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In what was not a surprising interview for anyone who has followed Jesse Ventura and his opinions about both the Democratic and Republican parties, our military industrial complex and what's wrong with our corporate media today, Piers Morgan allowed Ventura to air his grievances on all of the above this Monday evening on CNN.

While I do not agree with Ventura on all of his views by any means, it's hard to disagree with some of the points he made during this interview. Our political system has been corrupted by too much money on all sides. The two political parties have crowded out any chance for most in a third party to get elected. Our militarism and how we treat other countries would never be accepted if the tables were turned and other countries attempted to treat us the same way we do them. And our media is utterly broken and I agree completely with the point he made here:

MORGAN: How much do you think the media have to take responsibility for some of the way the political system has gone? You now have very partisan cable networks. FOX on the right, MSNBC on the left, CNN sort of squeezed somewhere in the middle.

When you see them getting more vociferous and partisan, does that matter? Is that good for political debate? Is it corrupting political debate? What do you think?

VENTURA: I think it's awful. It's terrible. You know, the news used to be to report facts and allow you to make the decision. All these shows are nothing but opinion moderators. They're hired guns to push an agenda. I think it's horrible.

When our forefathers created this country, the media was supposed to be the fourth branch of government, the unwritten branch. Their job was to keep track of what the other three were doing and report it to the American people so the American people could judge it accordingly. What you have now is nothing but a media with opinion and a media that I remember the death of Anna Nicole Smith. It was the headline for a month -- a month. And yet the meat and potatoes of running our country gets cast aside because why? The media today is not in to reporting the news, they're in to creating it, and that is very, very dangerous.

Because the light went on with "60 Minutes". They found out the news could make money. So the bean counters came in. Now the news is nothing but entertainment. It's done to get ratings.

Where in the old days of Walter Cronkite, the news took a loss and they accepted that and they made up for it in their entertainment division. Not today. Today, the news is expected to get ratings and expected to generate money and that is horrible.

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Time for your weekly podcast with The Professional Left, a.k.a. our own Driftglass and Bluegal.

Links for this episode include:

Adventus: “People are Messy”

Herman Cain sold his own campaign 100K worth of books.

Occupy the Boardroom

Charles Pierce at Esquire channels Driftglass

You can listen to the archives at The Professional Left and make a donation there if you'd like to help keep these going. You can also follow them on Facebook at The Professional Left Podcast with Driftglass and Blue Gal.

And exciting news. Marlene Zenker has written an I-phone app (will be sized for i-Pad soon) to benefit the podcast. It has both DG and BG's blogs and the podcast, and we have plans for exclusive iOS user content very soon. Have a great weekend everyone and enjoy the podcast.

This is good news. Looks like Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks is going to get another chance to guest host on MSNBC. He filled in for Dylan Ratigan for part of the week while he was gone on vacation and then for Chris Jansing last week and now he's going to get a chance to fill in for Ed Schultz next week. Good for Cenk. As I said before, MSNBC needs to just go ahead and give him his own slot and it would help make up for them canning David Shuster. We need some more progressive voices on our cable news shows and this makes me about as happy as I was when I found out Rachel was going to get her own show on there. Maybe we'll find out soon that Cenk is going to get his own show as well.

Cenk laid out one thing he wants to do while he's filling in for Ed.

Uygur: For example next week, what I'd love to do, is I'd love to punch Ronald Reagan's ghost in the mouth, okay. Not Ronald Reagan himself. God bless him. He's passed on to greener pastures alright, but the ghost of Ronald Reagan.

Oh, Ronald Reagan was awesome! No he wasn't. Okay, I'm going to show, we'll get an opportunity next week and I'm coming and we are going to do the Ed Schultz show and I hope I can do these segments for you guys to show you how Ronald Reagan was unelectable by today's standards, not as a Republican, even as a Democrat, totally unelectable, okay, would never make it through the primaries, wouldn't make it through anything.

He'd get destroyed by Fox News. Now why do I want to get that message out and why is it important we do it on national T.V.? So that the rest of the country can wake up, these guys in power, the media, the politicians, etc. and say "Hey wait a minute now, maybe this country has shifted way over to the right. Maybe we've lost our bearings. Maybe the center of the country is nowhere near where we are now."

Because if Reagan is unelectable as a Democrat today, then where the hell is the country? It's off the charts to the right wing.

