I'm on a bit of a forced vacation this week. The house we live in is a rental, and the owners are putting in a new roof, now. So the noise makes it impossible for me to do a show. And that's just as well, because my main computer melted down this weekend, and now I'll have to figure out a solution. So for now, anyway, I'm only able to stream audio.

And that's just as well, as I recently found an old stash of shows that I did on Air America back in 2009, and I didn't stream video then.

Today, we go back to August 17, 2009. Congress was in the middle of fighting over health care and the legislation that would become the Affordable Care Act. On that day, one of my guests was former Labor Secretary under Bill Clinton, Robert Reich, who was a professor at US Berkeley. Just over a week later, Senator Ted Kennedy, one of our biggest proponents of a single payer health care system succumbed to brain cancer. Robert Reich wrote a lovely tribute to him an Huffington Post. So I reached out to him again and he joined me again on my show the following day, August 26, 2009.

I had also produced a bit of a tribute to him so, today on the show, I shared both of those interviews, followed by the tribute.

And in the few minutes I had left, I shared another production piece I put together to celebrate George W Bush's finally leaving the White House, "Bushisms A to Z". Enjoy!

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Today is the 14th day of this insane war against Iran, launched by the demented orange man who's still occupying the White House for no apparent reason and appears to have no plan to end it either.

Every Friday, Marcy Wheeler of emptywheel.net joins me to discuss what happened since we spoke the week before and today, Marcy goes in-depth to pull all the crazy together and tries to help us make sense out of the senseless.

Both Marcy and I will be out next week. I'll run a combination of some of the best shows of the recent past and pull out a few interviews I just unearthed from my time at Air America radio which I think you'll truly appreciate...

Also, I want to send a big thank you to all who have supported my work with donations, subscriptions or in other ways. I couldn't continue doing this work without you, and just wanted to thank you all again. I know that not everyone can afford the support my work monetarily, but do share my stuff. Thank you for helping to let others know what I do here every day.

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So many aspects of our society have taken a major hit during both of the orange guy's time in office, notably education. I think, uniformly, all administrations - except for the current one- have tried to make the US system of education the best in the world. But in this Dump-led regime, the goal is the break it. That's just one of the topics I'll discuss with today's guest, a fascinating professor of sociology and a whole lot more. Dr. Art Jipson, who also hosts a very popular radio show on the University of Dayton's radio station, WUDR. If you haven't heard him yet, do listen or watch. I'm pretty sure you'll like him too!

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The world of progressive political talk media is relatively small. We don't ALL know each other, but most of us aren't much more than 2 degrees of separation apart. A relatively new show on the air and online, The Politics Bar, is hosted by an old friend and colleague Shawn "Smith" Peirce and a newer friend Jody Hamilton. We spent some time today talking a bit about everything from, obviously, the news and the idiot steering the news, to our/their histories, family, tv and so much more. It was a delightful conversation at a time when, frankly, we could all use it.

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Today's show is a serious and important one. There's so much to be concerned about these days, and the areas of concern have multiplied since the current administration moved into and took over DC. From day one, the orange madman, has dismantled, destroyed, and decimated the agencies, departments and safety nets that had made this country great.

And it was great. It is no longer because of his actions. This group has only been in office just over a year, though it feels like eons already, so some of his horrific actions in their first few months have faded from memory. They can't... We can't let them. Today, I speak with Chuck Borges, better known to millions who care about our futures, as the Social Security - DOGE Whistleblower! And lucky for some of us, he's now running for office.

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Welcome to a new week, sadly, same war- only more. More deaths, more destruction, more money burned, more madness run amok. Jonathan Larsen of TheFuckingNews.substack.com and his original report reporting at jonathanlarsen.substack.com will be here for the second half of the show. We'll talk about his big breaking news this week about what Hegseth's military is claiming regarding this war against Iran and how "Christianity" fits in. We'll begin with a lot of the rest of the news and, for that, I apologize in advance.

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Last Friday as we were wrapping that edition of Emptywheel Friday, Marcy Wheeler said something like, "... unless we invade Iran..." because we knew that was certainly a strong possibility." In the early morning hours of February 28, less than 24 hours after the show ended, the US and Israel struck Iran. And that's only one story from a week that included so much more. So get comfortable, as Marcy Wheeler and I have a lot of ground to cover, and we'll be here for a while. If you can't digest it all in one sitting, you can listen or watch in pieces any time you want.  

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BREAKING NEWS just as I'm in the final throes of show prep for today's show with goes live in 40 minutes! The orange mess just announced - via social media, of course - that Kristi Noem is FIRED and in her place, the moronic MarkWayne Mullin. I kid you not. And on another note, investigative reporter, filmmaker and so much more, Greg Palast returns to the show today. Strap in...

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Yes, it's exhausting. Even Heather Cox Richardson is in the land of the overwhelmed and cursing loudly with us. And we got a harbinger of things to come with yesterday's Democratic Party Senate primary in Texas. I'll try to encapsulate much of that as we begin today's show.

Then Will Bunch joins in from the Philadelphia Inquirer, where he's been opining about many of the same issues that have me freaked out lately.

Oh, and have I mentioned that Pete Kegsbreath is an obnoxious bully who thinks he's in charge? If not, I will...

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Day 4 of the war the orange mess promised he'd never start. The lies continue unabated. He lies and his sycophants swear to them. Everything is fucked up and stupid.

I may never recover from the parts of Kristi Noem's testimony this morning before the Senate Judiciary Committee. And it seems like every minute, there's some other breaking news that, alone under a Democratic administration, would have sent Republicans into conniption fits.

Thankfully, the one and only Heather 'Digby' Parton is here to commiserate with me as we get sucked further into Opposite World.

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