Hi. My name is Thomas Hedges, and I work as the Capitol Hill correspondent for The Real News Network. I have a mountain of story ideas in my head, and as a young reporter in the nation's capital and as someone who began his journalism career two years ago working with Ralph Nader, I've been exposed again and again to the injustice and fraud that is very characteristic of Washington politics nowadays.Since then I've struggled to materialize those stories. But with no corporate funding and no advertising at The Real News it's been tough translating all of those narratives into video. For example, at the moment I'm working on a piece about how the Pentagon doesn't get audited. Even though it's been required to by law since 1990, it keeps on getting extensions. That's more that $600 billion, or half of our discretionary budget yearly, that is never accounted for.To produce a hard-hitting piece on the issue, I need to do proper research, I need to do original reporting, I need to arrange for interviews, I need to develop contacts, I need to travel, shoot and edit the material that I get in a timely manner. It's difficult to do that with limited resources and staff. At the same time, it's quite rewarding, because I know I'm not beholden to the special interests that dictate the way journalism is done at other news outlets.That's why viewers like you are so important not only to The Real News, but to me. I care about bringing you the truth. Help me do that.