I could not agree more. If they're going to make him go up against Ed's usual guests that should be interesting, most of whom I can't stand and who IMO ruin the show a lot of times since Ed's way too friendly to the wingers he regularly has on his show. We'll see if Ron Christie, Heidi Harris, Scott Hennen and Ernest Istook think it's such a great idea to go Ed's show if it's Cenk they have to debate. Note to Ed Schultz... get some better guests buddy. I'd rather see you having on some good progressive voices that don't get enough air time than you trying to argue with those wingnuts any day of the week.

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Glenn Greenwald took on Dylan Ratigan fill-in Eliot Spitzer on MSNBC over Israel's raid on the flotilla and the Gaza blockade and frankly it was refreshing to see this sort of debate that is not all pro-Israel all the time on one of the cable news shows. Glenn has a bit more on this at Salon.

Talking about Israel with Eliot Spitzer on MSNBC:

I was just on MSNBC talking about Israel, the Gaza blockade and the flotilla attack with Eliot Spitzer, who was guest-hosting for Dylan Ratigan. It was a rather contentious discussion, though quite illustrative of how Israel is (and is not) typically discussed on American television, so I'm posting the whole 8-minute segment below. Two points: (1) before I was on, Spitzer had on an Israel-defending law professor, followed by Netanyahu's former Chief of Staff, and both of them (along with Spitzer) were spewing pure Israeli propaganda in uninterrupted and unchallenged fashion; at the end of Spitzer's discussions with them, he asked them to "stick around just in case," and once I was left, he brought at least one of them back on to respond to what I said without challenge; (2) literally 90 seconds before my segment was about to begin, the new cam and sound system I just acquired stopped working, forcing me to unplug everything and use only my laptop cam and mic, which caused the technical aspects to be less than ideal (though still perfectly workable).

Most of the interviews I've seen with him are worse than this one with that awful web cam of his, so I hope he's got something better if he's going to keep coming on television. It's hard to make your points if the viewers can't hear what the hell you're saying, but anyway, back to the subject at hand.

sluggahjells at Daily KOS made a few points about the interview that I agree with.

What makes this interview so important to watch is that it features a perspective that isn't common place on Israel in American television.

The ugly nature of the Netanyahu's Administration preference to keep the Gaza blockade going on and claim that the blockade is "To make the people of Gaza go on a diet" is really disturbing. And you'll never here what Greenwald said in a regular discussion about Israel here on our sad cable television news stations. Instead, you'll get the usual cautious dribble of support that preceded no matter how heinous the crimes that transpired under Israel's watch are.

Because sometimes the truth, especially in regards to international news in the Middle East, can be too much for the networks to bare. And that was certainly the case with TV's potential next network man in Spitzer, when he had to deal with a completely honest broker like Greenwald is.

The other thing Glenn pointed out is that Israel and the United States do not have the rest of the world with us on this one. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is untenable and when you've got this coming out in reports the problem is not going away any time soon.

Turkish navy 'to back next convoy' following Gaza flotilla raid:

Israel is facing another potentially explosive confrontation at sea as pro-Palestinian activists sent two more boats to challenge its blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Turkey - one of Israel's closest Muslim allies until Monday's clash left several of citizens dead - was last night reported to be considering sending a naval escort for the boats.

This would arrive in the region at the end of the week, creating a potential flashpoint for a major clash between the nations.

Yesterday Turkish premier Tayyip Erdogan called for Israel to be punished for its attack on the flotilla on Monday and said 'nothing would ever be the same' in relations between the two allies.

'Israel's behaviour should definitely, definitely be punished. No one should try to test Turkey's patience,' he said. Read on...

As the media has reported -- President Obama treads lightly in Gaza crisis:

The Obama administration walked a fine line yesterday in response to Israel’s deadly raid on a flotilla trying to break the blockade of Gaza, urging Israeli leaders to let more aid into the beleaguered territory but refusing to criticize the U.S. ally.

President Obama telephoned Turkey’s prime minister to express his “deep condolences” for the deaths and injuries aboard a Turkish-flagged vessel and called for an impartial investigation. And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed support for a U.N. Security Council statement that condemned the “acts” that cost the lives of nine pro-Palestinian activists off the Gaza coast.

The raid put Obama in a difficult position, caught between pressing Israel to ease harsh conditions in the Gaza Strip while at the same time supporting efforts to stop the smuggling of arms into Gaza that could be used to attack Israel. Read on...

Not a huge surprise there but as Jason noted, Israel really stepped in it this time and made it extremely hard for the United States to continue being a friend to Israel.

