure in becoming "hugely investigated in this story from the get to" to their similarly reckless coverage of the Bush Administration's claim that Iraq had WMD in the run-up to our disastrous war there beginning in 2003. He also goes on to offer warnings about the Administration's schemes to use the very same playbook in 2020.

"If you're concerned that we're going to have a repeat because the press not only refuses to learn any lessons from 2016, but doesn't even admit there are any lessons to be learned --- look at Joe Biden and the Ukraine. It's happening again. Not as bad as the other, because Trump has inadvertently impeached himself by publicly confessing to colluding with a foreign power. But we saw it in the beginning of this story, a lot of headlines, "Trump and Biden both tainted by Ukraine'. No, they're not. Let's not do that," he pleads.

We discuss why this seems to happen over and over (remember how the media fell for the John Kerry "Swiftboat scandal" in the 2004 campaign?) when it comes to the media's coverage of Democrats, what the media should have done both in 2016 and today, and what Americans can do to help avoid being taken for another predictable ride in 2020.

Finally, were joined by Desi Doyen for our latest Green News Report as Trump's Energy Secretary calls it quits, Arizona looks toward a future without water, and ExxonMobil goes on trial for climate fraud. All while the GNR creeps toward our 1000th episode and we gently ask for your support of unabashedly independent, fearless and accurate news over your public airwaves via BradBlog.com/Donate.

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Trump's Energy Secretary Rick Perry announces resignation amid impeachment scandal; Arizona's Pinal County faces severe water deficit; Exxon Mobil goes on trial for climate fraud in New York State; PLUS: Climate strike in Canada's tar sands country packed a punch on eve of national election... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Did Exxon deceive its investors on climate change? [Yes]; Bank regulators present a dire warning of financial risks from climate change; U.S. air quality was improving, now it's getting worse, with deadly impacts; Ozone hole shrinks to smallest size on record; Trump declines to participate in Weather Channel 2020 climate change special, because of course; Global warming is making baby sea turtles almost all female; America's biggest trash hauler stops shipping plastic waste to poor countries; Leaded audio reveals how Coca-Cola undermines plastic recycling efforts... PLUS: A wildlife emergency is brewing at the border... and much, MUCH more! ...

The outlook for Donald Trump appears grimmer by the day, but the systemic institutional problems that brought him to office and have now helped bring him to the brink of impeachment are of even larger concern on today's BradCast. [Audio link to today's program is posted below.]

First up, the latest in the House's ongoing impeachment inquiry, as the worm may --- emphasis on 'may' --- be turning, following Trump's Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney's nationally-televised admission that the Administration withheld hundreds of millions of dollars in Congressionally-allocated military aide to Ukraine in an effort to strong-arm the former Soviet nation into investigating Democrats and the 2016 election. Mulvaney's "confession", as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi described it, of a pretty clear quid pro quo has knocked several Republicans off their footing, as they struggle to find ways to defend the President's actions.

A number of Congressional Republicans in both the House and the Senate now appear troubled by the admission (which Mulvaney attempted to walk back just hours later) and it has led Ohio's former Republican Governor John Kasich to concede on Friday that he now supports the impeachment and removal of Trump based on the latest information.

Then, we're joined by BRENDAN FISCHER, Associate Counsel at the Campaign Legal Center (CLC) in Washington D.C., which filed a formal complaint with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) in July of 2018, detailing serious campaign fiance law violations by Rudy Giuliani associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman. The Soviet-born Ukrainian-Americans were dramatically arrested and indicted at Dulles International Airport just over a week ago by federal prosecutors from the Southern District of New York, as they were attempting to flee the country with one way tickets to Vienna. Parnas and Fruman were charged [PDF] with using a fake shell corporation to illegally funnel hundreds of thousands of dollars from an unknown source to Republicans, including Trump's America First Action SuperPAC, in a successful effort to gain political power.

They also paid some $500 thousand to Giuliani --- who is working, for free, as Trump's personal lawyer --- and donated to Texas Congressman Pete Sessions, all in an effort to act on the conspiracy theories used by Trump and Giuliani to strong-arm Ukraine. As Fischer lays out in a piece at CLC detailing the backstory of the arrests of the two Trump donors, "Working closely with the president’s personal attorney, Giuliani, their efforts touched two branches of U.S. government, two presidential administrations in Ukraine, at least five countries, numerous individuals in and out of government, and, now, an impeachment inquiry into the U.S. President himself."

