On today's BradCast, Donald Trump is well on his way to becoming the most corrupt U.S. President in history. And he's not even in office yet. For that matter, he's not even the officially winner of the election yet, as ballots are still be tallied and we're keeping an eye on three key battleground states (Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania) where less than 50,000 votes total (out of more than 13 million cast) remain the difference between a President Trump or a President Clinton. We continue to call for full hand-counts in those states and others to determine who actually won them. [Audio link to full show is posted below.]

Then, after Trump agreed to pay $25 million in a massive fraud settlement concerning his 'Trump University' scam late last week, the U.S. corporate media became immediately distracted by a his tweets about Mike Pence being booed at a Broadway play over the weekend.

We discuss today how the media --- and GOP politicians --- would have reacted differently if it was Hillary Clinton who had agreed to pay tens of millions of dollars to settle multiple fraud cases after the election. At the same time, word comes in from the foreign press that Trump has been cashing in since the election, on business deals in India, the Philippines and Argentina, while unconstitutionally receiving payoffs from foreign diplomats via his new Washington D.C. hotel.

So, what explains, if anything, the U.S. media's deferential treatment of Trump? Author Eric Boehlert of Media Matters joins us to discuss the extraordinary disparities between how the media cover Republicans versus Democrats and how they utterly failed the nation in the lead-up to the election.

Also today: Police unleash water cannons and tear gas in North Dakota overnight, against Native American protesters gathered to try and stop the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline and climate scientists are freaking out (for very good reason) as the Arctic is now an "insane 36 degrees" warmer than usual for this time of year and as global sea ice area is now way lower than it has ever been in recorded history. It is, in fact, off the charts from even previous record low years.

This is all very not good...

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On today's BradCast: Will Hillary Clinton's apparent lead in national polling and turnout to date translate into a Democratic majority in the U.S. Senate? Poll watchers and analysts, at least Democratic leaning ones, seem to think so. For now. But just barely. [Audio link for show posted below.]

More early voting numbers in several states continue to suggest a potentially banner year for Democrats. In addition to those new indicators today, Hillary Clinton's poll numbers continue to rise, even as Donald Trump argued over the weekend that all the polls are "phony", not to be believed, and are meant to do little more than suppress the vote. (Though someone may want to let his own campaign manager know about that.)

But, will the hints of success for the Clinton campaign translate into Democrats taking back control of the U.S. Senate? David Jarman, editor of Daily Kos Elections, joins me to explain what the polls currently suggest about the likelihood of a Senate majority for Dems, the races in 9 states that he believes will determine that balance and, specifically, the 3 states he believes will ultimately be the tipping points for control of the upper chamber of Congress over the next two years.

While Daily Kos is a website meant to support Democrats, Jarman explains the roll of the analysts at Daily Kos Elections: "We're sort of the quantitative side of Daily Kos, but we also do more qualitative analysis of where we feel the chances are in the Senate and the House, looking at it race by race, doing the sort of old-fashioned scouting approach of 'this is a toss-up, this is lean-Democratic', that kind of thing. We also compile a lot of the data that eludes other people, about where the ad dollars are going, what the topics of ads are, every poll, we collect those in our daily digest."

Jarman and I also discuss, among other things, how and if things like voter suppression are included in his predictions; how large a majority Democrats would need in order to be able to bypass some of the more conservative/corporatist members of its caucus; whether Democrats could also retake a majority in the U.S. House, and some serious havoc that may occur for House Speaker Ryan even in the likelihood that they don't; and, also, some of the gubernatorial races that may end up going "blue" this year as well.

Finally, Bernie Sanders responds to Wikileaks' release of emails from Clinton staffers painting him in a less than favorable light, and Donald Trump says that he has plans to rethink freedom of the press, as defined by the Constitution's First Amendment, should he become the next President.

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On today's BradCast, WikiLeaks releases transcripts from Hillary Clinton's paid speeches to Wall Street bankers (and more) as America's long national nightmare known as Election 2016 grinds towards the finish line. [Audio link to show posted below.]

But first, some encouraging breaking news at the top of the show: A federal judge today has ordered swing-state Florida's voter registration deadline to be extended by one week (until Oct 18th), after Republican Gov. Rick Scott refused to issue any extension, even as he ordered the evacuation of 1.5 million residents last week, over what had been planned as the big final weekend for voter registration drives, as Hurricane Matthew bore down on the Sunshine State. (We discussed why that was a huge problem on yesterday's BradCast with FL election expert Daniel Smith.) Also, as we went to air today, embattled Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf finally announced he was stepping down.