Democracy Now devoted most of their hour long program to covering the rest of the world's reaction of the attack on the flotilla. You won't see much of this in our corporate media that takes most of their talking points from the pro-Israeli lobbyists in the United States either. John King's been allowing Amy Goodman to come on his new show on CNN once in a while. I would guess he'll never allow her to come on and comment about this situation.

Global Condemnation of Israeli Armed Attack on Gaza-Bound Freedom Flotilla: At Least 10 Dead, Hundreds Remain in Detention

To compare and contrast the "news" coverage out there, here's propagandist Sean Hannity with Get-Off-My-Lawn-You-Kids Grandpa McCain complaining that President Obama hasn't done quite enough to suit them to kiss Israel's ass yet since of course the Israelis are never, ever wrong and the people living in squalor, the ones they're keeping confined to a third world slum they can't escape and those attempting to help them and draw attention to it, are never, ever right.

Israel has a right to make sure weapons aren't going into Gaza. They should not a have a right to do what they're doing to the general population of that country.

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TPM did a really nice job with this mash-up. As someone who played a whole lot of softball over the years with people who were gay and straight, black, white, male, female or whoever, I find this media narrative rather silly.

I know where the stereotype is coming from because the best league I ever played in was an A-League where our team really didn't belong and got beaten pretty badly in most of the games we played there. It didn't go unnoticed by my teammates and myself that we were probably one of the few teams there that was primarily comprised of straight women. My cousin who is gay was one of the best softball players I knew of and could knock the ball out of the park further than most of the men I ever played with, but she wasn't the only one by any means. I didn't care what the sexual orientation of my teammates or rival teams were any more than I cared what race they were. I just enjoyed playing the game.

Sports leagues have always been a place where gay women could come together and enjoy socializing without being scrutinized like they would be for going to a gay bar. To take that and imply that everyone who liked to play softball or basketball or any sport for that matter and never ended up getting married is gay is utterly ridiculous.

It puts women of all sexual orientations who like to play sports or decide not to get married into a box and implies there's something wrong with either or there's something wrong with being gay. A three-fer with the insults. This just looks like a cheap shot at women to me and an extremely outdated one at that.

I also don't like those who choose to stay single being insulted. I didn't get married until I was in my mid-thirties. A lot of people just don't meet anyone they want to get married to and stay single. When men stay single until they're older, they're some great catch for some lucky woman who's going to finally convince them to get hitched. When women decide to stay single, they're an old maid... or maybe they're gay. There must be something wrong with them since they never chose to get married.

And don't even get me started on the pressure to have kids when you're already in your mid-thirties and do finally get married. I'll leave that for another day.

The Gulf coast is about to be destroyed by a massive oil slick and this is what these idiots want to spend their time "reporting" on. Leave Elena Kagan the hell alone about her sexual orientation. I'm more concerned about whether she's going to help move the court back to the left and not vote on the side of corporations over people at every turn. If her defenders are correct that's what she'll do. I hope they're right since it's likely she'll be confirmed.

From Greg Sargent at The Plum Line -- New DNC Ad Rips GOP As Party Of Vitter And Ensign:

The Democratic National Committee is going up with a tough new ad on DC cable hitting the GOP as the party of David Vitter and John Ensign — a response to an earlier RNC spot targeting Dems over Charlie Rangel and Eric Massa. [...]

The ad seems designed to put Republicans on notice that if they use the Rangel/Massa stories as ammunition, the Dems will respond with a howitzer blast. The spot implicitly invites Beltway insiders and media figures to make the comparison — and to call it one way or the other.

It's good to see the Democrats hitting back on this but as I said before, they're not likely to get much help from the media on this. The Republicans put one of these out and they're getting free air time on every one of the cable news shows. I didn't catch anyone showing this one today. I guess we'll see if any of them pick it up next week.

Rachel Maddow calls out Dick Cheney and the Republicans who are parroting him for criticizing the Obama administration for reading terrorists their Miranda rights when every single person that was arrested on terrorism charges under the Bush administration was read their Miranda rights as well.

Frankly I'm tired of the glib nature of almost everyone on cable news and the politicians when talking about this issue and not getting to the underbelly of what this debate is all about, and that is whether it is acceptable to torture prisoners or not and whether we should respect our Constitution or not when it comes to anyone who is arrested for anything. It really just speaks to what road we want to go down when it comes to our system of justice. Are we a nation of laws and think that our system of justice works pretty well, or do we torture people and think it's okay to force confessions out of prisoners with no regard to whether we're getting the truth out of them or not if it makes the public feel better?

