have you. the show may be over but the conversation continues you can also find us on twitter @ajconsiderthis. we'll see you next time. >> hi everyone. this is al jazeera america. i'm john siegenthaler in new york. scorched earth. no relief in the war against california's wildfires, doubling in size taking a deadly toll in tonight's arson charges. the punishment. first the safety questions then the recall. washington's $35 million fine against general motors. is justice being served? albuquerque's police facing a justice department why charge for fatal shootings, a commander facing charges of undue force.

our special report how the nsa surveillance program has changed over the year and how much your privacy remains at risk. there is a measure of good news tonight out of california. five of the wildfires are now contained. but for thousands of firefighters, the battle is far from over. there are still several fires raging like in camp penl tonl where staff -- pendleton. request 20,000 acres have been steroid there. many communities are in harm's way tonight. a plan was charged with arson in san diego county. some residents are returning home and finding nothing left. brian rooney reports from san marcos where residents don't have much to return to. >> what's remarkable given the number of fires and they're

intensity and the size of the burning area is how few houses actually burned to the ground. this unfortunately was one of them. this was a bi big front door. house was three or 4,000 feet. big plume of smoke coming out of camp pendleton today. the house rambles along there, blue trash can, parts of the window casings are just kind of melted into the ground around you can feel the heat coming out of the driveway even a day after this happened. it all this is just a hot spot here. houses like this get taken out when everything around it stands, just because of the contours of the way the fire burns up the hillside and the sparks take out a house just like a rocket. conditions have been a little bit more favorable in the last 24 hours. it's windy now but not as windy as it has been. the temperatures are cooling.

the predictions are that the temperatures are trending downwards and even by tuesday the temperatures will be in the 70ss very favorable for firefighting. the firefighters should have lines around residential neighborhoods and things should be looking good if there's no bad weather to come. >> rebecca stevens joins us with more. rebecca. >> we can see moisture in the atmosphere starting to push inland because the winds have changed. no longer are they off shore, continuing to heat areas across the mountains of california but now cool marine air starting to filter in for the pacific, it is a different story when you move far inland where we're going to continue to triple digit heat in albuquerque and new mexico. parts of arizona we're going ocontinue with that heat.

but you can see humidity starting to lift up along the coastline of california, inland staying in the single digits for dry tinder conditions. so what we had today was these record high temperatures into the 90s. they are cooling down slowly but surely temperatures 6° cooler than they were this time last night along the coast. las vegas is still 2° warmer than they were yesterday and they'll continue to have the heat rise over the course of the next several days. triple digit heat inland through sunday, but welcome cooling winds for parts of southern california, john. >> one high ranking official his job, undersecretary of healthy robert petzel resigned today, he appeared alongside secretary eric shinseki.

general motors waded years before recalling faulty ignition switches. today, federal regulators say, the auto maker should pay, for many, the fine doesn't come close to the cost. john hendren reports. >> the world's largest auto make are has been ordered to own up and pay up. >> what we cannot tolerate, what we will never accept. is a person or a company that knows danger exists and says nothing. literally, silence can kill. >> gm took years to report a faulty ignition switch. the problem which shut on engines and disabled air bags,

power tears and brakes -- power steering and breaks is linked to 32 crashes and 13 deaths. >> gm received detailed briefings about this defect. so gm jersey knew about the defect. gm investigators knew about the defect, gm lawyers knew about the defect. but gm authorities did not act to protect the american citizens from that defect. >> gm was ordered to pay $35 million, the maximum allowable. the company must make significant and wide ranging changes to its safety regulations in the u.s. >> it's unfortunate that it took 13, that's the alleged injuries, and gm to actually pay attention. >> regulators are pushing, to

increase to $300 million. that's not even close to enough. >> it should be in this case at least $1 billion because toyota paid $1.2 billion for unintended acceleration. and this is a clear example of a company that covered up a defect. >> reporter: here in the heart land where people like to buy american. general motors cars pack parking lots. gm, toyota, gm, gm. but recent safety concerns have seriously damaged again motors reputation even here. >> they were covering it up much too long. >> why o why o why does mr. obama keep supporting general motors? >> mary obara, has spent most of