Then...WikiLeaks has been releasing thousands of hacked, private emails to and from Hillary Clinton campaign chief John Podesta. Included among them are partial transcripts of Clinton's paid speeches given to groups like Goldman Sachs and other bankers and Wall Streeters before she became a candidate. One of those transcripts was cited by Donald Trump during the 2nd Presidential debate. But did he tell the truth about it? Did she? She has refused to release the speeches during both the primary with Bernie Sanders and the general campaign with Trump. So, would they have helped or hurt her had she done so? They do reveal her, after all, lauding single payer health care and opposing both the TPP and KeystoneXL long before she did so publicly. But what else do tell us that we hadn't known previously?

Does anything in the transcripts released to date live up to the 'outrage' that corporate media and Clinton opponents have suggested? David Atkins of the generally-Clinton-supporting Washington Monthly described the hacked and leaked partial transcripts over the weekend as "problematic" and joins me today to explain why he thinks so.

Also today: Trump misinforms his own supporters about the date of the election (it's November 8th, not 28th) and GOP Veep nominee Mike Pence does something not horrible for a brief moment and we laud him for it, even though he can't help but lie to his supporters about "voter fraud" at the same time.

Finally, has Election 2016 hit 'rock bottom' yet? Evidence suggests we may not yet even be close...

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On today's BradCast, coverage and analysis of this year's one and only (thank God!) Vice Presidential Debate at Longwood University in Farmville, Virginia on Tuesday night between Hillary Clinton's centrist Democratic running mate Sen. Tim Kaine of VA and Donald Trump's religious right Republican running mate Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana. [Audio link is posted below.]

It was, in my opinion, as I noted on The Twitters last night, the worst Presidential or Vice Presidential debate in modern U.S. history, thanks in no small part to the disastrously horrible moderator, CBS News' Elaine Quijano. Her questions seem to come straight off of Fox "News" (where CBS News chief David Rhodes previously worked, coincidentally), failed to follow up any answers, failed to either keep decorum between the two candidates or at least get out of their way, and failed to raise real issues of note --- such as gun violence, race issues, health care, global warming, LGBT issues, campaign finance or voting rights, to name just a few --- effecting the actual everyday lives of Americans.

Mike Pence is a man who has argued smoking doesn't cause cancer, denies climate change, couldn't run for President himself in 2016 because he screwed up so badly on the anti-LGBT bill he signed in Indiana, in December of just last year tweeted "Calls to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. are offensive and unconstitutional" in response to Trump's call for same --- and, yet, Quijano couldn't muster up a single question on any of those incredibly disturbing things from Pence's career.

But it was also the remarkable avalanche of lies, as offered by the very impressive if astonishingly dishonest GOP Veep nominee, which made the evening simply jaw-dropping at times. Some of those lies were rebutted by a struggling, over-eager Kaine. Others have since been left to those in the media who care to sort such things out.

That's where we come in, I guess. I'm joined today to try and make sense of all of the above by Heather Digby Parton of Salon and the Hullabaloo blog, John Amato, founder of the Crooks and Liars blog and, of course, our own Desi Doyen.

Buckle up and tune in as we "whip out that Mexican thing again"...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Two new hurricanes breaking records in the Atlantic and Pacific; U.S. House Science Committee chair now investigating the SEC for investigating Exxon; India signs on to the Paris Agreement; PLUS: City of Angels gets on path to 100 per cent renewable electricity... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): The Paris climate agreement is entering into force. Now comes the hard part; Trudeau Unveils Carbon Price as Canada Acts on Paris Pledge; Only 1 in 5 people hear people talk about climate change at least once a month; Exxon faces a first-of-its-kind lawsuit over climate deception; Peak salt: is the desalination dream over for the Gulf states?; The planet hasn't been this hot for thousands of years; A Curious Plan to Fight Climate Change: Buy Mines, Sell Coal; Timber Company Tells California Town, Go Find Your Own Water... PLUS: Yes - Donald Trump Is a Threat to the Planet... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: More than 300 dead, 6 million displaced by flooding in India; President Obama pledges Louisiana flood victims will not be forgotten; Very bad news for wolves in Washington state; PLUS: Celebrating the 100th birthday of the National Park Service... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Standing Rock Sioux Chairman: Dakota Access Pipeline "Is Threatening the Lives of My Tribe"; Texas Vowed 34 Years Ago to Track Oilfield Waste in Aquifers. It Didn't; EPA: North Texas Earthquakes Likely Linked to Oil and Gas Drilling; Ex-FERC Commissioner’s Rulings Favored Companies His Wife Lobbied For... PLUS: Most Cities Too Hot to Host Summer Olympics by 2085... and much, MUCH more! ...