BlueGal and Driftglass were talking about this on their podcast from last week, and Driftglass made a really great point. No one can blame the public for wanting revenge on people that they feel want to do America harm. And it's human nature to want revenge on someone, but that's not how our criminal justice system is set up. It's why as Driftglass noted we don't allow the family of someone who has been the victim of a violent crime to decide what happens to the person charged with that crime, no matter how sure they might think they are about whether the person charged is guilty or not.

Those family members are not thinking rationally. They want revenge. The cable news industry and right wing hate radio has allowed the public to think that it's okay to want that same sort of cowboy system of justice instead of our system of justice which was put in place to stop the lynch mob mentality the media is propagating now. I thought we didn't want to be a country where a king or a queen decided to exact revenge on someone with no trial. I thought we were still supposed to be a country where everyone, no matter who you are is presumed innocent until you have your day in court.

It's really just disgusting to watch the national dialog deteriorate into that. We used to be better than that before the media decided it was more important to cover up the crimes of the Bush administration and a good portion of the country seemed to lose their minds after the attacks on 9-11. We need to quit being afraid to allow our criminal justice system to work as much as the Cheney's and the Hannity's and the Limbaugh's and the rest of the yappers out there want to keep us afraid and throwing our own system of justice down the toilet out of revenge, spite and fear.

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McCain wants to make sure no one in the Congress quits paying attention to that propoganda machine out there because his constituents are watching it.

Van Susteren: President Obama said to the Democrats today that they need to stop paying attention to cable news and we didn’t get singled out in particular this time.

McCain: I don’t know they were referring to.

Van Susteren: I think he actually said CNN and Fox News. But he said they need to go out and pay attention to their constituents. Is this President paying attention to his constituents and are those members of the House, both parties paying attention to constituents or not?

McCain: Well, first of all, I advise my friends to go ahead and watch the cable news because our constituents are. Listen…

Van Susteren: I’ll take that plug.

McCain: Yeah. Listen I’ll walk down the street in Phoenix and they’ll say “I saw you on Greta” you know. They may say lousy job but they’ll say “I saw you on Greta”. People watch and people get a lot of their news and information and opinion from cable news. So I would advise members of Congress just the opposite because we want to know what information that your constituents are getting.

Second of all it’s always the way that we have, politicians do in all due respect—shoot the messenger. Shoot the messenger, don’t worry about the message. And the message is that we’re hearing that they’re sick and tired of business as usual. Some polls have the approval rating of Congress in single digits and that you get down to blood relatives and paid staffers. The message I think may come in this November and it might be the most interesting political election that you and I have seen.

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From CNN's State of the Union, Liz Cheney says our "Federal courts are not an effective tool for fighting terror" despite as Donna Brazile asserts, her daddy's administration didn't seem to have any problem using them to prosecute terrorists. You know, it's bad enough that the cable news shows continually trot this torture monger out to defend her father's dirty work as someone we should consider credible, but you'd think John King would try to get some control over her instead of looking like he's just enjoying the show with her either talking over or refusing to respond to Donna Brazile.

Our sorry excuse for "news" really has sunk into the abyss when they day in and day out let these pundits go on the air and treat torture as something our government should be doing and that is legal. It's truly disgusting. And Liz, the "recruiting tool" for terrorism is not our court system. It's our foreign policy that you and your father condone that is making us enemies.

KING: Do Republicans have the upper hand on the political argument? We'll talk about the policy in a minute.

BRAZILE: Well, first of all, John, I take the position that when it comes to national security, this should be a bipartisan concern. I thought the president was absolutely right in taking responsibility but I also thought that the president called on the country to put citizenship ahead of bipartisanship was also the right thing to say.

There's no evidence that President Obama has put fighting terrorism on the back burner. There's no evidence his administration has downplayed the threat or downplaying, you know, whatever information that they have received regarding al Qaeda.

When the president gave what I thought to be strong remarks on Afghanistan in December, he mentioned Yemen. He mentioned the fact that we would have to fight al Qaeda in Yemen and Somalia and other places. So there's no information whatsoever that would lead anyone to believe that this president doesn't care about our security and he's not fighting with every tool that was left by the Bush-Cheney administration.

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President Barack Obama told CBS News' Bob Schieffer that "the 24-hour news cycle and cable television and blogs" focus on the most extreme elements which fuels angry protests.

"They can't get enough of conflict. It's cat nip to the media right now. The easiest way to get 15 minutes of fame is to be rude to somebody. In that environment, I think it makes it more difficult for us to solve the problems that the American people want us to solve," said Obama.