her position at ceo defending them. >> david k-eilly joins us from an arbor, michigan disaismed, d, welcome. >> thank you. >> what does this send to general motors? >> it sends a big message to general motors. the $35 million may not seem like much but it is the maximum allowable fine. but until the law changes and the maximums change, that's all the can law can do. on top of the fine the government now is all over gm. in terms of making sure that they comply with a much tougher standard. of reacting to the information and data that they get, when

accidents happen. when cars are brought do dealerships with problems. and the technicians fix them. all of that information flows to general motors. but for the last ten, 12 years there's been a cadre of people inside general motors, lawyers, investigators, compliance officers, that had a culture of minimizing recalls, instead of maximizing safety and quality. and that is a culture change that mary barra has to change and she has to demonstrate that she is changing it. >> let me go back to the maximum fine. you say it's a maximum crime, and the question that it really hurts general motors. at the same time, isn't it ironic that the government was trying to save general motors, in the sound bite we just heard a couple of minutes ago, trying

to save general motors, now charging them with a $35 million fine. a bit ironic? >> it is a bit ironic and i can totally understand the sentiment of the public in thinking these two things don't go together. the government saving this big company and now it comes to light that they really had a damaged culture. what i would say is that general motors is a big company. it is the biggest auto maker that we have. it's a huge employer. it spent decades building up businesses communities livelihoods. i know it's an easy thing to tie these two things together. i wouldn't do that. i think that the company was worth saving. and preserving. what we have here is that there were individuals at general motors who got on the wrong track. and what we all want to know is, who were the executives in charge, that basically gave those people that directive, to

minimize recalls, rather than maximizing safety and quality? gm has had five ceos in the last five and a half years. i think a lot of us would like to see those past ceos brought into the light, questioned before the public to find out exactly what they knew, when they knew it and who gave those people that directive. >> mary barra is new in her position but she's been with the company for decades. so can she survive this? >> i think so. i think that mary barra in many ways is actually the perfect ceo for general motors right now. because she came up through the company. she knows the company's culture. but my experience with her in covering her is that while she knows the culture, she also knows what's wrong with it. and she's going to be an effective change-agent i believe. i think if you brought -- look

they brought in outsider ceos, dan ackerson preceded mary barra. credit and nearly one proceeds with quality. ackerson leaves it to barra to clean it up. i think solis doing everything a good ceo can do, she's on the right track. >> dan thank you very much. >> you're welcome. >> nigeria's president cancelled the trip to the town where the over 200 nigerian girls were kidnapped. security concerns cited for this cancellation, area where thousands had been killed over the years. more than 1500 civilians were killed this year alone. there's been a dramatic

change in the political landscape of one of the world's largest economies. india has elected narendra many modi. plans to reeves the country's policies. for many years modi has been banned from the u.s. that stems from his role in riots where hundreds of muslims were killed but right now the white house says it welcomes his visit. honoring the brown versus board of education ruling, that ended school desegregation 60 years ago. the president said we should recommit ourselves to stamp out bigotry and racism in all its forms. one school in washington where students come from a range of country. sabrina register reports. >> foster high looks like most schools across the u.s. students arrive by bus by

skateboard on or foot, getting in a quick check with friends before the bell rings. but there's a difference. the 3,000 students in this district south of seattle speak 80 different languages and dialects. four times as many students are in english language learning classes here than in seattle's public schools. and there's no pork served in tukwila's caf nea cafeterias. >> people from somalia, ethiopia, just everywhere. >> diversity is one of the reasons connor forsythe said he wanted to attend foster high. far fewer than rest of the country are white. and the greatest difference? asian pacific islanders make up a third of the population here, that's six times the national average. one reason tukwila is attracting

immigrants refugees and other is affordable housing in seattle. varoom came to seattle, four years ago, from the only place he flew, the refugee camp. >> i was in the refugee camp. people from around the world, the country i never knew about and i was really nervous the first time. >> for a district with so many diversity, school staff says there is little friction to be found along the students. but having so many cultures in one district does come with challenges. >> over the past three years we've built and trained an interpreter pool so our staff has access to on call interpreters when they need them. >> leer at foster high school there are not only linguistic barriers but culture barriers to overcome. that's why a few years ago the school district went out in the community to solve that clalg.

