16 May 2019 – I promised you that in our next show I would get into the myths about Federal debt. This is that show. In addition, Will talks about why we should be going into space – for real. Some of the ideas sound crazy but I think there is enormous value in doing the work that takes us down those paths, regardless. There is so much possibility,…

2 April 2018 – Since I, admittedly, went on and on about debt politics in this episode, I will keep my description very short. Will updates you on the latest on Brexit crazy. May has completely lost control of Parliament and Macron will not continue to be impatient with British incompetence. I talk little bit about the mechanism of federal debt and…

12 March 2019 – We are back and we have a lot to say. I begin by explaining why I disappeared into my rabbit hole for so long and I talk a bit about how my process for healing and, hopefully, staying that way. Will then talks about how we have reimagined the show and made it more sustainable. We both summarize a laundry list of the things we will b…

30 August 2018 – Because of the holiday we did not have a show planned for Monday but then I noticed a tweet from ACA expert, Charles Gaba (@Charles_Gaba). The ACA is at serious risk again, this time in the courts in what Charles refers to as the Texas Fold ’em Case (Texas v Azar). Normally, this would not be a case which posed any threat but the T…

27 August 2018 – This week we have Nancy Altman, the President of Social Security Works and the Chair of the Strengthen Social Security Coalition. We are dedicating this entire episode to Nancy’s new book, The Truth About Social Security: the Founder’s Words Refute Revisionist History, Zombie Lies and Common Misunderstandings. Guess what…Social Sec…

20 August 2018 - Will is off today due to a family emergency and our expected interview has been rescheduled so it's just me and I thought I would try to get a jump start on our coming Puerto Rico interview show. In trying to understand what is going on with the economy and, therefore, the post-Maria recovery in Puerto Rico, I kept tripping over on…

13 August 2018 – We were lucky enough to have Steve Grumbine, of Real Progressives, for the entire show. We talked briefly about the recent OH-12 special election and his take on how the Greens impacted the election. We then spent the rest of the show talking about spreading the word about modern monetary theory and messaging. Next week we have ter…

7/30/2018 - Media often speaks of trade as if it is partitioned off from the rest of US interests including many major areas like national security, human rights and climate. Of course, these things (and many, many more) are all deeply intertwined. Sadly, that is a level of complexity which is well beyond the capacity of Trump. In this show Arliss …

23 June 2018 - We are back (and trying to stay that way.) This is a grab bag show covering a number of international issues which are getting only cursory coverage by US media (for obvious reasons.) Will has news about currency plans for Scotland which, for MMT folk, is especially frustrating. On another front, remember all those times, pre-Brexit …

25 June 2018 - We are back from hiatus with Amanda Werner (@wamandajd), leader of the action at the Mexican restaurant in DC which sent DHS Secretary Kirsjen Nielsen scuttling for cover like a cockroach when the lights get flipped on. Amanda tells us how, with a little help from a friend, she was able to pull together such an effective protest in a…

14 May 2018 – This past week, with the suicide of Frightened Rabbit frontman, Scott Hutchison, media and, well, all of us, once again came up against how best to talk about suicide and best practices for media. Dr. Dan Reidenberg, Executive Director of Suicide Awareness Voices of Education (SAVE), joined us for the interview. In particular he spoke…

Update: The original episode released this morning did not contain the extended interview. We've corrected that this evening. 7 May 2018 - Job Guarantee remains the talk of the Twitter town (nest?) as well as some mainstream media. Critics have been vocal and a core of MMT thought leaders have been guiding the response to the push-back. Nathan Tank…

7 May 2018 – Job Guarantee remains the talk of the Twitter town (nest?) as well as some mainstream media. Critics have been vocal and a core of MMT thought leaders have been guiding the response to the push-back. Nathan Tankus (@nathantankus), who is a research scholar at the Modern Money Network and a terrific follow on Twitter, is among those lea…

30 April 2018 – As I was flying through my Twitter stream this week, dipping in here and there to read all the many job guarantee (JG) tweets, I came across a thread, by Dr. Steven Attewell (@stevenattewell), that served to put JG into a historical context and provide background as to why past efforts had failed. What could be more timely! Steven j…

23 April 2018 – Everyone is talking about the Comey memos and I think I’m about over it BUT I have been curious about how Congress and the Justice Department both run investigations in parallel without pulling a Nunes or embarrassingly dropping a Gowdy on the floor. David Waldman (@KagroX), who is a lawyer, Congressional procedure expert and the ma…

16 April 2018 - There comes a time in every federal budget cycle when I have to find a way to talk about debt and, specifically, the Dems dangerous debt dance. This time I decided to switch things up and invited Frances Langum (Bluegal), from my favorite podcast, The Professional Left, to interview me and to provide push-back. Fran is someone for w…

9 April 2018 – Democrats are finally learning that Secretaries of State are more critical than even governors in state elections so we are lucky to have elections expert and Indiana State Democratic SOS candidate, Jim Harper for the interview. Jim is a strong candidate for Indiana and the videos on his FB page reinforce why he is a great choice bot…

