On today's BradCast, Congressional GOP leadership continues to ram their "ObamaCare" repeal and replacement bill through House Committees, even as the future of their American Health Care Act remains uncertain with Republican opposition in both the House and Senate, not to mention growing opposition from health care advocacy groups. But that's just one of the potential battles on the near horizon amongst Republicans in the House, Senate and White House. [Audio link to show posted below.]

Donald Trump's budget proposals include a huge increase in military spending and huge cuts across the board to domestic programs --- and just about everything else --- in order to pay for it, including taxes and cuts to the IRS itself, by itself, will cost the government billions in revenue alone. (The IRS brings in $4 for every $1 that funds it --- so why would the GOP and Trump want to cut it? We discuss.)

But the question of whether Republicans in the House and Senate can come to terms with the White House, much less each other, on spending priorities is another matter entirely. Journalist Alice Ollstein of Talking Points Memo joins us from Capitol Hill today to discuss what may be ahead for the upcoming budget battle that could include, yes, another Government Shutdown (today the Treasury Department announced we will hit the debt ceiling against next week) and even an attempt by Trump to circumvent the law entirely, "because you can't legally do what President Trump wants to do," she explains.

By way of just one example of surprises that Trump may encounter even with a friendly Republican Congress, Ollstein explains: "I am hearing a lot of opposition from Republican lawmakers, especially to cuts to the State Department, saying 'We do not support cutting the State Department's budget by a third, because diplomacy keeps us safe and would make us eventually have to spend more on war.'" Those proposed cuts to State, 37% of their current budget, have already been opposed by Trump's own Secretary of Defense James Mattis, among others.

Ollstein also cites "the ghost of Ronald Reagan" as a specter that could end up haunting Trump's plans, since he seems to be following a path for radically growing the military, cutting taxes and blowing out the deficit in the bargain, a model that even Reagan ultimately had to try and roll back. "So, we'll see if this Trump plan, that is sort of Reagan 2.0, goes forward" at all, she explains.

Finally, we close today with some listener e-mail from Costa Rica, on what a national health care system, actually looks like in a civilized country...

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On today's BradCast, Trump's "charitable" foundation gets shut down by law enforcement, two major (unusual) hurricanes threaten millions, and actual fact-checks from one side of this nightmarish election to the other. [Audio link posted below.]

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

• "The Trump Foundation must immediately cease soliciting contributions or engaging in any other fundraising activities in New York," according to the letter from New York state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's office, warning that the GOP nominee's charity "shall be deemed a continuing fraud upon the people of New York" unless it provides required paperwork regarding fundraising activities within the next 15 days.
• Two major hurricanes threatening island nations in both the Atlantic and Pacific.
• Much-needed fact-checking on the misreporting and purposeful mischaracterization of comments made at a February fundraiser by Hillary Clinton.
• More much-needed fact-checking on the misleading (and potentially illegal) comments made by Trump regarding long ago debunked 2012 "voter fraud" in Pennsylvania (which even Philadelphia Republicans are getting sick to death of) and details on why Trump is now being so careful about the words he is using to urge supporters to go to "certain areas" and "watch" the polls.
• Updates on the state of Wisconsin's failure to follow federal court orders concerning their discriminatory Photo ID voting restrictions. (More on this in last Friday's show.)
• More concerns about the possibility of hacked voting, voter registration and tabulation systems resulting in potential chaos this November 8th.

So many pants on fire, so little time before Election Day to try and help put them all out...

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On today's BradCast, the public reaction to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton's performance at the first Presidential debate --- from polls, betting markets, newspapers and listener callers (lots of them!) [Audio link for show posted below.]

After some breaking news today (on the elementary school shooting in South Carolina and the Congressional override of Obama's veto of a bill allowing 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia), and a story on the "not a terrorist" lawyer dressed in Nazi paraphernalia who injured 9 in Houston this week with legally purchased semi-automatic weapons (including a sub-machine gun and 2,600 rounds of ammo), we turn to the fallout from Monday's "Trumpwreck" of a Presidential debate.