>> community liaisons, help credit organize the events. federal funding for low income students and grants. but not knowing which populations will enroll in the future forces teachers to extend their own thinking. >> we have to be willing to change and grow with the students and if not we can't be effective in the classroom. >> whether it's somali or syrian. their origin evenly fades into the landscape. >> it doesn't matter where you came from. >> and in this the most culturally diverse district in the country, they could be from anywhere. are sabrina register, al jazeera, tukwila, washington. >> franklin roosevelt suffered from polio, you can see the president walking during a baseball game struggling in front of thousands of people.

the news media rarely filmed him like this because the secret service didn't want to publicize fdr's vulnerability. the video was shot by a player. coming up chain of command. why was a police officer with a history of excessive force promoted? >> plus the watchers, how amateur aviation buffs ended up working alongside the police. police.

i.

>> the section time this week the arkansas supreme court put a halt to same sex marriages. on wednesday, the state supreme court cited problems with the judge's order but not before more than 400 gay couples got marriage licenses. today the high court went further, banning all gay marriages until appeals can be heard. after a string of police shootings, albuquerque's police chief is trying to curb the violence but one of his first moves is already raising a lot of questions. jonathan betz has that story. >> facing weeks of protest albuquerque's police chief promised changes but even the changes prompted anger. >> this one is particularly troubling. >> the promotion of two

commanders, one of them timothy gunnerman, faces charges of excessive force after he burned off a part of a man's credit hands. >> it's a shock that chief gunnerman particularly the officer that the doj is skeptical of. >> he has learned from it and now trains other officers to avoid using force. the chief promoted the comearnsd after a scathing federal report last month urged the city to strengthsen its chain of command. >> we found that they used dangerous force against people who didn't pose an immediate threat of death or immediate harm. >> four shootings has rocked this city of half a million. many of the suspects were armed,

the police has prohibited the credit officers from using their own weapons and prohibits them from shooting as moving vehicles. credit cameras on lapels, sometimes capture are shootings, sometimes they don't. it's unclear if the officer actually turned on the camera. after the feds called the department's use of cameras highly inconsistent, the city promised reforms. >> there are difficult findings in the report and we recognize that. the good news is that this is an achievable goal. >> put the gun down please! >> promoting those officers was one step for a department consistently facing credit scrutiny. jonathan betz, why al jazeera. >> in today's first person report, joe talks about the problems that the system is

dealing with. >> we just spent a year looking into the criminal justice system because we have problems in our prison system. there are extreme racial inequities. there are too many wrongful wrol convictions. there are problems with allow evidence is gathered. there are problems with policing strategies. we do have a great justice system but sometimes the justice system runs off the rails. that is what the series ask, shining a lot on the injustices. sometimes people are guilty but the sentence doesn't match the crime and sometimes people are put in prison for things that they shouldn't be in prison for. and it's due to things like the phenomenon of false confessions. you know it's counterintuitive to think that somebody would falsely confess to a crime. but it happens more often than you think. one in three african americans can expect to go to prison at

one time in their life. it doesn't mean that one in three african americans are bad people, it is social and political strategies in place that trap people on the lower socioeconomic scale. the prison incarceration rate has gone through roof in the last two decades, over 700%. we have a country that has 5% of the world's population and yet 25% of the world's prison population. the police generally do the right things, the prosecutors generally do the right things. but with the advent of dna technology, so many people have been exoneratefor crimes they didn't commit. wrongful convictions do happen. there's just huge problems that need to be addressed. >> the system with joe berling berlinger, credit sun 9:00 pacific -- 9:00 eastern, 6:00

pacific. natasha guinane has a story. >> 23 miles of fencing of miami international airport snapping photos. keep their ears tuned to their radios just like air traffic controllers. >> this aircraft here is coming in probably from colombia, probably bringing flowers or some cargo like that. >> sometimes they have been viewed suspiciously and chased away by police. >> we were treated like we were enemies of the airport. >> reporter: now armed with their cameras and their observations the airport wants them to help fight crime. miami international airport is on the transportation security administration's list of are airports that are considered at high risk for terrorist attack. >> why not put them to good use at zero cost to the airport to