4 April 2018 - Due to the holiday weekend we do not have a new show this week. This is a rebroadcast of a special mid-week combined Hopping Mad and Irreverent Testimony entirely focused on trade. Travis Rosen and Rachel Hutcheson of Irreverent Testimony joined Will and I to talk about the domestic and international implications of the Trump Trade T…

In these days of increasing uncertainty, self-care gets to be more important. Toward that end, Will and I did a lightweight show this week. We dramatize the pearly gates meeting between Saint Peter and Pete Peterson. Will leads us in a discussion about the resources available in space and how important taking the next steps are in so many scientifi…

19 March 2018 – There have been a lot of things which Will and I have been wanting to talk about and we get into it. Ask yourself the following questions: Is Vanessa Trump’s filing for divorce really about divorce?; Is there a link between brain damage and religious fundamentalism?; Can Trump be so anxious to suppress the vote that even GOP Secreta…

12 March 2018 - Dr. Fadhel Kaboub (@FadhelKaboub and @BinzagrInfo), President of the Binzagr Institute for Sustainable Prosperity and Associate Professor at Denison University, gave us such a wonderful interview that we dedicated the entire show to it including the compelling extended part of the interview. Dr. Kaboub became interested in modern mo…

8 March 2018 – This is a special combined Hopping Mad and Irreverent Testimony entirely focused on trade. Travis Rosen and Rachel Hutcheson of Irreverent Testimony joined Will and I to talk about the domestic and international implications of the Trump Trade Tariffs and the basics of what international trade really means. This is a dive into what w…

5 March 2018 – WOW! We had an exhilarating, affirming, healing conversation with Real Progressives founder, Steve Grumbine (@sdgrumbine) who was on with us for the whole show. Steve is a long-time MMT evangelist and activist. He also has been active and is well known in Bernie & Green Party circles. I knew, from having heard his panel at the MMT co…

26 February 2018 – Perhaps this time we will be willing to finally talk about the elephant in the room, white men and guns. We will never be able to ask the right questions or find workable solutions until Americans acknowledge that white men are not only usually the shooters but purchase most of the guns, organize the gun shows, protest in favor o…

19 February 2018 – At this point it really all boils down to one thing, we cannot win until we win. Everything we cover on the show today boils down to that. Prosecuting those who colluded with Russia, opening our hearts and borders to Syrian refugees, securing our elections, passing gun safety legislation – none of these are doable until we have t…

12 February 2018 – We’re BACK!!! At least, we are back on the air. I’m still traveling so I’ll keep this really short. At the top of the show Will emphasizes the importance of continuing to work toward victory in November and not making the mistake of thinking we are already over the finish line. I get into the latest in the Brexit talks with the E…

18.12.2017 – What a year this has been. We were happy to end this year’s interview with the amazing Liz Brownlee, who talked farm policy with us, while Arliss tackled the continuing war on science, and the two of us discussed our hopes for 2018. What a year. Star Wars is breaking records at the box office again, and you know, when Episode 4, A New …

12/11/2017 - This week we were happy to welcome VA-09 Democratic Primary candidate Justin Santopietro (@JS4VA) to the show to discuss his ideas for Southwest Virginia and the country as a whole. At the top of the show we discussed the Hurricane, and in Will's section, we discussed Brexit, or did our best to do so considering how many developments h…

4 December 2017 - Though Will is still on vacation, I am joined by two of our associates. Basically, we came at the subject of framing from many different directions throughout the show. I start with a fairly deep dive into dynamic scoring. I know––you can't wait, right?!? While scoring methodology is one of those suuuuuppppper dry subjects, dynami…

20 November 2017 - What's old is new again or, in the case of Trump, never went away. Due to a confluence of unexpected events we were unable to produce an entirely new show this week so I went back to 30 January 2017 and grabbed the interview we did at the time with attorney, Armando Llorens. I put both the original broadcast interview and the Ext…

13 November 2017 – We accidentally ended up with a theme this week – rural spaces. During our interview block we were fortunate enough to have Lane Siekman (@LaneSiekman), Congressional candidate in IN-6, and Dearborn County, Indiana Democratic Party Chairman, Tricia Gaustad (@GaustadTricia). Lane gave us an articulate and well thought out rundown …

6 November 2017 – Architect and author JD Alt again graced us with his thoughts, this time talking about his new novella, Low Earth Orbit. The novella takes the functionality of modern monetary theory and applies it to solve major issues facing a society on the brink. The novella lives at the intersection between architecture, environment, society …

30 October 2017 – It worked! Brad Voracek (@bradvoracek) is back this week and the wait was worth it. This time you are able to hear his full answers on youth employment, Senator Sander’s & Congressman Conyers’ Employ Young Americans Now bill, the science versus human aspects of economics and his thinking on so-called (and wildly mis-named) “Right …

