Jim Hightower
Populist agitator

Featured Speaker, Sunday, Oct. 5, EPAC
"title TBD "

Nationally known radio commentator, writer and speaker Hightower was twice elected Texas agriculture commissioner and has spent his last thirty years “battling the powers that be on behalf of the powers that ought to be – consumers, working families, environmentalists, small businesses and just-plain folks.” Often describing himself as “a kick-ass populist,” Hightower is the author of “There’s Nothing in the Middle of the Road but Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos,” “Thieves in High Places,” “Let’s Stop Beating Around the Bush,” and the audio book, “The People Are Revolting.” He will next appear in print with the March 2009 book “Swim Against the Current; Even a Dead Fish Can Go With the Flow.” Hightower’s populist political newsletter, the Hightower Lowdown, has 135,000 subscribers and has received the Alternative Press Award and the Independent Press Association Award for best national newsletter. His radio commentaries are carried by 150 public and commercial radio stations. Hightower’s fiery, funny speeches reach thousands of people across America, as he gives about 100 talks a year. His newspaper column, Commonsense Commentary, is distributed nationally by Creators Syndicate. Raised in a Texas family of small business people, tenant farmers, and “working folks,” Hightower graduated from the University of North Texas, worked as a legislative aide to U.S. Senator Ralph Yarborough, and was national coordinator of the 1976 Fred Harris for President Campaign. According to legendary Texas political observer Molly Ivins, Hightower is the child that might have been born if Will Rogers and Mother Jones had had a baby together.

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