add another layer of security. >> the crew includes saresh, eddie and jonathan, a pilot in training. passion. >> i fell in love with airplanes very early in my life. >> and pragmatism. >> almost all the guys know airport ops. >> to let them be eyes and ears before the fence. one shot the photo of fuel spilling from the plane. and what turned out to be a toy can machine gun. after the air france disaster on the runway many years ago. >> i can spot something that doesn't belong to a crowd or up

to no good. >> there are up to five cities in the country with airport watch programs including chicago and phoenix, but miami, modeled after an israeli program. with the world cup expected to bring an additional 100,000 passengers through the airport on their way to brazil next month, these photographers will likely log a lot of hours. once viewed as nuisances they'll now be a welcome sight. natasha guinane, al jazeera, miami. >> coming up next. >> there is among the biggest stories yet to be reported. >> glenn greenwald, edward snowden and the nsa secrets. our special report, secrets and spying is coming up next. and a programming note, my entire interview with glenn greenwald will air on "talk to

al jazeera." 5 eastern, 2 pacific.

>> surveillance in the name of security. a government that can track your phone calls, your e-mails, every move you make online. the year long national debate, privacy or protection. >> and we will not be able to keep our people safe. >> my conversation with glenn greenwald. >> nobody has been injured or in any way harmed as a result of our reporting. >> defending his reporting on the nsa leaks. a national hero to some, a traitor to others. >> our special report, secrets and spying. i'm john siegenthaler in new york. glenn greenwald he's at the center of the controversy over are america's spying program. the spying secrets dwoand progrd

snowden. took with him. richelle carey is here with the story. richelle. >> they both took a chance and trusted each other, the year that fold changed snowden and greenwald and changes the way the world views the united states. >> high to hong kong carrying four laptops and some of the america's biggest secrets. a few days later, edward snowden met two journalists from the guardian nupt four days later the guardian published its first yb article on snowden's elaboration. it was the first of a torrent of are information. prism showed the are nsa had

direct access from google, facebook and other tech companies. president obama defended the programs immediately. he said you can't have 100% security and also then have 100% privacy and zero inconvenience. snowden went public soon after. i have no intention of hiding who i am because i know i have done nothing wrong. the u.s. soon filed espionage charges against snowden and tried have him extradited from hong kong. within a few days snowden was in moscow. the pace of the are are stories slowed but they didn't stop. the collaboration between snowden and greenwald, a report published by the new york times the guard and why an der spiegel that the u.s. and british intelligence spied on germany the united nations, israel dprans and other allies. greenwald's new book exposes new details of how the nsa are

cooperates with fbi and other agencies. >> all right richelle more on this now. greenwald's new book is called no place to hide and at times it reads like aa spy novel. when i talked to greenwald today, he told me sony pictures had just bought the movie rights to his book and i asked him what it was like to be in the biggest story of his life. >> it was like living in a spy film essentially because we knew a couple of things. that this was certainly the biggest leak in national security history. that if the u.s. government found out away it was that he was doing, that three would take very extreme measures to put a stop to it one way or the other but we didn't know much else. we didn't know what the u.s. government knew anything or what they knew or whether hong kong or chinese authorities knew, so everything we did needed constantly to be shrouded in

extreme levels of secrecy. and the intelligence community was well versed in how that needed to be done so everything was done in that context. >> you were surprised what he looked like. >> i was shocked by what he looked like. i know that he had access to tremendous amount of material and had sophisticated insights and that he was can prepared to spend the rest of his life in secret, so i expected him to be in his 60s or 70s. >> these articles would in essence send him to prison. >> it made me have him need oknow, that the decision make process was one grounded in rationality and a lot of agency and autonomy and i got that assurance pretty quickly. >> how did you do that? >> i questioned him very aggressively for six consecutive hours in the hotel room on the