The face-off broke the all-time viewer ratings record for a Presidential debate and early indications suggest the GOP nominee is likely to take a big hit in the polls (here's one in which he came in third in a two-person debate!), though there remain two more debates and a number of other reasons for Democrats to not rest easy just yet.

Also, another major Right-leaning newspaper endorses the Democratic Presidential candidate for the first time in their 126-year history and then callers ring in --- and boy howdy, do they! --- with their thoughts on what the world witnessed from Hofstra University on Monday night...

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The first Presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump unraveled on Monday night at Hofstra University in New York, as moderated by NBC's Lester Holt. We cover it, and the fallout, on today's BradCast. [Audio link posted below.]

Joining me to make sense of it all (though I can see it makes no sense at all), is award-winning journalist Heather Digby Parton of Salon and the Hullabaloo blog, and by David Dayen, Fiscal Times' financial journalist and author of Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street's Great Foreclosure Fraud.

Digby, writing at Salon earlier today, believes Clinton "dominated" Trump who "demonstrated not only that he didn’t prepare but that he has no underlying knowledge of the subjects a President is required to know." For his part, Dayen argues today that Clinton performed an important public service by "attacking the false premise that government is just like a business and should be run like one," adding "And it probably wouldn’t have happened without Donald Trump facing her behind the other podium."

Tune in for our rollicking (and, at times, hilarious) hour of post-debate coverage, clips and analysis of the first Presidential debate between Clinton and Trump, wherein the former exceeded the expectations of many and the latter met expectations by falling apart in rather extraordinary fashion on live TV in front of the largest U.S. debate audience in television history.

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On today's BradCast...

First up: New polling shows Bernie Sanders surging in NH among Democrats and Gov. John Kasich --- yes, John Kasich --- surging to second place among Republicans in the state...if you believe those sorts of things. At the same time, during the GOP establishment's half-hearted search for an alternative to Cruz/Trump, the Republican Party appears to be plummeting in popularity during the course of the 2016 Primary cycle, even as actual Republican voters seem to be warming up to the idea of Trump as their party's nominee.

Then, a remarkable new study from Oxfam finds that the world's richest "62 people own the same wealth as half the world" (the planet's 3.5 billion poorest!) And, some of those 62 richest-people-on-the-planet --- like the Koch Brothers and the Walmart heirs --- are amongst the biggest spenders when it comes to attempts to buy our political system.

So, what can be done about that last part? Jon Schwarz, Senior Editor at The Intercept, joins me to discuss how, despite "eloquent" comments suggesting otherwise during his State of the Union address last week, President Obama could take executive action immediately, on his own, to help radically reduce the "dark money" in our electoral and political system.

"One thing that Obama absolutely can do, by himself, this afternoon, if he wants to, is sign an executive order placing requirements on federal contractors," Schwarz explains, describing other similar actions that the President has taken in the recent past concerning federal contracting. "He can do it and he's done it in the past. What he could do about money in politics now is issue an executive order saying that federal contractors have to disclose any dark money contributions that they're making."

"If he did that, that would cover about 70 percent of the biggest corporations," Schwarz tells me. "So, it would not force the disclosure of any and all dark money, but it would force disclosure of a great deal of that. And, as I say, he could do that this afternoon."

We discuss some of the reasons Obama has failed to do this, to date, despite his calls for campaign finance reform throughout his career and as recently as last week's SOTU --- even with so many calls from so many quarters to take this action. "Obama likes to say really great-sounding stuff about money in politics --- he's said it his whole Senate career, his whole Presidency --- but he's never done anything. It's really extraordinary."

Finally on today's show, a few words on last night's passing of The Eagle's Glenn Frey and the latest on the outrageous lead poisoning crisis in Flint, MI, caused by the tyranny (literally) of Gov. Rick Snyder (R)...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

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Buckle up! On today's BradCast, we jump on board the crazy train to dissect last night's GOP/Fox 'News' Presidential Debate(s)!

My guests today are award-winning blogger/journalists Heather Digby Parton of Digby's Hullabaloo and Paul Rosenberg of Random Lengths News --- both also contributors for Salon.

