December 2 - Republicans Load Poison Pills Into the Spending Bill; Only 20 Americans Have Wealth Equal to Half of the Population; The UK Parliament Votes to Bomb Syria

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the deadline of December 11 when the federal government runs out of money and look into the ideological riders that are being loaded onto the spending bill that make it likely President Obama will have to veto it unless some or all of these poison bills are removed. Lisa Gilbert, the Director of Public Citizen’s Congress Watch, joins us. She warned us back in October that these riders were going to undo legislation through the backdoor slipping in provisions that will impose enormous economic harm on the American public to benefit corporate donors while the Tea Party “Freedom Caucus” uses the threat of a government shutdown as a weapon to extract special favors for ideological extremists.

Part 2

Then we hear from Chuck Collins the co-founder of the Patriotic Millionaires, who just released a report along with the Institute for Policy Studies, “Billionaire Bonanza: The Forbes 400 and the Rest of Us”. We discuss the shameful increase in wealth disparity the report reveals, finding that only 20 of America’s wealthiest people now own more wealth than half of America’s population, which means 20 Americans who could fit comfortably into one private jet, own more wealth than 152 million of their fellow Americans living in 57 million households.

Part 3

Then finally we go to London to discuss the debate in the British parliament today to authorize airstrikes in Syria against the Islamic State and speak with Nafeez Ahmed, the editor in chief of insurgeintelligence at medium.com who is a weekly columnist for the Middle East Eye. We discuss the difference between the vote today and the one that took place back in 2013 when the British parliament voted against intervention following the crossing of Obama’s red line when the Assad regime used chemical weapons against the Syrian people.