• Listen to the entire program

Billionaires’ Ball: Gluttony and Hubris in an Age of Epic Inequality

In their new book, Billionaires’ Ball: Gluttony and Hubris in an Age of Epic Inequality, Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks turn the abstract numbers of income inequality into concrete examples of cause and consequence that the average person can comprehend, and then work to change. Billionaires’ Ball asks how the income inequality gap in the US became a chasm and details lesser known influences in US history. The authors introduce their readers to Lewis Powell, who in the 1971 wrote an 8-page manifesto calling on the rich to engage in national politics. What followed was the birth of conservative, anti-tax, small government think tanks and advocacy organizations, including the Coors family funded Heritage Foundation, that have changed the course of American discourse and politics.

GUEST: Linda McQuaig, author of seven Canadian best sellers, an award winning journalist who has written for the Toronto Globe and Mail, Mclean’s magazine, and the Toronto Star, and she is the co-author of Billionaire’s Ball, Gluttony and Hubris in an Age of Inequality with Neil Brooks.

Billionaire’s Tea Party

Veteran Republican Senator Dick Lugar’s May 8th loss to Tea Party candidate Richard Mourdock in Indiana seems to have been the opening election salvo of the right wing movement. In Nebraska this week, a number of Tea Party backed candidates vied for a Senate primary with Sarah Palin’s favorite, Deb Fischer, ultimately winning. Upcoming elections in Texas on May 29th and in Utah on June 26th are also shaping up to be Tea Party dominated battles.

The Tea Party landscape is complex and includes groups like Freedom Works, Tea Party Express, Club For Growth, Americans For Prosperity, Tea Party Patriots, and more recently a number of Political Action Committee. In 2011, Australian film maker Taki Oldham infiltrated Americans for Prosperity (or AFP) and followed the antics of one of the billionaire Koch brothers, David Koch.

Weaving together commentary from propaganda experts and political insiders with unprecedented footage, Taki Oldham’s resulting film, The Billionaires’ Tea Party gives us an unprecedented look inside the Tea Party groups, and the Kochs’ extreme vision of free market capitalism. He showcases hysterical scenes as President Obama’s proposed Health Care bill is reframed as Soviet style ‘socialized medicine’, and follows industry-funded spin doctors and scientists dismissing Obama’s climate bill as a liberal conspiracy to control peoples lives and destroy the economy. He also exposes the cozy relationship between Koch operatives and Fox News.

Koch Brothers Exposed

President Obama’s Reelection campaign announced last week that it would spend a whopping $25 million on advertising this month. Campaign advisor David Axelrod specifically made reference to groups attacking the Obama administration as being tied to Former Bush Strategist Karl Rove and to the multi-billionaire Koch Brothers, referring to the latter as “contract killers over there in super PAC land.” The announcement coincided with an ad by Americans for Prosperity (AFP), a conservative organization tied to the Koch Brothers, attacking the Obama administration. The Obama Reelection Campaign retaliated by releasing its own video debunking the AFP ad’s claims and labeling the transnational Koch Brothers as “Big Oil.”

Petroleum, however, is only one part of the Kochs’ vast empire. A new film, The Koch Brothers-Exposed! from activist and film maker Robert Greenwald shows how over the past thirty years, the billionaire brothers have funneled over $100 million to rightwing foundations, think tanks, advocacy groups, public education and lawmakers to promote their agenda of unfettered capitalism and the near-abolition of government, environmental and public protection regulations that impact all of us. As Greenwald put it to Rolling Stone reporter Julian Brookes, the film aims to show how the brothers’ machinations affect the lives of “living, breathing human beings.”

The Koch Brothers’ influence over the socio-political sphere in the United States has been undeniable as evidenced by several recent well-known political phenomena including ( but not limited to) the Tea party movement, the pushing of stringent voter ID laws and financial support of ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council responsible for the controversial ‘Stand your Ground’ laws and other similar corporate-sponsored laws.

Thank you Gifts:

Special thanks to a generous donation made by the organizers of the Hola Mexico Film Festival, opening Thursday May 24th running through Wednesday May 30th in Los Angeles. For tickets and information Hola Mexico Film Festival

Koch Brother’s Exposed – DVD – $100

Billionaire’s Tea Party – DVD – $100

Call 818-985-5735 to make a pledge or click on the above links.