first day and i insisted upon understanding the thoughts behind his thoughts. the moral framework that led him to this reasoning that ultimately led to this decision. and i needed to know that it was coherent and cogent and rational and it was, it was extremely well thought out. >> do you think he recognized the things he might go through and has been through since. >> there is a video that the documentarian that i took with me, there were be people digging into all aspects of my life and my freedom and my life as i know it will never be the same. >> how is he handling that all right now? >> remarkably well. when we were in hong kong the working assumption was that he was going to spend the next

decade maybe several decades in a dmaij the american meanal state. >> you felt that would happen? >> we felt it would happen. to see him now in a place, it is the can case that he has had contact with his family cut off, in a place he did not choose, his contact has u unraveled. but he gets to put his head on his pillow every night knowing he took actions in defense of his principles. >> you speak to him often? >> i speak to him often yes. >> you use telephone lines? >> we use secure internet technologies. >> what is his life like? >> he is asked to speak all the time at various events and he's increasingly doing that. he speaks to journalists. he has always been a person of

the internet, spending a lot of times indoors online and he continues to do that. >> what is it like to be called otraitor and a hero by lots of different folks? >> you have to expect that you're going to alienate and anger many people. if you don't know that you slnt go into adjournment. >> what is your biggest beef? >> that journalists are an adversary force to those who wield political and economic power. over the last several decades but particularly the last decade the american media with some exceptions have become subservient to, and rendered impotent what journal shoulism d

be. >> there are a lot of people who say so what do you think the nsa should do? should the nsa exist? what do you say? >> i don't know of anybody who believes that all forms of surveillance should be imloshed or that all -- abolished or that all forms of why surveillance are legitimate. >> you do? >> i don't know that are, oversight driven surveillance is justified and you know i've made my opinions clear as part of the journalism, which isn't a new form of journalism. if you look at american journalism for the last two centuries, it has been crusading credit journalism, they candidly acknowledge the opinions they have and then tell their readers you can still rely on the facts that i'm reporting and ultimately that determines the credibility of a journalist. >> you made the fact that main

treatment sources go to the united states government bez they public things. >> what i dislike about the process is the one that results in the suppression of information that the public ought to know because it's news worthy as it's happened so many times before and that's the real problem. >> can you describe the excitement and the fear that you felt when you had this information in your hands and you knew that this was going ogo public? what is that like for a journalist? >> it was really whoamg. i marine on -- overwhelming. on the one hand, there was -- the difficult last been that you don't have the descruments do io make the public aware of what's going on. and sunlt in my lap there were all the instruments in the world i could have ever dreamed of having. but at the same time i knew it was an enormous responsibility

do make the right decisions about how this information ought to be reported. >> and much more of my conversation with glenn greenwald coming up. washington has not been the same since the milks o public works e first document coming -- publication of the first document. mike viqueria has more on the item. >> first defending the national security agency and trying to assure the public that they were not being spied upon. the administration has made numerous visits to capitol hill, there have been major speeches and reports, the president, a major speech at the justice department in january, but it's clear that the administration and the are president have been on the defensive over these revelations that broke over a year ago. james clapper was quite frankly

caught lying to congress. after a direct question from senator ron iow wyden. conservators including tea party conservatives teaming up with hated liberals and a civil lib libertarian middle ground. and then in december a blow from the federal court here in washington saying that the program violated the fourth amendment's prohibition against illegal search and seizure. the president made that january speech, later his proposal to stop bulk metadata collection by the government, shorten the time by which those records could be retrieved, make them go to the intelligence community and go to the court if they wanted do, go to the fisa court if they wanted those documents.

now congress has been moving a bill and it's been moving very quickly. it could go to the house of representatives later, by the way, back doorways being punched in this legislation, to gather this metadata if they want to regardless of the legislation. a year into the controversy and something very clear, satisfying the public, this issue is far from resolved. mike viqueria, al jazeera, the white house. >> snowden remains in russia, his temporary ooh asigh legal runs out in june. obviously he misses america and would like to come home. we just don't see that happening in the near future. and greenwald told me today he thinks snowden might end up spending the rest of his life in

russia. snowden appeared on russian television and are asked putin a question. >> i'd like to ask you, the bulk collection of records by intelligence sources. >> putin denied. they wanted to testify about america's surveillance of chancellor merkel's cell phone. coming up next, fallout, how snowden's credit composure of the secrets might have affected al qaeda. >> much more of my conversation with glenn greenwald as our special report, secrets and spying continues.

