This episode of Radio Free Dylan is a conversation with Jimmy Williams, a frequent contributor with us at MSNBC and partner in our effort to finally get money out of politics.  Here’s what Dylan has to say:

“As we find ourselves just about a year away from a presidential election,  the number of people in poverty in this country has ticked up to 50 million.  More than one out of every five of our children lives in poverty.  Simultaneously, we have a two-party political system that refuses to engage in any consequential debate around the core issues that are causing the incredible extraction and wealth discrepancies in this country, whether that is the lack of capital requirements in our banking system, the “for sale” or bought nature of our tax code, or trade agreements that are made in the interests of special interests and at the expense of the American people.

We all know that there are things we simply do not talk about in the two-party political system.  It’s like having that crazy uncle that you keep in the basement that no one discusses.  Well, that is the American political system, and it’s high time we discuss the crazy uncle, and that crazy uncle, for my money and I believe for yours, is money in politics.

It is the single most distorting factor in the way that legislation is prosecuted.  I know people like to indict given special interest, or for that matter, the congressmen or, for that matter, lobbyists, but the fact of the matter is all of those individuals and systems are necessary to the functionality of our democracy; they have simply been corrupted, as steroids has corrupted baseball, money has corrupted the political process.

We’ve got a long road ahead of us, and until we can get money out of politics, we will not be done.  But we believe this is the first step to restoring the greatness of America and restoring our democracy, both in the immediate term and for generations to come.”