"The big giving opened a lot of doors," Fischer tells me. "It got them into political fundraisers where they rubbed shoulders with President Trump's inner circle. That money allowed them to build and deepen a relationship with Giuliani. And they were able to leverage that relationship in order to advance this narrative about Ukraine --- the same narrative about Ukraine that President Trump espoused in his call with Ukrainian President Zelensky, which has now led to this impeachment inquiry."

In other words, despite the ongoing mysteries behind the true source of their funding, they got a lot of bang for their campaign finance bucks used to buy influence with GOP officials and effect actual U.S. foreign policy in the bargain. But, as Fischer explains on today's program, had they not used a phony corporation to do it with someone else's money (and lied about that to the FEC), everything they did appears to be largely perfectly legal under U.S. campaign finance laws! Yes, apparently if you have enough money, you are allowed to use it to buy a major political influence operation that can directly effect U.S. foreign and domestic policy, even out of the White House.

Fischer explains how the dark money operation --- which didn't even include all that much money --- is still being unraveled by federal investigators as the probe (which could even nab Giuliani) continues and, perhaps even more importantly, how it may represent just be the tip of a campaign finance iceberg that illustrates the dangers of our disgraceful campaign finance laws in the wake of the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling in 2010.

"The indictment makes clear that the purpose of the political contributions that Parnas and Fruman made was to buy access and to build influence with powerful political officials in order to advance their own personal financial interests," says Fischer. "But that is not what they are being indicted for. They were indicted because they laundered the funds through shell corporations and then lied about it." So, had they actually been rich dudes who used their own money for this scheme, it would have been just fine? "Yes, it would have been just a beautiful expression of their First Amendment right to free speech."

“This indictment of Parnas and Fruman is really an indictment of our big money political system. It lays out very clearly how powerful political figures operate on this cash-for-access practice. It's become entirely commonplace for wealthy political actors to buy their way into Congressional offices and into the President's inner circle. If you don't have money, your voice does not get heard in our democracy.”

Finally, longtime good government watchdog Fischer also rings in on Mulvaney's stunning announcement that the Administration has officially selected Trump National Doral resort in Miami, Florida as the location for next year's G-7 Summit of world leaders, despite the Emoluments Clause of the U.S. Constitution which strictly bans payments to the President from foreign officials --- a point that even Fox "News" (well, at least some there) appear to have a problem with as well...

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I'm still out of breath from today's BradCast, even after I had to cut a whole bunch of breaking (and not so breaking) news to make room for the sad passing of a much-beloved Congressional giant.

We begin today with the devastating news of the untimely death of 68-year old Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD), the larger than life Chair of the House Oversight and Reform Committee whose extraordinary 23-year legacy in Congress and decades of civil rights work before it has left an indelible mark on the nation and our ongoing fight for democracy and equal justice for all.

Next up, as support for the impeachment and removal from office of Donald J. Trump continues to build, chaos continues to unravel in the Middle East following his recent green light for Turkey's invasion of Northern Syria. Trump's approval, given to Turkish President Erdogan on a recent phone call, stunned White House aides, the Pentagon, bi-partisan members of Congress, and our Kurdish allies in the long fight against ISIS in the region.

It also led to an incredibly bonkers threat letter sent by the U.S. President to his Turkish counterpart (which was ignored); the escape of ISIS prisoners being held by the now-endangered and fleeing Kurds; Kurdish forces choosing to ally with Russian and Iran-backed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as Turkish and Russian forces rolled onto bases previously occupied by the U.S. and the Kurds; the U.S. military being forced to bomb its own military outpost and ammo dump near the Turkish border; bi-partisan condemnation from Congress (including from Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and a lopsided 354 to 60 resolution vote in the U.S. House against the Trump policy), Russia's emergence as the new power-broker in the Middle East, and a meeting between Democratic Congressional leaders and the President on Wednesday that ended with furious Democrats storming out after Trump reportedly insulted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as a "third-rate politician" and suggesting that the Democrats were communist sympathizers in what the Speaker described as a "meltdown" after she charged that "all roads lead to Putin" with this President.

And, amidst that chaos today, after Vice President Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo were dispatched to Ankara to try and clean up the mess created by Trump with Turkey, a supposed "deal" was struck for a short-term cease-fire to allow the Kurds (and U.S. troops) to retreat, while all but giving Turkey everything that it had sought on the Turkish/Syrian border for years, with the U.S. promising to lift economic sanctions against its NATO ally.