>> that's the voice of edward snowden. the impact of snowden's leaks depends on who you talk to. it changes how the nsa operates and possibly how terrorists do business. more from randall pinkston. >> it was the most shocking revelation from edward snowden'strophy of stolen government secrets. that the national security agency are chronicles metadata, time and location of where the call was made. top intelligence officials and members of congress repeatly

denounced snowden's allegations. >> going to school on u.s. intelligence sources methods and trade craft and the insights that they are gaining are making our job much, much harder. >> reporter: last week the first possible indication that american agencies were responding to snowden. the report that al qaeda is stepping up the pace of producing encryption software. in the six years before snowden's leaks, al qaeda reportedly released only go encryption tools. in the six months after snowden's revelations, there were six updates. helped glenn greenwald review snowden's secret documents. he says al qaeda's new

encryption may in fact assist nsa. >> now these al qaeda operatives are making home made stuff they can break. >> first to reassure americans that nsa's metadata collection program is legal and not a threat to u.s. citizens. >> nobody is listening to your telephone calls. that's not what the program's about. >> reporter: president obama also appointed a review panel which proposed 46 recommendations among them end being the nsa's -- ending the nsa's roles about collection of metadata. but bruce schneider says americans who are concerned about privacy need to look beyond the nsa. >> the average citizen needs to know that they are pretty much under constant surveillance certainly by the companies they choose to associate with. facebook and google. as to what people can do about it pretty much nothing. >> reporter: what everyone thinks of snowden's action he,

harvard's bruce schneider says are snowden accomplished one goal, credit a balance again privacy and the government's need to collect intelligence. randall pingston, al jazeera. >> i asked glenn greenwald if snowden's revelations endangered the united states, news story instead of just putting them all online. >> he came to me and actually demanded that we superb an agreement about how they would have been reported. he wouldn't have needed me, he could have uploaded them himself. the impact from these can disclosures is higher because we took the time to report the stories one by one. explain to the public what their meaning was. did reporting around them and let the public digest each individual story rather than just dump them all online.

>> we got a number of questions along these lines. this was from facebook from linda on facebook and she said how many agents had to be removed from their assignments because their cover had been blown and they were now in danger? >> none, none that the u.s. government has ever identified. nobody has been injured or in any way harmed as a result of our reporting. the u.s. government makes these claims without any evidence every time there's unwanted disclosures going back to daniel elsburg and the pentagon papers and that has always been false. and that's certainly the situation here. we have obviously played some decision to withhold some information. >> because it was too sensitive? >> because it wasn't news worthy and it had potential to do harm to individuals. we will continue to weigh those considerations. >> how many more documents? >> there's many more stories to go. i can't quantify them for you.

there were a lot of new stories in the book and olot of new documents in the book and there's still many of those left that i'll continue to report. >> you and edward snowden have discussed that and he's excited about it. >> there are a story a very complicated story to report and it stays a lot of time and there's legal sensitivities, but i think it will help to shape how the story is remembered from time to come. it answers questions about how surveillance is conducted that still aren't answered. >> you think you're out of legal trouble in the united states? >> i think there's a risk of some stories that the nsa is particularly angry about but by and large the cost for the united states to take action against me is too high. >> one of the personal opinions that is making news are your comments about hillary clinton the former secretary of state.

why did you -- where does this come from? >> you know, i -- the context for the interview was that a journalist from gq come down to rio de janeiro where i live and essentially followed me around for three days. we spent a lot of time talking to each other. when that happened we spoke where extensively. this kind of die tha dynastic sn politicians who are rewarded for always be very calculating, devoid of passion, she supported the war in iraq, militarism in the world and i just don't think she's a candidate who is worth getting excited about. quite the opposite. >> is there one you are excited about? what should the next president of the united states be thinking about whether it comes to the nsa and abuses you talk about?