Can Trump ever be derailed? Fox 'News' and Roger Ailes sure seems to be trying. And does any of it actually matter a year and a half out from the general election and more than six months before any votes are ever cast? We discuss all of the above (after "Digby" and I take short victory lap concerning Donald Trump!) and much more in today's post-debate roundtable!

"[Trump] has absorbed all of the rightwing tropes of the past 30 years and made them his own. He's ingested them, digested them, regurgitated them, played with them, shaped them into figurines, and just endlessly fascinated himself with them, and invited people to play along with him," Rosenberg tells me. "And people are happy to do so, because he is their ideal --- he is a super-wealthy person who is 'just one of us'."

For her part, Parton says the debate actually does matter, for one reason, "because what we're seeing are the contours and outlines of the Republican argument. I think it's pretty clear they're going to be running as war-mongering, tax-cutting, slash-and-burn politicians who are going to roll back everything that's happened in the last eight years. And they're going to do it all in the first day, so that's good."

A fascinating and fun discussion! Plus: Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report' on another new candidate in the GOP race and the pushback against the President's new rules for emissions cuts...

What a week. An incredibly busy one, but we've got some really good shows to show for it, I think. Enjoy today's!

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We have a number of encouraging items on today's BradCast, believe it or not, regarding elections and campaign finance for a change.

But first today, after an emotional debate in South Carolina, the Confederate flag will finally come down at the state capitol on Friday - clearing the way for debate on stuff that may actually reduce gun violence, racism and terrorism. But in the U.S. House, it's business as usual as the GOP fails on a Confederate flag-related amendment.

After that, another reminder why Internet Voting would be a disaster, and a bit of Trump news (which I know you crave every single moment --- don't lie!), some very good news today from the Florida Supreme Court on redistricting and even more good news from the U.S. Court of Appeals in D.C. on campaign finance.

Hamline University professor of political science and law David Schultz --- author of last year's Election Law and Democratic Theory and the upcoming Presidential Swing States: Why Only Ten Matter --- joins us to discuss those cases and four important steps he's laid out which could be taken immediately to reform our nation's campaign finance embarrassment. The best news: none of the steps require either a Constitutional amendment or our broken Congress! (Though it might require the President of the United States to step up.)

Among those steps, the FCC, for example, could immediately require free airtime for candidates over our public airwaves. "About 60-70% of all the money that will be spent in Presidential elections will be spent on media advertising predominantly on television," Schultz explains. "Forty years ago, the average time that a candidate got on the national news to describe his or her position was about a minute. Now it's down to about ten seconds."

"Requiring that free air time would be perfectly Constitutional" in exchange for licenses granted by the FCC. "If the FCC can move on Net Neutrality, it can move on this." But that's just one of several executive agencies which the President could instruct to take action without the need for Congress or amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

Plus: Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report on the terrible climate position of the latest Democrat to enter the 2016 Presidential race and much more...

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[I'm on the road today, so this BradCast was taped yesterday, just prior to the indictment of former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert. For some quick thoughts on that, please see this article from last night. More when we return next week, no doubt. - BF]

President Obama says the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement is "the most progressive trade agreement the world has ever seen." Maybe. But if we can't see it, how can we know? Democrats (lots of them) say the trade pact is anything but progressive. So who's right? Who can tell when it's all being done in secrecy? We discuss on today's BradCast.

Then I'm joined by Miles Grant, Communications Director of the National Wildlife Federation and blogger at TheGreenMiles.com, to talk about his recent piece on the nation's "Roads to Nowhere" and whether voters really want more of them. We discuss why new, expanded roads don't solve traffic woes and why there's such a disconnect between politicians' billion-dollar new road projects and the public's desire to repair the ones we already have.

Plus: A recent IRS data hack holds lessons (again) for Internet Voting proponents; Seattle literally rejects Shell Oil's shit, and much more on today's BradCast!

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I've been having sort of a running conversation/debate with author, comedian, friend and KPFK/Pacifica Radio colleague Jimmy Dore ever since the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris. He heard my take on the shootings, as discussed on KPFK at the time, and picked it up (a less generous person might say, misinterpreted it) on his own show.