It's all even more disastrous than that, according to Trump's own former Envoy in the Fight to Defeat ISIS who calls the new U.S. policy a "disaster" and "totally incoherent", and a former FBI official who warns that Trump is "spiraling down into a dangerous posture", acting in "almost total isolation" and is now "incredibly vulnerable" to foreign manipulation. But you'll have to both tune in and buckle up for the full details. They are worse than they sound.

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report with coverage of the lack of climate questions raised at the recent 2020 Democratic Presidential Debate in Ohio, California's latest plans to foil Trump's fossil fuel schemes in the Golden State and much more!...

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Our long road toward catching up with a month's worth of news continues on today's BradCast, with voting news out of Battleground Ohio, the latest on Trump's impeachment and chaos in Syria (and the thing that ties them together), as well as the latest environmental and climate news after a month away. [Audio link to show posted at end of summary.]

First up today: Some surprisingly good news for voters out of Ohio! The biggest surprise, perhaps, is that it comes, at least in part, thanks to the state's new Republican Sec. of State Frank LaRose, who had the good sense to check with voting rights groups beforewrongly purging some 40,000 perfectly active and eligible voters from the rolls who should never have been flagged for removal in the first place! Most of his fellow Republicans are likely not happy about that.

Then, we're joined by the great HEATHER DIGBY PARTON of Salon and Hullabaloo to discuss the latest impeachment news and Trump's deadly withdrawal of U.S. troops from northern Syrian.

The impeachment inquiry over Trump's attempt to withhold nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine in exchange for its President's trumped-up state investigation of Joe Biden and the 2016 election continues to gain steam, with half a dozen or more current and former Executive Branch officials now lining up to testify --- and not in favor of Trump or his lackey lawyer Rudy Giuliani --- to Congressional investigators. Trump's former Russia and Europe expert, Fiona Hill, testified for some ten hours on Monday, reportedly citing Giuliani's shadow foreign policy schemes meant to undermine U.S. foreign policy and personally enrich the President in some way.

According to reports of her deposition, her superior on the National Security Counsel, former National Security Advisor John Bolton, was so alarmed by Giuliani's efforts he described the former NYC Mayor turned Fox 'News' conspiracist as a "hand grenade who’s going to blow everybody up". Bolton reportedly tried to warn White House attorneys about Giuliani's many attempts to undermine U.S. Ukraine policy. Bolton himself, the unlikeliest of heroes in this shameful saga, may soon be called to testify to Congress in coming days, along with a long list of other State, Defense and National Security officials who now seem eager to defy the White House's strategy of denying both documents and testimony in the House Democrats' impeachment inquiry. "They're defying the White House telling them not to go testify," Parton observes, "That is a change. That is different than what we've seen. Suddenly that stonewall is crumbling."

We also discuss Parton's reasonable theory as to why this matter has finally resulted in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi giving full permission to her caucus to proceed with impeachment, where clear evidence of felony obstruction of justice from Robert Mueller's report and Trump's hush-money payoffs to porn stars to help win the 2016 Presidential election did not. "This is the same kind of stuff that Trump was accused of [in 2016], that we all suspected him of doing, colluding with a foreign government to sabotage his rival's campaign. Here he is [with Ukraine] doing it in real time. I think that's really what has made the difference."

In not-at-all-unrelated news, Parton goes on to discuss her latest Salon column in which she details how Trump's Syria pullout appears to be anything but an impulsive decision after a recent phone call with Turkish President Erdogan, as many in the media are still describing the disastrous move. She explains how the U.S. abandonment of our Kurdish allies with the U.S. withdrawal of troops from Northern Syria is of a piece with Trump's feckless Ukraine policy. In both cases, she explains, there is one unavoidable fact in common --- even for those of us who may not be Russia hawks: both actions, like so many other controversial policies of the Trump Administration, are in the clear and direct interest of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Finally, we close today with the long-awaited return of the Green News Report, which we had been forced to suspend over the past month due to my family emergency. Somehow or another, Desi Doyen manages to fit in a month's worth of green news into the latest GNR in just six minutes. Buckle up --- and stay that way!...

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Desi and I are back on today's BradCast, after an unscheduled month-long hiatus as my otherwise very healthy 80-year old dad suffered a sudden and major stroke in mid-September before ultimately passing away a few weeks later. [That's him on the left with me in the photo. Audio for today's program is posted below.]