>> even if you don't believe that the system is inherently abusive, there is enormous cost to having this ongoing surveillance. there are people around the world who refuse to buy american technological equipment because they don't believe they're being protected, there is a wide array of diplomat harm, there is a perception on the part of citizenry that their own government can't be trefted and so i think genuine fundamental reform is something that any rational leader would want to embark upon. judge there is a story out today that suggests almost every american company is collect egg information on us. it's not just the nsa but it might be the nsa thrust some of those companies that you suggested. >> there's a huge huge difference having a single company collecting the information from you, google can collect google searches, yahoo

can collect their yahoo e-mail, versus the united states government systematically collect all your information, the government that can put you into prison take your property and even can kill you, which is why the bill of rights in the constitution limits what you can do, we think of that as being particularly and uniquely threatening. >> there are a lot of kids students that you walked through as you came into your studio. do you think those young people in high school and college understand what you're saying do you think they've gotten the message? >> completely. what has fascinated me from the fallout of the story, the reaction to the story really doesn't break down on partisan lines. democrats and republicans either dislike or support the reporting i've been doing, and what edward slirm does, ideologic lines,

younger people, who overwhelmingly view snowden as a hero, understand the internet in the way older people don't. people have been inspired by what he did and by the 800 number that has resulted. >> joining us is john schindler, john work as an intelligence analyst of the nsa for eight years. john welcome. >> great to be here john. >> give me a reaction what you just heard from glenn greenwald. >> glenn's a very smart guy who is very good at self-promotion. i heard a lot of statements that ranged from disingenuous to simply untrue frankly. >> give me a few of them. >> i've got a lot. first of all the statement that no one's been harmed by these massive leaks, unprecedented leaks. that's simply untrue. you had a segment on how al qaeda why terrorists are making good use, that's got intelligent

consequence. badly impacted by leaks, including compromise of personal information i know some of them. when glenn says the u.s. government hasn't talked about it, of course they're not going to talk about it. it's classified. it's highly miss stating, no negative impact. i know glenn wants to be hero of the story. that's fine. perhaps there is some good coming out of the story, claiming no down side -- >> what good do you think would come out? >> if we actually engaged had a truly global debate about what degree of internet certifying we want, i'd highly recognize that, but with the understanding that there are dozens and dozens of countries that engage in this at a very high level not just the united states. the focus that glenn has given us ask entirely the united states, for diplomats that have been harmed very badly.

not just the united states and great britain. >> should edward snowden be in prison? >> oh of course if he comes back to the united states. he isn't going to. the russians aren't going to let him go any time soon. edward is a highly skilled operative? he is nothing of the sort. internet savvy with no understanding of the intelligence business, i have clear from the way these leaks came out. no one in the inner circle including glenn understands the mountains of purloined powerpoint presentation they have. i'm not sure they even understand. >> why would edward snowden have been at that low level given access to this sort of information? >> you know he was an i.t. person. your i.t. personnel are is weakest link in the organization. they have access to information

stored on databases, and if one of them goes rogue, terrible things can happen. this is not just a governmental thing. frankly i used do work in counterintelligence in nsa fully a decade or more ago, many of us were concerned about an i.t. person going wrong and having devastating consequences. that's the real story here. >> glenn greenwald given journalism awards including the pulitzer prize. do you think there's any value in the stories that he's written? >> i see more self aggrandizement than being journalistic value frankly. denied stalin terrible crimes won pult disers as well so -- pulitzers as well, denied stalin

as well and i'm not sure what that proves. >> thank you for coming. >> john thank you. held pictures of edward snowden, they're demanding the german government investigate the mass surveillance of germans. they want snowden to testify.

>> on "america tonight," the fix. addicts looking for a way out find what they and neuroscientists say is a miracle. but it's also an illegal drug. "america tonight" investigates, ibogaine. could the solution to addiction lie in a root? >> i've seen people at the end of the road completely detoxed, look like new human beings. no signs of withdrawal, and ready to change their life. >> also ahead: change at the top.