tea parties

Every day, the story changes. Sarah Palin's the leader of the Republican party--except that she can't raise money. Eliot Spitzer is a disgrace (but has a TV show), and David Vitter can run for reelection on a "family values" platform. The NAACP wants the Tea Party movement to declare itself not racist, and suddenly the NAACP is racist. And we can't even get started on the BP disaster--mostly because BP won't let reporters near the scene of the crime. Who can make any sense out of all this? Thankfully, we have expert political observers Rebecca Traister of Salon.com and Hendrik Hertzberg of The New Yorker join us in studio to try.

TV networks and bloggers alike got some mileage out of the comments in a Goldman Sachs email that an investment was a "sh*tty deal," but Ed Pilkington of the British newspaper The Guardian thinks it's about time that U.S. politics got a little rougher, say, how they've been in the U.K. for a while now. But an import from U.S. electoral politics--a televised debate between the three main candidates for Prime Minister--has shaken up politics in the U.K. and rocketed a former Nation magazine intern, Liberal Democrat candidate Nick Clegg, to fame. Pilkington joins us in studio to discuss the political scene in both countries, from Goldman to the Tea Parties, Nick Clegg to Barack Obama. GRITtv with Laura Flanders brings participatory democracy onto your computer screen and into your living room, bridging the gap between audience and advocates. Watch any show, at any time: http://grittv.org Distributed by Tubemogul.

Tea Party crowds held protests last week for tax day, but recent articles and polls have laid more blame for the anger at Obama at the feet of a deep-seated racial anxiety among certain sectors of Americans. "We have to embrace the fact that America is still going through a racial crisis," notes multimedia journalist and former NPR host Farai Chideya. Farai joins us in studio to talk about the "battle for the soul of America," and why the problem for some people isn't just their economic situation--it's that situation in relation to that of others. GRITtv with Laura Flanders brings participatory democracy onto your computer screen and into your living room, bridging the gap between audience and advocates. Watch any show, at any time: http://grittv.org Distributed by Tubemogul.

It's tax time again, the time of year when Americans grouse about forking over part of their hard-earned cash to the dear old government. These days, there's a whole movement dedicated to full time grumbling about taxes. I'm talking, of course, about the Right's latest incarnation: tea partiers, who are gearing up for another round of protests. One of the complaints heard a lot among those stirring up people's rage is that 47% of households owe no income taxes this year. That's apparently a sign that that 47% is a bunch of freeloaders, and the rich shouldn't be asked to make up the difference. But take a closer look and you'll find that the only reason taxes are going up at all on the wealthy is that they've seen their tax rates fall and their incomes skyrocket over the last 3 decades. In other words, the tiny tax increase they may see won't even begin to balance their compensation. And at the other end, state and local taxes, not to mention sales taxes, are actually regressive — they burden the poor more than the rich. Reporter David Leonhardt lays out the facts in a recent story. Then there's the fact that the working class and poor tend to pay more in payroll taxes. And the fact that what we really should be screaming about is that almost half our population's earning so little. Covering their taxes is the least of our worries. Who's going to buy our products? This is what jobless recovery looks like. Poverty for most and a tiny influential minority stirring up a movement to fight any responsibility. It sounds like a recipe for a failed state to me. So why the rampant anger on talk radio and cable news? Leonhardt has an answer for that: “It’s hard not to notice that the talk show hosts themselves tend to be among the very wealthy.” The F Word is a regular commentary by Laura Flanders, the host of GRITtv which broadcasts weekdays on satellite TV (Dish Network Ch. 9415 Free Speech TV) on cable, and online at GRITtv.org and TheNation.com. Follow GRITtv or GRITlaura on Twitter.com. Distributed by Tubemogul.