On today's BradCast, deadly natural disasters across the world and the potential for a man-made one here in the U.S., depending on the outcome of the November election.

First up today, the latest breaking news on the disastrous, deadly earthquake in Italy where, as of air-time, at least 159 have been killed; the horrific and even deadlier flooding in India, where more than 300 have died; and President Obama's visit to the site of historic flooding in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Then: Is voting for a so-called third party candidate in the November Presidential election tantamount to 'throwing your vote away'? That's a question confronting many U.S. voters who are dissatisfied with the two major party candidates. But does such a vote open the door to a deadly dangerous President Trump? And does it even matter if it does?

Historian and Salon columnist Matthew Rozsa, a Bernie Sanders supporter during the primary, joins me to discuss how American voters can take on the two-party duopoly, without taking the country and the world down with it, as discussed in his recent piece "Tired of Democrats vs. Republicans? Here's how to fix it".

Rozsa details what he sees as a moral case against Trump, that requires a vote for Clinton, even if his policy preferences are more closely aligned with someone like Green Party nominee Dr. Jill Stein. "When you juxtapose the possibility of a Clinton presidency with that of a Trump presidency," he argues, "you can see how policies they would implement on issues ranging from immigration, to taxes, to business regulations, would affect people directly. So when you say 'I don't see much of a difference between Clinton and Trump, and therefore I'm willing to risk the election of someone like Trump,' you are minimizing or ignoring how his policies would impact real people in this country."

But, he goes on to explain, there is a way to support third-parties in such a way that they can serve to crack the stranglehold of the two-party system and potentially even become viable at the Presidential level. "If you're going to try to empower third-party candidates, you shouldn't be indifferent for most of the four-year period, and then a few months before the general election say, 'oh, I don't like either of these alternatives, I'm going to vote third party to make that stance clear'. That doesn't accomplish anything. The way to really achieve this change is to be invested in the process constantly...even when it's not an election year," he says.

It's an interesting, detailed and history rich conversation, in which Rozsa and I disagree on a few key points, while agreeing on others. Please give it a listen and share your thoughts in comments.

Finally, don't count your chickens yet, Democrats. Trump regains the lead over Clinton in swing-state Florida, according to a new poll [PDF] out today from the Sunshine State...

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On today's BradCast: Day One of Donald Trump's Republican National Convention in Cleveland was insane. But it was all going well enough until it became apparent late on Monday night that portions of Melania Trump's headliner speech was plagiarized directly from Michelle Obama's 2008 Democratic convention speech.

Incredibly, the man who made 'You're fired!' a catch phrase can't seem to muster up the ability to hold anyone in his own campaign accountable for it. As such, the oratorical fraud and, more importantly, how its being handled (and denied) by Team Trump, offers a stark warning to voters as to how a Trump Presidency might handle the actual serious issues and difficult decisions that need to be made.

Or, at least, it should.

Speaking of warnings, new national polling remains tight between Trump and Hillary Clinton, who continues losing ground in several of them. That, as several new cases and disturbing allegations of voter registration fraud by Republican election insiders in a number of states, along with some very troubling news from the U.S. Dept. of Justice concerning their plans to no longer send observers to polling places in certain jurisdictions with a history of racial discrimination, should serve as yet another stark warning for American voters...

But will it?