We then had it out on his show and, finally, with the weekend shootings in Garland, TX at a rightwing group's event offering $10,000 for the most offensive cartoon featuring the prophet Mohammed, it seemed like a good time to pick up that conversation to see if either his or my views have changed.

So, Jimmy was my guest on today's BradCast and I think you'll enjoy the discussion!

Also, Bernie Sanders' refreshing words on a Sunday network news show; Carly and Carson both jumped into the 2016 GOP nomination clown car; one encouraging moment in Nepal amongst unspeakable tragedy following their recent devastating earthquake; the FEC continues to be dysfunctional, with one of their chairs now out-and-out noting that campaign finance regulations are unlikely to be enforced during the 2016 Presidential elections, despite record "dark money" set to be spent on them.

All of that and more on today's show! Please enjoy and spread the word!

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While we'll be posting The BradCast here everyday, and you can hear it across all of our great affiliate stations and websites, to automagically get new episodes as soon as they're available sent right to your computer or personal device, subscribe for free at iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn or our native RSS feed!

"I am not a victim," Catherine Engelbrecht, founder of the Rightwing voter suppression group calling themselves "True the Vote" told members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday morning. It was an odd turn of phrase given all that came before it in her testimony, both written and oral, at the confirmation hearings for U.S. Attorney General-nominee Loretta Lynch.

"I'm here today because I was targeted by the government for daring to speak out," the non-victim informed the Senators and those watching via C-Span at the very top of her remarks, much of which followed her written testimony [PDF] submitted in advance, and much of which did not. She is, she explained, just "one of thousands of Americans who have become living examples of a kind of trickle down tyranny that is actively endorsed by the current Administration and rigorously enforced by the Department of Justice."

"Over the years it has become clear to me that they don't just want True the Vote shut down, they want me broken," Engelbrecht wrote dramatically, but, for some reason, didn't say during her spoken testimony [video posted at the end of this article].

But, remember, she is "not a victim" at all. She is, on the other hand, the head of a wingnut Tea Party grifter organization which has, as we described in detail earlier this week, stepped on one rake after another since its ignominious appearance on the "voting rights" scene in 2010 when, in their introductory video, the group included a Photoshopped photo of an African-American woman holding a sign at a protest reading: "I ONLY GOT TO VOTE ONCE!" Another faked sign behind her head read "I'M WITH STUPID." (In actuality, as the original photos from a protest during the Presidential election theft in Florida in 2000 show, the woman's sign read: "DON'T MESS WITH OUR VOTES." The sign behind her had read "Gore/Lieberman 2000.")

During her testimony, Engelbrecht, after years of faking voter fraud statistics to try and help the GOP case for polling place Photo ID restrictions, even had the temerity to describe her organization as "a national non-profit initiative to protect voters' rights and promote election integrity."

Faking the truth seems to come easy to Engelbrecht and her group, as they've spent years attempting to intimidate voters at the polls under the guise of protecting against pretend Democratic "voter fraud". At the Senate hearing on Thursday, however, it was often what she didn't say during her oral testimony, as contrasted with her written testimony submitted beforehand, that may have been most revealing.

For some reason, for example, she --- or, perhaps a staffer on the new Republican-majority Senate committee --- must have thought it better not to discuss "pigment of skin" in polite company at the confirmation hearings for the first African-American woman to be nominated as the nation's chief law enforcement official. That part didn't make it into to Engelbrecht's spoken outrage...

During an appearance last week on the Allan Handelman Show on WSJS in North Carolina --- a state, like almost every one in the union now, where non-corporatist, non-wingnut views are almost non-existent over our public airwaves --- I was discussing the state Republicans' new voter suppression law, which is, hands-down, the most draconian in the nation since the era of Jim Crow was supposed to have ended.

While a Rightwing caller, apparently, was on hold to participate in the show, I detailed the fact that the polling place Photo ID restriction part of the GOP law (just one part of their horrific anti-voting statute) would do nothing to prevent so-called "voter fraud", since polling place impersonation is, for all intents and purposes, non-existent in this country, as this 2012 study by a non-partisan news consortium, detailing every known and/or reported incident of election or voter fraud in all 50 states going back to 2000, illustrated once again.

