Russia Today: Thom Hartmann: 'The GOP Idea of Freedom'

Source:Thom Hartmann's Big Picture on President Vladimir Puttin's Russia Today.

"Thom Hartmann will be leaving The Big Picture TV show (on RT TV and Free Speech TV) at the end of September. We’ve had a great run with The Big Picture and earlier this summer we decided to discontinue that evening show so we could focus more directly on our daily 3-hour midday show, The Thom Hartmann Program. 

Having complete editorial control over a TV show syndicated internationally into more than 700 million homes was a great (and rare) opportunity.  We worked hard not to do "sports" or "soap opera" when covering politics, and instead focus on issues; we believe we accomplished a lot in that regard.  We're grateful to RT for the opportunity, and for fully honoring our contractual independence at all times.

You’ll still be hearing and seeing me on The Thom Hartmann Program, which is growing weekly in the noon-3 PM ET daypart." 

From Thom Hartmann

"The GOP Idea of Freedom" 

From The Big Picture With Thom Hartmann

"RT (formerly Russia Today or Rossiya Segodnya) (Russian: Россия Сегодня)[9] is a Russian state-controlled[1] international news television network funded by the Russian government.[16][17] It operates pay television and free-to-air channels directed to audiences outside of Russia, as well as providing Internet content in Russian, English, Spanish, French, German and Arabic.

RT is a brand of TV-Novosti, an autonomous non-profit organization founded by the Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti in April 2005.[8][18] During the economic crisis in December 2008, the Russian government, headed by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, included ANO "TV-Novosti" on its list of core organizations of strategic importance to Russia.[19][20][21] RT operates as a multilingual service with channels in five languages: the original English-language channel was launched in 2005, the Arabic-language channel in 2007, Spanish in 2009, German in 2014 and French in 2017. RT America (2010–2022),[22][23] RT UK (2014–2022) and other regional channels also produce local content. RT is the parent company of the Ruptly video agency,[5] which owns the Redfish video channel and the Maffick digital media company.[6][7]

RT has regularly been described as a major propaganda outlet for the Russian government and its foreign policy.[2] Academics, fact-checkers, and news reporters (including some current and former RT reporters) have identified RT as a purveyor of disinformation[58] and conspiracy theories.[65] UK media regulator Ofcom has repeatedly found RT to have breached its rules on impartiality, including multiple instances in which RT broadcast "materially misleading" content.[72]

In 2012, RT's editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan compared the channel to the Russian Ministry of Defence.[73] Referring to the Russo-Georgian War, she stated that it was "waging an information war, and with the entire Western world".[17][74] In September 2017, RT America was ordered to register as a foreign agent with the United States Department of Justice under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.[75]

RT was banned in Ukraine in 2014 after Russia's annexation of Crimea;[76] Latvia and Lithuania implemented similar bans in 2020.[77][78] Germany banned RT DE in February 2022.[79] After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Poland and then the entire European Union as well as Canada announced they were formally banning RT as well, while independent service providers in over 10 countries suspended broadcasts of RT.[80][81][82] Social media websites followed by blocking external links to RT's website and restricting access to RT's content.[83][84] Microsoft removed RT from their app store and de-ranked their search results on Bing,[85][86] while Apple removed the RT app from all countries except for Russia." 

From Wikipedia

"Thomas Carl Hartmann[1] (born May 7, 1951) is an American radio personality, author, former psychotherapist, businessman, and progressive political commentator.[2] Hartmann has been hosting a nationally syndicated radio show, The Thom Hartmann Program, since 2003 and hosted a nightly television show, The Big Picture, between 2010 and 2017" 

From Wikipedia

Salon Magazine: 'Could Mitt Romney Take Paul Ryan Down With Him?'

Source:Salon Magazine.

"Grumbling from conservatives about Paul Ryan’s muted presence in the White House race could be a positive development for the Wisconsin congressman’s long-term political prospects. But it’s also possible that Ryan will end up ruing the day he accepted the offer to team up with Mitt Romney.

When Ryan was picked, many on the right hoped that the GOP ticket would run on Ryan’s budget blueprint, which calls for radical tax cuts for the wealthy, sweeping reductions in the federal social safety net, and the transformation of Medicare into a quasi-voucher program.

Instead, Ryan has been forced to present himself as a generic vice presidential candidate, disowning his own program and running on Romney’s intentionally non-specific platform.  This puts him in line with the Romney brain trust’s conviction that the weak economy will ultimately prompt swing voters to turn on Obama and that Romney will best be positioned to capture their votes if he’s seen as a competent but inoffensive protest vehicle." 

From Salon Magazine 

I hate to sound cliche and act like some cliche TV news reporter who at the end of his piece, doesn't have the answers to his own story and simply ends it by saying like: "Only time will tell. Back to you, Bob in the studio." but we'll know in about 6 weeks from now. 

If President Obama win reelection in a modern blowout, 10 points or so in the popular vote and wins North Carolina, Indiana, and Missouri, to go along with Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, and Florida, then of course both Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan will get a lot of well-deserved blame for that. You don't believe me, just look at Geraldine Ferraro's political career post-1984, after she ran with Walter Mondale, who was a destined landslide loser to President Ronald Reagan.

But if Romney-Ryan come close, maybe we don't know who won the election until Wednesday of that week or something like that, Representative Ryan would get credit for getting Mitt Romney very close to the finish line and adding a real spark to a pretty dull and sluggish presidential campaign.