All of that and Desi Doyen with today's Green News Report on the latest BradCast...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Surprise! Donald Trump's running mate is also a climate science denier; UK's new conservative prime minister abolishes climate department on her first day; Heat wave breaks records in Alaska; PLUS: India breaks record for most number of trees planted in a single day (you'll never guess how many!)... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): June marks 14 consecutive months of record heat for the globe; Inside the diabolical Ukrainian hack that put the U.S. grid on high alert; France decrees new rooftops must be covered in plants or solar panels; Canada to Introduce National Carbon Price in 2016; You'll never believe how cheap solar is now; China's $22 billion flood now the 5th costliest non-U.S. disaster in history; Crowd harasses Alaskan mountain goat to death... PLUS: Oil refiners agrees to pay $425 million to settle air pollution violations... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: India's Prime Minister praises environmental responsibility to Congressional Republicans; Bankrupt Peabody Coal secretly funded dozens of climate change denier groups; Coal use plunges in the U.S.; More oil companies abandon the Arctic; PLUS: Norway becomes the first nation to ban deforestation... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Scientists Turn Carbon Dioxide Emissions to Stone; Lights Drown Out Milky Way For Third Of World's Population; Arctic Sea Ice Breaks May Record . . . By A Lot; Supreme Court Rejects Challenge To Obama Mercury Air Pollution Rule; Idaho Superfund Site Is Still a Toxic Mess, With Legacy of Suffering; Is Coal Ash Killing an Oklahoma Town?; On Kodiak Island, Flywheels Are In And Diesel Is Out... PLUS: House Opposes Carbon And Oil Taxes In Symbolic Votes... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: In wake of massive Fort McMurray wildfire, Canada's insurance industry calls for national strategy to prepare for climate change losses; Pakistan digs mass graves in advance of heat wave; India breaks national temperature record; Portugal breaks world renewable energy record; Exxon Mobil developed and squashed patents for electric cars; PLUS: Donald Trump denies climate change, but not at his own golf course... 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): Exxon Investors Seek Assurance as Climate Shifts, Along With Attitudes; It's possible to charge electrical devices without wires. Soon it may even be practical; Science Education: Portland Does the Right Thing. The Right Freaks Out; Wildfire contaminants could sully Fort McMurray water supply; The Glaciers Will Melt, The Sea Will Rise Up; People may be breathing in microplastics, health expert warns; Al Gore: Donald Trump's position on climate change 'should concern everyone'... PLUS: Fate Of Poland's Primeval Forest In Balance As Poland Plans Logging... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: The Pope's unprecedented call for action on climate change; The Right predictably freaks out; India goes solar in a big way; PLUS: Trump is running for president. It's no hoax! But he thinks global warming is... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): World’s Aquifers Being Badly Depleted, Satellite Data Show; Senate GOP Moves Against Obama Green Agenda Via Spending; Plan for Fracking's Waste Pits Could Save Millions of Birds; Alaska’s Glaciers Are Now Losing 75 Billion Tons of Ice Every Year; Alaska Wildfires Destroy Dozens of Homes, Menace Highway... PLUS: Inside the Power Plant Fueling America’s Drought... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Three more Republicans enter crowded 2016 race - we'll tell you their positions on climate change (even if they won't); Also, another Democrat jumps in; PLUS: May 2015 breaks new records for extreme weather... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Big Oil companies want a price on carbon. Here’s why; VIDEO: Big Oil certainly wasn't expecting activists to do THIS; OPEC seen favoring market share over prices; 10 Billion tons of coal could erase Obama's progress on climate change; Bonn U.N. talks seek to trim unwieldy climate change plan; E.P.A. proposal will put bigger trucks on a fuel diet... PLUS: Holding Your Breath in India: millions of Indian children have permanent lung damage from air pollution... and much, MUCH more! ...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Deadly, record deluges in Texas and Oklahoma; Deadly, record heat in India; Heat-driven wildfires in Canada shut down tar sands oil production; Farmers make concession in California drought; PLUS: President Obama moves to limit pollution in the nation's drinking water, Republicans are against it ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Oil Sands Bigwig Declares “Climate Change is Real”; EPA plans temporary pesticide restrictions to protect bees; Did Texas Illegally Relax Rules on Coal Plants?; Oil co. wants to expand California drilling - critics point to new oil spill; Scientists Make Novel Attempt to Save Giant Turtle Species... PLUS: How to Green the U.S. Government... and much, MUCH more! ...

As its reputation goes to pot, it looks like Indiana's new "religious freedom" law has sparked up more trouble than even Gov. Mike Pence (R) expected.

U.S. News reports "Indiana's Church of Cannabis Growing Like a Weed":