We share a few memories of Harvey Friedman at the top of today's show (there are many more here) and a couple of very important lessons learned both before and after his death that will almost certainly be of use to you and your family! The two booklets I mentioned on air today are Five Wishes (available via AgingWithDignity.org) and the Advance Health Care Directive (available via PrepareForYourCare.org). Both are likely to be wildly helpul to your family, should you or they find themselves in a similar situation. Please consider clicking on those links when you find some time.

Then, we're joined by the great NICOLE SANDLER of The Nicole Sandler Show who filled in for us, with absolutely no notice, over the past month (with some occasional help from Angie Coiro along the way) even as she did her own show as well nearly every damned day! Desi and I cannot thank her enough. Though we try to today.

Since Nicole filled in for us during what was clearly a very very slow news month, she gets us caught up on what we missed while we were "gone", from the Impeachment process now under way in the House in response to Trump's strong-arming of the Ukrainian President for (apparently false) dirt on Joe Biden and the 2016 election; to Trump's disturbing sudden withdraw of U.S. troops in the Kurdish-controlled areas of northern Syria (and the death and chaos and escaped ISIS detainees and new deal cut between our previously-allied and now-abandoned Kurds and the Russian-supported Syrians in its wake); to the corporate media still falling for Trump's B.S. on everything from his "new impeachment attorney", former Rep. Trey Gowdy (who doesn't appear to have been hired after all) to his new trade deal with China (which may not be a deal after all); to the latest in the 2020 race for the Democratic Presidential nomination.

After a month off the grid, we're wading gently back in today and this week with a little help from our friends. My thanks to so many of you for your kind words while we were gone, and our thanks to all of our listeners and affiliate stations for tolerating our unexpected and unprecedented absence! Hope you'll enjoy today's program as we gently get back into the swing of things...

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It's NICOLE SANDLER back with you again today, guest hosting the BradCast. The good news is that Brad and Desi will return on Monday, so you'll just have to deal with me for one more day.

As has been the case the entire time Brad's been gone, the news is non-stop. We begin the show, as usual, with the latest. Then I check in to commiserate with our UK Correspondent- journalist, author and broadcaster DENIS CAMPBELL.

The new term of the Supreme Court convened on Monday, coinciding with the release of a new book, The Hidden History of the Supreme Court and the Betrayal of America, from our guest THOM HARTMANN.

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It's Nicole Sandler, in again today for Brad and Desi on the BradCast.

We begin with a recap of the latest news from the last 24 hours, including the release of the whistleblower complaint, and the Acting DNI's testimony before the House Intelligence Committee.

Then, I figured, we could use something to look forward to. So, I spoke with DAVID DAYEN, executive editor of The American Prospect, where they're running a new series about all the great things a new president could do on Day One --- 'The Day One Agenda'.

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It's Nicole Sandler, filling in again today for Brad and Desi on the BradCast.

We begin today's show with a review of the non-stop news from the past 24 hours, including the release of the not-a-transcript of the July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukraine's president, a rambling Trump at the UN blaming everyone else for his troubles, and the whistleblower report has been delivered to Congress.

RYAN GRIM at The Intercept wrote 'Why the House Dem Caucus was Able to Move So Rapidly Toward Impeachment' and discussed it with me.

And author, journalist and American ex-pat DENIS CAMPBELL checked in from Wales, UK to fill us in on the madness surrounding Brexit, Boris Johnson and the general turmoil in Great Britain.

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On today's BradCast, I’m in for Brad and Desi – Angie Coiro, of In Deep with Angie Coiro. Continued love and good wishes to Brad and Desi – and thanks to you all for making Nicole and me so welcome during their time off!

Of course Nancy Pelosi’s announcement of impeachment proceedings are the big story, but there’s a lot else going on – including what that move could mean for gun control. Lots of news stories wrapped into today’s round-up.

In the midst of all this, the Toddler in Chief still had the bandwidth to snark Greta Thunberg upside the head, and to sic the EPA on California again. On that latter point – my guest today is DR. JUSTIN FRANK. He’s the psychoanalyst behind the books Bush on the Couch, Obama on the Couch, and now Trump on the Couch. His insights into the man to whom no laws apply are intriguing.

Enjoy!

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On today's BradCast - guest hosted by moi, Angie Coiro - we hear from the worst and the best of human beings: first Corey Lewandowski then SHANNON WATTS.

