"We have legalized political corruption" - Ezra Klein show

A great discussion on the history of campaign finance, how elections are awash in money, and how our problems today are due to the ability of the wealthy to buy politicians.

Podcast from Ezra Klein at Vox talking to Zephyr Teachout. (Use link below or subscribe to the Ezra Klein show, it's the most recent episode.)

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3wpVPp7xa9jIolVxipWbkh

This episode is a must-listen, in my view.

Anyone know where to find a transcript of this?
Interested to hear people's opinions of this discussion.

The president is doing Putin's bidding (TPM/Marshall)

This is a good article. Josh Marshall has been cautious about making direct accusations. But this article is strong and direct.


http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/trumps-ominous-adventure


Whether Vladimir Putin has something on Donald Trump or somehow has him in his pay hardly matters. If he doesn’t, he apparently doesn’t need to do since Trump insists on doing more or less exactly what Putin would want of him entirely on his own. Does this sound hyperbolic. Yes, it absolutely does. I’m even surprised I’m writing it. But look at the evidence before us. A simple statement on a decades old security commitment is the simplest, most pro-forma thing to do. And yet he refuses. Again and again.

Something is very wrong here. But we don’t know yet its origins or where it’s taking us.

How Fox News handled a week of major Trump scandals (Video will make you angry. Or sad for America)

America's for-profit media corporations catastrophically failed us

NYTimes/Haberman amplify Trump's lies

Why does the media just replay Trump's comments without proper context?
There is now ample evidence that when he speaks to the media, his goal is to mislead, not to give facts.

Maggie Haberman at the NYT got called by Trump after the AHCA failed. What did she do? Repeat Trump's words.
Maggie, read this:
Media instructions: Talk about the truth, note diversion, go back to real issues] [link:Lakoff link

Here's the Haberman tweet below. It should have said:
"TRUMP tries to blame Democrats for AHCA failure and he will try to blame further failure on them".

Instead she says:
https://twitter.com/maggieNYT/status/845362688557486081

Excellent by Schiff: The Rise of the Autocrats. Our challenges, both short- and long-term

Excellent long article by Schiff, including historical and foreign perspectives on the challenges America faces.

Worth a read.

This is the kind of stuff that could launch Schiff into the Presidential race.

https://lawfareblog.com/rise-autocrats

How far-right media took over American public debate

In a time where so much is happening, this article does a good job of reminding us how much right wing talk radio, Fox NC, and right wing internet media hurts American society (and prevents investigations, advances Gorsuch, and smears Obama).

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/trolling-scholars-debunk-the-idea-that-the-alt-rights-trolls-have-magic-powers

Democrats gather in DC this week to plot the resistance

Donate to Steve King's opponents, not the DCCC? (Blue America email -comments?)

I just got the following email from Blue America. Is this right?!!!?!

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Maybe you got an email filled with outrage over Steve King's latest racist statement this week. The DCCC sent one out, asking for contributions. There's a problem with that though. Steve King isn't just some loud-mouthed crackpot and bigot; he's an actual congressman from western Iowa. And, the DCCC won't use the contributions they solicit to beat Republican Steve King. They'll waste the contributions trying to elect even more Blue Dog and New Dem garbage-crats like Josh Gottheimer (NJ) and Tom O'Halleran (AZ), on whom they spent $3.5 million and $2.6 million, respectively.

"I’ve learned that there are great people in the 4th District who are hungry for a representative who will focus on solutions, not division. During my campaign, I talked about ways we can improve the lives of all our neighbors. I know that this battle won’t be easy, but deeply believe it is one worth fighting and one that we can win IF I can get the support I need. - Kim Weaver
Last year there was a progressive Democrat running against Steve King, the O'Brien County Democratic Party chairwoman, Kim Weaver. The DCCC collected a lot of money by sending out e-mails telling Democrats how horrible Steve King is back then, too. How much of the money collected for IA-04 did the DCCC give Kim? ZERO. They did absolutely nothing to help her at all.

The thing is, even without any help from the DCCC, Kim earned more votes than Hillary Clinton in every single county in IA-04-- all 39 of them-- and even won the biggest county in the district! It's worth noting here that Kim out-performed Chuck Schumer's handpicked corporate conservative Senate candidate, Patty Judge, in all 39 counties as well.

This year Kim is taking on King again. And what is the DCCC doing? You probably guessed it-- sending out more letters demonizing King and collecting cash to use to elect more conservaDems while offering nothing at all to Kim Weaver. We're sick of it.

Blue America endorsed Kim this week and we're asking our members to contribute directly to her campaign.

Kim told us that "the most disappointing aspect of the campaign was being told time and again that although I was a 'great candidate,' various organizations declined to support me because I wasn’t 'viable.' Most organizations didn’t even respond to my applications for assistance. Additionally, whenever my opponent would say some new horrific thing, I would get emails after emails from organizations asking for money to 'help defeat Steve King.' Not a single one of those organizations passed along any of that support. King was a big money maker for them, and it appears that he still is."

The DCCC doesn't want to understand that it takes real effort and investment over time to defeat entrenched incumbents like King. It's beyond their scope of endeavor, which is why the House Democrats have hemorrhaged dozens and dozens of members since Rahm Emanuel set his reactionary strategic and tactical ideas into stone.

2018 is the greatest opportunity we have to defeat Republicans in Congress in decades. But, please, when you want to defeat a Steve King, contribute directly to his Democratic opponent, Kim Weaver. And when you want to defeat a Darrell Issa or a Lamar Smith, donate to Doug Applegate or Tom Wakely, and not to a DCCC that will continue to waste those contributions on their own questionable agenda.

(Factchecking!) 'That's not how it works': Trump's grasp of Nato questioned

A brilliant headline from the Guardian.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/18/trump-merkel-nato-germany-owe-money-tweet

All US media should use this format for reporting on Trump's distracting tweets.

State the real issue first
Note the distracting tactics
Come back to the real issue.


Here the real issue is that Trump doesn't understand NATO. Thank you, Guardian!!