23 October 2017 - This was one of those shows which fought every step of the way.* While at the MMT conference this summer I recorded a terrific interview with the bright and articulate young economist Brad Voracek (@bradvoracek) from one of my favorite websites, The Minskys. Embarrassingly, I managed to error during the recording process and had b…

16 October 2017 – Charles Gaba (@charles_gaba) comes back again to explain why Trump’s latest move against the ACA is so incredibly dangerous. This time, however, there are some really specific things we can be doing to help to keep the ACA from imploding. Join the Indivisible ACA Sign-up Project (@2018ACASignUps) and get involved on the ground wit…

At the last minute we were incredibly lucky to get an interview with the oh-so-popular Monopoly Man! Amanda Werner, of Americans for Financial Reform and Public Citizen, joined us right at the top of the show to talk about her experience as the Monopoly Man at the recent Senate hearing on SJ Res 47. GOP members of the Senate want to rollback the ne…

2 October 2017 – Some days it’s hard to remember that despite all appearances, there is a world out there beyond Trump and all the many, many ways he is failing this week. The truly dazzling economist Dr. Pavlina Tcherneva (her excellent site is here) is with us for the interview. I was able to interview her in person at the First International Con…

In this weeks show, Arliss interviews Zach Carter, and I discuss both the NFL and the German election. Yesterday was a tough day for German Democracy. The Far-Right took third place in their election, entitling them to become the third largest political party in the Bundestag. What's particularly worrying is the tough path that Merkel now has to fo…

18 September 2017 – Every time Denise Oliver-Velez is on our show I learn so much! This week we asked Denise to join us to cover what is happening in the Caribbean following Hurricane Irma. I particularly loved the posts Denise put up at Daily Kos on Puerto Rico and the history of the word “hurricane” as well as her thoughts on the subject. We spen…

11 September 2017 - The always interesting and informed Rachel Hutcheson, of Irreverent Testimony, joined us for a mini-roundtable. Will, Rachael and I each brought a topic and we spent some time thinking out loud about them. Will started us off talking about climate change, in terms both of the hurricanes and fires currently razing huge swaths of …

We started our show this week with a discussion of Republican exaggerations of the demise of Obamacare. Ryan claimed that dozens of counties were without an insurer. Turns out the actual number was one when he said it, and is now zero. In my block I discussed hurricanes and the lack of infrastructure and zoning laws, as it relates to Harvey, and Ho…

We weren't expecting what happened in Charlottesville, just over a week ago, but by the time events unfolded, last week's show was already recorded. And a portion of this week's as well. But with the terrorist attack that happened quite close to where I live, I thought a deep dive into the thread far-right terrorism represents was important. Joel a…

14 August 2017 – All across the country incredible first-time candidates are entering the political fray. Darlene McDonald (@VoteDarlene), running in UT-4, is an articulate, accomplished, woman with a truly compelling backstory. This is the very kind of candidate who has the ability to change the Democratic party…and I don’t mean only if she wins. …

7 August 2017 - This week we go really deep into the weeds, which is our favorite place! National ACA expert, Charles Gaba (@charles_gaba aka Brainwrap) of ACASignUps.org fame is with us to help us sort out current legislative efforts, what needs to be done as well as what is politically possible. Charles also defines and clarifies terms like "Medi…

31 July 2017 - We were incredibly lucky to have just the right interview guest at just the right time, Amanda Werner (@wamandajd), Arbitration Campaign Manager for Americans for Financial Reform & Public Citizen, was with us to talk about the dangerous efforts, by Congress, to overturn the new arbitration rule just published by the Consumer Finance…

This weeks show was a first amendment extravaganza. Arliss had to leave on business, but she still made time to participate in the show this week. In my section, I discussed freedom of speech with Joel Dent, long time listener and new member of the Hopping Mad team. We talked about what freedom of speech is, what it isn't, and how the alt right rep…

17 July 2017 - Will is back and he brought political risk and security expert Landon Shroder (@LandonShroder) with him. The interview, both in the broadcast and in the podcast versions of the show, is longer than usual and with good reason. We go wide getting into Mosul, the Kurds, Saudi, Yemen and the UAE during the broadcast show and then, in Ext…

10 July 2017 - Today I was joined by all three of the new associates: Michele LeSure, David Paquette & Joel Dent. They are all bringing new perspective and strengths to the show so I am reveling in the opportunity to showcase them. Will is still on vacation but he is back next week with, hopefully, some interesting stories to tell. Michele starts o…

3 July 2017 - Will is on vacation this week (and next) so I am joined on the show by two of our three new associates, Joel Dent and David Paquette. David, a self-professed connoisseur of lies, starts us off with a spectacular lie direct from a true master of the subject, Senator Orrin Hatch. I respond with a whopper from Secretary of Energy, Rick P…

26 June 2016 - Most of this show was recorded within a few hours after the Senate released their "Better Care" bill and we were lucky enough to have Linda Benesch (@LindaBenesch), the Communications Director for Social Security Works, with us to spell out the depth of the depravity of the GOP. I began by asking her "On a scale of 1 to I'm moving to…