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Thom's blog
We are subsidizing our own destruction
The fossil fuel industry is cashing in on government welfare. According to a new report from Oil Change International, the oil, gas, and coal industries raked in $21.6 billion dollars in state and federal subsidies in 2013 alone. In comparison, the entire 2013 budget request for the Department of Labor was only $12 billion dollars, and the Environmental Protection Agency only requested about $8 billion. We're giving the industry that destroys our planet more than two and half times the amount we pay to protect it.
As EcoWatch.com points out, subsidies to fossil fuel companies are "particularly harmful and hypocritical." The world's leading scientific institutions, including the International Energy Agency and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, all say that the majority of fossil fuels must stay in the ground in order to prevent extreme global warming. One of this new report's authors said, "The science is clear that at least two-thirds of proven fossil fuel reserves need to stay in the ground to avoid catastrophic climate change - it is time for the U.S. government to show leadership and immediately end the massive subsidies that encourage their production."
Not only do these subsidies pad the pockets of oil companies, but they put tax payers on the hook for the social costs of destroying our planet. If Big Oil had to pay the true cost of fossil fuel extraction, they wouldn't be able to drill away without a second thought about the communities and the lives that they devastate in the process. It's time to demand that our government start making $20 billion dollar investments in our future, instead of subsidizing the very industries that are bringing about our destruction.
-Thom
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Tonight on The Big Picture on RT TV at 7pm and 10pm... Gareth Porter, Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare (check your local listings for stations or stream at RT or Free Speech TV, and catch past shows on Youtube)
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Conversations with Great Minds - Gareth Porter, Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare 
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Friday's Daily Stack 
Hour One: Running for Congress on climate change- Nancy Skinner, Candidate for Congress (D-MI, 11th District) / previously, syndicated radio & TV commentator
Hour Two: Anything Goes Friday Article: " 4th Amendment". " The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.". Article: " 5th Amendment" (double jeopardy, witness against self, due process, due compensation).
Hour Three: Anything Goes Friday |
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Watch & Listen to Thom
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Full Show 7/10/14: A Union Win in Tennessee
Thom discusses economic bubbles with Economics Professor Stephanie Kelton and what UAW's small victory in Tennessee says about the future of the labor movement with Democracy Partners' Mike Lux. Thom takes viewer video questions and comments in "Your Take, My Take Live" and in tonight's "Daily Take" Thom discusses how developed countries are investing in green energy and how the U.S. should be doing the same.
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The Thom Hartmann Program - July 11, 2014
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We Know who the NSA is Spying on...
Bernie on the Demand Side of Economics |
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