I went to GritTV’s New York City studios to discuss the HBGary and AnonLeaks developments with respect to the role of the US Chamber of Commerce in spying on American citizens for political activities. Lee Fang, the reporter from ThinkProgress who, along with Marcy Wheeler, first reported on HBGary’s work with the Chamber joined us for the discussion.

Laura Flanders of GRITtv spoke with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka last week about jobs, Trumka’s union experience, and the future of the labor movement. Trumka is clearly aggravated about a lack of progress on jobs, saying that President Obama “is probably more pro-business than anybody in the past.” He also says “the worst thing this president could do” is replace Larry Summers with a CEO.

Yesterday I went to GRITtv and spoke with host Laura Flanders and Louisiana author Jordan Flahrety about BP’s exploitation of working people in the Gulf Coast. We discussed just a few of the many problems facing fishermen, recovery workers, and residents of the Gulf that are all at the mercy of BP.

Michael talks about Chuck Schumer, Robert Menendez and the “anonymous senior administration official” who trashed labor after they opposed the anti-labor Blanche Lincoln in Arkansas. As Michael notes, labor has given $15.8 million to DSCC candidates since 2006, and DSCC chief Menendez says he nonetheless expects that financial support to continue.

After nearly two years with the wonderful FireDogLake crew, GRITtv has launched its brand-new website at http://grittv.org.

In a special one-hour live stream, we bring back many of our guests from last year’s election day show to discuss what’s changed, what’s stayed the same, and what we still hope to see happen under Obama. Elections around the country of course saw nowhere near the turnout of the presidential race, yet the corporate [...]

Terry Jones, of Monty Python, on why he’s becoming an arms manufacturer. The forecast is good he says. Sales are up. And it doesn’t look like growth will slow any time soon. Think about it…by the time you finish watching this the United States will have spent an additional one million in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A chat about inside/outside electoral strategy and reality. This, and the full hour of GRITtv: Hillary and the RFK flap, Iraqi insurgency “Meeting Resistance”, Dr. Dahlia Wasfi, and Stop The Clash of Civilizations from Avaaz.org

Iran, Al-Qaeda, Saddam’s “dead-enders”…you’d have a pretty muddled picture of who’s fighting in Iraq if you only read the headlines in American media. Molly Bingham and Steve Conors offer a very different picture in their new film Meeting Resistance.

Iraq War veteran Kris Goldsmith had the grim job of working as a photo-documentarian for US Military intelligence on the ground in Iraq. I talk with Kris about his experiences in Iraq, and the consequences of stop-loss back home.