Lewandowski worked very hard to smarm and smirk a House committee into submission, as they probed the possibility of impeaching Donald Trump. Arguably, he had the upper hand until Barry Berke took the mound. Then the façade began to crumble. Check out my analysis.

The news roundup reveals a very surprising – as in, compassionate and sensible – proposal from a Trump advisor. Advisory: don't hold your breath waiting for Trump to jump on it.

A jarring new public service announcement from the folks at Sandy Hook Promise – which leads into a long-form interview with Moms Demand Action founder SHANNON WATTS. Sadly, the interview called for bodyguards for Shannon and bag searches for attendees. She is one incredible human being.

Continued good wishes to Brad, Desi, and family!

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The weekend brought us another avalanche of news in the Trump Era. As usual, we try to catch up by focusing on the stories that actually matter. But, even at that, we couldn't get to half of what we'd planned for today BradCast. But we did have time for a bunch of great callers. [Audio link to show is posted below.]

Among the many stories we cover today that they were calling in to comment on...

• A federal judge has restored a nationwide injunction to block the Trump Administration's likely-unlawful new policy that bars asylum to migrants who travels to the U.S. through another country before entering the U.S.;

• Former GOP Governor and Congressman Mark Sanford of South Carolina becomes the third major Republican candidate to announce his intention of running against Donald Trump for the party's 2020 Presidential nomination, after previously describing Trumpism as "a cancerous growth" and charging the Republican Party has "lost our way". His long-shot bid, joining former MA Gov. Bill Weld and former IL Rep. Joe Walsh, will be made all the more difficult now that the Republican Party in South Carolina, along with those in Nevada, Kansas and Arizona, have cancelled the GOP caucuses and primaries in those states for 2020 at the behest of our thin-skinned, cowardly, unfit President;

• Next door in North Carolina, it now appears to be full-speed ahead for Tuesday's two U.S. House Special Elections which were imperiled for a time by Hurricane Dorian. While the storm resulted in some cancelled Early Voting days last week, most of those hours were made up with extended hours over the weekend, leaving Democrats with a larger share of the early vote in the 9th Congressional District than they even had during early voting in last November's "Blue Wave" election. The Republican candidate reportedly "won" that race by about 900 votes in a district held by Republicans since the 1960s. But the election was never certified after revelations of a massive GOP Absentee Ballot Election Fraud scheme. Both Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence are in the 9th district on Monday night, with two separate rallies, for far-right GOP State Senator Dan Bishop in the do-over race against centrist Democrat Dan McCready. The contest is currently being characterized as a toss-up and is being regarded as a bellwether for the 2020 elections. The other race, in NC's 3rd Congressional District is to fill the seat of the late Republican Rep. Walter Jones in an even more "red", if Hurricane Dorian-battered, district on the state's coast;

• And in D.C. today, Trump declared that year-long peace talks with Taliban officials and the Afghan government are now "dead". That, after Trump revealed his cancellation of a secret meeting that had been set with Taliban officials this week at Camp David --- on the week when the nation commemorates the 18th anniversary of 9/11 while the nation's longest war (in response to it) continues on with no end in sight despite campaign promises from Trump to end it;

• We also briefly reference the plan announced today by Democrats on the U.S. House Judiciary Committee to hold a formal vote this week to officially begin their impeachment inquiry of Donald J. Trump before opening up our lines to callers on all of the above and more.

  Among the additional topics on listeners minds today: The Democratic Presidential primary and the likely-disastrous move by Los Angeles County to replace its hand-marked paper ballot voting system with an ill-considered and 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting system (pictured above) before the 2020 Presidential elections. The new system (pictured above) was developed by its brainchild, L.A. County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk Dean Logan, who now refuses to appear on the show or answer our questions about the new, still uncertified system, as he used to. He calls it Voting Solutions for All People or VSAP. As one caller notes, the new system is shamefully being supported by the L.A. County Board of Supervisors. One of them, longtime Democratic Supervisor Janice Hahn, has been (mis)representing the new system as an "exciting" "upgrade" from the previous system, despite the fact that the computer-marked "paper ballot" summaries the new system produces can never be known to reflect any voter's intent after an election in the nation's most populous voting jurisdiction. Similarly unverifiable touchscreen systems are being implemented in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Texas and other key states before the 2020 election, despite warnings against electronic Ballot Marking Devices from world-class cybersecurity and voting systems experts...

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