Once the caller "Jay" finally made it to air, his admission was quite revealing --- and even courageous --- yet illustrative of just about everything that is wrong with our corporate media (and the politics it has created) these days.

What he had to say is not what you'd probably expect. Give it a listen...

Download MP3 or listen online below. [Appx 9 mins, lightly edited to cover for a commercial break between two segments]...

Please help support The BRAD BLOG's fiercely independent, award-winning coverage of your electoral system --- now in our ELEVENTH YEAR! --- as available from no other media outlet in the nation...

The least surprising news of the week, except to those in the media who bought in to the months of Rightwing/Republican/Darrell Issa/GOP Victimization propaganda...

Those numbers, showing that progressive groups as well as "conservative" ones seeking tax-exempt status were given additional scrutiny by the IRS, are based on docs received via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests made by Think Progress.

We noted this very point in our initial coverage of the phony "IRS is targeting conservatives!!!" scam last year, just after the White House had (pathetically) fallen for it as well. (See here, then here, then here.)

While one might be excused for buying in to the scam in the first five minutes, 24 hours after it broke everyone should have known it was a scam. Nonetheless, the GOP, without having any legitimate basis for still being in business, has been making a career out of pretend scandals, including the one that "Obama is using the IRS to destroy Tea Party conservatives!!!" Their stupid base is dumb enough to believe them.

At this point, the Republican Party is no longer a political party. It's a permanent campaign organization with little more than self-victimization as their central platform.

For the record, as we've discussed many times, the problem is not the IRS giving too much scrutiny to political groups (aligned with either party) masquerading as "social welfare organizations", it's the fact that they are allowing such groups to continue the masquerade, despite the very clear statutory prohibition on any political activity by such groups.

It was another news week from hell on today's KFPK/Pacifica Radio BradCast.

We covered today's Supreme Court rulings on Prop 8 and DOMA with Evan Wolfson, one of the architects of the national marriage equality strategy, from FreedomtoMarry.org.

I had a word or three to say about the Court gutting the Voting Rights Act this week.

I also offered a thought or two on NBC's David Gregory suggesting that journalist Glenn Greenwald "aided and abetted" NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, and on the jackassery of national embarrassment Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) and the collapse of his pretend IRS "scandal". Desi Doyen joined me for the latest Green News Report update on President Obama's landmark climate speech this week.

And somehow we managed to fit in a few phone calls and a thought or two on Wendy Davis' stand in TX late last night and the state Republicans attempt to fraudulently pass a radical anti-abortion bill anyway. We got all of that into an incredibly fast moving single show, which follows for you below. Enjoy!

Download MP3 or listen online here [appx 58 mins]...

If you had read The BRAD BLOG when the Treasury Department's Inspector General's report on the pretend IRS "scandal" came out, you'd already know just about all of this. We tried to tell ya way back then. You see, unlike the rest of the media, it seems, we bothered to actually read that report before reporting on it. For anybody who did the same, the scam should have been pretty clear.

Now we learn that IRS flagged progressive groups for additional targeted scrutiny when applying for tax-exempt status --- just as they did for "Tea Party" groups. But, in the case of progressives, they continued doing so until this month, even after they had stopped flagging "Tea Party"-related groups, according to documents[PDF] released by Democrats on the U.S. House Ways and Means committee on Monday.

That, of course, is why we also described the pretend "scandal", in a subsequent report, as "nearly as phony as the Shirley Sherrod, Van Jones and ACORN 'scandals'".

As the New York Times describes the newly released documents...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: A Green News Special Report: Devastation as another record tornado hits Moore, OK - The city wakes up to the day after, questions about resilience and the influence of climate change ... 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): Midwest drought: Wells dry, fertile plains turn to dust; Utilities vs. rooftop solar: What the fight is about; Native chiefs walk out of Keystone XL negotiations; US hits 100k plug-in vehicles; Feds again delay restarting San Onofre nuke plant; Remember when IRS targeted environmental groups?; US approves natural gas export terminal; After 30 years, Camp Lejeune coming clean on toxic water ... PLUS: We Have Met the Unknown Unknowns --- and They are Us ... and much, MUCH more! ...